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That's kind of a No True Scotsman argument... I would actually be interested to have an example of a communist regime pointed out that didn't have mass graves i

That's kind of a No True Scotsman argument... I would actually be interested to have an example of a communist regime pointed out that didn't have mass graves in their back yard somewhere; I just can't think of one.

vidarh 9y ago
And I can't think of a communist regime. Certainly none of the states you might think of have described themselves as communist.
- leereeves 9y ago
  > And I can't think of a communist regime. Certainly none of the states you might think of have described themselves as communist. The ruling parties, however, did/do. For example: the Communist Party of China or the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
  - vidarh 9y ago
    That's true, but the point is none of them have claimed to have created a communist society. They've claimed to have started building a socialist society, and they've claimed that communism was their ultimate goal. More specifically, every single one of them, as far as I'm aware, claim to base their goals on Leninism or a derivation (e.g. Maoism, Juche etc. are derived from Leninism, not directly from Marxism), which is one specific ideology that even if one accepts it as genuinely having the goal of eventually creating communism is in direct opposition to Marxism when it comes to some of the most central points of Marxist theory. E.g. Marx throughout his life repeatedly warned against trying revolution in an underdeveloped country, as he saw advanced capitalism as essential to the success of socialism, and he specifically called out Russia - a central aspect of Leninism is Lenins contortionism to try to explain away Marx' reasons for that through his idea of the "vanguard party", and his party theory (democratic centralism), which are a large part of what enabled the authoritarianism of the Bolsheviks. It became the dominant re-interpretation of Marxism after the Bolsheviks gained power, but it's still only one of dozens of ideologies that call themselves communist, and the only one that has been used as a basis for justifying any national regimes of parties calling themselves communist. If someone wanted to ban specific interpretations of Leninism (because you'll find people picking and choosing from Lenin too - e.g. a lot of his analysis in Imperialism and in State and the Revolution is benign enough; State and the Revolution to a large extent makes the case against state power for example) that are explicitly agitating for violence or anti-democratic methods, then you'd find quite a few communists and socialists who'd be perfectly happy about that - no governments have murdered more communists than ones following Lenin or Leninist derived theories. Lenin himself grabbed power in a coup (the "October revolution" was not a revolution in any reasonable sense - the Tsarist government had fallen months previously) after months of agitation for violent overthrow of the predominantly socialist/communist provisional government that was actually trying to run a democratic process. The point is people you don't like will use the same words you do - we don't swear off democracy as a bad thing because the "Democratic" Peoples Republic of Korea uses the word to describe itself, or because pretty much every one of the states you refer to run by parties describing themselves as communist also made a big point of describing their states as democratic in their constitutions. We recognize that their use does not represent our use of the word, and we look for better ways of classifying them.
geofft 9y ago
The state of Kerala in India (the home of my parents / extended family) has had a communist coalition as one of the two major parties for the last several decades, and to my knowledge has no mass graves. (The argument "oh, but they're not really communist" here strikes me as about as meaningful/relevant as the argument that the Soviet Union wasn't really communist)

vidarh 9y ago

And I can't think of a communist regime. Certainly none of the states you might think of have described themselves as communist.

leereeves 9y ago
> And I can't think of a communist regime. Certainly none of the states you might think of have described themselves as communist. The ruling parties, however, did/do. For example: the Communist Party of China or the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
- vidarh 9y ago
  That's true, but the point is none of them have claimed to have created a communist society. They've claimed to have started building a socialist society, and they've claimed that communism was their ultimate goal. More specifically, every single one of them, as far as I'm aware, claim to base their goals on Leninism or a derivation (e.g. Maoism, Juche etc. are derived from Leninism, not directly from Marxism), which is one specific ideology that even if one accepts it as genuinely having the goal of eventually creating communism is in direct opposition to Marxism when it comes to some of the most central points of Marxist theory. E.g. Marx throughout his life repeatedly warned against trying revolution in an underdeveloped country, as he saw advanced capitalism as essential to the success of socialism, and he specifically called out Russia - a central aspect of Leninism is Lenins contortionism to try to explain away Marx' reasons for that through his idea of the "vanguard party", and his party theory (democratic centralism), which are a large part of what enabled the authoritarianism of the Bolsheviks. It became the dominant re-interpretation of Marxism after the Bolsheviks gained power, but it's still only one of dozens of ideologies that call themselves communist, and the only one that has been used as a basis for justifying any national regimes of parties calling themselves communist. If someone wanted to ban specific interpretations of Leninism (because you'll find people picking and choosing from Lenin too - e.g. a lot of his analysis in Imperialism and in State and the Revolution is benign enough; State and the Revolution to a large extent makes the case against state power for example) that are explicitly agitating for violence or anti-democratic methods, then you'd find quite a few communists and socialists who'd be perfectly happy about that - no governments have murdered more communists than ones following Lenin or Leninist derived theories. Lenin himself grabbed power in a coup (the "October revolution" was not a revolution in any reasonable sense - the Tsarist government had fallen months previously) after months of agitation for violent overthrow of the predominantly socialist/communist provisional government that was actually trying to run a democratic process. The point is people you don't like will use the same words you do - we don't swear off democracy as a bad thing because the "Democratic" Peoples Republic of Korea uses the word to describe itself, or because pretty much every one of the states you refer to run by parties describing themselves as communist also made a big point of describing their states as democratic in their constitutions. We recognize that their use does not represent our use of the word, and we look for better ways of classifying them.

geofft 9y ago

The state of Kerala in India (the home of my parents / extended family) has had a communist coalition as one of the two major parties for the last several decades, and to my knowledge has no mass graves. (The argument "oh, but they're not really communist" here strikes me as about as meaningful/relevant as the argument that the Soviet Union wasn't really communist)