Quote:
If your first instinct as a westerner is to criticize and lecture 3rd world communist movements, instead of learning from their successes, then you have internalized the patronizing arrogance of the colonial system you claim to oppose.
I wrote my thesis about how we can learn from Cuba’s green farming movements (because they were essentially locked out of capitalism) and was criticized for it.
This l find a general attitude among the Westerners.
I don’t know why they even left Reddit. Were they really that mad about app development?
Depends which wave of newcomers. Some in more recent migrations just got banned for criticizing musk or endorsing Luigism, which is pretty milquetoast stuff any old lib can do.
I am not only on .world (actually started out there and moved over here), but yeah, for me that was the last straw. That official app is just an affront.
Idk how anyone can defend how we (the US) does shit. Especially after this year. If you weren’t already privy to how monstrous we can be now you are, and now we pulled any good shit we might have done, too.
What are some succesful 3rd world communist movements? Asking for a friend
According to some theories, China.
I am hard pressed to think of any Americans older than twenty five that I have ever met IRL that was truly opposed to colonialism. High-schoolers and college students; sure. That’s about it though.
EDIT: To be clear, I am not defending colonialism. I just don’t think most Americans understand or think about its impact. Out of sight. Out of mind.
trying to remember the whiteboard in that show
Man I’m just here for the memes :(
Dang I didn’t know there were successful communist nations in developing countries.
Dang I didn’t know there were successful communist nations in developing countries.
Funnily enough, two started off as developing and ended up as world superpowers.
I’m assuming your talking about Russia and China I think it very fare to criticise them, considering they are both totalitarian nations which don’t respect the needs of there citizens.
The USSR (Soviet Union) and the PRC (China). The USSR is not Russia, and it doesn’t exist anymore.
And of course it’s fair, and in fact important to criticize them. We have the benefit of hindsight and can see how some of their decisions were serious mistakes. On the other hand, it’s also important to analyze what they did good and learn from that too. Neither was perfect, both were improvements, and the terrible fates of Russia and Ukraine after the fall of the Soviet Union is proof of how much good the SU was for its citizens.
which don’t respect the needs of there citizens.
They both inherited countries plagued with regular famine and have both eliminated it. In fact, in 1983 the CIA documented the SU as having a better typical diet than the USA. Clearly they respected the food security of their citizens.
The SU managed to rapidly build low-cost housing after repelling a HUGE invasion of extermination from Nazi Germany. The “commieblocks” were critical in housing people after war. China has also made huge strides in home ownership and elimination of poverty. Meanwhile, poverty and homelessness is increasing under capitalist countries, with them doing little to resolve their housing crises. Clearly they respected the need for shelter of their citizens.
Keep in mind, that both these countries were devastated by world wars and civil wars. Their countries started off in serious crisis and had already had revolutions. If they didn’t respect the needs of their citizens, they would have ended up failed states overthrown by their desperate population or quickly collapsing to invasions.
As for China, the government, despite censorship and political repression, still remains popular among its citizens, according to censorship-resistant US studies[1]. It’s largely avoided war, hugely reduced poverty, and has become a world leader in technology.
There are many valid reasons to criticize these countries and it’s important we do that. But they clearly respected the needs of their citizens. There are few other countries which have done more to reduce poverty and homelessness than them.
Thank you for telling me that. I never really thought that communist nations have done good things in the past, I suppose I already knew that about china. But I did not know that about the USSR. There is no education about any good thing communist nations have done well, at least in the curriculum I grew up with. And communism is therefore ingrained in people essentially as a synonym for bad.
… And a swing and a miss
…no? Pretty spot-on.
“Successes”?
Most of them are 3rd world countries because of these movements…
The few who succeeded only use “communism” as label but are aggressively balls deep into capitalism like China.
Most of them are 3rd world countries because of these movements…
There’s far too many of these to list, but lets take Vietnam and the DPRK as examples:
- Between 1963 and 1973, The US dropped ~388,000 tons of napalm bombs in vietnam, compared to 32,357 tons used over three years in the Korean War, and 16,500 tons dropped on Japan in 1945. US also sprayed over 5 million acres with herbicide, in Operation Ranch Hand, in a 10 year campaign to deprive the vietnamese of food and vegetation cover.
- US dropped large amounts of Agent Orange, an herbicide developed by monsanto and dow chemical for the department of defense, in vietnam. Its use, in particular the contaminant dioxin, causes multiple health problems, including cleft palate, mental disabilities, hernias, still births, poisoned breast milk, and extra fingers and toes, as well as destroying local species of plants and animals. The Red Cross of Vietnam estimates that up to 1 million people are disabled or have health problems due to Agent Orange.1, 2
- US Troops killed between 347 and 504 unarmed civilians, including women, children, and infants, in South Vietnam on March, 1968, in the My Lai Massacre. Some of the women were gang-raped and their bodies mutilated. Soldiers set fire to huts, waiting for civilians to come out so they could shoot them. For 30 years, the three US servicemen who tried to halt the massacre and rescue the hiding civilians were shunned and denounced as traitors, even by congressmen. 1
- In 1967, the CIA helped South Vietnamese agents identify and then murder alleged Viet Cong leaders operating in villages, in the Phoenix Program. By 1972, Phoenix operatives had executed between 26,000 and 41,000 suspected NLF operatives, informants and supporters.1
Vietnam and the DPRK are absolutely success stories, for breaking their colonial chains, and defeating the most powerful and evil empire in history.
Alse China is not a capitalist country, its a mixed economy with the planned socialist sector predominant, and the communist party standing above the political system.
- The backbone of the economy is state ownership and socialist planning. 24 / 25 of the top revenue companies are state-owned and planned. 70% of the top 500 companies are State-owned. 1, 2 The largest bank, construction, electricity, and energy companies in the world, are CPC controlled entities, subject to the 5 year plans laid out by the central committee.
- Workplace democracy in action in the CPC.
- Is modern day china communist? Is it staying true to communist values?
- Didn’t China go Capitalist with Deng Xiaoping? Didn’t it liberalize its economy? Is China’s drastic decrease in poverty a result of the increase in free market capitalist policies?
- Is the CPC committed to communism?
- The Long Game and Its Contradictions. Audiobook
- The myth of Chinese state capitalism. Did Deng really betray Chinese socialism?
- Tsinghua University- Is Socialism with Chinese Characteristics real socialism, or is it state Capitalism?
- Isn’t China revisionist for having a capitalist sector of the economy, and working with capitalists? Why isn’t it fully planned like the USSR was?
- Castro on why both China and Vietnam are socialist countries.
- Roderic Day - China has billionaires.
FYI i am currently working in Vietnam. Let me be clear: its a tourism country, corrupted and social programs are a joke compared to Europe… China is one of the worst countries in distribution of wealth. The communist country is a capitalist mafia ruling the country (and the party itself).
But yeah, i do agree, US is a dickhead country.
Communism is not, never was and will never be about socialism.
Like seriously, guess which country (the state itself) is spending the most of its GDP in social help? Not even the first one, look at the top ten. Guess what? None of them are communist countries or even had communist at the head of the state during their history…
Most of them are 3rd world countries because of these movements…
Lol. Name one country that went from first world to third world because of communist movements.
Easy, South Africa
Oh looks, another example of the meme right here.
I dont oppose colonialism. Its anti-colonialism that have created the worst blood thirsty and arrogant country in the world with its Uber capitalistic ideology: The US… Should have the “US” remained into UK colonies, we would have a better and more peaceful world right now. Same could be sayed about Israël and China… Hmmm… I see a pattern here… One common things between these… UK!
I dont oppose colonialism. Its anti-colonialism that have created the worst blood thirsty and arrogant country
That’s insane. The supremacy and dehumanization here is crazy
The US was not an anti-colonial country; it was a british settler garrison that broke away in order to conquer the continent unhindered by British treaties with native peoples. Westward genocidal expansion and the theft of land were the goals.
The actual anti-colonialists in the revolutionary war (the indigenous peoples), rightly sided with the British in that conflict. Unfortunately their loss resulted in the decimation and near-genocide of hundreds of tribes. Sun-yat-sen and Ho Chi Minh and other revolutionaries were rightly scared that their countries would suffer the same fate.
I was aware of the atrocities and agreement violations, but not that perspective that colonials wanted to get free from any agreements the British did with the natives… Is that a common knowledge in the academia, disputed or a minority one? It is not to discredit it at all the idea, just to genuinely know its status at university level?
I believe they have noted it, but they consider it more minor and less important than Marxist historians do.
Interestingly just like the british, the US itself went through various phases of disputes with its own settler frontier terrorists that it empowered, when it wanted to do the conquering in a more “orderly” manner (although the goal never changed). A lot of these are chronicled in Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz - an indigenous people’s history of the US.
Thanks for the info and all references you do in Lemmy. I don´t consider myself with a similar ideology as you, but indeed I am learning lots of info from your posts.
No probs!
Lol biggest woooosh of all time xD
Biggest clown of all time
I dont oppose colonialism.
What an amazing self-tell.
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You’re not making a joke, though, you’re just antagonizing for no benefit.
I dont oppose colonialism
I dont oppose colonialism
Oh! So you are just a Western colonist who spread the patronizing arrogance propaganda your “leftist” westerner compatriots are slopping up. The wall is that way, go face it!
Woooosh xD
Clown
Most of them are 3rd world countries because of these movements…
with perhaps the exception of south korea and with some good will taiwan, not a single capitalist country reached the so called “developed” status coming from underdeveloped. all of those who did received a downpour of american taxpayer money.
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Name one successful communist movement.
Tim Pool ass comment
The PRC is quite obviously the easiest example, but I’d say every existing Socialist system has achieved remarkable success in the face of horrible opposition.
It really depends on how you define “successful.” If your measure of success is based on how closely these societies resemble Western, liberal, capitalist societies, then, yeah, you’re probably not going to see a whole lot of “success,” but that’s not what these revolutionary movements were trying to achieve. I would say that first and foremost what essentially every communist movement was striving for was just autonomy and independence, and many have been successful in that regard. Vietnam is an independent nation, instead of a French colony. China, similarly, is no longer under the thumb of the British. You may not like what these nations do with their autonomy, but that is what they were striving for and they have achieved it.
Vietnam, Cuba, PRC, DPRK, USSR (for 80 years at least). All of them defeated either US, Japanese, French, and German imperialists, and uplifted their people despite the US never letting up.
The PRC’s acheivements:
- Uplifted more people out of poverty than any country in history, so much so that if we remove the PRC from rankings, world poverty would be increasing.
- Eliminated Urban Poverty. On track to eliminate all poverty within a decade.
- CGTN documentary - China’s war on poverty
Some of the USSR’s acheivements:
- USSR had a more nutritious diet than the US, according to the CIA. Calories consumed surpassed the US. source. Ended famines.
- Productive forces were not organized for capital gain and private enrichment; public ownership of the means of production supplanted private ownership. It was illegal to hire others and accumulate personal wealth from their labor.
- Had the 2nd fastest growing economy of the 20th century after Japan. The USSR started out at the same level of economic development and population as Brazil in 1920, which makes comparisons to the US, an already industrialized country by the 1920s, even more spectacular.
- Free Universal Health care, and most doctors per capita in the world. 42 doctors per 10k population, vs 24 in Denmark and Sweden, 19 in US.
- Had near zero unemployment, continuous economic growth for 70 straight years. The “continuous” part should make sense – the USSR was a planned, non-market economy, so market crashes á la capitalism were pretty much impossible.
- USSR moved from 58.5-hour workweeks to 41.6 hour workweeks (-0.36 h/yr) between 1913 and 1960
- USSR averaged 22 days of paid leave in 1986 while USA averaged 7.6 in 1996., 2
- In 1987, people in the USSR could retire with pension at 55 (female) and 60 (male) while receiving 50% of their wages at a at minimum. Meanwhile, in USA the average retirement age was 62-67.
- All education, including university level, free. 2
- 99% literacy.
- Saved the world from Fascism, Taking on the majority of Nazi divisions, and killing 90% of Nazi soldiers. Bore the enormous cost of blood and pain in WW2 (25M dead), with the bloodiest battles in the history of warfare.. An estimated 70% of Soviet housing was destroyed by Nazi invasion. Nazis were in retreat after the battle of Stalingrad in 1942, a full 2 years before the US landed troops in normandy.
- Doubled life expectancy. Eliminated poverty.
- Combatted sex inequality. Equal wages for men and women mandated by law, but sex inequality, although not as pronounced as under capitalism, was perpetuated in social roles. Very important lesson to learn.
- Combatted Racial inequality.
- Feudalism to space travel in 40 years. First satellite, rocket, space walk, woman, man, animal, space station, moon and mars probes.
- Soviet power production per capita in 1990 was more than the EU, Great Britain, or China’s in 2014.
- Housing was socialized by localized community organizations, and there was virtually no homelessness. Houses were often shared by two families throughout the 20s and 30s – so unlike capitalism, there were no empty houses, but the houses were very full. In the 40s there was the war, and in the 50s there were a number of orphans from the war. The mass housing projects began in the 60s, they were completed in the 70s, and by the 70s, there were homeless people, but they often had genuine issues with mental health.
- 66% of Russians polled in 2015 want the USSR back. The story is the same for all the former eastern-bloc countries: 72% of Hungarians say their country is worse off now than under communism, 57% of East Germans, 63% of Romanians, 77% of Czechs, 81% of Serbs (for Yugoslavia), 70% of Ukrainians, 60% of Bulgarians.
You either never went.to cuba or you are bending reality to fit your narrative.
Also, are you uaing the USSR as EXAMPLE?! you need better undertanding of people’s lifes befora talking shit. I have many friends that lived in the USSR and NONE of them.feel it was good at all
Edit: Americans angry at other non americans because they live in a hellscape. Just vote better dudes. Comunism doesn’t work but having a country with socialist politics like Free healthcare, free universities, labour laws and retirement support is amazing (believe me I know, I live in one of those)
Be less angry and Be better my american dudes!
Cubans are more satisfied with their political system than americans
According to a bunch of polls, in the majority of former eastern block countries most of the population (as high as 70% and no lower than 40%) think life under socialism was better. Also, you were literally given a big list of sources for the USSR example. But clearly didn’t bother reading any.
2 things can be true at the same time. Im not american i dont care. But saying ussr and cuba are amazing shows that you are very very young or very uninformed
You’re a big fan of Cuba under Batista then?
The DPRK defeated the US despite it killing 1 out of every 5 people, and having nearly half their country destroyed:
Vietnam suffered similar ruthless civilian bombing campaigns and massacres, and defeated the US.
unironically calling the DPRK a success
Yes
Typical arrogant chauvinism, that this very meme highlights.
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I’m willing to take the bait, but first re-read the meme and tell me what you missed?
I didn’t miss anything. I just see people throwing their opinions around without providing any supporting data.
I see that OP posted a long list of links in the comments to support their point of view. I haven’t read them yet, so I can’t say I agree or not, but now their opinion is not completely invalid.
I haven’t read them yet, so I can’t say I agree or not, but now their opinion is not completely invalid.
The state of liberal “intellectualism”.
Go read them
