I often see these words used interchangeably, though as I understand it there is a difference between the two ideologies, no?
I often see these words used interchangeably, though as I understand it there is a difference between the two ideologies, no?
socialism: workers control the means of production (the factories, the farms, the freight trains, etc). there is no separate owner. this is usually considered a key step on the way to communism.
communism: a society without any classes (no capitalists, no working class, no one in poverty, everyone is on the same level of society); without money (everything ppl need is provided for free and fairly, there are no capitalist markets); and without a state (government is not a separate group of people who command others, the people make decisions on things that affect them).
Even those communists who believe the right strategy to reach a communist society requires them to take control of the state first believe that the ultimate goal is for the state to “wither away” as it becomes less necessary over time. other communists disagree that it is a possible to reach a communist society by taking control of the state, rather the people have to build their own non-state power that eventually defeats it.
How would it even be possible to have a stateless society on the scale that communists envision? For example how could China become stateless (I know that might be their ultimate aim but still, it’s a useful example)? It doesn’t at all seem feasible to me
this is the only good comment in this entire thread so far.
it’s illuminating how poorly most of the so called socialist/anarchist/communists on lemmy understand the thing they claim to believe in and espouse. just a lot of virtue signalling and grasping at straws by desperate folks I guess. like that dude who keeps posting how to learn about socialism but he refuses to read or watch videos or anything… lol