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Utopian Pipe Dreams
What's your favorite utopian pipe dream for life with worker's power and without capitalism?
Of course it's ultimately unscientific and undemocratic to try and plan out specific features of what things might be like after a revolution, but I would like to hear what people's favorite pet utopain pipe-dreams are.
In contemporary society, utopianism is rare compared to other times in capitalism (like the Victorian age when people saw massive changes in society and incredible leaps in technology and industry). Probably the last wave of utopianism in the US (other than maybe high hopes for Obama) was the end of the cold war/begining of the internet. The end of the threat of nuclear war beteen the USSR and the US, made American and European liberals optomistic about the future while other people saw the internet and new digital technology as a way to build an alternative to the system. These turned out to be predicatably shallow and short-sighted, and so people went back the other way towards distopias and cynacism.
I think in some ways that cynical attitude makes out job harder, I think a little utopian imagination in society is necissary for people to beging thinking about what is it about society that they wish were different and this leads to thinking about how we can change it. The author of "Looking Backwards" wrote that hugely popular (at the time) utopian novel during the first American "great depression" in the late 1800s when there were major battles between labor and capital. He tried to imagine a future without the class conflict that was an unavoidable reality of that time and a society based on reason rather than victorian capitalist chaos. His book was hugely popular in the US and the right-wing dennouced him as a socialist. He wasn't but writing that book and speaking about "a better future society" with radicals eventually led him to become a socialist.
Anyway, here are a couple off the top of my head:
1. Campus-like living where induvidual housing surrouns a central common area whith the communal dining areas, a communal movie theater where induviduals or groups can reserve time to see any film, show, event, or sports game on a big screen.
2. Industrial scale urban farming. One of my favorite things that's possible now but impracticle for profit-making (while still practical for production) is large farms within scyscrapers in urban areas. I've read about this in popular science magazines and in theory these buildings could purify urban water supplies, produce oxygen, save farmland, decrease the ammount of shipping necissary for food production, and provide a safe and easy work environment for agricultrual workers.
people just smoking weed whenever they please
"Face the world like a roaring blaze, before all the tears begin to turn silent. Burn down everything that stands in our way. Bang the drum."
HUMMERS FOR ALL!
(I'm just kidding -- there's nothing utopian about that.)
All the people realizing how useless appearances are, and everyone resorting to bohemian lifestyle without any worries.
The sinking of Florida.
"I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying." -Wilde
"Beaucoup de clopes! Beaucoup de vin! Beaucoup de rhum! Viva la révolution!"- Bilan
"The Sun shines. To hell with everything else!" -Stephen Fry
How is that utopian... it's been happening. I think what you mean is the sudden sinking of Florida while Jeb Bush's yacht is in the shop for repairs.
No I mean the entire place going out like Atlantis, with few (Including myself and my family and friends) survivors. Florida is god awful, probably the single biggest reason for myths of a "hell", it sinking alone would make the world a utopia.
"I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying." -Wilde
"Beaucoup de clopes! Beaucoup de vin! Beaucoup de rhum! Viva la révolution!"- Bilan
"The Sun shines. To hell with everything else!" -Stephen Fry
Great thread. I agree that being a socialist involves being able to dream.
I remember when I was listening to a recording of a Marxism meeting from the 1980s, about alienation, the speaker suggested that under socialism one of the ways we would be able to exert greater control over our lives and the environment is by moving depending on the seasons, in much the same way as animals, so that, during the winter, people (i.e. a very large segment of the population - not just a rich minority) in countries like the UK (or rather, what is currently the UK - presumably there would be no such thing as the UK or any other country under socialism) would move to warmer regions, like Africa and the Middle East, and then move back to milder regions once those places became too hot. As someone who hates the cold, and who wishes they could travel more, that appealed to me a lot...although I'm not sure it would work in reality
There are a couple of specific things (in addition to general things like no poverty etc.) that I would love to see under socialism but which aren't utopian at all, and which I would actually expect to be implemented within a few months (if not weeks) after the abolition of capitalism - like free public transport, and the free distribution of books.
Free public transport and free Kindles for everyone... kindles that also play MP3s, surf the web (so you can look up words and references as you read) and allow you to make and record notes on the text.
Actually things like not being able to transfer an mp3 from one system to another or competing video systems artificially preventing cross-platform playing are proof enough of the illogical nature of the profit system.
marxists.org being printed out on a huge-ass book
"Face the world like a roaring blaze, before all the tears begin to turn silent. Burn down everything that stands in our way. Bang the drum."
And when Marx says, 'Hitherto the philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways', what that 'hitherto' means is not a renunciation of theory and that all we need to do is wade in with our fists and there will be no more need for thought. This idea is in fact fascist, and it would be grossly unjust to Marx to impute such views on him.
--Theodor Adorno, 'On Theory and Practice'
That's not utopia, that's just California.
explain
"Face the world like a roaring blaze, before all the tears begin to turn silent. Burn down everything that stands in our way. Bang the drum."
They smoke a lot of weed in California.
"I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying." -Wilde
"Beaucoup de clopes! Beaucoup de vin! Beaucoup de rhum! Viva la révolution!"- Bilan
"The Sun shines. To hell with everything else!" -Stephen Fry
[FONT=Arial]Teleportation. Or a device that conveniently shrinks the United States when trying to go from point A to point B. Whichever is better for the environment. [/FONT]
Lots of drugs and degenerate sex with the downfall of bourgeois morality.
"Win, lose or draw...long as you squabble and you get down, that's gangsta."
This.
..and this too.
Jobs for all that dont suck and the humbling of those that currently get a fortune for doing fuck all.
Agreed, that might be nice (although not my priority in terms of utopias)
Before it sinks we'll put all the major class enemies there so they can sink with hell too...
Coincidentally, the OIer Bud Struggle will also go down with Florida since he lives there already.
"My heart sings for you both. Imagine it singing. la la la la."- Hannah Kay
"if you keep calling average working people idiots i am sure they will be more apt to listen to what you have to say. "-bcbm
"Sometimes false consciousness can be more destructive than apathy, just like how sometimes, doing nothing is actually better than doing the wrong thing."- Robocommie
"The ruling class would tremble, and the revolution would be all but assured." -Explosive Situation, on the Revleft Merry Prankster bus
Yeah, Florida going out is probably my second priory in terms of our coming commie utopia. The weather has sucked lately and I have been particularly annoyed at Florida as of recent. But on normal occasions, I would agree with Explosive Situation and Red Manatee. Also think utopia should have at least 2 coffee shops and 1 bookstore in every town.
"I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying." -Wilde
"Beaucoup de clopes! Beaucoup de vin! Beaucoup de rhum! Viva la révolution!"- Bilan
"The Sun shines. To hell with everything else!" -Stephen Fry
