Comparing communists to liberals

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When conservatives criticize liberals they often compare them to communists. I disagree with this comparison as I think that Soviet communists in many ways would agree with conservatives rather than liberals. But let me make it a point that I have a lot more respect for soviet communism than I do for american liberalism -- coming from Russia I am nastalgic about communism. So IF you could convince me that american liberals have things in common with communists, maybe I would like liberals better. But I am not convinced about it at all, so I don't like liberals.

Don't get me wrong I don't think the goal of building a communism is a realistic one, but like I said I just feel nostalgic and I miss the good old soviet days. Sometimes I just feel like if communists were to get back in power in Russia I would magically become younger. Of course that won't happen, but I would love to think that it would!

Anyway, back to the topic of this thread. Here are the differences between liberals and communists:

a) Liberals support gays, communists oppose them

b) Liberals support things like affirmative action and accomodating students with disability. Communists didn't do it. On the contrary, in soviet union they had country-wide education standards that everyone had to comply with, and those standards were really high: for example everyone knew calculus in high school. US liberals wouldn't want that, since they would worry that black students wouldn't keep up.

c) Liberal statement is "be who you are". The communist statement is that everyone should change. As a matter of fact the idea of communist society where everything is free is based upon the idea that people would undergo ideological transformation that would enable them to work hard "despite" lack of incentive to. That is totally different from American liberal approach where they give free handouts to minorities "without" having them undergo that transformation.

d) Communists are antisemitic, liberals aren't. Now, this part would make communists worse, since I don't think antisemitism is a good thing. But it just stresses the point that they aren't liberal -- which is the premise I need to make in order to make the other points.

e) Putin -- who is former KGB agent -- supports Trump, who is Republican. Now its true that Putin is no longer a communist: in fact, communist party is one of the "opposition parties". But still it sort of makes the point that Russian things aren't liberal things.

I guess to be fair I can see the following two similarities between liberalism and communism:

(i) They both tend to be less religious than people that don't subscribe to their ideologies (well, in case of liberals its "less religious" while in case of communists its militant atheism -- but you see my point)

(ii) They are both in favor of free handouts, although for different motives

But still, all the other items I listed makes it clear they shouldn't be confused.

By the way I am really nostalgic about Soviet Union. Let me end it by giving you those few non-political clips that would just remind me of the good old days:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLnE4ny ... BqV96bMBGQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtmOsLdH2ac

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-cjRMYfKLRQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhKPao1ray8

There's a great distance between all forms of "liberalism" and Communism.

To call most of the Democratic candidates socialists is absurd. Perhaps some of them have a few socialist ideas---but they want to maintain the overall capitalist economic system of this country.

I don't agree with the idea that we have a capitalist economic system in the US.
We have central economic planning and controllers of the monetary system. The fed's monopoly on money is not capitalist or free market.
More than 50% of all healthcare is paid for using government dollars. This is incredibly far from capitalist. There's a reason why nobody has the audacity to call food a right and that's because the reality of how much prices increase when something becomes a government protected right will be too obvious for all to ignore.
Corporate welfare is all over the place. Sports teams taking in billions and paying incredible salaries to athletes while they get government dollars to build stadiums.
Garbage - Waste services are incredibly subsidized and waste management companies are allowed to dump their trash on public land, including the ocean, giving them very cheap ways to dispose of their product (while wrecking the environment). In a capitalist system they would own the land that they dump on and sanitation charges would be exponentially greater than they are (and we'd have a much healthier environment).
Bank bail outs, automobile industry bail outs...

The days of a capitalist economy in the US has long passed and I would say that both D's and R's are socialists.

The means of most production is not controlled by the State. It’s only regulated. It’s controlled by the private sector, primarily, with government subsidies sometimes in a few areas.

We have a few socialistic components to our economy....but not as much as most European nations.

I would concede that it's not socialist or capitalist, but I still would never consider what we have to be a free market or capitalism. The trajectory is socialism though if I was forced to pick a side. I also have a hard time using the word "few" when describing the industries that get government subsidies. Athletics, farms, healthcare, education, waste disposal, banks, automobiles and when the IT bubble bursts they will enter that list too. What isn't subsidized?

I agree that in terms of the economy there might be similarities between liberals and communists; but I wasn't focusing on economy, I was focusing on morals. In terms of morals I think communists are conservative in many ways.

Communism, as practiced in many nations, had many elements of conservatism, and even more right-wing tendencies which give the impression of fascism.

Yeah, thats precisely my point.

It's sad to me that we even have discussions on what the moral code is attached to a specific governing philosophy.

Ideally a moral code should have zero part in determining laws. Reducing government to protecting private property and a person's right to free will, so long as it doesn't impede others, would make for a really great place to live. Unfortunately communism, liberalism and modern conservatism all believe in forcing their morality on others which is incredibly frustrating and stands in the way of true human progress.

I agree with you that lack of government-imposed morality would be the best. But since ALL political parties impose their moral codes -- no matter what that party is -- then its best to pick the one that imposes the moral code that I like. Lesser of two evils I guess.

But, despite saying "lesser of two evils", this morality question is important one, far more important than economy. I mean, having a government force the type of morality that I find immoral is too high of a price to pay for having somewhat better economy.

The "best of two evils" game has sure brought us to a pretty dark place in government leadership, no? I am unable to accept the best of two evils as a legitimate and sustainable approach to voting.

Then what would you suggest? Not vote? Well then others would vote for you. You would still end up with one of the candidates becoming a president, whether you vote or not.

Me personally, I like third party candidates since I am tired of this whole two party system (although I voted for Trump since he felt like the only third party candidate who could actually win). But then again third party candidates have some morals to push on people too -- they are just different from the ones we are all tired of. Same goes for communists (and no, communists aren't either of those two parties no matter how much people like to say that they are).

I think it's a mistake to say that communists are homophobic. There are homophobic communists, but there are also communists who promote LGBT+ rights. (There have also, historically, been homophobic liberals - I would suggest that today it would be more usual to refer to such people as "centrists", usually with pejoratives attached, rather than "liberals").

Indeed, it's on economics that communists and liberals are furthest apart. Liberals believe in the power of markets with sensible regulation as the most efficient way to distribute resources and guarantee prosperity, although they usually acknowledge the need to overcome certain market failures. Communists outright don't believe in markets and think resources should be centrally managed, including manpower.

I note that extreme libertarianism - "governments should just be for protecting property" - is just as much "forcing a moral code" as any other form of government.

Haven't some of you read Rerum Novarum (Leo XIII, Pont. Max., May 15, 1891?)

Morals don't get more conservative than Catholic ones. (Westboro Baptist stuff isn't conservative, it's radical)

And we hate communism, laissez-fair capitalism, socialism, and Revolutionary liberalism alike. It's equal opportunity!

So no, I'm not joining in the nostalgia party for the USSR. Good riddance!

Well, back in the Soviet Union, homosexuality was a crime punishable with jail. Yeltsin got rid of this law (I don't remember if it was 1993 or 1995, one of those two) but that was after the collapse of Soviet Union in 1991.

The first time I heard the concept that homosexuality is good and homophobia is bad was in America, in 1997 (that was three years after I moved from Russia to America). So right before the beginning of history class one girl was calling the other lesbian and the history teacher interrupted them and said that she just had a meeting about homophobia at school and how horrible it is. My first two thoughts were "doesn't she see that they don't mean it literally but rather tease each other" and "why is she defending gays, is she gay or something?" So that second thought shows you that I never heard of a CONCEPT of anyone ever defending gays. Now, shortly thereafter, I heard a whole bunch of that concept and was asked to write essays about it in various classes. But like I said, I was already in America.

So the point is: back in Russia the fact that homosexuality is bad was a given, nobody ever told me there were any controversy about it. I guess its possible I didn't hear everything since I am isolated due to Asperger. But if you look at the stats here https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2013 ... sexuality/ they confirm my point: in Russia 74% of people anti-gay and 16% of people pro-gay, while in America 33% of people anti-gay and 60% of people pro-gay

I never heard of it. What is it about?



Ever since Vatican 2, catholics became a lot more liberal than they used to be



"Westboro Baptist church" is a parody website (unless I am confusing the name) -- so that church doesn't exist, and the authors of that website don't hold those views either.

However, as far as "actual" baptists go, yes a lot of them are a lot more conservatives than catholics. I am referring to after Vatican 2; I don't know how they would have compared before then.



Thats because you weren't born there and you only know about it from what your country's media wants you to know. I find that American perception of communism is quite distorted -- and the idea of equating communists to liberals would be one example of that distortion among many others.