Is Deliberately Starving Millions of the Populace to death A Good Thing

ninky_2

GDB2222 wrote: »

Well, the doctors were born with good brains - and did nothing special to deserve that - then they were trained by the state to do a worthwhile and satisfying job. Of course cleaners need to be paid more as their job isn't as much fun.

if we valued cleaners more highly in our culture we might have fewer hospital acquired infections and fewer resulting deaths. whilst it's not a highly skilled job it's not a particularly pleasant one. hospital cleaning is clearly not adequately funded or prioritised at the moment.

ninky_2

fc123 wrote: »

If I am really honest with myself....would I work as hard and take the personal financial risks that I do every so often plus the hassle and responsibility to those we employ directly or indirectly if I took home the same as someone who works 9-5 PAYE in something fairly straightforward and stress free?
No, I wouldn't. I would just do 'enough' to get by and enjoy the free time.

you work hard but is it any harder than many people in tough demanding job? the main difference here is that you are taking what you call a 'risk'. whilst the rewards are high you take a chance that you might lose. however, shouldn't we have a society where if people take business risks that fail and leave them destitute they should at least have a bit of a safety net of healthcare, housing and enough to prevent them starving?

i don't think any of us would like to see a one party state. but i also think it is important to protect those 'losers' of society. to try to level the playing field of opportunity where possible. and that the 'winners' need to pay something towards providing that to make it a better society to live in.

Kohoutek

GDB2222 wrote: »

Well, the doctors were born with good brains - and did nothing special to deserve that - then they were trained by the state to do a worthwhile and satisfying job. Of course cleaners need to be paid more as their job isn't as much fun.

Aren't you forgetting that doctors, and most successful people in general, have to work hard to get where they are?

What do you mean 'were born with good brains - and did nothing special to deserve that' - do you actually believe everything is that simple?

Doctors have to make some pretty important decisions with life or death implications - don't you think we should pay them more than cleaners to make sure we attract the best people? What a cleaner does can be substituted by any unskilled worker. If they don't like the job, then why don't they get a different one? We can't all be doctors, but there are still plenty of jobs out there that don't require lots of qualifications.

lostinrates

ninky wrote: »

if we valued cleaners more highly in our culture we might have fewer hospital acquired infections and fewer resulting deaths. whilst it's not a highly skilled job it's not a particularly pleasant one. hospital cleaning is clearly not adequately funded or prioritised at the moment.

I think this is less about valuing cleaners than it is commonsense and on the spot pomposity.

I watched a nurse drop something in hospital (where I have been three times in the last fortnight) and go and call a cleaner, then stand around till the cleaner came. I saw an almost identical thing about six months ago when taking my mum in for a minor procedure, accept two nurses were involved (one British one otherwise) the ''otherwise'' , th senior nurse immediately sorted out the mess obviously a bit unimpressed the junior looked uncomfortable and asked if she should call some one....the senior said yes, but no reason to let the mess spread/lie on floor in the mean time.....then she went and washed her hands and then got back to work....

lostinrates

ninky wrote: »

you work hard but is it any harder than many people in tough demanding job? the main difference here is that you are taking what you call a 'risk'. whilst the rewards are high you take a chance that you might lose. however, shouldn't we have a society where if people take business risks that fail and leave them destitute they should at least have a bit of a safety net of healthcare, housing and enough to prevent them starving?

i don't think any of us would like to see a one party state. but i also think it is important to protect those 'losers' of society. to try to level the playing field of opportunity where possible. and that the 'winners' need to pay something towards providing that to make it a better society to live in.

rewards high? FC talks about what seems to me a comfortable, but not un-normal lifestyle..that could have been so different just a year ago....

fc123

ninky wrote: »

you work hard but is it any harder than many people in tough demanding job? the main difference here is that you are taking what you call a 'risk'. whilst the rewards are high you take a chance that you might lose. however, shouldn't we have a society where if people take business risks that fail and leave them destitute they should at least have a bit of a safety net of healthcare, housing and enough to prevent them starving?

i don't think any of us would like to see a one party state. but i also think it is important to protect those 'losers' of society. to try to level the playing field of opportunity where possible. and that the 'winners' need to pay something towards providing that to make it a better society to live in.

I thought we did....you are talking about the UK?

If I lost 'everything'...by that the house gets repo'd and I have to sell off all our stuff, I would imagine I can sign on, rent something within the LHA allowance and get the £50 per week (is that the right amount?) which would feed me.

Day to day, I don't think about it but it's there...might be a bit of hassle to get it but it's there for any UK citizen.

fc123

lostinrates wrote: »

rewards high? FC talks about what seems to me a comfortable, but not un-normal lifestyle..that could have been so different just a year ago....

Unless you have actually put your nuts on the line for something, you have absolutely no idea how it feels or how it makes you behave. I could try to explain....but I should be working and I am procrastinating so badly at the mo.


:rotfl:I have rewards lir......I am going to buy new shoes end of the month...and I can't wait.:D

tomterm8

Going back to the original question, is it possible that just because someone calls their party 'communist', doesn't necessarily mean they actually are.

I'm just thinking about how 'National Socialism' was such a socialist regime.

I always thought communism was a great theory, and I agree with at least some of what Marx said, but in fact his solution was and will never be tried because human nature means that revolution just replaces one elite with another -generally even more ruthless and inevitably bloody- elite.

fc123

eta above the quote was to Ninky...the shoe note to LIR

Masomnia

tomterm8 wrote: »

Going back to the original question, is it possible that just because someone calls their party 'communist', doesn't necessarily mean they actually are.

I'm just thinking about how 'National Socialism' was such a socialist regime.

I always thought communism was a great theory, and I agree with at least some of what Marx said, but in fact his solution was and will never be tried because human nature means that revolution just replaces one elite with another -generally even more ruthless and inevitably bloody- elite.

Certainly you could argue that. You could argue that the Russian revolution wasn't Marxist, as one of the conditions for a marxist revolution is that is the proletariat seizing power, where Russia didn't really have one in the way that Britain or Germany did. Marx actually thought the first Communist revolution would happen in Germany for this reason.

The idea behind Marxism isn't just that Communism is a Good Thing, it's that Communism is inevitable, that society moved from Feudalism to Capitalism, and will move from Capitalism to Socialism, and then from Socialism to Communism.

So the idea is that the French Revolutions were bourgeois revolutions to get rid of the aristocracy and place power in the hands of the capitalists, and presumably they'd argue that what we see in Russia is socialist revolution, and that that would progress to Communism. I think it's the fact that this didn't happen that has led to a decline in the belief in Communism.