288
Gen Z embraces 'safety capitalism', says current social safety net is broken
(www.businessinsider.com)
this post was submitted on 29 Feb 2024
288 points (91.9% liked)
News
23275 readers
3519 users here now
Welcome to the News community!
Rules:
1. Be civil
Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.
2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.
Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.
3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.
Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.
4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.
Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.
5. Only recent news is allowed.
Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.
6. All posts must be news articles.
No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.
7. No duplicate posts.
If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.
8. Misinformation is prohibited.
Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.
9. No link shorteners.
The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.
10. Don't copy entire article in your post body
For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I don't know, man... most developed nations are having quite a nice ride compared to the so-called communist countries.
Do you think it's because they are Capitalist, or do you think it's because they're developed, and started industrializing earlier, with plentiful access to global trade?
Does this matter? Every communist state I've known has failed.
The idea may sound good in principle, but clearly humans can't grasp it.
It absolutely matters. If you're tying development to quality of life, which I agree with, you also have to make the absolute claim that Socialist states can't develop, which I disagree with. Capitalism is only a few hundred years old anyways, and already is failing, ie disparity is continuing to accelerate to unsustainable levels.
First of all, what is a "Communist state?" There's no such thing, so if you clarify what you are referring to, that would help.
Secondly, clarify what you mean by "failed," because either you don't know much about leftist states or you're using a different meaning of the word "failed."
Finally, what do you mean "the idea sounds good on paper?" If it sounds good on paper, ie it works in theory, what about reality is an unknown factor? If humans can't grasp it (whatever that means), then it doesn't work in theory!
You're playing red scare bingo, lol
A communist state is just that. A nation that adopted communism.
I never mentioned socialism. I think socialism is okay. Or at least democratic socialism.
I was referring to communism.
Communism is a Stateless, Classless, Moneyless society. It cannot be adopted by a state. You're referring to Socialist states.
You clearly do have problems with Socialism, or at least some forms. Democratic Socialism is Worker Ownership of the Means of Production, organized similar to a liberal democracy. That's fine, but the goal of Democratic Socialism is still Communism, eventually.
You were not in fact referring to Communism, which is why I asked that question in the first place.
Thanks for the lesson. Now, what do people mean when they say that Soviet Russia and Cuba are communists?
I don't think democratic socialism leads towards communism. Hasn't Sweden implemented a form of socialism, for example?
My questions are not confrontational, but I'll admit they're rooted in my limited knowledge but also in my very real experience.
I come from a country that could have been a communism wonder having adopted a socialist approach in 1999, and today it's in shambles.
Great questions, and I'll answer both.
The USSR was a Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. It was headed by a Communist Party, ie a party trying to build towards Communism, but through Socialism. The end-goal of Socialism is to eventually do away with the state, class, and money, as all 3 are used to oppress people, creating Communism. Same with Cuba.
Sweden is not Socialist, it's a Social Democracy. The mode of production is Capitalism, with expanded social safety nets. Some industries are nationalized, but Capital is largely in the hands of Capitalists, not shared among Workers. Actual Democratic Socialism would be like if Sweden's Unions took ownership of all Industry, but maintained government structures.
I hope that clears things up! What you call Communism, is in fact a specific form of Marxist-Leninist Socialism, most likely.
Thanks for explaining.
And why is it that there hasn't been a successful adoption of this movement?
What do you mean by successful? By most metrics, implementations have led to higher life expectancies, literacy rates, and more, when compared to preceding systems. In forms like Worker co-operatives, these systems are more stable than Capitalist businesses with higher satisfaction, and in cases like the EZLN where its more Libertarian Socialist, they have successfully created a community for themselves.
That's why I tried to ask why you think Socialist states can't develop, because quality of life follows development, not Capitalism.
Well, like I said, that's the perception I've had from observing nations such as Cuba, Russia and, more recently, Venezuela.
I'll concede that some programs under socialism/communism benefit a lot of people. But at what cost? Failing infrastructure, brain drain, indoctrination...
What country under communism has experienced such improvement in quality of life?
Cuba has higher literacy rates and life expectancy than the US, the USSR doubled life expectancy compared to Tsarist Russia and went from Feudalism style farming to space in less than a century. Let there be no misconception, none of these states were ideal, and all had a good deal of issues, but what you're describing just didn't exist. All of them improved upon previous conditions.
Venezuela is majority privatized, it's a Capitalist state anyways.
Again, not under Communism, but under Socialism.
Ok. Thanks. And what sources did you use to assert that? I'm not being pedantic or contrarian. It's just that if I type "did communism improve people's lives in the USSR and Cuba?" I don't know if I can trust the answers (whether yes or no.)
Literacy rates by country: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_literacy_rate
Life expectancy (looks like the US overtook Cuba as of 2021, likely due to the COVID problems within Cuba and the blockade against them): https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_expectancy
Life expectancy of Russia over time (note WWII as a significant dip): https://www.statista.com/statistics/1041395/life-expectancy-russia-all-time/
Again, I'm not at all a Marxist-Leninist, I'm more of an Anarchist. I think we need to learn from what did and did not work.
Thanks, man. I'm a pursuer of the truth, even if it challenges my own deep-rooted beliefs, so this is helpful.
One more question: what is it with those nations being overtly oppressive of its people? Would it be a coincidence and have nothing to do with communism? Or is it that authoritarian regimes somehow like the idea to promote communism so they get the people's support?
A mix of reasons, a little of A, a little of B, a little of C. Generally, with the Soviet Democratic structure, the upper level Soviets weren't as accountable to the masses as the ones below, leading to corruption in the Politburo. At the local level, things were fairly democratic, but the higher up you go the less the citizens can influence you directly.