To quote a man whom i assume you would respect, William F. Buckley, "Quod licet bovi non licet bovi", or "What is permitted to Jove is not permitted to the cow." i.e., there is a differemnce between using certain terminology and ideas in teh service of humanitarianism and in the service of anti-humanitarianism. Yes, both the Nazis and the Communists (and may I add, teh Christians, the Liberals, teh Secular Humanists, the Hindus, the Buddhists, and most other ideologies) talked about the perfection of man. The Nazis' "utopia" however, was a dystopia, becaudse it involved racial superiorism, eternal dictatorship, and bloody war. The Bolsheviks' was an order-of-magnitude better, because at least I could agree with the ends, but it too involved bloody repression and slaughter. The Bolsheviks did not achieve pure communsim however, and tehre have been plenty of communists who set about acheiving their altogether excellent ideas through peaceful and/or humanitarian, democratic ends. Thus, to slander Communsim by laying at its door the crimes of teh Soviets, or of teh Chinese, or of teh Cambodians, is in my view invalid. Attacking Cuba, VBietnam or Nicaragua, although teh factual premises are false, is at least understandable logically in that these experminets had 10 teh broad support of world Leftists, 2) a legitimate participatory party-=state rather than a dictatorship. : What is obvious in many Third World countries, especially upon the advent of a phenomenally successful world arms industry, is the almost insurmountable obstacles toward breaking the cycle of left-right totalitarian regimes. We in the U.S. of A. are doing what we can to help, of course. One might note that, for the few that are actually successful (Costa Rica comes to mind) that capitalist development plays a significant part. thus, the preferable lifestyle of those in the South of Korea, as opposed to the North. And so on.
Capitalist development didn't play a significant part in tehd evelopment of democracy in India (teh world's largest democracy), or in Zimbabwe, or in Nepal, or in Sri Lanka, or in Nicaragua.....
: I suppose reasonable and decent people can disagree on Communism, in the same way they might have differences of opinion on Nazism. Whatever the relevance of this might be, the fact remains that both systems are pretty much both repellant, in an obvious and objective sense - perhaps with Communism getting the nod, by virtue of its acceptability and body count. Although, of course, given the former, the Communists have had more time to excel at the latter, to be fair.
Communism is only "repellent" in your subjective definition fo what counts as communsim. More slaughter and suffering has been claimed in teh name of capitalism than communism; you can claim of course, that murder is not intrinsic to capitalism, but then I can do teh same fro communism. i deny that communsim is repellent in an objective sense, because I deny that the democratic humanitarianiusm in India, Nicaragua, etc. has any connection and/or responsibility for the crimes of Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot.
: It is strange that Communists seem to be persecuted in virtually every country they appear in. The same seems to be true for serial killers. I wonder if there is a connection of some sort?
Communists are not persecuted in democracies. The US persecuted tehm only for a few years, and since then has tolerated them admirably 9with some problems...) In India they are a major player in the govbernment and came close to winning teh national leadership. You can tell a non-communist state's degree of democracy by how it treats communists.
: A few comments:
: On Nicaragua - I'm quite suprised to see you, of all people, defending the massacre of Indians.
I'm not defending it. It was wrong. However, it was 1) much exaggerated in teh western press, 2) provoked by brutal crimes committed by the Miskitos and tehir CIA patrons 3) immediately stopped, 4) far inferior to teh crimes against native populations committed by almost every otehr Ameriacan state, inclduing teh US. Ina comparative spectrum, teh Nicaraguan treatment of ethir Indians deserves guarded praise, not condemnation. reserve your condemnation for Guatemala, or Brazil, or teh US; thsoe countries can tell us what genocide is REALLY about (84% of the Brazilian Indians in 50 years, for example.)
:I suppose they had it coming.
No victim ever "has it coming". But elements of teh Miskito community did provoke teh reproisals, and bear far more responsibility than the government for deliberate crimes. They did destroy hospitals, remember. What can be more pernicious than that?
: And since I am American, I cannot be moved by the issue - although I seem to recall some pretty strident language about genocide and crimes against humanity coming from the Left of the fence, during the Great WWII. Post Pact, of course. Anything for the revolution, by all means.
I'm glad that at least you acknowledge pour own government's record of bruitality taht dwarfs any minor lapses in teh Sandinistas' otherwise spotless record.
: El Salvador - Hmm. Middle class vigilante mobs hunting down peasants. The peasants seem to be very poor. The middle class don't employ them (they're farmers), hence need not 'keep them in their place'. Nor could theft be a motive; what might they steal? Hmm. Perhaps all the ambushes, exploding gas stations, sabotaged hydroelectric dams, etc. might have had something to do with the issue.
or plain and simple hatred of nanyone who wanted a better life and saw teh FMLN as tehri ticket...
: And no, he wasn't the 'appropriate counter-measure'. Although many in El Salvador seemed to think so, staking their lives on the point.
I'm gald we agree on this....
: Indonesia - I talked to an impassioned speaker on the subject, one who claimed to have only the welfare of this poor Portuguese minority at heart. I suggested that the Americans might help them emigrate out of this war zone, at least until some settlement might be reached - it seemed the only way to avoid further depredations against these defenseless people. He was quite cool to the idea, and was rather unfriendly afterwards.
: So much for 'saving the people'. Pawns are preferable, I suppose. Especially with all that potential oil ...
Why should a persecuted group move out? They own teh place! The Indonesians should move out, not teh Timorese. And it's not just teh Timnroese, either. It's the Communists; Chinese merchants; New Guinean tribesmen; Sunda Island animists; subversive intellectuals; Bornean peasants; and so on. Up to 1.7 million victism of genocdie, not including politivcal proisoners.
: Peru - Not if the Peruvians have anything to say about it. I think that they might have had less than warm feelings towards said 'bright-eyed youths', and seem even less interested in welcoming helpful gals into the country of the Jennifer Casalo type. Of course, we call such 'bright-eyed' types terrorists in the 'States, but what do we know?
Senator Moakley spoke out on her behalf, by teh way. Her suppression represents the suppression of hope and idealism; it represnets teh messaqge that evil will be rewqarded and good punished. Anyway, lots of peasants and workers liked her; it was the bsuiness calss and teh miliatry who didn't.
: Guatemala - Still no hard data, although the 'genocide'(?) statistics seem similar to those in the Persian Gulf war. Thus, likely why the Guatemalan government won. Enough said.
Erm? 250,000 indians murdered, of which 93% were killed by teh government and rightist death squads, 35 by teh guerillas, 4% unknown.
: Communism certainly had a great deal to be ashamed of. Of course, this didn't mean that they were - members could always absolve responsibility (Mao wasn't REALLY a Communist, Stalin REALLY wasn't an associate of Lenin, Pol Pot REALLY wasn't a once friendly associate of the Vietnamese administration, and so forth)
Communsits have nothing to be ashamed of, these men were not really communsits, and repressive Communsim always represented only oen starnd within teh broad communsit idea. Should topday's Catholics feel sorry fro teh Innquisition? of course not. Nor shoudl Communism bear any ersponsibility fo the criems of Mao, Stalin, et al.
:or claim that such 'repression' actually was beneficial (thus, the defense of Iraq by local Communists during the Gulf War,
utter nonsense on teh part of the local communist, but I've ahd thsi argiuemnt before- it's illegal to be a communist in Iraq, since it si a dictatorship.
:or the persistent and insane defence of a Cuban tyrant via 'literacy rates').
1) castro is not a tyrant
2) his advances fro teh Cuban perople, inc. literacy rates, make him eminently worth defending,a nd I will defend him till the day i die.
: Incidentally, no genocide was ever perpetrated in the nam e of 'capitalism'. Capitalism implies the investment of capital, and even in Marxist rhetoric, the exploitation of a workforce. This 'exploitation', which we call employment, is fairly difficult to accomplish with a dead work force.
So? It's easy to kill up to haldf of your work force, amnd then use thsi to terrorize teh rest into submission. Or some smaller fraction. Are you denying taht teh genocides I described happened?Surely we can agree on these FACTS, even if we have different interpretations. The Congolese massacres, of up to ha;lf teh population (10 million people) were committed in teh name of capitalism- afetr all, when you ahve cheap labor, you don't lsoe much by koilling a few million. Come on, just accept taht tehy HAPPENED, taht's all....
:Indeed, until quite late in the war, when the Nazis finally freed businessmen from the severe constraints of Party machinations (as per one Mr. Speer), productivity in this apparently 'capitalist' nation suffered severely. I would suggest you refer to Richard Overy, in his book Why the Allies Won, in regards to this particular instance. Also, I seem to remember something called the NEP, and a resultant boom in Soviet Russia (no corresponding genocide, strangely). Also, the "Communism with a Chinese face" of Deng Xiao Ping, and a similar jump in economic vitality (again, no mass slaughters, as in for example that famous capitalist genocide, the Great Leap Forward). And so on.
Deng murdered plenty of Tibetans. And are youd enying teh Indonesian, Congolese, German and other massacres committed in teh name of acpitalism? your statement about "no genocide" seems indifensible.
: A side note. In high school, I defended the British in a mock trial of the American revolutionaries. I won. An Emancipation Proclamation in 1807 might not have been so bad for the 'colonies' either, so no argument here.
: At least we agree on something ...
yes, 'something"....
None.
