[ralfd]

Your snark is a bit unfair. But I also noted how far-left and anti-capitalistic many talks/speaker are. I guess it shows the power differential between US vs Europe/Germany and also the difference between disrupting American and risk-averse European culture? Super smart people in the Bay Area found startups to get rich (and invent the future). Super smart people in Germany can only go into academia and research how to decolonize digital activism.

[jeffreygoesto]

Maybe it is a valid position to ask where the money for "get rich" comes from and if society would be different if it wasn't all about that money trickling upwards? Have you been to schools or nursing homes lately, having to let dear relatives go there?

[cbmuser]

Have been to any actual socialist country? Have experienced what scarcity means and what it feels like to be locked into your own country without a real chance of leaving until you reach retirement age?

[Ladsko]

The point is to meet somewhere in the middle and find compromises that prohibit uncontrolled growth of wealth and power by single individuals without crippling the economy too much. It does not have to be one extreme or the other.

[ahartmetz]

I have yet to see someone advocating for actual socialism. There is a huge difference between social democracy and socialism, but it's a popular argumentation technique in the US to pretend that they are the same.

[mytailorisrich]

There are socialist parties in every European countries, and some of them get a lot of votes.

In Germany, Die Linke is anti-capitalist and advocates "actual socialism" and current has 39 MPs in the Bundestag.

In France, LFI (France Unbowed) is anti-capitalist and advocates "actual socialism" and currently has 71 MPs in the French parliament (second largest party by number of MPs...). There are also several smaller parties that are more "hardcore", including the historic French Communist Party that still has 8 MPs and 14 Senators...

Now I do agree that social democracy is not socialism, but again, plenty of socialists in Europe, too.

On a related note, when people claim that they are "anti-capitalist" (which seems to be more popular than claiming to be socialist) it does not really leave many alternatives, just semantic flavours of socialism.

[CrLf]

Perhaps it's important to point out that socialism != communism.

I think this is something the US really doesn't understand about Europe.

Socialism is about putting people first and making sure no one is left behind by society, which is the opposite of communism (and capitalism).

In fact, US capitalism is much closer to communism regarding societal outcomes (social injustice, power concentration) than European socialism. It is very much possible to be anti-capitalist and anti-communist at the same time .

[mytailorisrich]

> Socialism is about putting people first and making sure no one is left behind by society

No, that's not what socialism is but I won't develop here because the definition is so available and well-known.

[davrosthedalek]

> Socialism is about putting people first and making sure no one is left behind by society, which is the opposite of communism (and capitalism).

The problem with that sentence is that you can say the same sentence with socialism/communism/capitalism in any order and you would find people who would sign it. And to some degree, maybe all would be right.

[_19qg]

For the US reader:

> 39 MPs in the Bundestag

Out of currently 733 MPs with a parliament with "proportional representation", where the number of seats is proportional to the number of votes (Germany-wide, not local). Die Linke thus has 5.3% seats in the Bundestag. Thus this is not "a lot of votes" in relation to the voting population.

> "anti-capitalist" (which seems to be more popular than claiming to be socialist)

Anti-capitalism is found in right-wing parties, too. Like the German AFD.

[davrosthedalek]

I don't think this gives an accurate picture. Even a 5% party can have an outsized influence on the politics. And it's not clear what the next election will bring.

> Anti-capitalism is found in right-wing parties, too. Like the German AFD. Well, many/most of their proponents now seem to be fans of an older party which had national socialism in the name, so no surprise.

In reality, the market rules and social net in most of Europe and US are not /that/ different. Both allow private ownership of production, both have market economy.

Yes, the US says it's a free market, but it isn't. It's maybe free-er. Germany has a "social market economy", which mostly means that some (insurance) costs are lifted from the incur-er and distributed socially. Both have a social security equivalent, with Germany better coverage for unemployment, and US better retirement, AFAICT.

[jeffreygoesto]

I spent enough parts of my youth in one, to know, yes. I know how you adapt to the inevitable.

[andrepd]

Almost nobody except fringe groups means "Marxism-Leninism" when they say "socialism". I'm sure you understand this.

[rsynnott]

There is a significant middle-ground between Libertarian Utopia/Dystopia (delete as appropriate) and North Korea, you realise?

[ahartmetz]

I'm not sure if the ones researching how to decolonize digital cat spaces are the super smart ones.

[imiric]

> I also noted how far-left and anti-capitalistic many talks/speaker are.

Why is this suprising? The hacker culture is rooted in anti-establishment philosophy, spun off from the hippy movement of the 1960s. This is not a regional thing.

It's more than a bit ironic that this site is called "hacker news", yet is hosted by a company that holds opposite ideals. :) The term "hacker" has largely lost its original meaning, most notably from being vilified by mainstream media.

Hack the planet! \m/

[saturn8601]

We come to these conferences to "see where the puck is moving to" not to hear someone's fantasy tales. So far this has been true in the technical tracks. How many times have there been a talk at CCC that was the unveiling of new ways of thinking in tech? Too many to count.

CCC also has a strong history of debuting talks in the social track that really moved the needle in the 2010s. Think about the Wikileaks talks or Snowden or how about the Snowden Angels?

Recently this has not been the case in the social tracks (they got this past years political changes extremely wrong) and so the question is where is the conference making a mistake and how to course correct?

[luckylion]

It's "wow, what cool things I can do with this new tech" vs "wow, this new tech is pretty dangerous, let me show you" -- it's a very different mindset. In the end, you can be anti-establishment all you want, it's very hard to let go of your culture.

[ahartmetz]

It was a pretty strong dissonance when reading some, let's say, Hunter S. Thompson short story, how "US conventional" some of his view were. Pretty sure it would be the same for any counterculture in any country. A counterculture doesn't actually rebuild its "host" culture from scratch, it just disagrees about a couple of things.

[karmakurtisaani]

Well said. However, a counter culture can't diverge too far simply because otherwise it will disappear in the fringes of society with only a handful of followers.

A lot of hippies were not vegetarian or accepting of gays, they just wanted to do drugs and rebel against authority.

[BoingBoomTschak]

The establishment has changed "a bit", though.

[bowsamic]

Are you saying that the establishment is anti capitalist?

[BoingBoomTschak]

No, but it's certainly pro "individualism" and hedonism. Anything that can dilute the moral fiber of a nation to make it easier to rule.

You'd have to be delusional to think you're fighting The Man^tm when you stand for immigration and LGBT, at least in western Europe.

[bowsamic]

Oh yes, I definitely agree, but I think that the CCC are aware of the risks of neoliberalism