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A guy I know, real nice guy but super liberal, was telling me how his Cuban grandfather suffered under Castro. Sure enough, when he got into more details, it turns out his grandfather was a wealthy landlord whose farmland got collectivized and he only had to go to jail after he got very vocal about trying to get people to oppose the revolution (in which he was very much the minority BTW, his own friend turned him in)
Reminds me of when a Finn told me about how the Soviets killed his grandad…and I was like…yeah? 😏 how come? 🥺🥺🥺
What did the Finn say?
Admittedly I don’t remember much! But only that I remember coming to the conclusion that he was talking about the Winter War, especially as he kept referring to his grandfather as a proud defender of homeland and the Soviets as barbarian invaders. I clocked out halfway through.
I think about this video a lot lol. It’s so iconic.
deleted by creator
Grandfather’s friend: Dude this is cringe, you need go serve time to think about what you just posted
Im curious if there’s even an attempt to reconcile that in your friend’s brain or did he just kinda wave it away?
We didn’t have much chance to discuss it in depth. He was hosting a local event where selected speakers take about 5 minutes to speak on a subject they are passionate about and he invited me to speak. I told him I wanted to talk about ending the embargo on cuba (which I did) and he said, oh that’s ironic because I will be opening the event by celebrating our right to free speech and saying how my grandfather didn’t have that right in Cuba. We both laughed and agreed we onviously don’t agree on some things, then just focused on boring procedural stuff about the event. At the actual event he elaborated the details I included in op but not with the exact same words I chose
To be clear I don’t think he supports embargoes or sanctions and certainly doesn’t support war or invasions, but he just doesn’t like communism at all and believes a lot of misinformation about communist led governments
Even the school textbooks in Western European diaspora that often publish false information to slander successful Communists admited that the Cuban working class support Fidel Castro against the Pig of Bay invasion. The Pig of Bay invasion by the Cuban emigrants was staged by the US government who falsely assumed that the Cubans oppose Castro’s rule and the failure of the invasion was from the false belief that the Cuban commoners that stayed in Cuba are unhappy with the new Communist government. The Western European diaspora school textbook attributed the mass support of Castro by the Cuban lower class to deception, but this assumes that the Cubans cannot compare the new communist rule with the previous Liberal puppet regime or that democracy cannot work unless the European emigrants have authoritarian rule over the people of color.
I have a relative that lived in the USSR and they didn’t complain about being imprisoned or questioned, they complained that Nazis destroyed their old village, they complained that there was not as much food (note: as much, not none)during the war, issues that people face during war, not during times of poor leadership.
So the problem is clearly war, which is 100% understandable.
Same thing about the (I’m pretty confident it’s fake) stories about people who would escape gulags by using another escapee as food - if you’re willing to kill and eat another person, you probably should be in a gulag!
Gulag stories just all sound like a teenager trying really hard to write an edgy CreepyPasta
tbf there are a few reasons why someone who didnt deserve it would suffer in a socialist country but those reasons are typically external, like embargoes
I said basically this to my friend group politics chat and then had 3 different friends all try and quibble with me about it.
Get 3 new friends
Yeah my familly left the USSR in the 20s less because of oppression and more because of their incorrect beliefs that America was a golden palace. My grandpa used to laugh about how his dad would complain that food costs money and that the company town was basically feudalism in America. Yet here I am, working in the coal mine just like my ancestors. Part of me yearns for the mines, and enjoys it more than my days off. My depression keeps me from feeling anything but hard work is still satisfying.
leave my Tom cat alone , he is my favorite cat XD
Can I have a serious question? Are you guys real? Or am I just not on the joke?
I do not like US, but being someone from country controled by USSR. There were ton of people arested just for publicaly saying “Goverment bad”.
Please don’t discredit me, compared to US, I would be considered socialist and by US right wing maybe communist, but claiming that USSR or current Russia are your friends seems insane.
Yes, Lemmygrad is explicitly communist.
Countries weren’t controlled by the USSR, they were a member state of the USSR and had input on democratic central planning and decisions. Please feel free to provide documentation if you feel that my worldview is incorrect.
Modern Russia and the USSR are two entirely different issues.
I’ll push back on this maybe they were controlled by the ussr. However like, is thst not better than the alternatives. The local bourgeoisie were so good? Or the nazis? Or thr Americans? Sovereignty is a myth and mostly harmful to the citizens of places that have it. Like, what freedom does it bring people that their government can decide how to opress them?
Oh bunch of rus trolls, and us teenagers who think living under cccp was good.
Xddddd
Capitalist tool.
Assalamualaikum brother mustafa, it seems that Allah SWT didn’t bless you with intelligence. Please read more books, inshallah you will be a better person
Countries weren’t controlled by the USSR, they were a member state of the USSR and had input on democratic central planning and decisions.
So countries that were forcibly integrated, like the Baltic states, weren’t controlled? Then why couldn’t they leave the union?
They could. Article 17 of the 1936 Constitution (can be found on https://marxists.org > English > History > Soviet Union > Soviet Government) explicitly allowed every Republic to secede from the U.S.S.R.
So why didn’t they? Clearly they never wanted to be a part of the union because prior to WW2 the foreign policy of those countries was neutrality. They created the Baltic entente and at end the of 1938 all three countries passed neutrality laws, Here’s the Estonian law. Furthermore after the union collapse all three countries designated the soviet era as an era of foreign occupation. Which part of of history gives you the indication that they actually wanted to be in the union?
Well, why didn’t they leave? You now know that they could have left. So why did they choose to stay until the whole bloc collapsed? Are you open to the possibility that the people and the leaders of the time wanted to be part of the USSR? And the people and the leaders who got what they wanted when they left:
- Now have the power to be the dominant voice, and
- Continue to say what they used to say now that they had power?
You said that you would be considered a socialist in the US, soYou probably know that capitalist states are run by a minority of wealthy people. It’s the same in post-Soviet capitalist states, right? (Like Russia, whichwe agreeis a capitalist hellhole like every other capitalist state.)If you’re still with me, could it be that a minority of liberals who complained about ‘conditions’ in the USSR are the same minority of liberals who today praise capitalism and criticise/slander the USSR?
Edit: realised I was talking to a different person.
Well, why didn’t they leave? You now know that they could have left. So why did they choose to stay until the whole bloc collapsed? Are you open to the possibility that the people and the leaders of the time wanted to be part of the USSR?
Are you open to the possibility that the USSR weren’t the good guys and didn’t allow those countries to leave? Because the rest of what you’re saying is on the premise that the USSR had to have been the good guys.
You said that you would be considered a socialist in the US
Maybe the other guy said that? I haven’t said that.
Which do you think is more likely though?
That a union of nations that has been dead for 30 years is still tricking people with evil commie propaganda to make them think it was a fairly normal place, and not a pointlessly cruel hell on earth,
Or that the capitalist class, in the capitalist west, the US especially, the heart of global capitalism, would want its citizens to think that socialism never works and that the people should just resign themselves to a life under capitalism, the system in which they are in charge and benefit the most from? And so lie to their citizens in order to achieve this goal?
I just realised I was talking to two people and edited my comment.
My other points still stand. You’ve proved my point: there isn’t a ‘right’ answer, there’s only, like always, a class-based answer. If you believe the ruling class you reach one conclusion. If not, you reach a different conclusion.
It’s up to you which side you find more authoritative. For me, I’m skeptical of every word that leaves the mouths or pens of people who keep the working class oppressed and living in shit conditions.
Why don’t you give up Hawaii and Puerto rico which you illegally annexed ? What about Mexcian lands that you stole ? Baltic states were given up by Lenin to Germany in Brest treaty , they were vassals of Germany and became fascistic in later years , why would Soviet Russia give up Baltic states when they got it back from Germany in 1939?
Why don’t you give up Hawaii and Puerto rico which you illegally annexed ? What about Mexcian lands that you stole ?
How about you don’t assume my nationality, my country isn’t even close those areas. Also nice whataboutism.
Baltic states were given up by Lenin to Germany in Brest treaty ,
You do realize that there were wars of independence after that treaty, that ended up with new treaties? There was the treaty of Tartu between Estonia and Soviet union, the treaty of Riga between Latvia and Soviet union and the Moscow peace treaty between Lithuania and Soviet union. The Soviet union recognized the independence of those countries so the Brest treaty is irrelevant.
they were vassals of Germany and became fascistic in later years ,
I know people like you love to throw the word around but authoritarian is not the same as fascist. And I have no idea where you take that they were vassals of German. You’re clearly not aware that the independence war in Estonia and Latvia wasn’t just against the Soviet union, it was also against Germany, more specifically the Baltic Germans who were in the Baltische Landeswehr.
why would Soviet Russia give up Baltic states when they got it back from Germany in 1939?
This is so far into historical revisionism there’s nothing to correct, it’s complete fiction.
Maybe the part where there were still a lot of people even in 1991 that wanted to stay?
(Yes, there were also independence referendums in 1991, but you were asking why it didn’t happen earlier.)
Source: https://www.sudd.ch/event.php?lang=en&id=su011991
I was asking why it didn’t happen earlier because before the Union those countries were “We don’t want to be in the union” and after the union those countries were “We said, we didn’t want to be in the union”. If before the union they didn’t want to be in it and after the union they still said they didn’t want to be in it then why should we assume that during the union they wanted to be in it? The answer is that they didn’t, they simply weren’t allowed to leave.
We said
Who is we? The bourgeoisie or the proletariat? There’s going to be severe conflicts of interest here.
I’m sorry but you need to consider that you simply have been lied to about your own history.
Fairly criticizing the government in the USSR–just like in China, just like in North Korea, and so on–is not illegal.
What these countries do crack down on is when fascists, capitalist opportunists, and foreign intelligence agents work actively to try and destroy, divide, and sabotage them.
The vast majority of people the USSR killed or imprisoned (a number far smaller than what we are told), were actively trying to destroy the USSR, and all the lives of millions of common people who were benefitting from this new system. Why when capitalists kill whoever they see fit, they can call them “traitors”, “treasonous”, or “terrorists”, but when socialists do something far more restrained and humane they are seen as devils?
Well, because, capitalist propaganda has strangled the world discourse, especially the last 30 years. The United States and its allies have spent the last century not only trying to destroy every socialist state but to muddy the waters, lie, and character assassinate its enemies. Everything from gulags, the Holodomor, WW2 war doctrine, the Great Purge, and everything before and after has been radically distorted by capitalist and fascist liars.
I believe you that in your heart you are a socialist. So please listen to me when I say: do not trust the lies about your socialist brothers and sisters that were invented by capitalist and fascist snakes who want to destroy everything you would build.
claiming that USSR or current Russia are your friends seems insane
The USSR is gone. It’s not around to be anyone’s friend. This means that communists who talk highly of the USSR are analysing the USSR and concluding that it was the greatest experiment in raising living standards in history. (Maybe that’s now China, but it’s going to be a difficult and possibility incoherent comparison.)
Compare the standard of living before and after the Soviets gained power. Success is the only word for it, even if they’re are valid criticisms. (Do not do that silly thing where you compare life for the average person at any time in the Soviet Union with the life of the most decadent and rich person in the US. That’s not logical.)
I doubt there are many communists who see Russia as a friend. What you see instead are communists acknowledging that Russia is fighting US imperialism. Considering how much death, tragedy, and destruction the US brings and has brought to the world, any work against the US is a net positive for humanity.
(To preclude misunderstanding, no I am not saying that people dying in the Ukraine war is a good thing. Except die hard Nazis. They can get fucked. It’s up to the reader to decide where they think the Nazis are.)
I want to emphasise and follow up something that KiG V2 said:
What these countries do crack down on is when fascists, capitalist opportunists, and foreign intelligence agents work actively to try and destroy, divide, and sabotage them.
Liberals tend to read things like this and say that it is a ‘conspiracy’. But think about it like this: if we know one thing for a fact, it is that “capitalist opportunists, and foreign intelligence agents work[ed] actively to … destroy, divide, and sabotage” the USSR until they won. The capitalists won. They got what they wanted. They got what the communists were saying that the reactionaries wanted all along—the end of the USSR.
Now we have 30 years of evidence of how capitalists would run the regions of the USSR differently. If you can compare what life in the USSR looked like before and after the Soviets gained power, you can also compare what life was like before and after the Soviets lost power.
So what happened after the Berlin wall fell? Can you honestly look at the statistics, the records, the economy, the stories, and say that life got better?
If you can, I’d ask you to look again at all segments of society, not just the lucky few in the middle and upper classes. If you think life got worse after the USSR (it did—living standards plummeted), ask: what changed? You, too, will answer that for all it’s flaws, the change was from socialism to capitalism and that socialism was by far a superior system for the mass of people.
(PS using ‘insane’ as a way of criticising something is ableism.)
Yes, we’re real communists.
If it were me I would simply not say the government was bad and avoid jail time. This really doesn’t seem so hard to me.
If you like your government, you don’t want anyone to organize against it. And if many people think like you, a truly democratic government would act according to your desires and jail the agitators.
Or, put otherwise, if you use the democratic mechanisms in place, it’s all good. If you protest or demonstrate because you feel you aren’t heard by the government, that’ll usually have an effect. But if, deep inside, you want to overthrow the government, everyone will hate you and you’ll be jailed or worse.
But if, deep inside, you want to overthrow the government, everyone will hate you and you’ll be jailed or worse.
Don’t you guys also want to overthrow a government?
Or, put otherwise, if you use the democratic mechanisms in place, it’s all good. If you protest or demonstrate because you feel you aren’t heard by the government, that’ll usually have an effect.
Tell that to the people in china.
Don’t you guys also want to overthrow a government?
According to communist theory, our current liberal governments are not democratic, because capital exerts control over them by various means. Thus, overthrowing them is necessary. Of course, if we had a democratic government, we wouldn’t wish to overthrow it.
Tell that to the people in china.
If I’m not mistaken, there were extremely small-scale protests about COVID-19 measures and the government immediately listened and removed them.
Chinese people overwhelming support their government.
Source: Harvard (We know how you western chauvinists don’t trust anything from a non-euroamerikkkan source)
In contrast to low US political approval ratings, 96% of Chinese are satisfied with the national government (Edelmans 2016). World Values Surveys says that 83% think the country is run for their benefit rather than for the benefit of special groups. A Harvard research center study of long-term public opinion survey finds that > 95% of Chinese citizens approved their government. How is this possible in a one-party state? (TED talk by Eric X Li)
A YouTube link was detected in your comment. Here are links to the same video on Invidious, which is a YouTube frontend that protects your privacy:
On what basis do you call me a western chauvinist?
America is in an active state of collapse. My own country England is also slowly declining or has at least lost its relevance. These and other countries like France have done large damage to the world through imperialism. These are all things I acknowledge.
This is the problem I have with Marxists online. You can’t actually discuss with someone you don’t agree with without putting them into a box and making wild assumptions towards this end.
I would say that it’s all well and good for the people to approve of the government but this is meaningless when they lie and cover up information while committing crimes like attempted genocide and forced reeducation of minority groups.
when they lie and cover up information while committing crimes like attempted genocide and forced reeducation of minority groups.
Again, only the anglo countries think this is happening. The rest of the world, namely Muslim countries (especially those who would be receiving refugees were there a genocide) , and the Uyghur people themselves, disagree with you :
“they lie”, enough with the orientalism rudyard kipling. Anglos are the most racist people on the planet, and you need to shut your damn mouths before you spout orientalism.
orientalism
Since when does calling out genocide have anything to do with orientalism? Like if you just want a successful (given the circumstances) nation under Marxism-Leninism you could just look to Cuba.
the Uyghur people themselves, disagree with you
You’re gonna need some evidence for claims like this. I would have expected better from someone named after Paul Atredies.
Do you have any proof or detail for your claim? Your claim sound like the many disproven slanders against the Communists that is accepted as fact in the school textbooks and “educational” documentaries in Western European diaspora countries. I know that Venezuela under the former Socialist president, Hugo Chavez, tolerate slanders and baseless conspiracy theories against the Socialist government and that “Putin’s police guards” allow people to freely sing Ukrainian anthem in Moscow without restrainment. The NATO did stage the 1989 False Flag massacre and write a false narrative that contradicts the original photo evidence by their Western European diaspora journalists (https://web.archive.org/web/19970329011405/http://www.cnd.org:8022/June4th/massacre.html) in China alongside the plothole of why the Chinese citizens somehow did not know about the repression before the 1989 false flag terrorism.
They are just scared idiots who are worried about the future of the world and instead of admitting that their is gray to the world they have taken an easy answer of saying the “other option” (because black and white is all people can think in) was perfect and that they could be 100% happy and never complain about anything ever cause surely communism would be perfect.
They are happy to ignore the rough edges because they aren’t actually living it. Not to say it couldn’t be a better system but that it would be one that needs work and effort to be best to its citizens.
Both capitalism and communism arrested its citizens for dissenting against the system they were in but this seems fucking ignorant of reality from people who put in half a thought on this at best.
If there is ‘gray to the world’ does that mean you accept that there must be a positive as well as a negative side to the USSR?
Your final sentence is pure projection.
Yeah this is mischaracterisation. I do not necessarily agree with the Marxists anymore but this doesn’t reflect what all Marxists believe at all.
In my country, communist killed so many people for political reasons. They ruined so many people’s lives. They stole landowners land and ruined it. They denied people from studying because their parents owned a shop or a company. They condemned or executed czech RAF pilots who escaped from Czechoslovakia when nazis occupied it to fought against nazis and communists did it to them because the pilots fought against nazis with the British army and Great Britain was now enemy of USSR. Communist executed woman called Milada Horáková (who were also active in underground resistance against nazis). They executed her because she was in other political party and communists banned all other parties except communist party. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milada_Horáková People who profited from communism the most was people who informed the secret police about who said something negative about communists. From wikipedia article about that secret police:
…obtained forced confessions by means of torture, including the use of psychoactive drugs, blackmail, and kidnapping.
Other common practices included telephone tapping, permanent monitoring of apartments, intercepting private mail, house searches, surveillance, and arrests and indictment for so-called “subversion of the republic”.
Some of the practices that communist were using were taken from nazis or even worse than the nazi ones. We had our version of gulags in Czechoslovakia. Their purpose wasn’t to kill people like in the nazi concentration camps, but working conditions were similar or even worse that in the nazi concentration camp. This is just few random things that I’ve had on my mind and it’s just a fragment of what communists did in Czechoslovakia and very similar things were happening in other Soviet block countries. I don’t believe anybody who lived in communism could create meme like this, because working communism without dictatorship and abusing of human rights is a pure utopia. So yes, millions of families suffered and still suffer under communism and in most cases, it’s not their fault. And yes, communism bad.
I’m gonna need some higher quality sources than Wikipedia for this one.
They’re usually at the bottom of the Wikipedia article.
For what exactly? It’s things that even communists in the Czechia do not deny, it’s like general knowledge here. For example for the work camps in Jáchymov where prisoners were forced to mine uranium, I was there year ago. I saw what remains from the camps. There was a museum with some photos, list of people who died there and which ones were political prisoners. There was letters that prisoners were smuggling from the camp to inform their families that they are alive. There were also video interviews with people who survived it. What I find the most convincing is the testimony of people who lived in communism in Czechoslovakia. Many people who survived the work camps are still alive and there is a project called “Memory of the nation”. In this project, people are interviewing the old people who lived in communism. I personally done it once, I interviewed mr. Brožek. There are over 16000 people who were interviewed and when you listen to it, when you see the old people talking about the monstrosities they experienced or when you even do the interview, it’s really convincing. I do not believe that these people all made it up or that somebody told them to say that. As I said, there’s nobody denying it. And in Czechoslovakia there were basically no communists arrested or punished after the revolution, so I belive that if it was made up, somebody would say it’s made up. Also you can’t pay that many people to lie. I’m pretty sure that in 20 years when all these people will be dead, people will start to deny it, but now when all these people are alive and lots of them had family members or friends executed, falsely sentenced or persecuted in other ways, nobody will say it’s not true. Also strangely, communist party was never banned, even after revolution, but in the most recent elections in 2021, they had 3,6% of the votes. That also proves that nobody wants communism in Czechia after 40 years of their dictatorship. Here is the link for the Memory of the nation project, it’s in czech, but you can use the translate page feature and most of the interviews are also avaivable in text form, so you should be able to translate them: https://www.pametnaroda.cz/cs/archive
EDIT: Also, I was in the archive in Prague where lots of documents are stored, mostly StB folder of people they were were watching for various reasons. There are tons of material and I don’t think anybody would want to fake it, it would be lot of work for no real reason.
So you are saying that the people in your country did not receive enough repression to retaliate against the Communist after the dissolution of the USSR, that prisoners get jobs, and that the witness in the prison camps were not executed to hide the ‘horror’ of prison camps. Also, the Communists somehow use enough conspiracy to maintain rule and deception, but do little to stop the delivery of letters from the prisoners to their families outside of the prisons. You mentioned videos and testimony of the witnesses, but have no link to them. You only cite a source that mentions the list of witnesses without the actual testimonies of the witnesses. You should at least mention the examples of the acts of “horrors” by the Communists.
Len sa nerozplač. (Just don’t cry.)
Now that’s an argument!
Všetci v Jachýmove boli určite nevinný. Rovnako boli nevinný Biela Légia, Černý Lev 777 a teroristi Mašínovci a nesmiem zabudnúť na Horákovú ktorá na 101% neviedla proti vládne aktivity. A KSČM nemá ani riadny program tých by som nevolil ani ja rovnako ako KSS. Najviac sa mi páči ako každý rok máme nových antikomunistických hrdinov ktorí boli vraj mučený komunistami a určite nič není pritiahnuté za vlasy. (Everyone in Jachýmov was definitely innocent. The White Legion, Černý Lev 777 and the Mašín terrorists were also innocent, and I must not forget Horáková, who 101% did not lead against government activities. And KSČM doesn’t even have a proper program, I wouldn’t vote for them either, just like KSS. What I like most is how every year we have new anti-communist heroes who were allegedly tortured by the communists and certainly nothing is far-fetched.)
Kurwa coś idzie zrozumieć pomimo różnicy naszych języków.
Not everyone in Jáchymov was innocent. Many people were, however. Nobody deserves to die in inhumane conditions after mining uranium for political reasons. In nazi concentration camps, there were also some people who wasn’t innocent. That doesn’t justify the existence of these monstrous places. Mašín brothers commited murders and are not heroes. But maybe if communists didn’t build electric fences around country (they were saying is great place to live in, so why would anybody want to escape), Mašíns would just leave the country. Milada Horáková did nothing illegal. She was against communists and she protested against them taking over the country. She didn’t lead anti government activities. Can you please tell me what activities did she do? Especially activities for which she deserves being strangled for more than 13 minutes? Please, go to https://www.pametnaroda.cz/cs/archive, watch listen to some of the thousands of people talking about what they experienced. Some of them cannot hold tears when they talk about communists murdered their loved ones or did other things I have already mentioned. Then tell me how it’s all fake or far-fetched.
Možno to nevieš ale koncentrák kde zomrelo milióny ľudí je odlišný od pracovného táboru na ťaženie uránia. Horáková bola antikomunista a reakcionár a neexistuje dôkaz že bola nevinná. A nepotrebujem Pamäť Národa aby mi hovorili ako sa počas komunistov žilo a čo si mám o nich myslieť. Celá moja rodina žila v Československu a z ich rozprávania si viem vytvoriť vlastný názor nepotrebujem na to vládnu antikomunistickú organizáciu. A nehovoria o ňom vždy v najlepšom, moja rodina bola a je veriaca čiže ti nemusím hovoriť aké to mali niekedy ťažké ale aj tak o ČSSR hovoria pozitívne. Čím to môže byť možno preto že ČSSR zaručila prácu všetkým občanom, elekrifikovala a plynofikovala krajinu, v každom meste postavila továreň, postavila vodné a tepelné elektrárne, postavila nemocnice, zdravotné strediská a zaistila bezplatnú zdravotnú starostlivosť, postavila obrovské množstvo cenovo dostupných bytov ktoré dnes majú takú cenu že hypotéku treba splácať celý život, vybudovala pionierské tábory, postavila dialnice, do dôchodku sa odchádzalo v 60 niekedy aj skôr, zabezpečila sebestačnosť vo výrobe potravín. Ukáž mi jediný národ našej veľkosti ktorý dokázal vyvíjať a vyrábať prúdové lietadlá, dopravné lietadlá, atómové reaktory, lokomotívy, trolejbusy, autobusy, traktory, radary, motocykle, automobily, špičkové zbrane, tkáčske stroje, poľnohospodárske stroje, obrovské turbíny, námorné lode, tanky, špičkové sklárske a porcelánové výrobky, podieľať sa na vesmírnom výskume a vyrábať kvalitnú oceľ a hútnické výrobky. Dnes nevyvíjame nič sme iba montovňa automobilov.(You may not know this, but a concentration camp where millions of people died is different from a work camp for uranium mining. Horáková was an anti-communist and a reactionary, and there is no proof that she was innocent. And I don’t need the Memory of the Nation to tell me how life was under the communists and what I should think about them. My whole family lived in Czechoslovakia and I can form my own opinion from their stories, I don’t need a government anti-communist organization for that. And they don’t always talk about him in the best way, my family was and is a religious, so I don’t have to tell you how hard it was at times, but they still talk positively about the Czechoslovakia. Why can this be because the Czechoslovak Republic guaranteed work for all citizens, electrified and gasified the country, built a factory in every city, built water and thermal power plants, built hospitals, health centers and ensured free health care, built a huge number of affordable apartments that they have today such a price that the mortgage has to be paid off throughout life, built pioneer camps, built highways, people retired at 60 sometimes even earlier, ensured self-sufficiency in food production. Show me a single nation of our size that has been able to develop and manufacture jet planes, airliners, nuclear reactors, locomotives, trolleybuses, buses, tractors, radars, motorcycles, automobiles, high-tech weapons, weaving machines, agricultural machinery, giant turbines, naval ships, tanks , glass and porcelain products, participate in space research and produce quality steel and metallurgical products. Today we are not developing anything, we are just a car assembly plant.)
I’m not saying that Jáchymov and concentration camp are the same. I’m saying that according to the statement of many people who were there, the conditions were similar. I’m also saying that in both cases, you can argue that not everyone there was innocent. The problem is that there were innocent people sent there on purpose. Horáková was anti-communist. She was reactionary in the meaning that she wanted another political regime. Neither of these makes her guilty of anything. In any political regime, there are people against it. Even now, and we don’t hang them up. The fact that there is no proof she was innocent is a complete bullshit argument. If you have a presumption of innocence, it means nothing. If you have a presumption of guilt, I can say there’s no evidence of your grandma not secretly leading resistance. Any modern society requires evidence to prove somebody being guilty, not innocent. Your family is one family. In the Memory of the nation’s archive, you can liten to thousands of people’s stories. By saying it’s an anti-communist organization, are you saying it’s fake? Do you think that the people are lying or what? There are also interviews with communists in their archives. Czechoslovak Republic had a great economy. That’s certainly true, but at least for me, it doesn’t justify totalitarian regime with killing political enemies, locking the country behind the iron curtain and doing all the other things I have already written that you either ignore or marginalize. If all the things that were happening here are still worth for good economy for you, than this debate can be ended because we we can’t agree on that. If you do not believe it, even with all the proves and all the people saying it, if you think all the thousands of interviews by the Memory of the nation are fake, somebody has written all the tons of documents in the archive in Prague after revolution and made it all up for no actual reason, if you believe that somebody just made up all the information trails and museums and all of this was done and still is being done by the goverment even when communists are not a political threat for them and our government that is not very capable in most cases is able to keep this secret for years, and you believe it just because nobody from your family wasn’t falsely sentenced or executed or tortured or shot when trying to leave the country or anything else, this debate can also be ended because i’m not able to convince you about the opposite.
made it all up for no actual reason…
For me, it’s not that information is ‘made up’. It’s a question of emphasis and one-sidedness. And there is a reason for the dominant narrative. You said:
even when communists are not a political threat…
But this is false. Communists are and always will be a threat to liberals and fascists. They can be slandered, tortured, imprisoned, misrepresented, and killed. But they will never disappear. They will never stop fighting. And they will never be finally silenced. That is why capitalists spend so much money, time, and effort distorting history. This is the reason you’re looking for.
Wikipedia is not a trustworthy source to the extent that college professors automatically failed student’s assignment that cited wikipedia. Why can you not cite other sources like the many propaganda that NATO commonly distributed for free on the internet?
When Poland was occupied by communists after the second world war, it was pretty bad. There was very little food, if any at all in stores. I remember specifically that the only thing being in stock in stores was vinegar because the shelves were empty. Everything of value Poland produced, like food, went to the USSR. The only import Poland got were things like matchsticks.
What a nonsense.
occupied by communists after the second world war
Polish communists occupied their own country?
There was very little food, if any at all in stores.
You might have heard about, you know, the war and the real occupation, nazi one. Requisition, destruction, mass murders, death camps. I wonder why that stopped. Who ended it.
I remember specifically
Unless you are 95 years old i doubt it was “you specifically”. And also:
I remember specifically that the only thing being in stock in stores was vinegar because the shelves were empty
At least get your propaganda sorted out, dumbass, those were two different separate pieces, the vinegar one was about the 80’s (and equally false as the other one).
Everything of value Poland produced, like food, went to the USSR. The only import Poland got were things like matchsticks.
As evidenced by the rapidly rebuilding and repopulating country being made entirely of matchsticks. Yawn. Seriously at least get something less boring, go read some IPN book or something for more plausibly spun propaganda instead of taking your historical knowledge from Jebzdzidy.
I wonder if they are so used to liberals just going “OMG! That’s so horrible! Evil commies! Thank you for sharing your story brave hero!” that they forget when they are talking to people who can use their brains and actually bother to try and understand history.
Yes, this is exactly the case, in Poland you can say the wildest shit about communism, on the Yeonmi Park level, and all you see are the wise gray hair heads solemnly nodding.
What were conditions like everywhere else in the world after the biggest war the world had ever seen?
Everything of value Poland produced, like food, went to the USSR.
Let’s see some sources to support this bold claim. I’ll wait.
Stalin was extra hungry after the war, so he personally ate all of Poland’s food. Everyone in Poland starved to death 5 times each! I know it is true because I was Poland from 1945-51.
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“I remember specifically”… Damn, I’m sorry you had to survive on only vinegar and matches, grandpa 🤣
Sounds like the stories I’ve heard from people of that generation in west Germany. Things didn’t get better until the Währungsreform of 1948, and didn’t get markedly better until the US dumped in money (with strings attached mind) via the Marshall Plan. Europe was decimated by the war, regardless of which class was in charge.
Then why didn’t 3 million people died out straight way like what British did to bengali people (I am from bengal btw).
Ahh yes, so we should have just let the naxais have the place. That would obviously have been preferred
Słuchaj, pierdolisz. PolandIsAStateOfMind napisał wszystko co trzeba, jedynie piszę abyś był świadom że paru polskich komuchów tu jest którzy są chętni do zwalczania typowych głupot jakie ludzie jak ty lubią rozprzestrzeniać.
A Poland immigrant in Canada had testified about Communist rule in Poland, so I can expand on your story. There was free food under Communism, but people need to wait in a long line because the Soviet Union used the financial institutions from the Western European countries for the recovery after World War 2. Since the Western Europeans want to sabotage Communism, their institutions attempted to overchange the Eastern European countries with huge debt for the financial assistance and this debt-trapping is the current practice of the Bretton Woods institutions like World Bank and International Monetary Fund to create third world problems in former European colonies. Also when there are evidence that a person is subverting Communist rule, the Communist government will conduct search within a more reasonable ethical boundary than the police search in the US.
This kinda whitewashes a lot of terrible shit that happened behind the Iron Curtain. Many Romanians suffered under the tyrannical rule of Ceaușescu, or the Yugoslavians under Tito. For many good honest proletariats, especially during the latter days of the Soviet Union, suffering was about the only thing being evenly distributed.
Now certainly, you can point much of the blame at Soviet leadership of the time who were content to allow these monsters to remain in power as long as quotas were met, as opposed to a particular failing of any political system, but I’d never go as far as to belittle people who were starving.
How many gigazillion people did the Soviet Union kill this time? Get your psyop outta here.
That Romanian dude (fuck that name) was an insane right winger not “communist.” Please fuck off and try again.
Ok I typed that before finishing- his statement got more stupid!
Tito is nearly universally beloved by former-Yugoslavians. Ask them. Not the Nazi ones, the normal ones. You will find few harsh words against him. They did not all love him, but few hated him. And the rule of Tito and Yugoslavia is CERTAINLY preferable to the hellscape that neoliberalism (brought, kindly, by the US and western EU post soviet and then Yugoslavia collapse) has wrought upon that part of the world.
Also the deaths towards the end of the Soviet Union cannot ALL be attributed to the west, but, then again… the west did absolutely undermine time after time after time the Soviet government. And certainly past like 1990 that massive spike in deaths, much of it suicide, WAS basically a EU and US joint mass genocide upon the Russian people and other former Soviet states. They could’ve helped, they could’ve done anything, but instead they forced further despair and eventually forced the handing over of formerly publicly owned properties, entire industries sometimes, to what we like to call now “Russian oligarchs.” We created those guys who robbed their country and countrymen fucking blind. Imagine living 50 years in the great Soviet Union, born after WWII. You live there, see amazing feats from your country, and then one day it all comes tumbling down and Americans and your collaborating brethren are over on the side buying up and shiti-fying (I made a word) your formerly glorious country that you had some part in creating. And we did that. The “west” ripped apart a great experiment in socialism, not perfect by any means, but infinitely more noble than ultra capitalist genocidial US, etc. And they did it a smile on their faces and a silent understanding that “the Russians had brought this on themselves, really. tut tut They never should’ve even bothered trying to create a better world!”
Sorry bud socialist QOL indicators called they want their better food/tech/hospitals/schools/wealth distribution/sex/art//leisure/social progressivism/self reported happiness back.
You can say whatever the fuck you want about Ceaușescu or Tito, but the opinion polls don’t lie, most Romanians and post Yugoslavs today preferred life under socialism, and no amount of made up atrocities seems to have changed their mind on that.
I will say that Ceucescu (however the fuck you spell it lol) was pretty awful, his abortion policies were like the worst imaginable, but USSR and Yugoslavia were decent examples of socialism
