What is communism?

[Soviet Steve]

That's completely wrong. One of the definitive characteristics of communism is that it completely abolishes ownership.

"Communism is a sociopolitical movement that aims for a classless and sometimes a stateless society structured upon common ownership of the means of production, free access to articles of consumption, and the end of wage labour and private property in the means of production and real estate"

From Wikipedia, but also practiced by every communist state that has ever existed. No ownership and no state and no laws etc. is anarchism.

 

[Crazy Zaul]

Communism is a method of grilling and eating babies and a way of life involving burning down candy stores and shooting kittens.

 

[Zorg Machine]

To me, it is an idealistic, utopian ideology doomed to always be plauged by corruption and failure due to human error.

 

[Patshiv]

That's completely wrong. One of the definitive characteristics of communism is that it completely abolishes ownership.

"Communism is a sociopolitical movement that aims for a classless and sometimes a stateless society structured upon common ownership of the means of production, free access to articles of consumption, and the end of wage labour and private property in the means of production and real estate"

From Wikipedia, but also practiced by every communist state that has ever existed. No ownership and no state and no laws etc. is anarchism.

The usual way people think of and use the concept of ownership tens to include the idea that it is something that is applied to an individual, even in the case of shared ownership people tend to think of that state of ownership being multiple individuals.

This concept of individual ownership is exactly what communism abolishes in that ownership in communism becomes impossible unless it is communal. Therefore in this context abolition of ownership is pretty much synonymous to common ownership.

At least thats what i think

 

[magicmonkeybars]

Communism is the perfect government, for robots.

 

[LordOmnit]

Spoiler: Just because I have it

And in all seriousness, Communism is a theory that will never be put into practice as it was written because it doesn't work on the scale it was intended for. Everyone won't/can't be held accountable for their actions in a large enough society where there is a real working class to overthrow the owners of the means of manufacture. That's another point as to why it won't ever work- by the time the owners of the means of manufacture have called in the workers they have already laid traps to stop their workers from rebelling: legal traps, propaganda, distractions, etc.

 

[go-10]

I'm not an expert on the subject but if you ask me the difference between communism and dictatorship are non-existent. I know that by definition they are different but when in practice its hard to tell them apart

 

[Zhukov]

Communism is a social ideology and political theory.

Its central tenants, at least as I understand it, are that the majority working class should (a) work for their own benefit and (b) be in control of forming public and legal policy.

Sounds good in theory but tends to go a bit funny in practice, mostly because whoever ends up in power will generally seek to maintain that power and use it for their own benefit. Also, it failed to account for the rise of the middle class.

(I'm from Australia, if it matters.)

 

[dillinger88]

I haven't made any serious research into communism, but from what I can tell from scraps of information I remember; communism is equality for all which sounds like in my head 'You have a dollar; everyone has a dollar'

I'm fairly ignorant in this respect and pretty much playing devil's advocate, but I think it's more "you have a dollar; you must share it with everyone."

There's two ways of looking at it. but to be honest I don't think it can be represented fully by either of those statements.

 

[matt87_50]

its great, but its gotten a bad rap.

 

[Maximum_Power_Cheese_Supreme]

Communism means taking a statement such as:
"In America, you can find a party."

and reversing the subject and objects the statement. "In (Soviet) Russia," or something of the equivalent is added, and the verb is often left unconjugated, and the articles are omitted, mimicking perceived Russian-accents.

"In Soviet Russia, the Party finds you!"

No I honestly don't know. Something to do with the people owning the corporations, or the government owning the corporations, therefore the government owns the people. There is this understanding of the way communism 'should' be, and the way it usually turns out via the eventual corruption of man. Capitalism isn't a great system, but it seems to have a better reputation and more stable for democracy. However, I think I would think the opposite if I lived in Russia or China (without the propaganda too).

 

[coolkirb]

Communism has a couple key points
-It must have been achieved though a violent revolution, if not it is socialism communism MUST have been achieved through violent revolution
-Their will be a temporay dictatorship (which has allways become perminate) in which wealth will be redistributed
-all resources are shared equally, "everyone will give what they can and take only what they need" though I am sure I got that quote wrong

Thats about as simple as I can put it

 

[Soviet Steve]

The usual way people think of and use the concept of ownership tens to include the idea that it is something that is applied to an individual, even in the case of shared ownership people tend to think of that state of ownership being multiple individuals.

This concept of individual ownership is exactly what communism abolishes in that ownership in communism becomes impossible unless it is communal. Therefore in this context abolition of ownership is pretty much synonymous to common ownership.

At least thats what i think

I didn't say "ownership" however, I said "collective ownership" which is ownership by the state.

 

[RicoADF]

Communism in it's pure form can't exist because people are too stupid to accept it. Our nature wouldn't allow such a system to last long because there will always be people who want to have more than others, who want money and power. Even though in the end none of that shit matter. This is what real communism should look like. Not the Russian and Chinese version, but this:

This basically, the Federation is communism that would work. Where people work together for no personal gain, but all would benefit from it. People have the oportunity to do whatever they want without the barrier of wealth. Overall a far better system, one that doesn't work today as people are too selfish to accept equality.

 

[thespyisdead]

being from an ex-soviet state(and living in a near proximity to one ATM(fyi, i was born post collapse)), and having immediate Russian relatives, i have gotten the impression, that communist Russia was not such a bad place(from hat i understand, , if you kept your mouth shut). things were built on time, while today you are lucky if something IS built at all, and things were built to last. generally, the standard of life was higher then too. i've been looking at programs( from Britain) that were looking at what people thing of the current matter of things on russia, and people say that things WERE better during the soviet times (like pensions being a whole lot bigger back then)

 

[SovietPanda]

communism is awesome, thats what it is. in seriousness communism is all about equality and working for the state. in principle it is a sound idea, in practice it is pretty much impossible since humans are evil (and by evil i mean not some programmed robot with no emotions and no dreams)

Sorry to pick on you but i this point has been made by a few times by different people and i just wanted to say my piece on it. "in principle a sound idea but flawed in reality" is just bad logic. A sound idea works reasonably well in reality. A lot of people seem to take this view on communism, I think it must translate into "It's a nice ideal, but it just doesn't work" but it irks me the way alot of people express that.

Slightly more on topic I think the biggest reason communism falls down, and must fall down, is the whole equality issue. If everyone has access to equal wealth, then why would i feel the need to become educated enough to be a doctor rather then working as a cleaner or in a factory. I don't want to sound like im saying one job is more important then the other but the stress and responsibility associated with medicine or similar jobs in my mind deserves higher reward.

I feel i've rambled abit, don't really know if i've really helped this conversation along, but with a screen name like mine i could hardly resist being apart of this topic.

 

[direkiller]

I'm not posting this to find out what communism is but rather to find out how communism is percieved, especially by americans who generally seem to have a pretty skewed idea about it.

I'm doing some research on cultural perspectives for an assignment in a course on organization analysis, and for this I'd like to get a general idea about what people think about communism in general and if at all possible the ideals on which communism was founded.

My basis for the statement that americans seem to have a skewed idea about it is really years of listening to american popculture but can be examplified by the phase "accuse them of being communists" which has a premise that clashes with absolutely everything I know about the subject. I dont wish to elaborate on this because I'd rather not bias any responses.

Also before you ask I'm from Denmark, and to the best of my knowledge there has never been a hugely successful communist party in government here.

I'm not really looking for a debate on the pros and cons of communism (though i am open for that debate as well) which is the reason why I'm not posting this in the religion and politics board.

Edit: To clarify I'd like input from absolutely anyone willing to give it.

well it hasn't been relevant here after the fall of the CCCP(and being accused one haven't been relevant sense the McCarthy hearings http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Army%E2%80%93McCarthy_hearings)

What most Americans think is Communism is really various forms of socialism( mao zedong,Lennon,Kim II,Ho Chi Minh). I don't know why we changed it except maybe as an f-u to Carl saying Capitalism has the seeds to it's destruction so his idea was already with bad blood with us.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

Communism is basically going to end up no other way but a Dictator run shit hole with Socialism mask on. Communism won't ever work as it relies on people not being selfish on a broad scale and not being corrupted by absolute power over a country. Socialism wouldn't work either.

I could go with problems with the Centrally Planned Economies as well but I am not sure that is what you are asking. Just to say on this before I get quoted Centrally Planned Economies are the opposite of Free Market/Capitalism I do not think either can work in their purest form for extended periods of time.

 

[Fusioncode9]

I always thought it meant complete equality. Like a person who studies for 12 years and becomes a doctor, and then makes the same amount of money as a high school dropout who became a janitor.