Why does much of the left have such a distain for the Soviet Union and China

Because the biggest part of this site are anarchists.

We don't oppose them because they weren't "Communist enough" (How ridiculous :rolleyes:) we oppose them because they were not workers states and see no reason why we should support them, as not only were China and the Soviet Union working against the interests of the revolutionary proletariat in many cases (China, also to note, supported reactionary forces globally, from South African backed butchers in Africa to The Muhajadeen) and obviously didn't pose themselves as representatives to our interests.

The Soviet Union(after a while) was just a different way for the rule of capital and the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie to organize itself. The Bourgeoisie takes many forms, strange and bizarre, but still a bourgeois dictatorship none the less.

Yeah, I suppose that insisting on the autonomous political rule of the working class as a class, as opposed to the rule of the party-state, is just part of an arsenal of the borugeois media machine dissing out cold war propaganda.
I also suppose that arguing for workers' control at the point of production, and for a diffused social planning, as opposed to one-man management, the autonomy of the enterprise, and economic administration in the form of state planning, is also something which the bourgeois media frequently support.
I suppose that insisting on free assembly and for free creation of proletarian political organizations, apart from the state and the party which fused with it, is bourgeois.
I suppose that denouncing the imeperialist foreign policy, and a resultant destruction of any kind of proletarian internationalism, is bourgeois.

You are, on the other hand, a simpleton who cannot grasp the concrete reasons why communists opposed the Soviet Union, which is probably the reason why you are drawn to create such ridiculous statements like the one of support for "provate capitalism", rationalizing this lack of ability to understand the real issues.

Also, I'd prefer to develop my understanding from the source itself - Marx, and not whichever interpretation, especially ones which are generalized as a universal road to socialism, but were in practice a result of historical contingencies of a particular time and space.


It's reasonable to assume that if workers' in the heavily industrialized countries smashed their respective bourgeois state and conquered political power as a class, things might have been much different, yes.

No one here embraces the "private capitalist systems". Again, this is a classic straw man argument, and moreover, it's a false dillemma, positing the need to support one imperialist camp over another.

self-hatred

Anyone who is ready to put the USA and USSR under a common "capitalist" category is deluded,ignorant of facts and detached from the real world and the past (and contemporary) struggles of the working class.
Just compare the USSR and today's Russia and it (should) all be clear to you.

Which facts would that be? And how would USSR figure in the contemporary struggles of the working class? As a long lost paradise?
Also, I think that anyone who concludes that the non-existence of individual capitalists (due to the nationalization of the productive facilities) is what amounts to socialism, a non-capitalist social formation, is either deluded or simply rejecting Marx's critique.

so wanting a dictatorshiüp of the proletariat and not over it is now "liberal" and wanting that the proletariat is controlling the means of production and not some party bureaucrats is also "liberal", well you have an interesting defenition of liberal it seems.

uh the evil trots are at it again:bored:. come on now china is fullblown capitalist and the soviet union was a party dictatorship over the proletariat, these are facts and these facts wont go away because of your "proletarian balls".

Where do you want to start from? The life expectancy rate,the rate of homeless people or the rate of abandoned street-children and ignored pensioners.

Even though some Russians would indeed say that,i wouldn't go that far.But facts are facts.
First we have to determine what "USSR" we're talking about anyway.Stalin's or Gorby's one?

You're arguing that the USSR was a better form of capitalism. Yes it probably was a better form of capitalism than in the west. But we're trying to end capitalism not create a better version of it.

What kind of crazy definition do you have? You support the freedom of the USSR where they prosecuted women for being late for work because they don't have child care? Where you couldn't change job without permission? And you had no union to stand up for you against the boss because the boss has the state and the unions behind them? Ignorance is strength, comrade, and freedom is slavery.

^^Good,now post sources for all these claims cmd. "rooster":

What period are you talking about?

Nove, Economic History of the USSR. He got them from the soviet court records. Are you going to dismiss this now? Do I also really need to post a source saying that the unions were incorporated into the state?

So much for being a "worker's state" let alone a socialist one.

And you seriously consider yourself a Marxist?
We're discussing the fundamental determinations of a mode of production here. How do these facts figure in such a discussion? The reality is that many capitalist countries are miles away when life expectancy, homelessness, abandoned children, and pensions are analyzed. Does this mean that the welfare states were not capitalist?
What utter rubbish.

OP, because the forum posters are mostly anarchists. Doesn't mean the majority of the left hates the USSR and/or China. Remember also that Marxism-Leninism is the only radical left idea that's actually been tried. Yes it failed but at least it was tried. I'm ready for the name-calling to begin. :cool:

That's your argument? The "unions were incorporated into a state" is the proof that it wasn't a worker's state? That doesn't make any sense.
Yes and how was the dominant mode of production in Stalin's USSR capitalist?

Tir don't be an idiot. He gave you a book called Economic History of the USSR.

Read it.

The it probably the most weakest and lamest argument I've ever heard. Marxism-Leninism is the only radical left idea that's actually been tried, and therefore--somehow--it's correct? Apart from that this evidences your ignorance of history, how does that show Marxism-Leninism is the best system, while you fully realize that it failed?!

By that logic National-Socialism is superior to radical left wing ideologies like guild socialism since at least National-Socialism has been tried, right? right? Or maybe slavery is better as it also has been tried?

The one by Penguin?