So today I was sitting in the tub and realized that the spectrum I’d always envisioned, of capitalism being on the extreme end of a line wasn’t really a linear spectrum after all. Suddenly, before my mind’s eye, this line turned into a circle, with the two ends meeting.
At the other end of that line, which was overlapping with capitalism, was communism. The concept of socialism exists on the other end of the circle as a much wider range of possibilities. Whereas communism and capitalism are like two little nodes at the top.
In societies now with these dictator-like rulers, critical thinking among citizens is a commodity that they don’t want us to have, to spend, to use, to wield. Because critical thinking allows us to separate these concepts and see them for what they are.
Critical thinking allows us to dig below the rhetoric, below the tropes, below all of the propaganda being fed to us by both hyper-capitalistic governments and communist governments and see that there is this circular spectrum of sorts and see it for what it is.
That if you are in these capitalistic and communistic nodes, there are haves and have nots. There is extreme suffering. Socialism on the other hand is the understated practice that a lot of European countries have put into place to different degrees, enforcing a social net around people. Simply put, socialism implies that the prioritization of individual welfare and empowerment is above the gains of overly-powerful people.
Socialism doesn’t wipe out markets or innovation or creativity. It bolsters these things.
So you can argue in capitalism this happens through the markets — that yes, this is how people become successful. They’ve succeeded in capturing the American Dream and have accumulate all this wealth and are “happy.” Meanwhile money starts accumulating in a smaller and smaller network of pockets while the general population is lulled asleep by the drone of consumerism. More and more people begin to suffer and education programs weaken to the point where, as we see now, people can’t think critically enough to realize the cause of this situation. In fact they might, as they do in the states now as they praise the GOP, even celebrate the cause.
In the case of communism the same effect is based on people being fed a lot of propaganda about being unified. About abiding to a social code. Meanwhile, a communist dictator and his nepotistic network of people are bringing in a lot of cash and goods: I will take care of you just give me all your food and we’re all connected and don’t look at any other system and don’t talk bad about our system and all this brainwashing rhetoric.
But there’s not really a system in place in either of these extreme situations that prioritizes the welfare of every individual. It’s more, and I hope we’re starting to see it:
Capitalism AND communism are about just a few people leaching off society, promoting this propaganda/marketing, saying they are helping you. But they’re not. They are selling you something that makes you feel secure superficially but that is then degrading the foundation of society.
It’s propaganda no matter if naked or wrapped in marketing. And people are just as brainwashed by fast fashion and cleverly marketed plastic purchasing as they are allegiance to a government/nation state/enforced ideology.
And I see now, for just one example, in the US that it’s like a mirror of China. It might be a different market setup, but if you look at China and watch movies like American Factory you see there are very wealthy people in China. And even if they say this is communist, this is not socialism. The Communist red scare lives in the minds of this older boomer generation in the states as something very bad. And they equate this with socialism.
Socialism does indeed make sure that you have health care, because it mandates it. I live in Switzerland and I wasn’t allowed to have a residency here — or even a pre-residency — without health insurance. You’re not. It’s illegal.
Because the socialist system protects you from your impulse and instincts to spend money on some other thing because the market is pushing all this stuff at you and you’re not even paying attention to your own welfare.
Because this capitalistic system is actually brainwashing people to think that it’s more important to have some fast fashion, gadget, instant gratification than to have health care.
It’s most important to have health care, to have food, to have a roof, to have a job, that pays you enough to have these things, and then to have items that would be considered luxurious. I don’t know if they still do this but in Turkey as far as I know there’s a system that taxes necessities much less, if at all, than luxuries. So things that are considered luxuries, like a car, that you can live without, are taxed. Things that are not are not.
This is socialism. And socialism is GOOD. Socialism is a series of decisions that prioritize the protection of people given the social structures around them.
Communism is a mirror image of capitalism whereby people use propaganda and sales techniques to vacuum people’s allegiance, attention and resources promising that everything is going to trickle down. But it doesn’t.
And then everyone ends up suffering because even the rich people end up protecting themselves and being in a constant defensive posture, jacked up on adrenaline defending themselves, grasping at their holdings. Their whole life is unhealthy, sheltered.
We need to think through this and see that these three concepts exist on a ring and this ring has two nodes that intersect and they are mirror images of each other. And socialism is a much wider, broader area of the circular spectrum that to varying degrees interprets systems and supports people within these systems.
Who am I to say all this? Here’s a bio.
