• eestileib
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    2 months ago

    Maaaaaaybe the USSR isn’t the best example of a better society we want to be building.

    I’m watching the whole ideological-purge thing happen in the US and it kinda sucks.

    • BrainInABox@lemmy.ml
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      2 months ago

      Either build something better or shutup, I say. Unless you’re a big fan of Tsarist Russia

      • rational_lib@lemmy.world
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        2 months ago

        I’ve played civilization and I’m pretty sure there’s other forms of government besides Communism and Monarchy that have low corruption, albeit lacking the ability to force the citizens into war on the leader’s whim.

          • Lightor@lemmy.world
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            2 months ago

            Yeah, it wasn’t one guy on Reddit lol. Why haven’t you started the revolution?

            And y’all wonder why people rag on .ml.

            • BrainInABox@lemmy.ml
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              2 months ago

              The whole point was that I don’t reject successful revolutions while not having achieved anything myself. That’s you dog.

              • Lightor@lemmy.world
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                2 months ago

                I never rejected anything, maybe try reading again and this time not just seeing what you want. And what was successful before doesn’t mean it will be successful today. People just don’t understand context or nuance. That’s you dog.

    • ptee@lemm.ee
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      2 months ago

      Both extremes on display those examples, seems like they both end up in the same place in the end. Maybe it would be reasonable to use any system that is a mix of things, instead of focusing on pure capitalism or communism.

      • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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        2 months ago

        There’s really no such thing as a pure system, any mix is still going to have either the public sector as principle or private, ie which controls the state, large firms, and key industries. There’s no way to keep them “balanced,” one will have power over the other, and its best for it to be the public sector.

  • oyzmo@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    Socialism allows for both public and private ownership, individual freedoms, and democratic decision-making, while still aiming for social equality. Communism, in contrast, tends to involve total state control and often limits personal freedoms.

    • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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      2 months ago

      Both Capitalism and Socialism have room for public and private ownership, the difference is which sector controls the state, large firms, and key industries. The Nordic Countries are dominated by Private Capital, ie it is Capitalist, while the PRC is dominated by Public Ownership, ie it is Socialist.

      Communism limits the personal freedoms of the bourgeoisie. All Communism is, is a more developed and global form of Socialism, where the small firms that once were private have all grown into the public sector or collapsed.

    • BrainInABox@lemmy.ml
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      2 months ago

      Tell me you’ve never read anything about communism that wasn’t written by anti-communists without telling me you’ve never read anything about communism that wasn’t written by anti-communists.

  • void_turtle
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    2 months ago

    The desire to dominate and the willingness to act on it has existed in a fraction of the population since before humans were human. This is the root of all evil, capitalism is a specific manifestation of this impulse that has only existed for some 400 years. If your analysis starts and ends at “capitalism bad” you miss the vast majority of oppression that has existed or will exist.

    • BrainInABox@lemmy.ml
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      2 months ago

      What’s your evidence for your the root of evil is that some people just have an “evil” gene theory?

      • void_turtle
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        2 months ago

        I never mentioned genetics, strange that you would bring it up. Sex isn’t even fully determined by genetics, something as complex and fragile as your personal values certainly can never be reduced to genetics.

        Humans brains are stochastic and the values we eventually settle on depend both on our environment and on somewhat random walks through possible values. Some people will land on violent domination as a social strategy just through randomness. I believe an environment where everyone is cared for and has the ability to flourish will minimize the people who randomly end up on violent domination, but it is not possible through environmental changes to completely prevent this. Thus we cannot allow any positions of power, since those will attract and eventually be captured by people who have chosen domination as their preferred strategy.

            • krolden@lemmy.ml
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              2 months ago

              The part where you excuse all atrocities currently taking place by writing it off as “human nature”

              • void_turtle
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                What a hilariously absurd interpretation of what I said. Total failure of reading comprehension. Or just a bad faith dipshit.

    • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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      2 months ago

      Soviet propaganda is a good thing, and it’s on the mark here. Socialism is necessary and Capitalism is clearly on the downhill.

      • storm
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        2 months ago

        And unfortunately, USSR falls smack damn on the barbarism side of that divide

          • storm
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            2 months ago

            …how could that possibly be your takeaway from what I said? I literally never even compared them to the Nazis, just said they weren’t socialist enough

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          2 months ago

          According to American ethnographer and Professor of Russian and East European Studies at the University of Pennsylvania Kristen Ghodsee, efforts to institutionalize the “double genocide thesis”, or the moral equivalence between the Nazi Holocaust (race murder) and the victims of communism (class murder), in particular the push at the beginning of the 2007–2008 financial crisis for commemoration of the latter in Europe, can be seen as the response by economic and political elites to fears of a leftist resurgence in the face of devastated economies and extreme social inequalities in both the Eastern and Western worlds as the result of the excesses of neoliberal capitalism. She says that any discussion of the achievements by Communist states, including literacy, education, women’s rights, and social security is usually silenced, and any discourse on the subject of communism is focused almost exclusively on Joseph Stalin’s crimes and the “double genocide thesis”, an intellectual paradigm summed up as such: “1) any move towards redistribution and away from a completely free market is seen as communist; 2) anything communist inevitably leads to class murder; and 3) class murder is the moral equivalent of the Holocaust.” By linking all leftist and socialist ideals to the excesses of Stalinism, Ghodsee posits that the elites hope to discredit and marginalize all political ideologies that could “threaten the primacy of private property and free markets”.

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_genocide_theory#Memory_politics_and_the_Holocaust_in_Eastern_Europe

          • storm
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            2 months ago

            I should have clarified that I’m not against socialism, just the hierarchy of states. We should instead pursue more egalitarian socialist expressions like social ecology or kinds of anarchy.

            • culprit@lemmy.ml
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              2 months ago

              making the perfect the enemy of the good

              this is you rn

              socialism >> communism is a evolving process, but every time it starts growing and developing, capital asserts itself to dominate and destroy it

              the only Actually Existing Socialisms today have nuclear deterrents to avoid this fate, they also have to develop counter-intelligence defenses because just nuclear weapons are not enough to protect from all the myriad threats that capital engages in towards anti-socialist >> anti-communist goals

              if you can not understand this material reality of history, and use it to analyze the struggle for liberation in this world, you are lost

      • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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        2 months ago

        The portrayal of the Communists and Nazis as “twin evils” exaggerates the sins of the Communists in quantity and quality, while minimizing the sins of the Nazis in quantity and quality, in order to show them as relatively equal problems. In other words, its Nazi apologia, and historical revisionism. Read Blackshirts and Reds.

        The Nazis executed the Communists, Socialists, gay people, trans people, disabled people, Jewish people, Slavic people, and many, many more. It wasn’t simple opposition, it was a racially supremacist ideology.

        The Communists executed Tsarists, fascists, and terrorists to the state. They did not create a systematic industrialized murder machine like the Nazis did in order to keep up with how many people they needed to kill.

    • JeSuisUnHombre@lemm.ee
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      2 months ago

      Capitalism rewards greed, thus perpetuating it and entrenching it. So capitalism is the root of our greed epidemic

    • juliebean@lemm.ee
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      2 months ago

      capitalism is the system whereby greed is raised above all other human impulses though. in most other systems, sure, people can be greedy, but they aren’t rewarded for it, and people who aren’t naturally greedy don’t get pushed and trained to be greedy as the highest aspiration.

    • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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      2 months ago

      Human aspects like greed are not intrinsic to humanity, but created by the material conditions and mechanisms surrounding them, and are thus malleable and expressed in lower or greater degrees in different systems. Capitalism in particular expresses greed as its entire foundation is the relentless accumulation of profit and exansion of markets and commodification for the purposes of private wealth.

      • fakir@lemm.ee
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        2 months ago

        Greed is not the cause of capitalism. Capitalism exists to create value for society. My grandfather, an immigrant, opened a bakery 50 years ago to serve his community and raise his family. I, an immigrant, opened a grocery store 10 years ago to serve my community and raise my family. Capitalism can be honest & hard work. In both cases, community over profits was a core principle.

        Greed comes with accumulation and has to be restrained.

        • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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          Capitalism doesn’t really exist soley in the micro, you must factor in the macro. A small gorcery store exists in the context of Capitalism, it isn’t Capitalist itself. The purpose of Capitalism systemically is Capital accumulation and the increase in profits through the general process of converting money into commodities, and into a higher quantity of money, thus seeding even more money for more commodoties and even more money after that in an endless loop.

          • fakir@lemm.ee
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            2 months ago

            The purpose of Capitalism systemically is Capital accumulation and the increase in profits through the general process of converting money into commodities in an endless loop.

            I disagree. The purpose of capitalism systemically is to simply allow for value creation for the entire ecosystem (customers, employees, vendors) and give anyone the individual freedom to do so.

            Current Western flavor of capitalism has allowed short-sighted greed to take over because Wall St demands so.

            On an ideological level, you and I are the same - community over commerce. I support capitalism only under such principles.

            • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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              2 months ago

              Capitalism did not arise out of ideological reasons, but as a material process with the shift from small manufacturing to large industry. It arised historically, not because it is natural (it’s only a few hundred years old) nor because someone thought it was a good idea. The mechanical process is as I described. Ideological justifications for it, ie liberalism, arose after the fact.

              Value is created even in non-Capitalist systems, and further, western Capitalism is Capitalism of a more developed stage. You cannot perpetuate small market mechanics, small firms will either grow or die. Once markets coalesce, there really is nowhere to go but revolution and Socialism, or barbarism and collapse.

              • fakir@lemm.ee
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                2 months ago

                The problem of ‘growing big’ has to be solved via cooperatives operating in the same markets, not by disbanding the entire system.

                • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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                  That’s not a solution, though. Cooperatives within Capitalism are subject to the same rules as other firms, only without firm control of the state. These cooperatives will either grow or die, and you end up at the same necessary point, revolution and Socialism, or barbarism. Centralization is a fact of markets that sustain over a long period of time, ergo we should master those laws to make it as democratic and equitable a system as possible. In other words, Socialism.

            • SabinStargem@lemmy.today
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              2 months ago

              I think the way forward is to have socialism provide all necessities for people - meal kits, utilities, shelter, transport, free gasoline, healthcare, and so forth that are designed to be boring but effective. Capitalism can be used to obtain luxuries - a wider variety of food, fancier cars, bigger houses, brazilian buttlifts, singing bass decorations, and so forth. Money is solely used for such things.

              By doing it this way, people can choose to protest or strike without suffering too much from doing so. Work becomes optional, since survival is ensured. Combined with imposing floors and ceilings on wealth, we can promote democracy and socialism, without sacrificing the vitality of a healthy capitalism.

              • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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                2 months ago

                That’s not really an accurate overview of what constitutes Capitalism and Socialism. Capitalism is not “markets” and Socialism isn’t government services, either. They are each determined by which aspect of the economy is principle, ie in control of the state, large firms, and key industries. Private Ownership as principle is Capitalism, Public Ownership as principle is Socialism. Both systems have a private and a public sector, but the trajectory of the system is very different.

                It sounds like you’re talking about the Nordic countries, ie deteriorating Imperialist states that are seeing crumbling worker protections and rely on super-exploitation of the Global South to subsidize cost of living and safety nets.

  • Grimel@lemm.ee
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    2 months ago

    Ah yes, get rid of extremism with different extremism. I think we’ve been there already. Spoiler: Didnt work.

    • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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      2 months ago

      Cool agitprop posters like what OP posted rarely give you a particularly nuanced perspective due to their limited space. The intended effect is to spark conversation, not to beam Marxism into the heads of anyone who sees it.

        • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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          2 months ago

          For real… 🫠

          If I write an essay, people don’t genuinely read it, if I write short responses I either over-simplify or manage to raise more questions than I answer… at least, it feels that way sometimes, lol

            • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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              Thanks, I appreciate it! I know there are people who do, some of them send me DMs or reply directly to me so it all justifies the efforts I do, I just wish the human brain worked better with direct argumentation than it does when viewing a debate from the outside. Ie, I wish those I carefully spend time writing for took it to heart more than onlookers tend to, but the net result is still positive so I keep with it.

              Thanks again!

          • rocket_dragon@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            2 months ago

            Your comments are consistently high quality and there’s plenty of people reading without engaging who will be influenced in small but meaningful ways. You’re planting good seeds.

            • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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              Thank you, I appreciate it! I do it more for others than the people I directly interact with, who have largely made up their mind already. That’s generally my strategy, people looking to argue online aren’t going to change their minds, they see it as a “win/lose” situation. Instead, I focus on refutation of absurd claims and well-sourced information more for onlookers to engage with. I really like Nia Frome’s articles on Red Sails called Marketing Socialism and On Dialectics, Or How to Defeat Enemies. They really help shape how I engage with others online, decisive and sharp refutation is very useful for onlookers to see.

              For more fun articles on why people believe what they do, I’m a big fan of Roderic Day’s “Brainwashing” and Masses, Elites, and Rebels: The Theory of “Brainwashing.” Those help dramatically with seeing that, really, there’s little convincing others directly in online debate, but there is hope for others whose material conditions have opened them up to new ideas to see and engage with more information they are curious about.

      • orca@orcas.enjoying.yachts
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        2 months ago

        It reminds me of how people hated on “defund the police” messaging. I got into an argument with someone that focused on the phrase alone and was completely uninterested in a genuine discussion about what it means. Like what do they expect? An entire novel written on a poster or a tweet to appease them? The point is to kick the conversation off, not spoon-feed you.

        • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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          Yep, you hit the nail on the head! Effective agitprop sparks conversations and forces engagement, not just people immediately dismissing it or accepting it before going on with their days.

    • darthelmet@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      It’s not really about defending the bad stuff. It’s about trying to get some more nuance on perhaps the most propagandized topic of the 20th century.

      There are all sorts of interesting discussions to have about the various failings of these countries amongst other leftists who have the relevant context as a starting point for a reasonable discussion.

      But when talking to libs/conservatives, they’re coming into the conversation with an already extremely warped, un-nuanced perspective. “These are all evil dictatorships that were also super incompetent and that shows why communism is bad.”

      Some of the stuff they base this on is either exaggerated or just straight up wrong. Some of it is completely valid criticism, but without the context to understand the issue or provide a useful critique.

      How do you have any meaningful conversation about these countries without acknowledging things like:

      • All of these countries were previously agrarian, un-democratic societies.
      • Most of them were formerly exploited colonies who had to fight fairly brutal wars for their independence.
      • Even after leaving, the imperialists kept messing with them through economic and diplomatic isolation and espionage including supporting right wing coups.

      We don’t have the counterfactual where we see what these countries would have turned out like without these challenges, but it’s an incomplete analysis to not at least consider the ways which they impacted both their economic success and their political developments. Maybe you could argue there were better ways to respond to all of this, but hindsight is 20-20.

      No actual leftists want to have to argue “authoritarianism was good actually.” But it’s hard for the conversation not to appear that way when we’re arguing with people who’ve been conditioned to think they’re somehow as bad or worse than Nazis and ending the thought there.

      • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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        2 months ago

        Great comment! You hit the nail on the head, proper conversation requires a factual starting point, and just conceding to conservatives and other anticommunists off the bat just so they are less hostile to you just hands them free rhetorical wins on that very basis.

        • nico198X@feddit.nl
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          2 months ago

          you need to know who you are talking to. you’re already assuming a position of hostility and conflict at base.

          • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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            I did not call you a conservative, if that’s what you’re implying. My point aligns with theirs, in that demonization of AES is usually a result of accepting bourgeois narratives uncritically. To be truly critical in an honest manner (which Marxists are, all the time, among ourselves), we need to dispell the thick layers of Red Scare fearmongering first.

            Dispelling myths and finding the hard truth is where we can look at what went right and what went wrong, not just agreeing that Socialism is when everyone starves or other such nonsense. Why support an ideology that truly is as bad in practice as anticommunists say it is, after all?

            • nico198X@feddit.nl
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              no, i’m not implying that. it would also be fine if you did. depends on the day and topic.

              “To be truly critical in an honest manner (which Marxists are, all the time, among ourselves)”

              lol XD it’s saying shit like this that tells me you’re not connected to reality.

              even so, i hear what you’re saying. my feedback, as an outsider, is you’re overcompensating. imo, it would go a long way to start with presenting a fair view of a couple pros and cons, acknowledging the concern of your interlocutor. what i see instead, almost universally, is kneejerk defense of AES and leaders, and just telling non-Leftists that they’re wrong, stupid, propagandized.

              • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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                You’ll find me critical of AES all the time, but I won’t cede ground for what I know to be false just for optics. I take a rigorous approach to rhetoric, I cede no ground that isn’t rooted in fact, and I do my best to encourage accurate critique. When you see me defending AES and seemingly not critiquing them as much, it’s usually in the context of someone repeating the same bog-standard state department anticommunist mythos that have existed for decades, and thus should be treated as such.

                Go ahead and ask me for critiques of AES, and I can do so, but I won’t lie about them either.

                • nico198X@feddit.nl
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                  that’s good. don’t lie, have standards.

                  i wouldn’t say it’s for “optics,” but you have to know your interlocutor. if the person is nervous about legitimate abuses in AES, acknowledging failures openly is more honest and real than dancing about to make excuses for them. owning failings is human, and would be a distinct departure from capitalism, that’s for sure.

                  but i get you, capitalism as a system is unironically constantly using force to extinguish you. i get it. it’s not an enviable position.

      • nico198X@feddit.nl
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        2 months ago

        i hear what you’re saying.

        what i’m saying is, for myself, and at least a few “Left-curious” neo/libs/progs, we don’t want to trade one shit tyranny for another. and it’s obvious, documented history of some pretty glaring failures in AES. if you like, think of ppl like us as trauma victims. it’s probably true anyway.

        it can go a long way to offer the olive branch and reassurance that, yes, you don’t want to just “red-wash” that all away, or that you aren’t just enamoured with Red aesthetic and lip-service while being YET ANOTHER group of mastubatory elitists who will trample the out-group-du-jour given the opportunity.

        • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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          The problem typically arises from the necessity for confrontation of anticommunist myths about AES. Anyone growing up in the West is bombarded with Anticommunism, and simply being aware that that process exists doesn’t actually make you immune to it. Confronting the myths surrounding Communism is an important first step. “Red-washing” is a much, much smaller problem than you likely realize.

      • thedruid@lemmy.world
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        communism isn’t bad, it just doesn’t scale up. after awhile someone wants everyone else’s stuff. When enough people gather together then anonymity becomes a thing. then those people start taking everyone else’s stuff and we end up with Russia.

        • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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          Communism is a fully publicly owned and planned global economy, I’m not sure what you’re trying to critique but it isn’t Communism.

    • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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      2 months ago

      I’m not dancing around anything, if you want to discuss, then please, do so.

      The DPRK is far from a paradise, but at the same time, much of its issues are externally driven.

      Xi is not president for life. Term limits are removed, but he can also be removed. He’s overwhelmingly popular among the party and people.

      For your last point, I recommend you read Marketing Socialism. I defend what is misrepresented or demonized unjustly, because these are problems every Socialist project recieves, to varying degrees.

      • nico198X@feddit.nl
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        2 months ago

        “Far from paradise” seems pretty generous for what i perceive as a dystopian nightmare state. they are cut off from outside information. there is retribution on families if ppl try to leave. also, you can’t leave. this is insanity. outside forces don’t make them behave that way.

        Xi: whether that popularity is real or not is a question, though, when he can push for the suppression of dissent or critique in the social sphere. one CAN’T challenge him. that doesn’t seem legitimately representative.

        i’m looking over your reading list. we can add that to the list. but there’s a reason i block hexbear and lemmygrad but not .ml. tankies fucking suck and i Socialism will never be taken seriously as long as it’s important to ppl to defend fucking Stalin.

        • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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          See, the problem is that you’re generally wrong, factually, which is why you have such knee-jerk reactions to people saying that maybe AES states aren’t hellholes, actually. As an example, it’s mostly western sanctions that limit freedom of movement from DPRK residents, and the myths about collective family punishment are largely unsubstantiated. Repeating Red Scare myths uncritically is a huge problem.

          People can challenge Xi, what they cannot do is use large private media apparatus to push anti-government propaganda.

          Regarding your last point, you’re generally wrong. Socialism is increasing in popularity globally, including Marxism-Leninism. Funny enough, Nia Frome, the author of “Marketing Socialism,” has another quick article called “Tankies” that would be perfect for you to read, IMO.

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            mate, i know ppl who literally risked their lives to flee from the USSR. your talking points are just academic. the reality is otherwise. trying to paint legitimate observation of tyranny in AES as some kind of capitalist conspiracy only makes you look more insane offputting.

            i’m literally TRYING to reach you, and all Leftists can do is bend over backward to defend tyrants.

            • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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              2 months ago

              The vast majority of post-Soviet citizens believe they are worse off now than under Socialism, which makes sense because the reintroduction of Capitalism resulted in skyrocketing rates of poverty, prostitution, drug abuse, homelessness, and an estimated 7 million excess deaths around the world.

              AES states are not perfect, I don’t paint all critique as Capitalist conspiracy, only what I know is in fact a myth based on the sources I have provided. You uncritically accept the bourgeois narrative despite mountains of evidence to a more nuanced position than “every Communist leader ate spoonfuls of babies for breakfast” or other nonsense.

              I’m hoping I reach you too.

              • nico198X@feddit.nl
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                2 months ago

                “You uncritically accept the bourgeois narrative”

                you don’t know anything about me to make such claims.

                citizenry can feel nostalgia for lots of reasons, and i’m not defending capitalism here. but that doesn’t erase the real lived trauma of the ppl in my life who have fled both the USSR and Venezuela.

                • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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                  2 months ago

                  I know that based on the hard data I’ve seen, the people I have spoken to, the history and critique I have read, that a good amount of what you have said is disconnected from reality, and closer to what the US State Department claims is the truth. I understand that you may have anecdotal experiences shaping your opinions, but I also know that it isn’t simple nostalgia like the Wikipedia entry suggests, but coincides with the massive increase in poverty and the difficulty of life in a Capitalist world after the dissolution of Socialism.

          • Maeve@kbin.earth
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            2 months ago

            Nia Frome, the author of “Marketing Socialism,” has another quick article called “Tankies” that would be perfect for you to read, IMO.

            I appreciated this read, thanks.

      • nico198X@feddit.nl
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        2 months ago

        i read your Marketing Socialism post. It just seems beside the point and is looking for a way to justify itself when all you have to do is admit that tyranny and gulags bad. It’s not a big ask. The fact that it is TAKEN to be a big ask, is a massive, if you will, red flag. XD

        • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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          The problem arises when people distort quantity or quality of struggles in AES states that would logically exist in any Socialist state. Ie, all Socialist states will have prisons, and all Capitalist countries are going to do their best to portray them in as negative a light as possible, no matter what they look like in reality.

          • nico198X@feddit.nl
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            2 months ago

            i get, but it’s not a NECESSARY component of communism. the DPRK is shit for a lot of reasons, mostly due to the consolidation of power in the hands single insane family. trying to rehabilitate their image or reclaim them is fucking insane. XD and just not helpful to the cause, imo. i certainly makes me care less about everything you’re trying to say, and i’m really giving you the benefit of the doubt here.

            • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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              What, specifically, is not a necessary component of Communism? The version of AES that exists in your mind, full of anticommunist prejudice and red scare mythos clouding your judgement, or the version that exists in real life, with far more nuanced issues applicable to all of Socialism, past, present, and future alike?

              Further, the Kim family does not have all of the power in the DPRK. A critical examination of the structure and history of the DPRK proves that isn’t true. That’s like saying the Bush and Kennedy familys have all of the power in the US.

  • Wilco@lemm.ee
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    2 months ago

    Last I checked the USSR didn’t do so well financially, and Russia is basically a criminal empire.

    • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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      The USSR did fairly well until liberalizing part of its economy, as well as struggling to recover from the immense cost it paid to win the Eastern Front and beat the Nazis while under the oppression of the Cold War.

      The Marxist-Leninist tradition is still carried forward by many states, including the PRC, which is on its way to surpass the US as world superpower.

      • KSP Atlas@sopuli.xyz
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        The PRC is barely communist nowadays, and the USSR did not do well, the liberalising was a last-ditch attempt to save it.

        • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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          The PRC is more classically Marxist than under the Gang of Four, when they abandoned materialist analysis and attempted to implement Communism through fiat. Large firms and key industries of the PRC are firmly in the public sector, while small firms, cooperatives, and sole proprietorships make up most of the private sector.

          Marx didn’t think you could abolish private property by making it illegal, but by developing out of it. Socialism and Communism, for Marx, were about analyzing and harnessing the natural laws of economics moving towards centralization, so as to democratize it and produce in the interests of all. This wasn’t about decentralization, but centralization.

          Markets themselves are not Capitalism, just like public ownership itself is not Socialist. The US is not Socialist just because it has a post-office, just like the PRC is not Capitalist just because it has some degree of private ownership. Rather, Marx believed you can’t just make private property illegal, but must develop out of it, as markets create large firms, and large firms work best with central planning:

          The proletariat will use its political supremacy to wrest, by degrees, all capital from the bourgeoisie, to centralise all instruments of production in the hands of the State, i. e., of the proletariat organised as the ruling class; and to increase the total of productive forces as rapidly as possible.

          I want you to look at the bolded word. Why did Marx say by degree? Did he think on day 1, businesses named A-C are nationalized, day 2 businesses D-E, etc etc? No. Marx believed that it is through nationalizing of the large firms that would be done immediately, and gradually as the small firms develop, they too can be folded into the public sector. The path to eliminated Private Property isn’t to make it illegal, but to develop out of it.

          The essential condition for the existence, and for the sway of the bourgeois class, is the formation and augmentation of capital;[43] the condition for capital is wage-labour. Wage-labour rests exclusively on competition between the labourers. The advance of industry, whose involuntary promoter is the bourgeoisie, replaces the isolation of the labourers, due to competition, by their revolutionary combination, due to association. The development of Modern Industry, therefore, cuts from under its feet the very foundation on which the bourgeoisie produces and appropriates products. What the bourgeoisie, therefore, produces, above all, are its own grave-diggers. Its fall and the victory of the proletariat are equally inevitable.

          This is why, in the previous paragraph, Marx described public seizure in degrees, but raising the level of the productive forces as rapidly as possible.

          China does have Billionaires, but these billionaires do not control key industries, nor vast megacorps. The number of billionaires is actually shrinking in the last few years. Instead, large firms and key industries are publicly owned, and small firms are privately owned. This is Marxism.

          As for the USSR, its economy worked quite well for most of its existence. I recommend reading Do Publicly Owned, Planned Economies Work? by Stephen Gowens, who goes over what went right and what went wrong in the Soviet Economy, including why it was dissolved. Further, GDP growth was positive throughout the near entirety of its existence, collapsing when it liberalized:

          I recommend doing more research on Marixsm and the economies of the PRC and former USSR.

  • storm
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    2 months ago

    (Hierarchical) Power in general is the root cause, not Capitalism in particular

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        Seems to me that about once a generation people allow the states they live in (and corporations they work for) to concentrate power to a point where it cannot be overlooked anymore? Kinda feel like you already have an answer you want tho (apologies if that’s not the case).

  • Letsdothisagain@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    Workers of the world unite!

    Edit: not that I’m into that sort of thing… I’ve taken history classes, I’ve read about, I’ve watched documentaries, I understand that communism is not to be desired or

    • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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      Communism is to be desired, though it’s understandable that you’d be opposed if your major exposure is through western education and western documentaries.

          • Letsdothisagain@lemmy.world
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            Look you dirty Marxist, I’ve looked at your bio. Pushing for the extremes you push is crazy. Why don’t you dial it back from 11. Why push past socialism. That’s the way to go if anything.

            • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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              Communism is just a later stage of Socialism, ie Socialism of a more developed character, similar to how the Capitalism of today is a more developed version of what it was in the 1800s. All Communists are advocates of Socialism, because Socialism is a necessary prerequisite. There’s nothing “crazy” about that at all.

              Further, “dirty Marxist?” Is this the 1950s? Yes, I am a Marxist, there are a lot of us on Lemmy, including the developers. I don’t hide being a Marxist-Leninist, I put it on my bio because I want to make it available information for those who want to know.

      • F_OFF_Reddit@lemmy.world
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        2 months ago

        yeah all of the mates I have from Latvia, Poland, Ukraine, Hungary… they really lived through it and tell me is shit so I’m just going to go ahead and believe those who have lived under it rather than a random dude on the internet who’s just a lumpen

        • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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          The vast majority of post-Soviet citizens believe they are worse off now than under Socialism, which makes sense because the reintroduction of Capitalism resulted in skyrocketing rates of poverty, prostitution, drug abuse, homelessness, and an estimated 7 million excess deaths around the world.

          Don’t know why you’re calling me a lumpen, tbh.

            • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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              Ah, the good 'ol “facts and data don’t matter, actually, because I said so” special. The fact that Socialism was better than Capitalism is today isn’t just in some studies, but repeated over and over again. It’s thoroughly well-documented.

              Further, you have no real proof of anything. Why on Earth would the sharp increase in poverty, prostitution, drug abuse, crime, wealth inequality, homelessness, and starvation occur because of the previously stable system? The dissolution of the USSR was driven instead by numerous complex factors:

              1. Liberal reforms that gave the Bourgeoisie power over key industries

              2. A firm dedication to planning by hand even as the economy grew more complex and computers too slow to be adapted to the planning mechanisms

              3. A huge portion of resources were spent on maintaining millitary parity with the US in order to dissuade US invasion

              4. 80% of the combat done in World War II was on the Eastern Front, and 20 million Soviets lost their lives, with no real economic support from the West in rebuilding despite taking the largest cost of war

              5. An enclosed, heavily sanctioned economy relied on internal resource gathering, closed off from the world market

              Countries like the PRC have taken to heart what happened in the USSR. As an example, the PRC shifted to a more classically Marxist economy, focusing on public ownership of only the large firms and key industries, and relying on markets to develop out of private ownership. This keeps them in touch with the global economy without giving the bourgeoisie control of key industries, and thus the bourgeoisie has no power over the economy or the state.

              Further yet, your casual queerphobia, assertion that I am both somehow lumpen and bourgeois, the incorrect claim that I’m a college student, and more baseless insults really just adds to the fact that you have no counter to the hard data, so you resort to personal attacks.

              The fact is, under Socialism, necessities were taken care of, and luxuries were shorter in supply. Luxuries increased for those who could afford them after Capitalism came, while many of those who couldn’t enjoyed their new “freedom” starving to death. You insult them.

              Unsurprisingly, you defend the fascist Bukele here. Entirely unsurprising, the anticommunism from you suddenly clicks when we see what makes you cheer.