• quarrk [he/him]
    ·
    9 months ago

    So why do Americans decide what socialism is?

    Why do capitalist nations decide what socialism is?

    If people want to know what socialism is, they should research what socialist theorists say and what major countries self-identifying as socialists say

    Scientific socialism isn’t a dogma and has no dogmatic definition. That’s the whole point. It’s really defined by what it negates, ie capitalism. All of the Lemmy folks saying AES doesn’t exist are totally incorrect. It is not necessary to achieve utopian communism to be considered socialist. All that matters is that a state takes definite steps to negating capitalism, ie ownership of private property, following the material conditions unique to that state. This nonsense about “socialism is when the workers own the means of production, and nothing less” (sadly encouraged by some armchair socialist named “Communism” in that thread) is utopian and anti-Marxist.