Unbridled Capitalism is self-destructive

[Stevicus]

Duh.
Way to miss the point about socialism needing to wall people in.

Notice how I dint call your post "vapid"?
You're experience the kinder gentler me today.

Yes, I did notice that. I didn't call your post "vapid" either.

 

[Stevicus]

Blaming the victims...who starved themselves, eh.
Have any evidence for your claims?

Oh, glorious socialism....

Kulak - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Excerpted....
On 30 January 1930, the Politburo approved the dissolving of the kulaks as a class. Three categories of kulaks were distinguished: kulaks who were supposed to be sent to the Gulags, kulaks who were supposed to be relocated to distant provinces, such as the north Urals and Kazakhstan, kulaks who were supposed to be sent to other areas within their home provinces.[22] The peasantry were required to relinquish their farm animals to government authorities. Many chose to slaughter their livestock rather than give them up to collective farms. In the first two months of 1930, peasants killed millions of cattle, horses, pigs, sheep and goats, with the meat and hides being consumed and bartered.

Notice how animals weren't slaughtered to be wasted.
This was better than losing them by confiscation.
They saw how their fellows were being treated, eg,
imprisoned, relocated.

Excerpted....
Stalin ordered severe measures to end kulak resistance. In 1930, he declared: "In order to oust the 'kulaks' as a class, the resistance of this class must be smashed in open battle and it must be deprived of the productive sources of its existence and development. ... That is a turn towards the policy of eliminating the kulaks as a class."[25]

Sounds like a pogrom, eh.
Such things are common under socialism.

Excerpted...
From 1929–1933, the grain quotas were artificially heightened. Peasants attempted to hide the grain and bury it. According to historian Robert Conquest, every brigade was equipped with a long iron bar which it would use to probe the ground for grain caches[26] and peasants who did not show signs of starvation were especially suspected of hiding food.[27] Conquest states: "When the snow melted true starvation began. People had swollen faces and legs and stomachs. They could not contain their urine... And now they ate anything at all. They caught mice, rats, sparrows, ants, earthworms. They ground up bones into flour, and did the same with leather and shoe soles ... ."[28]

Your post sounds like they deserved this fate.
So it is with socialist regimes, ie, submit to the
hive's every wish or be murdered.

There may have been fault on both sides, but I wasn't blaming the victims. It always takes two to tango, but even your own source here backs up what I said: They did slaughter their livestock and destroyed their crops to avoid confiscation. We both agree on the same basic facts on what happened, but it would have been better if they agreed to the state's prices for their produce. Also, the link I posted earlier (post #16) thoroughly debunks anything written by Robert Conquest. He and the Hearst newspapers were the primary sources of most of this information, and it was just plain wrong and propagandistic.

 

[Revoltingest]

Yes, I did notice that. I didn't call your post "vapid" either.

You're a gentleman.

 

[Audie]

100% of a nations wealth is 100%.
It doesn't get more, no matter how you distribute it.
And when, over time, the wealth distribution gets more and more skewed towards the already rich, then the poor getting poorer is a direct result of the rich getting richer - in percentage if not in absolute value.

You really really don't know what you are talking about.

And you won't believe me on anything.

So-

 

[Audie]

I wouldn't know what's in the commie handbook. I just go by what I can see and observe around me.



Illinois? The Kulaks were capitalists who got rich in the period after the ending of Serfdom. The dispute with Stalin was that the State instructed the Kulaks to sell their grain at the prices set by the State. They refused and ended up slaughtering their livestock, eating/destroying their crops, including their seed grain. They were angry because they wanted more money, and many ended up starving as a result. An enormous tragedy, but most of the blame lay with the Kulaks who literally destroyed the food supply. Latter-day historical revisionists try to make it sound like Stalin starved them intentionally, but there's absolutely zero evidence that that was ever the case. Most of the stories came from the Hearst newspapers, not any original sources.



Well, this is all just a hypothetical discussion about abstract issues. You like capitalism, I like socialism - we can agree to disagree without making it any more.



I don't recall discussing the illegality of monopolies. You have me confused with someone else.

Millions. Not Illinois.

 

[Revoltingest]

There may have been fault on both sides....

The Soviets may have some fault for starving people to death.
That's a generous admission.

, but I wasn't blaming the victims. It always takes two to tango....

Aye, one to be starved to death, & one to take their food.
Sounds like equal blame, eh.

...but even your own source here backs up what I said:

But not in the manner you used it, ie, blaming
the victims for starving themselves.

They did slaughter their livestock and destroyed their crops to avoid confiscation. We both agree on the same basic facts on what happened, but it would have been better if they agreed to the state's prices for their produce.

You mis-use the facts to exculpate socialism,
& make victims responsible for their own
death.
It's rather like a cop who beats someone
for being rude. Sure, rudeness caused
the reaction. But wrongfulness lies with
the perp who committed the violence.

 

[Revoltingest]

Millions. Not Illinois.

Are you using a phone to post?
Those things vex us.

 

[Heyo]

You really really don't know what you are talking about.

And you won't believe me on anything.

So-

Your resignation is accepted.

 

[Revoltingest]

Millions. Not Illinois.

Ever notice that those who advocate for socialism
are never ever from socialist countries? Under
capitalism, one has the luxury & liberty to believe
& express one's dreams.

 

[Audie]

Are you using a phone to post?
Those things vex us.

Yes and yes

 

[Audie]

Ever notice that those who advocate for socialism
are never ever from socialist countries? Under
capitalism, one has the luxury & liberty to believe
& express one's dreams.

China sure jumped on capitalism the
minute it became possible.

But weirdly, the total amount of money
in country stayed the same!

Your resignation is accepted.

Soecifically t's called "rolling eyes heavenward in
resignation"

 

[Stevicus]

The Soviets may have some fault for starving people to death.
That's a generous admission.



Aye, one to be starved to death, & one to take their food.
Sounds like equal blame, eh.

But not in the manner you used it, ie, blaming
the victims for starving themselves.

You mis-use the facts to exculpate socialism,
& make victims responsible for their own
death.
It's rather like a cop who beats someone
for being rude. Sure, rudeness caused
the reaction. But wrongfulness lies with
the perp who committed the violence.

Well, the kulaks had two choices:

1. Take the state's prices and get an equal share of food
2. Demand more money and destroy the food if they don't get their way

It was the kulaks who destroyed the food, not the state. I would blame those who did the actual destruction, not those who tried to prevent it and feed the people. Seriously, why would they intentionally starve their own people? That doesn't make any sense.

 

[Nakosis]

Lets say I happen to own a factory. I pay you to work and produce what I'm selling.
You get the pay check, I get the revenue, mutual benefit, isn't it?

Now, let's say at the end of the month you have just what you need to live and have another yacht. Then the "mutual" benefit is a bit biased, ain't it?

If I wanted a yacht it is up to me to figure out how to get one. It's not up to you.
If I can't do so working for you then it is up to me to find another way to go about it.

This is basically what I did my whole life, by not depending on others to get what I want.

 

[Stevicus]

Ever notice that those who advocate for socialism
are never ever from socialist countries? Under
capitalism, one has the luxury & liberty to believe
& express one's dreams.

I've seen mixed opinions, both from those who lived in socialist countries and those who did not. I didn't live in a socialist country, but I have visited the USSR when it was still socialist. I saw no visible evidence that people were starving or in any kind of misery. Some things may have been inconvenient, but it was hardly the horror show that one commonly hears from Western accounts. I even saw a guy openly arguing with a street cop, who clearly had no real power to do anything, which is much different from U.S. street cops, who ostensibly have the power to summarily execute people on the streets.

I also knew a Polish woman who had no love of the Russians, but she admitted that "when the Communists were in charge, they had things better organized." That was coming from someone who lived there. I knew another guy, an Armenian fellow but lived mostly in Moscow, who told me that when Stalin was in charge, a person could leave their wallet in a restaurant or bar, and then be able to come back and find it in the exact same spot hours later. No one would have dared touch it.

 

[Revoltingest]

Well, the kulaks had two choices:

1. Take the state's prices and get an equal share of food

Equal to whom....the Ukrainians during the Holodomor?
When someone plans to take all your food, there's a
big risk that their later generosity might not match
their current acquisitiveness.

2. Demand more money and destroy the food if they don't get their way

Destroy the food they need to survive?
You must be using an extra large crack pipe today.

(That "crack" is kind because it's mirthful.)
It was the kulaks who destroyed the food, not the state.
You say "destroy", but you've not
shown that to be the case.

I would blame those who did the actual destruction, not those who tried to prevent it and feed the people. Seriously, why would they intentionally starve their own people? That doesn't make any sense.

The Soviets had 2 choices...
1) Not starve them.
2) Starve them.
The Soviets chose to starve them.
And this is the problem with socialists, ie, they can
use the most far fetched rationale for mass murder.
It's with a religious fervor that the so easily kill the
infidel...er...counter-revolutionary groups.

 

[Yerda]

You're advocating for socialism then.

Do you think there are any problems
with your alternative of socialism?
If so, it would be worth comparing
results of socialist countries with
capitalist countries, comparing the
best of each.

Yes, I am a socialist. But of course you're absolutely right we should compare. There's plenty to be learned.

 

[Yerda]

You believe.

In experimental social engineering.
You do understand that idealist leaders in Europe and Asia
we're responsible for tens of millions of deaths in the last. century

This is true and I don't believe we should disregard the things that have happened.

I was not kidding about moral weakness and / or insanity.

Ok. It doesn't strike me as morally weak or insane to desire better for everyone.

 

[Stevicus]

Equal to whom....the Ukrainians during the Holodomor?
When someone plans to take all your food, there's a
big risk that their later generosity might not match
their current acquisitiveness.

The point is that if they were willing to cooperate, there would have been no famine.

Destroy the food they need to survive?
You must be using an extra large crack pipe today.

(That "crack" is kind because it's mirthful.)
It was the kulaks who destroyed the food, not the state.
You say "destroy", but you've not
shown that to be the case.

Actually I have shown it to be the case, and so have you. From your own link upthread: "Many chose to slaughter their livestock rather than give them up to collective farms. In the first two months of 1930, peasants killed millions of cattle, horses, pigs, sheep and goats, with the meat and hides being consumed and bartered."

I think that pretty well settles the question of who destroyed the food and why.

In my studies of that era, I've read accounts from the peasants themselves, graphic descriptions about how they gorged themselves on as much as they could eat. Multiply this by millions, and it's easy to see why there were food shortages and famine.

The Soviets had 2 choices...
1) Not starve them.
2) Starve them.
The Soviets chose to starve them.

Not by choice. There are those who speculate that the Soviets did it intentionally, but no one has been able to produce any hard evidence to prove this. It's all based in assumption, but without a shred of evidence.

And this is the problem with socialists, ie, they can
use the most far fetched rationale for mass murder.
It's with a religious fervor that the so easily kill the
infidel...er...counter-revolutionary groups.

Lies concerning the history of the Soviet Union

www.mariosousa.se

Robert Conquest at the heart of the myths

This man, who is so widely quoted in the bourgeois press, this veritable oracle of the bourgeoisie, deserves some specific attention at this point. Robert Conquest is one of the two authors who has most written on the millions dying in the Soviet Union. He is in truth the creator of all the myths and lies concerning the Soviet Union that have been spread since the Second World War. Conquest is primarily known for his books The Great Terror (1969) and Harvest of Sorrow (1986). Conquest writes of millions dying of starvation in the Ukraine, in the gulag labour camps and during the Trials of 1936-38, using as his sources of information exiled Ukrainians living in the US and belonging to rightist parties, people who had collaborated with the Nazis in the Second World War. Many of Conquest’s heroes were known to have been war criminals who led and participated in the genocide of the Ukraine’s Jewish population in 1942. One of these people was Mykola Lebed, convicted as a war criminal after the Second World War. Lebed had been security chief in Lvov during the Nazi occupation and presided over the terrible persecutions of the Jews which took place in 1942. In 1949 the CIA took Lebed off to the United States where he worked as a source of disinformation.

The style of Conquest’s books is one of violent and fanatical anti-communism. In his 1969 book, Conquest tells us that those who died of starvation in the Soviet Union between 1932-1933 amounted to between 5 million and 6 million people, half of them in the Ukraine. But in 1983, during Reagan’s anti-communist crusade, Conquest had extended the famine into 1937 and increased the number of victims to 14 million! Such assertions turned out to be well rewarded: in 1986 he was signed up by Reagan to write material for his presidential campaign aimed at preparing the American people for a Soviet invasion, The text in question was called ‘What to do when the Russians come – a survivaists’ handbook’! Strange words coming from a Professor of History!

The fact is that there is nothing strange in it at all, coming as it does from a man who has spent his entire life living off lies and fabrications about the Soviet Union and Stalin – first as a secret service agent and then as a writer and professor at Stamford University in California. Conquest’s past was exposed by the Guardian of 27 January 1978 in an article which identified him as a former agent in the disinformation department of the British Secret Service, i.e., the Information Research Department (IRD). The IRD was a section set up in 1947 (originally called the Communist Information Bureau) whose main task it was to combat communist influence throughout the world by planting stories among politicians, journalists and others in a position to influence public opinion. The activities of the IRD were very wide-ranging, as much in Britain as abroad. When the IRD had to be formally disbanded in 1977, as a result of the exposure of its involvement with the far right, it was discovered that in Britain alone more than 100 of the best-known journalists had an IRD contact who regularly supplied them with material for articles. This was routine in several major British newspapers, such as the Financial Times, The Times, Economist, Daily Mail, Daily Mirror, The Express, The Guardian and others. The facts exposed by the Guardian therefore give us an indication as to how the secret services were able to manipulate the news reaching the public at large.

Robert Conquest worked for the IRD from when it was set up until 1956. Conquest’s ‘work’ there was to contribute to the so-called ‘black history’ of the Soviet Union fake stories put out as fact and distributed among journalists and others able to influence public opinion. After he had formally left the IRD, Conquest continued to write books suggested by the IRD, with secret service support. His book ‘The Great Terror’, a basic right-wing text on the subject of the power struggle that took place in the Soviet Union in 1937, was in fact a recompilation of text he had written when working for the secret services. The book was finished and published with the help of the IRD. A third of the publication run was bought by the Praeger press, normally associated with the publication of literature originating from CIA sources. Conquest’s book was intended for presentation to ‘useful fools’, such as university professors and people working in the press, radio and TV, to ensure that the lies of Conquest and the extreme right continued to be spread throughout large swathes of the population. Conquest to this day remains for right-wing historians one of the most important sources of material on the Soviet Union.

Or if you don't like that source: Excess mortality in the Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin - Wikipedia

Conversely, Wheatcroft states that prior to the opening of the archives for historical research, "our understanding of the scale and the nature of Soviet repression has been extremely poor" and that some specialists who wish to maintain earlier high estimates of the Stalinist death toll are "finding it difficult to adapt to the new circumstances when the archives are open and when there are plenty of irrefutable data" and instead "hang on to their old Sovietological methods with round-about calculations based on odd statements from emigres and other informants who are supposed to have superior knowledge."[77][3] British historian Michael Ellman argues that mass deaths from famines should be placed in a different category than the repression victims, mentioning that throughout Russian history famines and droughts have been a common occurrence, including the Russian famine of 1921–1922, triggered by Stalin's predecessor Vladimir Lenin's war communism policies, which killed about five million people.[78][79] He also states that famines were widespread throughout the world in the 19th and 20th centuries in countries such as China, India, Ireland, and Russia.[15] Ellman compared the behaviour of the Stalinist regime vis-à-vis the Holodomor to that of the British government (towards Ireland and India) and the G8 in contemporary times. According to Ellman, the G8 "are guilty of mass manslaughter or mass deaths from criminal negligence because of their not taking obvious measures to reduce mass deaths" and Stalin's "behaviour was no worse than that of many rulers in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries."[15]

So, in other words, even among historians, the jury is still out.

 

[Revoltingest]

The point is that if they were willing to cooperate, there would have been no famine.



Actually I have shown it to be the case, and so have you. From your own link upthread: "Many chose to slaughter their livestock rather than give them up to collective farms. In the first two months of 1930, peasants killed millions of cattle, horses, pigs, sheep and goats, with the meat and hides being consumed and bartered."

I think that pretty well settles the question of who destroyed the food and why.

In my studies of that era, I've read accounts from the peasants themselves, graphic descriptions about how they gorged themselves on as much as they could eat. Multiply this by millions, and it's easy to see why there were food shortages and famine.



Not by choice. There are those who speculate that the Soviets did it intentionally, but no one has been able to produce any hard evidence to prove this. It's all based in assumption, but without a shred of evidence.

Lies concerning the history of the Soviet Union

www.mariosousa.se

Or if you don't like that source: Excess mortality in the Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin - Wikipedia



So, in other words, even among historians, the jury is still out.

We must agree to disagree about the
victims being at fault for their starvation.

 

[Stevicus]

We must agree to disagree about the
victims being at fault for their starvation.

Very well.