Soviet Union

[Lucky C]

Hi,

Sorry if this is posted in the wrong place, but I'm looking for opinions from all sides of the political spectrum as to why the soviet union (specifically Poland) collapsed in 1989. I need this information for a university assignment so please give me your intelligent opinions.

Thanks

 

[insein]

The soviet structure was socialist by nature and communist in practice. Meaning the government takes all the peoples money under the guise that the state is the one true ruler. All the money was put into the Cold War. They built rockets and tanks and guns instead of schools and farms. The living standards were deplorable.

If left uncontested by America and Reagan, the SU would have expanded and gathered more people to sustain itself for a longer period of time. It would have ultimately failed due to its flawed governmental structure, but Reagan's willingness to combat the SU instead of appeasing it brought about its destruction much quicker.

Capitalism and the Republic of America were capable of having sustained schools, food and living standards while competing in an arms race due to its free market economy. The closed market of the SU where all money goes to the state and is redistributed by the state creates dependancy on the state to provide everything and eliminates the independance and motiviation of the individual to achieve better standards for themselves. Why do they need to work harder when the state provides everything? So why waste more energy then the next guy? That is the inherant flaw in socialism and communism.

 

[DKSuddeth]

Why do they need to work harder when the state provides everything? So why waste more energy then the next guy? That is the inherant flaw in socialism and communism.

It's not a flaw in socialism or communism, its a flaw in human nature.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

Originally posted by DKSuddeth
It's not a flaw in socialism or communism, its a flaw in human nature.

The flaw is in the system which denies human nature, not human nature.

"communism is perfect, we are flawed" --bullshit

 

[DKSuddeth]

I stand by what I said. It's a flaw in human nature, not the system.

No system is perfect, including ours, despite the fact that you wish it to be.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

Originally posted by DKSuddeth
I stand by what I said. It's a flaw in human nature, not the system.

No system is perfect, including ours, despite the fact that you wish it to be.

Self interest is a flaw in human nature?
Stand by it. You're on sinking ground.

Socialism and communism are idiotic in that they ignore the fact that people are motivated by self interest; ours does not, it is better. It has been proven better by any objective measure. Standard of living, rate of growth, environmental impact, ability to raise an army, technological innovation on and on.

 

[DKSuddeth]

Originally posted by rtwngAvngr
Self interest is a flaw in human nature?
Stand by it. You're on sinking ground.

Socialism and communism are idiotic in that they ignore the fact that people are motivated by self interest; ours does not, it is better. It has been proven better by any objective measure. Standard of living, rate of growth, environmental impact, ability to raise an army, technological innovation on and on.

in other words - BLAH BLAH BLAH.

you are still handicapped with the inability to see more than one facet of the gem.

Humans are flawed, you can't deny it honestly.

greed, hate, spite, envy. These are all a part of human nature which leaves us flawed. It is these flaws which cause all systems to be imperfect, including ours.

 

[insein]

Humans are flawed and there in lies the flaw of socialism and communism to deny the existence of our fallability. Socialism ignores this flaw and sees humanity as genuinely good. This is an ultimate irony since Communist and Socialist regimes usually end up being led by the worst examples of humanity.

People are selfish by nature. Your personal survival or survival of your offspring and mate is the ultimate goal by anyone. So if you live in a society where you are supposedly taken care of by the state, then there is no need to work as hard as you would if you were the one providing.

 

[Hobbit]

Okay, first off:

Yes, humans are imperfect. However, humans have been imperfect for thousands of years of recorded history, and any system that assumes they aren't is guilty of stupidity.

Capitalism isn't perfect. Many people slip through the cracks. However, it's a lot better than communism.

Now, for your project.

Communism was a failed regime since it was an oppressive regime in which the individual had no rights. Communism was a socialist government in which the state was charged with the distribution of all resources and the assignmet of jobs. You did what you were best at, period. This lack of individual freedom, combined with the overall selfishness and inneffectuality of the government, caused the people to object and rebel, eventually resulting in the downfall of the system. Even in a repressive regime, capitalism is a far superior economic system, as all people have a hope that they can rise above poverty, even if it's a futile hope.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

http://www.yale.edu/yrb/summer01/review02.htm

"Singer’s argument boils down to this: the left will be better able to achieve its social and political agenda if it acknowledges and incorporates a more accurate understanding of human nature into its worldview. He believes that the best tool we have to unravel the mysteries of our common behavior is sociobiology, and that if the left doesn’t embrace the science and what it can tell us, leftist ideology will necessarily be flawed, perhaps tragically so."

“To be blind to the facts about human nature is to risk disaster,” writes Singer. So what does he believe are the left’s major misunderstandings about human nature that Darwin can correct?_ First and foremost is the left’s belief in the great plasticity of human behavior. Marxism is based on the notion that human nature is the product of an “ensemble of the social relations” and is therefore highly malleable. This malleability, according to Singer, dominates the left’s worldview and goes back all the way to Locke and his idea of the mind as a “white Paper, void of all characters, without any ideas.”_ The standard social science model, which dominates the left’s ideology and owes itself to Locke’s notion of a tabula rasa, views human nature, as Emile Durkheim put it, as “merely the indeterminate material that the social factor molds and transforms.” In essence, the standard social science model doesn’t believe in an inherent human nature beyond the most rudimentary biological constraints.

The idea of man’s malleability, present in both Marxist ideology and the standard social science model, leads to a belief in the inherent equality of men, and to a faith in education as the great panacea. According to Singer, it is also behind the left’s dream of a perfect human being living in a perfectly utopian society. But, Singer warns, a Darwinian acknowledgement of the many relatively fixed aspects of human nature tells us that man is not perfectible, and neither are his societies. One of the great errors of Marxism was its confidence that hierarchies could be abolished in an egalitarian revolution. Singer believes that if the left had only possessed a Darwinian understanding that the formation of hierarchies is inherent in human nature, the authoritarian horrors of Stalinism might have been prevented.

 

[Zhukov]

Originally posted by Lucky C
but I'm looking for opinions from all sides of the political spectrum as to why the soviet union (specifically Poland) collapsed in 1989.

Specifically Poland? In a word: Solidarity

A growing dicontent among workers in Poland under their communist government led to the formation of non-communist trade unions. This collection of non-communist trade unions was called Solidarity and was openly supported by first-world states, the papacy, and likely (covertly) by the U.S. C.I.A. Solidarity was tolerated by the Polish communists because of the widespread support of it among workers.

Solidarity became more popular as economic conditions of the Soviet sattelite worsensed and they forced a limited parliamentary election to be held against the wishes of the communist rulers. These elections led to a non-communist majority in Poland.

The Soviet Union at this period in history was no longer willing or able to militarily enforce communism on its satellites as it had decades previously in other eastern bloc nations.

The leader of Solidarity, Lech Walesa, became president of Poland 1990.

Mounting concern internally and externally among communist hardliners in the Soviet Union because of Gorbachev's reforms and lax treatment of deviant Soviet sattellites led to a coup. The coup failed and the Soviet Union was subsequently dissolved.

 

[NewGuy]

Originally posted by rtwngAvngr
http://www.yale.edu/yrb/summer01/review02.htm

"Singer’s argument boils down to this: the left will be better able to achieve its social and political agenda if it acknowledges and incorporates a more accurate understanding of human nature into its worldview. He believes that the best tool we have to unravel the mysteries of our common behavior is sociobiology, and that if the left doesn’t embrace the science and what it can tell us, leftist ideology will necessarily be flawed, perhaps tragically so."

“To be blind to the facts about human nature is to risk disaster,” writes Singer. So what does he believe are the left’s major misunderstandings about human nature that Darwin can correct?_ First and foremost is the left’s belief in the great plasticity of human behavior. Marxism is based on the notion that human nature is the product of an “ensemble of the social relations” and is therefore highly malleable. This malleability, according to Singer, dominates the left’s worldview and goes back all the way to Locke and his idea of the mind as a “white Paper, void of all characters, without any ideas.”_ The standard social science model, which dominates the left’s ideology and owes itself to Locke’s notion of a tabula rasa, views human nature, as Emile Durkheim put it, as “merely the indeterminate material that the social factor molds and transforms.” In essence, the standard social science model doesn’t believe in an inherent human nature beyond the most rudimentary biological constraints.

The idea of man’s malleability, present in both Marxist ideology and the standard social science model, leads to a belief in the inherent equality of men, and to a faith in education as the great panacea. According to Singer, it is also behind the left’s dream of a perfect human being living in a perfectly utopian society. But, Singer warns, a Darwinian acknowledgement of the many relatively fixed aspects of human nature tells us that man is not perfectible, and neither are his societies. One of the great errors of Marxism was its confidence that hierarchies could be abolished in an egalitarian revolution. Singer believes that if the left had only possessed a Darwinian understanding that the formation of hierarchies is inherent in human nature, the authoritarian horrors of Stalinism might have been prevented.

Darwin has been proved wrong, RWA.....Logic dictates that if you follow his theories as fact, you then would be ____________.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

Originally posted by NewGuy
Darwin has been proved wrong, RWA.....Logic dictates that if you follow his theories as fact, you then would be ____________.

Blee bloe blue. No he hasn't. Not to my satisfaction.

Are you still ignoring me? Guess not.

 

[Zhukov]

Originally posted by NewGuy
Darwin has been proved wrong

You just go on believing that if it makes you feel better.

Meanwhile humanity will continue to use selective breeding techniques to change wild flowers into commercial grain crops, and wild animals into domesticated pets over long periods of time.

Did you know that cabbage, brussel sprouts, cauliflower, collards and brocoli are all varieties of the same species of plant that humans have selectively breed into seperate varieties of vegetables?

 

[insein]

Originally posted by Zhukov
You just go on believing that if it makes you feel better.

Meanwhile humanity will continue to use selective breeding techniques to change wild flowers into commercial grain crops, and wild animals into domesticated pets over long periods of time.

Did you know that cabbage, brussel sprouts, cauliflower, collards and brocoli are all varieties of the same species of plant that humans have selectively breed into seperate varieties of vegetables?

Or that corn has become almost completely artificial.

 

[Zhukov]

Originally posted by insein
Or that corn has become almost completely artificial.

Zea mays, or corn, was transformed using selective breeding techniques over thousands of years from a wild grass called teosinte to the commercial grain grown so abundantly in the great state of Ohio today.

At present corn and teosinte are still the same species, but artificial selection by humans has only been going on for a couple thousand years. The transformation between distinct, non-breeding, species should typical take between 10,000 years to half a million years.

Still what it does prove is that the mechanisms of Darwin's evolution exist and are provable, from genetic mutations to genetic inheritance and change over generations.

That is not to say that the conclusions that Darwin reached concerning the origin of Homo sapiens can currently be proven, but the study of the mechanisms by which he came to that conclusion are obvious and easily observable in the natural world.



We've come a long way from the dissolution of the Polish Communist Party haven't we.

 

[NewGuy]

That is not to say that the conclusions that Darwin reached concerning the origin of Homo sapiens can currently be proven, but the study of the mechanisms by which he came to that conclusion are obvious and easily observable in the natural world.

That is exactly my point. Mechanisms are not a chain of events and not proof.

The only way anything you have suggested has been proven to have happened is by human intervention. If we want a detailed thread on where Darwinism went wrong, we can do that too.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

iginally posted by NewGuy [/i]
That is exactly my point. Mechanisms are not a chain of events and not proof.

The only way anything you have suggested has been proven to have happened is by human intervention. If we want a detailed thread on where Darwinism went wrong, we can do that too.

lack of proof does not disprove it either. And since the mechanisms are obvious, rational, and proven repeatedly, I've decided evolution is a safe bet and the probable origin or our species.

 

[Zhukov]

That is exactly my point.

?

You said Darwin has been proven wrong. He has not been. That was my point.

Human intervention is not that much different from natural selection.

If we don't like the way certain plants turn out, we do not allow them to interbreed with those plants of the same species that we do like.

If a mutation that naturally occurs in a living organism adversely affects it's ability to reach functional maturity it will not leave progeny, and that mutated characterisitc will not persist in the gene pool. And vice versa. This is obvious, and it is called natural selection, that being the foundation of evolution.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

NewGuy - an example of how far you can get on bluster and psuedoreasoning. you can get pretty far, but not far enough.