Why is socialism viewed so negatively in politics and media?

[Vix150]

Why do people not like socialism?

To me it doesn't seem disastrous but it's portrayed in the media as a horrific way for a society to run.

Any thoughts?

@Pineneedlesincarpet That isn’t quite what I said.

I didn’t state that individual rights should always override the good of society, or that collectivism simply means ‘the will of the masses’.
My point was that a free society has to preserve individual rights and autonomy, and that some political thinking now does seem to lean to the subordination of individual rights in order to impose solely collective goals.

Of course societies need limits and shared obligations. But once the collective is treated as morally sovereign over the individual, adversely, we become even less of a just society.

Political thinking may think that. But the reality is that collective goals are often being subordinated in order to impose solely the rights of individuals. For example, the right to free speech (a collective good) is being subordinated to the right of an individual not to be offended by a derogatory comment on religion that the individual may consider blasphemous. Or someone's right not to be deported on the grounds of family life trumps the collective good regarding the safety of the population.

What are your examples of the pendulum going the other way, out of interest?

They haven't always worked extra hard. My boss who got what today is worth £10 million because the company that owned our company decided to sell it was a complete twat only in his job because my team and one of my colleagues teams were producing all the profit he got credited with. He was very good at licking arses, though.

Most people earning £50k a year aren't working any harder than a care home shift worker on minimum wage.

But no, i don't think it's fair to take off of an entrepreneur who risked his own home and worked himself to the bone to establish his company and give it to someone (and they do exist) who is sponging of the state. I just don't know any fair way to manage that situation.

Blimey! If working extra hard made you rich I’d be rolling in it! I’m sure there are some clever business people out there but also a lot of rich buggers who inherited it. I worked my arse off , got a degree, teaching qualifications, 25 years service, paid all my taxes, (I love paying taxes honestly!) I’ve also worked in care homes, done cleaning and I do voluntary work. For that I get a mortgage on a two up two down, a 19 year old car and a el cheapo trip to Spain every so often, plus I’m putting DS through uni. And I’m so bloody happy! I’ve got all I NEED and more. When I had multiple health scares last year I was scanned and biopsied to an inch of my life within weeks. When I crashed with burnout and WRS I was treated with care and dignity. God bless the NHS and the welfare state! And God bless my union (NEU) who got me through it. I can’t work in business because I don’t know how to charge people for things and services at more than they’re worth - that’s what entrepreneurialism is isn’t?

Ignoring the mega rich and inherited wealth, do sme’s (and landlords) fund the public sector and the benefits system or materially benefit from it? Obviously government spending is funded through taxation rather than the generosity of sme’s and landlords but the fact that low wages and in work benefits benefit the sme’s and landlords means they as a class take more from the government whilst employees and tenants pay less tax.

This is compounded by the entitlement of those who don’t need state support believing it’s not fair to not receive it like wfh allowance for all pensioners, non means tested state pension, free childcare provision for those on a high salary.

It’s the greed and selfishness of capitalism applied to state provision for the poor and needy by those that think they are more deserving. For some unknown reason I keep getting emails about the huge profits that can be made by investing in property where rent is paid by the government. Capitalism is treating the poor as a profit resource backed my government funding.

This is one reason why capitalism does not work for the pubic good - not for tenants, not for government funding for anything but social housing.

It seems like capitalism is no longer survival of the fittest but continual and unaffordable top ups and bail outs by government. And then the right wing press complain about the costs of health education and welfare.

You're both making good points here. I'd hate to be in government - trying to balance individual rights & freedoms along with majority needs & rights, in a constantly shifting environment with changing costs, benefits and priorities.

None of these are easy questions, none can be looked at in isolation.

I killed a bit of time this morning by looking at the states deemed to be closest to pure capitalist. They all fund national infrastructure and 'social good' by redistributing citizen wealth - only a few of them avoid the ills of an excessive wealth gap, by being tiny states with vast internal resources. Most other wealthy states manage the economic lives and general wellbeing of their people by using mechanisms to move funds to where they're most needed. The definitions of 'needed' may vary but are broadly the same.

The way our state supports employers to pay unliveable wages - and things like the property rental strategy mentioned above - stick in my throat a bit, but I get that economic activity must be kept going. I might want to handle it in a different (and much more 'socialist') way; as I said, I'm glad it's not my job to decide!

The UK doesn't do badly, actually. Taking all factors together, we sit in the upper middle of the OECD.

I can’t work in business because I don’t know how to charge people for things and services at more than they’re worth - that’s what entrepreneurialism is isn’t?

No.

I visited the USSR before the iron curtain fell. You'll have to trust me that you would not want to live in a country where there are no entrepreneurs to develop new goods and services for people to buy, a country which does not allow people with new ideas to earn any money from their new idea.

That's the essence of what entrepreneurs do.

I accept your counterpoint, but I think your argument comes from a slightly different angle.

Your argument refers to overreaching individual claims that can override the public good. You’ve given two valid examples of that.

My point, though, was about the direction of politics and some institutions towards subordinating the individual to a collective identity and morality.

Take, for instance, pressure to use certain language and sanctions around debate in order to avoid upsetting particular groups.

So yes, the pendulum does swing both ways, and the collectivist swing is real too.

I would say that the collective having rules to avoid upsetting individual particular groups was an example of the collective being subordinated to the individual/individual groups. All rules should apply equally to everyone. And the perception that that isn't currently the case in the UK and that the rights of the individual / individual groups trumps the rights of the rest of us is why division is growing.

Its not a coincidence we have a PM and AG who are human rights lawyers. And that acvordingly the national interest is subordinate to the interest of an individual wherever they may be from in the world.

I see the point you are making but I do think the boundaries are getting a bit blurred.

Rules relating to language or speech that causes offence can be framed as protecting individual rights and therefore overriding the common good. But they can also be seen as institutions enforcing a collective moral code about what may be said and about the level of debate.

And therefore this isn’t a simple question of individualism versus collectivism, institutions need to operate at the level of individual and selected rights claims. Which is where your argument lands.

So I agree the pendulum can swing both ways, but I still think the collectivist dynamic is real,
it just takes a different form and is often less explicit.

If the collectivist dynamic weren't real, our laws would be very different!

It's an interesting topic by itself, and I like the way you're both approaching it. Just fulfilling my late-in-life mission to remind people that what may feel like specialised, fine-tuned considerations often have large, universally known expressions.

As Margaret Thatcher said " The trouble with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money,"

"They can also be seen as institutions enforcing a collective moral code about what may be said and about the level of debate"

I do see that too. Shades of grey as always in politics...

And with capitalism, with so many that would be poor theres no one to sell too

Lol! we had a deep recession just before Blairs win, so bad, Major implemented some heavy spending restraints.

As for education? how many children in the state sector ever got Latin lessons? a tiny tiny %, so small in fact, students couldn't finish their studies as teachers retired.
NHS? funding slashed in terms of increasing demand, AHP bursaries removed... Hospital capital build stopped... in charge for most of the post war period but we have so few nurses beds equipment..... who else is too blame?

On current issues, the big 2 big ones, Housing and Cost of Living, the Tories sold off our social housing, leading to the rise in BTL and huge amounts of taxes transferred to the private sector (not that Blair reversed this)

COL... Utilities sold, massive profits, much of which has gone overseas, yet investment slashed... now we have to pay yet again... in standing charges, unit costs in water & energy...

But the biggie is the full privatisation of NS oil, given away in tax cuts for the wealthy.

As you say, Tories in power for most of the post war period, hence they are to blame for our now terminal decline.... they even cut defence & the justice system.. 2 corner stones they have always claimed to have protected.... but the reality is somewhat different.

13 front line destroyers in 2010, 8 in 2024.... and 13 was pathetic, yet still the Tories cut cut and cut again.

Oh yes they are the ultimate capitalists... only interested in themselves and their ilk.

Capitalism couldn't do that to itself, it can't continue unless it pays enough people enough to buy its products.

@Alexandra2001, there can be no denial of Conservative responsibility for the current state of things, but solely blaming the Conservatives is too easy and shows your political bias. Fair enough.

You provide a comprehensive list of Tory failures, again fair enough. But what are your thoughts on how Blairism helped entrench managerialism in the political landscape and, as a result, deepen the legalistic style of government we now live under?

Your argument also does not address the fact
of uncontrolled mass immigration into the UK,
under Blair. Look at where we are now.

Or the fact that we now have a fragmented system of government, full of unelected quangos, operating under a technocratic model that seems increasingly unable to act coherently. Today’s system of government is virtually paralysed.

I think a more nuanced debate needs to be had about where we are today as a country, which more and more seems to be ungovernable. Are
we becoming ungovernable solely because of past Tory failures or because of our current system of government, which Tony Blair helped to build also.

That is the part I think centre left voters are unwilling to acknowledge.

Yep! The original post asked about negativity from media and the simple answer is most media is owned by capitalists.

so true. We are in a state of bad capitalism. For capitalism to work, you need workers with money.

The alternative the state owning and controlling the media is worse. No separation or criticism. Plus a lot of the media is just a consumer event which means everyone plays a role.

The demand gives consumers power too. It can’t all be a few in the state.

SevenYellowHammers · Today 12:22
Yep! The original post asked about negativity from media and the simple answer is most media is owned by capitalists

Who should own media?

Most people on this forum are too young to remember when telecomms was a nationalised industry and the Post Office was the only supplier you were allowed to buy phones from and connect them to the phone network. People think the privatised trains were bad, but they never experienced British Rail. (They will soon now is going back to public control. ) They think the beaches were clean before water was privatised (a move I didn't agree with) but raw sewage was pumped into the sea and rivers as standard.

For older people, there are lived experiences of what happens when the State is in charge of the means of production. and by no means is all the criticism of socialism in older people driven by capitalist media.

It is also difficult to know for sure which changes have really been driven by different governments and which would have
happened anyway due to technology, fashions, world events etc or would have been implemented by governments on different parts of the spectrum or simply with different personalities in charge.

I have come to realise that many of the serious mistakes made in and by the West in the 20th century (often heavily criticised by those on the left today) were driven by an absolute terror of communism (actual communism). If you grew up in the West after the Berlin Wall came down it’s probably harder to understand that.

@SisterTeatime, I think we were right to be opposed to the USSR and should, now, be more afraid of Russia than we seemingly are. One of the prime drivers for a united Europe was to present a blockade against Russian incursion. It's a mistake, imo, to have become complacent.

most of the media should be disbanded