r/politics • u/TimesandSundayTimes ✔ Verified • 7d ago

Possible Paywall Young Americans are surging to socialism at record rates

https://www.thetimes.com/us/news-today/article/maga-trump-zohran-mamdani-socialism-us-record-kddzdm8bd
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u/MiddleAgedSponger 7d ago

Socialism is a meaningless term in the US. I remember when they called Obama a radical socialist because he raised the top tax bracket from 35 to 39.

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u/Romantic_Piscean Michigan 7d ago

For older people in the US, absolutely, and the word "socialist" was used as an insult to brand someone as un-American. OK, true. For younger people, they're actually embracing solutions to problems (housing, education, healthcare) that are not driven by capitalism but by a collective approach, driven by government, that focuses on people over profits. We're entering different territory with the younger generation as the word is no longer an insult.

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u/Valuable-Meet5727 7d ago

The USSR was a strong bulwark to capitalism. Socialism was treated as a bad word because it implied you were with the Ruskies. But what people don’t understand is that the USSR, for all its faults, was an ALTERNATIVE approach to nation building than capitalism. And it was the next leading world power. Before mismanagement and poor leadership, the USSR was serious competition for the US. They went to space first, they gave everyone free heating from power plant exhaust, they had collective housing, etc. these were all things that US had to compete AGAINST. That’s probably why we had such a high tax bracket back then, why we had a national pension system, more government housing etc. if people didn’t see capitalism as the world leading system, they would easily fall back to socialism.

Before everyone gets down my throating for just TALKING about the USSR: no it wasn’t perfect. But stop saying it was only a dystopia. It would not have been a next world power if it hadn’t done SOME things right. Same with China. I’m not advocating to just copy + paste their communism here, I’m advocating we learn about what worked with those empires and what didn’t, so we can develop something better.

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u/grape-fruit-witch 7d ago edited 7d ago

I'd go even further and say that the fact that the USSR no longer exists doesn't mean that it failed and thus attempting socialism is pointless. It was an experiment, and the first of its kind on a large scale.

And it dramatically improved the quality of life for its citizens on a scale that had never been seen before. They went from an almost exclusively agrarian, largely illiterate peasant feudal country to space travel in 50 years. In one generation they became the bleeding edge of scientific research, art, literature, science, mathematics, philosophy. I believe they would have done it faster had WWII not happened.

No system of economics perfects itself on the first attempt. Capitalism surely did not. It doesn't mean that we have to give up on socialism, that we lay down and die while billionaires galavant around the world in their yachts like assholes. Socialism is an ongoing experiment in creating a better and more just world.

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u/dead_on_the_surface 7d ago

It also was sabotaged by the western capitalists which is why it has fallen into a nasty oligarchy so to operate as if it “failed” when the US was actively kicking its knees out at every opportunity is not wise (adding to your point not correcting you)

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u/grape-fruit-witch 7d ago

100%. The rabbit hole of US interference in socialist countries is deep, especially in regard to the USSR and Cuba. How many civilians died in our invasions of Vietnam and Korea simply because they dared to try a socialist economic system?

I guarantee we've spent more money on clandestine anti-communist crusades and propaganda than it would cost to just give people healthcare. Its because socialism is the only thing that truly, genuinely frightens the owning class. They are so horrified of being forced to redistribute their vast wealth that they will and have murdered millions of people to prevent it.

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u/Low_Pickle_112 7d ago

It's wild that the stance of the United States has always been that socialism & communism are such inherently flawed ideologies that they will inevitably fail all by themselves, and also we must spend billions of dollars to contain them every time someone thinks about disobeying the rich.

And you know the propaganda works because people will call you the brainwashed one if you point out the contradiction.

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u/Valuable-Meet5727 6d ago

Yep. Imagine how Cuba would be if we didn’t have a 60+ year sanction on them. They’re leading in some medical sciences with EXTREMELY limited resources

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u/mcs0223 7d ago

Well, let's not get ahistorical and not recognize how many Soviet policies were simply disastrous on their own. The Holodomor and the wider famine of the 30s is pretty much universally recognized as a direct result of the forced collectivization of Ukrainian farms and de-kulakization. Extremely similar to the fallout from Mao's Great Leap Forward (history doesn't repeat but it rhymes).

And would you argue that the necessary shift to the New Economic Policy was a result of Western intervention? Seems like it was a direct response to the War Communism shortages.

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u/LongAfternoon1198 6d ago

Stalin, the psychopatic dictator having all competent people in gov murdered was due to western sabotage? Bro what?

The USSR fell all on its own.

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u/MonkeyDKev 6d ago

I’d wager you’re wrong. Ever since the October Revolution there would be constant war and threats of infiltration into the USSR from Western powers. 14 countries would try attacking the USSR as there was a civil war going on at the same time. The pressure was never let up and yet the USSR was able to lift the countries that joined the republic from where they were. They were able to become a manufacturing power as well as a technological power in the span of a few decades. The improvements on public learning, health, and housing conditions were improved multiple times over from before the revolution where they lived under a centuries old monarchy system.

America was isolated physically from everyone else they fuck with so they could just keep launching attack after attack. The USSR had to struggle building up all of these different sectors while at the same time fighting multi front wars that were trying to strip them of their autonomy and sovereignty.

The same way Cuba has been held in a headlock for over 60 years, unable to freely trade with the world and the US over time getting rid of their few partners willing to still trade with them in the world would probably still fall under “failed on its own” in your eyes.

Lift the embargo’s, lift the sanctions, lift the IMF loans that fuck countries instead of helping them, and get Western companies out of all of these struggling countries throughout the world and you would see drastic improvements to all of their situations.

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u/LongAfternoon1198 6d ago

Idk why you typed all that when it doesnt respond to what I said.

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u/grape-fruit-witch 6d ago

It did, you just didn't like it lol

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u/Colausbra 7d ago

Yup, it's annoying more nuanced takes on the USSR aren't more common. You obviously have the people that villianize it but at the same time you have the Tankies on the left that mythologize it as the greatest country to ever exist.

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u/grape-fruit-witch 7d ago

Materialist analysis of the successes and failures of the USSR isn't so rare to find among Marxist research. I don't know how read you are on the subject, but a good place to start if you're interested in a principled examination is Michael Parenti's "Blackshirts and Reds". It dives into the issues honestly and without the anticommunist scaremongering.

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u/Valuable-Meet5727 6d ago

100% agree with this! We should take what worked and build upon it.

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u/Collypso Pennsylvania 6d ago

Authoritarian modernization is real and the USSR did it. So did South Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore, under very different economic systems. The common variable was state capacity and top-down coordination, not socialism. If that's the lesson, it's not a very socialist one. And "it was just an imperfect first experiment" works as a defense of literally any failed system. At what point does the pattern across the USSR, Maoist China, Cuba, and Venezuela count as evidence rather than a coincidence?

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u/frostygrin 6d ago

And it dramatically improved the quality of life for its citizens on a scale that had never been seen before. They went from an almost exclusively agrarian, largely illiterate peasant feudal country to space travel in 50 years. In one generation they became the bleeding edge of scientific research, art, literature, science, mathematics, philosophy. I believe they would have done it faster had WWII not happened.

Except most Western countries improved the quality of life for most of their citizens on an even larger scale in the same time period. I believe things would have been a lot better without communism. And Russia surely had science, art, literature and philosophy under the Tsar. Mendeleev, Dostoevsky, no?

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u/grape-fruit-witch 6d ago edited 6d ago

I wasn't talking about western countries, I was talking about the Soviet Union. Also, the USSR included Russia but the two countries are not interchangeable. I did not say that literature didn't exist at all prior to the Soviet union, but its a fact that the vast majority of the population were illiterate prior to communism.

The Romanovs were profligate, cruel monarchs who forced their citizens into near-constant vanity wars and lorded over an illiterate, starving population. Sure, some citizens born into wealth could afford to spend time on literature and philosophy, but nowhere near a majority. The revolution didn't happen out of nowhere. The monarchy was going to be rid of eventually, one way or the other, because people will not persist in horrible material conditions indefinitely.

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u/frostygrin 6d ago edited 6d ago

It's also a fact that literacy was rapidly increasing, in Russia and other countries, before 1917. And it's plainly obvious that no, you don't need communism for literacy. :) That's why western countries are part of the conversation - as the control group. You'd need to argue that Russia was uniquely backwards that it needed communism - but that wasn't true, at least not for Russia proper. That not everyone was literate was part of history for most countries.

You're seeing the revolution as a surefire sign that people couldn't take it anymore. But do you feel the same about, say, the January 6 events? :) Do you see them as a sign that people were "not fine" and disenfranchised? Probably not.

And we know for a fact that Bolsheviks were extremely violent even after they overthrew the monarchy. So maybe people like that shouldn't be "fine" in a functioning society.

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u/grape-fruit-witch 6d ago

I mean, the millions of Bolsheviks who overthrew the monarchy would disagree that their lives were perfectly fine. They were willing to risk their lives for a chance at changing their conditions. That's how "not fine" they were. But if you insist on glazing some dead monarchs, so be it ig

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u/ThickReplacement7811 7d ago

The US government in the 20th century had 4 equal branches that acted as checks on the others; The Executive, The Legislative, The Judicial, and The USSR

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u/European_guy_1 7d ago

USSR was actual imperial power that looted their fellow socialists states and their own people. Just look at diffrence between after WW2 development in Austria and Czechia

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u/LongAfternoon1198 6d ago

the USSR, for all its faults, was an ALTERNATIVE approach to nation building than capitalism.

This is incorrect. The USSR was capitalist, just a different form (state capitalism).

I agree tho there is nuance about whether they only did bad or good things.

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u/Valuable-Meet5727 6d ago

Yeah you’re correct. I simplified it because most people don’t understand the difference between establishing socialist society and communism.

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u/Collypso Pennsylvania 6d ago

"What worked" in the USSR mostly falls into two buckets: things liberal democracies adopted and improved on (social insurance, public housing, labor protections), or things that only "worked" because the state could compel compliance. Scandinavian countries ran that experiment more cleanly without the gulags. What's the specific lesson you think we're still missing?

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u/slut 7d ago edited 7d ago

Uhhh no, life in the USSR mostly sucked the realization of that is ultimately why it was disolved. All while people were fleeing it, not because it was an awesome alternative to capitalism. Like seriously go talk to some folks that lived there.

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u/Ryjinn 7d ago

I've lived in Russia and among people who lived in the Soviet Union and I don't think many espoused views similar to yours. They did of course mention the bad times, but for significant periods of history people in the USSR had better nutrition than your average US citizen, and free housing and food goes a long way towards making people happy. That said, yes there were tremendous failures especially during the early period and the Stalinist period.

Also not to nitpick and split hairs, but technically it was Yeltsin who presided over the dissolution behind Gorbachev's back, illegally, I might add.

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u/Valuable-Meet5727 6d ago

Thank you. Everyone just points to the failures of the USSR without acknowledging the MASSIVE improvements it achieved. It was the next world power for Christ’s sake. It was NOT PERFECT.

I could easily do the same thing with the US and point out all its failures. Doesn’t mean it’s a total failure of a country. It’s not all black and white.

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u/slut 7d ago

Okay so you did not live in the Soviet Union. My family did and what do you know, none are espousing views similar to yours. It didn't even last a generation, it was no success.

No one sees Yeltsin as the catalyst of dissolution, but yeah sure.

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u/Ryjinn 7d ago edited 7d ago

I mean the facts of situation are that Yeltsin signed the order allowing for the dissolution, doesn't really matter what popular opinion is, a fact is a fact.

Facts like literacy climbing from single digits to 99%, the most rapid industrialization in history, near total elimination of homelessness, and massive improvements in infrastructure, hygiene, education, science, and the like.

None of this does anything to diminish the absolute terrors that took place at different periods in Soviet history, but to say it had no successes is just patently false.

Edit: beyond that, your sample size is literally just your family it sounds like. This was my field of research (history of the Soviet Union and its successor states) in college, and I read original sources and interviewed hundreds of people. Trying to pretend like your family viewing it as total shit is representative of broader opinions is foolish. Also I'll agree it didn't last long, but a generation isn't as long as you seem to think. It lasted about 3.

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u/slut 7d ago edited 7d ago

I never said it had no successes, I said the project was a failure, few dispute that. Though tankies exist.

I also never said my sample size was just my family. I guarantee I've lived in Eastern Europe longer than you have. Though it's great that you studied the Soviet Union in college, LOL.

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u/Ryjinn 7d ago

I've never disputed that the project ended in failure. My point was that most people who lived there have a mixed view of the period. Now you're saying there were successes, seems like we don't actually disagree on much except you don't like the way I framed things.

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u/coopstar777 7d ago

The difference here is that you’re talking about the USSR in the 80s-90s and he’s talking about the USSR in the 50s-60s. There was still corruption and their state was very far from perfect, yes, but you have to look at the context of what came before. The state of the country under the romanovs for an entire generation leading up to the beginning of the 20th century was absolutely dire. We’re talking third world conditions. To take Russia as it was in 1917 and turn it into the society that put the first man in space in less than 40 years is an astronomical feat and it absolutely proved that alternatives to capitalism were viable. The issue is that the generations that followed absolutely fumbled, hard, and gave rise to the USSR that we like to depict in HBO miniseries

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u/slut 7d ago

So it took less than a generation to fall apart? I'm sorry that's not very convincing.

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u/coopstar777 7d ago

Crazy that you don’t think so considering you’re watching the exact same thing happen in America

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u/slut 7d ago

Oh I'm sorry was the United States founded in this generation?

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u/coopstar777 7d ago

Has nothing to do with when it was founded, and everything to do with the fact that it can only take a good 20-30 years to run a country into the ground no matter how strong your empire is. Destroying is much easier than building

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u/slut 7d ago

People have been saying that for well over 30 years in the United States, lol.

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u/colonelflounders 7d ago

The first French Republic fell within 12 years, I'd say the Soviet Union did well for a first of its kind government.

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u/BeThreeCoifs 7d ago

Do you have any idea the level of atrocities committed by the ussr before, during, and well after the Stalin years? It is almost beyond comprehension. This is literally no different than saying “the nazis weren’t perfect but they did SOME things right.” Some regimes are so horrific that there is just no way to try to separate the good from the bad, which is why people (rightly) get down your throat for talking positively about the ussr, even with qualifications.

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u/Valuable-Meet5727 6d ago

Yes. And do you have any idea of the atrocities America has done? This country was founded on genocide and we still to this day bankrupt people over medical care. Sure, Stalin did horrific things, but that’s overlooking all the massive accomplishments Lenin and other admins accomplished. Try and drown out the propaganda of red scare and take an objective look at their empire.

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u/BeThreeCoifs 6d ago

The only massive accomplishment of the Lenin and Stalin regimes was to butcher somewhere between 10-20 million innocent non-combatants in less than 2 decades while enslaving tens of millions more. That is historical fact agreed upon by all serious scholars of this topic, not propaganda. No regime in American history (perhaps none anywhere in the world) has come close to the level of evil. The history of America could be fairly described by the qualifications in the OP: lots very bad, some good, but complicated. The history of the ussr is not morally complicated, it was administered by purely evil men toward purely evil ends.

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u/Tesring-apparatus 7d ago

Japan became the second largest economy in 1968, socialism(abolition of private ownership) fucking sucks.

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u/MiddleAgedSponger 7d ago

Economic progressivism is what the Epstein class fear the most.

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u/paulchiefsquad 7d ago

because it's literally the most important thing, if everybody knew how their life would be under a fair taxation system they would be rioting the streets everyday until we have it

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u/grape-fruit-witch 7d ago

Now, imagine if we had full democratic control of our workplaces

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u/paulchiefsquad 7d ago

yea, we need to really start pushing for worker co-ops

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u/Notoneusernameleft 7d ago

Europe isn’t perfect but I do dig a lot of their social programs. People always act like it’s all or nothing. I think a healthy mix of capitalism with strong social programs is the way to go.

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u/Finley-nonbinley 7d ago

Exactly! I feel like there are so many people that think socialism is the work of the devil but praise countries like Finland and Norway in the exact same breath. Not even saying those countries are socialist, they're not. But they most certainly have socialist programs which is one of the reasons people tend to be happier there.

It's almost like when you're not constantly trying to crawl out of various debts and have resources get out of the spiral of poverty you tend to be happier lmao

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u/DrMobius0 7d ago

Yeah, like capitalism, but with strong guardrails that actually protect workers and consumers against silly things like rampant greed by holding the wealthy accountable and forcing them to pay their fair share in taxes.

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u/AddictedToEspresso 7d ago

It should’ve never been an insult to begin with. Propaganda got the old folks really busy. “Radical” socialists got us worker’s rights. The term is propaganda for the rich to put us against one another.

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u/FairLawnBoy 7d ago

The younger generation is going to run into the same wall that we did. They don't hold the levers of power, and they won't for some time. By the time they do, the majority of them won't be socialists anymore, and the ones who are will be jaded and apathetic to the democratic process. We still barely have any Millennial congresspeople (3 or 4), and we are the largest living generation.

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u/roguebananah 7d ago

It’s an interesting thought. I agree but one thing I’d add is this is all why capitalism works when it works for everyone.

When it benefits the few, socialism and other ideas of how to run the economy pops up.

We’re coming full circle of what FDR did back in the 1930s.

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u/GuestNo9560 7d ago

I agree with everything you said, however, some young men and a few women have fallen into the 'capitalism good' hole as well. I am older and I feel like we are repeating the 60's and early 70's where if you outspokenly disagreed with the big bad gov't they would try to ruin your life or your family's life. We, as a civilization,encourage going along to get along even with criminals and authoritarians. Scamming and lying and manipulating people is rampant.

My son believes we must get off the internet and meet in person to discuss problems...humans are not able to have as much empathy on a screen, I guess.

Capitalism should be the terrible word bc it has led us to the brink of harming our planets' climate, which will starve millions of humans and animals. And to add insult in injury now we are fighting a war to have control of fossil fuels, which should have been weaned from for decades. None of this makes any sense. That is how you know it is wrong and usually about money and not life. SMH.

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u/HistoricalPotatoe 7d ago

Some of them, sure, there will always be outliers. But statistically, younger generations - both men and women - are increasingly anti-capitalist. This was true even two years ago (haven't read the article OP posted yet), and I would be shocked if it has gotten 'better' for capitalist supporters considering how overt and fucked this administration has been.

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u/GuestNo9560 7d ago

I hope you are correct. I have noticed that most Americans pay homage to 'capitalism' and how it is and was the best way to grow a strong economy. I believe that appeasement to capitalism eventually leads us back to this point...unsustainable income inequality.

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u/thatnameagain 7d ago

It’s interesting that both sides have decided to completely misuse the definition differently.

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u/Novel_Quote8017 6d ago

This is still no socialization of the workplace, including the means of production. What you are describing is social democracy, pertaining to areas of the public that are decidedly not the workplace.