First, communism is an economic theory. A very stripped down version of the theory is this: It proposes that the rich have obtained their wealth through the exploitation of workers. They justify the exploitation by “owning” the raw materials, tools, factories, land, and other apparatuses that the workers need to produce things. But without workers those things could not be converted or used to convert raw materials into goods. The theory suggests that the workers should own those things instead of the rich people. The idea is that the workers would then share amongst each other because, being of the same class, they are naturally more likely to care about the needs of the others in that class. Whatever your opinion or critique of this general idea, it is an idea not a cult.

Like all theories that have some level of popularity it has a lot of variations and sub theories. Some are more idealistic than others. These factions have a lot of history with one another a review of the Russian revolution and lead up show the kind of factionalism that exists with the movement. If you study revolutions you know that this is common.

Second, people have used virtually any ideal to justify atrocities. We should not throw out an idea only because someone somewhere used it to justify violence.

Third dogma is a problem. It is used in communist communities in the same way that it is used in the Catholic Church, to try and prevent descension. As noted above communist movements tend to have a lot of factions but the one that gains the most traction always tries to force the others into line. This is common wherever there are new ideas being implemented as policy.

This is likely why people think communism is intent on murdering its enemies. However, every revolution, Russian, French, Haitian, United States, etc. used violence and murder to achieve its goal.

Communists also say that capitalism murders people every day, and they die with a smile on their face. A pittance of a paycheck goes in their widow’s purse while they have died without realizing that they were exploited to death.

[–] btaf45@lemmy.world -1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

However, every revolution, Russian, French, Haitian, United States, etc. used violence and murder to achieve its goal.

This is a ridiculous false equivalence.

[–] Carl@lemm.ee 1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

You're right. The Bolsheviks and Haitians didn't own slaves!

[–] btaf45@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

You mean the French and Russians didn't have slavery before their revolutions. But the Bolsheviks killed millions. And they established slave labor camps for decades.

[Soviet Genocide and Mass Murder Since 1917]

https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/NOTE4.HTM

And in the French revolution, just a handful of people caused thousands of executions.

https://www.worldhistory.org/Reign_of_Terror/

[This led to the enactment of the Law of Suspects, which allowed for the arrests of between 300,000 and half a million citizens nationwide. 16,594 of these 'suspects' were formally executed after a trial, while around 10,000 died in prison, and thousands more were killed in various massacres staged across France. It is estimated that the total death toll during the ten-month Reign of Terror rests anywhere between 30-50,000.]

Did you really think I couldn't back up my statement with facts? How is the Reign of Terror in France and the mass genocide in the USSR in any way "equivalent" to the American and Haitian revolutions?

[–] Carl@lemm.ee 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

That first link is pure cold warrior nonsense on par with the black book of communism. As for the second, I defer to the words of Mark Twain:

“THERE were two “Reigns of Terror,” if we would but remember it and consider it; the one wrought murder in hot passion, the other in heartless cold blood; the one lasted mere months, the other had lasted a thousand years; the one inflicted death upon ten thousand persons, the other upon a hundred millions; but our shudders are all for the “horrors” of the minor Terror, the momentary Terror, so to speak; whereas, what is the horror of swift death by the axe, compared with lifelong death from hunger, cold, insult, cruelty, and heart-break? What is swift death by lightning compared with death by slow fire at the stake? A city cemetery could contain the coffins filled by that brief Terror which we have all been so diligently taught to shiver at and mourn over; but all France could hardly contain the coffins filled by that older and real Terror—that unspeakably bitter and awful Terror which none of us has been taught to see in its vastness or pity as it deserves.”

Truthfully I support all of those revolutions as historical processes which have brought about necessary change, but the Haitians and the Russians fighting for their freedom from Slavery and Capitalism respectively are much more commendable than the Americans doing so because they didn't want to slow down their westward expansion.

[–] btaf45@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

That first link is pure cold warrior nonsense

Lenin and Stalin did more harm to socialism than any other people in the entire history of mankind. You are a 20th century fossil. Soviet genocide are well documented facts. Here you go...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excess_mortality_in_the_Soviet_Union_under_Joseph_Stalin

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gulag_Archipelago

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0967067X97000111

https://www.chinafile.com/library/nyrb-china-archive/who-killed-more-hitler-stalin-or-mao

https://news.stanford.edu/stories/2010/09/naimark-stalin-genocide-092310

https://www.reddit.com/r/history/comments/ezpp8k/how_many_people_did_stalin_actually_kill/

https://allthatsinteresting.com/how-many-people-did-stalin-kill

https://www.britannica.com/place/Soviet-Union/The-U-S-S-R-from-the-death-of-Lenin-to-the-death-of-Stalin

[–] Carl@lemm.ee 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gulag_Archipelago

literally a fiction book. You might as well cite fucking Animal Farm.

btw I'm giving your comment exactly as nuanced and in-depth a look as it deserves.

[–] shortrounddev@lemmy.world -2 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Socialism is the theory that workers should own the means of production. Communism is the theory that the workers should massacre the owners in order to get them. While socialism describes an ideal state of society, communism is explicitly a program for mass murder to achieve a much more vague definition of an ideal society. That is why, after establishing a communist state, communist governments continue to seek out and purge or murder heretics against the Marxist-Leninist state ideology (or "Mao Zedong thought"). Communism is not a theory, as dialectical materialism likes to pretend it is. At its best, communism is a political cult that attract white middle class college freshman. At its worst, communism is a state religion with all the inquisitions and mass murder and auto-genocide that comes with that.

Communism is unintelligible without perceived enemies of the working class. This was not a perversion by Lenin or Stalin; this is baked into the DNA of the writings of Marx, who dedicated a few thousand pages to misdescribing the economics of capitalism and his fantasies for mass murder, but comparatively few pages describing what the end result of that revolution looks like.

I can intellectually respect a Socialist who is convinced that the world would be better if all companies were worker coops, or if all business were regulated by state councils of proletarian soviets. I do not respect anybody claiming to be a communist in precisely the same way that I don't respect anyone claiming to be a Nazi; they are equally evil and murderous ideologies that are responsible for tens if not over a hundred million deaths throughout the 20th century. Anybody who endorses this ideology in the 21st century is as low as a fucking neo-Nazi

[–] Belgdore@lemm.ee 2 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Arguing terminology is not really that helpful here, nazis called themselves socialists. And very few countries with “democratic republic of” in their name are democratic republics.

The terms Socialism and Communism have been used interchangeably since the beginning. This move to split socialism off is both a move by some within the movement to be more palatable to liberals and a move by opposition from without to further factionalize the movement. However, many people use the terms interchangeably or use communism to differentiate themselves from capitalist liberals claiming to be socialists.

Specific subsets of communism/socialism like Marxism, Leninism, Stalinism, Maoism, vanguard theory and various other implementations of communism are violent, should be criticized and learned from.

All this is to say plenty of people claiming to be communists do not want widespread suffering or genocide. They may be willing to use force to implement their ideas, but so are the adherents of nearly every other ideology.

Nazis always want racial segregation and the of Jews. Communists want equity. Nazis want superiority.

What you are focused on is Vanguard Communism which proposes that because the workers are not yet educated enough to understand that communism is better for them, a group of communists should make a totalitarian government. That totalitarian government will then shepherd the country to total communism.

History shows that this form of communism generally falls to corruption and they never get to full on communism. The proponents of this view always blame outside influences (like the west), while conveniently ignoring that power corrupts everyone.

Cuba is often shown as an example of successful vanguard communism. However it still hasn’t fully divested the communist party of its totalitarian power, and a lot of migrants move to Florida. So, it doesn’t really meet the criteria in my eyes.

[–] shortrounddev@lemmy.world -1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Communism is an ideology about murdering capitalists. That is baked into its DNA. Maybe some western European philosophy professors came along in the 1950s and sanitized the idea for their undergrads, but the idea is and always has been about violently overthrowing capital owners. You discount Marxism, Leninism, Stalinism, Maoism, and vanguard theory, despite this covering virtually 99% of all communists who have ever lived.

Nazis want to impose a pseudoscientific system of racial hygiene and they massacred anyone who got in their way. Communists want worker ownership of the means of production and the massacred anyone who got in their way. I see no difference.

Cuba is often shown as an example of successful vanguard communism. However it still hasn’t fully divested the communist party of its totalitarian power, and a lot of migrants move to Florida. So, it doesn’t really meet the criteria in my eyes.

Cuba is an authoritarian regime which should be overthrown and replaced with a liberal democracy. It is absolutely not a success story

[–] Belgdore@lemm.ee 5 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Yeah, you have no idea what you’re talking about. Go listen to some people that don’t use PragerU talking points.

[–] VinesNFluff@pawb.social 2 points 1 day ago

And now you know why I just said "ok neolib".