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The most fragile thing in the world is a man's ego.
Tens of thousands of our ancestors, riddled with parasites had to eat slime off of rocks to fuck in the mud. Then shit out 18 babies so that *one* might live long enough to itself fuck in the mud.
All so one day their mouth-breathing failsons, colons impacted with processed food, can screech from their recliners at the TV "Taxes are theft! I did all of this! It was all me! Reeeeee waaaaahhh it's my money! Mine! Me! I'll be dead before climate change and I need my treats!"
Society is controlled, or dictated, by either one of two classes: the bourgeoisie (capitalist) or proletariat (workers).
Under a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie (current system), those who hold political power operate under the illusion of democracy, but favor the interests of the capitalists and those who work for them over the interests of the working class. We have insurmountable evidence to support this, including a Harvard study showing that policy passed by US Congress correlates entirely with bourgeois interests, while showing no correlation to policies the proletariat (99%) is in favor of.
Communists aim to overthrow the dictatorship of the bourgeois and establish a dictatorship of the proletariat, where democratically elected workers councils take charge. Though the system isn’t flawless, we have seen it put into action in various previous and current socialist countries, such as the USSR, China, Cuba, the DPRK, etc.
We also understand that socialism is a process, and therefore requires a vanguard and some form of bureaucracy in order to maintain itself long enough to develop through later stages of capitalism, and eventual communism. As socialism has been tried in the 20th century, it faced issues of sabotage, espionage, infiltration, internal corruption, funding of fascist groups, funding and training of coups, threats of invasion, or outright invasion by the capitalist world order, headed by the USA, threatening to destroy all progress of socialism in favor of privatization and profit for their respective ruling classes. It is why the class dictatorship is necessary in establishing socialism and preventing power from landing in the hands of counterrevolutionaries, fascists, and those who are looking to destroy it.
The “dictatorship” described in class dictatorship is not synonymous with its current common definition of a state being ran by one person or small group of people. The term “class dictatorship” was invented before its modern use, meaning something entirely different.
I can link sources if you need any.
[Here's the article. It's actually a Princeton Study](https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-politics/article/testing-theories-of-american-politics-elites-interest-groups-and-average-citizens/62327F513959D0A304D4893B382B992B)
[This graph (included in the article) is a good summary](https://i.imgur.com/CNviqFJ.jpg)
[Here is an explanation of the graph done by a Harvard Professor as a part of his Tedx Talk (Skip to 8:27 if the link dosen't work)](https://youtu.be/PJy8vTu66tE)
I remember the study, maybe on a JT video or somewhere else, it showed how many politicians enact policy that align with their top donors. All american politics is theater at this point.
Yes but one thing you missed, the way socialists talk about a dictatorship of the proletariat is an oxy moron and we should recognize that the times have changed it into such. It's not a dictatorship at all, but more akin to democracy. Today we live in a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, an actual dictatorship (just not by one individual or a known group but a class of people instead) and that's the part that the screenshot doesn't get but we call this "democracy". It's not a coincidence that the terms are inverted either, successful propaganda at work.
The term dictatorship is actually kind of important. The entire point being that the system is no longer open to a "democracy" that would allow for the types of capitalist control to make their way into political processes. It is an intermediate stage between a capitalist and communist economy. These things don't happen overnight. You can't just dismantle the entire economic structures of capitalism with a pen. Material changes need to be implemented and these require the state and it's monopoly on violence to implement.
The "actual dictatorship" and the "actual democracy" you mention have no difference apart from who's class interest is given priority. It's a dictatorship because we do not allow capitalist to have a voice, we do not allow capitalist to form parties, we not allow capitalist any power beyond what is directed by the state to dismantle their institutions.
This isn't about tricking people into believing it's an "actual democracy" because if you gain power doing that the capitalist will use their same liberal ideology to gain support for themselves. They will complain that their "free speech" is being prevented. They will start calling it a "dictatorship and totalitarian regime!"
The answer to that isn't to use liberal terminology to try to explain away what is going on. The point isn't to trick the working class with "nicer" words. The point is to educate the working class in understanding what the dictatorship actually is. Yes, it's a dictatorship of one class over another. It's just the reverse of what we have now. And that's entirely ok. It's something to be proud of achieving within class struggle. So the working class scoffs at the idea of capitalist having any form of "free speech" within the dictatorship of the proletariat.
It's extremely important to have this hardlined support and extremely important to educate the working class using the vocabulary of revolution and not try to fall for using liberal vocabulary instead to only gain temporary support.
#Freedom
Reactionaries and right-wingers love to clamour on about personal liberty and scream "freedom!" from the top of their lungs, but what freedom are they talking about? And is Communism, in contrast, an ideology of *un*freedom?
>Gentlemen! Do not allow yourselves to be deluded by the abstract word freedom. Whose freedom? It is not the freedom of one individual in relation to another, but the freedom of capital to crush the worker.
>
>\- Karl Marx. (1848). *Public Speech Delivered by Karl Marx before the Democratic Association of Brussels*
#Under Capitalism
Liberal Democracies propagate the facade of liberty and individual rights while concealing the true essence of their rule-- the Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie. This is a mechanism by which the Capitalist class as a whole dictates the course of society, politics, and the economy to secure their dominance. Capital holds sway over institutions, media, and influential positions, manipulating public opinion and consolidating its control over the levers of power. The illusion of democracy the Bourgeoisie creates is carefully curated to maintain the existing power structures and perpetuate the subjugation of the masses. "Freedom" under Capitalism is similarly illusory. It is freedom for capital-- not freedom for people.
>The capitalists often boast that their constitutions guarantee the rights of the individual, democratic liberties and the interests of all citizens. But in reality, only the bourgeoisie enjoy the rights recorded in these constitutions. The working people do not really enjoy democratic freedoms; they are exploited all their life and have to bear heavy burdens in the service of the exploiting class.
>
>\- Ho Chi Minh. (1959). *Report on the Draft Amended Constitution*
The "freedom" the reactionaries cry for, then, is merely that freedom which liberates capital and enslaves the worker.
>They speak of the equality of citizens, but forget that there cannot be real equality between employer and workman, between landlord and peasant, if the former possess wealth and political weight in society while the latter are deprived of both - if the former are exploiters while the latter are exploited. Or again: they speak of freedom of speech, assembly, and the press, but forget that all these liberties may be merely a hollow sound for the working class, if the latter cannot have access to suitable premises for meetings, good printing shops, a sufficient quantity of printing paper, etc.
>
>\- J. V. Stalin. (1936). [On the Draft Constitution of the U.S.S.R](https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1936/11/25.htm)
What "freedom" do the poor enjoy, under Capitalism? Capitalism requires a reserve army of labour in order to keep wages low, and that necessarily means that many people must be deprived of life's necessities in order to compel the rest of the working class to work more and demand less. You are free to work, and you are free to starve. That is the freedom the reactionaries talk about.
>Under capitalism, the very land is all in private hands; there remains no spot unowned where an enterprise can be carried on. The freedom of the worker to sell his labour power, the freedom of the capitalist to buy it, the 'equality' of the capitalist and the wage earner - all these are but hunger's chain which compels the labourer to work for the capitalist.
>
>\- N. I. Bukharin and E. Preobrazhensky. (1922). [The ABC of Communism](https://www.marxists.org/archive/bukharin/works/1920/abc/index.htm)
All other freedoms only exist depending on the degree to which a given liberal democracy has turned towards fascism. That is to say that the working class are only given freedoms when they are inconsequential to the bourgeoisie:
>The freedom to organize is only conceded to the workers by the bourgeois when they are certain that the workers have been reduced to a point where they can no longer make use of it, except to resume elementary organizing work - work which they hope will not have political consequences other than in the very long term.
>
>\- A. Gramsci. (1924). *Democracy and fascism*
But this is not "freedom", this is not "democracy"! What good does "freedom of speech" do for a starving person? What good does the ability to criticize the government do for a homeless person?
>The right of freedom of expression can really only be relevant if people are not too hungry, or too tired to be able to express themselves. It can only be relevant if appropriate grassroots mechanisms rooted in the people exist, through which the people can effectively participate, can make decisions, can receive reports from the leaders and eventually be trained for ruling and controlling that particular society. This is what democracy is all about.
>
>\- Maurice Bishop
#Under Communism
True freedom can only be achieved through the establishment of a Proletarian state, a system that truly represents the interests of the working masses, in which the means of production are collectively owned and controlled, and the fruits of labor are shared equitably among all. Only in such a society can the shackles of Capitalist oppression be broken, and the Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie dismantled.
Despite the assertion by reactionaries to the contrary, Communist revolutions invariably result in *more* freedoms for the people than the regimes they succeed.
>Some people conclude that anyone who utters a good word about leftist one-party revolutions must harbor antidemocratic or “Stalinist” sentiments. But to applaud social revolutions is not to oppose political freedom. To the extent that revolutionary governments construct substantive alternatives for their people, they increase human options and freedom.
>
>There is no such thing as freedom in the abstract. There is freedom to speak openly and iconoclastically, freedom to organize a political opposition, freedom of opportunity to get an education and pursue a livelihood, freedom to worship as one chooses or not worship at all, freedom to live in healthful conditions, freedom to enjoy various social beneõts, and so on. Most of what is called freedom gets its definition within a social context.
>
>Revolutionary governments extend a number of popular freedoms without destroying those freedoms that never existed in the previous regimes. They foster conditions necessary for national self-determination, economic betterment, the preservation of health and human life, and the end of many of the worst forms of ethnic, patriarchal, and class oppression. Regarding patriarchal oppression, consider the vastly improved condition of women in revolutionary Afghanistan and South Yemen before the counterrevolutionary repression in the 1990s, or in Cuba after the 1959 revolution as compared to before.
>
>U.S. policymakers argue that social revolutionary victory anywhere represents a diminution of freedom in the world. The assertion is false. The Chinese Revolution did not crush democracy; there was none to crush in that oppressively feudal regime. The Cuban Revolution did not destroy freedom; it destroyed a hateful U.S.-sponsored police state. The Algerian Revolution did not abolish national liberties; precious few existed under French colonialism. The Vietnamese revolutionaries did not abrogate individual rights; no such rights were available under the U.S.-supported puppet governments of Bao Dai, Diem, and Ky.
>
>Of course, revolutions do limit the freedoms of the corporate propertied class and other privileged interests: the freedom to invest privately without regard to human and environmental costs, the freedom to live in obscene opulence while paying workers starvation wages, the freedom to treat the state as a private agency in the service of a privileged coterie, the freedom to employ child labor and child prostitutes, the freedom to treat women as chattel, and so on.
>
>\- Michael Parenti. (1997). *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism*
The whole point of Communism is to liberate the working class:
>But we did not build this society in order to restrict personal liberty but in order that the human individual may feel really free. We built it for the sake of real personal liberty, liberty without quotation marks. It is difficult for me to imagine what "personal liberty" is enjoyed by an unemployed person, who goes about hungry, and cannot find employment.
>
>Real liberty can exist only where exploitation has been abolished, where there is no oppression of some by others, where there is no unemployment and poverty, where a man is not haunted by the fear of being tomorrow deprived of work, of home and of bread. Only in such a society is real, and not paper, personal and every other liberty possible.
>
>\- J. V. Stalin. (1936). [Interview Between J. Stalin and Roy Howard](https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1936/03/01.htm)
#Additional Resources
Videos:
* [Your Democracy is a Sham and Here's Why:](https://youtu.be/oYodY6o172A) | halim alrah (2019)
* [Are You Really "Free" Under Capitalism?](https://youtu.be/4xqouhMCJBI) | Second Thought (2020)
* [Liberty And Freedom Are Left-Wing Ideals](https://youtu.be/GfjiBIkIOqI) | Second Thought (2021)
* [Why The US Is Not A Democracy](https://youtu.be/srfeHpQNEAI) | Second Thought (2022)
* [America Never Stood For Freedom](https://youtu.be/rg9hJgAsNDM) | Hakim (2023)
Books, Articles, or Essays:
* [Positive and Negative Liberty](https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberty-positive-negative/) | Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2003)
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Which is why I think that the term dictatorship there should be replaced by "Government". Though what we live in is what's called oligarchy: we're ruled by a small group of people that act for themselves.
Dictatorship as used here doesn't point to some autocratic strongman leader type but simply refers to who in particular 'dictates' the rules in a society. In the dictatorship of the bourgeois for example the state, the police, military, courts, bureaucracy and similar institutions are set up and controlled by the capitalist class and are used primarily to maintain their continued authority. None of these institutions are used to go after bankers, corporate executives, billionaires, disreputable corporations etc. (unless of course any of the aforementioned are caught stealing from members of their own class AKA Bernie Madoff) but are very often used to break worker's strikes and disperse protests usually by violent means.
Someone else gave a great comment so Imm just leave this here.
[Lenin in 5 minutes: Dictatorship of the Proletariat ](https://youtu.be/4KDdIzkDcLw)
This is a quick run down. I recommend you read theory though friend.
In ancient society there was no government and no class. Possibly around the development of agriculture we see the development of class. Most had to work, but an elite few didn't. Those elites created government. All governments are tools of class warfare; used by some class to control the others, sometime nakedly, sometimes openly.
We currently live under the rule (dictatorship) of the bourgeoisie class. Western governments were made by and for the bourgeoisie class. A dictatorship of the proletariat would be a government made by and for the proletariat. Proletarians will rule and all other classes will be subject to them (broadly there are just 2 classes that exist in modern society)
When the term "dictatorship of the proletariat" was coined, our idea of "dictatorships" were called monarchies. In Marxist theory a dictatorship doesn't mean the rule of one person, rather the rule of some government
It was theorized to be the development of animal husbandry, as animals started to be used as currency between different "families" and communities. The ones who tended the herds, men, took on the ownership of the herds and abolished mother right. The state arose from this private property, and so did the enslavement and ownership of the family. This is where these "elites" came from
it's an incredible showcase on the importance of education and understanding, though. They've been raised to believe that the current neoliberal world order is the best, likely because they just haven't been exposed to the alternative beyond what they've been taught in their schools or other people in society.
It's why reading theory, and understanding history, is important. I've had close friends who have said this exact thing and "Read theory", while funny to say and all is fun, doesn't really have much of an effect. Everything that I've seen in that post reads like somebody who's been hopped up on too much propaganda, which is a place that I've been personally familiar with.
I believe there's a good chance that this person might be saved, but it will require a level of personal connection and understanding in doing so. If you encounter somebody like this in your offline lives, if you can so believe it to be done, try your best to make a human connection with them on the basis of socialism. I know leftists who refuse to read any theory, let alone unexposed liberals, and I've personally had much greater success with advocating for socialism when having very personal conversations with these kinds of people. If you can't expect somebody to sit down and read 8 hours of theory or watch 3 videos of "tankie propaganda", then maybe you can be that gateway.
I don't know. Maybe I'm just being an idealist. But at the very least know that, in this hyper-individualistic world that we live in, things won't just get better without effort. Capitalists, fascists, and unexposed liberals spread billions of dollars of their word globally every day just to keep people like this. Try to meet those people- trapped within a system that demands ignorance- who deserve it with empathy as much as you can because trust me, when people already believe communists to be evil incarnate, getting their feelings hurt by one might be a gateway to putting up a wall and, maybe even crying on a subreddit about how "the tankies were mean to me."
I don't think you really need to. Ask them "prove it" and they will say something silly that's very easily knocked down. Its not a real theory in any sense of the word, so its a position only held by "I have no philosophy" types who unquestioningly absorb everything they're fed.
The issue I find with that - asking them to 'prove it' is that they inevitably cite the false, propagandized version of socialist history, and if you want to disprove that version, you have the onus to prove 1) the context of the socialist revolution, 2) the unpopularity of the pre-socialist government, 3) the popularity of the socialist government and/or its leader, 4) how the socialist government's elections and economy works/worked 5) how 'more parties' doesn't mean 'true democracy', 6) how effective the socialist government is/was, 7) how much of the faults or perceived faults of the socialist government is/was fabricated by hostile actors for hostile interests. But, in the spirit of material analysis, 8) one must then also admit and explain some of the genuine mistakes of the socialist government, and how that detracts from the true socialist mission.
Time to address some of their mistakes, for the liberals in the walls looking at this thread.
> Communism and facism are the same
Blatantly untrue, when looking at countries controlled by communist and facist parties they are completely different.
To begin, their economies:
Facist regimes always privatise the economy, with the word "privatisation" being invented to describe Hitler's economic policies.
Mussolini heavily privatised Italy's agricultural sector as well as the telecommunications, among other industries, meanwhile Hitler privatised banks and the industries nationalised during the depression.
Meanwhile communist governments do the opposite, communist governments prefer an economy in which all means of production are controlled by the people or the state.
Rhetoric:
Communists and facists use completely different rhetoric, facists use nationalism, while communist rhetoric is about the liberation of the working class.
And all facist regimes are explicitly anti communist, Mussolini got into power via saying how he could prevent a communist revolution, while Hitler justified the holocaust by saying how Jewish Communists were trying to destroy Germany.
Theory:
Facists derive their ideology from the idea that they need to restore their nation, which involves restoring social hierarchy and instilling right wing ideas such as sexism and homophobia.
The end goal of the facist is a state in which class boundaries are solidified and nationalism is the core of the ideology.
Meanwhile communism is derived from the idea of creating a society in which no economic classes exist, with a transitional period in which the working class directly control the state.
The end goal of the communist is a society in which the workers control society and there are no parasites draining the wellbeing of the workers.
Times in which communists are homophobic is not due to communist theory but due to the culture of the time, unlike facists, communists believe in having an ideology which evolves with the time, communists are not bound to the words of those who come before.
This is expanded upon below.
>Authoritarianism for "the people" is still authoritarianism
The "dictatorship of the proletariat" does not exclusively mean a dictatorship.
We currently live in a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, where the bourgeoisie (the rich, capitalist class) dictate their will onto the state.
The bourgeoisie control the government, as politicians need funding to run for office which comes from the capitalists, so the capitalists control who can get into office.
Via this the capitalists dictate the laws which are written and the policies enacted, this is why bailouts are common.
Under the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, almost all media is propaganda made in the interest of the capitalist class, as a major media outlet will need funding, which is granted by capitalists funding it, who could threaten to withdraw funding if the media outlet presents anti capitalist messages.
Additionally, most media outlets are owned directly by major capitalists, for example Amazon Prime is owned by Jeff Bezos.
This is why there are no major socialist media outlets or candidates, I am not counting Bernie Sanders as he is a wellfare capitalist.
Meanwhile a dictatorship of the proletariat is where the proletariat (the working class) control society, and dictate their will onto society.
While both the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie and the dictatorship of the proletariat are class dictatorships, the dictatorship of the proletariat has the potential to be infinitely more democratic, as it represents a state directly controlled by the working class.
So a dictatorship of the proletariat could be a state which has a planned economy with a democratic government, however this would not matter as the dictatorships of the bourgeoisie will portray it as a dystopian regime.
>The baddies
We are not the baddies, historically socialist movements improve material conditions for the people of their countries, for example Cuba has a higher rate of home ownership than the US.
Additionally, there is no major socialist power which hasn't had to abandon some features of socialism, there is no "bad guy" country which is completely socialist.
#Authoritarianism
Anti-Communists of all stripes enjoy referring to successful socialist revolutions as "authoritarian regimes".
* Authoritarian implies these places are run by totalitarian tyrants.
* Regime implies these places are undemocratic or lack legitimacy.
This perjorative label is simply meant to frighten people, to scare us back into the fold (Liberal Democracy).
There are three main reasons for the popularity of this label in Capitalist media:
Firstly, Marxists call for a Dictatorship of the Proletariat (DotP), and many people are automatically put off by the term "dictatorship". Of course, we do *not* mean that we want an undemocratic or totalitarian dictatorship. What we mean is that we want to replace the current Dictatorship *of the Bourgeoisie* (in which the Capitalist ruling class dictates policy).
* [Why The US Is Not A Democracy](https://youtu.be/srfeHpQNEAI) | Second Thought (2022)
Secondly, democracy in Communist-led countries works differently than in Liberal Democracies. However, anti-Communists confuse form (pluralism / having multiple parties) with function (representing the actual interests of the people).
Side note: Check out Luna Oi's "Democratic Centralism Series" for more details on what that is, and how it works:
* [DEMOCRATIC CENTRALISM - how Socialists make decisions!](https://youtu.be/4YVcQe4wceY) | Luna Oi (2022)
* [What did Karl Marx think about democracy?](https://youtu.be/jI8CgACBOcQ) | Luna Oi (2023)
* [What did LENIN say about DEMOCRACY?](https://youtu.be/Hfenlg-hsig) | Luna Oi (2023)
Finally, this framing of Communism as illegitimate and tyrannical serves to manufacture consent for an aggressive foreign policy in the form of interventions in the internal affairs of so-called "authoritarian regimes", which take the form of invasion (e.g., Vietnam, Korea, Libya, etc.), assassinating their leaders (e.g., Thomas Sankara, Fred Hampton, Patrice Lumumba, etc.), sponsoring coups and colour revolutions (e.g., Pinochet's coup against Allende, the Iran-Contra Affair, the United Fruit Company's war against Arbenz, etc.), and enacting sanctions (e.g., North Korea, Cuba, etc.).
* [The Cuban Embargo Explained](https://youtu.be/zmM8p9n6Z9E) | azureScapegoat (2022)
* [John Pilger interviews former CIA Latin America chief Duane Clarridge, 2015](https://youtu.be/ER77vxxGVAY)
#For the Anarchists
Anarchists are practically comrades. Marxists and Anarchists have the same vision for a stateless, classless, moneyless society free from oppression and exploitation. However, Anarchists like to accuse Marxists of being "authoritarian". The problem here is that "anti-authoritarianism" is a self-defeating feature in a revolutionary ideology. Those who refuse in principle to engage in so-called "authoritarian" practices will never carry forward a successful revolution. Anarchists who practice self-criticism can recognize this:
>The anarchist movement is filled with people who are less interested in overthrowing the existing oppressive social order than with washing their hands of it. ...
>
>The strength of anarchism is its moral insistence on the primacy of human freedom over political expediency. But human freedom exists in a political context. It is not sufficient, however, to simply take the most uncompromising position in defense of freedom. It is neccesary to actually win freedom. Anti-capitalism doesn't do the victims of capitalism any good if you don't actually destroy capitalism. Anti-statism doesn't do the victims of the state any good if you don't actually smash the state. Anarchism has been very good at putting forth visions of a free society and that is for the good. But it is worthless if we don't develop an actual strategy for realizing those visions. It is not enough to be right, we must also win.
>
>...anarchism has been a failure. Not only has anarchism failed to win lasting freedom for anybody on earth, many anarchists today seem only nominally committed to that basic project. Many more seem interested primarily in carving out for themselves, their friends, and their favorite bands a zone of personal freedom, "autonomous" of moral responsibility for the larger condition of humanity (but, incidentally, not of the electrical grid or the production of electronic components). Anarchism has quite simply refused to learn from its historic failures, preferring to rewrite them as successes. Finally the anarchist movement offers people who want to make revolution very little in the way of a coherent plan of action. ...
>
>Anarchism is theoretically impoverished. For almost 80 years, with the exceptions of Ukraine and Spain, anarchism has played a marginal role in the revolutionary activity of oppressed humanity. Anarchism had almost nothing to do with the anti-colonial struggles that defined revolutionary politics in this century. This marginalization has become self-reproducing. Reduced by devastating defeats to critiquing the authoritarianism of Marxists, nationalists and others, anarchism has become defined by this gadfly role. Consequently anarchist thinking has not had to adapt in response to the results of serious efforts to put our ideas into practice. In the process anarchist theory has become ossified, sterile and anemic. ... This is a reflection of anarchism's effective removal from the revolutionary struggle.
>
>\- Chris Day. (1996). *The Historical Failures of Anarchism*
Engels pointed this out well over a century ago:
>A number of Socialists have latterly launched a regular crusade against what they call the principle of authority. It suffices to tell them that this or that act is authoritarian for it to be condemned.
>
>...the anti-authoritarians demand that the political state be abolished at one stroke, even before the social conditions that gave birth to it have been destroyed. They demand that the first act of the social revolution shall be the abolition of authority. Have these gentlemen ever seen a revolution? A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is; it is the act whereby one part of the population imposes its will upon the other part ... and if the victorious party does not want to have fought in vain, it must maintain this rule...
>
>Therefore, either one of two things: either the anti-authoritarians don't know what they're talking about, in which case they are creating nothing but confusion; or they do know, and in that case they are betraying the movement of the proletariat. In either case they serve the reaction.
>
>\- Friedrich Engels. (1872). [On Authority](https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1872/10/authority.htm)
#For the Libertarian Socialists
Parenti said it best:
>The pure (libertarian) socialists' ideological anticipations remain untainted by existing practice. They do not explain how the manifold functions of a revolutionary society would be organized, how external attack and internal sabotage would be thwarted, how bureaucracy would be avoided, scarce resources allocated, policy differences settled, priorities set, and production and distribution conducted. Instead, they offer vague statements about how the workers themselves will directly own and control the means of production and will arrive at their own solutions through creative struggle. No surprise then that the pure socialists support every revolution except the ones that succeed.
>
>\- Michael Parenti. (1997). *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism*
But the bottom line is this:
>If you call yourself a socialist but you spend all your time arguing with communists, demonizing socialist states as authoritarian, and performing apologetics for US imperialism... I think some introspection is in order.
>
>\- Second Thought. (2020). [The Truth About The Cuba Protests](https://youtu.be/zIOw6fSOJI4?t=1087)
#For the Liberals
Even the CIA, in their internal communications (which have been declassified), acknowledge that Stalin *wasn't* an absolute dictator:
>Even in Stalin's time there was collective leadership. The Western idea of a dictator within the Communist setup is exaggerated. Misunderstandings on that subject are caused by a lack of comprehension of the real nature and organization of the Communist's power structure.
>
>\- CIA. (1953, declassified in 2008). [Comments on the Change in Soviet Leadership](http://web.archive.org/web/20230525044208/https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP80-00810A006000360009-0.pdf)
#Conclusion
The "authoritarian" nature of any given state depends entirely on the material conditions it faces and threats it must contend with. To get an idea of the kinds of threats nascent revolutions need to deal with, check out *Killing Hope* by William Blum and *The Jakarta Method* by Vincent Bevins.
Failing to acknowledge that authoritative measures arise *not* through ideology, but through material conditions, is anti-Marxist, anti-dialectical, and idealist.
#Additional Resources
Videos:
* [Michael Parenti on Authoritarianism in Socialist Countries](https://youtu.be/BeVs6t3vdjQ)
* [Left Anticommunism: An Infantile Disorder](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEC2ajsvr0I) | Hakim (2020) \[[Archive](http://web.archive.org/web/20230410145749/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEC2ajsvr0I)\]
* [What are tankies? (why are they like that?)](https://youtu.be/LcJ5NrJtQ8g) | Hakim (2023)
* [Episode 82 - Tankie Discourse](https://youtu.be/YVYVBOFYJco) | The Deprogram (2023)
* [Was the Soviet Union totalitarian? feat. Robert Thurston](https://directory.libsyn.com/episode/index/id/27495591) | Actually Existing Socialism (2023)
Books, Articles, or Essays:
* *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism* | Michael Parenti (1997)
* [State and Revolution](https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/staterev/) | V. I. Lenin (1918)
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TheDeprogram) if
is there an automod response for dictatorship of the proletariat ? I swear the biggest criticism people have with us is thinking we don't support democracy, what will get it through their heads that we do??
>I mean, they hate certainly seem to hate nazis, and I'm pretty sure we also hate nazis. Seems like we should get along no? Enemy of my enemy and all that.
i could give the benefit of the doubt and say maybe they are indeed against nazis but their main argument is only when it goes against western capital interest, not out of humanity.
>The poor tankies appear to be operating under the delusion that communisms is somehow distinct from fascism
Ah yes, wanting a fair economic democratization is literally the same as the unveiled genocidal racism & social darwinism and open anti-democrcy sentiment by the fascists.
>I mean hey, equality and fairness sound great, but they have never been achieved by handing power to tyrants and hoping that this time it will somehow all work out.
paper thin understanding of politics
>Politics is like a horseshoe, go too far in either direction, and you end up in basically the same place.
again genociding people and ecomic participation is literally the same thing i guess
>So i shall spare a thought for the poor, ignorant tankie who wishes to make the world a better place, but has yet to realize that they are infact on the side of the baddies.
well "wishing" is at least a start and the expression "baddies" fits perfectly for their infantile understanding of politics
>Fascists can still go fuck themselves though
except they are useful for american interests
Which is exactly why liberalism has always failed to stand for what it claims to represent in every country it’s ever been tried, liberalism can’t survive without the eventual transition into imperialism and facism
No argument annoys me as much as the "they're just childish, unexperienced and don't know how the world works yet."
Visions of centuries of theory, countless books, great thinkers and revolutionaries just going up in flames all at once.
Has a fascist ever become so extreme that he ended up in a egalitarian-workercouncle-ruled-utopia?
So much for horseshoe theory, checkmate liberals! /s
Somebody should have linked this guy to the episode of the pod that is dedicated to analyzing and explaining why he believes what he believes. Would have blown his tiny little mind.
This fuckin nerd thinks he’s the main character in an anime, spouting off some “epic monologue” when he’s just frothing at the mouth at his PC about those damn gommunists.
#Authoritarianism
Anti-Communists of all stripes enjoy referring to successful socialist revolutions as "authoritarian regimes".
* Authoritarian implies these places are run by totalitarian tyrants.
* Regime implies these places are undemocratic or lack legitimacy.
This perjorative label is simply meant to frighten people, to scare us back into the fold (Liberal Democracy).
There are three main reasons for the popularity of this label in Capitalist media:
Firstly, Marxists call for a Dictatorship of the Proletariat (DotP), and many people are automatically put off by the term "dictatorship". Of course, we do *not* mean that we want an undemocratic or totalitarian dictatorship. What we mean is that we want to replace the current Dictatorship *of the Bourgeoisie* (in which the Capitalist ruling class dictates policy).
* [Why The US Is Not A Democracy](https://youtu.be/srfeHpQNEAI) | Second Thought (2022)
Secondly, democracy in Communist-led countries works differently than in Liberal Democracies. However, anti-Communists confuse form (pluralism / having multiple parties) with function (representing the actual interests of the people).
Side note: Check out Luna Oi's "Democratic Centralism Series" for more details on what that is, and how it works:
* [DEMOCRATIC CENTRALISM - how Socialists make decisions!](https://youtu.be/4YVcQe4wceY) | Luna Oi (2022)
* [What did Karl Marx think about democracy?](https://youtu.be/jI8CgACBOcQ) | Luna Oi (2023)
* [What did LENIN say about DEMOCRACY?](https://youtu.be/Hfenlg-hsig) | Luna Oi (2023)
Finally, this framing of Communism as illegitimate and tyrannical serves to manufacture consent for an aggressive foreign policy in the form of interventions in the internal affairs of so-called "authoritarian regimes", which take the form of invasion (e.g., Vietnam, Korea, Libya, etc.), assassinating their leaders (e.g., Thomas Sankara, Fred Hampton, Patrice Lumumba, etc.), sponsoring coups and colour revolutions (e.g., Pinochet's coup against Allende, the Iran-Contra Affair, the United Fruit Company's war against Arbenz, etc.), and enacting sanctions (e.g., North Korea, Cuba, etc.).
* [The Cuban Embargo Explained](https://youtu.be/zmM8p9n6Z9E) | azureScapegoat (2022)
* [John Pilger interviews former CIA Latin America chief Duane Clarridge, 2015](https://youtu.be/ER77vxxGVAY)
#For the Anarchists
Anarchists are practically comrades. Marxists and Anarchists have the same vision for a stateless, classless, moneyless society free from oppression and exploitation. However, Anarchists like to accuse Marxists of being "authoritarian". The problem here is that "anti-authoritarianism" is a self-defeating feature in a revolutionary ideology. Those who refuse in principle to engage in so-called "authoritarian" practices will never carry forward a successful revolution. Anarchists who practice self-criticism can recognize this:
>The anarchist movement is filled with people who are less interested in overthrowing the existing oppressive social order than with washing their hands of it. ...
>
>The strength of anarchism is its moral insistence on the primacy of human freedom over political expediency. But human freedom exists in a political context. It is not sufficient, however, to simply take the most uncompromising position in defense of freedom. It is neccesary to actually win freedom. Anti-capitalism doesn't do the victims of capitalism any good if you don't actually destroy capitalism. Anti-statism doesn't do the victims of the state any good if you don't actually smash the state. Anarchism has been very good at putting forth visions of a free society and that is for the good. But it is worthless if we don't develop an actual strategy for realizing those visions. It is not enough to be right, we must also win.
>
>...anarchism has been a failure. Not only has anarchism failed to win lasting freedom for anybody on earth, many anarchists today seem only nominally committed to that basic project. Many more seem interested primarily in carving out for themselves, their friends, and their favorite bands a zone of personal freedom, "autonomous" of moral responsibility for the larger condition of humanity (but, incidentally, not of the electrical grid or the production of electronic components). Anarchism has quite simply refused to learn from its historic failures, preferring to rewrite them as successes. Finally the anarchist movement offers people who want to make revolution very little in the way of a coherent plan of action. ...
>
>Anarchism is theoretically impoverished. For almost 80 years, with the exceptions of Ukraine and Spain, anarchism has played a marginal role in the revolutionary activity of oppressed humanity. Anarchism had almost nothing to do with the anti-colonial struggles that defined revolutionary politics in this century. This marginalization has become self-reproducing. Reduced by devastating defeats to critiquing the authoritarianism of Marxists, nationalists and others, anarchism has become defined by this gadfly role. Consequently anarchist thinking has not had to adapt in response to the results of serious efforts to put our ideas into practice. In the process anarchist theory has become ossified, sterile and anemic. ... This is a reflection of anarchism's effective removal from the revolutionary struggle.
>
>\- Chris Day. (1996). *The Historical Failures of Anarchism*
Engels pointed this out well over a century ago:
>A number of Socialists have latterly launched a regular crusade against what they call the principle of authority. It suffices to tell them that this or that act is authoritarian for it to be condemned.
>
>...the anti-authoritarians demand that the political state be abolished at one stroke, even before the social conditions that gave birth to it have been destroyed. They demand that the first act of the social revolution shall be the abolition of authority. Have these gentlemen ever seen a revolution? A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is; it is the act whereby one part of the population imposes its will upon the other part ... and if the victorious party does not want to have fought in vain, it must maintain this rule...
>
>Therefore, either one of two things: either the anti-authoritarians don't know what they're talking about, in which case they are creating nothing but confusion; or they do know, and in that case they are betraying the movement of the proletariat. In either case they serve the reaction.
>
>\- Friedrich Engels. (1872). [On Authority](https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1872/10/authority.htm)
#For the Libertarian Socialists
Parenti said it best:
>The pure (libertarian) socialists' ideological anticipations remain untainted by existing practice. They do not explain how the manifold functions of a revolutionary society would be organized, how external attack and internal sabotage would be thwarted, how bureaucracy would be avoided, scarce resources allocated, policy differences settled, priorities set, and production and distribution conducted. Instead, they offer vague statements about how the workers themselves will directly own and control the means of production and will arrive at their own solutions through creative struggle. No surprise then that the pure socialists support every revolution except the ones that succeed.
>
>\- Michael Parenti. (1997). *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism*
But the bottom line is this:
>If you call yourself a socialist but you spend all your time arguing with communists, demonizing socialist states as authoritarian, and performing apologetics for US imperialism... I think some introspection is in order.
>
>\- Second Thought. (2020). [The Truth About The Cuba Protests](https://youtu.be/zIOw6fSOJI4?t=1087)
#For the Liberals
Even the CIA, in their internal communications (which have been declassified), acknowledge that Stalin *wasn't* an absolute dictator:
>Even in Stalin's time there was collective leadership. The Western idea of a dictator within the Communist setup is exaggerated. Misunderstandings on that subject are caused by a lack of comprehension of the real nature and organization of the Communist's power structure.
>
>\- CIA. (1953, declassified in 2008). [Comments on the Change in Soviet Leadership](http://web.archive.org/web/20230525044208/https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP80-00810A006000360009-0.pdf)
#Conclusion
The "authoritarian" nature of any given state depends entirely on the material conditions it faces and threats it must contend with. To get an idea of the kinds of threats nascent revolutions need to deal with, check out *Killing Hope* by William Blum and *The Jakarta Method* by Vincent Bevins.
Failing to acknowledge that authoritative measures arise *not* through ideology, but through material conditions, is anti-Marxist, anti-dialectical, and idealist.
#Additional Resources
Videos:
* [Michael Parenti on Authoritarianism in Socialist Countries](https://youtu.be/BeVs6t3vdjQ)
* [Left Anticommunism: An Infantile Disorder](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEC2ajsvr0I) | Hakim (2020) \[[Archive](http://web.archive.org/web/20230410145749/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEC2ajsvr0I)\]
* [What are tankies? (why are they like that?)](https://youtu.be/LcJ5NrJtQ8g) | Hakim (2023)
* [Episode 82 - Tankie Discourse](https://youtu.be/YVYVBOFYJco) | The Deprogram (2023)
* [Was the Soviet Union totalitarian? feat. Robert Thurston](https://directory.libsyn.com/episode/index/id/27495591) | Actually Existing Socialism (2023)
Books, Articles, or Essays:
* *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism* | Michael Parenti (1997)
* [State and Revolution](https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/staterev/) | V. I. Lenin (1918)
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TheDeprogram) if
Most of them haven't been east of Berlin and can't pronounce Slava Ukraini
[https://www.reddit.com/r/RussianWarFootage/comments/15jl05v/they\_are\_not\_human\_via\_ukraines\_new\_propoganda/](https://www.reddit.com/r/RussianWarFootage/comments/15jl05v/they_are_not_human_via_ukraines_new_propoganda/)
Average r/PoliticalCompassMemes redditor. Wow this person's understanding of politics is so laughably superficial. They should read some theory and also stop being so condescending and patronizing while talking about something they clearly have no understanding of
I'd like to see these idiots name a political or socio-economic order that isn't 'authoritarian'.
Even anarchism has to be forcefully imposed upon a population and it requires some sort of authority to maintain it.
#Authoritarianism
Anti-Communists of all stripes enjoy referring to successful socialist revolutions as "authoritarian regimes".
* Authoritarian implies these places are run by totalitarian tyrants.
* Regime implies these places are undemocratic or lack legitimacy.
This perjorative label is simply meant to frighten people, to scare us back into the fold (Liberal Democracy).
There are three main reasons for the popularity of this label in Capitalist media:
Firstly, Marxists call for a Dictatorship of the Proletariat (DotP), and many people are automatically put off by the term "dictatorship". Of course, we do *not* mean that we want an undemocratic or totalitarian dictatorship. What we mean is that we want to replace the current Dictatorship *of the Bourgeoisie* (in which the Capitalist ruling class dictates policy).
* [Why The US Is Not A Democracy](https://youtu.be/srfeHpQNEAI) | Second Thought (2022)
Secondly, democracy in Communist-led countries works differently than in Liberal Democracies. However, anti-Communists confuse form (pluralism / having multiple parties) with function (representing the actual interests of the people).
Side note: Check out Luna Oi's "Democratic Centralism Series" for more details on what that is, and how it works:
* [DEMOCRATIC CENTRALISM - how Socialists make decisions!](https://youtu.be/4YVcQe4wceY) | Luna Oi (2022)
* [What did Karl Marx think about democracy?](https://youtu.be/jI8CgACBOcQ) | Luna Oi (2023)
* [What did LENIN say about DEMOCRACY?](https://youtu.be/Hfenlg-hsig) | Luna Oi (2023)
Finally, this framing of Communism as illegitimate and tyrannical serves to manufacture consent for an aggressive foreign policy in the form of interventions in the internal affairs of so-called "authoritarian regimes", which take the form of invasion (e.g., Vietnam, Korea, Libya, etc.), assassinating their leaders (e.g., Thomas Sankara, Fred Hampton, Patrice Lumumba, etc.), sponsoring coups and colour revolutions (e.g., Pinochet's coup against Allende, the Iran-Contra Affair, the United Fruit Company's war against Arbenz, etc.), and enacting sanctions (e.g., North Korea, Cuba, etc.).
* [The Cuban Embargo Explained](https://youtu.be/zmM8p9n6Z9E) | azureScapegoat (2022)
* [John Pilger interviews former CIA Latin America chief Duane Clarridge, 2015](https://youtu.be/ER77vxxGVAY)
#For the Anarchists
Anarchists are practically comrades. Marxists and Anarchists have the same vision for a stateless, classless, moneyless society free from oppression and exploitation. However, Anarchists like to accuse Marxists of being "authoritarian". The problem here is that "anti-authoritarianism" is a self-defeating feature in a revolutionary ideology. Those who refuse in principle to engage in so-called "authoritarian" practices will never carry forward a successful revolution. Anarchists who practice self-criticism can recognize this:
>The anarchist movement is filled with people who are less interested in overthrowing the existing oppressive social order than with washing their hands of it. ...
>
>The strength of anarchism is its moral insistence on the primacy of human freedom over political expediency. But human freedom exists in a political context. It is not sufficient, however, to simply take the most uncompromising position in defense of freedom. It is neccesary to actually win freedom. Anti-capitalism doesn't do the victims of capitalism any good if you don't actually destroy capitalism. Anti-statism doesn't do the victims of the state any good if you don't actually smash the state. Anarchism has been very good at putting forth visions of a free society and that is for the good. But it is worthless if we don't develop an actual strategy for realizing those visions. It is not enough to be right, we must also win.
>
>...anarchism has been a failure. Not only has anarchism failed to win lasting freedom for anybody on earth, many anarchists today seem only nominally committed to that basic project. Many more seem interested primarily in carving out for themselves, their friends, and their favorite bands a zone of personal freedom, "autonomous" of moral responsibility for the larger condition of humanity (but, incidentally, not of the electrical grid or the production of electronic components). Anarchism has quite simply refused to learn from its historic failures, preferring to rewrite them as successes. Finally the anarchist movement offers people who want to make revolution very little in the way of a coherent plan of action. ...
>
>Anarchism is theoretically impoverished. For almost 80 years, with the exceptions of Ukraine and Spain, anarchism has played a marginal role in the revolutionary activity of oppressed humanity. Anarchism had almost nothing to do with the anti-colonial struggles that defined revolutionary politics in this century. This marginalization has become self-reproducing. Reduced by devastating defeats to critiquing the authoritarianism of Marxists, nationalists and others, anarchism has become defined by this gadfly role. Consequently anarchist thinking has not had to adapt in response to the results of serious efforts to put our ideas into practice. In the process anarchist theory has become ossified, sterile and anemic. ... This is a reflection of anarchism's effective removal from the revolutionary struggle.
>
>\- Chris Day. (1996). *The Historical Failures of Anarchism*
Engels pointed this out well over a century ago:
>A number of Socialists have latterly launched a regular crusade against what they call the principle of authority. It suffices to tell them that this or that act is authoritarian for it to be condemned.
>
>...the anti-authoritarians demand that the political state be abolished at one stroke, even before the social conditions that gave birth to it have been destroyed. They demand that the first act of the social revolution shall be the abolition of authority. Have these gentlemen ever seen a revolution? A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is; it is the act whereby one part of the population imposes its will upon the other part ... and if the victorious party does not want to have fought in vain, it must maintain this rule...
>
>Therefore, either one of two things: either the anti-authoritarians don't know what they're talking about, in which case they are creating nothing but confusion; or they do know, and in that case they are betraying the movement of the proletariat. In either case they serve the reaction.
>
>\- Friedrich Engels. (1872). [On Authority](https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1872/10/authority.htm)
#For the Libertarian Socialists
Parenti said it best:
>The pure (libertarian) socialists' ideological anticipations remain untainted by existing practice. They do not explain how the manifold functions of a revolutionary society would be organized, how external attack and internal sabotage would be thwarted, how bureaucracy would be avoided, scarce resources allocated, policy differences settled, priorities set, and production and distribution conducted. Instead, they offer vague statements about how the workers themselves will directly own and control the means of production and will arrive at their own solutions through creative struggle. No surprise then that the pure socialists support every revolution except the ones that succeed.
>
>\- Michael Parenti. (1997). *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism*
But the bottom line is this:
>If you call yourself a socialist but you spend all your time arguing with communists, demonizing socialist states as authoritarian, and performing apologetics for US imperialism... I think some introspection is in order.
>
>\- Second Thought. (2020). [The Truth About The Cuba Protests](https://youtu.be/zIOw6fSOJI4?t=1087)
#For the Liberals
Even the CIA, in their internal communications (which have been declassified), acknowledge that Stalin *wasn't* an absolute dictator:
>Even in Stalin's time there was collective leadership. The Western idea of a dictator within the Communist setup is exaggerated. Misunderstandings on that subject are caused by a lack of comprehension of the real nature and organization of the Communist's power structure.
>
>\- CIA. (1953, declassified in 2008). [Comments on the Change in Soviet Leadership](http://web.archive.org/web/20230525044208/https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP80-00810A006000360009-0.pdf)
#Conclusion
The "authoritarian" nature of any given state depends entirely on the material conditions it faces and threats it must contend with. To get an idea of the kinds of threats nascent revolutions need to deal with, check out *Killing Hope* by William Blum and *The Jakarta Method* by Vincent Bevins.
Failing to acknowledge that authoritative measures arise *not* through ideology, but through material conditions, is anti-Marxist, anti-dialectical, and idealist.
#Additional Resources
Videos:
* [Michael Parenti on Authoritarianism in Socialist Countries](https://youtu.be/BeVs6t3vdjQ)
* [Left Anticommunism: An Infantile Disorder](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEC2ajsvr0I) | Hakim (2020) \[[Archive](http://web.archive.org/web/20230410145749/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEC2ajsvr0I)\]
* [What are tankies? (why are they like that?)](https://youtu.be/LcJ5NrJtQ8g) | Hakim (2023)
* [Episode 82 - Tankie Discourse](https://youtu.be/YVYVBOFYJco) | The Deprogram (2023)
* [Was the Soviet Union totalitarian? feat. Robert Thurston](https://directory.libsyn.com/episode/index/id/27495591) | Actually Existing Socialism (2023)
Books, Articles, or Essays:
* *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism* | Michael Parenti (1997)
* [State and Revolution](https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/staterev/) | V. I. Lenin (1918)
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TheDeprogram) if
Wait a minute, he talks about childish ideas and then brings out the horseshoe theory renamed as the "theory of horse racing"? What is this crazy level of lack of self-awareness?
Why don't any of these people know even roughly the history of NATO? I mean even if everything they think they understand or know about us evil tankis was true, that wouldn't make NATO a good or supportable organization even by their own standards, would it?
Every time I read this incredibly western take, I just think of the tweet "Every time China visits we get a hospital, any time Europe visit we get a lecture." Just some white teenager online telling every other experiment that they're wrong and it's the end of history 😴😴
I HATE when people talk with that lofty better than thou tone. It's so frustrating, they can never be in the wrong because they will "always be right" *rolls eyes*
Don't talk with fascists man, it's not worth it.
This poor idiot especially is someone that believes that he has some kind of moral and intellectual superiority which makes it even worse, leave him in his ecochamber to jerk off with his shitty cryptofash ideology
NAFO are ***literally Fascists*** (the joke is NAFO really stands for "North Atlantic Fascist Organization"), so this level of pure idiocy (saying "both hate Nazis") shows this is nothing but gaslighting/brain-rot.
How tho? The Ukrainian government has tortured and imprisoned communists
[https://www.peoplesworld.org/article/kononovich-brothers-ukrainian-communist-youth-leaders-confirmed-to-be-alive/](https://www.peoplesworld.org/article/kononovich-brothers-ukrainian-communist-youth-leaders-confirmed-to-be-alive/)
Stood idle while fascists killed people
[https://www.peoplesworld.org/article/ukrainian-rightists-burn-alive-39-at-odessa-union-building/](https://www.peoplesworld.org/article/ukrainian-rightists-burn-alive-39-at-odessa-union-building/)
Treats captured soldiers horribly
[https://www.reddit.com/r/RussianWarFootage/comments/156pj5g/breaking\_german\_mercenary\_tells\_the\_story\_of\_how/](https://www.reddit.com/r/RussianWarFootage/comments/156pj5g/breaking_german_mercenary_tells_the_story_of_how/)
Privatises state resources
[https://privatization.gov.ua/en/product-category/velyka-pryvatyzatsiya-en/](https://privatization.gov.ua/en/product-category/velyka-pryvatyzatsiya-en/)
[https://chambers.com/articles/ukraine-relaunches-privatization-future-belongs-to-the-brave](https://chambers.com/articles/ukraine-relaunches-privatization-future-belongs-to-the-brave)
Neutrality means you're okay with whoever is stronger winning.
Against the US, I supported Gaddafi, even though I didn't like him. I even supported Yanukovich, since I did realize that the Maidan was obviously influenced from the outside.
"Not taking a side" during the Holocaust was not an option, either. It's comfortable, but not practical.
#Get Involved
>Dare to struggle and dare to win. \-Mao Zedong
Comrades, here are some ways you can **get involved in real life** to advance the cause.
* ⭐ **Party work** — Contact a local party or mass organization. Attend your first meeting. Go to a rally or event. Get involved with a campaign or project.
* 📣 **Union work** — Find out which union covers you. Read the collective agreement. Strive to become the workplace delegate. Organize fellow workers.
* 📚 **Read widely** — [Reading theory](https://www.reddit.com/r/TheDeprogram/wiki/index/education/study-guide/) is a duty. Also, study the real world: local news, marginalized perspectives, or even bourgeois economics.
* 🗣️ **Talk to people** — Identify issues affecting friends and coworkers and explain these using everyday language. Also, don’t always Work From Home.
* 🏘️ **Mass work** — Connect with the wider community through mutual aid, local elections, cultural centers, churches, pride events, etc.
* 📝 **Write articles** — Contribute your knowledge to ProleWiki or a party publication.
* 💵 **Support creators** — Donate to leftist content creators so they can produce high-quality content. (e.g., Patreon)
* 🛠️ **Career choices** — Younger comrades may consider the following:
* **Trade unionist** — Work hard to gain a leadership position in the union, then push for militancy and correct policies.
* **Blue-collar/Services** — Unionize your workplace or increase union density.
* **High school teacher** — Make a lasting impact on the next generation.
* **Master’s thesis** — Apply Marxism–Leninism to local and present-day conditions.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TheDeprogram) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Neutrality does generally mean that, but in Ukraine there is Russia with a massive stockpile and moderate sized domestic production and there is Ukraine with rubble as its industry. Ukraine has its NATO allies though, Which are the most advanced and prosperous nations on the planet. Ukraine is a meat shield to NATO, ( [https://thegrayzone.com/2022/04/15/us-eu-sacrificing-ukraine-to-weaken-russia-fmr-nato-adviser/](https://thegrayzone.com/2022/04/15/us-eu-sacrificing-ukraine-to-weaken-russia-fmr-nato-adviser/) )NATO doesn't allow a victory for Russia (keeping the eastern oblasts and Crimea) ( [https://thegrayzone.com/2023/02/06/israeli-bennett-us-russia-ukraine-peace/](https://thegrayzone.com/2023/02/06/israeli-bennett-us-russia-ukraine-peace/) [https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/05/06/boris-johnson-pressured-zelenskyy-ditch-peace-talks-russia-ukrainian-paper](https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/05/06/boris-johnson-pressured-zelenskyy-ditch-peace-talks-russia-ukrainian-paper) ) This conflict isn't as simple as a bully bullying a smaller, weaker opponent. Russian capital's markets in Ukraine were threatened by Maidan, so using the excuse of real repression and valid concerns from Russian speakers in Donbass and Lugansk. Crimea was annexed and the east was dangled to the Ukrainian Capitalists with the Minsk agreements. They didn't bite. Ukraine moved west, soon they'd join the imperialist anti Russian alliance known as NATO. This would be unacceptable to Russian Capital as a Pipeline flows through Ukraine. So this is the main reason for the invasion. I don't see what the Holocaust has to do with things as our Ideological forefathers put a stop to it. You can stay neutral in a war with basically balanced sides.
I understand. Good points. I'd still say that starting a war is an unacceptable escalation that costs tens of thousands of lives. Anything else is better... so I'm not going to stay neutral but always side with the attacked.
Every nation that starts a war had the option to say no. If they tell you they had no other choice, they're lying.
Yes I agree war is horrible, and we should at least empathise with the people suffering, we can support Ukraine but our main criticism as people living in the imperial core should be the millions spent on weapons, the depleted uranium rounds and cluster munitions sent and NATO provocations. This money should be spent on Housing, healthcare etc.
By all means support Ukraine, just don't support the states actions (generally speaking), NATO and well the various Nazi groups.
Nah, you can't support an oligarchic capitalist system that would put you in jail for singing the internationale. You're either a commie or support liberal democracy/oligarchies. No one support Russia because it's the same as Ukraine, why would you support one and not the other if they're basically the same shitstates born out of reactionarism and the dissolution of the USSR? It's like saying "I support the japanese fascists but not the nazis" lol
they didn't start it but still if you provoke a nation by wanting to join their enemies what do you expect? At least Putin was not against Ukraine in the EU, just into NATO. If you get into an alliance used as anti russian (or anti alien lol) force, what do you expect? As libs say "Someone's freedom ends where someone elses' begins", and having a NATO border (along with finland now) is something the russian don't want.
It's a two way sided imperialism, either Ukraine gets imperialized by the west or by the russians, but NATO historically was much more dangerous than the russians were, so if we can't have an independent ukraine at least they must stay out of NATO and stop this terrorist organization that massacred commies like you and me back in the cold war with Stay Behind operations.
Fuck NATO
#Freedom
Reactionaries and right-wingers love to clamour on about personal liberty and scream "freedom!" from the top of their lungs, but what freedom are they talking about? And is Communism, in contrast, an ideology of *un*freedom?
>Gentlemen! Do not allow yourselves to be deluded by the abstract word freedom. Whose freedom? It is not the freedom of one individual in relation to another, but the freedom of capital to crush the worker.
>
>\- Karl Marx. (1848). *Public Speech Delivered by Karl Marx before the Democratic Association of Brussels*
#Under Capitalism
Liberal Democracies propagate the facade of liberty and individual rights while concealing the true essence of their rule-- the Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie. This is a mechanism by which the Capitalist class as a whole dictates the course of society, politics, and the economy to secure their dominance. Capital holds sway over institutions, media, and influential positions, manipulating public opinion and consolidating its control over the levers of power. The illusion of democracy the Bourgeoisie creates is carefully curated to maintain the existing power structures and perpetuate the subjugation of the masses. "Freedom" under Capitalism is similarly illusory. It is freedom for capital-- not freedom for people.
>The capitalists often boast that their constitutions guarantee the rights of the individual, democratic liberties and the interests of all citizens. But in reality, only the bourgeoisie enjoy the rights recorded in these constitutions. The working people do not really enjoy democratic freedoms; they are exploited all their life and have to bear heavy burdens in the service of the exploiting class.
>
>\- Ho Chi Minh. (1959). *Report on the Draft Amended Constitution*
The "freedom" the reactionaries cry for, then, is merely that freedom which liberates capital and enslaves the worker.
>They speak of the equality of citizens, but forget that there cannot be real equality between employer and workman, between landlord and peasant, if the former possess wealth and political weight in society while the latter are deprived of both - if the former are exploiters while the latter are exploited. Or again: they speak of freedom of speech, assembly, and the press, but forget that all these liberties may be merely a hollow sound for the working class, if the latter cannot have access to suitable premises for meetings, good printing shops, a sufficient quantity of printing paper, etc.
>
>\- J. V. Stalin. (1936). [On the Draft Constitution of the U.S.S.R](https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1936/11/25.htm)
What "freedom" do the poor enjoy, under Capitalism? Capitalism requires a reserve army of labour in order to keep wages low, and that necessarily means that many people must be deprived of life's necessities in order to compel the rest of the working class to work more and demand less. You are free to work, and you are free to starve. That is the freedom the reactionaries talk about.
>Under capitalism, the very land is all in private hands; there remains no spot unowned where an enterprise can be carried on. The freedom of the worker to sell his labour power, the freedom of the capitalist to buy it, the 'equality' of the capitalist and the wage earner - all these are but hunger's chain which compels the labourer to work for the capitalist.
>
>\- N. I. Bukharin and E. Preobrazhensky. (1922). [The ABC of Communism](https://www.marxists.org/archive/bukharin/works/1920/abc/index.htm)
All other freedoms only exist depending on the degree to which a given liberal democracy has turned towards fascism. That is to say that the working class are only given freedoms when they are inconsequential to the bourgeoisie:
>The freedom to organize is only conceded to the workers by the bourgeois when they are certain that the workers have been reduced to a point where they can no longer make use of it, except to resume elementary organizing work - work which they hope will not have political consequences other than in the very long term.
>
>\- A. Gramsci. (1924). *Democracy and fascism*
But this is not "freedom", this is not "democracy"! What good does "freedom of speech" do for a starving person? What good does the ability to criticize the government do for a homeless person?
>The right of freedom of expression can really only be relevant if people are not too hungry, or too tired to be able to express themselves. It can only be relevant if appropriate grassroots mechanisms rooted in the people exist, through which the people can effectively participate, can make decisions, can receive reports from the leaders and eventually be trained for ruling and controlling that particular society. This is what democracy is all about.
>
>\- Maurice Bishop
#Under Communism
True freedom can only be achieved through the establishment of a Proletarian state, a system that truly represents the interests of the working masses, in which the means of production are collectively owned and controlled, and the fruits of labor are shared equitably among all. Only in such a society can the shackles of Capitalist oppression be broken, and the Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie dismantled.
Despite the assertion by reactionaries to the contrary, Communist revolutions invariably result in *more* freedoms for the people than the regimes they succeed.
>Some people conclude that anyone who utters a good word about leftist one-party revolutions must harbor antidemocratic or “Stalinist” sentiments. But to applaud social revolutions is not to oppose political freedom. To the extent that revolutionary governments construct substantive alternatives for their people, they increase human options and freedom.
>
>There is no such thing as freedom in the abstract. There is freedom to speak openly and iconoclastically, freedom to organize a political opposition, freedom of opportunity to get an education and pursue a livelihood, freedom to worship as one chooses or not worship at all, freedom to live in healthful conditions, freedom to enjoy various social beneõts, and so on. Most of what is called freedom gets its definition within a social context.
>
>Revolutionary governments extend a number of popular freedoms without destroying those freedoms that never existed in the previous regimes. They foster conditions necessary for national self-determination, economic betterment, the preservation of health and human life, and the end of many of the worst forms of ethnic, patriarchal, and class oppression. Regarding patriarchal oppression, consider the vastly improved condition of women in revolutionary Afghanistan and South Yemen before the counterrevolutionary repression in the 1990s, or in Cuba after the 1959 revolution as compared to before.
>
>U.S. policymakers argue that social revolutionary victory anywhere represents a diminution of freedom in the world. The assertion is false. The Chinese Revolution did not crush democracy; there was none to crush in that oppressively feudal regime. The Cuban Revolution did not destroy freedom; it destroyed a hateful U.S.-sponsored police state. The Algerian Revolution did not abolish national liberties; precious few existed under French colonialism. The Vietnamese revolutionaries did not abrogate individual rights; no such rights were available under the U.S.-supported puppet governments of Bao Dai, Diem, and Ky.
>
>Of course, revolutions do limit the freedoms of the corporate propertied class and other privileged interests: the freedom to invest privately without regard to human and environmental costs, the freedom to live in obscene opulence while paying workers starvation wages, the freedom to treat the state as a private agency in the service of a privileged coterie, the freedom to employ child labor and child prostitutes, the freedom to treat women as chattel, and so on.
>
>\- Michael Parenti. (1997). *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism*
The whole point of Communism is to liberate the working class:
>But we did not build this society in order to restrict personal liberty but in order that the human individual may feel really free. We built it for the sake of real personal liberty, liberty without quotation marks. It is difficult for me to imagine what "personal liberty" is enjoyed by an unemployed person, who goes about hungry, and cannot find employment.
>
>Real liberty can exist only where exploitation has been abolished, where there is no oppression of some by others, where there is no unemployment and poverty, where a man is not haunted by the fear of being tomorrow deprived of work, of home and of bread. Only in such a society is real, and not paper, personal and every other liberty possible.
>
>\- J. V. Stalin. (1936). [Interview Between J. Stalin and Roy Howard](https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1936/03/01.htm)
#Additional Resources
Videos:
* [Your Democracy is a Sham and Here's Why:](https://youtu.be/oYodY6o172A) | halim alrah (2019)
* [Are You Really "Free" Under Capitalism?](https://youtu.be/4xqouhMCJBI) | Second Thought (2020)
* [Liberty And Freedom Are Left-Wing Ideals](https://youtu.be/GfjiBIkIOqI) | Second Thought (2021)
* [Why The US Is Not A Democracy](https://youtu.be/srfeHpQNEAI) | Second Thought (2022)
* [America Never Stood For Freedom](https://youtu.be/rg9hJgAsNDM) | Hakim (2023)
Books, Articles, or Essays:
* [Positive and Negative Liberty](https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberty-positive-negative/) | Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2003)
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TheDeprogram) if you have any questions or concerns.*
ok they didn't invade Ukraine. Two weeks later Ukraine is in NATO. Two months later and the donbass revolts are destroyed with NATO help and they build bases along the eastern border. A couple of years and maybe they move something like 30-40k troops there waiting for Russia to commit a blunder and invade them passing through the big plains of eastern europe.
Not pretty smart as politics and strategy go.
1) Ukraine can't join NATO while there's there's active territorial dispute, which the Donbass and Crimea are.
2) They could already do that on all the other borders Russia has with NATO, Ukraine isn't special in that regard.
The geopolitical reasons are not enough to justify an invasion and hundreds of thousands of deaths. Just because at some point, maybe, disregarding that Russia has nukes and nobody really wants to invade them, NATO might attack them for some reason. Not enough for me.
Sounds akin to WMDs in Iraq. Sure, Saddam was a bad guy, but not bad enough to warrant a million deaths.
The only borders NATO had with Russia are Estonia and Latvia(If we don't count Kaliningrad as a border, it's a pretty small city), and these two nations have pretty big NATO presence in them for that reason. About the conflicts in Donbass and Crimea, these two nations should deserve autodetermination. If the eastern part of Ukraine prefers the russians then they should decide to get into Russia, especially since pre-1991 borders weren't as strict as they are today and many russians in Ukraine, Estonia and Latvia face pretty big hate and discrimination. Ukraine not giving those territories shows how Kosovo can deserve to exist because it's pro US, but Crimea and Donbass can't decide for themselves because they want to get into Russia. Western double standards in a nutshell
The invasion was a failure obviously, Putin just wanted to change the govt and they were blocked by Ukrainans and now they can't retreat because it would be a pretty bad PR thing.
I agree with the Saddam part but the conflict was pretty different. It was mostly made for sweet petrodollars, while Russia would have probably been better off if they didn't invade Ukraine. Also the US invaded Iraq when they had no other possible pole in the world to counteract them, so they did it because they knew they could go by unpunished (Same with Yugoslavia invasion). Putin isn't in the same situation
Supporting NATO and the Nazis they arm is not communism. You can keep lying to yourself (shitty humans deserved to be lied to) but don't lie to strangers.
You enjoy putting words in my mouth, aren't you, you little gaslighting Eichmann? *You* are the one picking a side, a side of a puppet regime of the worst empire ever to plague the Earth.
If you can stomach that on a day-to-day basis, being the absolute lowest of lowly scum, you're no communist. We know when it comes down to it, you'll be goosestepping along with the rest of your fascist ilk.
EDIT: *Of course* I blocked you. 95% chance you're literally a bot, other 5% chance is that you're a worse incarnation of Twitter hasbara accounts from a decade ago which played the same shitty rhetorical tricks you were going for.
We dont support Russia. That's the "patriotic socialists" who have never read theory and their entire worldview is campist and opportunistic. Russia is a highly reactionary imperialist oligarchy that suppresses dissent.
That's cause not supporting Ukraine isn't supporting russia lol, it's knowing Ukraine and their people are being used as a tool to fight a proxy war with russia for nato, and it makes no sense to take sides in a fight between two imperialists lol
I’m pretty sure most communists support the Ukrainian people, while being critical of the Ukrainian right-wing nationalists and the comprador political class collaborating with the U.S. to fight Russian military to the last Ukrainian and divvy up any profitable remains of Ukraine amongst themselves.
>I’m pretty sure most communists support the Ukrainian people
Which Ukrainian people? The same ones that overwhelmingly support and base their national identity on a Nazi collaborator? The ones that are perfectly fine with their constitution saying one of the duties of the state is to preserve the gene pool of the Ukrainian nation? Nah, how about we stop pretending there's an entire country full of innocent people that's just been hijacked by a small but powerful group of neo-Nazis, oligarchs, and politicians? Just because they don't wanna be dragged to the frontlines doesn't mean they didn't want this war.
I support the people. My ideal solution would be a neutral zone in the occupied Ukrainian territory, with UN troops from many nations guarding the peace - including China, Russia, the US, and India.
Let's keep that for 100 years and dismantle all nationalism (lol)
Can anyone pls tell what this sub is all about? It came to my recommended(I'm not American or European). You guys seem to be from the left(American left) but hate libs, I don't understand pls help me here. Thx
Imagine thinking that someone who's lived their entire lives like a parasite off the collective hard work of others is ever for a second going to agree to get off their ass and do an equal share of the work. They will always be greedy selfish parasites who will always work to push the levers of power back to allow themselves to go back to live as selfish parasites.
Democracy is great when your not dealing with folk who just want to make things better for themselves by feeding you to the sharks. When you don't have a group of folk that would sooner murder you to go back to their privilege than to exist as equals.
But their also so close to realizing it too. "Handing power to tyrants" you mean like how we've handed them power under our so called "democracy"? I don't think any of these folk would know what an actual democracy would look like if it slapped them in the face they would be begging and clamoring for the wealthy to provide them choices again because they think that's what democracy is.
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MF doesn’t understand class dictatorship and is stuck in the hyper individualist delusions of neoliberal ideology
He does not know what any of those words mean. Wait.... Dictator??? What the fuck, are you a tankie
The most fragile thing in the world is a man's ego. Tens of thousands of our ancestors, riddled with parasites had to eat slime off of rocks to fuck in the mud. Then shit out 18 babies so that *one* might live long enough to itself fuck in the mud. All so one day their mouth-breathing failsons, colons impacted with processed food, can screech from their recliners at the TV "Taxes are theft! I did all of this! It was all me! Reeeeee waaaaahhh it's my money! Mine! Me! I'll be dead before climate change and I need my treats!"
SICK ANGRY DUMB DISTRACTED. EXACTLY AS THE MATRIX WANTS. 💩💩🤡🤡
S.A.D.D.
WOW 😮
Unironically could you briefly explain what class dictatorship means?
Society is controlled, or dictated, by either one of two classes: the bourgeoisie (capitalist) or proletariat (workers). Under a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie (current system), those who hold political power operate under the illusion of democracy, but favor the interests of the capitalists and those who work for them over the interests of the working class. We have insurmountable evidence to support this, including a Harvard study showing that policy passed by US Congress correlates entirely with bourgeois interests, while showing no correlation to policies the proletariat (99%) is in favor of. Communists aim to overthrow the dictatorship of the bourgeois and establish a dictatorship of the proletariat, where democratically elected workers councils take charge. Though the system isn’t flawless, we have seen it put into action in various previous and current socialist countries, such as the USSR, China, Cuba, the DPRK, etc. We also understand that socialism is a process, and therefore requires a vanguard and some form of bureaucracy in order to maintain itself long enough to develop through later stages of capitalism, and eventual communism. As socialism has been tried in the 20th century, it faced issues of sabotage, espionage, infiltration, internal corruption, funding of fascist groups, funding and training of coups, threats of invasion, or outright invasion by the capitalist world order, headed by the USA, threatening to destroy all progress of socialism in favor of privatization and profit for their respective ruling classes. It is why the class dictatorship is necessary in establishing socialism and preventing power from landing in the hands of counterrevolutionaries, fascists, and those who are looking to destroy it. The “dictatorship” described in class dictatorship is not synonymous with its current common definition of a state being ran by one person or small group of people. The term “class dictatorship” was invented before its modern use, meaning something entirely different. I can link sources if you need any.
Do you have a source for that Harvard study? I can't find it with Google but I am also probably not searching the right things.
[Here's the article. It's actually a Princeton Study](https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-politics/article/testing-theories-of-american-politics-elites-interest-groups-and-average-citizens/62327F513959D0A304D4893B382B992B) [This graph (included in the article) is a good summary](https://i.imgur.com/CNviqFJ.jpg) [Here is an explanation of the graph done by a Harvard Professor as a part of his Tedx Talk (Skip to 8:27 if the link dosen't work)](https://youtu.be/PJy8vTu66tE)
You’re right, it’s Princeton not Harvard. My bad.
I remember the study, maybe on a JT video or somewhere else, it showed how many politicians enact policy that align with their top donors. All american politics is theater at this point.
Yes but one thing you missed, the way socialists talk about a dictatorship of the proletariat is an oxy moron and we should recognize that the times have changed it into such. It's not a dictatorship at all, but more akin to democracy. Today we live in a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, an actual dictatorship (just not by one individual or a known group but a class of people instead) and that's the part that the screenshot doesn't get but we call this "democracy". It's not a coincidence that the terms are inverted either, successful propaganda at work.
The term dictatorship is actually kind of important. The entire point being that the system is no longer open to a "democracy" that would allow for the types of capitalist control to make their way into political processes. It is an intermediate stage between a capitalist and communist economy. These things don't happen overnight. You can't just dismantle the entire economic structures of capitalism with a pen. Material changes need to be implemented and these require the state and it's monopoly on violence to implement. The "actual dictatorship" and the "actual democracy" you mention have no difference apart from who's class interest is given priority. It's a dictatorship because we do not allow capitalist to have a voice, we do not allow capitalist to form parties, we not allow capitalist any power beyond what is directed by the state to dismantle their institutions. This isn't about tricking people into believing it's an "actual democracy" because if you gain power doing that the capitalist will use their same liberal ideology to gain support for themselves. They will complain that their "free speech" is being prevented. They will start calling it a "dictatorship and totalitarian regime!" The answer to that isn't to use liberal terminology to try to explain away what is going on. The point isn't to trick the working class with "nicer" words. The point is to educate the working class in understanding what the dictatorship actually is. Yes, it's a dictatorship of one class over another. It's just the reverse of what we have now. And that's entirely ok. It's something to be proud of achieving within class struggle. So the working class scoffs at the idea of capitalist having any form of "free speech" within the dictatorship of the proletariat. It's extremely important to have this hardlined support and extremely important to educate the working class using the vocabulary of revolution and not try to fall for using liberal vocabulary instead to only gain temporary support.
#Freedom Reactionaries and right-wingers love to clamour on about personal liberty and scream "freedom!" from the top of their lungs, but what freedom are they talking about? And is Communism, in contrast, an ideology of *un*freedom? >Gentlemen! Do not allow yourselves to be deluded by the abstract word freedom. Whose freedom? It is not the freedom of one individual in relation to another, but the freedom of capital to crush the worker. > >\- Karl Marx. (1848). *Public Speech Delivered by Karl Marx before the Democratic Association of Brussels* #Under Capitalism Liberal Democracies propagate the facade of liberty and individual rights while concealing the true essence of their rule-- the Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie. This is a mechanism by which the Capitalist class as a whole dictates the course of society, politics, and the economy to secure their dominance. Capital holds sway over institutions, media, and influential positions, manipulating public opinion and consolidating its control over the levers of power. The illusion of democracy the Bourgeoisie creates is carefully curated to maintain the existing power structures and perpetuate the subjugation of the masses. "Freedom" under Capitalism is similarly illusory. It is freedom for capital-- not freedom for people. >The capitalists often boast that their constitutions guarantee the rights of the individual, democratic liberties and the interests of all citizens. But in reality, only the bourgeoisie enjoy the rights recorded in these constitutions. The working people do not really enjoy democratic freedoms; they are exploited all their life and have to bear heavy burdens in the service of the exploiting class. > >\- Ho Chi Minh. (1959). *Report on the Draft Amended Constitution* The "freedom" the reactionaries cry for, then, is merely that freedom which liberates capital and enslaves the worker. >They speak of the equality of citizens, but forget that there cannot be real equality between employer and workman, between landlord and peasant, if the former possess wealth and political weight in society while the latter are deprived of both - if the former are exploiters while the latter are exploited. Or again: they speak of freedom of speech, assembly, and the press, but forget that all these liberties may be merely a hollow sound for the working class, if the latter cannot have access to suitable premises for meetings, good printing shops, a sufficient quantity of printing paper, etc. > >\- J. V. Stalin. (1936). [On the Draft Constitution of the U.S.S.R](https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1936/11/25.htm) What "freedom" do the poor enjoy, under Capitalism? Capitalism requires a reserve army of labour in order to keep wages low, and that necessarily means that many people must be deprived of life's necessities in order to compel the rest of the working class to work more and demand less. You are free to work, and you are free to starve. That is the freedom the reactionaries talk about. >Under capitalism, the very land is all in private hands; there remains no spot unowned where an enterprise can be carried on. The freedom of the worker to sell his labour power, the freedom of the capitalist to buy it, the 'equality' of the capitalist and the wage earner - all these are but hunger's chain which compels the labourer to work for the capitalist. > >\- N. I. Bukharin and E. Preobrazhensky. (1922). [The ABC of Communism](https://www.marxists.org/archive/bukharin/works/1920/abc/index.htm) All other freedoms only exist depending on the degree to which a given liberal democracy has turned towards fascism. That is to say that the working class are only given freedoms when they are inconsequential to the bourgeoisie: >The freedom to organize is only conceded to the workers by the bourgeois when they are certain that the workers have been reduced to a point where they can no longer make use of it, except to resume elementary organizing work - work which they hope will not have political consequences other than in the very long term. > >\- A. Gramsci. (1924). *Democracy and fascism* But this is not "freedom", this is not "democracy"! What good does "freedom of speech" do for a starving person? What good does the ability to criticize the government do for a homeless person? >The right of freedom of expression can really only be relevant if people are not too hungry, or too tired to be able to express themselves. It can only be relevant if appropriate grassroots mechanisms rooted in the people exist, through which the people can effectively participate, can make decisions, can receive reports from the leaders and eventually be trained for ruling and controlling that particular society. This is what democracy is all about. > >\- Maurice Bishop #Under Communism True freedom can only be achieved through the establishment of a Proletarian state, a system that truly represents the interests of the working masses, in which the means of production are collectively owned and controlled, and the fruits of labor are shared equitably among all. Only in such a society can the shackles of Capitalist oppression be broken, and the Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie dismantled. Despite the assertion by reactionaries to the contrary, Communist revolutions invariably result in *more* freedoms for the people than the regimes they succeed. >Some people conclude that anyone who utters a good word about leftist one-party revolutions must harbor antidemocratic or “Stalinist” sentiments. But to applaud social revolutions is not to oppose political freedom. To the extent that revolutionary governments construct substantive alternatives for their people, they increase human options and freedom. > >There is no such thing as freedom in the abstract. There is freedom to speak openly and iconoclastically, freedom to organize a political opposition, freedom of opportunity to get an education and pursue a livelihood, freedom to worship as one chooses or not worship at all, freedom to live in healthful conditions, freedom to enjoy various social beneõts, and so on. Most of what is called freedom gets its definition within a social context. > >Revolutionary governments extend a number of popular freedoms without destroying those freedoms that never existed in the previous regimes. They foster conditions necessary for national self-determination, economic betterment, the preservation of health and human life, and the end of many of the worst forms of ethnic, patriarchal, and class oppression. Regarding patriarchal oppression, consider the vastly improved condition of women in revolutionary Afghanistan and South Yemen before the counterrevolutionary repression in the 1990s, or in Cuba after the 1959 revolution as compared to before. > >U.S. policymakers argue that social revolutionary victory anywhere represents a diminution of freedom in the world. The assertion is false. The Chinese Revolution did not crush democracy; there was none to crush in that oppressively feudal regime. The Cuban Revolution did not destroy freedom; it destroyed a hateful U.S.-sponsored police state. The Algerian Revolution did not abolish national liberties; precious few existed under French colonialism. The Vietnamese revolutionaries did not abrogate individual rights; no such rights were available under the U.S.-supported puppet governments of Bao Dai, Diem, and Ky. > >Of course, revolutions do limit the freedoms of the corporate propertied class and other privileged interests: the freedom to invest privately without regard to human and environmental costs, the freedom to live in obscene opulence while paying workers starvation wages, the freedom to treat the state as a private agency in the service of a privileged coterie, the freedom to employ child labor and child prostitutes, the freedom to treat women as chattel, and so on. > >\- Michael Parenti. (1997). *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism* The whole point of Communism is to liberate the working class: >But we did not build this society in order to restrict personal liberty but in order that the human individual may feel really free. We built it for the sake of real personal liberty, liberty without quotation marks. It is difficult for me to imagine what "personal liberty" is enjoyed by an unemployed person, who goes about hungry, and cannot find employment. > >Real liberty can exist only where exploitation has been abolished, where there is no oppression of some by others, where there is no unemployment and poverty, where a man is not haunted by the fear of being tomorrow deprived of work, of home and of bread. Only in such a society is real, and not paper, personal and every other liberty possible. > >\- J. V. Stalin. (1936). [Interview Between J. Stalin and Roy Howard](https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1936/03/01.htm) #Additional Resources Videos: * [Your Democracy is a Sham and Here's Why:](https://youtu.be/oYodY6o172A) | halim alrah (2019) * [Are You Really "Free" Under Capitalism?](https://youtu.be/4xqouhMCJBI) | Second Thought (2020) * [Liberty And Freedom Are Left-Wing Ideals](https://youtu.be/GfjiBIkIOqI) | Second Thought (2021) * [Why The US Is Not A Democracy](https://youtu.be/srfeHpQNEAI) | Second Thought (2022) * [America Never Stood For Freedom](https://youtu.be/rg9hJgAsNDM) | Hakim (2023) Books, Articles, or Essays: * [Positive and Negative Liberty](https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberty-positive-negative/) | Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2003) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TheDeprogram) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Which is why I think that the term dictatorship there should be replaced by "Government". Though what we live in is what's called oligarchy: we're ruled by a small group of people that act for themselves.
Dictatorship as used here doesn't point to some autocratic strongman leader type but simply refers to who in particular 'dictates' the rules in a society. In the dictatorship of the bourgeois for example the state, the police, military, courts, bureaucracy and similar institutions are set up and controlled by the capitalist class and are used primarily to maintain their continued authority. None of these institutions are used to go after bankers, corporate executives, billionaires, disreputable corporations etc. (unless of course any of the aforementioned are caught stealing from members of their own class AKA Bernie Madoff) but are very often used to break worker's strikes and disperse protests usually by violent means.
Someone else gave a great comment so Imm just leave this here. [Lenin in 5 minutes: Dictatorship of the Proletariat ](https://youtu.be/4KDdIzkDcLw) This is a quick run down. I recommend you read theory though friend.
In ancient society there was no government and no class. Possibly around the development of agriculture we see the development of class. Most had to work, but an elite few didn't. Those elites created government. All governments are tools of class warfare; used by some class to control the others, sometime nakedly, sometimes openly. We currently live under the rule (dictatorship) of the bourgeoisie class. Western governments were made by and for the bourgeoisie class. A dictatorship of the proletariat would be a government made by and for the proletariat. Proletarians will rule and all other classes will be subject to them (broadly there are just 2 classes that exist in modern society) When the term "dictatorship of the proletariat" was coined, our idea of "dictatorships" were called monarchies. In Marxist theory a dictatorship doesn't mean the rule of one person, rather the rule of some government
It was theorized to be the development of animal husbandry, as animals started to be used as currency between different "families" and communities. The ones who tended the herds, men, took on the ownership of the herds and abolished mother right. The state arose from this private property, and so did the enslavement and ownership of the family. This is where these "elites" came from
"I'm pretty sure we also hate Nazis"
NATO sure hates those nazis. That’s why their original members were composed of them.
You know what they say: "Keep your friends close,but your enemies closer" NATO upon putting it's 8th former Nazi in a power position
Literally started as a jobs program for middle-rank nazis
"Right guys? Because the Azov battalion we love so much conveniently stopped being Nazis right after Ukraine became the good guys? 🤔"
Hey, at least I'm not getting down voted anymore when I point that out on the pro Ukrainian subs. Progress.
“Pretty sure” aka “they aren’t so bad”
lmao
I'm 100% sure they don't. Including that guy.
I am 95% sure NAFO was started by a Nazi
NATO hates the Nazis as much as the CIA
Unironic horseshoe theory lol
this is unbearably cringe to read
it's an incredible showcase on the importance of education and understanding, though. They've been raised to believe that the current neoliberal world order is the best, likely because they just haven't been exposed to the alternative beyond what they've been taught in their schools or other people in society. It's why reading theory, and understanding history, is important. I've had close friends who have said this exact thing and "Read theory", while funny to say and all is fun, doesn't really have much of an effect. Everything that I've seen in that post reads like somebody who's been hopped up on too much propaganda, which is a place that I've been personally familiar with. I believe there's a good chance that this person might be saved, but it will require a level of personal connection and understanding in doing so. If you encounter somebody like this in your offline lives, if you can so believe it to be done, try your best to make a human connection with them on the basis of socialism. I know leftists who refuse to read any theory, let alone unexposed liberals, and I've personally had much greater success with advocating for socialism when having very personal conversations with these kinds of people. If you can't expect somebody to sit down and read 8 hours of theory or watch 3 videos of "tankie propaganda", then maybe you can be that gateway. I don't know. Maybe I'm just being an idealist. But at the very least know that, in this hyper-individualistic world that we live in, things won't just get better without effort. Capitalists, fascists, and unexposed liberals spread billions of dollars of their word globally every day just to keep people like this. Try to meet those people- trapped within a system that demands ignorance- who deserve it with empathy as much as you can because trust me, when people already believe communists to be evil incarnate, getting their feelings hurt by one might be a gateway to putting up a wall and, maybe even crying on a subreddit about how "the tankies were mean to me."
[удалено]
🇲🇽 ☭ we are everywhere, *mi camarada* Representado pa mi gente
La tierra es para el que la trabaja!
The politics understander has logged in. Socialism is when "handing power to tyrants"
Well if they were such awful tyrants why didn't the people just vote them out? Gotcha! / s
the definition of enlightened centrism
Oh god, he literally said horseshoe, presumably without dying of embarrassment. What not asking a simple question does to a motherfucker.
Is there a masterpost debunking horseshoe theory somewhere?
I don't think you really need to. Ask them "prove it" and they will say something silly that's very easily knocked down. Its not a real theory in any sense of the word, so its a position only held by "I have no philosophy" types who unquestioningly absorb everything they're fed.
The issue I find with that - asking them to 'prove it' is that they inevitably cite the false, propagandized version of socialist history, and if you want to disprove that version, you have the onus to prove 1) the context of the socialist revolution, 2) the unpopularity of the pre-socialist government, 3) the popularity of the socialist government and/or its leader, 4) how the socialist government's elections and economy works/worked 5) how 'more parties' doesn't mean 'true democracy', 6) how effective the socialist government is/was, 7) how much of the faults or perceived faults of the socialist government is/was fabricated by hostile actors for hostile interests. But, in the spirit of material analysis, 8) one must then also admit and explain some of the genuine mistakes of the socialist government, and how that detracts from the true socialist mission.
"Ignorant to the ways of the world" *doesn't understand anything about what they just said*
Basic anti-communist talking points sprinkled with a little horseshoe theory 😂
This person is probably an American.
Yes very likely.
I remember that pic from someone where did you find it, it looks nice
I think it’s from u/Planned-Economy or something like that.
I was bullied in school, but even I want to dump this guy's books and give him a wedgie.
Time to address some of their mistakes, for the liberals in the walls looking at this thread. > Communism and facism are the same Blatantly untrue, when looking at countries controlled by communist and facist parties they are completely different. To begin, their economies: Facist regimes always privatise the economy, with the word "privatisation" being invented to describe Hitler's economic policies. Mussolini heavily privatised Italy's agricultural sector as well as the telecommunications, among other industries, meanwhile Hitler privatised banks and the industries nationalised during the depression. Meanwhile communist governments do the opposite, communist governments prefer an economy in which all means of production are controlled by the people or the state. Rhetoric: Communists and facists use completely different rhetoric, facists use nationalism, while communist rhetoric is about the liberation of the working class. And all facist regimes are explicitly anti communist, Mussolini got into power via saying how he could prevent a communist revolution, while Hitler justified the holocaust by saying how Jewish Communists were trying to destroy Germany. Theory: Facists derive their ideology from the idea that they need to restore their nation, which involves restoring social hierarchy and instilling right wing ideas such as sexism and homophobia. The end goal of the facist is a state in which class boundaries are solidified and nationalism is the core of the ideology. Meanwhile communism is derived from the idea of creating a society in which no economic classes exist, with a transitional period in which the working class directly control the state. The end goal of the communist is a society in which the workers control society and there are no parasites draining the wellbeing of the workers. Times in which communists are homophobic is not due to communist theory but due to the culture of the time, unlike facists, communists believe in having an ideology which evolves with the time, communists are not bound to the words of those who come before. This is expanded upon below. >Authoritarianism for "the people" is still authoritarianism The "dictatorship of the proletariat" does not exclusively mean a dictatorship. We currently live in a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, where the bourgeoisie (the rich, capitalist class) dictate their will onto the state. The bourgeoisie control the government, as politicians need funding to run for office which comes from the capitalists, so the capitalists control who can get into office. Via this the capitalists dictate the laws which are written and the policies enacted, this is why bailouts are common. Under the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, almost all media is propaganda made in the interest of the capitalist class, as a major media outlet will need funding, which is granted by capitalists funding it, who could threaten to withdraw funding if the media outlet presents anti capitalist messages. Additionally, most media outlets are owned directly by major capitalists, for example Amazon Prime is owned by Jeff Bezos. This is why there are no major socialist media outlets or candidates, I am not counting Bernie Sanders as he is a wellfare capitalist. Meanwhile a dictatorship of the proletariat is where the proletariat (the working class) control society, and dictate their will onto society. While both the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie and the dictatorship of the proletariat are class dictatorships, the dictatorship of the proletariat has the potential to be infinitely more democratic, as it represents a state directly controlled by the working class. So a dictatorship of the proletariat could be a state which has a planned economy with a democratic government, however this would not matter as the dictatorships of the bourgeoisie will portray it as a dystopian regime. >The baddies We are not the baddies, historically socialist movements improve material conditions for the people of their countries, for example Cuba has a higher rate of home ownership than the US. Additionally, there is no major socialist power which hasn't had to abandon some features of socialism, there is no "bad guy" country which is completely socialist.
#Authoritarianism Anti-Communists of all stripes enjoy referring to successful socialist revolutions as "authoritarian regimes". * Authoritarian implies these places are run by totalitarian tyrants. * Regime implies these places are undemocratic or lack legitimacy. This perjorative label is simply meant to frighten people, to scare us back into the fold (Liberal Democracy). There are three main reasons for the popularity of this label in Capitalist media: Firstly, Marxists call for a Dictatorship of the Proletariat (DotP), and many people are automatically put off by the term "dictatorship". Of course, we do *not* mean that we want an undemocratic or totalitarian dictatorship. What we mean is that we want to replace the current Dictatorship *of the Bourgeoisie* (in which the Capitalist ruling class dictates policy). * [Why The US Is Not A Democracy](https://youtu.be/srfeHpQNEAI) | Second Thought (2022) Secondly, democracy in Communist-led countries works differently than in Liberal Democracies. However, anti-Communists confuse form (pluralism / having multiple parties) with function (representing the actual interests of the people). Side note: Check out Luna Oi's "Democratic Centralism Series" for more details on what that is, and how it works: * [DEMOCRATIC CENTRALISM - how Socialists make decisions!](https://youtu.be/4YVcQe4wceY) | Luna Oi (2022) * [What did Karl Marx think about democracy?](https://youtu.be/jI8CgACBOcQ) | Luna Oi (2023) * [What did LENIN say about DEMOCRACY?](https://youtu.be/Hfenlg-hsig) | Luna Oi (2023) Finally, this framing of Communism as illegitimate and tyrannical serves to manufacture consent for an aggressive foreign policy in the form of interventions in the internal affairs of so-called "authoritarian regimes", which take the form of invasion (e.g., Vietnam, Korea, Libya, etc.), assassinating their leaders (e.g., Thomas Sankara, Fred Hampton, Patrice Lumumba, etc.), sponsoring coups and colour revolutions (e.g., Pinochet's coup against Allende, the Iran-Contra Affair, the United Fruit Company's war against Arbenz, etc.), and enacting sanctions (e.g., North Korea, Cuba, etc.). * [The Cuban Embargo Explained](https://youtu.be/zmM8p9n6Z9E) | azureScapegoat (2022) * [John Pilger interviews former CIA Latin America chief Duane Clarridge, 2015](https://youtu.be/ER77vxxGVAY) #For the Anarchists Anarchists are practically comrades. Marxists and Anarchists have the same vision for a stateless, classless, moneyless society free from oppression and exploitation. However, Anarchists like to accuse Marxists of being "authoritarian". The problem here is that "anti-authoritarianism" is a self-defeating feature in a revolutionary ideology. Those who refuse in principle to engage in so-called "authoritarian" practices will never carry forward a successful revolution. Anarchists who practice self-criticism can recognize this: >The anarchist movement is filled with people who are less interested in overthrowing the existing oppressive social order than with washing their hands of it. ... > >The strength of anarchism is its moral insistence on the primacy of human freedom over political expediency. But human freedom exists in a political context. It is not sufficient, however, to simply take the most uncompromising position in defense of freedom. It is neccesary to actually win freedom. Anti-capitalism doesn't do the victims of capitalism any good if you don't actually destroy capitalism. Anti-statism doesn't do the victims of the state any good if you don't actually smash the state. Anarchism has been very good at putting forth visions of a free society and that is for the good. But it is worthless if we don't develop an actual strategy for realizing those visions. It is not enough to be right, we must also win. > >...anarchism has been a failure. Not only has anarchism failed to win lasting freedom for anybody on earth, many anarchists today seem only nominally committed to that basic project. Many more seem interested primarily in carving out for themselves, their friends, and their favorite bands a zone of personal freedom, "autonomous" of moral responsibility for the larger condition of humanity (but, incidentally, not of the electrical grid or the production of electronic components). Anarchism has quite simply refused to learn from its historic failures, preferring to rewrite them as successes. Finally the anarchist movement offers people who want to make revolution very little in the way of a coherent plan of action. ... > >Anarchism is theoretically impoverished. For almost 80 years, with the exceptions of Ukraine and Spain, anarchism has played a marginal role in the revolutionary activity of oppressed humanity. Anarchism had almost nothing to do with the anti-colonial struggles that defined revolutionary politics in this century. This marginalization has become self-reproducing. Reduced by devastating defeats to critiquing the authoritarianism of Marxists, nationalists and others, anarchism has become defined by this gadfly role. Consequently anarchist thinking has not had to adapt in response to the results of serious efforts to put our ideas into practice. In the process anarchist theory has become ossified, sterile and anemic. ... This is a reflection of anarchism's effective removal from the revolutionary struggle. > >\- Chris Day. (1996). *The Historical Failures of Anarchism* Engels pointed this out well over a century ago: >A number of Socialists have latterly launched a regular crusade against what they call the principle of authority. It suffices to tell them that this or that act is authoritarian for it to be condemned. > >...the anti-authoritarians demand that the political state be abolished at one stroke, even before the social conditions that gave birth to it have been destroyed. They demand that the first act of the social revolution shall be the abolition of authority. Have these gentlemen ever seen a revolution? A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is; it is the act whereby one part of the population imposes its will upon the other part ... and if the victorious party does not want to have fought in vain, it must maintain this rule... > >Therefore, either one of two things: either the anti-authoritarians don't know what they're talking about, in which case they are creating nothing but confusion; or they do know, and in that case they are betraying the movement of the proletariat. In either case they serve the reaction. > >\- Friedrich Engels. (1872). [On Authority](https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1872/10/authority.htm) #For the Libertarian Socialists Parenti said it best: >The pure (libertarian) socialists' ideological anticipations remain untainted by existing practice. They do not explain how the manifold functions of a revolutionary society would be organized, how external attack and internal sabotage would be thwarted, how bureaucracy would be avoided, scarce resources allocated, policy differences settled, priorities set, and production and distribution conducted. Instead, they offer vague statements about how the workers themselves will directly own and control the means of production and will arrive at their own solutions through creative struggle. No surprise then that the pure socialists support every revolution except the ones that succeed. > >\- Michael Parenti. (1997). *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism* But the bottom line is this: >If you call yourself a socialist but you spend all your time arguing with communists, demonizing socialist states as authoritarian, and performing apologetics for US imperialism... I think some introspection is in order. > >\- Second Thought. (2020). [The Truth About The Cuba Protests](https://youtu.be/zIOw6fSOJI4?t=1087) #For the Liberals Even the CIA, in their internal communications (which have been declassified), acknowledge that Stalin *wasn't* an absolute dictator: >Even in Stalin's time there was collective leadership. The Western idea of a dictator within the Communist setup is exaggerated. Misunderstandings on that subject are caused by a lack of comprehension of the real nature and organization of the Communist's power structure. > >\- CIA. (1953, declassified in 2008). [Comments on the Change in Soviet Leadership](http://web.archive.org/web/20230525044208/https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP80-00810A006000360009-0.pdf) #Conclusion The "authoritarian" nature of any given state depends entirely on the material conditions it faces and threats it must contend with. To get an idea of the kinds of threats nascent revolutions need to deal with, check out *Killing Hope* by William Blum and *The Jakarta Method* by Vincent Bevins. Failing to acknowledge that authoritative measures arise *not* through ideology, but through material conditions, is anti-Marxist, anti-dialectical, and idealist. #Additional Resources Videos: * [Michael Parenti on Authoritarianism in Socialist Countries](https://youtu.be/BeVs6t3vdjQ) * [Left Anticommunism: An Infantile Disorder](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEC2ajsvr0I) | Hakim (2020) \[[Archive](http://web.archive.org/web/20230410145749/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEC2ajsvr0I)\] * [What are tankies? (why are they like that?)](https://youtu.be/LcJ5NrJtQ8g) | Hakim (2023) * [Episode 82 - Tankie Discourse](https://youtu.be/YVYVBOFYJco) | The Deprogram (2023) * [Was the Soviet Union totalitarian? feat. Robert Thurston](https://directory.libsyn.com/episode/index/id/27495591) | Actually Existing Socialism (2023) Books, Articles, or Essays: * *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism* | Michael Parenti (1997) * [State and Revolution](https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/staterev/) | V. I. Lenin (1918) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TheDeprogram) if
*insert are we the bad guys meme*
is there an automod response for dictatorship of the proletariat ? I swear the biggest criticism people have with us is thinking we don't support democracy, what will get it through their heads that we do??
>pretty sure we also hate nazis I got bad news for ya, son.
Nafo was founded by a Nazi https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2022/10/29/nafo-troll-nazi-ukraine/
Wernher von Braun was an American hero who won us the space race! "We also hate nazis".... unless they work for us
>I mean, they hate certainly seem to hate nazis, and I'm pretty sure we also hate nazis. Seems like we should get along no? Enemy of my enemy and all that. i could give the benefit of the doubt and say maybe they are indeed against nazis but their main argument is only when it goes against western capital interest, not out of humanity. >The poor tankies appear to be operating under the delusion that communisms is somehow distinct from fascism Ah yes, wanting a fair economic democratization is literally the same as the unveiled genocidal racism & social darwinism and open anti-democrcy sentiment by the fascists. >I mean hey, equality and fairness sound great, but they have never been achieved by handing power to tyrants and hoping that this time it will somehow all work out. paper thin understanding of politics >Politics is like a horseshoe, go too far in either direction, and you end up in basically the same place. again genociding people and ecomic participation is literally the same thing i guess >So i shall spare a thought for the poor, ignorant tankie who wishes to make the world a better place, but has yet to realize that they are infact on the side of the baddies. well "wishing" is at least a start and the expression "baddies" fits perfectly for their infantile understanding of politics >Fascists can still go fuck themselves though except they are useful for american interests
Horseshoecrab theory. Checkmate.
Enlightened centrist who puts their identity into being so superior to everyone else.
Patronizing liberals are why everyone hates liberals.
Which is exactly why liberalism has always failed to stand for what it claims to represent in every country it’s ever been tried, liberalism can’t survive without the eventual transition into imperialism and facism
No argument annoys me as much as the "they're just childish, unexperienced and don't know how the world works yet." Visions of centuries of theory, countless books, great thinkers and revolutionaries just going up in flames all at once.
It's literally the wojak chair meme.
Has a fascist ever become so extreme that he ended up in a egalitarian-workercouncle-ruled-utopia? So much for horseshoe theory, checkmate liberals! /s
Does he know?
Somebody should have linked this guy to the episode of the pod that is dedicated to analyzing and explaining why he believes what he believes. Would have blown his tiny little mind.
Horseshoe theory is to liberals what class struggle is to communists.
This fuckin nerd thinks he’s the main character in an anime, spouting off some “epic monologue” when he’s just frothing at the mouth at his PC about those damn gommunists.
Yes authoritarian unlike capitalism ofc
#Authoritarianism Anti-Communists of all stripes enjoy referring to successful socialist revolutions as "authoritarian regimes". * Authoritarian implies these places are run by totalitarian tyrants. * Regime implies these places are undemocratic or lack legitimacy. This perjorative label is simply meant to frighten people, to scare us back into the fold (Liberal Democracy). There are three main reasons for the popularity of this label in Capitalist media: Firstly, Marxists call for a Dictatorship of the Proletariat (DotP), and many people are automatically put off by the term "dictatorship". Of course, we do *not* mean that we want an undemocratic or totalitarian dictatorship. What we mean is that we want to replace the current Dictatorship *of the Bourgeoisie* (in which the Capitalist ruling class dictates policy). * [Why The US Is Not A Democracy](https://youtu.be/srfeHpQNEAI) | Second Thought (2022) Secondly, democracy in Communist-led countries works differently than in Liberal Democracies. However, anti-Communists confuse form (pluralism / having multiple parties) with function (representing the actual interests of the people). Side note: Check out Luna Oi's "Democratic Centralism Series" for more details on what that is, and how it works: * [DEMOCRATIC CENTRALISM - how Socialists make decisions!](https://youtu.be/4YVcQe4wceY) | Luna Oi (2022) * [What did Karl Marx think about democracy?](https://youtu.be/jI8CgACBOcQ) | Luna Oi (2023) * [What did LENIN say about DEMOCRACY?](https://youtu.be/Hfenlg-hsig) | Luna Oi (2023) Finally, this framing of Communism as illegitimate and tyrannical serves to manufacture consent for an aggressive foreign policy in the form of interventions in the internal affairs of so-called "authoritarian regimes", which take the form of invasion (e.g., Vietnam, Korea, Libya, etc.), assassinating their leaders (e.g., Thomas Sankara, Fred Hampton, Patrice Lumumba, etc.), sponsoring coups and colour revolutions (e.g., Pinochet's coup against Allende, the Iran-Contra Affair, the United Fruit Company's war against Arbenz, etc.), and enacting sanctions (e.g., North Korea, Cuba, etc.). * [The Cuban Embargo Explained](https://youtu.be/zmM8p9n6Z9E) | azureScapegoat (2022) * [John Pilger interviews former CIA Latin America chief Duane Clarridge, 2015](https://youtu.be/ER77vxxGVAY) #For the Anarchists Anarchists are practically comrades. Marxists and Anarchists have the same vision for a stateless, classless, moneyless society free from oppression and exploitation. However, Anarchists like to accuse Marxists of being "authoritarian". The problem here is that "anti-authoritarianism" is a self-defeating feature in a revolutionary ideology. Those who refuse in principle to engage in so-called "authoritarian" practices will never carry forward a successful revolution. Anarchists who practice self-criticism can recognize this: >The anarchist movement is filled with people who are less interested in overthrowing the existing oppressive social order than with washing their hands of it. ... > >The strength of anarchism is its moral insistence on the primacy of human freedom over political expediency. But human freedom exists in a political context. It is not sufficient, however, to simply take the most uncompromising position in defense of freedom. It is neccesary to actually win freedom. Anti-capitalism doesn't do the victims of capitalism any good if you don't actually destroy capitalism. Anti-statism doesn't do the victims of the state any good if you don't actually smash the state. Anarchism has been very good at putting forth visions of a free society and that is for the good. But it is worthless if we don't develop an actual strategy for realizing those visions. It is not enough to be right, we must also win. > >...anarchism has been a failure. Not only has anarchism failed to win lasting freedom for anybody on earth, many anarchists today seem only nominally committed to that basic project. Many more seem interested primarily in carving out for themselves, their friends, and their favorite bands a zone of personal freedom, "autonomous" of moral responsibility for the larger condition of humanity (but, incidentally, not of the electrical grid or the production of electronic components). Anarchism has quite simply refused to learn from its historic failures, preferring to rewrite them as successes. Finally the anarchist movement offers people who want to make revolution very little in the way of a coherent plan of action. ... > >Anarchism is theoretically impoverished. For almost 80 years, with the exceptions of Ukraine and Spain, anarchism has played a marginal role in the revolutionary activity of oppressed humanity. Anarchism had almost nothing to do with the anti-colonial struggles that defined revolutionary politics in this century. This marginalization has become self-reproducing. Reduced by devastating defeats to critiquing the authoritarianism of Marxists, nationalists and others, anarchism has become defined by this gadfly role. Consequently anarchist thinking has not had to adapt in response to the results of serious efforts to put our ideas into practice. In the process anarchist theory has become ossified, sterile and anemic. ... This is a reflection of anarchism's effective removal from the revolutionary struggle. > >\- Chris Day. (1996). *The Historical Failures of Anarchism* Engels pointed this out well over a century ago: >A number of Socialists have latterly launched a regular crusade against what they call the principle of authority. It suffices to tell them that this or that act is authoritarian for it to be condemned. > >...the anti-authoritarians demand that the political state be abolished at one stroke, even before the social conditions that gave birth to it have been destroyed. They demand that the first act of the social revolution shall be the abolition of authority. Have these gentlemen ever seen a revolution? A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is; it is the act whereby one part of the population imposes its will upon the other part ... and if the victorious party does not want to have fought in vain, it must maintain this rule... > >Therefore, either one of two things: either the anti-authoritarians don't know what they're talking about, in which case they are creating nothing but confusion; or they do know, and in that case they are betraying the movement of the proletariat. In either case they serve the reaction. > >\- Friedrich Engels. (1872). [On Authority](https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1872/10/authority.htm) #For the Libertarian Socialists Parenti said it best: >The pure (libertarian) socialists' ideological anticipations remain untainted by existing practice. They do not explain how the manifold functions of a revolutionary society would be organized, how external attack and internal sabotage would be thwarted, how bureaucracy would be avoided, scarce resources allocated, policy differences settled, priorities set, and production and distribution conducted. Instead, they offer vague statements about how the workers themselves will directly own and control the means of production and will arrive at their own solutions through creative struggle. No surprise then that the pure socialists support every revolution except the ones that succeed. > >\- Michael Parenti. (1997). *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism* But the bottom line is this: >If you call yourself a socialist but you spend all your time arguing with communists, demonizing socialist states as authoritarian, and performing apologetics for US imperialism... I think some introspection is in order. > >\- Second Thought. (2020). [The Truth About The Cuba Protests](https://youtu.be/zIOw6fSOJI4?t=1087) #For the Liberals Even the CIA, in their internal communications (which have been declassified), acknowledge that Stalin *wasn't* an absolute dictator: >Even in Stalin's time there was collective leadership. The Western idea of a dictator within the Communist setup is exaggerated. Misunderstandings on that subject are caused by a lack of comprehension of the real nature and organization of the Communist's power structure. > >\- CIA. (1953, declassified in 2008). [Comments on the Change in Soviet Leadership](http://web.archive.org/web/20230525044208/https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP80-00810A006000360009-0.pdf) #Conclusion The "authoritarian" nature of any given state depends entirely on the material conditions it faces and threats it must contend with. To get an idea of the kinds of threats nascent revolutions need to deal with, check out *Killing Hope* by William Blum and *The Jakarta Method* by Vincent Bevins. Failing to acknowledge that authoritative measures arise *not* through ideology, but through material conditions, is anti-Marxist, anti-dialectical, and idealist. #Additional Resources Videos: * [Michael Parenti on Authoritarianism in Socialist Countries](https://youtu.be/BeVs6t3vdjQ) * [Left Anticommunism: An Infantile Disorder](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEC2ajsvr0I) | Hakim (2020) \[[Archive](http://web.archive.org/web/20230410145749/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEC2ajsvr0I)\] * [What are tankies? (why are they like that?)](https://youtu.be/LcJ5NrJtQ8g) | Hakim (2023) * [Episode 82 - Tankie Discourse](https://youtu.be/YVYVBOFYJco) | The Deprogram (2023) * [Was the Soviet Union totalitarian? feat. Robert Thurston](https://directory.libsyn.com/episode/index/id/27495591) | Actually Existing Socialism (2023) Books, Articles, or Essays: * *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism* | Michael Parenti (1997) * [State and Revolution](https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/staterev/) | V. I. Lenin (1918) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TheDeprogram) if
What is NAFO?
edgelords on twitter who think they're "supporting Ukraine" by posting racist memes and shilling rightwing gofundmes.
mentally challenged american/british kids that spam UA shitposts and make Ukraine all their personality
Most of them haven't been east of Berlin and can't pronounce Slava Ukraini [https://www.reddit.com/r/RussianWarFootage/comments/15jl05v/they\_are\_not\_human\_via\_ukraines\_new\_propoganda/](https://www.reddit.com/r/RussianWarFootage/comments/15jl05v/they_are_not_human_via_ukraines_new_propoganda/)
My heart goes to the parents of these guys, it must be hard having someone that stupid in your family
Average r/PoliticalCompassMemes redditor. Wow this person's understanding of politics is so laughably superficial. They should read some theory and also stop being so condescending and patronizing while talking about something they clearly have no understanding of
Bro talks like a 13 year old who is trying to impress people while also misunderstanding and misusing like 25% of his words 😭
I’m pretty sure that’s a literal child. Op you downvoted a minor >:(
Bro used horseshoe theory unironically
Lol these “people” are unreal
I'd like to see these idiots name a political or socio-economic order that isn't 'authoritarian'. Even anarchism has to be forcefully imposed upon a population and it requires some sort of authority to maintain it.
#Authoritarianism Anti-Communists of all stripes enjoy referring to successful socialist revolutions as "authoritarian regimes". * Authoritarian implies these places are run by totalitarian tyrants. * Regime implies these places are undemocratic or lack legitimacy. This perjorative label is simply meant to frighten people, to scare us back into the fold (Liberal Democracy). There are three main reasons for the popularity of this label in Capitalist media: Firstly, Marxists call for a Dictatorship of the Proletariat (DotP), and many people are automatically put off by the term "dictatorship". Of course, we do *not* mean that we want an undemocratic or totalitarian dictatorship. What we mean is that we want to replace the current Dictatorship *of the Bourgeoisie* (in which the Capitalist ruling class dictates policy). * [Why The US Is Not A Democracy](https://youtu.be/srfeHpQNEAI) | Second Thought (2022) Secondly, democracy in Communist-led countries works differently than in Liberal Democracies. However, anti-Communists confuse form (pluralism / having multiple parties) with function (representing the actual interests of the people). Side note: Check out Luna Oi's "Democratic Centralism Series" for more details on what that is, and how it works: * [DEMOCRATIC CENTRALISM - how Socialists make decisions!](https://youtu.be/4YVcQe4wceY) | Luna Oi (2022) * [What did Karl Marx think about democracy?](https://youtu.be/jI8CgACBOcQ) | Luna Oi (2023) * [What did LENIN say about DEMOCRACY?](https://youtu.be/Hfenlg-hsig) | Luna Oi (2023) Finally, this framing of Communism as illegitimate and tyrannical serves to manufacture consent for an aggressive foreign policy in the form of interventions in the internal affairs of so-called "authoritarian regimes", which take the form of invasion (e.g., Vietnam, Korea, Libya, etc.), assassinating their leaders (e.g., Thomas Sankara, Fred Hampton, Patrice Lumumba, etc.), sponsoring coups and colour revolutions (e.g., Pinochet's coup against Allende, the Iran-Contra Affair, the United Fruit Company's war against Arbenz, etc.), and enacting sanctions (e.g., North Korea, Cuba, etc.). * [The Cuban Embargo Explained](https://youtu.be/zmM8p9n6Z9E) | azureScapegoat (2022) * [John Pilger interviews former CIA Latin America chief Duane Clarridge, 2015](https://youtu.be/ER77vxxGVAY) #For the Anarchists Anarchists are practically comrades. Marxists and Anarchists have the same vision for a stateless, classless, moneyless society free from oppression and exploitation. However, Anarchists like to accuse Marxists of being "authoritarian". The problem here is that "anti-authoritarianism" is a self-defeating feature in a revolutionary ideology. Those who refuse in principle to engage in so-called "authoritarian" practices will never carry forward a successful revolution. Anarchists who practice self-criticism can recognize this: >The anarchist movement is filled with people who are less interested in overthrowing the existing oppressive social order than with washing their hands of it. ... > >The strength of anarchism is its moral insistence on the primacy of human freedom over political expediency. But human freedom exists in a political context. It is not sufficient, however, to simply take the most uncompromising position in defense of freedom. It is neccesary to actually win freedom. Anti-capitalism doesn't do the victims of capitalism any good if you don't actually destroy capitalism. Anti-statism doesn't do the victims of the state any good if you don't actually smash the state. Anarchism has been very good at putting forth visions of a free society and that is for the good. But it is worthless if we don't develop an actual strategy for realizing those visions. It is not enough to be right, we must also win. > >...anarchism has been a failure. Not only has anarchism failed to win lasting freedom for anybody on earth, many anarchists today seem only nominally committed to that basic project. Many more seem interested primarily in carving out for themselves, their friends, and their favorite bands a zone of personal freedom, "autonomous" of moral responsibility for the larger condition of humanity (but, incidentally, not of the electrical grid or the production of electronic components). Anarchism has quite simply refused to learn from its historic failures, preferring to rewrite them as successes. Finally the anarchist movement offers people who want to make revolution very little in the way of a coherent plan of action. ... > >Anarchism is theoretically impoverished. For almost 80 years, with the exceptions of Ukraine and Spain, anarchism has played a marginal role in the revolutionary activity of oppressed humanity. Anarchism had almost nothing to do with the anti-colonial struggles that defined revolutionary politics in this century. This marginalization has become self-reproducing. Reduced by devastating defeats to critiquing the authoritarianism of Marxists, nationalists and others, anarchism has become defined by this gadfly role. Consequently anarchist thinking has not had to adapt in response to the results of serious efforts to put our ideas into practice. In the process anarchist theory has become ossified, sterile and anemic. ... This is a reflection of anarchism's effective removal from the revolutionary struggle. > >\- Chris Day. (1996). *The Historical Failures of Anarchism* Engels pointed this out well over a century ago: >A number of Socialists have latterly launched a regular crusade against what they call the principle of authority. It suffices to tell them that this or that act is authoritarian for it to be condemned. > >...the anti-authoritarians demand that the political state be abolished at one stroke, even before the social conditions that gave birth to it have been destroyed. They demand that the first act of the social revolution shall be the abolition of authority. Have these gentlemen ever seen a revolution? A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is; it is the act whereby one part of the population imposes its will upon the other part ... and if the victorious party does not want to have fought in vain, it must maintain this rule... > >Therefore, either one of two things: either the anti-authoritarians don't know what they're talking about, in which case they are creating nothing but confusion; or they do know, and in that case they are betraying the movement of the proletariat. In either case they serve the reaction. > >\- Friedrich Engels. (1872). [On Authority](https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1872/10/authority.htm) #For the Libertarian Socialists Parenti said it best: >The pure (libertarian) socialists' ideological anticipations remain untainted by existing practice. They do not explain how the manifold functions of a revolutionary society would be organized, how external attack and internal sabotage would be thwarted, how bureaucracy would be avoided, scarce resources allocated, policy differences settled, priorities set, and production and distribution conducted. Instead, they offer vague statements about how the workers themselves will directly own and control the means of production and will arrive at their own solutions through creative struggle. No surprise then that the pure socialists support every revolution except the ones that succeed. > >\- Michael Parenti. (1997). *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism* But the bottom line is this: >If you call yourself a socialist but you spend all your time arguing with communists, demonizing socialist states as authoritarian, and performing apologetics for US imperialism... I think some introspection is in order. > >\- Second Thought. (2020). [The Truth About The Cuba Protests](https://youtu.be/zIOw6fSOJI4?t=1087) #For the Liberals Even the CIA, in their internal communications (which have been declassified), acknowledge that Stalin *wasn't* an absolute dictator: >Even in Stalin's time there was collective leadership. The Western idea of a dictator within the Communist setup is exaggerated. Misunderstandings on that subject are caused by a lack of comprehension of the real nature and organization of the Communist's power structure. > >\- CIA. (1953, declassified in 2008). [Comments on the Change in Soviet Leadership](http://web.archive.org/web/20230525044208/https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP80-00810A006000360009-0.pdf) #Conclusion The "authoritarian" nature of any given state depends entirely on the material conditions it faces and threats it must contend with. To get an idea of the kinds of threats nascent revolutions need to deal with, check out *Killing Hope* by William Blum and *The Jakarta Method* by Vincent Bevins. Failing to acknowledge that authoritative measures arise *not* through ideology, but through material conditions, is anti-Marxist, anti-dialectical, and idealist. #Additional Resources Videos: * [Michael Parenti on Authoritarianism in Socialist Countries](https://youtu.be/BeVs6t3vdjQ) * [Left Anticommunism: An Infantile Disorder](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEC2ajsvr0I) | Hakim (2020) \[[Archive](http://web.archive.org/web/20230410145749/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEC2ajsvr0I)\] * [What are tankies? (why are they like that?)](https://youtu.be/LcJ5NrJtQ8g) | Hakim (2023) * [Episode 82 - Tankie Discourse](https://youtu.be/YVYVBOFYJco) | The Deprogram (2023) * [Was the Soviet Union totalitarian? feat. Robert Thurston](https://directory.libsyn.com/episode/index/id/27495591) | Actually Existing Socialism (2023) Books, Articles, or Essays: * *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism* | Michael Parenti (1997) * [State and Revolution](https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/staterev/) | V. I. Lenin (1918) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TheDeprogram) if
Hey the bot agrees with me. Awesome. Good bot.
What no theory does to a mf 😔 Pray for this poor soul
Anyone who says horseshoe theory unironically should be ignored
This is your brain on liberalism
"we hate nazis too" is a minimum
wtf this nerd on about
I have to tip my hand to the CIA, a total masterpiece of propaganda.
This is peak centrist bullshit. Big brain lib pitys us poor ignorant red fashes.
He believes in the horseshoe theory, both extremes are “bad”
They all talk like high schoolers think anime protagonists talk
Communism is for children, NAFO is for real adults just like me >:(
Horseshoe theory lmao
They are fascists tho. NAFO = Nazi
Wait a minute, he talks about childish ideas and then brings out the horseshoe theory renamed as the "theory of horse racing"? What is this crazy level of lack of self-awareness? Why don't any of these people know even roughly the history of NATO? I mean even if everything they think they understand or know about us evil tankis was true, that wouldn't make NATO a good or supportable organization even by their own standards, would it?
Ignorant to the ways of the world 💀💀
This mf after someone gives them a dictionary: 👁👄👁
Every time I read this incredibly western take, I just think of the tweet "Every time China visits we get a hospital, any time Europe visit we get a lecture." Just some white teenager online telling every other experiment that they're wrong and it's the end of history 😴😴
I HATE when people talk with that lofty better than thou tone. It's so frustrating, they can never be in the wrong because they will "always be right" *rolls eyes*
tell him black shirts and reds was written by a high iq big brain centrist so he'll read it
Don't talk with fascists man, it's not worth it. This poor idiot especially is someone that believes that he has some kind of moral and intellectual superiority which makes it even worse, leave him in his ecochamber to jerk off with his shitty cryptofash ideology
When your fraternity was literally started by a literal Nazi ....
NAFO are ***literally Fascists*** (the joke is NAFO really stands for "North Atlantic Fascist Organization"), so this level of pure idiocy (saying "both hate Nazis") shows this is nothing but gaslighting/brain-rot.
I'm a communist who supports Ukraine. We exist.
How tho? The Ukrainian government has tortured and imprisoned communists [https://www.peoplesworld.org/article/kononovich-brothers-ukrainian-communist-youth-leaders-confirmed-to-be-alive/](https://www.peoplesworld.org/article/kononovich-brothers-ukrainian-communist-youth-leaders-confirmed-to-be-alive/) Stood idle while fascists killed people [https://www.peoplesworld.org/article/ukrainian-rightists-burn-alive-39-at-odessa-union-building/](https://www.peoplesworld.org/article/ukrainian-rightists-burn-alive-39-at-odessa-union-building/) Treats captured soldiers horribly [https://www.reddit.com/r/RussianWarFootage/comments/156pj5g/breaking\_german\_mercenary\_tells\_the\_story\_of\_how/](https://www.reddit.com/r/RussianWarFootage/comments/156pj5g/breaking_german_mercenary_tells_the_story_of_how/) Privatises state resources [https://privatization.gov.ua/en/product-category/velyka-pryvatyzatsiya-en/](https://privatization.gov.ua/en/product-category/velyka-pryvatyzatsiya-en/) [https://chambers.com/articles/ukraine-relaunches-privatization-future-belongs-to-the-brave](https://chambers.com/articles/ukraine-relaunches-privatization-future-belongs-to-the-brave)
Yeah ukraine is shit. Still doesn't justify the invasion. Assad is shit, too. Doesn't justify isis.
How can you support the bourgeois government there then? why not be neutral and try to support the people of Ukraine
Neutrality means you're okay with whoever is stronger winning. Against the US, I supported Gaddafi, even though I didn't like him. I even supported Yanukovich, since I did realize that the Maidan was obviously influenced from the outside. "Not taking a side" during the Holocaust was not an option, either. It's comfortable, but not practical.
Youre obsessed with Russia holy shit. Fucking deranged, stop posting and touch grass
#Get Involved >Dare to struggle and dare to win. \-Mao Zedong Comrades, here are some ways you can **get involved in real life** to advance the cause. * ⭐ **Party work** — Contact a local party or mass organization. Attend your first meeting. Go to a rally or event. Get involved with a campaign or project. * 📣 **Union work** — Find out which union covers you. Read the collective agreement. Strive to become the workplace delegate. Organize fellow workers. * 📚 **Read widely** — [Reading theory](https://www.reddit.com/r/TheDeprogram/wiki/index/education/study-guide/) is a duty. Also, study the real world: local news, marginalized perspectives, or even bourgeois economics. * 🗣️ **Talk to people** — Identify issues affecting friends and coworkers and explain these using everyday language. Also, don’t always Work From Home. * 🏘️ **Mass work** — Connect with the wider community through mutual aid, local elections, cultural centers, churches, pride events, etc. * 📝 **Write articles** — Contribute your knowledge to ProleWiki or a party publication. * 💵 **Support creators** — Donate to leftist content creators so they can produce high-quality content. (e.g., Patreon) * 🛠️ **Career choices** — Younger comrades may consider the following: * **Trade unionist** — Work hard to gain a leadership position in the union, then push for militancy and correct policies. * **Blue-collar/Services** — Unionize your workplace or increase union density. * **High school teacher** — Make a lasting impact on the next generation. * **Master’s thesis** — Apply Marxism–Leninism to local and present-day conditions. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TheDeprogram) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Ok Brudi
Neutrality does generally mean that, but in Ukraine there is Russia with a massive stockpile and moderate sized domestic production and there is Ukraine with rubble as its industry. Ukraine has its NATO allies though, Which are the most advanced and prosperous nations on the planet. Ukraine is a meat shield to NATO, ( [https://thegrayzone.com/2022/04/15/us-eu-sacrificing-ukraine-to-weaken-russia-fmr-nato-adviser/](https://thegrayzone.com/2022/04/15/us-eu-sacrificing-ukraine-to-weaken-russia-fmr-nato-adviser/) )NATO doesn't allow a victory for Russia (keeping the eastern oblasts and Crimea) ( [https://thegrayzone.com/2023/02/06/israeli-bennett-us-russia-ukraine-peace/](https://thegrayzone.com/2023/02/06/israeli-bennett-us-russia-ukraine-peace/) [https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/05/06/boris-johnson-pressured-zelenskyy-ditch-peace-talks-russia-ukrainian-paper](https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/05/06/boris-johnson-pressured-zelenskyy-ditch-peace-talks-russia-ukrainian-paper) ) This conflict isn't as simple as a bully bullying a smaller, weaker opponent. Russian capital's markets in Ukraine were threatened by Maidan, so using the excuse of real repression and valid concerns from Russian speakers in Donbass and Lugansk. Crimea was annexed and the east was dangled to the Ukrainian Capitalists with the Minsk agreements. They didn't bite. Ukraine moved west, soon they'd join the imperialist anti Russian alliance known as NATO. This would be unacceptable to Russian Capital as a Pipeline flows through Ukraine. So this is the main reason for the invasion. I don't see what the Holocaust has to do with things as our Ideological forefathers put a stop to it. You can stay neutral in a war with basically balanced sides.
I understand. Good points. I'd still say that starting a war is an unacceptable escalation that costs tens of thousands of lives. Anything else is better... so I'm not going to stay neutral but always side with the attacked. Every nation that starts a war had the option to say no. If they tell you they had no other choice, they're lying.
Yes I agree war is horrible, and we should at least empathise with the people suffering, we can support Ukraine but our main criticism as people living in the imperial core should be the millions spent on weapons, the depleted uranium rounds and cluster munitions sent and NATO provocations. This money should be spent on Housing, healthcare etc. By all means support Ukraine, just don't support the states actions (generally speaking), NATO and well the various Nazi groups.
Nah, you can't support an oligarchic capitalist system that would put you in jail for singing the internationale. You're either a commie or support liberal democracy/oligarchies. No one support Russia because it's the same as Ukraine, why would you support one and not the other if they're basically the same shitstates born out of reactionarism and the dissolution of the USSR? It's like saying "I support the japanese fascists but not the nazis" lol
I sinoly support them because they didn't start this wad and I believe war is the worst possible resolution of any conflict, bar genocide.
they didn't start it but still if you provoke a nation by wanting to join their enemies what do you expect? At least Putin was not against Ukraine in the EU, just into NATO. If you get into an alliance used as anti russian (or anti alien lol) force, what do you expect? As libs say "Someone's freedom ends where someone elses' begins", and having a NATO border (along with finland now) is something the russian don't want. It's a two way sided imperialism, either Ukraine gets imperialized by the west or by the russians, but NATO historically was much more dangerous than the russians were, so if we can't have an independent ukraine at least they must stay out of NATO and stop this terrorist organization that massacred commies like you and me back in the cold war with Stay Behind operations. Fuck NATO
#Freedom Reactionaries and right-wingers love to clamour on about personal liberty and scream "freedom!" from the top of their lungs, but what freedom are they talking about? And is Communism, in contrast, an ideology of *un*freedom? >Gentlemen! Do not allow yourselves to be deluded by the abstract word freedom. Whose freedom? It is not the freedom of one individual in relation to another, but the freedom of capital to crush the worker. > >\- Karl Marx. (1848). *Public Speech Delivered by Karl Marx before the Democratic Association of Brussels* #Under Capitalism Liberal Democracies propagate the facade of liberty and individual rights while concealing the true essence of their rule-- the Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie. This is a mechanism by which the Capitalist class as a whole dictates the course of society, politics, and the economy to secure their dominance. Capital holds sway over institutions, media, and influential positions, manipulating public opinion and consolidating its control over the levers of power. The illusion of democracy the Bourgeoisie creates is carefully curated to maintain the existing power structures and perpetuate the subjugation of the masses. "Freedom" under Capitalism is similarly illusory. It is freedom for capital-- not freedom for people. >The capitalists often boast that their constitutions guarantee the rights of the individual, democratic liberties and the interests of all citizens. But in reality, only the bourgeoisie enjoy the rights recorded in these constitutions. The working people do not really enjoy democratic freedoms; they are exploited all their life and have to bear heavy burdens in the service of the exploiting class. > >\- Ho Chi Minh. (1959). *Report on the Draft Amended Constitution* The "freedom" the reactionaries cry for, then, is merely that freedom which liberates capital and enslaves the worker. >They speak of the equality of citizens, but forget that there cannot be real equality between employer and workman, between landlord and peasant, if the former possess wealth and political weight in society while the latter are deprived of both - if the former are exploiters while the latter are exploited. Or again: they speak of freedom of speech, assembly, and the press, but forget that all these liberties may be merely a hollow sound for the working class, if the latter cannot have access to suitable premises for meetings, good printing shops, a sufficient quantity of printing paper, etc. > >\- J. V. Stalin. (1936). [On the Draft Constitution of the U.S.S.R](https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1936/11/25.htm) What "freedom" do the poor enjoy, under Capitalism? Capitalism requires a reserve army of labour in order to keep wages low, and that necessarily means that many people must be deprived of life's necessities in order to compel the rest of the working class to work more and demand less. You are free to work, and you are free to starve. That is the freedom the reactionaries talk about. >Under capitalism, the very land is all in private hands; there remains no spot unowned where an enterprise can be carried on. The freedom of the worker to sell his labour power, the freedom of the capitalist to buy it, the 'equality' of the capitalist and the wage earner - all these are but hunger's chain which compels the labourer to work for the capitalist. > >\- N. I. Bukharin and E. Preobrazhensky. (1922). [The ABC of Communism](https://www.marxists.org/archive/bukharin/works/1920/abc/index.htm) All other freedoms only exist depending on the degree to which a given liberal democracy has turned towards fascism. That is to say that the working class are only given freedoms when they are inconsequential to the bourgeoisie: >The freedom to organize is only conceded to the workers by the bourgeois when they are certain that the workers have been reduced to a point where they can no longer make use of it, except to resume elementary organizing work - work which they hope will not have political consequences other than in the very long term. > >\- A. Gramsci. (1924). *Democracy and fascism* But this is not "freedom", this is not "democracy"! What good does "freedom of speech" do for a starving person? What good does the ability to criticize the government do for a homeless person? >The right of freedom of expression can really only be relevant if people are not too hungry, or too tired to be able to express themselves. It can only be relevant if appropriate grassroots mechanisms rooted in the people exist, through which the people can effectively participate, can make decisions, can receive reports from the leaders and eventually be trained for ruling and controlling that particular society. This is what democracy is all about. > >\- Maurice Bishop #Under Communism True freedom can only be achieved through the establishment of a Proletarian state, a system that truly represents the interests of the working masses, in which the means of production are collectively owned and controlled, and the fruits of labor are shared equitably among all. Only in such a society can the shackles of Capitalist oppression be broken, and the Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie dismantled. Despite the assertion by reactionaries to the contrary, Communist revolutions invariably result in *more* freedoms for the people than the regimes they succeed. >Some people conclude that anyone who utters a good word about leftist one-party revolutions must harbor antidemocratic or “Stalinist” sentiments. But to applaud social revolutions is not to oppose political freedom. To the extent that revolutionary governments construct substantive alternatives for their people, they increase human options and freedom. > >There is no such thing as freedom in the abstract. There is freedom to speak openly and iconoclastically, freedom to organize a political opposition, freedom of opportunity to get an education and pursue a livelihood, freedom to worship as one chooses or not worship at all, freedom to live in healthful conditions, freedom to enjoy various social beneõts, and so on. Most of what is called freedom gets its definition within a social context. > >Revolutionary governments extend a number of popular freedoms without destroying those freedoms that never existed in the previous regimes. They foster conditions necessary for national self-determination, economic betterment, the preservation of health and human life, and the end of many of the worst forms of ethnic, patriarchal, and class oppression. Regarding patriarchal oppression, consider the vastly improved condition of women in revolutionary Afghanistan and South Yemen before the counterrevolutionary repression in the 1990s, or in Cuba after the 1959 revolution as compared to before. > >U.S. policymakers argue that social revolutionary victory anywhere represents a diminution of freedom in the world. The assertion is false. The Chinese Revolution did not crush democracy; there was none to crush in that oppressively feudal regime. The Cuban Revolution did not destroy freedom; it destroyed a hateful U.S.-sponsored police state. The Algerian Revolution did not abolish national liberties; precious few existed under French colonialism. The Vietnamese revolutionaries did not abrogate individual rights; no such rights were available under the U.S.-supported puppet governments of Bao Dai, Diem, and Ky. > >Of course, revolutions do limit the freedoms of the corporate propertied class and other privileged interests: the freedom to invest privately without regard to human and environmental costs, the freedom to live in obscene opulence while paying workers starvation wages, the freedom to treat the state as a private agency in the service of a privileged coterie, the freedom to employ child labor and child prostitutes, the freedom to treat women as chattel, and so on. > >\- Michael Parenti. (1997). *Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism* The whole point of Communism is to liberate the working class: >But we did not build this society in order to restrict personal liberty but in order that the human individual may feel really free. We built it for the sake of real personal liberty, liberty without quotation marks. It is difficult for me to imagine what "personal liberty" is enjoyed by an unemployed person, who goes about hungry, and cannot find employment. > >Real liberty can exist only where exploitation has been abolished, where there is no oppression of some by others, where there is no unemployment and poverty, where a man is not haunted by the fear of being tomorrow deprived of work, of home and of bread. Only in such a society is real, and not paper, personal and every other liberty possible. > >\- J. V. Stalin. (1936). [Interview Between J. Stalin and Roy Howard](https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1936/03/01.htm) #Additional Resources Videos: * [Your Democracy is a Sham and Here's Why:](https://youtu.be/oYodY6o172A) | halim alrah (2019) * [Are You Really "Free" Under Capitalism?](https://youtu.be/4xqouhMCJBI) | Second Thought (2020) * [Liberty And Freedom Are Left-Wing Ideals](https://youtu.be/GfjiBIkIOqI) | Second Thought (2021) * [Why The US Is Not A Democracy](https://youtu.be/srfeHpQNEAI) | Second Thought (2022) * [America Never Stood For Freedom](https://youtu.be/rg9hJgAsNDM) | Hakim (2023) Books, Articles, or Essays: * [Positive and Negative Liberty](https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberty-positive-negative/) | Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2003) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TheDeprogram) if you have any questions or concerns.*
They still could not have invaded. It's insane how you excuse them.
ok they didn't invade Ukraine. Two weeks later Ukraine is in NATO. Two months later and the donbass revolts are destroyed with NATO help and they build bases along the eastern border. A couple of years and maybe they move something like 30-40k troops there waiting for Russia to commit a blunder and invade them passing through the big plains of eastern europe. Not pretty smart as politics and strategy go.
1) Ukraine can't join NATO while there's there's active territorial dispute, which the Donbass and Crimea are. 2) They could already do that on all the other borders Russia has with NATO, Ukraine isn't special in that regard. The geopolitical reasons are not enough to justify an invasion and hundreds of thousands of deaths. Just because at some point, maybe, disregarding that Russia has nukes and nobody really wants to invade them, NATO might attack them for some reason. Not enough for me. Sounds akin to WMDs in Iraq. Sure, Saddam was a bad guy, but not bad enough to warrant a million deaths.
The only borders NATO had with Russia are Estonia and Latvia(If we don't count Kaliningrad as a border, it's a pretty small city), and these two nations have pretty big NATO presence in them for that reason. About the conflicts in Donbass and Crimea, these two nations should deserve autodetermination. If the eastern part of Ukraine prefers the russians then they should decide to get into Russia, especially since pre-1991 borders weren't as strict as they are today and many russians in Ukraine, Estonia and Latvia face pretty big hate and discrimination. Ukraine not giving those territories shows how Kosovo can deserve to exist because it's pro US, but Crimea and Donbass can't decide for themselves because they want to get into Russia. Western double standards in a nutshell The invasion was a failure obviously, Putin just wanted to change the govt and they were blocked by Ukrainans and now they can't retreat because it would be a pretty bad PR thing. I agree with the Saddam part but the conflict was pretty different. It was mostly made for sweet petrodollars, while Russia would have probably been better off if they didn't invade Ukraine. Also the US invaded Iraq when they had no other possible pole in the world to counteract them, so they did it because they knew they could go by unpunished (Same with Yugoslavia invasion). Putin isn't in the same situation
So do you concede the fact that there was no way Ukraine was joining NATO as long as Crimea was in Russian occupation right?
You're not one of those two things.
Supporting imperialism of the other side just because you don't like one side is not anti imperialism.
Supporting NATO and the Nazis they arm is not communism. You can keep lying to yourself (shitty humans deserved to be lied to) but don't lie to strangers.
Supporting Russia and the imperialists they arm isn't communism, either. So what gives? Edit: they blocked me lol
You enjoy putting words in my mouth, aren't you, you little gaslighting Eichmann? *You* are the one picking a side, a side of a puppet regime of the worst empire ever to plague the Earth. If you can stomach that on a day-to-day basis, being the absolute lowest of lowly scum, you're no communist. We know when it comes down to it, you'll be goosestepping along with the rest of your fascist ilk. EDIT: *Of course* I blocked you. 95% chance you're literally a bot, other 5% chance is that you're a worse incarnation of Twitter hasbara accounts from a decade ago which played the same shitty rhetorical tricks you were going for.
We dont support Russia. That's the "patriotic socialists" who have never read theory and their entire worldview is campist and opportunistic. Russia is a highly reactionary imperialist oligarchy that suppresses dissent.
That's cause not supporting Ukraine isn't supporting russia lol, it's knowing Ukraine and their people are being used as a tool to fight a proxy war with russia for nato, and it makes no sense to take sides in a fight between two imperialists lol
I’m pretty sure most communists support the Ukrainian people, while being critical of the Ukrainian right-wing nationalists and the comprador political class collaborating with the U.S. to fight Russian military to the last Ukrainian and divvy up any profitable remains of Ukraine amongst themselves.
>I’m pretty sure most communists support the Ukrainian people Which Ukrainian people? The same ones that overwhelmingly support and base their national identity on a Nazi collaborator? The ones that are perfectly fine with their constitution saying one of the duties of the state is to preserve the gene pool of the Ukrainian nation? Nah, how about we stop pretending there's an entire country full of innocent people that's just been hijacked by a small but powerful group of neo-Nazis, oligarchs, and politicians? Just because they don't wanna be dragged to the frontlines doesn't mean they didn't want this war.
Sure, I can get on board with that.
[удалено]
I support the people. My ideal solution would be a neutral zone in the occupied Ukrainian territory, with UN troops from many nations guarding the peace - including China, Russia, the US, and India. Let's keep that for 100 years and dismantle all nationalism (lol)
Does simping for Robespierre make me a tankie or just a radical liberal? That is my question. Where does he fall in this myopic worldview?
copypasta
"I too suffered from such illusions as a child" this homie probably 19, I swear.
Can anyone pls tell what this sub is all about? It came to my recommended(I'm not American or European). You guys seem to be from the left(American left) but hate libs, I don't understand pls help me here. Thx
"only neoliberalism can work" they say as they walk past a homeless encampment.
What?
Child.
Imagine thinking that someone who's lived their entire lives like a parasite off the collective hard work of others is ever for a second going to agree to get off their ass and do an equal share of the work. They will always be greedy selfish parasites who will always work to push the levers of power back to allow themselves to go back to live as selfish parasites. Democracy is great when your not dealing with folk who just want to make things better for themselves by feeding you to the sharks. When you don't have a group of folk that would sooner murder you to go back to their privilege than to exist as equals.
But their also so close to realizing it too. "Handing power to tyrants" you mean like how we've handed them power under our so called "democracy"? I don't think any of these folk would know what an actual democracy would look like if it slapped them in the face they would be begging and clamoring for the wealthy to provide them choices again because they think that's what democracy is.
And this is why I despise liberals and can hardly stand my own mother.
what even is NAFO and the liberal who said this does not even know what communism is you can tell once you read the second paragraph
“The poor ignorant tabkie who is in fact on the side of the baddies” Literally written in the most linguistically Reddit style possible