Socialism (to contrast with social-democrats like some European nations which are primarily democracies, free markets, with a social component) is not a democracy those are opposing ideas.
That reads as though you’re saying they want to abolish the democratic process, but as somebody living in a country with many of the democratic processes they’re proposing, looking in on what seems like a very dysfunctional democratic process in the US, it seems to be that they want to replace it with a much better version of itself.
The US process is far from ideal. I agree with that. I'm not American and looking from the outside there's a lot of head scratching I can do.
But- It's worked pretty well over the last few hundred years. You can't just take that and throw it in the garbage and replace it with some "workers will decide" socialist mumbo-jumbo.
Seriously. It doesn't work. You can't say let's take Germany's process and apply it in the US. It won't work. We should know better. There is a delicate balance of power (arguably already somewhat disrupted) and there is a culture and a history. That's why we also can't just bring "democracy" to non-democratic countries that easily.
The DSA are saying let's break everything and then figure it out. It won't work. We need responsible adults not revolutionaries to fix things with care.
Isn't it clear to you that you're misrepresenting DSA's position?
Except form the million of black people living in the south of the US. For them, the USA is a democracy only since 1964.
And if you argue "yes but it got better", the Republicans are making everything to get back to before 1964.
Incidentally, your "we can't let workers decide" sounds a lot like "we can't let negroes vote" or "we can't let women vote". And is as much FUD.
I think most of us want a moderate Democrat. I hope populism dies with Trump/MAGA in the coming years. We don’t need to match them with our own distasteful populism.
"Defund the police" was a campaign slogan at last election.
I'm looking from Europe and I'm often impressed how extreme american leftists are. If it's not socialism, it sure shares the same conclusions. And yet "The most extreme left in the US is the most extreme right wing for Europe" is a common belief.
I am often impressed how abusive and violent US policemen are. And they have budgets rivaling the defense spending of whole countries and are armed to the teeth with military grade equipment.
And sure, there are also ideas like healthcare for all which I think are similar but that isn't really what the DSA is about. It's definitely not about transforming the USA to have a better social network like healthcare or protection for employees. It's a lot more radical than that.
Yes, they are center-left at best, and your frenzied rebuttal against regular people trying to improve their lives and the country they live in is alarming. Free public transportation..the horror.
> Yes
Respectfully, you may have skimmed some material or watched a couple of minutes of MSNOW, because you wouldn't come to the conclusion that the DSA just wants free public transportation otherwise. Key aspects of the DSA's goals and the actual policy implementation actions of elected DSA-aligned politicians that are quite well aligned with the position of a person holding communist and other relatively extremist sympathies:
- state-controlled grocery stores [0]
- public ownership of the largest corporations and essential industries [1]
- abolition in full of police and prisons ("cut police budgets annually toward zero") [1]
- ending sanctions on states backing terrorist activities [1]
- permitting open, uncontrolled immigration [2]
- disregarding the existence of Israel ("democratic secular state [Palestine], from the river to the sea") [3]
- giving voting rights to noncitizens and prisoners [4]
[0] https://edc.nyc/program/nyc-groceries (a city headed by a DSA-aligned mayor)
[1] https://program.dsausa.org/
[2] https://www.dsausa.org/democratic-left/using-power-builds-po...
[3] https://www.dsausa.org/statements/on-the-ceasefire-in-gaza/
[4] https://program.dsausa.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/DSA_WD...
[edited for formatting]
Wouldn't you recognize that bad faith characterizes the DSA lines?
Public-transit where I live is not free, but it is subsidized, with various recent efforts from municipal and state governments to further reduce costs for all residents.
Germany is defined as Social Democracy or a Social Market Economy. It marries free-market capitalism with social welfare policies, state regulation, and collective bargaining to ensure economic growth and social security, including robust social safety nets.
The US once had stronger unions and basic worker-oriented safety nets. This has been dismantled since the 80s, while piling on the National Debt by pilfering the treasury and "returning" the money to the (rich) end of the tax base.
There was a great quote in the original Deus Ex: "In 1945, corporations paid 50 percent of federal taxes. Now they pay about 5 percent."
In my mind the DSA is trying to shift the Overton window towards something more reasonable, that has already existed in the US. Focusing on the extremes to dismiss the DSA entirely is like throwing the baby out with the bath water.
Bernie is probably the most well-known democratic socialist in the US, but he is not a member of DSA. By his political positions he would be either in the left wing of Finnish Social Democratic Party or in the mainstream of the Left Alliance. He would probably choose the Left Alliance, since it is more like a coalition of like-minded activists, while the party is the primary actor for the Social Democrats.
AOC, another well-known democratic socialist, would also fit in the Left Alliance. She is part of the moderate wing of DSA. But if you start looking into the ideological wing, you find plenty of actual socialists who would make Finnish mainstream leftists uncomfortable.
> The DSA wants to abolish the existing US democratic process.
So, getting into elected office by winning elections is wanting to abolish the democratic process?
I think I'm beginning to understand why the hardcore MAGA folks loves Trump so much.
You misspelled "Trump".
There is only one party making it harder for people to vote, and it is the Republican party.
As for their agenda, you are wrong.
"The Democratic Socialists of America is the largest socialist organization in the United States, with over 100,000 members and chapters in all 50 states. We believe that working people should run both the economy and society democratically to meet human needs, not to make profits for a few."
"Capitalism is a system designed by the owning class to exploit the rest of us for their own profit. We must replace it with democratic socialism, a system where ordinary people have a real voice in our workplaces, neighborhoods, and society."
"democratic socialism" is an oxymoron. socialism conflicts directly with democratic values. At the very least there is no pre-existing example of democracy and socialism working side by side. All previous socialist "experiments" were not democracies.
No it's not, check out Europe, mostly northern countries, it's working just fine.
> At the very least there is no pre-existing example of democracy and socialism working side by side.
Again, northern europe screaming at you.
So you're wrong...
Also, you're Canadian, maybe it's not your business
I feeel those topics are a bit of my business.
In other words, Social Democrat != Democratic Socialist
Scandinavian model relies on competitive private enterprise to create wealth, combined with strong labor union collective bargaining, universal public services, and high consumption/income taxes that apply broadly across society.
DSA seeks to move past or dismantle the capitalist economic system, advocating for social, public, or worker ownership of the means of production.[1]
[1] https://www.dsausa.org/about-us/what-is-democratic-socialism...
Why are you lieing?
From what i can read they want the same scandinavian model with strong labor unions, universal public services and so on.
From the linked website. Now, that's not quite "the means of production", explicitly stated. It's just "the key economic drivers", so most of the means of production.
Maybe you ought to be a little less quick to accuse others of lying.
Norway collectively owns its 'key economic drivers'.
Is that a bad thing?, they're still capitalistic, just with better respect for its people.
In socialism with supposed democracy, where the state owns the means of production and supposedly the workers supposedly have a say about everything, they actually end up with a say about nothing (at least not without greasing the right palms in the inevitably corrupt system that arises).
In Social Democracy, capitalism is the underlying system, where corporations and workers can own means of production, but it operates under sufficient regulation that the excesses and systemic failures of captialism (e.g., failure to prevent Tragedies Of The Commons, tendency towards monopoly and excess concentration of power, consistent tendency to abuse and impoverish workers, etc.), you end up with successful systems like Northern Europe.
The two are very different, and we need to hold the DSA people to the latter and not let them sneak in the former.
The term you are looking for is communism, not socialism.
Nordic countries are practicing Democratic Socialism.
DSA is not communist.
Why are you spreading this crap when it takes 2 neurons and a few searches to find out you are wrong?