East Germany - A Left Fascist State? - Page 4 - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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#14713512
mikema63 wrote:Honestly I think most people in most groups are pretty weird and out there but larger groups just have respectable looking people to be the face of the group in the media.

The difference is that people in some groups can only be weird to a certain point because they have the responsibility of government, while people in other groups have settled permanently into opposition and can be as weird as they like.
#14713772
@ Political Interest
Political Interest wrote:The DDR was ostensibly a socialist country based on Marxism-Leninism. However it was also very nationalistic. Most of the propaganda looked like something from a fascist state.

They had minimal immigration.

How did communists produce such a country?

If this theme really interests you, then it is worth while to learn the German language. For the warehouses in East-Germany still contain loads of books, that were published in the GDR, about vertually every aspect of the system. They can be bought at second-hand bookshops for a few dollars. They are the last reminders of a system, that decayed and collapsed due to its inadequacy. Besides, their publishers have translated many Russian books, especially those of Leninist ideologists. So a knowledge of German opens the Soviet (scientific) literature as well.
#14713789
Atlantis wrote:I guess you didn't read my posts. If you had, you would know that I showed by facts and arguments that virtually everything you said (poor peasants sob stories, and the like) is erroneous.

It's no my fault you decided to ignore facts.


Let's look at these you brought up just before this hysterical declaration:

Atlantis wrote:The bottom line remains that the real socialism did not work, not because of outside forces but because of internal problems. That is the hard truth every socialist today has to face.


What do you expect me to say to this heady analysis?

You off a conclusions based on no facts, with no citations, no examples, there is nothing here aside from your apparent feelings that you demand I address.

You follow this up with more feels at about the same time by pretending that all time and space ceases to exist.

Past experience clearly. Shows that the free market achieves better conditions


Yet fail to address this was gone over pages ago with no answer when it was countered that:

1. Capitalism did not work before it worked. Earlier experience with it showed that feudalism achieves better conditions. The secret as to why there was a transition from feudalism to capitalism is essential to the Marxist that accepts that the world changes. For the capitalist, who apparently suggests that there has never been and cannot be change in the world , this is a puzzle.

2. Taking some of the shittiest semi-feudal countries in the world to compare against the greatest empires the Earth has ever seen is a laughable way to pretend to have an objective experiment.

3. As per my second post on this thread, theoretical frameworks set up for this issue that you're welcome to look into. Instead, you stubbornly refuse to accept anything beyond, "The reality in which I exist is the only one possible because time and space cannot alter in any way whatsoever!"

PI is right in pointing the finger at the relation of socialism and migration as the left's greatest current contradiction.


Decky, Potemkin, and myself have addressed this a few times. I did just before this and, predictably, got no reaction. The thing is, this utopian version of capitalism that you seem to adore is the source of your problems. Somehow you imagine that socialism (which doesn't work and can never work) is so powerful and efficient that it is bringing in cheap labour for you to compete with for no apparent reason at all.

The fact is, as I've tried to explain in three different ways in this thread, is that capitalism will always maximize its profits.

Cheap labour is always going to help them do this.

The system you're defending with such dedicated feelings is the system that is creating the problems you dislike. In order to reconcile your emotional love of the free market with your irrational hatred of immigrants, you blame some imaginary socialists promoting a system you don't even believe can work, that must be something-something. This, then, becomes the, "fact," you peddle.

I'll try to dumb this down even further, since even the way I'd explain this to a child went over the heads of rightwingers:

If you have trouble with this, consult a previous post when I had to explain to one of your ideological friends what an example was.

1. Billy wants to open a lemonade stand. He wants to charge a dollar per glass, and doesn't want to mix the lemonade, so he asks Suzie to do it in exchange for twenty-five cents. Billy gets to keep seventy-five cents.

2. Paco, who lived down the street, came up and asked Billy if he could do the same job that Suzy was doing for five cents. Because of THE POWER OF THE FREE MARKET, Billy accepts this. Suzie is now out of a job.

3. Suzie now has a few options. She can have her mommy sew her a white hood that she can use to terrorize Paco and make him go away. However, this has never worked as it means that Paco's family and friends are now more desperate for money and will do the lemonade stand for two cents.

Suzie could get all the white kids on the block and try to organize in such a way that would exclude Paco and his friends, but that would ultimately do the same as having her mommy make her a white hood.

She could work with her mommy and other parents to circumvent THE POWER OF THE FREE MARKET by not allowing people from Paco's block onto their own block. But the result of this would be that Billy could just have Paco make lemonade at his house and give it to Billy to sell both on his block and Paco's block.

What solution should Suzie go for?

If you chose get onto an Internet forum and whine about how Jamal next door was reading the Communist Manifesto, you're very consistent, but have yet to even address the problem you're whining about.
#14713793
Decky wrote:So PI has noticed that he likes socialism but he self identifies as a right winger. Solution? Try and redefine socialism as left fascism so he does not have to admit that he was wrong about socialism being bad. :lol:


I like many aspects of socialism but there is a problem when most socialists in the West I have met are like this:

Image

Quite different to this:

Image

And they do not discuss building socialism but instead talk about the white power structure and privilege. How is a member of the white working class meant to relate to any of this bollocks?

I showed you those clips from East Germany and the Soviet Union. Why do our communists not look like that instead of the gentleman in the image above?

Decky wrote::roll:

Internationalism does not mean what you think it means. It has never meant a support for open borders. It means workers states helping each other out. For example the massive military aid Vietnam got to help it curb stomp the yanks or the missiles the Soviet Union gave to Cuba to defend it.

What is it with right wing people are not people able to tell the difference between liberalism and socialism? :?:

The open borders lets hold hands and teach the world to sing people are middle class liberals and have nothing to do with working class socialism today or ever. There is no contradiction as you are talking about beliefs held by two different groups not one group. We hate Liberals as much as anyone.


Would you then care to explain why the left in Western countries have always advocated for open borders? And this is nothing new. You cannot dismiss it as just a middle class infiltration. They have been doing this as far back as the 1950s.

mikema63 wrote:This is a pretty weird thread by the way. Have we finally given up any logical categorization system for ideologies?


Not really. It is quite possible to discuss ideologies and explore the different ways in which they manifested in different countries. Political ideology is not a science measured in absolutes.

Stegerwald wrote:If this theme really interests you, then it is worth while to learn the German language. For the warehouses in East-Germany still contain loads of books, that were published in the GDR, about vertually every aspect of the system. They can be bought at second-hand bookshops for a few dollars. They are the last reminders of a system, that decayed and collapsed due to its inadequacy. Besides, their publishers have translated many Russian books, especially those of Leninist ideologists. So a knowledge of German opens the Soviet (scientific) literature as well.


I would like to learn German but my second language of choice is Russian.

The Immortal Goon wrote:Decky, Potemkin, and myself have addressed this a few times. I did just before this and, predictably, got no reaction. The thing is, this utopian version of capitalism that you seem to adore is the source of your problems. Somehow you imagine that socialism (which doesn't work and can never work) is so powerful and efficient that it is bringing in cheap labour for you to compete with for no apparent reason at all.

The fact is, as I've tried to explain in three different ways in this thread, is that capitalism will always maximize its profits.

Cheap labour is always going to help them do this.

The system you're defending with such dedicated feelings is the system that is creating the problems you dislike. In order to reconcile your emotional love of the free market with your irrational hatred of immigrants, you blame some imaginary socialists promoting a system you don't even believe can work, that must be something-something. This, then, becomes the, "fact," you peddle.

I'll try to dumb this down even further, since even the way I'd explain this to a child went over the heads of rightwingers:

If you have trouble with this, consult a previous post when I had to explain to one of your ideological friends what an example was.

1. Billy wants to open a lemonade stand. He wants to charge a dollar per glass, and doesn't want to mix the lemonade, so he asks Suzie to do it in exchange for twenty-five cents. Billy gets to keep seventy-five cents.

2. Paco, who lived down the street, came up and asked Billy if he could do the same job that Suzy was doing for five cents. Because of THE POWER OF THE FREE MARKET, Billy accepts this. Suzie is now out of a job.

3. Suzie now has a few options. She can have her mommy sew her a white hood that she can use to terrorize Paco and make him go away. However, this has never worked as it means that Paco's family and friends are now more desperate for money and will do the lemonade stand for two cents.

Suzie could get all the white kids on the block and try to organize in such a way that would exclude Paco and his friends, but that would ultimately do the same as having her mommy make her a white hood.

She could work with her mommy and other parents to circumvent THE POWER OF THE FREE MARKET by not allowing people from Paco's block onto their own block. But the result of this would be that Billy could just have Paco make lemonade at his house and give it to Billy to sell both on his block and Paco's block.

What solution should Suzie go for?

If you chose get onto an Internet forum and whine about how Jamal next door was reading the Communist Manifesto, you're very consistent, but have yet to even address the problem you're whining about.


The issue is not about mass immigration under capitalism. Socialists advocate it even after a socialist system has been established. They label any controls on immigration as inherently racist regardless of whether or not they happen under a market system or a socialist command economy.

And this is why I asked the question in the OP. I never saw any Warsaw Pact country have open borders like a lot of socialists I encounter advocate.

And please do not assume that concerns over immigration are born out of an irrational hatred of immigrants. The year is not 1975 anymore. There are very real reasons to have misgivings about it.
#14713858
:lol:

Have you got any actual facts rather than memes PI? You are a speaking to western communists right now and instead of listening to what we believe you are putting your fingers in your ears and inventing new beliefs for us to hold so you can argue against the imaginary ones. I am sorry that you do not like the imaginary communists in your head but I am not a psychiatrist. I can't help you with them.

Socialists are against rape and are against workers being dicked on for having the wrong head shape. People who are pro rape and pro racism will not like us sure but who cares? Who would want those people as part of our movement.

Why is it you have a problem with people who are anti rape and anti racism? That is what your meme seems to suggest.

And they do not discuss building socialism but instead talk about the white power structure and privilege.


Nothing to do with socialism and you know it. More dishonesty from you. Middle class liberal wankers talk about this.

Guess what? We do not like liberalism. We hate it more than you do. Maybe you have heard of the cold war (or maybe not, judging by this thread your knowlege of history leaves something to be desired).

It was a massive conflict between Socialism and Liberalism where millions died (Korea, Vietnam, various African wars etc). You can bitch about liberalism all you like but pretending that criticisms of liberalism have anything to do with socialism is fundamentally dishonest. You have shot down in my estimations as a poster over these lies.

Would you then care to explain why the left in Western countries have always advocated for open borders? And this is nothing new. You cannot dismiss it as just a middle class infiltration. They have been doing this as far back as the 1950s.


For a start this is not true in anyway shape or form, if you think the trade union movement in the UK has been pro immigration ever since the 50s then you are not educated enough to be in this conversation. Trade unionists marched in support of Enoch Powell for example.

More dishonesty from PI.

You are (aain) using "the left" to refer to liberalism (fuck knows why). If you are bitching about liberalism that is fine but why are you using your dislike of liberalism to try and smear socialism? They are different things.

Not really. It is quite possible to discuss ideologies and explore the different ways in which they manifested in different countries. Political ideology is not a science measured in absolutes.


You are not doing this, you are complaining about the flaws of liberal capitalism (pro immigration, hatred of working class culture etc) and pretending these flaws in Liberal capitalism are somehow proof of a problem with a totally different ideology.

The issue is not about mass immigration under capitalism. Socialists advocate it even after a socialist system has been established. They label any controls on immigration as inherently racist regardless of whether or not they happen under a market system or a socialist command economy.


Again PI, none of us are psychiatrists, we can not help you with the straw man socialists inside your head only with real existing ones.

Real existing ones are anti immigration, immigration fuckes up the counties they come from (theft of skilled workers by former colonial overlords preventing the developed world developing) and fucks up the countries they come to (for obvious reasons).

And this is why I asked the question in the OP. I never saw any Warsaw Pact country have open borders like a lot of socialists I encounter advocate.


Liberals are not socialists, you know this and I know this. And we both know why you are dishonestly pretending it is otherwise, you are propagandist. :roll:
User avatar
By Rugoz
#14713947
Political Interest wrote:And this is why I asked the question in the OP. I never saw any Warsaw Pact country have open borders like a lot of socialists I encounter advocate.


Jeez...the Soviets were ruthless assholes. Today's socialists are delusional idiots. End of debate.
#14714055
The Immortal Goon wrote:If you chose get onto an Internet forum and whine about how Jamal next door was reading the Communist Manifesto, you're very consistent, but have yet to even address the problem you're whining about.

You obviously live in a world on your own that has not relation to the real world.
#14714072
Atlantis wrote:You obviously live in a world on your own that has not relation to the real world.


How do you expect someone to take you seriously when you reply like this?

I've been laying out the problem with immigration as many ways and as simply as I can. Nobody bites on it and instead tries to throw shade based on completely irrelevant side-insults. Or memes. Or whatever.

I lay out why this is a problem that is inherent in capitalism, and that this is what needs to be addressed.

I never get facts. I never get citations. I never get any kind of feedback, or argument, or anybody disputing that this is a problem in capitalism. Simply that, for some reason, communists are the problem.

There has been no reason given as to why this is the case; why communists, who oppose capitalism which creates these problems, are some how responsible. Just whiney declarations that we should defend ourselves from accusations that make no sense at all.

Why should I take you, or any other right-winger in this thread, seriously at all?

I should just post:

Image

And get it over with.

But I'm legitimately curious as to how you can think there's been an even remotely effective discussion on your side at all.

It's as if we stormed into a capitalist subforum and then demanded to know why you all wanted all boats to sink.

Sure, sinking boats have happen for all kinds of reasons and whatever, but it doesn't matter. Some capitalists just want all boats to sink. I don't care that I can't articulate the issue further than that. Explain to me why capitalists want all boats to sink.

You could try to explain how this doesn't make any sense or whatever, or that the issues facing sinking boats have certain factors that exist in whatever time and place in history, but we'd just triumphantly say, "You clearly don't know how the world works."

What else could I possibly do to break down how immigration and capitalism are related? Or how the solutions to immigration issues that are common for capitalists are self-defeating? And that this issue has to do with broader systems than whatever pet-xenophobia or whatever ye are trying to harbour?
#14714081
Decky wrote:Liberals are not socialists, you know this and I know this. And we both know why you are dishonestly pretending it is otherwise, you are propagandist. :roll:

Corbyn seems to be both, liberal progressive (on social issues) and socialist (economically). I think in the real world this is the most common type of socialist by a large margin. An even larger number has obviously abandoned socialism completely and moved right economically, but almost all have retained their liberal progressive social policies.

Of course you can disown them all and say they aren't socialists as you understand it, but it cannot be denied that they represent the legacy of socialism in Western Europe. Somewhat ironically, the legacy of socialism in Eastern Europe seems to be the opposite: social conservatism.
#14714135
But therein lies the problem, were liberals considered communists during cold war era? I am guessing not. Was Labour party singing praise of East Germany during cold war? Obviously not, so how Decky's or other socialists position in this thread is inconsistent? Communist party of Britain was not working with liberals during cold war so why communists today should associate themselves with liberals now. These communists who are defending East Germany were not with labour party during cold war, so why should they associate themselves with labour now?

Trying to associate communists with these liberals in today's world is dishonest at best.
#14714155
In 1968 Enoch Powell broke decisively with what Leon Trotksy would call the compromisers and produced his April Thesis. When sacked by the British establishment, the vanguard of the British working class: the dockers and their more Anarchic brothers from the building sites came out on strike in support of Powell and in defence of their beloved overcrowded island being flooded with ever more immigrants. Some times I really wish I was intelligent, but I'm not. I don't understand dialectics, in the same way I could never understand Christian theology or biblical ethics. If I was intelligent I would be able to work out the effect on rent and house prices of flooding an overcrowded country with fast breeding immigrants, year after year after. But I'm not so I have no idea. So I have no idea whether it was in the material interests of British workers to oppose mass immigration.

But this is the question: did Jack Dash and fellow Communists support the striking workers or did they rush to the defence of the liberal establishment and try and undermine the resistance from the inside. Virtually every Communist party in the world, whether Stalinist, Euro, Maoist, Trotskyist, Syndicalist has consistently opposed all immigration controls. They have consistently opposed every attempt by workers and poor farmers to defend their homelands from being flooded as the Polish Communist Party in 1939 opposed resistance to the Nazi invasion, as the Norwegian Communist Party opposed resistance to the Nazi invasion in April 1940 and as the French Communist party opposed resistance to the Nazi invasion in May 1940.
#14714398
:lol:

The best that you could come up with is, "...b-b-b-but the Comintern let the Nazis overrun the West after the West turned down his proposal to crush the Nazis and tried to send them to crush the Comintern instead.

From there, you extrapolate for no reason, that all communists of any strain agreed with this.

From there, you trace this to all communists being for immigration in Britain.

You take a false statement and build upon it until you have a little conspiracy on your hands with no evidence, citations, or proof. Just the excuse, "I'm not smart enough to figure out the charges I'm making and why they don't make sense!"

Again: the immigration issue is an issue that exists within the framework of capitalism.

All of the solutions proposed by capitalists to stop capitalism will not work because: capitalism.

Turning around and blaming this on the people that oppose capitalism based on some convoluted theory you yourself have to admit that you don't understand, is beyond weak.
#14714418
fuser wrote:But therein lies the problem, were liberals considered communists during cold war era? I am guessing not. Was Labour party singing praise of East Germany during cold war? Obviously not, so how Decky's or other socialists position in this thread is inconsistent? Communist party of Britain was not working with liberals during cold war so why communists today should associate themselves with liberals now. These communists who are defending East Germany were not with labour party during cold war, so why should they associate themselves with labour now?

People and parties self-identified and were considered by others to be socialists (and sometimes communists) post-WWII. High profile names would be Jeremy Corbyn and Joschka Fischer. The vast majority of them, individuals and parties, over time moved to the right economically to varying degrees.

fuser wrote:Trying to associate communists with these liberals in today's world is dishonest at best.

There is a connections because progressive liberalism is their legacy. Their social policies just had far more traction in the real world in post-WWII Western Europe - mainly because people were doing so well economically under capitalism - and hence that's where they have left a lasting impact.
#14714467
The Immortal Goon wrote:How do you expect someone to take you seriously when you reply like this?

Since you didn't reply in substance to anything I said apart from going on a polemic rant, you can't expect me to keep on repeating what I said.

I've been laying out the problem with immigration as many ways and as simply as I can.

You have given a personal sentimental story of how you feel about immigrants. That in no way tells us how we, as a community, can address the urgent problem of migration.

I lay out why this is a problem that is inherent in capitalism, and that this is what needs to be addressed.

That is nonsense. People have always migrated. If the socialist states used fascist methods to prevent migration (shooting their own citizen at the border), that doesn't mean that people in socialist countries didn't want to emigrate, on the contrary, most desperately wanted to escape their socialist prison. The reason Germany had to hurry reunification after the fall of the iron curtain (despite economic good sense) was that East Germans were fleeing their workers’ paradise by the millions, thus threatening to virtually empty the whole country.

LoL, I can see how you solve the immigration problem with socialism. Nobody would want to come and live in a socialist country. That still doesn’t solve the emigration problem.

I never get facts. I never get citations.

The failure of the real socialism is still in the living memory of hundreds of millions of people who have suffered under socialism. They are in no mood to repeat that experiment. Hypothetical arguments are not facts. The only facts that count are the results of real socialism.

Why should I take you, or any other right-winger in this thread, seriously at all?

I'm neither right-wing nor a capitalist. Save your straw men for another occasion.

As long as you adhere to the idea of a hypothetical socialist paradise, and scorn practical ways of improving social justice, it is you who is the objective ally of the right wing.

Some capitalists just want all boats to sink. I don't care that I can't articulate the issue further than that. Explain to me why capitalists want all boats to sink.

Now you have lost me. The last I heard was that capitalists want to make money. It is left-wing revolutionaries who want the boat to sink so they can rebuild their utopia on the ruins. Can you explain to me how people can adhere to such idiotic illusions?
#14714484
The same party and people who never supported labour party but did supported East Germany during cold war era, still don't support labour but do support East Germany, I for one fail to see whats so hard understanding this simple fact and why would anyone expect them to suddenly support the liberal establishment.
#14714555
Atlantis wrote:Since you didn't reply in substance to anything I said apart from going on a polemic rant, you can't expect me to keep on repeating what I said


Oh, ignoring everything of substance that a socialist has said and chewing deliciously on flavorful nonsense is here for the world to see.

Atlantis wrote:You have given a personal sentimental story of how you feel about immigrants. That in no way tells us how we, as a community, can address the urgent problem of migration.


For the sixth time, migration in capitalism has various self-defeating solutions that are advocated by capitalists:

1. Exclude migrants from the work force. This always fails as capitalism works on the premise of paying less money for more production and the excluded migrants will now work for cheaper.

2. Attempt to terrorize migrants into leaving. This always fails as capitalism works on the premise of paying less money for more production and the excluded migrants will now work for cheaper.

3. Create an Exclusion Act to ban migrants from coming it all. This always fails as capitalism works on the premise of paying less money for more production and the excluded country will now work for cheaper and their product can be shipped where it needs to go.

This has been repeated many times in history, and it still occurs today. The issue is not the migrants, but the fact that we have an economic system that is designed specifically to generate items for as cheaply as possible and sell them for as much as possible. There is no way around this if one wants to solve the migrant problem.

I don't know what you think a personal story is, but the above isn't one.

Atlantis wrote:That is nonsense. People have always migrated.


Atlantis wrote:That in no way tells us how we, as a community, can address the urgent problem of migration.


:lol:

Oh, sometimes it's an "urgent problem," when you have scary feels about it, sometimes it's something to dismissed as a simple part of the human condition because nothing ever can and has changed when you don't have scary feels.

[in relation to my accusation that your side has yet to use a fact or citation]The failure of real socialism is still in the living memory of hundreds of millions of people who have suffered under socialism.


If you need help with citations, then let someone know and I'm sure one of us would be willing to help.

I'm neither right-wing nor a capitalist. Save your straw men for another occasion.

As long as you adhere to the idea of a hypothetical socialist paradise...


The left-right system works because of degrees. Are you somehow claiming that from my perspective, as a communist, you are somehow not to my right? That you are some kind of ultra-leftist that will defend capitalism against socialism?

It is you who is the objective ally of the right wing.


:lol:

Now you have lost me. The last I heard was that capitalists want to make money. It is left-wing revolutionaries who want the boat to sink so they can rebuild their utopia on the ruins.


It was an example, not a metaphor. I can't believe that I, again, have to explain basic English mechanics.

Alright, by assigning right-wingers like you some preposterous policy (you want all boats to sink) I was comparing that to the accusation in this thread that communists all want a preposterous policy (migration within a capitalist framework to benefit capitalists).

But, as always, I feel confident I'll get a response to whatever feelings I may have hurt instead of the mechanics of what role migration plays in capitalism and what a socialist may think about it...
#14714568
The Immortal Goon wrote:But, as always, I feel confident I'll get a response to whatever feelings I may have hurt instead of the mechanics of what role migration plays in capitalism and what a socialist may think about it...

If I were to respond to all your polemics and emotionalizing, we would just end up in dirt slinging contest. So I will try to mine whatever meaning there may be hidden in your polemics and try to respond in common sense terms without any ideological codes.

You seem to think that migration is a problem caused by capitalism(?) Even if we leave aside the fact that capitalism is too vague a term to make any sense, that is hardly something that can be proven. While migration has always occurred, even prior to what can reasonably be termed capitalist period, the problem of economic migration is due to international inequality, which is due to imperialism, which in turn is an extreme form of nationalism.

Socialism didn't prevent economic migration, other than by brute force. In fact socialism even aggravated economic migration due to retarding the economic development of socialist countries. Or why do you think you have nearly a million economic migrants from the former communist republic of Poland in the UK?
#14714585
Atlantis wrote:While migration has always occurred, even prior to what can reasonably be termed capitalist period, the problem of economic migration is due to international inequality, which is due to imperialism, which in turn is an extreme form of nationalism.

How is "international inequality" due to imperialism?

Empires create wider more secure trading networks which in turn tends to increase overall wealth and spread it out, no?
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