I recently had a discussion with someone about socialism etc… I thought about countering the argument that socialism doesn’t work, because it has failed once. I came up with: “Well, the first French revolution failed, and the people still continued establishing a second bourgeois democratic republic. So why should we stop to create a second socialist republic, just because the first attempt failed / has issues?”

Does this argument make any sense, or is this incomparable (I know it kind of is, but still)?

Also, isn’t it a core value of Marxism-Leninism to learn from past failed policies and politics, and correct them in the future?

  • BrooklynMan
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    10 months ago

    capitalism has failed many, many times. should it also be abandoned?

    edit: yes, it should, but not simply because it failed once.

    • Better Red Than DeadOP
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      510 months ago

      Capitalism has failed many times, yes, but the bourgeois democratic system has had clinged to power for a very long time now, and the contradictions are becoming more and more obvious. Still, people are thinking reactionaries and nationalism will change their situation for the better, as you can see in the election results of the western world. I know some people that think like this and I am trying to educate them, but I am not that good at debating.

      • BrooklynMan
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        310 months ago

        i was offering a counterpoint to show your debate partner the absurdity of abandoning socialism as an economic system just because it failed once, as capitalism has also failed, yet people are willing to keep trying it regardless.

        democracy is a form of government, and another matter-- one which, incidentally, typically fails because of capitalism.

  • @HaSch@lemmygrad.ml
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    810 months ago

    This is a correct analogy for how messy it gets when new modes of production emerge out of each other. It is unreasonable to expect a new stage of the political economy to arise fully formed, and it is even more unreasonable to expect it will instantly be able to defend against everything the old system throws at it.