Of course, there were good things which came out of the communist regime, but I wouldn’t say that “it worked”.

The people supported the economic system that had free healthcare and education, doubled life expectancies, dramatic improvements in science, made it to space, rapidly industrialized, and dramatically reduced inequality.

Free healthcare still exists in all developed countries other than the US, life expectancies increased all over the world same with improvements in science, the space race was very close between the USSR and the US and the moon landing is very often brought up by US nationalists as well. I would say the industrialization was actually a bit too fast, people were, sometimes forcefully, relocated from rural areas to concrete boxes in cities. As for inequality, yes, there were no billionaires, and, while the quality of life for the poorest was maybe higher than it is today, I’d say the quality of life for average people was lower during communist time.

Even prisoners were paid in the USSR for forced labor, this is ahistorical.

While this may have been true at the beginning, later on, there were no wages. Still, conditions were very poor.

Furthermore, the vast majority of people voted to retain the USSR

Wow, you’re telling me the people who were brainwashed into believing their country is the best (not saying it doesn’t happen nowadays (cough cough USA), voted to retain it?

In my country (Romania) the only point I hear people praising the communist regime about is infrastructure. Why? Because, as it turns out, it’s much easier to build infrastructure when you have slaves prisoners which you don’t have to pay. Of course, the corruption in our post-communist government doesn’t help either.

I agree, capitalism is VERY far from ideal, but, please, stop glazing the USSR regime just because it was “communist”.

Tell this to the people from the former USSR/Eastern Block. I’m not saying communism can’t work in any way, but I am saying that, at least historically, it has not worked.

True, brother

In my country (and I think most of Europe) malls (especially those in more central areas) have underground parking, or limited above-ground parking. There is a really nice one which is connected to a big park in the back. So maybe you can replace the parking lots with apartment buildings, recreational spaces and transit infrastructure and maybe include some underground parking.

If memory serves me right, the person who invented the mall, was an Austrian immigrant in the US. He wanted to recreate the experience of Austrian walkable city centre streets (which are full of mixed-use buildings, with storefronts at the bottom floor and apartments above). But I think only having shops was deemed more profitable by corporate.

Okay, that sounds fine, but what about an apartment high rise? That’s a residential property, and there’s not a great way to have it all be rental property without being owned by a corporation of some kind.

Then not all of them have to be for rent. In my country at least you can buy individual apartments.

Also you could allow them to own the property they build, but once sold off, they or another corporation (or individual with too many properties, maybe the limit can be 3 or 4) cannot buy them again.

Obviously I’m not a lawyer and this was just a quick suggestion. I expect people more familiar with the law can word this better.

I can’t wait for LineageOS to be available for my Samsung phone.

Yeah, I think many people thought you were talking about those electric scooters, which are, well pretty damn silent and good to make cities less car focused (like in the US). I mean things like this.

Tipping is fine, but only as a bonus for excellent service. There shouldn’t be a “suggested gratuity” or some shit like that and also obviously shouldn’t be counted as part of the employee’s salary, like in the US

• Slave labour in prisons.

It would be nice if prisoners of non-violent/minor crimes could (voluntarily) work (at maybe a lower wage than usual) and and they would be able to get what they earned once they get out of prison.

It’s fine as a concept, it allows you to live somewhere without making a commitment long-term.

But there needs to be more regulations in place, like maybe making it illegal for corporations to buy residential property and requiring by law that any new residential building must have the option to buy as well as rent, with regulations to ensure it’s a fair price.

What should we use?

All bottled water - no one needs them and it’s plastic that’s here forever

Depends on where you live. It’s a bit ignorant to say “no one needs them”. Also sometimes you have no choice, like maybe in an airport.

I’m Gen Z and use all of them

Yes, except we shouldn’t “pitch” it as a total change if we want it to happen. Unfortunately the general public has been brainwashed into believing we are basically either terrorists or we belong in an asylum. It’s insane but it’s the world we live in…

I hope we (as a society) start moving towards this sooner rather than later…

Why are people downvoting this…

There may be a point when we don’t need nuclear, maybe once we dramatically level up our battery technology, but that point is not now, and probably not for the next 50 years

I don’t disagree with you, but this is unrealistic. Starting the whole principles of society from scratch is never gonna happen. We should focus on making sure that, while we still “build and build”, it is in a sustainable way, using renewable energy sources, as well as nuclear.

Edit: this is not saying we don’t need societal change, there are definitely lots of things that need fixing, but it’s never gonna be done all at once, completely different. What needs to happen is we focus on the core of the problems, fix that now, and then it will end up looking completeley different than what we have today.