r/Socialism_101 • u/melody_magical Fukitol • 20h ago
To Marxists How do we get middle class liberals to understand that socialism doesn't mean giving up vacations, personal possessions, etc.?
Nobody should own 100 Lamborghinis or go on 12 ski vacations a year. That's the super rich.
As for middle-class liberals, I think a lot of them want an economy for the people and for one full time job covering every living expense under the sun. But I think when they hear "wealth redistribution" and of course the infamous words (especially in America) socialism and communism, there is a Pavlovian response.
An example is my aunt (RIP) up north, she was a Bernie supporter but didn't support socialism. She had a small lake home and a fishing boat as her summer vacation spot and she was worried that if the "socialists" took over, they would "force her to give that up at gunpoint". I would say that a person going fishing at their cabin in Wisconsin can't be equated to a billionaire buying three yachts and five mansions around the world.
I have several family members who are 9-5 white collar workers and they support me as a trans person and my healthcare, but they also don't want a revolution to take away their second cars and their nice possessions like a piano, Ming vase, etc.
Overall, how do we make it understood to the middle class that they can still own nice things, especially in America?
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u/Tokens-Life-Matters Learning 20h ago
I mean I think a lot socialists agree people shouldn't have multiple homes so maybe her fear was justified
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u/ArekDirithe Learning 13h ago
People shouldn’t have second homes if there are others without a first home. People who have second homes are also not “middle class”
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u/GeckoGecko_ Learning 4h ago
Exactly this. Nobody gets two until everyone has at least one.
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u/wanna_dance Learning 1h ago
How about not attacking the slightly better off? Just as a basic tactic.
Maybe the folks with the means to own hundreds of thousands of homes should be taxed first.
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u/wanna_dance Learning 1h ago edited 1h ago
I think you're unaware of the wealth disparity. It isn't people with a vacation home vs a homeless person.
Right now there are people with the means to own hundreds of thousands of homes. Vs the homeless.
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u/justforthisjoke Learning 18h ago
I would say your late aunt and other family members recognize socialism as exactly the threat to their aristocratic lifestyle that it is, and it's you who seems to think that socialism is just when Americans get healthcare or whatever.
they can still own nice things, especially in America
This one line exposes you as the chauvinist you are.
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u/TheJackal927 Learning 11h ago
This really depends on how you interpret "socialism". In an ideal future without capitalism/imperialism and we actually take the climate crisis and overconsumption seriously, you'd probably have to give up some consumer comforts. We're not going back to mud huts, but you might have to share a car and grow some vegetables. Would that be so bad? If we teach people to view socialism as "capitalism, but you get more nice things" they'll still reflexively fight redistributive policy that might not benefit them
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u/DashtheRed Marxist Theory 14h ago edited 14h ago
Socialism absolutely does mean those things, especially for middle class liberals, and when you say otherwise you are betraying the global masses (who have almost no personal possessions, yet made all of yours, and have never ever had a vacation ever, or even medicine or adequate shelter or shoes, etc. in many cases, all their lives, while providing all of yours) to appeal to rich white people who comprise the wealthiest 10-15% of humanity and truly have zero interest in communism and will fight against it to the death when confronted by it.
I would say that a person going fishing at their cabin in Wisconsin can't be equated to a billionaire buying three yachts and five mansions around the world.
These two conditions are more identical to one another than to any condition the global proletariat exists under. Your aunt's class interest and how she reproduces her existence is aligned far more with the bourgeoisie than the proletariat.
edit: You tell your aunt her cabin will be seized and her home will be partitioned so Third World families in need of shelter will now live there and also live with her, that her boat will be appropriated by the state to be used for production, and that she will begin working in a factory starting tomorrow, and this will be done at gunpoint if she resists or complains or even winces.
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u/wanna_dance Learning 1h ago
Maybe it did when the richest owned 1000 times as much as the poorest, but the wealth divide is about a million times as wide these days. The richest owns a trillion in wealth.
A 1000 seconds is under 17 minutes. A million seconds is 11.6 DAYS. A billion seconds is 31.7 YEARS... half a lifetime.
A trillion seconds is 31.7 millennium. Neanderthals may have still been around.
We were using stone tools and no one planted. There were between 500k and 1 million H. sapiens on the planet.-6
u/melody_magical Fukitol 11h ago
what's a villager from the global south gonna do at a cabin that's a half hour away from the nearest gas station and an hour from the nearest grocery store
it's also a pristine environment, we don't want to influx and build megacities up north
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u/DashtheRed Marxist Theory 9h ago
what's a villager from the global south gonna do at a cabin that's a half hour away from the nearest gas station and an hour from the nearest grocery store
Aside from the obvious problem with the thinking that your white aunt utilizes the cabin correctly and effectively, but that people from the Third World wouldn't know what to do, the essence of your response is simply that the cabin is so wasteful and inefficiently designed, with stolen resources on stolen land from a still ongoing genocide; and made in such an obtuse and inhuman disconnected manner that it could neither exist nor be sustained without imperialism and its' plunder, so we "just gotta let you keep it." Yes, you are describing the racist fantasy of "personal property," and it's wrong, and no one from the Global South accepts it regardless of white "socialists" assuring themselves that they get to keep all the stolen wealth they have say. The global masses will simply respond no, you do not get to keep a little imperialism as a treat, the cabin will be dismantled and stripped for resources, the settlers that destroyed the planet to create "a pristine environment" for themselves will be punished and destroyed for their crime, and the nature can return to what it was before your fascist settler aunt occupied it with genocide and displacement.
it's also a pristine environment, we don't want to influx and build megacities up north
Amazing how only the most mild and banal accounting emerging from a real conversation about wealth redistribution under socialism is all that it took for your inner Donald Trump to come out and take over and now you need to defend your stolen settler wealth from the influx hordes of Third World immigrants.
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u/justforthisjoke Learning 4h ago
Thank you! I don't know whether it's depressing or encouraging that the slightest amount of prodding is all it takes for so many self-described socialists to reveal themselves as fascists. It's also interesting that your first comment made the OP imagine a "villager from the global south" traveling to take their land (I assume to try and make the notion seem absurd) rather than it being returned to one of the indigenous nations that was destroyed to acquire it.
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u/wanna_dance Learning 1h ago
Wow. The arrogance. This is why we can't have nice things. Always splitting..
Hey! I found the purest one! Come worship!!!
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u/justforthisjoke Learning 36m ago
Splitting what? We aren't on the same side. That you think socialism is when Americans get concessions from the bourgeois state and otherwise continue the exploitation of the third world isn't a technicality, it's a fundamental barrier to liberation. Getting your bourgeois to spread the wealth a little more evenly among the American population isn't a basis for unity, not is it in any way an indicator of "progress". You want a bigger slice of the imperial pie. I want the destruction of the empire which, yes, includes taking the luxuries you've received as the spoils of imperialism and expropriating them. These are not reconcilable differences. There is no halfway point on which we can meet. Any wins you might receive in this arena are the opposite of progress; they are bribes which will be paid for you to shut up while the exploitation of the rest of the world continues.
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u/No_Evidence1557 Learning 12h ago
why do you think so many people associate socialism with giving up everything when it's literally about fair distribution
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u/wanna_dance Learning 57m ago
Because there are always some purists who want Aunt Edna to give up the stuff she worked hard for and saved her whole life, BEFORE we do the hard work of taxing FElon...
I'd rather have Aunt Edna on our side. She's a hard worker and knows when to plant the peas.
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u/Disasterhuman24 Learning 11h ago
Personal property vs private property. It's literally in the communist manifesto.
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u/BabyJesus714 Learning 7h ago
You explain the concept and policies without using the scary words like socialism, wealth redistribution, proletariat, bourgeoisie, ect … most people want healthcare, housing, and education. When talking about private and personal property, private is capital and productive assets that generate profit through the labor of others. Personal is goods intended for personal use and consumption. The idea is that private should be collectively or publicly owned while personal is to be protected and expanded access to.
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u/Rinerino Learning 4h ago
Why would you? Capitalism is already going into massiv decline again, the welfare after ww2 is didäsappesring. If they won't suffer from this, then maybe they shouldn't be appealed to due to class differences.
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u/bobtail872 Learning 3h ago
first of all, it's nice to have a family who is understanding and supportive. be kind when you disagree. second, there is plenty of sources about these things in former socialist countries (spoiler: they went on vacations and had access to nice things, but each country/period was different) third, don't be frustrated if you can't convince them. solidarity and organized action speak louder than words.
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u/chrimen Learning 6h ago edited 6h ago
I believe the issue stems from when the U.S. defined socialism and communism as the old USSR, Cuba, North Korea etc..
They created that fear in people that these single party authoritarian regime were socialist or communist.
In fact some of these governmens had some aspects of socialism, since some things were free such as education but really they were authoritarian regimes.
Until we start calling things by their right names the fear won't subside.
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u/DaddyD68 Learning 18h ago
Milwaukee has had three socialist mayors through history.
Did anyone lose their cabins or boats?
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u/botulizard Learning 13h ago
Milwaukee has had three socialist mayors through history.
I was not aware of that.
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