Has anyone encountered someone from a country that has had socialist in the past falling for propaganda.
I have a couple friends who know I’m a ML and its difficult to try to discuss communism around them because of how they fall for the anti red propaganda.
I can discuss the issues with them but they often dismiss everything at themselves being an authority on the subject as I do not live in a post socialist society. I ususally write them off as impossible to enter reasonable discussions with and also I focus mostly on the people within my region to agitate. But occasionally they’re a mutual friend or are in the vicinity of the discussion and return to the same old things.
Unnecessary but relevant story:
There was even an incident with a German I met at a party. I talked for a bit about normal stuff and mentioned how hard living was for me in my country because of capitalism and he shut me down not wanting to talk about politics which ofc I respect its a party. But later when I was discussing the feminist progress in socialist countries have accomplished and their impact on our country and culture with a professor I was totally chattin up(she wrote her final thesis on a similar matter), they came over and interrupted the conversation with their own opinions on the matter. Mostly referring to the history in Berlin of which ofc they hands personally experienced. Thankfully this didnt ruin the vibe and us socialists got social lmao.
But Its something I have encountered repeatedly and I’m not sure how to approach it. Especially as someone from a imperial country.
社会主義採用してた国の人とプロパガンダ信じるのがありますか？ 少し友達に僕はMLだを知ってます。プロパガンダひっかかるので、辺で共産主義について話は難しです。
あの人とよく話せますけど、よく僕の意見は無視されますよ。あの人にとって、あの人は共産主義について権威振舞いますよ。あの人とちゃんと話無理と思いますて, 同国人とに焦点変わります。しかし、よくあの人辺がいますて、よく僕の話に遮ります。どうしようかな
[Edit: lmao I misclicked or something into the wrong community ty for the replies tho]
So you reference studies of several countries, and now it’s all “the Soviet Union was an idyllic Paradise” and 1 author is a dick. Ignore 95% of what I said with 2,000 words of Soviet fangirl copy pasta?
Explain to me in detail WHY the far right is leaning on socialist-era nostalgia. Please.
Simple, fascism always glorifies the past, but tries to twist it into a point of national pride rather than socialist pride, combined with the fact that the left was thoroughly de-rooted. I didn’t debunk literally every author, because the first one I saw was a Nazi and a fiction writer. I also gave you many books written by people living in the USSR giving a positive overview of the experience, something you said is rare.
Right. You’ve got it.
The economic system means nothing for the nostalgia to work. The nostalgia is not for socialism. It was for anything else.
Anything. Not socialism specifically. Anything else.
So why lean so hard on a misunderstanding of those surveys you admit yourself is wrong?
Regretting the fall of the USSR and stating that they live worse lives economically than under socialism doesn’t make them all fascists. There’s a collective yearning for a time when life was better, that doesn’t make every one of them fascist, and the fact that fascists try to take advantage of this fact to gain power does not mean that socialism was secretly worse. I demonstrated numerous ways how the dissolution of socialism was disastrous to back this up, which you called “fangirling” (which itself is misogynistic and misgendering) and unrelated.
“Better” can also be defined as simply not going through the total collapse of one’s country. Stability, not economic power, has value. Humans do a lot to maintain homeostasis and low risk living. It’s a looooong timeline to unfuck a country. Generations, in fact. Not limited to post-Soviet bloc counties either. Sierra Leone, Liberia, Angola, the US after the Civil War, Germany, Italy, Spain, Iraq. Take your pick.
How many East Germans “regretted” the collapse of the Nazi regime simply because their currency ceased to buy them food?
Stop thinking that an economic model of governance solves or causes all problems. Humans cause problems. They’ll use any economic model to show you how easy it is to fuck it up.
This is just you turning a blind eye to the very real fact that the reason metrics collapsed with the adoption of capitalism and the dissolution of socialism is because critical safety nets were destroyed, disparity skyrocketed, and profit became king. I didn’t give you hard evidence of the successes of socialism for no reason, but to definitively point out why socialism’s absence and capitalism’s presence has been disastrous. Because this is inconvenient for you, you just try to shift it to a general “human problem,” even though the socialist system worked well up until the very end.
Is the absence of socialism capitalism? Is the absence of capitalism socialism?
I’m asking you to take a higher level philosophical view of being tied to defending a human-made economic model.
Why even waste the energy? Never mind the fact that socialism requires authoritarianism as the starting point. You don’t even have many models of success to point to. Have even half of counties that tried socialism survived? It’s not much different than wearing a Confederate flag on your shirt and shouting “The South Will Rise Again!” Even China went to a hybrid system. Why spend you limited life defending a proven mediocre idea?
You don’t want countries to chose for themselves based on their own priorities? You really think you have it all figured out and should force it on everyone?
No. Capitalism is a mode of production and distribution where private ownership is the principal aspect of the economy and the capitalist class in control of the state. Socialisn is a mode of production and distribution where public ownership is the principal aspect of the economy and the working classes control the state. Feudalism is neither socialism nor capitalism, as an example of absence of both.
All views are baked in our philosophy, whether we are aware of it or not. Everyone is a “philosopher,” based on their own values and experiences shaping how they view the world and their place in it. I follow dialectical materialism, which is how I view the world and attempt to understand it.
My energy isn’t wasted, in my opinion, because I’ve created many comrades that otherwise may not have come around to socialism.
All societies since primitive communism have been class societies, and thus all societies rely on the authority of the state to represent the ruling class. Capitalism requires the authoritarianism of capitalists over the working classes, socialism is superior to capitalism in that it is the authoritarianism of workers over capitalists, landlords, and fascists. Only once all class has been abolished through socialism into communism will the state wither away, leaving classless society devoid of such talk of “authoritarianism.”
This is nonsense, the confederacy was a slave-driven economy that lasted 4 years on its own. Socialism in Europe lasted nearly a century, and today we still have the PRC, Vietnam, DPRK, Laos, and Cuba. China is not a “hybrid system,” it’s a socialist market economy. The backbone of the economy is in strong State Owned Enterprises, with marketization filling in the gaps left behind by the publicly owned commanding heights of the economy.
Socialism is the opposite of a “proven mediocre idea,” it has worked every time it has been implemented in achieving its broad aims. The largest ecomomy in the world by PPP is socialist, and the PRC shows no signs of this slowing down. The 21st century will be driven by decay of imperialism and the rise of socialism.
I agree with self-determination, I also believe that based on the facts at hand, capitalism is at the end of its existence and socialism remains the only path forward. I advocate for the formation of revolutionary parties to grow working class movements and establish socialism, not for tiny adventurist cells to try to coup governments. Establishing socialism only works with popular support.
OK. Well I see that encouraging freedom of thought with you is, itself, a waste of time.
You mention a lack of poverty - as defined by an authoritarian regime that defines both who is poor as well as who can talk about it. Same with citing surveys of subjective experience that is objectively questionable at best as your only reference of people that enjoyed living under socialism.
This is a list of one-party states. Not countries practicing socialism.
Vietnam and the DPRK are client states of China so that political class Boomers can stick it to each other using 60-year-old political stances. Cuba is a client state of Russia for the same reasons. Or maybe it’s socialism in that Gazprom sales to Europe used to keep the power running in Havana.
I do want to say, I genuinely feel sorry for the people of Cuba. An entire nation used as leverage so that a few old guys can thumb their nose at a few other old guys. Every Cuban (not Miami Cubans, doctors across Africa) I’ve ever met was really quite nice. Weird Spanish and some definite clothing…choices… but they didn’t talk up Cuba’s success. It’s natural beauty, sure.
This is very much not the case. Basic bartering in a village where one farmer sells grain or sheep cheese dispels the notion that the a “worker class” is powerless without socialism.
I know a guy that grew up in Moldova as part of the USSR. Tons of stories of all the side hustles his parents had to survive. He gave me an avoska bag, which is one of the greatest things ever. His mother taught him “always carry one, you never know when you’ll see someone selling bread!” His family would make and trade vodka and wine to construction workers so they could get things like wood or cement to fix their house.
Socialism can’t even prevent capitalism from occurring because socialism is inherently a blunt tool intended to control the fine-details of human life. It is incompatible with human dignity. I’m not saying anything else is - but don’t for a minute think your brand of authoritarianism really changes much other than who wields power over workers.
You don’t actually believe this, do you?
How many suicides from the Chinese-authorized Foxconn building due to low wages and brutal working conditions? Who, exactly, did those workers have authority over? The state? Apple? The political class in China? The landlords they still need to pay with those low wages? Answer: they had authority over no one and nothing. Not even to cry for help. So they fucking killed themselves to end it all. And it’s not changed.
Seriously - you’re going to tell me that China is a successful model of socialism when it’s developed a middle class over the last 20 years to help propagate state-run businesses that exploit workers on behalf of capitalist companies? It’s not making class go away, it’s making MORE classes! It’s entrenching political class stratification and menial workers that serve them. Mao murdered a million landlords - but there’s still landlords in China, my friend. It’s just that the current landlords are part of the CCP.
China is the largest sponsor of capitalism and classism in the world. It’s economic model relies on capitalism entirely, at a global scale. It’s kind of funny you don’t or won’t see that. This is China’s success? Gaslight yourself all you want. No country listed in your 5 survivors is even marching towards some golden dawn where class ceases to exist. It’s a laughable claim.
My friend, thanks for the chat, but whew…please, I beg you, go visit any of places where socialism failed and find out why. Five countries still doing it and literally dozens of failures. I’ve been to 17 countries that once tried socialism, and I always ask about it. Always a lively conversation with people!
Is it really so superior if the failure rate is more than 90%?
Buddy…for real. You’re into super fail sauce like this? Is it just to piss off your parents or something? It’s like Marxist-Leninist folks and Flat Earthers share some attribute about ignoring obvious evidence. I’ve never been so sold on the idea that socialism is maybe the silliest, worst thing people have ever tried. We can do better. It’s just time for something new, right?
Here - go find a failed socialist country near you and check it out:
Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Lithuania, Moldova, Latvia, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Armenia, Turkmenistan, Estonia, half of Germany, Poland, Czechia, Slovakia, Armenia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Albania, any former Yugoslavian country, Mongolia, Benin, Ethiopia, Angola, Mozambique, Tanzania, Guinea, Ghana, Congo-Brazzaville, Burkina Faso, Somalia, Mali, Algeria, Madagascar, Afghanistan, Cambodia, Yemen, Iraq, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, Sierra Leone, Zambia, Zimbabwe. I’m sure I’m missing a couple.
Have a nice day! (should I say “Have my nice day” because it’s socialism? I did work at making it nice, after all.)