ITT: we post stupid memes that dumb westerners believe

>it's an r/fullcommunism thread

>Agreeing with his narrative would require dismissing the narrative of the other Russians who disagree with him.
There's just as much of a problem with using his opinions of Soviet-style communism as evidence that it's bad as there is of using someone else's opinions of Soviet-style communism as evidence that it's good.

>Not saying I like the USSR terribly (since I'm an outright Tsarist), but I definitely would prefer some aspects of it to the way Russia is now
The problem I had was that you used the way that Russia is now as evidence that capitalism is bad. I came off a bit snarky cause it's late, but I think the point still stands. There's a lot of different kinds of capitalism, man. There's the conservative version of it, the social version of it, the American 'libertarian' version of it, the classical liberal version of it, so on and so forth. All these employ different amounts/kinds of regulation within capitalism and they all work to different extents. Judging capitalism in general because of the way Russia does it isn't really fair or substantive.

Oh, I'm not OP, and I agree that his argument is shit. When I defend the USSR, I try to use statistics. While I do find it interesting most Russians preferred the Soviet Union, it also needs to be stressed that Russian politics is very different from Western politics. In Russia, the liberals want to shaft everyone and the conservatives want free healthcare.

and the most powerful country on the planet is capitalist yet people still think capitalism is bad

youtube.com/watch?v=gDoIilJ-_Z0

this

Holy shit, is this satire?

Nope, it's what Stefan actually believes.

Nope, that's what ancaps believe.

They literally believe governments "spray bullets" at civilians to fund pocket protectors

They are literally this delusional.

Working better than muh authoritarianism.

> and the most powerful guy in the class is a bully yet people still think bullying is bad

>muh false equivalence
>mug zero sum game
>muh doesn't have anything to do with anything
>muh conflict theory
>mug meming with reckless abandon

How do the Pole, Hungarian, Romanians, Germans, etc feel, though? I doubt many of them want to go back to living under communism.

Russia is just a shithole, with or without communism.

it destroyed Poland forever on more levels than it's comfortable to speak of

economically, territorially, culturally, mentally...

...

>a bunch of Russian teenagers who never lived under Communism and young adults who were children during it's fall wish the country was communist again
>the country is so shitty because of the collapse created by communism and the fact an oligarchy immediately formed out of the resulting power struggle which never let actual capitalism form

Sure, let em be Communist again. We'll see if they're still singing the same tune in 20 years. I knew two Ukranians who lived under Communism, they're both dead now, cancer and old age respectively. They were pretty clear about how bad it was.

Stop shitposting.

It's the other way round: support of Communism is higher in older groups.

Communism or the exit from Communism?

Yeah nothing like old geezers with their rosy eyed nostalgia goggles and conventiently lacking memory to tell us how good it used to be.

> they are too young! they never properly lived in USSR!
> they are too old! they forgot how it was in USSR!

>rageface
>>/9gag/

But yeah more or less.
I don't trust young people and I don't trust the elderly. 19 year olds and 69 year olds are what's fucking the US and Europe so hard. I'd bet my left but the same is true for Russia.

The exit.

Fuck off.

You have an excuse for any age category. There is only one person on the whole planet who PROPERLY judge - and that's you.

Man your English is terrible, I have no idea what you meant by this.

it was bad and it got worse after

Are you describing Russia in general or just the Communist parts?

During the period of the oligarchs?

not russian

He said that you'll have an excuse for any group which disagrees with you.
Basically you'll ad hominem your way until only your opinion is left.
>Too old.
>Too young.
>Marxist.
>Feminist.
>Muslim.
>Jew.
>Woman.
etc.

>it's a communist claim the USSR was socialist when it's convenient but deny when it is not episode

Russia was really bad in the 90's but I don't think they were really worse off a few years ago before the sanctions started fucking with the economy.

This desu. Russian uncompetitive capitalism is dreadful. You need free competition not oligarchs

tell me how western magnets and corporation any better than oligarchs?
its literally the same thing, russia simply dont produce enough "value" (as long as you consider value if it sells) to have enough left for the population

IT was a disaster

> I knew two Ukranians who lived under Communism, they're both dead now, cancer and old age respectively.
>tells us how each one died
>doesn't differentiate either
?

>muh true capitalism has never been tried
>muh capitalism looks good on paper
>muh post-soviet russia isn't a real capitalist country

Nah. Russia's economy never truly recovered. Even before the sanctions, the best it could do was to surpass RSFSR (Soviet Russia) in a very few areas.

I.e. despite oil prices going through the roof, Russia economy was basically worse than 20 years ago. Moreover, economy showed signs of stagnation in 2013 (before the whole Crimea mess). So it's not all sanctions.

It's just USSR was kinda long ago and people are comparing modern Russia to the 90s, not USSR.

>>muh true capitalism has never been tried
it works better than communism in most places that aren't Russia even when it isn't "real" capitalism

Life in the USSR was actually better for everyone who wasn't in an upper income bracket, if you consider the fact that people wouldn't care about having consumer goods like in the West if they were unaware about them.

It still wouldn't have lasted. Capitalism always needs to happen before Communism. The current development in Russia based off capitalism is a requirement to continue competing with the rest of the world.

...

It gets better. There are lunatics actually claiming that it is still Communism, because there are former members of the Party (20 million people by 1989) in government.

The only good thing is that most of those lunatics live in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus (though it is somewhat justified in the latter case) and speak only Russian/Ukrainian.

Like Ukraine? Or all those *stans? And don't get me started on Iran and other states "blessed by democracy and capitalism" via forceful intervention of the West.

depends on how you define ""better""

99% of the world is capitalist
only a portion of it is considered developed

> Capitalism always needs to happen before Communism
USSR was Socialist, not Communist.

Lenin literally stated that the plan is to build Communism via "State Capitalism" (i.e. Socialism).

I never said it was communist. The USSR's command economy wasn't sufficient to eventually implement communism either.

>tips
>the guy actually lived in communist Russia and is calling you a retard
hey guess what
communism fucking sucks

>hey lets ignore all statistical or otherwise because ONE RETARD who we can't confirm anything about DISAGREED

Ok user, why don't you go live in a communist country then? Tell us how great it is while you are there.
Stupid fucking underage.

Why are there so many fucking unironical Communists on this board?

4ch has really been invaded by Reddit

you just answered your own question, it's fucking Reddit, you can't be someone who studies or practices history for a living and then defend communism, it's fucking retarded. I'm convinced people who are "communists" are either underage or not even old enough to drink in the US.

> The USSR's command economy wasn't sufficient to eventually implement communism either.
That's twisting the facts.

It is the level of technological advancement that matters, not type of economy. And I'm not persuaded that Soviet economy was incapavle of technological advancement.

Hey, not that user, but I'd go. Except there isn't any. Even Belarus went capitalist.

I researched USSR and Marxism.

I wouldn't even say unironic, they all act like they're straight off one of the meme boards like r/fullcommunism

What statistical evidence?

And a poll? Really now? 42% of Americans believe in the literal creation story taught in the Bible.

Trusting public opinion to dictate public policy is nothing but an asinine belief; especially because an opinion poll done on Russians conflates the feelings of lost Empire and world power with the economics.

Is life expectancy also fake?

>Veeky Forums before reddit invasion
Christian, Straight, Monarchist/Republic/Constitutional

>Veeky Forums after reddit invasion
Atheist, Gay, Liberal, Relativist, Marxist/Communist/Socialist

>I researched USSR and Marxism
>I still want communism
you're not that bright, are you?

> ad hominem
Yeah. Ignorance is bliss. Only dumb people doubt authorities.

>telesur as a source
Venezuelan here, KEK.
Telesur is an unabashed propaganda network set up by Chavez. I've seen some real jewels on there, like a "documentary" about how the Korean War started when evil South Korean puppet imperialists invaded the peaceful worker's state of North Korea unexpectedly.

>t is the level of technological advancement that matters, not type of economy. And I'm not persuaded that Soviet economy was incapable of technological advancement.
There isn't enough incentive for technological advancement on the scale it's seen in the USSR due to the lack of economic benefit you would get from investing resources in it. Furthermore, the thing about technological advancement is that you can't just say "we want this" and let it happen. A lot of technological advancement comes unexpectedly from developments, and as such technological advancement would require technology being developed in a very large variety of industries and fields. The USSR would not be able to achieve this variety with a command economy, that's why their military technology was so great while everything else was years behind.

>communism is doubting authority
my fucking sides

Aren't you a snowflake.

rt.com/politics/340158-most-russians-regret-ussr-has/

>rt
now this is a proofs I can get behind

>RT
>no link to the poll itself
>lower percentage want the USSR than in 2000
top kek

> Furthermore, the thing about technological advancement is that you can't just say "we want this" and let it happen.
Yes. You actually can. What economical benefit did space industry provide? None. Somebody simply said "we want this" and things happened.

And you can't pretend that Soviets had some kind of unfair advantage over USA in this aspect, like stopping all other development to improve only space industry.

> A lot of technological advancement comes unexpectedly from developments
Myth. Fundamental technological breakthroughs require immense investements. You can't unexpectedly build thermonuclear reactor that works.

Moreover, you don't seem to understand, that modern economy (even "capitalist" economy) is no longer free market. There are monopolies and huge corporations all over. The only difference between them and "command economy" of USSR is that profits go to select few, not get distributed among the population.

> everything else was years behind.
Nope. Quite a lot of stuff was cutting edge. As for electronics - even USA fell behind Japan in 80s.

>life expectancy

Okay. Let me explain as to why this is stupid and not be too mean about it, because you sound kinda young and uninformed.

The first thing you have to acknowledge is that these questions are not meant to be answered on Veeky Forums, or in internet arguments.

Why? Because you're comparing apples and oranges. Anybody that has taken one statistic from one country, compared it with another, and said its because of X, is in all likelihood wrong.

Let me explain.

When you're doing any comparison, you need to have populations of identical characteristics in order to ascertain any sort of causality.

An example would be an experiment where you examine the effects of fertilizer on apples. You take a statistically significant sample of apple trees, randomized them, assign a control and an experimental group, and pour fertilizer on your experimental group, measure their output of apples, do statistical analysis to determine if there's a different in means, and boom, you're done.

However, if you take your control group, and put them over a hill where the soil retains less moisture, you are introducing the effects of another variable into your experiment. Or worse, your control group could be orange trees, which have entirely different outputs of fruit.

Now back to your point. The Brookings paper earlier highlighted this by controlling for SES (socio economic status). However, SES is not the only set of variables influencing life expectancy. Life expectancy is influenced by things such as smoking habits, number of miles driver per capita, diet, availability of firearms, population density, and even the weather.

This is why its very difficult to ascertain causation in the social sciences. Especially when the paper didn't even have the variable "capitalism" in it.

>Yes. You actually can. What economical benefit did space industry provide? None. Somebody simply said "we want this" and things happened.
Some industries, obviously. I openly stated it was the case with military technology.
>Myth. Fundamental technological breakthroughs require immense investements. You can't unexpectedly build thermonuclear reactor that works.
Technological breakthroughs that require massive investment aren't the only kind of technology. The massive amount of different technologies made possible through the Internet for example, would not have been possible just by massively investing in a specified "Internet Technology" program.
>Moreover, you don't seem to understand, that modern economy (even "capitalist" economy) is no longer free market. There are monopolies and huge corporations all over. The only difference between them and "command economy" of USSR is that profits go to select few, not get distributed among the population.
Yes monopolies and corporations stagnate progress, although you're wrong to assume there is a monopoly in every single industry to exist, as made evident by the continuing success of many new start-ups.
>Nope. Quite a lot of stuff was cutting edge.
Apart from energy and military, what was cutting edge?
>As for electronics - even USA fell behind Japan in 80s.
Which is also a capitalist society

> because you sound kinda young and uninformed.
You are comparing Russia under Soviet rule to Russia under neocon rule.

You are stating, that population en masse is dumb: they don't accept inherent glory of Capitalism, despite all the government brainwashing and anti-Soviet propaganda.

Then you try to say "it's all too complicated for you" and copypaste some bullshit that "numbers don't matter", expecting everyone to believe that your (completely unsubstantiated) opinion is correct, instead of presenting some evidence that supports it.

Did I miss anything?

>numbers that support me are objective and shouldn't be questioned
>numbers that disagree with me are lies
top cyka

thanks for ousting yourself as young and uninformed

Most Russians who are voting pro-USSR don't give a shit about the socialist economy or Marxism. They care about clay and superpower status. In most people's minds, communism = tanks, planes and lots of red color on the world map. Not worker control of the workplace or whatever.

Also saying that Russians were better off materially under the USSR than now is downright retarded. I don't have to stand in queue for several hours to buy something other than bread and vodka, for once.

t.Russian

>You are comparing Russia under Soviet rule to Russia under neocon rule.

I was doing no such thing.

Unfortunately there's no IDs on this board.

>You are stating, that population en masse is dumb

Yes. As a rule of thumb, public opinion isn't the best way to do public policy. Public policy has to be evidence based in order to have any sort of merit.

> instead of presenting some evidence that supports it.

This is literally epistemology and experimental design 101. But your very same paper supports my points. Why did they control for SES using multiple linear regression if my points have no merits?Just compare the raw numbers across completely different populations and exclaim that X did it!

> Which is also a capitalist society
Most of the world was capitalist, you dumbfuck.

Why do you demand one semi-developed socialist state to beat all developed capitalist states in all areas?

Based Russian bro

>numbers that disagree with me
Weren't even posted. And the user here pretends that he doesn't need to post anything.

Try to keep up.

> your very same paper
What paper are you talking about?

You're acting like the USSR was cut off from the rest of the world. You really didn't get the first/second highest GDP from completely isolating yourself. The USSR was fully involved in the world economy and had access to the developments from capitalist societies. Doesn't change the fact they could not keep up in their own developments due to the reasons I stated.

>"Russians are much better off after the USSR fell"

Tell me how Russians had great live when drunkard Yeltsin had power over them?

>Russia is empirically worse off, and yet people still act as if capitalism is a good thing.

Food lines?
Blackouts?
A large wall of concrete, steel, and guns separating Russia from Europe?
Secret police whisking people away to gulags?

Is there more or less of this now?

Oh my mistake. Again, no IDs.

It was this paper cited in the thread.

brookings.edu/~/media/research/files/papers/2014/04/differential-mortality-retirement-benefits-bosworth/differential_mortality_retirement_benefits_bosworth_version_2.pdf

See the logistic regression estimates?

Also. Causation is based on consensus, and not necessarily on one paper. However, you would be hard pressed to find a paper about life expectancy that does not control for variables.

> In most people's minds, communism = tanks, planes and lots of red color on the world map. Not worker control of the workplace or whatever.
Actually, no.

But you can't prove your point, and you expect nobody can prove otherwise (not in a single post, at least). Is that correct?

> The USSR was fully involved in the world economy and had access to the developments from capitalist societies.
Are you high? Or is this bait?

Because that's an outright lie.

state access to technologies =/= state preventing importation of consumer goods

see

idiot

> Food lines?
> Blackouts?
Compared to 30 years ago? More.

Well, I didn't have blackouts in USSR and I don't have now, but rural regions are much worse when it comes to electricity.

> Secret police whisking people away
Now it's worse.

how am I an idiot? The government can get shit the people can't
don't act retarded you underage moron

> state access to technologies
West was very keen on limiting Soviets access to Western technologies. Export of senstive technologies (at some point even wire) to USSR was forbidden.

Is this really news to people here?

>this is what commies actually believe

Well, I can approximate the mental gymnastics you're going to use to prove that Russians love Marx rather than simply being nationalist revanchists and that KPRF is a communist party, so nah, you don't have to.

And were citizen run business the ones developing technology? No everything was fucking state run so it's irrelevant
And what about them stagnating in almost everything that wasn't a sensitive technology? As in shit that you could literally fucking see just by visiting their countries. It really wasn't difficult for the USSR to gain access to technologies that would have been impossible to hide from the 1st/2nd most powerful country in the world.