Split Thread What is Communism

[The Great Zaganza]

Data Point:
Israel used to be communist (Kibbutz) with close ties to the Soviet Union.
And it worked fine, economically.

 

[dann]

You know as little about the Kibbutzim as you do about about Cuba and communism.
In spite of the headline of this article, The Israeli Experiments in Voluntary Communism (Foundation for Economic Education, April 15, 2017), the article itself shows that they were actually closer to:

Utopian socialism: Related concepts (Wikipedia)
Some communities of the modern intentional community movement such as kibbutzim could be categorized as utopian socialist.

And the article's conclusion is:

An example of a voluntary communist society?
So are the Kibbutzim an example of a voluntary communist society, heeding to socialist ideals without a use of governmental force? Not exactly. Practically, they were subsidized by socialist (and less socialist) governments, and their agricultural businesses were protected by government tariffs and cheap governmental lands. But before the establishment of the state of Israel, Kibbutzim were almost an example of libertarian philosophy: settling on private soil legally purchased by a private fund, working hard to earn their living, selling their products to compete on global markets.

 

[The Great Zaganza]

don't think I said anything about Cuban communism.

 

[dann]

Sorry, you're right. I confused your post with one of Ziggurat's.

 

[John Albert]

"Communism is bad" is an opinion, not a fact.

 

[dudalb]

A stupid political and economic system that has failed miserably when ever tried at best, and has become a murder machine equal to anything in History at worst.

 

[dudalb]

"Communism is bad" is an opinion, not a fact.

An opinion backed up by a lot of facts.

 

[John Albert]

An opinion backed up by a lot of facts.

I suspect that your objection has more to do with authoritarianism, not necessarily communism per se.
.

 

[The Great Zaganza]

A stupid political and economic system that has failed miserably when ever tried at best, and has become a murder machine equal to anything in History at worst.

you don't know that, I don't know that.
When a machine is constantly sabotaged, damaged, it's input sanctioned and output boycotted might or might not work, but we won't know until we let it work without interference.

What we do know is that Capitalism will destroy itself within decades or less, and it needs regular rescuing by The State.


And no, I don't think Communism is a good system, but neither is Capitalism.

 

[Ziggurat]

"Communism is bad" is an opinion, not a fact.

True.

So is "murder is bad", and "mass starvation is bad" and "oppression is bad". Value judgements are always opinions. Some value judgements are sufficiently fundamental to my moral understanding that I'm willing to treat them as if they were facts, but you are correct, they remain opinions. That is true of all your value judgements as well.

 

[dann]

Are we playing Jeopardy! now?
OK, I'm game!

A stupid political and economic system that has failed miserably when ever tried at best, and has become a murder machine equal to anything in History at worst.

What is capitalism?

 

[dann]

Revisited:

Did you know that your buddy Che Guevara was racist? And a major homophobe too. Was he only pretending to be a communist?

And there's this brand-new YouTube video that I haven't watched yet but look forward to watching:
What Cuba Got Right About LGBTQ+ Rights (That the West Won't Tell You) (revolutionaryth0t on YouTube, June 19, 2026 – 27:40 min.)

00:00 Intro
02:41 1. Pre-revolutionary Cuba
06:06 2. Early revolution
10:19 3. The revolution within the revolution
17:18 4. The 2022 Families Code
22:25 5. Conclusion
Cuba went from viewing homosexuality as a form of bourgeois decadence to passing one of the most progressive family law codes in the world. What changed? In this video, we explore the complex history of LGBTQ+ rights in Cuba, from the repression in the early days of the revolution to the Federation of Cuban Women and the frameworks that ultimately led to the passing of the 2022 Families Code.

I've taken the time to watch the video. It's really good!

0:00–> Over the course of several decades, Cuba went from viewing homosexuality as a form of bourgeoa decadence and an infection to be contained to passing one of the most progressive family law codes in the world, which affirms marriage and gender equality for all, including trans and non-binary people. But you certainly wouldn't guess that from Western discourse, where Cuba's record on LGBTQ+ rights gets reduced to them cancelling a pride parade in 2019.

One of the things I learned was that the process of eliminating homophobia in Cuba started in the late 1970s and not, as I thought, with the film Fresa y chocolate (Wikipedia) in 1993.

13:48–> The first book published for this purpose in Cuba in 1979 was Schnabl's Man and Women in Intimacy.* Interestingly enough, the last chapter, Homosexuality in Men and Women, discussed the importance of being respectful towards people of varying orientations, explained that orientation can't be changed and has many psychosocial causes, and compared homophobes to Nazis.
The central thesis was basically that everyone deserves respect because socialism is about equal rights for all.

* El hombre y la mujer en la intimidad. (English: Man and Woman, Intimately) Havanna: Editorial Científico-Técnica, 1979 (Wikipedia)

 

[dann]

I can also recommend this video from revolutionaryth0t:

You are being primed to accept fascism (and don't even realize it) (revolutionaryth0t on YouTube, June 30, 2026 – 25:32 min.)
Why do ordinary people become fascists? More importantly, why aren't the rest of us immune to the same patterns of thinking? Fascism doesn't recruit people by promising evil - it recruits by promising meaning, stability, and someone to blame. In this video, I explore how capitalism reproduces an "us vs. them" worldview, how the far right exploits that logic by redirecting legitimate grievances toward scapegoats, and why the left has to resist reproducing the same logic if we want to build a better world rooted in genuine solidarity.
00:00 Intro
02:40 1. How capitalism generates us vs. them logic
09:58 2. How the right exploits us vs. them logic
15:43 3. Fascist brain worms but make it leftist
22:33 4. Conclusion

It's not about Cuba. In this thread, its relevance is that it helps explain why fascists don't understand communism.
Unlike the conservatives in this thread, she actually seems to have read (and not least: understood) a lot of Marx and Engels.

 

[dann]

More 'human nature'

And probably unachievable as long as Human Beings are involved.
My favorite statement on Marxism is "Nice Theory. Wrong Species".
BTW I think the same way about Libertarian Theory. Equally unrealistic.

Ah yes, the eternal, 'Alas, human nature doesn't allow it,' with which conservatives and centrists alike dismiss any and all criticism of capitalism.

I hadn't seen that revolutionaryth0t had made a whole video about the idiocy of 'human nature' as an argument.
It's great! I guess I'll have to subscribe to her channel, so I don't miss new videos.

Stop blaming human nature for capitalism (revolutionaryth0it on YouTube, Jan 28, 2026 – 31:29 min.)
✧Is capitalism REALLY human nature? | revolutionaryth0t✧
The claim that capitalism or socialism succeeds or fails because of ‘human nature’ is ahistorical and unscientific. In this video, I explain how material conditions shape behavior, why capitalism incentivizes our worst traits, and how changing the economic base changes social consciousness.
00:00 Intro
02:09 1. “Human nature is selfish” is just neoliberal cope
09:38 2. What is human nature?
13:01 3. Capitalism incentivizes our worst traits
19:24 4. Changing human nature
27:53 Conclusion

 

[theprestige]

@dann, since you seem to understand revolutionary communism so well, can you explain to us how Lenin and Mao got it so wrong? The pogroms, the purges, the gulags, the police state, the environmental and economic disasters, the mass deaths... Did they just not understand communism as well as you understand it?

 

[Ziggurat]

I hadn't seen that revolutionaryth0t had made a whole video about the idiocy of 'human nature' as an argument.
It's great!

Not really. It's incredibly shallow. And almost nothing she says is actually about human nature at all. It's mostly a rant against neoliberalism. There's no real examination of human nature, her focus is primarily on social conditioning. And while social conditioning matters a lot, she has nothing actually interesting to say about it. She says "dialectic struggle" a lot, and expects that to impress us. It doesn't. It just tells me she's read a lot of academic jargon. And she claims that socialism will encourage more pro-social behavior, but that's an un-evidenced assumption.

I also love how she's shilling product during her video. Chef's kiss.

 

[theprestige]

If human nature isn't a problem, then libertarianism would work just fine, and communism would never be necessary.

 

[The Great Zaganza]

Capitalism doesn't work without State Violence to protect it, either

 

[Ziggurat]

Capitalism doesn't work without State Violence to protect it, either

What exactly is your point? Are you claiming an equivalence between capitalism and communism?

 

[Trausti]

Capitalism doesn't work without State Violence to protect it, either

You are free under capitalism to create a co-op or organize any business enterprise as you like. But most people don't want to do that.