this post was submitted on 15 Jun 2026
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me_irl
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It sounds like you've just never bothered to read what socialism is.
Socialism doesn't advocate for no work, everybody gets free stuff, and we all eat berries while sitting under rainbows.
Here's a simple definition of what socialism is:
https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism
The internet is full of information, I'm sure an engineer is capable of figuring out how to locate and read it.
As a starting point, I like this book for its simple explanations of how capitalism works: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Now_and_After. You can read it for free here. It then goes on to explain anarchism, which is a form of socialism. Not all socialists are anarchists though.
til im more of a socialist than i thought i was. all i want is to work at a worker cooperative where we can just fucking fire our leaders if they aren't looking out for our long term best interests. im so sick of working for fucking psychopaths who dont give a shit about the people who work for them or tomorrow seemingly with how recklessly selfish all of their decisions are. the last place i worked the ceo just made fucking boneheaded mistake after mistake fucking over critical employees causing attrition, refusing to hire new people, and expecting people to bend over backwards to keep the same schedule with less than half the fucking people. and they get controlling interest in the company and get to be a multimillionaire or billionaire or whatever for, what, actively undermining the business and threatening everyones fucking living? capitalism is the fucking worst and ceos are a big fat pus filled boil growing on the face of society.
But you can do that within a capitalist system, can't you? Start a company with a bunch of coworkers and share ownership. If you grow and want more workers, give them a share. Since everyone will be so happy and productive and there's no owner siphoning off unmerited profits, you should be able to wipe out and capitalist competition.
That's one idea. One I participated in for a few years. Although the idea of competition isn't necessarily accurate. That's a capitalist concept where your goal is maximum profit. Infinite growth through the capture of a market. And one that a collective must contend with.
There's also the difficulty of working within the framework of capitalist law.
For example, if an anarchist organisation chose to enact freedom from association, collectively, against one member. The whole collective refuses to work with this member any more for some justifiable reason. They are clearly therefore no longer a member of the collective. But if not done wisely the ex member could take the organisation to court for breach of employment law.
Put simply, the law in many countries is written to oppose this form of ownership in many subtle and annoying ways.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Workers'_self-management
Thank you!!
Its not that I haven't bothered, I just find it hard to trust anything because theres so much propaganda against it. Same for finding out any information on political candidates.
Very good site, I saved that to read.
So very surface level for a normal person,
Joe makes 80k/year at his desk job managing large client projects (they build cheese factories ) Let's say we go full socialism right now. So we the workers become owners (this already exists with employee owned companies doesn't it?). How does joes life change ? Billionaires dissapear somehow ? Where does their wealth go that isnt straight into government pockets ? What if Joe is sick of working 50 hr weeks but needs to afford house payments (or other costs)?
Its stuff like this I can't glean from a book or a video. Specific things like this are what folks IRL will argue with me.
These sound like simple questions with simple answers but it all depends on the flavour of socialism. As you can see here, there's a lot to choose from!
Some wish for a gradual transition where we tax the billionaires until there's no longer billionaires, some wish for a sudden change where the billionaires are executed. And of course there's many ideas in between these two. Some wish for some form of government, some wish for the abolition of government. Whose idea is correct? Is there one single correct way? That's for you to determine for yourself. There's no point me saying my views because who's to say I have the correct idea. Leftists are famous for their infighting after all, arguing over whose way is the correct way.
But the broad idea is you would no longer be compelled to work through risk of starvation, homelessness, or lack of healthcare. No longer have to constantly fight for better pay and working conditions.
Some forms of socialism still wish to use money, some wish to abolish money. You see how your questions, which seem simple are actually kind of difficult? But they all think Joe shouldn't have to kill themself working 50h a week, for somebody else, just to afford a home and a belly full of food.
Joe, and people like Joe, run the cheese factory, so they and their community should benefit from the value created by the cheese factory. Not someone who stumped up some cash 20 years ago to buy the factory, so now has a bit of paper that says it is theirs, and has never even been inside it.
The book I linked does cover some of your questions though, I highly encourage giving it a read.