Communism. Good or bad. What do you really know about Communism?

[Nobody1]

Originally Posted by bowlinggreen

I also have to point out that even once they stabilized collectivism, production was always lower than what it had been when the peasants were free to produce and sell as they pleased.

Well, let's see if I understood you correctly.

US farmers are forming cooperatives because they want to produce less output. They want to see the American people go hungry, like in the good old days of the Dust Bowl, and be as poor as their colleagues in the former Soviet Union.

I am always busy to learn.

[Mosco Vito]

Originally Posted by bowlinggreen

That's a pretty silly argument.

When Stalin was doing forced collectivization, he sent soldiers to take food away from the peasants and kulaks by force, because they resisted being integrated into the new collectivist Soviet economy. Communism feared the idea of independent farmers retaining land, and their surpluses, and engaging in capitalist behavior by selling those surpluses for what they could get. As a result, millions starved.

Stalin's policy towards peasants was not the know-how of Communists. In the late 19th century, tsarist government increased taxes to peasants and began to take out from the grain-producing areas of whole wheat bread, including that required for internal consumption. Farmers were forced to sell bread to pay their debts. The result of this policy was the great famine of 1891-1892. Peasants in Russia have been exploited always, both under tsarism and communism.
Many times the reason for the Russian famine was an ordinary crop failure.

[Nobody1]

Originally Posted by Wendigo

As for life in the DDR being so great how come so many were shot and killed at the Berlin Wall if all they were doing was trying to travel to West Berlin to bring the good news of how fantastic their lives were
A bureaucracy that was out of control where jumped up little pricks became power crazed mini-fuhrers if you did not have the right forms with you

https://thevieweast.wordpress.com/20...fe-in-the-gdr/
https://www.hdg.de/en/museum-in-der-...fe-in-the-gdr/

"How did the country function in which for 40 years a bread roll cost 5 pfennigs, but there were as good as no bananas? The country that built the highest TV tower in Germany, but did not provide enough housing to go around? That produced beautiful fairy-tale films, but forced critical artists into exile?"

http://www.spiegel.de/international/...-a-707570.html

Claiming the DDR (Democratic Republic ) was some sort of Communist Nirvana is total bollocks.

If it was such a fantastic place to live how come ordinary people were shot trying to leave.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...he_Berlin_Wall

Why were the people subject to controls as to what they could read or watch?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censor...n_East_Germany

That is true. I have not forgotten what life was like in the DDR, and it certainly was no picnic. Well maybe it was a picnic sometimes, but one without bananas. Well, maybe sometimes even with bananas, but they were carved out of wood. At least some of them. But I digress.

I can tell you from own experience that each system has very specific advantages and disadvantages. Life in the West, though with real bananas, is no picnic as well. It is only possible to improve our current system by replacing own systemic disadvantages by systemic advantages of others. Not by ignoring them.

Thesis + antithesis → synthesis. This is one of the core theorems of Marxist theory.

[Wendigo]

Originally Posted by Nobody1

That is true. I have not forgotten what life was like in the DDR, and it certainly was no picnic. Well maybe it was a picnic sometimes, but one without bananas. Well, maybe sometimes even with bananas, but they were carved out of wood. At least some of them. But I digress.

I can tell you from own experience that each system has very specific advantages and disadvantages. Life in the West, though with real bananas, is no picnic as well. It is only possible to improve our current system by replacing own systemic disadvantages by systemic advantages of others. Not by ignoring them.

Fully agree, there is no one ideal answer, each system has merits however those in charge often bastardise the systems so much that they are just empty horses.

Originally Posted by Nobody1

Thesis + antithesis → synthesis. This is one of the core theorems of Marxist theory.

Possibly so but I have no desire to read Marx or his theories. The world has moved on a lot since he died and 19th/20th century ideologies need to adapt to those changes and it's a trite phrase but maybe we need a New World Order, one that is neither Marxism nor greed powered Capitalism.

[Roubignol]

I've got a question to the American members.

Do you consider your American Amish as a collectivist community?

1) If no, why?

2) If yes, did they suffer of frequent famine in the USA?

[deepsepia]

Originally Posted by xyzde69

Collectivism has nothing to do famine.

That's a biaised argument.

It has everything to do with famine. Reality is my "bias":

The Soviet Union collectivizes: famine
China collectivizes: famine
North Korea collectivizes: famine
Cuba collectivizes: famine
Cambodia collectivizes: famine
Venezuela collectivizes: famine.

The total number of dead from this is in the tens of millions. Its an atrocity.

How much more evidence do you need?

Oh, by the way, you even have States like Poland, which never collectivized their agriculture (between '48 and 56 there were a few attempts, but they were rejected). No collectivization= no famine.

It kind of comical -- you spout ideological BS like "Famine occured during transition or because of the international division of work." These are words. Tens of millions of starved people are evidence that your notions are wrong.

The ideas you favor, when put into practice in the real world produce famine, reliably and repeatably.

Notice that countries like Russia and China have abandoned collectivism -- and guess what? Now they don't starve.

What a coincidence.

As I noted before, the fact that Venezuelans are starving is a staggering indictment of collectivism. Venezuela has the world's largest petroleum reserves, a lot of money. Yet they're starving. Meanwhile, neighboring Colombia-- much poorer in natural resources-- is getting fat. Even Mexico, poorer than Venezuela, and which has a disaster of a government and a near civil war with the Narcos, Mexico is getting fat.

In the modern world, Collectivism is about the only policy prescription that produces starvation. To find other starving people, you have to look to places with complete state failure and civil conflict-- Sudan and Somalia, for example.

Sooner or later, pretty much nation which collectivizes agriculture has to reverse their policy and permit private markets, because collectivization is a policy that reliably produces starvation, even in rich countries like Venezuela.

[bowlinggreen]

Originally Posted by Nobody1

Well, let's see if I understood you correctly.

US farmers are forming cooperatives because they want to produce less output. They want to see the American people go hungry, like in the good old days of the Dust Bowl, and be as poor as their colleagues in the former Soviet Union.

I am always busy to learn.

What makes you think an American farmer's co-op is anything like a Soviet collective farm?

The farmers pool for some things, but still own private property and the harvest from their land is theirs to dispose of as they see fit.

If you are looking for an example of American farmers banding together to fight the evil big capitalists, the Grange movement is far more appropriate:

https://www.gilderlehrman.org/conten...-movement-1875

Originally Posted by xyzde69

I've got a question to the American members.

Do you consider your American Amish as a collectivist community?

1) If no, why?

2) If yes, did they suffer of frequent famine in the USA?

The Amish are not collectivists, they simply eschew modern technology in favor of more primitive agricultural methods and a more primitive way of living in general, because their religion tells them to.

They get together for some things, like raising a barn, but that is not collectivism, it is just common sense, why not get everybody together for a couple of days to build a barn rather then have one guy spend a couple of months doing it all on his own, which would really cut into his other farm work? Then he helps out on his neighbors barns, as needed. Ditto if there is a fire, some Amish around here had a big fire and the rest of the Amish community chipped in to rebuild their house quickly. This sort of thing is seen more as "doing religiously good deeds to support the community" than collectivism. You sure won't find any atheist Amish.

They are quite serious about the way they are supposed to live according to God, and some people around here get quite annoyed at their horses and buggies sharing the same roads with automobiles.

[deepsepia]

Originally Posted by xyzde69

I've got a question to the American members.

Do you consider your American Amish as a collectivist community?

1) If no, why?

2) If yes, did they suffer of frequent famine in the USA?

The Amish are a VOLUNTARY community, just like kibbutzes in Israel. Join if you want, leave if you want.

No commissar showed up with guns and said "Comrade, your land belongs to the people, and you will now work it as they command".

People come and go from religious or social communities like the Amish or Kibbutzim as they please-- and these communities have never been more than a small percentage of the agriculture in their respective nations. Some are efficient, some not-- but no one ever suggested banning private agriculture, and indeed these communities are privately owned by the community itself, not by the State.

These communities all sell their products on markets. The state doesn't distribute oranges from Israel or milk from the Amish-- they operate as businesses, selling to other businesses. In your "theory" there are no markets; instead another commissar decides that food from collective farm A will be transported to city B-- inevitably what happens is, as in Venezuela, it sits on a railroad siding rotting, while waiting for someone to move a piece of paper from one pile to the next.

Your "theory" calls for FORCED collectivization and confiscation of all land from its owners, the allocation and distribution of food by commissars, with the threat of violence. That's what produces famine, over and over.

Here's how it works under your "theory":

Addendum to the minutes of Politburo [meeting] No. 93.

RESOLUTION OF THE COUNCIL OF PEOPLE'S COMMISSARS OF THE UKRAINIAN
SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLIC AND OF THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE
COMMUNIST PARTY (BOLSHEVIK) OF UKRAINE ON BLACKLISTING VILLAGES
THAT MALICIOUSLY SABOTAGE THE COLLECTION OF GRAIN.

In view of the shameful collapse of grain collection in the
more remote regions of Ukraine, the Council of People's
Commissars and the Central Committee call upon the oblast
executive committees and the oblast [party] committees as well as
the raion executive committees and the raion [party] committees:
to break up the sabotage of grain collection, which has been
organized by kulak and counterrevolutionary elements; to
liquidate the resistance of some of the rural communists, who in
fact have become the leaders of the sabotage; to eliminate the
passivity and complacency toward the saboteurs, incompatible with
being a party member; and to ensure, with maximum speed, full and
absolute compliance with the plan for grain collection.

The Council of People's Commissars and the Central Committee
resolve:

To place the following villages on the black list for overt
disruption of the grain collection plan and for malicious
sabotage, organized by kulak and counterrevolutionary elements:

1. village of Verbka in Pavlograd raion, Dnepropetrovsk
oblast.

...

5. village of Sviatotroitskoe in Troitsk raion, Odessa oblast.

6. village of Peski in Bashtan raion, Odessa oblast.

The following measures should be undertaken with respect to
these villages :

1. Immediate cessation of delivery of goods, complete
suspension of cooperative and state trade in the villages, and
removal of all available goods from cooperative and state stores.

2. Full prohibition of collective farm trade for both
collective farms and collective farmers, and for private farmers.

3. Cessation of any sort of credit and demand for early
repayment of credit and other financial obligations.

4. Investigation and purge of all sorts of foreign and
hostile elements from cooperative and state institutions, to be
carried out by organs of the Workers and Peasants Inspectorate.

5. Investigation and purge of collective farms in these
villages, with removal of counterrevolutionary elements and
organizers of grain collection disruption.

The Council of People's Commissars and the Central Committee
call upon all collective and private farmers who are honest and
dedicated to Soviet rule to organize all their efforts for a
merciless struggle against kulaks and their accomplices in order
to: defeat in their villages the kulak sabotage of grain
collection; fulfill honestly and conscientiously their grain
collection obligations to the Soviet authorities; and strengthen
collective farms.

[Roubignol]

Originally Posted by deepsepia

It has everything to do with famine. Reality is my "bias":

The Soviet Union collectivizes: famine
China collectivizes: famine
North Korea collectivizes: famine
Cuba collectivizes: famine
Cambodia collectivizes: famine
Venezuela collectivizes: famine.

The total number of dead from this is in the tens of millions. Its an atrocity.

How much more evidence do you need?
...

The history of famines in China and Russia always were devastating... with or without Marxism. It was a fact of bad knowledges.

Your theory is so wrong that we only need to see one fact:
In China from 1961 to 1997, the population grew from 600 millions to 1,2 billions. It doubled in 35 years.
Explain me how a Communist country starving can more than double its population in 50 years?

Chinese average longevity for men is the same as the American one. 69 years old.
But to be honest, American women get a longer life expectancy than Chinese women...

Famine have nothing to do with Marxism. It had to do with mistakes of undeducated dictators using a bad planning, but not with collectivism.

But to be sure that your informations are not taken from propaganda, I'll ask to my Czeck, Polish, Ukrainian and Yugoslavian friends if they starved in the past. Two of them are huge ennemies of Sovietism.

[Roubignol]

Originally Posted by bowlinggreen

The Amish are not collectivists, they simply eschew modern technology in favor of more primitive agricultural methods and a more primitive way of living in general, because their religion tells them to.

They get together for some things, like raising a barn, but that is not collectivism, it is just common sense, .....

They are quite serious about the way they are supposed to live according to God, and some people around here get quite annoyed at their horses and buggies sharing the same roads with automobiles.

Making several researches, I learned that they were pointed as a good model during the first petrol crisis.