I learned something disgusting today

Careful now, you know how some people react to facts….

Edit
but, but, greed is good

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You mean ‘some people react to facts differently than you or I.’ We tend to get off our butts, and do a bit of checking. Then we get back with the person posting the facts and thank them for the new information we were previously unaware of. But then, I don’t think that is the sort of ‘reaction’ you are referencing.

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Rejecting contrary or new information is a disturbingly common reaction (i.e. confirmation bias).
However, it need not be so. Much like a lack of emotion regulation, “fact rejection syndrome” can be managed with a modicum of effort.

Edit don’t confuse me with the facts

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I disagree that the Nordic countries are socialist, as per its definition. Granted, they started out in the 1930s as social democratic, but have transformed quite a lot in the past century. The nordics have free markets, high product market freedom, strong property rights, private ownership over the means of production, high levels of democracy, low corruption, and high social mobility. The nordics also have a strong emphasis on things like social safety nets, free education, universal healthcare, and worker’s rights. You can view it from a capitalist perspective as investments to keep the population healthy and happy, so as to stay in their jobs, and keep the economy running. More here.

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So we have a ‘recent movement’ in the previously socialist countries. I see you are correct as they seem to be classified as more centrist. Nordic Countries Aren't Actually Socialist Okay.

Does that let our ‘socialist hater’ out of the fishbowl? I’ve been to all the Nordic Countries, It was over 20 years ago, but the standard of life and medical care was all very good. I had experience in Sweeden, Denmark, and Finland.

So I found this on Finland… In Finland, the government owns nearly one-third of the nation’s wealth, and 90 percent of workers are covered by a union contract. That may not be socialism, but it’s also not a “capitalist paradise,” as the New York Times ridiculously claimed over the weekend.

Perhaps we are splitting hairs. My understanding is that there has never been a truly socialist economy. Has there ever been a completely Capitalist economy? " The term mixed economy is also used to describe economies with these attributes. The term seeks to point out the discrepancy between capitalism as normally defined and what is labeled as capitalism in practice and to claim that (1) capitalism, as defined, does not and will not exist and (2) such a “pure” capitalist system is undesirable. The term is used as a response to the economic doctrines that have dominated Western economic thought throughout the neoliberal period."

Government is not anything I am adept at. I simply imagine that when someone begins spouting absolutes, they are most likely off the mark.

Even communist China is a mix of economic systems. China has an upper-middle-income, developing, mixed, socialist market economy incorporating industrial policies and strategic five-year plans.

So perhaps, I am nowhere near qualified to get into all the nuances of economic systems. All economic systems seem to have their problems. If I presented the Nordic countries as shining gems of socialism, that was not my intent.

Do not confuse nordic trade unions with US style unions. They are not the same, and things work quite differently from in the US. Conclusions you might draw about the nordic countries using your knowledge about US style unions will be wrong, or at the very least inaccurate.

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I’m suggesting both that socialism grew out of religion. It’s more than suggestion that fascism and socialism are of identical origins. As for touting socialism, it is a daily ‘political reality’ throughout the U.S. and Europe. Every promise made by persons seeking election are in themselves inevitably based on the expectation of access, use, and control of another persons ability, knowledge, skill, monies…
Ballot does not imbue any candidate with any of the above.
While proofs of concentration to refrigeration may be pending, proofs of concentration camps has not been, and is not lacking.
It follows rationally that where individual competence is in no regard transferable on public demand, the ‘realisation’ of any promise one cannot accomplish independently in public forums is dependent on willingness to exercise force to appropriate it from its irreducible origins. One form of incarceration, or another.

The British Empire, founded on unfettered free market and exploitation of those considered inferior had the first formal “concentration camps”. The U.S had its own version, but based on race not economics…you called them “reservations” where the “primitives” were sent to be stripped of their nationhood, identity and language…yep, you have a great record to spruick at your next town hall rally.

Reading the rest of the drivel you seem to think is persuasive “thought” and some sort of twisted history you have dreamt up just makes me determined not to allow your uneducated ilk in power ever again.

Have you asked yourself, (as is proven by your posts) if you are not “the best and brightest” and not privileged with a monied background…what the fuck you really are and what you deserve?

A shack by the railroad and grifting perhaps? Certainly not medical treatment and no education that you, yourself, don’t pay for up front.

Then a nice spell in one of the USA’s prisons where slavery is entirely legal, ( have you read your 13th Amendment?) and of course, the slave labor contracted out depriving those “honest 'Murican laborers” of a job at real wages?

This seems to be your Utopian dream…

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Not only am I dubious that this is rational, I couldn’t even swear it is English? Overcome with the exuberance of your own verbosity… :face_with_raised_eyebrow:

It would take a few seconds of Googling to disavow yourself of the notion that socialism grew out of religion, this is just a risible sweeping claim. It is conceivable perhaps that some aspects of some religions are reflected in some aspects of socialism, but this is hardly saying much, given most religious ideas are not unique to those religions.

Perhaps if you define accurately what you mean by socialism it might be a better starting point, as I am not at all confident it means what you think it does.

In what way is socialism “all about” controlling anyone’s mind, please be specific, as again this also sounds risible to me.

Socialism
noun

  1. 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.

Explain to me simply and precisely, why in your opinion any version of that is "all about the control of individual minds? As I have to say I am pretty dubious.

Oh look, it’s rectal stream of consciousness time again.

Even an elementary examination of historical data, tells us that organised religions, regardless of any talk about concern for the poor, quickly launch into the task of aligning themselves with power elites.

Europe used to have a Holy Roman Emperor. The Catholic Church has a long history of siding with wealth and power, even before it began its 20th century flirtation with a sleazy range of fascist dictators.

The idea that the Catholic Church, certainly at the top, has had any enthusiasm for “socialism” is roundly falsified by the facts. It signed a Concordat with Hitler, enabled the viciousness that was Ante Pavelic in Croatia, and got its hands dirty in Latin America schmoozing with some seriously unpleasant figures.

As for Protestantism, its record isn’t squeaky clean either. Leaving aside such aberrations as the Quakers, the Unitarians and the comic ultra-isolationist “Wee Frees” and descendants in Scotland, Protestantism shacked up with power and money elites with indecent haste once launched. It became part of the Establishment here in the UK in pretty short order, to the point where the Royal Family were intertwined with its hierarchy.

For example, we had to wait all the way to the 19th century for the Catholic Emancipation, the end of the most ruthless anti-Catholic discrimination that had been in place beforehand for the best part of 400 years.

The Church of England was at best silently complicit in the misdeeds of Empire, and provided supposed “moral support” for British Imperialism long before socialism even existed. The thought of all those juicy natives to “convert” was giving some figures in the C of E a hard on.

Which, of course, dovetailed exquisitely with the interests of those who got rich exploiting said natives and helping themselves to nice, juicy heaps of lucrative resources.

Oh, and even an elementary reader of Das Kapital is aware of that famous aphorism, “religion is the opium of the masses”.

Indeed, religion has been a convenient tool for power seizure by rich authoritarians long before capitalism was formally codified, let alone the emergence of Marx and the first serious opposition to capitalism.

Oh, making unctuous noises such as “the meek shall inherit the Earth” all sounds very “socialist” to those who use the term as a knee-jerk reaction to everything they hate (usually because they’re too stupid to realise that they’re not the part of the power elite they delude themselves to be, merely its useful dupes), in much the same way as more recently, railing against “woke” has become an inverse virtue signalling and identity totem among assorted bigots and inadequate malcontents.

Indeed, simply talking about making life better for those at the bottom, while attending lavish galas and dinners with exploiters of multiple stripes, has been a key feature of Christianity for most of its history.

Making soothing noises to keep the plebs quiet while brown nosing money and power, has been the modus operandi of organised religion pretty much since its inception, and became a fixture thereof long before Machiavelli wrote The Prince.

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Huh? Is this sentence missing punctuation or some words?

Please cite your source for this assertion.

Every one of them? You’re sure about that?

What does this sentence even mean?

In other words, you’re unable to demonstrate your assertion as I requested, eh?

Vinaigrette, ranch, or blue cheese…which is your preference?

salad

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Pardon me, moderators, but that is pure and utter bullshit. Go read some history.

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Yet the suggestion is all you have offered, should I even feign surprise?

No pardon required. :grinning:

I’m guessing that word salad shooting is somehow connected to the output of an “AI”.

I think someday soon we’ll need a new fallacy name for the appeal to AI; I suppose it is an appeal to authority, but need a funnier name for this specific kind of fallacy.

Kids are already trying this with the math homework, with the results you can expect. Them running to their teachers with printout of what the AI said the answer was. It is funny, and kind of scary.

Pulling a Hal9000? Needs work.

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Holy shit, man. Go easy on the whores.

Review El Duce, the admiration of Hitler, and their eventual alliance. It is not mere suggestion.

My apologies to you, and them.

Assuming you can find translators for both Italian Fascism, and German National Socialism (Nazi) you could watch the archival footage of their own speeches and rallies.