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[Succinct Verbosity]

From a British perspective, the National Front and BNP have been largely decimated due to the media's ability to coherently demonstrate why racist policies also translate into corruption and incompetence. Of course, the same has been tried on UKIP, and it has currently backfired... But UKIP's ascendency has come at a unique time where the traditional third party is in power, economic growth isn't felt and hatred of the establishment is increasing... Give it time though. I doubt UKIP will mean much -or racist parties in general- when economic growth is felt.

 

[MacNille]

You are not going to convince him man, just stop feeding him.

Maybe I should, but I will not stand here and see he spreading bullshit.

 

[Kotetsu534]

In the near future the Western nations may be faced with the issue of invading Russia if they keep grabbing land.

And you're solution is to adopt Capitalism and Bourgeois Democracy, an ideology that has also led to 100+ million dead worldwide

This is NeoGAF politics.

Spoiler

Yes, there have been a lot of interesting, insightful posts in this thread, and this post isn't helping anything, but I couldn't hold back.

 

[Resident_UA]

And you're solution is to adopt Capitalism and Bourgeois Democracy, an ideology that has also led to 100+ million dead worldwide.

Dude, you can't just backpedal on everything you just said. At least "Bourgeois Democracy" does not kill their own people. In theory Communism is not bad, but neither is any other form of government. In practice Communism killed more of their own people than fascism did. You can argue that killing your own people is as bad as creating an enemy abroad, but under Democracy the government is at least somewhat accountable...

 

[Real Hero]

'Communism' didn't kill anyone neither did democracy. People will warp any ideology or system to fit their goals.

 

[mellz]

By trying to decrease institutional racism:

- Talk about institutional racism, racism is so much more than some drunk shouting slurs.
- Let all education have an anti-racist dimension and talk about racism in schools.
- Public education free from kindergarten to university and more help with homework in areas where the parents don't have higher education.
- Decrease segregation by building apartments with low rent cost in middle class white areas.
- The right to full time employment for part time workers in the public sector.

I think a lot of this would long term decrease the support for racist parties. In Sweden the Left Party and Feminist Initiative have these suggestions.

 

[ItWasMeantToBe19]

'Communism' didn't kill anyone neither did democracy.

What do you think of the Holodomor and Great Leap Forward.

 

[Resident_UA]

'Communism' didn't kill anyone neither did democracy.

Regimes without accountability kill people. It just happens that in Russia this regime was called "communism" and in Germany it was called "fascism."

 

[pgtl_10]

dude, don't take anything that zuhzuhzombie say serious.He is prasing Communism ffs. It is odd that he doesn't mention the total lack of freedom, the secret police watching everyone, the economic stagnation, the lack of political freedom, etc.

I agree but my general belief is that ideologies don't harm as much as people do. East Germany was probably terrible. The voting for the old communist party is probably from disillusion with the neoliberal economics. I would
like to see if a new generation of socialists can learn from the past and not resort to authoritarianism to promote their views.

 

[Ty4on]

Jews were not targeted. Zionists were. Zionism and Nationalism are not compatible with a socialist system.

Not only were Jews not targeted, Soviet Jews were given an entire state unto themselves where Yiddish and Hebrew culture could be the dominate culture.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_Autonomous_Oblast

lawl
Thanks Stalin for giving them a state in the middle of nowhere were at most one quarter of the population was Jewish and where the first Synagogue was built in 2004. It was so successful that today the Jewish population is less than 1% (or more if the Russian Census Bureau isn't to be believed, still very low).

It was a nice gesture for 1934, but let's not pretend the Soviet Union treated minorities very well.

 

[Mrmartel]

Man, I'd really love for you to expand on that last sentence. Really, please expand on it.

Progressives against Islamic fundamentalists? I have no doubt they vote for the same parties, at least so far. That could change in the future, I made a post in this thread questioning possible new formations of parties in the future. Is that enough for you? Mind you I suppose killings is a little Hyperbolic from my part. Violence would be a better word, aggression as well. No doubt it's there in other parts of the world.

 

[Messofanego]

[/B]How about the minimum 14.5 million peasants killed during the dekulakization/collectivisation of the 1930s? Stalin's "revolution from above" and collectivist policies directly resulted in the terror famines inflicted on Ukrainians and people of the Kuban areas (Don and Volga), where the state forced the peasantry to produce grain in kolkhozes and sovkhozes knowing that the quotas were impossibly high. When the state would come to the community farms to collect the impossibly high grain quotas, they took everything the peasants had, purposely leaving them to starve to death and eat each other as a means of eliminating the potential counter-revolutionary threats posed by the peasants and to destroy the national identity of the Ukrainian people. Stalin's class warfare, waged through collectivist policies, was directly responsible for the an amount of deaths that is actually triple those sustained during the Holocaust. Does that qualify as a "real tragedy" to you?

Wow, did not know this. So quick, too.

 

[Zuhzuhzombie!!]

It is thanks to Democracy that you are able to puke out all of this bullshit and I call bullshit on your "100+ million dead". Give me a source.

Democracy? No. Imperialism, cultural chauvinism, bourgeois democracy are often features of Capitalism.

50 million dead in British India alone. 15 million in Belgian Congo. 20 million in WW1. 15 million from Japan's invasion of SE Asia. 30 million from Germany's invasion of the USSR.

That's just the historical. The dozens of millions of Native American's that disappeared from colonial Britain and Spain can't even be counted.

Plenty of modern examples like the several million SE Asian's indiscriminately bombed by the US during Vietnam. Or the US and UK's collusion to finance fucking Pol Pot. Or the million dead and the complete destruction of the Iraq state. The arming of Croatian Neo Nazis in the former Yugoslavia.

 

[DeFiBkIlLeR]

Democracy? No. Imperialism, cultural chauvinism, bourgeois democracy are often features of Capitalism.

50 million dead in British India alone. 15 million in Belgian Congo. 20 million in WW1. 15 million from Japan's invasion of SE Asia. 30 million from Germany's invasion of the USSR.

That's just the historical. The dozens of millions of Native American's that disappeared from colonial Britain and Spain can't even be counted.

Plenty of modern examples like the several million SE Asian's indiscriminately bombed by the US during Vietnam. Or the US and UK's collusion to finance fucking Pol Pot. Or the million dead and the complete destruction of the Iraq state. The arming of Croatian Neo Nazis in the former Yugoslavia.

..lol

 

[PlayALLtheGames]

Education.

 

[Abounder]

Ikael and Abounder, you both have made excellent points (Aside from France and UKs resiliency, I think they're all screwed).

The left has abandoned their most loyal/consistent voters, for every type of niche group, minority imaginable. We are currently seeing the collapse of that strategy. Especially when underneath that big tent are groups that would literally being killing each other in a different political climate or country.

The rest of Europe could export their inevitable future crisis to France and UK but their future will be fine. France uses the EU similar to the USA/Bretton Woods System.

This is NeoGAF politics.

Spoiler

Yes, there have been a lot of interesting, insightful posts in this thread, and this post isn't helping anything, but I couldn't hold back.

Yea I hope it's outlandish but Russia faces even worse challenges ahead, and their military and population isn't going to get any better in the near future. You could also apply your spoiler to this post:

Improve the economic position of the working classes. While their wages stagnate, and housing eats up a greater and greater portion of their income, there will inevitably be populists who blame the "other" and try to whip up anti-immigrant/ethnic sentiment. To do that, you would need to solve a whole host of other problems stemming from globalisation and the increasing wealth, power and influence of an elite class (and the Eurozone's contradictions too).

European nations don't have the voters, money, economy, or demographics to improve the future for the working class; and will only get worse as the boom taxpayers retire and other government services shut down. Which means even more bad news for minorities.

 

[MacNille]

Democracy? No. Imperialism, cultural chauvinism, bourgeois democracy are often features of Capitalism.

50 million dead in British India alone. 15 million in Belgian Congo. 20 million in WW1. 15 million from Japan's invasion of SE Asia. 30 million from Germany's invasion of the USSR.

That's just the historical. The dozens of millions of Native American's that disappeared from colonial Britain and Spain can't even be counted.

Plenty of modern examples like the several million SE Asian's indiscriminately bombed by the US during Vietnam. Or the US and UK's collusion to finance fucking Pol Pot. Or the million dead and the complete destruction of the Iraq state. The arming of Croatian Neo Nazis in the former Yugoslavia.

Those millions dead in world war 1 was not because of capitalism, those dead on the eastern front was because of Nazism and fascism, not capitalism, Japan invade SE Asia for Imperialistic gain, not because of Capitalism. If Capitalism created Imperialism, why did USSR took control over all of eastern Europa in a imperialistic manner (yes they took over in a imperialistic manner so don't bother trying to excuse that) ? Pol Pot was a communism and he got most of the aid from US and UK after he had been kicked out. It was communism that killed 1/4 of all the people in Cambodia.. And how the fuck do you connect capitalism to the neo nazi in Yugoslavia? .So yeah, you are full of on most of this issue.

 

[Zuhzuhzombie!!]

Dude, you can't just backpedal on everything you just said. At least "Bourgeois Democracy" does not kill their own people. In theory Communism is not bad, but neither is any other form of government. In practice Communism killed more of their own people than fascism did. You can argue that killing your own people is as bad as creating an enemy abroad, but under Democracy the government is at least somewhat accountable...

I agree with you in principle, but I don't necessarily agree that it is a "better" situation. Yeah, if, say, the US enacted programs that resulted in horrific issues, the President would probably be voted out. On the flip side, the US and its population tends to not have a problem with causing horrific issues in countries around the world.

Shooting the guy down the road isn't really a better situation compared to shooting your next door neighbor, so to speak.

What do you think of the Holodomor and Great Leap Forward.

I don't think anyone is in favor of famines.

Holodomor and GLF are what happens when unmodern, unscientific, third world countries make sweeping attempts at scientific progress. They're shitty situations but there's not much reason to think either, nor something like the famines in India, would ever happen again.

"Collectivization" isn't a bad idea in general. The US' agriculture is highly collectivized.

It was a nice gesture for 1934, but let's not pretend the Soviet Union treated minorities very well.

Stalin himself was a minority.... so....

A theory put forward to understand Stalin links his mindset with his upbringing. He was Georgian, a people who were on the absolute bottom rung of society.

I can't speak for the poster that you're responding to but the argument that Stalinism diverged quite significantly from mainstream communism is fairly strong and dismissing it as a "no true Scotsman" argument is unfair; merely stating that something is that kind of an argument doesn't make it true.

"Obama is a socialist!"
"No he isn't!"
"No true Scotsman tho"

I'm not necessarily a "Stalinist" or a "Maoist" or whatever, but just like fans of Obama aren't forced to apologize for all of the US' crimes, real or imagined, I'm not going to let my support of Socialism be rebuked because early Socialist states, who were the first to ever try it, fucked up.

 

[Fugu]

What do you think of the Holodomor and Great Leap Forward.

These are not examples of people killed "by communism" (in quotes because I think this is an asinine concept) but of people killed by massacres disguised as communism.

Attributing the actions of anyone who claims to be professing an ideology to the ideology itself is about the most dangerous slippery slope I can possibly imagine.

 

[MacNille]

These are not examples of people killed "by communism" (in quotes because I think this is an asinine concept) but of people killed by massacres disguised as communism.

Attributing the actions of anyone who claims to be professing an ideology to the ideology itself is about the most dangerous slippery slope I can possibly imagine.

No. They were killed because of communism.

 

[Fugu]

No. They were killed because of communism.

And I suppose you can just attribute the entire death toll of the cold war (or, to be generous, half) to capitalism because there was a belief that proxy wars were a necessary component to maintaining an economically aligned movement?

Seriously, it isn't even remotely difficult to see why this is a stupid argument. I'm not going to waste my time.

 

[Real Hero]

No. They were killed because of communism.

Were the napalmed Vietnamese killed by capitalism or freedom? No, of course not.

 

[MacNille]

And I suppose you can just attribute the entire death toll of the cold war (or, to be generous, half) to capitalism because there was a belief that proxy wars were a necessary component to maintaining an economically aligned movement?

no, but I attribute masskilling to a certain ideology if they were killed in that name, as they were in hologram, the great leap and the culture revolution. Same as I do with Nazism to the holocaust.

 

[Fugu]

no, but I attribute masskilling to a certain ideology if they were killed in that name, as they were in hologram, the great leap and the culture revolution. Same as I do with Nazism to the holocaust.

Oh I see, so if a man shouts "communism!" before he kills you, you've been killed by communsim? Alright. We're just going to have to agree to disagree on this one.

 

[ItWasMeantToBe19]

These are not examples of people killed "by communism" (in quotes because I think this is an asinine concept) but of people killed by massacres disguised as communism.

Attributing the actions of anyone who claims to be professing an ideology to the ideology itself is about the most dangerous slippery slope I can possibly imagine.

Great, as a Nazi myself I can finally not that have whole Holocaust thing attributed to our great movement.

Not sure what taking farm land from people who know what they're doing and giving it to the general masses is "not communism" either.

 

[Zuhzuhzombie!!]

Those millions dead in world war 1 was not because of capitalism

They absolutely are. WW1 was fought largely over the ability to trade.

those dead on the eastern front was because of Nazism and fascism, not capitalism, Japan invade SE Asia for Imperialistic gain, not because of Capitalism.

Fascism is capitalism.

Imperialism is capitalism.

If Capitalism created Imperialism, why did USSR took control over all of eastern europa in a imperialistic manner?

There are severe issues with how the USSR handled the Baltics/Lithuania/etc, but the Baltic State's petitioning of the USSR and Western Imperialism are two decidedly different things.

If you call it an "imperialistic manner" then sure, I'll agree it shares similar characters, but where as Imperialism is used to transfer all legal and mineral wealth from the occupied country to the occupier as well as practically enslave the occupied for the total benefit of the occupier. Circumstances for the USSR were decidedly different.

 

[Anjelus_]

Oh I see, so if a man shouts "communism!" before he kills you, you've been killed by communsim? Alright. We're just going to have to agree to disagree on this one.

I can see where he's coming from even if I think it's a bit misguided. It's like being killed by a religious fanatic in a holy war. Political ideologies and religion aren't so very different.

 

[MacNille]

Oh I see, so if a man shouts "communism!" before he kills you, you've been killed by communsim? Alright. We're just going to have to agree to disagree on this one.

Agree to that, but what I mean, is that they died because of the politics that the regime put to use. And as they were communist, they died because of communism.

 

[Real Hero]

no, but I attribute masskilling to a certain ideology if they were killed in that name, as they were in hologram, the great leap and the culture revolution. Same as I do with Nazism to the holocaust.

Militarism and violence is a core concept of Fascism, it's not a core concept of Communism. I just think it's ridiculous to equate someone who is a socialist or a Communist with being a Nazi. I'd say they died because of the actions of the totalitarian state that was Stalinist Russia.

 

[Irminsul]

I'm pretty familiar with the European New Right, as not innocent and cute as that is...
It's because of things like black metal, folk metal, neofolk, and martial industrial. And people like Julius Evola and Troy Southgate.

If you haven't heard of them... Julius Evola was a super male supremacist who didn't like the modern world and wanted to ethnic pride and hypermasculnity. And he believed that all religions had some spiritual truth. And Troy Southgate is a white nationalist who believes that there shouldn't be a state, so he identifies as an Anarchist. But he also believes that white people should use being stateless to separate themselves from other races.

[...]

H.E.R.R.'s music albums are really pretty things about European culture. It's sad that one one made an album about Vondel's Lucifer like that. But anyone could do that, no matter what their race or ethnicity is. Japan makes RPGs and other video games about ancient European culture all the time. And Japanese RPGs romanticize European culture every bit as much as neofolk. And they make military bombastic music and games, too. Like Valkyria Chronicles.

I know I'm a bit late, one point of your post was already addressed and it's probably not strictly on topic, but... Reading a post discussing Evola, certain music genres and H.E.R.R. is the last thing I expected of this thread. Heh. So here goes a rather long text about what I never expected to discuss on NeoGAF...

As others have already said, they are all far away from the European "mainstream" right-wing. For a start, they are far too out there regarding their ideas and ideologies – this is nothing that could appeal to a larger public.

But I actually wanted to discuss the other things you said, which haven't been addressed by others yet (which really doesn't surprise me)... I don't really know what you mean with your second sentence. Do you claim Black and Folk Metal as well as Neofolk and Martial Industrial are intrinsically right-wing? Because none of these genres are. I'd even say there's far more non-political or not-right-wing-political stuff in each of them than the things you describe. Beside the fact that Black Metal, Folk Metal and Neofolk/Martial Industrial are all pretty separated of each other, especially culturally. Only the latter two share a lot of common ground.

True, Evola is a bit "famous" in Neofolk/Martial circles, but I'd argue that just because someone devotes their time to him it doesn't necessarily mean they agree with his ideas. Neofolk/Martial bands tend to obscure the "true meanings" of their songs (if there even are "true" meanings), and there certainly are quite a bunch of rather "unpleasant" bands, but I don't think marking every band in these genres as right-wing is fair.

It's also true that there are a fair share of xenophobic, racist or even Neo-Nazis (I mean, National Socialist Black Metal is a thing), but the overwhelming majority of Black/Folk Metal bands aren't.

As for H.E.R.R... well, the music's quite good (not really great in my opinion, but good), but again, I don't really understand what you're saying about them... I mean, Troy Southgate is an active member. I wouldn't say the single album you mentioned is their sole problem. "The Winter of Constantinople" does have its share of rather not-so-nice ideas and their name literally means "Holy Europe! Roman Empire".

Which leaves the question whether one should actually listen to music by people supporting the ideas you mentioned. There's also music that's decidedly non-political, but still made by people who even describe themselves as racists (i.e., Burzum and Varg Vikernes).

As to your last point: I disagree to some extend. I think it tremendously helps if you're actually living in the culture you're dealing with. An outsider's perspective can be refreshing and something different, yes, but very, very rarely the same as an insider's perspective. I don't mean necessarily better or worse, but definitely different.


=========================

Actually on topic: In a certain way I guess these political movements were always there, they just had different targets in the past. Heck, in Germany, there were protests by "concerned residents" against refugees from the GDR – against people from the same nationality, even in the minds of the protesters. The arguments, btw., were mostly the same. Don't work, can't integrate and so on and so forth.

As for fears of the "Islamisation" of Europe: I mean, to a certain extent there's really little that can be done. What do you say if someone's convinced "Sharia" will be the basis of German law in 20 years? What would be the basis of a discussion? I can't really think of one.

 

[Anjelus_]

They absolutely are. WW1 was fought largely over the ability to trade.

No no no no no no you do not want to go down this road. I know so much about this topic and I can shoot you down dead wrong but I don't have time to go into it because i need to start working and get off Gaf. Grah.

For now I'll just say nope.

 

[Ty4on]

Edit: ^^^^Probably the best solution. This thread was supposed to be about racism and not capitalism vs communism.....

Stalin himself was a minority.... so....

A theory put forward to understand Stalin links his mindset with his upbringing. He was Georgian, a people who were on the absolute bottom rung of society.

I know that, but it doesn't change any of his actions.
A non-white or minority leading a European party/movement with racist ideas or taking racist actions doesn't stop it being racist.

 

[Cromat]

The secondary discussion in this thread is pointless as Marxism is unfalsifiable. The structure of the theory means that it's a political article of faith and its supporters would not be dissuaded by any particular empirical fact.

I think that the root of the ascent of these extreme right wing parties is because at some point of their history, the left wing stopped being socialist / communist and started to be "progressive". In short, they abbandoned the whole idea about thinking and defending the interests of a universal (or at least, nation-wide) working class, and embraced instead the much touted "multiculturalism" paradygm. It was a purely ellectoral, opportunistic movement, no matter how they are trying to legitimize it now. The left wing tried to expand its base by cattering to a different plethora of "ellectoral niches" (gays, ecologists, inmigrants from different stripes, etc) outside of its bread and butter voters (blue collar workers) by empatizing the values of "difference" while assuming that their old ellectorate (native working class) would keep voting them because hell, what else they would vote? The right wing and their anti-welfare programs?

The idea was that somehow, these diverse niches could be glued by an overaching cultural interest, aka "multiculturalism", as if culture, much less some vague, weak cosmopolitan culture could trump class. That idea is, simply put, stupid and asisine as fuck. Because these much touted diverse niches had different, if not outright opposed values and interests, no matter how much convenient would be for the traditional left wing parties for them to stay inside one happy big tent. This ain't happening. At all. Chielfly, because some of these people hate each other's guts with passion. And also, because their economic interests are not merely "different" nor "diverse", but downright extreme oposites in some cases by the virtue of class difference. Devoutly muslim inmigrants embracing gay rights? Poor factory workers accepting paying more for their ellectric bills so the ecologically minded hipsters can sleep better at night? Are you freaking serious?

The left wing had to make a decision as to who will be the loser in this new set of priorities, and the big looser was, of course, the native working class. It was bound to happen, because it let them catter to one of these new niches (inmigrants, which compete for these low-wage jobs against the native worker class) while making it easier to reconcile the party's interests with the elites (increase labour supply in order to decrease labor price) and because hell, the working class will keep voting us, right? Where else are they going to?

Well, they are going to Le Pen, to the Tea Party, to the "True Finns" and frankly, they will be going with anyone that doesn't treat them like an old, obsolete broken toy. Political extremism is not born out of poverty per se, nor ignorance, even if demagoges thrieve in these two elements. The extreme right wing is getting hold in countries with a rich and educated popullace because people trows into the hands of extremists whenever they feel that they have been "politically orphaned". Desperation can breed violence and emigration waves, but these political currents are something else entirely, me thinks.

So in conclusion: There's an ellectoral vaccuum that ought to be filled, pronto. The narrative of class interests superceeding cultural differences ought to be recovered too. Or else, the narrative of cultural differences attacking your class interests will take place instead (as it is happening right now) and the results won't be pretty.

Interesting and well-written post.

 

[MacNille]

Militarism and violence is a core concept of Fascism say it's not a core concept of Communism.

So are we going down this road again with "no true scotsman" bullshit again?

 

[Resident_UA]

Oh I see, so if a man shouts "communism!" before he kills you, you've been killed by communsim? Alright. We're just going to have to agree to disagree on this one.

Wait... Why would you disagree? If somebody yells "communism!" it's at least somewhat suspicious. I think it would fair to assume that ideology is driving that man rather than anything else. You can say the same about somebody who kills you and says "democracy!" (I think Iraq qualifies as casualty here). If you don't "agree" with this what could you agree with? There's no such thing as "pure" capitalism or "pure" communism. You can't blame everything on one side. There have been plenty of conflicts in the history where all sides were right/wrong. I think the arguments in this thread are about what sort of works not what is a "perfect" form of government.

 

[Zuhzuhzombie!!]

Edit: ^^^^Probably the best solution. This thread was supposed to be about racism and not capitalism vs communism......

FWIW, Marxism Leninism is my solution to the problem of race as those states are the only ones to make it illegal.

A non-white or minority leading a European party/movement with racist ideas or taking racist actions doesn't stop it being racist.

True, but the USSR was generally the only entity that was sympathetic to things like the wars of liberation in Africa, SE Asia, and South America.

Wait... Why would you disagree? If somebody yells "communism!" it's at least somewhat suspicious. I think it would fair to assume that ideology is driving that man rather than anything else.

Again, FWIW, Marxism doesn't believe that "ideology" is the driving force of behavior but someone's immediate and material surroundings/conditions. If a poor man robs you, he robs you because he's poor, not because he's a socialist.

 

[Axial]

Kinda ignorant and dare I even say bigoted to label these people as racists(and the sentiment that nationalism = racism), while making the assumption that the only root of the problem are Europeans having issues with multiculturalism and not the other way around. From what I've experienced first hand it seems to me like a majority of immigrants who come to Europe have problems with not only accepting but even respecting the culture and laws of their new countries. Some of these people are simply not compatible with the idea of living as a minority and to accept the fundamental pillars of modern European societies like pluralism and a secular social system characterised by tolerance of people with different political or religious viewpoints. On the other hand the notion held by supporters of multiculturalism of celebrating diversity, but at the same time ignoring inequality, inevitably leads to entrenched segregation or even worse - institutionalized racism, and is quite likely going to turn european countries into a collection of separatist groups, each competing for power with the others.
Just take a look at these so called urban no-go zones throughout Europe - autonomous Islamic entities under Sharia rule which reject their host countries legal systems, where non-muslims must either conform to the cultural, legal, and religious norms of fundamentalist Islam or expect to be greeted with violence. Lacking the political and cultural will to assert control in areas that in some cases have become urban war zones, the authorities have simply retreated and abandoned them. These are the byproducts of decades of multicultural policies that have encouraged immigrants to create parallel societies and remain segregated rather than become integrated into their European host nations.

 

[Fugu]

Great, as a Nazi myself I can finally not that have whole Holocaust thing attributed to our great movement.

Not sure what taking farm land from people who know what they're doing and giving it to the general masses is "not communism" either.

I feel like that this is what this debate is actually what this is about. It's convenient to use this system of simply attributing to deaths to ideologies as a way to win internet arguments; you can say communism sucks without having to debate the actual merits or implications of communism because your worldview lets you attribute hundreds of millions of deaths directly to communism.

It also conveniently ignores the need to critically think about statistics and ascertain how useful they actually are. If a man with the world views of Chomsky or, hell, even Trotsky had been in charge post-Lenin instead of Stalin, would the same number of people have died? You can't answer this question with certainty, yet all of these men profess to be of a similar economic ideology. This issue relates to your second point as well: communism is an extremely varied movement and a good chunk of living, modern day communists (and, indeed, many dead communists for that matter) are staunchly opposed to the totalitarian form that the USSR advocated. You might also want to make note of the fact that the original blueprint for communism mandated, as a prerequisite, that the nation was sufficiently developed, which Russia was not. None of these things make the USSR decidedly not communist, but it indicates how big of a generalization you're making when you say that this was communism and all communism is like Stalinsim. We don't use, I don't know, the DRC to represent all of capitalism, so we shouldn't use Stalinism to represent all of communism.

I can see where he's coming from even if I think it's a bit misguided. It's like being killed by a religious fanatic in a holy war. Political ideologies and religion aren't so very different.

Perhaps, but I'm inclined to say that the religion still hasn't killed the man.

Agree to that, but what I mean, is that they died because of the politics that the regime put to use. And as they were communist, they died because of communism.

A poor man who dies in the United States has then died because of capitalism, which means that both ideologies are left with positively enormous death tolls. Again we are forced to ask what the use of this statistic is.

 

[Zuhzuhzombie!!]

Trotsky had been in charge post-Lenin instead of Stalin, would the same number of people have died? You can't answer this question with certainty

We have an idea about Trotsky though, at least for a certain time frame.

Trotsky advocated for the immediate assault on kulaks post Civil War with Lenin and Stalin both opposing him in favor of the NEP, which was implemented specifically to increase the QoL of the nations peasants and proletariat.

That is the 20s and while Trotsky was still in power. Though he did spend the rest of his career saying that Stalin both betrayed the revolution and that Stalin also stole all of his ideas from Trotsky.

You might also want to make note of the fact that the original blueprint for communism mandated, as a prerequisite, that the nation was sufficiently developed, which Russia was not. None of these things make the USSR decidedly not communist, but it indicates how big of a generalization you're making when you say that this was communism and all communism is like Stalinsim. We don't use, I don't know, the DRC to represent all of capitalism, so we shouldn't use Stalinism to represent all of communism.

This is true, but the USSR never considered itself Communist, only Socialist, or at the beginning stages of Socialism.

They were well aware that they needed to go through a phase of development prior to the "realization of communism". The choices presented to them were Western/Bourgeois Democracy or the Dictatorship of the Proletariat. Their experience during the Civil War proved to them that Bourgeois Democracy was unreliable. For example, even though the Bolshevik's were the largest political party (300,000 members + the entire Army), they still faced significant opposition from other Left parties who continually advocated for war against Germany or allied with the faltering Right Wing parties. They repeatedly invited the other Left parties to join them in a coalition government.

 

[Violet_0]

Fascism is capitalism.

Imperialism is capitalism.

fascism has nothing to do with capitalism

fascism -: a way of organizing a society in which a government ruled by a dictator controls the lives of the people and in which people are not allowed to disagree with the government
: very harsh control or authority

capitalism - : a way of organizing an economy so that the things that are used to make and transport products (such as land, oil, factories, ships, etc.) are owned by individual people and companies rather than by the government

imperialism -: a policy or practice by which a country increases its power by gaining control over other areas of the world
Imperialism is "a policy of extending a country's power and influence through colonisation, use of military force, or other means"

 

[Fugu]

Wait... Why would you disagree? If somebody yells "communism!" it's at least somewhat suspicious. I think it would fair to assume that ideology is driving that man rather than anything else. You can say the same about somebody who kills you and says "democracy!" (I think Iraq qualifies as casualty here). If you don't "agree" with this what could you agree with? There's no such thing as "pure" capitalism or "pure" communism. You can't blame everything on one side. There have been plenty of conflicts in the history where all sides were right/wrong. I think the arguments in this thread are about what sort of works not what is a "perfect" form of government.

I disagree because it doesn't say anything useful about anything to say that a man who killed someone while claiming to be a communist has increased the death toll for the ideology of communism. In fact, there are so many problems with doing so -- where does the attributing stop? If I say I'm a capitalist but act like a communist, whose death toll goes up? How do we define responsibility -- in other words, are ALL deaths incurred by a regime, even so-called natural ones, counted in such a toll? Et cetera -- that it actually just obfuscates the issue.

 

[Resident_UA]

Again, FWIW, Marxism doesn't believe that "ideology" is the driving force of behavior but someone's immediate and material surroundings/conditions. If a poor man robs you, he robs you because he's poor, not because he's a socialist.

You don't have to tell me this. I 100% agree with you on this. As I said before there's nothing "inherently" evil about communism/marxism. We just know that it does not work. Humans are kind of terrible at sharing. Technically there's supposed to be very little government in communism, but that's not how it worked out. People will grab power at the earliest opportunity and what you are left with is unaccountable government. In fact all extremes do not work. "Pure" capitalism also has plenty of failures (Great Depression, etc).

 

[ItWasMeantToBe19]

To Fugu,

Marxism is fucking stupid because it was created in das-Kapital, which bases itself entirely on the Labor Theory of Value, which is completely wrong. Value is based on how much people want something and how much of something there is, not about how many labor hours are put into an object. Marx also assumed that almost all people could perform any job and that specialization was unnecessary because anyone could learn any job easily which is not correct. Original Marxism involves all resources being available for the general public to use to create, which would lead to mass inefficiency as the anyone could acquire resources for any reason even if they had no idea how to use the resources. Actually practiced Marxism involved government dictating production, leading to mass overproduction of certain goods and long bread lines because of the lack of a price system. And people are naturally somewhat selfish and free ride if they can.

I can go far beyond the easy arguments against Communism but I haven't because all of the arguments in this thread from Marxists are terrible and make no sense.

 

[Zuhzuhzombie!!]

fascism has nothing to do with capitalism

fascism -: a way of organizing a society in which a government ruled by a dictator controls the lives of the people and in which people are not allowed to disagree with the government
: very harsh control or authority

capitalism - : a way of organizing an economy so that the things that are used to make and transport products (such as land, oil, factories, ships, etc.) are owned by individual people and companies rather than by the government

imperialism -: a policy or practice by which a country increases its power by gaining control over other areas of the world
Imperialism is "a policy of extending a country's power and influence through colonisation, use of military force, or other means"

Both Germany, Italy, and Japan had private ownership and a capitalist oriented economy.

You don't have to tell me this. I 100% agree with you on this. As I said before there's nothing "inherently" evil about communism/marxism. We just know that it does not work. Humans are kind of terrible at sharing. .

Well, Marxists also don't believe in things like "human nature" ie: human's don't like to share.

 

[Resident_UA]

I disagree because it doesn't say anything useful about anything to say that a man who killed someone while claiming to be a communist has increased the death toll for the ideology of communism. In fact, there are so many problems with doing so -- where does the attributing stop? If I say I'm a capitalist but act like a communist, whose death toll goes up? How do we define responsibility -- in other words, are ALL deaths incurred by a regime, even so-called natural ones, counted in such a toll? Et cetera -- that it actually just obfuscates the issue.

It really isn't as difficult of a question as you are making it out to be. The bold statement is sort of true, you don't need to over think it. All things being equal, if you (a regime) are in charge of a country where life expectancy is 50 years you are a worse government (regime) than a country where life expectancy is 80 years. If they are pretty close, you probably are not that bad. Same thing applies to ideology. If your regime is killing huge % of population in the name of ideology you are bad, if it's small % you are not as bad. If you don't have any rules you can argue anything.

 

[Violet_0]

Both Germany, Italy, and Japan had private ownership and a capitalist oriented economy.

and the USA is a representative democratic republic with a capitalist market and Stalin Russia was a dictatorship with a communist economy. They aren't directly linked to each other
e: this thread went completely off-topic

 

[CoolOff]

- The right to full time employment for part time workers in the public sector.

In Sweden the Left Party and Feminist Initiative have these suggestions.

And the Sweden Democrats.

Spoiler

 

[Fugu]

To Fugu,

Marxism is fucking stupid because it was created in das-Kapital, which bases itself entirely on the Labor Theory of Value, which is completely wrong. Value is based on how much people want something and how much of something there is, not about how many labor hours are put into an object. Marx also assumed that almost all people could perform any job and that specialization was unnecessary because anyone could learn any job easily which is not correct. Original Marxism involves all resources being available for the general public to use to create, which would lead to mass inefficiency as the anyone could acquire resources for any reason even if they had no idea how to use the resources. Actually practiced Marxism involved government dictating production, leading to mass overproduction of certain goods and long bread lines because of the lack of a price system. And people are naturally somewhat selfish and free ride if they can.

I can go far beyond the easy arguments against Communism but I haven't because all of the arguments in this thread from Marxists are terrible and make no sense.

You would have a hard time convincing a Marxist that command economies are predisposed towards overproduction when Burgeoise overproduction is a pretty fundamental tenant of Marxism.

It really isn't as difficult of a question as you are making it out to be. The bold statement is sort of true, you don't need to over think it. All things being equal, if you (a regime) are in charge of a country where life expectancy is 50 years you are a worse government (regime) than a country where life expectancy is 80 years. If they are pretty close, you probably are not that bad. Same thing applies to ideology. If your regime is killing huge % of population in the name of ideology you are bad, if it's small % you are not as bad. If you don't have any rules you can argue anything.

Name one point in time in the history of mankind that this has been remotely possible. Go ahead, I'll wait.

You also haven't addressed who represents their ideology.

 

[Resident_UA]

Name one point in time in the history of mankind that this has been remotely possible. Go ahead, I'll wait.

You also haven't addressed who represents their ideology.

1980s, paid government employees

 

[Beefy]

This thread has gone crazy.