Talk:Socialism

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Isn't this all blatantly lopsided? 90% of these quotes are either attacks or apologies for socialism.

—This unsigned comment is by 69.249.57.84 (talk • contribs) .

Nearly all the pages here could use some improvement, and many could use MUCH, but the actual laborers are few — and complainers and would-be dictators of what should be the labors of others and how they should proceed tend to be far too many. IF indeed most of the quotes are either of sincere attacks or sincere defense of socialism then things are probably proceeding to a great extent as they actually should — perhaps if there are severe imbalances of either sort, or large proportion of insincere or sarcastic remarks either way, that would probably be very deplorable — but if most remarks were simply vacuous efforts to explain or explain away the passions of people devoted or hostile to various ideas about socialism — that would probably be most regrettable thing of all, as it would then be blatantly banal — and about as nearly worthless as the banal attitude that all things should be reduced to such banalities as the majority of the most cowardly conformists can accept and approve. ~ Kalki (talk · contributions) 23:07, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Unsourced

Published sources should be provided before moving these back into the article

• Socialism and rationalism are to this day the touchstones of humanity, the rocks which lie in the course of revolution and science. Groups of swimmers, driven by reflection or the waves of circumstance against these rocks, break up at once into two camps, which, under different disguises, remain the same throughout all history, and may be distinguished either in a great political party or in a group of a dozen young men. One represents logic; the other, history: one stands for dialectics; the other for evolution. Truth is the main object of the former, and feasibility of the latter.
  • Alexander Herzen

• Socialism is theft as a form of state maxim.
  • Lars Johan Hierta

• Socialism is dead. Even the labour party has turned against socialism.
  • Matthew Wharton, Conservative Party member

• Neutrality gets the worm.
  • Jacqueline E. Marcoux

• He who is not a socialist at 19, has no heart. He who is still a socialist at 30, has no brain.
  • Exists in different variations, this one attributed to Otto von Bismarck

• Socialism is workable only in heaven where it is not needed, and in hell where they've got it.
  • Cecil Palmer

• Socialism is the flame of anger against injustice and the flame of hope that you can build a better world.
  • Tony Benn this statement as rendered has not been located in any published source, but Benn is known to have made similar remarks:

• Inside him burned the flame of anger against injustice, and the flame of hope that we could build a better world. That was what moved him.
  • Remarks in the House of Commons regarding the death of John Smith (12 May 1994)

• If you want change you do it yourself. All progress historically has come from below. The people at the top find life very attractive, but the discontent about injustice bubbles among the population and in every generation, in every country, in every century, two flames are burning, the flame of anger against injustice and the flame of hope you can build a better world. And those two flames are burning very brightly now.
  • Interview in State of Nature (Spring 2006)

• We are socialists because we see in socialism, that is the union of all citizens, the only chance to maintain our racial inheritance and to regain our political freedom and renew our German state.
  • Joseph Goebbels, 1933
    • Source: Joseph Goebbels and Mjölnir, Die verfluchten Hakenkreuzler. Etwas zum Nachdenken (Munich: Verlag Frz. Eher, 1932).

• Socialism is the doctrine of liberation for the working class. It promotes the rise of the fourth class and its incorporation in the political organism of our Fatherland, and is inextricably bound to breaking the present slavery and the regaining of German freedom. Socialism therefore is not merely a matter of the oppressed class, but a matter for everyone, for freeing the German people from slavery is the goal of contemporary policy. Socialism gains its true form only through a total combat brotherhood with the forward-striving energies of a newly awakened nationalism. Without nationalism it is nothing, a phantom, a mere theory, a castle in the sky, a book. With it it is everything, the future, freedom, the Fatherland!
  • Joseph Goebbels, 1933

• The sin of liberal thinking was to overlook socialism's nation-building strengths, thereby allowing its energies to go in anti-national directions. The sin of Marxism was to degrade socialism into a question of wages and the stomach, putting it in conflict with the state and its national existence. An understanding of both these facts leads us to a new sense of socialism, which sees its nature as nationalistic, state-building, liberating and constructive.
  • Joseph Goebbels, 1933

• I am a Socialist, and a very different kind of Socialist from your rich friend, Count Reventlow. . . . What you understand by Socialism is nothing more than Marxism.
  • Adolf Hitler, Spoken to Otto Strasser, Berlin, May 21, 1930

False Quotations

Sometimes on encounters a fictitious quote or a misattribution; any devotee of Benjamin Franklin or Mark Twain, for example, know that the latter are very common. But fictitious quotes often come with a cited source that is not the original source, and that source doesn't cite the original either. This can create a chain of citation upon citation upon citation that creates the illusion of legitimacy. These are worth identifying, as well as removal and/or correction.

• Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.
  • Winston Churchill, as quoted in The New American Newspeak Dictionary (2005) by Adrian Krieg, p. 96

References:

“The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings. The inherent virtue of Socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.” (Speech in the House of Commons, October 22, 1945 “Demobilisation”)

“Socialism is the philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance and the gospel of envy.” (Speech (May 28, 1948) at the Scottish Unionist Conference, Perth, Scotland)

“SOCIALISM A PHILOSOPHY OF FAILURE” (J. Laurence Laughlin, , Scribner’s Magazine, May 1909, pg. 613) --Brucewh (talk) 09:09, 26 June 2014 (UTC)

Socialism

As quotes by Adolf Hitler on National Socialism were removed from Socialism and put on Right-wing socialism because they were a variant of socialism and not socialism proper, should quotes on Leninist Socialism and Marxian Socialism be removed from Socialism for the same reason? --2001:8003:412B:6300:9C1:5968:1D8:CC27 22:41, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

C. L. R. James

By a remorseless logic, ... representation of the proletariat turns into its opposite, administration over the proletariat. ~ C. L. R. James

• By a remorseless logic, ... representation of the proletariat turns into its opposite, administration over the proletariat.
  • C. L. R. James, "State Capitalism and World Revolution" (1950)

@Peter1c: this quote is about Rationalism as the source states, it should be added there. Rupert Loup 01:01, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

After further reading it is clear that he was talking about Stalinism, the philosophy of "planned economy and one-party state" in 1950, in that line. He talks about socialism in other parts so I will add those quotes instead. Rupert Loup 02:09, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi Rupert Loup. Good to talk to you. Sorry I should have put my reasoning on talk page rather than edit summary. James (a Marxist philosopher) is talking about socialism's aspiration for representation of the proletariat and how the aspiration turns into its opposite, administration over the proletariat. This is part of James's critique of socialist regimes. Criticism of socialist regimes is a legitimate debate within the realm of socialism.

I agree that "administration over the proletariat" is a reference to Stalin, but what about "representation of the proletariat"? I think that is clearly a reference to socialism. Maybe I am missing something. Can you say more about why you don't like the quote here on the page? Of course I will acquiesce to your decision if you feel strongly. ~ Peter1c (talk) 02:16, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

• • He didn't talked about "socialist regimes", he was refering to communist states. He specifically named "Stalinism". When he refers to socialism he addressed it directly as in the quotes that I added. They should be in their respective articles, this article should be for socialism in general. Rupert Loup 02:26, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Rupert, thank you. I understand better now. But he is simultaneously talking about the ideals of the socialist regime as he says Stalinism does not meet them. "Representation of the proletariat" is the aspiration of all socialist parties and states. Maybe I'm missing something. Anyway, it's an enjoyable debate. I'm sorry I undid change before I saw you had posted in talk page. I added quote to Communism so if it is OK with you, it can stay there. But I still think the articulation of the ideal of representation of the proletariat and its disappointment in Stalinism is relevant. Thanks. ~ Peter1c (talk) 02:32, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

• I think that it could be added but it should be with the omitted content, or at least a note, that explain in how it is relevant to the article because by itself is misleading out of context. Rupert Loup 03:01, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

"what about "representation of the proletariat"?" I think that by "representation of the proletariat" he is referring to the dictatorship of the proletariat and by "administration over the proletariat" he is referring to the nomenklatura. Rupert Loup 03:09, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

OK this is a good argument. I had not thought of it that way. Sorry again for putting my reasons in edit summary rather than talk page. Regarding additional context, I agree it would help. ~ Peter1c (talk) 03:18, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Now I see you added several quotes from the text with more context. Thank you, Rupert Loup. It's an important text and worthy of our efforts. ~ Peter1c (talk) 03:24, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

In the European century that began in the 1840s from Engels's article of 1849 down to the death of Hitler, everyone who advocated genocide called himself a socialist, and no exception has been found.

This is a conflation and a reductio ad Hitlerum fallacy, not specific about socialism. It should go to their respective page. Rupert Loup 03:44, 15 May 2020 (UTC)

The quote is explicitly about socialism, the quote says "everyone who advocated genocide called himself a socialist, and no exception has been found.". It is about socialism. Since it is about socialism and notable and quoteworthy it belongs on this page. --2001:8003:59DB:4100:6D23:CD06:337B:3834 03:53, 15 May 2020 (UTC)

The quote is about genocide, and the source is conflating different terms. There is a page for that, here is offtopic. Rupert Loup 04:24, 15 May 2020 (UTC)