I don’t think I could be considered “internet famous,” especially considering Lemmy is itself extremely niche. I’m also not comparable to a dead fascist. I am a communist, sure, but there’s more to my life than organizing in real life and doing what I do on Lemmy.

Is it a habit of yours to ask a question, then jump to insults when you get an answer you don’t know how to respond to?

Cool?

The US isn’t democratic, the state is run by capitalists and the two major parties are subservient to capital. You can even see the effects of this with how low approval rates are for the government, and much lower perceptions of democracy. The reason the working classes in China can maintain such strong control over the state is because public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy, and the working class party overthrew the nationalists back in 1949. What part of what I said is “peddling bullshit?”

Not implying, stating. In China, they have direct elections for local representatives, which elect further “rungs,” laddering to the top. The top then has mass polling and opinion gathering. This combination of top-down and bottom-up democracy ensures effective results. For more on this, see Professor Roland Boer’s Socialism in Power: On the History and Theory of Socialist Governance. The government itself has no capitalists in the top positions either:

This system has achieved fantastic metrics, such as over 90% of the citizenry supporting the government. This also shows why perceptions around democracy are so much higher in China than the west:

So yes, the working classes do control the state in China.

The PRC is socialist, public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy and the working classes control the state.

First part is true. Though it’s ironic considering people are calling it fascism for Trump to hint at a third term, while Xi removed constitutional term limits so he could stay in power.

While term limits restrict voter choice, the complete absence of opposition parties restricts it far more. “Popularity” is functionally unmeasurable in a system without free press or competitive elections. You cannot accurately gauge approval ratings when disapproval is criminalized. Removing term limits without adding checks and balances historically leads to autocracy, not “radical change” as it entrenches a specific elite rather than the working class.

Trump isn’t a fascist for wanting to remove term limits, Trump is a fascist because the US Empire is a genocidal, imperialist settler-colony where private ownership is principle and the state owned by private capital. In the PRC, on the other hand, over 90% of Chinese citizens support the central government, and ranks far higher than western countries on perceptions of democracy:

The “protectionism” argument fails because the Firewall blocks information, not just competitors. Blocking Wikipedia, news regarding 1989, or criticisms of the leadership has zero economic benefit. It is strictly political thought control.

Conversely, Communist parties are legal in the US. They run candidates and publish newspapers. In China, advocating for independent Marxist unions (like the Jasic Incident student group) gets you arrested. The state suppresses unauthorized leftists just as harshly as liberals.

The firewall is for protectionism. Discussion on June 4th, 1989 happens in China, just not the propagandized version most westerners are taught in school. Instead, political unity in the socialist system is supported. Opposition has historically been supported by western countries to undermine the socialist system, when supposed “leftists” try to separate from the socialist system and agitate against it, these are suppressed just like liberals because they essentially function the same way.

Meanwhile, the US Empire has murdered communists, and funds massive propaganda networks against them. Liberals act far more out in the open in China, for better or worse, than communists in the US.

You are confusing Fascism with Plutocracy or Oligarchy. Fascism, by definition (as articulated by Mussolini and Gentile, or practiced by the Nazis), is the State dominating the corporation, not the other way around. Fascism seeks to merge corporate and state power under the direction of the state to serve national interests. This describes the Chinese model (statist control of capital) far more accurately than the US model (capitalist influence over the state). If the state commands the corporation, that aligns with the structural mechanics of fascism, regardless of whether the state calls itself “Communist.”

No, “plutocracy” and “oligarchy” are not what I’m talking about. In Mussolini’s economy, private ownership was principle, and capitalists in control of the state. Any capitalists that did not toe the line were punished, sure, by the capitalists in charge od the state. If public ownership is principle, and the working classes are in charge of the state, as in China, then it’s socialist.

The idea that socialism is when corporations are independent of and can control the state, your definition, is absurd and stems purely from your incorrect understanding of fascism.

The west doesn’t at all do the same thing, it completely eradicates massive swaths of people via massive genocidal campaigns, enslaves survivors, and uses this as fuel to colonize the global south. The soviets focusing on industrial development and therefore improving the quality of life, life expectancies, and more of the various peoples in the soviet union while preserving their ethnic identities and cultures is astronomically different.

Your comment is borderline genocide denial.

Unless you mean anarchist conceptions of communism, ie communalist structures, all Marxist formations recognize the necessity of the working classes using state power, ie authority, to protect the gains of socialism and gradually collectivize production and distribution. In that sense, all communism can be seen as authoritarian, at least until all production and distribution is collectivized globally and thus the state finally fully withers away.

Further, worker owned governments with public ownership as the principle aspect of the economy are never fascist, fascism is uniquely tied to capitalism in decay.

Just my 2 cents on the matter.

A core part of fascism is economic control and corporatism (nationalizing corporations and controlling private property).

This isn’t corporatism. Corporatism refers to corporations having control over the state, and using it against the working classes. You’re confusing corporatism for its very opposite.

Just because a fascist government takes control of it doesn’t mean it ceases to be private property. They still defer to the property owners, who often become wealthy. This would not happen if the public owned it, as everyone would be enriched instead. People like Jack Ma could never be worth billions.

This is extremely confused. Jack Ma is an owner of Alibaba, not publicly owned industry like China’s SOEs. The public does not own Alibaba, the public owns SOEs, which eclipse Alibaba in size and scope. Alibaba is small compared to the huge SOEs in China.

China permits and thrives on such government controlled private property.

China thrives on public ownership of the large firms and key industries, and private ownership of sole proprietorships, agricultural cooperatives, and small and medium firms. As these firms grow, they are folded into the public sector.

Throw away that textbook you mentioned earlier.

Actually, on second thought, link it here, I want to see whoever is publishing that nonsense.

Jack Ma was punished for suggesting that the CPC needed to relinquish control, and privatize more. He wasn’t a billionaire fighting for the working classes, but instead a billionaire fighting for the free movement of capital and liberalization. The fact that the CPC humiliated and punished Jack Ma for trying to undermine the publicly driven economy is precisely evidence of the weakness of private capital within the PRC.

As for Trump, he’s nakedly fascist already. Private ownership is what drives the US economy. Nationalization in such a context strengthens the bourgeois state and facilitates the control of private capital.

At this point I’m not sure why you genuinely don’t seem to understand the difference between public and private ownership, and how that impacts the state and therefore helps us see what a system actually is.

Cult of Personality / Leader. From Mao to Xi Jinping, the allegiance to their leaders is much more strongly enforced when compared to Trump. US has term limits and doesn’t even permit a “leader for life.”

Term limits are anti-democratic, and are put in place in bourgeois democracy to prevent left-wing leaders from lasting long enough to overhaul the system, effectively gutting any radical change. Mao and Xi are both examples of extremely popular leaders, far moreso than Trump, Macron, Starmer, etc.

Radical Nationalism. The “Chinese Dream” and “Great Rejuvenation of the Chinese Nation” emphasize righting the wrongs of the “Century of Humiliation.” This is often exclusionary, emphasizing Han Chinese identity over others. US has a broader international identity and is much less isolationist.

Han Chinese are not placed above ethnic minorities in the PRC or non-Chinese externally. The PRC has strong minority representation at the state level, and legal protections for them. The PRC isn’t isolationist either, it trades and partners with practically everyone, especially the global south. The US Empire brutally oppresses ethnic minorities, and is dominated by old, white men at the state level. The US Empire is also imperialist, and interventionist, while being extremely nationalist.

Control of Media. China maintains the world’s most sophisticated digital censorship system (The Great Firewall). All domestic media is state-aligned. Under the principle of Dang Guan Meiti (“The Party controls the media”), all news outlets in China are legally considered the “mouthpiece” of the Communist Party.

The Great Firewall isn’t censorship, it’s to promote domestic internet production and infrastructure so as to not be reliant on the west. The CPC does censor liberals, capitalists, and fascists, whereas the west censors communists and the working classes.

Economic Corporatism. While corporate lobbying is very strong in the US, they still have an adversarial relationship. Corporations will often do stuff like suing the US government. Meanwhile in China, all corporations are required to have CCP cells and align their goals with state national interests. They effectively seized control of corporations for nationalistic purposes (epitome of fascism).

This is where you highlight how little you understand fascism. The US Empire is driven by private ownership, corporations dominate the state. This is fascism. In the PRC, private property is subservient to the public sector and to the state. The CPC controls what capitalists can do, not the other way around, because the CPC is communist.

Suppression of Labor. All labor unions must belong to the state-sanctioned All-China Federation of Trade Unions. Independent strikes and labor organizing are illegal and strictly suppressed. There are strong anti-union sentiments in the US, but independent unionizing is still very much legally permitted.

Labor isn’t suppressed, the PRC restricts independent organizations that can be steered by the west in favor of fully integrating unions into the socialist system itself, in the form of the All-China Federation of Trade Unions. Unions in the US Empire are extremely weakened and the state sides with capital over them.

You fundamentally do not know what fascism is because you think it’s public ownership.

No, I’m saying that tigers are not ducks, and I explained clearly why. No matter how much you point to ducks and tigers both having feet, they aren’t the same in any capacity. The PRC has a publicly driven economy, with the working classes in control of the state. It’s funny that you bring up Jack Ma, because he was punished by the state for acting against socialism. Nazi Germany was driven by private ownership as principle, and a strong state, the fundamental differences lie in whether public ownership or private ownership is principle and which class is in control.

All modern economies have some degree of a public/private split, even the DPRK has special economic zones like Rason. The difference between capitalism (which fascism is a derivative of) and socialism is which aspect of the economy is principle, private or public, and which class is in control of the state, capitalists or workers. In China, public ownership is principle and the state is under the control of the working classes.

The PRC does use nationalized industry and resources for their own benefit, as does every single country, with the partial exception of colonized and imperialized countries that are exploited by the west. Xi Jinping is popular, but doesn’t have a cult of personality. I don’t know what textbook you’re reading, but if it’s telling you that public ownership is fascist you should probably discard it.

That’s quite a dodge, why are you calling a Chinese man similar-looking to a yellow bear?

No he doesn’t, can you elaborate? Why are you calling a Chinese man similar to a yellow bear?

No? China is a socialist country. Public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy, and the working classes control the state. Fascism is the diametric opposite, it’s private ownership as principle and capitalists in charge of the state, ie capitalism, when it needs to violently break up labor organizing and force austerity due to capitalist decay.

I’m certainly not a scholar either, but I do think we can investigate certain statements further. Human rights abuses largely stem from class struggle and latent contradictions in society, opposing identities and possibilities, if that makes sense. Excess is a feature of all systems, and as such investigating what drives conflict and the manner of how it’s resolved requires a class analysis. In other words, it isn’t about size, or ideas of power, but largely resolution of contradictions.

In China, the working classes are in control of the state. However, contradictions exist, like the gap between urban and rural development, the class conflict between the proletariat and bourgeoisie, the contradiction between domestic and foreign capital, between liberalism and communism. These contradictions give rise to excess, which is avoidable suffering. However, unlike dictatorships of capital, China’s socialist system is built to address these contradictions.

Rural development is being prioritized to close the gap, including expanding rail, poverty alleviation programs, and making use of urban industrial production to build up rural areas. The proletariat are in control of the state, and use it to publicly own the commanding heights of industry, keeping the bourgeoisie subservient. Foreign capital is limited in what it can actually own, and technology share is mandatory. Corruption is regularly checked, and corrupt party members expelled from the party and punished.

China, compared to capitalist countries, has a great human rights track record, domestic and foreign. It is flawed, because it is real, and more than capitalist countries its structure allows it to improve over time. This extends to areas like LGBTQIA+ rights, which are increasingly important to younger generations while the more socially conservative older generations are replaced. China systemically has a people-first structure.

What do you mean? I just see Xi Jinping and Zelensky.

How would China have to change their democratic processes, or methods of governance, to turn you around more on how they handle things? I often see people claim China should be less authoritarian, but I rarely see concrete steps they could take to be less-so structurally from those that see China that way.

The bird has the hammer and sickle, the symbol of the joint partnership of the industrial proletariat and the agrarian peasantry, the symbol of Marxism-Leninism. The hammer and sickle was created in the RSFSR, the first socialist state in history. Using any one person as symbol for the working class movement, and not symbols of the working classes themselves, is akin to liberal Great Man Theory.