No Stupid Questions

Then there is the modern usage of the terms which seem to vary based on who invokes the[m]

I think the thing to keep in mind is: 1) words evolve over time, and 2) the people using those words might be abbreviating what they actually mean, because they don't know that there's another related concept that is named similarly. The best example of the first is how "truck" in the 1910s meant what we now call a "hand truck", and "car" from that era meant traincar. Whereas in the 2020s, "truck" and "car" both refer to automobiles, and we had to create the backronyns of "hand truck" and "rail car" to avoid confusion.

I don't think your theoretical understanding of Marxism is wrong -- though I've not read enough to confirm -- but I would hazard against using other people's wrong definitions and usage guide your own understanding. If you understand the ideology, then it's a matter of rendering it using the right words; that is, it becomes a communications problem.

For example, Republican politicians will use the term socialism to mean communism and vice versa

I would especially not suggest relying on right-wingers to properly use -- let alone understand -- left-wing ideology, since their objective is to denigrate leftists through FUD and infantile repetition. Basically, the maxim of "if enough people are 'talking' about something, it must be controversial" or "I'm just asking questions bro", neither of which are anywhere approaching a good-faith discussion on the merits.

Some politicians like Mamdani or Bernie will describe socialism to mean a more humane type of capitalism that has other priorities other than pure profit seeking

How the two use the word "socialism" is almost always understood as a shorthand for what Europeans would call "social democracy". So it's definitely on the list of valid implementations of socialism, but is specifically about reforming an openly capitalist system into something more egalitarian. That said, "social democracy" still leaves out a lot of details which need clarification: do Mamdani or Bernie support (re)building the social safety net? Does the state need to also own railroads the same way that they own highways? For the former, there's the standalone word "welfare state", but I'm not aware of a compound phrase that means "social democratic welfare state", if that even describes Bernie or Mamdani at all. I'd certainly love a word that means "social democratic welfare railway state" but nothing has caught on.

I think that should underscore my point: even after resolving exactly which word they might be abbreviating, there aren't enough short words to succinctly describe any particular ideology. Rather, the words are useful to get a rough idea of a person's views, but ultimately, every one and every candidate is going to have a slightly different take on certain questions.

Some people use communism to describe an authoritarian system that has no regard for human agency

I personally refer to this definition as "Stalinist communism", because it does accurately describe how the USSR was operating under Stalin. Essentially, it wrapped a cult-of-personality in the trappings of communist thought, though people like Trotsky pointed out how communism could be done much differently. Obviously, history is quite clear that the Stalinist approach was not adopted as-is by any other country, nor retained in the USSR after Stalin's death. Indeed, I've never come across anyone who genuinely refers to themselves as a Stalinist or who seriously proposes to the adoption of Stalin-style, top-down authoritarian communism. Maybe some right-wing Russians do, but idk. My point is that, like the Republican examples above, Stalin and authoritarian communism is usually only brought up as a "thought terminating answer" rather than to seriously debate the merits of communism, either theoretically or practically.

multiple people will have multiple definitions that most often don't align with how Marxists describe communism and socialism

Yes, because they're usually talking past each other about different things. Being able to detect which definition someone means to use, that's a skill that you can develop for yourself, to have a clearer picture than they do.

I'm primarily writing this comment because I abhor the idea that an idea -- it could be anything, from rocket science to theorrtical mathematics -- is perceived as being an arena where everyone is just making up stuff, and if that should lead to people becoming turned off the idea of studying it for themselves, that's a net-negative. No doubt, some countries, politicians, and agencies want to denigrate or prop up their own definitions, but that just makes it easier to identify fake socialists and "communists in name only".

The merits and failures of socialism and communism deserve to be comprehensively hashed out in the public mind, and it only serves the status quo that this not happen. And the longer the conversation is delayed, the more that the indisputable ails of the status quo will take more victims.

This is completely incorrect, cite any socialist or communist philosophers agreeing with you.

Socialism - any system of government where the workers own the means of production. This has nothing to do with welfare or healthcare or any of that, just that the working class owns the factories and other private property. (The marxist and original definition of private property is property that generates capital, not your toothbrush, which is personal property. Same with your home.)

communism - a post socialist system where the workers own the means of production, currency has been abolished, there are no class divisions or state (note the marxist concept of the state is probably not what you're thinking if this is new to you.)

That's just social democracy, not socialism.

In your communism definition, the government is not supposed to step aside, it's supposed to stop having a function as classes are eliminated, because the state's purpose is the oppression of one class by the other.

More simply, socialism is about indirect redistribution of wealth through taxes paying for social programs that benefit everyone. Communism seeks literal redistribution of wealth to maintain equal economic status for all.

It's important to consider the fact that an economy does not have to be entirely Capitalist, Socialist, or Communist.

Most countries already have Socialist and Capitalist components at this point.

What I'd personally like to see is Land be a communist system. Necessities be Socialist. Luxuries be Capitalist.

Every citizen of a country should own and share in the land of the country equally. It should not be possible to privately own land. If land is leased or rented from this pool for individual or corporate use, that money should be given to everyone equally. Likely that would be handled by a government in reality, but it should be fairly hands off other than facilitating the transfer of value.

Necessities like Basic Housing, Basic Food, Public Transportation, Medical Care, Parks, Rec Centers, Schools, Police, Courts, etc. should be all handled with socialism. Where the government collects taxes from the land value and capitalist markets, and operates these systems itself for the benefit of everyone who needs them.

If you want more than necessities, capitalism should stick around to handle those desires. Want a bigger fancier house, some fancy oranges from another country, a suit made of silk, go ahead and buy it on a capitalist market either with the money you receive from your portion of land ownership value, or through participating in the capitalist market yourself.

communism is an utopia ideal far more than an actionable form of government. I have never met a human being who didn't function without a conception of social class. it only really works in small communities that have closed belief systems and practice social-isolation.

socialism is very actionable, it's more of a policy than a form of government. you can have a socialist monarchy or dictatorship. most 'communist' countries were/are socialist dictatorships.

So close until you got to communism. Cite marx.

communism describes an economic system that places most of the control with the government.

I know you're simplifying things for brevity but this is misleading at best. You can't gloss over the goal of a classless, stateless society when defining communism, and it is explicitly a left-wing philosophy. Contrast with fascism, a right-wing political philosophy that places most of the control with the government by reinforcing control over capital and creating a clear national identity.

That's not true at all, socialism is just worker ownership of the means of production and not related to centrally planned economies. Lookup market socialism for a counterexample.

Socialism - any system of government where the workers own the means of production. This has nothing to do with welfare or healthcare or any of that, just that the working class owns the factories and other private property. (The marxist and original definition of private property is property that generates capital, not your toothbrush, which is personal property. Same with your home.)

communism - a post socialist system where the workers own the means of production, currency has been abolished, there are no class divisions or state (note the marxist concept of the state is probably not what you're thinking if this is new to you.)

Talking about "socalism" in a language beset by capitalist oligarchs applying the label to things as mundane as "feeding children" really does require we draw a distinction between the numerous resultant definitions.

Some people use "socialism" to mean the anti-capitalist ideal you describe, while others mean either "thing I dont want my taxes to provide" or "the things those guys keep blocking."

First off, the 1956 Republican party is not the same as the modern GOP. You conveniently chose the time immediately before the schism that essentially reversed the two parties.

If anyone wants to argue about this, I suggest you read about Strom Thurmond. Perhaps the most vile, openly racist politician of the 20th century US. Thurmond was a lifelong Democrat, until the party started supporting civil rights.

That's when he and his fellow Dixiecrats (racist Southern Democrats) moved to the Republican party. You're highlighting their platform from immediately before the influx of racist shit heads.

Second, nobody classifies North Korea as that, except for North Korea. That doesn't mean that we cannot label it accurately.

Third, Hitler never claimed to be a Marxist, nor have I ever seen anyone make that claim. I've seen the "hurr durr Nazis are socialist because it's in the name," but there's a distinction between socialism and Marxism.

Fourth, the logic of the Bloomberg thing isn't sound. "Almost as if he were a green" as if wanting less cars is completely unique to the Green party. Not how logic works.

Socialism - any system of government where the workers own the means of production. This has nothing to do with welfare or healthcare or any of that, just that the working class owns the factories and other private property. (The marxist and original definition of private property is property that generates capital, not your toothbrush, which is personal property. Same with your home.)

communism - a post socialist system where the workers own the means of production, currency has been abolished, there are no class divisions or state (note the marxist concept of the state is probably not what you're thinking if this is new to you.)