Cowbee [he/they]

Actually, this town has more than enough room for the two of us

He/him or they/them, doesn’t matter too much

Marxist-Leninist ☭

Interested in Marxism-Leninism, but don’t know where to start? Check out my “Read Theory, Darn it!” introductory reading list!

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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: December 31st, 2023

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  • As @DefinitelyNotAPhone@hexbear.net said, there’s a huge difference between selectively using Nazis for their knowledge on R&D while keeping them on a tight leash, imprisoning, and even executing them, and what the West did, which involved giving them cushy jobs, erasing their crimes, and putting them in the highest seats of leadership of organizations like NATO. The West loved the Nazis (still does), the Soviets hated them.






  • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.mltoMemes@lemmy.mlLiberals: 🙈
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    1 hour ago

    It’s okay to shit on Stalin on a Marxist-Leninist board, the synthesizer of Marxism-Leninism? MLs don’t uphold Stalin as a god, but we also don’t engage in historical nihilism, cedeing the historical narrative to the bourgeoisie and liberal historian perspectives. Stalin was no saint, but was far more effective and moral than contemporary leaders like Churchill and Hitler.


  • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.mltoMemes@lemmy.mlLiberals: 🙈
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    3 minutes ago

    The fact that the CPSU was under constant danger of infiltration and espionage, and thus needed to be purged, does not contradict Stalin’s reported style of leadership as recognized by the CIA in an internal document shared in the meme above. The USSR, throughout its early period (founding until end of World War II), was under constant siege, invasions by capitalist powers, civil war, and active infiltrarion by fascists. These drastic conditions required resolute actions, ones broadly supported both by the party as well as by the general population. We are cutting out the Cold War and Red Scare for the purpose of this conversation, but it wasn’t that the siege lessened, it just changed character.

    Stalin’s style of leadership in meetings was generally recognized as being quiet, allowing other members of the Politburo to speak up first, contemplating, then coming to a firm motion to push for and vote on. This was an effective method of leadership, and is what the CIA is principly describing here as being a “captain of the team.” Additionally, Stalin tried to resign no fewer than 4 times, all of which were rejected. Had he abandoned his post against the wishes of the Politburo, there would possibly be political crisis.

    I recommend you read Domenico Losurdo’s Stalin: History and Critique of a Black Legend. Losurdo challenges the liberal over-demonization of Stalin while shedding accurate light on Stalin’s real and genuine shortcomings and mistakes. It’s perhaps the best attempt by a modern writer to utilize all of the information we actually have available to sweep away the mountain of Red Scare propaganda to recognize the real Stalin, both good and bad.



  • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.mltoMemes@lemmy.mlLazy moochers
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    3 hours ago

    Stalin did not “sieze the country and turn it into a crony dictatorship.” You can read works like Soviet Democracy, This Soviet World, and Is The Red Flag Flying? The Political Economy of the Soviet Union. The Soviets had a robust system of democracy. It didn’t “fall into authoritarianism,” it entered into a state of siege in all sides from capitalist invaders and as such had to defend itself. You should really read about the soviet government structure and democracy.

    As for your lightning round:

    1. Bread Lines - it’s a good thing to feed people in times of crisis. The US did it too, and that was a good thing.

    2. Famine - famine was common in Russia before collectivization, which ended famine in the USSR.

    3. Forced labor and relocation - this part is an issue, but it isn’t intrinsic to Marxism or socialism, and was phased out over time.

    4. Imperial expansionism - the USSR was not imperialist. It did expand, but expanding itself is not a bad thing, especially when the majority of people who lived in the Soviet Union said they were better off then.

    “Stalinism” isn’t an ideology. Stalin had his own policies during his time as the leader of the Soviet Union, especially Socialism in One Country as opposed to Trotsky’s Permanent Revolution, but Stalin was a Marxist-Leninist. Marxism-Leninism was synthesized by him. There was no betrayal of Marxism-Leninism until the Khruschev era, where reforms began to work against the centralized socialist system, leading to the utter disasters of the later Gorbachev and Yeltsin eras and the dissolution.

    The PRC is Marxist-Leninist. There’s no such thing as “Stalinism,” to begin with, but you can’t use Stalinist to describe the PRC anyways because there’s no Stalin, so you can’t even use it to describe Stalin’s specific economic policies. Either way, over 90% of Chinese citizens approve of their government. The revolution saved countless lives and doubled life expectancies, same as in Russia.

    I really don’t know what you think Marxism-Leninism is. If you want, I have an introductory reading list you can check out. It also isn’t just the guiding ideology of the USSR and PRC, but other countries like Vietnam, Cuba, and more, with similar success stories.


  • Georgism is both reformist, so it requires asking the ruling class to willingly kneecap their profits, and only covers rent, really, meaning it ignores exploitation, production, imperialism, overproduction, and crisis. Marxism answers those, and is revolutionary, it’s more relevant because it works and is more complete.


  • The USSR was a historic success. The dissolution of the USSR is one large failure, but doesn’t negate the century of success after success in proving socialism works, siding with national liberation movements, and advancing the needs of the working class. The USSR worked, economically, its dissolution was more of a political failure than one pointing to Marxism not being able to work.

    The PRC is socialist, those who say it’s capitalist typically conflate markets for capitalism, when the process of sublimating private property is a gradual one once the large firms and key industries are siezed. Both the USSR and PRC are examples of socialism working.

    Marxism was implemented, and still is. Rather, Marxism-Leninism is a tool for analysis and revolution, to bring about socialism, and is has many historical successes, and continues to succeed today. Marxism-Leninism is the guiding ideology of the largest economy in the world by purchasing power parity.

    So no, you can’t really say the same of Marxism as you can of Georgism. Marxism works, still works, and will continue to work. Georgism was a curiosity for a while and fades while Marxism-Leninism became the defining ideology of the 20th century, and will continue to prove even more relevant thanks to the rise of the PRC over the US.





  • The reason Georgism fell out of favor on the left is because Marxism already develops beyond where Georgism falls flat. It’s certainly broadly appealing, in that liberals can get behind it rather quickly, but it falls short of Marxist economics in completeness, to the point that it doesn’t really bother resolving the fundamental problems with capitalist exploitation, centralization, crisis, or production and overproduction, it just focuses on rent.

    It’s also very difficult to get through, it’s a reformist approach that depends on asking those that have full control of the economy to make it less exploitative. That doesn’t happen without revolution, at which point you can go far beyond and address core, systemic issues.