this post was submitted on 20 Aug 2023
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I know a lot of you are meming, but the amount of dogshit takes here is almost depressing.
There is no single answer to what a good government looks like, there is no "best one" and surely any single one that is based purely on ideals or idealized human behavior will fail, no matter how hard you believe in it.
One of the arguably most successful governments is the Chinese one and they are and were neither just, nor friendly, nor purely capitalist, communist or authoritarian. They are very China first and fuck everyone else and that works because of a lack of conscience and them adapting to everything without a second thought. Looking away and screwing people over as needed. You can be capitalist as long as it works for them. You can do whatever if it benefits them.
The US does this too, in different ways with similar effects.
the amount of dogshit takes here is depressing. This guy just praised the chinese government.
The Chinese government is responsible for the biggest and fastest uplift of people out of poverty ever seen in history.
And they are also responsible for horrible horrible human rights violations against minorites and dissidents and they caused millions of needless deaths during the cultural revolution.
The second fact however does not negate the first one because they did, in fact, pull almost their entire population out of poverty and into a modern industrialized economy.
Please learn to make some space in your head for uncomfortable facts that cause conflicting emotions.
OP was right, they are an extremely successful government with a surprisingly broad support within the population because most Chinese have living grandparents that where still farmers and had no industry at all. And they now live in modern cities with modern amenities. The transformation happened in two generations.
And India is doing it even faster.
That's a good point, India is currently also in a fantastic trajectory
:3
The German government took their country from a destitute postwar state staring down perpetual crippling debt to a restored world power in just a few years, all while having a less than stellar attitude toward minorities...but I'm not seeing too many praising them overall.
Just because a take might be pragmatic doesn't mean it's not a bad take.
But that's even worse a comparison.
First of all, the German recovery after WW2 is called "miracle of the Rhine" (or Wirtschaftswunder) for a reason. It WAS very impressive.
At the end of WW2 Germany had a gdp of 160 billion dollars, a fully literate und educated population and a reduced but existing industrial base.
Wikipedia: "When the People's Republic of China was founded in 1949, more than 400 million of the country's more than 500 million people were illiterate, and the illiteracy rate was about 80 percent, including over 95 percent in rural areas."
Per Capita GDP in china was 10% of that of post war Germany and china had no major industry to speak of and was mostly agrarian.
I never said that other countries did not do impressive things, but I think there is merit to the claim that few improved the lives of the population as thoroughly and fast and at a scale as china did.
I find it quite weird that you take my comment as praise. They are objectively successful, but as I mentioned, their methods are often morally questionable. And also, they like to act like communists, but really only as long as it benefits them. That was kinda the whole point.
And? Do you believe that they're 100% evil doing nothing worthy of praise and wherever you are is "good"? And you say others have dogshit takes?
Yup. My politics opens me up to being in opposition to the state, any state, or even all states, without discounting the achievements of the people. Value is built by labor and funded by capital. That state is pure evil and finding new ways to do more evil.
Well, that is your loss.
We wouldn't have a functioning society without a state.
You think those corporations will do the best for a fair and even society without someone hitting them in submission?
They would bring slavery back if it weren't for regulations, since that is even more cost effective than paying the minimum amount they can.