So you define a utopian society as being one that keeps people alive rather than one that also satisfies people's wants? — I like sushi

No. I defined it as a society that satisfies peoples needs and provides opportunity for people to satisfy their own and one another's wants. This should not be such a difficult concept, since all functional societies have a mandate to do this. They just don't do it very well.

If we all envisage different things they also contradict each other. — I like sushi

I say that if we don't have to fight over the necessities, we are better able to choose and create the luxuries. You say the luxuries must come with the package. You demand more than is possible and then argue that it's not possible.
A place where there is nothing left to try and nothing left to desire is not Utopia - it's death.
If you prefer fish and I prefer pasta, we don't need to fight over either. All we need are some very basic laws regarding personal liberty and responsibility. (Not the million contentious laws we have been trying to uphold and knock down in civilized countries.)

Height, sex, weight, intelligence, personal preferences, tastes, fortitude, vulnerability, sociability, etc.,. — I like sushi

And all these differences grate on you? You want to kill all those 'other' people? Me, I find uniformity rather a bore.

Because they would not be able to communicate and negotiate well enough leaving many on the fringes of society. — I like sushi

And yet they did. And we do, with people around the whole globe. (We're even trying to communicate with other planets.) Even now, with all the strife over territory and resources and population movement. So why would we suddenly stop being able to communicate if the strife ended and there was nothing major to negotiate? I don't see the logic of people being on the fringes (whatever fringes are when the needs of all are satisfied) because they're less able to communicate with people they don't choose for company than the ones they do choose.
In fact, I don't see the logic of variety as an obstacle to social cohesion.

I do not feel that you appreciate the danger of opting for some utopian scheme rather than just trying to improve the current state. — I like sushi

I'm not opting for it. The option was never open to me. I'm saying it's theoretically possible. And also that having a destination in mind is useful in choosing one's path; that a clear vision of how society should work is helpful in making incremental improvements. ....

.... in theory. In actuality, we're just hanging on the precipice of extinction by our fingernails. Survival is still possible, but it's not going to be any picnic.

Satisfying people's wants and needs is part of the utopian ideal. — I like sushi

Needs, yes. Wants are individual; all the society can or should do is provide the opportunity for people to satisfy their own wants.

Separate communities in a utopian society cannot stably coexist because of this limitation. — I like sushi

Why the hell not? Native tribes on various continents managed quite well to remain separate, and yet trade and party and look for marriage partners.

Yes, but people still differ. the larger the population the prominent differences become as they grate harder on each other. — I like sushi

Why should they? What - aside from cultural indoctrination - are these prominent differences? Even with cultural diversity, people can get along just fine. Toronto used to enjoy a thriving Chinatown, a Jewish district and market, the Italian strip, the Ukrainian and Hungarian, Greek and Caribbean, Irish and Portuguese neighbourhoods. Yonge Street got pretty raucous during FIFA playoffs. St. Patrick's day was a lot of fun, and so was Caribana. If there is no scarcity of resources or ethnic dominance to compete for, and nobody inciting one group of people against another, what have they to grate about? Anyone is free to associate with those they find pleasant company and avoid people they don't like.

With Dunbar's Number we know that societal ties breakdown over a certain population threshold. — I like sushi

And yet, cities and nations consist of many million citizens, and don't break out in civil war. Why does everyone need a direct tie to everyone else? How long has the place where you currentIy reside existed? If you can tolerate the presence of strangers there, in spite of whatever inequalities, injustices and annoyances exist there right now, why could you not accept them in a fair and benevolent society?

Of course a utopian or optimal society cannot be brought about in our present state of affairs. And maybe too many of us are too crazy to want it. Nevertheless, I believe it to be a theoretical possibility.

That was an example of how everyone would be happy. the simple truth is people are different and as long as they are different utopia is impossible - hence clones or forcing conformity. — I like sushi

Why would people drag 'happiness' into social organization? Whether a person is happy or sad, grumpy or cheerful, bluff or dour, sociable or reclusive is entire personal. You can have personalities, proclivities, preferences and moods under any political system. What a good, or optimal or utopian society does is prevent people damaging, oppressing and exploiting one another; provide a means of settling disagreements, make sure every child is cared-for, nourished and educated, take care of the sick, injured and feeble, then allow its members to pursue their own path to happiness.
(Incidentally, the snapshot of happiness my mind invariably throws up is of three men fixing a tractor. There are other pictures, like a 10-year-old bringing home an A on a complicated science project and a young mother showing off her baby. Assuming physical and mental health, I don't see why the things and situations that make us happy need to be incompatible.)

The push and pull between individualism and state authority is the biggest hurdle for utopian ideals. — I like sushi

Yes. It's an obstacle, just as long as egalitarian, democratic means of participation in "the state authority" is not available to all citizens.

In no way shape or form are humans alike enough to inhabit - en masse - a singular society. — I like sushi

What is a singular society? We currently have a number of countries where large numbers of individual have been able work out a system that accommodates most, and that could include all but the most aggressive and greediest - since they're the ones hogging the resources.
This is one basic assumption about humans on which you and I disagree. All living things have needs in common; all members of a phylum have even more in common; all members of a family have even more in common; all members of a species are more like one another than they are like any other species. The natural (not culturally induced) differences in taste, ambition and temperament are so superficial that any well managed social group (such as a labour union, sports team, men's benevolent association, congregation, knitting circle or community garden) can accommodate them.

If they choose to leave then it is clearly not a utopian society. — I like sushi

Why can a good society not consist of many communities? All the bad ones and okay ones do.

Okay. You have a certain set of assumptions about humans. Mine are slightly different, and my idea of a good society - one that aspires to incremental improvement in the life of every individual - certainly doesn't include brainwashing. Nor is there any reason for a good society to operate on a single model. If you're not happy and you're free to leave, I suppose there would have to be an alternative community to join that's closer to your ideal. There is no reason a number of communities with different organization and living arrangements should not co-exist.
Of course, as previously noted, this presupposes a considerable reduction in population. That's not something I advocate - that's something I predict.

It is the idea that someone believes they know what the best is that irks me. — I like sushi

Yes, I get that. It's like someone believing they know what's 'optimal', but they don't specify any metrics or benchmarks. The ideal, like the optimal, is just a big picture that we try to colour in, one tile at a time, coherently, instead of throwing random pigments at the bits we don't like at a given moment.
I think we have a similar vision, couched in different terms.

The measuring stick for an unreachable goal is infinite. — I like sushi

If you believe it to be unreachable. And yet, in order for the traveler to keep striding, the horizon has keep receding. "This still sucks, but it's as good as we can expect." really isn't enough.
Besides, when progressives actually manage to effect improvements, there are always regressives trying to tear it down, so there's always plenty to do.

Imagine a world of people walking around thinking they are the saviors of humanity. I do actually think they would be more likely to execute one another (albeit by the hands of others maybe) than feed to support each other. — I like sushi

That's what they did, and are doing. But not because they're trying to behave the way Jesus is fabled to or according to his advice; it's because they're trying to channel Jehovah. Their promised land in post-mortem. The Utopian ideal is a high-functioning, happy society on Earth, where people and the environment can thrive. It can only be approached by small incremental improvements, not massacres.

By all means search for whatever inner utopian ideal you wish, but do not assume anyone else wants it nor that they would welcome it - that is the thrust of my point. — I like sushi

These are never individual endeavours. If you read the Utopian literature, you'll find that a lot of people, in different times, have had similar ideal societies. (Huxley's was a rather tiresome, but even so....)

As for killing people - -- what the actual.....? Any Utopian worth their salt knows that ends don't justify means; the means determine the ends.

If everyone was walking around trying to be Buddha/Jesus/Mohammad/ — I like sushi

If Christians tried to behave like Jesus, they would feed one another, not execute them. If Muslims tried to behave like Muhammad, they'd be a lot more disciplined and circumspect in their actions. And if a lot of Asians really tried to be like the Buddha, that might be a nicer continent, too.
(They didn't, we haven't - people just yell at one another about what their religious figureheads demand, while grabbing whatever they can for themselves - and the world is pretty dystopian already.)

I think it is probably better to aim for a possible optimum than assume an ideal. — I like sushi

What's the point of aiming for a compromise? If you want to go to Hollywood, you don't set your sights on Flagstaff and plan to reassess. If Flagstaff is as far you can get - well, it's not a bad town.... may, in fact, be better than LA. But if Flagstaff were your intended destination, you might only get to Albuquerque. Why not aim for the ultimate - even though you may have to settle for whatever you can reach?
Is there a theoretical or philosophical ideal? Yes; in fact, several, and they're remarkably similar. The reason it's called Nowhere is that it is assumed not to exist in a real time and place. It's an ideal. That's what you aim for, the standard against which you measure your actual accomplishment.

On reading over this, not participating looks like the best option. Can't help forming a picture in my mind, though, and that will amuse till I fall asleep.

The thing about chaos is, if there are no rules, there is no real way to proceed, other than whim, desire, chaos. I suppose you could claim that that is the only real rule, that there are none. — Chet Hawkins

If there were no rules, or chaos, the universe could not organize itself into galaxies, nebulae, suns and planets, compounds, molecules, life forms. From the laws of physics comes all that we are, all that we know. Chaos is not something we can experience. We experience disorientation, confusion, occasional temporary states of befuddlement. Chaos is not something we can see in the world. We witness occasional temporary states of disruption and disturbance in nature and our own organizations; transient events that interrupt the prevailing order. With our very limited access to information, we fail to predict the course of all events in the universe. These observations, the busy human imagination exaggerates into a big, noisy concept like 'chaos'.

People make themselves and one another miserable by looking for and by creating the anomalous state, the disruption of order; by breaking down the reasonable and sustainable organization of things and communities, by upsetting the functional relationships of people and their environment.

But Utopia is extant. — Chet Hawkins

It does certainly persist as an idea, a possible goal to achieve. And - carpers and whiners notwithstanding - many humans are fortunate enough and aware enough that between sleep and death, they experience fulfillment, pleasure, comfort, affection, satisfaction, amusement, surprise, awe, even moments of ecstasy. No wonder these happy people wish the same for their fellow humans and strive to bring it about.

We should realize that arrival at the perfect Utopia is not very probable, but it remains the only truly worthy goal. — Chet Hawkins

Just so.

Just as well the ova are not, or menstruation would be a mortal sin, as well as unclean. (That was a funny song, but a really awful movie.)

The foetus starts after the nineth month and goes until conception. — Lionino

You didn't look at the tutorial - or a dictionary. Take another shot? Human gestation begins at the moment of fertilization (conception) and proceeds to delivery, typically 280 days - approximately 40 weeks or 9 months. During that process, the newly conceived human goes through three stages of development: germinal, embryonic and fetal.
People really, really need to learn this basic stuff in middle school - especially if they're planning to weigh in on a political position on the subject or have sex any time after puberty.

If you have no clue what the difference between blastocyst and an embryo is, you should not raise your opinion on the topic. — Lionino

My very point!

Contraception is preventing the fertilisation of the eggs. — Lionino

Bingo! No conception = no baby!

Physiologically, besides small details such as eyes and lungs, a baby the day before it is born is the same as the day after it is born. Killing a foetus one day before it is born is killing a baby. — Lionino

The small details, like eyes and lungs are completely formed two weeks before the projected delivery date, though a slightly premature infant may need a little more encouragement to start breathing and can take a bit longer to focus its vision. Premature babies - barring genetic defects and trauma - can survive without technological intervention 6-10 weeks before their due date; with medical help, premies as young as 24 weeks have a survival rate of 60+%.

So? Who proposed killing them? More to the point: where did you hear this nonsense?

Yes, we can. A baby inside the womb is alive. What is this nonsense? — Lionino

A baby is not inside the womb, or anywhere else, without conception. It doesn't exist; therefore it cannot be alive. That's pretty much the point ofcontra-ception. People really need to learn this basic stuff!

You have to learn how to use words correctly before starting an argument. — Lionino

Helpful advice. Please heed it!

"Utopia is when we can kill babies". — Lionino

Whom are you quoting? Nobody can a kill a baby that was never conceived, but one that was brought into the world though coercion or brainwashing is prey to every kind of hazard, aggression and abuse.

The birth control / prisons thing I am not sure I follow. — Chet Hawkins

My original statement had been that women should be free to decide whether or not to have children.
I didn't go into tedious detail, but reproductive autonomy - which I thought was fairly obvious - includes accurate information, the availability of safe birth control, and freedom from coercion. Where these three requirements have been met, the birth-rate declined to a sustainable level. I assumed this was well known.
Your riff on justice, while perfectly valid, didn't seem related to that earlier remark.

But, paying it forward as a species duty will probably not be needed much longer. Technology will eventually make artificial wombs I suspect and sooner than we think. — Chet Hawkins

I suppose there will always be some people who so yearn to preserve their DNA that if they can't physically replicate will resort to any means. But they would be a small minority. Most people, given self-determination, will either have not have children according to how much they think can offer a child.

A well-functioning society can make room for all kinds of reproductive arrangements. Some individuals are so wrapped up in their art or scientific research or spiritual pursuit that they have no need for close human connections. Some are sociable, but prefer the company of peers, rather than commiting to a family. They may not want any children at all; nor would they make good parents. Some people - indivdually, as couples, as extended family units or polyamorous compacts could produce, love and support several children. Some families that either cannot or choose not to reproduce physically nevertheless love children and are happy to adopt or foster someone else's mistake. This doesn't need to be complicated or litigious or onerous. A good society doesn't assign arbitrary functions to its members; doesn't interfere in their personal lives, except in order to protect the vulnerable and help the helpless.

So, although yes people can make choices, all of us have a valid say in every choice. And immoral choices need to be called out. So, patterns of immorality must be restrained. — Chet Hawkins

That may be fine or horrific, depending on who defines "immoral" and what they mean by restraint. If you mean stop people from beating and raping one another, I'm in agreement. However, forcing people to have more children than they can cherish, or than the ecosystem can support, I don't see as either moral or beneficial to society.
How did birth control turn into prisons?

In my impression, it is mostly women who complain that they "want more". It is rarely men who start the "What are we?" conversation. Men just want sex. If we can get it without putting in any effort or any money, so much the better. — Tarskian

And, again, what has your twisted idea of the nature of men and women to do with reproductive choice?

What is there so hard about staying alone? — Tarskian

In a well-regulated egalitarian society, it's quite easy. It's not even hard to have consensual intimate relations or protracted marital commitment without progeny.
In authoritarian, patriarchal societies, young girls are bartered like cattle and used as sexual objects/ reproductive vessels. That, too is a reality of bad societies.

How did you two get all sexist in this disucssion? — Chet Hawkins

Without even trying. I said a good society would let women make their own decisions as to the bearing of young. My purpose in saying so had little to do with sex and much to do with overpopulation. My naive notion of a good society is a community of self-regulating individuals who all contribute to and share in the welfare of the whole.

The willingness to fight comes through the belief in the extent of the 'evil' perceived. — I like sushi

And the threat being perceived. The protection of loved kin and territory is also a strong animal instinct. But there is a huge difference between willingness to fight for one's convictions and loyalties, and a desire for war.

In your "good" society, you would get something for nothing. Fine, but not from me. — Tarskian

How does not being forced to procreate equate to getting something for nothing? Your reasoning, as often happens, eludes me.

In the West, men have heard women loud and clear. That is why men don't provide anymore. If you manage to provide for yourself, fine. If not, then also fine. That is obviously not our problem, is it? — Tarskian

And this is your idea of a good society?

If you don't like the deal, then you bring your body elsewhere, while I bring my wallet elsewhere. Simple, no? — Tarskian

And this is your idea of a good society?

Outside the West, there are still lots of women who eagerly want to exchange favors. — Tarskian

And that is your idea of a good society.

My personal opinion is if you are not willing to kill an animal you should not eat meat. — I like sushi

That's how we turned vegetarian. When we moved to the country, my OG asked where he should build the chicken coop. I said, we're not having chickens. Why not? Because I won't kill them and I bet you won't, either. But that's hypocritical. Yup. So, let's try not eating what we don't kill. Okay. It's worked for 40 years, so, I guess...

But that's a digression from the question of war. If men want to go war, and men have pretty been in charge of things through history, why has there ever been conscription? I'm supposing that the men who run things and want wars are not the same ones who actually have to fight the wars. Most of the latter would prefer to be left alone to work their farms or looms or forges and play with their kids on a sunny day.

As long as society agrees that men have no obligation to provide for women who only recognize that they have rights but do not accept any obligation, everything should be fine. If women have no obligations, then men shouldn't have any either. Everybody rows his own boat, while people with only rights and no obligations cannot sit in mine. — Tarskian

Why should women in a good society need men to 'provide for' them? Every member of a society has obligations, but they do not include submitting one's body to another's will.

In Australia we often regarded strident American patriotism as amusing - the hand on heart stuff is something alien to the Australian sensibility of my youth. But since the late 1990's, we've begun to resemble the US in as much as we borrow their identity politics and right wing tropes. — Tom Storm

Ad yet Australians (relation to natives notwithstanding) have always been valiant in their aid of their sovereign (who was not even of their physical country) and of the Commonwealth, just like Canadians. We're independent now, but we didn't stop being patriots. The traditions and loyalties persist.
Neither Australians nor Canadians tend to be especially bellicose or demonstrative by temperament. The American jingoism had always struck me as 'protesting too much', as if trying to convince themselves. But maybe they just like theater - to do everything big and splashy and shiny and noisy.
I guess it's contagious... Hey, we're good patriots, too!

Post agreement utopia where everyone in that society has the same criteria, ideal and vision where the only disagreements would come prior to its founding then AI would not be necessary in that regard. — kindred

No, that will take two generations of contentment and new horizons. The first fifty years or so would be full of strife, claims and counterclaims, old feuds and grudges, gripes about lost kingdoms, redistributed wealth, eroded superiorities, and the great big headache (even for AI) of placing all the displaced people and establishing universal reproductive rights for women.

Yet this paints a static ideal of what a utopia is, for it is after all a perfect society without the need for a political class because those ideals would be entrenched in every individual. — kindred

What makes you think it would static. People don't cease to aspire, tinker and imagine just because they have have enough to eat and up-to-date vaccinations. People don't stop getting on one another's nerves, bickering and jockeying for advantage just because they're not allowed to subjugate others. People don't stop being human when they're happy - but at least they behave like better people.

Perpetual peace would be the norm and wars would be anti-utopian and unnecessary because in such a society there would be nothing to disagree on when it come to this fundamental such as perpetual peace. — kindred

Peace between nations is generally desired by most individuals. While some enjoy the idea of killing (they're not the ones recruited for the peace-keeping force), nobody likes trenches, field rations and having their limbs blown off.
Internal disagreements wouldn't be political, but there is still plenty to disagree about - the state of your neighbour's yard, his taste in music, the behaviour of his child and dog, the way he cut off, willy-nilly, a branch of your cherry tree just because it hung over his gazebo, and then, of course, how he stole the girl you were sweet on in middle school....

There could however be disagreements but they would be constructive or philosophical disagreements such as that found in academia rather than political because there would no longer be a need for politics. — kindred

Lively international conference on all kinds of academic subjects - yes! - and the way forward in technology and how best to deal with the detritus of climate change damage.

Since many people seem incapable of loving other people, one wonders how they fair with the nation state. — Tom Storm

It's easy to declare a passionate adherence to something that makes very few demands.

Such states and its citizens would be required to be collectively enlightened to avoid wars by being more collaborative than confrontational when it came to differing interests. In addition a world government level of politics rather than nation states would eventually lead to a great minimisation of wars if not completely making them redundant. — kindred

War can be made redundant - along with the unimaginable waste of resources we currently plough into armaments, spying, vehicles and other expensive with no purpose but destruction and no possible fate but obsolescence. Not to mention the people, lands and infrastructure wars destroy. Of course, to accomplish that, a world government would be required with the power to arbitrate disagreements and a compact, mobile enforcement agency made up of armed forces from all member nations. (That in itself - an international fraternity of global police - would help to cement lasting peace.)
The human rights set out by he UN could work fine. Add mutual assistance among nations and a bar against oppressors who seek to curtail other people's rights, plus universal general education at least to Gr. 10 level, heavy on life science.

Since almost no three people can agree on whether or how such a world government should be constituted or how it should function, the whole thing will have to be handed over to a sophisticated AI program with control of the energy and a prime directive to promote the welfare of the planet, including humankind. (I know, lots of people would scream about that, too.)

A utopia could in theory be isolated from the rest of the world where a sufficiently advanced civilisation has no need to impose its ideals on other nation states and sufficiently strong enough to be unbothered by wars waged on it by other nation states or actors — kindred

On another planet, maybe.

So, for a starters, according to you, people should not seek to improve their own lives because there are other people who are poor? — Tarskian

Seek to, sure. Options available at the bottom of society: nothing even remotely as you so quaintly depict. All you need is faith? Get real!

"Love" is a great big, amorphous, elastic Santa sack of a word.

For some people, love of country means being loyal to the hierarchy of that country - reverence for the monarch, the president, the constitution, the state religion or whatever system of command is in place. That's pretty much the same as the need to belong, to feel secure in one's place and function within the society. Such people are usually willing to do whatever is asked of them by the system.

For some, it means a culture, a people with language, history and traditions in common. Again, this is about belonging, but more like affection for one's family. Even if some of its members are annoying and troublesome, even if our ancestors did despicable things, even if we can see room for improvement in many of our customs, we can tolerate, even humour our family members, and defend them against all outsiders.

For some, it's an attachment to the geographical place itself, like being rooted - the wild landscape, the productive farmland, the rivers and lakes, seashore, mountains, cities, bridges, prairies, deserts - whatever one's native country looks and sounds and smells like. While such a lover of place may find similar landscapes elsewhere, they can never shake the nostalgia for home. And if some stranger wants to take that home-land from them, or despoil it, they will take up arms, however pacific they may otherwise be.

For some, it's strong belief in the ideology of their nation; a set of beliefs that supports a shared self-image, which is the national identity. These are convictions (or delusions) so intensely held that people kill and die for them. When the image begins to fray, the mirror is tarnished, and lovers of country questions their own belief in it, and maybe even the veracity of the national narrative itself, one of two things happen. A frank discussion, airing of different views, and reform, or that country lapses into social unrest, internal strife, sometimes civil war.

And that wonderful lifestyle is open to all the 712 million people who subsist under $2.15 a day.
Not one frickin' clue!

So, choose another ruling mafia, and go where you are treated best. — Tarskian

You have no frickin' clue, have you?

I believe this all takes place in a certain setting we call society, no? Seems people (by default) have influence over you by default. — schopenhauer1

They do, like it or not. And vice versa. But the influence of each on each is so diluted by numbers that it makes no discernible ripple in our personal decision-making.

We can prevent it for others though, and follow the Pessimistic framework I laid out. — schopenhauer1

By all means, go ahead and do what you think best.
I don't believe there is a "we" for me to prevent or understand or influence.

"Is THIS universe worth continuing if it doesn't meet those type of perfected/utopian standards?". — schopenhauer1

Not up to you or me whether the universe continues. Chances are, it will proceed regardless of our sense of its worth. If you don't want to stay in it, it's you prerogative to leave. When the effort becomes greater than the rewards, I'll take my own leave. I do not presume to direct other people, either way.

Seems like bashing on Stalin really dismantles whatever the Soviet Union was or became after him. — Shawn

What Russia became after Stalin was the devolution of the Stalin era. The satellite states more or less broke away but inherited the basic structure of government and its agencies. He had set up the apparatus, which is still working for Putin. In between, a few dozen capitalists, abetted by local sharks, amassed fortunes and a swarm of opportunistic religious zealots wrought havoc with people's stupefied minds. Still not a whole lot to do with communism.

So you didn't directly address this version of utopia either. — schopenhauer1

no, I didn't. Both non-being and dial-a-wish are perfect in their self-containment, so I didn't see anything to address.

But then again, in just a few months time, you can for example become a licensed truck driver. — Tarskian

...especially if you have kidney stone, three kids and a wife working two jobs...
Okay, so then France will welcome all 4000 of us?

There are solutions but people who are pessimistic will not see these solutions but only see everything as one big insurmountable problem. — Tarskian

The people at the bottom of society don't have the same solutions available to them as people with three months' computer bootcamp and a prestigious resume. But spiritual advisors can keep them afloat with promises of pie in the sky when they die - only they'd better not hurry death!

Was the failure of communism mainly due to pursuing happiness not as a methodology or process; but, as the final goal of the system itself? — Shawn

Happiness wasn't even on the agenda.
The final goal of the idea was the physical welfare of every member of society. The interim goals were to wrest power from the owner class, redistribute wealth, rationalize the means of production and make sure every member of society had food, work, shelter and access to services.
The final goal of the 'leaders' was to take over the rulership from the upper class. Their interim goals were to eliminate their rivals, silence dissent, consolidate their power and control over land, industry, commerce and social organization by appointing their political lackeys - however incompetent, to all key positions and giving unlimited license to their enforcement agencies.

I think the gist here is associated with the simple fact that Soviet communists were really sincere about their intentions of improving the life of every individual, the collective, that is. — Shawn

They were killed or jailed early on; their adherents relegated to positions of no influence.
Communism didn't fail. It was smothered in the cradle.

Is this meant to be practical advice? — Tarskian

Not really. It's a comment on dysfunctional societies.

They can keep you afloat while you evaluate your options. Sometimes it is indeed preferable to start all over again elsewhere. — Tarskian

The poor and afflicted have options? Other countries welcome them? Nor do spiritual advisors 'keep you afloat', unless you mean that some monastic orders run homeless shelters and hospices.

As a digital nomad and nomad capitalist, I do not hesitate to engage in extensive jurisdiction shopping. — Tarskian

How nice for you to be able to do that 'at the bottom of society', buoyed up, no doubt, by your pastor.

People at the bottom of society or other vulnerable individuals do not always choose to suffer from deep mental anguish. — Tarskian

Yes, they do. They're bullied into it. More appropriately, they should be mad as hell. Instead of escaping into 'spiritual' whatnot, they should rise up and fix the bastards that shoved them down to the bottom of a bad society.

They may need help from others as well as the inner strength to keep striving for improvement in their situation. — Tarskian

And that's the point of a good society - or Utopia. Not pie in the sky.

In my opinion, synagogues, churches, and mosques are well-positioned to offer material and spiritual assistance. In my opinion, someone in serious trouble needs both. — Tarskian

Bullshit. The pastor, imam or rabbi may offer some psychological support, family relations guidance, community adjustment advice, but they can't do squat about your economic or legal woes.

A society can only survive through history if it can keep its very bottom alive and afloat. Otherwise, the whole thing will just keep eroding, with every new bottom disappearing, until nothing will be left. — Tarskian

An interesting thought-experiment, tops of societies continuing to exist after the bottoms have eroded. Try this at home, see how far up the pyramid you get.
Then, just for fun, try it upside-down. How many top tiers can erode before the bottom one starts dying?

This merely means that you cannot make use of spirituality to address deep mental anguish. — Tarskian

No, it means you don't need the deep mental anguish in the first place; you're imposing it on yourself for no good reason.

If a society as a whole could survive without spirituality, the history books would definitely mention it.
They don't. — Tarskian

Because history wasn't written until after people had been imprisoned by agriculture, walled cities and stratification of society.

Every misbehavior tends to be its own punishment. That is why there is no compulsion in religion. — Tarskian

Racks, disembowellings, beheadings and pyres in the public square notwithstanding... you're a free agent. Good to know.