We live in a society. It's organised socially. So the underlying political function, must, be socialist. Regardless of what thought is determined to tell you otherwise.
I'm not saying I agree with this, that it is right it wrong or that something should be done about it or that is should be reinforced. I'm just pointing at it directly for further observation. Because nobody seems to realise it's real.
Groups of people have forever been trying to create images of the world that are really just socialism, in the hope no one will notice. Such as capitalism, marxism, libertarianism and of course socialism nominally.
I'll show you how this system wide worldview will always deliver slavery, even for the wealthiest among us. Especially when there's a veil of freedom covering up this reality.
The simple point is this: everything is socialist, there are simply multiple sub-forns of it. Such as capitalism, fascism, libertarianism, Marxism and so on and so on.
The label 'socialism' often touted as fundamentally different to say, capitalism, is just a co-opting of the word socialism, for political effect - or a formalised way to state this ideologically.
The Goodies are not a 1979's comedy trio. Goodies are what labour creates from doing work using natural resources. Or wealth. Goodies are what all people want more than anything else in life, there are no exceptions to this desire. How the Goodies are distributed is the primary function of socialism and is also known as political economy - how the wealth is created and who ends up getting it in the end, notwithstanding who put in the labour to make them.
Socialism, as the fundamental worldview of the entire organised world, in all times and places, defines how the Goodies are re-distributed. All these different forms of socialism, such as socialism nominally, capitalism, Marxism, libertarianism etc etc are different ways of making an appeal to authority about who should be getting the Goodies, without requiring an obligation to deliver justice in that distribution. As can be seen a across the ten millennia or so since society first formed.
Look at nominal socialism, the name sake of fundamental socialism. The name given to the political ideology which claims but never achieves, and only seems to succeed at exploiting, the poor or diversity groups. It's function is to define and uphold a fantasy set of images about how the world works, who should own what and what rights people should have. That is all. Just because it's monopolised the label of 'socialism' does not place it on a higher level relative to the other forms of the same thing. It is just a sub set of socialism. It has no primacy over the other subsets of socialism such as so called capitalism.
Look deeper and you will see there's no such thing as de facto capitalism either. Capitalism, if it actually even exists, is just another form of the same kind of socialism, with a different name. An image of socialism made to look different but the same thing. Capitalism, again only exists as a subset of fundamental socialism. The term is so ill defined it's hard to speak about with logic and reason. For example most so called capitalists, especially the most wealthy ones, do not possess much capital. They mostly own land assets which obviously are not capital. Capitalism at best is just a form of socialism were it's ideological leaders want to protect the class of people worth more financially. But it's still socialism at its heart.
The form of socialism which comes closest to hitting the mark, but still missing it by a mile, is called Georgism. It gets further along the well trodden path because at least it points directly at a theory showing directly how the distribution of wealth is so unjust - the systemic privatisation of the commons and forced confiscation of earned incomes known as taxation. But it's still just a different form of the same kind of thing at the root - socialism.
Libertarianism claims the title of the most fantastically absurd image of socialism as it tries to makes itself fundamentally different from socialism, while failing miserably at that. Libertarians are so easy to trip up. It talks about independence and so on and so on. No sooner has it done that than it's starts demanding more taxation and private property in land. After making it's high sounding and apparently intellectual speeches it immediately resorts to fundamental socialism. What can be said about supporters of this image of the world other than they are the most conditioned of all.
Groups of people have forever been trying to create images of the world that are really just socialism, in the hope no one will notice. How odd people become when organised into what we call society.
And so it goes...
Amen.