@DasHiveMind  
Oh absolutely, but it does kinda kill the No True Scotsman. They were (and the fuckers on trial still are) claiming to be totally communist! They attempted something resembling central economic planning (from the year zero, like psychos), but did lots of other really wacky shit (read: murder anyone with a degree or glasses) that just made everyone distance themselves very far from their “communism”. And yes, they were rolled over by the Vietnamese once they were done handing the US its ass, and then having to teach China the same damn lesson. I might have the timeline mixed up, but Vietnam is hardcore.
 
That’s the problem with open movements: You get really bizarre fringe characters. Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge did have collective farms and collectivized factories (sorta). It was economically a communist country. Politically, it was a totalitarian, Mad Max, psychotic hellhole where a million or more died in a genocide carried out BY HAND. And that’s really the distinction here, Communism and Capitalism are ECONOMIC theories, not political. When you mix communism and capitalism you get Social Democracy, which is working out rather well in the nordic countries. When you mix capitalist free market with totalitarian “Vanguard” single party states, you get China. Which is a polluted wasteland near the cities.

@Some Jerk  
We even brought up the Khmer Rouge, but it should be noted that even within the Communist circle they where hated. I mean they where brought down by Communist Vietnam.

@DasHiveMind  
I agree wholeheartedly, but everyone forget that Democratic Kampuchea tried exactly what Starlight did on a human scale.
 
Instead of stealing talents, the Khmer Rouge bashed open one million skulls of “enemies of the people”. So, it CAN happen on a country scale but, uh. Genocide quickly results.

@SFSLovenought  

Pretty much this, more or less. Though I’d agree that the UFoP is broadly communist, a better word to describe it is egalitarian

Star Trek had replicators, which made any economy based on standardized currency (aka. trading) pointless.
 
Communism does not work, because in order to enforce it, you need an all powerful government. Having a system where one institution governs all leads to abuse of power and unaccountability, which is almost the same as if the system was a straight up dictatorship. The separation of power exists for a reason and is a tried and trialed concept.
 
The problem with communism is the power it is granted through the government – not the ideals themselves, necessarily. Socialism works when the ideals are enforced through mere taxation in a capitalistic society.
 
How well socialism works is all dependant on the numbers used and how efficiently the money is used. 80% income taxation is criplling to an economy, but 30% with a slight increase at the very top is more than doable.

@Ponyko  
Hhmm, I never heard of the story it was based off, nor that the story was even based off anything. Where did you hear that fact?

@DasHiveMind  
I agree, My interpretation is that this episode was about taking any ideology to the extreme. If you read the original work this is based from, “harrison bergeron”, you will see that this episode is about an ideology taken to the extreme. A Cult is a good example of an ideology taken to the extreme. here is the authors interpretation of the story “The story was written as a satire of works on authoritarian dystopias and the common perceptions and fears of egalitarian policies, with its over-the-top dramatic portrayals of its dystopic society and titular character. However, it has been embraced by those critical of egalitarianism as an allegory of caution against socially enforced equality, more specifically the dangers of enforcing equality by virtue of leveling”

This is what happens when a feminist gets to run a town on her own.

I have a friend who had a amazing post about this  
“Much less communism and more sects. Communism actually praised the “heroes of the people”, to the point that the word “Stakhanov” entered into the French language as “a massively productive worker”, despite the guy being a propaganda invention from the USSR in the Thirties.
 
No, this kind of small communities with a charismatic guru, close surveillance and denunciations done by the “faithful” and so on is definitely the sects and closed communities you find in sadly many countries.
 
Same thing for the massive brainwashing. In dictatorships, you find propaganda here and there. But the kind of personal-level behaviour modification is specific to the sects. You need to go all the way to North Korea to start getting the level of endoctrinment sects have as a matter of course.  
someone brings up the USSR during the 1940s  
No, not even 1940’s USSR. The Soviets used for their entire history the concept of the “People’s Hero”. The workers who were the best in the world, who went above and beyond to help further the communist dream.
 
They did not actually squash personal skills that much. If they did, they would never have gone to space. Or won World War II. Or made such advanced planes. The kind of society shown in this episode cannot work without being completely propped by an outside source of food, income and products. Not for more than a few years. And no communist nation bar DPRK was that mad. Even DPRK probably treats well its nuclear and rocket scientists.
 
It’s why, beyond the ultra-heavy-handed appearance of criticizing “communism” or “equalitarian societies”, it’s IMO much more clearly directed towards sects and closed-communities. But doing it openly would be quite bad in the States, given the number of them and, in some cases, their political power.”
 
Eventually, he brought up how this is has far more similarities to groups like Scientologists and their ilk as well.

@stargrazer  
“True communism could be great, but human nature prevents it from happening.”  
That’s true, it’s a noble thought on paper, but communism always lead to harsh dictators and plebs like us suffering because of it. If it has no chance of working realistically I would dissagree that communism has any valid points.
 
Sure, it would be great if everyone was nice to each other all the time and helped each other out, much like the little horses in the show, but human nature makes that an impossibility, therefore it’s not taken as anything more than wishful thinking and should never be ‘forced’ upon anyone.

@ArrJaySketch  
Luckily I was born after the USSR broke up. I still live in the aftermath though, as the political “elite” remained in power, just under different party names.

@stargrazer  
That’s very informative! Starlight Glimmer nailed it, then.
 
That also makes me feel very bad for you. It sounds like an awful way to live…

@Background Pony #9111  
See my previous comment. That thing that happened in europe and asia wasn’t communism, it was an autocracy flavored with enforced worshipping of a dictator under the pretense of communism. True communism could be great, but human nature prevents it from happening.
 
@Huacaya  
In a sense, it’s really close to what was called communism here on earth.  
>Starlight Glimmer is a cult leader and controlled the town with tactics and techniques that have nothing to do with communism.  
See Joseph Jugashvili.

What annoys me about people equating the town to communism is that it’s really lazy thinking. I highly doubt the people calling the town and Starlight Glimmer’s ideology communism could even define communism without resorting to looking it up.
 
It does a disservice to the blatant abuses Starlight Glimmer does to the town to blame it on an ideology. Starlight Glimmer is a cult leader and controlled the town with tactics and techniques that have nothing to do with communism.

The Federation is Post-Scarcity. It is madness to compare them to any existing economic ideology.

Pure communism is stupid.  
Pure capitalism is just as stupid.  
You have to use aspects from both.

@Background Pony #1770  
Say that to the tens of millions of corpses buried all over Europe and Asia.
 
If you do anything but shun communism you have no idea what kind of damage that poison of an ideology has plagued humanity with. Your Government do well in making propaganda against such vile filth.

@Background Pony #CF87  
Star Trek was a post-scarcity egalitarian society with massive social saftey nets. Hell there weren’t any countries left in a real functional sense. They outright say everyone gets a job and taken care of.
 
It’s basically communism with some vestiges of social democracy. You only ever see Starfleet which is pseudo-military.

@Background Pony #CF87  
There’s a saying that goes “communism that works doesn’t exist; communism that exists doesn’t work.”
 
As someone who lives in an ex-USSR country (where most politicians are still the same as 30 years ago) I can tell you that the thing they called communism was indeed similar to what is represented by Starlight Glimmer and co. but that means it wasn’t actual communism - it wasn’t equality since the leaders were “more equal” than the rest. It, like the community in the show, was more a personal cult than true communism.

@Background Pony #CF87  
I don’t think there’s ever been a truly accurate representation of communism. They’re either colored by humanity (which fucks over all government systems), colored by American Propaganda, or otherwise stated but not adhered to (Cough-North Korea-Unconvincing Cough).
 
The Federation comes the closest without being a tacit endorsement or condemnation on either end.

Death is a preferable alternative to communism.

I guess the OP lives in Murica and has never seen what communism really means.