Debunking the “Communism Is Against Human Nature” Argument

Lately I’ve been very very involved in political debate both on and offline, and I often hear one common reoccurring argument that’s been driving me up the walls:“Communism doesn’t work because it goes against human nature”Here, I will not only prove why this line of thought is silly and nonsensical, but also the best way to disprove it. I understand that posting this here is kinda preaching to the choir, but I’m hoping that the following stuff below can be as of much use to others as it has been to me and can help people in similar discussions be able to better articulate a rebuttal. Anyways, let’s get right to it:MY REBUTTAL / COUNTER ARGUMENT:First off, human nature is an idea. It is a concept—an interpretation, if you will—of how people interact with one another and themselves on both a social and private level. But when discussing Communism or even Socialism with those who have either a deeply flawed misunderstanding of what it is or how it works, human nature is not treated with that in mind. In fact, it is treated as something completely different; almost as a sort of all imposing metaphysical force, constantly looming above all people at all times for all eternity—a line of thinking more appropriate to that of religion or a cult and not one that has any real understanding of reality. “Human Nature” is not a real physical entity or thing, but rather an intellectual construct that we as people indulge in and explore the meaning of.Furthermore, when you ask someone for proof of why they believe that something like Capitalism is more in line with human nature than Communism, “look around,” they’ll probably give some iteration of. “Don’t you see all the greed, all the self-interest, all the competition, all the acquisitiveness, all the egoism, all the war, all the lying, all the stealing, and all the cheating that’s going on? That’s human nature.” They’ll tell you.“That is us.”But in my many conversations both on and offline, it never really seems to dawn on these same people to think these attributes and characteristics that they go on and on about and how they are more the results of the current material organization of society than some built in characteristic we all have. I’ll even give you a historical example: Hunter-Gatherer groups mostly survived through cooperation, and this was because the material conditions of their existence excluded the possibility of acquisitiveness. I think it’s more than fair enough to say that this was their “human nature.” Alternatively, we could take a look at medieval peasants. They were certainly not industrious like how we are today. And when peasants were thrown off their lands and into the towns, the mass majority worked just enough to meet their basic needs. Their idea of “human nature” was once again shifted.Long story short, what human nature truly “is” at the moment really depends on the social, material, and economic organization of a society. If social arrangements were naturally determined by our biology, “human nature” and whatever else your opponents may try and lump in there would’ve naturally repressed the great diversity of behaviour patterns we’ve seen in humans over time, as well as relationships and cultures that we’ve forged as well.When someone tries to mash together human nature with human behavior, they often cannot tell which is which and after awhile they even fail to understand why we behave differently in differing circumstances with one another. Thank you for reading, and I hope to be posting here again soon. via /r/communism https://ift.tt/37rd6yk