I have heard good things about that book and it is on my long to read list don. Like I said I'm not a stalinist apologist. would be like if I called you a fascist and asked you to defend Hitler and Pinochet. I'm going to try to be reasonable and not call insults, as difficult as it is on a Tuchy issue like this
Not accusing you of being a Stalinist, can't point you to anything specific about Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn but Canadian clinical psychologist Jordan Peterson talks about the importance of his work while expressing general dismay at the lack of knowledge about the atrocities.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GfEYKSxXC5o
Cuba is doing extremely well considering that they have been under an embargo for 50 years by their former biggest trading partner and loss of a sponsor to pro them up (USSR). Cuba has a good election system, Excellent health care and education and guarantee's it's people a decent standard of living. The DDR if you read earlier I called 'horrific', Do I like the Stazi? No. If you want a decent read on them read Ana Funder's Staziland. I find one thing funny about the DDR though, Why are people nostalgic towards it if it was soo awful? It baffles me too
Cuba might be the exception rather than the rule, haven't read much about that apart from the actual revolution. Communism is a really high control and high obedience kind of ideology that kinda suited some people I'm sure... the Stasi paying off a quarter of the East German population was positively Orwellian though -
I would call that cruelty! I have not studied maoist china enough, you got me in a hole there. I will refer you to my definition of genocide
I read a book recently about the modern history of China and it was never really a single entity until the 19th century when repeated attacks by the West (and others) forced some degree of centralisation of power in the last few monarchs. The KMT tried to unify the Chinese nation but got over-run by the murderous Japanese... the more I read the more I'm convinced genocide is in our genes somehow!
I do agree that stalinism's (Stalinist Russia and Mao's China) crimes are horrific and Need to serve as a reminder of what absolution can do but I disagree with calling the Holodomor (not purposefully done) and the great purge a genocide. It in my opinion Genocide is a racially motivated idea. At least the USSR realised how horrific Stalin was.
I don't know, even in Russia there's still lots of people who remember the Stalinist era with fondness because there was a rapid industrialisation and lots of certainty in a centrally-controlled economy.
I disagree with the west not being on equal ground with the Stalinists. China I agree is horrific with the treatment of minorities makes stalinist Russia look like a paradise (they were tolerated somewhat though forced to move around). China will always do it unless some Khrushchev esque leader takes power and reverses all of its Han homogeny policies
China is taking up to the worlds mantle and your going to see a lot more of them this century whether you like them or not due to they're economic power.
All these things are just accidents of history; when leader X was in power they instigated policy Y.
When you read a lot about China you realise it's not very homogeneous at all - even their claim to Taiwan is historically dubious. Anyway, I'm not convinced that China can keep their cyber-punk Orwellian "brainwashing" going forever, the Chinese diaspora who have experienced life in the West might not be so easy to keep under their control in the longer run... anyway.
I disagree respectfully with that, the west has done murdered just as many in their colonial wars, Economic and proxy wars and oppressive puppets. The western puppets did the same as you know.
More than enough material for another thread then.
Agreed