U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday called China a "ticking time bomb" because of its economic challenges and said the country was in trouble because of weak growth.
For the debate bros in the crowd, the error RoomAndBored is pointing out is an example of the fundamental attribution error, also known as correspondence bias.
So, like, instead of making assumptions about someone’s internal life, look at the material, economic, social situations they’re in and ask of those situations are dictating or constraining their behavior?
Not really. If you see a stranger kicking a vending machine, there’s a (well-documented!) bias to think “that much be a violent and angry person” instead of “that person is having such a bad day they’re kicking vending machines now.”
You could go dig all the way into material and social situations that caused a person to yada yada yada, but that’s way deeper in.
Well, there’s a fair chance I wasn’t talking about you.
Are you a communist, or are you one of the authoritarian worshiping shit-heels that don’t deserve the title? Because I thought communism was fundamentally about equity and human dignity – which means the later needs to be kicked back into the sewers whenever they try to crawl out.
Anyone that fellates or defends authoritarians (or those that aspire to be one) regardless of their “side” can fuck off.
A number of Socialists have latterly launched a regular crusade against what they call the principle of authority. It suffices to tell them that this or that act is authoritarian for it to be condemned. This summary mode of procedure is being abused to such an extent that it has become necessary to look into the matter somewhat more closely.
Authority, in the sense in which the word is used here, means: the imposition of the will of another upon ours; on the other hand, authority presupposes subordination. Now, since these two words sound bad, and the relationship which they represent is disagreeable to the subordinated party, the question is to ascertain whether there is any way of dispensing with it, whether — given the conditions of present-day society — we could not create another social system, in which this authority would be given no scope any longer, and would consequently have to disappear.
On examining the economic, industrial and agricultural conditions which form the basis of present-day bourgeois society, we find that they tend more and more to replace isolated action by combined action of individuals. Modern industry, with its big factories and mills, where hundreds of workers supervise complicated machines driven by steam, has superseded the small workshops of the separate producers; the carriages and wagons of the highways have become substituted by railway trains, just as the small schooners and sailing feluccas have been by steam-boats. Even agriculture falls increasingly under the dominion of the machine and of steam, which slowly but relentlessly put in the place of the small proprietors big capitalists, who with the aid of hired workers cultivate vast stretches of land.
Everywhere combined action, the complication of processes dependent upon each other, displaces independent action by individuals. But whoever mentions combined action speaks of organisation; now, is it possible to have organisation without authority?
Supposing a social revolution dethroned the capitalists, who now exercise their authority over the production and circulation of wealth. Supposing, to adopt entirely the point of view of the anti-authoritarians, that the land and the instruments of labour had become the collective property of the workers who use them. Will authority have disappeared, or will it only have changed its form? Let us see.
Let us take by way of example a cotton spinning mill. The cotton must pass through at least six successive operations before it is reduced to the state of thread, and these operations take place for the most part in different rooms. Furthermore, keeping the machines going requires an engineer to look after the steam engine, mechanics to make the current repairs, and many other labourers whose business it is to transfer the products from one room to another, and so forth. All these workers, men, women and children, are obliged to begin and finish their work at the hours fixed by the authority of the steam, which cares nothing for individual autonomy. The workers must, therefore, first come to an understanding on the hours of work; and these hours, once they are fixed, must be observed by all, without any exception. Thereafter particular questions arise in each room and at every moment concerning the mode of production, distribution of material, etc., which must be settled by decision of a delegate placed at the head of each branch of labour or, if possible, by a majority vote, the will of the single individual will always have to subordinate itself, which means that questions are settled in an authoritarian way. The automatic machinery of the big factory is much more despotic than the small capitalists who employ workers ever have been. At least with regard to the hours of work one may write upon the portals of these factories: Lasciate ogni autonomia, voi che entrate! [Leave, ye that enter in, all autonomy behind!]
If man, by dint of his knowledge and inventive genius, has subdued the forces of nature, the latter avenge themselves upon him by subjecting him, in so far as he employs them, to a veritable despotism independent of all social organisation. Wanting to abolish authority in large-scale industry is tantamount to wanting to abolish industry itself, to destroy the power loom in order to return to the spinning wheel.
Let us take another example — the railway. Here too the co-operation of an infinite number of individuals is absolutely necessary, and this co-operation must be practised during precisely fixed hours so that no accidents may happen. Here, too, the first condition of the job is a dominant will that settles all subordinate questions, whether this will is represented by a single delegate or a committee charged with the execution of the resolutions of the majority of persona interested. In either case there is a very pronounced authority. Moreover, what would happen to the first train dispatched if the authority of the railway employees over the Hon. passengers were abolished?
But the necessity of authority, and of imperious authority at that, will nowhere be found more evident than on board a ship on the high seas. There, in time of danger, the lives of all depend on the instantaneous and absolute obedience of all to the will of one.
When I submitted arguments like these to the most rabid anti-authoritarians, the only answer they were able to give me was the following: Yes, that’s true, but there it is not the case of authority which we confer on our delegates, but of a commission entrusted! These gentlemen think that when they have changed the names of things they have changed the things themselves. This is how these profound thinkers mock at the whole world.
We have thus seen that, on the one hand, a certain authority, no matter how delegated, and, on the other hand, a certain subordination, are things which, independently of all social organisation, are imposed upon us together with the material conditions under which we produce and make products circulate.
We have seen, besides, that the material conditions of production and circulation inevitably develop with large-scale industry and large-scale agriculture, and increasingly tend to enlarge the scope of this authority. Hence it is absurd to speak of the principle of authority as being absolutely evil, and of the principle of autonomy as being absolutely good. Authority and autonomy are relative things whose spheres vary with the various phases of the development of society. If the autonomists confined themselves to saying that the social organisation of the future would restrict authority solely to the limits within which the conditions of production render it inevitable, we could understand each other; but they are blind to all facts that make the thing necessary and they passionately fight the world.
Why do the anti-authoritarians not confine themselves to crying out against political authority, the state? All Socialists are agreed that the political state, and with it political authority, will disappear as a result of the coming social revolution, that is, that public functions will lose their political character and will be transformed into the simple administrative functions of watching over the true interests of society. But the anti-authoritarians demand that the political state be abolished at one stroke, even before the social conditions that gave birth to it have been destroyed. They demand that the first act of the social revolution shall be the abolition of authority. Have these gentlemen ever seen a revolution? A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is; it is the act whereby one part of the population imposes its will upon the other part by means of rifles, bayonets and cannon — authoritarian means, if such there be at all; and if the victorious party does not want to have fought in vain, it must maintain this rule by means of the terror which its arms inspire in the reactionists. Would the Paris Commune have lasted a single day if it had not made use of this authority of the armed people against the bourgeois? Should we not, on the contrary, reproach it for not having used it freely enough?
Therefore, either one of two things: either the anti-authoritarians don’t know what they’re talking about, in which case they are creating nothing but confusion; or they do know, and in that case they are betraying the movement of the proletariat. In either case they serve the reaction.
A form of government in which the governing body has absolute, or almost absolute, control. Typically this control is maintained by force, and little heed is paid to public opinion or the judicial system.
A form of government in which the ruler is an absolute dictator (not restricted by a constitution or laws or opposition etc.).
Maybe something was lost in translation, but I don’t care if Marx himself descended from the heavens and tattooed that on my forehead: no. Anyone willingly to unquestioningly submit to authority isn’t worthy of consideration or respect. Leaders need to be questioned and held to law and decency. My issue is with the people that follow leaders that don’t head the will and well being of others.
I’ll happily be an “enemy” of anyone that takes issue with that.
Letting liberals write your political theory isn’t doing you any favors. I don’t give a shit what sect you are, you’re no better than a Blairite. All states are maintained through force and that judicial bit is 100% extraneous because, if the judicial branch has observable sway, it will be declared to either be kabuki theater or part of the oligarchy (see: people talking about China’s Supreme Court).
So you are basically just saying “undemocratic” but with a pretentious buzzword sanctioned by liberal morons and hucksters.
Here’s a fun one though: if that’s the only relevant measurement, China does great because it has immense public approval even according to hostile western polling!
So you would therefore need to admit that it wasn’t a good fit for the term “authoritarian,” right?
A form of government in which the governing body has absolute, or almost absolute, control. Typically this control is maintained by force, and little heed is paid to public opinion or the judicial system.
This definition of “authoritarian” applies to everybody. And literally none of the leaders of the Soviet union or the dprk qualify as dictators according to your definition either lmfao.
Please, please read State and Revolution. There are a lot of confusions that you have that that reading would do a lot to clear up. You have no historical materialist understanding of the state and frankly I think a lot of the disagreements that you have are not in actuality disagreements on principles but of confusion on the topic.
I disagree with your definition of authoritarianism. 50.5% of a population voting to elect a representative or enact a referendum versus the 49.5% is authoritarianism. The same if the margin is 67-33, or 80-22 or 99.9 to 0.1. In any case, the minority is imposed upon by the majority. The individual is imposed upon by the collective, or even merely another individual.
Like Engels said, the revolution is certainly an authoritarian endeavor. The original expropriation was authoritarian, and the counter-expropriation would be a counter-posing authoritarianism. How can you take something from someone without imposition? If asking nicely worked, then we wouldn’t be posting here.
The opposite of authoritarianism isn’t democracy, but pure volunteerism. That would be nice.
Please try harder. This is really tedious. Posting half baked “definitions” of political boggarts makes it hard to take the piss. I need you to give me something to work with here.
I’m one of those authoritarian shitheels. Forcing people to build a better world is good and I’m tired of pretending it’s not.
Communism is about workers owning the means of production, and the end result being a moneyless, classless, stateless society. Maybe you should go read the book.
fellates
What is it with y’all and the homophobia? And it’s always blowjobs. Why not give the vagina’s some love? Why can’t we flick the bean of authoritarianism? Paddle the love canoe? Munch the carpet of repression? Can’t escape the damn patriarchy anywhere these days.
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I saw a MAGA drink water once. I also saw a tankie drink water… COINCIDENCE?!
For the debate bros in the crowd, the error RoomAndBored is pointing out is an example of the fundamental attribution error, also known as correspondence bias.
So, like, instead of making assumptions about someone’s internal life, look at the material, economic, social situations they’re in and ask of those situations are dictating or constraining their behavior?
Not really. If you see a stranger kicking a vending machine, there’s a (well-documented!) bias to think “that much be a violent and angry person” instead of “that person is having such a bad day they’re kicking vending machines now.”
You could go dig all the way into material and social situations that caused a person to yada yada yada, but that’s way deeper in.
Cool, thank you for the explanation.
Other people don’t think. I know this because the only thoughts I hear are my own.
Well, there’s a fair chance I wasn’t talking about you.
Are you a communist, or are you one of the authoritarian worshiping shit-heels that don’t deserve the title? Because I thought communism was fundamentally about equity and human dignity – which means the later needs to be kicked back into the sewers whenever they try to crawl out.
Anyone that fellates or defends authoritarians (or those that aspire to be one) regardless of their “side” can fuck off.
Lenin would kill it on here
The kind Vladimir Ilyich would have killed everyone here.
If twitter had existed in the 1910s communism would have died on the vine. Non of them would would have ever stopped posting.
Maybe something was lost in translation, but I don’t care if Marx himself descended from the heavens and tattooed that on my forehead: no. Anyone willingly to unquestioningly submit to authority isn’t worthy of consideration or respect. Leaders need to be questioned and held to law and decency. My issue is with the people that follow leaders that don’t head the will and well being of others.
I’ll happily be an “enemy” of anyone that takes issue with that.
Letting liberals write your political theory isn’t doing you any favors. I don’t give a shit what sect you are, you’re no better than a Blairite. All states are maintained through force and that judicial bit is 100% extraneous because, if the judicial branch has observable sway, it will be declared to either be kabuki theater or part of the oligarchy (see: people talking about China’s Supreme Court).
So you are basically just saying “undemocratic” but with a pretentious buzzword sanctioned by liberal morons and hucksters.
Here’s a fun one though: if that’s the only relevant measurement, China does great because it has immense public approval even according to hostile western polling!
So you would therefore need to admit that it wasn’t a good fit for the term “authoritarian,” right?
This definition of “authoritarian” applies to everybody. And literally none of the leaders of the Soviet union or the dprk qualify as dictators according to your definition either lmfao.
Please, please read State and Revolution. There are a lot of confusions that you have that that reading would do a lot to clear up. You have no historical materialist understanding of the state and frankly I think a lot of the disagreements that you have are not in actuality disagreements on principles but of confusion on the topic.
I disagree with your definition of authoritarianism. 50.5% of a population voting to elect a representative or enact a referendum versus the 49.5% is authoritarianism. The same if the margin is 67-33, or 80-22 or 99.9 to 0.1. In any case, the minority is imposed upon by the majority. The individual is imposed upon by the collective, or even merely another individual.
Like Engels said, the revolution is certainly an authoritarian endeavor. The original expropriation was authoritarian, and the counter-expropriation would be a counter-posing authoritarianism. How can you take something from someone without imposition? If asking nicely worked, then we wouldn’t be posting here.
The opposite of authoritarianism isn’t democracy, but pure volunteerism. That would be nice.
Please try harder. This is really tedious. Posting half baked “definitions” of political boggarts makes it hard to take the piss. I need you to give me something to work with here.
Yeah! Fuck fake communists like - checks notes - Engels
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I’m one of those authoritarian shitheels. Forcing people to build a better world is good and I’m tired of pretending it’s not.
Communism is about workers owning the means of production, and the end result being a moneyless, classless, stateless society. Maybe you should go read the book.
What is it with y’all and the homophobia? And it’s always blowjobs. Why not give the vagina’s some love? Why can’t we flick the bean of authoritarianism? Paddle the love canoe? Munch the carpet of repression? Can’t escape the damn patriarchy anywhere these days.
Ok vaush