• Cowbee [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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    4 months ago

    Ah yes, we’re running socities based off of vibes. I’m sure those 40 to 80 million Chinese who were murdered under Mao were totally not vibing with his tyrannical Marxism. Do you even hear yourself? Governments don’t exist in a binary states of tyrannical and free, the levels of authoritarianism exist in a spectrum. But the levels of tyranny and freedom are measurable, and we do have stats for them. But even if there weren’t it really easy to tell the difference between the extremes. Anybody with a shred of common sense can see that New Zealand and Norway are free and democratic countries while Iran and North Korea are tyrannical. All Marxist attempts have been on the more extreme end of tyranny than anywhere near the free and democratic end.

    You still didn’t answer the question, where is the definitive metric that something becomes authoritarian or not? Mao’s cultural revolution was largely a failure, and he was democratically removed for it. Secondly, economies which have democratic participation are more democratic than Capitalist economies, which are governed by essentially warlords.

    This doesn’t disprove my point. Whether Allende took power democratically or by force, the result was going to be the same. So no, Marx and Engles were not right. Not to mention, that the cold war wasn’t just the US, the USSR was the other superpower who was also overthrowing governments, starting civil wars, invading countries, and so on. The only difference is that history proved that capitalist societies to be more resilient.

    It does disprove your point, Allende got couped by the US. Secondly, putting the USSR and the US as equal evils and simply saying it’s fine because the USSR voted to balkanize late in its life is silly. The US is absolutely hated by the global south, while Marxist revolutions were popping up all the time during the cold war, and still do at a lower rate today. There was a clear difference in which society was better for the global south. The USSR collapsing via vote wasn’t due to lack of resiliance, it didn’t crumble or fail to support itself, it was killed off.

    All in all, you need to check your history, and read Marx if you want to have such strong yet wrong understandings of Marxism. Even reading Critique of the Gotha Programme would help you a lot.

    • SleezyDizasta@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      Marxism is not destroying a system, but replacing it and moving beyond. Capitalism is failing and continues to see increased disparity over time.

      This is a dumb statement. How do you replace a “failing” system without destroying it? Especially when the replacement is prescribed in the form of violent revolution.

      Also I’m going to insert a little counter to add up how many times you try to pass your opinion as fact.

      Counter++

      Count = 1

      Reason: Capitalism isn’t failing, that’s just your opinion.

      Petite bourgeoisie have more to gain under Socialism than they would under Capitalism, typically.

      By losing their livelihoods and their life’s work? Actually delusional.

      Secondly, managing to be a lawyer with a firm is not simply “a good choice,” it takes luck and a safety net that allows for that.

      You could say that about everything in life.

      The idea that most people would opt out of Socialism is historically inaccurate as well. All in all, you’re deeply goofy here.

      I’m the goofy one? You’re literally making stuff up because you can’t come with any evidence based rebuttals.

      Counter++

      Count = 2

      Reason: Most people not wanting socialism is not historically inaccurate, hence why so much violence is necessary. You just simply think that is the case.

      You’re inserting your own conclusions here, yet again.

      No, my argument is logically sound. In fact, it’s common sense.

      These instutitions would be removed or replaced, sure, but not firebombed. You can see historical Marxist revolutions to know that wasn’t accurate.

      This is just the red herring fallacy. I already said that I was being hyperbolic with that, even though the statement does hold some truth to it. Regardless, you’re intentionally dodging the actual point made with this.

      Representative democracy is still democracy, I cannot believe you are genuinely suggesting otherwise.

      Authoritarianism and democracy aren’t opposite concepts. If you consider CPSU and the CCP examples of democracy then your threshold for what a democracy is not right.

      Oh, more historical inaccuracy. Marxist revolutions have been because of civil unrest, which is why they were supported by the mahority of people.

      You make this claim twice now without any evidence. In Russia, China, Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, and the list goes on all resulted in civil wars where the majority of the population, or the very least around half, did not support the Marxists. In all these cases, the Marxists groups tried to instigate coups or civil wars with the aim of grabbing power. These aren’t civil unrest turned revolution like the French revolution.

      Counter++

      Count = 3

      Reason: Marxist revolutions have not been supported by the majority of people. You just think that’s the case.

      Secondly, you’re asserting that a party cannot be controlled democratically by the general public, and that the general public cannot enter the party, which is also wrong.

      />sees a claim

      />calls it wrong

      />refuses to elaborate

      Winning formula you got there. But no, this is not what I said. I said that the volatility and fragility of a post revolution society controlled by the Marxist faction that initially took control won’t allow any dissent or a diversity of opinion because it’s threatens their newly found authoritarian powers and the fate of the revolution they fought for. There’s a reason why every single Marxist revolution ended up being either an authoritarian dictatorship or an authoritarian one party state dictatorship.

      America is a dictatorship of the bourgeoise as described by Marx. The state is run by parties that are nearly entirely funded by wealthy Capitalists, with media funded by wealthy Capitalists that manufacture consent in the general public. This is basic Marxism here, not understanding what Marx meant has been a core issue with your entire argument.

      You know what? Let’s use basic Marxism to disprove your ridiculous claim. While Marx didn’t have a specific definition of what a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie is, he did talk a lot about it was through his works. It could be boiled down to these five points:

      1. Marx thought that an integral part of the the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie was the use of the state apparatus such as government institutions, the legal system, police, and military to protect their dominance and interests.

      Is this true here? No, from Teddy Roosevelt all the way up to today, the state apparatus has constantly stood alongside the American people, and especially the American workers. There’s a tug of war that pulls one way or another, but the state is not a tool of the bourgeoisie as Marx defined it.

      1. Marx viewed the enforcement of capitalist Interests as a key part of the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie refers where the bourgeoisie use state power to impose their economic and political interests on society. This includes protecting private property, enforcing laws that benefit capitalists, suppressing dissent and resistance from the working class, and maintaining social order favorable to capitalist accumulation.

      Is this true here? Sort of. It true that bourgeoisie as defined by Marx do impose their economic and political interests on society to their benefit. This isn’t exactly a big secret and it is why a lot of people are calling for stronger economic regulations and accountability in political discourse. However, at the same time, Marx viewed objectively positive things like protecting private property, promoting capitalism, or maintaining social order to be examples of the state doing the bidding of the bourgeoisie when that’s not true, these things are to the benefit of everybody.

      1. Marx constantly argued that the bourgeoisie would resort to authoritarian measures, such censorship, repression of political opposition, and the use of state violence to maintain its rule and protect its privileges.

      Is this true here? No, the US has pretty strong laws that ban such practices and punishes those who do. Not to mention that most of these actions would be protected by the 1st amendment of the constitution. This Actually used to be more true during the gilded age, but that stopped being a thing in the early 20th century.

      1. Marx saw the bourgeoisie as a historical phase that emerged with the rise of capitalism where the bourgeoisie replaced the feudal nobility as the ruling class and reshaped society according to capitalist principles.

      Is this true here? No, the US was never a feudalist society. It was always capitalist liberal democracy.

      1. One of the things that Marx kept harping on is the idea that the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie would eventually give way to the dictatorship of the proletariat.

      Is this true here? Lol no, Americans overwhelmingly reject Marxism, and no this isn’t a result of propaganda like you keep telling yourself to cope. It’s an objectively bad ideology that most people reject on the basis of it’s own atrocious history and bad merits that don’t hold up. If Marxism didn’t take hold back during the gilded age where things were wayyyyyyy worse and Marxism was way more popular, then it’s not going to happen any time soon.

      So let’s tally up how many of these points apply… and the results are? 1/5, maybe. The US today is not a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie as Marx defined it. Do you know what was? 19th century Britain, France, and Prussia… the place he’s from. This is because his ideology is a result of the location where he lived and of era when he lived. But Prussia is no more and so is the 19th century, Marxism is irrelevant.

      Democratic for the people. Owning stocks doesn’t make you bourgeois, neither does owning your home. Petite bourgeoisie are suppressed by larger bourgeoisie into the proletariat.

      What people dingus? Saying for the people is meaningless when most people will end up suffering and being in a worse position.

      Secondly, the idea that the average worker with a 401k would be upset to not have to worry about saving for retirement ever again, with higher wages and free healthcare, education, and shorter work weeks is silly.

      Ah yes, everybody also gets free ponies, genies, and a state of the art AI powered sex robots. You’re actually out of touch. For the record, I am actually in favor of all of those things, but none of these are going to be brought by Marxism. Do you know how I know? Because every Marxist attempt in history has brought the opposite. In the situations where these were implemented, the results abysmal and conditions actually got worse. The real irony here is that all the things you listed exist under capitalism, and they are implemented best under capitalist societies.

      Counter++

      Count = 4

      Reason: Writing as delusional wish list of what you think Marxism would bring doesn’t actually mean Marxism will bring those things, it doesn’t even promise or advocate for those things.

      “It’s accurate because I say it is.”

      Uhhh that’s what you’re doing, not me. You’re the one who claimed that my phrases were loaded, wrong, fearmongering, and a bunch of other nonsense without providing any arguments to support claims whatsoever. That is literally “you’re wrong because i said so”. I merely pointed out the fact that your opinions on my descriptions don’t invalidate them. You not liking them does not make them any less true or valid, especially when you don’t even have an argument to go off of. Trying to pull a “no u” is not going to work here.

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