this post was submitted on 26 Sep 2023
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[–] spacesweedkid27@lemmy.world 52 points 1 year ago (8 children)

2 things:

  1. The victors write history

  2. After Lenin the USSR was not really communist anymore but more really a totalitarian state that didn't believe in the values of communism. Just like China.

Everything would probably have been better if Lenin didn't die so fast and then Trotsky would have ruled.

[–] Kerred@lemmy.world 20 points 1 year ago
  1. The victors write history

Flashback to stories of Rus conquests written by the Rus that said the people asked to be conquered

[–] Depress_Mode@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

“History is written by the victors” is a tired cliché that doesn’t always hold up super well if you spend a moment to consider it.

Who conquered Rome? Surely, it was a people remembered for their great military prowess, right? Nope, still commonly remembered as barbarians thousands of year later.

The Mongols had one of the largest empires in history, and yet in much of the lands they conquered, they’re remembered as being monstrously ugly brutes, which is where words like “mongoloid” and “mongrel” come from.

[–] PolandIsAStateOfMind@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Trotsky would have ruled.

Mask off trot lmao

[–] idiomaddict@feddit.de 11 points 1 year ago

To be clear, the alternative here is Stalin. There are like only five people who would be worse choices

[–] mindbleach@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Just like China.

And Cuba. And North Korea.

One of those funny coincidences that keeps happening.

To be perfectly clear: I'm not strongly opposed to what any "14-year-old white girl" means when she promotes communism. I understand leftist goals as distinct from what these countries actually did. But the fact these countries had those goals, and then did this shit instead, demands a better explanation than 'that doesn't count.' Especially when leftist philosophy has a lot to say about liberals and capitalism inevitably producing terrible outcomes.

[–] TheLordHumungus@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago

Trotsky was as much a tyrant and potentially even more blood would have been spilled. Trotsky was a strong proponent of war communism which was brutal towards the Russian civilians.

[–] Not_mikey@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Stalin believed in the values of communism, he just also believed everyone was out to get him. Economically he followed Lenin's plan of nationalization and collectivization even more zealously then Lenin would have. Lenin wasn't as paranoid as Stalin and probably wouldn't have killed and gulaged millions of "suspicious" people but he was still very much a dictator and was willing to use any means necessary to achieve his goals, same with Trotsky.

With any of them the super structure of the state and how it's organized may vary a bit, but it would have all been built off a nationalized and collectivized base. Whether you want to call that base communism is up to you, but you can't say one is and one isn't.

[–] tpihkal@lemmy.world -5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Until the next tyrant came along. It's a system that is always bound to fail.

[–] MotoAsh@lemmy.world 10 points 1 year ago

It is a system that never gets transitioned to fully. It doesn't fail because it has basically never existed. If I invade your house, kill your father, and make you call me the milk man, that doesn't make me a milk man.