Debate with a friend

[Reznov]

Ok, me and a friend are debating, here how it basically starts,

He says Communism cannot work because it goes against human nature.

He then continues to say "Well, according to communism, everyone is treated equal and receives equal wealth. If every human were to live in middle class conditions, the environment will surely perish. There is not enough resources to sustain communism."

What would be a good, detailed and effective comeback to this?

[the Left™]

Communism =/= Redistributionist party-state egalitarian consumerist orgy

Communism= Society in which property as a privately owned phenomenon being replaced with "Industrial Organization of Freely Associated and Cooperative Workingmen".

His notion of middle class and wealth are too capitalistic. Tell him that in a communist society capital would be phased out and "middle class" would be impossible to demarcate as property ownership defines class.

[Susurrus]

Nobody will receive equal wealth, they will only be given enough to live and be happy. The essentials are all renewable resources, and the non-renewable(metal, etc) will be used for less extravagant and un-necessary purposes. Also, more environmentally friendly technology will likely be put into place.

[miltonwasfried...man]

There is no inherent "human nature"; people are products of their environment. So yes under capitalism some of us tend to become greedy and selfish. And a capitalist is telling you about sustainability? :laugh:The current system is destroying the environment for short term profit all in the lame of constant consumerism. Capitalists cut down the forests, drill into the earth and poison the water with no regard for the future generations all the while maintaining their practise of planned obsolescence (making products break down so there is continous demand for the product).

[scarletghoul]

Ok, me and a friend are debating, here how it basically starts,

He says Communism cannot work because it goes against human nature.next time he shares anything with you, point out that his 'human nature' in that instance is essentially communistic (if he doesnt share anything ever then hes not worth being friends with). then go on to explain that, contrary to what the capitalist ideology would like people to think, greediness etc are only 'human nature' in social conditions where there is scarcity (ie, if theres not enough food to go around then you have to survive by taking it for yourself), but in conditions like we have where there is more than enough resources to go around there is no need to be selfish..

He then continues to say "Well, according to communism, everyone is treated equal and receives equal wealth. If every human were to live in middle class conditions, the environment will surely perish. There is not enough resources to sustain communism."

What would be a good, detailed and effective comeback to this?
he's taking one abstract principle and applying it to the present system while keeping everything else the same, which is a ridiculous approach. he misses the key point, which is not some abstract 'equal wealth', but the fact that society and its resources would/should be organised for the good of all, both collectively and individually. This means not just sharing the wealth and giving people a good standard of living, but also managing things (like the environment) in a way that is rational and beneficial for everyone. This would include making sure that our resources arent depleted, etc, so that the environment wont 'surely perish' (which is a funny and strange remark, id like to hear his reasoning for that lol)... its only in capitalist society that an immediate goal (profit) is pursued at the cost of general disaster (economic crisis, enviroment destruction, etc). in a socialist/communist system things would be more planned and coordinated

blargh didnt word this too well but yeah those are my main points lol

[The Dark Side of the Moon]

tell him to go fuck himself, capitalism is the exact same thing, it just tries to distribute things better than capitalism. people wouldnt be dieing in "3rd World Countries" if communism was introduced

ask him to read the literature

[L'horlage]

So egalitarianism violates human nature? How painfully right wing. Also communism by definition ia the elimination of private ownership for public ownership. Theres actually more than one possible means of distributing stuff (free acess, parecon, etc.) and so their statement lies on an assumption not all that true

[Nox]

Opening Moves

First, the argument is logically fallacious. It is an appeal to nature, akin to saying that if you break your arm, you should not put it in a cast and take painkillers because after all, this is not how nature deals with these matters. Perhaps more importantly, there is no scientific proof to support the existence of “human nature.” If a static, predictable human nature existed, psychologists and many other workers in scientific fields would need to spend so much time doing research in trying to understand human behavior.

Next, and in line with the first points, it is necessary to highlight the fact that “human nature,” has changed dramatically over time. If our most ancient, prehistoric ancestors had been driven primarily by self-interest, our species never would have survived. Life for early humans was such a daily struggle that anyone putting their self-interest above that of their clan or tribe would have either starved, been killed, or even been cannibalized. Seeking self-interest first might lead to a fuller stomach one day, but to certain death beyond that. Even as mankind advanced and the agricultural revolution led to the beginnings of private property, production was still social enough to curtail the lure of naked self-interest.

The last in the series of basic arguments concerns all manner of examples which might be given to show the extent of altruism or social consciousness of human beings. The Marxist Professor Richard Wolff provided in one of his lectures an excellent example of modern transactions which are still not only handled outside the market, but which would be met with shock and scorn were anyone to suggest that they should be. The concrete example he provides is that of a person who visits his or her parents for the Thanksgiving holiday. The father asks the son or daughter to take out the trash on their way out. Wolff then asks us to imagine the reaction which would occur if the child were to quote a price for this service, explaining that it was based on the free market. In real life of course, you would do the favor and never even consider your opportunity cost in taking out the trash versus some other minute-long activity, like eating a few more pieces of turkey.

Arguments like these are all well and good, but capitalist apologists, especially those with training in mainstream economics, have developed counter-measures which often successfully dupe most of us unless we have the confidence to challenge their assumptions. Often times what the capitalist apologist will claim is that examples of selfless or altruistic behavior are actually “optical illusions”; the seemingly selfless individual must have had some kind of selfish motive, even if he or she never realized it, and this possibly unknown motive was the real reason for an altruistic action.

Apologists are quite fond of projecting the logic of the capitalist or merchant onto the population as a whole, as doing so erases the lines of class and makes it seem as though we all basically think in the same way, workers and capitalists alike. So for example, a person who dedicates their life to vaccinating children in Africa actually has a selfish motive in the sense that he values the satisfaction of helping people in the same way a merchant might value money. Because absurd ideas like this might be used in defense of the human nature argument, we need to go further, and strike harder.


Getting them on the Ropes


Put simply, as much as capitalism foments negative traits such as greed, dishonesty and narcissism, it is clear that even today we do not live in a society where everyone is primarily seeking their own self-interest. How do we know? It’s simple: because if this were the case, such a society could not function.

The Korean economist Ha Joon Chang deals with this argument beautifully in his book 23 Things They Don’t Tell You About Capitalism. He begins with a common example of the argument, the core of which is quoted below from the introduction to “Thing 5.”

The market beautifully harnesses the energy of selfish individuals thinking only of themselves (and, at most, their families) to produce social harmony. Communism failed because it denied this human instinct and ran the economy assuming everyone to be selfless, or at least largely altruistic.
Take note of the words regarding communism, as this is a common argument used against it and we will address that aspect of the argument later. Getting back to Ha-Joon Chang’s counter-argument, let us look at this quote from his initial counter-argument:

Indeed, if the world were full of the self-seeking individuals found in economics textbooks, it would grind to a halt because we would be spending most of our time cheating, trying to catch the cheaters, and punishing the caught.
Here we see the author already hinting at the fact that society could not function if humans were primarily ruled by self-interest. Here, Ha-Joon uses three examples of activities which would take up nearly all our time if we were to take this common economist’s assumption at face value. But imagine what this would actually entail. Imagine one day you understand that nobody will tell you the truth unless it is either beneficial to their own self-interests, or if they simply don’t care. Imagine everyone else also understands this as well as you do. What this means is that everyone would spend an enormous amount of time checking and verifying virtually every piece of information they get, even if a large part of that turns out to be true anyway. It is clear that this is no way to run a healthy society, and in such cases it might turn out to be impossible.

Continuing, Ha Joon acknowledges counter-arguments which claim that obvious examples of altruism are actually selfish acts in disguise, and then proceeds to destroy them by pointing out why society would be impossible if this assumption about human nature were true. To use one of his examples, he asks the rhetorical question as to why more customers don’t run away from taxis without paying. He points out that the likelihood of running into the same taxi driver are low. He probably had a city such as New York in mind, but in a city such as Moscow, there are an untold amount of unlicensed taxis, the use of which could be called hitchhiking for a small fee.

Whatever city Ha-Joon might be referring to, and whether or not we are talking about licensed or unofficial taxis, it is clear that most passengers won’t attempt to run away without paying, and the whole taxi industry could not work were it not for this fact. Ha-Joon goes on to point out why in the selfish world of free-market economists, the taxi driver would not be able to enforce his fare. He might get cited for illegal parking as he leaves his cab to chase the passenger. He can get charged with assault. He stands to lose some things and he really stands to gain little from enforcing the fare. Other taxi drivers aren’t going to enforce fares either, because then they face the same risks and get no rewards. The useful system of taxis work because there is an assumption that you should pay the fare regardless of whether or not you could potentially get away without paying.

In the fantasy world of free-market economics, where the human nature argument is given the air of a scientific law, it is believed that the market brings different self-seeking individuals together and reconciles their differences for the good of society. Put simply, the reason why shops aren’t cheating you and companies don’t make ridiculously low-quality products is because it would drive consumers away to their competitors in the market. As Ha-Joon points out, punishing a company’s bad behavior or rewarding someone’s good behavior in the market does not benefit the person who does so, but rather society as a whole. If the free-market assumption were true, individuals such as the taxi driver who is ripped off would prefer someone else to do the work of correcting cheaters. Because everyone is assumed to be the same, nobody would waste their personal time and resources catching and punishing cheaters, nor would they do the same in order to reward some company or individual who has done good.
Ha-Joon Chang’s argument is a powerful one, which cuts the human nature claim off at the knees by pointing out how society simply could not function if the claim were true. We can go further though.


Finish Him!


In the beginning of this article it was mentioned that the human nature argument is often made by intellectuals and other respected figures. What is probably more interesting, and what the reader may have already experienced, is that this argument is used not only by libertarians or conservatives but even by members of America’s mainstream, so-called “left”, i.e. “progressives.” In fact one may hear it from seemingly radical “leftists,” and whatever the specifics, these “leftists” use the argument pretty much exclusively when debating with communists, anarchists, or pretty much anyone who openly states that they seek to abolish capitalism and help humanity move on to a better form of society.

As such, when it rolls of the tongues of liberals it is a shining example of moral cowardice. “Oh I do agree that we have a problem with our capitalist system, and we definitely need reforms, but you can’t change human nature,” they say, washing their hands of any responsibility to actually make good on their lofty idealistic promises.

If there is a system that requires saintly altruism, surely it is this centrist liberalism which goes by the name “progressivism” in contemporary America. It relies on the ruling class to suddenly find a conscious and start creating jobs, paying their fair share of taxes, and contributing to the society which has provided them with so much. But it is at this point where we move on to the most powerful argument Marxists could ever have against this “human nature” nonsense, an argument which applies whether the opponent in question is a radical Democrat or a Tea Party Republican. Socialism does not require everyone to be altruistic. It does not require the denial of self-interest. In fact, it is capitalism which requires the majority of the population to be excessively altruistic, while denying their most obvious self-interests.



Source: http://theredphoenixapl.org/2011/06/02/the-human-nature-argument/

[the Left™]

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_WCrIotSdkFA/STsRh3uiTbI/AAAAAAAAA7M/6_oi6JIax8E/s1600/finish%2Bhim

FINISH HIM

[#FF0000]

Nobody will receive equal wealth, they will only be given enough to live and be happy.

If by this you mean "anything they fucking want" then you'd be correct.

[CommunityBeliever]

He says Communism cannot work because it goes against human nature.There was the primitive communist mode of production for a long time, and there have been many worker's states, starting with the Paris Commune (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Commune). If there was something inherently anti-communist in human nature I don't think any of these things would've happened.


If every human were to live in middle class conditions, the environment will surely perish.Okay, assuming that is the case, why does putting all of our limited wealth in the hands of a minority help matters much? Is it better to have the environment destroyed by a minority of less then 1% of the population then to have it done by most people?


There is not enough resources to sustain communism."Our solar system is abundant with resources, such that we could give a nice lifestyle to 10 billion people or more if we utilise the right technologies. However, capitalism is inhibiting technological progress, preventing important technologies from coming into fruition.