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By: - 3rd September 2016 at 18:43 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Excellent debate. Theodore Dalrymple is quite a star. He used to write now and again for the Sunday Telegraph.
MBS
Thanks for bringing this to our attention.
By: - 4th September 2016 at 00:06 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Hi John...
This is just the start, we've got so many things to show... :highly_amused:
By: - 4th September 2016 at 13:06 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Ramble on ☺
By: - 4th September 2016 at 13:30 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I haven't hear of that. Is it a former Beatles hit ?
By: - 4th September 2016 at 13:41 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
You have heard of the Beatles, then? No, not them. Probably didn't get as far as your 1950's Tory dream-world. Warning: 1:10 onwards might make you spill your Ovaltine - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=S0NFaQcTJsg
By: - 4th September 2016 at 15:12 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
In that case, I won't watch it. Thanks for the warning. My bedtime cocoa is very precious.
By: - 4th September 2016 at 15:51 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Sounded like a bit of a tedious ramble from both sides to me.
By: - 6th September 2016 at 16:29 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Socialism is a farce that will never ever work.... fine in principal, but while the Soviet population lived in squalor and with shortages of everything, the party elite lived a grandiose life style of Dachas, Private holiday villas and plenty of everything the decadent west produced. For every ideal there are those that will rise to the top and take advantage of that position to better their cause..
Lenin's home and Roller
http://www.lateet.com/lenins-former-estate-and-home-of-his-death-mask/
Communist flats
says it all really
Communist leader Nicolae Ceausescu's home
http://www.local-life.com/bucharest/pages/b.968_palace-of-parliament.jpg
everyone elses
https://thevelvetrocket.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/romanian_revolution_tour.jpg
Socialism, a political and economic theory of social organization which advocates that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole.
By: - 6th September 2016 at 17:41 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
To true Tony.
By: - 6th September 2016 at 19:01 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Socialism is a farce that will never ever work.... fine in principal, but while the Soviet population lived in squalor and with shortages of everything, the party elite lived a grandiose life style of Dachas, Private holiday villas and plenty of everything the decadent west produced. For every ideal there are those that will rise to the top and take advantage of that position to better their cause..
Which only goes to prove that theory about excrement floating.
The essence of socialism has never been practised when governing a nation. Soviet Russia was communist Russia, despite calling itself socialist Russia - which any student of politics will tell you it was not.
The excesses of the communist regime more or less match those of a fascist regime - both are essentially dictatorships where any attempt at voting is skewed and the opposition (if they are permitted) are scapegoats for whatever the ruler/s care to blame them for, the common downtrodden people live in fear of changes in direction and political mood swings, the accepted class system still has a ladder with the lowest rung being those in a position of disenfranchised worker and the highest an elite whose position has been given as a reward or due to their usefulness to the regime, where if they upset those in authority then they can become an 'unperson' and disappear into the legion of missing or be subjected to a show trial where their crimes - real or not - will be revealed to the world. Witness the treatment of East Europeans or South Americans in the latter half of the last century, or the happy state that is North Korea at the moment.
But you all know this.
A socialist utopia has yet to happen, anywhere. You would do better to pass judgement on one when it happens.
By: - 6th September 2016 at 19:10 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
It will never happen.
By: - 6th September 2016 at 19:34 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
No. Too many way too interested in getting their snouts in the trough for their own personal gain.
But it is a bit like insisting the world would be a better place if we were all Buddhists. It might be, it may not, but since there will always be mankind involved in the decision we shall never know.
By: - 6th September 2016 at 19:44 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
"A socialist utopia has yet to happen, anywhere. You would do better to pass judgement on one when it happens."
I won't hold my breath...
By: - 6th September 2016 at 20:19 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Oh, please do...:oD
By: - 6th September 2016 at 20:37 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
No. Too many way too interested in getting their snouts in the trough for their own personal gain.But it is a bit like insisting the world would be a better place if we were all Buddhists. It might be, it may not, but since there will always be mankind involved in the decision we shall never know.
"Too many way too interested....!
I'd given up on ever finding anything intelligent or original in any of your scribblings. I stand corrected.
By: - 6th September 2016 at 20:53 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I am only too pleased to have made an old man happy. Without paying him is a bonus, of course.
Let us celebrate; have some undercooked chicken, John?
By: - 6th September 2016 at 21:41 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Got news for you, John and Paul. How do you think we won the last world war? State organisation, sacrifice for the common good, a sense of collective effort over individual material gain.
Socialist principle works, in fact it has worked repeatedly over the years. You think we'd have ever stood up to Hitler by applying modern capitalist virtues? Where's the fast buck? Not in standing up for Poland. Or even ourselves, if the price is right.
It's only when the 'ism' becomes corrupted by power that we hit problems. Yes, human nature means a socialist 'state' is doomed to fail. But that is not an excuse for 'self over society' - thus denying the positive principle of socialism (in a non-state-imposed sense).
I have never been a socialist in political (ie voting) terms for this reason. But I don't believe the principal to be wrong.
There 's no logic in 'The fact we're all too selfish makes being unselfish wrong'.
By: - 7th September 2016 at 00:58 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
How do you think we won the last world war?
Well, that's maybe how Britain fought the war.....but I doubt that's why we won the war!
What did we do differently from Germany, Japan or Italy then? Didn't they fight the war with 'state organisation, sacrifice for the common good, a sense of collective effort over individual material gain'?
And yet those countries lost their war.....very, very badly in fact.
No, whether you were on the winning or losing side of the Second World War is absolutely no proof of the effectiveness (or otherwise) of 'socialist principle' whatsoever; in fact, it can be argued with some conviction, that the war was won as much by military industrial capacity, private enterprise industrial capacity, as almost anything else!
By: - 7th September 2016 at 01:40 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
You think we'd have ever stood up to Hitler by applying modern capitalist virtues?
Would we? Or could we?
Britain certainly could have stood-up to Hitler whether Britain embraced 'socialist principles' or not; I doubt you could argue that Britain stood-up because we were 'socialist'. France was arguably more 'socialist' than Britain and yet, not only did France not stand-up to Hitler as well as one may have hoped, plenty in France were more than sympathetic to the aims of Nazi Germany.
Does 'socialism' frown on 'making a buck', or does it just frown on making a 'fast buck'? (And yes, I am aware of the connotation of that expression.) I thought 'socialism' just cared who made the 'buck' rather that how it was made (assuming it was made in a sustainable, 'ethical' manner) since even 'socialism' must ultimately be driven by the bottom-line; whoever is in charge the means of production must make a profit (or avoid a loss) since no loss-making enterprise is sustainable long-term. And plenty of 'capitalist' means of production make lots, and lots, of very 'slow bucks' too.
By: - 7th September 2016 at 01:44 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Not in standing up for Poland...
Hardly 'evidence' either-way, that one...
...what good did Britain 'standing-up' for Poland do (for Britain or Poland)? Apart from bragging-rights?
Posts: 1,071
By: MrBlueSky - 3rd September 2016 at 17:39
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THE OXFORD UNION SOCIETY
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLOAFgXcJkZ2we2fby4wIRwHsnwZ3onNr5