Why do conservatives mock communism, marxism, and socialism yet lack an understanding of any?

[LLStarks]

I just don't understand the modern day pseudo-McCarthyism.

[leftstreet]

1. It's not just conservatives mocking those things

There's plenty of it coming from the alleged 'left.'

[Echo In Light]

31. Exactly. There's a vast split between lefty Dems and rightward Dems

[hobbit709]

2. They only philosophy they have any understanding of is

"I got mine and screw you, Jack"

[knixphan]

7. exactly so.

and it's pathetic.

[baldguy]

3. Because Ronald Reagan & Jesus told them so.

(In that order.) No one said they had to understand it to know it's EEEVIEL!!!

[Lorax7844]

25. Bwaha, awesome response

:rofl:

[Xicano]

4. n/t

[Fumesucker]

27. Brilliant!! I love it.. n/t

[Curtland1015]

5. What's to understand? Commies tried to kill Rambo!

Commies must die!

In all seriousness, I don't think any of them know there's a difference between those things.

[Unvanguard]

6. Because like Ronald Reagan they thought understanding could come without reading. n/t

[jody]

8. Is it possible that "communism, marxism, and socialism" have both bad and good features or are you

contending they are without fault?

[Warpy]

9. Many of them are essentially parrots

and they spend their lives with their ears glued to conservative AM radio where the words are constantly disparaged without ever being explained. The average loudmouth is only repeating what he's heard from people who are either as clueless as he is or who have a vested interest in keeping him clueless.

If anyone ever did try to give him an inkling of words mean, he'd probably try to find another station to listen to, one that reinforces all the stuff he's already heard.

Since he spends so much time listening to this emotion based swill, he assumes he's being well informed.

They have as much understanding of what they're saying as a parrot does.

[Fumesucker]

28. You malign parrots, Sir..

There are indeed parrots that understand what they say, at least to some extent.

Not so with AM radio listeners.

[Gman]

10. To be conservative is to be low information

They must be low information or else their whole scheme collapses.

[Kansas Wyatt]

11. Brainwashed

People in this country have been told over and over again that all of what you mentioned is evil and should be fought. The conservatives are just the extremists parroting the propaganda.

[LuckyLib]

12. Fear.

[BolivarianHero]

13. Me neither...

The only predominantly Muslim countries with universal female literacy are the former Soviet republics. Socialism is the only ideology capable of enlightening societies that suffer from the plague of fundamentalism, rather Christian, Islamic, Hindu, or something else entirely. As for the problems that plague the Soviet, remember that Stalin and his proteges are megalomaniacs and that the post-revolutionary USSR ran into many caught in a bloody civil war in which over 20 foreign nations were providing military and logistical support to the Tsarist side.

[booley]

14. False certainty beats honest ambivalence

Simply put when it comes to arguing Liberals and Conservatives often have totally opposite problems.

Liberals want to be right but that means they also tend to be verbose and debate to the point of the ever infamous "circular firing squad".

Conservatives want to be certain so being right takes back seat.

In thier world view, "Communism" and "Socialism" are buzzwords, meant to replace any actual thought much less debate. When these words are used, the idea is that every con will automatically know what is meant and they will all be on the same page. Accuracy is not important and often even detrimental because the purpose is to manipulate, not inform.

This is a strength and a weakness. While Liberals may be right, they also are disorganized and not as successful at convincing undecideds. Cons on the other hand are great at getting their ideas out, even though those ideas are almost always failures.

A large reason that conservatism has fallen is because they got what they wanted for a long time.

And yes these are generalizations. But I have seen it enough to think it works a san explanation more often then not.

This reminds me of the series "Dawn of the New Sun" where in the far future, there was a society where people had to express every thought using ONLY pre-approved phrases.

Because as Orwell pointed out, Language is thought.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

15. Those are just three (of many) things they don't understand...

Indoor plumbing, for example...

[JanMichael]

16. Ignorance of alternative economic systems has been battered into our collective skulls.

Money money. Bling blam blubber.

[Rabrrrrrr]

17. And it's funny because there are legitimate and definite critiques to be made of those systems,

and yet, in the mocking from the right, those critiques are never made, favoring instead uninformed jingoism, which makes them look even dumber.

"You fool, there are a thousand legitimate critiques of communism and socialism, and you aren't bringing up any of them! HA HA HA!!!!"

Plus, you know, they really don't understand capitalism or the American version of regulated capitalism/partial socialism.


Because, of course, there is very little that they understand on anything even approaching a deep, informed, intellectual level.

[timeforpeace]

18. They just need to give communism, marxism and socialism a chance.

Someone, somewhere, sometime is going to successfully implement those -isms and then they'll see.

[jody]

19. Good point. What is the biggest mistake Russia made in its effort that should be corrected

"to successfully implement those -isms"?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

21. Being coercive and trying to make reality fit the philosophy

instead of making the philosophy fit reality.

[BolivarianHero]

30. A lot of it wasn't their fault, especially early on...

How do you build a utopia when fighting an army of moderates and Tsarists backed by over 20 foreign nations? Those of you who suggest taht Bolsheviks strong-armed their way to power without popular support ignore the fact that the Reds could not have won the Russian civil war in a vaccuum in the face of such overwhelming opposition. (And if it makes you feel better, I make this argument independent of any arguments that could be made about their performance once the dust had settled.)

[jody]

32. Interesting “21. Being coercive” versus “22. Not being violent enough”. n/t

[JVS]

22. Not being violent enough and taking our ruling class douchebags seriously

[jody]

33. Interesting “21. Being coercive” versus “22. Not being violent enough”. n/t

[Lydia Leftcoast]

20. They couldn't tell you the main points of these philosophies if you held a gun to their head

They're just parroting what their media idols tell them, because American pop culture has taught them that thinking and reading are for nerds, and the right-wing propaganda machine is busy filling all those empty spaces in their brains.

[HughBeaumont]

23. I asked this last week. You'd think the media would put this fire out.

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/HughBeaumont/93

These "cold war", Evil Empire-ish burns have no significance to those under 45. What I don't get is why there are people from my generation and younger that still cling to these lame canards. It's so phenomenally stupid.

[Blue_Tires]

24. usually when i see a RWer going on a rant like that

i ask the person to define the term, and it's usually crickets...

"communism, marxism, and socialism" tags are usually freely interchanged with the word 'liberalism' in the RW mind...I mean, during the primaries i actually had a friend call Hillary Clinton a communist...all i could do was laugh

[Peacetrain]

26. Communism does not exist..If they were talking about the old Soviet Union and China

That is dictatorship by committee.. I am not for that either.. Socialism.. The United States is a socialist country, periodically put through the hoops of recession by out of control capitalism.

[Odin2005]

29. Indoctrinated fear.

That said, I like mocking Marxism, too, but at least I understand it and thus can reasonably criticize it, and not just scream "GODLESS COMMIE 'MURKA-HATERS!!!" like the wing-nuts do. :banghead: