Anyone that learns what socialism really means and then thinks it is a bad thing must be selfish and self centered. There is no alternative, you either don’t get it or you believe society should continue to hold “certain people” down for the uplifting of “us”
Socialism is based on public ownership of means of production. In order to shift to socialism in foreseeable future and in the past, it requires forceful removal of private property and converting it into public, since I can not imagine that all people would do this voluntarily (and they did not do that voluntarily historically). So, yes, you require forceful state, a dictatorship. Soviets openly called that “dictatorship of the working class” when they were nationalizing means of production. That included by the way farmers who used seasonally hired labour. They fought to destroy those farms and farmers were treated as enemy to socialism. Ukrainian Holodomor that killed millions of people is a good example of such fight.
So, before blank-calling other people self-centered and selfish, maybe you should learn a bit more about socialism and its history?
While I don't particularly agree with the example you've given, the idea is correct. In order to have any kind of system (especially at its inception), you need to have authoritarianism of some sort, and in the modern liberal democratic countries, this authoritarianism is in the form of the law and police, who protect private property so capitalists can do their thing.
When it comes to socialism, in almost every case it was done via a military dictatorship, and it's rather hard to tell if this was done because everyone was copying the big 'socialist' countries like soviet union or china, or if dictatorships are the most practical way to do so. With dictatorships there's a substantial risk of putting someone in power who's just an opportunist and wants all the power above all else like Stalin, or having a party that doesn't really care to bring on communism and it turns into oligarchy.
However, it's not all dictators - Paris Commune was a revolution that had the dictatorship of proletariat, as in the dictator was the working class, and while it failed, it definitely was on the right track, at least in my opinion. You minimize the risks of having a singular dictator, but to succeed you need to have the majority of people on board with the idea, which is a tall order especially today where any talk of socialism is met by misinformed skepticism and years of anti-communist propaganda by the liberal democracy world.
Until you understand what socialism is?
Anyone that learns what socialism really means and then thinks it is a bad thing must be selfish and self centered. There is no alternative, you either don’t get it or you believe society should continue to hold “certain people” down for the uplifting of “us”
Socialism is based on public ownership of means of production. In order to shift to socialism in foreseeable future and in the past, it requires forceful removal of private property and converting it into public, since I can not imagine that all people would do this voluntarily (and they did not do that voluntarily historically). So, yes, you require forceful state, a dictatorship. Soviets openly called that “dictatorship of the working class” when they were nationalizing means of production. That included by the way farmers who used seasonally hired labour. They fought to destroy those farms and farmers were treated as enemy to socialism. Ukrainian Holodomor that killed millions of people is a good example of such fight.
So, before blank-calling other people self-centered and selfish, maybe you should learn a bit more about socialism and its history?
While I don't particularly agree with the example you've given, the idea is correct. In order to have any kind of system (especially at its inception), you need to have authoritarianism of some sort, and in the modern liberal democratic countries, this authoritarianism is in the form of the law and police, who protect private property so capitalists can do their thing.
When it comes to socialism, in almost every case it was done via a military dictatorship, and it's rather hard to tell if this was done because everyone was copying the big 'socialist' countries like soviet union or china, or if dictatorships are the most practical way to do so. With dictatorships there's a substantial risk of putting someone in power who's just an opportunist and wants all the power above all else like Stalin, or having a party that doesn't really care to bring on communism and it turns into oligarchy.
However, it's not all dictators - Paris Commune was a revolution that had the dictatorship of proletariat, as in the dictator was the working class, and while it failed, it definitely was on the right track, at least in my opinion. You minimize the risks of having a singular dictator, but to succeed you need to have the majority of people on board with the idea, which is a tall order especially today where any talk of socialism is met by misinformed skepticism and years of anti-communist propaganda by the liberal democracy world.