• BrainInABox@lemmy.ml
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        10 months ago

        Yes, that was my point. Socialism doesn’t become capitalism just because you call them “state capitalism”. Just like koala bears don’t become bears just because you call them that.

        • zloubida@sh.itjust.worksBanned from community
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          10 months ago

          And state capitalism doesn’t become socialism just because you call it that.

          • BrainInABox@lemmy.ml
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            10 months ago

            Your only argument was essentially “it has capitalism in the name!”.

            Now you just have “nuh-uh”

            • zloubida@sh.itjust.worksBanned from community
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              10 months ago

              No. I defined what’s socialism for me (owning of the mean of production by the workers), and all can see that the USSR and friends weren’t that. Then I gave Marx’s definition of socialism, even if I’m not Marxist (a mode of production were the usefulness replaced the price as value), and all can see that the USSR and friends weren’t that. Thus they’re something else, and I used a term that Lenin himself used: state capitalism (which wasn’t limited to the NEP). Please stop with your strawmen.

              • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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                10 months ago

                You did not give “Marx’s definition of Socialism,” you erased dialectics from his analysis of the transition from one mode of production to the next. Marx frequently referenced commodity production even remaining in lower-stage Communism, the goal is to abolish it but the presence of it alone does not disqualify a system from being Socialist. State Capitalism was a descriptor for the NEP by Lenin, and he still considered the USSR to be Socialist in that it was a transitional state towards Communism.

                It’s extremely condescending when you act like you know more about a subject while admitting to not studying it.

                  • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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                    10 months ago

                    You said you aren’t a Marxist, and you’ve claimed things about Marxism that are undeniably false. If I’m mistaken and you have studied Marxism, then I apologize for misunderstanding you, though that doesn’t validate your misconceptions.

              • BrainInABox@lemmy.ml
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                10 months ago

                If your definition of socialism is “ownership by the workers, but they can’t form any kind of representative body to administrate production (ie. a state)”, then you’ve just defined socialism out of existence. Unless the expecting the entire population to come together and form a consensus on every decision, (“what color should we make the wall paper? Oh well time to get all eight billion humans on a group call”).

                • zloubida@sh.itjust.worksBanned from community
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                  10 months ago

                  If you think workers had anything to say in the USSR, you’re delusional.

                  • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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                    10 months ago

                    You can drop the ableism, and the proletariat ran the government in the USSR. The democratic structure looked like this:

                  • BrainInABox@lemmy.ml
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                    10 months ago

                    K. Very compelling point. “If you disagree with me you are mentally unwell.”

                    But you’ve already condemned any representative representative body administrating things, so I’m not sure what your point is anyway.