"Communism, Fascism, two sides of the same coin!" Topic

You were asked – TMP link

"Communism and fascism are two sides of the same coin." True or false?

52% said "true"
33% said "false"

It's more complicated than that [obviously!].

What the two have in common is authoritarianism.

It makes little difference to the people getting killed what end of the imaginary spectrum the killers have been classified on.

WS: +1

Winston and Joe: +1

Has anyone thought of people killed in the name of profits?

Many died for profit thru out the ages. Money vs. Ideology. I'm for making a profit !

The dead do not care for what reason they were destroyed. But the question arises – where is the profit used? For the good of all, or for the good of the elect?

This "for the good of all" business, Cuprum. Who decides? In my reading, the Party, of course. But they're not "the elect." They've told us so themselves--and people who disagree disappear.

"Has anyone thought of people killed in the name of profits?"

As compared to murdered in the name of the state?

Who would you rather have as a boss? Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot or Rockefeller, Vanderbilt, and Carnegie?

I would suggest for those interested in politics and the differences between communism and fascism also take a look at this site:-
politicalcompass.org

Hans Eysenck pointed out the left/right scale does not as some posters have commented differentiate between authoritarianism and libertarian regimes and proposed a more complex analysis of political movements.

I'll leave it at that, other than to say this was on my Government & Politics A level syllabus back in 1995.

Marx and Lenin said that the state must die. Communism – the highest form of democracy really is.
What we saw in the 20th century is a monster generated by the confrontation of two systems. The first thing that was done after the appearance of the world's first socialist state was foreign intervention and foreign support of all anti-Soviet forces within Russia without exception. As a result, Russia has become a military camp. In a military camp, democracy is impossible.
And without democracy, communism is impossible.

Two sides of the same sausage rather…

Sorry but, Marx and Lenin were either idiots, or just didn't understand the show…

Communism is inherently vulnerable to severe corruption. In order for a true Communist system to work properly, there can be no fault in the people involved in that system. All humans are subject to fault (by our nature, we are all imperfect).

Lenin tried (I believe he honestly did, at some point) to setup a system that would run for the people but… Stalin – classic corrupt leader. Enriched himself, and those who actively supported him. "Removed" those that in anyway either opposed him – or he perceived as a threat to his power.

The millions who have died at the hands of "Communism" in the short time it's been around – show 'the violence inherent in the system' (help, help – I'm being repressed!).

You may claim that millions more have died due to other systems and yes, they have but, those other political systems have had centuries more time to do it than Communism has so..?

"Who decides? In my reading, the Party, of course".

Multiparty system is required. In Russia, after the October Revolution, there were three parties in power – the Bolsheviks, the Left Socialist Revolutionaries and the anarchists. Unfortunately, their struggle has shifted from the realm of discussion to armed confrontation. And not only the fault of the Bolsheviks.

Meet the new boss
Same as the old boss
Songwriter: Peter Townsend

Don't matter what 'ism you call it.

I think most political systems would work better if the people involved were more trustworthy, honest and selfless. Unfortunately, people suck, therefore the political systems they develop suck more. Of course, anarchy sucks, too. So I'm going to go play a game.

StarCruiser. I do not agree.
For a start: communism is the ideal. The case of the distant future, if at all possible. It is a society of gods, completely devoid of selfishness and thinking about the welfare of all people around the world.
Maybe – in a couple of thousand years))) I personally hardly believe in it. Animal instincts in man are always stronger.

In a reasonable perspective, we can only talk about socialism. And here it is possible to argue a lot about which forms are most suitable for creating such a society. I like the idea of ​​a cooperative society. There is no private ownership of the means of production, they all belong to all the personnel who work for them. Each employee receives his share of the profit (depending on the qualifications and the amount of labor invested).

No party should exercise dictatorship. Multi-party system and free elections.

Stalin – the head of the military camp. His task is to prepare the country for a new world war. And he succeeded. Monstrous price. Talking about Stalin's corruption is ridiculous. Where in the USSR could spend a lot of money? Buy 100 coats and 10 kilogram caviar? And is this all profit? Power – that was what interested people then. Money was insignificant.

About the victims. For example, the First World War, colonialism … Are there few victims? All in the name of pitiful profits …

In International Relations back in the 1970s, we were taught that the political spectrum was not a trational straight line with Communism and fascism at each end but a circle. In that representation those concepts share more common aspects than polar opposites.

Of course, cuprum. It was the Bolsheviks' abiding interest in multi-party democracy which caused them to seize power rather than to run for seats in the Constituent Assembly, to ban every other party, institute the Red Terror and construct the camps. If it hadn't been for the armed intervention, they'd have abolished the state, just as the Communists did in Yugoslavia, China, Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Cuba…

Explain to me again how someone else will determine the conditions of my labor--what I work at, how long and at what compensation--but in that glorious future "the state" will be abolished?

Marx thought no labor would be necessary--but he never explained who would fix stopped-up drains. And the state would be unnecessary--but who investigates and punishes rape and murder? Or sets the bag limits for game, come to that?

There are some things only an intellectual could believe.

Describe for yourself the ideal communist society, and the ideal fascist society. These are antagonists.
Under communism, the state is missing. Fascism – an absolute state.
The USSR was Frankenstein, who embodied both systems simultaneously to one degree or another.

Nothing gets me more fired up than this Right is Fascism, left is Communist.

Sometimes the same side of the coin, given the recent rise of fascist socialist/communists.

I think a system that doesn't reward an individual for exceptional accomplishment leads to mediocrity for all. My two cents.

It's why Hitler liked to recruit communists into the Nazi party and the East Germans liked to recruit former Nazis into the Stasi.

I always choke on using "ideal" and "communist" in the same sentence, Cuprum. Perhaps you could give us an example of a real communist state--ANY real communist state from Marx's day to this--which reduced the size and reach of government? In fairness, I don't see how they could, for the reasons I already gave and which you ignored.

And no serious Communist party anywhere in Lenin's day or Stalin's raised objections to purges, massacres, secret police or camps. A small minority of them thought Trotsky should have supervised the secret police rather than Stalin, but that would have made a difference only to the two of them.

Somehow the existing communist state is always the workers' paradise until someone starts excavating the mass graves and interviewing the camp survivors. At that point it turns out that communism has never really been tried. Again.

"The first thing that was done after the appearance of the world's first socialist state was foreign intervention and foreign support of all anti-Soviet forces within Russia without exception."

Actually the first thing that happened was that they put the intelligentsia up against the wall.

Fascism isn't clearly defined anywhere really, people say it's about militarism but it's essentially the same as extreme socialist or communist nations, ultimately the government has total control over every citizen. Wasn't Hitler part of a Socialist party and best friends with Stalin?

Don't tell me Fascism is the one concerned with race because communist leaders have always been happy to wipe out races and ethnic groups if it's in their interests.

I think today the word fascist is used by communists to oppress free people.

"Fascist" Germany was actually an extreme socialist, authoritarian, militaristic dictatorship.

Under FDR the USA was a free socialist country as well don't forget. It was the fashion.

I have neither the time nor the desire to lead discussions on such topics. Moreover, this little suitable for this site. I managed to live under socialism (even if it was perverted), and in its absence – and I can compare these systems, having personal experience. I just expressed my opinion on this issue. To agree or not is your right.

The only people happy in a police state are those that run it…

My parents were ordinary workers. At that time I was a technical specialist in production. None are members of the Communist Party. Now I am an entrepreneur.
And my family was happy in that period. My friends and relatives now, overwhelmingly, assess the Soviet period positively. Although no one denies the crimes and shortcomings of that period.
But I agree that a police state is bad. There is no alternative to democracy.

Any "ISM" will go bad in the end and that certainly includes capitalism.

"Socialism is great … until you run out of someone else's money !"

"Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others."

¯ Winston S. Churchill

Nazism has never really been properly tried.

As to life in the former Soviet Union or Warsaw pact countries under Communism, every expat Russian or Warsaw pact citizen I have ever run into is happy to be out.

And if they have friends or relatives still in their original countries they would like to get them out.

> every expat Russian or Warsaw pact citizen I have ever run into is happy to be out.

Understandable since the number that left who actually wanted to stay in would be a very small number.

Immigrants are just a small percentage of people dissatisfied with something. They are always and everywhere – even in the most prosperous country. In the USSR there were a lot of people who somehow had the opportunity to travel abroad. Something not all of them escaped))) Although in the late USSR there were no repressions imposed on relatives for the illegal emigration of someone close to them. By the way, now emigration from the former socialist countries is much more. So living here has become much worse following your logic?
It's funny that I myself was an opponent of socialism in Russia at one time, and supported the country's rejection of communist ideas. Now I think it was a mistake. It was necessary to get rid of political dictate. Sufficiently large economic reforms were needed (the release of a private initiative based on cooperation) – but not the abandonment of a regulated economy in the field of natural monopolies (energy, resources, some transport sectors). Need control over international trade and circulation of capital. This may seem strange, but the market has significantly reduced economic efficiency. The country, which previously had a very good economy, has become a cheap gas station. No country other than China and, perhaps, Poland, from the former "socialist camp" is flourishing. All of them are degrading, slower or faster.

Well I always have to think how many people are trying to immigrate to a certain countries ? I don't see any "caravans" heading to too many places in the world.

I mean who would wake up one morning and say, "You know I think I want become a citizen, of a failed or failing country, with little to no chance for having a better quality of life." …

Of course in some places in the world, pretty much any place would be better than where they are. As we see with the huge influx of immigrants/refugees fleeing to Western Europe and North America. Know they'd be much better off "here" verses where they came from.

But as we also see, the countries where they are fleeing to may have a difficult time supporting more mouths to feed, provide medical care, etc., etc. For the huge numbers. "Money does not grow on trees", as the saying goes.

Well Cuprum, put down the vodka bottle, get off your arse and MAKE something that people might want to BUY. At the moment that only thing that people want to buy from the former USSR is cheap army surplus weapons, mail order brides and caviar. Quite frankly, yer guns don't shoot straight and caviar tastes crap anyway. So basically, yer stuffed. You should make some more cute female tennis players and maybe even get one that could win.

Also: Vietnam, Cambodia, Slovenia, Slovakia, Czech Republic, East Germany, Hungary, Croatia – all seem to be doing quite well since throwing off the suffocating blanket of Marxism. And we no longer hear about Romania, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia being in the news for being bleak hell holes.

William, if we are not able to do anything well – then why do American space rockets still fly on old Soviet engines?))) And our guys, together with the Indians, occupied the "Silicon Valley"?
I think, for a start, we need to impose our currency on the world as a means of payment and just live on credit … Paying for the real goods with cut paper;)
We do not complain – we are working on changing the situation.
And stop sucking beer – vodka is better. I recommend)))

@ Cuprum

Russia has plenty of talented engineers, entrepreneurs, and everything else – as individuals.

The problem is that Russia has never been a proper democracy (one where there is more than one party, not Soviet "democracy" where all the candidates were communists). Thus whenever one dictatorship is chucked out, it just gets replaced with another because nobody can imagine anything different. You replaced Tsarism with Marxism and now your country is basically a kleptocracy run by murderous ex-spooks.

If you look at how long it takes historically f!cked countries to recover from that position, it's a lot more than 30 years, and some sort of apocalyptic reset is usually involved. Germany wasn't a proper democracy until after WW1, and within 14 years they elected a Nazi government. It took another world war for them to wise up. Even then, post-war German officialdom was bulging with ex-Nazis, in the same way that in Romania after 1989 the same people were still in charge. In both cases they'd worked out that the old methods wouldn't work, so Germany joined civilisation at last and Romania joined the EU.

Italy arguably is in some ways just as much of a basket case now as it was when it was a corrupt theocracy 500 years ago.

Japan likewise had to be bombed flat and even after implementing democracy they've persistently elected the JDP most of the time. They still don't really get it.

The biggest issue with communism was that in order for it to work, you need a different kind of people. These people had to completely forget the issues of their own well-being, private and even personal property in favour for the state interests and ideology, at the same time the state, run by honest and fair government should be distributing the wealth equally. This part is mentioned in all socialist utopia books, and it was named "new soviet human" in CPSU documents.
Putting state interests and existence of the state/others over your personal life was cultivated, and it worked during pre war, WWII and first after war years, but people still wanted personal life, and there were always people more equal than others. USSR went down for a number of reasons, but one of the main issues was that party nomenclature was living much better than common people, and a lot of politicians made themsleves political careers writing about priveleges of party and the government…but at least at that time they were hiding their wealth.
Our current opposition is hitting in the same spot – showing the wealth, acquired by questionable means by elite without really offering an alternative.
We have a real problem – basically you might need to invite aliens to run the country, bcs we're not happy with our own politicians and we'll never trust smb from the West, as we all know too well how it worked in 90s.
A lot of good stuff we have now (like being the top wheat exporter in the world) happens not bcs. of government help, but bcs of its little interference…

put down the vodka bottle,

Well they do make good vodka !

then why do American space rockets still fly on old Soviet engines?

Very good question … I blame the elected and appointed leadership in the US Gov't.

I think Russia and the West still have a lot of leftover "points of contention", etc., on many old Cold War topics. But those emotions still run deep for many. In the US especially today with many in the leadership are not former Cold War types. Which has certainly it's pros & cons. But to many the leader of Russia being a very old school Cold War former KGB type. Can be a bit "disconcerting". So IMO much work still needs to be done between the West and Russia.

However, IMO the average US citizen has little to no knowledge about the US/West's history, etc., with Russia. They don't know about much beyond Russia is waaay over on the other side of the world. However, the Media, etc., has made it clear, the Russians among others are interfering with the US online. But I don't doubt the US/West does the same to the Russians, Chinese, etc. It's the new frontier for espionage for everyone.

Bottom line, again much work still needs to be done. And it won't happen overnight. However, this new version of the Cold War is much better that the original, IMO. If for no other reasons the threat on MAD has certainly decreased considerably.

And I frequently have said in the past. The US made a big mistake supporting the Muj in their war against the USSR in A'stan. They should have left them both to fight in out on their own. As we see A'stan and that region will be in conflict among themselves and others for a long time to come. And probably in the distant future.

Possibly had the US left the situation there to "work it out" or just continue on like many insurgencies. Possible events like 9/11, the rise of religious inspired terrorism, etc., may have been held in check? And not be the worldwide problem it is today. But I could be wrong. And hindsight is 20/20 generally.

Now IMO everybody should watch that old movie from the '60s, "The Russians Are Coming" … Albeit a comedy … it showed, we, the West and the Russians are more alike than otherwise when it comes to the common man[or woman].

I agree with you guys (I'm talking about the last three messages).
But we are far away from the topic of the branch)))
I once asked a Pole, a good friend of mine who is very negative about the USSR, what would be better for Poland to remain under Nazi occupation or still be liberated by the Soviets. Guess what he said)))

Legion4 wrote: "Possibly had the US left the situation there to "work it out" or just continue on like many insurgencies. Possible events like 9/11, the rise of religious inspired terrorism, etc., may have been held in check? And not be the worldwide problem it is today. But I could be wrong. And hindsight is 20/20 generally."

I think the US was right to fight back against the Soviets in Afghanistan, it helped bleed them and led to a speedier collapse. I think it meant that Cold Warriors like you got to go home earlier.

I don't think the US support of the Mujahadeen (which were not the Taliban, the Mujahadeen mostly became the Northern Alliance, still America's friends) had anything to do with 9/11. Bin Laden stated that was about the US presence in Saudi Arabia and the ME in general with it's war against Iraq and support for Israel. The US even being friends with the Saudi regime was a problem as the Wahabis are sworn enemies of the Suadi royals, who exiled them like a long long time ago. Heck, even the US support for Isreal makes them a general satan. Every jihad needs a Satan.

The US and Russia should be friends today. They have the same enemy, Islamic extremism.

Russia sells plenty of gas to Europe btw, they don't just make vodka and pretty tennis players haha

Cuprum +1

I think the US was right to fight back against the Soviets in Afghanistan, it helped bleed them and led to a speedier collapse. I think it meant that Cold Warriors like you got to go home earlier.

Well I think they were doing a pretty good job bleeding each other out on their own. The big game changer was when the US[with help from the Saudis, Egypt and Israel] gave the Muj Stingers and other weapons like the Milan AT weapon, etc.

By about '86 the Russians had pushed most of the Muj up into the mountains. And had nominal control of many towns. One of the big reasons for this was the Russian's use of Hinds. So the Stinger gave the Muj an effective way to fight back.

And yes the Taliban came about after the Muj. And were supported/created by the Pakistanis. They wanted to be able to have some "control" over their Afghan neighbor. The Pakistanis are not really friends of the US, IMO …

As far as Cold Warriors like me going home because of/after the USSR's "collapse". Frankly if given the option, I'd have rather stayed to get my 20 years and retire from the Army. As it was, mine and many of my friends careers/comrades were cut short. And had planned to go 20 or more. Or die … which ever came first …

Yeah I know some may think it was a good thing to be out of the military and harms way. But after 4 years as an ROTC Cadet and 10 and 1/2 years as an active duty Infantry Officer. I didn't really want to be a civilian.

But as we were told since DAY 1 … The Needs of the military comes first. And they believed they no longer needed all these Grunt Officers around. Many who may have died if WWIII broke out. And bottom line regardless of all our training and experience. It was cheaper in the long run to RIF us and save having to pay our pensions after 20 years.

It always comes down to $$$ …

The US and Russia should be friends today. They have the same enemy, Islamic extremism.

Agreed …