|
Korean Job Discussion Forums
"The Internet's Meeting Place for ESL/EFL Teachers from Around the World!"
|
| View previous topic :: View next topic |
| Author |
Message |
Sergio Stefanuto
Joined: 14 May 2009
Location: UK
|
 Posted: Thu Apr 01, 2010 10:39 pm Post subject: |
 |
|
Thanks, OP.
Whether 'lies' is the right word or not, it succeeds in offering a stark insight into the psyche of the far left.
For example:
| Quote: |
The Lie: �Also relevant is the history of collectivization in China, which, as compared with the Soviet Union, shows a much higher reliance on persuasion and mutual aid than on force and terror, and appears to have been more successful.�
The Truth: Its culmination was the Great Leap Forward, the worst man-made catastrophe in history, in which 30 million died.
|
|
|
| Back to top |
|
 |
rollo
Joined: 10 May 2006
Location: China
|
| Posted: Thu Apr 01, 2010 11:25 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Saw an old video of Chomsky being interviewed by Bill Buckley. buckley chewed him up and spit him out. It was painful to watch as Chomsky had no facts to back up his assertions and seemed to be fabricating things. Buckley cooly tore everything he said to pieces. .He is not a historian and seemed unable to see outside of the paradigm that the U.s. is bad and all those who oppose the U.S. are saintly. Rather pathetic. He defended the genocide in Cambodia, a big fan of Pol Pot is Noam. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
visitorq
Joined: 11 Jan 2008
|
| Posted: Fri Apr 02, 2010 7:30 am Post subject: |
|
|
Chomsky is a master at disinformation, and a leftist gate-keeper. Some of what he spouts is actually quite true, but like Michael Moore he always stops well short of the full truth. He never mentions the Federal Reserve or central banking at all, or any of the think tanks or round table groups that control the governments around the world. If something like the Council on Foreign Relations or the Trilateral Commission is ever brought up he just balks, gives his usual smug dismissal of it and changes the subject (typically to bashing capitalism).
I can't stand the guy, I think he's a total cretin. Still, he's dangerously effective at gate keeping the leftists, keeping them focused on any issues other than those that matter most (like the Federal Reserve). I wouldn't be in the least surprised if he actually works for the CIA. I don't have direct evidence of this, but he sure fits the bill. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
mises
Joined: 05 Nov 2007
Location: retired
|
| Posted: Fri Apr 02, 2010 7:48 am Post subject: |
|
|
| He has an agenda. Don't we all? I respect his free speech stance and agree strongly with his positions on non-violence. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
visitorq
Joined: 11 Jan 2008
|
| Posted: Fri Apr 02, 2010 8:26 am Post subject: |
|
|
| mises wrote: |
| He has an agenda. Don't we all? |
Yes, but most people do not have hidden agendas. Chomsky does. You gotta wonder why someone purportedly so anti-capitalist never talks about the power behind the scenes and the banking establishment that controls it all (not real capitalism of course, but the point stands). Chomsky is there to distract people and frame the discussion away from the bottom line issues (like the Fed and globalist round-table groups that control governments). That is the role he plays, and he plays it well. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Sergio Stefanuto
Joined: 14 May 2009
Location: UK
|
| Posted: Sun Apr 04, 2010 10:12 am Post subject: |
|
|
| In the 'Citigroup is Toast' thread (let's not take it offtopic), Chellovek wrote: |
[Socialism] seeks to use the state to redistribute wealth to the working-class, more equitable distribution of wealth through state ownership etc.
|
The most pure manifestation of socialism remains Cambodia 1975-9. They successfully eliminated the market, all private ownership, and also money itself - all of which replaced by malnourished slave labor in massive rural and collectivist farms. A socialist could hardly ask for more than that. Certainly, this was communism rather than socialism, since some private property is permissible under socialism, but communism is just socialism - government ownership and operation - applied to the whole of society (including the decision as to who lives and who dies) and not just to the means of production.
A man who tries to do 10 things at once will inevitably find that he does all of them poorly. Likewise, a government with too many responsibilities and a finite budget finds itself having to cut corners and prioritize between one public work and another. Again, the most stark illustration of this is in Pol Pot's Cambodia, where corpses were found with their heads smashed in (the govt wanted to save on bullets. . .)
So, socialism even prevents a govt whose purpose is to exterminate 25% of its own population doing so efficiently. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Sergio Stefanuto
Joined: 14 May 2009
Location: UK
|
| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 7:41 am Post subject: |
|
|
A similar character to Chomsky - Portuguese Nobel laureate in literature, Jose Saramago - died last week, aged 87.
He was a dedicated communist and a harsh critic of the State of Israel.
You know you're on the far left when over 100 million people being murdered by practitioners of your political creed is either ignored or excused but you get bent out of shape when Israel kills nine. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Leon
Joined: 31 May 2010
|
| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 8:37 am Post subject: |
|
|
| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| communism is just socialism - government ownership and operation - applied to the whole of society (including the decision as to who lives and who dies) and not just to the means of production. |
Wrong, in communism there is no government. Anyways regardless of politics Chomsky is a brilliant linguist. Some of his works on foreign policy are good, many are overly simplistic. He is quite right about much of what he says about Latin America, especially during the cold war, but his more recent works I've found a bit more dubious. I do feel that he downplays violence in communist countries.
His work on the media is stellar though, manufacturing consent is one of the most thorough books I've read. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
recessiontime
Joined: 21 Jun 2010
Location: Got avatar privileges nyahahaha
|
| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 8:47 am Post subject: |
|
|
no government in communism?
 |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Leon
Joined: 31 May 2010
|
| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 9:21 am Post subject: |
|
|
| recessiontime wrote: |
no government in communism?
|
"Pure communism" in the Marxian sense refers to a classless, stateless and oppression-free society where decisions on what to produce and what policies to pursue are made democratically, allowing every member of society to participate in the decision-making process in both the political and economic spheres of life."
No such thing as a communist country, just authoritarian ones that use the name. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Sergio Stefanuto
Joined: 14 May 2009
Location: UK
|
| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 9:40 am Post subject: |
|
|
| Leon wrote: |
| "Pure communism" in the Marxian sense refers to a classless, stateless and oppression-free society where decisions on what to produce and what policies to pursue are made democratically, allowing every member of society to participate in the decision-making process in both the political and economic spheres of life." |
This quote doesn't support your assertion that there is "no government" in communism |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Sergio Stefanuto
Joined: 14 May 2009
Location: UK
|
| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 10:20 am Post subject: |
|
|
| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| Leon wrote: |
| "Pure communism" in the Marxian sense refers to a classless, stateless and oppression-free society where decisions on what to produce and what policies to pursue are made democratically, allowing every member of society to participate in the decision-making process in both the political and economic spheres of life." |
This quote doesn't support your assertion that there is "no government" in communism |
Oh dear, Leon, this quote also doesn't contain citations for "oppression-free" and "made democratically".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communism
Why didn't you provide the wiki link? And why did you delete "citation needed"? In a thread essentially dealing with academic malfeasance, how fitting. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Leon
Joined: 31 May 2010
|
| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 11:14 am Post subject: |
|
|
| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| Leon wrote: |
| "Pure communism" in the Marxian sense refers to a classless, stateless and oppression-free society where decisions on what to produce and what policies to pursue are made democratically, allowing every member of society to participate in the decision-making process in both the political and economic spheres of life." |
This quote doesn't support your assertion that there is "no government" in communism |
Oh dear, Leon, this quote also doesn't contain citations for "oppression-free" and "made democratically".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communism
Why didn't you provide the wiki link? And why did you delete "citation needed"? In a thread essentially dealing with academic malfeasance, how fitting. |
Out of convenience. If you've read the communist manifesto, required reading for my political theories class, then you would know that the end of government is an important point in communism. The Wikipedia was used because it provided the information in a quick and easy format. Here's proof from Karl Marx's pen in the communist manifesto.
"The Communists are further reproached with desiring to abolish countries and nationality.
The working men have no country. We cannot take from them what they have not got. Since the proletariat must first of all acquire political supremacy, must rise to be the leading class of the nation, must constitute itself the nation, it is so far, itself national, though not in the bourgeois sense of the word.
National differences and antagonism between peoples are daily more and more vanishing, owing to the development of the bourgeoisie, to freedom of commerce, to the world market, to uniformity in the mode of production and in the conditions of life corresponding thereto.
The supremacy of the proletariat will cause them to vanish still faster. United action, of the leading civilised countries at least, is one of the first conditions for the emancipation of the proletariat.
In proportion as the exploitation of one individual by another will also be put an end to, the exploitation of one nation by another will also be put an end to. In proportion as the antagonism between classes within the nation vanishes, the hostility of one nation to another will come to an end."
Marx saw society as evolutionary, and thought that socialism was the last step before a state less communist society. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Sergio Stefanuto
Joined: 14 May 2009
Location: UK
|
| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 1:59 pm Post subject: |
|
|
Well, I didn't realize you were referring to Marxian philosophy, firstly as there being "no government" in communism, and secondly as "pure communism".
Marx envisaged the gradual withering away of the state, that's true, albeit after the violent overthrow of private enterprise and in its place a command economy. This idea led to the unnecessary and cruel deaths of millions of people. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Leon
Joined: 31 May 2010
|
| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 3:09 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
Well, I didn't realize you were referring to Marxian philosophy, firstly as there being "no government" in communism, and secondly as "pure communism".
Marx envisaged the gradual withering away of the state, that's true, albeit after the violent overthrow of private enterprise and in its place a command economy. This idea led to the unnecessary and cruel deaths of millions of people. |
That's true. Communism in practice doesn't work. I'm not a communist by any means, I just find it frustrating when governments are called communist, but are more along the lines of authoritarian. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
|
|
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum
|
|
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Usergroups
Register
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
