A communist nation that can really provide all that is as realistic as capitalistic utopia.
this post was submitted on 11 Nov 2023
874 points (83.3% liked)
Memes
45104 readers
2719 users here now
Rules:
- Be civil and nice.
- Try not to excessively repost, as a rule of thumb, wait at least 2 months to do it if you have to.
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
Not a tankie, but the USSR had mostly solved this problem, despite all its other issues. There did exist some homelessness, but nowhere near the extent of current USA.
Sure, you could get a piece of land in Siberian tundra at any time, I would not call that housing.
Moving to a city was way more complicated than in capitalist US. You could not simply buy an apartment. You had to be allocated an apartment by the government. And you needed connections for that. Or bribes. Ideally both. If you think your local rabid Republicans do not care for little wage slave men, you never experienced USSR, it was like that but 100x worse.
If you got a new job in a different city, they gave you a new flat, at least in Romania
load more comments
(10 replies)
load more comments
(1 replies)
load more comments
(61 replies)
This is fundamentally false.
While it is true that there was inexpensive housing available in the USSR, and that rents were quite reasonable compared to anything that currently exists in the US, and people couldn't readily be evicted if they lacked the ability to pay, it's a flat-out lie to say that that was the "solution" to homelessness, or that it eliminated the problem. Rather, the USSR criminalized being homeless and not being engaged in socially-productive labor; people that were homeless ended up in prisons and were labelled as parasites. The problem that we have now is that the official records simply didn't record the problem, in much the same way that Stalin had histories and photos revised to eliminate people that had become enemies of the state.
Rather, the USSR criminalized being homeless and not being engaged in socially-productive labor; people that were homeless ended up in prisons and were labelled as parasites.
Swap USSR with USA and the statement remains true. Though Im sure the degree of severity was much greater in the USSR.
That's kind of true in some parts of the US, indirectly. Some places criminalize not being homeless but all the things that are the result of being homeless like sleeping outside or in public places. But there are a lot of places in the US that do provide for the homeless. New York City has a right to housing provision, for example.
load more comments
(4 replies)
load more comments
(5 replies)
These discussions on communism vs capitalism that devolve into comparing the US with the USSR are like discussing feudalism vs liberalism in 1825, when the only perceptible legacies of the French Revolution were the Reign of Terror and Napoleon's degeneration into monarchy.
If you're sensibly anticapitalist, for the love of Marx do not argue in favor of states that rejected all pretension of wanting to let the economy be democratically managed, ultimately turning into party-controlled hierarchies rather than socialism. If you're a liberal in 1825 and rather than arguing in favor of ending serfdom and enfranchising everyone you keep going on about how Robespierre wasn't really that bad, you're politically useless.
load more comments
(11 replies)
This is capitalist solution to homelessness
I love the top one, because it's the same way they deal with pigeons. They see poor people as just another pest.
Personally I've never seen the spikes or anything that horrific in Canada. But fuck do those stupid bench "armrests" ever piss me off
There are much more examples, search hostile architecture or hostile urbanism
The nicest
load more comments
(7 replies)
load more comments
(2 replies)
load more comments
(6 replies)
Why is this shit always communist vs capitalist, like we've only got 2 answers avaliable. You fuckers never set foot in a communist country and worship this shit
Fucking communist countries have killed how many millions of their own citizens? Don't really think showing a picture of some buildings is enough to prove that they actually solved any issues. They may have solved those issues for some who were lucky enough to get an apartment, but don't be a hexbear and pretend they housed everyone.
And no, I don't want a response with a link about hurr duer capitalism bad, yeah I know, but I live in capitalism so I already know that.
Fucking communist countries have killed how many millions of their own citizens?
Bruh, centuries of capitalist exploitation of its citizens and treating them like a disposable commodity would like to have a word on the whole 'citizens killed by their own country' topic.
How many thousands or millions of citizens die yearly because they can't afford to live in this fucked up system?
load more comments
(9 replies)
This is not "one or the another" situation, communism is the next qualitative stage in development of society. It solves the primary contradiction that we experience in capitalism, that is socialized production being privatized by individuals, aka capitalists.
You can't just declare communism by signing a document, because it is a process of development in which small quantitative changes in production (socialism) lead to a qualitative change (communism), thus to achieve the communism stage you have to achieve a certain level of development.
This is why China is considered a communist country by marxists-leninist even though qualitatively it is a capitalist country. They are actively working to develop communism, this can be clearly seen throughout their rhetoric (i.e. "The Governance of China") and their material results.
load more comments
(20 replies)
Remind me, how many capitalist countries have killed millions of their own citizens?
Germany, pre-communist China, Japan, Armenia, pre-USSR Russia, Pakistan...
load more comments
(2 replies)
load more comments
(45 replies)
I live in north-east Germany in one of these Blocks (it was firmly renovated tho). It's actually not bad. Most of them are build in Horseshoe shape so you have small parks inside. But it's nearly impossible to hang anything to the wall without proper power tools. EDIT: typos
Yes, but since the wall isn't paper you can hang really heavy stuff on your walls. I have a massive ghettoblaster sitting on a wooden board over my desk 🥰
load more comments
(5 replies)
What if, and hear me out on this one, the problem isn't which "-ism" is prevalent. The real problem is that ANY form of power or society needs checks and balances. If those are missing or not enforced, then everything goes to shit. It's a balancing act, not just a matter of black or white.
load more comments
(20 replies)
Why a lot of people on Lemmy like communist so much? As a person who grow up in a country which is almost destroyed by the communist party in the past I don't know what to say just why?, capitalist or not it's depends on your own country's government, at least you still can talking shit about them without getting arrested and torture to death, have we not learn from the past or other communist country, why don't you live in North Korea or China and see how've you like it
It's an unfortunately nuanced subject, where people don't agree on the underlying definitions of words. For instance, I think you're confusing "capitalism" with "democracy". You can have authoritarian undemocratic capitalist countries, where you can't talk shit about your government.
For me personally, I think communism has too many issues to actually try, but I like some of its theoretical tennants when compared to that of capitalism. Those goals are something to strive for. The spirit of communism is helping eachother and rewarding work, and the spirit of capitalism is sacrificing others for personal gain
load more comments
(3 replies)
Though to be fair, DPRK is the way it is at least in part thanks to the Americans obliterating their cities and farm land. But we can ignore history to make a "I used to be in a communist country and it's bad, trust me bro" statement.
And I agree, I prefer to live in a system where prisoners aren't primarily minorities or political prisoners. And where the prison system isn't the most populated in the world, and rife with for-profit forced labour.
I would also be curious to hear which definition of "capitalism" and "Communism" you are using. That is, if you are open to dialogue.
load more comments
(4 replies)
load more comments
(39 replies)
Capitalism has a solution to the tent problem though
UK - The home secretary is proposing new laws to restrict the use of tents by homeless people, arguing that many of them see it as a "lifestyle choice".
It sure is a lifestyle choice. The choice is the tent or a cardboard box, fucking insensitive assholes.
load more comments
(1 replies)
Please, not this again.... Personally, I am a lot in favour of communism. But some people, especially US Americans, have a fundamentally wrong idea about the housing shown in the upper picture.
This is often neither cheap, nor does it reduce homelessness. And it's also not the goal of that kind of rental homes to reduce homelessness.
That is just normal homes of average people in many places.
It's not "cheap housing for everyone".
Those houses were built by state-backed actors to support growing urbanization and create a housing surplus for that urbanization to give the workers more power since they no longer have to deal with aggressively rent-seeking private landlords.
Wait, isn't that communism?
load more comments
(4 replies)
load more comments
(2 replies)
Not in the UK. Our government is looking to ban the tents next. That'll fix the homeless issue 😕
load more comments
(1 replies)
"Darn that's a lot of tents, this is starting to become a real problem. Better build more rental properties."
load more comments
(3 replies)
view more: next ›