Turning Socialists into Capitalists — Recommended method?

Miscellaneous General
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21

@Pony

In my experience I find that Illegal cocain, smart water (also known as rationalistic H2O) , a hardcover copy of Man, Economy, and State (it’s bigger and the cover is black making it more holy), and will to express rational self-intersted cooperation works better, but DISCLAIMER, THIS DOES NOT WORK ON ALL SOCIALISTS

Some of the more Marxist socialists will be reduced to ashes by such concentrated level of rationality and ethical behavior. If you are afraid that this will occur then simple store bought bottled water, name brand salt, and a copy of economics in one lesson will suffice and the socialist should come out of it with only mild burns.

Happy hunting!

22

First off, right off the bat, ignore the labels, avoid the labels - at all costs - yours or theirs. Forever. They are meaningless. Labels get co-opted all the time. The “Green” label is a perfect example. Just call yourself, your company, your product or whatever “Green”, while doing some token “greenish” thing for Consciousness Awareness-ish-ness, and you are Green, almost irrespective of who you are or what you do.

Focus on principles only, not sound-bites, not platforms, not competing ideologies that get hashed over mindlessly, ad nauseum, and remember that engaging in any of the familiar or “typical” rhetoric (to any person of any stripe, not just them) is an automatic trigger - one that will cause eyes to glaze over, the conversation and exchange will effectively be over at that point, as all answers are lobbed, thoughtlessly and effortlessly, from camp trenches. Quite by rote, these responses will be dug out from the auto-response arsenal that everyone has in abundance. There are virtually no exceptions to this rule, so don’t even go there. Come out of your trench and talk to them, but only when they are out of theirs.

Here is the beauty of this approach. You are only discussing ideas, while getting to know the person who has adopted some for him/herself; ideas that you don’t even have to attack. You’re just having a conversation, after all. You can freely point out the strengths and good parts of the end result they would like to see (“Yes, an end to starvation would be good!”), regardless of their preferred means of getting there. And you can also play referee to all ideas, including ideological methodologies and principles (not wearing a label or being in a camp and all).

I have had residence in China for the past 4 years, and was very surprised to learn how few socialists there are there - right up to leaders in the so-called “Communist” party, and how much more capitalistic they are in many ways than us in the States. That should not surprise me, given how how much more socialist we are in so-called “capitalistic” America. But the labels persist, such that stinking pile of crap can still be called a rose and everyone will believe it.

So the Chinese “Socialist” way, to most Chinese, is “whatever we are in the moment”. To most of them, that is Socialist, including all the rampant free market capitalism that is now taking place in China. Likewise the “American Way” is whatever we are in the moment (which of course always means that we are forever the land of the free and the home of the brave, even if we are busily straight-jacketing one another, and quivering in fear and cowering in corners).

/stuffandblather

23

Tell them to study North Korea up close. No, really. North Korea is the perfect example of a Socialist economy in its final stage: all means of production are owned by the State and the end result is out for all to see. Nuclear weapons and famine going hand in hand.

Also point out the dramatic failure of Nikita Krushchev’s politics in the then USSR. Krushchev’s long standing goal was to improve the lives of the citizens of the then USSR. Despite being by all accounts a smart man wielding enormous power, he failed miserably. Krushchev perfectly understood the single, largest fatal flaw of a Socialist economy: the price calculation issue. But instead of allowing for free market reforms to solve the problem for him, he simply aped the Western economies. He ordered factories to churn out consumer’s goods (scooters, record players, watches etc) and prices were set arbitrarly by committees using complicated mathematical models. Pay levels were also set by committees without regards to the labour value. In the end this generated enormous confusion: for example there was a massive overproduction of glassware (the famous GUM general store in Moscow was notoriously overstocked with these goods) while women’s stockings were always in short supply. Factory managers simply met the production goals set by Moscow and product designers simply did what they were told regardless of consumers’ demands. Struggling to understand what they were doing wrong the bureaucrats in Moscow spent enormous sums to buy Western designs and to have Western companies set up whole factories for them. In the end nothing mattered as the price calculation simply could not be solved by edict.

That should give you something to think about for your upcoming debates.

24

Yo Sam.

Division of labor.

Along with the fact that they have a fairly good class analysis, it’s just blaming exploitation on the wrong people. See Hoppe.

25

No one deleted your comment, chief. If that were the case it wouldn’t show up in the thread, the whole post would be in the trash. The forum just doesn’t load the content (usually when you use a crappy browser like Internet Explorer). This has been happening for a while. Thanks for the low-grade similes and metaphors though.

26

Then I stand corrected. My apologies.

27

Oh look. Another post from a pony. A birthday pony.

28

"

It’s complex, but it can be done. You will need:

Kosher salt, holy water, a copy of Human Action, and fearlessness.

Approach the socialist calmly. Then make a circle around them with the salt. Lightly splash them with holy water by dipping your fingers in it and flicking them forward. As you splash them, rock while holding your copy of Human Action while demanding they solve the calculation problem.

Best of luck."

Replace Human Action wit Das Kapital and there you go.