As an Anarchist even I have to acknowledge that to date the Soviet Union has been the most successful socialist state, of course I am also of the belief that if the Republicans in Spain or the Anarchists in Ukraine they would have established far more successful implementations of socialism. Still the fact remains that the Soviet Union was by all metrics available successful and even until the very end the majority of people in nearly every SSR supported keeping the Soviet Union alive (if not with reforms), they suffered CIA and western backed reactionary rebellions and I don’t belive any other socialist state would have handled it any better
(yes according to polling made by the reactionaries to gage how much the Soviet population wanted to end to the Soviet Union the majority did not, they promptly ignored the results)
The ones that didn’t give up & dismantle themselves, because they couldn’t deliver on their promises[1] or beat the west even on their own terms & measures of success[2]?
labor, free from exploitation, as the source of growth
continuous improvement of their living standards (art. 39)
steady growth of the productive forces (art. 40).
It never fulfilled its founding promise of a communist society. ↩︎
Forced labor camps/Gulags are the opposite of labor free from exploitation.
When the wall fell, East Germany was significantly poorer than West Germany: GDP per capita less than half with lagging living standards.
Other economies that started poorer than East Germany beat it or caught up to West Germany.
The Soviet experience of socialist ownership and the concomitant centrally planned character of the economy showed the difficulties of realizing economic growth in order to ensure an increasing standard of living. Growth in the Soviet Union had been high in the nineteen thirties and early fifties, but had been deteriorating ever since.
The end of the Cold War has changed the focus of the debate on human rights. The West, with its focus on civil and political rights, no longer opposed the Soviet states, with their emphasis on economic, social and cultural rights. The demise of the communist systems gave rise to a certain extent of triumphalism in the West, which had proven to be not only superior in political and civil rights, but also in economic and social rights. The economies of the western countries produced much more income and the material welfare of their populations was much higher than that of those living in Eastern Europe.
I am not a fan of the USSR, but when the guy in charge is nationalizing everything and abolishing private property it is socialism whether we like it or not.
Claiming to be an anarchist and insist we use flags is peak irony. Never met an anarchist that thinks nations should even exist. Your beliefs are incoherent.
Claiming the most popular socialist symbol is a fake leftist symbol is a bit rich. I guess real leftism is posturing about anarchism online lol.
You haven’t broken out of your CIA education even. Fascinating.
i don’t see someone demanding you comply with their worldview, i see someone giving you advice on how to be a more effective communicator, and therefor recruiter. class-based politics is all about solidarity with the working people, and for a lot of working people the hammer and sickle represents the capital holders that opressed them. leftists operating in post-soviet countries go out of their way to ensure that it’s clear that their politics align with Nestor Mahkno and not Vladimir Lenin. they are still communists, but they very universally identify as anarchists because the goal is not to revive the soviet union which dissappeared their relatives, but instead bring about a true post-state world.
they do this not because they haven’t broken out of their CIA poison but because the hammer and sickle was representative of a system of authoritarianism that was left wing in aesthetic only
i feel pretty unwelcome in this community. it’s making me plan a lemmy hiatus to focus the energy i waste here on distributing some more zines this week with instructions on strategies that have proven useful against ICE
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This is literally leftymemes, what are you even doing here??
I mean it does represent the soviet union, a brutal dictatorship. Though I don’t think there’s a better symbol
The hammer and sickle is used by practically every socialist movement. What sort of leftist doesn’t know that??
I know. It’s just that it was originally created by the soviet union.
The nation that created the most successful iteration of socialism ever…
you have got to be kidding me. Tankies gonna tankie i guess
As an Anarchist even I have to acknowledge that to date the Soviet Union has been the most successful socialist state, of course I am also of the belief that if the Republicans in Spain or the Anarchists in Ukraine they would have established far more successful implementations of socialism. Still the fact remains that the Soviet Union was by all metrics available successful and even until the very end the majority of people in nearly every SSR supported keeping the Soviet Union alive (if not with reforms), they suffered CIA and western backed reactionary rebellions and I don’t belive any other socialist state would have handled it any better
(yes according to polling made by the reactionaries to gage how much the Soviet population wanted to end to the Soviet Union the majority did not, they promptly ignored the results)
The Republicans did win in Catalonia - that’s why anarchist Catalonia had essentially ceased to exist before any fascist even set foot in it.
And no…
…as an anarchist you should understand perfectly well that the USSR was about as “socialist” as the US is “democratic.”
Westerners gonna western. None of your fam is from there probably ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
How would you know that?
Name a more successful iteration of socialism. I’ll wait. You seem very confident about this lol.
Edit: they were never heard from again 🤣
The ones that didn’t give up & dismantle themselves, because they couldn’t deliver on their promises[1] or beat the west even on their own terms & measures of success[2]?
Other communist states still exist: Cuba, China, Vietnam, Laos, North Korea. China is a strong contender. However, it achieved its economic edge by liberalizing its state capitalist economy. Its economic inequality is worse than that of liberal democracies in Europe, Canada, East Asia, Australia: check out the detailed view of this world map of gini coefficients. Its civil & political rights are difficult to understate & its recent campaign to repress its LGBT+ population is only the latest episode. Nonetheless, it’s credibly a “more successful iteration of socialism”.
Beyond communist states, social democracies in the West are “successful iteration[s] of socialism” with lower economic inequality.
The Soviet constitution of 1977 made a number of promises it couldn’t realize.
It never fulfilled its founding promise of a communist society. ↩︎
Forced labor camps/Gulags are the opposite of labor free from exploitation.
When the wall fell, East Germany was significantly poorer than West Germany: GDP per capita less than half with lagging living standards. Other economies that started poorer than East Germany beat it or caught up to West Germany.
Chronic shortages increasingly led people to the second economy with its blat (favors) network. They were unable to sustain economic growth to increase living standards.
Eventually, the last Soviet leaders, conceding failure by their own standards (economic, social, & cultural rights) & western standards (civil & political rights), dismantled the system from within: Western governments had exceeded their communist state by all standards.
↩︎It’s concerning that you think the Soviet union was socialist and not authoritarian.
Sure, you could call most of these socialist: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/the-anarchist-faq-editorial-collective-an-anarchist-faq-full#text-amuse-label-seca5
It seems like you did not, in fact, wait. I have better stuff to do than debating tankies.
Also, the fact that you consider the USSR a successful iteration of socialism is… concerning.
Except that there was nothing socialist about it.
I am not a fan of the USSR, but when the guy in charge is nationalizing everything and abolishing private property it is socialism whether we like it or not.
Alight fine that’s State Socialism… which, apparently, is the only type of Socialism that is talked about or allowed to exist here.
So you’re claiming the Apartheid-regime was socialist?
congratulations you found a liberal
Hasn’t China surpassed it at this point?
Yeah, but that’s “socialism with Chinese characteristics” aka state capitalism. Modern China is very much not socialist.
If we mention China, the libs here are gonna be even more pissed. Baby steps.
Really?
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Claiming to be an anarchist and insist we use flags is peak irony. Never met an anarchist that thinks nations should even exist. Your beliefs are incoherent.
Claiming the most popular socialist symbol is a fake leftist symbol is a bit rich. I guess real leftism is posturing about anarchism online lol.
You haven’t broken out of your CIA education even. Fascinating.
i don’t see someone demanding you comply with their worldview, i see someone giving you advice on how to be a more effective communicator, and therefor recruiter. class-based politics is all about solidarity with the working people, and for a lot of working people the hammer and sickle represents the capital holders that opressed them. leftists operating in post-soviet countries go out of their way to ensure that it’s clear that their politics align with Nestor Mahkno and not Vladimir Lenin. they are still communists, but they very universally identify as anarchists because the goal is not to revive the soviet union which dissappeared their relatives, but instead bring about a true post-state world.
they do this not because they haven’t broken out of their CIA poison but because the hammer and sickle was representative of a system of authoritarianism that was left wing in aesthetic only
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I don’t know who “we” is, but I think you would fit in better in an anarchist community instead.
this is a lefty memes community on an anarchist server. it is an anarchist community
Check the sidebar :3
For a community of anarchists, there’s a lotta liberals in here…
It’s always been a problem since the inception of this com ^^’
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If I remember right, “we” is celes personal pronoun.
I don’t know what was said before the deletion, but are anarchists not welcome here?
i feel pretty unwelcome in this community. it’s making me plan a lemmy hiatus to focus the energy i waste here on distributing some more zines this week with instructions on strategies that have proven useful against ICE
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…don’t preach, anarchists aren’t really…