Just as capitalist states are “authoritarian” against working class interests, socialist states are “authoritarian” against capitalist interests.

The state is a tool for one class to oppress another. The goal of (most) communists is to transition from capitalism — where the capitalist class is in power — to a stateless, classless communist society via socialism — where the working class is in power.

Public perception of which is more “authoritarian” therefore depends on which class is currently in power and is able to manufacture consent, and that is the capitalist class in the vast majority of the world right now since the USSR’s overthrow.

• What is “Authoritarianism”?

With the USSR overthrown, virtually all mainstream media now is capitalist propaganda. And the capitalist class obviously would not want the working class to prefer a system where workers are in power.

Isn’t that generally said by countries that oppose them?

The land of the less authoritarian had race discrimination until half a century ago, right? Seeing the BLM, it seems to have a prominent role even now. So are they any better?

Most large-scale attempts at communism were managed in a centralized way top-down by force. One strong leader, usually with a cult of personality. Glorification of the military. Devaluation of individual life and emphasis on sacrifice for the common good. Suppression of dissent by violence.

You can see the parallels with fascism. I’d even argue that what we know as communism and fascism mainly differ in their approach to the economy.

On the other hand, capitalism exists and thrives in chaos. It doesn’t exclude authoritarianism - actually it tends to produce it when capitalists capture the government. But some capitalist countries manage not to slide all the way and have been keeping up some kind of freedom for decades, so it kinda works.

Because of who controls the presses in capitalist countries.

From Losurdo - A critique of the category of totalitarianism:

Nowadays we constantly hear denunciations, directed toward Islam, of ‘religious totalitarianism’ or of the ‘new totalitarian enemy that is terrorism’. The language of the Cold War has reappeared with renewed vitality, as confirmed by the warning that American Senator Joseph Lieberman has issued to Saudi Arabia: beware the seduction of Islamic totalitarianism, and do not let a ‘theological iron curtain’ separate you from the Western world.

Even though the target has changed, the denunciation of totalitarianism continues to function with perfect efficiency as an ideology of war against the enemies of the Western world. And this ideology justifies the violation of the Geneva Convention, the inhuman treatment of prisoners in Guantanamo Bay, the embargo and collective punishment inflicted upon the Iraqis and other peoples, and the further torment perpetrated against the Palestinians. The struggle against totalitarianism serves to legitimate and transfigure the total war against the ‘barbarians’ who are alien to the Western world.

From a Swedish standpoint, this is just nonsense. The Nordic countries (Sweden, Norway, Finland, Island and Denmark) are all in the top six most democratic countries in the world (according to The economist, England). These are were much socialist countries and most definitely democratic.

Then you have china, soviet and alike. Those are countries that call(ed) themself communist. I will argue that that’s however mostly used as a label to legitimate the government and to obscure what they really are, in the same manner north Korea is formaly named the democratic people’s republic of Korea (DPRK). Those countries does/did not operate as communist states the way that Marx and other political theorists imaginend them.

Wew lad but can you ever tell this is .ml.

So, thought experiment for you. What do you need to overthrow a government and oust a bunch of rich assholes from power? Well, you need power of your own, right? You need loyal comrades.

And say you actually manage it. Chances are it was tough. Some didn’t make it. But now you’re sitting on all this wealth and power. Are you just going to give it back? To who? What if someone abuses it?

You’re the one who did the work. You’re the one with a vision for the future. And now you have these loyal comrades and surely they deserve something for their sacrifices and hard work?

And so it goes.

Anyway, it’s less about Communism as a set of ideas and more about what power does to revolutionaries and how that mixes with the local culture.

Or the CIA made it all up because Mao and Stalin et al did nothing wrong. 🙄

Because mass media, manufactured consent, and regulatory capture are the “good” kind of coercion.

I see a lot of comments saying they aren’t. I’d disagree, but I agree they don’t have to be. The issue is most of the major powers in the world have opposed leftist governments anytime they show up. The ones that didn’t have a strong central power and cultural hegymony collapsed under the pressure. Any nation that had a weaker central power was either destroyed, couped, or undermined by the west.

There is nothing intrinsically authoritarian about leftism (really, I’d say it’s less authoritarian in it’s ideals), but authoritarianism is easier to hold together when outside pressures are trying to destroy you.

Because our bourgeois state propaganda and corporate media tell us that they are, because it’s in their best interest that we believe it.

some people have to be forced into being a part of a social system.

IE, there are people who would rather let others die in the streets than have their taxes raised. some people are just terrible human beings who believe ‘i got mine, fuck everyone else’ which is antithetical to socialism, and requires a heavy hand via regulation.

Because communism doesn’t work for large, heterogenous groups, so increasing amounts of coercion are used to keep the system running.

And new forms of government such as socialism are generally more succeptible to corruption as people find the new loopholes; as a government gets more corrupt, those who corrupted it seek to consolidate their power.

I think socialism can be made workable, as we examine and correct the problems with previous attempts. I don’t think communism works well for human societies, as it requires people to act better than we know they do.

Because they are. They are all very bad at social justice, probably because no matter the best intentions, humans are going to fuck it up. China isn’t even communist, it’s capitalist through and through. They have lousy worker protections, banks, housing markets, stock markets. The USSR was as expansionist and militaristic as any fascist regime, just like the current Russian one. Korea is essentially a tyrannical monarchy, no real communism to be found there. Why do you think the first ones to go up against the wall after a revolution are the true believers? Because they know it’s all gone wrong.

When you have a lot of bullets, you will never run out of targets. Or in other words, if your revolution involves killing a lot of people in the name of the people, you’re doing it wrong.

Edit: added another post that should go here, deleted the other one.

“All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others”