this post was submitted on 22 May 2024
372 points (96.5% liked)
Memes
44094 readers
2344 users here now
Rules:
- Be civil and nice.
- Try not to excessively repost, as a rule of thumb, wait at least 2 months to do it if you have to.
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
You would have to prove the party and the workers entirely distinct.
Assuming I am not involved in local politics because I am more well-read than you is a silly ad hominem attack when logic is exhausted.
Are you saying that if the bolshevik party had 1% workers in it it would count as socialist even though the party had different class interests to the workers and workers had no control over the means of production? If the party was controlled by the workers there would be no need to violently put down mass worker protests.
The assumption was made based on how insufferable some of your ad hominems were and contact with other people who talk like that. Work in effective local politics groups tends to mellow people like this out and makes them less pedantic.
Who in the party represented another class? Workers, and who else? As the USSR liberalized towards the end, there were bourgeois elements added, but for most of the USSR's existence there was no other class.
Calling correcting your misconceptions "ad hominems" is goofy, lmao.
The Wikipedia article you started with had this info. The party was more interested with remaining in power and benefitting it's members than the working class after Lenin. They banned any dissenting voice and cracked down on the working class. They became closer to a royal family in a monarchy with Stalin. And I do repeat that the workers had no control of the means of production after 1924, potentially even after 1921.
So it still had elections, and workers still participated, got it. Via having elections and participating in government, workers can direct production.
What royal family is as large as the USSR's Communist Party and allowed new membership?
Flawed Socialism is still Socialism.
Are you being purposely optuse or bad faith? The elections were symbolic with no effect on production as I already said and provided sources for. It's not socialism if workers have no control over the means of production.
You did not provide sources. There are facts that they existed, and differing opinions on the extent to which workers controlled the Means of Production. The elections did not disappear under Stalin, opposition parties were banned. This means it was flawed, but ultimately still existed, which is my point.
You cannot say that the Means of Production were state owned, and elections regularly practiced, and still say it was not Socialist. We are not arguing with whether or not the USSR was Socialist, but its effectiveness in carrying out the will of the Working Class. That much is obviously not 100%, the party was corrupt, you will not find pushback from me there, but it was Socialist.
You are arguing off of vibes.
The Communist Party was fundamentally not a new class. They did not own the Means of Production any more than the average worker, any worker could join, and the party was massive. A royal family would have engaged in feudalism, but that wasn't the case.
I guess you missed the link I provided: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elections_in_the_Soviet_Union
During those elections you were voting for local party picks that all had the same instructions from the party. Who won had no effect on how things were run. The high ups in the party controlled how the means of production were used, not the workers. As you may recall from your own link factions in the party were banned meaning dissent got you ousted.
Elections that don't give workers any control over the means of production are meaningless and not socialism. How many times do I have to repeat this?
Your source backs me up, I read it.
Workers did have control. It was not ironclad, but there also wasn't a separate class, and the interests of the workers were advanced, such as free education, healthcare, etc.
You can repeat that you believe 7 to be equal to 0 all you want, repeating it won't make you correct.
You are arguing off of vibes.
No it doesn't, I read it too. If this has degraded to you just going nuhuh we can call it a day, that's no longer fun.
I think you should look in the mirror before you attack me, lol