I haven’t assessed the quality of the comments yet, but this is incredibly interesting to see.
Edit: aaannd its gone. I should have copied the post when it was up.
I haven’t assessed the quality of the comments yet, but this is incredibly interesting to see.
Edit: aaannd its gone. I should have copied the post when it was up.
Alot of poorly read “marxists” in the comments, more interested in absolving the so-called crimes of socialism than helping the op attain a more grounded understanding of reality
Yeah saw a lot of “look, a lot of Marxists also think Stalin was an evil dictator”
Was he not? Described to be a generally paranoid man and also all the purges that occured
Enlighten me
Being wary about capitalist (including Nazi) spies as the leader of the world’s first socialist country, one that had been under attack since it was born, is prudent, not “paranoid.”
Some of the purges (to be clear, purges means “party members being kicked out of the party” and not “mass executions”) might have been in excess, but as I said above, they really worry under constant attack both overt and covert and their concern that capitalist sympathizers might have infiltrated the party was obviously warranted given that a capitalist sympathizer infiltrating the party ultimately became a pro-Western dictator and illegally overthrew the Soviet Union.
I’m not saying he was perfect, he was a human and had as many flaws as anyone, but he was a devoted communist, led the Soviet Union competently and these people are trying to throw him under the bus (and to avoid beating around the bush, they’re trying to throw the whole Soviet project, as well as all other Communist projects under the bus) to gain clout with liberals who will never respect them.
I do believe that he was a communist thoroughly but I am not sure about your claim that his purges weren’t a cause for bloodshed, it would be great if there was a source I could read
His leadership was not perfect and I do view him in a negative light (you may guess why) but it did propel the socialist world forward and his reforms helped many people and it was the first stepping stone for what came after
I’m not sure how much I’m wasting my time here, especially since you commented on a nearly week old comment to start this conversation, and you’re from an instance I don’t recognize as ideologically socialist, but we agree that this is a mark in his favor, right?
I’m not particularly well-read to be honest, but Alaskaball put together a thread explaining what the purges were actually about (mostly expelling people who’d joined the party for personal advancement rather than ideological commitment to socialism, along with other assorted scum. Some people did get kicked out for holding beliefs at odds with party leadership, but it was mostly careerist and people with bad reputations amongst the [non-party] people they interacted with daily, like a University president who got purged for being deeply disliked by his school’s students).
https://hexbear.net/post/213460?scrollToComments=false
Probably the redscare propaganda out society is inundated with daily, it even affects communists in the West.
Not a waste of time if you helped me — which you did — so thank you.
Thanks, a lot of people ask questions like that in bad faith so people (me included) are a little quick to get defensive sometimes. Glad you felt the interaction was beneficial.
They think they will gain mainstream approval from accepting “unavoidable evils” aka lies, revisionism, and slander. They have already surrendered the language of history to the empire.
Reddit is awful for Marxists.
Reddit is awful
Fair, lol.