Social democracy in the global north relies on imperialism, resulting in the plunder of the global south for super-profits. It isn’t about balance or compromise, it’s about maintaining capitalism and bribing workers domestically into not rebelling. It also doesn’t work, nor does it benefit the majority considering they are imperialist. When people sit down and talk together, establishing socialism, that’s when the majority benefit without requiring plunder of the global south.

I read 2! Just haven’t started 3 yet.

Thanks! I’ll keep that in mind!

Hahaha, fair! I’ll have to try it one day!

I do, would just be nice to try the real deal someday!

Yea I’m aware that that’s not a good version of it, haha.

Yea it’s pretty good! Not everyone likes it, same as coffee and tea. It has its own herbal taste distinct from tea, but is closer to tea than coffee. I have it every once in a while, but have never had it the traditional way as shown in the image above, just the bottled stuff.

It’s good! If you like coffee and tea without milk or sugar, you’ll probably like it too!

Lil guy’s on volume 3, he means business!

Yerba mate, it looks like.

And the space can be more walkable, with grocery stores, schools, clinics, and more nearby.

Yea that’s entirely fair. One day for me, maybe, haha.

Interesting! I’ll have to check that out later, thanks comrade!

I believe I originally found it while looking for similar images. A good bit of info on housing I know came from Hakim’s video on soviet housing. I’d love to have a primary source document to reference, such as a newspaper or book, but for images I usually grab them from internet searches.

Actually maintained soviet apartment blocs aren’t nearly as depressing as the ones taken in winter, that haven’t been maintained properly since the dissolution of socialism:

These apartments provided housing for people that lived largely in shacks, where smoke from heating caused early deaths:

Soviet city planning made things walkable, with schools, playgrounds, and greenery within walking distance from nearly every apartment.

Both. The state is controlled by the working classes, and the administrators themselves are the same class. The DPRK has a form of consultative democracy outlined in the book I showed you.

I’ve explained class and how there isn’t some separate class in the DPRK. The landlords were appropriated from, same as the bourgeoisie. The working classes control the state, and have the same class interests as the people outside of the state apparatus. So far your only point against it is an unsupported “potential,” which is the same metaphysical error made by Bordiga and the “Left” communists.

Sure? I don’t see what that has to do with the meme.

The government does not exist outside of class society, but within it. The classes in power in the DPRK are the working classes, there is extremely minimal private property and that private property is largely foreign owned. The structures in place were put there by the organized working classes. When you erase class analysis, or diverge from it by inventing new classes that don’t actually fit how we understand class, you run into problems.

As for actions you’ve taken that are upsetting, I already explained in earlier comments the regular strawmanning and misframing you’ve done of my position, and the positions of others.

See, this is the problem again. The form of socialist society that exists in Korea is one that was formed through direct practice and based on Korea’s existing situation. It’s what works for them, regardless of whether or not you approve of the “model.” You’re saying it isn’t “promising,” more gesturing to potentials of misconduct that you percieve based on your own comparison to the ideal, perfect, impossible version of socialism that exists purely in imagination.

The problem rests on your belief that you know better than the millions of people in the DPRK over the last century how to run their country, without doing the study to see how and why their structures were formed. For example, the Democratic Front is an integral part to their socialist democracy, and this has heritage in liberation from colonialism by Japan. The various councils and committees have heritage in the culture formed in Korea and were solidified into a state.

Then, you go and strawman people and misrepresent them. Though you maintain a polite tone, your actual actions speak against that, and thus you aren’t acting in a comradely way like you first seemed to be. It’s frustrating.