Right. You have to actually make the argument and build power on a solid foundation. You aren't going to trick people into socialism.
If my goal is to actually build working class power to move towards socialism, I'd rather start with 10,000 committed communists than 1,000,000 socdems and left-libs.
You can’t convince someone to suddenly accept overt socialism after years of saying “actually, we don’t want that.”
What if you convince them to buy into Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, and greatly expanded labor rights? What if you eventually get them on board with worker ownership of the means of production, all without mentioning socialism by name?
At that point you have no need to get them to accept overt socialism. You have socialism in practice; who cares what it's called? This is the start of that process -- getting people to support something like M4A.
I imagine every socialist nation would care because the US would continue to condemn them
We're so unimaginably far off from that point it's ridiculous to speculate over.
The point is that we should be focused on policies that help the working class, not winning academic discussions over which country is socialist or which country is good. Delivering something material for the working class is the best way to get them to listen to you about socialism, anyway.
But she's not saying that. She's not even talking about socialism -- she's talking about stuff like Medicare for All.
The question was a bad-faith attempt to suck her into a debate about foreign countries most people in America know nothing about; it's a derailment tactic. It's good she didn't take the bait. If you talk about universal healthcare -- and overwhelmingly popular policy -- people listen. If you talk about the Soviet Union (at least in this context) people tune out.
deleted by creator
Right. You have to actually make the argument and build power on a solid foundation. You aren't going to trick people into socialism.
If my goal is to actually build working class power to move towards socialism, I'd rather start with 10,000 committed communists than 1,000,000 socdems and left-libs.
What if you convince them to buy into Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, and greatly expanded labor rights? What if you eventually get them on board with worker ownership of the means of production, all without mentioning socialism by name?
At that point you have no need to get them to accept overt socialism. You have socialism in practice; who cares what it's called? This is the start of that process -- getting people to support something like M4A.
deleted by creator
We're so unimaginably far off from that point it's ridiculous to speculate over.
The point is that we should be focused on policies that help the working class, not winning academic discussions over which country is socialist or which country is good. Delivering something material for the working class is the best way to get them to listen to you about socialism, anyway.
deleted by creator
But she's not saying that. She's not even talking about socialism -- she's talking about stuff like Medicare for All.
The question was a bad-faith attempt to suck her into a debate about foreign countries most people in America know nothing about; it's a derailment tactic. It's good she didn't take the bait. If you talk about universal healthcare -- and overwhelmingly popular policy -- people listen. If you talk about the Soviet Union (at least in this context) people tune out.