What do you think of Communism

[El Lazaro]

the bureaucrats' inclination towards Asiatic despotism

tfw the newest anthropology book you've ever read was published in 1924

Well, at least he didn’t call them Mongoloids

[Kubra]

Akshually, it called itself communist as a fuck-you to the mainstream marxists who took up social-democracy as their title, to say "nah nah nah, *we're* the revolutionaries"
and then the name just sort of stuck

Complete and utter ahistoricism here. Regardless of your stance on whether the USSR was actually on the path to socialism or communism or what-not, the term "Social-Democracy" has been completely warped by history from a Marxist term into a bourgeois one (thanks bernstein). For instance, the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) was by no doubt in every sense of the word a Marxist organisation, though obviously the Bolshevik-Menshevik split muddied the water a little bit. It called itself Communist in 1918, *after* the revolution, because that more clearly stated their views and aims at the time -- which, considering how the social-democrats in Germany proceeded very shortly afterwards to chuck Luxemburg into the Landwehr Canal, was probably for the best.

>complete and utter ahistoricism here
>the RSDLP was by no doubt in every sense of the word a marxist organisation
lol

There's that famous quote from Marx about how 'men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted from the past', and if there are any people in history who stand as exceptions to that rule it's Nicholas and Alexandra.

These are two people who through a propriety blend of arrogance, stupidity and genuine interpersonal unpleasantness were pretty much entirely the sole authors of their own fate. They went from heads of one of the greatest powers on the face of the earth to prisoners that were so unpopular that nobody wanted to receive them in exile entirely through their own decisions. If anyone is to be blamed for their killing, especially the killing of their children, it's them we should be pointing our fingers at, tbh.

Ehh, get raised as a tsar and you're probably gonna turn out unpleasant and out-of-touch
it's a terrible and insidious disease known as privilege

[Irisya]

I understand the left-wing critics (Social Democrats, left-liberals, Trotskyists) who reproach the communist parties of the socialist countries for deviating from communist ideas. Such a deviation, conservative and barracks, was real - partly under the influence of agrarian backwardness, partly because of the bureaucrats' inclination towards Asiatic despotism (there burocracy opress workers and capitalist equaly). In addition, pro-government parties have recently emerged that, under the false brand of "communists", support the chauvinism and militarism of bourgeois governments, the exposure of such fraudsters is also justified.

But for me, the ideology of anti-communists who deny communism as an idea is enigmatic. After all, this idea includes, as I understand it:
* The right of the oppressed to rebel against oppression (this is the essence of the class struggle, this thesis is also in the US constitution).
* The right to be protected from hunger, disease, homelessness and illiteracy (social package, free education and health care, affordable housing, pensions for the elderly, scholarships for students).
* The right to be protected from the actions of nationalists and religious fanatics who are trying to impose on society the discriminatory norms and practices of the Middle Ages.
* The project of technological modernization with the displacement of human labor by machine, the release of people from exploitation in the production process, with the preservation and growth of their well-being.

I understand those who resent the apostasy of the communist parties from these principles - but I do not understand those who reject these principles themselves. Who can reject them? Except maybe exploiters, nationalists, religious fanatics and technophobes.

For the average Joe, the biggest turn-off when it comes to communism is the fact that they would like to be able to get a car in a time-window of "a few days, weeks or months at worst" rather than "a few years". Also the fact that no communist state has managed to not become a corrupt dictatorship with its own rulling-class dominating the rest of the nation. The points you have stated is basically the goal of any nation.

EDIT : For reference, I'm a western european in their 20s, I vote left because it's litteraly what is in my interests for the moment, my situation being a student in university. No one in my family has lived under a communist regime.

[Nilokeras]

There's that famous quote from Marx about how 'men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted from the past', and if there are any people in history who stand as exceptions to that rule it's Nicholas and Alexandra.

These are two people who through a propriety blend of arrogance, stupidity and genuine interpersonal unpleasantness were pretty much entirely the sole authors of their own fate. They went from heads of one of the greatest powers on the face of the earth to prisoners that were so unpopular that nobody wanted to receive them in exile entirely through their own decisions. If anyone is to be blamed for their killing, especially the killing of their children, it's them we should be pointing our fingers at, tbh.

Ehh, get raised as a tsar and you're probably gonna turn out unpleasant and out-of-touch
it's a terrible and insidious disease known as privilege

You have to be a special kind of unpleasant and out of touch to have all your other unpleasant and out of touch grand duke and prince cousins pull you aside and say 'dude you need to stop this', though, and then when you refuse back a coup against you

[Technoscience Leftwing]

I understand the left-wing critics (Social Democrats, left-liberals, Trotskyists) who reproach the communist parties of the socialist countries for deviating from communist ideas. Such a deviation, conservative and barracks, was real - partly under the influence of agrarian backwardness, partly because of the bureaucrats' inclination towards Asiatic despotism (there burocracy opress workers and capitalist equaly). In addition, pro-government parties have recently emerged that, under the false brand of "communists", support the chauvinism and militarism of bourgeois governments, the exposure of such fraudsters is also justified.

But for me, the ideology of anti-communists who deny communism as an idea is enigmatic. After all, this idea includes, as I understand it:
* The right of the oppressed to rebel against oppression (this is the essence of the class struggle, this thesis is also in the US constitution).
* The right to be protected from hunger, disease, homelessness and illiteracy (social package, free education and health care, affordable housing, pensions for the elderly, scholarships for students).
* The right to be protected from the actions of nationalists and religious fanatics who are trying to impose on society the discriminatory norms and practices of the Middle Ages.
* The project of technological modernization with the displacement of human labor by machine, the release of people from exploitation in the production process, with the preservation and growth of their well-being.

I understand those who resent the apostasy of the communist parties from these principles - but I do not understand those who reject these principles themselves. Who can reject them? Except maybe exploiters, nationalists, religious fanatics and technophobes.

For the average Joe, the biggest turn-off when it comes to communism is the fact that they would like to be able to get a car in a time-window of "a few days, weeks or months at worst" rather than "a few years". Also the fact that no communist state has managed to not become a corrupt dictatorship with its own rulling-class dominating the rest of the nation. The points you have stated is basically the goal of any nation.

EDIT : For reference, I'm a western european in their 20s, I vote left because it's litteraly what is in my interests for the moment, my situation being a student in university. No one in my family has lived under a communist regime.

Of course, the point is not in the name, and if the humanistic principles are not carried out under the banner of "communist", then the main thing is the essence, not the name and not the design.

But in the USSR, these principles were just presented as the characteristic goals of the communist parties - and since 1991, under the banner of anti-communism, they began to be vilified in the media. The idea of ​​an uprising was viewed as extreme and extremist, leading to a "fratricidal civil war." The right to protect people from poverty was rejected as "encouraging laziness." Protection from nationalists and clericals was presented as "the suppression of national identity" and "the suppression of spirituality." Technical modernization was presented as "harmful to the environment and to the traditional way of life."

What did they get as a result of such denigration? First, "shock therapy" and hyperinflation with the ruin of many people, then the onset of clericalism, traditionalism and chauvinism, with a natural tragic outcome.

Therefore, the legacy of the USSR and the communists must, probably, be approached selectively so that, along with the outdated and barracks orders, the humanistic and advanced ideas that also existed in this legacy do not perish.

[Mattopilos III]

Complete and utter ahistoricism here. Regardless of your stance on whether the USSR was actually on the path to socialism or communism or what-not, the term "Social-Democracy" has been completely warped by history from a Marxist term into a bourgeois one (thanks bernstein). For instance, the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) was by no doubt in every sense of the word a Marxist organisation, though obviously the Bolshevik-Menshevik split muddied the water a little bit. It called itself Communist in 1918, *after* the revolution, because that more clearly stated their views and aims at the time -- which, considering how the social-democrats in Germany proceeded very shortly afterwards to chuck Luxemburg into the Landwehr Canal, was probably for the best.

>complete and utter ahistoricism here
>the RSDLP was by no doubt in every sense of the word a marxist organisation
lol

There's that famous quote from Marx about how 'men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted from the past', and if there are any people in history who stand as exceptions to that rule it's Nicholas and Alexandra.

These are two people who through a propriety blend of arrogance, stupidity and genuine interpersonal unpleasantness were pretty much entirely the sole authors of their own fate. They went from heads of one of the greatest powers on the face of the earth to prisoners that were so unpopular that nobody wanted to receive them in exile entirely through their own decisions. If anyone is to be blamed for their killing, especially the killing of their children, it's them we should be pointing our fingers at, tbh.

Ehh, get raised as a tsar and you're probably gonna turn out unpleasant and out-of-touch
it's a terrible and insidious disease known as privilege

Hmm, almost like the use of representatives who have very little in common with the people they supposedly represent makes it so they are never actually represented.
I wonder if that has some more far-reaching implications than just communist, fascist, etc. dictatorships... Just maybe.

[Kubra]

Ehh, get raised as a tsar and you're probably gonna turn out unpleasant and out-of-touch
it's a terrible and insidious disease known as privilege

You have to be a special kind of unpleasant and out of touch to have all your other unpleasant and out of touch grand duke and prince cousins pull you aside and say 'dude you need to stop this', though, and then when you refuse back a coup against you

Nah not really. The problem was he was a tsar, and the whole russian state apparatus of the times was a liiiiiiittle behind the curve when it came to the whole "what the emperor can think he can and cannot do" business. I mean one can fairly strongly compare him to Charles I, another monarch who was raised in such a way that he straight up did not understand how the world actually worked, and also got himself killed because of it.

[Kalivyah]

>complete and utter ahistoricism here
>the RSDLP was by no doubt in every sense of the word a marxist organisation
lol

Please do enlighten the class as to how the RSDLP was not Marxist in any way shape or form

[Lagrasa]

Viva el comunismo porque todas las personas son iguales y no estan clasificadas segun su dinero y estado economico

[Kubra]

>complete and utter ahistoricism here
>the RSDLP was by no doubt in every sense of the word a marxist organisation
lol

Please do enlighten the class as to how the RSDLP was not Marxist in any way shape or form

Oh no, it was marxist, alright. That's the joke, innit?

[Des-Bal]

How does this have anything to do with communism.

Well you said communism is better. It's not, that's why there isn't some communist paradise you can go to- it's pretty much all shitholes and always has been. If communism was better you would just go somewhere communist.

[Laka Strolistandiler]

Communism has ruined Russia, turned people here into obedient servants of the regime and cemented the authoritarianism. Not only that but because of this people here extremely commonly do things “because it’s common to do”, and follow the leader regardless of the circumstances. It is because of communism why the reaction to Afghanistan, both Chechnya’s and now Ukraine is this stale. Yes- some of the ideas on which it as an ideology was built are good, but in general it sucks.

DemSoc is based though

[Informed Consent]

Communism has ruined Russia, turned people here into obedient servants of the regime and cemented the authoritarianism. Not only that but because of this people here extremely commonly do things “because it’s common to do”, and follow the leader regardless of the circumstances. It is because of communism why the reaction to Afghanistan, both Chechnya’s and now Ukraine is this stale. Yes- some of the ideas on which it as an ideology was built are good, but in general it sucks.

DemSoc is based though

The old Soviet Union never once lived up to its own constitution, and for decades proved beyond doubt that prosperity as a statute is something you can only legislate a few people into, and most people out of.
After seeing how readily the children of the old NATO nanny states are to put on their own collars for the sake of arbitrary amalgamation, I sympathize with your view of how Soviet doctrine must have brutally conditioned the Russian psyche.

[Umeria]

Communism has ruined Russia, turned people here into obedient servants of the regime and cemented the authoritarianism. Not only that but because of this people here extremely commonly do things “because it’s common to do”, and follow the leader regardless of the circumstances. It is because of communism why the reaction to Afghanistan, both Chechnya’s and now Ukraine is this stale. Yes- some of the ideas on which it as an ideology was built are good, but in general it sucks.

DemSoc is based though

The old Soviet Union never once lived up to its own constitution, and for decades proved beyond doubt that prosperity as a statute is something you can only legislate a few people into, and most people out of.
After seeing how readily the children of the old NATO nanny states are to put on their own collars for the sake of arbitrary amalgamation, I sympathize with your view of how Soviet doctrine must have brutally conditioned the Russian psyche.

Wait how else would you get prosperity if not by legislating? Even if you prefer free markets and stuff, you still have to pass laws to make that system happen.

[The Finntopian Empire]

Well, as a feudalist robot communist monarchist myself (not contradictory because I said so) communism is a part of my economic ideology, so I think it is lovely

[Demiurges]

Looks very pretty on paper, but is absolute god awful in practice. Some things are better left on a piece of parchment and never actually being acted on, and communism is pretty high up there. It's unrealistic in its most true to belief form because it completely disregards human nature. Humanity is a hyper competitive species that revels in having more of something. When you have more money than the guy next to you or you have a better lifestyle it feels great. Communism looks pretty because it makes everyone supposedly 'equal' but the fact remains that it also constrains any form of ambition to further your station in life or to move ahead. Most of humanities progress in the modern day is borne from one person or anothers pursuit to make their own lives better and then realizing that they can profit off of their own ideas to make their lives easier and more comfortable. Everyone is entitlted to their own ideas on this, but I personally dislike Communism and I admit alot of that probably has to do with the fact that I do in fact live a comfortable life where I am rarely wanting for anything when I can get it myself more often than not.

[Informed Consent]

Wait how else would you get prosperity if not by legislating? Even if you prefer free markets and stuff, you still have to pass laws to make that system happen.

Big difference between policing a marketplace and creating one, and a state is constituted for only conducting one of those tasks with any hope of competency, since the lack of zero sum accountability seriously curbs quality control, and virtually breeds inefficiency and corruption for its own sake.

[Uinted Communist of Africa]

Well, as a feudalist robot communist monarchist myself (not contradictory because I said so) communism is a part of my economic ideology, so I think it is lovely

communist monarchies must stick together. lol
best of both worlds.
A brave leader that never has to step down due to "democracy" while making sure everything is semi comfortable for most people.

[The Union of Soviet-Socialist Republics]

Murdering socialists? Eh. Executing protestors? Yikes.

"Eh." So you do not care about the lives of socialiste and fellow humans?

[The Union of Soviet-Socialist Republics]

You're an idiot. Look at the statistics of deaths in Iraq and Vietnam for instance. Those wars killed millions total and look at the UN statistics on world starvation.

*** Warning for Flaming ***

I wasn't "flaming." I was mad. Difference.

[Pirusavia]

Honestly I'd say that Marxian communism is a philantropic ideology made to alleviate poverty and suffering, but it requires a huge amount of materials and manpowers for it to work at full swing.

There are three main aspects of a true, perfect communist society: statelessness, classlessness, and moneylessness. In theory, this is possible, but all these three needs a level of industrial and scientific development that our current civilizations are incapable of. It is truly a slow, evolutionary ideology—you can't just transform our current societies into a perfect utopian communist society.

Some widespread violence that happened in previous communist regimes were happened because those in power wanted a communist society rather immediately, although this is a case-by-case basis to some extent.

[Bovad]

How does this have anything to do with communism.

Well you said communism is better. It's not, that's why there isn't some communist paradise you can go to- it's pretty much all shitholes and always has been. If communism was better you would just go somewhere communist.

They're all shitholes because of all the coups and sanctions and even then many of them are doing a lot better than you'd expect.

[HISPIDA]

Well you said communism is better. It's not, that's why there isn't some communist paradise you can go to- it's pretty much all shitholes and always has been. If communism was better you would just go somewhere communist.

They're all shitholes because of all the coups and sanctions and even then many of them are doing a lot better than you'd expect.

tfw JFK's rolling and crying in his grave while cuba has positive economic growth and higher stats in child mortality, life expectancy, hospital beds and doctors per 1,000 citizens, diabetes and TB cure rates, and literacy than the US alongside an active and relatively large supply of goods and services despite a 60 year embargo specifically designed to cripple the cuban government

[Bovad]

They're all shitholes because of all the coups and sanctions and even then many of them are doing a lot better than you'd expect.

tfw JFK's rolling and crying in his grave while cuba has positive economic growth and higher stats in child mortality, life expectancy, hospital beds and doctors per 1,000 citizens, diabetes and TB cure rates, and literacy than the US alongside an active and relatively large supply of goods and services despite a 60 year embargo specifically designed to cripple the cuban government

That's exactly what I would have said if I'd had more time

[Sordhau]

Well, as a feudalist robot communist monarchist myself (not contradictory because I said so) communism is a part of my economic ideology, so I think it is lovely

communist monarchies must stick together. lol
best of both worlds.
A brave leader that never has to step down due to "democracy" while making sure everything is semi comfortable for most people.

I think I just cringed so hard I briefly phased out of this reality.