Joseph Smith proposed the United Order--which was a theocratic communism, and the Church still makes temple worthy members commit to the Law of Consecration.
So it seems odd that the LDS faithful should be so staunchly anti-socialist. socialism shares the same basic principles of the United Order, in deed, the UO is a version of socialism.
I raised this question as a true believing teenager. It was a good question, I was told (I was lucky, as a kid I was never chastized at church for asking tough questions). The answer was simple. Socialism and communism are atheistic. Atheism is immoral. So it matters not that the practices might be same. Without God at the center of the system, it was by default immoral.

Fair enough to my 17 year old mind.

As a post 17 year old (to say the least), I no longer find the answer satisfying. By that logic, shouldn't non-Temple weddings also be considered "Satan's counterfeit"--especially if they occur in those satan funded protestant churches or whore of babylon catholic churches. Surely non-temple weddings should be in the same category as communism?
Maybe the church should stop picking on gay marriage and start trying to legislate against any marriage not performed in the Temple.

Just thinking out loud.

Very good question and topic. I immediately think of communism when I think of the United Order and Law of Consecration.

That Communism and socialism is immoral because of atheism is hogwash! That is the best rebutal the mormon spin doctors could throw at that?

What is immoral is to have a theocracy and the United Order and Law of Consecration. A theocracy is nothing more than an intolerant, brutal dictatorship, the likes of what Brigham Young ran during the Utah Wars. People had their lives destroyed if they didn't tow the party line. Heads were cut off, property was stolen, kids and wives were reassigned, gruesome castrations performed with impunity, others were killed by lynch mobs (see Steve Benson's relative in Logan UT) slaves were the status quo and not to mention The Mountain Meadow Massacre and the cover up that followed. Now this is immoral.

When I was a teenager a Sunday school teacher told me that the United Order was the opposite of communism. Huh?