There were no actual efforts to establish communism in eastern europe. Only autocratic regimes backed by soviet russia.
this post was submitted on 22 Jul 2023
134 points (79.9% liked)
Memes
45726 readers
1001 users here now
Rules:
- Be civil and nice.
- Try not to excessively repost, as a rule of thumb, wait at least 2 months to do it if you have to.
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
It's like saying democracy sucks because look at states like Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Democratic Republic of Congo and German Democratic Republic.
When people proclaim to be something doesn't make it true.
Lol someone once told me "nazis are socialists its in the name"
I'm no too learned in the subject but what would "true" communism even look like on the large scale like a country? Would it even be feasible?
True communism in a country is impossible.
You can have socialism, or anarchy, which we've seen before, but communism cannot function in one country alone, unless said country is completely and absolutely self reliant.
A major part of communism is internationalism, which is why socialist countries had the Comintern. (Communist International). Besides a political/social system, communism has a strong basis as an economic system. You can't apply communist economic system principles to the capitalist market.
To my knowledge, no existing country is self reliant to the point that they can completely cut off trade with the rest of the world. USSR didn't do it, China didn't do it and they were the two biggest countries at the time.
That, of course is all a very surface level ELI5, and if you want to ask something more specific or in depth, feel free to.
Unless you’re an ultra-orthodox marxist, there is no such thing as trüe communism™.
There always have been many different ideas what „communism“ is, e.g. there have been various „nationalist communist“ ideologies (complicated by the fact that the Russian SFSR called everything „nationalist“ that wasn’t 100% aligned with its ideas of the Soviet Union, e.g. Hungary).
There are also no clear boundaries between communism, socialism, and anarchism, e.g. Kropotkin with his theories of anarchist communism.
That being said, I don’t think communism is a system (either social or economic), it’s strictly an idealogy, meaning it’s a way to achieve something, i.e. the classless and stateless society. If you follow that thought to its logical end, you cannot even „achieve“ communism at all, since at this point e.g. the proletariat ceases to exist, and as a result you cannot have a „dictatorship of the proletariat“.
It’s… complicated.
In feel like you make it complicated to arrive at your conclusion here. Communism, as described by Marx and Engels and to some degree Lenin, is something very specific that covers most aspects of the society. Political, social and economic. Marx himself wrote books upon books on the economy of a socialist, communist system.
It is not an abstract "I don't like capitalism so let's try something different" approach. And yes, many have tried to adapt it, as you mentioned which is why those different approaches carry a different name 'anarchist communism' in your example. Because they are different enough from flat out communism.
No, I have a very easy explanation what communism is, it’s just that nobody else agrees is the issue.
different approaches carry a different name
Yeah, well... So let’s see, we have: Marxism, Leninism, Trotskyism, Stalinism, Titoism, Gulyáskommunizmus (both, as mentioned before, considered „nationalist communism“ by other communists), Rätekommunismus, Realsozialismus, Maoism …
So, which one of those is the true communism?
Joking aside, most of the 20th century was spent with people killing other people because they had slightly different opinions on what true communism means, so it’s really not me who made things complicated.
And you keep using different names to describe them. As you should. Communism is not one thing and never was. But when people refer to base or true communism, the answer is just one.
It's how it was defined in the communist manifesto in 1848. You could say it's Marxism, but I dislike that naming since others played a big role on forming it as well, like Engels and others who based on Marx's mostly economic study added the philosophical and political angles.
Every theme or name change after the manifesto (that is not found in later revisions by the communist international) is attempts at adapting it with different angles and for different purposes and circumstances, aka NOT base or pure communism. Don't bundle everything in one basket and try to make sense, same way that bundling Putin's Russian form of Capitalism with US's imperialism and French Revolution's early capitalism together doesn't make sense either.
He asked for pure communism, I answered for that. If he asked about Trotsky, I'd focus more on the permanent revolution and the Fourth International. If he asked of Stalin, I'd talk about his socialism in one country theory
I've got no horse in this race, I just want to point out the irony of asserting that there is only one "true" communism in reply to a comment about how leftists have spent the last century arguing over what "true" communism even is.
load more comments
(1 replies)
load more comments
(1 replies)
load more comments
(3 replies)
Realistically, it would look something like how the Anarchists organized society in Catalonia during the Spanish Civil War, or how Rojava is organizing today with communal federations. Anarchism sidesteps the inevitable authoritarian regime that various Marxist theories have by not installing a 'temporary' vanguard state that quickly becomes autocratic and dictatorial, they just jump straight to decentralizing power immediately by giving it to the people.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
Catalonia during the Spanish Civil War
Rojava is organizing today with communal federations
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.
And here comes the guy who thinks he can do it better, this time without mass killings.
Hey, I can think what happened in Eastern Europe was just authoritarian dictatorships, backed by Muscovite colonialism & branded as communism just the same as what happened in parts of South America was just authoritarian dictatorship, backed by American imperialism & branded as laissez-faire capitalism.
Also I can think communism has never actually been tried, and that it’s functionally impossible (therefore people should stop advocating for it).
With capitalism we just outsource the death to 3rd world countries.
load more comments
(3 replies)
In what sense was it not an actual effort? Just because it quickly slid into non-marxism doesn't say anything about the initial idea of the revolutionaries. Bakunin predicted exactly what would happen with Marxism, and it did every time.
If you are against an authoritarian state, the only viable way to communism is to skip the dictatorship part directly and just have anarchism.
I literally pissed a slow day at work away pointing out the many, many flaws in the USSR to a lemming whose primary response was LALALALA I CAN't HEAR YOU, GO READ THIS BOOK
There is definitely a cadre of extremely disillusioned and extremely ill informed users who think the USSR was legitimate sunshine and candy communism
There were no actual efforts to establish communism
Period. Relying on the “temporary” government to relinquish their power is…foolish. If you’re building a system for the greater good, hierarchy will always undermine that goal. Unequal amounts of power does not a just system make.
load more comments
(7 replies)
The US political spectrum is leaning so far to the right. A US left is a France center or moderate right. So what Americans consider communism is merely what French consider moderate leftist.
- I’m French living in the US
Yeah, it's basically "If you keep calling all of the stuff I like 'communism', then I guess that makes me a communist."
Or if you’re not a Nazi you’re a communist, then I’m a communist I guess.
load more comments
(4 replies)
More like: People on the internet being critical of the current system, Americans on the internet saying "COMMUNISM BAD" as if USSR style state capitalism is the only other possible option.
load more comments
(5 replies)
7 out of 11 countries believe the end of the USSR harmed their countries rather than benefited them
Reflecting back on the breakup of the Soviet Union that happened 22 years ago next week, residents in seven out of 11 countries that were part of the union are more likely to believe its collapse harmed their countries than benefited them. Only Azerbaijanis, Kazakhstanis, and Turkmens are more likely to see benefit than harm from the breakup. Georgians are divided.
Hungary: 72% of Hungarians say they are worse off today economically than under communism
A remarkable 72% of Hungarians say that most people in their country are actually worse off today economically than they were under communism. Only 8% say most people in Hungary are better off, and 16% say things are about the same. In no other Central or Eastern European country surveyed did so many believe that economic life is worse now than during the communist era. This is the result of almost universal displeasure with the economy. Fully 94% describe the country's economy as bad, the highest level of economic discontent in the hard hit region of Central and Eastern Europe. Just 46% of Hungarians approve of their country's switch from a state-controlled economy to a market economy; 42% disapprove of the move away from communism. The public is even more negative toward Hungary's integration into Europe; 71% say their country has been weakened by the process.
Romania: 63% of the survey participants said their life was better during communism
The most incredible result was registered in a July 2010 IRES (Romanian Institute for Evaluation and Strategy) poll, according to which 41% of the respondents would have voted for Ceausescu, had he run for the position of president. And 63% of the survey participants said their life was better during communism, while only 23% attested that their life was worse then. Some 68% declared that communism was a good idea, just one that had been poorly applied.
Germany: more than half of former eastern Germans defend the GDR
Glorification of the German Democratic Republic is on the rise two decades after the Berlin Wall fell. Young people and the better off are among those rebuffing criticism of East Germany as an "illegitimate state." In a new poll, more than half of former eastern Germans defend the GDR.
28 percent of Czechs say they were better off under the Communist regime
Roughly 28 percent of Czechs say they were better off under the Communist regime, according to a poll conducted by the polling institute SC&C and released Sunday.
81% of Serbians believe they lived best in Yugoslavia
A poll shows that as many as 81 per cent of Serbians believe they lived best in the former Yugoslavia -”during the time of socialism”.
The majority of Russians polled in a 2016 study said they would prefer living under the old Soviet Union and would like to see the socialist system and the Soviet state restored.
The above memes are almost always made by Americans, whose brains are riddled with red scare brainworms and are completely devoid of any knowledge or understand of what the left thinks in Europe because Americans do not have a left.
Hungarian here. We had ten good years, then the same ruling class started to do the same shit they did back then but under a different name. But at least nowadays you can leave the country, which many do since -- the frequent attempts to do so were an important cultural touchstone here in the 45 years of soviet occupation.
Trust me, no one wants the same shit back, that's just a political talking point propping up Orbán's pro-russian bullshit.
load more comments
(2 replies)
These polls are really out of date. These numbers have since improved substantially in capitalism’s favour.
load more comments
(3 replies)
load more comments
(12 replies)
*rich eastern europeans
Redditors try not to froth and post anticommunism for 120 seconds challenge (impossible!!!)
Well we're not praising fascism and corruption.
The main issue is that they communism is economic policy, NOT social policy. While they do go hand in hand people often conflate the two. Many dictatorships use communism as a way to control the people but that doesn't mean that communism leads directly to dictatorships.
If they're using "communism" to control the people, then they're not really using communism
Is true Communism even possible if it's being attempted by flawed humans? Seems like it doesn't matter the economic system so much as the fact that people will ruin anything given enough time.
It’s about incentives. Worker oppression in Monarchy requires a bad King, in Feudalism bad lords, in Capitalism bad shareholders, and in Socialism self-hating workers. If you shared your workplace, would you push to remove your rights? Or to screw over your customers? And then argue for that against everyone else you share power with? The incentives are plainly better in a worker owned economy.
Communism is an economic fairy tale, not policy.
It would be nice if it were possible but with the current state of the world, it is not.
Social democracy is a reasonable compromise.
load more comments
(4 replies)
load more comments
(3 replies)
How dare teenagers not become Neoliberals while growing up in a late capitalist hellscape where climate change can't be taken seriously because it isn't a profitable problem to solve.
Fuck Communism and fuck unchecked capitalism. People deserve basic human rights. Free heallthcare, education, insurance and liveable basic income is a must. It doesn't make your society full of freeloaders instead it gives all the people a chance to become what they want in the society. I hope that people can see this basic difference and we can work towards for a better future as humanity instead of whatever country title.
load more comments
(3 replies)
boomers destroyed the earth beyond all belief, poisoned everyone with sketchy ass chemicals, destroyed the economy more than once (twice in my life), most of us will NEVER own a home because the housed your grand pappy paid 100k for is now worth 2.5 million and average yearly wage is less than 30,000... among a million other things. The greed and entitlement is baffling, mix that in with delusional red scare propaganda that a ton of people fall for and yall mfers spending time defending all this insane shit.
we effectively live in a corporate government where what the people want doesn't matter alongside the million other ways we are lied to and exploited. Billionaires and trillionaires run the world and they keep pushing for "the next thing" like the metaverse, blockchain and going mars while most of us cant even afford to fucking eat. Suck it. I guarantee that you cant even define communism and point out how it differs from social policies even on a very basic fundamental level. Fuck dude
load more comments
(1 replies)
To be honest, I've been using Lemmy for a week now, and I'm kind of concerned with all the communism stuff around here.
By "East Europeans" you of course mean your fellow fascists. The vast majority of post Soviet citizens disagree.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/14/unhappy-russians-nostalgic-for-soviet-style-rule-study
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-youth-idUSL2559010520070725?feedType=RSS&rpc=22&sp=true
http://www.gallup.com/poll/166538/former-soviet-countries-harm-breakup.aspx
load more comments
(2 replies)
counterpoint and some reading material for capitalism stans on here https://ia800309.us.archive.org/26/items/fp_Killing_Hope-US_Military_and_CIA_Interventions_Since_WWII-William_Blum/Killing_Hope-US_Military_and_CIA_Interventions_Since_WWII-William_Blum.pdf
Making this meme took longer than opening a book to understand what communism actually is.
What everyone points to as "communism" shares more in common with capitalism than anything else. They had authoritarian rulers and a small wealthy class that lords over the rest of the populace.
There is nothing "worker owned" about these examples and it only serves to spread FUD about moving away from capitalism towards a more human centric economy
view more: next ›