• melpomenesclevage@lemm.ee
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      8 months ago

      Not formally. Talk to a cop while wearing a red bandana and clothing with a red star or hammer and sickle on it.

      (Please don’t ban me for suggesting suicide, I don’t actually want them to do this)

      • oatscoop@midwest.social
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        8 months ago

        If you had actually read the Wikipedia article:

        In 1973, a federal district court in Arizona decided that the act was unconstitutional, and Arizona could not keep the party off the ballot in the 1972 general election (Blawis v. Bolin). In 1961, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the act did not bar the party from participating in New York’s unemployment insurance system (Communist Party v. Catherwood).

        So yes, the law passed during the the McCarthy era … and was afterwards declared unconstitutional.

        The Communist Party USA is still around and even have a website.

        • Cowbee [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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          8 months ago

          Ah, fair, didn’t see that it got repealed. My original point was more to state that the legal system works against Communism, America is a thoroughly anti-Communist project both within and without.

      • Ranvier@sopuli.xyz
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        8 months ago

        Someone better tell these people they all could be arrested at any moment!

        https://www.cpusa.org/

        https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_Party_USA

        No but seriously it’s an unenforceable junk law that no one has bothered to take the time to repeal that was never even really used in the first place. I mean, the communist party runs candidates for office to this day. Someone finally tried to use it in 1972 to keep a communist candidate off the ballot and a federal district Court promptly ruled it unconstitutional.

        https://www.plainsite.org/dockets/1zey0ee5l/arizona-district-court/blawis-v-bolin/

        • Cowbee [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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          8 months ago

          Ah, fair, didn’t see that it got repealed. My original point was more to state that the legal system works against Communism, America is a thoroughly anti-Communist project both within and without.

          • Ranvier@sopuli.xyz
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            8 months ago

            I’d say more broadly the legal and political system works against any organizations that threaten the status quo, but yes America’s attitudes toward communism have been pretty obvious throughout the twentieth century. I just took issue with the idea that political parties or idealogies are illegal in and of themselves in the US, constitution still manages to protects some things.

      • force@lemmy.world
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        8 months ago

        “Communist Party” and “Communism” are not equivalent concepts

        • Cowbee [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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          8 months ago

          Who makes that distinction? Plus, the idea of destroying the state, Capitalism, class divides, and money definitely is legally opposed.

          • force@lemmy.world
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            8 months ago

            Who makes that distinction?

            … literally anyone who thinks about it? The US Communist Party is one party, there are plenty of other parties that identify as communist. You don’t have to be called “The Communist Party” to be communist.

            Socialist Alternative

            Revolutionary Communist Party

            Workers World Party

            New Afrikan Black Panther Party

            Party for Socialism and Liberation

            Communist parties aren’t popular at all, but they’re far from banned. There are multiple such parties.

            • Cowbee [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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              8 months ago

              Laws are interpreted and wielded by those in power. The Democrats are already called Communists, what happens if a genuine Socialist party takes some amount of power?

              • force@lemmy.world
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                8 months ago

                That’s literally an argument against anything that exists at all. That’s kind of how laws work, linguistics is complicated so everyone’s interpretation is different, and many people in power intentionally misinterperet laws. But as it stands, communist parties are not banned. What you speak of is a big “what if”, and currently you saying communism as a whole is banned is simply wrong, even as an oversimplification.

                It is a big stretch to turn “Parties other than the two largest ones in the country have considerable cultural, legal, and logistical obstacles to being able to participate in high-level American politics, and an unenforced law from 70 years ago banned one specific communist party before most of the provisions being repealed by congress and the law being overturned in state courts as unconstitutional” into “Communism is banned in the United States”. There is no legal way to criminally prosecute someone on the basis of them being a communist, or belonging to any specific communist party at all, in the modern day.

                I’m not trying to be condescending or anything btw.

                • Cowbee [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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                  8 months ago

                  It’s an intentionally anti-Communist law, it’s pretty simple to see how Communism is legally unfavored.

                  • force@lemmy.world
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                    8 months ago

                    That’s very far from “banned”. That’s the point. Plenty of things are very disfavored legally, but it’s far-fetched to call them banned. Communism is one of them. There’s a whole list of openly socialist&/communist mayors in the US on Wikipedia, even. I can openly be extremely communist and the government won’t do anything about it. I can even attend a communist protest and that’s as legal as any other protest.

                    I could see “nearly banned” as a valid exaggeration though. And I definitely agree that the system is stacked against leftists in general, especially anyone identified as a “communist” or “socialist”, and hope for getting rid of the alt-right’s grasp on our country before most of us are destroyed by global warming is exponentially decreasing as time progresses. So I would totally say it’d make little difference in our fate if it were banned.

          • Rusty Shackleford@programming.dev
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            8 months ago

            Who makes that distinction?

            Anyone versed in basic political theory.

            An ideology and a political organization are obviously different. Just like republicanism and The Republican Party, democracy and The Democratic Party, socialism and The Socialist Party, etc.

            destroying the state

            That’s technically sedition, so, yes, illegal.

            Capitalism

            Nowhere in U.S. jurisprudence is “capitalism” (verbatim) explicitly protected as an economic system. The 14th Amendment’s Due Process Clause prevents the state from taking someone’s life, liberty, or property without a proper justification under the laws of the land. The Constitution protects individuals from the government. Freedom to contract is a principle that underpins the basis for a free-market economy.

            After the Great Depression, the Court began to treat the freedom to contract as less than absolute, asserting that such freedom may be limited by the State’s interest to protect its citizens. Capitalism is a right guaranteed by the constitution but limited in scope to protect individuals against the dangers of laissez-faire capitalism.

            class divides

            There are no explicit laws in U.S. jurisprudence (that I know of or have turned up on brief internet searches) that enforce “class divides”.

            money

            Be it resources, precious metals, or legal tender, money is protected by the 14th Amendment’s Due Process Clause.

            So we can conclude that the advocacy or practice of communism isn’t itself illegal. Forcing people to practice it or overthrowing the government and dissolving The Bill of Rights in order to force people to practice most certainly is.

            In my opinion, that’s a good thing.

            • Cowbee [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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              8 months ago

              Communism isn’t Communalism. Advocating for Communism and attempting to implement Communism at a national level is illegal, as you’ve shown.

              • Rusty Shackleford@programming.dev
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                8 months ago

                Communism isn’t Communalism.

                Yes, that’s true.

                Advocating for Communism

                … is legal, under the 1st Amendment.

                attempting to implement Communism at a national level is illegal

                By force, yes. Theoretically, with a broad enough consensus, it could be voted on and enacted.

                All pedantry aside, it’s important to differentiate between theory and practice or ideology and an organization.

                • Cowbee [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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                  8 months ago

                  I understand, however my non-pedantic point is that the US legal system works against Communism. The US is a firmly anti-Communist project both within and without.

                  Attempting to bring about Communism is impossible legally because it cannot be voted in, unless you believe it’s possible to simply ask a billionaire to not be.

                  • Rusty Shackleford@programming.dev
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                    8 months ago

                    it cannot be voted in

                    Technically, it can.

                    simply ask a billionaire to not be

                    One doesn’t have to ask; under the very same Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment, the legal argument would be, theoretically, that the vast accumulation of wealth and its legal and political ramifications violates the life, liberty, and property of other citizens.

                    The dissolution of the union and the United States government is also possible with the ratification of 2/3 majority of the states.