Reading about FOSS philosophy, degoogling, becoming against corporations, and now a full-blown woke communist (like Linus Torvalds)
I was feeling the last part had some more story behind it so I went ahead and found this:
Seems like I’m a full-blown woke communist too
Doesn’t read like he’s an actual communist, more insulting people (rightly so) that would call liberals communists.
Nvm
er… did torvalds just say trans rights? based alert
I think he said trans rights in the wording that >90% of people would agree with.
God I wish that were true but there are a LOT of people (well, conservatives) who are vehemently against wider society allowing cross dressing or medical transition. It’s not 90% :(
I’m definitely woke af. And proud of it.
I have come to think that when profits are at odds with health, happiness, the good of society and humanity, then either a non profit foundation needs to be running it or it needs to be in the hands of the government—but a much less corrupt one. And I believe oligopolies need to be broken up and anti trust laws greatly expanded and enforced. Then we can deal with the oligopoly / plutocracy. We set a maximum wage (including all earnings) and tax 100% above that. Penalties for regulatory breaches include jail time. For corporations. With corporations reigned in, oligopolies and oligarchies crumbled, we can prevent regulatory capture and corruption. Campaign finance is abolished and it is paid for out of public funds. We abolish first past the post voting in favor of scientifically determined better alternatives to ensure voters actually have a variety of choices.
Idk wtf that makes me except maybe a ranting lunatic lol
In my mind, “woke” has two meanings that apply to this context:
- positive: aware of the hardships different groups of people might face
- negative: overboard political correctness, cancel culture
It’s entirely possible to be pro-woke and anti-woke at the same time because of this.
As a full fledged Ancapper, I respect your opinion
I personally think communism especially Marxism sounds really good on paper. The problem is that just about every time it has been attempted things didn’t really seem to work like they are supposed to.
Its like every state that attempts communism just ends up being a perpetual Vanguard state, and it ends up being authoritarian and terrible.
I really think there are several good ideas in Marx theories, but the actual implementation of those theories needs some work to figure out how they should be incorporated without being corrupted and overtaken by tyrants.
You’re right. Communism is like the greatest social form a society can possibly achieve. The Problem is, that humans are dumb and will always try to get the best out of it for themselves so the concept of communism is ruined by those people. It maybe is practicable in small “society’s” (your family as example) but fails in big societies like states.
I personally think communism especially Marxism sounds really good on paper. The problem is that just about every time it has been attempted things didn’t really seem to work like they are supposed to.
Boy, that’s the understatement of the century. Not only did it not work, it often results in mass murder and the ushering in of a totalitarian regime.
Capitalism didn’t appear over night. It took several attempts and iterations to get it anywhere near what it is today. Most modern theories on the implementation of Marxism focus less on centralized government authority and more on democracy in the work place, and eliminating 3rd party shareholders’ control. Much of the struggle with implementation of this, is that the existing financial structures aren’t set up to handle this type of thing well.
What we have today isn’t really even capitalism anymore. It is becoming something else. We don’t have free markets, for example, because large corporate players are not allowed to fail. Under a central banking system, the state can simply print money to fund its corporate protectorates while artificially suppressing interest rates to avoid paying any interest on the debt. And then we use tariffs and policy to pick and choose winners, suppressing competition. This is about as far from capitalism as one can imagine.
Can you point me to a time when capitalism did happen? Where governments and outside forces weren’t picking winners and losers in the market? In such a time what was the plight of the common worker? Did we see overwork, workplace safety, and child labor issues?
Third wave communism doesn’t seek to abandon the “free market” (which is free within bounds), it instead favors democracy in the workplace. Where all members of the organization are employee-owners including ceos and middle management and the “Board” is dissolved into either a representative or direct democracy made up of employee-owners. In this way one increases the incentives for each individual to perform and see the company perform well. This also mitigates much income inequality by allowing the workers a say in the compensation of middle and upper management.
Just when I thought I couldn’t admire him more…
Common sense on the internet in this economy 😮
Linux and open source in general completely blow apart capitalist arguments that profit motive is necessary for innovation and technological advancement. Open source ecosystem primarily run by volunteers has produces some of the most interesting and innovative technologies that we’ve seen. The reality is that people make interesting things because they’re curious and they enjoy making stuff. Pretty much nobody makes anything interesting with profit being the primary motive.
capitalist arguments that profit motive is necessary for innovation and technological advancement
I don’t know who is arguing this because it’s incredibly stupid. The greatest scientific minds of history, the mathematicians, the physicists, the inventors, were not capitalists, they’re people with passion for their work.
If we move to a society that guarantees basic human needs and good education, we’re only going to have more scientists and engineers that progress technology even faster.
Capitalists argue this because it gives them the appearance of a moral high ground.
Enshittification shows how untrue this - capitalism by its very nature will always devolve into worse and worse offerings because it’s reliant on squeezing out ever more profit.
Capitalism will only ever puh out the bare minimum of technological advancement. And keeping people in indentured labour (aka employees) to the capitalist system so that they either have no time to come up with innovations themselves or they own the intellectual property of any indentured workers means that the overwhelming majority of innovation is monopolised by capitalism too. Which also contributes to the appearance of pushing advancement.
And while we are at it… novelists, poets, painters, musicians, philosophers, …
Tragically, however, it may spell the end of the sandwich artist.
The innovation argument is shaky at best many of the corporations innovations are brought or copied really. Is a story that became pretty common in the latest decades one guy come with a good idea some other mofo takes it and profits with it.
That’s why it’s important to use hard copyleft licenses like the GPLv3 instead of merely open-source MIT or BSD licenses wherever possible when you publish software.
Indeed, the corps did a whole campaign lobbying for permissive licenses precisely so they could plunder open source work. Hard copyleft should be used for any serious project.
Preach brother!
What’s more is that corporate driven research is necessarily biased towards whatever is profitable which is often at odds with what’s socially useful. For example, it’s more profitable to research drugs that help maintain disease and can be sold over a long time than drugs that cure it. Profit motive here ends up being completely at odds with what’s beneficial for people who get sick.
And of course, any research that doesn’t have a clear path towards monetization isn’t going to be pursued. This is precisely why pretty much all fundamental research comes out of the public sector.
I disagree somewhat.
A lot of high tech development comes with a greed motive, e.g. IPO, or getting bought out by a large company seeking to enter the space, e.g. Google buying Android, or Facebook buying Instagram and Oculus.
And conversely, a lot of open source software are copies of commercially successful products, albeit they only become widely adopted after the originals have entered the enshittified phase of their life.
Is there a Lemmy without Reddit? Is there a Mastodon without Twitter? Is there LibreOffice without Microsoft Office and decades of commercial word processors and spreadsheets before that? Or OpenOffice becoming enshittified for that matter? Is there qBittorrent without uTorrent enshittified? Is there postgreSQL without IBM’s DB2?
The exception that I can see is social media and networked services that require active network and server resources, like Facebook YouTube, or even Dropbox and Evernote.
Okay, The WELL is still around and is arguably the granddaddy of all online services, and has avoided enshittification, but it isn’t really open source.
The idea that these things wouldn’t exist without commercial analogs is silly. You do realize that things like BBS boards and IRC existed long before commercial social media platforms right? In fact, we might’ve seen things like social media evolve in completely different directions if not for commercial platforms setting standards based on attracting clicks, and monetizing users.
This is true to some extent, but the best, most successful open source software is nowadays to a large extent made by for-profit businesses developing it for their own use but sharing it with the world.
There is a strong correlation between “is this kind of software mainly used by businesses vs. individuals” and “does this kind of software tend to be open source”. Hardly anyone uses proprietary version control or web server software anymore. But (other extreme) in the area of video games, nearly all of them are still proprietary and probably will be for a long time. Software such as web browsers or office suites sits somewhere in between, both kinds exist there.
Biggest and most popular projects are attractive to companies as well as individuals for the same reasons. However, the original point was that companies are not needed for open source to exist or for innovation to happen.
Linux and open source in general completely blow apart capitalist arguments that profit motive
Wrong! Linux and open source only shows that the profit motive is not the only motive. One should broaden the definition of profit to encompass value in all its forms. ie A person can gain value from the satisfaction of DIY as it can be self-empowering. One can gain emotional value from sharing. It also invokes the law of reciprocation - value exchange but without a $ sign. The Open source ecosystem is also heavily funded by business who relies on open source components. It is a capital investment.
The profit motive as used in capitalist sense strictly refers to financial gain. My whole point was that people do open source development for broader reasons than just base financial gain.
And while companies do some funding, the ecosystem can exist without them perfectly fine.
If the profit motive is not the only motive that drives innovation, as you just agreed, then it isn’t necessary, logically. And not sure why you would then go on to expand the definition of profit into meaninglessness after agreeing there are other motives.
What? How the f do you transition from ‘not only’ to ‘isn’t necessary’? That is not logic - that is mental gymnastics with a triple back flip! Profit is the PRIMARY motivator! People wish to move away from discomfort more than anything else. Currency is the best way of alleviating discomfort!
- If X is a necessary motive for Y, then in the absence of X, Y cannot happen.
- Innovation can happen in the absence of a profit motive.
- Therefore, the profit motive is not necessary for innovation.
People can grow food in the absence of technology - but subsistence living is a hell of time!
nb. Marxists still have no answer for the calculation problem.
So I guess you agree that the profit motive isn’t necessary, because you moved to a completely unrelated point
So I guess you cannot process anything other than black/white logical fallacies let alone analogies.
This is so wrong. It’s not volunteers writing this code it is people employed by companies who are paid to write this code. You do know people have to eat.
Open source has existed long before companies started getting involved with it. Meanwhile, people having to eat has nothing to do with the argument being made which is that capitalism and profit motive are not required for creativity and technological progress.
Context for those who are baffled (I was)
https://news.itsfoss.com/linus-torvalds-woke-communists/
No Linus hasn’t grabbed a red rag and isn’t off to foment revolution
Guy’s Finnish. The chances of him being actually communist are pretty much zero.
Just wait for the next stage as a libertarian socialist, without a leading communist party, because we can take care of us ourselves - it’s usually called anarchy (which doesn’t mean no social norms, just self-organisation without leadership)
libertarian socialist
idk about you comrade but I don’t read from thelibertariansocialistlibrary.org
I considered myself libsoc but not anarchist for a long time. Still kinda do. I believe in the ideal of a classless, oppressionless, non-hierarchical society, but I’m not out there living that ideal and doing praxis.
If all it takes to belong to any political movement is simply to claim you belong regardless of what your actions say, I don’t care for nor want your meaningless, substanceless labels. On the other hand, if it takes participation, then spending my time arguing online about whose
fantasy football teampolitical philosophy is better sure ain’t it either.Either way, I’m probably just another lib with lofty aspirations. My best hope is that someone reads this, goes “you know what? That jaded shitlib has a motherfucking point!” And then logs out to go be an anarchist instead of just throwing the term around.
This meme shows completely my journey. I became a FOSS advocate in 2020 after realized that all sites that I visited wanted my “cookies”. I started to questioning myself about and after some research I became a disciple of Richard Stallman and a Marxist-Leninist.
Removed by mod
I still have this poster!
In my experience I’ve noticed Linux tends to (disproportionately) attract both libertarians and socialists/communists. I feel like I run into more of both within the Linux community than I do in other communities.
I started using Linux because I couldn’t force myself to use Windows 8. Up to that point I used whatever version of Windows came right before the graphical interface but 8 was too awful so I started playing with mint and never went back…
I got off the capitalism train in the middle of that but that was only because I decided to major in business and when I saw how the sausage was made I jumped ship but I didn’t know anything about socialism or communism or marxism or whatever you want to call it. I was so not into politics or economics that I literally had to search the Internet and ask people on social media what was an alternative to the crap I was reading for my classes… And then I went down that rabbit hole. If was enlightening. I learned a lot.
Also… for people who think college is Marxist indoctrination…Marx was brought up for one paragraph in one book at the very very end of my 4 years. But by that point I already knew who he was just from the rabbit hole I went down when I was curious for some alternative to what I was being taught.
I feel called out.
I’m not quite there yet but im definitly at the second to last block
ITT: people who have no idea what communism is
rant:
I have been using Linux since 2006, a lefty and against the super-rich and big corporations since I remember (to the point of avoiding their products like the plague), also never having understood or accepted gender roles and other stupid traditional concepts, yet never turned into a communist 🤷
It baffles me that so many people think that respecting gender equality, understanding the evil in big corporations and avoiding them, valuing community and being tolerant (except for intolerance) and against discrimination somehow equals communism… I say this because I’ve been called a communist by many people who know me, while I have always rejected it explicitly!
/rant
respecting gender equality, understanding the evil in big corporations and avoiding them, valuing community and being tolerant (except for intolerance) and against discrimination somehow equals communism
All of these have their basis in the liberatory framework of anarchism, and a large and traditional portion of communism is anarchist. These kinds of liberation are the goals of anarchy and by extension communism. This is why, for example, Marx described communism as stateless and why it manifests a strong opposition to religion/religious institutions.
I agree that these things do not make one a communist, but at the same I believe these stances themselves are communist, even if they overlap with other ideologies and/or economic frameworks.
I suspect that as one embraces these stances, they are more likely to adopt the views of larger populations that share the same ideals, and that this facilitates the transition many have to communism. But clearly that political transition does not have to occur, as it did not in your case.
Sounds a lot like me. That’s not communism, that’s just being a decent person. One that respects others and just wants everyone to live a good life without being the target of hate and harassment.
That’s overlapping with communism.
The Linux to trans anarchocommunist catgirl pipeline is very real. The moment you move to Arch it’s already over.
I just installed pop!_os am I safe?
that’s how I started. nobody’s safe.
Just began using Linux, was already Marxist
Literally same, even the years match up lol
Am I doing it wrong because I’ve use Ubuntu (12 years) and Kali Linux (8 years) and… I’m still not a marxist?
Skill issue
Fuck communist statist, foss is pure anarchism.
My
brother in ChristComrade in the revolution, Communism is a stateless, moneyless, classless society. Whatever self-proclaimed “Statist Communists” thare are, are no-more Communist than the National “Socialists” who sent our kind to the death camps.The end stage of the dialectic is that, yes. But that’s doesn’t just appear from nothing. Read state and Revolution or What is to be done.
But that’s doesn’t just appear from nothing.
Yea I think that’s kinda their point
FLOSS is Voluntaryism - it only requires voluntary participation.
Anarchism does not necessarily exclude Communism! :)
Good Explanations: https://www.anarchistfaq.org/afaq/index.html for those interested
Disagree. If FOSS were an anarchism what would be the point of FOSS lincences of which some are very long legal documents? Also corporations would just take your code, say its theirs and tell you to go fuck yourself.
Foss licenses are copyleft, they bar individuals from enclosing the commons built by the collective for profit. Anarchism isn’t just letting people do whatever they want. Anarchism means against hierarchy. Having rules that prevent unjustified hierarchies from forming is entirely with in the bounds of anarchism. Including rules that prevent using copyright as a coercive hierarchy.
All heirarchies are unjustified.
I’d look at foss licenses more as tools of defence against (and within) the current system/context than “rules” that serve to enforce some kind of anti-capitalist “heirarchy”.
Honest question: “Without any authority who gets to enforce the rules?”. Everyone, as they see fit it seems. What makes “your” hierarchy better than “my” hierarchy?
Everyone sort of enforces the rules as they see fit now. The difference is there is an expectation to not resist when someone is abusing their power because they are an authority figure. Under anarchism, it is your peers holding each other accountable, and your right to question actions against you is accepted.
