General Russia! (And its history)

[Lord Goomy]

Yeah, I had an assignment to do that involved a blog post, but I decided that Blogger is not the place to put anything. Ever. In the meantime, enjoy yourself.

I bet some wise old guy (or lady, who knows) once said that if we don’t learn from our mistakes, we’re bound to repeat them. Enter Russia.
As most of us know, the Soviet Union, before it was turned into a meme, was a communist superpower that nearly went to nuclear war with the USA, nearly wiping both of them out. Luckily, that never happened, and this guy named Gorbachev said “Hey. Ya’ll can have freedom now if you want to.” And so it went. Communism was voted very bad by nearly all of the countries on the Eastern Bloc (more on that later) and after everyone realized that maybe this communist stuff wasn’t so great after all, and on Christmas Day, 1991, the Soviet Union dissolved. Putin has now annexed the Crimean Peninsula. Well, needless to say, that’s not good, because annexing land is not something the Russians do once. In fact, Russia has a long history of great and terrible conquerors.
The first inhabitants of the gigantic continent-sized parcel of land we know as Russia today were the Kievan Rus’, the first Slavic people. The Kievan Rus’ were basically just vikings that went from the Baltic Sea down to the Caspian and Black Seas and made a decently-sized state. By the 10th and 11th centuries, the Kievan Rus’ were basically the China of today: you might not know much about them, and you might be on opposite sides of the world, but you know it’s there and that it certainly has its fair share of power and wealth.
Then, raids happened. In the 11th and 12th centuries, the Turkic (probably just ye olde Turks) people started frequent raids on the Kievan Rus’ state, and the Rus’ just moved on up north. They’re Vikings, cold doesn’t exist, and they had no problem with a little cold.
The problems didn’t stop there. After these invasions, constant bickering between the leaders of the Rus’ led to the disintegration of the medieval-ages kingdom. The final blow to the kingdom of the Kievan Rus’ was by those dang Mongols, who, once destroying Kiev, capital of the kingdom, established the state of the Golden Horde because, you know, they’re mongols.
With the Kievan Rus’ gone, it’s time for more domination action: the Grand Duchy of Vladimir, then taken over to be the Grand Duchy of Moscow, who then annexed some more territory to, once again, become about half the size of Europe. These Russians weren’t fooling around. However, neither were those dang Mongols, who kept invading the Duchy. By now, the Duchy (and Russians in general) were sick of getting invaded all the time, so they called the Russian Orthodox Church and said “hey, can you help us kick the mongols out of our land?” And the church said “ya know what, sure” and then it was. The pair of the two struck a mighty, crippling blow to the Mongols and, with no Mongol distractions, took over more land (see a trend here?), even absorbing previously powerful rivals of its. Now, enter Ivan the Great, who finished off the Mongols and took part of the previous Byzantine Empire to obtain heaps of land for its own, and because the Duchy was so big, the people shouted HOORAY and crowned Ivan the Great the first Grand Duke of All Russians (yeah, it’s still a duchy, but the people are Russians).
Now, enter the Tsars. The Tsars are a bit iffy, but they are nonetheless an unavoidable piece of the history of Russia because they still influence behavior today. The first Tsar (or Czar, if you want to call it that) was Ivan the fourth, son of Ivan the Great, Grand Duke of all the Russians. This grand leader’s son went on to become Ivan the Terrible, 1st Tsar of Russia (yes, it was formally Russia now). Ivan, true to his epitaph, was indeed terrible. While he did triple the size of the already gargantuan Russia, he was fascinated with death. When one of his builders built this beautifully massive building, Ivan decided the best thing to do was to stab the builder’s eyes out so that he could never create something that beautiful again. He was terrible. And now he’s dead.
A few Tsars later comes Peter the Great. Unlike Ivan, he wasn’t terrible, he was great. Peter turned the whole Tsardom into an empire, and that’s why he was the last Tsar and the first Emperor. Along his path to greatness, he took some more land and gained access to sea ports, which Russia needs badly even today. The greatest and most well-known achievement of Peter, though, was him trotting off to Western Europe, saying “oh that’s cool” and coming back to Russia and saying “let’s go modern.” So they did. They modernized Russia, and everything was Great. He was Great. And now he’s dead.
Time for more Great, in the form of Catherine the Great. She was the current empress at the time when Russia was participating in the Seven Years’ War, and also participated in the Age of Russian Enlightnment. The only reason she’s mentioned here is because she took some more land and seized the Crimean Peninsula, which will be important later. She was Great. And now she’s dead. Then, World War 1 happens and people everywhere die.
But before that happened, though, Karl Marx all the way back in Germany invented communism. Later, Lenin decided that might be a good idea, but everyone thought he was nuts and sent him to Switzerland. Then, someone else said “Hey, maybe this worker equality thing isn’t that bad of an idea.” And they brought him back by train. The workers, under Lenin, organized the Red Army to fight against the (air quotes) “evil of capitalism” and his supporters and supporters of communism were collected into the Bolsheviks. Welcome to the most important moment in Russian history, probably: the Russian Revolution and Russian Civil War.
The Bolsheviks quickly made a coup on the government with Lenin in charge. Civil war broke out even faster, but the Bolsheviks came out on top. The royal family was executed, and the empire was no more. The communist party was on the rise, and more and more countries neighboring Russia thought that they had the right idea and joined Russia. Now, with the full support of 15 independent republics, they all united to become the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (the USSR) or the Soviet Union for short.
We can’t explain the USSR without explaining how communism works.
Step 1: everyone gets the same paycheck; workers, CEOs, everyone.
Step 2: the government will take care of the people.
Well, we can take a lesson from history and say how well that worked out: badly. For now, though, the Russians were happy. The problem is, the Russians were also paranoid, and started building up a huge stock of nuclear weapons in case someone, most notably the United States, were to invade. The USSR wanted to spread communism, but the USA wanted to prevent that spread. The USA even went as far to establish the Truman Doctrine, which basically said communism is evil and we need to stop it. Then, the Cold War began.
Both countries scrambled to build up their nuclear arsenal and to race to space. Unfortunately for both countries, nobody likes war and space is expensive. The USA’s people started protesting the war, and the USSR’s money was going to the military, not the people’s equal paychecks. It’s rewind time. I said that step 1 in communism was that everyone got the same paycheck. What I DIDN’T say is that the paychecks were on a fixed amount. EVERYONE was poor. Russians didn’t like this. But they persevered, and still believed in communism. Then Lenin died.
Who remembers Stalin? He took over. If epitaphs still existed today, he would be Stalin the Terrible. He was really the one who put the USSR in the slums. Under his rule, things went down the drain in every possible way. He was mean. And now he’s dead.
Still, the thread of a nuclear war loomed in the distance, ever closer. Both countries had nukes, which had now been upgraded to H-bombs from A-bombs. The doctrine of MAD was created, meaning Mutually Assured Destruction. If one side attacked the other, and both had nuclear weapons, both countries would be destroyed, so neither country would risk starting a nuclear war. Two more alliances were struck, basically doing the same thing: NATO and the Warsaw Pact. NATO basically said that if you attack any one member of NATO, all the countries of NATO strike back. The Warsaw Pact did the same thing, but mirrored. If you attack any one country of the USSR, all of them strike back. This created a stalemate.
After Stalin’s awful dictatorship, the people “elected” Nikita Khrushchev. Khrushchev wasn’t Stalin the Terrible, but he wasn’t a capitalist either. He led the country just like Lenin did: he did okay, but capitalism is better.
Here’s the “minor” conflict of the entire war: Berlin. West Berlin was capitalist, and East Berlin was communist. The capitalist side looked prosperous and good, while the communist side looked like it just came out of an apocalypse. People were starving, but could just as easily walk across to West Berlin and see all the prosperity. Communism, they thought, might not be the best. So, the USSR did what Trump wants to do: he built a wall. Families were separated, and no longer could the people stuck in the slums of East Berlin escape. It was terrible.
Khrushchev’s reign, besides ordering the construction of the Berlin Wall, wasn’t thick with big activities. He was okay. And now he’s dead.
Here’s the game-changer of the Cold War: Mikhail Gorbachev. Gorbachev wasn’t as extreme as all other former communist dictators had been. He believed the reason communism wasn’t doing so hot was because the people couldn’t enjoy their work. He was actually okay with giving some freedom to his people. This was huge. All of a sudden, people could enjoy Western culture. People could criticize the government. But how would reforms work? Poland’s leader went over to Moscow and introduced these reforms to Gorbachev. Gorbachev said that he didn’t really agree with the reforms, but he wouldn’t stop them if it meant his workers could enjoy their work. That was the best thing since sliced bread to the poor souls of the USSR. Countries began planning actual free and fair elections, and capitalism was deemed superior to communism. Because of Gorbachev, the entire Cold War just… ended. It was huge. The closest the world has ever been to whole annhiliation just dropped. If anything, Gorbachev was the hero of the Cold War, and on Christmas Day, 1991, the USSR, global superpower, dissolved into 15, independent, republics.
After the Cold War, Russia turned to the greatness of democracy and capitalism. Vladimir Putin became the new leader of democratic Russia. Or, so we think. A few years ago, in 2014, Russia annexed Crimea so they could have its warm-water port. This wasn’t a good sign. Every time Russia gets more land, a war happens. Also, the Mueller Report that came out recently states that Trump didn’t know about any interference in the election, not that it didn’t happen. Also, Russia has been keeping secrets. What about, who knows, but here’s where Russia is about to repeat history.
Step 1. Russia gets more land. As it was back in the Russian Empire and the rule of the Tsars, Russia always gets bigger. And, to get bigger, it’ll fight. The best word to describe Russia in this step is paranoid. They want the largest buffer zone they possibly can get. This isn’t good, to say the least. This practically means war is coming.
Step 2. Putin’s power. Putin has been in power as either president or Prime Minister for the last 19 years, and will be in power till 2024. This looks like a dictatorship, and that’s also not good.
Also, Russia likes to keep secrets. This dictatorship and large land size is like looking in a flashback mirror all the way back to the USSR. I wouldn’t like to say that this is the next Cold War, though that theory is speculated to be true, but communism never works out. NEVER.
Like looking in a mirror, this new Russia is slowly, very slowly, morphing back into the old communist regime known as the USSR. This could mean any number of things, but as history shows, none of them are that Great. In fact, some of them might just be Terrible.

I hope you had fun, because if you’ve actually read all this way, and you’re not my teacher, give yourself a pat on the back and come up with some conspiracy theories.

 

[PokeMedic]

You skipped the Perestroika Reforms. Also, how is Putin being in power a dictatorship? Gotta know how to make that argument if you'll be taking that kind of position.

I disagree that Russia is slipping back into the USSR. If you look at the current political turmoils in Europe, the European Union has been slowly becoming the next socialist super state, though it lacks any ability to project any unified military power over Eastern Europe or it's non-compliant neighbors. Hench why the EU wants to start an EU army. Russia, when it came to the Ukraine, did not want any more EU influence that close to Russia itself. What Russia has been doing in the Ukraine, either directly or indirectly, as well as it's shows of force in Syria, is to show Europe and the world that it is capable of military action in ways that people didn't think they were capable of -even during the Cold War.

It's worth mentioning when the USSR is discussed how deep the Cold War went. Throughout the Cold War the KGB engaged in ideological subversion of Western culture to accelerate and bring down their systems of government and culture. This was to make it easier for socialist and communist ideology to subvert the foundations of the West and bring about a change in thinking. It's warfare without a shot being fired. This took off in the 60's big time but died down as the Cold War came to a close. The ideals stuck around though in the minds of educators since those young people from the past are now in positions of authority today. Only now there's no Soviet Union to swoop in and clean house. You see this all around us today. The utterances we hear so much in the news and on Tumblr and Twitter are the ghosts of Marxist Leninism.

You might also like to read about the Venona Project. tl;dr: Senator McArthy was absolutely correct. It was found around the turn of the century, after code-breakers finally deciphered Soviet cables, that the Secretary of State under President Truman was a Soviet agent. This is the same Secretary of State who pressed the Truman administration into not supporting Nationalist China, thus leading to the rise and domination of Communism in that region.

 

[Lord Goomy]

You skipped the Perestroika Reforms. Also, how is Putin being in power a dictatorship? Gotta know how to make that argument if you'll be taking that kind of position.

I disagree that Russia is slipping back into the USSR. If you look at the current political turmoils in Europe, the European Union has been slowly becoming the next socialist super state, though it lacks any ability to project any unified military power over Eastern Europe or it's non-compliant neighbors. Hench why the EU wants to start an EU army. Russia, when it came to the Ukraine, did not want any more EU influence that close to Russia itself. What Russia has been doing in the Ukraine, either directly or indirectly, as well as it's shows of force in Syria, is to show Europe and the world that it is capable of military action in ways that people didn't think they were capable of -even during the Cold War.

It's worth mentioning when the USSR is discussed how deep the Cold War went. Throughout the Cold War the KGB engaged in ideological subversion of Western culture to accelerate and bring down their systems of government and culture. This was to make it easier for socialist and communist ideology to subvert the foundations of the West and bring about a change in thinking. It's warfare without a shot being fired. This took off in the 60's big time but died down as the Cold War came to a close. The ideals stuck around though in the minds of educators since those young people from the past are now in positions of authority today. Only now there's no Soviet Union to swoop in and clean house. You see this all around us today. The utterances we hear so much in the news and on Tumblr and Twitter are the ghosts of Marxist Leninism.

You might also like to read about the Venona Project. tl;dr: Senator McArthy was absolutely correct. It was found around the turn of the century, after code-breakers finally deciphered Soviet cables, that the Secretary of State under President Truman was a Soviet agent. This is the same Secretary of State who pressed the Truman administration into not supporting Nationalist China, thus leading to the rise and domination of Communism in that region.

Oh yeah. Perestroika. Whoops.
The EU wants to start an army? Exciting, but that’s news to me.
Well, thanks for your thoughts, and I also don’t think it’s going to go back to its old Soviet self, but I certainly think that Russia might just be up to something. People in power too long tend to lead into... other things. And Putin will be in power 24 years. That’s a long time.
Probably should’ve specified more. Thanks!
...huh.

Spoiler

Hey, your account says you’re 7. There’s no real problem with that, I just thought I’d point it out.

 

[PokeMedic]

Spoiler

Hey, your account says you’re 7. There’s no real problem with that, I just thought I’d point it out.

Spoiler

I joined in 2011, so I should be 8

 

[Celever]

PokéPolitics? Sign me up; I work in politics so this is my specialty area. I'm not gonna comment on this historical stuff Lord Goomy mentioned since it's for the most part factual, but this post really isn't.

I disagree that Russia is slipping back into the USSR.

Agree

If you look at the current political turmoils in Europe, the European Union has been slowly becoming the next socialist super state, though it lacks any ability to project any unified military power over Eastern Europe or it's non-compliant neighbors. Hench why the EU wants to start an EU army.

Ohoho disagree. I'm gonna take this one by one.

socialist

I'll be interested if you reply with how you justify this: the EU hasn't been majority socialist since 1999. Right now the largest party there is the alliance of Christian Democrat & Conservative parties, and while their share of the vote dropped in the most recent elections (that were held 5 years ago; there are more next month which will be interesting results) that's on account of the rise of far right groups, not socialist ones. So no, the EU is not socialist, because the "governing" party is conservative. In fact, the EU directly blocks nationalisation of a lot of institutions, which is the only reason anyone on the left voted to leave the EU in the Brexit referendum, so it's anti-socialist. It was literally formed in the wake of WWII to stop extremism, and hasn't been hijacked yet.

super state

Structurally a super state in the same sense as America, yes, but with one great distinction: European countries have a history that states don't. I've spoken at the European Parliament in Strasbourg on a few occasions and spoken with elected politicians from a lot of different countries there, and one thing's for sure: hegemony is off the table for the majority of member states of the EU. East and West coast America have different rap style, Eastern and Western Europe have different architecture, language, political overton windows, music also, identities in general. They would never all fly under the same flag like Texas and California agreed to do, or Belarus and Latvia were forced to do; they would rather leave the union, and the reason they can do that is

it lacks any ability to project any unified military power over Eastern Europe or its non-compliant neighbours. Hence why the EU wants to start an EU army

because this is impossible. Scandiwegia (Sweden, Finland, Denmark (and Norway which isn't a full member but still has influence)) are now ostensible pacifist nations and, even though forming an EU army isn't even on the table, because of the false allegation that it is on the table, pretty much every politician throughout those regions has said they would block any attempt to form an EU army that is attempted. And yes, they absolutely have the power to do so, because it's not just them. As previously mentioned, national identity and sovereignty are valued incredibly highly in Europe, and so actually the most militaristic states in the EU are the ones who would fight an EU army the hardest. Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Cyprus, Malta, Czechia, Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia... Eastern Europe and the islands are proud as hell of their militaries and it is a core part of who they are. A lot of politicians in those countries already feel somewhat neglected by the EU in regards to infrastructure programs and the like so, like Scandiwegia, if attempts were made to unify the armies of those nations that would be seen as an attack on sovereignty and they would sooner leave the union than join the army, and the EU doesn't want that. People forget it was founded as the European Economic Union, and before that the European Coal & Steel Community. Peace between EU states is and always will be its modus operandi. And in regards to non-compliant neighbours, every state wants to be a part of the EU (except the UK, apparently, though attitude has shifted back towards joining); any state around Europe you see that isn't a part of the union is because it doesn't pass the economic tests in regards to GDP a country must to join the union, because they would be a burden on the other countries rather than an asset, and the whole point of the union is trading on favourable terms. If they're not gonna be able to contribute economically as sovereign states, then the EU has no reason to take them over.

Also, you contradicted yourself. Socialism has two categories overarching categories: socialism, and revolutionary socialism. The former is pacifist and if the latter was taking over the EU, Europe would currently be a warzone. So it's impossible for the EU to be becoming socialist and also looking into military affairs.

Russia, when it came to the Ukraine, did not want any more EU influence that close to Russia itself. What Russia has been doing in the Ukraine, either directly or indirectly, as well as it's shows of force in Syria, is to show Europe and the world that it is capable of military action in ways that people didn't think they were capable of -even during the Cold War.

I think you may think that Ukraine is in the EU, but it isn't. If you didn't think that, I have no clue what you mean by Russia not wanting EU influence close to Russia. And Syria is a clusterfrick beyond proportions but isn't really part of the cold war, at least I assume from your perspective, because the good ol' democratic west were the instigators of that war, not Russia. Russia may have seized the opportunity to show off their military power, and that's somewhat feasible, but at the very least, it was America that restarted the Cold War and not Russia in that case (since if Russia did logic dictates America did too) so Russia's not really the enemy on a global scale, America is.

It's worth mentioning when the USSR is discussed how deep the Cold War went. Throughout the Cold War the KGB engaged in ideological subversion of Western culture to accelerate and bring down their systems of government and culture. This was to make it easier for socialist and communist ideology to subvert the foundations of the West and bring about a change in thinking.

This is all for the most part correct: they felt that they were fighting the good fight by freeing the proletariat from bourgeoisie control. You can disagree with it, but that was the intention -- at the very least, had Marx been leading the country, that would be the intention, which is what's important when speaking ideologically. I note you didn't say what foundations you're referring to; I assume you mean of liberty, equality, and fraternity, as those are considered academically to be the three foundations of Western culture. And I hope I don't need to tell you that that tripartite motto arose when revolutionary socialists overthrew capitalists in the French Revolution. I mean, fraternity means communitarianism, which take out a few letters and you can see why that's one of the pillars of communism. I'm not a communist by any stretch of the imagination, but factually and sociologically, the West is communist at the bottom and exploitative capitalist at the top, the same structure as Stalinist Russia. It just hasn't crumbled down in the West because that structure didn't erect itself at once and occurred very gradually, through a process of ideological subversion away from rural communities and into industrialisation.

It's warfare without a shot being fired.

Because, don't forget, socialists are pacifsts.

This took off in the 60's big time but died down as the Cold War came to a close. The ideals stuck around though in the minds of educators since those young people from the past are now in positions of authority today. Only now there's no Soviet Union to swoop in and clean house. You see this all around us today. The utterances we hear so much in the news and on Tumblr and Twitter are the ghosts of Marxist Leninism.

No, they are the utterances of Marxism. Marx, a thinker who analysed all societies. Marxist Leninism is Russia's own version of it, catered to their society's needs. The thing is, is when people are dying because they can't afford healthcare, dying or clinging to life on the streets because they can't afford shelter, have no reasonable employment opportunities because their parents couldn't afford private education, are locked up for crimes that shouldn't be illegal, or not committing a crime at all.... Marx is proved time and time again to, on some issues, have been correct. These are not things that should exist in a society, I'm sure you would agree, and the root of all of that is money and ideological state apparatus. No academic denies that, whether they dwell on the left or right wing of politics.

 

[Lord Goomy]

PokéPolitics? Sign me up; I work in politics so this is my specialty area. I'm not gonna comment on this historical stuff Lord Goomy mentioned since it's for the most part factual, but this post really isn't.

Agree

Ohoho disagree. I'm gonna take this one by one.

I'll be interested if you reply with how you justify this: the EU hasn't been majority socialist since 1999. Right now the largest party there is the alliance of Christian Democrat & Conservative parties, and while their share of the vote dropped in the most recent elections (that were held 5 years ago; there are more next month which will be interesting results) that's on account of the rise of far right groups, not socialist ones. So no, the EU is not socialist, because the "governing" party is conservative. In fact, the EU directly blocks nationalisation of a lot of institutions, which is the only reason anyone on the left voted to leave the EU in the Brexit referendum, so it's anti-socialist. It was literally formed in the wake of WWII to stop extremism, and hasn't been hijacked yet.

Structurally a super state in the same sense as America, yes, but with one great distinction: European countries have a history that states don't. I've spoken at the European Parliament in Strasbourg on a few occasions and spoken with elected politicians from a lot of different countries there, and one thing's for sure: hegemony is off the table for the majority of member states of the EU. East and West coast America have different rap style, Eastern and Western Europe have different architecture, language, political overton windows, music also, identities in general. They would never all fly under the same flag like Texas and California agreed to do, or Belarus and Latvia were forced to do; they would rather leave the union, and the reason they can do that is

because this is impossible. Scandiwegia (Sweden, Finland, Denmark (and Norway which isn't a full member but still has influence)) are now ostensible pacifist nations and, even though forming an EU army isn't even on the table, because of the false allegation that it is on the table, pretty much every politician throughout those regions has said they would block any attempt to form an EU army that is attempted. And yes, they absolutely have the power to do so, because it's not just them. As previously mentioned, national identity and sovereignty are valued incredibly highly in Europe, and so actually the most militaristic states in the EU are the ones who would fight an EU army the hardest. Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Cyprus, Malta, Czechia, Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia... Eastern Europe and the islands are proud as hell of their militaries and it is a core part of who they are. A lot of politicians in those countries already feel somewhat neglected by the EU in regards to infrastructure programs and the like so, like Scandiwegia, if attempts were made to unify the armies of those nations that would be seen as an attack on sovereignty and they would sooner leave the union than join the army, and the EU doesn't want that. People forget it was founded as the European Economic Union, and before that the European Coal & Steel Community. Peace between EU states is and always will be its modus operandi. And in regards to non-compliant neighbours, every state wants to be a part of the EU (except the UK, apparently, though attitude has shifted back towards joining); any state around Europe you see that isn't a part of the union is because it doesn't pass the economic tests in regards to GDP a country must to join the union, because they would be a burden on the other countries rather than an asset, and the whole point of the union is trading on favourable terms. If they're not gonna be able to contribute economically as sovereign states, then the EU has no reason to take them over.

Also, you contradicted yourself. Socialism has two categories overarching categories: socialism, and revolutionary socialism. The former is pacifist and if the latter was taking over the EU, Europe would currently be a warzone. So it's impossible for the EU to be becoming socialist and also looking into military affairs.

I think you may think that Ukraine is in the EU, but it isn't. If you didn't think that, I have no clue what you mean by Russia not wanting EU influence close to Russia. And Syria is a clusterfrick beyond proportions but isn't really part of the cold war, at least I assume from your perspective, because the good ol' democratic west were the instigators of that war, not Russia. Russia may have seized the opportunity to show off their military power, and that's somewhat feasible, but at the very least, it was America that restarted the Cold War and not Russia in that case (since if Russia did logic dictates America did too) so Russia's not really the enemy on a global scale, America is.

This is all for the most part correct: they felt that they were fighting the good fight by freeing the proletariat from bourgeoisie control. You can disagree with it, but that was the intention -- at the very least, had Marx been leading the country, that would be the intention, which is what's important when speaking ideologically. I note you didn't say what foundations you're referring to; I assume you mean of liberty, equality, and fraternity, as those are considered academically to be the three foundations of Western culture. And I hope I don't need to tell you that that tripartite motto arose when revolutionary socialists overthrew capitalists in the French Revolution. I mean, fraternity means communitarianism, which take out a few letters and you can see why that's one of the pillars of communism. I'm not a communist by any stretch of the imagination, but factually and sociologically, the West is communist at the bottom and exploitative capitalist at the top, the same structure as Stalinist Russia. It just hasn't crumbled down in the West because that structure didn't erect itself at once and occurred very gradually, through a process of ideological subversion away from rural communities and into industrialisation.

Because, don't forget, socialists are pacifsts.

No, they are the utterances of Marxism. Marx, a thinker who analysed all societies. Marxist Leninism is Russia's own version of it, catered to their society's needs. The thing is, is when people are dying because they can't afford healthcare, dying or clinging to life on the streets because they can't afford shelter, have no reasonable employment opportunities because their parents couldn't afford private education, are locked up for crimes that shouldn't be illegal, or not committing a crime at all.... Marx is proved time and time again to, on some issues, have been correct. These are not things that should exist in a society, I'm sure you would agree, and the root of all of that is money and ideological state apparatus. No academic denies that, whether they dwell on the left or right wing of politics.

I should have done more research. Before you go, as you seem to know your stuff incredibly well, do you agree or disagree that Russia is going back to its communist ways?

 

[Celever]

I should have done more research. Before you go, as you seem to know your stuff incredibly well, do you agree or disagree that Russia is going back to its communist ways?

Not at all. Communism is an economic outlook and Marx identified the following 10 things as being necessary for a developed country to enact for it to be communist:
1. All land owned by the state, rented out for specific uses
- Russia allows for private land ownership
2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax
- Russia has one of the lowest income tax rates in the world
3. A central state bank
- Russia still has this from over 150 years ago, as do most other countries. Isn't strictly a communist feature.
4. Accessible education
- Russia has this but it's obviously a good feature in any society
5. Government controlled labour
- Russia does not have this besides the civil service roles present in every country in the world -- Marx meant the Government had to control all labour, and that's not the case in Russia any more than it is in America
6. Abolition of material inheritance
- Russia allows for material inheritance
7. Total abolition of private ownership
- Russia certainly allows for private ownership; Russian oligarchs are seen globally, including in America.
8. Government owned transport
- Russia does have Government owned transport, as do the vast majority of other developed countries in the world. In fact, Russia has possibly the greatest transport system in any country; there's a massive amount of land to connect by trams and bus and the cities are huge too, but you can get anywhere pretty fast with their transport links.
9. Government ownership of agriculture and factory (the means of production)
- These are all privately owned too
10. Break down the walls between rural and urban communities
- Russia's segregation between rural and urban communities is possibly more than any other developed country in the world.

So according to Marx, the father of Communism, Russia only fulfils 3 of the 10 criteria, and they're very basic ones. America fulfils the same 3, as do most European countries. However, interestingly, in regards to taxation and private ownership, Russians actually have more freedoms right now than Americans do. As in, Communism is on the far left of the (flawed) political spectrum, and Putin's on the far right.

I don't blame you for not knowing any of this stuff though, because the American education system is littered with political propaganda. They're scared that if they educate you about what Communism really is it'd be appealing, so they just educate teenagers that Communists are warmongers and a likely effect of their policies is that their citizens starve. That's Bolshevism, not Communism, and those ideologies are further apart than Clinton and Trump's are.

 

[PokeMedic]

This is too much to go through all at once, but I'll do what I can

I'll be interested if you reply with how you justify this: the EU hasn't been majority socialist since 1999. Right now the largest party there is the alliance of Christian Democrat & Conservative parties, and while their share of the vote dropped in the most recent elections (that were held 5 years ago; there are more next month which will be interesting results) that's on account of the rise of far right groups, not socialist ones. So no, the EU is not socialist, because the "governing" party is conservative. In fact, the EU directly blocks nationalisation of a lot of institutions, which is the only reason anyone on the left voted to leave the EU in the Brexit referendum, so it's anti-socialist. It was literally formed in the wake of WWII to stop extremism, and hasn't been hijacked yet.

The EU was formed originally as a trade union after the war, but has grown in power over the decades to encompass political and economic decision making. It is operated by an un-elected bureaucracy. Why do those people get to dictate any policy to the UK about how to regulate their own fishing waters? That's the level of economic micromanagement this has led to, and socialism is an economic ideology before it's a system of government. The only extremism that was stopped after World War II was the National Socialist party (Nationalsozialismus/Nazi). After the war the Allies left the Soviet Union to absorb countries that were once held under the boot of National Socialism only to be held under the boot of Communism. Not an improvement at all. The more a state or government, or in this case the EU, tries to dictate things to other people and finds ways to coerce them to do so, it becomes tyranny. In the case of the EU it's the belief that unelected officials know better than the nations leaders what should be done with the nations people and resources

For the rise of the 'far right': it's a very weird conception people have. On the left end of the political spectrum we end with Communism, but the right is always demonized in any regard because of National Socialism. Despite what people may hear, National Socialism that has had no real foundation, no real following, and has been no threat to society since the 1940s. Communists however are all over the place. National Socialist isn't a far-right ideology though as it follows a system of government ownership of resources and people. 'Far right' should really be anarchy and no government at all, but its historically convenient to have the right as a punching bag to make anything 'left' look good.

Structurally a super state in the same sense as America, yes, but with one great distinction: European countries have a history that states don't. I've spoken at the European Parliament in Strasbourg on a few occasions and speaking with elected politicians from a lot of different countries there, and one thing's for sure: hegemony is off the table for the majority of member states of the EU. East and West coast America have different rap style, Eastern and Western Europe have different architecture, language, political overton windows, music also, identities in general. They would never all fly under the same flag like Texas and California agreed to do, or Belarus and Latvia were forced to do

Different countries, different peoples, have totally different interests. Why should they give more and more of their freedom to make their own choices away to an unelected bureaucracy in Brussels? Every year they try to gain more and more power of their member states economically and politically. Economically, especially. Warfare these days is fought less with bullets and more with pocketbooks. I have to source some things out about this, but later.

I think you may think that Ukraine is in the EU, but it isn't.

The Ukraine wanted to become an EU member state for some time. Once this was becoming more of a possibility we began to see the recent turmoils there with the war in Donbass and the annexation of Crimea. Russia has always wanted a buffer zone of friendly or neutral states between it and the rest of Europe both for defense against military action and political influence. Russia does not want the EU sphere of influence any closer to its borders than it already is. In a way it's bullying like it was during the Cold War, but the reason for it now is the same as it was back then.

Because, don't forget, socialists are pacifsts.

They are pacifists until they aren't. You can say that socialism is pacifism but it only is until it isn't. History shows that again and again and again. And when it is voted on an accepted, you get stuff like Venezuela. Don't forget that Lenin even said "The goal is socialism is communism"

No, they are the utterances of Marxism. Marx, a thinker who analysed all societies. Marxist Leninism is Russia's own version of it, catered to their society's needs. The thing is, is when people are dying because they can't afford healthcare, dying or clinging to life on the streets because they can't afford shelter, have no reasonable employment opportunities because their parents couldn't afford private education, are locked up for crimes that shouldn't be illegal, or not committing a crime at all.... Marx is proved time and time again to, on some issues, have been correct. These are not things that should exist in a society, I'm sure you would agree, and the root of all of that is money and ideological state apparatus. No academic denies that, whether they dwell on the left or right wing of politics.

Marxist Leninism espoused the ideal that revolution could be a global affair, and that the more poor or ignorant you were, the better of a person you were to everyone else- especially those who had any resources that you didn't have. As the revolution continued even the poor farmers were murdered or Gulag'd simply because they had land and property. Their farms were then turned over to the new proletariat who, uh-oh, didn't know how to work the land. This led to famines. And if there were too many mouths to feed then whatever, let the Ukraine starve to death like in the Holodomor.

This later translated into Cultural Marxism in the West and has been in use since the Soviet Union came about. In the US in particular it was much harder to convince people to rise up and revolt because people actually had opportunity to go from being poor to having a job, a home, a car, etc. How do you get people to accept the workers revolution when they're not upset over their own existence? You breed the discord yourself along fracture points. Are you gay? Then straight people are the cause of all your problems. Did you not get into Yale and you're a minority? The white man stopped you. Are you poor and keep making terrible financial choices with your money? Whatever- the rich man is why you have no money. And here we are today.

 

[Celever]

This is too much to go through all at once, but I'll do what I can

Fair enough, but if you respond again I hope you at least acknowledge the impossibility of an EU army, because you still seem to think it's gonna happen.

The EU was formed originally as a trade union after the war, but has grown in power over the decades to encompass political and economic decision making. It is operated by an un-elected bureaucracy.

OK I don't think you understand the EU at all so I'm gonna walk you through it. Sorry if any of this sounds patronising, I've given lectures to politics students about this before, as this is all knowledge required for the Politics A-Level exam:
There are 5 institutions with legislative or executive powers within the EU: the European Council (EC), European Parliament, the Council of Europe (CoE), the European Commission, and the European Court of Human Rights. We'll run through them one by one:

- The European Council is the ultimate head of the whole institution of the EU, and its members consist of the state leader of all 28 EU countries (so Theresa May, Angela Merkel, Emmanuel Macron etc. etc.), Donald Tusk (President of the European Council), and Jean-Claude Juncker (President of the European Commission). They meet once per quarter but emergency sessions can be called like for Brexit. They don't create specific legislation, but set the agenda for the rest of the EU such as by commissioning research institutions within the EU to perform certain studies, or European Parliament to discuss topic areas and draft legislation to give an intended effect that the EC wants. Usually votes taken in the EC are done by consensus, but sometimes unanimity or qualified majority voting are required. Democratically elected because they're the elected state leaders.

- European Parliament does what it says on the tin. Democratically elected through European elections conducted at the same time in every member state. They discuss and pass law. Overarching agendas are set by the EC, but enough time is always left for Parliaments to discuss issues that they want to be fielded independent of the state leaders. The only contentious thing about the democracy of this institution is that elections are conducted using the political parties of each member state rather than overall European parties, so almost every national party signs up to an ideologically-similar alliance of MEPs (Members of European Parliament) so they have influence, as they vote in a bloc. It's basically just another tier of parties above the traditional amount a country should have.

- Once Parliament passes legislation it's sent to the Council of Europe to be ratified. This is composed of the (cabinet) minister of the area the legislation is concerned with. So for example, if a law were passed by European Parliament that was concerned with increasing Europe's efforts of switching from polluted energy to renewable, the Council of Europe would be composed of the Environment/Energy ministers/secretaries, one from each of the 28 EU member states, who then ratify the legislation. Like with the EC, as the CoE is made up of the democratically elected Government from each of the member states, it's entirely democratic.

- The European Commission is the only somewhat undemocratic part of the EU, because the members of the Commission aren't elected but rather appointed by the Governing party and, once again, it's one per EU country, so there are 28 members and headed by Jean-Clause Juncker who doesn't get voting rights and basically just chairs meetings they have. For the vast majority of countries in the EU (read: everyone except the UK) being appointed to the European Commission is a high, high honour, and so the person appointed is usually a former leader, chancellor, other political great of that country. Either way, they're well in the public conscience, and are still held to account by the media and therefore public of those countries. This is the executive part of the EU so that the EC isn't too busy, because if state leaders had to meet every time legislation was passed in the EU, their own states would be neglected. However, the members of the Commission basically follow whatever the state leaders want them to do. There are also areas such as foreign policy that the Commission doesn't have power over.

- European Court of Human Rights has legislative power through convention, just as any supreme court does. As the name implies, it's only concerned with human rights, and human rights are good.

So, where's the unelected bureaucracy?

Why do those people get to dictate any policy to the UK about how to regulate their own fishing waters?

Because the EU is set up to ensure pacifism in Europe. There's a political theory that relates to this, and while you may not know the term it's because it's basically just an accepted common sense now (and also it was afforded a really bad name: McDonald's Theory of Conflict Prevention. Basically, if one nation monopolises production of a certain good or resource, if another country becomes desperate for that resource, it gives them a motive to try and take the territory where that good is located. If, on the other hand, there are multiple nations that trade away that good then, in this case, the landlocked country that doesn't have a source of fish wouldn't have a motive to take the closest coastal country they've got if for whatever reason they're unable to get fish from their traditional fish-trading partner. It might sound absurd to be talking about fish-want causing war, but Anthony Crossland's principle of "what one generation sees as a luxury the next sees as a necessity" is widely accepted in economics now too, and fish are so ingrained in every culture in the world that there is a CHANCE, if not a likelihood, that a loss of affordable fish could lead to a country declaring war, if public outcry was sufficient. The Fisheries Common Policy is also a conservation policy first and a peace policy second, and basically just exists so that the UK doesn't overfish when the population is in their area, so then when they migrate to Scandiwegia and later the Balkans that there's still sufficient population left for those countries to fish.

The whole fishing thing was a massive red herring anyway. The regulation concerns the North Sea, which is owned by Scotland, which is the most pro-EU region in the UK. And those two things aren't unconnected, because now that Scottish Parliament exists as a devolved power within the EU, Scotland retains a significant amount of its own domestic GDP and tax, and is gaining more and more power independent of the UK Parliament. If the fishermen in Scotland like the Common Fisheries Policy, it's probably a good thing. And, don't forget, the power surrounding the Common Fisheries Policy, i.e. setting the quotas every 6 months, is conducted by the democratically elected Council of Europe. The UK literally ratifies the policy every 6 months.

That's the level of economic micromanagement this has led to, and socialism is an economic ideology before it's a system of government. The only extremism that was stopped after World War II was the National Socialist party (Nationalsozialismus/Nazi). After the war the Allies left the Soviet Union to absorb countries that were once held under the boot of National Socialism only to be held under the boot of Communism. Not an improvement at all.

The EU had to be set up gradually. I think you think it's older than it is; the actual "EU" was founded in 1993 following the Maastricht Treaty. Besides that, the membership of the EU began as just the culturally aligned countries in Europe (Italy, France, Germany and Benelux). It tooks 20 years for the UK, Ireland and Denmark to join, which is still all very Western Europe, then Greece in 1981 and Hispania in 1986. This is because, firstly, those countries were the economically affluent ones and the EU is an economic country first, and secondly as a follow-on of that it's only rational that the EU nation states shouldn't be trying to solve political unrest throughout Europe -- unlike in America, Europe was actually where World War II took place. An unprecedented amount of prosperity had to be achieved to rebuild infrastructure in the wake of it, so the trade relations were necessary. You're saying that the EU shouldn't push political ideology, but also shouldn't allow countries to fall into political unrest, even if they're not even within the EU. It's flawed.

The fact that so many formerly Communist states are now in the capitalist institution that is the EU should be a massive win from your perspective. Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary, Cyprus, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Czechia all joined in 2004 after overcoming Communism, demonstrating a massive political shift within those countries. It's been 74 years since World War II ended -- 3, 4 generations at most. That's impressive.

The more a state or government, or in this case the EU, tries to dictate things to other people and finds ways to coerce them to do so, it becomes tyranny. In the case of the EU it's the belief that unelected officials know better than the nations leaders what should be done with the nations people and resources

Again, not unelected. Secondly, it's not dictating what should occur. The European ideology is being transferred through Favourable Terms -- mutual prosperity inherently makes people more interested in the ideology behind that affluency. The UK Prime Minister who took them into the EU, Ted Heath, said it's an institution that pools sovereignty rather than giving it away. That's very accurate: every member state has a loud voice on everything that affects not only their own state but the other 27 of them.

For the rise of the 'far right': it's a very weird conception people have. On the left end of the political spectrum we end with Communism, but the right is always demonized in any regard because of National Socialism. Despite what people may hear, National Socialism that has had no real foundation, no real following, and has been no threat to society since the 1940s. Communists however are all over the place. National Socialist isn't a far-right ideology though as it follows a system of government ownership of resources and people.

Wait..... wait, really? Here's a list of political parties and movements founded after 1945 that literally use the term National Socialism in their names:

National Socialist Movement of Denmark (contemporary)
Iranian National Socialist Party, created in 1952 (pro-Hitler, anti-Semitic, anti-Arab, anti-Turk)
National Socialist Party of New Zealand (German-style Nazi, anti-Semitic)
National Socialist Movement of Norway (contemporary)
Russian National Socialist Party (Russian nationalist, fascist, anti-immigrant, promoting Orthodox Christian theocracy)
Colin Jordan's National Socialist Movement (UK, 1962) of the United Kingdom
National Socialist Action Party (British, founded in 1982)
National Socialist Movement (United Kingdom) (contemporary)
National Socialist League (United States) (gay, "Aryan", pro-Hitler)
National Socialist Party of America (white, anti-Semitic, anti-black)
National Socialist Movement (United States) (contemporary)

And those are only the ones significant enough to have legacy and/or ongoing modern effects.

And then, let's actually dissect National Socialism a bit. By ideology, it's basically Social Darwinism: the fittest should survive, and those who are unfit are dragging society down for the rest of us. Now, I'm gonna repeat myself here:

The thing is, is when people are dying because they can't afford healthcare, dying or clinging to life on the streets because they can't afford shelter, have no reasonable employment opportunities because their parents couldn't afford private education,

America is currently Social Darwinism in action. As is the UK: one of the highest-genocided demographic in Nazi Germany was disabled people, and currently the UK is going through a real attack on the disabled. Nazism in ideology is not genocidal, it's segregationist. They wanted to remove Jews, gays, disabled people, ethnic minorities and all the rest of everyone not Aryan from society not by killing them but by putting them in their own degenerative communities away from "civilised" society. That's why the Holocaust is called the Final Solution, and that's historical fact. And, well, racial segregation formally "ended" in America in 1954, but think about elsewhere in the world: the Rwanda genocide, for example. And no one's killing Muslims or Mexicans, but Trump trying to remove people from society because of the colour of their skin? Yeah, that's Social Darwinism too. It doesn't have to be called national socialism to be national socialism, and ideologically that's national socialism.

Now the one distinction you're gonna prescribe between Nazism and America is that Nazism was concerned with pseudo-communitarianism and America individualism. I accept that distinction, because I'm not by any means calling Trump a Nazi. He's happy to let inequality grow more gradually from the top to the bottom of society, whereas Hitler wanted equality at the top, equality at the bottom, and massive inequality in the middle. But note that that means Hitler isn't an actual socialist. Again, names mean nothing in politics: North Korea is called the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

In regards to Communism, yeah there are still Communists because it's never been tested yet. Bolshevism's been tested, and that's not the same thing as Communism. There are definitely also still Nazis or pragmatically similar ideologies, though. I mean, the Christchurch shooter, for one. That's pretty bloody threatening to society.

'Far right' should really be anarchy and no government at all, but its historically convenient to have the right as a punching bag to make anything 'left' look good.

This is showing a deep misunderstanding of the political spectrum, because it's a compass. 2 perpendicular lines, on the horizontal line you have the left and the right, and on the vertical line you have authoritarianism and liberalism. The horizontal line is economic, and the vertical social. So anarchism is at the very bottom of the political compass, but can be either left-wing or right-wing (and there are notable anarchists from both sides of the spectrum). Hitler is right wing because of Social Darwinism: the belief that some members of society have a birthright to be better off in society. Left wing is equality of opportunity. That's why Trump is right wing, because America doesn't have equality of opportunity. That's also why Clinton and Obama are right wing. The overton window in America doesn't reach the left wing right now, but that might change after the Democrat candidate elections.

Different countries, different peoples, have totally different interests. Why should they give more and more of their freedom to make their own choices away to an unelected bureaucracy in Brussels? Every year they try to gain more and more power of their member states economically and politically. Economically, especially. Warfare these days is fought less with bullets and more with pocketbooks. I have to source some things out about this, but later.

Interested in what you source because the bureaucracy in Brussels is elected, and the EU has caused mutual prosperity for its member states.

The Ukraine wanted to become an EU member state for some time. Once this was becoming more of a possibility we began to see the recent turmoils there with the war in Donbass and the annexation of Crimea.

It's never been a possibility: Ukraine has the second-lowest GDP per capita in Europe, ahead only of Moldova. It's less than 40% of the GDP per capita of the lowest member state of the EU. Ukraine doesn't pass the economic tests to join.

Russia has always wanted a buffer zone of friendly or neutral states between it and the rest of Europe both for defense against military action and political influence. Russia does not want the EU sphere of influence any closer to its borders than it already is. In a way it's bullying like it was during the Cold War, but the reason for it now is the same as it was back then.

Russia shares a direct land border with Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and Finland. It shares a direct sea border with most of the rest of the EU. I mean no offense but look at a map aha.

They are pacifists until they aren't. You can say that socialism is pacifism but it only is until it isn't. History shows that again and again and again. And when it is voted on an accepted, you get stuff like Venezuela. Don't forget that Lenin even said "The goal is socialism is communism"

First, Lenin is literally a Communist of course he'd say that. Second, no, socialism is pacifist and once a country stops being pacifist it stops being socialist: socialism depends upon equality of opportunity and quality of life for all members of its country. War's effects are always the direct inverse of that, and war creates massive wealth gaps. Venezuela crumbled as a result of Saudia Arabia hiking up oil prices, and that would have happened whether it was socialist or not. It's basically the country's only export.

Marxist Leninism espoused the ideal that revolution could be a global affair, and that the more poor or ignorant you were, the better of a person you were to everyone else- especially those who had any resources that you didn't have. As the revolution continued even the poor farmers were murdered or Gulag'd simply because they had land and property. Their farms were then turned over to the new proletariat who, uh-oh, didn't know how to work the land. This led to famines. And if there were too many mouths to feed then whatever, let the Ukraine starve to death like in the Holodomor.

Yes, Leninism had that effect. And yes Leninism was influenced by Marxism. But no, Marxist Leninism is completely distinct from Marxism. No one seriously says that the 10 things I said in my post to Lord Goomy should all be policy anywhere, realistically. There's a massive difference between equality and equity, and though Lenin (and, arguably, Marx) stated that equity was the aim, contemporary Marxists argue that equality is. And that means equality of opportunity, which you state below is something you think America's doing right and that that's a good thing. It isn't, and that's why Marxism's still around.

This later translated into Cultural Marxism in the West and has been in use since the Soviet Union came about. In the US in particular it was much harder to convince people to rise up and revolt because people actually had opportunity to go from being poor to having a job, a home, a car, etc. How do you get people to accept the workers revolution when they're not upset over their own existence?

Marx spoke of this. He uses the term ideological state apparatus to mean the venues through which the state indoctrinates its impoverished citizens into acceptance of their oppression. For example, I'm sure you went to school, but you have no idea how the EU works, that Marxism is different to Marxist Leninism (and I'm sure further don't know about movements such as Marxist Feminism), what the political compass looks like, even. In the UK we're taught what the political compass looks like, how the EU works, and the ideology behind Marxism (and look both at the strengths and failings of it of which there are many), and have the same education for liberalism, conservatism, socialism, feminism, neoliberalism, the New Right.... the list goes on. You'll also be taught things in America we don't get taught here. For example, you sing the national anthem in your schools, promoting a massive sense of national identity: Marx said that nationalism is the backbone of oppression, because it creates a false notion of communitarianism while in reality enforcing individualist practices while the people who lose out on those practices don't even know it's happening. That's true, right? America is individualist, but you all feel "American", part of the American community, part of the American Dream, even, which is this really confusing conflation of enforcing communitarianism through idealistic individualism. This goes further, though, for example many media outlets in America slammed Obamacare, but in any other developed country in the world (because pretty much everywhere except America has state healthcare to some extent) that would not have happened, because it's seen as a basic necessity in society. People weren't upset over their own existence because they had been taught to feel that way better than Russia managed to do in its feudal system.

One of the main distinctions between Marxist Leninism and Marxism is that Lenin felt that the revolution had to happen quickly and globally, but Marx was much more realistic about the whole situation. As you say, if people are told to think a certain way by the top directly, they usually push back against it. Marx said that revolution will occur when the wealth gap becomes so untenably vast that the bottom of society wakes up and smells the roses, realise that their lives aren't good, and take back control, and that this would happen organically (interestingly, organic society is a right wing concept he adopted here). The American Dream is the greatest piece of propaganda ever created, and in Marx's view, that's the only reason the revolt hasn't happened yet, not because "people actually had the opportunity to go from being poor to having a job, a home, a car, etc." but because they believed that they did. In reality, and this is inarguable, they don't have as much opportunity to do so as someone who's born into a rich family. If they got really lucky then they could, hence things like the national lottery exist as another form of the American Dream, but a progeny wouldn't have to work to have a job, home or car, whereas someone born into poverty would have to devote their lives to such ownership and even then only possibly get it. That's why for the first time in recent history, the leader of the Democrat Party could well be a socialist; people are realising more and more that the American Dream isn't real, and I'm not saying you're gonna become Communist, but you might start taking more and more influence from Marx and close that inequality of opportunity gap a bit. I'm eager to watch it happen, as an unaffected bystander.

You breed the discord yourself along fracture points. Are you gay? Then straight people are the cause of all your problems. Did you not get into Yale and you're a minority? The white man stopped you. Are you poor and keep making terrible financial choices with your money? Whatever- the rich man is why you have no money. And here we are today.

Oh man this is where I lost quite a bit of respect for you, to be honest. You really do seem to think society's equal, don't you? The life expectancy of a trans black woman in America is 35 years old, because they are killed either by themselves or others really young. If you go to a private school of course you get given an incredibly easy road into Yale; there is a massive generational wealth deficit between ethnic minorities and white people that is being closed gradually generation by generation, but still, factually, monetarily exists, and so yeah, if you're black you have, as a deterministic, overall societal trend, less opportunity to get into Yale than a white person. It's macrosociology which sure allows for anomalies but the whole point of anomalies is that they aren't normal, and equality should be normal. Plus, poor people don't have any money to make terrible financial choices with. If you have that level of disposable income you're lower middle class, and that's not the demographic that's growing in America, the working and underclasses are, while the lower middle class is shrinking. I don't think you get that America has the lowest minimum wage of any developed country not currently facing an unemployment crisis (which brings the figure down). And the responsibility for that isn't necessarily on the rich people -- it's on the Government for not raising it -- but a rich person who still chooses to pay a poor person that insufficient minimum wage when their profits are in the billions and could easily afford to do so? Yeah, that's on the rich man.


tl;dr (not actually a tl;dr but read this first) Read the post and reply to what you want to, if any. I know it's long but at least digest what I'm telling you as someone who works in politics and knows both theory and current affairs a lot better than you do, because on most of these issues you're actually just factually incorrect. There's no blame or attack behind that statement, but it's your responsibility to educate yourself now.

 

[Cinesra]

I come back to the beach to edit my profile and find someone pushing far right propaganda lol. Cultural Marxism is a conspiracy theory literally invented by Nazis originally called cultural Bolshevism before being resurrected by neo-nazis based on a misunderstanding of both the Frankfurt school and its influence and in this instance. That being said there are plenty of people who believe in it who aren't far right. It's frequently used as an umbrella boogeyman for conservatives and some adjacent centrists for any socially left wing idea they dislike to brush off any criticisms of past or present America as a nefarious product of communists. As we all know people are only poor because they made bad decisions and racism and homophobia either didn't exist or immediately stopped having effects when legally given equal rights.

"Nazis weren't right wing" is another false right wing talking point. "The more government does things the more left wing it is" is a comical misunderstanding of the flawed political spectrum. Anarchists (as in people who believe in actual anarchist philosophy not whooo let's smash some windows and steal some beer anarchists) are primarily left wing and communists will usually tell you their end goal is a classless moneyless stateless society hence the true communism has never been achieved meme. The Nazis are the reason privatization is even a word and were extremely fond of hierarchy and both of these are pretty much antithetical to leftism.

To be fair, PokeMedic isn't the only one making questionable statements. "socialists are pacifists" chief among them.

 

[NoaWithoutaH]

I got excited when I saw the word Russia. Always wanted to learn about this unique country, thanks comrades.

 

[DragonFang101]

I come back to the beach to edit my profile and find someone pushing far right propaganda lol. Cultural Marxism is a conspiracy theory literally invented by Nazis originally called cultural Bolshevism before being resurrected by neo-nazis based on a misunderstanding of both the Frankfurt school and its influence and in this instance. That being said there are plenty of people who believe in it who aren't far right. It's frequently used as an umbrella boogeyman for conservatives and some adjacent centrists for any socially left wing idea they dislike to brush off any criticisms of past or present America as a nefarious product of communists. As we all know people are only poor because they made bad decisions and racism and homophobia either didn't exist or immediately stopped having effects when legally given equal rights.

"Nazis weren't right wing" is another false right wing talking point. "The more government does things the more left wing it is" is a comical misunderstanding of the flawed political spectrum. Anarchists (as in people who believe in actual anarchist philosophy not whooo let's smash some windows and steal some beer anarchists) are primarily left wing and communists will usually tell you their end goal is a classless moneyless stateless society hence the true communism has never been achieved meme. The Nazis are the reason privatization is even a word and were extremely fond of hierarchy and both of these are pretty much antithetical to leftism.

To be fair, PokeMedic isn't the only one making questionable statements. "socialists are pacifists" chief among them.

"Nazis weren't right wing"
This is actually a fact. It's all in the name. Do you know what Nazi even stands for?
National Socialist Worker's Party.
"Anarchists (as in people who believe in actual anarchist philosophy not whooo let's smash some windows and steal some beer anarchists) are primarily left wing and communists will usually tell you their end goal is a classless moneyless stateless society hence the true communism has never been achieved meme."
What I am perceiving here is that one can successfully establish a communism on the condition that there are no anarchists? That in itself is a very dangerous proposition. All you need to do is look at China. https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/991420258987757569?lang=en
"The Nazis are the reason privatization is even a word and were extremely fond of hierarchy and both of these are pretty much antithetical to leftism."
How is privitization even compatible with the Bolshevistic form of Communism, or even socialism for that matter?

 

[Celever]

Oh man you answered yourself in your own post. I'll just point it out.

"Nazis weren't right wing"
This is actually a fact. It's all in the name. Do you know what Nazi even stands for?
National Socialist Worker's Party.

And North Korea is called the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. The word misnomer is accurately used in politics more often than anywhere else. Saying they're a socialist doesn't make someone a socialist if none of their policies are socialist.

Besides, the term socialist was undergoing a lot of shift and change during this period anyway. It's predated by movements such as the cooperative movement and communism, which it later came to incorporate both of in various different branches, and the modern definition of socialism was generally considered to be formed by Lenin 2 years before the Nazi Party was formed. It's not crazy to think Hitler was referring moreso to Social Darwinism, shortening it to "socialism", as the Nazi Party is ideologically Social Darwinist above all else.

Either that, or he just understood that socialism is enticing to people and was a new worldwide trend because the masses all want to be more equal, so he named his party as such to try and attract people. Certainly wouldn't be the first time a misnomer is used for political gain.

"Anarchists (as in people who believe in actual anarchist philosophy not whooo let's smash some windows and steal some beer anarchists) are primarily left wing and communists will usually tell you their end goal is a classless moneyless stateless society hence the true communism has never been achieved meme."
What I am perceiving here is that one can successfully establish a communism on the condition that there are no anarchists? That in itself is a very dangerous proposition. All you need to do is look at China. https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/991420258987757569?lang=en

I honestly don't know what message you're trying to communicate here, other than I think "communism bad cos china tried a form of it that didnt work" and providing no further details than that. However, Jordan Peterson is a joke. Watch his debate with Slavoj Zizek for an exemplar for his ineptitude in any political conversation. His whole philosophy is based on the psychologist Jung, who the psychology community decisively discounted and debunked while he was writing and even moreso after he died. Peterson is just profiting off of commenting on the divisiveness he's playing a part in causing and has nothing of value to add to any conversation.

"The Nazis are the reason privatization is even a word and were extremely fond of hierarchy and both of these are pretty much antithetical to leftism."
How is privitization even compatible with the Bolshevistic form of Communism, or even socialism for that matter?

And here's the crux of it. Neither privatisation nor hierarchy are compatible with any form of left-wing ideology, even centre-left ideology. That's why the Nazis aren't socialist. Because their policies were pretty much antithetical to socialism. It doesn't matter what they called themselves.

 

[DragonFang101]

Oh man you answered yourself in your own post. I'll just point it out.

And North Korea is called the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. The word misnomer is accurately used in politics more often than anywhere else. Saying they're a socialist doesn't make someone a socialist if none of their policies are socialist.

Besides, the term socialist was undergoing a lot of shift and change during this period anyway. It's predated by movements such as the cooperative movement and communism, which it later came to incorporate both of in various different branches, and the modern definition of socialism was generally considered to be formed by Lenin 2 years before the Nazi Party was formed. It's not crazy to think Hitler was referring moreso to Social Darwinism, shortening it to "socialism", as the Nazi Party is ideologically Social Darwinist above all else.

Either that, or he just understood that socialism is enticing to people and was a new worldwide trend because the masses all want to be more equal, so he named his party as such to try and attract people. Certainly wouldn't be the first time a misnomer is used for political gain.

I honestly don't know what message you're trying to communicate here, other than I think "communism bad cos china tried a form of it that didnt work" and providing no further details than that. However, Jordan Peterson is a joke. Watch his debate with Slavoj Zizek for an exemplar for his ineptitude in any political conversation. His whole philosophy is based on the psychologist Jung, who the psychology community decisively discounted and debunked while he was writing and even moreso after he died. Peterson is just profiting off of commenting on the divisiveness he's playing a part in causing and has nothing of value to add to any conversation.

And here's the crux of it. Neither privatisation nor hierarchy are compatible with any form of left-wing ideology, even centre-left ideology. That's why the Nazis aren't socialist. Because their policies were pretty much antithetical to socialism. It doesn't matter what they called themselves.

I know others that would accuse you of making a "No True Scotsman Fallacy," but I know this isn't the case because you are correct in regards to how political labels are thrown around. However, this is happening on both sides of the coin here. Fast-forwarding to one of your last statements, "Neither privatisation nor hierarchy are compatible with any form of left-wing ideology, even centre-left ideology", we need to define terms. Namely, old Left or new Left. The left and right wings are more divided than they were in years past, so in some modern-day far left ideologies (or far right ideologies), hierarchical roots abound. (Funny enough, the hierarchy bit is under question as well, since they didn't restore Germany's monarchy after getting power on a national level and even fought alongside anti-monarchist forces in Hungary. But for the sake of argument let's ignore that)

Yes, above all else, I agree that Nazism is a Social Darwinist movement. Funny enough, this is one of the few things that the Nazis were actually consistent with, as they chose labels that weren't very accurate and dissociated themselves with other ideologies that are in fact very similar to it.

Here's where I make my main point: A couple reasons why people associate Nazism with the far right is because they declared themselves as anti-communism and anti-Marxism, but this is quite contrary to how they actually functioned. For the same reason you say they called themselves a socialist party, they disassociated themselves with those that stood for the same things, in order to sway the general public and claim to be "in touch" with popular, favorable political ideologies. Even if their policies were, as you say, "antithetical to socialism," they aren't necessarily antithetical to the far left of today.

Antisemitism, for one, was greatly advocated by Karl Marx. The idea that the Nazis were strictly conservative people who had puritanical beliefs about sexual relationships has been soundly disproved. They were in fact, bohemians in their lifestyles. Another point made by an economist, Ludwig Von Mises I believe, was that the level of socialism in Communist Russia was the same as what existed in Nazi Germany, due to the common belief in BIG GOVERNMENT. This is a reason why Nazism might be considered far left. Even if you aren't in favor of hierarchy per se, the mere aspect of having large government is entirely antithetical to any right wing ideology. Russia, as you already know, had a government with the power to seize the means of production (as the meme goes), and allotting goods to the individual. Granted, the modern left wing certainly doesn't want the government to function this way, but it wouldn't be correct to pin this to any modern far right ideology. Nazism is also a totalitarian setup where the government directs production decisions, curbs entrepreneurship and the labor market, wage/interest determination, using market exchange, yooooou get the point. Basically, the product of Nazism has a funky left wing stench to it but if we want to be accurate, it is neither far left nor far right wing. but a unique form of totalitarianism that has no practical use being in either side.

Let it be known, I am not a "follower" of Jordan Peterson nor am I a fan of him. I do, however, believe the response to the other tweet was adequate and more or less described exactly what went through my head when I initially read it. Real communism doesn't work!

 

[Celever]

I know others that would accuse you of making a "No True Scotsman Fallacy," but I know this isn't the case because you are correct in regards to how political labels are thrown around. However, this is happening on both sides of the coin here. Fast-forwarding to one of your last statements, "Neither privatisation nor hierarchy are compatible with any form of left-wing ideology, even centre-left ideology", we need to define terms. Namely, old Left or new Left. The left and right wings are more divided than they were in years past, so in some modern-day far left ideologies (or far right ideologies), hierarchical roots abound. (Funny enough, the hierarchy bit is under question as well, since they didn't restore Germany's monarchy after getting power on a national level and even fought alongside anti-monarchist forces in Hungary. But for the sake of argument let's ignore that)

I don't know what left wing theories you're interpreting as hierarchical so you need to give more detail, because it's a contradiction in terms. Far left means egalitarian, and egalitarianism is incompatible with hierarchy by definition. That's why the further right you move, the more hierarchy you find, because the left- to right-wing spectrum basically starts at absolute equality (which is what egalitarianism is) and gets more unequal from there the further right you move. It's inaccurate to argue that the political compass has changed. Certainly, overton windows have shifted on both the left and right, which I suspect is what you mean by "old and new left", but that just changes where on the political compass the discourse is. The compass itself remains a constant, and so egalitarianism remains left wing and hierarchy right wing.

Hierarchy is little to do with monarchy. None of the wealthiest people in the world are monarchs now, and all monarchs are fully considered under the rule of law and tend to not have more power (speaking for the Western world). Historically, sure monarchs tended to be the top bean on the pole, but that's not necessarily true. Now we're all subject to King Bezos of the Sultanate of Amazon. Monarchy used to simply only be an example of hierarchy, and instead the Nazis believed in a hegemonic hierarchical structure.

Here's where I make my main point: A couple reasons why people associate Nazism with the far right is because they declared themselves as anti-communism and anti-Marxism, but this is quite contrary to how they actually functioned. For the same reason you say they called themselves a socialist party, they disassociated themselves with those that stood for the same things, in order to sway the general public and claim to be "in touch" with popular, favorable political ideologies. Even if their policies were, as you say, "antithetical to socialism," they aren't necessarily antithetical to the far left of today.

Antisemitism, for one, was greatly advocated by Karl Marx. The idea that the Nazis were strictly conservative people who had puritanical beliefs about sexual relationships has been soundly disproved. They were in fact, bohemians in their lifestyles. Another point made by an economist, Ludwig Von Mises I believe, was that the level of socialism in Communist Russia was the same as what existed in Nazi Germany, due to the common belief in BIG GOVERNMENT. This is a reason why Nazism might be considered far left. Even if you aren't in favor of hierarchy per se, the mere aspect of having large government is entirely antithetical to any right wing ideology. Russia, as you already know, had a government with the power to seize the means of production (as the meme goes), and allotting goods to the individual. Granted, the modern left wing certainly doesn't want the government to function this way, but it wouldn't be correct to pin this to any modern far right ideology. Nazism is also a totalitarian setup where the government directs production decisions, curbs entrepreneurship and the labor market, wage/interest determination, using market exchange, yooooou get the point. Basically, the product of Nazism has a funky left wing stench to it but if we want to be accurate, it is neither far left nor far right wing. but a unique form of totalitarianism that has no practical use being in either side.

First off, the political spectrum is a compass not a line. Left- and Right-wing can both be authoritarian, or they can both be anarchist. Nazi Germany was authoritarian and right wing, Stalinist Russia was authoritarian and, arguably, left wing, though also arguably right wing. Assuming Stalinist Russia was left wing though, it doesn't mean that the similarities they shared suddenly makes Hitler left wing too. They were both high on the political compass, but opposite sides in terms of left or right. (The middle line and so the vertical axis literally just represents the size of the state, authoritarian means a large state and the antithesis of it is anarchism, which can also be either left or right wing). This is important, because the claim that something can be antithetical to socialism but not antithetical to the far left is wrong: the far left is by definition socialism. If a movement isn't socialist, it's not far left.

Antisemitism in that time is an extremely messy topic to discuss, but it was one thing that the entirety of Europe had in common. We only have records to base historical analysis off so we can never know for certain, but the mass perception at the time was that Jews caused inequality. Marx himself was Jewish in the ethnographic sense of the term -- his parents were Jewish -- and in The Communist Manifesto he accredited his Jewish lineage with the fact that he received an education, and claimed that his parents' Judaism is why he was born a member of the bourgeoisie, and also claimed that he witnessed first-hand that inequality was largely caused by Jews as they controlled the commerce. Those observations were echoed by the Germans in Nazi Germany, as well as countries in the Balkans and other parts of East Europe. In that social, historical context, antisemitism appeared to be a fairly uniting concept that could exist anywhere on the political compass.

The difference, however, is how it was handled by Marx and Hitler. Marx argued for antisemitism to bring them down to the same level as the proletariat and force them to be equal. Hitler argued for antisemitism to thrust them into destitution and to take away many of their human rights in return for their actions. That's the fundamental difference between left- and right-wing: Marx was batting for egalitarianism and Hitler for hierarchy, placing Jews on a lower tier than most of the rest of society (though the same tier as gays, the disabled, and a few other sections of society who are forgotten victims of the Holocaust).

I don't think anyone has ever claimed the Nazis were puritanical about sex -- they wanted Aryans to breed like bunnies. But they were extremely misogynistic, which is right wing, and I think may be what you were interpreting as people arguing they're puritanical about sex.

No, Nazism is certainly far right. Picture the compass with the 2 lines crossing in the middle, large state at the top, anarchism at the bottom, and left and right through the middle. Everything you list in the last 2 sentences belongs in an ideology that inhabits the bottom-right quart. Nazism inhabits the upper-right quart. So yes, Nazism wasn't economically liberal, because that's the whole point: it wasn't liberal at all. That's why it's high on the compass, but it did prioritise inequality and hierarchy, and no matter what justification is provided for that mindset, that makes it right wing.

Let it be known, I am not a "follower" of Jordan Peterson nor am I a fan of him. I do, however, believe the response to the other tweet was adequate and more or less described exactly what went through my head when I initially read it. Real communism doesn't work!

Real Communism has worked well in isolation when it's been tested (such as in Venezuela, where the economy crashed due to a hike in oil prices, its essential sole export, meaning the economic crash would have occurred under any ideology). Russia wasn't Communist, and you'd be hard-pressed to find a decorated historian who claims they were.

 

[VillagerHoss]

I don't know what left wing theories you're interpreting as hierarchical so you need to give more detail, because it's a contradiction in terms. Far left means egalitarian, and egalitarianism is incompatible with hierarchy by definition. That's why the further right you move, the more hierarchy you find, because the left- to right-wing spectrum basically starts at absolute equality (which is what egalitarianism is) and gets more unequal from there the further right you move. It's inaccurate to argue that the political compass has changed. Certainly, overton windows have shifted on both the left and right, which I suspect is what you mean by "old and new left", but that just changes where on the political compass the discourse is. The compass itself remains a constant, and so egalitarianism remains left wing and hierarchy right wing.

Hierarchy is little to do with monarchy. None of the wealthiest people in the world are monarchs now, and all monarchs are fully considered under the rule of law and tend to not have more power (speaking for the Western world). Historically, sure monarchs tended to be the top bean on the pole, but that's not necessarily true. Now we're all subject to King Bezos of the Sultanate of Amazon. Monarchy used to simply only be an example of hierarchy, and instead the Nazis believed in a hegemonic hierarchical structure.

First off, the political spectrum is a compass not a line. Left- and Right-wing can both be authoritarian, or they can both be anarchist. Nazi Germany was authoritarian and right wing, Stalinist Russia was authoritarian and, arguably, left wing, though also arguably right wing. Assuming Stalinist Russia was left wing though, it doesn't mean that the similarities they shared suddenly makes Hitler left wing too. They were both high on the political compass, but opposite sides in terms of left or right. (The middle line and so the vertical axis literally just represents the size of the state, authoritarian means a large state and the antithesis of it is anarchism, which can also be either left or right wing). This is important, because the claim that something can be antithetical to socialism but not antithetical to the far left is wrong: the far left is by definition socialism. If a movement isn't socialist, it's not far left.

Antisemitism in that time is an extremely messy topic to discuss, but it was one thing that the entirety of Europe had in common. We only have records to base historical analysis off so we can never know for certain, but the mass perception at the time was that Jews caused inequality. Marx himself was Jewish in the ethnographic sense of the term -- his parents were Jewish -- and in The Communist Manifesto he accredited his Jewish lineage with the fact that he received an education, and claimed that his parents' Judaism is why he was born a member of the bourgeoisie, and also claimed that he witnessed first-hand that inequality was largely caused by Jews as they controlled the commerce. Those observations were echoed by the Germans in Nazi Germany, as well as countries in the Balkans and other parts of East Europe. In that social, historical context, antisemitism appeared to be a fairly uniting concept that could exist anywhere on the political compass.

The difference, however, is how it was handled by Marx and Hitler. Marx argued for antisemitism to bring them down to the same level as the proletariat and force them to be equal. Hitler argued for antisemitism to thrust them into destitution and to take away many of their human rights in return for their actions. That's the fundamental difference between left- and right-wing: Marx was batting for egalitarianism and Hitler for hierarchy, placing Jews on a lower tier than most of the rest of society (though the same tier as gays, the disabled, and a few other sections of society who are forgotten victims of the Holocaust).

I don't think anyone has ever claimed the Nazis were puritanical about sex -- they wanted Aryans to breed like bunnies. But they were extremely misogynistic, which is right wing, and I think may be what you were interpreting as people arguing they're puritanical about sex.

No, Nazism is certainly far right. Picture the compass with the 2 lines crossing in the middle, large state at the top, anarchism at the bottom, and left and right through the middle. Everything you list in the last 2 sentences belongs in an ideology that inhabits the bottom-right quart. Nazism inhabits the upper-right quart. So yes, Nazism wasn't economically liberal, because that's the whole point: it wasn't liberal at all. That's why it's high on the compass, but it did prioritise inequality and hierarchy, and no matter what justification is provided for that mindset, that makes it right wing.

Real Communism has worked well in isolation when it's been tested (such as in Venezuela, where the economy crashed due to a hike in oil prices, its essential sole export, meaning the economic crash would have occurred under any ideology). Russia wasn't Communist, and you'd be hard-pressed to find a decorated historian who claims they were.

@DragonFang101 if I may; Some substantial proofs that the Nazis are far left are as follows:
In European politics, the parties of the Right are the Monarchical ones. The very defining terms Left and Right go back to the time of the French Revolution, where the Monarchists sat on the right in the National Assembly and the Republicans on the left. Although claiming to be a party of the Right--largely a political sop to the basic conservatism of the German people--the Nazis repeatedly acted to block attempts to restore Monarchy in both Germany and Austria. Late in the War, they actually engineered a coup d'etat to overthrow the Monarchists in Germany's wartime ally Hungary. It is, then, quite understandable that the old Kaiser died, still in exile in Holland, 8 years after Hitler took over; quite understandable that in 1999, the current Hapsburgs announced that they were at least considering joining in a law suit brought by the relatives of Austrian Jews, who had also had property confiscated by the Nazis.

Traditional values and old allegiances are the very essence of Conservatism, the motivation of the Right. In building a New Order immediately after taking power, the Nazis trashed the rights of the traditional German States, and insisted on treating all of the diverse peoples of Germany as one collectivist Society; later forcing Austria and parts of Czechoslovakia into the new monolith.

The Right-wing/Conservative value system puts the highest priority on qualities of personal integrity and honor; one's word is supposed to be one's bond! Hitler--who defined National Socialism--repeatedly flaunted a total contempt for the integrity of his own word; indeed, no one but the Communists, themselves, have made such a mockery of promises and truth, of treaties and covenants.

The full name of Hitler's party was the National Socialist German Workers' Party. While many blue collar workers are actually more conservative than some of the politically correct sycophants who drift into positions in corporate management, those conservatives do not organize into "Socialist Workers' Parties." Rather they break ranks with those who see manual labor as a class apart demanding a social leveling, and rally around candidates who support the rights of the individual. Blue collar conservatives do not aspire to equality, but to whatever heights they may be able to obtain by honest, dedicated effort. (Many of the so-called "Reagan Democrats" came from this group.) Hitler's nomenclature, on the other hand, suggests--and was intended to suggest--one of the tenets of Communism.

No one ever accused FDR of running a "right-wing" Administration. Although he ran on a conservative platform, he moved sharply left in the famous first "Hundred Days"; continuing to initiate many seemingly novel--yet clearly not Constitutionally authorized--schemes to put people back to work. The principal difference from Hitler's approach was that FDR, in his alphabet soup of projects to make work at the expense of Government, was a bit more moderate. That the Nazis saw close parallels between the New Deal and their own system is evidenced by the fact that before America came into the War, Nazi intelligence attributed FDR's obvious preference for the British (who had a Conservative Government at the time) over the Germans, to jealousy because Hitler had been more successful than Roosevelt in achieving common goals.

Both the New Deal and National Socialism were sold to susceptible businessmen as ways to protect Capitalism from the scourge of Communism. Each offered itself as the proponent of painful but essential "reform," necessary to save industry from Communism, seen as otherwise certain to find an army of recruits among the millions of unemployed in a terrible depression.

Hitler's selection of Jews, as the prime scape goat for demonization, was taken directly from Karl Marx, who had employed the same technique eighty years earlier, blaming all of the claimed vices of Capitalism on a Jewish mentality. Hitler used the technique precisely as Marx had recommended, focusing on the Jews as the principal source of every social ill--the single enemy device that Marx had urged on his own followers. While, for tactical reasons, the Marxists had shifted their emphasis in the interim--setting the stage for something akin to the application of the "good-cop/bad-cop" technique in American popular culture--the historic origin for the demonization of Jews, as fall guys for the economic and social woes of Europe, is very clear. The Communist switch from a direct demonization of Jews to a general focus on the bourgeoisie, then provided a convenient opportunity to recruit susceptible Jews by pretending to be the answer to Hitler and the Nazis! That recruitment, in turn, afforded the Nazis "evidence" to support the historically outrageous lie that Communism was a "Jewish plot"; enabling them to recruit middle-class anti-Communists on the pretense that only Nazis really told the truth about Communism!

At the time Hitler came to power, his number two man--his extremely close, long term associate--was a homosexual thug named Ernst Rohm, the man in charge of the SA, the Nazi army of the streets. Rohm and his immediate underlings wanted to follow the original purge of Jews and anti-Nazi democratic elements from positions of influence, with a purge of the German military and the Junker aristocracy (the bastion of German Conservatism) and other large landowners. It would have been the equivalent of a Communist revolution under a different name. However, in the short interval between gaining office and assuming ultimate power, Hitler had found that his hypnotic oratory and charismatic presence could be almost as effective with the upper classes as with the rabble in the streets. (He was able to convince many that he was very different from the Socialist mob around him.) When he had to choose between the SA and the German military establishment, he had his former associates systematically murdered. But to suggest that he did not know the almost Pol Pot like extremism of men with whom he had worked closely for over 10 years, and on whom he would have remained dependent had he not found that he could mesmerize former foes, would be absurd.

While Hitler made a peace of sorts with the true Right, he did not deviate from a basic Left-wing Socialist orientation. Thus he put workers into military uniforms, and paraded them at rallies as one of the pillars of the New Germany; the Germany that was as "one" with its Socialist Fuehrer. The fact that the Nazis had better designed uniforms, and paraded the workers in their version of a "Workers' Paradise" in September rather than on May Day with the Communists, does not refute the obvious fact that both were movements of the extreme Left.

Hitler's bloody divorce from Rohm in 1933--not unlike the way Stalin handled embarrassing former comrades in the same period--did not prevent Hitler from calling for a "Classless, Casteless" Germany (ie. neither social classes nor racial distinctions) at the 1934 Party Congress in Nuremberg. By then in absolute control, addressing his followers and outlining the future, the rhetoric must be assumed to reflect what he actually believed.

At the same Party Congress, Hitler announced to a massed formation of 52,000 of his General Labor Service (in military uniforms holding shovels to their shoulders and addressing one another as "Comrade," as did the Russian Communists in the same era) that he planned to make all Germans go through service in such units as a prerequisite for acceptance into the new German Society. Anyone who could consider that idea "right-wing" would deem Chairman Mao's Cultural Revolution "reactionary!"

Although Hitler justified his private army of homosexual led thugs as part of the fight against Bolshevism (the Communist Party of Lenin and Stalin ) in Germany; he had no sooner obtained power than he instructed the German foreign service to 'cosy up' to Moscow. While this was explained as necessary for the eventual, and already contemplated, move against Poland, it shows that there was little actual hatred of Communism. Indeed, when Hitler and Stalin finally met in 1939 to conclude the alliance that led to World War II, the pictures of the meeting suggested a more relaxed body language and more spontaneous good will between the two Socialist dictators than either showed in meetings with more conservative leaders. Following that meeting, there was a two year period in which every Communist front in America, even those set up to "fight fascism," enthusiastically endorsed American neutrality in the coming war.

In order to appeal to German patriotism, and mask the depth of his actual Socialist ethos, Hitler relied on beautifully choreographed spectacles. These created the subliminal impression of a conservatism they did not actually represent. The Nazis, in fact, used massive ceremony for the same purposes as other Socialist movements: To demonstrate their appeal to numbers--the masses--and the solidarity of their followers. That they were more intelligently staged than those in other Socialist States--to suggest other messages, also--does not alter their fundamental orientation on the Left.

Hitler's policy of "Total War," the deliberate savaging of civilian populations, was a radical repudiation of Centuries of effort by the true Right to "civilize" warfare by trying to minimize the effect on innocent civilians. That the Americans and British responded in kind--as in the atrocity committed on Dresden--does not change the Left-wing character of this departure. The traditional American attitude was stated by Jefferson in his indictment of the "Cruelty & perfidy" of the British (in the Declaration) for bringing on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of war-fare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

The Nazi indoctrination of young children into a monolithic Statist ideology, with no concession to any traditional family or community idiosyncrasies or values that might differ from imposed norms, was comparable only to the indoctrination imposed under the most rigid of the Communist States.

extremely misogynistic, which is right wing, and I think may be what you were interpreting as people arguing they're puritanical about sex.

Please don't display your ignorance to make a foolish statement like that. Misogyny has nothing to do with the right wing and is a problem that exists on both sides.

Venezuela didn't use real communism. They relied on capitalism on the state level to improve inflation rates and chose to pin it to some communistic policies happening on the federal level.

Russia certainly was communistic, as many historians and peer-reviewed articles conclude. Russia's post-February Revolution phase, Nikita Khrushchev's reign through the cold war, Mikhail Gorbachev's leadership in the 80s, and all other history concerning the Soviet Union empirically prove that Russia certainly was Communist. Even if you try to convince me that it wasn't Communist by its textbook definition, you have to look at the fact that Marx declared socialism as a gateway to communism. All this points to the fact that Nazism certainly was left wing, any way you slice it.