That’s misleading and deliberately misses the commenter’s point. The DSA explicitly rejects authoritarian models of socialism (USSR, DPRK, etc).
The red-scare-fueled conflation of democratic socialism with basically Stalinism is largely what drives the general disfavorability of “socialism” in these sorts of opinion polls.
It’s not like people were asked, “Do you favor ordinary people having a real voice in their workplaces, neighborhoods, and society? Do you favor a higher minimum wage, universal health care (Medicare for All), strengthening labor unions, and increasing the power of working people while weakening the power of corporations?”
People broadly support those things, but would very likely hesitate to call that democratic socialism (which, spoiler: those are the DSA’s core tenets).
It’s like when people say they hate obamacare but they love the ACA. They don’t know what they’re talking about, but they have a well worn heuristic of “what does my in-group say?”
Or it’s like that spongebob meme with patrick and the wallet
“So you want workers to be treated with respect” : “Yep”
“And they should be paid a fair wage for their work”: “Sounds good to me.”
“And vital services like health care should be provided to everyone” : “Of course”
“So you’ll vote for the left wing candidate” : “No, I don’t like left wing policies”
It’s not like people were asked, “Do you favor ordinary people having a real voice in their workplaces, neighborhoods, and society? Do you favor a higher minimum wage, universal health care (Medicare for All), strengthening labor unions, and increasing the power of working people while weakening the power of corporations?”
Those are not socialist policies, I’d say they’re more social democratic than socialist.
I don’t understand how Americans use the Labels “capitalism” and “socialism” especially how americans seem to use these terms as well defined and opposed systems of governance. Weren’t these supposed to be economic systems? Are they as hard edged as american propaganda makes us believe? Is it all buzzwords?
Is taxing the rich “socialist?” is putting a billionaire oligarch in jail for a crime “socialist?” Is making politicians accountable for their crimes “socialist?” the answer is yes for what I’ve seen of American propaganda across the aisle. Normal people would call that “bare minimum governance”
Economic equality is part of socialism. Which is something welfare, free healthcare, free childcare, free education, etc all help with making everyone equal.
The entire system of economic governance doesn’t have to be socialist for socialism to be part of it. We have socialist programs in the US, too. But we are still economically driven by capitalism and private ownership.
But there are a lot of old dumb bastards that don’t understand what socialism actually means and just equate it to enemies of the state (China, Russia, NK, etc).
He’s a part of the DSA
That’s misleading and deliberately misses the commenter’s point. The DSA explicitly rejects authoritarian models of socialism (USSR, DPRK, etc).
The red-scare-fueled conflation of democratic socialism with basically Stalinism is largely what drives the general disfavorability of “socialism” in these sorts of opinion polls.
It’s not like people were asked, “Do you favor ordinary people having a real voice in their workplaces, neighborhoods, and society? Do you favor a higher minimum wage, universal health care (Medicare for All), strengthening labor unions, and increasing the power of working people while weakening the power of corporations?”
People broadly support those things, but would very likely hesitate to call that democratic socialism (which, spoiler: those are the DSA’s core tenets).
It’s like when people say they hate obamacare but they love the ACA. They don’t know what they’re talking about, but they have a well worn heuristic of “what does my in-group say?”
Or it’s like that spongebob meme with patrick and the wallet
“So you want workers to be treated with respect” : “Yep”
“And they should be paid a fair wage for their work”: “Sounds good to me.”
“And vital services like health care should be provided to everyone” : “Of course”
“So you’ll vote for the left wing candidate” : “No, I don’t like left wing policies”
Those are not socialist policies, I’d say they’re more social democratic than socialist.
Uh weren’t they considered communist? (Which is still a misrepresentation of what communism is)
My point was hes a part of the DSA so he self identifies as socialist.
When I think socialist countries I think of Nordic countries not the friggin USSR.
The Nordic countries aren’t socialist they are capitalist countries with strong welfare states.
Socialism is the democratic ownership of the means of production, the nordics are still very much capitalist.
But what are his socialist policies?
Are free busses and free childcare not considered socialist?
The country I live in is not socialist and we have those things. We also have limited free healthcare.
So you think capitalism is the reason you have those things?
I don’t understand how Americans use the Labels “capitalism” and “socialism” especially how americans seem to use these terms as well defined and opposed systems of governance. Weren’t these supposed to be economic systems? Are they as hard edged as american propaganda makes us believe? Is it all buzzwords?
Is taxing the rich “socialist?” is putting a billionaire oligarch in jail for a crime “socialist?” Is making politicians accountable for their crimes “socialist?” the answer is yes for what I’ve seen of American propaganda across the aisle. Normal people would call that “bare minimum governance”
Economic equality is part of socialism. Which is something welfare, free healthcare, free childcare, free education, etc all help with making everyone equal.
The entire system of economic governance doesn’t have to be socialist for socialism to be part of it. We have socialist programs in the US, too. But we are still economically driven by capitalism and private ownership.
But there are a lot of old dumb bastards that don’t understand what socialism actually means and just equate it to enemies of the state (China, Russia, NK, etc).