The Russian Revolution was communist but the USSR was never communist.
Yes. But what does that mean? If I have a recipe for potion of immortality, but anyone that drinks the resulting potion dies instead, it’s a bad recipe. It doesn’t matter its promise of immortality sounds good.
Communism makes good promises. However, every time you have a communist revolution, it ends up being authoritarian instead. What does that say about the communist political system?
I think it says more about how Lemmings and other westerners understand authoritarianism. Because capitalist countries are way more authoritarian than any communist country has ever been. Y’all have just been fed lie after lie until you start repeating them yourselves.
More like every time there’s been democratically elected socialists or communists, western powers intervene with staged coups, assassinations, or embargos.
Even if that’s true, so what? You are just pointing out one possible reason why communism doesn’t work in reality. Still doesn’t work.
If I say my immortal potion recipe would work in an alternate reality where humans didn’t breathe oxygen, it does not make it any more useful. Equally, in our reality, coups, assassinations and embargoes exist. If a political system can’t withstand them, it is not useful.
If you say something is bad, you must have some frame of reference to know how bad it is. So if you say communism is bad, we will want to know, “relative to what?” And since capitalism and western hegemony are the dominant systems, naturally they will draw comparisons. And those comparisons will be unfavorable since capitalism is clearly broken and incentivizes great evil.
So OK, we’re still not really discussing the merits and flaws of communism as they stand on their own, but most of you aren’t ready to accept that almost everything you have learned about communism is a lie and you definitely aren’t ready to engage with the actual historical record.
So instead, the arguments revolve around what-aboutisms. Because most of you deny the evidence of your eyes and just listen to daddy. Long before we can delve into how the soviets actually existed in the world, you have dismissed us as “tankies” and stuck your fingers in your ears.
I must also stop believing my eyes and ears as I grew up in a country bordering the URSS.
I went there. It was a hell hole. Nothing to buy in the stores. I can tell you more.
It also was trying to invade or coerce its neighbours. All The Time. They (the russians) still do.
Capitalism has its flaws but that doesn’t mean the soviet union was in any way good. Ffs open a history book, travel, go there and talk to people who lived during the brutal dictatorship of the soviet union and maybe You can open Your eyes.
This is like saying the idea of solar panels is bad because capitalists work against them to destroy their reputation. Judging a system based on the assumption that theres someone else trying to destroy it is very simple minded.
A political and economic system is not some random piece of infrastructure, like a solar panel. It’s more comparable to a padlock. It’s entire point is to manage human nature. If all people were benevolent and willing to work for collective good on their own, we wouldn’t need political systems at all. Neither would we need padlocks. A padlock that can’t hinder an intruder is a bad padlock. A political or economic system that can’t handle human nature (greed, lust for power) is a bad system.
A political and economic system is not some random piece of infrastructure, like a solar panel.
And its also not a magic potion.
A padlock that can’t hinder an intruder is a bad padlock.
A political and economic system is not some random piece of infrastructure object, like a solar panel padlock.
Youre saying a political system can only work if there is not a single aspect that can be taken advantage of? Thats equivalent to every single person being controlled 100% in their actions. If thats your idea of ideal, sure. I guess some people currently being in leading positions would agree with you.
The US is currently in the middle of a fascist takeover, while being a Democracy (in the past at least). Are you saying Democracy is not a political system worth pursuing because it doesnt work?
Youre saying a political system can only work if there is not a single aspect that can be taken advantage of? Thats equivalent to every single person being controlled 100% in their actions.
I did not say anything even close to that. I am saying a political system can only work if it can’t be easily overturned. It has nothing to do with how much it controls peoples lives or if it can be taken advantage of.
What is this bullshit argument? If a lightbulb stops working after 10 years, is it as useless as a lightbulb that breaks after 10 minutes?
can’t be easily overturned
Did I write they have to be impossible to overturn? Why don’t you read what I write more carefully instead of reacting to some made up version of my comment.
In many of these cases, the political system which couldn’t withstand coups were democracies. Does this mean that democracy isn’t useful? Are you saying that democracies should forbid socialists from being elected since if they get elected then america will intervene and the democracy will cease to be useful? Sounds like you don’t care for democracy and self-determination of nations. Bonus points will be awarded for being able to make your point without a potion metaphor.
My entire point is that political systems like democracies are not isolated from economic systems. Democracies fail when combined with communism, because all power is concentrated in the political apparatus, leaving no leverage for the rest of the population. Then, seizing power and removing democracy is too easy.
The problem isn’t political systems, it’s superpowers intervening, e.g. america funding fascist coups of democratically elected socialists. It would be hard for any small nation, regardless of political system, to defend against a coup funded by a superpower. Please prove me wrong and tell me how e.g. the coup in Chile 1973 could have been prevented by decentralizing power.
The problem isn’t political systems, it’s superpowers intervening
There can be more than one problem.
Please prove me wrong and tell me how e.g. the coup in Chile 1973 could have been prevented by decentralizing power.
A coup still inherently relies on there being internal forces willing to execute said coup. I don’t dare say being capitalist could have stopped this particular one, quite likely it couldn’t. But it it is at least more resilient in general.
If it was impossible to resist superpower sponsored coups, I am sure the Baltics wouldn’t be able to remain democratic right next to Russia.
A coup still inherently relies on there being internal forces willing to execute said coup.
No shit, what are you trying to say? Are you saying there exists political systems which are immune to people wanting to stage a coup?
I don’t dare say being capitalist could have stopped this particular one, quite likely it couldn’t. But it it is at least more resilient in general.
How would it be more resilient?
If it was impossible to resist superpower sponsored coups, I am sure the Baltics wouldn’t be able to remain democratic right next to Russia.
What coup attempts are you talking about? Let’s try to focus on coups that were at least attempted or has any substantial evidence of being in the works.
Every time a capitalist system is implemented the oligarchy grows and seizes power and some corrupt oligarchs usurp the power of the people. What does that say about capitalism? I think your generalized question is terribly bad faithed when every can point out the US system and straight capitalism is a failure also. Rather then generalized ideas and theory we look at all the systems and see what does work and how we can keep the power in the hands of people
I think the issue is corruption, power, and control. To have a capitalist society you must allow businesses do what they want or they will seize power. In a communist society power is centralized when it is focused on the state as a communistic in which power and control when questioned or control loosened gets cracked down.
Democratic Republicans are great but there is a few problems when they move so slow. One, what if the charter is never fixed when we add more rights. We just tack it on as precedent and never amend the charter.
Second,if the population is growing is it still representing people properly. I think having a representative for every 1 million people is to huge. And the fact we have disparities as large as 1 to million but then some have as low as 1 in 250k. Is unequal.
Third. I don’t think as long as businesses hold power over an individuals life businesses should have political power. They hold to much currently. Also the fact through a business they can unlimitedly donate money but i as an individual can only spend $2,500(somewhere around there is the campaign cap)on a candidate is insane power wise.
Fourth a mixed economic/ business system would be wonderful a more planned economy by what citizens need would be nice. Also economy and business shouldn’t be running the country. The individual people should.
Fifth States are stupid unless they can leave. The lines/borders are arbitrarily stupid and the fact the power federal is based on the lines fucks us up. If so chooses states should be able to break apart and make local states of the people so it is easier to have democratic control over your local area. Yes this means almost every state would become major cities and then the rural areas. Unless they want to partner with a city.
I don’t see how what you write relates to what I write other than what-aboutism directing attention to (non-fatal) issues of capitalism instead of addressing the fatal issues of communism.
Do I have to remind you that capitalistic democracies other than USA exist? Plenty of them work decently well. Certainly still far from perfect, but well enough to prove these issues can be overcome, and are therefore non-fatal.
Ill be the patsy: You can’t make rules to eliminate human greed / lust for power?
I’m very simplistic with this stuff and haven’t studied it, but that seems to be the fundamental limitation with communism. Would work great with robots but we’re more ‘complex’ with our subconscious bias, unexamined motives and insecurities driving our actions.
I read a Chinese visual novel where society actual DID manage to eradicate humanity’s greed/lust for power.
The biggest issue with the depicted society is that people live out their lives in ways deemed safe by the state. No one who lives in the society sees any problem with this, since their needs are cared for, and they’re allowed to freely pursue interests the state considers safe. The society determined that any culture that existed before their rise to power has to be destroyed or locked up - introduction of such items can have a majorly destabilizing effect, and bring greed/lust for power back.
More like you have a simple and easy to follow recipe for cake. You and a friend are following it dutifully. Just before the last step of the recipe your friend gets a call from their partner. Your friend then pushes you out of the kitchen and locks you out. The cake is served frosted in your friends freshly cut hair clippings.
Yes. But what does that mean? If I have a recipe for potion of immortality, but anyone that drinks the resulting potion dies instead, it’s a bad recipe. It doesn’t matter its promise of immortality sounds good.
Communism makes good promises. However, every time you have a communist revolution, it ends up being authoritarian instead. What does that say about the communist political system?
I think it says more about how Lemmings and other westerners understand authoritarianism. Because capitalist countries are way more authoritarian than any communist country has ever been. Y’all have just been fed lie after lie until you start repeating them yourselves.
More like every time there’s been democratically elected socialists or communists, western powers intervene with staged coups, assassinations, or embargos.
Even if that’s true, so what? You are just pointing out one possible reason why communism doesn’t work in reality. Still doesn’t work.
If I say my immortal potion recipe would work in an alternate reality where humans didn’t breathe oxygen, it does not make it any more useful. Equally, in our reality, coups, assassinations and embargoes exist. If a political system can’t withstand them, it is not useful.
You’re discussing with brainwashed tankies who can only answer “what about xyz in the west” to any kind of, even constructive, criticism.
Lots of anarchists are like that too, a shame because there is surely something to take from those kind of ideas.
If you say something is bad, you must have some frame of reference to know how bad it is. So if you say communism is bad, we will want to know, “relative to what?” And since capitalism and western hegemony are the dominant systems, naturally they will draw comparisons. And those comparisons will be unfavorable since capitalism is clearly broken and incentivizes great evil.
So OK, we’re still not really discussing the merits and flaws of communism as they stand on their own, but most of you aren’t ready to accept that almost everything you have learned about communism is a lie and you definitely aren’t ready to engage with the actual historical record.
So instead, the arguments revolve around what-aboutisms. Because most of you deny the evidence of your eyes and just listen to daddy. Long before we can delve into how the soviets actually existed in the world, you have dismissed us as “tankies” and stuck your fingers in your ears.
I must also stop believing my eyes and ears as I grew up in a country bordering the URSS.
I went there. It was a hell hole. Nothing to buy in the stores. I can tell you more.
It also was trying to invade or coerce its neighbours. All The Time. They (the russians) still do.
Capitalism has its flaws but that doesn’t mean the soviet union was in any way good. Ffs open a history book, travel, go there and talk to people who lived during the brutal dictatorship of the soviet union and maybe You can open Your eyes.
64 per cent of Russians say life was better in the Soviet Union than now
Data is better than anecdotes.
This is like saying the idea of solar panels is bad because capitalists work against them to destroy their reputation. Judging a system based on the assumption that theres someone else trying to destroy it is very simple minded.
A political and economic system is not some random piece of infrastructure, like a solar panel. It’s more comparable to a padlock. It’s entire point is to manage human nature. If all people were benevolent and willing to work for collective good on their own, we wouldn’t need political systems at all. Neither would we need padlocks. A padlock that can’t hinder an intruder is a bad padlock. A political or economic system that can’t handle human nature (greed, lust for power) is a bad system.
And its also not a magic potion.
A political and economic system is not some random
piece of infrastructureobject, like asolar panelpadlock.Youre saying a political system can only work if there is not a single aspect that can be taken advantage of? Thats equivalent to every single person being controlled 100% in their actions. If thats your idea of ideal, sure. I guess some people currently being in leading positions would agree with you.
The US is currently in the middle of a fascist takeover, while being a Democracy (in the past at least). Are you saying Democracy is not a political system worth pursuing because it doesnt work?
I did not say anything even close to that. I am saying a political system can only work if it can’t be easily overturned. It has nothing to do with how much it controls peoples lives or if it can be taken advantage of.
So just to be clear, there doesnt currently exist a political system that works, as they all have been overturned multiple times?
What is this bullshit argument? If a lightbulb stops working after 10 years, is it as useless as a lightbulb that breaks after 10 minutes?
Did I write they have to be impossible to overturn? Why don’t you read what I write more carefully instead of reacting to some made up version of my comment.
In many of these cases, the political system which couldn’t withstand coups were democracies. Does this mean that democracy isn’t useful? Are you saying that democracies should forbid socialists from being elected since if they get elected then america will intervene and the democracy will cease to be useful? Sounds like you don’t care for democracy and self-determination of nations. Bonus points will be awarded for being able to make your point without a potion metaphor.
My entire point is that political systems like democracies are not isolated from economic systems. Democracies fail when combined with communism, because all power is concentrated in the political apparatus, leaving no leverage for the rest of the population. Then, seizing power and removing democracy is too easy.
The problem isn’t political systems, it’s superpowers intervening, e.g. america funding fascist coups of democratically elected socialists. It would be hard for any small nation, regardless of political system, to defend against a coup funded by a superpower. Please prove me wrong and tell me how e.g. the coup in Chile 1973 could have been prevented by decentralizing power.
There can be more than one problem.
A coup still inherently relies on there being internal forces willing to execute said coup. I don’t dare say being capitalist could have stopped this particular one, quite likely it couldn’t. But it it is at least more resilient in general.
If it was impossible to resist superpower sponsored coups, I am sure the Baltics wouldn’t be able to remain democratic right next to Russia.
That’s not what you’ve been saying until now.
No shit, what are you trying to say? Are you saying there exists political systems which are immune to people wanting to stage a coup?
How would it be more resilient?
What coup attempts are you talking about? Let’s try to focus on coups that were at least attempted or has any substantial evidence of being in the works.
Every time a capitalist system is implemented the oligarchy grows and seizes power and some corrupt oligarchs usurp the power of the people. What does that say about capitalism? I think your generalized question is terribly bad faithed when every can point out the US system and straight capitalism is a failure also. Rather then generalized ideas and theory we look at all the systems and see what does work and how we can keep the power in the hands of people
I think the issue is corruption, power, and control. To have a capitalist society you must allow businesses do what they want or they will seize power. In a communist society power is centralized when it is focused on the state as a communistic in which power and control when questioned or control loosened gets cracked down.
Democratic Republicans are great but there is a few problems when they move so slow. One, what if the charter is never fixed when we add more rights. We just tack it on as precedent and never amend the charter.
Second,if the population is growing is it still representing people properly. I think having a representative for every 1 million people is to huge. And the fact we have disparities as large as 1 to million but then some have as low as 1 in 250k. Is unequal.
Third. I don’t think as long as businesses hold power over an individuals life businesses should have political power. They hold to much currently. Also the fact through a business they can unlimitedly donate money but i as an individual can only spend $2,500(somewhere around there is the campaign cap)on a candidate is insane power wise.
Fourth a mixed economic/ business system would be wonderful a more planned economy by what citizens need would be nice. Also economy and business shouldn’t be running the country. The individual people should.
Fifth States are stupid unless they can leave. The lines/borders are arbitrarily stupid and the fact the power federal is based on the lines fucks us up. If so chooses states should be able to break apart and make local states of the people so it is easier to have democratic control over your local area. Yes this means almost every state would become major cities and then the rural areas. Unless they want to partner with a city.
I don’t see how what you write relates to what I write other than what-aboutism directing attention to (non-fatal) issues of capitalism instead of addressing the fatal issues of communism.
…
Do I have to remind you that capitalistic democracies other than USA exist? Plenty of them work decently well. Certainly still far from perfect, but well enough to prove these issues can be overcome, and are therefore non-fatal.
…Dude, the planet is frying.
Ill be the patsy: You can’t make rules to eliminate human greed / lust for power?
I’m very simplistic with this stuff and haven’t studied it, but that seems to be the fundamental limitation with communism. Would work great with robots but we’re more ‘complex’ with our subconscious bias, unexamined motives and insecurities driving our actions.
I read a Chinese visual novel where society actual DID manage to eradicate humanity’s greed/lust for power.
The biggest issue with the depicted society is that people live out their lives in ways deemed safe by the state. No one who lives in the society sees any problem with this, since their needs are cared for, and they’re allowed to freely pursue interests the state considers safe. The society determined that any culture that existed before their rise to power has to be destroyed or locked up - introduction of such items can have a majorly destabilizing effect, and bring greed/lust for power back.
More like you have a simple and easy to follow recipe for cake. You and a friend are following it dutifully. Just before the last step of the recipe your friend gets a call from their partner. Your friend then pushes you out of the kitchen and locks you out. The cake is served frosted in your friends freshly cut hair clippings.