Comments by "Regis" (@Timbo5000) on "TIKhistory"
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@LibertarianLeninistRants
1. Regarding class and exploitation: what we say is the same. I wanted to say that class exploitation in capitalism is laid in the fact that the upper class not only manages the working class, but also owns the means of production. It's the owning of the means of production that causes class exploitation and solving this problem is the core of socialism. What you described here is exactly what I meant with the upper class being able to live off others' work if they were allowed to own the means of production, we absolutely agree on that. What I tried to say is that there is no such thing as a classless society. There will always be a hierarchy between more skilled/intelligent people that will occupy higher positions with more power (the upper class) and regular workers. And you might call the top members of the communist party the elite. What socialism does is in practice not abolish classes altogether, but to stop them from exploiting eachother. That was my point.
The common goal is to organise an economy that serves the greater good of society, instead of merely a certain class or an elite. For National Socialism this was the same, but instead of all of society, they organised the economy only to serve the German race (which they eventually wanted to be the whole society anyway, by removing other races).
2. Regarding class collaboration/struggle, thank you for pointing out the difference. I was describing the practical reality in socialist states instead of their theoretical ambitions. And I think I see why the practice didn't correspond with the theoretical background: as I said before, a classless society is not possible in an developed and organised society (it would be in f.e. an anarchy or communist society, but not in a socialist state). If you have a government guiding the economy and if you have factories that need leadership to properly function, you have an upper and lower class. Hierarchies are not social constructs, they are facts of nature. You have more skilled/intelligent people and less skilled/intelligent people. The former will be placed in more important government positions and will be put at the helm of a factory with workers under him/her. The latter will be the workers. The former will always wield more power and have more influence than the latter. It is an inevitable matter of fact that you will always retain a certain degree of class distinctions.
But practice aside and into the theoretical sphere, I think you pointed out one of the main differences between traditional socialism and NS/fascism. Whereas socialism seeks to create a classless society and rejects the idea of a social hierarchy, NS/fascism embraces the hierarchy and sees it as a central element of what makes for an effectively organised society. Or as I said earlier, Hitler hated the exploitative elements of capitalism (same as socialism), but he also hated the egalitarian elements of socialism. This may have been a more important statement than I initially thought. In theory, socialists want to move towards a fully classless egalitarian society, while NS/fascists absolutely do not.
Regarding the difference between the working class and race, de facto they lead to the same situation: the economy is reorganised to serve the "common man" instead of a particular class and exploitation is stopped (and this reorganisation is done largely in the same way to boot). But I do agree that the theoretical element is significantly different. That again ties into the aforementioned class collaboration vs classlessness.
3. for the sake of brevity I will briefly respond to point 2 and 3 made here.
Regarding point 2, my argument is that socialism has as a goal to enter into a classless society where there is no exploitation and the economy is organised in such a way to benefit the whole of society more or less equally and fairly. NS/fascism is the same, except you switch classlessness out for class collaboration and the whole of society is either a race (NS) or the whole of a nation (fascism). Therefore I'd say the three are very closely related, albeit also fundamentally different in other ways.
Regarding point 3, there never was any democratic element to any socialist state to date, as far as I know. Workers never had direct say in their wages and whatnot, it was always a central government communist party doing what it saw as fair for everyone, without actual democratic legitimacy. Actual socialist states were like that and so was National Socialism.
To conclude, I think we see two systems that are remarkably similar in many ways, but fundamentally differ particularly in the area of egalitarianism vs hierarchies. I can see why some people call both socialism, but at the same time I can see why others say they're just different enough to warrant separating them altogether. For me it's a grey area at this point.
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@TheImperatorKnight Your response seems to be targeting collectivist libertarian socialism and anarchism. I understand why you see no reason to distinguish between the 'public' in the sense of the state and the 'public' in the sense of for example a commune. Both are collectivist in nature, after all. Wouldn't entirely agree with the term 'totalitarian', but those are semantics. However, the real issue I have with your argument is that libertarian socialism doesn't require collectivised property, as you seem to imply. There is also individualist anarchism and left-libertarianism. These forms of libertarian socialism often espouse not public, but mutual ownership. The easiest example would probably be libertarian market socialism, in which (for example) worker cooperatives compete in a free market. This is socialism because the means of production are owned by workers. Essentially everyone who contributes to a company, shares in its profits (not necessarily equally by the way). Not the public, ONLY those that directly contribute to the company. This also means that capitalism cannot exist, because for someone to gain (partial) ownership of a business means they must be an active partner in it. Not just give money as a one-off and then enjoy the fruits of ownership permanently, even passively if they like. Capital investments can still exist in this market, but they can only be a service for which the company pays a reward, not a means to gain permanent ownership of the company.
There are many more forms of libertarian socialism which do not have completely public ownership of the means of production. End goal of libertarian socialism is to take away what they see as exploitative relationships. Anarchism goes further and seeks to abolish all/most hierarchies in society. I.e. they see wage labour as exploitative because in principle capitalists see humans as mere economic input in their business, as a means to generate profit. With mutual ownership, all people that work for the company are seen as equal partners who together contribute to the company and are entitled to a reasonable part of the profits because of this contribution. I don't see how the simple act of seeing other humans with whom you create something of value as equal partners in business rather than economic input that you must pay the lowest possible wage in order to gain profit for yourself is 'totalitarian'. Or how a free market in which one enters into equal contracts with other people is 'public' while a free market in which people with a lot of capital are allowed to passively profit from ownership of others' companies because of initial investments is 'private'. I see both of these examples as 'private'. They are both free markets that simply operate on different ground rules on who is entitled to the profits of a business.
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@bobhabib7662 _"If libertarian socialism doesn't require collectivized property, then why does it need income tax to feed it? lol - that's literally collectivizing someone's property is it not?" _
Libertarian socialism does not require that. I already named that market socialism in particular is really just a free market in which companies that are owned by those that directly contribute to said company compete with one another. Income tax or not. Could be a stateless society, even. Several forms exist.
"Collectives are socialist ideas even if they might be applied in a capitalistic society."
Are you one of those people that think "free market = capitalism"? Because that's untrue. Capitalism is just one of several ways to organise a free market. Capitalism is by far not the only type of free market and no, capitalism is not "just what happens" in freedom either. All myths that have come into existence after capitalism became the norm. We have come to see capitalism as so normal that we cannot imagine another type of free market anymore. Which is only natural when living under an economic system for so long. But it still is untrue.
Capitalism is a free market which emphasises capital growth with elements like wage labour and the ability to gain passive ownership of a company by investment. A very specific type of free market. Solid system, because free market economics are great. But not without flaws.
So to correct you, collectives are socialist ideas even if applied to a _free market_. Yes. That's why that form of a free market is not called capitalism, but something else. It's an anti-capitalist free market.
"And no, just because you are a line worker at Amazon for example, doesn't mean you created anything. Yes, you may have pulled the packages so they can be delivered, but you are getting paid for pulling those packages. That is your contribution and you received payment for it. That's what you agreed to."
Wage labour can exist within market socialism. The LITERAL only difference with capitalism is that all profits are divided among those that directly contribute to the company. And not equally, but fairly according to the actual contribution (at least roughly so, you can't "calculate" someone's contribution always, especially because the value we create is subjective). Obviously someone who does more valuable work will get a higher wage and probably a higher part of the profits too.
The one and only thing market socialism demands is that it is impossible for third parties to passively take profits from a company just because they invested a bit of money. This permanent ownership, regardless of actual contribution to the business, is seen as exploitative by socialists across the board.
Sure, the person that built a company and continues to be an important part of keeping it afloat deserves a much higher pay than a regular worker that stepped in doing an essential, but basic job. But does the capitalist who paid the person that built the company 10.000 dollars 30 years ago as start-up capital deserve 1.000.000 dollars pay from the coffers of the company that others have worked hard to build and expand over the years? No, not if all the capitalist did is pay the money and then sit on his arse doing nothing for the business. Providing start-up investments is an essential service in any market economy, but giving capitalists life-long ownership that entitles them to permanent passive profiteering off the work of others is a bit too much.
The idea of giving people who have NOTHING to do with a company, part ownership of the company and a permanent entitlement to part of its profits is stupid. It makes no sense unless you're trying to create an economy that is massively skewed towards making already rich people richer.
"You will never get rid of "exploitative relationships" as long as there are human beings. The best you can do is create an environment where if you think you're being exploited, you can change companies or start your own. Just another reason that capitalism is superior to collectivist thinking."
There is nothing exploitative about starting a company and hiring people you see as partners together with whom you keep the business afloat. There is nothing exploitative about basic workers receiving significantly less pay than people doing more demanding/complex work, and/or people who gave a lot to build the business up. How this is divided? That's for each company to decide internally, as long as it's reasonable.
What is exploitative is only this: seeing humans as nothing other than economic input for you to personally profit from. With a preference for passive profit from capital investment returns. That is not the standard for humans, not at all. And if you think it is, then you have a very bleak view of humanity.
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Are you seriously even entertaining the thought of anarcho-capitalism? Capitalism is only acceptable when you keep the corporations somewhat in check while still leaving them free enough to innovate and create wealth. Left unchecked, capitalism is some distopic shit, with massively powerful corporations that'll do anything to maximise profit. I don't understand why anyone would even consider such a system. Capitalism is very good at innovation and wealth-creating, but some very serious side effects are that 99% of wealth eventually ends up in the hands of the 1% and that as corporations get more powerful they start to drown out small and middle-sized companies with vicious tactics. Capitalism only works when you find a good balance between regulating its flaws (really skewed wealth distribution and tendency towards monopolies/oligarchies by drowning out the competition) and leaving it unregulated enough to allow its benefits to flourish (massive wealth creation and very good innovation).
In its core unregulated form, capitalism is hell for all except the 1% that amasses an ever increasing amount of wealth and power. If overregulated, the benefits of capitalism are killed as wealth creation and innovation is stifled. Anarcho capitalism is absolutely unacceptable as a means of government, it's a seriously bad idea.
Oh, and socialism is not just "government does stuff". Socialism means that the entire economy is collectivised for the working class and all means of production are used by and for the working class. Other classes don't exist anymore and an egalitarian society without private ownership of any factories/etc. is created. Wealth is distributed purely by how much your work is worth. All wealth first goes to the government and is then redistributed. The US military is not "socialist" just because it's the government organising something. Socialism requires an entire economic revolution. A capitalist system with social policies or a generally big government is still capitalism; see most of Western Europe, capitalist social democracies. Essentially, their balance between regulating capitalism and leaving it free, skews more to the regulating side than it does in the US. It's really nothing more than that.
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I agree with your take on National Socialism being a form of Socialism (or at the least a similar social revolution), but you're missing something. Socialism is not just about state control, that is merely one of several elements of it. The most important element of socialism is the ideological reasons for designing the economy the way they do. It makes a lot more sense to not only point out the lack of free market, but also explain the ideological reasons for it and how similar those are to marxism. And there are enough similarities to either say Nazism is socialism or at the least that Fascism is its own third ideology besides socialism/capitalism that is in many ways related to socialism.
You can have state control while being capitalist, for example the war economy in the US during WW2. But if that state control goes coupled with an ideological social revolution, it's no longer capitalism. This is the case for Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy and the USSR, none were capitalist. To complete your argument, spend more time explaining the social revolutions.
And about your points regarding Cambridge/Oxford, I don't know why you're surprised they publish books that are contradictory to one another. They aren't one homogenous group of scholars, they educate many different kinds of scholars with different opinions. Your point about Keynesians distorting history to defend their views MAY be true for some scholars, but it's a very bad idea to claim that the entirety of Cambridge somehow teaches this and they're all elites with the same views.
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@HannibalBarcaRTW No, the reason these speeches appeal to you is because they distract from the true reason behind these issues. Yes, quality of life is decreasing that is true, but why? It’s because of capitalism increasing wealth inequality more and more, forcing our governments to placate big businesses more and more. Big businesses are getting more powerful, especially with globalism they are becoming impervious to government regulation. If we do something they don’t like, they can move their business elsewhere, outside of our reach. We now need to court businesses to settle in our countries, to choose us over other countries. They are the true global leaders and they’re united in having interests in policy that benefits their profit margins.
Why do immigrants come here? Two answers: businesses want them here for cheap labour (notice how after brexit, the UK simply replaced eastern european immigrants with African, Indian etc immigrants? It’s because corporate interests require immigrants to do cheap labour, regardless of what the people vote for) and businesses keep those third world nations poor by extracting their resources, giving VERY little in return and pocketing all the profits. Africa is insanely rich in resources, but when a French company mines them, they employ a small number of your people maybe and pay a little tax, but 90% of that wealth is gone. Extracted never to be seen again. And if they revolt against this system? Get ready for regime change. Need a loan due to how little you profit from how we extract your resources? Here you go, except there are conditions attached that further ensure you remain poor (mostly we impose austerity measures which make investment in developing their economies impossible). So conditions are terrible there and en masse these people seek to escape this economic trap by moving to rich nations like ours. We created these conditions, our institutions like the IMF and our businesses. This is not to speak of warzones we created, like Libya, and all the refugees coming from these places. We created this issue ourselves, largely. We chose profit and the result is mass immigration. 95% of Africans coming here would gladly stay home if they could build a decent life there. And with their resources there is no reason why they can’t… IF businesses stopped exploiting their land and shipping the profits abroad.
In short, we the people are NOT in power. Not even our governments are in power. Global capital interests are in power and decide most of our economic and political life. Even our cultural/social life. We are entirely dependent on placating them to grant us their business and some taxes. And with globalism this dynamic has reached new heights, enabling businesses to pit countries against one another and forcing us to beg more than ever for them to keep their business in our nations. THAT is the core of the issue. Everything from immigration to decreasing quality of life traces back to this issue and why we can’t fix it as long as we remain capitalist
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@Bhigr Bond You don't understand that Declaration at all. I guess according to you article 3 ("Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.") means the death penalty or even the police shooting criminals is illegal because it takes lives, prison sentences are illegal because they limit liberty, etc..... The UDHR doesn't work like this. Hell, the UDHR doesn't even have legal power in any country. It's exclusively used as a basis to prosecute extreme breaches of human rights without specific laws prohibiting it, to counter the "I just followed orders/the law" arguments of Nazis. The UDHR just indicates the vague existence of universal human rights, floating somewhere above all legal structures. Meaning that following the law under a Nazi system doesn't mean you escape punishment for serious cirme because "well I didn't breach any law in my country". Nobody can derive any specific rights from the UDHR. The UDHR is deliberately vague and without any legal power. America already breached half of it within seconds of signing the thing, with its segregation, torture, the US constitution slavery as "illegal except for prisoners", etc.
No such thing as absolute freedom of speech exists. In virtually the entire world, it's limited. In most of the world, hate speech is not allowed. And for good reason.
And as a side note, even in countries where holocaust denial is illegal, it's NOT illegal in a scientific context . So if you in good faith want to challenge the views on the holocaust and provide proper evidence to support your views, it's allowed. People like you, who just spout denialist talking points are RIGHTLY BANNED.
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Yeah that's a pretty poor explanation of Hitler in those schools. Almost makes him sound like a comic book villain...
The real question is WHY was Hitler anti-Slav and anti-Semite? Because he believed there was a race struggle going on in which the interest of one race is always counter to the other. He believed that because of shrinking markets he needed autarky to ensure the survival of the German race (i.e. to ensure Germany was fully self-sufficient and could feed itself and produce industrial goods for itself). He believed nations (races, in his mind) would have to fight to achieve self-sufficiency by grabbing enough resources to form an autarky and that the races that would fail to do this, would go extinct as they would starve. National Socialism is also anti-capitalist and shares the same criticisms of owners of the means of production exploiting the workers as Marxism does. At the same time Nazis were anti-Marxist because of their egalitarian and globalist views.
So, why anti-Slav hatred? Well, Eastern Europe had agricultural lands Hitler needed to form a Germany that could feed itself, so he planned to pretty much murder out the Slavs from Eastern Europe and take it as Lebensraum. So this is associated with the idea of autarky and that different races had to fight over resources to feed themselves so they could survive. Slavs had resources Germans needed to become self-sufficient, therefore they were the enemy and had to be fought. Another factor is the USSR that Hitler hated. Essentially, in Hitler's mind it was "either the German race starves out due to lack of agricultural lands, or I take agricultural lands from the Slavs and they die out".
And, why anti-Semitism? Considering the Nazi idea of different races struggling over resources to survive, the idea of members of a different race living within German society is nothing short of parasitical. They believed the Jews' very existence in Germany was them being parasitical on the survival of the German race. They believed that to survive, the German race needed to control a certain amount of resources or else they would eventually starve to death. So there could be no other races competing for those resources from within German society. Because race = nation in National Socialism, you can't have two races mingling in one area. Every "nation" would have to be racially pure and using the means of production and resources to further the survival of that race. The German race didn't want to use their resources to further the survival of another race, the Jews. They were their competitors. Another factor that made their hatred for the Jews even worse was the fact that Jews were overrepresented as businessmen. So they were not only seen as a foreign race benefiting from German resources, but also as a foreign race directly exploiting the German race/workers for their own survival/monetary gain. The Jews were pretty much the ultimate example of what National Socialism was against.
I think it's very sad that schools today essentially teach "he was just insane" because that doesn't properly portray how screwed up and dangerous the National Socialist ideology is. Hitler was not "just insane", he followed a very clear and consistent ideology. An ideology we should understand to avoid. When you call Hitler "just a monster", people are more likely to question why Hitler really did what he did or even deny it altogher because it's pretty illogical unless you understand the ideological reasons he did it. That is the danger of not properly teaching the ideology of Nazism and why it leads to more holocaust denialism: because without understanding the ideological reasons behind it, killing 17 million people is so random and so illogically evil that some start to question "this is so absurd, did it even happen at all?".
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You don’t understand socialism. You’re absolutely correct that so long as we remain in capitalism, “social” reforms can and often do have long term knock on effects. Absolutely correct, because they do nothing to change to fundamentals of capitalist power dynamics between capital owners and the rest of society. It tries to mitigate the effects of a system that fundamentally always leads to those effects due to this power imbalance and how we structured the entire economy to placate those few capitalists. It’s fighting windmills and may often enough even exacerbate those effects. Your example of rent controls and the housing market is an apt one. But what you fail to see is that there are more options than simply accepting capitalism and introducing social policies within that capitalist context. We can also critique how capitalism works on a more fundamental level and seek fundamental changes in how our economic system functions. And by this I don’t mean having the government plan the economy. If we learn anything from the 20th century it should be that planned economies do not work.
It is important to realise that every type of economy, including capitalism, has certain ground rules that can be altered. Whether or not something as basic in our present economy as the ability to own ideas should exist at all, was a major discussion in the late 1800s. Intellectual property is not a natural part of the free market, it’s a rule we created ourselves and chose to enforce on society, thereby shaping the basics of our present economy. And yes, even property as such is such a constructed rule.
Many types of free markets exist, including markets much more free than capitalism is. Market anarchists for instance propose a free market based on usufruct: whoever uses something owns it. I.e. you own your house not because of a piece of paper that says you do, but because you actually live there. And yes this is a form of socialism because the people that operate a business, own it because they operate it. And all people engage with one another on the basis of free exchange and market dynamics. Without property existing. There is only one thing prohibited: you don’t forcibly take something that is used by another. That’s theft. This funnily enough makes property a form of theft, as Proudhon famously wrote. In short, many types if markets are possible, and capitalism is but one of them. We decide on which basic rules an economy functions. Property is a made up rule based on state violence enforcing it upon us all, and that is what determines much of how our market functions. Different rules can be enforced or no rules can be enforced at all (except no theft/violence) and we can have free markets that function very differently. You don’t like publicly traded companies for example, this is another one of these made up rules that exists only by virtue of state violence enforcing it. Most rules do, down to the very basics of property itself.
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If Socialism allows for extensive privatisation, then what exactly is the difference between modern day Europe (social democracies) and Nazi Germany, apart from the obvious fascism/democracy differences? Are we socialists? The problem is; when do we call something capitalism with socialist elements and when socialism with capitalistic elements?
I think calling National Socialism a form of Socialism is fair, because it had many socialist elements within it and allowed the government to direct the production output of even private companies on demand. What I think is the most problematic about your last video is how you equate it with the USSR. Stalin turned the USSR into a command economy, a completely planned economy. Stalin took away land from farmers so as to collectivise agriculture. Hitler privatised companies and even let them compete in a capitalistic style, but when deemed in the interest for the greater good of the German people the government could place an order with a company (this was for profit, but repeated non-compliance could have nationalisation of the company as a result). Hitler also did the exact opposite with farmers: he did not take it away from them, but forced them to keep it as property and forbade selling of land.
In short, the USSR was collectivising and factually taking control over the means of production, or at least the grand majority of it, and National Socialism was privatising but increasing government control over private corporations. Both were trying to achieve a socialist society in which the means of production served the common good, BUT both went about it in a radically different way. National Socialism is a bit of a strange one because it allowed capitalism style freedom for companies, BUT increased government soft power over companies. It is like a conditional capitalism. You get capitalistic freedoms, but only if you occasionally (?) serve the general interest of the German people instead of just your own profit interests. The companies did what they need to do to contribute to the socialist society, and when they were "off duty" they had the full capitalist freedoms.
I think you could place National Socialism between Capitalism and Socialism on the political spectrum, but it is mainly socialist. I'd say it's like modern day social democracies but the other way around: mainly socialist, with capitalist elements. Alternatively, one could say that National Socialism was capitalism with very heavy socialistic government intervention (capitalism, unless the government orders you to do X or Y). Best place would be between Capitalism and Socialism on the political spectrum
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44:45 What is this? Someone who actually sees that corporations are incompatible with anarchism? Now I respect you even more, TIK, even if I'm more of a leftie. I'd sign up for such a society for sure. Still have a few points though.
I actually watched the video by the way, so what follows is constructive.
I do have to say I don't quite agree with your definitions of socialism and capitalism. I definitely admire your view of corporations being public in and of themselves, but being public is not the same thing as being socialist. I feel like your statement there is a bit too general and misses some nuances. Socialism as an ideology, encompasses a lot more than simply public control over the means of production. A corporation is a public entity in the sense of it being a body of multiple people functioning within said corporation (which indeed also makes the government a corporation), but capitalism nor socialism is opposed to the simple idea of a group of individuals banding together to form corporations. What socialism is against is the capitalists within this system being able to have ownership of that corporation and thereby also the labour of the workers within said corporation. Socialism wants every individual to be the owner of their own labour and wants to abolish the very idea of being able to own a company beyond your share of actual labour within said company. Whether you have an economy with worker-owned corporations or an economy with individuals owning their own labour, that is socialist because everyone in society owns the means of production by their own share of labour.
Capitalism is a system based on the concept of capitalist investors being able to buy (parts of) a company, including the labour of the workers there (you buy labour by entering into a wage contract) and those singular investors reaping the profits of the labour done at that company. Because the workers don't own their own labour, but are instead selling it for a set wage, the net value that they create does not go to them as workers, but to the capitalist that owns their labour. These profits are then used to further invest in that company or invest elsewhere (or to get a huge pay for the capitalists as individuals), enacting economic growth/expansion. The idea of capitalism is that this benefits both the investors and the wage workers. The workers get a deal they agreed on (socialists would argue that it is not a choice because the market sets their wages and the entire point of the market is to keep those wages as low as they can possibly be without losing the worker to a competitor who pays better). The capitalists get the full reward for making the business possible in the first place and ensure that the economy expands, offering opportunities for more and more workers to get a wage as well as fulfilling in the needs of as many consumers as possible. Other characteristics are a (more or less) free market, (more or less) free private ownership, competition and more. There is nothing in capitalism that opposes the creation of corporations either. Corporations can exist in a capitalist as well as socialist setting, depending on how ownership within that corporation is organised. If either the state (representing the "proletariat") or all workers employed at that corporation owns the company, it is socialist. If individuals, not in their capacity as workers, but in their private interests as investors own a company, that is capitalist.
Same for the state; it can exist both in a capitalist and socialist setting. You already know how it exists in a socialist setting by examples of authoritarian socialism seen in f.e. the USSR. But state intervention in the free market and capitalism? It all depends on the nature of that intervention. A state can nationalise industry for the sake of abolishing class conflict (auth. socialist), but a state can also partake in a capitalist economy by f.e. buying shares in a company or simply buying pencils from a corporation. In the same way an individual can own a company either as a capitalist investor (representing their own individual interest) or as one of many workers collectively owning the company they work at (being part of the socialist principle of collective ownership of one's own labour), a state can act either as a neutral actor on the capitalist market or as a facilitator of socialist principles. A state buying pencils from a company is not socialist. Even a state putting into place regulations on the free market to prevent big corporations from dominating the market is not socialist; they are simply regulating a capitalist market with the intention of protecting the capitalist principle of competition regulating market prices (which would be drowned out if a state of monopoly or oligarchy is achieved by big corporations).
So your specific view of capitalism, which you call "true" capitalism, is not the only iteration of capitalism. There are man forms of it (as there are many forms of socialism) and yours is merely one of them. Probably the one I find the most admirable form, but that's besides the point.
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@bakters Complete abolition of class by having the proletariat seize the means of production, creating an egalitarian society (socialism). Solidification of class and having them work together in the common interest of the nation (or for NS: race), creating a hierarchical collectivist society (fascism).
There you have it, folks. Essentially, class abolition versus class collaboration, egalitarianism versus hierarchy. TIK is mostly accurate with his videos, but he really misses the difference between socialism and fascism. He sadly subscribes to the overly simplified "government does something = socialism" narrative. That's his only mistake from what I can tell (so it's not that he's totally wrong or "dumb"), but it has massive impact on his videos.
In truth, socialism is about a lot more than just collectivism; it's about abolishing class conflict by creating an egalitarian, single-class society. Fascism is also collectivist, but a different flavour: it strengthens the concept of class (they believe class distinction/hierarchy is necessary to run a strong nation), but stops class conflict by uniting the classes under the banner of one nation or race.
A good example of fascism at work would be Volkswagen. The Deutsche Arbeitsfront (DAF, a Nazi government institution facilitating class collaboration) spoke with the upper class and workers and devised a plan that would benefit both of them, as well as the nation as a whole. A cheap car would be produced because the Nazis wanted a more mobile population (national interest). To achieve this, they sat with the upper class and working class to set up a scheme with which the workers would get cheap cars and the upper class would get a lot of orders and thus profit. Thus the Volkswagen was created. Central to Fascism is that economic projects are in the broader national interest, with the government having a large role in deciding what the national interest is. A scheme like Volkswagen would be designed to be in the interests of the working class, upper class and broader nation.
Under fascism, workers unions were illegal... because they only represent the interests of the workers. Instead the DAF was a union that represented the interests of both the workers AND the upper class, setting up projects that were in the interest of both of them. This is called class collaboration and is what sets fascism apart from capitalism as well as socialism.
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@bakters >"Are you trying to claim that in Soviet Union there were no classes? That Stalin or Beria and your common Yuri Bezumov were of the same social class?"
Yes, because the difference between upper and working class is determined by who owns the means of production. The upper class owns the means of production and enjoys its fruits, the working class are wage employees of the upper class. Since the proletariat seized the means of production in the Soviet Union, there is no upper class in the Soviet Union. The entire point of the class struggle is that the upper class interest in max profit from their means of production and the working class interest in getting paid the value of their work and having decent working conditions, clash. Enter Hegelian dialectics and you have Marxism. Under Socialism this clash is taken away by having the working class/proletariat take control of the means of production and using it in their interest; with wages based on the value of the work you do. The entire point of the USSR was that the proletariat had decimated the upper class.
>"If so, both Third Reich and Soviet Union have failed equally badly. Where are the differences?"
The Third Reich never intended to have an egalitarian society; they HATED this part of Marxism (it's in fact the main and possibly only reason they weren't Marxist, as for the rest their ideology is actually very similar). NS is all about hierarchy, all about strengthening the class divide and even adding a new hierarchy to the mix: racial purity. And they were socially very conservative, with clear roles for women and such.
The USSR wanted to create an economy in which everyone is a worker and everyone gets paid what the work they do is worth. Equal, performance-based payment. There is no upper class that is of inherent higher social status by birth; there is no upper class because there is no private ownership of the means of production. There is no aristocracy. There is no superior or inferior race. And compared to the Nazis they were socially a lot more progressive.
>"I was raised under Socialism. Worker's unions were illegal. Where are the differences?"
That's a good question. Under Soviet Socialism, LOCAL worker's unions were deemed unwanted. The government-proletariat would represent the worker's voice under that system. Dissenting voices of any kind - including of other workers - were seen as going against the working class. As opposing the government utopia. Soviet Socialism was a heavily authoritarian kind of Socialism.
Under Fascism, organisations representing workers' interests were seen as inherently against class collaboration and therefore unwanted. The entire point of class collaboration is that the classes do not fight and instead unite to act in the interest of the nation. This requires the classes to not organise around their own interests, but to collaborate with one another. This collaboration was facilitated by the government/nation, which would essentially mediate between the upper and working class and organise projects to make both sides happy. Profit for the upper class, a decent life for the workers and production in the interest of the nation.
So in short, the Soviet Union disliked worker's unions because the government-proletariat already dictated what was in the workers' interest and they didn't want any dissent. Fascism disliked worker's unions because they were fundamentally against the idea of workers organising around their own interests in the first place. They HATED either the upper class using the means of production is their own interest (saw it as leeching off the Nation, kind of similar to Marxist criticisms on capitalism) and the working class trying to create a worker's paradise. They saw the class hierarchy as something a Nation needed to succeed, yet the class struggle (= Hegelian dialectics caused by each class organising purely around their own interests and clashing) as a threat to the Nation.
> "Under Socialism I was raised in, it was exactly the same.(...) Where are the differences?"
The difference is that the DAF (government) mediated between upper class and lower class to create projects that, to stick with the example of Volkswagen:
- generated profit for the upper class (Volkswagen sales, with artificially high demand created by project)
- gave something back to the workers (cheap cars, within their wage range)
- produced something that benefitted the nation (mobilised the German population)
The USSR just unilaterally dictated what the proletariat wanted. There is no mediation because no upper class exists, there is no profit as all value is distributed among workers. There are no clashing interests that need to be reconciled. There are only the interests of the working class to be dictated by the government.
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@bakters - "Stalin owned the means of ... "
The difference is that the upper class owns the means of production PRIVATELY. I.e. purely for their personal benefit. The Nazi's employed the means of prod for THE GERMAN PEOPLE collectively. The USSR for the PROLETARIAT collectively. They were both collectivists and authoritarian, but similarities end there. For whom and why they organised the economy is different, as laid out before.
- "oh that's why the Nazi's were a workers party..."
The Nazi's were only a workers party in name. Though technically one could say that RELATIVE TO CAPITALISM they were a workers party, since they despised capitalism for the same reasons as the Marxists (abusing the working class and nation for personal profit) and wanted to create a society in which the upper class' private profit ambitions would be kept in check by the government to make sure they act in the interest of the NATION (and thus also the workers).
In short, the Nazi's wanted to keep the class' hierarchy BUT have them act in the interest of all, i.e. more BALANCE between the interests of the upper and working class instead of the upper class purely acting in their private interests. This means LESS power to the upper class and MORE power to the workers, relative to capitalism.
The Soviets didn't want balance, they wanted ABSOLUTE POWER to the workers. They wanted to solve the class struggle by making the upper class DISAPPEAR. They were fundamentally against the hierarchy of class.
Nazi's: more power to workers.
USSR: ABSOLUTE power to workers.
- "They were aiming for an egalitarian society for all Germans..."
National Socialists did NOT want an egalitarian society. They revered social and racial hierarchies. Yes, even ethnic Germans themselves were categorised along racial lines and were discriminated. Only the most "pure" among the Germans could for example apply for certain social programmes, other Germans could not. As mentioned earlier, they also loved the idea of class hierarchy, claiming that the working class needed the upper class for guidance. They believed that no not all humans are equal and that those at the top should get higher social positions and positions of power/leadership in the Nation. They HATED the idea of the common worker grabbing absolute power; that is the WEAK governing themselves. Yet, they were also against the upper class misusing their positions of power for personal gain; they should be there to guide the Nation, not their own monetary interests.
- "But then war happened and in order to win...."
Yes, and then America started its war economy and therefore they were Socialists! No..... temporary measures in war time =/= ideological identity of a nation. You have to look at how a country ideologically wants to shape itself to determine what ideology it falls under.
- "Lenin, Stalin etc were tyrants......"
You completely ignore the ideological groundwork of the Soviet Union (thereby by the way contradicting yourself, as you before rightly stated that the USSR wanted to create an egalitarian society for all workers). You can't just arbitrarily rank members of the USSR society by the power they had and say "therefore they were just the same as the Tsars". You have to look at how and why they used their power the way they did; then you see what ideology they were.
- "They were not conservative at all......"
Nice cherry picking. The nazis promoted women to stay home, under the nazi regime the amount of working women went down, they promoted other very conservative family values and of course their love for the class distinction and hierarchy is deeply conservative.
Saying what you did here is like claiming the notoriously misogynist Ancient Greece was incredibly progressive because famous philosopher Hypatia existed. Or that hyper conservative and women unfriendly medieval christianity was actually progressive because queens existed and figures like Joan of Arc. It makes no sense.
The USSR and Nazi's were not even close in terms of progressivism. The USSR had women actually fly and fight on the battlefield.
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We aren't really becoming poorer as a whole, but the anti-globalisation narratives do have certain truths in them. Globalisation is definitely no zero-sum game and both the west and east massively benefit from it if you look at the large scale. We get huge markets to trade with, they get an opportunity to grow their economy by manufacturing things for us and later industrialising to our level. It's a win-win.
But there are some side effects. We in the west lose our factory jobs en masse. We get other jobs in return, but those are mostly skilled jobs in cities. Globalisation is as a consequence draining our countryside from jobs and making the lower classes even poorer than they already were, even though the country as a whole becomes richer. This is the reason the yellow vests protest in France and the reason the countryside voted Trump in the US. We ignore and neglect the lower classes in favour of economic growth. Another consequence is that our larger companies become more and more global entities instead of linked to a country and become powerful enough to dictate countries' policies. If, for example, one country creates strict environmental laws or chooses to tax pollution or something, the local companies can simply threaten with leaving that country for another one without such laws. If those companies leave, that country may lose out on massive amounts of GDP and jobs. So it all becomes a fight of who can appease the corporations the best. Who has the best settling climate? Who has the lowest taxes? Who allows for loopholes in the law to escape taxing altogether? Who has lenient laws in terms of workers rights or environmental laws? What is actually good for society matters less and less and that is a serious problem. There is no more link between the society and its companies, only their own corporate interests count. The days of a company feeling connected to its society and investing in it are gone; even where they do charity work, what they give is hugely overshadowed by the amount of tax money they evade.
So yes, some anti-globalist movements certainly to have a point. There are massive positive sides to globalism, but also very flawed aspects of it.
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