I wasn't referring to 30s and 70s as time periods, but the actual life expectancies. LE dropped sharply during the formation of the USSR due to civil war and WWI, and during the 30s due to famine from collectivization. After collectivization and WWII, the USSR was food secure and LE jumped sharply, combined with free Healthcare and mass housing initiatives.
Again, pre-USSR LE was far lower, and post-USSR there was another drop in LE until the last decade or so.
The US has insane growth because it managed to dodge all of the damage of WWII and export Imperialism and control over the global economy as it solidified itself as the reigning superpower. The USSR was a developing country, nowhere near as developed, and had a far more active role in WWII. Not a fair comparison, IMO.
The US has far worse housing problems even today than the USSR had. The USSR attempted to solve this problem, the US has not.
People in the USSR had far more than they had under the Tsars, and the idea that those at the top were cartoonishly wealthy is false. They didn't have luxury goods, but they had little issues with necessities.
Holding ownership in common is the only way to have a Stateless society, Private Property Rights require a state while public property does not, as the community itself enforces this.
All in all, I am not pro-USSR. I think the process of Democratic Centralism is highly flawed and not accountable to the Workers, as the Politburo sustained itself. I also think Stalin was a horrible thug, and tragedies like the Katyn Massacre should be learned from so as to never repeat them. However, it's also important to acknowledge that many parts of the USSR did work, and as such we should equally learn from where they did succeed.
My opinion is that decentralization is a fantastic thing, and is an excellent way to combat central control. However, this cannot be meaningfully achieved in a top-down system like Capitalism.
You followed an arbitrary logical chain to depict one form of Socialism, yes.
In Capitalism, the market is controlled by Capitalists, who represent a minor fraction of the population. In Socialism, the economy is controlled by everyone.
If Workers democratically and decentrally decide things, it's central planning, and not only is it central planning, it's more centralized than if they had no say whatsoever a la Capitalism?
I'm sorry, I don't subscribe to mental gymnastics like that. I prefer decentralization and democratization over letting the few control everything unopposed except by each other.
FOSS isn't a political ideology itself, no. That's like saying Mutual Aid or Worker Democracy aren't political ideologies. Technically correct, but that wasn't the point, all of those are leftist structures.
Communism is a political ideology, and I don't think it can be globally considered fringe. Perhaps in the US, but not globally.
Socialism has existed, that's what the USSR was. It was an ML Socialist state, but it failed to become a Stateless, Classless, Moneyless society. In other words, it failed to reach Communism. Communism has been attempted, but never reached. It never reached the Communist stage, so Communism itself hasn't been tried, only the ML form of Socialism.
The Soviet Union doubled life expectancy from the mid 30s to the mid 70s, had constant GDP growth until it liberalized and collapsed, guaranteed free Healthcare and education, and had mass housing initiatives. It had far lower wealth inequality than before or after its existence. This is all freely available information.
Am I a USSR Stan? Fuck no, the Politburo was a corrupt mess and Stalin was a thug. However, you've completely misconstrued my argument.
I think it's fully possible to criticize Bethesda's incomplete and highly flawed game design and praise their willingness to support the modding community with great tools at the same time.
Do you consider drastically improving upon previous conditions to be a miserable failure? Ignoring that Communism has never existed, and only specific forms of Marxism-Leninism have existed, and ignoring that MLism is only a fraction of all of Communist ideology, even MLism drastically improved upon previous conditions.
I'm not even close to a tankie, but I'm genuinely curious what you mean by what you've said.
100% I actually think Starfield has the best bones, even if it has the worst meat, so to speak, so adding meat gives it a much higher ceiling in a few years time.
Oh I'm anti-Bethesda and Bethesda practices, I'm just sure it will eventually be a great game once the community steps in and fixes it. It isn't an excuse for Bethesda, but rather admiration for the modding community, and an example of why FOSS and a rejection of the profit motive is so good.
I wasn't referring to 30s and 70s as time periods, but the actual life expectancies. LE dropped sharply during the formation of the USSR due to civil war and WWI, and during the 30s due to famine from collectivization. After collectivization and WWII, the USSR was food secure and LE jumped sharply, combined with free Healthcare and mass housing initiatives.
Again, pre-USSR LE was far lower, and post-USSR there was another drop in LE until the last decade or so.
The US has insane growth because it managed to dodge all of the damage of WWII and export Imperialism and control over the global economy as it solidified itself as the reigning superpower. The USSR was a developing country, nowhere near as developed, and had a far more active role in WWII. Not a fair comparison, IMO.
The US has far worse housing problems even today than the USSR had. The USSR attempted to solve this problem, the US has not.
People in the USSR had far more than they had under the Tsars, and the idea that those at the top were cartoonishly wealthy is false. They didn't have luxury goods, but they had little issues with necessities.
Holding ownership in common is the only way to have a Stateless society, Private Property Rights require a state while public property does not, as the community itself enforces this.
All in all, I am not pro-USSR. I think the process of Democratic Centralism is highly flawed and not accountable to the Workers, as the Politburo sustained itself. I also think Stalin was a horrible thug, and tragedies like the Katyn Massacre should be learned from so as to never repeat them. However, it's also important to acknowledge that many parts of the USSR did work, and as such we should equally learn from where they did succeed.
My opinion is that decentralization is a fantastic thing, and is an excellent way to combat central control. However, this cannot be meaningfully achieved in a top-down system like Capitalism.