DocWatts

That's because you can moralize and preach to people until you're blue in the face, but until you actually take the time and effort to understand and address the obstacles that are making it difficult for disadvantaged communities to self actualize it's not going to work. At a minimum this would include public investments to provide well funded schools, functional infrastructure, jobs that pay a livable wage, public transportation, affordable housing, funding for public safety, support for at risk teenagers through youth programs and sports, sex education including easily available contraceptives, and an actual path out of poverty and towards a decent life. If the person outside of these communities is advocating for these things in a serious way, then I have no problem whatsoever with advocating for personal responsibility as part of this overall solution. But if your only 'solution' is to moralize at people without addressing any of these underlying systemic issues that are at the root of toxic and dysfunctional behavior, I feel no compunction on calling that behavior out as at best counter productive and at worst as potentially racist (or at the very least aggressively insensitive and ignorant).

The giga-cringe meme that started this thread is more or less a stupid person's idea of Hegelian Dialectics after taking one Intro to Philosophy Class

I kind of liken it to the differing roles and responsibilities for someone who has suffered a traumatic experience, versus how a community should respond to that happening. If you're going through a traumatic experience yourself, it's completely reasonable to look for warning signs you may have missed, what you could have done differently, etc. An outsider's role in this scenario is to provide love and support. Not to punitively criticize and berate that person for what they could have done differently in the bad scenario. Not to parrot thier words back at them to justify not helping that person.

That's totally valid. But at the same time whether this is being said from an insider vs an outsider's perspective makes all the difference. In a way it's a version of saying something similar from below (an outsider parroting discussions internal to that community for self serving reasons) or above (an insider with understanding that comes from lived experience). Similiar to how something like science can be critiqued from either below or above. To someone who's actually living in the bad situation your point can be potentially empowering, because a victim mindset isn't actually helpful for getting yourself out of a bad situation. An outsider parroting some of those same points without an actual understanding of the obstacles that people in a bad scenario will come across as condescending and potentially insulting. Rather than helping anyone, all they're really doing is absolving the broader society of its responsibility to remove external obstacles and barriers that that community is facing.

@Raptorsin7 There's a place for personal responsibility, but people need to be given a fair chance to succeed through external love and support. Moralizing at disadvantaged.communities without doing anything to actually address (or even understand) the obstacles that they face amounts to little more than talking down to people. It's condescending and insulting. Just preaching personal responsibility without advocating for actual policy solutions to address external barriers that make it harder to self actualize is evidence that you're not actually concerned about the well being of the people you're talking down to. Candice Owens is about as interested in the problems faced by disadvantaged communities as Fossil Fuel companies are in 'solving' climate change. Both are Bad Faith actors who are more interested in sweeping problems under the rug than in actually doing anything to solve problems, because both cases involve some amount of sacrifice (in the form of higher taxes, regulations, etc) from those who have isolated themselves from systemic problems

I think the challenge would be to develop a viable alternative to capitalism within a pluralistic democratic framework, while leaving room for other worldviews to co-exist without threatening the survival of the entire system. It's a challenging problem because even in an SD Green society you're still going to have some amount of Blue and Orange that are going to want (and have a right) to express themselves politically. So a relatively high degree of social solidarity around basic egalitarian values seems like a requirement, similiar to how both the Left and Right in many places agree on the basic principle of a national healthcare system.

I don't necessarily disagree, which is why a societal center of gravity at or near Green is a prerequisite for this type of system to be sustainable. Both for the reasons you mention, and because the population needs to be willing to defend it within the framework of a pluralistic democracy. I wouldn't expect someone within an Blue / Orange paradigm to have an expansive enough circle of concern to care about the well being of people in the third world. A social context where ordinary people are secure enough in their livelihoods to not be operating with a scarcity mindset would also seem to be a prerequisite as well. Not at all that surprising when we consider that people in a privileged position have more freedom to self actualize and expand their circle of concern. All this is to say that Green Social Democracy is better suited to measured implementation of aspects of Democratic Socialism than societies at earlier stages of development.

@Fleetinglife Awesome and informative write up. The idea of a revolutionary vanguard is mercifully left in the past, though it's somewhat understandable why it arose within the context it did. Not surprising at all that SD-Red / Blue ended up winning that power struggle, considering the desperation of the Survival Conditions at that time. It's an interesting counter factual to ponder how things could have turned out had Kerensky's Provisional Government been able to build enough of a basis of legitimacy to transition in to a social democracy, or had one of the other ideological wings been better at playing the political game than Lenin.

Also a system that's held afloat by suppressing a large chunk of the political spectrum is going to have substantial negative consequences and necessarily be authoritarian in nature. For Market Socialism to work the population needs to consent to its implementation and be willing to defend it within a democratic framework. Which probably necessitates a societal center of gravity at or near Green to be sustainable. But the attractors in developed countries are moving towards Green, so it's far from an unrealistic or unattainable prerequisite.

Can't see any way how that could be abused *cough* If your proposed system can't be implemented within a pluralistic democratic framework it's probably not worth advocating for.

Those are excellent case studies for the purposing of demonstrating that market socialism can work, but because the system hasn't been adopted on a country wide scale in a large developed nation like Germany or the US, there are still several unknowns and it behooves those of us who see merit in such a system to be honest about that. One can't just assume there won't be difficulties scaling this system up. That doesn't mean it's not worth advocating for, rather that we should use case studies that exist to inform how Market Socialism could be implemented in other contexts. Achieving such a system within a democratic framework is going to different than doing so within a relatively isolated nondemocratic country. Which is why I myself see gradual and measured implementation as a better path forward, most likely within the frame of a Social Democracy.

@LfcCharlie4 Noam Chomsky (a libertarian socialist) had an interesting response when confronted by a self professed Leninist during a Q &A session following one of his lectures.

Multinational corporations directly benefit from keeping the third world from developing, because it's a source of cheap and easily exploitable labor. They can also pay far less than full market share for resources that are extracted from very poor countries. They can benefit from the opening of developing countries as new markets for their goods, regardless of whether its to the detriment of the receiving country whose local industries aren't developed enough to compete with foreign imports. Institutions like the IMF and World Bank use debt as leverage to foster unequal exchange between the developing and the developed world. Multinational corporations lobby state governments to interfere with the development of poor nations, and prevent them from doing things like nationalizing natural resources, erecting protectionist trade barriers, or instituting labor laws. Naomi Klein wrote about this extensively in Shock Doctrine (which is on the book list I believe), and details how countries like Russia in the 90s were devastated by these practices. Even if Social Democracies such as Norway or Denmark don't directly participate in Imperialism, multinational corporations operating within their borders still benefit from the Imperialist practices and institutions put in to practice by countries like the United States. Consumers benefit from a flow of cheap goods made by people in countries with incredibly low wages and non-existent labor laws. In countries like the United States, this flow of cheap goods is used to 'subsidize' and let people survive to some degree on poverty wages payed by huge employers like WalkMart and McDonalds. Corporations are allowed to do this because the current way of running a large business is as a completely undemocratic and unaccountable syndicate, which uses the incentive structure of Capitalism to capture political institutions within governments to lobby for their private interests (up to and including imperialism). Generally it's a small handful of people making these decisions, and it's much harder to imagine how an organization that's run democratically and with transparency could condone half of the evil shit that many of these transnationals are up to. A socio-economic system such as Market Socialism where private industry is far more democratic and not given the opportunity to capture political systems by amassing enormous amounts of wealth and influence, would be far more limited in the ways it could motivate States to interfere in the developing world.

To be fair it's masking it with solutions that functionally make life much better for the people living within that particular country, but it does little to address exploitation of developing countries nor the contradictions which put democracy and capitalism at cross purposes

Politically, I'm flexible enough to see Social Democracy as a huge improvement over what exists in places like the United States, while also recognizing there are some problems inherent to that system (such as unequal trade with the developing world). Market socialism is quite promising in the ways in which it proposes to fix many of the issues inherent to capitalist economies, yet at the same time I'm able to recognize that because this system hasn't really been implemented on a large scale anywhere in the world there are going to be inherent challenges that will need to be worked out for it to translate in to real world policy and economics. And if it's going to be adopted, it should be done in a gradual and measured way. Never made sense to me to overly ideological about this, healthy politics is about dialogue, consensus, and coalition building rather rigidly adhering to a single viewpoint. I was listening to a political podcast once where someone described their viewpoint as the 'non-ideological Left', and even if that's a bit self contradictory I find it to be a healthier ethos to embody.

Socialism isn't really a united movement so much as a tent of Left wing ideologies that range from Anarchist (Mikhail Bakunin) to Libertarian (Noam Chomsky) to Authoritarian (Vladimir Lenin), with infighting between the various sects. I'd argue that there's more overlap between Libertarian Socialism (Green) and Social Democracy (Orange / Green) than there is between Libertarian Socialism and Anarchist / Authoritarian Socialism (both at Red / Blue). People who outright reject political pluralism aren't worth engaging with, regardless of whether they're on the Left or Right.

For people below a certain level of sophistication (usually SD-Blue or hyper-rationalist SD-Orange) whose idea of God is Sky Daddy, I usually just answer 'no' and leave it at that. If I'm talking to someone a bit more sophisticated and open minded I might say that I'm atheistic about a supernatural god, but more agnostic about a Hegelian embodied God that's a manifestation of the universe becoming aware of itself

Here in the US, the Republican Party has been drifting towards becoming a white nationalist party over the last half century. You have to understand that self interest doesn't only mean everyone economic policy, it's also about validating one's identity. For many poor white people who voted Republican, validation of thier resentments towards an increasingly diverse society that they feel is leaving them behind is a stronger motivator than economic concerns that will actually impact thier lives in tangible ways. For young people, the LGBT community, and communities of color a much more diverse and inclusive Democratic Party is also validating. But on top of that, since this side of the political divide is at a higher developmental stage than those who vote Republican, they're more successfully able to understand the connection between politics and material conditions that impact thier own lives.

And for me this is usually the result

In the context of contemporary US politics: Conservatives - Regressive. Picks an arbitrary point in the past to romanticize, and will take steps to roll back societal progress if given the opportunity Liberals - About preserving the status quo. May make some tweaks around the edges to ensure the continued viability of current Institutions (at least in the short term), but are unwilling to seriously entertain changing existing structures and institutions in a substantiative way. Leftists - Advocates for transformative change to existing structures and institutions. This runs the spectrum from pragmatic and reasonable to instances of game denial which doesn't give enough weight to existing contexts and constraints.

Yeah worth keeping in mind that those videos are Leo's own perspective on Spiral Dynamics, and intertwined with his own worldview and spiritual practice. As for Spiral Dynamics itself, I think it has far more utility as a sociological model for examining the dialectical interplay of meta-ideologies, than it has as a personal development model (for which something like Suzanne Cook-Greuter's model or the Model of Hierarchical Complexity is a much better fit).

Jordon Peterson reminds me of Scientology in some ways. In that both dispense very basic self help advice which does actually improve people's lives to some degree, but both are motivated by problematic ideologies that they intertwine with their motivational messaging, making both seem far more reasonable than they actually are. Though of course Scientology (it being a Cult and all) is far more malignant in thier motivations than Jordy P, who's really just a well intentioned evangelist for outdated values and social norms (when applied to the entire society in places like the UK, US, and Canada; they're perfectly functional for individuals stuck at Red)

@Raptorsin7 It's not whataboutism, it's just demonstrating the actual implications of empowering private citizens to enforce the Law through the use of vigilante violence. I chose that example because the Right is making a hero of Rittenhouse, with Trump supporters shouting about it the loudest (including the person who posted this thread). However, if I attributed to you political views that you do not hold, I apologize. As to looting and the destruction of property, the only legitimate use of violence from private citizens is to defend thier lives from immediate danger. If someone breaks in to your house you have a right to shoot that person because in that situation your life is in danger. Once that person leaves your house, you do not have a right to chase them down, shoot them in the back, and reclaim whatever it was that was stolen from you. It's the role of the Police and Criminal Justice system to enforce the Law, not that of a private Citizen to take the law in to thier own hands. If the Police aren't doing thier job, then Police Institutions need to be made more accountable to the communities they serve. Which is to be done using political institutions, rather than by untrained citizens with zero vetting or oversight getting to enforce the Law in whatever manner they see as appropriate.

By that logic DC Residents would have been completely justified showing up to the Jan 6 insurrection and gunning down the MAGA insurrectionists who were breaking in to the capital building to prevent the Election from being certified. Why not? Institutional biases within the Capitol Hill Police led to them to not take violence breaking out as a serious possibility, despite numerous warnings well in advance. Politicians wouldn't send in the national guard to restore order because it would look bad, and because Trump was hoping the insurrection would succeed in preventing the election from.being certified. And all while the lives of US representatives were in danger. Are you supportive of vigilantism because the one pulling the trigger in Rittenhouse's case is on your 'Team', or are you willing to take a more consistent and principled stance on this issue?

The role of how and when public demonstrations turn violent, and how law enforcement should respond when that happens is a discussion worth having. But it's a separate discussion from whether private citizens should have the Right to use vigilante violence to enforce the law. The world we're living in isn't Watchmen, a private citizen has no business going out of his way to travel to a protest with the aim of shooting looters. And what the hell did Rittenhouse accomplish by the way? Rather than preventing violence from breaking out, his presence escalated an already tense situation so that two people were killed. Both legally and ethically individuals have a responsibility to de-escalate. Vigilantism does exactly the opposite.