The Philosophy Discussion Forum

MikeNovack wrote: ↑Sat Apr 11, 2026 10:05 pm And I'm sure I've spoken with, argued with, etc. orders of magnitude more socialist (of all brands) than you have met, let alone talked to

He's already won if you're describing your knowledge and it leads directly to responses like the one below. IC thinks Amazon want socialism. When the idiocy of this was pointed out, he shifted to they, and the other elites including the Clintons, want socialism for the little people but not for themselves - hence his later fascination with Fabianism that seemed to confirm this. He'll then go ahead and describe fascism or an oligharchy and call it socialism. His sense of socialism has little to do with economics.

He's not to be taken seriously. Oddly he doesn't consider Scandinavia socialist, even a few decades ago. Even though they have more socialism than the Clintons and Amazon would ever, ever want. Note: I'm not saying Scandinavia is socialist, just that we are dealing with someone with a stochastic process and not a position.

Socialism=bad and control which is also bad. We could call it badism, since anything that he thinks is bad, is socialism.

At least he hasn't 'accused' you of being feminine, yet, like he has other posters here.

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 12:34 pm

phyllo wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 12:05 pm But IC knows that there is only one true socialism and it's whatever he thinks it is.

As I have just helped explain with that extraordinary clarity that comes so easy to me, there is in a very general sense a core ideology in Socialism theory when it derives from Marxian principles. Once you get this, Phyllo, you will understand IC’s emphasis.

But it is entirely possible to propose or enact social programs from a non-Marxian stance, if that makes sense. But Marxianism is pretty insidious and it has a way of infecting thought and attitude.

If he was talking about a core ideology, then there would be (a lot) of variations that would fall into the category of socialism.

But he dismisses anything that doesn't fall into his rigid definition as "not socialism". No variations allowed.

phyllo wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 12:05 pm
You are ignorant if you don't accept IC's definition of socialism.

Not "mine." Definitions are mutually-consented common property, not the right of one person to make up.

But just read what people like Marx and Hegel wrote. Or just watch any case of Socialism on a national scale...

Iwannaplato wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 12:36 pm IC thinks Amazon want socialism.

Well, Amazon is a company. Companies don't "want" anything. It's people who do. And many of the people who have all the money and power today, including the richest politicians and celebrities and the biggest business types, want Socialism for you...and money for them. Just observe; you'll see it.

And Socialism isn't "bad because I say so." Socialism is bad because of what it has done in 100% of the cases in which it's been foisted on the masses. Let it stand on its record, I say.

phyllo wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 1:03 pm If he was talking about a core ideology, then there would be (a lot) of variations that would fall into the category of socialism.

In any case there is a core ideology. However, I think that whatever it is we may refer to as its core is “complicated ” in the sense that Lindsay refers to with that word.

May I insert here a short video that I think very nicely broaches the topic of a social contagion, an idea-infection, a sort of personal corruption that necessarily involves even states of mental illness which previously had been abnormalized but which seek with a certain aggressiveness to normalize the deviant? A celebration of the deviant identity.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 1:10 pm

phyllo wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 12:05 pm
You are ignorant if you don't accept IC's definition of socialism.

Not "mine." Definitions are mutually-consented common property, not the right of one person to make up.

But just read what people like Marx and Hegel wrote. Or just watch any case of Socialism on a national scale...

Nobody has agreed to the definition that you are using.

IC wrote: wrote:But we need some new name for a phenomenon so general. And the tradition has been to meld some man's name with "ism" to designate the ideology behind the idea.

This from the OP. I think that there could well be wisdom in defining more and better what has happened to our culture(s) and to us over the course of 4 decades or so.

Life isn't static.

There is change and evolution.

Some fixed definition is always going to be inadequate.

phyllo wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 1:35 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 1:10 pm

phyllo wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 12:05 pm
You are ignorant if you don't accept IC's definition of socialism.

Not "mine." Definitions are mutually-consented common property, not the right of one person to make up.

But just read what people like Marx and Hegel wrote. Or just watch any case of Socialism on a national scale...

Nobody has agreed to the definition that you are using.

Well, nobody but Oxford, AI, Cambridge, Webster's, and a whole host of websites you can also look up. They seem to be struggling with the same delusions I am.

Good thing you've got a better definition. What is it?

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 1:49 pm

IC wrote: wrote:But we need some new name for a phenomenon so general. And the tradition has been to meld some man's name with "ism" to designate the ideology behind the idea.

This from the OP. I think that there could well be wisdom in defining more and better what has happened to our culture(s) and to us over the course of 4 decades or so.

Yes, or longer. We mustn't exclude the legacy of Socialism, which started to do most of its darkest work even earlier than that. We should include the gulags, the Long March and the Killing Fields, the Holomodor and the fall of the USSR, and the developments in Korea, Zimbabwe, Cuba...

phyllo wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 2:06 pm Some fixed definition is always going to be inadequate.

Not really. Some definitions persist for a very long while indeed.

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 1:49 pm

IC wrote: wrote:But we need some new name for a phenomenon so general. And the tradition has been to meld some man's name with "ism" to designate the ideology behind the idea.

This from the OP. I think that there could well be wisdom in defining more and better what has happened to our culture(s) and to us over the course of 4 decades or so.

The "culture wars" are a topic very separate from Fabianism, probably worth discussion on their own. And although the "field of battle" is essentially "the arts" playing out in the political arena, so under politics and not aesthetics.

So I'm going to start that off by opening a new topic. I am pretty sure we have enough people on both sides of this asymmetrical conflict to have a lively discussion. But first a note from MY life experience. Been going on far more than just four decades.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 2:10 pm Yes, or longer. We mustn't exclude the legacy of Socialism, which started to do most of its darkest work even earlier than that. We should include the gulags, the Long March and the Killing Fields, the Holomodor and the fall of the USSR, and the developments in Korea, Zimbabwe, Cuba...

This is certainly true, but my own supposition (it is a relatively common idea) is that the impetus of the ideology, to continue to have influence, transformed itself from classical militancy to something of modified insidiousness. We do not now have a Marxist-Communist militancy, though there were sone of that in the 1960s, but we do have many different currents of undermining influence.

What is additionally interesting (if of course this analysis is accepted and I am uncertain if others here also see this)(?) — is the struggle to claw one’s way back to a ground of normality. Presently, there is a sort of mood in the culture to turn harshly against this ‘sprit’ of rebellious deviancy (the revolution against “woke”) but there is uncertainty about what genuine recovery is and should be.

It does seem pretty evident that we can examine semi-socialist and quasi-socialist government in the US (for example). California seems to fit the bill. But I am uncertain if the socialized nations of Europe exactly correspond. I do not know the degree to which “militant wokeness” of the sort that Lindsay describes is quite as marked in Europe …

MikeNovack wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 3:16 pm The "culture wars" are a topic very separate from Fabianism, probably worth discussion on their own. And although the "field of battle" is essentially "the arts" playing out in the political arena, so under politics and not aesthetics.

So I'm going to start that off by opening a new topic. I am pretty sure we have enough people on both sides of this asymmetrical conflict to have a lively discussion. But first a note from MY life experience. Been going on far more than just four decades.

I will agree with whatever is decided. I am just one more leaf blown about by the winds of mutability in the here-below.

That said, I would still like to demonstrate at least one potential tactic we can all learn and institute when we confront post-structuralism, the woke madness, and other nefarious deviancies. Kinda like Alinsky-in-Reverse.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 2:08 pm

phyllo wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 1:35 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2026 1:10 pm
Not "mine." Definitions are mutually-consented common property, not the right of one person to make up.

But just read what people like Marx and Hegel wrote. Or just watch any case of Socialism on a national scale...

Nobody has agreed to the definition that you are using.

Well, nobody but Oxford, AI, Cambridge, Webster's, and a whole host of websites you can also look up. They seem to be struggling with the same delusions I am.

Good thing you've got a better definition. What is it?

You throw in a bunch of extra features/requirements/characteristics and then pretend that you have the same definition as "Oxford, AI, Cambridge, Webster's, and a whole host of websites".

That's laughable.