Thoughts on socialism

Socialism is one of those things that sounds great as a broad idea but once you start to get into the nitty gritty details falls apart pretty quickly.


Source: Zazzle.co.uk



The biggest problem with socialism is that for it to work you need complete buy in.

Even if a small number of people in a society aren't completely sold on it it stops working.

Which is why for a socialist society to work you would need to start with the children.

You would need to start, in the nicest possible sense of the word, indoctrinating them at a young age so that once they become adults they couldn't conceive of society behaving in any other way.

And for those who indoctrination didn't work on, you would also need to be able to kick them out.

As I suggested earlier, it only takes a small number of people putting themselves ahead of society for socialism to break down, so when someone starts showing those signs you would need to remove them from society.

Which is one of the details that's makes socialism probably unworkable.

But doesn't mean we shouldn't at least try.

Does it?

American reactions to 9/11

I was reading an article today in Wired magazine (this one) about a woman who had just become head of IARPA, a government agency tasked with outfitting US spies with advanced technology.

The part I found interesting was the reason she gave for switching from academic work to government work:

Like many Americans," she says, "I felt a need to step up and contribute."

It seems to me her thought process was "We were attacked, how can I help retaliate?". Now, she isn't unique in thinking like this as I've heard multiple stories of people joining the military after 9/11, but I do find it interesting that there weren't more Americans who didn't instead think "Why were we attacked?" or "What was it about us that made someone want to go to such lengths to inflict pain?"

Chris Rock Quote

Something I saw Chris Rock say during a stand-up show:

A black C grade student can't even manage a Burger King, but a white C grade student is the President of the United States of America...

Probably not true (I'm sure Bush dreamed about getting C grades) but funny nonetheless.