I remember once building a nice charity program that would make meals for homeless people. I had deluded myself into thinking I was building some kind of revolution or whatever.
I had a book club where we all read theory, and it basically was just a tacked on addition to the food charity.
It was really stupid, but it also broke my heart when a guy deliberately sabotaged it because I was a tankie. It was set up in a very level way where we all basically took turns being the coordinator. He intentionally did nothing and told everyone that each role for that week (driver, cook, etc) was filled. Then when the day for distribution came he laughed about how it wasn’t going to happen.
I had to buy like 10 pizzas that day, and I remember not having internet because those pizzas were my bill money. The group kept functioning for a while until it fizzled out, but not because of him.
Most people of all political leanings were willing to help me with my stupid idea, but not that guy. I think about that a lot.
Mutual aide is not really the issue with tankies, the problem is the authoritarianism. Mutual aide can be very effective when done properly. For example, anarchists tend to answer the question of “leeches” by giving them the resources to self-actualize, and if the “leech” does not care to do that, they can be kicked out of an anarchist community.
Maybe those are problems with the ideology, but its not with the people who believe it. I’ve met a lot of people who have very incoherent beliefs. Nobody bullied them and so they absorbed the sane beliefs of the group.
I really just don’t think exclusion or hostility are useful unless people are dangerous. A Nazi makes Jewish and gay members of a group scared. A tankie really doesn’t because 90% of the time they’re gay or trans.
Then I haven’t even gotten to how a lot of people join extremist ideologies because they are lonely and need friends. So when you combine that with how small scale local activism is, kicking safe useful people out of a group is just abusing the socially inept.
I am a queer person, and I am scared of tankies because they support the creation of an authoritarian state which is fundamentally incompatible with the ideas queer liberation and self-determination.
I’m all for communism. Every day is a new day for me to witness and live the horrors of capitalism. Hell, I got laid off a couple months ago and I may be facing homelessness soon. I could go on a tangent here but it’s very clear to me that we need a different system soon. But I don’t want to build a “fiscally leftists, socially conservative” society. I want it all left.
It’s not just that, they support existing regimes that are known to be queerphobic. China is having its own trans panic right now, and their government is contributing to it, so when people support states like that it’s not just that they don’t support queer liberation, but it seems like they specifically want queer people gone entirely. It seems like they agree with fascists when it comes to queer people.
Named after a literal weapon of war, that serve no function except to kill people. It doesn’t till fields for crops to feed people, it doesn’t really even serve as a transport except for transporting it’s own crew to whoever they are going to shoot or crush
And then the whining:
“How come you don’t feel safe around us???”
I get you’re trying to make a big point here about China, but within the last 3 years they opened a multidisciplinary trans healthcare clinic in Beijing and additionally a well known TV host in the country is transgender and this is easily findable even within US new sources. It may still not be culturally fully accepted but I don’t see how the government is doing anything against us when they’re literally opening trans healthcare clinics. Hell there were trans expat teachers who used to move to China for teaching before the changes in education laws for expat teacher licensing.
The US and UK are also opening more trans healthcare clinics, and I don’t think any reasonable person would argue that these countries don’t have trans panics, or the the governments aren’t capitulating. So, the existence of trans healthcare clinics doesn’t really go against what I’m saying. The same goes for whether a single TV host is trans.
But as for whether the government is doing anything against us… they literally are. Just last year, the government cracked down on the sale of HRT drugs. This matters especially in China because of the severe legal barriers on every stage of medical transition. When it comes to being prescribed HRT drugs, you are required to undergo psychological intervention, have no criminal record, and have parental consent (even if they’re an adult).
This is exactly what I’m referring to when I say the government is capitulating to a trans panic, a phenomenon that you can’t so easily separate from social climate and cultural attitudes.
I recommend you see what Chinese trans activists are saying on this, because they say that the government is increasingly cracking down on their activities, they’re getting erased from both official and unofficial media, social media is increasingly taking down trans accounts, and the idea of trans people being a “social contagion” is becoming increasingly popular among nationalists. In general, I would trust queer activists over any other group on this one.
There is nothing about the core ideology of Marxism Leninism that is opposed to queer rights. Actually there are a lot of queer people in the community at large who are communist and findable on YouTube or Lemmy. I’m one of them.
I’m not here to teach everything and I trust you know enough to be able to look up more as you wish. If you want an example of an ML nation that is pro queer look up the Cuba Family Code changes made recently. They’re among the most progressive in the world and help to guarente rights for trans people, lgbt, and more. Additionally China has a large trans healthcare clinic first of its kind recently opened in Beijing and a well known trans TV host. Vietnam also has a vibrant lgbt community and even in North Korea homosexuality and cross dressing to my research are not criminalized despite lacking public interest/support.
The days of old are over and new communist nations can and are doing better to ditch reactionary tendencies especially around queer rights.
The common thread of ‘authoritarian’ countries isn’t communism or fascism. It’s having significant opposition. Almost always from the US.
No Communist supports suppression of dissent. It’s a countermeasure to foreign interference. It doesn’t exist because tankes feel like authoritarian states work better but because the US has an extensive and well known track record of breaking international sovereignty laws and installing fascist regimes by force.
Communists didn’t want to be slaughtered for wanting to abolish poverty. Therefore every real life communist is a tankie, either because they understood that class war is war or because they’re buried under capitalist soil.
This suppression of opposition doesn’t have ideological basis. It’s an emergency measure in a time of war. Hence why even every CAPITALIST country opposed to US interests is ‘authoritarian’.
Join the stupid phone meetings any American Communist party has. You will see that a strongly disproportionate amount are gay or trans. I’m gay and nonbinary. My husband is gay. Half my local Communists are lgbt. Leftists in general are often lgbt.
Tankies tend to be social outcasts and so do lgbt people. That might be part of the connection.
Authoritarianism isn’t a thing. No state wants to suppress dissent.
Dissent is suppressed when it needs to be because there’s foreign powers trying to destabilize your state. Like when the most powerful country in the world creates a Central Intelligence Agency with the overt purpose of eradicating communism. Which they did covertly through the funding of internal dissent, terrorism and sabotage of infrastructure.
Unless you think the CIA just twiddled their thumbs for 70 years, of course. In that case I recommend reading the book ‘Killing Hope’ by William Blum.
wait, so you’re saying that even the fascist states (e.g. the nazis) were only trying to defend themselves against foreign powers trying to destabilize their state? or am i misinterpreting you?
a state doesn’t have a mind of its own, it consists of people and those people are often power-hungry and do actively want to suppress dissent regardless of what would be good for the state. the whole point of socialism is to dismantle hierarchies, but by placing a powerful leader without accountability on the top you have undermined the whole concept
maybe cia actions were what caused them to be authoritarian, but that doesn’t excuse their actions in any way. the moment they became authoritarian, cia had already defeated socialism
suppressing “dissent” in the form of e.g. refusing to follow laws about distribution of resources (within reason) is one thing, but suppressing dissenting voices is a whole different thing altogether and those two shouldn’t be lumped together in one category. the former is a part of the normal job of a state while the latter is authoritarianism
wait, so you’re saying that even the fascist states (e.g. the nazis) were only trying to defend themselves against foreign powers trying to destabilize their state? or am i misinterpreting you?
I was referencing socialist states, but yes they do both resist political pressure. The difference is fascist states are a minority class resisting domestic dissent by the majority class. It’s a forced ideology undermining a natural uprising, which is why it draws so many parallels with socialism in its revolutionary anti-establishment sentiment but is as a result lacking in internal consistency. In other words it’s reactionary.
The post WW1 German government was resisting political pressure from socialist factions that were especially dominant in Germany due to the aftermath of the war. There was constant turmoil including insurgencies, massacres, executions and of course the massive surge of the KPD into electoral politics that lead capitalists to fund the staunchly anti-communist Nazi party (read “Who Financed Hitler” by James Pool) and subsequently purged communist thought.
a state doesn’t have a mind of its own, it consists of people
The state is the monopoly of power in the hands of one class; they’re a state because the interests of the people in it align. Though it can, the state doesn’t have to be a conspiracy. What capitalists believe or think about on a personal level is irrelevant, their material interests lead them to support the same thing.
those people are often power-hungry
They’re power hungry, so they appeal to the interests of the most powerless class in defiance of the most powerful class, only to then alienate the powerless class as well? They’re power hungry so they isolate their state from the world stage and reduce themselves to running an impoverished nation? I think your view of ‘authoritarianism’ is shaped by the misconceptions about the cause of Nazi Germany addressed above.
Even if we assume this is true, it’s not a useful observation. It avoids pinpointing the conditions we need to address. There isn’t much we can do about an ‘evil’ dormant in an undefined subset of the population. You’re just fingerpointing, which is a primer for fascism.
by placing a powerful leader without accountability on the top you have undermined the whole concept
First, there’s no lack of accountability. Socialist parties consist of MILLIONS in members and hundreds to thousands in parliament, which is much larger than all parties in liberal democracies combined. Socialist countries don’t have singular dictators but operate through massive debate and cooperation. What they lack are people promoting goals contrary to socialism (and yes this does lead to wrongful punishment, that’s par for the course given the chaotic nature of covert war). Accountability and dissent are WILDLY different things that can’t be conflated. Every state is accountable to the material interests it serves.
Second, the concept of socialism is abolition of the state. There’s no ‘rule’ or empirical justification prescribing socialism to be an erratic transition rather than gradual. The point of communism isn’t just electing different leaders. Where you think socialism must come from tolerance to an undefined time of unchecked capitalist rule before an abstract ‘mass revolution’ ushers in socialism, communists simply think socialism must come from intolerance to capitalist rule but concrete tolerance to state functions that can resist capitalist subjugation until they aren’t needed anymore.
By tolerating the bureaucracy of capitalism for the sake of awaiting ‘principled’ instantaneous global revolution, you’re already admitting you’re willing to compromise for the goal of socialism. So it doesn’t make sense to pretend your aversion to socialist states has anything to do with principled opposition to a similar bureaucratic structure serving the working class(by providing housing, education, healthcare and food) instead of elites.
You can believe Leninism is a flawed way to achieve socialism and maybe even doomed to fail, but if you can’t even appreciate it as better than capitalism, you’re just not a socialist.
maybe cia actions were what caused them to be authoritarian, but that doesn’t excuse their actions in any way. the moment they became authoritarian, cia had already defeated socialism
‘Authoritarian’ isn’t a thing, it’s just a state, with just as much power as before, at war. I don’t understand what you mean by ‘excusing actions’ when you admit it’s caused by US intervention. You’re saying their actions aren’t excusable while personally providing the excuse.
And what’s the point in a ‘principled stance’ when this stance consists of letting your own people be massacred and condemning billions of people to extreme poverty? What’s the point of ‘principles’ when it consists of tolerating the mass genocide of the entire planet? You tolerate the ‘peaceful’ because dominant tyranny of capitalism, but socialism must be flawless and overcome hurdles with complete perfection no matter the efficacy.
You don’t seem to appreciate that the struggle for socialism is a war, not civil debate. You demand people meet capitalist artillery fire with a cool headed essay recital and wonder why socialism is nowhere to be found.
sure, it’s a war and violence might be necessary, but it’s a question of proportionality. you don’t meet a peaceful protest with artillery fire either
you also seem to be under the belief that anyone who dissents or in any way acts against the will of the state are doing so because of foreign interference instead of simply from their own volition. in neither case do deserve to be killed unless they are themselves violent or otherwise explicitly soldiers. i guess a more common issue than powerhungriness among communist leaders is the related issue of extreme paranoia which leads to tons of innocent people being killed or imprisoned. this is an example of something that can be triggered by CIA, but not excused by CIAs actions
why do leninist states even have a singular leader in the top if they’re trying to abolish hierarchy? why not cap it off with a committee with some further safeguards to prevent the power from getting to their head instead?
i doubt you yourself believe that all the actions of people in the top of the party represents the class of the proletariat that they are trying to represent instead of a hybrid between that an actions to further the class they themselves are now in as elite party members. this issue is furthered by corruption which all communist states are vulnerable to (especially since they are initially centralizing a lot of power) and which a very large amount of precautions need to be taken against to prevent it from collapsing the system on its own even without outside interference. now, capitalism isn’t better with corruption since the system is essentially a case of legalizing corruption under a formal system, but that’s also why it doesn’t collapse from corruption
i don’t mind the bureaucracy of a communist state at all, i don’t see where you got that. just the extreme actions against any dissenting voices, especially since they usually are talking about some real problem that needs to be addressed rather than just destabilizing for the sake of destabilizing
i also hope that you agree that russia is no longer in any way a communist state?
I am trying to be as respectful as possible here, but saying that authoritarianism doesn’t exist is an absolutely insane take. Obviously the CIA did a lot to try and stop communism, we all know that. And why wouldn’t a state want to suppress dissent, do you think that all “communist” regimes were these perfect, do nothing wrong utopias? Of course a state wants to suppress dissent, it gives them more control over their people, Governments are greedy, even if they claim to be communist. I don’t think the extent of mass surveillance, forced propaganda, censorship, and imprisonment could be justified by "stopping a foreign entity. Here are some examples of the things authoritarian “communist” regimes did to supposedly “fight foreign powers”.
Soviet Union (USSR): Under the leadership of Joseph Stalin, the Soviet Union carried out numerous purges and suppressions of dissent. The Great Purge in the late 1930s resulted in the execution or imprisonment of millions of people, including political opponents, intellectuals, military officers, and ordinary citizens accused of disloyalty or counter-revolutionary activities. The state employed the secret police, censorship, forced labor camps (Gulags), and surveillance to maintain control and suppress dissent.
People’s Republic of China: The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has a long history of suppressing dissent. During the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), Mao Zedong mobilized student groups known as the Red Guards to target intellectuals, artists, and political opponents. Many individuals were persecuted, imprisoned, or killed. In more recent times, the Chinese government has tightened control over the media, the internet, and social media platforms, censoring content, monitoring online activities, and imprisoning activists and dissidents who challenge the party’s authority.
Cuba: The Cuban government under Fidel Castro and his successors has been known for suppressing dissent. The regime has restricted freedom of speech, assembly, and the press, controlling the media and limiting access to information. Independent journalists, activists, and political opponents have been subject to harassment, imprisonment, and surveillance. The government also tightly controls access to the internet and social media platforms.
North Korea: The totalitarian regime in North Korea, led by the Kim family, has implemented strict controls on information and dissent. The state maintains a pervasive surveillance system and enforces ideological conformity through propaganda, censorship, and forced indoctrination. Any form of dissent or criticism of the regime is severely punished, with individuals and even entire families sent to political prison camps.
East Germany: During the existence of the German Democratic Republic (GDR), the ruling Socialist Unity Party suppressed dissent through surveillance, censorship, and repression. The Ministry for State Security, commonly known as the Stasi, maintained a vast network of informants and spies to monitor citizens’ activities and control dissent. The government restricted travel, controlled the media, and imprisoned those who challenged the state’s authority.
Most suppression of dissent was done to citizens of the state. If you think that any of this can be justified by “fighting foreign powers”, you are absolutely delusional.
You start by saying you want to be ‘respectful’. You end up calling me ‘absolutely delusional’. It seems you can’t even be consistent in your own behavior. Do you think Einstein was delusional as well? (Source: Born-Einstein Letters)
Again, I recommend you read the book ‘Killing Hope’ by William Blum to properly contextualize the response of socialist states, including the ones you brought up that to be frank read like ChatGPT prompts, if you truly come here to talk in good faith.
Authority exists. It exists everywhere. That’s what states are. What doesn’t exist is this idea of a state that has more authority over its country than other states. Every state has a monopoly of power by definition. That’s what allows a state to define its own laws and values.
There is suppression of dissent because this is the sole purpose of a state. What distinguishes so called ‘authoritarian’ countries is the extent of brute force required to suppress it. In capitalist nations, this presents itself as fascism. In socialist nations this presents itself as Leninism.
I might add you have to at least acknowledge there must be some reason the only socialist states to have ever existed for longer than a year have been exclusively authoritarian. They didn’t outnumber anarchists, socdems or demsocs by any stretch. Leninism has been as succesful as it is because socialist states live in a capitalist world. A world that wants to eradicate communism root and stem with whatever magnitude of violence and cruelty necessary. Lenin and Stalin expressed this and reality has proven their thesis correct.
Now, you bring up examples, which you seem to be unaware are sourced primarily from CIA investigations. First, I would like to note that you call these actions disproportionate while admitting to being ignorant to the interference these countries faced. Second, I would note you trivialize the mass poverty in western states, disassociate it with its fascist sattelite states and ignore mass policing by the NSA on a GLOBAL scale. You also ignore the immensive devastation these states wrought upon their colonies, including recurring mass famines, only ever seeming to consider these deaths mass murder the moment managment falls into the hands of a collectivist meaning to eradicate it.
Of every single country you’ve mentioned, I would like to remind you the US and its allies have invaded extensively, used terrorism, had numerous assassination attempts and in China particularly used WMD.
Now I would like you to compare this response to the response of the west to the isolated 9/11 attack by Al Qaeda(an organization funded by the US to overthrow the socialist Afghan government), rendering entire cities level to the ground, murdering millions of men, women and children and letting whoever knows how many more to die of famine or drown at the European border.
Is it ‘ethical’ or ‘utopian’? Absolutely not (and you evidently don’t understand what communism is if you think it can be utopian while having a state at the same time).
But these measures undountedly are the grim reality of the way every state operates. It doesn’t matter if it’s socialist, capitalist, feudal or anything else. So the question isn’t if you support purges or no purges. They are the current reality of every state. The question is whether you support a movement for the transition away from the state towards communism or the continuation of the state.
Socialist states aren’t perfect, far from it. But mismanagement is not the same as malice that is pervasive in capitalist society.
I remember once building a nice charity program that would make meals for homeless people. I had deluded myself into thinking I was building some kind of revolution or whatever.
I had a book club where we all read theory, and it basically was just a tacked on addition to the food charity.
It was really stupid, but it also broke my heart when a guy deliberately sabotaged it because I was a tankie. It was set up in a very level way where we all basically took turns being the coordinator. He intentionally did nothing and told everyone that each role for that week (driver, cook, etc) was filled. Then when the day for distribution came he laughed about how it wasn’t going to happen.
I had to buy like 10 pizzas that day, and I remember not having internet because those pizzas were my bill money. The group kept functioning for a while until it fizzled out, but not because of him.
Most people of all political leanings were willing to help me with my stupid idea, but not that guy. I think about that a lot.
Mutual aide is not really the issue with tankies, the problem is the authoritarianism. Mutual aide can be very effective when done properly. For example, anarchists tend to answer the question of “leeches” by giving them the resources to self-actualize, and if the “leech” does not care to do that, they can be kicked out of an anarchist community.
Maybe those are problems with the ideology, but its not with the people who believe it. I’ve met a lot of people who have very incoherent beliefs. Nobody bullied them and so they absorbed the sane beliefs of the group.
I really just don’t think exclusion or hostility are useful unless people are dangerous. A Nazi makes Jewish and gay members of a group scared. A tankie really doesn’t because 90% of the time they’re gay or trans.
Then I haven’t even gotten to how a lot of people join extremist ideologies because they are lonely and need friends. So when you combine that with how small scale local activism is, kicking safe useful people out of a group is just abusing the socially inept.
I am a queer person, and I am scared of tankies because they support the creation of an authoritarian state which is fundamentally incompatible with the ideas queer liberation and self-determination.
I’m all for communism. Every day is a new day for me to witness and live the horrors of capitalism. Hell, I got laid off a couple months ago and I may be facing homelessness soon. I could go on a tangent here but it’s very clear to me that we need a different system soon. But I don’t want to build a “fiscally leftists, socially conservative” society. I want it all left.
It’s not just that, they support existing regimes that are known to be queerphobic. China is having its own trans panic right now, and their government is contributing to it, so when people support states like that it’s not just that they don’t support queer liberation, but it seems like they specifically want queer people gone entirely. It seems like they agree with fascists when it comes to queer people.
Named after a literal weapon of war, that serve no function except to kill people. It doesn’t till fields for crops to feed people, it doesn’t really even serve as a transport except for transporting it’s own crew to whoever they are going to shoot or crush
And then the whining: “How come you don’t feel safe around us???”
Gee I don’t know
I get you’re trying to make a big point here about China, but within the last 3 years they opened a multidisciplinary trans healthcare clinic in Beijing and additionally a well known TV host in the country is transgender and this is easily findable even within US new sources. It may still not be culturally fully accepted but I don’t see how the government is doing anything against us when they’re literally opening trans healthcare clinics. Hell there were trans expat teachers who used to move to China for teaching before the changes in education laws for expat teacher licensing.
The US and UK are also opening more trans healthcare clinics, and I don’t think any reasonable person would argue that these countries don’t have trans panics, or the the governments aren’t capitulating. So, the existence of trans healthcare clinics doesn’t really go against what I’m saying. The same goes for whether a single TV host is trans.
But as for whether the government is doing anything against us… they literally are. Just last year, the government cracked down on the sale of HRT drugs. This matters especially in China because of the severe legal barriers on every stage of medical transition. When it comes to being prescribed HRT drugs, you are required to undergo psychological intervention, have no criminal record, and have parental consent (even if they’re an adult).
This is exactly what I’m referring to when I say the government is capitulating to a trans panic, a phenomenon that you can’t so easily separate from social climate and cultural attitudes.
I recommend you see what Chinese trans activists are saying on this, because they say that the government is increasingly cracking down on their activities, they’re getting erased from both official and unofficial media, social media is increasingly taking down trans accounts, and the idea of trans people being a “social contagion” is becoming increasingly popular among nationalists. In general, I would trust queer activists over any other group on this one.
There is nothing about the core ideology of Marxism Leninism that is opposed to queer rights. Actually there are a lot of queer people in the community at large who are communist and findable on YouTube or Lemmy. I’m one of them.
I’m not here to teach everything and I trust you know enough to be able to look up more as you wish. If you want an example of an ML nation that is pro queer look up the Cuba Family Code changes made recently. They’re among the most progressive in the world and help to guarente rights for trans people, lgbt, and more. Additionally China has a large trans healthcare clinic first of its kind recently opened in Beijing and a well known trans TV host. Vietnam also has a vibrant lgbt community and even in North Korea homosexuality and cross dressing to my research are not criminalized despite lacking public interest/support.
The days of old are over and new communist nations can and are doing better to ditch reactionary tendencies especially around queer rights.
The common thread of ‘authoritarian’ countries isn’t communism or fascism. It’s having significant opposition. Almost always from the US.
No Communist supports suppression of dissent. It’s a countermeasure to foreign interference. It doesn’t exist because tankes feel like authoritarian states work better but because the US has an extensive and well known track record of breaking international sovereignty laws and installing fascist regimes by force.
Communists didn’t want to be slaughtered for wanting to abolish poverty. Therefore every real life communist is a tankie, either because they understood that class war is war or because they’re buried under capitalist soil.
This suppression of opposition doesn’t have ideological basis. It’s an emergency measure in a time of war. Hence why even every CAPITALIST country opposed to US interests is ‘authoritarian’.
citation needed
Join the stupid phone meetings any American Communist party has. You will see that a strongly disproportionate amount are gay or trans. I’m gay and nonbinary. My husband is gay. Half my local Communists are lgbt. Leftists in general are often lgbt.
Tankies tend to be social outcasts and so do lgbt people. That might be part of the connection.
Authoritarianism isn’t a thing. No state wants to suppress dissent.
Dissent is suppressed when it needs to be because there’s foreign powers trying to destabilize your state. Like when the most powerful country in the world creates a Central Intelligence Agency with the overt purpose of eradicating communism. Which they did covertly through the funding of internal dissent, terrorism and sabotage of infrastructure.
Unless you think the CIA just twiddled their thumbs for 70 years, of course. In that case I recommend reading the book ‘Killing Hope’ by William Blum.
wait, so you’re saying that even the fascist states (e.g. the nazis) were only trying to defend themselves against foreign powers trying to destabilize their state? or am i misinterpreting you?
a state doesn’t have a mind of its own, it consists of people and those people are often power-hungry and do actively want to suppress dissent regardless of what would be good for the state. the whole point of socialism is to dismantle hierarchies, but by placing a powerful leader without accountability on the top you have undermined the whole concept
maybe cia actions were what caused them to be authoritarian, but that doesn’t excuse their actions in any way. the moment they became authoritarian, cia had already defeated socialism
suppressing “dissent” in the form of e.g. refusing to follow laws about distribution of resources (within reason) is one thing, but suppressing dissenting voices is a whole different thing altogether and those two shouldn’t be lumped together in one category. the former is a part of the normal job of a state while the latter is authoritarianism
I was referencing socialist states, but yes they do both resist political pressure. The difference is fascist states are a minority class resisting domestic dissent by the majority class. It’s a forced ideology undermining a natural uprising, which is why it draws so many parallels with socialism in its revolutionary anti-establishment sentiment but is as a result lacking in internal consistency. In other words it’s reactionary.
The post WW1 German government was resisting political pressure from socialist factions that were especially dominant in Germany due to the aftermath of the war. There was constant turmoil including insurgencies, massacres, executions and of course the massive surge of the KPD into electoral politics that lead capitalists to fund the staunchly anti-communist Nazi party (read “Who Financed Hitler” by James Pool) and subsequently purged communist thought.
The state is the monopoly of power in the hands of one class; they’re a state because the interests of the people in it align. Though it can, the state doesn’t have to be a conspiracy. What capitalists believe or think about on a personal level is irrelevant, their material interests lead them to support the same thing.
They’re power hungry, so they appeal to the interests of the most powerless class in defiance of the most powerful class, only to then alienate the powerless class as well? They’re power hungry so they isolate their state from the world stage and reduce themselves to running an impoverished nation? I think your view of ‘authoritarianism’ is shaped by the misconceptions about the cause of Nazi Germany addressed above.
Even if we assume this is true, it’s not a useful observation. It avoids pinpointing the conditions we need to address. There isn’t much we can do about an ‘evil’ dormant in an undefined subset of the population. You’re just fingerpointing, which is a primer for fascism.
First, there’s no lack of accountability. Socialist parties consist of MILLIONS in members and hundreds to thousands in parliament, which is much larger than all parties in liberal democracies combined. Socialist countries don’t have singular dictators but operate through massive debate and cooperation. What they lack are people promoting goals contrary to socialism (and yes this does lead to wrongful punishment, that’s par for the course given the chaotic nature of covert war). Accountability and dissent are WILDLY different things that can’t be conflated. Every state is accountable to the material interests it serves.
Second, the concept of socialism is abolition of the state. There’s no ‘rule’ or empirical justification prescribing socialism to be an erratic transition rather than gradual. The point of communism isn’t just electing different leaders. Where you think socialism must come from tolerance to an undefined time of unchecked capitalist rule before an abstract ‘mass revolution’ ushers in socialism, communists simply think socialism must come from intolerance to capitalist rule but concrete tolerance to state functions that can resist capitalist subjugation until they aren’t needed anymore.
By tolerating the bureaucracy of capitalism for the sake of awaiting ‘principled’ instantaneous global revolution, you’re already admitting you’re willing to compromise for the goal of socialism. So it doesn’t make sense to pretend your aversion to socialist states has anything to do with principled opposition to a similar bureaucratic structure serving the working class(by providing housing, education, healthcare and food) instead of elites.
You can believe Leninism is a flawed way to achieve socialism and maybe even doomed to fail, but if you can’t even appreciate it as better than capitalism, you’re just not a socialist.
‘Authoritarian’ isn’t a thing, it’s just a state, with just as much power as before, at war. I don’t understand what you mean by ‘excusing actions’ when you admit it’s caused by US intervention. You’re saying their actions aren’t excusable while personally providing the excuse.
And what’s the point in a ‘principled stance’ when this stance consists of letting your own people be massacred and condemning billions of people to extreme poverty? What’s the point of ‘principles’ when it consists of tolerating the mass genocide of the entire planet? You tolerate the ‘peaceful’ because dominant tyranny of capitalism, but socialism must be flawless and overcome hurdles with complete perfection no matter the efficacy.
You don’t seem to appreciate that the struggle for socialism is a war, not civil debate. You demand people meet capitalist artillery fire with a cool headed essay recital and wonder why socialism is nowhere to be found.
sure, it’s a war and violence might be necessary, but it’s a question of proportionality. you don’t meet a peaceful protest with artillery fire either
you also seem to be under the belief that anyone who dissents or in any way acts against the will of the state are doing so because of foreign interference instead of simply from their own volition. in neither case do deserve to be killed unless they are themselves violent or otherwise explicitly soldiers. i guess a more common issue than powerhungriness among communist leaders is the related issue of extreme paranoia which leads to tons of innocent people being killed or imprisoned. this is an example of something that can be triggered by CIA, but not excused by CIAs actions
why do leninist states even have a singular leader in the top if they’re trying to abolish hierarchy? why not cap it off with a committee with some further safeguards to prevent the power from getting to their head instead?
i doubt you yourself believe that all the actions of people in the top of the party represents the class of the proletariat that they are trying to represent instead of a hybrid between that an actions to further the class they themselves are now in as elite party members. this issue is furthered by corruption which all communist states are vulnerable to (especially since they are initially centralizing a lot of power) and which a very large amount of precautions need to be taken against to prevent it from collapsing the system on its own even without outside interference. now, capitalism isn’t better with corruption since the system is essentially a case of legalizing corruption under a formal system, but that’s also why it doesn’t collapse from corruption
i don’t mind the bureaucracy of a communist state at all, i don’t see where you got that. just the extreme actions against any dissenting voices, especially since they usually are talking about some real problem that needs to be addressed rather than just destabilizing for the sake of destabilizing
i also hope that you agree that russia is no longer in any way a communist state?
I am trying to be as respectful as possible here, but saying that authoritarianism doesn’t exist is an absolutely insane take. Obviously the CIA did a lot to try and stop communism, we all know that. And why wouldn’t a state want to suppress dissent, do you think that all “communist” regimes were these perfect, do nothing wrong utopias? Of course a state wants to suppress dissent, it gives them more control over their people, Governments are greedy, even if they claim to be communist. I don’t think the extent of mass surveillance, forced propaganda, censorship, and imprisonment could be justified by "stopping a foreign entity. Here are some examples of the things authoritarian “communist” regimes did to supposedly “fight foreign powers”.
Soviet Union (USSR): Under the leadership of Joseph Stalin, the Soviet Union carried out numerous purges and suppressions of dissent. The Great Purge in the late 1930s resulted in the execution or imprisonment of millions of people, including political opponents, intellectuals, military officers, and ordinary citizens accused of disloyalty or counter-revolutionary activities. The state employed the secret police, censorship, forced labor camps (Gulags), and surveillance to maintain control and suppress dissent.
People’s Republic of China: The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has a long history of suppressing dissent. During the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), Mao Zedong mobilized student groups known as the Red Guards to target intellectuals, artists, and political opponents. Many individuals were persecuted, imprisoned, or killed. In more recent times, the Chinese government has tightened control over the media, the internet, and social media platforms, censoring content, monitoring online activities, and imprisoning activists and dissidents who challenge the party’s authority.
Cuba: The Cuban government under Fidel Castro and his successors has been known for suppressing dissent. The regime has restricted freedom of speech, assembly, and the press, controlling the media and limiting access to information. Independent journalists, activists, and political opponents have been subject to harassment, imprisonment, and surveillance. The government also tightly controls access to the internet and social media platforms.
North Korea: The totalitarian regime in North Korea, led by the Kim family, has implemented strict controls on information and dissent. The state maintains a pervasive surveillance system and enforces ideological conformity through propaganda, censorship, and forced indoctrination. Any form of dissent or criticism of the regime is severely punished, with individuals and even entire families sent to political prison camps.
East Germany: During the existence of the German Democratic Republic (GDR), the ruling Socialist Unity Party suppressed dissent through surveillance, censorship, and repression. The Ministry for State Security, commonly known as the Stasi, maintained a vast network of informants and spies to monitor citizens’ activities and control dissent. The government restricted travel, controlled the media, and imprisoned those who challenged the state’s authority.
Most suppression of dissent was done to citizens of the state. If you think that any of this can be justified by “fighting foreign powers”, you are absolutely delusional.
You start by saying you want to be ‘respectful’. You end up calling me ‘absolutely delusional’. It seems you can’t even be consistent in your own behavior. Do you think Einstein was delusional as well? (Source: Born-Einstein Letters)
Again, I recommend you read the book ‘Killing Hope’ by William Blum to properly contextualize the response of socialist states, including the ones you brought up that to be frank read like ChatGPT prompts, if you truly come here to talk in good faith.
Authority exists. It exists everywhere. That’s what states are. What doesn’t exist is this idea of a state that has more authority over its country than other states. Every state has a monopoly of power by definition. That’s what allows a state to define its own laws and values.
There is suppression of dissent because this is the sole purpose of a state. What distinguishes so called ‘authoritarian’ countries is the extent of brute force required to suppress it. In capitalist nations, this presents itself as fascism. In socialist nations this presents itself as Leninism.
I might add you have to at least acknowledge there must be some reason the only socialist states to have ever existed for longer than a year have been exclusively authoritarian. They didn’t outnumber anarchists, socdems or demsocs by any stretch. Leninism has been as succesful as it is because socialist states live in a capitalist world. A world that wants to eradicate communism root and stem with whatever magnitude of violence and cruelty necessary. Lenin and Stalin expressed this and reality has proven their thesis correct.
Now, you bring up examples, which you seem to be unaware are sourced primarily from CIA investigations. First, I would like to note that you call these actions disproportionate while admitting to being ignorant to the interference these countries faced. Second, I would note you trivialize the mass poverty in western states, disassociate it with its fascist sattelite states and ignore mass policing by the NSA on a GLOBAL scale. You also ignore the immensive devastation these states wrought upon their colonies, including recurring mass famines, only ever seeming to consider these deaths mass murder the moment managment falls into the hands of a collectivist meaning to eradicate it.
Of every single country you’ve mentioned, I would like to remind you the US and its allies have invaded extensively, used terrorism, had numerous assassination attempts and in China particularly used WMD.
Now I would like you to compare this response to the response of the west to the isolated 9/11 attack by Al Qaeda(an organization funded by the US to overthrow the socialist Afghan government), rendering entire cities level to the ground, murdering millions of men, women and children and letting whoever knows how many more to die of famine or drown at the European border.
Is it ‘ethical’ or ‘utopian’? Absolutely not (and you evidently don’t understand what communism is if you think it can be utopian while having a state at the same time).
But these measures undountedly are the grim reality of the way every state operates. It doesn’t matter if it’s socialist, capitalist, feudal or anything else. So the question isn’t if you support purges or no purges. They are the current reality of every state. The question is whether you support a movement for the transition away from the state towards communism or the continuation of the state.
Socialist states aren’t perfect, far from it. But mismanagement is not the same as malice that is pervasive in capitalist society.
And then the bus driver clapped.