What argument do 'Stalinists' have?

[The Sloth]

I'm interested in this...after reading Trosty's The Revolution Betrayed, I can't help to think that Stalinists have no argument.

Do they deny Stalin's expansion of the bureaucracy after the "Lenin levy," do they deny the atrocities he committed, regardless if it was really 20 million or even a QUARTER of that number (still a huge amount of deaths)?

Any Stalinist (or, at least, anyone that understands Stalinism) on here, please answer the following:

1) WHY was the principle of "international revolution" compromised for "socialism in one country," something that is obviously impractical considering the current capitalistic internvention in socialist Europe?

2) How do you justify such a huge degree of censorship? It must be understood that, by denying free speech, the people's political expression becomes confined to whatever is acceptable to the ruling stratum. Thus, the naturally differing tendencies among classes (since 'classes' were not truly abolished) are ignored as if they do not exist.

3) Justify the 20 million

Of course there are so many others, so many more things that went wrong with Stalin's leadership, but those are just the basics.

[Salvador Allende]

I am no Stalinist, but I will try to explain these to the best of my knowledge.

1) WHY was the principle of "international revolution" compromised for "socialism in one country," something that is obviously impractical considering the current capitalistic internvention in socialist Europe?

Socialism in one country is much more practical and can secure a place for socialism to use as a base to spread through the world instead of risking collapse.

2) How do you justify such a huge degree of censorship? It must be understood that, by denying free speech, the people's political expression becomes confined to whatever is acceptable to the ruling stratum. Thus, the naturally differing tendencies among classes (since 'classes' were not truly abolished) are ignored as if they do not exist.

This is kind of described in Stalin's quote "Ideas are far more powerful than guns. We don't allow our enemies to have guns, why should we allow them to have ideas?"

3) Justify the 20 million

The 20 million are the kulaks, that is the land owners and other oppressors, one theory is that they can never accept being on an equal level with the former-oppresees and will only spread oppression. Thus, one theory to solve that is to kill them all.

*note: I am not justifying any of Koba's actions nor am I a Stalinist, I just tried to answer them as I have been given by various Stalinists.

[The Sloth]

Originally posted by Salvador [email protected] 15 2004, 03:47 AM
I am no Stalinist, but I will try to explain these to the best of my knowledge.

1) WHY was the principle of "international revolution" compromised for "socialism in one country," something that is obviously impractical considering the current capitalistic internvention in socialist Europe?

Socialism in one country is much more practical and can secure a place for socialism to use as a base to spread through the world instead of risking collapse.

2) How do you justify such a huge degree of censorship? It must be understood that, by denying free speech, the people's political expression becomes confined to whatever is acceptable to the ruling stratum. Thus, the naturally differing tendencies among classes (since 'classes' were not truly abolished) are ignored as if they do not exist.

This is kind of described in Stalin's quote "Ideas are far more powerful than guns. We don't allow our enemies to have guns, why should we allow them to have ideas?"

3) Justify the 20 million

The 20 million are the kulaks, that is the land owners and other oppressors, one theory is that they can never accept being on an equal level with the former-oppresees and will only spread oppression. Thus, one theory to solve that is to kill them all.

*note: I am not justifying any of Koba's actions nor am I a Stalinist, I just tried to answer them as I have been given by various Stalinists.
Thanks for elaborating, but I suspected those were the answers that I was going to get. It still makes no sense to me, because...

1) I don't understand how 'socialism in one country' is much more practical. Today, democratic socialism, as it exists in Europe, is obviously greatly flawed simply BECAUSE of a lack of support from nations sympathetic to socialism. Capitalist intervention ensures the socialist nation today to continue in contradictory terms: "These [modern Western and Easter European socialist nations] used their relative wealth to insure a high standard of living for their citizens - high wages and subsidized education. More importantly, these states supported strong labor movements which became central players in economic decision-making. But times have changed, and as the work economy becomes more and more internationalized, the old social-democratic model becomes harder and harder to maintain. Stiff competition from low-wage labor markets in developing countries and the constant fear that industry will move to avoid taxes and strong labor regulations has diminished the ability of nations ot launch ambitious economic reforms on their own...Social-democratic reform must happe on the international level..."

Thus, it can be said that failing socialism is mostly due to the intervention policies of capitalist nations. Also, it is important to remember that American gross domestic product is incredibly high...and the higher the gross domestic product, the higher standard of living (capitalism's failures can be seen in the fact that even with this incredible GDP, there are still communities like Fort Greene, Brownsville, etc.)

Now, imagine this capitalist intervention within the context of the early-mid USSR...not only were we NOT supporting communism, but America was also VIOLENTLY opposed to it. There were hardly any sympathizers at all, and on top of this, the only reason why the capitalist nations started their dealings with the USSR is because they felt she was no longer a threat; not living up to the maximum potential.

2) It makes no sense to kill a kulak. The USSR allowed the kulak to exist because he was PRACTICAL for the economy; he had technique, he had the farms and the necesarry tools at those critical stages of the Soviet Union's development. When Stalin no longer had any use for this kulak, he hoped to make a statement regarding his "commitment" towards "communism" (ha!) by destroying this rich farmer. Why couldn't the kulak's assets, NOT the kulak himself, been liquidated?

[elijahcraig]

There's already a thread on this about 7 pages long, which your "questions" could easily be inserted into.

[Raisa]

Originally posted by Salvador [email protected] 15 2004, 03:47 AM


This is kind of described in Stalin's quote "Ideas are far more powerful than guns. We don't allow our enemies to have guns, why should we allow them to have ideas?"

See....thats what makes Stalin an asshole. The people are his enemies.

[mEds]

stalinism wasn't even communism or marxism. he was also fairly oppressive and far too "political" as in caters to specific groups. I am against stalinism for that reason.