this post was submitted on 03 Dec 2024
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Afaik this happened with every single instance of a communist country. Communism seems like a pretty good idea on the surface, but then why does it always become autocratic?

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[–] [email protected] -2 points 2 weeks ago

In modern communist societies the government has an insane amount of power and control over just about everything. This power and control attracts a certain type of person who thirsts for power and control. People usually develop a bloodthirsty desire for power and control due to underlying psychological issues. These issues influence the person to think they ALWAYS need more power (think anorexic person who weighs 95lbs but still insists they are overweight).

It's a human nature problem imo.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

You can really ask the same question about capitalist societies. Why is there such oppression? Why is there a group that can do anything and a group that cannot? Regardless of your political system, human behavior is the same and it usually involves insecure ape-like people who want power for power's sake. Communism, just like every political system ever created, trends towards this sort of behavior.

As someone else said, desperation will cause people to move towards authoritarian thought, be that the extreme right (fascism) or the extreme left (communism).

[–] [email protected] -2 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (17 children)

Because thats the end result of embiggening the state: The state gets bigger, and the oligarchs just changes faces.

It was something Marx remarked on later, post Paris Commune.

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[–] [email protected] -2 points 2 weeks ago

"Why do tadpoles always turn into frogs?"

[–] [email protected] -2 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (2 children)

because of a few things

a) when you start a game of monopoly, everybody is equal. by the end of the game, wealth (think of wealth as an analog to power) snowballs and only one or two people will have all the resources.

when you start a communist government, it's not a fresh game of monopoly. it's a continuation of the previous game. and the vast majority of people are joining in after the wealth has been accumulated. therefore, power remains in the hand of the powerful

b) there is a large variance in human capabilities. to be frank, the vast majority of people are sheep. their world view is narrow and motivation stunted. they don't really care very much about things outside of their life and they don't want to learn, grow, etc. there isn't anything wrong with that, and there's sort of a whole religion based on this

but some people are very talented, ambitious, and greedy. these people will end up at higher positions, no matter your form of government. humans tend to naturally distribute ourselves in hierarchies. aka pyramids

this goes all the way back to our primate roots. look at chimps where the male leader of the pack has dibs on which female monkey he wants to mate with. the weaker monkeys have to bow their head and take what they can get.

tldr: hierarchy and pyramids are in the very fabric of human existence. doesn't matter what form of government or economic system you pick. pyramid will develop somehow, someway

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[–] [email protected] -2 points 2 weeks ago

In a decentralized network I wasn't expecting this amount of shallow answers about this topic

[–] [email protected] -4 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

The word "communism" means a specific social arrangement, but is misused to denounce things people don't like. Similar to the word "slavery" today.

[–] [email protected] -5 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

Because it is not human nature and has to be forced on people. Eventually even those who are in charge of it fall into the normal human nature of social structures and such.

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[–] [email protected] -5 points 2 weeks ago (5 children)

Because extremes don't work.

From what I've seen over the past 100 years, pure capitalist societies fail (hello Americans!) just lie pure communist societies (hello Russia!)

What works well are free societies that mix strong capitalism systems to fund strong social systems and safety nets (hello, north west Europe!)

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