I'm farther to the left than anyone I know, but I don't think Communism is the answer to our problems. Rather, I hope for a future of well-regulated capitalism. I keep seeing pieces deriding the "far left" but NONE of these support their claims with a shred of evidence as to who comprise the far left or how many of those folks are anti-capitalism or, in this case, pro-communism. I can't help but think this is more about ringing alarm bells for clicks that anything else. Piker may have a lot of followers, but following him on Social Media does not mean he will lead his followers into the Abyss.
There are around 15-20,000 members of the Communist Party of America. They have a grand total of 3 elected local officials. Nobody seriously believes Communists are a significant force in American politics.
Instead the author refers to two online twitch streamers (where Right-Wing commentary abounds), a 2018 Teenage Vogue article (!) and a 1981 book as evidence for ''the return of the tankies'' as she puts it. None of which were anti-democratic as far as I'm aware.
However, there is a real current debate within the Democratic Party about whether their failure to beat Trump twice by trying to win the status quo Centrist vote (recruiting figureheads like Liz Cheney to their election campaign) needs to change. And looking at the current Democratic Party unfavorability, even in the face of Trump as President, the Democrat base is right to be concerned about where its leadership has gotten us. Because it's gotten us President Trump. Twice.
It's therefore hardly surprising that many Democrats are looking to find a more popular strategy than ''We're not Trump''. And recognizing, as the Republicans clearly have, that the Centrist Status Quo is no longer a vote winner. Disaffection with neoliberal Politics as Usual has indeed seen the Far Right make sweeping gains across the West, in lieu of a populist Left alternative. And voices are increasing for the Democrats to pay heed, and start offering truely Leftist (in American terms) popular policies.
Mamdani's win over Cuomo being cited to show that policies like rent capping, better public transport and free childcare, along with free healthcare, are actually vote winners. These are the sort of policies Young is caricaturing as 'Communist Chic', but to many of us they are looking like desperately needed basic improvements in ordinary people's lives. And hey, stop starting wars, and spending people's tax money supporting other countries who do. Outrageous eh?
This is what's actually scaring the Corporate, usually AIPAC funded Democrats currently running the party. And status quo Centrists like Young. Who will always be able to dredge the internet for outrage-inducing one-liners and incidents, without offering a balanced and unbiased assessment of what underlies the real current debate in the Democratic Party.
one word: NEOLIBERALISM. if you're focused on any other enemy you're just a partisan hack because we have 50 years of neoliberal policy on the one hand (with obligatory Dem consent) and 50 years of conservative culture wars on the other to thank for the sickening demagoguery in which we are knee-deep today.
neoliberalism (austerity, deregulation, the lobby industry, crony capitalism, corporate welfare) has utterly destroyed the American Dream in one generation, spanning the Boomers to Gen X. and as (Marxian, but not communist) critical theory points out, when a population is alienated and desperate, the authoritarian turn is inevitable (see Adorno, Arendt, Habermas or Fromm). throw in Fox News and a very potent reactionary backlash to post-1960s progressivism (AKA wokeness)--and to the nation’s first Black president, for that matter--and you have *right wing* authoritarianism.
there is no Communist movement in US politics, so technically this article should not exist, but there is a small socialist one…socialism being what MADE AMERICA GREAT in the first place (see: labor laws, public education, high taxes on the rich, public works projects, and social security…ya know, a left-wing populist platform). neoliberalism has destroyed what FDR and LBJ tried to build. but anyway /rant.
this petty, petulant Hasan Piker witch hunt / band wagon becomes fully superfluous in light of the *actual* evils we are facing: those that neoliberalism and its late stage capitalism have perpetrated on American society. as such, Never Trumper Republicans need to take a good hard look inside themselves for the answers to their sociopolitical concerns before scapegoating a marginal Twitch streamer who is simply one amongst a multitude of liberals who want justice in apartheid Israel cheaper healthcare, and a cheaper post-secondary education.
It's interesting you point the finger at neoliberalism specifically, and the common inability of Status Quo Centrists to self-critique. For Americans especially it's the water you swim in, barely noticing, and equating normal with normative - so why would you stop and question it? Why is there a need to defend it? It's just common sense, right? The alternative becomes de facto extreme and threatening.
Of course in reality that's all the more reason to self-reflect and examine your own internalized biases. Much, much more so when it results in the Far Right hate-based authoritarianism it has brought us to.
It would be refreshing to see Never Trump Republicans engage seriously with their own responsibility for the state we're in, along with the Democrat leadership, and offer some constructive alternative. Instead of throwing this type of distracting chum into the water to bait.
it's hard to take stock of your own internalized biases when you believe you are the most Objective and Reasonable person in the room. this is the problem with status quo centrists, as you call them, especially on the Right, as their enmeshment in the neoliberalism of it all gives them complete hegemonic cover on the one hand while on the other hand their Never Trumpism makes them feel superior to the poor Triple Trumper CHUDs. citing random isolated instances of extremism (like Teen Vogue) and then making an entire ideological stance out of them is faux intellectualism starting with a logical fallacy as its premise. it's like saying "racism is a big problem in the workplace" and then using the example of one DEI training curriculum that went of the rails 15 years ago as an argument against the use of DEI training in the workplace. this kind of centrist argument structure that poses as Objective and Reasonable (because, you know, you're all for criticism of the Right, but ultimately the Right is more right) is what folks need to be most wary of when sifting through the mountains of sociopolitical commentary on Substack.
We see 'bubble communities' fall into this trap all the time, and it's easy to convince yourself that Centrism is less vulnerable to bias But as you say the enmeshment with the status quo makes it a less obvious, but more likely, risk. It's a lot easier to claim non-bias when you're aligning with conservative norms, and to dismiss contrary analysis as 'extremism' and inherently untrustworthy.
This perhaps contributed to the lazy arguments and silly examples cited to support the premise of this article.
Left wing stupidity is still alive and well among some dems. Interesting is that it was the “culture wars” that scared the right wing nuts to voting a convicted felon for prez. It is what thing for the average person to not see the pattern as it is human nature to only care for themselves. However, there are many “hoity-toity” insecure folks who think they are “smarter”. In the hood, we called them “wussies”.
In reading some of the good comments below, there is hope. Thank you. 🙏
This is why it’s actually a good thing to read Marx for academic and historical reasons as an intellectual exercise rather than like its a piece of theological scripture. The man was a philosopher, political theorist, and economist attempting to analyze and explain the world around him. His theory that society is essentially a history of class struggle between those with power and resources and those without is hardly controversial or revolutionary stuff, and his evaluation of capitalism as he observed it in the 1800s and many of his predictions about how it would evolve have shown to be prescient. It’s hardly remarkable and should not be viewed as controversial that his writings inspired revolutionary movements that sought to overthrew entrenched authoritarian power and corrupt economic systems in places like Russia and Cuba. That these rulers and systems were often replaced by the revolutionaries own versions of corrupt authoritarian governments, with a class of leaders who developed personality cults and/or accumulated personal wealth and privilege of their own, and committed many crimes against their countrymen that were no different than those of the regimes they overthrew should not be ignored simply bc their “revolution” against the prior power was understandable and or justified.
Batista was a former democratically elected president of Cuba who was out of power and running for president again in 1952. He became military dictator through a coup that overthrew the sitting democratically elected government days before the election after it appeared likely that he was going to lose. He turned the country into a corrupt self enrichment scheme for himself and his cronies as he monetized the functions of government to enrich himself, sold off business assets and opportunities to private investors, including to American organized crime families, whom he gave protection and free, lawless reign over the hotels and casinos in Havana. His was a corrupt, authoritarian regime that deserved to be overthrown by Castro's forces or any other rebel movement that seized upon the opportunity, no matter what your feelings on anything that happened thereafter. Tsarist Russia was likewise a cesspool of tyranny that was basically a relic of absolute monarchial rule in Europe that deserved to be overthrown by the Russian people. That doesn’t automatically make Castro or the Bolsheviks the good guys in these events in history or justify everything they did, nor does it change the fact that Stalin was basically our ally against Germany only because he was a slightly less evil dictator than the mustache wearing Austrian man that we were all fighting against in that same moment in history. The most clear cut example of the enemy of my enemy is my friend in modern historical times without question... But he was still a murderous tyrant.
I’d imagine the global trend since 1945 would enrage the ideologues - in aggregate probably the biggest increase in human flourishing across a number of metrics, all through the combined efforts of democracies, private markets, and NGOs, all working together. Even China and Vietnam embraced markets to a certain extent to grow their economies. Must be infuriating seeing per capita incomes and standard of living rising.
Who was the American intellectual (Lincoln Steffens?) who traveled to Stalin’s Soviet Union in the 1930s, was apparently impressed, and came home to the U.S. and said: “I’ve seen the future, and it works!” I guess his visit avoided the gulag, the notorious show trials, and the horrors of collectivization in the countryside.
Just out of curiosity, how many children did the Communists murder in the USSR, China, Cambodia, etc. And, actually, you completely missed the tenor of my comment. Have you heard of irony. But you are reminding me why I seldom post.
An authoritarian is an authoritarian. Putin or Trump: no ideological purity is needed. And democracy will never deliver purity either. But college students will keep talking about purity.
How many “excess deaths” in the USSR after 1917? 20,000,000 to 1945 seems like a conservative estimate, and how many more since. Astonishing that these people are treated more respectfully than the neo-Nazis.
The Youtube was video of Madelline Albright speaking on 60 minutes admitting that the deaths of 500,000 children due to her Administation sanctions regime was "worth it".
I'd call that a fact.
If we called "sanctions" the gulag, would that make those deaths equal?
So, just for the record, Albright’s comment on 60 minutes was not her finest moment, but does it matter that subsequent investigation showed that the death estimate was a fabrication of Saddam Hussein’s government. You can check that out in the Washington Post or the LSE. So, as far as I am concerned, your premise is based on a lie, and I continue to be unconvinced that the Soviet system is no different than the US. But, you be you.
"Albright’s comment on 60 Minutes was not her finest moment"
How casually you alibi yourself, but how harshly you condemn others for far less. It reminds me of the phrase "all my friends are noble freedom fighters, all my enemies are swarthy terrorists".
"does it matter that subsequent investigation showed that the death estimate was a fabrication of Saddam Hussein’s government"
No, the "subsequent investigation" did NOT show that. The "subsequent investigation" was a PR emergency to give cover for Albright.
But even if that WAS true - and it is not - when Albright was presented with the figure by 60 Minutes, she didn't blink, she didn't deny it, she didn't offer any heartfelt sympathy for the 500,000 dead children.
She just said it was "worth it" with very, very dry eyes.
But I see you've shifted your position. Previously, it had been "communism bad, capitalism good". Now it is " I continue to be unconvinced that the Soviet system is no different than the US."
I think you can be a democratic socialist (small “ds”), even Marxist and still oppose the Stalinist bureaucratic regimes mistakenly called Communist. My main idea of a possible socialist program for the US includes a generous safety net, universal public health coverage, outright public ownership of some transport systems and shared worker and shareholder control of corporations.
I would flip this on its head a little. As Sarah often states, if there is not some kind of centrist response to a problem, the response will come from extremists.
So, if you have a sizable amount of people that do not feel they are getting a fair shake out of the current state of the market economy, you will get kooky ideas. What is that centrist response to those concerns?
How much should a retail worker get paid?
Also, if you call any one looking for some kind of economic reform a Communist, you are going to create a lot of communists.
Regarding creating communists by calling people communists: American liberals in the mid 20th century helped to create the conservative movement by labeling all of their opponents "conservative". By the time Reagan came along, he found all these disparate groups with differing concerns and ideologies who had been told for decades that they were all conservatives, which made it easy to forge them into a movement.
What you are experiencing is neo-liberalism. It's basically using the government to transfer what little wealth the poor have to the already wealthy. You can see it here in this graph:
It is a weird situation when people living in the United States, the product of wholesale genocide and imperial conquest, slag off at others for any reason at all. Americans have yet to fully come to grips with how they got where they are, and until they do, it's a better idea to keep silent. There is, it is true, no excuse for labeling Bolshevism, Stalinism, Maoism, or any other other variants that arose out of Russia and spread around the world as Marxist. They were and are distortions of Marxism, which is implicit in the label "Marxism-Leninism". It is wholly inappropriate for anyone to defend those regimes in their real history or their theoretical claims. They were and where still extant, are awful. But when people who are fat off the consequences of the American Revolution that was partly aimed at ending the restrictions on settlement west of the Appalachians, and in ending them, enabled both genocide and the revolting extension of slavery in the south, are screaming at Lenin, they need to look in the mirror.
Its not hypocrisy to claim something is bad because something else that was not mentioned and is not the current topic of discussion. In the Cold War this was a propaganda strategy called whataboutism, where one party responds to an accusation with a counter-accusation instead of offering an explanation or defense against the original accusation. This strategy was regularly used by the Soviets and their defenders against the West to avoid discussion or accountability for the initial accusation by either trying to shift the focus of discussion or by attempting to offer a justification by pointing to allegedly similar behavior, which may or may not be true or accurately characterized, but which is in any event irrelevant.
Its like responding All Lives Matter to an Black Lives Matters protest slogan. Its Patrick Bateman listing out a bunch of generic problems we should be worried about that are more important than the unrest in Sri Lanka.... Its a rhetorical device that attempts to preclude discussion of an issue by leveling an ad hominen attack against the person who brought it up... Its nothing but self-serving rationalization employed by wrongdoers to avoid discussion of their wrongdoing and the last refuge of tyrants and scoundrels.
I don't think the whatabout to the right here really works. As you note, critical race theory, the pedagogy of the oppressed, and the like, highlight some important, deep, and dark flaws in American history. But, without falling into the cartoonish rants of the MAGAs, let's also be honest: critical theory and the anti-colonialist paradigm is Marxian and it's what the kids are learning today. There's more than a grain of truth in the claim that mainstream educational institutions are suffused with Marxism.
Marxism like it recognizes that moneyed interests heavily influenced historical events? Marx analyzed the Peloponnesian war. Or, like, do you think sixth graders are being taught about seizing the means of production? I mean, the ‘one man, one vote’ principle is somewhat Marxian in that it holds that a democratic majority should control the politics of a society without regard to wealth.
Again, I hate the culture wars, and there are important insights in anti-colonialist critiques but . . . the pedagogy of the oppressed is Marxian, and this methodology is infused into mainstream academia today (I say as an academic) including not least in schools of education.
I'm curious about the idea that "the pedagogy of the oppressed is Marxian." How would this apply to the idea of protecting minorities (in the broadest sense of the word, not just racial) or the vulnerable? I don't see that as inherently communist. This is a running theme (in theory) in much of American laws and institutions, or it used to be. What is the "methodology" you're referring to? I don't understand how opposing colonialism writ large is inherently Marxist, unless Marx owns the idea of respect for the dignity of all humans.
If considering the interplay between economics and politics is always Marxian, then it is impossible to understand something like the English Civil War without some kind of ‘Marxist’ understanding because the conflict was driven by the interplay of a rising free laboring class and the traditional hierarchy. I have very limited understanding of what ‘anti Colonial critiques’ are. It strikes me as a vague preference or critique of a power structure that came into existence. Kind of like a more left sided term for ‘cultural Marxism’, which has never been defined. I cannot imagine there are a great deal of people out there that have some kind of preference for, say, the late Mughal Empire. Having said all that, we love an underdog, and a moral story, but history usually does not provide perfect examples of either.
The Puritans and Cromwell as Marxists! Hmm, not so sure about that. The German Peasant's Revolt, for sure. Decolonizing / anti-colonialist discourse has specific meaning and relates to thinkers like Paulo Freire.
Anti-colonial and decolonization movements have been a thing for 200 years before Freire published his book in 1968, at a point in time when even the post WWII decolonization wave had already largely concluded.
Heck, arguably the American Revolution was a decolonization movement by virtue of the colonial grievances listed in the Declaration, and especially those that related to the attempts by Great Britain to economically exploit by the colonists by controlling and restricting their commerce to solely benefit British financial interests, and the premise that just and legitimate government may derive its legitimate powers only from the consent of the governed. Do you contend that the American Revolution or any of the Spanish American wars of independence were Marxian? What about the decolonization waves that followed both WWI and WWII? How does the study of these events and movements or the history of any other colonial empires through their decolonization or revolutions support the notion that Marxist thought is engrained in mainstream academia today? Stop referring to decolonizing discourse in general and give us an actual, specific example.
I mean, if Freire isn’t an actual, specific example of this discourse, what is? Nobody is arguing colonialism is or was a good thing. There are reams of journal articles, books, conferences, etc on decolonization discourse. There’s even a Wikipedia entry on this for heaven’s sake: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decolonization_of_knowledge
Not that Cromwell was trying to establish a dictatorship of the Proletariat, but emerging economic forces heavily influenced the events, and, like the Bolsheviks, they both executed a monarch to institute a different form of government.
For non whites, their feelings of being oppressed or the knowledge of past oppression by white rulers is real - and in the Americas, but of Central and South America are examples of a persistent white minority that rules over indigenous, black and mixed race majorities.
The whites represent the business elite as well as the governing and educational elites. And anti-capitalist language (so socialist) language is joined to anti oppression.
I see that in folks in my town (largely hispanic) who harbor various levels of anger at white and US domination.
This explains a segment of those who admire socialism and even communism.
I'm farther to the left than anyone I know, but I don't think Communism is the answer to our problems. Rather, I hope for a future of well-regulated capitalism. I keep seeing pieces deriding the "far left" but NONE of these support their claims with a shred of evidence as to who comprise the far left or how many of those folks are anti-capitalism or, in this case, pro-communism. I can't help but think this is more about ringing alarm bells for clicks that anything else. Piker may have a lot of followers, but following him on Social Media does not mean he will lead his followers into the Abyss.
There are around 15-20,000 members of the Communist Party of America. They have a grand total of 3 elected local officials. Nobody seriously believes Communists are a significant force in American politics.
Instead the author refers to two online twitch streamers (where Right-Wing commentary abounds), a 2018 Teenage Vogue article (!) and a 1981 book as evidence for ''the return of the tankies'' as she puts it. None of which were anti-democratic as far as I'm aware.
However, there is a real current debate within the Democratic Party about whether their failure to beat Trump twice by trying to win the status quo Centrist vote (recruiting figureheads like Liz Cheney to their election campaign) needs to change. And looking at the current Democratic Party unfavorability, even in the face of Trump as President, the Democrat base is right to be concerned about where its leadership has gotten us. Because it's gotten us President Trump. Twice.
It's therefore hardly surprising that many Democrats are looking to find a more popular strategy than ''We're not Trump''. And recognizing, as the Republicans clearly have, that the Centrist Status Quo is no longer a vote winner. Disaffection with neoliberal Politics as Usual has indeed seen the Far Right make sweeping gains across the West, in lieu of a populist Left alternative. And voices are increasing for the Democrats to pay heed, and start offering truely Leftist (in American terms) popular policies.
Mamdani's win over Cuomo being cited to show that policies like rent capping, better public transport and free childcare, along with free healthcare, are actually vote winners. These are the sort of policies Young is caricaturing as 'Communist Chic', but to many of us they are looking like desperately needed basic improvements in ordinary people's lives. And hey, stop starting wars, and spending people's tax money supporting other countries who do. Outrageous eh?
This is what's actually scaring the Corporate, usually AIPAC funded Democrats currently running the party. And status quo Centrists like Young. Who will always be able to dredge the internet for outrage-inducing one-liners and incidents, without offering a balanced and unbiased assessment of what underlies the real current debate in the Democratic Party.
100% agreed, Gert!
one word: NEOLIBERALISM. if you're focused on any other enemy you're just a partisan hack because we have 50 years of neoliberal policy on the one hand (with obligatory Dem consent) and 50 years of conservative culture wars on the other to thank for the sickening demagoguery in which we are knee-deep today.
neoliberalism (austerity, deregulation, the lobby industry, crony capitalism, corporate welfare) has utterly destroyed the American Dream in one generation, spanning the Boomers to Gen X. and as (Marxian, but not communist) critical theory points out, when a population is alienated and desperate, the authoritarian turn is inevitable (see Adorno, Arendt, Habermas or Fromm). throw in Fox News and a very potent reactionary backlash to post-1960s progressivism (AKA wokeness)--and to the nation’s first Black president, for that matter--and you have *right wing* authoritarianism.
there is no Communist movement in US politics, so technically this article should not exist, but there is a small socialist one…socialism being what MADE AMERICA GREAT in the first place (see: labor laws, public education, high taxes on the rich, public works projects, and social security…ya know, a left-wing populist platform). neoliberalism has destroyed what FDR and LBJ tried to build. but anyway /rant.
this petty, petulant Hasan Piker witch hunt / band wagon becomes fully superfluous in light of the *actual* evils we are facing: those that neoliberalism and its late stage capitalism have perpetrated on American society. as such, Never Trumper Republicans need to take a good hard look inside themselves for the answers to their sociopolitical concerns before scapegoating a marginal Twitch streamer who is simply one amongst a multitude of liberals who want justice in apartheid Israel cheaper healthcare, and a cheaper post-secondary education.
You make good points, thank you.
It's interesting you point the finger at neoliberalism specifically, and the common inability of Status Quo Centrists to self-critique. For Americans especially it's the water you swim in, barely noticing, and equating normal with normative - so why would you stop and question it? Why is there a need to defend it? It's just common sense, right? The alternative becomes de facto extreme and threatening.
Of course in reality that's all the more reason to self-reflect and examine your own internalized biases. Much, much more so when it results in the Far Right hate-based authoritarianism it has brought us to.
It would be refreshing to see Never Trump Republicans engage seriously with their own responsibility for the state we're in, along with the Democrat leadership, and offer some constructive alternative. Instead of throwing this type of distracting chum into the water to bait.
I expect better of Bulwark .
it's hard to take stock of your own internalized biases when you believe you are the most Objective and Reasonable person in the room. this is the problem with status quo centrists, as you call them, especially on the Right, as their enmeshment in the neoliberalism of it all gives them complete hegemonic cover on the one hand while on the other hand their Never Trumpism makes them feel superior to the poor Triple Trumper CHUDs. citing random isolated instances of extremism (like Teen Vogue) and then making an entire ideological stance out of them is faux intellectualism starting with a logical fallacy as its premise. it's like saying "racism is a big problem in the workplace" and then using the example of one DEI training curriculum that went of the rails 15 years ago as an argument against the use of DEI training in the workplace. this kind of centrist argument structure that poses as Objective and Reasonable (because, you know, you're all for criticism of the Right, but ultimately the Right is more right) is what folks need to be most wary of when sifting through the mountains of sociopolitical commentary on Substack.
That's a very astute comment Lostcause.
We see 'bubble communities' fall into this trap all the time, and it's easy to convince yourself that Centrism is less vulnerable to bias But as you say the enmeshment with the status quo makes it a less obvious, but more likely, risk. It's a lot easier to claim non-bias when you're aligning with conservative norms, and to dismiss contrary analysis as 'extremism' and inherently untrustworthy.
This perhaps contributed to the lazy arguments and silly examples cited to support the premise of this article.
thank you Gertie. may I call you Gertie?
Of course, but I prefer Gert! :)
Thank you kindly for this great article.
Left wing stupidity is still alive and well among some dems. Interesting is that it was the “culture wars” that scared the right wing nuts to voting a convicted felon for prez. It is what thing for the average person to not see the pattern as it is human nature to only care for themselves. However, there are many “hoity-toity” insecure folks who think they are “smarter”. In the hood, we called them “wussies”.
In reading some of the good comments below, there is hope. Thank you. 🙏
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2026-04-20/why-trump-can-mock-christianity-and-get-away-with-it
I am grateful I've met few outright Communists (I know a few) but sadly the generation after mine recalls little of Communism's failures
This is why it’s actually a good thing to read Marx for academic and historical reasons as an intellectual exercise rather than like its a piece of theological scripture. The man was a philosopher, political theorist, and economist attempting to analyze and explain the world around him. His theory that society is essentially a history of class struggle between those with power and resources and those without is hardly controversial or revolutionary stuff, and his evaluation of capitalism as he observed it in the 1800s and many of his predictions about how it would evolve have shown to be prescient. It’s hardly remarkable and should not be viewed as controversial that his writings inspired revolutionary movements that sought to overthrew entrenched authoritarian power and corrupt economic systems in places like Russia and Cuba. That these rulers and systems were often replaced by the revolutionaries own versions of corrupt authoritarian governments, with a class of leaders who developed personality cults and/or accumulated personal wealth and privilege of their own, and committed many crimes against their countrymen that were no different than those of the regimes they overthrew should not be ignored simply bc their “revolution” against the prior power was understandable and or justified.
Batista was a former democratically elected president of Cuba who was out of power and running for president again in 1952. He became military dictator through a coup that overthrew the sitting democratically elected government days before the election after it appeared likely that he was going to lose. He turned the country into a corrupt self enrichment scheme for himself and his cronies as he monetized the functions of government to enrich himself, sold off business assets and opportunities to private investors, including to American organized crime families, whom he gave protection and free, lawless reign over the hotels and casinos in Havana. His was a corrupt, authoritarian regime that deserved to be overthrown by Castro's forces or any other rebel movement that seized upon the opportunity, no matter what your feelings on anything that happened thereafter. Tsarist Russia was likewise a cesspool of tyranny that was basically a relic of absolute monarchial rule in Europe that deserved to be overthrown by the Russian people. That doesn’t automatically make Castro or the Bolsheviks the good guys in these events in history or justify everything they did, nor does it change the fact that Stalin was basically our ally against Germany only because he was a slightly less evil dictator than the mustache wearing Austrian man that we were all fighting against in that same moment in history. The most clear cut example of the enemy of my enemy is my friend in modern historical times without question... But he was still a murderous tyrant.
A lot of angry tankies in the comments…
There's a lot to be angry about.
I’d imagine the global trend since 1945 would enrage the ideologues - in aggregate probably the biggest increase in human flourishing across a number of metrics, all through the combined efforts of democracies, private markets, and NGOs, all working together. Even China and Vietnam embraced markets to a certain extent to grow their economies. Must be infuriating seeing per capita incomes and standard of living rising.
Who was the American intellectual (Lincoln Steffens?) who traveled to Stalin’s Soviet Union in the 1930s, was apparently impressed, and came home to the U.S. and said: “I’ve seen the future, and it works!” I guess his visit avoided the gulag, the notorious show trials, and the horrors of collectivization in the countryside.
Yes, Lincoln Steffens, according to Google.
Just out of curiosity, how many children did the Communists murder in the USSR, China, Cambodia, etc. And, actually, you completely missed the tenor of my comment. Have you heard of irony. But you are reminding me why I seldom post.
BTW, do you live in the US?
An authoritarian is an authoritarian. Putin or Trump: no ideological purity is needed. And democracy will never deliver purity either. But college students will keep talking about purity.
How many “excess deaths” in the USSR after 1917? 20,000,000 to 1945 seems like a conservative estimate, and how many more since. Astonishing that these people are treated more respectfully than the neo-Nazis.
Oh, Ishmael.
How many excess deaths since 1945 can be attributed to Capitalism?
Should those capitalists be treated as neo-NAZIs?
https://youtube.com/shorts/Q5xL_6_GlU4?si=ys7NzR5_I6hqSxhh
500,000 dead children in a decade in just one of many US "wars". Do you want to do the math?
Is Madeleine Albright a neo-Nazi? If not, why not?
I prefer facts to YouTube. Love that you equate capitalism with the gulag. Madeline Albright a neo-Nazi? Glad I am not in your head.
Wow.
The Youtube was video of Madelline Albright speaking on 60 minutes admitting that the deaths of 500,000 children due to her Administation sanctions regime was "worth it".
I'd call that a fact.
If we called "sanctions" the gulag, would that make those deaths equal?
So, just for the record, Albright’s comment on 60 minutes was not her finest moment, but does it matter that subsequent investigation showed that the death estimate was a fabrication of Saddam Hussein’s government. You can check that out in the Washington Post or the LSE. So, as far as I am concerned, your premise is based on a lie, and I continue to be unconvinced that the Soviet system is no different than the US. But, you be you.
"Albright’s comment on 60 Minutes was not her finest moment"
How casually you alibi yourself, but how harshly you condemn others for far less. It reminds me of the phrase "all my friends are noble freedom fighters, all my enemies are swarthy terrorists".
"does it matter that subsequent investigation showed that the death estimate was a fabrication of Saddam Hussein’s government"
No, the "subsequent investigation" did NOT show that. The "subsequent investigation" was a PR emergency to give cover for Albright.
But even if that WAS true - and it is not - when Albright was presented with the figure by 60 Minutes, she didn't blink, she didn't deny it, she didn't offer any heartfelt sympathy for the 500,000 dead children.
She just said it was "worth it" with very, very dry eyes.
But I see you've shifted your position. Previously, it had been "communism bad, capitalism good". Now it is " I continue to be unconvinced that the Soviet system is no different than the US."
Hmmmm. Interesting.
I think you can be a democratic socialist (small “ds”), even Marxist and still oppose the Stalinist bureaucratic regimes mistakenly called Communist. My main idea of a possible socialist program for the US includes a generous safety net, universal public health coverage, outright public ownership of some transport systems and shared worker and shareholder control of corporations.
Good article.
I would flip this on its head a little. As Sarah often states, if there is not some kind of centrist response to a problem, the response will come from extremists.
So, if you have a sizable amount of people that do not feel they are getting a fair shake out of the current state of the market economy, you will get kooky ideas. What is that centrist response to those concerns?
How much should a retail worker get paid?
Also, if you call any one looking for some kind of economic reform a Communist, you are going to create a lot of communists.
Regarding creating communists by calling people communists: American liberals in the mid 20th century helped to create the conservative movement by labeling all of their opponents "conservative". By the time Reagan came along, he found all these disparate groups with differing concerns and ideologies who had been told for decades that they were all conservatives, which made it easy to forge them into a movement.
"What is that centrist response to those concerns?"
More tax breaks for the rich, paid for by cutting the safety net for the poor.
"How much should a retail worker get paid?"
Less.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5luQB_yFmTM
What you are experiencing is neo-liberalism. It's basically using the government to transfer what little wealth the poor have to the already wealthy. You can see it here in this graph:
https://static.guim.co.uk/ni/1415721490539/Wealth_line-chart.svg
Cathy looks at this graph and says "anyone who opposes this wealth transfer from the poor to the rich is a communist".
"Also, if you call any one looking for some kind of economic reform a Communist, you are going to create a lot of communists."
Hope so.
It is a weird situation when people living in the United States, the product of wholesale genocide and imperial conquest, slag off at others for any reason at all. Americans have yet to fully come to grips with how they got where they are, and until they do, it's a better idea to keep silent. There is, it is true, no excuse for labeling Bolshevism, Stalinism, Maoism, or any other other variants that arose out of Russia and spread around the world as Marxist. They were and are distortions of Marxism, which is implicit in the label "Marxism-Leninism". It is wholly inappropriate for anyone to defend those regimes in their real history or their theoretical claims. They were and where still extant, are awful. But when people who are fat off the consequences of the American Revolution that was partly aimed at ending the restrictions on settlement west of the Appalachians, and in ending them, enabled both genocide and the revolting extension of slavery in the south, are screaming at Lenin, they need to look in the mirror.
True Marxism has never been tried, if I got the essence of your argument correctly.
People are allowed to point out bad things without having to go over an exhaustive laundry list of everything they've personally done bad first.
I'm told that you MUST go over the exhaustive laundry list of every other atrocity of every other country before criticizing Israel.
Is this not correct?
Yes, people are allowed to do this, despite the illustrative posturings of pseudo-radical polemicists.
Yeah hypocrisy rules OK.
Its not hypocrisy to claim something is bad because something else that was not mentioned and is not the current topic of discussion. In the Cold War this was a propaganda strategy called whataboutism, where one party responds to an accusation with a counter-accusation instead of offering an explanation or defense against the original accusation. This strategy was regularly used by the Soviets and their defenders against the West to avoid discussion or accountability for the initial accusation by either trying to shift the focus of discussion or by attempting to offer a justification by pointing to allegedly similar behavior, which may or may not be true or accurately characterized, but which is in any event irrelevant.
Its like responding All Lives Matter to an Black Lives Matters protest slogan. Its Patrick Bateman listing out a bunch of generic problems we should be worried about that are more important than the unrest in Sri Lanka.... Its a rhetorical device that attempts to preclude discussion of an issue by leveling an ad hominen attack against the person who brought it up... Its nothing but self-serving rationalization employed by wrongdoers to avoid discussion of their wrongdoing and the last refuge of tyrants and scoundrels.
I don't think the whatabout to the right here really works. As you note, critical race theory, the pedagogy of the oppressed, and the like, highlight some important, deep, and dark flaws in American history. But, without falling into the cartoonish rants of the MAGAs, let's also be honest: critical theory and the anti-colonialist paradigm is Marxian and it's what the kids are learning today. There's more than a grain of truth in the claim that mainstream educational institutions are suffused with Marxism.
Marxism like it recognizes that moneyed interests heavily influenced historical events? Marx analyzed the Peloponnesian war. Or, like, do you think sixth graders are being taught about seizing the means of production? I mean, the ‘one man, one vote’ principle is somewhat Marxian in that it holds that a democratic majority should control the politics of a society without regard to wealth.
Again, I hate the culture wars, and there are important insights in anti-colonialist critiques but . . . the pedagogy of the oppressed is Marxian, and this methodology is infused into mainstream academia today (I say as an academic) including not least in schools of education.
I'm curious about the idea that "the pedagogy of the oppressed is Marxian." How would this apply to the idea of protecting minorities (in the broadest sense of the word, not just racial) or the vulnerable? I don't see that as inherently communist. This is a running theme (in theory) in much of American laws and institutions, or it used to be. What is the "methodology" you're referring to? I don't understand how opposing colonialism writ large is inherently Marxist, unless Marx owns the idea of respect for the dignity of all humans.
The Bolsheviks did a lot more than execute a monarch. That different form of government murdered millions.
If considering the interplay between economics and politics is always Marxian, then it is impossible to understand something like the English Civil War without some kind of ‘Marxist’ understanding because the conflict was driven by the interplay of a rising free laboring class and the traditional hierarchy. I have very limited understanding of what ‘anti Colonial critiques’ are. It strikes me as a vague preference or critique of a power structure that came into existence. Kind of like a more left sided term for ‘cultural Marxism’, which has never been defined. I cannot imagine there are a great deal of people out there that have some kind of preference for, say, the late Mughal Empire. Having said all that, we love an underdog, and a moral story, but history usually does not provide perfect examples of either.
The Puritans and Cromwell as Marxists! Hmm, not so sure about that. The German Peasant's Revolt, for sure. Decolonizing / anti-colonialist discourse has specific meaning and relates to thinkers like Paulo Freire.
Anti-colonial and decolonization movements have been a thing for 200 years before Freire published his book in 1968, at a point in time when even the post WWII decolonization wave had already largely concluded.
Heck, arguably the American Revolution was a decolonization movement by virtue of the colonial grievances listed in the Declaration, and especially those that related to the attempts by Great Britain to economically exploit by the colonists by controlling and restricting their commerce to solely benefit British financial interests, and the premise that just and legitimate government may derive its legitimate powers only from the consent of the governed. Do you contend that the American Revolution or any of the Spanish American wars of independence were Marxian? What about the decolonization waves that followed both WWI and WWII? How does the study of these events and movements or the history of any other colonial empires through their decolonization or revolutions support the notion that Marxist thought is engrained in mainstream academia today? Stop referring to decolonizing discourse in general and give us an actual, specific example.
I mean, if Freire isn’t an actual, specific example of this discourse, what is? Nobody is arguing colonialism is or was a good thing. There are reams of journal articles, books, conferences, etc on decolonization discourse. There’s even a Wikipedia entry on this for heaven’s sake: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decolonization_of_knowledge
Not that Cromwell was trying to establish a dictatorship of the Proletariat, but emerging economic forces heavily influenced the events, and, like the Bolsheviks, they both executed a monarch to institute a different form of government.
And then the Lord Protector became one.
For non whites, their feelings of being oppressed or the knowledge of past oppression by white rulers is real - and in the Americas, but of Central and South America are examples of a persistent white minority that rules over indigenous, black and mixed race majorities.
The whites represent the business elite as well as the governing and educational elites. And anti-capitalist language (so socialist) language is joined to anti oppression.
I see that in folks in my town (largely hispanic) who harbor various levels of anger at white and US domination.
This explains a segment of those who admire socialism and even communism.