zenforyen

Let's better say what I do accept. I have read Marx and accept his analysis of dynamics of capital as correct, it's hard not to see that it is spot-on. I accept the general paradigm that the foundation of all such dynamics is the underlying material conditions, i.e. wealth inequality, which leads to power inequality. He however never outlined a clear way out.

I read enough secondary literature about whatever people tried to build on Marx as ways out and have seen enough of evidence against "real existing socialism" and have first-hand family experience from this system. I know all the objections that it was state capitalism or whatever, but I am pessimistic about human nature.

Actual socialism emerging from a revolution and whatever leadership to stay uncorrupted instead of eventually seizing power seems very utopian and unlikely to me, just as utopian and naive as anarchists believe that self-organized structures will not degenerate back to capitalistic tribalism with a few extra steps that will just redistribute the power a little bit and new opportunists to win the next round.

You misunderstood my "European patriotism" (in quotes!), because I never said anything about loving or approving everything done by the organisation you criticize (EU). What I was talking about was the ethos of wanting to protect the least shitty system I see anywhere on earth right now, which is deployed most successfully around Europe-the-continent, the "real existing faulty bureaucratic democracy".

You seem to be of the opinion that it needs to be dismantled and replaced by something else. The right extremists say the same. The problem is that it's easy to call for destruction but it's difficult to build. All I see is "we need to tear it down... And then we'll somehow magically build something new from scratch".

I am a software developer by profession. You know how this works? You have to work with shitty systems other people you despise built over decades. I wish I could throw it all into the garbage and just build from scratch. But unlike politics, where talk is cheap, here I can see and quantify how much fucking work it is both technically and socially. It's just like wanting to "just build a different sky scraper" without understanding anything about engineering. You can try, and probably will end up with another flavor if ugly mess. You also need to (re)educate other developers, you need to convince people, and finally the users need to either not be bothered by your "improvements" and you cannot allow such a long down time or reconstruction phase because the outside world is not waiting for you to get your shit together.

Now, I think politics is exactly the same. Law is the code of society, and developers and users need to buy into different paradigms I.e. accept other values and standards and possibly form of organization. I don't see any proposed alternative being even close to have a clear realistic path, except of a strong faith that "it somehow will work out". I doubt that it works that way. History works incrementally, and complex systems become incrementally fucked up, does not matter where you start.

The radical left is losing against the fascists because the fascists learned how to incrementally win mind-share of the people and hide it's radical nature, while the radical left is continuing to engage in black and white thinking and pushing regular people away.

That leads me to the hypothesis that the only way to fix the system is actually good people low-key moving up in power and tweaking it from the inside, that means the reverse direction of what is happening right now.

Then I believe we need "pro-social propaganda", working in a subtle way like the capitalistic matrix, which means that you have to win back the media. If you have the media, you can win the hearts and minds of people.

The classic approach of the left only works in a society where the majority is in such distress that they are open to extreme changes and have nothing to lose. But the system we are in is a system of "good enough".

So I don't believe in the tactics of the radical left and I don't believe in the existence of a solid plan, there is at most a "concept of a plan", in the words of a well-known dictator. I doubt the practical experience and competence of radical left thinkers and intellectuals, who have never worked inside a complex system such as academia or a company and have a simplistic idea of "change management" for social, bureaucratic and technical structures. Being able to organize some demonstration or violent resistance to break something does not necessarily correlate with the ability to build something better in its place and might not justify possible damage done in between.

So what is the way forward? I have no idea. But that is why I hope for some genuine and smartly executed "reformist" movement and would not expect any good outcomes from naive "revolutionary" ambitions. The revolutionary left is ultimately also a collection of populist movements, in the sense of promising simple answers to complex problems.

What does that make me ideologically? No idea. I don't care about labels. Call it "pragmatic realistic left" or whatever.

By the way, nice username. I got some of these recently.

Are you one of those "tankies" everyone is talking about here on Lemmy?

And how do you know whether I read "some books" or not? Could it maybe just be that I just don't accept their conclusions, question the suggested alternative or the way to get there?

Do you think that either you become enlightened by reading them, or you must be dumb or the enemy?

And maybe that does say more about you thank about me?

Good Points in general. But where did you read about me wanting to destroy something? The only thing I actively think we need to destroy is fascism and imbalance of power, which is slowly corrupting everything like mold.

Pluralistic democracy in that regard is a more abstract concept than a concrete agenda and it is hard to unite people for such an abstract value. This value should only be a proxy value for other concrete outcomes/values, ideally. But let's turn it around. Only because it's free and democratic does not guarantee it is effective and doing good. But without it, there will be no chance for good outcomes.

I agree with your general message, it probably would be better to have a cause "for" something good and not against something bad. Only sadly it seems that in practice people are easier to unite against something or out of fear of something.

Oh je... Naja, der hat bei der Wahl auch seiner Basis versprochen keine neuen Schulden zu machen, man kann ja hoffen, das mit den Windrädern war jetzt auch nicht so gemeint. Muss man schon verstehen, da war halt Wahlkampf, und man sagt so ein paar wilde Dinge einfach mal, wie wird man denn sonst Kanzler ?

By authority of the central bank and the state? Checks out.

Are you mixing up some things? The only person who publicly said something about dismantling is the crazy lady from the AfD. I don't like Merz, but I've not heard anything about him shitting on wind energy directly.

However you are right that our new government will probably suck pretty much. The only option that was possible without involving fascists, sadly.

How I wish our societies could get there. Agree on a humane and empathy driven system, as you say. Maybe imperfect, but practically feasible and pragmatic. Idealistic in spirit, but not naive. Friendly, but with teeth if provoked. Something that can survive in this world and still be a good place for everyone, without illusions but also without cynicism and hypocrisy.

Yeah I also believe that good communication is key. Communication with everyone we might even strongly disagree with, as long as they are not actually beyond that in their beliefs and are just mislead or uninformed etc., but well-meaning. Such people need to be somehow included and heard and not pushed away into the arms of the extremists...

Yeah you can't argue with logic and reason of the other side does not accept this language and is always acting in bad faith. Engaging fascists civilly is always helping them gain ground. But not engaging with them becomes more difficult the more mind share they gain. How should not engaging look in practice? All of politics and media would need to stop giving them a platform at once. And again this is something we regular people don't really have in our hands at all.

Nobody is really trying to stop the oligarchs and their lobbies, it's the only real political taboo that remains. People watch the right rising and it's being shown as if that was coming out of nowhere and too unregulated capitalism wasn't the main driver of the issue. The occasional article points out that billionaires should not have so much power or even exist, but these are drowned in the noise of the media.

Haha nice bait, which I took to get some actually interesting statistics, well executed !

Here is your comment, you deserve it. Now your post made it to "average"! You're welcome.

(Was there any correlation between upvote count and the comment-based metrics? That could also be pretty interesting)