h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

my respect for h2g2 editors has taken a severe knock. this entry seems to have been writen by some smartarse public schoolboy, whose argument consists of 'communism! ha! don't you know people are natrually selfish? ha! it'll never work!'

the second paragraph contains so many flaws i'm not sure i can be bothered to point them all out. but i will anyway because i don't think people should be allowed to be so authoritatively stupid.

1) the 'communist' countries are not communist at all, but state capitalist, ie everything still run for profit but owned by the state. in the case of china, it's not even state capitalist but capitalist capitalist, so if you point at china and say it proves communism doesn't work, you're being irrelevant.

2) the 'communist' countries ceases to be anything like communist at the same time as becoming dictatorships, so it would be more accurate to say that capitalism leads to dictatorship. which it does. like in chile.

3) 'the above average perception problem'. i've never heard of it before, although the writer seems to think it's well known... it seems to be the same old theory held by tories that since they're a selfish arrogant tosser, everyone else must be too. has it ever occured to him that people ca be motivated by things other than greed? i'm a trotskyist. why? because i think it will bring me power and money? unlikely. being a trotkyist generally brings you nothing but funny looks, and if we're unlucky enough to get a military dictatorship one day, i'll be shot. so i must be insane i guess. still my insanity is a very specific sort that makes me stand on a windy street on saturdays trying to get shoppers to sign a petition about something.

4) 'this works fairly well'? works fairly well how? in the sense that the richest 300 and something people have a wealth equal to that of the poorest 40% of the world's population? in that 800 million people don't get enough to eat? that 2/3 of people live on less than $2 a day? or does he mean that it works fairly well because he has enough to eat, lives in a nice house and ony occasionally suffers the inconvenience of our crappy privatised public services. i suppose that's what he was referring to when he said 'fairly' rather than 'very'. because if he was talking about third world poverty, the appropriate description would have been 'very f*****g badly'.

5) 'everyone's guaranteed the same paycheck'. what is he on about??? do you really think communism means 'everyone gets paid the same'? where did you get that one from? the Daily Mail guide to Understanding Marxism? oh yeah, and everyone'll have to wear identical grey uniforms and eat nothing but porridge, and women will be nationalised, whatvever *that* means. under capitalism, most people do as little work as they can get away with because they hate their job and it means nothing to them. and i don't mean middle class office job types like our writer, i mean real people who work in tescos and sweatshops in indonesia and things like that. they don't go around thinking 'hmm, if i sew an extra 3 disney caps an hour i might get a promotion', they think 's**t, i have to sew 200 of the things a day to get enough money to eat, and that takes 16 hours after which i'm too exhausted to think'.

in communism, the factory or whatver is owned and controlled *by the workers* (not by the state, please note) and they can decide how much work they want to do or not. if they decide they'd rather have less money but more time on the beach, that's fine. but they wouldn't put up with some lazy sod going 'aha, i have my guaranteed share of the profits, let these poor suckers do all the work cos i'm off to the beach'.

people, even working class people, aren't stupid. they know that for things to happen, you have to do work. it doesn't take a genius to figure that out. they know that for the nhs to give people blood transfusions, other people have to give blood. and they do. not for the free biscuit either.

in conclusion, communism is the future and whoever edited this is an idiot.

sloidarity, comrade

It didn't get edited. Although it says in the box, 'edited by whoever', if it was in the actual Edited Guide it would say, 'written and researched by whoever' and underneath that 'edited by a subeditor'. Any registered researcher can post an article about anything they like, however much rubbish it may be - provided it doesn't break the rules it will stay up there.

It would have to meet rather stricter criteria to make the Edited Guide - any old tosh won't do.

Actually, a better clue is the bit that says:
"Entry ID: A280829 (Edited)"

in the Entry Data Box. But yes, this isn't an edited entry, and it probably never will be

"5) 'everyone's guaranteed the same paycheck'. what is he on about??? do you really think communism means 'everyone gets paid the same'?"


Isn't Communism "From each according to ability, to each according to need"?


I.e, not necessarily the same paycheck, but you get paid as much as you need. (Or rather, as much as whoever handing out the pay thinks you "need").

Actually, I found this article by following the link from the "Socialism" entry in the EG A280829. Surely any link in a edited article should point to another edited entry?