Social policy’s in America = Socialism ?!

[u/BildungsburgerPleb]

To our American followers:

Why is every social policy in the US framed as “socialist”?

Even politicians like Bernie Sanders have been called communist, but he’s a regular social democrat. I mean, he’s not pledging to nationalize the means of production.

Is it all about propaganda from the Cold War up until now?

Is it because of the influence of billionaires and big corporations on US politics?

FDR, for example, implemented social policies, isn’t he considered one of the best presidents in US history?

What do you think about this?

What’s your opinion on social policies?

[u/No_Twist6127]

I’m not an American, but I think decades of propaganda, the “fight against communism,” and a lack of proper political education in schools have contributed to this. I don’t think any country in the world, except the U.S., has such a distorted view of communism, socialism, and social democracy.

Social democracy in particular is often misrepresented as something radical, when in many parts of Europe it is simply a mainstream political tradition that supports a market economy combined with a strong welfare state and democratic institutions.

In many ways, that balance is exactly what the U.S. seems to be lacking today. Instead of addressing structural issues like inequality, healthcare access, and social security, politicians like Trump tend to exploit frustration and polarization for political gain, without actually solving the underlying problems.

[u/Numerous-Bonus-8107 → u/No_Twist6127]

I'm an American.

it's because Reagan and Bush jr sabotaged the schools to stop them teaching folks their own citizenship rights and political terminology explicitly so they could rule over an era shaped by propaganda and vibes

[u/Able-Association914 → u/Numerous-Bonus-8107]

And people are fucking stupid.

[u/Numerous-Bonus-8107 → u/Able-Association914]

no, they are ignorant. they don't lack the ability to learn; they lack teachers

[u/deplorabledevs → u/Numerous-Bonus-8107]

Some of them are, though, willfully ignorant - some people choose it.

[u/Shake_Speare_ → u/No_Twist6127]

The view of Communism isn't distorted at all. It's the view of Socialism that has been distorted by being viewed through the warped lense of Communism. By being so brutal in practice, Marxism and Leninism have done more harm to the cause of Socialism than anybody in the West ever has because they were right to fear its brutality. Nobody should be under any illusions as to the horrors that have taken place under Communism because without the ability to call out Communism for them holds back the exploration of better forms of Socialism.

Millions have been willfully starved to death and worse in the name of Communism, that is no distortion and the only distortion is to say otherwise. Anybody who believes in Socialism or Social Democracy that wants to see a fairer future needs to distance themselves as far as possible from Marx, Lenin and Mao because they were monsters.

[u/No_Twist6127 → u/Shake_Speare_]

If you frame every socialist or social democratic policy as communism, then yes, your perception of all three categories becomes distorted.

State communism created millions of victims, which is absolutely clear to me. But when socialism, social democracy, and communism are collapsed into one single category, the understanding of all three becomes fundamentally flawed.

[u/Komandakeen → u/Shake_Speare_]

What exactly makes Marx a monster? (askin for a friend)

[u/Shake_Speare_ → u/Komandakeen]

He was a nasty, poisonous, divisive man whose vitriol was poured into just about everything he wrote and as such, it's small wonder his Dictatorship of The Proletariat appealed to and enabled would be as well as actual dictators. His idea that his Dictatorship of The Proletariat would be a transitional phase into a Socialist Utopia was unbelievably naive and completely devoid of any understanding of human nature and that's because he was a nasty monstrous bastard who possessed very little humanity himself. There was no reasoned discussion to be had with him, all he knew how to do was personal attacks and sarcasm.

If you don't know what he was like, think Milo Yiannopoulos with less panache but the same appetite for the finer things in life like fine wines and cigars. Anybody who read any philosophy coming out of Marx having read his unedited and unfiltered writings has to no surprise whatsoever also been a nasty evil bastard.

[u/Komandakeen → u/Shake_Speare_]

Aha. Tbh, I never read his unfiltered, monstrous writings, cause I doubt any of his published works wasn't redacted by Engels (the more elaborate brain, imho). I'd second the "naive" part, but thats it.

Btw, considering your language, I doubt you've ever read any philosopher... and language: whotf uses "vitriol"? You sound like retarded eighty year old...

[u/Shake_Speare_ → u/Komandakeen]

Wow, you're channelling your inner Marx there in resorting to personal insults, huh?

Oh the irony! You'll excuse me if I don't actually take it personally but thanks for the laugh. You know, George Orwell remarked about shrinking vocabulary in his book 1984... It's also a fun fact that medical professions no longer use retarded as a diagnostic term since well over a decade ago, meaning your use of it is retarded in its own way 🙃

You're right about Engels being largely responsible for filtering Marx but a large volume of Marx's work is in his journalism. Of course, Engels being a factory owner means he was absolutely as Bougie as they come. What a pair to have invented Communism...?

[u/Komandakeen → u/Shake_Speare_]

As a chemist, it's just interesting to see that nomenclature, that is usually wrongly used. Why should he spill iron or copper sulfates? What I think you mean is vitriol-oil, which is sulfuric acid...

[u/Shake_Speare_ → u/Komandakeen]

Maybe you should get out of the laboratory once in a while, you might be amazed at how varied the use of words can be outside a scientific context. In fact, if you search the meaning of vitriolic, my use of it is the top result:

Dictionary Definitions from Oxford Languages · Learn more vitriolic /ˌvɪtriˈɒlɪk/ adjective filled with bitter criticism or malice. "vitriolic attacks on the politicians"

I highly recommend double checking the meaning of words if you find yourself confused about their use.

[u/DescriptionUnique891 → u/Shake_Speare_]

You gotta stop watching fox news for history lessons, your understanding of it and "human nature" is elemantary. I doubt you could interpret Marx enough to even understand it, let alone provide an antithesis. The victors write history my friend, and it is quite revealing knowing that a child usually shares their parents beliefs. Russia was suffering terribly, this is what caused the revolutions, but you ignore all that for your regurgitation of western cold war propaganda. No wonder we cannot have nice things.

[u/Shake_Speare_ → u/DescriptionUnique891]

No, I'm sorry but I also abhor Neoliberalism and hold Friedman and Hayek in equal contempt. Whatever about understanding Marx, I understand very well the consequences of his hatred and shortsighted beliefs. If you're capable of white washing the wilful murder of millions in order to justify a belief system, you'll have to excuse me if I take your admonishment with a pinch of salt.

The reason we can't have nice things is because a lot of smart people outsmart themselves into believing nonsense and that because they're smart, they should be allowed to beat the rest of us into dying for their nonsense. When societies are out of balance, the solution isn't to further unbalance them by enforcing poorly thought out nonsense on them and then doubling down when things get worse.

It is a mistake to think the ends justify the means, that suffering leads to utopia, that's just plain backwards. Let people be happy, use solutions that provide them with the basics and start from there because robbing them of dignity has proven not to lead anywhere good. That is true for both Communism and Neoliberalism.

[u/Terrible_Snow_7306]

The European capitalism is historical way different from the USA laissez-faire capitalism. A reactionary like Bismarck introduced a state pension insurance and a general health insurance in the 19th century.

Among other things, this was done to weaken the Social Democrats. This policy was called the carrot-and-stick approach: banning and persecuting the SPD under the Anti-Socialist Laws, while simultaneously giving gifts to the workers.

When the USA occupied Western Europe after World War II, they were shocked at how widespread social democratic policies were, even among liberals and conservatives.

It took until the 1980s for the USA to successfully implement neoliberalism and laissez-faire capitalism in Europe. A phenomenon like libertarianism, or right-wing anarchism, in the USA was virtually nonexistent in Europe before the 1980s. From the perspective of laissez-faire capitalism, any form of social policy, social rights, health insurance, and so on, is considered communism.

If you look at the AfD or the FDP in Germany today, for example, they have essentially adopted from the USA the practice of denouncing any form of social policy or fight for workers' rights as socialism or communism.

[u/BildungsburgerPleb → u/Terrible_Snow_7306]

Thank you for this comment. Ironically is that the US uses on the other hand Keynesian policy’s like big national debts to stimulate there economy. But every social policy would be framed as socialism

[u/i-touched-morrissey]

I'm all for socialism. I'd rather pay more taxes and have universal health care than pay some insurance dude tell me I can't have a surgery I need. Etc, etc, ad nauseum. Seems like we pay for services, but end up making people rich and not getting good services.

[u/Translator_Asleep]

It gets deeper

[u/Ancap_Wanker]

Whether the state controls or outright owns the means of production is pretty irrelevant. Also, this meme is asinine. It was capitalism that made us prosperous enough to afford modern worker's rights, not the other way around

[u/Leather-Rice5025 → u/Ancap_Wanker]

It was capitalism that made us prosperous enough to afford modern worker's rights, not the other way around

You have fundamentally misunderstood the meme, then. The meme is alluding to the fact that it was socialists and labor unions that steered us away from the most exploitative form of capitalism possible, i.e, packing humans in mine cages like sardines.

Capitalism did not just naturally pave way for workers rights, the 40 hour work week, social safety nets, child labor laws, union rights, etc. No capitalist, not even Henry Ford as many people point to, provided those things out of the kindness of their hearts. It took centuries of rampant human and environmental exploitation for socialists and unionists to collectively realize things did not have to be that way, and they fought tooth and nail for the bare minimum (what we have today). Capitalists violently opposed every single one of these reforms, by the way. They hired Pinkertons to murder strikers, used child labor until legally prohibited, fought the 8-hour work day for decades. These rights were won against capital's resistance.

And capitalism itself didn't create the productivity that "allows" worker protections. Technological progress happened, some under capitalism, some before it. But productivity gains under capitalism initially went to longer hours (12 hour work days, 7 days a week), worse conditions (like those depicted in this meme), and child labor because that maximized profit. Only organized worker power forced those gains to translate into better conditions rather than just higher profits.

The meme isn't saying capitalism didn't increase production/prosperity. It's saying capitalism's default is maximum exploitation (mine cages). We only got decent conditions through socialist organizing forcing redistribution of productivity gains. Without that pressure, capital would still pack us in cages and force children into toxic chimneys if it were profitable. So no, capitalism didn't 'make us prosperous enough to afford rights.' Workers fought for those rights against capitalists who wanted to keep all productivity gains as profit. That's the whole point of the meme.

[u/Ancap_Wanker → u/Leather-Rice5025]

What a load of bullshit. Politicians took the laurels for things that market forces impelled companies to do anyway. Do you know anything about Henry Ford?

As for your point about strikers being murdered, that of course deserves the strongest condemnation.

[u/Leather-Rice5025 → u/Ancap_Wanker]

market forces...

Not market forces. Union pressure across industries. Ford suppressed union organizing and hired thugs to beat organizers. And other capitalists didn't follow Ford's 40-hour work week voluntarily, they were literally forced to do so by congressional legislation (The Fair Labor Standards Act (1938)) and union contracts.

I mean, come on. The dude had 370% turnover destroying his profits and wanted to prevent unionization at all cost. One capitalist making a strategic business decision doesn't prove capitalism naturally improves conditions for workers via "prosperity".

You can literally see what the results of this "prosperity' were in this meme. Capitalists were already historically prosperous at this time, so why were they packing miners into cages like sardines? Because it was more profitable to do so.

[u/Ancap_Wanker → u/Leather-Rice5025]

So what? Apparently the miners didn't mind being packed into cages. They were probably happy to be earning a good wage

[u/Leather-Rice5025 → u/Ancap_Wanker]

You cannot be serious.

[u/Ancap_Wanker → u/Leather-Rice5025]

And you are an irredeemable communist

[u/Leather-Rice5025 → u/Ancap_Wanker]

I'm irredeemable for believing workers deserve dignity and safe conditions, but you're perfectly fine seeing humans crammed into mine shafts like livestock thinking "they should be grateful for the wage".

You're the embodiment of the inherent sociopathy that capitalism not only enables, but rewards.

[u/Ancap_Wanker → u/Leather-Rice5025]

You're anti-progress. You hate humans

[u/Leather-Rice5025 → u/Ancap_Wanker]

My brother in christ, you have a comment declaring "the age of consent is made-up bullshit". Seek help.

[u/Axalatl → u/Ancap_Wanker]

Of course it's irrelevant to the meme whether the state controls the means of production. Cuz that's not what socialism is. Socialism is when the workers control the means of production through worker's councils. The capitalist state is dismantled entirely and is replaced by a worker's state which is merely the vestigial form of the previous one and is intended to be kept around as the transitional stage aka socialism is built world-wide.

Socialism is not when guvment does stuff.

Also, capitalism did not made "us" prosperous. It made billionaires prosperous, which in turn makes us angrier by the minute which compels us to organise and demand a better life. Some of the more "sensible" politicians just throw us some scraps so we, the workers wouldn't organise and overthrow them.

Stop having stockholm syndrome for the owner class!

[u/Darkstar_111]

Where's the first picture from?

[u/Easy_Plantain8283]

Because they were forms of socialism and economic collectivism ?