By the way, this sort of thing is how many of those historical “religious schisms” happened. They weren’t really about religious belief; they were about whether a particular congregation should follow a dictator or a rebel movement.
Yes, this sort of thing probably informed the Nicene Creed and other core elements of Roman Christianity.
In this case it’s more like they’re eating their own face. Assuming the justice system they built applies to themselves. But probably not right? If this was a normal citizen they’d have been tortured to death by now.
Though this is great. I hope the Iranian government become targets of some fun and creative AI content.
Well, what’s the point of being a religious leader if you can’t use that position to secretly engage in all of the debauchery you’re so vehemently condemning?
Damn I had no idea that’s where the phrase came from. Now I want to start showing up at his rallies to give him the Nazi salute… Oh wait, that’s right, his followers already do that.
Going out on a limb and betting China or Russia gangs are responsible. Happy to be priced won’t but… Yea. Not holding my breath.
Every web service provider should block all China and Russia IPs until they agree to behave like responsible parties. AWS’s WAF has pretty good geo IP blocking.
Of having hysterical bullshit invented about them? True enough. Quick, does every man in North Korea need to have Kim’s haircut or is no one allowed to have it?
How would that work if they have a toxic family and decided to kill 2 birds with one stone?
I mean if the CCP threatened my family while I’m abroad, I’d just go: “Lol go ahead, idgaf. They’re toxic anyways. Thanks for getting rid of them for me.” 😎
But too bad my toxic family is already here and I had to endure their abuse. 😥
I mean I have some pretty toxic family members as well, but at least a few of them are decent or innocent people. Pretty much everyone is going to have at least one family member that they care about even if most are shit heads.
Its a very weakly sourced state sponsored media article reporting on their state enemy. You have to be willfully credulous to believe their claims without further proof.
That statement is illogical. You must have huge problems with the simplest logic to argue that. You can’t bent logic by twisting what I said. Stop clowning.
I swear some of these people have never even been to China. I’ve had the opportunity, and had a lot of Chinese expat friends. I will say THEY believe the same as rest of the world does on a lot of these issues. I was told in no uncertain terms by my tour guide not to say anything about “things you might have heard” when I went to Tienanmen Square. And trust me, the soldiers everywhere with automatic weapons were enough to dissuade me from THINKING about it.
There are a lot of differences that can be passed off as unpleasant cultural differences (like the one guy was a second class citizen and couldn’t get a city passport because he was from a village… the other guy had a full country Visa with zero effort because he grew up in Beijing), but other things “yeah, we’d look up the truth on all that stuff, but we had to work hard to get around the censors and some of our friends got in caught and got in trouble for doing it”.
These tankies never seem to cover the part where the Chinese government is ACTIVELY suppressing this stuff in China. I could walk up to the site of the Bonus Army massacre and LOUDLY announce “I can’t believe the US government opened fired on American troops here over a peaceful protest” and not so much as draw police attention.
So you’re ok with guys with machineguns keeping people to afraid to ask about the Tianenmen Square Massacre because you think it’s “misrepresented”? As an American in China who thoughts things were overblown, I left China 100% sure the Massacre is as bad as I was taught, because of the way the Chinese government behaved in Tienanmen Square when I was there.
And you really feel that it’s ok that there’s human rights advocates serving time for the crime of “inciting others to knowingly participate in unauthorised assemblies” about the Tianenmen Square Massacre, like Chow Hang-tung? Do you approve of jailing for speech where most countries will, at worst, have civil libel charges?
What’s the most severe penalty you would approve of for people who witnessed and survived the massacre recounting stories that are absolutely true to them? Maybe execute them all?
In my world, EVEN if the victim witnessed the event incorrectly, this is at best Witness Intimidation, and at worst its own human rights violation.
You seem to be projecting a lot of things that don’t have a firm basis in external reality. Are the guys with machine guns there to intimidate tourists, or are they there because Tienanmen Square is right in front of the Chinese equivalent of the White House and several other important buildings that require high security? The incident (which, let us be clear, also involved armed insurrectionists with incendiaries and commandeered rifles) wasn’t even the last major violent event in the area, as people did die actually in the Square some time later when Falun Gong members set themselves and a small girl on fire in protest of the group being banned!
The thought police you are imagining seem, if anything, to be a much better case for you being wrong. However you might feel intimidated in the moment, clearly once you left you understandably made a firm association between the Square and machine guns!
Furthermore, you’re making silly excuses for liars. There were people who weren’t even there for the supposed massacre (see the video) who were accounting very peculiar events in lurid detail, like tanks running over inhabited tents and then mulching them and such. Do you think some scared college student is going to have an anxiety-based hallucination that causes them to think they were places they weren’t and saw things that have probably never happened anywhere? When does that happen besides severe schizophrenics and children who aren’t processing that they just had a nightmare?
It seems to me that you are reaching for excuses, especially since you are disregarding the numerous witness, both domestic and foreign visitors, who all saw that there was no massacre in the Square as the media hysterically portrayed. Leaked state documents over the years (from ambassadors and such) only affirm this further. I can look up some if you like.
You seem to be projecting a lot of things that don’t have a firm basis in external reality
I’m not sure why you would say that.
Are the guys with machine guns there to intimidate tourists, or are they there because Tienanmen Square is right in front of the Chinese equivalent of the White House and several other important buildings that require high security?
Considering the exact placement, I would say the former. Considering their non-presence at other equally important locations? I would also say the former.
The incident (which, let us be clear, also involved armed insurrectionists with incendiaries and commandeered rifles) wasn’t even the last major violent event in the area,
Do you know what double-think is? Was the military killing armed insurrectionists, or was it all made up? Or were they standing their with tanks and watching the armed insurrectionists kill everyone? I trust Amnesty international more than you, and more than propaganda recordings from the Chinese government. Not as someone with a prejudice against China, either. The narrative makes sense, where yours does not.
when Falun Gong members set themselves and a small girl on fire in protest of the group being banned
Are you implying that the soldiers with machineguns were ther ebecause Falun Gong members set themselves on fire? And not because of the internationally known incident that, whether true or not, China is clearly censoring and jailing people for publicizing?
However you might feel intimidated in the moment, clearly once you left you understandably made a firm association between the Square and machine guns!
You’re absolutely right. I did not think China were death dealers before Tianenmen Square, but now I do. They succeeded in terrifying me, and I think that was their intention. I was sure as hell afraid to speak truth aloud in China.
Furthermore, you’re making silly excuses for liars
Why should I believe you over pretty much every unbiased body in the world?
There were people who weren’t even there for the supposed massacre (see the video) who were accounting very peculiar events in lurid detail, like tanks running over inhabited tents and then mulching them and such
Are you referring to the on-site live announcers saying they were witnessing it in real time, and the grisly follow-up photos that China was unable to suppress of a line of corpses with tank-tread sized crush marks destoying their bodies? Are those the lie? All the photos that show half naked and unarmed people killed by large military vehicles were fabricated? Or did “armed insurrectionists” bring tanks?
Do you think some scared college student is going to have an anxiety-based hallucination that causes them to think they were places they weren’t and saw things that have probably never happened anywhere?
No you’re right. People can have panic-based hallucinations when tanks open fire. And the first thing they’ll do is try to take photos of it. And no matter how hard you try, the photos come out eventually. Let me reiterate, photos of bodies crushed by tanks.
It seems to me that you are reaching for excuses, especially since you are disregarding the numerous witness, both domestic and foreign visitors, who all saw that there was no massacre in the Square
I’ve seen photos of the massacre. I have heard witness testimonies that corroborate those photos, and witness testimonies that do not. I am aware of several governments (including my own) that have used false or intimidated witnesses to try to hide an atrocity. Why EXACTLY do you see me as “reaching for excuses”? Do you think I WANT any government to mass-murder its protestors?
At what point should I throw out every piece of evidence I’ve ever seen in my life and believe this? How would you prove to an outside observer that Tienanmen Denial is different from Holocaust Denial?
Do you know what double-think is? Was the military killing armed insurrectionists, or was it all made up? Or were they standing their with tanks and watching the armed insurrectionists kill everyone?
You are underestimating me. There was no killing in the Square itself, but there was fighting all around the surrounding area. The Square was killed with the highest degree of violence being hitting some protestors with batons when they didn’t disperse on the deadline after having many hours to comply.
My position is completely consistent.
and more than propaganda recordings from the Chinese government.
It was a documentary made by westerners! The people speaking were student leaders at the protest and all remain Chinese dissidents! What level of being a “friendly source” could even hypothetically meet your standard without agreeing with you? I can dig up literal internal memos from US political actors that were leaked and you would still call it Chinese propaganda!
I can dig it up for you if you’d like, though.
Are you implying that the soldiers with machineguns were ther ebecause Falun Gong members set themselves on fire? And not because
I’m saying there is a history of many violent incidents in connection with the Square and the government doesn’t want to let more happen. You literally suggest they are there to wordlessly pressure people into what to think despite that same incident that lead to that conclusion having the opposite effect on you! It’s a nonsensical psychodrama, not a cogent political observation.
No you’re right. People can have panic-based hallucinations when tanks open fire
As far as I know, the tanks never opened fire, it was all gunfire from the PLA side. It was an urban combat situation within Beijing (because it wasn’t on the Square itself, but slightly more closed areas) so having the tanks fire seems like it would be excessively destructive and hazardous. Then again, I don’t know.
And the first thing they’ll do is try to take photos of it. And no matter how hard you try, the photos come out eventually. Let me reiterate, photos of bodies crushed by tanks.
I think you might be thinking of some famous photos of what are clearly bikes strewn about and people taking cover.
I’ve seen photos of the massacre. I have heard witness testimonies that corroborate those photos, and witness testimonies that do not. I am aware of several governments (including my own) that have used false or intimidated witnesses to try to hide an atrocity. Why EXACTLY do you see me as “reaching for excuses”? Do you think I WANT any government to mass-murder its protestors?
I don’t know your life, I can’t say. You give the impression that you are a sensitive person who was traumatized and now you seek to affirm that trauma, but that’s just my impression. Atrocity propaganda is very effective, turns out, and western powers are happy to give you as much morbid slop as you can stomach. If you’ve seen any photos of people killed on the Square, feel free to reproduce them.
At what point should I throw out every piece of evidence I’ve ever seen in my life and believe this? How would you prove to an outside observer that Tienanmen Denial is different from Holocaust Denial?
[Aside from that being a hysterical comparison] When you speak so strongly about the evidence and then don’t produce it, you aren’t really giving me a reason to believe you. If I wanted to persuade you on the Holocaust, I’d have plenty of photos that I could show you of mass graves, piles of shoes, piles of gold teeth and fillings, nail marks on the doors of the gas chambers, and notably virtually no one who was kept prisoner in the camps who denied that killing and brutality were taking place! It’s not like we have people who were prisoners in Auschwitz saying “yeah, there were no gas chambers, no butchering, it was just a prison.” Plenty of Holocaust Deniers say that, but none were prisoners of Auschwitz.
And yet, I can point you to people who were actually at the Square and say no one was killed on it, meanwhile other people who were already gone by that time talk about viscera being washed down gutters. In the video I showed you, two people were there to see it and one person wasn’t, and you are literally defending the “witness testimony” of the person who wasn’t there! Furthermore, she says in the hotel interview before the Incident that [in so many words] it was her plan to create atrocity propaganda in order to “wake the Chinese people up”! She explicitly wanted stories of bloodshed for the sake of her political goals, to the point of trying to deliberately endanger students who trust her for the sake of them being harmed! What makes you think she wouldn’t lie when every fact about the situation also makes it impossible for her to be telling the truth?!
I don’t know what you seem to think about the billions of people who know about the Massacre and millions who know enough about it not to be convinced by you. You are taking the same tactic of other deniers, expecting me to have nothing but Tank Guy and my High School History book in my back pocket.
Further, you are now accusing ME of being broken or “sensitive” for simply knowing the Tienanmen Square Massacre happened. I’m going to apply the outsider test of faith here again (I know it won’t work, I don’t care). You sound exactly like a Holocaust Denier I dealt with a year ago.
After the hysterical comparison claims… are you asking me to post the grisly photo of a line of human bodies, crushed, with joints in wrong directions, or you won’t believe it’s true? I’m not trying to convince YOU. I know from “How to Respond to Tiananmen Trolls” (from anti-propaganda Doublethink Labs) that a video of it happening would do nothing but make you smile and say “see, no evidence”. I just need to provide a voice that the world is indeed round so that flat-earthers don’t get a better foothold.
As for the evidence, most people have already seen it and you’re just helping them forget it was there by pointing out that I haven’t bombarded YOU with articles and photos you would just deny. I would really love (hate) to hear your rebuttal to the disgusting photo of corpses crushed by tanks, but I will not be posting NSFL content in this place.
Also, for anyone reading, I’d like to remind people of one rebuttal to your Holocaust comparison response. YES, there are more pictures of the Holocaust than the Tienanmen Square massacre. The holocaust happened over TWELVE YEARS and there are dozens of photos. The Tienanmen Square Massacre happened on ONE day. And for the casual observer who might still be here, note that this wasn’t just some protest-turned-riot. It was a long peaceful protest that was ended by the march-in of the military. In fact, there were upper leaders in the Chinese government who wanted to NOT kill all the protestors, and instead find a peaceful agreement with them (Zhao Ziyang comes to mind) whose career ended for not being on board. But I guess they’d just be Tienanmen Square deniers too?
There’s literally nothing but a few obviously coerced confessions that counter the truth of the massacre. And you don’t care. Ultimately, Massacre deniers will just start defending China’s “necessary” action to kill those innocent protestors, as you’ve already started doing. What you did wrong was accidentally doing it while still pretending it didn’t happen. People will notice that.
A black and white world where objective measures of press freedoms are apparently inversely proportional to trustworthiness of said journalists.
Oh my god, are you seriously claiming you can objectively measure press freedoms while saying socialists live in a black and white world? Just want to give you a chance to walk back your statement
I am quite curious to know your methodology for measuring press freedom so we can compare and perhaps find something which can be considered locally objective.
You’re retreating into “locally” objective. In this topic you’re not going to get agreement on what constitutes press freedom, so it is pointless. My point is that the claim of objective press freedom existing is ridiculous. You walked it back, but to a position that still seems ridiculous to me.
For example, I dont believe there is such thing as a free press. Any org that can produce a press machine is going to influence that press, whether that is a government or private interests. Editorial freedom isn’t possible, editorial control just ranges from the subtle to the overt.
You are the only one making assumptions here. I want to find some common ground.
So let’s pull this thread. I agree that bias is inevitable, but do you believe this negates the value of even trying to protect press freedom? And if so, do you extend this to all forms of truth seeking?
So let’s pull this thread. I agree that bias is inevitable, but do you believe this negates the value of even trying to protect press freedom? And if so, do you extend this to all forms of truth seeking?
Of course bias is inevitable, Im saying institutional bias will always be enforced down the chain onto journalists and writers.
Can you give me your definition of press freedom? Because it seems contradictory if the owner of a press will influence what is published but journalists of that press somehow have press freedom.
Well so first of all, I don’t consider only corporate or state owned media outlets to be “the press.” But certainly, editorial freedom is a big part of press freedom. One media outlet can only exert editorial control over its own journalists. It cannot force editorial restrictions onto all media the same way a government can. I think this is pretty low hanging fruit when it comes to press freedom - individual bias can be averaged out, but centralized, legally enforced bias cannot. This feels axiomatic to me, but it may not be to others whichbis why I think these conversations are so interesting.
cannot force editorial restrictions onto all media the same way a government can. I think this is pretty low hanging fruit when it comes to press freedom
Yes they can, it is called private (as opposed to personal) property rights enforced by the state. The range of opinion will always be broadly supportive of the capitalist government.
Please read inventing reality or manufacturing consent. I am tired and I feel like you aren’t interested in learning, with or without changing your opinion.
I don’t know why you think I have not read those books. I’m quite familiar with both, and agree with many aspects of them. I assure you though, Chomsky is not a press skeptic they way I think you are implying. And not everyone who disagrees with you is ignorant. You are the one shutting down conversation and making accusations.
But either way, this is quite easy to back test. Is there no western media you can think of which is critical of Capitalism? Maybe even someone you just cited?
Based on what you’ve said you really need to read those books again.
But either way, this is quite easy to back test. Is there no western media you can think of which is critical of Capitalism? Maybe even someone you just cited?
Point out the flaw in this rhetoric like Parenti would, given you’ve read him.
The corporate media will always serve the elites over token dissent. And token dissent protects capitalists from Capitalism. He is quite funny and self aware when he wants be.
Trust me I get it. What I don’t recall is Parenti expressing general skepticism of press freedom as a first principle. He mostly argues that capitalism corrupts the media. Again, this is laughably self evident.
Parenti and Chomsky are more left-libertarians though. Chomsky in particular is a outspoken and vocal critic of Lenin’s centralism and is a vehement defender of press freedom. I would say that my ideas of press freedom are quite aligned with theirs, and it seems as if you are one who has fundamentally missed the message.
The corporate media will always serve the elites over token dissent. And token dissent protects capitalists from Capitalism. He is quite funny and self aware when he wants be.
So why did you say the silly thing you said in the first place? And why do you consider corporate press to be more free than government press?
Do you have proof that there is no dissent within socialist countries? Because based on my readings there is plenty of lively debate. Hell, you can look at streams of the vietnamese assembly.
I literally know nothing about Vietnamese politics. But I also don’t think I’ve made any assertion that press/individual freedoms are incompatible with socialism. In fact, I think I’ve been pretty clear about this forum “deserving a better brand of socialist”
Wow, what? Communists talk openly about propaganda… You have no idea what you’re talking about.
We are well aware what our biases are. We are trying to get westerners to see their own biases. Being called out as hypocrites feels like an attack, but when we say everyone have biases, we know it’s true about us too.
Absorb news from a wide variety of sources, including sources from other countries, and you’ll see that the BBC is in fact biased against China.
It takes time, and reading a lot, and you won’t get it from Lemmy/Reddit/twitter(or X or whatever now)/FB. Even ground news only has so many sources. And you know what, the BBC does great coverage for a lot of things, they are a pretty high quality source for a lot of news. But yeah, everyone has biases, and the BBC is biased against China.
It doesn’t mean that reports are false just because two states are enemies (which is an exaggeration).
If they were strongly cited I would not be criticizing people believing them. All sources are biased, the question is how factual a source is.
The BBC is strongly biased against China. If they make claims without proof the most logical course of action is to not assume they are telling the truth and not incorporate what they say into your beliefs. (Note that this is different than “assume they are lying”)
Aren’t these threads wild? These people don’t want to engage in actual discussion here. They just want to remove your agency by calling you brainwashed, do the sealion “source” thing, and then ad hominem away any sources you do provide.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again - the world deserves a better class of communist.
They just want to remove your agency by calling you brainwashed
Unlike when the liberals in this very thread accuse people of being brainwashed or paid shills, because then it is righteous!
do the sealion “source” thing,
lmao what dastardly trolls they are to care about sourcing
and then ad hominem away any sources you do provide.
Like you’d ever accept People’s Daily or whatever. The “tankies” need to mostly rely on liberal outlets because you will discard reporting out of China (etc.) out of hand.
the world deserves a better class of communist.
If we had a better class of communist, you’d hate them too because you’d believe everything you’re told about them, just like you do with the existing breeds.
I have no doubt, every nation has secret police. I simply doubt they are doing what the article suggests theyre doing. It seems to me the article is interested in explaining why there aren’t many uyghur Muslims joining their narrative and why a lot of them are supportive of China and feel their culture is respected.
Well I, as a former citizen of China, do “speak out” against CCP as in family discussions, in online forums, and sometimes with classmates in school, but I don’t “speak out” as in actually participate in protests. Demonstrations just isn’t my thing. Protesting against CCP gets you labeled a “race traitor”. I mean honestly, with all the racial problems in the US, and having to deal with my abusive family, I really don’t have to energy care about CCP anymore. It’s dead to me. I view China just like how an anti-fascist German view Nazi Germany. There’s no point of protests. It’s beyond anything a protest can fix. Like… why do I even care, it isn’t even my country anymore.
Edit: Also, it isn’t a conspiracy that ethnic Chinese (I’m gonna use the term “ethnic Chinese” because this applies regardless of citizenship status) people don’t “speak out”. People just value “Social Harmony” more than being correct. Like if you live abroad, why care about what happens back in China? Most ethnic Chinese people who lives abroad don’t really feel welcome in their new country, so why be against your former country if you aren’t even sure if you are actually safe in your new one? You don’t end up in a situation where you have no safe harbor in the world. Ethnic Chinese people living abroad believe China will accept them again in-case their living situation abroad goes south, so they don’t want to get on the bad side of the Chinese government. Like what happened with the Chinese Exclusion act in the US more than 100 years ago, and also the Japanese Internment Camps. Maybe you disagree with the thought process, but that is what most ethnic Chinese people think.
If your comment (the top-level one) was supposed to be sarcasm, you need a /s tag because there are people actually being serious saying that “it’s a conspiracy, couldn’t be any other possible explanation” stuff.
But also, the “hostage” thing is not entirely false, just very exaggerated. They only take your family “hostage” if you are like a leader of a protest or something. But I doubt they care if you are just some forum user that has no followers and “protesting” online. They got too many dissidents within their jurisdiction to care about those abroad.
As someone who legitimately has family in China and who visits them and speaks to them in Mandarin, there is 100% a chilling effect caused by CCP autocracy.
But I am eager to hear how a bunch of people who have never been and don’t speak the language know more about this because they read a pamphlet.
Is there a way to jump instances and bring all your content/moderation with you? I really didn’t sign up for tankie voat, but I have growing communities in this instance.
Unfortunately not right now, maybe in the future. You can make the community on the new instance, stop all posting on the old one and pin a link to the new one so users are forced over, but that might not work and you could lose a largish portion of your userbase.
The term tankie comes from the 1956 hungarian revolution/counter-revoluton (depending on who you ask) which split the British communist party, those that supported the Soviet Union suppressing it with the military were called tankies.
The video of the man in front of the tank column related to the June 4th incident did not result in the man standing in front of the tank dying, and those tanks were leaving the area where the violence occurred and is not where the word tankie comes from like I believe you are suggesting.
No, I was suggesting that tankie came to describe USSR supporters (which modern apologists project onto Russia, as if the wall never fell). I am aware of the origin of the term.
My comment was a reply on people supporting whatever Russia and China do. It takes a jab at both.
No, I was suggesting that tankie came to describe USSR supporters
No, it started that way? Do you mean started to be more all encompassing? I literally explained the origin of the term one comment ago. Also, I dont see how this
" Imagine thinking Chinese workers own the means of production, or not even knowing where the term “tankie” comes from. "
-can mean what you say you meant.
(which modern apologists project onto Russia, as if the wall never fell).
Anyone who has researched the USSR enough to cut through capitalist propaganda knows Russia is now a neolib-ish bourgeois democracy.
No, it started that way? Do you mean started to be more all encompassing?
So, didn’t the term come to describe people who support the USSR imperialist practices by rolling into countries with tanks?
Anyone who has researched the USSR enough to cut through capitalist propaganda knows Russia is now a neolib-ish bourgeois democracy.
Have you ever seen anything written by the average lemmy tankie? They will defend Russia because it’s not the US.
If the US invades a middle eastern country because of “terrorists”, the true motive is oil (which I don’t disagree with). But if Russia invades Ukraine because they could potentially become a competitor petrol state in Europe more aligned with the EU, then it’s actually “nazis”.
Have you ever seen anything written by the average lemmy tankie? They will defend Russia because it’s not the US.
No, they will defend Russia’s actions because they understand the lead up to the war. The coup, the ceasefire violations, the waves of ethnically russian ukrainian refugees. And because they understand that the west expending itself on unfavorable terms is good for multipolarity and for the people the west would have otherwise used those weapons on.
Taking this at face value, that is still extremely different from “defend Russia because they believe in the intrinsic merit of the Soviet project” as you suggested before. The liberal mobsters who took over Russia tried to join the NATO club but were rejected, and the current situation is in many respects a consequence of that.
Imperialism is the final stage of capitalism. Finance capitalism takes over from industrial capitalism and seeks out markets abroad, having exhausted the internal ones. It teams up with other finance capitalism to become a global force, the export of capital becomes the most prominent feature of the economy rather than the export of raw materials or finished goods. The states they come from tend to become fascist in nature, or as some people put it, “fascism is imperialism turned inward”.
Even if China was a capitalist country as some people claim, it still wouldn’t be at that stage yet. Russia might wish to one day be there, but it too has a long way to go.
Because you need to get to imperialism via capitalism.
Socialism’s goal is to provide for its people; in theory, why can’t it engage in colonialism to bring in resources to benefit its people?
There is definitely no other way.
Its obvious how capitalism leads to imperialism, but it’s definitely not obvious how that would be the only way to arrive there.
Any elaboration you can provide would be great because you’re acting as if it should be obvious why what you’re saying is true but it absolutely is not.
Socialism’s goal is to provide for its people by moving past a society based on exploitation. This is why it wouldn’t engage in colonialism.
I think you’d need a different word to use to describe your socialist-colonialist state. Imperialism doesn’t mean, “when you invade”.
Imperialism is the monopoly stage of capitalism where finance capitalists export capital rather than commodities and these capitalists become the most dominant.
There’s many different capitalist interest groups, but one is by far the most powerful and dominant in global politics, the finance capitalists. This group of capitalists always come to dominate over all others, most capitalists require access to financial capital to expand their businesses, or to weather difficult circumstances in the marketplace. Financial capitalists gradually gain control of all industries through being able to see the movements of each industry and by them being the spider in the web, put simplistically. Then when they’ve run out of domestic exploitative growth opportunities they reach out beyond their borders and team up with other financial capitalists through mergers etc. This is imperialism, the final stage of capitalism. All capitalism eventually ends up here. Russia will too, but not yet.
The major capitalist interest group in opposition to the finance capitalists are the always losing group of industrial / national capitalists. These are private owners of domestic industries who mainly derive most of their profits from operating within the borders of a particular country (or the EU or whatever). Donald Trump would be an example of one of these, and he’d be in political alignment with many other industrial capitalists, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates… “industry leaders”. Their politics tend to be libertarian in nature, the social conservative aspect of their politics is just a front they put up to gain the electoral support of naïve socially-conservative people and exploit them. They don’t really care about religion or guns or anything like that. They usually like traditionalism because it provides them with a reliable exploitable source of labour. They would have opposed women in the workplace until they realised they could exploit them too without risk. Same with LGBTQ+ stuff, they used to be opposed but are now less so. They still are in Russia, indicating their capitalist immaturity. The western capitalists have grown beyond this stuff to some extent. A lot of conservative politics comes from this group. The Finance capitalists are less well known. You know the names of many western finance companies but probably not nearly as many outside the west.
Russia is an example of a country emerging from a primitive stage of capitalism that stands opposed to western financial imperialism. They are largely in control of their economy and government after western financial capitalists pillaged Russian industry after the fall of the USSR. This is upsetting to western finance capitalists, who desperately want to destabilise Russia and would love to install a government that is friendly to western finance so they can pillage it again. it slipped out of their grasp with Putin after Iraq, they want it back.
It’s western finance capitalist imperialism versus Russian industrial capitalism. Putin is the Russian industrial capitalist’s thug godfather. If any of the oligarchs step out of line and try to sell out mother Russia, they’ll find themselves defenestrated quick sharp. If he falls then they all need to quickly put someone else in place to rule over them and protect them from each other. If the US gets a foot in the door again they’re all fucked. It’s constantly knocking.
Russia’s industrial capitalists have already been raped by the US twice before now, they trust Putin as their administrator. He lets them do what they want as long as they don’t fuck over Russia. He’s a dictator, but one that prioritises a strong and functional Russia over one that collapses to be strip-mined and sold off by NATO capitalists. Given the lack of real alternatives (the Communist party was outlawed for a time), Putin has clearly been the only real option for Russians for most of the past two decades. They will not be pillaged a third time, hence this completely predictable Ukraine reaction they’d hoped for after constant provocations, the last one being the Nazi led coup and overthrow of Ukraine’s democracy by the Right Sector Nazis and others. The one thought experiment that no lib can answer is what the USA would do it the shoe was on the other foot and Russia was arming nutcases in Mexico.
You’re hearing “imperialism” a lot right now because it’s been inserted into the discourse as a wildcard term to con people into explaining away the motivations behind Russia’s invasion, instantly dismissing thought of all of NATO’s provocations. It would probably take Russia decades more to become Imperialist, maybe I’m wrong, maybe it would take less time but it’s not now, and “imperialism” is not the reason for the invasion by a long stretch.
I don’t think you’re doing a very good job of attempting to answer the very direct confusion I’m having. You’re doing a lot to make sure it’s obvious how capitalism can and does result in imperialism, which frankly I’m mostly in agreement with. My issue is that you’re asserting that socialism can’t lead to imperialism. You’ve still given no reason that this is to be the case except for this attempt:
Socialism’s goal is to provide for its people by moving past a society based on exploitation. This is why it wouldn’t engage in colonialism.
And I agree that, by definition, it’s a society based on the betterment of its people. Stress should be applied there to its people. I’m not justifying imperialism at all, but it’s a pretty obvious argument that by subjugating other nations/peoples and exploiting them, you can make the lives of your people better. Perhaps you’re trying to say that the type of leadership and ideology that creates and maintains socialism would also be ideologically against imperialism, but that seems more pragmatic than theoretic. You’re saying socialism can’t engage in imperialism by definition but the most I’d give is that it doesn’t engage in imperialism in practice.
That guy has zero interest in being persuaded, he was just trolling and trying to waste my time. I’d already replied in detail and he pretended not to understand.
Because you need to get to imperialism via capitalism. There is definitively no other way.
You have more than zero point, but this is an excessively modernist way of viewing development that Marx explicitly refutes in his later writings after facing spurious accusations of supporting such views.
Thank you, I’ll look at that. It might be my misunderstanding of a technical term, but I don’t see the logical sequence that makes it apparent that socialist countries can’t engage in imperialism/colonialism.
The very short answer is that imperialism requires very specific economic systems and incentives. Those systems are not going to occur in socialist States because socialist States develop different economic systems than capitalism because the profit motive is absent, which impacts short term and long term economic development plans in many significant ways. For an extreme example look at Juche’s emphasis on self reliant socialism within an internationalist socialist order. They cannot do imperialism because all of their economic planning is built around a stable self sufficient economy. An extractivist economy isn’t just something you can graft on, it has to be a central part of an economy to make economic sense.
For an example of socialism not being imperialist when it has the opportunity to, you can look at China forgiving loans. It doesn’t do so out if the charity of its heart, it does so because it is incentivized to because damaging other nations self determination through financial coercion actively harms its project. It wants strong neighbors with close economic ties, it doesn’t want to suck the marrow out of their bones because that is destructive to China in the long term, and socialism is able to plan in the long term unlike capitalism which has to be more short term oriented because of the way its incentives function.
Imperialism is actually a very costly affair (in many cases it costs the home country and only benefits specific lobbyists within that country) compared to mutual cooperation and always rebounds on empire, it only happens because of market failures that do not happen under socialism.
They’re saying if Communists do it, it’s not Imperialism even if it looks exactly the same.
They are willfully committing an equivocation fallacy, using their definition of “Imperialism” as being necessarily related to Capitalism. The textbook definition of Imperialism does NOT necessarily relate to capitalism, so you are indeed in the right.
a policy of extending a country’s power and influence through diplomacy or military force. -Imperialism
A non-capitalist country most certainly can do that definition. And Russian and China have both done that quite unambiguously.
So you’re in the right. But you’ll never win an argument against them because lies are truth.
These are Leninists who believe that socialism cannot do imperialism because socialism is ideological manifest destiny. Nevermind that this was more or less one of the original debates between Trotsky and Lenin on how do do “global communism.”
They like to redefine words to carry whatever ideological weight they want, because it’s much easier than introspection. Like how they will carry the “Nazi means anti-Russian” banner to unironically defend mass deportation children from Ukraine. "Obviously it can’t be the UN definition of genocide, because you can’t genocide Nazis.
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