you know how libs always say knee-jerk "communism only works on paper" despite the opposite being true? i would like to crowdsource help in writing a good retort to that, that could. hopefully plant seeds in someone’s mind.
you know how libs always say knee-jerk "communism only works on paper" despite the opposite being true? i would like to crowdsource help in writing a good retort to that, that could. hopefully plant seeds in someone’s mind.
That'll be tough. Capitalism doesn't work on paper.
You can argue that, but ultimately the theory (whether it works or doesn't) isn't as important as how it looks in practice. You could have endless debates with someone over whether capitalism works on paper, and if finally beat them down on every single point, they'll just fall back to "but look at America; it's capitalist and it's the wealthiest country in the world" or some such bullshit.
So you're better off just starting with "capitalism doesn't work in practice." That's where the conversation will eventually go, anyway, and then you're skipping a bunch of theoretical stuff that the vast majority of people don't understand well enough to persuade or be persuaded on.
I don't really engage in sincere argument with anyone that thinks capitalism is good. If that's coming at me I just go full tank and am a dismissive prick to them. I'm lucky enough to engage with radlibs at worst most of the time. With full libs, they're probably not willing to engage with your ideas anyway and you're usually just chipping away capitalist realism, they may get there over time but you will more or less never be the person that says the one magic phrase that will undue a lifetime of conditioning. The only way you might is if they are sincerely interested in engaging and approach you about it. Otherwise, partially for the sake of my own sanity I usually just go direct and hope it takes a notch into the lib brain that helps it eventually break, plus I'm good at making people feel guilty.
For real arguments I'm way better at friendly sectarianism.
how does one go full tank?
Don't compromise your views because of who you're talking to. There are plenty of radlibs for that. Just express yourself as you are and literally are and the rest follows. It's not up to you to make every lib you meet a communist.
but you’re not gonna stop me from trying and I don’t care if they don’t get all the way
Good luck building a socialist movement in the imperial core, then. Being a dismissive prick isn't that good of a way to change anyone's opinion -- it's just good for not wasting time or sanity on trolls and lost causes.
Fuck off.
Do you actually want to achieve socialism or do you just want to do epic dunks on twitter?
Do you really think putting time and effort into explaining socialism is actually useful to literally anyone but a few? I mostly deal IRL with homelessness and addiction issues cause they affect me, people are swayed by what affects their day to day material conditions. Explaining the finer points of Engels to a lib online is the exact opposite of advancing socialism, I don't have twitter and i don't engage online politically anywhere but here becaue it's pointless. Once again, fuck off.
Yes? Is this a serious question? Exactly that sort of thing has been a key part of every successful socialist movement. At some point we're going to have to get people who don't currently buy into socialism to become socialists, and you're telling me you have no interest in doing that.
Obviously you have to speak to material issues that directly affect people, but that's pretty easy to do if you're explaining why socialism is a good thing. Obviously getting into a reddit debate about the finer points of some obscure socialist text is not productive, but it's pretty easy to make the case for socialism to non-socialists without falling into that. Being an asshole to people -- especially if you're doing it in person, not even online -- is a shitty way to get them to agree with you. It's prioritizing what makes you feel good over what might actually get more people to seriously consider socialism.
I don't deal with the same people you do.
That could be a good starting point for a critique of capitalism. The US is extremely rich but it still sucks ass for the people.
Exactly -- the reality of the situation is even more favorable for socialism, so let's just start there. Capitalism, regardless of what anyone says about the theory, doesn't "work" by any definition that most people would find meaningful.