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[1989] [Video] Rebellion in Ceauşescu's rally
In the last days of Ceauşescu's regime, a rally of 100,000 people was held with desperation. Workers was forced to attend, threatened with being fired otherwise. But only the front line was reacting positively. In a little while, there started to be negative reactions from within really. Some days later, Ceauşescu was no more.
+ YouTube Video
2nd part: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uv7-LVFgd8U
Here's a transcript of Ceauşescu's trial: http://www.securitate.org/trial.htm
Last edited by RedWorker; 25th November 2014 at 13:59.
Ugh. This prick deserved every fucking bullet that went into his murdering carcass. The firing squad was too good for him.
"I've never read Marx's Capital, but I've got the marks of capital all over my body." -Big Bill Haywood
"...Experience declares that man is the only animal which devours his own kind, for I can apply no milder term to the governments of Europe, and to the general prey of the rich on the poor."- Thomas Jefferson
-=UTOPIA IS THE MORAL RIGHT OF HUMANITY=-
Why so? He was already deposed, what's the point of ending his life? The trial was a mere show.
User Devrim was there at the time if I remember correctly so if your looking for a first hand account of the day...
The mind is its own place, and in itself Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven. What matter where, if I be still the same, And what I should be, all but less than he Whom thunder hath made greater?
Here at least We shall be free
Yes, it's a good thing Ceausescu was overthrown by a junta of generals, who proceeded to privatise the entire economy. I'm sure the average Romanian is overjoyed at this.
That must have been an abrupt change from all the workers control they had been used to up until that point.
I always enjoy that clip, it's very ominous.
Man is but a goat in the hands of butchers
That's not the point. I ran out of cereal this morning, so let's not discuss the deformed workers' state analysis. It doesn't matter. Assume that Romania was capitalist under Ceausescu. Then what you have is one bourgeois faction overthrowing another, with significant loss of life, and the material conditions of the workers deteriorating significantly (yes, even from the low levels in Ceausescu-era Romania). In fact it would be the same as Pinochet's coup, and while I have seen quite a few people here with an unhealthy attachment to Allende, I have to admit I haven't seen one of them, not even the most hardcore "whatever Mao did we support" Maoists, support Pinochet. But Iliescu and his colleagues? Well, then it's all for FREEDOME! and DEMOCRACY!
Nobody in this thread has expressed support for Ion Iliescu...
The material conditions of workers changed as a result of the neoliberal era as well. Should I pine for the 'good old days' of the new deal? Aren't you the one constantly calling everyone else social democrats and mensheviks? One armed gang replaced another. You are of course free to pretend otherwise.
Man is but a goat in the hands of butchers
The Spart line at the time and now is that Ceauşescu and his securitate forces deserved military defense and support from revolutionaries. The line is so ludicrous that even the SL, which is not shy about taking controversial stands, refrained from publicly pronouncing it in their press. It is nice to see that 870 is finally owning the issue now, however late it may be.
Do you know if he ever posted anything about it? I would be interested in reading about it. I had never read the transcript until just now. Delusional right until the end, bad way to go yikes.
Man is but a goat in the hands of butchers
he did but he missed most of it, he just kind of wandered in on it and by the time the shit was hitting the fan he was in a bar getting drunk; http://www.revleft.com/vb/rip-nicola...288/index.html
if the chitchat awards had a category "user most suitable to have a tragicomic art house movie made of their life" he should win hands down, think he met Che too.
The mind is its own place, and in itself Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven. What matter where, if I be still the same, And what I should be, all but less than he Whom thunder hath made greater?
Here at least We shall be free
I can't help but comment that this is part of 870s tendency toward intellectual dishonesty.
If you like tyrannicide it obviously in no way means anything other than that you like seeing tyrants perish. In no way does it in and of itself mean you support the political consequences. In the same way that I would enjoy seeing Assad hung or executed, without support for Islamist rebels. Similarly, if someone posts a picture of a lynched Mussolini it in no way means they support the Christian democratic regime that followed. But now that 870 has political ('military') affinity with the cruel Romanian regime, such dishonest comments serve his position.
(and of course, the comparison with Pinochet is a false equivalence since it moved from a democracy to a dictatorship, whereas in this instance it was the opposite).
Incidentally, the economy was already 'privatised' in that it was dominated by ownership by the state, which labourers confronted as alien property.
Last edited by Tim Cornelis; 25th November 2014 at 16:57.
pew pew pew
That would have depended on the actual disposition of forces on the ground - e.g. the ICL did not back the August coup as it was obvious at that point that not even the coup leaders believed in it. But in any case, this isn't about the military defence of deformed workers' states. As I said, let us suppose that SR Romania had been capitalist. We are still left with a significant difference in how people treat the overthrow of Ceausescu and co. and how people treat the overthrow of Allende or Sankara.
Now, Skinz claims that:
And while no one has done so by name, Brandon's post was effectively an endorsement of the overthrow. (Of course, I imagine Ceausescu wouldn't have fared better in front of a revolutionary tribunal. But neither would Allende or Sankara.) I could also find quite a few posts where people describe the events of 1989-92 as "revolutions", with all that entails.Originally Posted by Skinz
So to sum up, I wasn't even talking about the deformed workers' state, the planned economy and so on; rather, I was talking about the unhealthy attachment to liberal democracy that many RL members have (many, but not all: Ethics Gradient, for example, the old bastard, is consistent in his view of Sankara and Ceausescu, and I would imagine Allende as well).
No, I said, let us assume that one armed gang did replace another. Why show such enthusiasm toward the gang that upheld liberal democracy, then? (Just as an exercise, imagine if someone had said that a bullet was too good for Allende? Although he would technically be right, but given the context it would have been obvious mealy-mouthed support for Pinochet.) As for the "neoliberal era" (which I don't think is a well-defined term at all), keep in mind the transition from more to less regulated capitalism did not mean an economic collapse, like what happened in the former Eastern Bloc. Of course, Trotskyists don't say states like Romania were DWS because the workers were better off. (I was just pointing out the material cost of the glorious transition to democracy for the workers, which would remain even if it was a case of capitalism in one form replacing capitalism in another form.)Originally Posted by Ethics Gradient
What "enthusiasm" have I shown towards anyone? The first person to bring up the liberals that replaced this shithead was you, surprise surprise. You can't even hold out for an entire thread page before you start making shit up. Where is your sock puppet account that was trying to debate me about this yesterday lol
Man is but a goat in the hands of butchers
Whereas what I actually said was:
"I was talking about the unhealthy attachment to liberal democracy that many RL members have (many, but not all: Ethics Gradient, for example, the old bastard, is consistent in his view of Sankara and Ceausescu, and I would imagine Allende as well)."
As for the last statement, I think you're seeing things.
This is you suggesting that I was showing enthusiasm for something and then using that as a jumping point for an argument, in spite of none of it, you know, happening.
This is you being disingenuous, for future reference.
Man is but a goat in the hands of butchers
The issue really is the military defence of what you call the deformed workers' states. The movement in Romania was similar in its politics to those that developed in Poland in the 1980s. The SL derided it as an attempt by the Polish workers to extract from the bureaucracy the world's largest free lunch. They also called it bourgeois in essence. That is the reason they supported the crackdown on Solidarnosc, why they support a crackdown on the Umbrella movement in Hong Kong. If they had been consistent, they would have advocated the same against the Romanian masses. They were just too afraid to show up their terrible political line by jumping onto the side of what was clearly one of the most anti-worker states in Eastern Europe, and that's saying quite a lot.
Ah labour idolatry. I guess labour and economic security are the only relevant factors for measuring quality of life.
At least they had healthcare, right?
La dialectique, peut-elle casser des briques?
As Tim points out in the above post, you can support an overthrow without necessarily supporting what replaces it.
What do you mean? When some people use the term "revolution" they often simply mean "a forcible overthrow of a government or social order." I've heard the Norman invasion of Britain referred to as a revolution before.
That might be the case but nobody in this thread has expressed any support for Ion Iliescu, and I'd hazard a guess that there as just as many people with an unhealthy attachment to the failed "socialist" states.
