Kaiserschmarrn wrote:For me, a person has to show to some degree a lack of sincerity about socialism for that label to be applied. Corbyn also doesn't lead a lifestyle that would warrant the term.
I agree and people can still make that argument.
As for welfare abuse, a narrower safety net will usually also lead to more abuse of the system. The question is how many vulnerable people we are willing to let fall through the net in order to prevent undeserving people from getting money. If the answer is 0 then we are going to end up with something akin to universal basic income.
Why all this great concern about keeping some lower-income bracket people who are struggling in society from receiving small incomes from the state purse? That they then apply to food, shelter and staying afloat in expensive cities---and no real thought going into 1 trillion dollars worth of war spending. 1 trillion dollars is not a small amount by any measure of the imagination. And what is the final result of Iraq's invasion? Peace and harmony and everyone doing well? No. But instead, let us concentrate on the money being spent on some abusers who might want to get $100 more a month than what they are entitled to because they are fraudsters. It is ridiculous what the conservatives do. It is.
Your original post didn't mention dictatorship, so you cannot blame me for distortion in that respect. If I had to choose between anarchy and a dictatorship run by horrible people I would regard this as a lose-lose situation.
I've made no judgement about the people who espouse anarchy as a desirable way to organise society, and I don't believe it's primitive to rely on kinship or tribal affiliation in the absence of state authority. Rather, people do it because it is more likely to ensure the groups safety and posterity. Having a state with a power monopoly takes away the necessity to organise in this way and down the line often moderates tribal instincts in humans.
It is lose all around with the Tories Kaiser. They are not doing much for the people in the UK terrified of Brexit because they will lose economic opportunities and trade relationships. They are glaringly incompetent and looking out for their own best interests. I did not say it is a desirable way. I am again an international socialist. Not an anarchist. My point being it is better to have anarchists who want to get rid of state power and have an absence of power than deal with a bunch of rotten conservatives who are serving a plutocracy and ignore the vast majority of the average income citizens in a nation. That was my point. Do I have to point that out for you now? Who do people identify with? Humans all are members of various groups. They could be organized around the fact that they are parents, or they belong to a golf club, or they are Irish, or they are graduates from a private school, or they are this or that. Tribalism and anarchy for you are synonyms and they should not be that way Kaiser. Anarchists are not believers in the authority of the state. Because power corrupts people. For them, it corrupts absolutely and as such they think people should not be organised around authoritarian structures related to a state. The last stages of communism also wants statelessness if you are talking about Communist theories.
Didn't you study your political philosophies Kaiser? Anyway, I am not advocating for anarchy. If I was I would have put 'anarchist' under my political category. I did not.
What I don't like are conservatives creating all this crap about serving people and they don't serve anyone but themselves. And anarchist who dissolves a state that sucks and is incompetent, and oppressive is being less detrimental to a hard-working tax-paying citizen than some Tory incompetent of the worst sort. That was my point!
I just think it's a curious thing for a woman to advocate anarchy. Aren't you an anthropologist? If so, it's even more curious.
Who said I advocated anarchy. I have been on here for 10 years and I have never written a post advocating anarchy. That you interpret is as advocating for it? It is about your fear of lack of law and order and government structures. Government structure and authorities should be legitimized by how well they
serve the majority of the citizens Kaiser, not about how well they keep the money in the hands of the well off and the conservative. No, I don't think the conservatives as in the Tories in the UK are the moral superiors of anyone in current politics. A mess and gag-worthy folk.
Yes, I am an anthropologist. And have political opinions. As well as scientific ones. And English is not the only language I write in. My opinion about the Next UK PM everybody...? Don't elect any Tories. They are horrible.
Who knows who the conservative elements are in Kiwi land over there? All that predictable lack of wanting to spend on needs that regular folk has to seem to be the uniting horror theme for them.
I reject the idea that the only meaningful way to group people is by income, and I regard this as one of the left's major weaknesses. The left is certainly closer to low and middle-income people's preferences in their spending policies, but the right is closer in terms of values. And while spending money on a particular group is part of serving that group, it's by no means the whole story. At any rate, the Tories spend plenty on people on lower and middle incomes. Every party does. The difference is that the left usually proposes to spend a little more whereas the right tends to say let's spend a little less. Compared to the overall spending the increase/decrease is fairly small.
Well, Kaiser Karl Marx and his
Das Kapital is very persuasive, the reason why there are wage earners and non-wage earners is how the economy is structured in society. The entire premise of it rests on what a capitalist economy needs to run. Things change over time. But the basic tenets continue. Haven't you ever been curious about why feudalism died off? And then slavery and then wage-earning in capitalism? Why does that happen? How all those economic structures affect power relationships between humans? Haven't you ever been curious Kaiser how in almost every aspect of human society and human relationship there is a power structure built into it? Between priest and nun, between banker and customer, between parent and child, between teacher and student, between owner and employees? Almost all commercial relationships are about economic exchange? The weakness of the left you say is that we recognize that economic relationships are set up under capitalism to shape every aspect of the social and economic hierarchy and with it how people fight and gain or lose power. Do you think that is a figment of the Left's imagination? So what are those relationships based on then? Spiritual guidance? Lol. Even in those televangelist churches, they ask for money from the flock. Even there in the supposedly spiritual relationship money comes into the equation dictating how people are organized. Or you argue differently? What do you believe all that activity is about? God giving the pounds sterling or 'quid' away for free?
The whole point of a previous post of mine was that the Tories could gain a lot of votes by moving somewhat to the left on the economic scale. I also think that it's far easier to move on that scale than on the value scale as the latter is more strongly tied to identity and emotions.
You have now turned this into the impossible task of me finding Tories that appeal to you.
One of the upsides of being a radical or idealist is that one is not restricted by boring things like political reality. Gove learned in education how difficult it is to bring about meaningful change even if your party is in power. That said, putting my balanced hat on for a minute and looking past your partisanship, the political system does have many weaknesses in terms of incentives and accountability. That's why the Brexit referendum and subsequent developments are such significant events and have to lead me to reassess some people, as it touches on the fundamental aspects of our societies such as how serious MPs take democracy and how they deal with a situation that upends their basic assumptions and goes against their wishes. The question of whether Labour or the Tories redistribute more money to people on a lower income for the next couple of years or whether I find an MP likable rather pales in comparison.
The impossible task of finding Tories that appeal to me? Lol. Tories have rotten values, Kaiser. They demonstrate it every day by not solving incredibly important issues in political life. Why do they do this? Because their value system is making sure they keep the money in the hands of the people who support them. it is not about some wider good. It is not about practical considerations about one must invest in projects that generate jobs that are well paid or pay enough to sustain UK families. They gave up on that goal. IF you are not doing the job of dealing with creating stability, jobs, and making things happen for most people in the UK who have bread and butter political concerns? Then just get out of the way.
That is the MY point in all this.
It boils down to who are you going to serve in this life? Selfish petty crap agendas? Or are you going to get things done for people who are left out of the wealth distribution because power is only relevant if it is in the hands of those who benefit the most from keeping things the same? You know....the moniker of
conservative--keeping things the same.
For me? Life doesn't stay the same ever. Change is part of life. And progress is imperative for the improvement of all living conditions, technology, economy, social well being. So for me? Conservatives are the opposite of life-giving.
Draw your conclusions on that one.