Objection

joined 6 months ago
[–] Objection@lemmy.ml 5 points 5 months ago

You can go to archive.is and put in the url of a news story you want to read in the second box and it will usually let you bypass the paywall.

[–] Objection@lemmy.ml 6 points 5 months ago

China has official death estimates so I don't believe that they deny that anything at all happened.

Now, it’s considered patriotic to protest poor government decisions.

Is it now? Would you say the student protests over Gaza are considered "patriotic" in mainstream American culture?

[–] Objection@lemmy.ml -1 points 5 months ago

Comparing an incident where 11 million people were killed to one where hundreds of people were killed is a form of Holocaust denialism.

[–] Objection@lemmy.ml 12 points 5 months ago

Sell their land to a shell company (pun intended) which leased the land back to the main company at inflated rates as part of a convoluted financial scheme to embezzle money, and then blame the endless shrimp.

[–] Objection@lemmy.ml 2 points 6 months ago

Even if that's true, isn't it better for countries in the global South to have multiple options instead of being forced to accept whatever conditions are imposed on them by the IMF?

[–] Objection@lemmy.ml 4 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Are you a Maoist?

[–] Objection@lemmy.ml -5 points 6 months ago

Oh great the NSA bots have showed up

How's the weather in Langley?

[–] Objection@lemmy.ml -3 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

So you're a Maoist?

[–] Objection@lemmy.ml 12 points 6 months ago

There's no country where every single person lives in freedom and happiness. But there are numerous countries that have significantly improved the quality of life for the vast majority of people compared to what they had before, including Cuba, Vietnam, and China.

It may be true that in some cases the quality of life is higher in capitalist countries. But there's a good reason for that! Historically, the countries most prone to socialist revolutions... were countries with some of the lowest standards of living in the world!

Despite this, China has recently eclipsed the United States in life expectancy. If you compare the two countries' life expectancies before the Communists came to power, no one would expect that to happen! Why? Because for the average rural Chinese person, their way of life was virtually unchanged since ancient times with a life expectancy of 35, comparable to that of the Roman Empire.

Anti-communists would have us compare communist countries against either an imagined utopia, or against countries starting from a significantly higher level of industrial development. But those comparisons are not relevant to the question at hand! In order to evaluate the efficacy of socialism, the relevant comparison is the system that actually existed before, and what it was on track to do! And in cases like China, we can clearly see that the quality of life was miserable and stagnant for the vast majority of people, until the communists came to power!

Why do Westerners fail to account for this vital evidence? Because people used to a higher standard of living would take these improvements for granted! For a village tailor, being able to afford a sewing machine could be life-changing - but someone living in the imperial core would have no relevant experience to relate to that! The only thing they would notice is how poor the person still is, regardless of how much or how quickly their life is improving!

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