For what reasons is communism seen as being bad?

Question

And what are the good points to it?

I am interested in this but i dont know alot about it, i wiki'd it and it says "Communism is an ideology that seeks to establish a classless, stateless social organization based on common ownership of the means of production".

This seems good to me, i know there is alot more to it than this but is it the idea that is flawed, or is it the people that have thus far put it into practice?

Wolf, i really don't think there is any need to insult me, i fully admit that i do not know about politics, which is why i am reading about it and asking for people's input on here, i really cannot see how you making a personal attack on me is appropriate. You not know to what level i am educated, and i am not going to give you the satisfaction of telling you, but at least i am willing to learn, and at least i have manners.

Answer 1

it starts out fine and then the people who rule become corrupt.

So if humans were perfect it would be ok, but humans are imperfect and therefore need an imperfect system of government.

Besides, bush has already taken enough of our freedoms away.

Answer 2

Communism is seen as being bad because there are many misconceptions about it which are fed and propagated by ignorance. Also, it is a natural enemy to capitalism. Growing up in the period of the cold war between Russia and the United States, I had grown up thinking that communism was evil and to accept that statement at face value. After reading about the original ideals proposed by Karl Marx in his Communist Manifesto, I couldn't understand why for all that time people have simply hated it. Marx proposes that there is perpetual struggle between the bourgeois (middle class) and the proletariat (elite upper class) and that this fighting will continue until a system is devised to cancel the differences between the two classes. His idea was to create a classless society in which all people are equal in social rank. Money and property were all to be distributed by a central figurehead government whose will reflected the opinions of the conglomerated whole of the people. There are numerous flaws though and its institution as a form of government in any country yet has simply become a glorified dictatorship because of leaders heedless ambitions for power. The contradiction is that a classless society cannot exist because it is direction less and having a leader makes a classless society moot. It's irreconsilable. But the original idea was still in good spirit. A classless society would do away with poverty and hierarchal bigotry. No more advantages for the few rich people as we would all share equally. Your position in life would not be based on how cutthroat and dastardly you can be. People would be allowed to express themselves without being harassed by their position in life. Only problem is that it just hasn't worked. There is too much greed for an ambitious person not to take advantage of it. Communism also eliminates competition so that a good worker gets the same as a bad worker. since there is no benefit for doing an exceptional job, mediocrity becomes the new standard. In capitalism, it sure is nice to know that I can make myself as successful as I want simply by putting in the time and effort. Equality versus inequality. Control versus freedom. Individuality versus community. The question as to which is better in the long run is yet to be answered.

Answer 3

Good question, Comrade uksandy!

The thing is, for one, there has to be a leader. And, guess what? This abandons the whole thing about everyone being equal, for the leader is above them all.

Another thing is that a hardworking person would get the same amount of money as a lazy person, or a lawyer would get the same amount as a dustman, that kind of thing. In which case, the workers could just not do any work, and so is not providing for the country, but gets paid for it anyway. So, if not many people work, the standard of living drops, and the country can go into chaos.

Good points? Well, everyone is equal, so idealy, everyone should be happy, as they are earning as much as everyone else, and there is no superior (appart from the leader, of course), etc. Also, unemployment is abolished! In communism, the government aids its people to find jobs. I believe in soviet Russia, around the 50s or the 60s (going by memory here), the last unemployed person was given a job. Hurrah!

Edit: Wolf, that isn't communism. That is about individual leaders who ran by communism. I don't see anywhere in Karl Marx's little write-ups about "the communist leader must kill millions of his own men for no reason at all!" So, uh, don't call uksandy uneducated, because, well, you can't read. Sorry!

Answer 4

Good question. Communism really does work in theory, but the problem is that you give people more power by giving them the ability to organize the government into working groups. You have way more power than ever before, and power tends to corrupt people. That is why communism has never worked on a massive scale. On the other hand, it does work sometimes in small communities. Look up the trancendentalist movement and Robert Owen if you're interested.

Answer 5

Karl Marx wrote the "Communist Manifesto" which preached that society would eventually devolve from a class-based society (Bourgeousie) to a common class society (Proletariat).

The problem with communism in its modern interpretation is its most sever flaw. Common ownership of the means of production, means centralized ownership. That is the State owns the means of production and the people in theory own the State but the State owns everything (including the people).

The Soviet Union and Chinese tried this experiment which is still in my opinion doomed to failure.

Capitalism and market economies run on two basic axis points:

X = reward and Y = ownership of property.

The whole point is to utilize the market place to earn money. That begets innovation and the creation of what we know today to be infrastructure.

The most credible evidence that "communism" as an ideology (centralized ownership and control of the means of production) is the adoption by China of a market-based economy that is regulated by the State.

This market economy has created capital, which in turn is reinvested in the creation of infrastructure. Hence Shanghai, Beijing and other large Chinese cities are seeing the incredible growth of an infrastructure both inside and between these cities and the rest of the world. Railroad systems, airports, sewers, electric power plants, and other conveniences non-existent during Deng Chao Ping'ss time now exist where a scant 35 - 40 years ago they did not.

China's economy is blazing past most other Asian, European and the American markets. This explosive growth has allowed China to modernize. It has also brought unprecedented prosperity to a nation that has never, in its history seen so many people prosper into what we consider to be here, the middle class.

Now look to North Korea. It is a communist dictatorship which does not have a market economy. North Korea is backwards, its people are suffering and hungry. Its government spends every red cent it has on missiles and nuclear weapons while its people starve. There is no prosperity.

Need I say more?

Karl Marx's communist manifesto was nothing more than a utopian dream.

However, I will say that China has taken large steps to regulate its economy and prohibit the kinds of unbridled capitalism that led to the Laize Faire capitalism.

This hands-off approach has resulted in unstable economies and recessions.

So to a certain extent, modern governments today utilize a certain degree of centralized market controls, but otherwise let the "invisible hand" of the marketplace guide economic growth as Adam Smith suggested in his work, The Wealth of Nations.

Answer 6

In capitalism, supply and demand make for a nimble economy. If Joe wants a widget more than he wants a dollar, he goes to John, who wants a dollar more than the widget he's made. That's a sale, and both get what they want. There's always going to be close to an ideal number of Joes and their dollars, and Johns with their widgets, no matter how many of either there might be. Take John out of the equation, and Joe is not going to be able to rely on getting widgets, no matter how much he wants them. What has happened in all Communist countries so far is that the state tries to take the place of John with a "five year plan" for all of society, which winds up meaning that Joe is going to have to want what the state wants, not what he wants for himself. It simply isn't workable.
The old Russian story is that a village are jealous of the one villager in town who owns a pig. They go to the local commissar to complain that Ivan has a pig, and none of the rest of them do. The commissar promises to see if he can get each of them a pig, to which they reply, "No, we don't want a pig, we just don't want Ivan to have his!" That's how communism winds up working.
Your extreme choices are communism, in which everybody has an equal share of nothing, and unbridled capitalism, in which people have wildly unequal shares of everything. Most modern political arguments are over what compromises are wise.

Answer 7

The idea of everyone having an equal say in everything and an equal claim to everything etc works fine in theory or on a very small scale.

However when you come to running a country you need to have a government to handle international affairs,you need someone to command the military etc.These people are bound to have more power than everyone else and so the communist ideal collapses.

Answer 8

The problem is the how.

Communism as it is understood now demands the rule of a strong elite over the rest of the people, to _impose_ "a classless, stateless social organization based on common ownership of the means of production."

That elite are usually organized around a party (Soviet Communist Party, Khmer Rouge, China Communist Party, etc.).

Since an elite in power is needed to impose communist ideals, then a class system is established: those high-ranking members of the party above everyone else.

The basic problem is that humans don't have an innate tendency to "establish a classless, stateless social organization based on common ownership of the means of production," and since it must be imposed, the ideal itself of equality is destroyed in the process.

Answer 9

The people have thus far failed to put it into practice. In communist Russia there was always the elite politbureau that got all the perks, the car, the summer home on the Caspian, etc. Same with communist China, although they are doing a bit better there. Why? Because they are applying capitalist ideas to their economy. True parity among ALL humans is a pipe dream. At least with capitalism, in theory everyone has the same chance at the American Dream. In theory, anyway.

Answer 10

Because communism is BIG threat to the upper class, some people are going to TD me for saying that, but it's true. The USA and other Western countries used to be scared shitless that the lower/middle class would have a soviet style revolution, this is why everyone is taught communism is bad and also why the USA embargos trade with Cuba.

I am not pro communist however, I am merely stating why it's constantly repeated that communism is all bad etc..

Answer 11

Communism is seen as bad because of American propaganda. Our government thinks it bad because it takes power away from them and gives it to us "the people" So your hole life your government has been telling you and everybody around you its bad. The problem is there has never really been a communist country. Just a dictator laundered in communism. Sense the basic idea of communism goes against our human nature. It will never work. Somebody will be put into a position of power then exploit it...