Incorrect on both counts. Democracy is rule by the majority, socialism is a mode of production where public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy and the working class is in control of the state. Libertarianism just refers to a limited state, it cares nothing about how that is achieved. Anarchism and anarchist-adjacent ideologies are almost always revolutionary as well. Pacifism is uncommon.

I’m not “brainwashed” for sharing the opinions of the majority of major communist parties. I’m a communist, and my views are consistent with that. The WPK has the overwhelming majority of seats, but is also popularly supported, and does not have direct control over who people vote for. These are “tankie,” sure, they’re views shared by the majority of communists and “tankie” is just a pejorative for us.

I encourage you to look into how the DPRK actually functions, as well as its inception as an indigenous movement against colonization by Japan and later the US.

All socialism is democratic, so I assume you mean reformist socialism. Reformism has extremely specific and limited use-cases, Allende being a short-lived example. Chile was able to successfully elect a Marxist, but he was ousted in a coup. It isn’t impossible, but relying on reformism as the main strategy in all or even most cases is a significant departure from Marxist analysis of the state and its class character.

Libertarian socialism is more anarchist than anything, and has no problems with revolution. I don’t see why you bring it up.

I mention the Black Panthers because they are one of the more beloved and successful leftist groups in US history, and absolutely deserve to be taken seriously. You’re right, claiming to be democratic and communist doesn’t make a group democratic nor communist, what matters is their structure. Democratically, they have approval-based voting, and 3 political parties. There are also factory councils for direct worker management. Public ownership is the principle aspect of their economy.

More than anything, their self-determination in the face of a brutal empire sanctioning them into starvation should be supported, even if you don’t agree with their structure.

Like what?

I mean, kinda? Revolution is a core part of Marxism. There are rare instances like in Chile where voting worked, but then Allende was couped by the US and Pinochet.

The Black Panther Party had close ties with the DPRK, so that’s not really unreasonable. Leftist groups historically have had support for the DPRK, especially in context of the US Empire’s attempted genocide of northern Koreans.

They don’t, they reference what they call the “June 4th incident” all the time when relevant. What they don’t allow is spreading the fictionalized version of events, ie tanks running over 10000 protestors in the square. They acknowledge the real events, which were riots around Beijing that were put down by the PLA, resulting in a few dozen deaths of officers and a few hundred rioters killed by the PLA. The west uses the atrocity propaganda of the former story to undermine the socialist project in the PRC.

The Red Army was responsible for 80-90% of the war effort in Europe against the Nazis, the eastern front absolutely eclipsed the western front.

The US has floated the idea of using special forces units as an alternative to land invasion, so sabotage isn’t unlikely.

I’m sure you can find an isolated case or two, but your point was that it’s something common enough to be the backbone of western investment in China, and not the fact that China leveraged it’s relatively cheaper labor power initially in order to gain access to production technology. These days wages are much higher, but production is so effective per labor hour that it’s surpassed everywhere else. Child labor is strictly forbidden by law in China.

The vast majority of those found guilty were just removed from office. Executions were reserved for those found guilty of treason, sexual assault, or other serious crimes. It wasn’t just killing everyone suspicious. Furthermore, it wasn’t a dictatorship, Stalin was contested numerous times throughout his service. The soviet model of democracy had many moving parts, and required a large group of people making decisons collectively, from the bottom to the top.

As for the PRC, child labor is illegal, and is actually more common among western countries. Chinese workers have recieved large pay increases year over year for decades. Purchasing Power in 2022 was 25 times higher than 1978. There was also a successful extreme poverty elimination campaign, I recommend reading The Metamorphosis of Yuangudui to see an example of the major transformations taking place due to dedicated and targeted poverty eradication.

As for Vietnam, they are largely playing by the same playbook China did. Once it becomes clear to the west that they are in fact still dedicated to socialism and not simply letting the west use them for cheap labor, they will likely recieve similar fearmongering China does today, just like the USSR recieved during its existence. Public perception is largely shaped by how beneficial the west sees other countries.

I’m not trying to be condescending here, I used to hold similar views to yourself, before I started taking theory and history seriously and joined an org. I really encourage you to seek more working class perspectives. The Black Panther Party is an excellent example of a group that is popular with the people, so hearing for the first time about how friendly they were with the DPRK can be shocking if you haven’t already been digging into socialist perspectives on the 20th century and AES states.

The kulaks were a form of bourgeois-farmers that existed in Tsarist Russia. The 1930s was when the soviet union began collectivizing agriculture and creating cooperative farms. You’re correct in saying that kulaks don’t sound very communist, and you’re right, that’s why they fought against the communists who were trying to socialize farming, therefore making the famine far worse.

As for the Great Purge, the exact number of deaths is unknown, but the purge itself was necessary. The soviet union was infiltrated by huge numbers of fascists and former white army members, corrupt officials, and in many cases criminals. They weren’t simply “political opponents,” the socialist system was in an extremely dangerous position. The majority of those found guilty were simply expelled from the party, with some being sentenced to prison, and some of those being sentenced to death.

I don’t “worship a dictator,” nor do I cover up the past. I investigate the past, especially now that the soviet archives are (relatively) open. Stalin did do terrible things, like criminalizing homosexuality, and excess deaths absolutely occured because of his actions. At the same time, he wasn’t a dictator, nor was the soviet system capable of such a position. I already linked a bunch of resources, but if you want a genuine critical look at Stalin, you should read Losurdo’s Stalin: The History and Critique of a Black Legend. Losurdo only uses western sources for this, and it does an excellent job showcasing Stalin’s genuine merits and failures.

Socialism is doing wonderfully right now. The PRC is the world’s most advanced socialist state right now, soon to be the world’s most developed country. Vietnam and Laos are also rising rapidly. The DPRK is doing surprisingly well now after decades of recovering from the Arduous March. Cuba is struggling with energy production, but solidarity from Vietnam and the PRC in the form of large solar panel construction has helped alleviate that. Nicaragua is doing okay, and Venezuela is in a tough position due to the US Empire’s aggression, but even then good news still comes out.

I do read history, that’s a part of my theory reading. I do my best to understand what did and did not work in historical socialism, and read history to better understand the context of the present day. Given that you didn’t even know about Churchill’s genocide of Bengal (or worse, didn’t care), nor about the DPRK’s ties to parties like the Black Panthers, nor the role of the kulaks, etc, I think you should take your own advice here as well. Theory, history, and joining an org should all be priorities for you.

Sounds like you need to learn more about Churchill, because he was responsible for starving millions of people in Bengal. He had this to say:

I hate Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion. The famine was their own fault for breeding like rabbits.

Lovely.

The 1930s famine, on the other hand, wasn’t forced, though. It was a combination of adverse weather conditions leading to lower crop yields, wealthy farmers called kulaks killing their livestock and burning their crops to “resist collectivization,” and some degree of mismanagement. It’s important to recognize that pre-1930s, Eastern Europe had regular famines as well, and that following collectivization the 1930s famine was the last famine outside of World War II (when the Nazis took Ukraine, the USSR’s breadbasket). To pin that on Stalin alone is a serious mistake.

As for the DPRK, they have approval-based voting, and 3 political parties. There are also factory councils for direct worker management. On top of this, they have been strong allies to Palestine, Cuba, South Africa, and had close ties to the Black Panther Party.

My opinions are absolutely sane. My views are shared by orgs like PSL, FRSO, the Black Panther Party, and every major communist party in power throughout the world. Contrary to your pessimism, socialism is succeeding throughout the world, and we are progressing despite your protestations. I don’t “idealize failure” or “worship dictators,” I’m a practicing communist that organizes in real life and studies theory, even making my own intro Marxist-Leninist reading list. The “true” communism is the work of communists in real life building it, not the magic utopia free from sin that exists in your head.

I suggest you actually join an org and start reading theory.

Private ownership, directed for the purposes of profit, is inherently “unfair.” Markets have utility in finding demand at low levels of development, but in terms of accountability and fairness, directing production for the purposes of profit rather than the satisfaction of needs will always inherently trend towards conflict between workers and owners. Even the most benign “owner” is still going to be producing for profit, trying to maximize production and consumption, all in an incredibly inefficient manner in order to line their pockets.

Collectivized production can be more transparent and directly accountable. Full abolition of private property into collectivized production and distribution is a gradual process, but it’s one that marches on as development continues. Since all markets are “mixed” right now, it remains important that we identify where the power lies in the system and ensure that’s in the hands of the working classes.

1. Didn’t realize you weren’t the original person, but the conversation thread still holds, the original question was:

How do you force people to give according to their ability? What if they don’t want to?

2. “From each according to their ability, to each according to their needs” refers to communism. It’s a direct response to the OP. "From each according to their ability, to each according to their work" refers to socialism and revolution, but wasn’t the subject of the OP.

3. No. I answered OP’s question about communism, then it got shifted to socialism and revolution. This is important, as the original question was framed as how do you keep communism going.

4. Sure.

That’s not really how it works. People don’t try to go for power for the sake of power, they do so in modes of production where they can leverage the system to gain far more by gaining more power. In socialism this isn’t nearly as true, thus we can see that socialist systems don’t typically have the same results capitalist systems do.

When I say “anti-communist,” I generally mean those who would use pejoratives against Marxists, I’m aware anarchists use it as well as liberals.

Communism as an economic system isn’t some genie you have to trick into giving you stuff, or else you’ll be swindled by malicious compliance simply based on the phrase “according to need.” It’s a mode of production characterized by collectivized production and distribution according to a common plan, not a game of semantics.

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