donathos said: 

Look at the history of socialist countries and tell me whether or not they are "better societies." I'd say that the evidence points in the other direction: that socialism destroys economy, liberty and life. And, in general, I'd advise that you read the applicable histories, because you currently speak like someone who is steeped in propaganda but without any understanding of how any of this has worked in practice.

I am serious with this modified Churchill quote. Capitalism, like democracy, may be condemned because it's imperfect, but people need to be conscious of the fact that everything else is imperfect too.

As an analogy, we could look at internet comment culture where a place like VGC would be capitalistic because it has a police force, a hierarchy and somewhat of a reward system for people who put in effort. VGC isn't perfect, but nothing is. The equivalent of socialism would be the Youtube comments section.

That is because generally only people that have a good standard of living and didn't lived on the places that they tried Socialism really defend it... like in Brazil where Socialists are mostly milionaries that think the government should do everything instead of using their own money.

I know what you mean. I'm currently studying in the States, and there is vocal and obnoxious Socialist community here that stages protests all the time. All I see there is privileged, entitled brats that are too blind to see how easy they have it.

I'm from Ecuador myself where socialist policies for 10 years left our economy in tatters and our democracy, international credibility and institutions seriously damaged. Even though our current government is slightly more centrist I don't think it goes far enough in eroding the previous toxic policies.

1. It is unempirical to assert the amount and level of exploitation is a constant among institutions (or societies.) Many more people were exploited to a much larger degree in Nazi Germany or the Antebellum South than our current capitalist societies, would you disagree? Likewise in prehistorical hunter-gatherer societies there was very little exploitation at all, which changed in the first agricultural revolution. There is no single human nature which mandates that people exploit others. 

2. A voluntary institution can still have rules of membership. Laws in the sense of "statute" won't exist, but that doesn't mean that "laws" in the sense that other people will limit your interactions won't. Exploitation =|= violence, exploitation =|= profiting off violence. 

3. Suppose I consented to sex, and in the middle of sex I said I no longer wished to have sex. Does my partner have a right to force me to continue? Likewise, suppose I have consented to exchange a future amount of the labor-product I produce and then change my mind and decide to keep that which I produced? Does the capitalist have a right to force me to give up that which I produced? What would happen if I did keep that which I produced? Would I be free to do that? Or would the capitalist beg the state to force me to pay his/her tribute? 

4. Nope, I meant what I said. That many individuals' interests align on one issue doesn't mean they align on every issue. See: Union of Egoists . I am an individualist anarchist, not a collectivist. 

5. Don't surround yourself with people for whom you are in a precarious situation by being around them, in other words, people whom have a proclivity to irrational violence. Good or bad is of course subjective, determined by your interests as an individual. I don't know where you get the idea that I deny "the inherent complexity of human beings." In fact, I do the opposite. I treat people as more than human, as unique individuals whose interests might align with mine, or might not. "Good people" are those whose interests align with mine, whereas "bad people" are those whose interests are in conflict with mine. Hence "good" and "bad" are subjective (dependent on the subject -- me.) 

6. I never said anything about "building a society." I spoke only of letting a society be free from the restraints of unilateral power. I am interested in building institutions which fulfill my interests, not an abstraction like how you're using "society" in this context. The rest of your statement is merely a misrepresentation and misreading based on projections of what you think I think. Next time read what I say carefully and ask questions, rather than attempt to fill in the gaps yourself  (assuming you're interested in an honest discussion.) 

7. My ideas aren't utopian because I don't think a perfect society can be obtained, merely a better one. Idealist =|= utopian. Furthermore, most feminisms do not assert that men and women are equal as biological sexes, but rather the gender norms which are placed upon men and women by societies create unequal autonomy which expresses itself in social functions like "rights" and "power". Feminism prescribes that individual men and individual women be treated as if they are equals, rather than as if they are mean specimens of their constituent groups. Hence my criticism of the definition that "a feminist is a person who believes men and women are equal." Nobody is equal in terms of substance (that which makes them -- them), but that doesn't mean people can't be equal in terms of autonomy, influence, and power. 

8. Certainly this is true, but neither are we 100% products of our genes. Phenotype is the expression of genotype in the context of our environment. Some traits are very predictive of one's genotype, while others are very predictive of one's environment. I was asking which predominates here, which requires an empirical investigation. Merely assuming that people are naturally better and their success is determined by their natural genetic predisposition is just as erroneous as assuming that natural genetic predisposition has no role at all. Earlier in our discussion you made a statement which seemed to imply that such inequalities in access to and control of wealth are natural manifestations of those differences in human beings. I asked you to substantiate this with empirical data, rather than merely assume it is so. 

9. I am with you until the bolded. You need to substantiate the bolded claim with evidence. It's possible that all that is required to succeed as a capitalist is middling intelligence and some other quality, or it might be the case that social connections are vastly more helpful than any thing beyond a minimal level of intelligence. Or it could be that some capitalists have some qualities and other capitalists have other qualities. My allusion to the power law distribution of wealth, seems to critique this view that hierarchies are mainly due to intelligence, because intelligence doesn't follow a power distribution, it follows a linearly limited exponential distribution (meaning within some maximum and some minimum intelligence varies exponentially, but these maxes and mins are hard limits.) If hierarchies were the products of intelligent we'd either 1. expect intelligence to follow a power distribution (which it does not) or 2. expect hierarchies to follow a more egalitarian distribution (as intelligence does.) 

If you want to understand the topic and argument better, see: Pareto Distribution.

10. Again, provide some empirical, scientific, evidence to support this hypothesis. 

11. The important question though is how it varies. Very few socialists want everybody to have equal wealth. What they want is for everyone to have wealth in proportion to that which they produced (just the same as "free-market" capitalists assert their goal is.) Any inequality in the distribution of wealth according to one's ability to produce isn't all that bad. It's the inequalities beyond that, which depend on privilege and centralization which socialists argue against. 

12. Don't forget special privileges, protections, rewards, social connections, nepotism, etc. All of these are probably more contributive to wealth inequalities than luck (socialists aren't luck egalitarians.) 

13. How so? How much of the inequality is due to natural capabilities and how much is due to social structures is pretty much the crux of this discussion, is it not? 

14. Well then I am asking you to substantiate and support this assertion with evidence. Even if this is true though, you did not address my argument about the economic calculation problem of large, centralized, hierarchical firms. If these individual men are all we need, then why not just have them plan everything? Well, because there are limits to what individual men can do, regardless of how intelligent they are. Consequently, the size and authoritarian quality of an institution is due to more than mere differences in natural ability. No individual man can do what many individual men can do. The anarchist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon called this concept "the collective force of labor" in the following quote. 

"Divide et impera — divide, and you shall command; divide, and you shall grow rich; divide, and you shall deceive men, you shall daze their minds, you shall mock at justice! Separate laborers from each other, perhaps each one’s daily wage exceeds the value of each individual’s product; but that is not the question under consideration. A force of one thousand men working twenty days has been paid the same wages that one would be paid for working fifty-five years; but this force of one thousand has done in twenty days what a single man could not have accomplished, though he had labored for a million centuries. Is the exchange an equitable one? Once more, no; when you have paid all the individual forces, the collective force still remains to be paid. Consequently, there remains always a right of collective property which you have not acquired, and which you enjoy unjustly."

and before you call Proudhon a silly communist, this is what he has to say of association in general. 

"When I speak of either collective force or of an extreme division of labor, as a necessary condition for association, it must be understood from a practical point of view, rather than in a rigorous logical or mathematical sense. Liberty of association being unrestricted, it is evident that if the peasants think well to associate, they will associate, independently of the considerations against it; on the other hand, it is not less clear that if one must live up to the rigorous definitions of science, the conclusion would be that all workers must associate, inasmuch as collective force and division of labor exist everywhere, to however slight a degree.

We must supplement the deficiencies of language, and do for political economy what naturalists do in their classifications, that is to select always not doubtful but marked characteristics, upon which to base our definitions.

I mean to say, therefore, that the degree of associative tendency among workers must be in proportion to the economic relations which unite them, so that where these relations are inappreciable or insignificant, no account need be taken of them; where they predominate and control, they must be regarded.

Thus I do not consider as falling within the logical class of division of labor nor of collective force the innumerable small shops which are found in all trades, and which seem to me the effect of the preference of the individuals who conduct them, rather than the organic result of a combination of forces. Anybody who is capable of cutting out and sewing up a pair of shoes can get a license, open a shop, and hang out a sign, So-and-So, Manufacturing Shoe Merchant, although there may be only himself behind his counter. If a companion, who prefers journeyman’s wages to running the risk of starting in business, joins with the first, one will call himself the employer, the other, the hired man; in fact, they are completely equal and completely free."

As long as I am quoting Proudhon, I think this quote is insightful. 

"Nevertheless, I build no system. I ask an end to privilege, the abolition of slavery, equality of rights, and the reign of law. Justice, nothing else; that is the alpha and omega of my argument: to others I leave the business of governing the world."

15. If it's obvious then you should easily be able to substantiate it with evidence. 

16. Because pareto distributions are far less equal than the raw distribution of intelligence in humans. In other-words, there needs to be other functions which explain the non-linear mathematical transformation of the distribution of intelligence (or any other single variable) to wealth.

17. You'll have to show that they are at the very top, yes. Because wealth is not proportional to these things. 

18. Why do you believe this? (I'm not disagreeing, just want to know the theory behind it.) According to a dictionary definition of feminist, you'd be a feminist. Which was my original point. 

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/feminist

"advocating social, political, legal, and economic rights for women  equal to those of men."

Of course this is a pretty naive definition of feminism which ignores the nuance of the political ideology. Many feminists (as you noted) believe in a second definition, 

"the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes"

which is also a naive definition when taken out of context. Dictionary definitions lack nuance when it comes to describing political ideologies. An academic encyclopedia of philosophy or political science would be a much better source to get an idea of what a political ideology entails. 

19. Expand on this? I must enslave people to eliminate state privilege? Wouldn't merely eliminating the state or reducing its scope have the same effect? Again, the level, degree, and kind of exploitation is not a constant independent of the social relationships of human beings. 

20. And I reiterate, this is not a problem. The problem is when they are given state-granted monopolies on being allowed to gather and access said resources. Until that resource is collected and turned into something, it is not theirs, and if they abandon it for others to maintain, it's also not theirs. 

21. Only in a society which appreciates basketball. If Lebron James was born and raised in Zimbabwe his ability to play basketball would likely mean nothing. Social and material conditions do factor into the success of a person. You can't ignore them. You seem (correct me if I am wrong) to want to ignore socio-politics in this equation and assert some false determinism that all (or most) inequalities in wealth are due to inequalities in capability, which I contest. When I ask you for evidence, you merely say "isn't it obvious?" 

22. Nothing. There is nothing wrong with somebody producing more for themselves. Hell, there is nothing universally wrong with exploitation either. But under different social conditions, when people are self-interested they are not going to allow themselves to be exploited. They will bargain for their full labor-product.

23. So I am free to live a life of squalor in the woods, but I can't mix my labor with it to produce anything of worth? How exactly is this "freedom"? It's merely conditional slavery. 

24. Who said it is or it will be? That doesn't mean it can't be better. If the enlightenment showed us anything, it showed us that, while there is no utopia there is a better world than what we have. It's the person who concedes that what we have now is the best we will ever have who is more similar to the utopian. 

25. I actually agree with this to an extent. 

26. No I said the only thing special about capitalists was their capital. In the context you provided, Steve Jobs wasn't a capitalist. He was a worker. 

27. Didn't you just say that I already asserted this. Did I or did I not? Hint: I didn't. The question (and its answer) is irrelevant, because Steve Jobs wasn't acting as a capitalist. 

28. Um no. There is a whole branch of socialism called "individualist-anarchism." One of the main thinkers in this branch, Max Stirner, criticized (classicial) liberal humanism for doing as you suggest socialists do. He also criticized some socialists for inheriting this from liberalism. Anarchists certainly recognize the individual, it is pretty much the whole point of anarchism. We also recognize that the individual is influenced by external social forces, and we must disentangle these forces in order to analyze them. Socialism (when contextualized to the individual) is not incompatible with individualism.

"The divine is God's concern; the human, man's. My concern is neither the divine nor the human, not the true, good, just, free, etc., but solely what is mine, and it is not a general one, but is — unique, as I am unique. Nothing is more to me than myself!"

“Egoism, as Stirner uses it, is not opposed to love nor to thought; it is no enemy of the sweet life of love, nor of devotion and sacrifice; it is no enemy of intimate warmth, but it is also no enemy of critique, nor of socialism, nor, in short, of any actual interest. It doesn’t exclude any interest. It is directed against only disinterestedness and the uninteresting; not against love, but against sacred love, not against thought, but against sacred thought, not against socialists, but against sacred socialists, etc.” 

29. Hierarchies aren't created by mere differences between people. They are created by inequalities in particular qualities of people, with the most important being the ability to induce violence. If people can equally assert their will through violence (and they are conscious of their interests), then there would be no hierarchies, regardless of whatever other differences exist. 

30. Are you an individualist or a humanist? Individualism is necessarily anti-human, but not anti-individual men/women. It's pretty ironic that your critiques of socialism are the same critiques thoughtful socialists have of political liberals, humanists and capitalists. 

31. IT'S NOT IRRELEVANT, that's the entire crux of our discussion. Steve Jobs, despite likely being much more capable than the capitalists who supported him, needed them in order to succeed. He didn't do it on his own volition with his own autonomy. The socialist wishes to get the capitalist out of the equation so that a future Steve Jobs doesn't need to depend on them. That was the original point I made to which you responded. 

32. I agree, your lack of knowledge on this topic is hindering your ability to discuss it. 

33. I don't. I've said it many times, and you keep asserting it. Stop misrepresenting my ideas. 

34. Provide the research. I've asked multiple times. 

35. Although before you provide the research first understand what my position actually is, rather than straw-manning it. 

36. This is a very weak definition of voluntary. That I have a choice doesn't mean my choice isn't limited. If my choice is limited by unilateral violence it is less voluntary than if it were not (unless you believe that a person whom makes a choice with a gun to their head voluntarily agreed.) That I am limited (due to state violence) to wage labor makes my choice less voluntary than if I weren't limited to wage labor.

37. This is wholly untrue. There have been plenty of societies where not everybody agreed and where a unilateral position isn't imposed on others, but rather compromise is reached through arbitration. 

38. What a silly and simplistic derivation of the state. I prefer the 19th century lawyer, Lysander Spooner's account in No Treason. Government comes from some people asserting their authority on others through violence. It always has and it always will. The question is what happens to government when the capacity to induce violence is more evenly distributed and decentralized. 

This argument is of the same form as the argument absolutists used against early liberals when they advocated for republicanism and representative democracy. "Rome and Greece failed, monarchy is the best form of government because the people need a sovereign to keep order. Do you want the war of all against all?"

There is quite a bit of diversity in socialist thought, and it does oneself a disservice to only understand and know about Marxist-Leninism.

If the democratic and republican governments of Athens and Rome had produced results on par with the Soviet Union, then perhaps that would have been a good argument to make against making another attempt. For after all, if we do not learn from history, what is our other recourse? If I cannot point to the results of fascism as an argument why fascism is a bad idea, then how do we assess the claim that fascism deserves another try? I expect you might agree with regards to fascism, but socialism did just as much harm.

The Roman Republic is infamous for it's crimes. Julius Caesar said that one million people (mostly civilians) were killed in the Gallic Wars, Carthage was razed to the ground (sometimes referred to as the first genocide). The wars between the Jews and Romans also started during the Republic and ended when the Roman Empire destroyed the Jerusalem and Jewish society in Palestine.

I know what you mean. I'm currently studying in the States, and there is vocal and obnoxious Socialist community here that stages protests all the time. All I see there is privileged, entitled brats that are too blind to see how easy they have it.

I'm from Ecuador myself where socialist policies for 10 years left our economy in tatters and our democracy, international credibility and institutions seriously damaged. Even though our current government is slightly more centrist I don't think it goes far enough in eroding the previous toxic policies.