Perfect introduction to socialism

Really great balance of information and humour, feel like I’ve retained everything that was in it which is pretty rare!

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This helped me alot.

A 'mostly' thoughtful and pragmatic introduction that has helped me massively make a bit more sense of the complex ideas, values and role socialism has. I will be referring back to this, it's given me much to think about, and soothed alot of uncertainty I had about my own vague beliefs, I feel much more comfortable calling myself a socialist after reading this, after years of struggling with doing so due to the complexity and vagueness of the term.

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1 person found this helpful

Alt title: Strawman: What is Capitalism Anyway?

1 hr in and I want to die.....
I really wanted an intelligent arguement and for my silly optimism I get slapped in the face by a strawman in the first chapter.
Yet again we have a Socialist who understands Capitalism as "but you have more than meeeee! That's soo meeaann!" and takes no notice of the Absolute gain in wealth and material comfort Capitalism has brought the world. Anyone notice we aren't living in freezing, drafty stone castles anymore?

The arguments for Socialism are wildly idealistic, unrealistic and historically ignorant and the counter arguments against the 'right wing', which in this book means everyone who's not a socialist, boil down to "So you want everyone to starve? You love evil don't you, you xxxist and xxxism!". And annoyingly, that's not a strawman.

For the sake of the Author:
Capitalism works because if I'm great at making chairs and you aren't, but have money. And I want money more than I want the chairs I can very easily replace. And you want a chair more than the money you have. Good news! We can exchange my chair for your money and both of us walk away having gained from the exchange (In our own opinions).
The free market is this mechanism scaled up, which is why, for the most part, it works great for assigning an agreed upon value to labour or products, which is why I assume I got this book for free.....

......because your opinion on politics is worthless

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4 people found this helpful

heavy on stories & jokes, thin on data & evidence

I'm interested in socialism, fairly liberal and have plenty of criticisms of capitalism as we see it today. however this book is not really convincing at all. the book seems to be written for people who have already decided that socialism is correct and just need arguments. it's not written to convince people who are genuinely on the fence. In first chapter the author strangely argues everything is getting worse, despite it being well established that war, terrorism, poverty, disease, hunger and prejudice and discrimination are literally the lowest they've ever been in human history. from there it was all downhill.

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1 person found this helpful

Cliched slogans made into a book. Dissapointed .

should of been called The marxists rant on all that is wrong with America

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Laughable - seriously.

Im trying to find a credible argument for socialism. This book is totally ridiculous. Where it makes simple arguments for why capitalism is terrible (i agree its broken), it argues over simplistic reasons for why 'this vision' is plausible. Of course, the author tries to explain that other socialist models didn't work, mostly because it was the wrong type of socialism everywhere else so far, but fails miserably. It does cover some of the changes in broken capital models and climate change, but with impossible, only in dreamland, solutions. Ironically, the author calls for a uprising of millions for a better world, but seems to count the current support for such radical change as the absolute minority. Typically, it ignores the human need for consumerism. If you want a really simple, easy life with little desire. This is your model. Still worth leaning how others think tho. Those who want this, could separate themselves already

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6 people found this helpful