Thread: I just realized something... Version 1.0 was Socialism in practice.

Originally Posted by Eldryan

So much misinformation in this thread, Kira is right though, Americans have distorted the definition of socialism and many people now throw that word around without understanding what it really means, and end up mistaking it with communism.

Socialism is an ownership structure where society and it's citizens take a collective responsibility in the enterprise in question, and the benefits and services of that enterprise is then distributed fairly amongst the citizens. Your police and fire departments, are an example of a socialist organization, because they are paid for and funded by the public, and are suppose to serve each member of the public equally in it's entirety. A private police/security force on the other hand, would serve the private interests of whomever is paying for them, such as bank security guards. A private fire department would only respond to, and put out fires of homes where the owners pay a monthly protection fee.

Another example of a socialist enterprise (if you do not live in the US) is healthcare, every developed country excluding the US uses a socialized healthcare system. I'm not gonna get into any debate of which structure works better, but at the very least people should educate themselves on a topic before making false assumptions.

Some countries socialize their natural resources, meaning the profit from sales of natural resources of the land in their country are used to fund government operations, such as those mentioned in the previous paragraphs, which in turns allow the country to lower the taxes it need to collect from everyone. While other countries privatize those natural resources, allowing individuals or group to profit from sole ownership of the land, and not have to share that profit with the rest of the country.

Again, I will say I don't plan on getting into a debate on this forum, but hope I at least helped better inform some people. Using a word in the improper context or definition is akin to someone new to a country waving their middle finger everywhere because they thought it's a way of saying "hello".

tl;dr 'MURICA

Originally Posted by Eldryan

So much misinformation in this thread, Kira is right though, Americans have distorted the definition of socialism and many people now throw that word around without understanding what it really means, and end up mistaking it with communism.

Socialism is an ownership structure where society and it's citizens take a collective responsibility in the enterprise in question, and the benefits and services of that enterprise is then distributed fairly amongst the citizens. Your police and fire departments, are an example of a socialist organization, because they are paid for and funded by the public, and are suppose to serve each member of the public equally in it's entirety. A private police/security force on the other hand, would serve the private interests of whomever is paying for them, such as bank security guards. A private fire department would only respond to, and put out fires of homes where the owners pay a monthly protection fee.

Another example of a socialist enterprise (if you do not live in the US) is healthcare, every developed country excluding the US uses a socialized healthcare system. I'm not gonna get into any debate of which structure works better, but at the very least people should educate themselves on a topic before making false assumptions.

Some countries socialize their natural resources, meaning the profit from sales of natural resources of the land in their country are used to fund government operations, such as those mentioned in the previous paragraphs, which in turns allow the country to lower the taxes it need to collect from everyone. While other countries privatize those natural resources, allowing individuals or group to profit from sole ownership of the land, and not have to share that profit with the rest of the country.

Again, I will say I don't plan on getting into a debate on this forum, but hope I at least helped better inform some people. Using a word in the improper context or definition is akin to someone new to a country waving their middle finger everywhere because they thought it's a way of saying "hello".

^

Also your post reminds me of a fire department in ... Florida? I can't remember. They let a house burn to the ground, watching from a few hundred feet away saying that the owner's didn't pay the city/county its fire protection fee. America at it's finest haha. Also refused to take payment right there as it had to go through some sort of processing if I recall.

Originally Posted by MartaDemireux

^

Also your post reminds me of a fire department in ... Florida? I can't remember. They let a house burn to the ground, watching from a few hundred feet away saying that the owner's didn't pay the city/county its fire protection fee. America at it's finest haha. Also refused to take payment right there as it had to go through some sort of processing if I recall.

That was in Tennessee. It would be illegal for fire fighters to do that here in Florida.

Originally Posted by Eldryan

Socialism is an ownership structure where society and it's citizens take a collective responsibility in the enterprise in question, and the benefits and services of that enterprise is then distributed fairly amongst the citizens.

How do we decide what constitutes a "fair" distribution? How is such a thing determined or measured, and by whom?

Originally Posted by Eldryan

Some countries socialize their natural resources, meaning the profit from sales of natural resources of the land in their country are used to fund government operations, such as those mentioned in the previous paragraphs, which in turns allow the country to lower the taxes it need to collect from everyone. While other countries privatize those natural resources, allowing individuals or group to profit from sole ownership of the land, and not have to share that profit with the rest of the country.

Can you think of any example in which a privately owned company has not benefited the citizens in its local area?

Originally Posted by Rhianu

How do we decide what constitutes a "fair" distribution? How is such a thing determined or measured, and by whom?

For fair distribution, and easy example comes up of my home country's healthcare (England).

Everyone pays a little national insurance each month (comes off wages automatically).
Everyone gets the same healthcare.

The govt. decides how it's distributed, there's guildlines in place to help those who are less able to help themselves. While people may not get everything exactly the same (heeey communism), the idea is that if you're better off you can chip in and help those less fortunate, even have your own backside covered too in the process.

If you lost your job for example and could no longer pay national insurance, you'd get a living allowance, your rent paid for you plus a fortnightly stipend to help cover living expenses PLUS medications you may need 100% free.

When you found a new job, those stipends would be taken away but you'd still get free healthcare and your medications would cost a flat rate, when I left the country it was about 7GBP per item on the prescription (I can't make the pound sterling sign on my keyboard D:! lol).

I would like to say that even America has some strong socialist parts, such as Medicare/aid, unemployment and retirement stipend checks (I think the retirement one is called social security?). Again, it's the govt. that decides how these are distributed. It may be that you (general term) may be too well off to benefit from these at this time, but they are there incase you ever needed to fall back on them.

As for the last question, I can't think of a good example right now - Got a really foggy head and a stack of paperwork to mow through. I'll have a think on it