(05-13-2020, 09:13 AM)flsprtsgod Wrote:

(05-13-2020, 08:42 AM)Last42min Wrote: Uh, that's not socialism. That's welfare. It would be nice if everyone was using the same terminology.

Correct, welfare is Communism, Socialism bigger, meaner, older brother.

I can't agree by that definition, either. You can have capitalist welfare. You can have socialist welfare. You can't have capitalist socialism. That is because welfare relies on the redistribution of wealth, which can be created in both systems (in theory at least). Conservatives argue against involuntarily taking from someone to give to another, but this can and does exist in a capitalist system. Until the means of production is seized, the argument is really about the morality of wealth redistribution, which, in my opinion, should be a stand alone issue. Democratic socialists not only want to redistribute wealth, but ultimately want to control the means of production. This gets muddied by the fact that they are not honest about their end goal, with a few exceptions. 

I know Glenn Beck through out that line the other day, but I disagree with him entirely. Communism not only concerns itself with the means of production, but also has other tenants that define it. It's stateless, classless, and money-less... this is all in addition to controlling the means of production. Other versions of communism took it a step further: controlling the way you think, worship, interact with your neighbors, etc. In theory a socialist country could just control the means of production and leave the population free to do what it wants (which is kind of like anarchy). I personally don't believe that is possible, because anyone with the power to control the economy would have to have the discipline from refraining in social interactions, which has not played out in any socialist nation. You'd have to figure out how to stop corruption before I think any of this is remotely viable, but that's a different discussion.

Anyone who wants to use the terms correctly should watch the following video. It breaks this down more clearly than any other video I have watched on the differences between capitalism and socialism, and the difference between socialist nations:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vyl2DeKT-Vs

To Glenn Beck's credit, he did say that socialism was communism's older, bigger, meaner brother because it is the transition stage to communism, which can include revolutionaries. The video above references this in multiple spots. However, I am not sure his average listener would be able to make the distinction as to why he made that claim. Quick aside, I think it's interesting that Bernie Sanders uses the democratic socialist tag instead of the social democrat tag. He's either too stupid to know the difference, or his end goals are socialist in nature. I don't think he's stupid.

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