Don’t forget how they will also criticize western leftists and progressives endlessly for not being perfect and not even mention the right wing or non-western dictators. Bernie Sanders and AOC are apparently basically Nazis but Stalin was fiiiiine and who even cares about keeping fascists out of power.
Europe will never forgive the USSR for things like the 8-hour working day, women’s rights, fighting against colonialism (including Germany and Japan, but also including many other places, like Vietnam, Mozambique, Korea, etc.), massively improving life expectancy and education, guaranteed housing, and otherwise improving workers’ living conditions.
Don’t forget how the idea of anti-authoritarianism is just reactionary and therefore can be hand-waved away. Dictatorships are cool as long as they align with the “correct” principles.
I’ve said this in another comment, so likewise I’ll preface that I’m not from the US so I use liberal as in classical liberalism, but under a materialist interpretation that I’m prone to agree with, liberalism is a bourgeois conservative ideology, thus a liberal is inherently in favor of the status quo and capitalism. So really, it’s not about perfection, but rather an irreconcilable difference, or a contradiction, if you will. This is not to say that progressive liberals/social democrats can’t enact meaningful material reforms, but usually not without confounding factors.
As for excusing Stalin and dismissing the opposition from progressives against the real threat of the far right, can’t say I’m fond of the tribalism so common, but not exclusively, with MLs either.
Yes, OUTSIDE of the western bubble, the concept of right wing communists is pretty common. But as soon as westerners see it they’re like “Why are you Communist AND criticizing the progressive left?”
Welcome to your first encounter with right/conservative/traditionalist or Nationalist Communism.
This is not a difficult thing to grasp:
Communism/Socialism are ECONOMIC as well as political philosophies. So you can have ECONOMIC views that can have either left or right POLITICAL philosophies attached.
Don’t forget how they will also criticize western leftists and progressives endlessly for not being perfect and not even mention the right wing or non-western dictators. Bernie Sanders and AOC are apparently basically Nazis but Stalin was fiiiiine and who even cares about keeping fascists out of power.
Obligatory fuck the USSR, rest in piss
ok… but why fuck the USSR?
Europe will never forgive the USSR for things like the 8-hour working day, women’s rights, fighting against colonialism (including Germany and Japan, but also including many other places, like Vietnam, Mozambique, Korea, etc.), massively improving life expectancy and education, guaranteed housing, and otherwise improving workers’ living conditions.
We didn’t rely on the USSR for the 8-hour working day or women’s rights
The presence of the USSR absolutely caused capitalist countries to make concessions on those things.
Further, who were the people in those respective countries who fight for those things? By and large, Communists
Don’t forget how the idea of anti-authoritarianism is just reactionary and therefore can be hand-waved away. Dictatorships are cool as long as they align with the “correct” principles.
https://lemmy.today/comment/26047567
I’ve said this in another comment, so likewise I’ll preface that I’m not from the US so I use liberal as in classical liberalism, but under a materialist interpretation that I’m prone to agree with, liberalism is a bourgeois conservative ideology, thus a liberal is inherently in favor of the status quo and capitalism. So really, it’s not about perfection, but rather an irreconcilable difference, or a contradiction, if you will. This is not to say that progressive liberals/social democrats can’t enact meaningful material reforms, but usually not without confounding factors.
As for excusing Stalin and dismissing the opposition from progressives against the real threat of the far right, can’t say I’m fond of the tribalism so common, but not exclusively, with MLs either.
Yes, OUTSIDE of the western bubble, the concept of right wing communists is pretty common. But as soon as westerners see it they’re like “Why are you Communist AND criticizing the progressive left?”
Welcome to your first encounter with right/conservative/traditionalist or Nationalist Communism.
This is not a difficult thing to grasp:
Communism/Socialism are ECONOMIC as well as political philosophies. So you can have ECONOMIC views that can have either left or right POLITICAL philosophies attached.
Understand?