Imperialism, authoritarianism and oppression is bad all around m'kay

Remember folks: China is communist in the same way that North Korea is democratic and the Nazis were socialist.
It's just a smokescreen.
- A core tenant of socialism is a democratized workplace, being able to vote for your wage and company policy, like an Engineer choosing when to launch the rocket instead of some MBS degree.
  Last time I checked I dont think factory workers in China that make all our shit can do that.
  
  Yes. That was the point of what they posted. None of those groups are what they claim to be beyond nominally.
  
  ThAt's jUst WeSTeRnn prOpaGAndA
  
  Workplace democracy isn't necessarily a core concept of Socialism, at least not in the Marxian sense. Removing the issues that come with the profit motive alleviates issues you describe. Instead, Marxists advocate for public ownership and central planning with extensive democratic controls, without necessitating competing democratic worker coops. Engels argued against such a concept in Anti-Dühring, actually, believing such a system to revert to Capitalism through competition and accumulation.
  
  Which is also why socialism will never work. Humans are piss poor at evaluating the common good and making decisions collectively (see also: the last US election.)
- Eh, there's a notional aspiration to socialism at least, which is more than can be said about the US sphere of countries.
  In practice though? Yeah, China is hyper-captialist, without much of the social security present in wealthier countries.
  Why Leftist get a hard-on for the former USSR, Russia and China, or frankly any country, is beyond me.
  There are positive and negative outcomes in line or against socialist ideals everywhere (I think people are too black and white about China in both directions personally)
  I just do not understand simping for any country, just because they are "socialist".
  
  That notional aspiration to socialism is basically the ideological smokescreen. It was much more effective in the Cold War era, but it condenses down to: "Suffer through our version of (state) capitalism and exploitative labour for our capital accumulation" - be it by state institutions or even state-sponsored billionaires - "and at the end of it, we promise, there will be communism."
  But that "communism" then tends to be like nuclear fusion - always 20 years away.
  
  The USSR at least outwardly promoted socialist values like solidarity and being kind to your fellow people. They fucked up pretty bad in practice, but at least they made an attempt.
  
  IMO this is why it takes an additional axis to define a government, not just left/right but also free/authoritarian. You can find examples of all combinations. Left wing and repressive? Cuba. Left leaning and free? Sweden. Right wing and repressive? Russia, Saudi Arabia, whatever. Right leaning and free (mostly)? USA.
  Obviously, there’s a gradient within these axes, but it’s strange to see people cheering on a country that matches their preferred left or right wing ideology if they’re super repressive.
- China has a Socialist Market Economy, it hasn't reached Communism of course but at the same time the Public Sector covers over half of the economy, and is gradually folding the Private Sector into it with the degree to which it develops. This is the process Marx and Engels described a Socialist State would take. From Principles of Communism:
  Question 17 : Will it be possible to abolish private property at one stroke?
  Answer : No, no more than the existing productive forces can at one stroke be multiplied to the extent necessary for the creation of a communal society. Hence, the proletarian revolution, which in all probability is approaching, will be able gradually to transform existing society and abolish private property only when the necessary means of production have been created in sufficient quantity.
  The backbone of the PRC is central planning and public ownership, Marx is regularly taught in class, and Marxism-Leninism continues to be the dominant and guiding ideology. They are ideologically Communist, and it is rather silly to protest otherwise simply because they haven't immediately siezed all property, which would be anti-Marxist as the PRC is still underdeveloped.
  The purpose of Marxian analysis of Capitalism is the insight that markets naturally centralize and develop complicated methods of planning. You can't just will these into existence, and markets provide a quick way of creating them. Once they have sufficiently developed, markets cease to be the best tool to use, and public ownership and central planning becomes more efficient. Given that the PRC is Marxist, it stands to reason it is useful to analyze them with a Marxist lense. I have yet to see a genuine Marxist take on why the PRC is not Socialist, only liberals paying lip service to Marx yet vulgurizing him into a Utopian Idealist, and not a Materialist.
  
  You can call their economy whatever you want, doesn't stop them from being a dictatorship.
  
  Look, I'll admit I'm not as smart as some of the folks who debate this topic, so for me it comes down to a simple question:
  Do the Chinese people own the means of production? Not a government body claiming to represent the people, but the people themselves; do the people own the means of production? Can the factory workers choose how the factory operates?
  If no, then what's the point?

"NOOOOOOO you have to pick one of the two teams or you're a RADICAL CENTRIST!!!!"
- Not really the point, but that's a funny little oxymoron; to be a radical anything you'd need to be actually committed to something so much that you want to do actual ground work to further a cause.
  
  Radical centrism:
  ^needs ^more ^jpeg, ^I ^know
  
  It is a real thing but the term radical is used a bit different
  The radical in the term refers to a willingness on the part of most radical centrists to call for fundamental reform of institutions.[1] The centrism refers to a belief that genuine solutions require realism and pragmatism, not just idealism and emotion
  So not radical as in extremist action but radical change
- Lol, this place has changed its tone a lot now that the US election is over
- Now hang on. If you pretend the two teams are the same and refuse to pick a side because neither is perfect so it doesn't matter, you are an enabler of fascism.
  You can support a team while acknowledging their flaws. Refusing to play because the better team isn't perfect is either naive or malicious.
  
  Or you can not join a team and evaluate things individually based on their merits
  
  Once you talk about "both teams", you imply there are only two instead of supporting those who to this day resist all states
  
  Is this intentional misinterpretation for mischief purposes, or is this your best?
  
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campism

You are banned from /c/hexbear
- lemmygrad, and lemmy.ml 😭
  Learnt this the hard way, my first account was on lemmy.ml
  
  Lemmy.ml is a default instance, so many newbies start there and find out how the admins operate there. So that's a funny thing with lemmy
  
  Good
- It's easy, mmmm'kay!

This is just like how I can praise so many things about China, push back against anti-China US propaganda, and still not pretend it isn’t an authoritarian regime where Xi made himself essentially life time president now.
Speaking of that, are there any left leaning subs that aren’t delusional?
- If you find one, let us know
- Probably on DB0.
- Of course you can, unless you're on a certain lemmy instance.
  
  Yeah, Lemmy.world.
- It's hard finding people with this opinion, sadly. I'm with you on this one comrade
- go make one, id join ;3
  assuming you arent a delussional leftist yourself, unaware of your own delusions...
  
  I would be willing to try and do that :) What would be interesting to you? A general leftist non-liberal non-authoritarian apologist community? @ne0n@lemmy.world @MisterFrog@lemmy.world
  
  Eh, we are all victims to delusion right? Can't know what is a dream and what is reality until it's being lived in the moment.
  I think the mark of a true leftist is picking a dream that's so big you know it couldn't possibly come true so you could never mistake it for reality, but then work towards it anyways.
- where Xi made himself essentially life time president now.
  What? When?
- are there any left leaning subs that aren’t delusional?
  Not on lemmy, no.
- authoritarian regime
  Both of these terms are obfuscstory propaganda that mean a person hasn't placed enough scrutiny on what they have internalized. That might sound like I am simply attacking you, but I mean this as a way of answering your (combative) question: you want a space where people have some basic ideas about cold war propaganda but where they retain a significant amount of chauvinist framibgs from that propaganda. You can find like-minded people wherever left education arrests itself, which is why you won't find it in organizations or spaces that require reading on these topics.
  To explain my response, I'll go over the two words.
  Authoritarian. This word is poisoned beyond clear meaning. Every state is authoritarian, so what is the meaning of calling a particular state authoritarian? Every revolution is authoritarian, so do you also criticize them as such and seek out anti-revolutionary spaces? In reality, I know that this term is just thrown around in chauvinist contexts as a dog whistle. In this context it just means "bad" and "the enemy". It's the liberal version of, "they hate us for our freedoms".
  Regime. This term is synonymous with givernment or state, but just colors it as, again, "bad". Venezuela must always be described as being led by a regime, not a government. As a target of imperialist propaganda, it must be implicitly propagandized as illegitimate and bad. Think of someone saying, "the Biden regime". How often do you hear that phrase? If you've heard it, it was a socialist trying to make this point and even the playing field.
  If you remove the propaganda aspects, your framing becomes, "still not pretend it isn't a government". Becomes less spicy, doesn't it? Despite having no differences in meaning outside of implying it is bad.
  Finally, Xi didn't make himself president for life, he must be regularly reelected. The government itself removed term limits in the normal way: with a vote. Imperialist media calls this "president for life" because they are chauvinists. When the US had no term limits, was every president "president for life"? Aren't term limits antidemocratic, i.e. more authoritarian?
  In short: please do some self-criticism on this internalized chauvinism and you will find it easier to find comrades. You are currently in an incoherent position and that means you'd only find comeradery among the incoherent snd incurious. Be around people that challenge you based on their reading and knowledge.
- No. Failing to praise all US empire efforts to diminish China is "letting China win". There cannot be a "some good some bad" view on China. "all bad only" is allowed.

TYpIcAl ShItLiB
- I HatE when cApiTal lEtter ALternation doesn't hoLd a hidDEn BUt relevant meSSage, don't You?
  
  "I heat E all Debussy?"
  
  He ate all DeBussy?

Really though, the level of imperialism apologizing I've seen has been pretty humorous on this platform. Like people will say with a straight face that we need to support our client state Israel to secure our regional interests. It's the same song and dance from the concert of Europe giving guns to the corrupt African client kings so they can murder the other guy's corrupt African client kings. All for the noble civilizing influence of the state. But this time it'll turn out different. Just like it was different every other fucking time an empire ideologically justified it's imperialism. Because this one time is exceptional, unlike all the other instances of exceptionalism. Furthermore, I consider Carthage to need to be destroyed
- Really though, the level of imperialism apologizing I’ve seen has been pretty humorous on this platform. Like people will say with a straight face that we need to support our client state Israel to secure our regional interests.
  Is this being federated from some platform other than Lemmy? Because I have literally never seen someone support that position here.
  
  Likely you are understating how often that occurs as much as the person is overstating how much that occurs. You don't interact with those people and they, trying to argue against, constantly interact with them.
  I've seen people absolutely take the side of "Israel must be protected, there is no other answer" and plenty of it on Lemmy and it comes from its users.
  Don't diminish other people's experience when they share it, people are often honest about their perspective even if it might be wrong. Ignoring it does no help for either of you.
- Ah, Cato the Elder. He had a good cheesecake recipe, but was otherwise a complete jackass.
- Well it does work until it doesn't and the high imperialists get out of it can be quite high. A chunk of the oligarchic boomers feel like they have have everything they ever could have wanted even if their younger counterparts are starting to get greedy for more like addicts they are. And now we have fights between the rulers that want it to stay exactly as is and those that want more battling it out while we get nothing for those of us below that want better.
  Lessons are learned and forgotten constantly in this world. The next empire along will also justify its existing as a good until it no longer can.
  Let's see what happens when Carthage falls and weapons are handed out asking the meek to pick sides to groups promising to own them better. I doubt that it will be a lesson we learn and pushed off to be learned again later.
  
  It works until they start believing their own propaganda, which America did long ago. Using flimsy justifications to steal things from people will enrich you. Driving your empire because you must continuously validate those justifications will destroy you.

No no, you don't understand. America bad, therefore anything against America is automatically good. It doesn't matter who it is or what they do.
- Ah yes, the Noem Chomsky. Famously when he was defending Pol Pot's regime.

- imperialism against imperialists is good

As a Venezuelan who's against Yankee imperialism and our current oppressive """""Socialist""""" government, I approve this message.
- Would be nice having the "real socialists" condemn the fake socialists
  
  We do though, look up BadEmpanada

I think people should separate
A) ideal world they want
B) what has to be done now to survive because everyone is an asshole

How is this a shitpost? there's no shit!
- Its a magnet for shitpost comments, comrade
  
  can't deny that

The US is the biggest source of imperialism in the world. We don't have to always follow that up with "butwhatabout" to distract from that, which is what the US media machine does by running stories all the time to manufacture consent for its own imperialism.
- Someone had their Chomsky-o’s for breakfast this morning.
- I'd say that Russia is the biggest source of suffering caused by imperialism in the world right now ( just going by the death toll of the Ukraine war ) . Is saying that a 'distraction' from American imperialism?
  
  Gaza is happening because of US imperialism. Biden said that's what Israel does in the region very clearly.
  Joe Biden's long history of pro-Israel statements
  
  Gaza absolutely dwarfs Ukraine in terms of suffering caused by imperialism.
  Honestly, this is why I increasingly believe that people who say things like the OP don't actually believe American Imperialism is bad, they're just doing whataboutism to defend it.
- Whataboutusm is a russian invention and is 9 times out of ten usad to excuse russia agressions.
  
  Trying to change the subject was not invented by anyone in particular, but the US likes to slap that label onto everything that directs criticism at them. For example, the US has the highest prison population per capita but will preemptively scream about enemy countries imprisoning people with countless stories in the media. Calling out the hypocrisy is countered with accusations of "whataboutism" but that's not whataboutism, it's simply pointing out hypocrisy since it's the same subject.
- People that are being literally killed, tortured, displaced, bombed, denied their identity, starved, raped, genocided right now by China/Russia/North Korea, looking for any support, any help from anyone willing to give it
  A Leftist American: US is the biggest source of imperialism in the world and you're not being oppressed by the US, so you're not real. Have a good day. takes a privileged slurp from the huge cup of Starbucks and closes his Macbook
  
  Nice caricature, but it has nothing to do with my post. Pointing out that the US is the biggest source of imperialism doesn't mean no one else is doing bad things, but thanks for proving my point. Fuck Starbucks and Apple, by the way.

This is literally why the LGBTQ+ community trusts neither the left nor the right, because historically both sides have brutalized them.
- Corporate leftists, the "libruls", are right wing political actors pretending to be left wing for a variety of reasons. Supporting business over people is fascism and the liberals are fascists who don't mean to be.
  
  Supporting business over people is fascism and the liberals are fascists who don't mean to be.
  Fascism - Any right-wing, authoritarian, nationalist ideology characterized by centralized, totalitarian governance, strong regimentation of the economy and society, and repression of criticism or opposition.
  I understand your sentiment, but please stop pulling shit out of your ass.
- Same as the disability community.
- The LGBTQ+ community is not a monolith and you do not speak on behalf of us.
- Except they do thrust to the left
- That's cuz LGBTQ+ attack all of them with their fake victim narcissism, the REAL question is why would anyone sane tolerate their nastiness Hell even LGBTQ+ attack other LGBTQ+
  
  What do you mean by „fake victim narcissism“?

... or to hide their own imperialism.

"Quit hitting yourself, quit hitting yourself, quit hitting yourself"

"And thus I clothe my naked villainy : With odd old ends stolen forth from holy writ; and seem a saint, when most I play the devil."

Take away imperialism, authoritarianism and oppression, and what are we left with? Man I wish you were advocating anarchism, but I've almost given uphope of seeing people understand its wisdom.

Oh, you reminded me to check out Yanis Varoufakis's latest videos!
He talks of imperialism and the differences between China and the USA.
Thanks for the meme!
For those interested: https://lemmy.world/post/23027760
- Why is that post heavily downvoted?
  
  Your instance is full of incurious liberals
- Subscribed.

100% this.

literally Canada :(

Be sure to consider that the past examples of US imperialism were widely supported by Americans just like you. In hindsight, we can often see more clearly since we aren't immersed in the contemporary propaganda.
- Yet you are completely missing the point. Oh, the enlightend one!
- Really, Masses, Elites, and Rebels: The Theory of "Brainwashing" should be required reading for anyone considering themselves a Leftist.
  
  Thanks for sharing!

The crimes of the US empire dwarf anything you bring up on any "authoritarian" countries that are curiously always enemies of the US. No complaints on Myanmar here no sir!

"oppressive govts that use socialism to hide their atrocities" => welcome to European politics.
- All of those 'Socialist' governments in the EU, with the highest quality of life, highest quality of happiness, and some of the least wealth disparity in the world, are committing atrocities against their own people?
  Some of these governments probably commit atrocities in countries other than their own, but that would be because of Capitalistic and Imperialistic policies, not Socialistic ones.
  
  "against their own people" is a chauvinist attitude. Why would it be particularly bad to oppress people in "their own" country vs other countries? The only way this logic works is if you subscribe to nationalism and are projecting it onto others.
  EU countries overlap with NATO, an aggressive military force that, among other things, destroyed Libya, turning it from the highest HDI African country into a hellscaoe with open air slave markets fought over by warlords. Would it be worse for that to happen to Germany?
  EU countries also still have their own neocolonies. Sahel countries are still trying to kick out the French, who saddled them with debt and still controls their banking systems. Would it be worse if that were happening to French people?
  Finally, there are no socialist countries in the EU, nor "socialistic" countries. Every EU country is run for and by capiralists and by capitalist parties. They have social safety nets left over from the cold war when they were combatting and coopting communists and they are now being slowly dismantled by capital.
  
  What you're missing there is that the Europe you describe is only a small sub-set of countries. The rest are committing atrocities against their own people in the form of continuously increasing the number of people living close to poverty and by enacting policies that ended up making majority of the youngest generations unable to buy/rent homes and/or eventually have children.

Fixed it .
- Average ml user
  
  Just ignore the part you don't like because it makes you feel bad. Typical.
- Why not just change it to "imperialism is bad" lmao
  Unless there's some good imperialism somewhere..
  
  That would be better
- Weren't you saying you ML mfs don't support authoritarianism like a week ago?
- Why is this fixing it? Both memes work, they dont contradict each other
- Based & Redpilled

Except US is biggest imperialist & no one intelligent is supporting Russia just cause "America Bad" Typical RadLib Let's hear your complains about Socialism (He's gonna call me a Tankie & ban me huh😂)
- Nicely done. Barely read the meme, missed the point, built a strawman, had an imaginary argument and called OP a liberal. 10/10 perfect form. Can I interest you in an account at lemmy.ml?
  
  Listen buddy I'm not here to make "sense" or use "critical thought"
  
  Can I interest you in a lesson in reading & gaslighting ?
- Least scratched tankie.
  Enjoy getting dunked on
  
  That's it ? You call this a dunking ?

Wait, are you saying "both sides bad?" "Both sides are the same?" Am I hearing this right?
Look, if either Xi Jinping or Donald Trump is going to emerge as leader of a global hegemon, then any and all criticism of Xi Jinping is the exact same as being a Trump supporter. When are we going to do something about all these secret Trump supporters pretending to be leftists?
At least, that's what I'd say if I accepted the absurd logic of lesser evilism the liberals were constantly berating everyone with.
- No, they are saying one side being bad doesn't make "the other side" perfect or immune to criticism
  The US participating in the Palestinian genicide does not excuse Russia invading Ukraine. The US invading Iraq does not excuse nationalists in India attacking Muslims
  It is not the same thing, and western imperialism doesnt make non-western imperialism ok. Even if it is a lot worse
  
  Right, and what I'm saying is that by that very same logic, Trump supporting the Palestinian genocide doesn't justify the democrats supporting the Palestinian genocide - they should not be considered immune to criticism either, and when people criticize them, they should not be assumed to be supporting the other side.
- Silence, imperialist.
  
  No u.
- Both sides can be bad in different ways. Just because both sides are considered bad, doesn't mean they are the same.
  
  Correct, whether it's about countries or parties.

I'd say US imperialism is many magnitudes worse than any other governments, except for the brutality of Israel. Who else has more than 750 bases in at least 80 countries worldwide and spends more on its military than the next 10 countries combined. But sure Russia, Iran, China, North-Korea, Venezuela bad.
- It's funny, but not surprising how much you're down voted here. The meme is heavily upvoted for equating (presumably US) imperialism and (presumably Chinese) authoritarianism. But give an example of how much worse the US is, and people who pretend to hate imperialism fall over themselves to defend the US.
  
  I think the point is that both are bad. But somehow it always ends up with a competition where the US is more bad than the rest, and the rest is therefore somehow excused when .ml is involved
- Who else has more than 750 bases in at least 80 countries worldwide and spends more on its military than the next 10 countries combined.
  And yet Russia still managed to launch a war with casualties on par with Iraq. Sorry sunshine, if you're a global power, you've got a body count in the millions. Period.
  
  if you’re a global power, you’ve got a body count in the millions.
  Very true. But is this an inherent trait of the world, or is there some path forward that would change or mitigate this fact?
- I'd say US imperialism is many magnitudes worse than any other governments, except for the brutality of Israel
  Read a fucking history book at least once. The only country that makes the top 5 is russia by the sheer scale of terrain it held at one point and age.
  Not even sure if US imperialism makes it to the top 5. With all its capitalism, systematic racism, history of camps, military might across the globe. Barely top 5.
  Read. A. History. Book.
  Israel? Fucking peanuts with its genocide of Palestine. PEANUTS!
- Seems like this post is about you! :)
- Shoot... US imperialism is soft-serve ice cream compared to the empires of history. Those military bases by and large extend the American security umbrella to protect the host country, not to put its population to the colonial boot and extract wealth. Yeah they sort of have to tow the line on US foreign policy, but it's a far cry from, say, the Boer enslaving natives in South Africa or Alexander the great wiping out populations who defied him.
  The US has a long laundry list of dirty deeds, but overall the US "empire" has led to the longest and wealthiest period of global peace and scientific/technical/social advancement in the history of humankind. That doesn't excuse anything but neither is it particularly useful to condition our allegiances on utopian absolutes of moral purities. When we do, evil wins (e.g., see recent election where 10M Democratic voters stayed home).
  
  Are you really sure you want to be ascribing global trends to the US empire?
  
  Shoot... US imperialism is soft-serve ice cream compared to the empires of history.
  Amartya Sen estimated that Indian capitalism killed around 4 million people per year as compared to China's more planned economy. Indian capitalism was maintained by the British and the US as part of "decolonization" and the superprofits reaped from India and ending up in the US are basically public record.
  This is a larger total number than basically any older empire you can think of.
  Those military bases by and large extend the American security umbrella to protect the host country, not to put its population to the colonial boot and extract wealth.
  Oh sweet summer child. Those are forward bases for US imperialism. They have been used to stage and supply every oppressive US war and to control shipping routes. They don't all just sit there doing nothing. How much did Vietnam enjoy the "security umbrella" of US bases, again?
  This is just plain dishonest imperislist propaganda.
  Yeah they sort of have to tow the line on US foreign policy
  US bases are a symptom of already being beholden to the US. The people of Okinawa hate the US base there. It is only there because Japsn was conquered in WWII and surrendered to the US, and the US built it into a satellite for harassing Korea, China, and the USSR.
  but it's a far cry from, say, the Boer enslaving natives in South Africa or Alexander the great wiping out populations who defied him.
  US imperialism is carrying out a genocide in Gaza right now via their ethnic supremacist proxy and just toppled the Syrian state, which will likely go the way of Libya if it doesn't balkanize first. The US supports its ckient states that engage in slavery, such as the Saudis or Qatat, where South Asian laborers are brought in and their passports stolen.
  The US supported apartheid South Africa in a way that is very similar yo how it supports Israel.
  The US has a long laundry list of dirty deeds, but overall the US "empire" has led to the longest and wealthiest period of global peace and scientific/technical/social advancement in the history of humankind.
  Where is this period of global peace? The US is engaged in constant war. Where is this wealth? If you exclude socialist blocs the trends on poverty reverse. Scientific advancement was global and much of what you could list will have Soviet or Chinese workers behind it.
  That doesn't excuse anything but neither is it particularly useful to condition our allegiances on utopian absolutes of moral purities. When we do, evil wins (e.g., see recent election where 10M Democratic voters stayed home).
  "If we don't accept evil, evil wins" just listen to yourself, it doesn't even make sense in this simplistic form.
  And who are "we"? Your statements place you squarely against those who suffer under global capitalism, dismissive of ongoing genocide. You're basically doing the Stephen Pinker thing, and he is full of shit in addition to being buddy buddy with Epstein.
- Facts gets downvotes here!
  
  Fools get downvotes here. When the US launches a violent offensive directly on a neighboring independent country with the intent of destroying its people and conquering its land, which NK and Russia are currently trying to do, maybe you'll have a point.
  Let's just summarize the argument made here using actual facts:
  Everyone says Russia is so bad for bombing children's hospitals and rest homes and apartment buildings, but look at the US's military budget!"
  It's pathetic.
  
  I'd say..
  Facts gets downvotes here!
  Do you know how opinions are different from facts?
  Such a sad excuse for an intellect.