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
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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.
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.
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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
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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.
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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.
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though most brainwashed USAians seem to think having basic shit like Sweden/UK/Australian style healthcare system is some kind of evil communism.
Well capitalism is about making a selfish choice. We have no significant capital, so maybe they cut us in or don't be surprised when some don't care for the system.
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
Redditors try not to froth and post anticommunism for 120 seconds challenge (impossible!!!)
I mean there is, but all of the major nations fall somewhere in the middle of the capitalism / socialism spectrum.
China, a communist nation, has private businesses. The US, a capitalist nation, has public infrastructure and social safety nets.
It’s a gradient, and very few nations are 100% on the edge of the spectrum.
China is socialist under Primary Stage Socialism with development emphasized. Social safety nets and public infrastructure are not automatically steps towards socialism (in the first place because the U.S. is imperialist and finances these gains with the wealth of other nations with the aim of pacifying conflict rather than ushering in genuine positive change). This spectrum approach ignores political and developmental realities, in the first place with China being a dictatorship of the proletariat and the US being a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, and with private businesses subordinated at every step to the popular mass party (and with the final goal of expelling them when socialism is fully developed (1949/1950), since China is a backward nation that did not undergo a capitalist period before developing the DOTP. The “more state or more private” dichotomy is imo an incorrect way of looking at things.
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Top: Filthy rich capitalists and Boomers that lick up their cool aid
Bottom: Global South that produces both their wealth
Blocking you I don't want another reddit experience
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
The Red Scare is still working it's magic I see. I don't think many people think that communism is the perfect system. Even the ones who support it. It's just that after living in a capitalist hellhole our whole lives and watching the world burn, some of those ideas start to look like they are worth trying.
Star Trek is a good example of what the endgame of communism is supposed to look like. It's just the process of getting there that is hard to figure out.
Star Trek is an example of a post scarcity society. I worry about persisting military rank instead of a horizontal power structure.
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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
Estonian here. Soviet period was very problematic, and if you claim here that criticism of communism is fascism, then you are greatly mistaken. The crimes of communism during the Soviet period are well documented. E.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_war_crimes To point out that many Russians are longing for communism is quite possible, but these are the same Russians who are currently "liberating" Ukraine.
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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.
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I wonder, are people advocating for a system similar to the USSR or North Korea? Or actual communism?
Neither of those countries ever claimed to have a communist mode of production. Being led by a Communist Party and having a communist economic system are two different things. The USSR never claimed to have achieved communism, they achieved socialism (a transitionary phase between capitalism and communism) according to Marxist-Leninist theory.
This is a quote from Engels describing such a transitionary system:
What we have to deal with here is a communist society, not as it has developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it emerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect, economically, morally, and intellectually, still stamped with the birthmarks of the old society from whose womb it emerges.
If an advanced capitalist country in the imperial Core, today, attempted a similar transition, it would be nothing like these other examples because our material conditions are entirely different (Marx didn't expect communism to be tried within individual countries in isolation or within undeveloped countries). Marx didn't provide a blueprint for transitioning to communism because what that looks like is different in every country and material situation etc.
I am from Eastern Europe and I share this sentiment when I see anyone from the West defending communism. The issue is complicated but, to put it bluntly:
No, Timothy, communism didn't fail in Eastern Europe because it was implemented wrongly. This is a very complicated topic but the tldr summary is "It is a broken idea, it did not work and it will never work. The natural and logical outcome of any attempt at Marxism is a bloodbath followed by autocracy."
That being said, communism isn't the only way to achieve a more equitable society. You have social democracy (in Lennin's words - communism's greatest adversary); organized labour movements; collectivist anarchism; communitariasm, etc.
Communism, as applied in the 20th century, violently fought against or oppressed all of these movements and is incompatible with any of them.
Not to mention that in most countries nowadays orthodox communists have been hugely discredited for excusing the Russian war of annihilation against the Ukrainian people.
In conclusion, if you live in the USA or Western Europe and you are unhappy with how corporate greed has ruined society, don't look to communism for answers. There are many other proposed solutions out there - go and research these. Communism is very well known, which makes it easily accessible to people who want change - but it is never, ever the solution.
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Communism isn't the issue the same way Capitalism isn't the issue, the issue is rich people abusing working class and poor people. Removing democracy from these systems just make them absolutely horrid in the long run. Also China isn't communist it's state capitalist dictatorship.
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Oh yes because those same westerners are talking about Soviet Union 2, not democracy in the workplace.
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