this post was submitted on 13 Feb 2026
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"Sorry, our motto was meant to be 'NO power to the Soviets'!" (media.piefed.social)
submitted 1 day ago by PugJesus@piefed.social to c/historymemes@piefed.social
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[–] PugJesus@piefed.social 40 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Explanation: After the October Revolution, the Bolshevik faction took power in a coup from the Russian provisional government organizing elections. One of their many slogans was "All power to the Soviets!", the Soviets being the local democratic workers' councils.

After dissolving the democratically elected socialist-supermajority national legislature that was returned by the recent elections, they opted to... forbid the Soviets from having new elections to maintain their power over the Soviets without the risk of the workers making the 'wrong' choices. And after that, they would dissolve the other parties and allow only the (single, picked) candidate of the Bolsheviks to run in the elections (almost always uncontested).

NO power to the Soviets!

[–] RmDebArc_5@feddit.org 6 points 23 hours ago* (last edited 23 hours ago) (2 children)

Do you have a good source to read more about this? I have been searching on this what feels like half an hour and the results are not saying anything on the topic or either boil down to 'Soviet=Communist dictatorship gulag 100 billion dead' or 'Your boot tastes so good comrade Stalin'

[–] PugJesus@piefed.social 5 points 19 hours ago

Sure, I have a few leftist commentaries on the matter I've cited before! Thank Marxists.org for being free and searchable, lmao, they're a darling resource.

https://www.marxists.org/archive/luxemburg/1918/russian-revolution/ch04.htm

https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/wright/1937/12/intnotes1.htm

https://www.marxists.org/archive/kollonta/1921/workers-opposition/intro.htm

[–] Vicinus@piefed.zip 4 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago)

The "Revolutions" podcast (season 10) by Mike Duncan goes into great detail about the Russian revolution.

Be for warned, the Russian revolution season is over 100 episodes (more than 50 hours). Each of the seasons start out slow, introducing the characters, setting, and background, but once it gets going it gets so good.

My recollections of the Russian revolution season was the Bolsheviks were pretty worthless and considered a joke. They kind of just succeeded because everyone else was so exhausted and apathetic by the time they tried to grab power. Also, Stalin was a Georgian bank robber.

All the seasons are good, but the first two (English and American) aren't as good. Mike was still trying to figure out how in-depth he wanted to be for the podcast and so those seasons are rather shallow. I particularly like the Mexican revolution (Zapata!).

[–] deegeese@sopuli.xyz 39 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Like how “drain the swamp” turned into bribes and ballrooms.

[–] PugJesus@piefed.social 23 points 1 day ago

tbf, that one was at least obvious from the start. The Bolsheviks didn't have a long record, so thinking they might be sincere was a much more forgivable mistake.

[–] edgemaster72@lemmy.world 6 points 23 hours ago

Drain the swamp, we got a whole new swamp coming in and we need to make room

[–] Semi_Hemi_Demigod@lemmy.world 11 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

The problem with self government is that governing Is a shitty job that people will gladly let someone do for them.

The only solution is to never have more than a dozen or so humans in the same place at the same time or you’re gonna need a government.

[–] Skullgrid@lemmy.world 9 points 1 day ago

The only solution is to never have more than a dozen or so humans in the same place at the same time or you’re gonna need a government.

try two. for someone keen on learning lessons, I fucked up understanding the amount of infrastructure necessary to keep TWO fucking people on the same page, TWICE.

[–] PugJesus@piefed.social 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

A dozen sounds a little dangerous

[–] Semi_Hemi_Demigod@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago

I mean, I wouldn’t want to be there but some people are gregarious.

[–] jcorvera@quokk.au 8 points 1 day ago

"Power to the Soviets?

No! Power to a small group of individuals over everyone else."