Communism, Anarchy, or Socialism

[yo soy el mejor]

[vixnix]

Originally Posted by MyOneAndOnly

do you have to subtract the dead in China from those lifted from poverty? 55 million people died in China in the 50s alone due to Mao's agricultural policies.

that's just the factoid i remember off the top of my head.. .i'm sure there's more. Kind of like "who killed more people, Hitler or Stalin?

I get what you're saying, though. In terms of population China is larger than the EU and USA-Canada-Australia combined. China's poverty rate is approximately 15%. The USA is 11%. Canada is 6%. Australia is 13%. The EU is 22%, although I suspect those below poverty line in the EU are better off than those in the USA.

Agree about the 50s - that’s why my comment was about the last forty years, just the 80s onwards.

In the early 80s China was a backwater third world country in economic terms. They’re poised to be the biggest economy any day now. Part of that swift rise is linked to the number of people lifted out of poverty in the last 40 years

I was disputing dk’s claim that liberal democracies have lifted more people out of poverty than any other system - I’m assuming that’s true for all time.

But China is an interesting anomaly in the last 40 years. It’s not liberal and it’s not a democracy, but it has been very successful in many areas, including poverty reduction

[vixnix]

I was born in a socialist country that quickly became more privatised and more of a mixed economy after I was born.

When I was younger I entered discussions with the International Bolshevik Tendency and read a bit of Marx and Lenin and was somewhat convinced by the idea of communism being a necessary transitional state on the way to anarchy.

But I’ve returned to my roots and I’d go socialist now. Boring!

Things like public transport don’t seem to work under privatisation here. The UK has had issues there, too. I think some things are better run by the state because privatisation inevitably leads to market failure

[slunken]

[ilikeplanets]

Del

[ilikeplanets]

Is this supposed to be some sort of joke?

[run2pee]

On Christmas day 1995, I was opening presents and found 2 small gifts wrapped – one larger than the other. I opened the smaller one first and saw this red cassette box with 2 smiling little girls on it. I didn’t know what it was, but I saw the title, “Smashing Pumpkins * Siamese Dream.” At this time I had no idea what was possibly on it. The larger package I opened up and recognized right away! It was Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness on cassette. I must have jumped 2 feet in the air with excitement by the arrival of this gift. I opened up the Mellon Collie cassette and looked at all the art, amazed with the kitty cats that were being married and the bunnies playing baseball. Then I saw the band’s picture for the first time: Billy Corgan standing there with his dark hair combed back, D’arcy holding a carrot as if it had some magical power, Jimmy looking like he was about to fall over, and James, well, looking like James. I would later go upstairs and open up this new — unknown to me at the time — cassette of Siamese Dream. I put on side A and these familiar drums started playing. Once again I grabbed my trusty air guitar and rocked out! The album I had never heard of ended up being one of my favorite albums of all time. I later listened to all of Mellon Collie and rocked out so much and also enjoyed “To Forgive” as it brought me back down. I even remember fast forwarding through “Tales of a Scorched Earth,” finding it too heavy for my liking, and acting super silly as I heard “We Only Come Out at Night.”>

[run2pee]

It was then on a July evening that my mom came to my room and said “Jonathan, someone in your Pumpkin band died!”

“WHAT!” I yelled as I rushed to my mother’s room where she had Entertainment Tonight on (or something like that) and they showed this hotel room that the Pumpkins were staying in. I found out that a touring keyboardist, whom I had never heard of, had died of a drug overdose. My parents started to question whether I should ever see such a band. It wasn’t until a few days later that I learned about the firing of Jimmy Chamberlin and this put my parents at ease.

[run2pee]

The Smashing Pumpkins would later return to Berkley on May 24th the day after the Billy announced on KROQ that the band was calling it quit. I started to feel lost and the Machina mystery wasn’t helping as it was hard to understand at the time. Before the Berkeley show the nice people who I knew from the Edge show were on the side of the road when I showed up. I came over just in time when Billy would come out quickly and say hello to them. He was asked why the band was calling it a day where he said it was just the right time. I bravely asked him about (what I now know to be a kind of pointless gift) the VHS tape and if he ever saw it or if it just landed in a pile of a bunch of random stuff. To which he said “ likely in the pile”.

[run2pee]

JC WEBSTER III on October 19, 2011 at 6:10 pm
THANK U FOR SHARING THIS TOUCHING STORY IT IS NICE TO FIND OUT HOW PEOPLE DISCOVER THEIR FAVORITE BANDS AGAIN THANK U FOR SHARING THIS WITH THE COMMUNITY

[run2pee]

The 1st person was Melisa. I handed her the jacket and told her thank you so much for the great show the month before. She was so gentle and friendly and signed my superman and wrote a large “A” on the top of his head. Next would be James, I handed him the Alf doll he looked at it confessed and said ‘you want me to sign this?” I told him, that it was for him he gave me an awkward thanks and went to sign the Superman. Jimmy gave me an enthusiastic hello, as I gave him the cat in the hat, hat he put it right on. It was the most uplifting thing after the little bit of awkwardness with James.

[yo soy el mejor]

cool beans

[vixnix]

run2pee are you trying to say i write like monte micropenis jonathan LSD

I mean

Fuck you man

I can’t help it, I gotta lotta shit on my mind, this stuff just comes out

But ok I hear you

[MyOneAndOnly]

Originally Posted by slunken

people don't call that a Sub are scum

[MyOneAndOnly]

Originally Posted by vixnix

run2pee are you trying to say i write like monte micropenis jonathan LSD

I mean

Fuck you man

I can’t help it, I gotta lotta shit on my mind, this stuff just comes out

But ok I hear you

I love how Monte is still the worst slur on this board.

FTR you don't think you're all that because you know how many people are in the world. So you're cool

[topleybird]

I will just say "wedge" is utter bullshit and I had to look it up to make sure it wasn't a joke entry