"Another Hopeless Venture" (The Comic)- Application

[Sol_Dynamite]

I'm going to take another approach to this situation and do something that I have been thinking up for a while.

The Possibilites of Communism Actually Working and the Reasons Why It Failed

This however is going to touch all over Capitalism, Anarchy, and Communism as a whole and the political agenda of the world at the time. I would like to point out even though that I am currently intrested in Karl Marx (I own both his Das Kapital and Communist Manifesto books), I'm not a Communist. In fact I'm not really anything more than an observer, an "observationist". And I think that is one the best stances you can take towards politics, observing.

Major Points:
- The time, the place, and the people involved in making Communism happen.
- The fact that every other country instead of helping Communist leaders did everything they could to stop it.
- Communist ideas vs. Capitalist connotation
- Corruption in the State and the mutation of the ideas to benefit the State.
- Western Idealism vs. Eastern Philosophy.

Why didn't Communism work? Why did it collapse in on itself only after 80 years of being carried out as a governemnt?

I have had a couple theories on why it is possible that Communism could have actually worked or have been an elaborate experiment created by Karl Marx to show that true equality can not be enacted alongside freedom. Freedom and equality is an oxymoron because think of it like this: If a person is truly free than he is free to not hold the ideals of equality, to discriminate, to eliminate what's different, to prejudge, he is "free" to do that, but he is not equal. Maybe Marx was trying to show through Communism that when everything is eliminated, social structure, race, income, special priveleges, intelligence, jobs, all of the things that define a person then that person is truely equal with his fellow man, but not free to seek a higher job, intelligence, income, to hold his racial beliefs above others, to be on a greater social platform.

Communism was a rushed political belief centered in a time of great change in Europe. Everyone was having a revolution, an industrial revolution, a self-determination revolution, empires were crumbling and breeding new states, new ideas, new situations. But why did Communism decide to surface in Russia? Why did V.I. Lenin take his Marxian beliefs to one of the most ass backwards countries in Eurasia, what was the benefit of a nation that had only begun to take on Industrialism (which is one of the main reasons Communism surfaced)? Did he not see that he would fail miserably? Hindsight I guess is 20/20 in some respects but he should have kept it in Germany or spread it some other way. It was also the wrong time, exactly the right time for Communism to rise, but the wrong time for Communism to work.

But all of that aside. What was really that horrific about Communism? When people think of Communism they think of shackles, death, corruption, Josef Stalin, the Cold War. The horrible connotation of what is only half truth.

Think about this, everybody is equal and all that you work for goes towards to benefit of the community. When you work, make your shoes, you don't get capital, instead your child goes to school and he learns for free, instead you get a free hospital visit, free surgery, free medicine, free housing, free food, all the basic necesseties for human life are paid for (which the necessities were learned in 7th grade science, water, food, shelter, etc.). Look at things now in the US. There isn't such things like that, everything has a price. Is that always good? To put a price on the possibility of life thriving through medicine, to put a price on the future of a community who depends on education to survive but if it is not paid for it slowly crumbles? Is it right to make people pay to live, to survive?

Communism is always looked at from a psuedo-capitalistic view, the opposite of Capitialism is Communism so it seems only right that something like that would happen. Communism, you aren't free, you can't be an entrepenuer, but you aren't poor. Capitalism you have this immense freedom, but you are poor or you are rich or you are middle class, there is such a line of disparity in Capitalism, if you don't suceed you ultimately fail and there is nothing you can do, there will be a failure. Hope is in Capitalism, hoping to not fail. So is it so bad to have so much security in Communism, the promise you will always have a job no matter what it is, or do people feel that being chosen for you job is wrong.

Why so?

It happens all the time in Capitalism but people fail to see it. You could go to college for years upon years and study advanced medicine, but if your labor skill isn't needed then there is no job for you so the jobs that are avaliable are filled. The more of a job there is the more likely thats the job you are going to take that job. For example:

You go to college, because thats the predesitination of every adult in a Capitalistic society, and you work towards getting your degree in like what I mentioned before medicine. But so is everyone else. So you have competition to try and be better than your rivals in the same field. Does it make you become better through competition? Sometimes. But most often times than not it leads to corruption. And when you do get out of college and your jobs are taken you have nothing but a skill you competitively worked hard for and nothing to do with it. So you take the jobs that aren't taken, hamburger flipper, trash man, etc. The supply and demand of jobs determines which job you get, you don't choose, capitalism chooses for you. There is no job security, there are no garuntees.

So shouldn't Capitalism be associated with loss, freedom, insecurity, oppression?

How is Capitalism oppressive? Because in a Capitalistic society there are the poor and the rich, the weak and the strong, the boss and his workers. The boss collects his profit and the workers work for him. He opresses them, he tells them what to do, they no longer make their own decisions. Is that truly free? Why does he not get down and work with his workers, instead he uses them.

The weak depend on the strong, the poor depend on the rich. And as long as the rich are around there will be poor. So what is so wrong with the dissolvement of social structure? To make everyone equal, is that so wrong? To abolish the rich who do the opressing and the poor who are being opressed?

When people think of Communism they get the wrong idea completely. They think of a big war machine, nuclear weaponary, and mass deaths. But that is a mere mutation of Communism brought on by bother Josef Stalin and V.I. Lenin. The real Communism was never practiced anywhere on the face of the planet. Does that mean that it is impossible? No. But did everyone try to make it as hard as humanly possible for it to work? Yes. That's why it mutated, so it could survive. Communism was no longer Communism, it was Stalinism, corruption of the State as a whole, the creation of secret police, the fierce action that needed to be taken so Russia wouldn't lose its battle...but why did it recieve so much flak? Why couldn't ideas such as Communism been accepted and helped along? Is Democracy and Capitalism the only way?

Stalin was corrupt, he gave Communism a bad name.

All be it Communism destroyed the idea of evolution, something that I myself strongly believe in. It didn't allow for any progressing because most progression happens when you have to adapt to be better. It is human nature to be better than those around you, to be the top, and if you are not then you are weak, and not fit, so therefore you fail at "Survival of the Fittest". Communism is against human nature, while Capitalism embraces it, that seems to be my only problem with it myself.

Why has Communism worked better in the Far East than it did in the west, take Communist China for example. it leads to world in population yet it is one of the most controlled and "successful" Communist states still around. Why is that? Is it Eastern philosophy, the ability to accept life for what it is and take into consideration of who it would help? Eastern humbleness?

Why wouldn't the Chinese just overthrow their government if their was something so wrong with it, we are talking 2 billion people, each person would just have to grab up a knife and you could practically stab their way through the government. Why haven't they held democratic elections? Why haven't they turned into a primarily Capitalistic country (although they have changed a bit to work into the framework of the rest of the world)?  Could Communism really work?

Theoritcally, Communism could be the best idea out there. Most people would not agree I'm sure, I wouldn't either if it were for the simple fact that it is the only government that promotes TRUE equality. We keep going on and on about it in our country, but it is never going to happen, if you want TRUE equality than you are a Communist. If you are a Capitalist you believe in Freedom.

I'm neither. By nature I have to be a Capitalist. But if I had a choice I would be nothing except a Survivalist.


I hope you enjoyed it, it took my quite a while to write this up. I didn't really try to "sell" you on anything but just give you a broad look at things from multiple perspectives, its what I do in my life. Just observe and allow multiple perspectives to be shown.

I'm going to sleep.

[Sol_Dynamite]

I can also do one on capital punishment if you want.

[Xepher]

No... I apologize, I just haven't had time to read it, work's been battering my skull a bit much lately. I'll get to it soon, I promise.

[Aetre]

i think the applicant is fine and all, but i would like to point out to any socialists or would-be socialists, read the book, The Road To Serfdom by Hayek. it's a 200-page systematic disproof of just about everything marx ever said. and it is beautiful.

[AskZeek]

Feh, it's easy to systamatically disprove anything.

Honestly, try making anyone who beleieves in anything not beleive in it anymore.  Logic is not a powerful tool in that reguard.

Which is why we still war over imaginary men in the sky.

[Aetre]

it's equally easy to disprove the "universal dismissal" argument. namely, you have to take known examples to prove that you don't know anything...

but seriously. hayek kicks ass.

[Xepher]

"I refuse to prove I exist," says God. "For proof denies faith, and without faith, I'm nothing."
"Ah, but," says Man. "The babelfish is a dead giveaway, isn't it? It couldn't possibly have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. Q.E.D."
"Oh dear," says God. "I hadn't thought of that." And promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.
"That was easy," says Man. Who, for an encore, goes on to prove that black is white and gets Himself killed on the next Zebra crossing.

--The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, on logical disproofs.


(I'm quoting entirely from memory here, so don't bash me too hard for getting a couple words switched around.)

[Sol_Dynamite]

i think the applicant is fine and all, but i would like to point out to any socialists or would-be socialists, read the book, The Road To Serfdom by Hayek. it's a 200-page systematic disproof of just about everything marx ever said. and it is beautiful.

Never said I was a socialist, I was simply touching on both things. I'll have to pick that book up on my next run though, along with a couple other books..."Beyond Good and Evil" "Thus Spoke Zarthusa" (both by Neitzche) and "Origin of Species" (by of course my main naturalist homie Charles Darwin).

I like Marx though, he was just speaking from his point of view of the time, he wasn't a rich man speaking for the poor working man in hope for political gain, he was a peasent fincially supported by Fredrich Engles (co-writer and editor of all of Marx's work).

But I don't agree with everything he said, however he did have alot of wise things to say on the other hand. However, most of his ideas got turned on their head and mutated. I mean I would rather work for communal gain in some cases and in individual gain in others. So I'll put it down like this:

Marx is interesting.

[Xepher]

Finally found the time to read the bit on communism. Interesting overview, but doesn't really tell me anything I didn't already know. What's interesting to me is that you picked communism as a subject. I was waiting to see what you pulled in terms of topic more than anything. Had you picked some cliche "pop-politics" thing... abortion, gun control, war in Iraq, etc... that... well, you didn't so let's move on.

The overview you gave was decently detailed, and some of your conjecture was interesting. However, at the end you suggest that communism is about true equality, and point out that it failed. However, I think you failed to see a possible connection between the two. Now, this is just my opinion, and I'm stating it because I like talking about things like this, but just because I believe differently in no way affects your "score." I do however, think that communism fails specifically because it's about true equality. The reason is that there is no such thing. Everyone is different, perhaps equal in general terms like "worth" or "humanity," but not interchangeable in the way the communism demands. Communism, in its purer forms, requires people to basically be interchangable cogs. That is, all people are expected to be equally good at all jobs. Problem is, you end up with mechanics playing doctor, and doctors sweeping floors. At the worst, it means incompetence, but even at the best, it still means a lot of people struggling in things they're not fit for, and that leads to depression and the overall failure of the system.


Okay, enough ranting, you win, you're in. Email should arrive shortly with instructions.

[Sol_Dynamite]

WOOHOO!

I would like to also point out something, that everyone seems to DEMAND equality. You see it everyday, people want this and this to be equal, they wanted to be treated the same. That's kind of what Communism did in a sense in the purest of forms and that was through the abolishment of social classes which both of us can see cause many problems of unequality in Capitalistic societies.

I don't think equality exists at all, people are different in all manners and any attempt to make them all the same would surely fail without some kind of outside intervention, which wouldn't be equality anyways because you would still have to distinct classes the controllers and the controlled. I read an intresting book about this a while back, I forgot the name for it was a WHILE back in the 6th grade or so, but I remember the premise. It set down that equality could not be achieved unless there was an average to reach, the smart would be less smart and the less smart would be more intelligent but not anymore intelligent than the average, the mean of society. There would have to be something to control that equality, like almost a State that controls what is intelligence and what isn't. Communism brings benefits to the State which is immuned to their own Communistic philosophies it seems.

It would probably destroy human existence and what makes it so great, the ability to be unequal and to succeed.

But what I meant to point out with that is some people desire Communistic properties in their government, and that's the demand for things to be equal, for everyone to be equal.

Erm, done. TIME TO GET TO WORK!

EDIT: I was tired when I wrote this so if it sounds like its just a bunch of structured rambles, its because it is.

[Sol_Dynamite]

Site Update:
 
It's been a while since I've said anything and I thought I should let you know that I'm still currently working on the site and my recent spill of inactivity (at least with the online part, I have been working on it feverishly offline in the little time I have) doesn't mean of lost intrest in the site itself.

Currently however I'm redoing everything (I thought I liked the layout and the color scheme, but now that I've started on my first comic it doesn't seem to fit right) and adding the banners now that I have my tablet, the ones up now are just placeholders. The site itself should be up within maybe 2 weeks, I might be a little swamped because I have to take my road test next week to get my license. But somewhere around the middle of Janurary you could expect the grand unveiling (which I will announce on here of course).

I've changed the site name to "Phantom White Studio" instead of just "Another Hopeless Adventure" which is the main comic, instead I wanted the site to showcase all of my work at once. I'm currently working on my practice comic "Diamond Pepperoni" then starting on "Another Hopeless Adventure" when that gets off the ground (I'm still working on the script with that.).

Well, just thought I would keep you updated.