It is actually capitalism that thinks that it is vital to allocate resources fairly. Communists, on the other hand, think that resources should be allocated _equally_ with no regard to fairness. "To each according to his need."
> this can be done efficiently if only people would be good enough.
And until people get good enough, which in reality will never happen, communists think that the use of force to take from those who have and give to those who dont is perfectly justifiable.
> The other side thinks that market forces are the only way
Nope. The other side thinks that central planing and big goverment are a source of abuse of power. A free market isnt a perfect solution, but it is the lesser of two evils. If nobody has massive power, nobody can abuse power massively. There inevitably will be some abuse in a free market, but not in the orders of magnitude of, say, North Korea, Soviet Union, Nazi Germany and other central planning epic fails.
> deviating too far from this in the name of fairness
It is not done in the name of fairness, but in the name of equality. If fiarness was the goal, communism would be the side trying to not interfere and to leave everybody alone. But it is not. Communism is the side advocating maximum interventionism, of requiring (and enforcing) sacrifices for a centrally planed "greater good" etc.
> Extremists on both sides make it hard to have a sensible conversation.
In my view, the only way to solve it would be to create communist and capitalist zones, and make it legally impossible to change that economic basis of a zone. The "conversation" would then amount to fans of capitalism and communism moving to their preferred zone. Neither side would be trying to forcibly make the other side live under their economic religion.
The problem is that the left doesnt actually want to draw that border between takers and makers, because they _are_ takers trying to get total control of the makers in order to exploit their productivity.
As long as communists are able to get control of a whole state and then forcibly redistribute _other_ people's wealth, there will be a state of perpetual low-intensity warfare between the left and the right. Knowing that once you give communists a single finger, they will feel entitled to the whole hand and try to forcibly amputate it, is not in any way extremism, but knowlege of history paired with a sense of self-preservation.
What point does it make to have a conversation with people who are basically trying to legally mug you?
What point does it make to have a conversation with people running the machine that systematically impoverishes billions, to enable the lives of a thin crust of tens of millions?
(Not that I'm juvenile enough to believe such an extreme position in either direction--and yours relies on the sort of maker-taker dichotomy that I think I grew out of when I was seventeen and the bloom was off the libertarian rose--but you see how useful this sort of froth is, yeah? Then why do you do it?)
There are plenty of countries (large parts of Western Europe post-WWII) which have had predominantly left-leaning governments for 60+ years and not devolved into centrally-planned communist states. There's a genuine debate to be had about the role of governments, markets, taxation and distribution, but trying to frame it as the world threatened by the sword of communism hanging over all our heads just stakes out your position way out on one side and signals a refusal to enter any kind of debate.
It is extremism if and only if refusing to negotiate with muggers also is extremism.
> trying to frame it as the world threatened by the sword of communism
Whether the world at whole is threatened or not I dont know (people seem to survive in North Korea), but leftists like you certainly threaten my income and my freedom. If you scheme to force me to give a part of the products of my labor to you, it is the same thing as forcing me to work a part of my workday for you. In my eyes, wanting to force people to work for you against their will makes _you_ an extremist.
> signals a refusal to enter any kind of debate.
If you carefully observe, we're already debating right now. But you seem to be more preoccupied with labeling your opponents as extremist, refusing to debate, etc, than with debating itself. Refusing to play the "let's meet at the middle ground" game doesnt imply refusing to debate at all. It just means your argument (communism is good, so gimme your stuff) is too nonsensical to make me accept even parts of it as reasonable.
Can you quote that argument actually made by anyone in the thread you are responding to?
> you seem to be more preoccupied with labeling your opponents
Your own post jumped immediately "distrusting capitalism", "social workers" and "allocating resources fairly" to "communism" and "muggers", so I think it's fair to say you're projecting. And it reminded me of this:
We've changed. And we've become contemptuous of the idea that we're all in this together. This is about sharing. And about, you know... when you say sharing, there is a percentage of the population, and it's the moneyed percent of our population, that hears "socialism" or "communism" or any of the other -isms they wanna put on it, but ultimately, we are all a part of the same society, and it's either gonna be a mediocre society that, you know, abuses people, or it's not.
-- David Simon ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SL6Jv2Jpnpg&t=6m50s )
I can quote you quoting David Simon: "This is about sharing."
If "sharing" implies forcibly mugging those people who do not _want_ to share --and it of course does-- is is just an euphemism for outright communism.
So you magically knew I would post that?
> If "sharing" implies forcibly mugging those people
Yeah, IF. A mighty huge if. I wonder how it can be so huge... is it filled with straw perhaps?
Seems to me a libertarian of the Ayn Rand variety. Your splitting the world into capitalist and communist zones (as if those were the only two options!) as well as your use of the terms "makers" and "takers" are right out of Atlas Shrugged.
Can you answer me one question: Are you a real libertarian, or a royal libertarian?[1] Read the referenced article and then tell me where you stand with respect to land as private property?
We won't settle anything in this discussion: it's fundamental to the left-right divide. One side thinks that it's vital to allocate resources fairly, and this can be done efficiently if only people would be good enough. The other side thinks that market forces are the only way we know to allocate resources efficiently, and that deviating too far from this in the name of fairness will become self-defeating due to excessive waste. Extremists on both sides make it hard to have a sensible conversation.