You’re right that the focal point of socialism should be need and equality, but on the other hand, if the abundance of capitalism were distributed evenly the result would be comparatively luxurious.

I don’t think it’s necessarily wrong to emphasize that aspect as a way to counter the connotation of communism as this bleak potato-eating existence where everyone drinks Victory-brand vodka and smokes Victory cigarettes.

While you’re on the right track asserting that we shouldn’t center consumerism in the narrative about what communism is, you can’t underestimate the value of consumer goods to the ideological project of capitalism, and by extension, the task of articulating an alternative. Think Yeltsin’s trip to the supermarket and Churchill’s pithy quote about the “equal distribution of misery.

The traditional argument for socialism is that it’s better at meeting needs whereas capitalism is geared toward wants. The case can and should be made that socialism is better equipped to do both, to provide bread as well as roses.

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