Socialism Debate with Erik Engheim REMATCH

Source

Original Claim

To all the morons who say “socialism never worked” or “socialism failed everywhere” I give you Eduard Bernstein.

One of the first Socialists to attempt a revision of britannica.com/biograph…tenets, such as abandoning the ideas of the merriam-webster.com/dic… collapse of the britannica.com/money/ca… economy and the seizure of power by the britannica.com/topic/pr…

He very much represents the kind of socialism I am behind, and the socialist traditions of Northern Europe which has been very successful. Especially in the Nordics.

Invariably some lame MAGA will come and say “Nordics are capitalist societies, and not socialist,” to which I would answer: “No they are mixed economies.”

And really that is the whole idea that Eduard Bernstein pioneered. It is to see socialism much more as a direction than an endpoint. If you fret about whether a society should have the label “capitalist” or “socialist” then you are really missing the point.

What Bernstein was pushing was for gradual reforms within liberal democracy. And he was not talking about abolishing the capitalist class or anything like that.

What ultimately matters is creating a good society for people. Not what label you put on that society.

britannica.com/biograph…

My Response (1)

I agree with basically everything you wrote there, but at that point I genuinely don’t understand why you still want to call it “socialism.”

Take the country I live in, Austria. The party most associated with that tradition is the Social Democratic Party of Austria. In practice, it frequently governs in coalition with the conservative Austrian People's Party. And if you actually look at their economic model, the differences between them are mostly about emphasis, policy priorities, and the margins of the system, not about fundamentally different economic structures.

Both parties operate comfortably within a mixed economy that combines markets, private property, and a welfare state. Neither is trying to abolish capitalism, expropriate the capitalist class, or replace the market with central planning. So from a structural perspective, they are working within the same basic framework.

That’s why I don’t see the need to introduce the label of a different economic system. If the model you’re describing is essentially regulated capitalism with social protections, then calling it “socialism” seems unnecessary and confusing.

This also makes it hard to understand your emphasis on identifying as a socialist rather than a liberal. If the policies you support are gradual reform within liberal democracy and a mixed-market system, then the liberal tradition already covers that territory. Drawing a hard identity line at “socialist” instead of “liberal” just feels arbitrary. My best guess is that it is associated with the Nordic tradition, but I genuinely don’t know.

Erik' Response (1

Okay let me try to distill what I believe is the core question to answer her: What is the difference between social liberals and social democrats or democratic socialists?

What is Liberalism

Liberals primarily try to deal with the ills of capitalism by providing some kind of poverty relief.

So a liberal might have private insurance as we see in liberal Netherlands but government provided health insurance for those who cannot afford that.

The liberal analysis of the problems of capitalism is not much beyond: Some people end up poor and we need to help them. Keep in mind liberalism started as a pro capitalism ideology that sought to advance capitalism, not remove it.

What is Socialism

This is diametrically opposite to the socialist (social democrat) analysis of capitalism. The ideology was founded as a criticism of capitalism itself.

To clarify, it may not be correct to say liberalism came about to advance capitalism, as the term did not exit then. It would be more correct to say it was to promote low regulated free market economics.

But socialism starts with a definition of capitalism as a system of production with emphasis on capital, and where that capital is concentrated within the hands of a small elite. Of course we associated capitalism with free market economics, but it is really this wealth concentration and the division of people into wage earners and capitalists that socialists really homed in on.

Socialist Goal is Economic Democracy

So socialist inspired ideologies wants to move away from this wealth and power concentration towards a more democratic economy. That means an economy where more of the economic decision making is made by the people. That means things like cooperatives, workers on corporate boards, triparty wage negotiations, strong unions, sectorial bargain systems etc.

Universal Solutions over Individualized Solutions

And socialists think in groups and glass. We must stand together. Solidarity and all that. That means socialists will push one health care system for all citizens regardless of income. Not buying private insure you feel like and then those who cannot afford it get a special one from government.

It means one school for all people. Not pay private school and some free choice for the poor.

Poverty: Universal Goods or Means Tested Relief?

You see the pattern? Liberals approach the issue of poverty through means testing. Everyone buys what they need in the market with their own money. Then use means testing to offer relief for those who cannot afford that.

This is very much against socialist principles that calls for universal goods. Everyone gets school, health, pensions etc. It is not means tested. Being together regardless of income or class is seen as a good. Socialists value community, togetherness and solidairty among people. Liberals value individual choice and freedom.

Leverage of the Individual vs the Group

And this difference can be understood if you consider the difference in the glass of people which pushed each ideology. The burgoisie pushing liberalism were typically well educated professionals who had a lot of freedom in picking a workplace. With their skills and good finances they had the freedom to pick professions and workplaces. They had leverage through their unique skills.

Workers in contrast met a world where they were replacable. The factory owner held all the cards. Take whatever you are offered. Take shit work conditions and shit pay. They do not have unique skills to object. They are a tiny cog in the wheel. What lessons did that teach the working class that it didn't teach the Burgoisie? That you must stand together to matter. Workers united through unions. Through unions and togetherness they had bargaining power. Through unions they could demand reasonable work conditions and pay.

Only then could they get what the Burgosie liberals could easily get as individuals.

Summary: Socialist and Liberal Approach to Welfare

So to summarize. Liberals and Socialists may both build welfare system to take care of the poor, but they are built on entirely different principles: Liberals treat the poor as exceptions that need a specifically targeted aid.

Socialists do not see the poor as exceptions. They see the poor as citizens to get the same universal goods as everyone else.

And there are some good reasons for that. Liberals wanted means tested poverty relief out of pragmatic compassion for the poor, but they were never the poor and never had an idea what that felt like.

The working class knew poverty. They knew the shame and stigma of being a man who had to hold his hat out asking for handouts.

This is a key point my grandfather made to me as a child when he talked about our longest serving socialist prime minister Einar Gerhardsen. He said "Gerhardsen gave dignity to the working man. He did not have to hold his hat out in shame anymore."

Liberals have never understood this important point.

Summary: Socialist and Liberal Approach to Capitalism and Markets

The second part to summarize is the view on capitalism and market economics. Socialists want workers and citizens to decide as much as possible, but modern day social democrats are pragmatic enough to tolerate capitalism to the degree it is needed.

Liberalism has no such goal to shift economic power to citizens. That is a complete non-goal in liberalism. Quite the contrary liberals will ideally see as much economic freedom as possible lest it causes other serious societal problems.

You see the difference? Us socialists want as little capitalism as we can get away with. Liberals want as much capitalism as they can get away with.

That means that Utopia for a socialist has no capitalists, while Utopia for liberals has no welfare. See the difference?

My Response (2)

I see a differrence now, I remain a liberal under that definition.

What I don’t see is why you would prefer “socialist” when there is a large variety of people operating under the same term which seem to be radically different from you. I also don’t see how I could reasonably differentiate between you and someone who self-identifies as socialist, but is less pragmatic about “tolerating” capitalism and thus shuns social democratic parties.

Erik Response (2)

My view is pretty much what mainstream socialism means in the country I live and I would argue probably across most of Western Europe.

Also consider that social democrats went much further in tolerating capitalism. They don't even talk about pursuing socialism. Maybe if you push them into a corner they might admit that is a goal.

But hence why I don't consider myself a modern day socialist democrat. I am a democratic socialist. Of course that is what we call social democrats in the past but since the 1980s that meaning has split.

Social democrats today is primarily about the welfare state and workers rights. But I actually want to see a continued erosion of capitalism. That is a big difference. They kind of accept the level it is at in Nordics today. I want to see it further minimized.

How far can we go? I don't know. Excluding capitalists entirely probably cause far more problems than it solves. But I would like to see if we can achieve something like workers having 70% of the corporate vote. We already know 50% works well from decades in Germany.

And we know people still invest in companies like Facebook where founders have controlling stakes.

So to me getting to say 60-70% worker control would be a real world “ending of capitalism” as in citizens power would finally clearly dominate over capitalist power. Even if capitalist will still be around and an individual capitalist will of course have much more power than an individual worker.

But I also like to see as much diversity as possible in the capitalist class. I would rather see a lot of millionaires than a few billionaires.

Instead of 1 billionaire, have a 100 millionaires. Why, because as socialist we actively want to avoid power and wealth concentration.

Naturally we cannot force this but look at policies that favors more semi rich people over a few ultra rich.

My Response (3)

Ok, with that I can try to concretize and streamline my issue with that stance. From what I can gather you seem to be broadly in favor of socialists as well as social democrats electorally, as well as a reformist approach to capitalism and call yourself a socialist. The disconnect I have is that it seems that the term socialist is also being used in a way that describes someone who wants to abolish capitalism and fully implement the socialist utopia, while electorally opposing social democrats because they are too conforming to the establishment. I don't see how groups that are so different in kind can co-exist under the same term, and I certainly don't see a way of differentiating between them with clean terminology when I make my critiques of the second group.

Erik's Response (3)

I think your confusion stems from the fact that you define capitalism differently from most socialists. Since we see capitalism primarily as wealth and power concentration, many of us would regard a system where capitalists as existing but marginalized as being a system where capitalism has been ended.

Many of us will see socialism as a system where the people primarily rule. Just as you do not stop calling a system capitalism just because some things are run by the government or some companies are cooperatives.

But also it is a but of a moot point as most of us socialist today aren’t really striving towards some magical end point called socialism. We are going in a socialist direction. We don’t really care what the system is labeled as such. Perhaps after we rule for a hundred years people will still label it a capitalist society. But who cares if we have pulled off democratizing the economy and putting the common people in charge?

And these kinds of conflicts in understanding a term is the same for capitalism fanboys. You have plenty of anarcho and libertarian style capitalists who argues the US isn’t a capitalist country. For any ideology or concept there will be extremists who insists on very narrow definitions.

And I don’t think there are many who champion socialist Utopia. Ask them to define what this Utopia looks like and they will not have a clear answer. In other words a socialist Utopia doesn’t exist.

My Response (4)

I don't think the definition of capitalism is relevant for my disagreement (this one at least, I do not like it, but it doesn't influence my arguments). I also don't actively dispute that you are in the majority of socialist thought. I'm asking a simple, two part question:

As for the libertarians, you have spotted the difference yourself. I'm broadly in favor of a liberal democracy with mixed economies, so I don't call myself a libertarian. I have no problem in calling out libertarians. If someone attacks libertarians, I don't have to feel implicated.

Erik's Response (4)

We don’t have a problem with boycott of social democrats here in Norway. All our socialist parties are ready to cooperate with social democrats here in Norway. And I my impression is that is the case in most of Western Europe.

So I am not sure I see the problem. If there are som Twitter socialists who don’t want to cooperate, why should I care? They don’t have any power. They don’t make the decisions

If I understand correctly, your issue is that you want to debate and criticize the sort of “crazy” socialist types, whatever those are. But I think my objection is that I don’t think a lot of the socialists you view as extreme are remotely as extreme as you think.

I remember you characterized Hasan Piker as one of these crazies. And I really don’t think Hasan Piker has radically different views from me. I just don’t think he is that crazy. Sure he speak in big letter a lot, but if you drill down into what he believes, I would venture that he isn’t that different from me.

I suspect the difference is more in rhetorical style and being from a different tradition. He is an American and part of a movement that never held actual political power. That makes it harder for him to speak in concrete terms about socialism. Unlike him I can point to actual parties and party programs I support.

But I would venture that if given these party programs and asked to voice his opinion, he would mostly agree.

My Response (5)

I'll start by clarifying what I'm talking about in the boycotting: It is mostly people from the arena of public discourse.

When it comes to why I personally think you should care, I'd say that you are a public figure participating in a larger public debate about politics and society. People from this sphere can have a big influence electorally down the line. For example, if you have a socialist media pundit with huge reach from, let's say Germany, and he starts talking about how the SPD and Die Linke are parties that bow to the capitalist status quo and are not worthy of support. Let's expand that to not just one pundit, but a larger media ecosystem that participates in this sort of rhetoric. That will have a ripple effect that will directly and indirectly worsen election results of the SPD and Die Linke. As I understand it, anyone who wants to enact the socialism you describe should be banking on the electoral success of these parties, and thus directly counteract such destructive forces.

As a liberal with leftist tendencies, I also want them (well, my preference would be the SPD) to win, which is why I would insist on going after that destructive political movement. Obviously, I'm going to call them out by their preferred identification, in that case "socialists", which then includes people like you (unless you can convince me of another way of calling them out, which I'm open to).

I hope that the principle is clear. Now as for the examples, I'm pretty confident about the examples I provide in the article you referenced, though they could have been chosen better. I'm not sure whether you want this to be a debate about Hasan specifically, but I have updated my characterization of his position in the article to be a little more charitable. But since you brought him up, I think I can pretty concisely demonstrate why I regard him the way I do:

This is from a podcast appearance on "The Deprogram": https://youtu.be/NBrC62rPoIw
(40:25-43:13)

"Hasan: Because I do, just like you said, advocate for social-democratic reforms. And I think that in order to develop any kind of mechanism of pushback—a robust labor force that has any kind of speaking power, any kind of fighting power to strike at the heart of the imperial core where value is generated—you have to advocate, in the short term, for a much lighter form of propaganda.

Despite that, I perfectly understand that social democracies benefit tremendously from American imperialism—Western imperialism—and would not exist in the way that they do without such atrocities being committed.

But if you want America, in the way that I feel about it, to get out of the way for places with more revolutionary potential to do what they would normally do, then one thing you have to do is advocate for a lighter form of propaganda—while simultaneously still doing agitative propaganda that goes beyond social-democratic ideas.

Hakim: I just wanted to put emphasis on the exact point of the so-called ‘radicalization funnel.’ For example, Hasan and JT catch people while they're young, as they say. They start looking into these new ideas, and then move forward through the funnel—getting more informed, getting more radicalized, and so on.

That process can absolutely utilize the kind of stuff Hasan does. Because Hasan does one very particular thing that social democrats—who would never call into this podcast, and who we would give a lot of shit to—often fail to do: they cut the funnel from both sides.

What do I mean by that? They introduce people to lukewarm socialist ideas, etc., and then they want to keep them there.

But when Hasan introduces people to socialist ideas—yes, the lukewarm, not-so-scary sounding ones, keeping your power level low and so on—he does not stop them from progressing through the funnel and getting more and more information.

He doesn’t agitate against, for example, the revolutionary perspective. That is the main difference."

That sounds pretty straightforward to me.

Erik's Response (5)

People who support Soviet style systems already have a name: tankies. Call them that.

As for calling people whatever they label themselves. Sure, that is a preference but I encounter plenty of people calling themselves libertarian or apolitical who are just fascists.

In my experience people who have really extreme socialist views call themselves communists.

I guess the issue is I don't get where you see all these people labeling themselves democratic socialists who opinion anything radically different from me.

Maybe it is my bias but I feel like when you listen to socialists you read into what they are saying something far more extreme than what they actually advocate.

And this is why capitalism definitions matter. Because if a socialist says “I want you crush capitalism” and your idea of capitalism is the mere existence of private property and markets then that becomes a very extreme statement in your mind.

But as I elaborated on that isn't what most of us define as capitalism. Ergo the statement is far more moderate than it sounds like to you at first glance.

I don't know think there is a simple fix for this other than learning more about each ideology. Not how it may have existed 70 years ago but as it exists today.

My Response (6)

I'm actually principally ok with just calling them tankies, but I'm not sure how effective that will be. When I address them as socialist, the audience will better understand who I'm tackling, since attaching a negative label to someone is harder than just using their preferred one.

And just to understand, if you saw the type of destructive behavior I describe, you would consider them a tankie and regard their actions as negative?

We can disagree on the scope of the problem and how prevalent it is, as I'm not actually sure what evidence I could even provide to conclusively prove such a thing. I can outline my reasoning behind it but I doubt that would bear productive results.

To address your point about me misreading socialists, I think that's not particularly true. As with any other ideology I don't subscribe to, I will apply a pretty thorough level of skepticism to statements by socialists, particularly in the public sphere. That's partly because of my biases and partly because I want to understand the mechanics and triggers of a political discourse which I perceive as destructive.

On that point "crushing capitalism", which is colloquially understood as our entire economic system will remain a radical statement in my mind, because we're not in a political science discussion circle, but in the internet. Also, when I hear people say that, they usually don't add your caveats, but rather let it stand as is. I shouldn't be required to read Marx or listen to Socialist theory to understand what people mean when they say that.

Apart from these clarifications, I think that I now largely understand your point, while still disagreeing with some conclusions and not sharing your perception of the wider debate.

Erik's Response (6)

So I just said “crush capitalism” mainly to make a point. I don’t think the average socialist is actually putting it that crudely. But remember this is indeed the internet and we all use a lot of hyperbole when arguing.

If it is just a title or one liner I might say something similar. I find it funny that on the left we need to speak with complete nuance in every interaction while on the right they get away with calling a fully controlled border “open”. They call unarmed women and children crossing a border to seek asylum an “invasion” as if it was an army crossing the border heavily armed.

And us regular democratic socialists are called communists, marxists and all sorts of stuff. But somehow we are supposed to hold a 100x higher standard than our opposition.

No, I think online debate naturally has some exaggerations and the demands put on us is utterly unreasonable.

My Response (7)

I think the right wing is predominantly wrong on cultural issues, especially in the US, I don't know what you're trying to prove there.

I don't know how this is in any way responsive to what I wrote in general. I think I outlined my reasoning behind my position in a pretty nuanced way. In this conversation I was extremely precise in how I phrased things.

You can exaggerate in online debate, but don't expect people to come away understanding your position accurately or approving of it (if that's what you are getting at). That is what I think you have been counteracting well by actually clarifying some positions that I couldn't parse, which is a good thing.

To maybe clarify: When someone just writes “crush capitalism” or something to that affect, I’m going to assume that person is radical. They can disprove that (as you did), but I think that’s a reasonable assumption.

Erik's Response (7)

I guess my point is everyone uses a bit exaggerated language, but in the US it seems like one allows for that on the right, but while the left is expected to not use it. That is utterly unreasonable to demand.

I feel there is an implied assumption that the right is full of idiots saying stupid stuff and we must just “understand” and “accommodate” the crazy shit they say.

But on the left there is an expectation that everyone is some super smart PhD that says everything in full nuance with citations and what not.

But we have dumbasses on the left too. We got people who are not very articulate. But I would say we still do not say things as extreme as the right, but get judged more harshly for far more moderate slogans and expressions.

You are basically saying that if I said “bring down capitalism” you label me an extremist right away. But to me as a socialist that isn’t an extreme take. You think it is extreme because you interpret it as something crazy like ban all private property, kill the capitalists, nationalize all industry, nobody is allowed to be rich and what not.

And then you make it OUR problem that YOU think that is what we meant. But it can hardly be our problem that anti-socialist have created this scaremongering version of socialism and anti-capitalism that we stand for.

Imagine if you said “I am pro capitalism” and then the rest of us went “oh so you want people to be poor, and you favor child labour, no worker protections, police and prisons must be privatized etc.”

You would find that unreasonable. But that is kind of the problem. Dominant political ideologies tend to get to define all the others in a negative light and their own very positive.

And I have a real world example of that. In the US when people say “capitalism” it invokes a lot of positive connotations about things like free choice, work hard and get the fruits of your own labour, quality products, make your own money. Well I don’t know what people think but you get the idea. Meanwhile if you say “socialism” in the US people think: dictatorship, government owns and control everything, everybody is miserable etc.

But if you say these words in Norway they get completely different associations. Capitalism generally has very negative associations such as: Greed, focus on money as the most important goal, inequality, lack of welfare etc.

“Socialism” is a bit more tricky. Norwegians have a bit schizophrenic relation to it as many will both associate it with the Eastblock, but also our historical socialist parties. But in short there is not the same automatic assumption around dictatorship and government owning everything and controlling your lives as it would be in the US.

Thus saying you want to end capitalism doesn’t have that negative connotations in Norway. It sounds more like wanting to end greed and too much focus on money and profits.

So where does all this get us?

I think it is a bit unreasonable to demand that socialist adapt their language in a way that works in a culture dominated by anti-socialists who have already created lots of negative connotations towards anything socialists champion while seeding lots of artificially inflated positive connotations to the things socialists criticize, such as capitalism.

I think most of us socialists are very aware of the negative image we have many places, which is why we try to educate people about what we stand for, so people can see us in a more positive light.

I feel you are in a way insist we must accept the overly black characterization American society has given us, while we must accept the rose tinted characterization of capitalism when engaging in public debate.

But I would rather work to change people’s perceptions of what capitalism and socialism means. Rather than let the pro-capitalism fanboy club get to define all the parameters for the debate.

My Response (8)

So your takeaway from me trying to interrogate your position, and trying to understand where your conflict lines with tankies are, while explicitly asking for correction almost every time I made an assertion, is that I want you to "accept the overly black characterization American society has given us, while we must accept the rose tinted characterization of capitalism when engaging in public debate.".

At this point, I don't know what I'm doing wrong, but I might as well clarify some things.

  1. I don't allow the right wing to get away with anything, a sizeable portion of my content is dedicated to criticizing them. I don't see where you think I said that we should just accommodate them, on my platform I'll just criticize who I feel like criticizing, electoral politics is a whole other level. I just don't see how it is relevant in discourse where I'm trying to understand what socialists think and how I can actually call out destructive behavior I see, and trying to understand why they don't.

  2. I'm saying that if you say "bring down capitalism", most people, including me, will reasonably assume that you are trying to rework the economic system we live under. I'm happy to be proven wrong of course, but I think the inference is reasonable. Under the assumption that reformist socialists want to convince people to go to their side, I'd say this is not productive. I'm not even making a moral judgement here. And yes, I think that if public opinion against my side was very negative because of propaganda, I'd try to actually change that opinion by dropping loaded phrases and language, but that might just be a preference.

  3. If I said "I'm pro capitalism" and you'd bring up all these negative things, then I would just say that I don't want that, clarifying that I'm for a mixed economy with capitalist elements. From there I don't know how the discussion would go, but I certainly wouldn't get stuck on the word or argue how it's unconscionable that people accuse me of having those positions.

    • In fact, this has literally happened to me in the comment section under the post you made about our last debate. People were saying that I'm against public healthcare (among others), to which I simply responded that that's not true. It's not just socialists face that this adversity.

  4. I'm happy for you that the associations with that word are different in Norway. I don't understand how that is connected to anything I am saying.

  5. I'm not some secret capitalist operative trying to make you immediately stop making any positive allusion to the word "socialism". In the course of this conversation, I was trying to understand how and why you are choosing a term that includes many people who you seem to have huge disagreements with. And I now understand your reasoning! I might not agree with it, but I don't think it's unreasonable, I just think that we have different perceptions of public discourse and disagree about the severity of the tankie problem. And that's fine, I'm not going to be able to flip your perception of your political identity.

    • I can provide justification for why I think you're mistaken, or offer counterexamples, but realistically speaking, we won't hash this out in a public internet forum over text messages. I'm open to chat about it if you want though.

Erik's Response (8)

Sorry, I wasn’t referring really to your writing but how people in general characterize socialism and capitalism in the English speaking world.

No, to Adopting Capitalist Centris Language

And no I don’t think we should have to adopt to the world view of capitalists. Listen as a Norwegian I notice how the American-English language is extreme loaded in terms of being very anti government and pro capitalism.

The Norwegian language is very different in this way. Not doubt because we have a very different culture and history where socialism played a much more important role.

The problem with how you insist I should talk and present my view is that you are telling me to play by rules you define to favor your side. I am already playing handicapped using the English language. I face this problem all the time when discussing political and economic systems because so many things I could express positively in Norwegian sounds very negative in American-English.

There is no way around it because the language has been built to give those things meanings. You could almost say American-English is pro-capitalism, anti-government type of language. You see it in words like big-government. No such word exists in Norwegian. You couldn’t imply a government being big is negative in that way in Norwegian.

You got words like “welfare” which is very negatively loaded in American-English but a profoundly positive word in Norwegian. You got words like “entitlement programs.” Again very negative loaded in ways you cannot get negative in Norwegian.

And sure, I got to play that game while using English. I don’t have much choice. But when it comes to socialism I still want to get across a positive definition. Educate the public on it. Rather than let the capitalist keep having the definitional power to define everything I stand for as something profoundly negative.

The problem with the “Mixed Economy with Capitalism” Communication Strategy

You can say “oh you should say you are for a mixed economy with bit of capitalism.” No offense but that is retarded. Socialism already has a long tradition elaborating on this at length. You are telling me that something like socialism with tons of great thinkers and ideas must abandon all of that because the word “socialism” offensive your sensibilities? No fucking. I don’t want to play the came in a way that is pleasant to your side and give you advantages. I just don’t.

The thing is that what we seek has a lot of details to it and ideas which socialists have elaborated on extensively. Your approach is just vague and solves nothing. Someone asks me what my political ideology is and I am supposed to say what exactly? I am a “mixed economy with a bit of capitalism” ideology? Come on that is stupid. And it explains nothing.

It sound to me what you are saying is “I don’t want to learn what modern day socialism is,” so I want to insist they invent a completely new vocabulary to speak of the very same thing.

Socialism Didn’t Change. People Just Changed How they Talked About It

And really it makes no sense, because socialism hasn’t really change. These ideas I call modern day socialism was there already a 100 years ago. What we have as the issue is the f*cking East Block communist regimes poisoning the water and twisting public perception of what socialism is.

You are right, people will misunderstand what we mean. That sucks for us. But we are trying to solve that problem by educating people on socialism. What you call for is just offensive. You try to get me to disown a proud tradition. I am proud of what my democratic socialist brothers have achieved here in the Nordics over the last 100 years or so.

Socialists have done an amazing job. We have proud record and I want to shared that. I am not going to hide away with that and try to invent new vocabulary so as to not offend the sensibilities of people brainwashed on decades of capitalism worship.

Time is on Our Side

And I believe we can win that fight, because the young generation is not as brainwashed as the old and is more open to explore what socialism is about. Sure it is an uphill battle but I believe in it. Look at what Bernie Sanders achieved. It can be done.

My Response (9)

Sure, if you think I'm a bad-faith operative and want to twist everything you say to my advantage, continuing this conversation is pointless. Nothing I can say except for "yes, you're right, socialism is great and you should continue to advocate for it the way you've been doing until now" can probably sway that perception.

Anyways, I think this was a really good conversation and I'm grateful that you were willing to elaborate on your ideas so that I can understand them better.

Also, as an Eastern European, I’m supposed to feel bad for my parents and such talking about their experiences with socialism? No, they won’t and I sure as hell won’t be guilt tripped as well.

Erik's Response (9)

David I don't think that. I thought my initial line should have cleared up that a lot of my remarks were NOT aimed at you personally, but a discussion of how people talk about socialism in general. I was just trying to explain my perspective. And why following your suggestions on language usage isn't easy.

You also talk about how other socialist talk of socialism without referring to me specifically. I am just doing the same thing: talking about how many detractors of socialism speak of it. In particular in the US.

And how in general due to the culture and language in America it is very hard to advocate any kind of system that takes a positive view of government. American rhetoric has as a ground truth that government is some kind of evil menace.

That is why so many prominent left-wingers in the US have been anarchists in my view. Look at Chomsky and David Graeber e.g.

Americans whether left or right just don't have any faith in government.

Even for the East block there is a need for nuance. Important to point out that Eastern Europe wasn't any more socialist than Scandinavia. It wasn't a socialist system as such. It was state capitalism.

Why? Because just as in private capitalism, power and money was concentrated with an elite, not under the control of the people.

But of course like Norway the people in government were socialists. So obviously just like Norway the system was heavily influenced but socialist ideas and policies even if the system as such cannot be called socialist.

On the other hand that is what they choose to call it for propaganda reasons and anti-socialist in the West fighting democratic socialists like me were happy to agree because it made socialism look every bit as bad as they wanted it to look.

Still, when it comes to the East block a lot of what made people hate it was the oppression, not the social economic system itself. There are many stories from East German though about how they would have wished for a more hybrid system. Keep Western democracy, more liberties etc but also retain more of the old DDR system that took care of people.

Rammstein famously from the East are quite leftist and made the point that there was actually many good parts of the old system.

The problem today is that one has declared everything about the East block shit instead of acknowledging they did some things well and learn from that. Learn from both the good and bad.

After the fall of the wall I feel the perspective on how to organize a economy got very little nuance. All aspects of Capitalism became good as a matter of faith rather than on merit.

My Response (10)

Erik, this discussion can't continue. You say that you didn't frame me as bad faith? Well fine, how do you explain these quotes, directly addressed to me?:

"The problem with how you insist I should talk and present my view is that you are telling me to play by rules you define to favor your side.

You are telling me that something like socialism with tons of great thinkers and ideas must abandon all of that because the word “socialism” offensive your sensibilities?

You try to get me to disown a proud tradition."

I have explicitly told you multiple times by now that that is not my position. Still, you insist on saying that I'm trying to get you to disown your political identity. Meanwhile me:

"And I now understand your reasoning! I might not agree with it, but I don't think it's unreasonable, I just think that we have different perceptions of public discourse and disagree about the severity of the tankie problem. And that's fine, I'm not going to be able to flip your perception of your political identity."

I definitely won't engage with someone who is attributing positions to me directly opposite to what I say.

Erik's Response (10)

Sorry, revisiting what you wrote I think I misread you and thus had an unreasonable negative response. You wrote this part:

If I said "I'm pro capitalism" and you'd bring up all these negative things, then I would just say that I don't want that, clarifying that I'm for a mixed economy with capitalist elements. From there I don't know how the discussion would go, but I certainly wouldn't get stuck on the word or argue how it's unconscionable that people accuse me of having those positions.

And I for some reason thought you were advising me to say I wasn't socialist but pro mixed economy. So assuming this was a misunderstanding you should disregard several of my replies to this post. I just misread you. My apologies. I have a really bad week and not on top of my game.

So perhaps we actually found quite a lot of common understanding in the end 😉

My Response (11)

Great stuff, that clears things up a lot! Glad we managed to get to common understanding.