The major premise of Capitalism is risk vs reward. We hit a tipping point though, where 99% of people do not have any capital to risk, and the people who do have the capital have enough to nullify any risk.
Tax the rich.
Sometimes I get mad about how we in practice have basic income for the rich. If you have a few million dollars, you can park it in zero or low risk investments (eg: high yield savings, bonds) and get free money. Then you can just fuck off and pursue your dreams. No risk. Lots of reward.
But if you’re poor? Well you better take any job for any salary or you’re just a parasite blah blah blah. All pain, some risk, little reward.
Someone gets it.
Lets instead do this:
Every citizen, irrespective of their nationality, skincolor, gender has the right to:
- living quarters
- work
- maximum of 7 hours of work
- free healthcare
- paid vacation
- equal pay and treatment for women
- freedom of religion and speech
This is directly taken from a 1936 constitution. Today one could improve on it but we’re so much worse, everywhere.
Now guess which one.
The maximum hours you can work did not apply to everyone as my former boss has stories of working 12+ hours in the gulag he was sent to for reasons he does not know.
And those were obviously 100% kept 🤡
Luckily, the Soviet union treated homosexuals to a similar standard. /s
Couldn’t we just add equality for sexual orientation and gender expression to a new list of rights, along with the things already mentioned?
OP even said, “Today one could improve on it,” implying that the referenced constitution isn’t meant to be a comprehensive list for the modern day.
The Soviet Union didn’t particularly treat homosexuals any worse than most countries at the time. Sure, it should have done better, but there are limitations to ideology when lessentially your entire ideological base members die in the struggle against the Nazis due to being the first to volunteer.
After the October Revolution of 1917, homosexuality was decriminalised in Soviet Russia with the repeal of the legal code of the Russian Empire, and this decriminalisation was confirmed with new criminal codes in 1922 and 1926. Under Joseph Stalin, the Soviet government reversed course in the late 1920s and promoted harsher policy against LGBTQ rights. In 1933, homosexuality was recriminalised in the Soviet Union, and Article 121, which prohibited male homosexuality, was added to the Soviet penal code in the following year.
You don’t get to blame this on the Nazis.
Again, not any worse than any other country of the time.
Actually it is worse because they were better and then actively decided to make things worse.
If you had actually read anything on the “decriminalization” of homosexuality in Soviet Russia after 1917, you’d know that there was not really any social movement on the side of legalizing homosexuality. The fact that its criminalization was repealed is mostly due to Bolsheviks wanting to repeal essentially all Russian Imperial law.
Homosexuality wasn’t even well-understood at the time, they conflated gender and sexuality, which is why only male homosexuality was criminalized. The Soviet Union, due to it being heir to a very patriarchal society, wanted “stronger men and workers”, and lesbians were seen as a more masculine version of men (which was accepted) whereas gays were seen as “feminized men”, which was seen negatively.
Even then, my point is that after the 40s most of the theorists of socialism were fucking killed at the hands of Nazis, and that’s one of the biggest reasons why social policy didn’t develop sufficiently in the Soviet Union. But even so, the criminalization of homosexuality for the most part wasn’t particularly prosecuted compared to many countries, there’s a difference between something being illegal and something being prosecuted.
All in all: yes, they should have done better, but the material conditions of the moment didn’t really allow for much better.
Stalin 1936 constitution. Holidays for “enemies of the people” were unpaid and in a quite cold climate of Siberia. They also cared about fitness of citizens by ensuring no one has too much of food. And if you didn’t like it, you get a free ride in a black car to the place of final rest.
Holidays for “enemies of the people” were unpaid
Not true. The GULAG system, which is simply the prison system of the Soviet Union at the time, did pay inmates a wage while they worked there, this is common knowledge and you can check it up if you want to.
and in a quite cold climate of Siberia
Really? The Gulags were all in Siberia? How about you actually check what you’re talking about instead of spreading misinformation? From the Gulag museum:
www.gulag.online/articles/mapa-taborovych-sprav-gulagu-a-pribehu-ze-stredni-evropy?locale=en
Wow, a ton of Gulags were actually to the west of the Urals, not in Siberia, who would have thought. If only this information was widely available and public…
They also cared about fitness of citizens by ensuring no one has too much of food
Huh? Life expectancy in the Soviet Union rose exponentially, it was below 30 years of age before the Russian Revolution and 60 by the time Stalin died. The diet of the Soviet citizen was by the 60s healthier than that of a US citizen. The CIA itself says this BTW, check out on google “CIA USSR nutrition”, you’ll find a 1983 document claiming, and I quote, “American and Soviet citizens eat about the same amount of rood each day but the Soviet diet may be more nutritious”. Almost as if centering food production around the needs of the population instead of around the profit of food producers, gives a better result…
Just admit it: you don’t have any fucking idea what you’re talking about. You’re repeating talking points you’ve heard on Reddit or TV without actually checking anything.
My former boss was in a gulag for most of his teens. He was not paid and to this day he has no idea what crime he was convicted of. He just knows he served time and was targeted by guards because he was Jewish and the Soviets were very bigoted.
Maybe take a second to ask yourself what your real life experience is with the USSR.
Are you a little bit slow?
did pay inmates a wage while they worked
In a form of a piece of lead in their heads, no doubt.
Really? The Gulags were all in Siberia?
Where did I say ALL gulags were in Siberia, sweetie?
The diet of the Soviet citizen was by the 60s
Stalin was alive in 60s? News to me.
Another tankie. 🙄
The diet bit is correct because Soviets typically have less meat and more veggies in their diet as well as less sugar.
In a form of a piece of lead
You could literally open up a book someday and check your info, gulag inmates were paid. Wages were lower than those of a free worker, but nothing like the modern slavery that the USA uses in its prison system for example.
Where did I say ALL gulags were in Siberia
By using the cliche of “forced labor to the cold Siberia”, you’re propagating misinformation about the system, willingly or not. The fact that the majority of Gulags were in fact not in Siberia is kind of a strong statement in that it shows that the intent of gulags was not that of mass-murder of dissidents (which is the claim anticommunists like you normally do). The vast majority of gulag inmates were actually not political dissidents, but normal criminals. The gulag system was the prison system of the USSR for all crimes. Why would you send your average criminal who stole from another person to a death camp instead of trying to reform them? Why did most of the deaths in gulags coincide with a famine that affected the entire Soviet Union during a war and not before or after that? Why did the Gulag system, at its peak during the mass hysteria against nazism, have a number of prisoners similar to that of the modern USA? Maybe if you weren’t a propagandized misinformation spreader you could answer any of those questions. But no, you can’t, because you haven’t lifted the cover of one book in your entire life.
Stalin was alive in 60s?
I brought up the 60s because the Soviet Union was essentially industrialised by then. In 1917, when the Bolsheviks get to power, the former Russian Empire was a predominantly agrarian country where 80+% of people worked the land and the life expectancy was <30 years, there was no industry to speak of. The civil war which the fascists started, and in which England, France and the USA invaded Soviet Russia for the sin of being communist and gave material aid and troops to the pro-tsarist fascists, and which came right after WW1, left the country in a state of utter destruction, and the economy didn’t recover to pre-WW1 levels until 1929, the year when the first 5-year-plan was adopted. Industrialization of the Soviet Union was FAST as lightning, with GDP growths above 10% per year, the fastest industrialization process in history up to that point (and only surpassed by China to this day). But in 1941, as you may know, the Nazis invaded the country, and murdered about 27 million Soviet Citizens and essentially leveled the entire country west of Stalingrad. After 1945, the industrialization progress continued to its previous speed together with the reconstruction of the country, but it isn’t until at least the 60s when you can say the country was properly industrialized. This is why I said the 60s, because comparing a predominantly feudal country in terms of food security to our modern standards is an exercise of either ignorance of bad faith. So tell me, are you arguing from ignorance or from bad faith?
And there it is again. Dont you ever wonder why they had a constitution like this but treated their people like this. Do you have a window in your room? Can you check what happens to enemies of the state where you live? What happens again if you become disabled in our “civilized” societies?
have you ever wondered if you’re being fed bullshit?
Dont you ever wonder why they had a constitution like this but treated their people like this. Do you have a window in your room?
“Tankie’s thoughts”, page 423.
What you’re doing is called a “thought stopper” or “conversation stopper”. It is used in propaganda for hundreds of years.
thought stopper
I am pretty sure that would be a permanent condition you are suffering from.
Wow. You’re showing very civilized behavior. Maybe i should rethink my stance. :D
Uh… This is coming from the folks who said “he who does not work, neither shall he eat” during a famine so… uh… yeah, that’s not the flex you think it is.
Edit: And in case anyone is wondering, this gets worse with context.
As opposed to the current time of surplus and abundance where it is if “you don’t work you don’t eat”. Which is morally a lot worse considering there is more than enough food to feed everyone
Yeah… no. Very little in modern history is morally worse than Soviet management of the famine of 1930-1933 (which they caused, too). That shit was at least on par with the Irish Famine in terms of sheer moral depravity.
Let me get this straight. To you, a famine produced unintentionally through policy that spiked class war and originated primarily from rich farmers sabotaging the crops and livestock as a response to their lands being collectivized in the first successful collectivization of a country in the history of the Earth, is to you as morally depraved as the English colonists literally starving Irish to death because of colonial and racist beliefs?
I won’t dignify this slop with a response. Fucking tankies, man.
You won’t dignify me with a response because you’re simply replicating propaganda that you’ve heard on Reddit, and you can’t argue from knowledge but from vibes.
I don’t know choosing to not feed people when there is enough food to feed everyone seems a lot worse than choosing which people to not feed during a time of famine.
Obviously more people die from the famine, but at least that’s due to a lack of resources and not a manufactured scarcity
I can’t find a way to phrase this that’s not offensive, so I’ll just go ahead: Are you being obtuse or do you just not know what you’re talking about? Because if it’s the latter you should at least take a scroll down this Wikipedia page before you talk about this stuff. However, I will say that sacrificing millions of people for holy communism (which is what happened; the famine was a choice) isn’t much better than sacrificing them for holy property rights. Not asking for foreign aid and denying a famine even existed was also inexcusable.
during a famine
And this was said about able-bodied parasites such as owners of the means of production, shareholders, landlords, and others living off society on non-labor income. At the same time, the population received old-age and disability pensions, maternity leave for women in labor and a huge number of social payments and compensations. Too bad most believe Goebbels propaganda and don’t study history.
And this was said about able-bodied parasites such as owners of the means of production, shareholders, landlords, and others living off society on non-labor income.
And Ukrainians, don’t forget Ukrainians. I know enough about early Soviet history to know that Stalin was a cold-blooded murderer. Not that the rest of the Communist Party was full of upstanding global citizens, but Stalin was particularly egregious.
I know enough
I assure you: you do not.
Here we go again with the false claims of hunger directed particularly against Ukrainians.
The Bolsheviks gave Ukrainians for the first time in history borders of their own, representation of their own in politics and the right to study for free and in their own language. There are literal letters between Rosa Luxembourg and Lenin in which Rosa argues against Ukraine getting its own representation as a nationality, and Lenin argues in favour of it (which ultimately was done).
The president of the Soviet Union after Stalin was Ukrainian. There is no precedent, no continuation, and no following episode of hunger spiking particularly in Ukraine as it more-or-less did in the early 30s. And millions died outside Ukraine too during that hunger episode, primarily in southern Russia and Central Asia.
Trying to make the 30s famine about Ukrainians is a propaganda exercise first invented by the Nazis to draw Ukrainian sympathy during the Nazi invasion, and it’s picking up strength again as it’s used in Europe to stoke Russophobia and anti-communist sentiment.
Of course you do, from the textbooks of Goebels and his followers.
https://liva.com.ua/lenin-ukraine.html
et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
edit: updated links
Surely anyone who dares criticize the great Soviets is a straight up Nazi! There can be no other explanation!
In this case, yes. These criticisms are literally Nazi propaganda.
I don’t think that’s what they’re saying. There are countless pieces of Nazi propaganda that were taken as fact at some point in the intervening 80 years. Famously, the number of people killed in the Dresden bombing was hugely inflated by the Nazis to smear the Allies, and those numbers were accepted for a very long time.
How are those comparable? In one an able bodied person refuses work, for they need not to. On the other someone incapable of work receive negligible amounts so they may survive
I also very much so doubt you know who Goebbels is
The whole IP debate is just pure nonsense. It still relies on the cartesian mind/body dichotomy and an idealism of some sort where “the ideas” exist in their own immaterial cognitive realm. And they think that I can steal these imaginary immaterial entities and they will be gone for good. Yeah…
It’s about incentivising people to share their ideas by ensuring they’ll be rewarded for it. Without IP laws it’s beneficial to keep new ideas a secret so you can profit off of them. It’s a social contract that promises creators compensation for creating. Everyone benefits from the system the problem has been its exploitation due to weakening public institutions.
But wait, I arranged atoms in this order before you did! Now you’re not allowed to arrange atoms in this order unless you pay me!!
I feel like so many people don’t understand the purpose of IP law.
So someone arranges some atoms for the first time, let’s say they make a vaccine. Now the creator of that vaccine might be financially motivated to sell it for profit. If no IP law existed then the only way to ensure that they’d be able to profit from their arrangement of atoms is by keeping the way they managed to create it a secret. IP law is a social contract that says “hey, if you share this massively beneficial idea with the rest of society we’ll make sure that you can make a profit off of it.” In this way IP law incentivises creators to share their creations with society in a way that everyone benefits from.
The problem is with public institutions being eroded away by corporate interests not with the concept of IP law.
Also for anyone coming out with the “creators aren’t profit motivated” bs. Yes they absolutely are. No it is not because of greed. Material success for people who have made contributions is the most valuable encouragement.
Oh, so uouve never gone on a spirit journey, cutting your way through dense pneuma with an enchanted cgainsaw to get ideas?
I bet thats why you’re poor, and i thought of ’bank but on computer’, ‘music but on computer’ and ‘books but computer’, so get 50% of all thevworlds resources.
This meme shows a complete misunderstanding of patent law. A patent is a social contract that allows for a limited amount of protection for an invention being copied (usually 20 years) in exchange for it becoming public domain after that. This enables people to make a living inventing things. Are games played with the system, sure, does it work perfectly- no, but it’s better than the alternatives. (Source, am inventor)
All other things aside, 20 years is a long fucking time. 20 years ago we barely had cell phones. The iPhone was 2007 I think.
This comment shows a complete misunderstanding of patent practice. Patents exist not for inventors, but for companies. Destin, from Smarter Every Day, has a recent video trying to make a grill scrubber in which he talks with many people about how Amazon for example constantly avoids patent claims from small inventors.
Humanity progressed from hunter-gatherers to the industrial revolution without the need for a judge to determine whether I can arrange atoms in a given way or not without giving a canon to someone else who decided to arrange atoms like that before me.
The problem is with corporations pushing up against weak public institutions and finding no resistance not those public institutions dummy.
If it were a misunderstanding, why do we always see a spike in innovation once a patent expires? According to capitalist ideology, isn’t competition the best that could happen, instead of having an unlimited monopoly for 20 years?
Patents are a good idea in every form of society. People are motivated by material rewards. By ensuring a creator is entitled to their labour and that some scum fuck corporation isn’t going to steal it, society incentivises innovation. The problem isn’t patents, it’s corporations abusing the system to serve their own interests because public institutions (such as the patent office) aren’t strong enough to push back.
I think their point was that in a way, patents are supposed to be more equitable because it allows the inventor to meet their basic needs by being the one to invent the patent.
There’s also the argument that while innovation skyrockets after a parent opens up, there would be less incentive to invent new things if Walmart could just copy it for cheaper the day after you show how you make it.
Or people would be super secretive with instructions for how to make their products that innovations could die with their creators since they have no incentive to release it.
I’m not super familiar with patents themselves, but I used to work in genetics back when human genes were able to be patented, and Myriad Genetics used their patent of the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes to lock genetic testing for these common factors in breast cancer predisposition behind a massive paywall. Even after gene patents were no longer allowed, they refused to share their previous test results with researchers trying to develop a more comprehensive, accurate, and cost-effective test, slowing down medical research.
Research eventually progressed without Myriad Genetics’ help, and within a few years after the genes stopped being patented, genetic testing for the BRCA genes and many more was down to an affordable price, even for people without insurance coverage. We now learn more and more about these genes quicker than ever, and can offer tests that cover many genes at once for a low price and with high accuracy, due to the sharing of test results between labs that never would have happened while genes were patented.
This may be an outlier in patent usage - though I doubt it - but it still shows that big companies can use patent laws more to bully fair competition than to offer a better product. Patents are a good idea for helping small businesses and individuals protect their right to make a new product without a big company swooping in, but there are still massive issues with the process that need to be fixed to keep those same big companies from using the process in reverse to keep small businesses from growing into the competition necessary for a healthy economy.
I understand what you are saying but i hope you never invent something that can solve a current day crisis.
We are already behind schedule to solve things like climate change. If someone invents breakthrough tech then we need that today and open so other minds can quickly iterate and improve. Not after 20 years of stalling on a bureaucratic advantage.
If it wasn’t for capitalism chaining survival to productivity there would be no reason for this system to exist and we can move on to teach that “all good ideas should be copied” And “the same ideas can emerge in multiple different minds”
People work for material gain. By not entitling creators to the product of their labour you will discourage them from creating (and also be stealing from them). Patent law is exactly the kind of thing that protects the interests of working people but our current system is too weak to stand up to corporations.
What happens if the person who can solve climate change decides instead to trade stocks because saving the world doesn’t put food on the table?
IP laws are not your enemy, corporations are.
In that case literally every court also shows a complete misunderstabding of patent law
So…
Would it not be cooler just to be able to live with having to toil and labor for the crumbs of your capitalist owner and you know invent things because you liked to? (Source, you are brainwashed)
Then patent law is better than intellectual property law, I think it’s 50 years after the creator dies and there are loopholes for companies
Technically IP law covers patents, trademarks, copyright, and designs (sometimes also called design patents). Patent protection is 20 years (plus a little bit extra under certain conditions. Trademarks is indefinite in theory. Copyright (in many jurisdictions) is 70 yrs after death or 50 yrs for certain works (e.g., music recordings). Designs, I’m not really sure.
Copyright (in many jurisdictions) is 70 yrs after death until next time Disney extends it
