this post was submitted on 30 Sep 2025
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Okay I would just upvote and move on, but you're clearly baiting with that title so if it's alright with you let's have some banter :P
If I say that
but I also say that I still don't like the Chinese state because I don't consider that (and ML in general) a form of worker-owned means of production (whether or not you agree)
Am I a "lib"?
Kinda? What do you think socialism looks like, if not the PRC? What about the PRC makes it not "genuine worker control," or more broadly, Marxism-Leninism not "genuine worker control?"
It's mostly to do with how the workers aren't in control of anything
The workers are absolutely in control. If you don't know what worker's congresses are, then you should do more studying, and less talking.
They are, though. China is a democratic country, and public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy. Polling shows genuine democracy:
What would worker control have to look like for you to accept it?
Compared to the robust system of democracy in the US where corporations buy elections and the average person never gets to see a single policy enacted that benefits them? Is that what you're comparing China to?
No, the US isn't a democracy either
The PRC isn't a western liberal faux-democracy, no, but it is a comprehensive unitary socialist democracy. Policy is usually pushed from the bottom-up, and there are comprehensive levels of provincial, regional, and national democracy. They abolished term limits for the presidential position, but that doesn't mean "president for life," Xi can be taken down democratically. It's unlikely, though, considering he enjoys over 90% support.
As for being "authoritarian," all states are. The difference with China is that the working class is in control of the state, rather than the capitalist class like in western countries.
🤣🤣🙈🤣
We've shown many times how the PRC is a worker-owned-and-controlled econoxy, and how the worker's congresses function in action.
If you don't consider any actually existing country that's trying to build socialism "up to your standard", then you should re-evaluate the basis of your opposition. If you kow-tow to every western-supremacist talking point about how Vietnam, the PRC, the DPRK, and Cuba "aren't doing socialism correctly because they aren't as smart as [insert western-supremacist marxist here], then yes, you are a liberal.
Can you define what the word means to you exactly?
"Socialism is worker ownership of the means of production" is a syndicalist distortion of socialism. Workers should control the means of production, as in their operation should be based on popular consensus, but "ownership" suggests something like cooperatives (or, you know, syndicates), which operate on the same market system and a permutation of petite-bourgeois races to the bottom that we see under capitalism.
The people must control the state, "win the battle of democracy," and via their control of the state dictate what happens to the means of production. Specific ownership is a secondary concern, though I agree with what I assume your position is, that the bourgeoisie have been granted too much power and authority in China.