I totally understand having a world view like this but it’s the rampant censorship of any opposing view point on this instance that made me reconsider my monthly donation to the development of Lemmy and move it to piefed instead.
PieFed is worse when it comes to censorship, though, as a platform. There’s all sorts of tools for “reputation,” replies from blocked users outright aren’t sent for anyone to see, and more. Lemmy as a platform is less susceptible to censorship outright and is more transparent about removed content.
I’m talking about your instance.
It literally has a list of words that dessalines doesn’t like and are replaced with removed.
Yea, it has a slur filter. I’m okay with that, and it’s preferable to PieFed’s thoughtcrime style censorship with literal social credit scores.
Are you taking about the attitude where I’m currently sitting at 92% even though I don’t ever say the popular thing?
I don’t even know how it works but why is mine there?
There’s a bunch that goes into the reputation score, it’s a combination of upvotes/downvotes as well as other factors. PieFed also has a stronger slur filter, where instead of replacing with removed, it outright doesn’t accept the comment if you type the phrase.
All in all PieFed is built specifically to cultivate echo chambers in ways that go beyond what Lemmy limits itself to, by design.
I’ve never have a comment that hasn’t been posted so can you show me some code to prove what you’re saying?
Here’s a snippet from the code regarding blocking comments if a phrase is set to blocked. Credit to @[email protected] for finding this.
If one paycheck is all that stands between half of the people and homelessness, can it really be called the “middle” class?
It’s better to think of working, middle, and upper class in terms of how much of their income derives from labour vs capital.
Working class = majority of income from working.
Upper class = majority of income from owning capital, i.e. can afford not to work at all.
Middle = somewhat evenly split.
Traditionally working class was associated with “lower” jobs such as labourers, and those working cushy office jobs usually earnt a high enough income to accumulate enough capital to become middle or upper class.
This is more aligned with the British definition, where their “middle class” is more equivalent to the US “upper middle class.” Make no mistake though, with many jobs not paying enough to accumulate capital, professionals such as teachers, accountants, and nurses would firmly be considered working class, because they you know, need to work.
So I learned it this way:
Upper Class - can live a luxurious life without working at all, and even have domestic employees etc.
Middle Class - can live comfortably but only if they work
Lower class - cannot live comfortably even if they work, and can very easily end up homeless (no social safety net)
The dude who taught me this was my Sociology of Work teacher over twenty years ago.
This isn’t particularly helpful, though, as it doesn’t explain why these classes exist. Class traditionally refers to how we engage with societal production and distribution, like wage laborers, business owners, sole proprietors, artisans, etc. By focusing on the outcomes of this class distinctions, you obscure the mechanisms by which they persist and are reinforced.
I was just trying to offer a quick explanation/summary of the concepts or the main distinguishing external features of each class, because I see a lot of confusion and wrong self-perception. I see a lot of people saying they’re “mid to upper class” because they can afford a nice home and two cars. Just looking at how much money they have, not how do they have it or whether they can maintain that without working. Obviously to understand class and social stratification you have to read more. I am aware that the upper class are there because of the work of the lower classes and the surplus etc. I’m not obscuring anything, just offering some definitions. Sorry if it didn’t come out that way.
Understood, I just wanted to build on your comment.
Class traditionally
It only refers to how we engage with societal production in a handful of belief systems such as Marxism. These are different from how Anthropologists view class which is different from how sociologists view class and all of the above are different from how many older societies viewed class.
Marxism did not invent that class previously meant things like “serf, lord, slave, merchant, etc,” this was something Marx just used that everyone else was using. Marx developed class struggle further by developing dialectical and historical materialism, but did not invent this conception of class.
Marx overly focused on one criteria to describe class. It’s ok to accept ownership/working classes as a useful tool for understanding the world but other systems also offer useful lessons for understanding the world in different ways and contexts.
Marxism does not limit one’s understanding purely to production and distribution, though, I’m not sure what you’re getting at. Domenico Losurdo’s Class Struggle is a good read.
Hence why some of the US simply CAN’T protest. If they miss a single pay check-- or get fired for missing work-- they’re fucked. Insurance is also tired to work.
Financial slavery
Mario’s brother said what?
I’m not in/from the US. I haven’t been one paycheck away from homelessness since I was a student.
Enough savings to last half a year without income has always been a rule of thumb.
I go with 10 year rule of thumb
Fuck it. Chips on the table, china taking over america would be a net positive at this point. I’ve never bought into the “country bad because ideology different” bullshit we’re fed here in the us. As I can see from here, just about any other large nation assuming control would bring me everything I ask my government for as a default.
Please, president Xi, the Statesian public yearns for liberation
Maybe the Chinese proletariat can launch a concurrent revolution to overthrow Xi.
Why would they do that? Over 90% of Chinese citizens support their government.
I didn’t seriously consider that they would just like I wouldn’t seriously consider White Americans in the 1950’s launching a revolution. China has high propaganda and they’re at the part of both industrialization and capitalism where average people see benefit from both.
China isn’t capitalist, nor is it an imperialist settler colony that gave 1950s white Statesians a better life. It’s a socialist country, the large firms and key industries are overwhelmingly publicly owned and the working classes are in charge of the state. A revolution would be devastating for the Chinese working classes.
China isn’t capitalist
That’s delusional
the working classes are in charge of the state
The party is in charge of the state. The working class have vanishingly little power.
A revolution would be devastating for the Chinese working classes.
That’s what the Ruling Class in every country says. Can’t let everyday people get too uppity
The CPC is a working class party, not a class in itself. In the PRC, public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy, private ownership is relegated to the small and medium firms, which are about half sole proprietorships anyways.
The idea that the party is a distinct class and the idea that an economy where public ownership is principle is somehow capitalist both are contradictory to Marx and common sense, so I’m not sure where you’re coming from.
A revolution would result in bleak reaction and capitalists in charge of the state, this is the opposite of what the working class wants in China.
It’s genuinely sad to see people who have been so traumatized by living in an epicenter of capitalist profiteering, gaslighting propaganda, and government violence that they can’t imagine a society that doesn’t work that way. You think this is a normal way for a government to be, and you think the smart thing to do is assume everyone is like the US.
Trading late stage capitalism for mid stage capitalism and a pre-existing merger of state and corporate power doesn’t sound like a permanent fix. Also, deposing a strongman in favor a system that has reestablished it’s leadership as a strongman is not an improvement.
China is socialist, the large firms and key industries are publicly owned and the working class is in control of the state. They don’t have a “strongman,” just because Xi gets re-elected. Stability is good if public support is high.
They have a Strongman because Xi went to great efforts to sideline people or policies that served as a check to his power. Something that would have been unthinkable in China at any point after Mao and before Xi.
Do you have an example? The anti-corruption campaigns are immensely popular among the public in China, and they support the government.
Just years of reading. That you bring up the anti-corruption campaign means you’re at least familiar with allegations that Xi unevenly applied the campaign against his political opponents. As a side not, I’ll say the anti-corruption campaigns in China are definitely popular and also one clear situation where improvements in computer technology made a major advance in society and peoples quality of life. Corruption of low level officials was hard to root out when the people would be making complaints to other corrupt low level officials and risking retaliation in the process. Computer technology helped bypass that.
So I still don’t see any evidence of Xi being a “strongman,” but instead an extremely popular and influential leader.
You’re whole persona is pushing the party line and pushing back against any dissent. I didn’t expect you to see any evidence.
I think you underestimate the term “improvement”. Lossing two fingers instead of three is an improvement. 8inches from the ledge is better than 4inches from the ledge even if either measure isn’t even one whole step. If in never going to see best then I’ll take any better I can get.
A permanently better world is possible so why settle for a temporary better situation with little hope for further improvement? Why insist people have to lose fingers when no one losing fingers is achievable and not at all far fetched?
China is still making rapid progress and hasn’t slowed down in that respect, though. It isn’t that they are following a temporary solution, it’s that they are developing towards that better world, and building that better world takes time and effort. There’s no such thing as a static system.
“Unless you’re creating an instant utopia you should not change to the status quo”
What part of creating a mixed capitalist society run by an authoritarian regime leads to an utopia on any time frame? Spell it out for me because history suggests it will end poorly.
China is a socialist market economy, not capitalist. It’s also run by the working classes in democratic fashion. The large firms and key industries in China are overwhelmingly publicly owned and planned, and as the small and medium firms grow they are folded more into the public sphere of influence. The basis of communism is in large scale industry, not in small manufacturing, so it doesn’t necessarily make the most sense to socialize small firms.
As time continues and the productive forces develop, these become economically compelled towards socialization, which is expedited by having a socialist economy where public ownership is principle. These are all basic Marxist observations about production and distribution.
