I’ve been speaking with other more informed communists and they’ve told me that none actually exist. Is this true?
China, Laos, and Vietnam: now notoriously capitalists. Workers work 12+ hours with no protection in horrible factory conditions. Suicide rates are so high that suicide nets are installed. The air is so polluted millions die from lung cancer, especially factory workers w/out basic masks. Corporations dominate
North Korea: Undemocratically ruled by the Kim dynasty. Jong un indulges lavishly at the expense of his citizens, ordering millions in fine wine and trips from Denis Rodman. They might be the most socialist though, as Juche seems to otherwise be democratic.
Cuba: Sanctions have taken a massive toll, but even taking that into account the country still has its own problems. They have massive food shortages and inventory probs and aren’t self sufficient after 60+ years. Why couldn’t they’ve use machinery imported from the Soviet Union to develop their agriculture and fishery? The Soviets supported them heavily. They seem to be incredibly mismanaged or corrupt
I don’t think you really read what I wrote, lol. I said that the entire concept of what is democratic should be challenged and questioned.
You’d have to make this coherent with a class analysis. If the ruling class is pretending to have the support of the working class, i.e. is not itself of the working class, then what class is ruling? There is no general answer to this question, you must apply it to a real country with its class divisions.
They make me feel… bored? They were/are a line taken against perceived discontent factions, with the figure of Kim Il-Sung used as a cudgel to say, “shut the fuck up”. I guess they also remind me of the silly things that ignorant Westerners believe about North Korea and of the power of choosing words during translation.
Can you be specific about what fundamental principles of democracy you question? You just said America doesn’t really have a democracy, so you were implying that more democracy would be a good thing.
So you don’t actually believe that? And if that’s the case, why did you signal as if you did? It seems pretty disingenuous to me
I already wrote some out in my first reply to you. Do you have any thoughts on them?
Incorrect on both counts. What I did was say that the language and concept itself are laden with propaganda and selective or incomplete application, raising serious doubts about what it even means.
An interesting aspect to your responses here is that you’re repeatedly reading things that I didn’t say while not recognizing the things I did say. This is very relevant my attempt to head off simplistic acceptance of, say, “democracy”. The point is that there are a lot of propaganda narratives and unjustified (implicit) assumptions that tend to get made and your inability to have a conversation with me is a good example of this. You’re clearly trying to slot what I’m saying to you into your existing framework, a precious epistemology, even when it doesn’t really make sense. This is another thought pattern you’ll have to leave behind if you want to have correct opinions or even just be capable of talking to other humans about politics.
Having made no effort to understand my pretty simple and direct statements, you’re deciding to blame me for your confusion, lol.
This situation is fairly simple: you think you’re here to “own” your perceived enemies and are now reaching at straws because it’s not going the way you hoped. Gotta find some way for me to be the bad guy, eh kid?
Okay, so regarding democracy, when you said you didn’t vote to allow a genocide in Gaza, were you saying a vote should have been taken, thus making the United States a more democratic country?
If that’s the case, then we agree that more democracy is good. If that’s not the case, why did you bring it up?
I was giving an example to challenge common presumptions about what is democratic and what something with that labels can then be used to justify. The idea is to get you to think critically and ask your own questions about what the true meaning of that label is by how it gets applied. It’s not about what is simply true democracy and what is not. It’s what function the term and concept serves in our societies, particularly Western ones where it is used chauvinistically and is full of contradictions. Nothing can be more “authoritarian” (the other half of this concept’s dichotomy) than inflicting mass death and disposession and there isn’t even a fig leaf of requiring informed consent from the people of the state that’s supporting the genocide you see happening right in front of you. At the same time, the label of “democracy” is used everywhere to justify these dehumanizing, racist actions. Have you ever heard, “only democracy in the Middle East”? Have you ever wondered what makes an apartheid settler ethnostate democratic? What does it really mean?
The goal is to get you to critically engage with the tropes and thought-controlling cliches at work here. Your questions are full of them. It’s clear you’ve never really questioned hegemonic thinking and at the moment you’re being combative towards the idea of applying a little critical thinking or, God forbid, answering my questions or statements.
That last question is the only thing you should’ve said in reply to my first comment. An attempt to understand rather than an attempt to eagerly dismiss what you have never investigated.
I have answered that question twice now, though.
I would love to see an example of your own critical thinking:
Would you have preferred a vote, instead of the United States government unilaterally deciding to support the ethnic genocide of Gazans by Israel?
I will wait for you to reply to the things I’ve said.
You simply can’t answer, can you. Why so scared?
Me: writes paragraphs explaining my thoughts and answering your questions and ask a few questions, all of which you ignore.
You: write 1-2 sentences in response, usually just asking new questions rather than engage.
Sure buddy, I’m the scared one.
I’ll answer it.
You’re missing the point. You are equating “democracy” as “good”. Your question is not relevant to the point being made. They are asking, what is good? What is democracy? And you’re responding with “you must agree democracy is good”.
Regarding your complaint about the 10 principles, can you demonstrate that they were not translated to your personal preference? And does that mean, as they are written, you do object to them?
I understand that their existence is extremely inconvenient to you, as you are attempting to fall back on liberal identity politics in order to ignore them. But I would prefer it if you didn’t attempt to dodge the question.
I didn’t list a complaint. I’m just familiar with the fun that Westerners have with, for example, using the term “worship” when it is just as validly (arguably more valid given the lack of religious implications in general) translated as “respect” or “admire”. Westerners are very gullible, you see, and love to think of themselves as superior to the Asian hordes, which includes constructing cartoonish ideas of designated enemy countries.
None of that list is inconvenient for me, lol. You seem to be talking to yourself and hyping yourself up because you think you have a slam dunk and in the process are failing to read or understand what I’ve written. Remember, my answer to your question of how I feel about them is that it makes me bored. Perhaps you should take a little more time to read what is written before claiming anyone is dodging, lol.
It looks like you’re spamming this same question to others, seemingly without it being relevant to what they’re talking about. Have you considered addressing anything I wrote in the comment you initially replied to? You didn’t actually do that, you know.
In other words, you would have a problem with the country telling its people to worship a strong man, but you wouldn’t have a problem with a strong man in general being put at the head of a state?
Do you believe the working class, in general, requires paternalism in order to correctly flourish?
Do you believe vocal criticism of a country’s leader should be allowed or not?
“Strong man” is another thought-terminating cliche used to denigrate designated enemy countries, or at least ones at which Western chauvinism is to be directed. Do you believe in Iraqi WMDs and justifying the US war of aggression there? Because you sound like the people who said “they hate us for our freedom”, and so on. The point I keep making is that a more critical and informed approach must be taken in order to understand these topics.
I reject the premise of your question.
I don’t know what those things mean without a concrete grounding in real situations, like an example country. I’ve said this before, actually, and you didn’t respond to it.
I think such questions serve to obfuscate rather than clarify precisely because they rely on abstractions into which hegemonic biases can be inserted.
Sure why not. Do you have any real questions about things?
That’s great. Because you dodged the first two questions and only answered the third, can you tell me how the CCP, the North Korean dictatorship, and any other nominally socialist country that you want to include handles vocal criticism?
I haven’t dodged any questions, lol. I’m being very direct with you. You may want to take a moment to ask whether you are projecting, as your pattern in this conversation has been to ignore basically everything I say and literally every question I’ve asked and to instead try to belabor the point you really want to make, thigh you’re too afraid to state it directly. It’s very clear that you want to stay in your comfort zone, which is apparently silly tropes about North Korea, and no realities or other humans you’re talking to are gonna get in the way of that!
You might as well just talk to yourself, since it’s only your voice you want to hear.
Nope you have shown yourself to be here in bad faith and I’m not going to explain such a large topic to you until you figure out how to be honest with me (and probably yourself). Or maybe you can pay me to tutor you - combative, ignorant students cost extra btw.
Before you reach for your crutch of a “dodge”, remind yourself that at no point have I offered to do the thing you seem to feel entitled to, which is for me to answer all of your questions while you ignore everything I tell you. I’m not your parent or your teacher, I’m not obligated to share knowledge that you refuse to digest.
PS I’ve said basically nothing about the CPC. I would recommend that you figure out how to communicate around one topic before expanding them. You already can’t keep track of what I’ve said about North Korea or>!!< democracy.
Stop being disingenuous. “I am personally offended and I refuse to answer your question” is a dodge, not a response.
You just said you were okay with vocal criticism of the government, so how about it? To what degree should people be allowed to vocally criticize their government?
lol, you think I’m offended? I’m really just bored. I’ve been giving you chance after chance to engage just in case, but it eventually gets tedious - and indicates that good faith is not something you respond to. You seem to engage much more directly with people in this thread that you think you have bothered. Ask yourself if that’s a healthy thing to do.
It’s funny that you haven’t learned that I don’t actually care about your attempts at goading, either. Refer to my previous response to your question.