I've got a (D) relative who worked their whole life for the MIC - who gets along just fine with (R)s, curious thonk - who dropped the "I don't hate the people I just hate their government" line about China and it got me thinking.

What happened after the dissolution of the Soviet Union? Massive collapse in life expectancy and standard of living, explosion in drug abuse and alcoholism, prostitution, child abuse, well-positioned capitalists and underworld figures snapping up the people's assets for ~~pennies~~ kopeks on the ruble, just complete disaster. What the hell do they think is going to happen to one billion Chinese if the CPC is replaced with a capitalist ruling class?

And for that matter, how would your average USAian react to a Chinese saying, I don't hate the American people I just want to liberate them from their capitalist government and institute a dictatorship of the proletariat? Truly a lack of awareness and aptitude for projection that continues to stagger me.

[–] SorosFootSoldier@hexbear.net 49 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

And for that matter, how would you average USAian react to a Chinese saying, I don't hate the American people I just want to liberate them from their capitalist government and institute a dictatorship of the proletariat? Truly a lack of awareness and aptitude for projection that continues to stagger me.

That's the funny thing is that your average chud thinks China is trying to invade to do just that.

[–] mickey@hexbear.net 49 points 3 weeks ago

sicko-wistful

[–] Meh@hexbear.net 37 points 3 weeks ago

I-was-saying

[–] vovchik_ilich@hexbear.net 44 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

What happened after the dissolution of the Soviet Union?

This has actually been twisted in the west. Most people haven't even heard about this (economic violence isn't violence to libs), and the ones who heard blame it not on restoration of capitalism, but on "the crumbling of the system because communism failed". Most people call it "the collapse of the Soviet Union", not "dismantling" as you did.

[–] ThermonuclearEgg@hexbear.net 31 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (2 children)

This. It's not taught in classrooms. In fact, the teachers of their own volition teach students that "communism will never work" yet they of course didn't prepare us to explain why capitalist Russia is somehow also the bad guy again 30 years after the USSR is no more

[–] engineer@hexbear.net 21 points 3 weeks ago

You must remember that Americans are also susceptible to bigotry as well as capitalism.

[–] BadTakesHaver@hexbear.net 6 points 3 weeks ago

after the USSR collapsed, Putin changed its name back to Russia. Then that evil commie invaded Ukraine to spread communism because he hates our freedom i-love-not-thinking

[–] very_poggers_gay@hexbear.net 26 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Yup, the capitalist revolutions that defined the dissolution of the USSR were disastrous in so many respects. The cost of these revolutions was millions of premature deaths. Things like living standards, income, mortality, etc. took years/decades to recover. So much progress was lost.

It also makes you rethink a lot of young people talking about "My parents fled XYZ...". A lot of these stories are of people fleeing the devastation caused by neoliberal shock therapy and capitalist revolution in post-Soviet states.

I hope that left-libs who are on the fence about AES would be sympathetic to this framing. But lord knows that many conservatives would be excited by that history replaying again in AES like China, DPRK, Vietnam, Venezuela, etc.

[–] vovchik_ilich@hexbear.net 12 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

The cost of these revolutions was millions of premature deaths

By Paul Cockshott's estimates., the former USSR has seen 10-12 million extra deaths in the 30 years following the illegal and antidemocratic dissolution. It's really a total war scale of destruction and misery, a terrible humanitarian crisis.

A lot of these stories are of people fleeing the devastation caused by neoliberal shock therapy and capitalist revolution in post-Soviet states.

Bulgaria peaked its population with about 9mn during socialist times, nowadays they've lost a third of that and are at 6.5mn. What a wonderful way to completely hollow out multiple countries. Also millions of Poles, Czech, etc fled the misery created by capitalism. Hakim has a powerful video talking about the demographic crisis of Eastern Europe.

Libs will tell you everything about their compassion and love for poor and heroic Ukrainians, but Ukraine has been the poorest European country for 2+ decades, causing millions of premature deaths, and nobody gave a single flying fuck for the people who had to endure that. My Ukrainian coworker to this day doesn't like to eat noodles because for a period of her childhood her father was unemployed and they literally couldn't afford anything but that.

[–] mickey@hexbear.net 14 points 3 weeks ago

Oh absolutely tovarisch, I have to remind myself not to call it a collapse, failure, etc.; I am just as propagandized as the rest.

[–] BodyBySisyphus@hexbear.net 16 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

~~pennies~~ kopeks on the ruble

I know this is next-level pedantry but I can't let it go.

[–] mickey@hexbear.net 2 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Not at all, I appreciate it. I figured there was a smaller unit but I was in the true poster's mindset and wasn't going to look it up.

[–] BodyBySisyphus@hexbear.net 2 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

rat-salute-2 Understandable - post on, comrade.

[–] mickey@hexbear.net 3 points 3 weeks ago

rat-salute Also I did change it in the post since you pointed it out, even though the thread has gone inactive I think that is a useful detail I appreciated learning.

[–] Rod_Blagojevic@hexbear.net 12 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I struggle with this all the time. The disaster the boomers brought to the USSR was regularly on the evening news. I know this because I was a kid and saw them watching it. I remember it, so I assume they do, which probably isn't actually a good assumption to make. All the boomers I know are obsessed with watching the news, but I don't know why because they seem profoundly uninterested in thinking about the news. Really this is just the consequence of boiling their brains in 70 years of red scare bullshit. There's too much racism for them overcome.

[–] mickey@hexbear.net 3 points 3 weeks ago

Consuming the news but not wanting to discuss or analyze or reflect, that is a good observation. It seems almost obvious but I hadn't looked at it quite that way before. I've certainly observed and seen it discussed here how one might carefully, painstakingly have a conversation with someone like that and feel like you have made some progress, then the next day or the next time a similar story comes up, it's like they've completely had the reset button pushed.

[–] Evilsandwichman@hexbear.net 4 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

What the hell do they think is going to happen to one billion Chinese if the CPC is replaced with a capitalist ruling class?

These same people will celebrate invading countries in the global South to 'liberate' them, and then not care that our military decimated their country and we placed sanctions on them so now they're starving to death.

After the end of the Afghan occupation, there were sanctions on Afghanistan but apparently through some Asian developed system, people were able to donate funds to Afghanistan to prevent famine. The same people crying about the fate of the Afghan people under the Taliban couldn't give a damn about the Afghan people starving to death.

Then you have ghouls like Giuliani celebrating that people are starving and being forced to sell their organs in Iran because it was evidence that sanctions were working, and people were cheering

The tweet above, while probably meant in jest, is horrifyingly apropos

[–] mickey@hexbear.net 1 points 3 weeks ago

With the US forces withdrawing from Afghanistan a few events stick out to me. Missile-striking a man and IIRC his children because he was doing door to door deliveries of meals or water to people who needed aid. The attack at the Kabul airport that killed I think north of a hundred people, but all Western media talked about was ThE tHiRtEeN as they wanted to wave the bloody shirt over the service members that were killed. That also may have involved occupation forces firing into the crowd, which they definitely would want to cover up.

I remember our media class going after Brandon for pulling out, but hey!, this was already negotiated, set up under Trump 1st term, and it's good to end a 20 year occupation! Plus the ANA was collapsing and Taliban rapidly advancing territory so what even could the US and Afghan govt have done. And yeah sanctioning Afghanistan after the withdrawal is just damning people to starve.

[–] dead@hexbear.net 64 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

Almost every speaker has said that Charlie is martyr in the same way as Jesus. Is there anything more blasphemous?

[–] SorosFootSoldier@hexbear.net 37 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Is there anything more blasphemous?

I don't think so but then again I really don't follow the Christian right.

[–] LaughingLion@hexbear.net 9 points 3 weeks ago

i remember the parable of jesus questioning whether the samaritan driving his chariot was qualified for the job or not

[–] GenderIsOpSec@hexbear.net 32 points 3 weeks ago

the ai slop videos with him giving last words with all the apostles is probably pretty close

[–] SchillMenaker@hexbear.net 7 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I have genuinely thought that what is needed is a liberation theology-led crusade against American evangelicalism. Maybe the Pope can lend a few of his divisions.

[–] muad_dibber@lemmygrad.ml 30 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

The current pope ratted out several liberation-theologist priests to the argentine military junta, and got them killed.

There's a good section on him in the book Operation gladio, about both his and the vatican's role is helping the CIA crush liberation theology and get a bunch of leftist priests assassinated.

[–] SchillMenaker@hexbear.net 9 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

It was a Stalin joke, I don't actually think the Pope is going to help a whole lot.

[–] muad_dibber@lemmygrad.ml 3 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Ohhh woosh /me. That "how many divisions does the pope command" quote.

[–] SchillMenaker@hexbear.net 3 points 3 weeks ago

No worries, your reply was so excellent and scathing that I didn't want to be standing in the crossfire, lol.

[–] Evilsandwichman@hexbear.net 2 points 3 weeks ago

Conservative infiltration of the Vatican has had disastrous consequences; literally worse consequences than Stalin's infiltration into Soviet leadership

[–] smokeppb@hexbear.net 57 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

The best part about CNN is that I don't have to watch it to know that it sucks

[–] SacredExcrement@hexbear.net 28 points 3 weeks ago

It was an experience, because the gym I use has it on next to Fox

Both were absolutely glazing this open septic tank of a human being

[–] Damarcusart@hexbear.net 44 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

It's all just so fake and forced. Like I cannot really fathom why they are doing this, they clearly don't give a shit about Kirk. Seems that they were just looking for any incident to push their fascism harder and this just happened to be the one.

[–] PorkrollPosadist@hexbear.net 47 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

The crescendo of public celebrations of dead reactionaries has them spooked. It started roughly around the time Trump caught the Rona. It happened again when Rumsfeld bit it. Then again when Shinzo Abe got blasted. Then again when Kissinger bit it. It really ramped up when Brian Thompson got blasted. And then now, with Kirk. It has been the same pattern over and over again to greater and lesser extremes (less so when they die as centurions). The indefinite abandonment of political opposition out of 'respect,' completely hagiographical news coverage of the dead in spite of their well known world historical crimes, and a crack-down on any corner of social media which refuses to pretend it is a tragedy.

Way back in 2020 when Trump caught Covid we saw Rachel Maddow basically praying for his health on TV and we saw liberal corners of social media cracking down on any celebrations or merriment. The reaction and mechanisms of control have gotten more sophisticated each time after, but for anybody who can tell the difference between good and bad things, it is kind of futile. It does not demonstrate a state and propaganda apparatus that is in control of the situation. It projects desperation.

Every time they do this it like listening to landlords try to didactically explain how they are providing a valuable service to society. Just completely undeniable bullshit wrapped in the veneer of wisdom. It is insulting that they would even attempt it. It only deepens the chasm between the people and the political and media institutions doing it.

[–] glimmer_twin@hexbear.net 13 points 3 weeks ago

Even his widow doesn’t seem to really give a shit

[–] BodyBySisyphus@hexbear.net 32 points 3 weeks ago

People who came together to underplay, whitewash, and/or studiously ignore a genocide have not earned the right to celebrate the sanctity of any human life. May their own days be numbered and their names forgotten.

[–] sexywheat@hexbear.net 31 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Can we not wish harm on both?

[–] SorosFootSoldier@hexbear.net 32 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Of course you can, but this meme popped into my head as my immediate gut reaction. Death to america.

[–] miz@hexbear.net 12 points 3 weeks ago

amerikkka

[–] glimmer_twin@hexbear.net 22 points 3 weeks ago

America is so totally brain melted man. I literally can’t fathom having a state funeral level event (but with professional wrestling elements to its presentation) for a media personality/get out the vote guy.

[–] TrueStalinistPatriot@hexbear.net 6 points 3 weeks ago

Bro thinks he's so cool with that planck constant in his name (is it obvious I'm jealous?)