this post was submitted on 06 Nov 2023
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Amazing how he could do all that while apparently being a totally normal non-autocratic political figure, clearly beholden to democratic workers' councils below him. Thirty years of unchallenged power (violently suppressing any internal opposition!) and that's not at all the same thing as dictatorial power over a nation-state.
Do you think hair-splitting is what barbers do?
Yeah, I read your one citation the first time. You, personally, here, now, are still listing a bunch of horrifying shit the man did, and could just as easily have not done, by his whim alone, during his decades of unitary executive power over a nation which brutalized any citizens who did not fall in line. 'Well he had a team!' Yeah dude, most autocrats do, or they get stabbed in their sleep.
I don't understand how you can talk about purging political opponents and still not get that 'well he's teeechnically not a dictator' is stupid word game. By the definition you're using - does Hitler count? Does anyone?
There's people here absofuckinglutely defending Stalin's atrocities. And the atrocities of other allegedly-communist or at least anti-"western" governments. Those are the tankies we're supposed to be talking about. When you say you've never seen them, I don't believe you.
It is our national shame that Andrew Jackson was ever elected - let alone twice - but the motherfucker was in fact beholden to congress and the courts, and when his time was up, he left like anybody else. More recently, we had The Idiot try not to leave. Nothing that narcissistic bastard did compare with Jackson's atrocities. And yet: if The Idiot had maintained power, in spite of popular opposition and without apparent limit, he would be an American dictator. And there would be assholes defending him, as they now excuse his failed coup. They'd loudly declare we're a republic, not a democracy - and other word-salad excuses for their desired conclusion - and it would be exactly the same kneejerk ingroup-loyalist hierarchy game as saying Russia / China / Hamas did nothing wrong.
Have a scroll.
I'm not playing this stupid word game where it's only dictatorship if it's from the dictateur region of France, and any micron short of literal absolute power means it doesn't count. Ask any normal person to define dictatorship and they'll name all the shit you already said Stalin did. The mechanics of his inner party don't fucking matter. They don't change the effect. When a king has viziers and vassals and so on, and needs them to enact his next pogrom, that's still absolute monarchy. "The riddle of steel" doesn't make Charlemagne a respected bipartisan official. Dude owned a country.
You will almost never see someone describe their worship of that hierarchy, because they don't understand there's any alternative. It's like saying things should obey gravity. But it is visibly the ideology shared by a shockingly broad variety of bootlickers. It's what every Republican twat is saying, when their defense of The Idiot's abuse of power is, 'but he had that power!' Listen to those people. They are telling you how they think. They don't understand power can be abused. It is a contradiction, in their worldview. Either a figure has that power, and can use it however they see fit - or they do not deserve power in the first place. There's no third option. This is every aggravating non-argument you've had with Elon Musk fanboys who think disagreeing with him means you have to be smarter and richer and less bald.
"That's only sparkling authoritarianism!"
Sorry, no, you even denied Stalin's rule qualified as that. He did a bunch of bad stuff but how dare anyone use blunt terms to describe when one guy in charge until he dies gets to do basically anything and kill his opponents. And nobody better call kneejerk defenses of that hierarchy a kneejerk defense of hierarchy!
Name an actual dictatorship. Tell me what the hell you mean when you use that word, if you mean anything when you use that word.
If you notice, I actually made that accusation toward all forms of conservatism, so you're not even doing a good job of this mindlessly rigid literalism. You seem to expect I'm describing unreasonable people who would come out and say "why yes, I am being unreasonable, thank you for noticing." No, genius: I am describing inferred motivation behind visible behavior. Explaining that isn't a moving goal-post, it's how a fucking argument works.
You could build a battleship from this much irony.
No, asshole, I don't think you're a tankie, but you are being an asshole by using a lot of their same stupid tactics, including and especially denying there is any such thing as a tankie.
Or a dictatorship.
'You could call Stalin a dictator,' allows someone previously going to the paint to declare there's no possible way Stalin was a dictator.
Someone now pretending that when I condemn tankies, I must be describing all leftists, and all leftists don't believe what I'm condemning, therefore nuh-uh. Even though that's completely fucking stupid and the opposite of how labels work. Like there's no possible way I am specifically talking about a minority of crazy people, the same way there's no possible way I am specifically talking about the abuses of a by-some-stretch-dictator, even though you freely fucking acknowledge both problems do exist.
An accusation based on literally nothing. The opposite of everything I've argued here. A fantasy of your own invention.
Cool, who asked? I'm accusing you of saying Stalin wasn't a dictator, because that was kinda your central objection, several comments in a row, until I guess you forgot.
I am calling you a blithe hypocrite and you don't even understand which claim you just fumbled. This whole conversation started with me saying tankies just like leftist-colored dictatorships and you saying 'that wasn't a dictatorship.' Now you want to casually slip that yeah okay you guess it might be, "by some stretches," and pretend it's my fault for not dragging it out of you sooner?
You've looked straight at comments saying 'I wish Stalin gulag'd more people' and 'the uigher genocide is a de-radicalization program' and go, nope, that can't possibly be defending the evils of allegedly communist countries. That's still not a me problem. You can mumble about critical support, but there's ever any context where genocide is an acceptable... political strategy.
These people are out there.
That crazy bullshit is really what they think.
Loyalist hierarchy is the best model explaining their crazy bullshit.
'Nobody says that.' Proof given. 'Oh they're joking.'
Fuck off.
I wish you meant things when you say words.
Case in point.
Hi there! Looks like you linked to a Lemmy community using a URL instead of its name, which doesn't work well for people on different instances. Try fixing it like this: !meanwhileongrad@sh.itjust.works