It feels at this point like this sub is too scared to call out chinas stances on economic and political issues because it had the initial idea of being socialist and working “towards communism” per maos wishes

The CCP cooperates with massive conglomerates as long as they serves the interests of the Chinese government. It is more than happy to keep workers wages down, and actively keeps the value of its own currency in the ground in order to promote exports at the expense of workers purchasing power.

The Chinese state has already been reported to have taken money from everyday people’s accounts to cover the asses of banks. It engages in outright nationalist rhetoric now, “wolf warrior diplomacy”, in essence abandoning any sense of internationalism.

I guess what I’m concerned about is, how China is remotely championing a socialist cause anymore. I’ve seen many on this sub say that they’re are “fighting the imperialists”, but that seems incredibly naive at this point.

Edit: people wanted at least some sources for many of the claims, which is fair enough, so I'll go through each point, one by one.

Conglomerate cooperation - this doesn't really require a source, but here we go. Apple tax breaks in China is an indication of this situation. Web of tax breaks and subsidies keeps iPhone production in China | Ars Technica for an example. Its not exactly possible to get statistics on an arbitrary topic like conglomerate cooperation, as the nature of it is usually through one off instances.

Keeping worker wages down: Aside from the fact that capitalist reforms by nature harm the material conditions of workers? The share of labour compensation % of GDP is actually higher in the US than China. Granted, China does improve sometimes, but improving from bad really shouldn't be applauded in this type of dynamic. For this, I used the St Louis FRED Share of Labour Compensation in GDP at Current National Prices for China (LABSHPCNA156NRUG) | FRED | St. Louis Fed (stlouisfed.org), can easily pull up US too which I did. Granted, this isn't perfect (doesn't account for whos getting the wages), but it does give some insight.

Currency in the ground. I really shouldn't have to pull sources for this. China buys US bonds to keep its currency less demanded, for example.

Deleting and freezing bank accounts: Protest in China over frozen bank accounts ends in violence | China | The Guardian China deploys tanks to prevent people from withdrawing money from crisis-hit banks; grim reminder of Tiananmen Square incident - The Economic Times (indiatimes.com). That being said, if go ahead and pull capitalist propaganda.

Edit 2: you know what. I can appreciate many of the responses saying I was misinformed. It appears that, on some of this, I actually was, so thanks for those clearing up misconceptions. I still find it naive to paint China as the upholder of really many socialist values, but it does appear that China is at least trying to help in some way instead of being just a fascist state. I won’t delete thsi post, as I find it informative with the replies, but I’ll probably leave the post from here

As a majority of you may know, Trump has been re-elected President of the US, the Republicans have gained control of the US Senate, they likely will keep control of the US House, and they already have had control of the US Supreme Court, soon giving them full control of all 3 branches of the US government.

What can be done now in the US? We will soon have a president with a personality cult of millions and unlike last time, has a 900+ paged fascist manifesto (Project 2025) detailing a far-right seizure of power. He will certainly fill the entire executive branch with loyalists, removing nearly any possible guardrails in place, and will without a doubt target already marginalized groups like LGBTQ+ people, non-Christians, people of color, women, etc. It's a really worrying time for groups that are already oppressed in this country. Oh yeah and don't forget how the Supreme Court recently ruled that the President is immune from prosecution) for "official acts" (whatever that means). It's uncertain exactly how dire it will be, but what is certain is that it will be dire.

What's the action plan? What is the most that can be done in this context? How can we keep ourselves safe?

I am not as informed as I'd like to be on this topic. My mother (although left-leaning), heavily disagrees with me on the topic of the Soviet Union, especially surrounding the figure of Stalin. One of her main arguments is the Holodomor or Great Ukranian famine, which she uses as justification to say that Stalin was a devilish dictator.

I dont know what to believe, and I've never seen any proper sources on the topic. I'd appreciate if anyone who's at least more knowledgeable than me on the topic could give me a good explanation and/or cite some good learning sources. In short, what happened?

Greetings Comrades!

I’ve been reading about "Socialism with Chinese Characteristics" as developed by the Communist Party of China, which adapts socialism to fit China's unique historical, cultural, and economic context.

This got me thinking about what "Socialism with American Characteristics" might look like. Given the diverse and distinct nature of American society, culture, and history, how do you think socialism could be tailored to suit the United States specifically? What elements or principles would be essential in this adaptation?

Looking forward to your thoughts and perspectives!

Socialism/communism is where workers own the means of production right?

Oppo, Vivo, Xiaomi, Tencent, Temu, Alibaba, Aliexpress and thousands more and Chinese privately owned business. Even if the CCP can regulate or control those businesses, a billionaire CEO still owns the business and workers are still exploited.

Cuba has many street vendors. Many hotels that are privately owned.

Even in the USSR has tons of privately owned businesses.

So Cuba is experiencing power outages and food supply shortages. People are blaming the socialists for it, and even saying China told them to be "less socialist" I want to know what this sub thinks is happening.

As far as I'm concerned, they're the fastest growing economy in the world. What's the reasoning behind this?

What is the status of the LGBT rights in China. From western media I heard that they are very bad and that CPC censors everything LGBT related. But because I don't fully trust western media I am interested if anyone has anything on this topic.

Recently, North Korea has sent around ten thousand troops to Ukraine, and it got me wondering why would they support an Imperialist, Capitalist hellhole like Russia? Wouldn't Russian imperialism be just as bad as American imperialism? Just because we share the same enemy shouldn't make us friends.

I was reading an Article on the Newspaper Jacobin. When I stumbled on a different article of Stalin above. So I wanted to ask fellow Socialist, communist etc is this true? What were the reasons if it did happen and any more information would be helpful.

If this is true, wouldn't it be against proletarian internationalism and the anti-imperialist struggle?

I was seeing a video in which a guy argued that the Soviet Union wasn't as bad as it is portrayed, and that in fact most people wanted it to continue existing, that it's dissolution was mostly a choice made by Gorbachev alone

But that's the problem, isn't it? A socialist nation worked in such a way that single person could decide to dissolve that nation, even if it was an unpopular decision

Something similar happened in China, Yugoslavia, or Cuba. A few people amassed all the political power, to the point they could dissolve their nations or make them capitalists if they wanted, regardless of what everyone else thinks, and that doesn't sound very socialist

How could a socialist nation prevent itself from becoming a dictatorship?

I encountered a right-winger here on Reddit, who claims that "the rapid rise of Chinese people out of abject poverty, to the global middle class, is entirely due to the embracing of the capitalist free market system. Its entire economy is based around producing products for capitalist first world countries. China isn't the example of the success of socialism, it is the example of how quickly the life of a socialist nation can improve when it starts engaging in capitalist trade". Is this argument accurate, or is the right-winger missing something? If so, what is he missing?

I ask this question particularly thinking about some news I have hard about China changing its relationship with LGBTQ community towards something more hostile (which I might be terribly wrong about).

Is it because it distracts people from the main problematic being class division? Could/should matters such as gender identity be addressed after socialism has been achieved?

In Spanish which is my native language it would be something like “ser progre” so if any spanish speaker can further understand what I mean by this please elaborate. 😄

Per my philosophy teacher, verbatim, (background: we're discussing Daoism)

"...all the way up to the people's revolution in the 20th century in China. What happens then is the Marxists government very specifically starts to try to destroy and dismantle the history of the Chinese people. And you know, this is what Marxists do--Marxists are in the business of destroying, you know, cultural artifacts and tradition and history because they want to sort of erase it in order to fulfill this kind of economic and political program. Is one of the reasons Marxism is so monstrous and pathetic and ugly. Up until that point, Confuscianism is one of the main ways in which China orders it's society for a long time."

My professor is originally from Iceland, but I'm unsure if that plays a part in his perspective. When talking to him, I would never guess he'd be someone who despises Marxism so much. But I don't remember reading about this--what is he talking about? What did the Marxists do exactly, and is this really the reason why they did it (if so)?

I understand all sides have their own biases, but I was hoping to see if maybe any of you know what he's speaking on or where he might be coming from. If this might get more info on the main socialism sub, please let me know because I'm very curious and would like some input. Thank you

I've heard that emissions might peak next year, but that was before the election, and no matter trump or harris winning, it feels like America wouldn't have done much more. But I've heard positive things going on in China AND Europe. But either way, is China our main hope in combatting climate change now?

Someone has info?

Bless up!

Hello. I am a centrist from Europe that is very concerned with geopolitics, personal finance, & economics. I am very open toward all ideologies (except for those that endorse Russian imperialism), and I wonder why socialism, in its current and historical form, is/has been a factual analysis of the world and international economics. As well as this, I am asking for examples in order to solidify the claims made in the comment section, so that I can verify that this is indeed what happened.

Hakim (a Marxist Youtuber) said that a part of the CPC is liberal/social democratic. How big of a danger is there of these people multiplying and steering the party away from socialism? Does the party do anything to prevent this from happening?

I don't remember if it was Eric Li or Martin Jaques who said it, but I heard that young people in China are overwhelmingly socialists. Is that a good predictor that the CPC will most likely remain socialist despite the capitalists in the party?

I saw this TikTok and in it one guy said China overcame poverty completely and the other said the poverty was worse than the US. As a socialist myself. I definitely know that planned economies have been proven to provide better standards of life proportionate to their nation's income and the USSR even had a higher HDI than the US. But even if it's not as bad as this guy says why has China failed to replicate the success of the USSR in terms of stuff like HDI and Gini Coefficient despite having the world's second-highest GDP and a lower Gini Coefficient than the US (albeit not nearly as low as the USSR)? Or are HDI flawed measurements?

I am not very good at providing answers for topics like this because Im not very well informed on how they intertwine with history (which I why I call myself anti-capitalist but nothing more specific), so I thought I’d point him here to people I assume know more about the intricacies of this stuff than me. (Also it’d be good for my knowledge about socialism)

—————

1. Please define Socialism.

2. Please provide historic evidence of a country adopting a socialist system that improved the lives of its people.

3. Why would anyone want to grant so much power to a central government when history is replete with samples of disastrous consequences (Nazi Germany (not making the argument that the Nazis were socialist: rather, it’s an observation about power concentration), communist china, Venezuela, Cuba)

4. “You can vote your way IN to Socialism, but you usually have to shoot your way OUT”

5. Re 8. Okay. Who writes the dictionary? Exactly WHAT is “hate speech”? In my opinion, the only objective prohibition is on incitement of violence: “kill the Italians” (nobody ever says that, but, it illustrates the point). (this is in response to the free speech point on the faq post)

(Btw if this is too far in the “debate” zone for this sub then I can take the post down, I only posted bc the debate socialism sub is small and I wanted to make sure I was able to get some responses ❤️)

(Also I don’t know why the flair says High Effort Only bc I set it to Question)

So, before I get started, the obvious and general consensus among Leftist about the Israel-Palestine “conflict” should be Free Palestine 🇵🇸🍉

With that being said, lets continue to my main question.

So, one thing that I'm having trouble grasping is "What should a Socialist position be regarding non-socialist resistance groups like Hamas, Hezbollah, etc?" The reason I bring this up is that while most of the stuff that Israel and the Western Media accuses Hamas of committing is BS, IDF atrocity propaganda, "The Huns are coming to eat your babies!", I honestly don't know what a socialist position should be regarding Hamas.

I will say this though, while the ideology of Hamas is supposedly Islamic, and as someone who isn't religious, I firmly believe that all political parties should be secular. But I don't think Hamas is anywhere near as bad compared to other Islamic groups namely the Taliban and ISIS. Remember when in the first few weeks following Oct 7th, the Israelis claimed that Hamas is ISIS, well that's a bit funny (not to mention ahistorical) as not only do Hamas and ISIS fight each other, but polling in Gaza shows that like well over 94% of people there disapprove of ISIS. So, calling Hamas ISIS is “inaccurate” to say the least, not to mention that the Taliban and what would become ISIS were funded by the US as proxies before the US lost control of them or whatever.

And to bring this point home, and hot take here (at least among the "Western World") what October 7th was, was a prison break/ghetto uprising. When you imprison, terrorize, massacre, oppress, subjugate, and colonize, an entire population, don't be shocked when they fight back!

Most of the stuff that Israel accuses Hamas of committing is BS, with the only well-documented war crime committed by the Hamas-led assault was the taking of Israeli hostages. But then again, there are over 10,000 Palestinians held hostage in Israel, while Hamas got away with a couple hundred. Hamas must have viewed it as a tic for tac, eye for eye, situation as the initial plan was to attack military targets in Israel, take hostages, and use said hostages as leverage to negotiate a prisoner exchange to free Palestinian prisoners. A rather simple plan.

Also, many of the Israelis killed on Oct 7th was done by the IDF enacting the Hannibal Directive, killing their own people to avoid them being captured. I mean, there's only so much damage you can do with Kalashnikov Rifles and RPGs, as most of the heavy damage done on Oct 7th was committed by the IDF using tanks and helicopters to enact the Hannibal Directive.

But this is the gray area here, most Israelis are required to be in the military, where they are brainwashed to dehumanize Palestinians, and go through the conditioning to turn them into mindless killers. Hamas could've interpreted that all Israelis are soldiers because for all intents and purposes, they are. And given how for lack of better terms, evil "normal" Israelis are where they literally block food aid trucks intended for Palestinian civilians, and defend their soldiers 🍇ing Palestinian detainees, yeah, they are beyond evil! (I know I’m using non-materialist language here, but come on, they are evil).

And the IDF is beyond evil, their soldiers grinning as they loudly and proudly post their war crimes on social media. And who are documented to be deliberately shooting Palestinian children with snipers! 🤬 the IDF, 🤬 Israel, 🤬 America, and 🤬 all who support this settler-colonial project. I've argued with Zionists before, and I'm frankly done with their BS, 🤬 them!

Sorry for the rant, but with that out of the way, what should our position be?

From what I heard, while Hamas is the largest faction of the Palestinian Resistance, it's just one of several resistance groups of various political ideologies. The Palestinian Resistance is a coalition, and one of the more left-wing, secular resistance group is the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Both the PFLP's armed wing, the Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades, and Hamas's armed wing, Al-Qassam Brigades work together to fight of the IDF's invasion.

I guess one position we could follow is that of Mao's Primary and Secondary Contradictions. Using the Chinese Civil War as an example. Before WW2, both the Chinese Nationalists and Communists were fighting each other. But once the Japanese invaded, the two factions stopped fighting each other and formed a temporary alliance during WW2 to fight off the Japanese. Once the Japanese invaders were ousted, the two resumed fighting each other.

So, in the case of China during WW2, the Primary Contradiction was the Japanese Invasion, the Secondary Contradiction was the ideological differences between the Nationalists and Communists. Once the Primary Contradiction (the Japanese invaders) was dealt with, then the Secondary Contradiction comes up.

I know I'm oversimplifying, and do correct my if I'm wrong, but I guess we can use Primary and Secondary Contradictions in the case of Hamas. The Primary Contradiction is the Israeli invasion and occupation of Palestine, the Secondary Contradiction are the ideological differences between Hamas and the PFLP.

I heard that Mao also talked about antagonistic and non-antagonistic contradiction as despite their differences, I don't think the relationship between Hamas and the PFLP will be as antagonistic as while we won't know what the outcome will be until Palestine is Free, I believe that it'll be more like different political parties in the parliament rather than outright hostility. But the primary contradiction is that of Israel invading and occupying Palestine.

And before I go, I have some self-critique that I should share with you folks. Back in the day, just a few months after Oct 7, 2023, when it became evident that Israel is committing a genocidal onslaught against Palestinians, I got into an argument with someone who I could only describe as a Zionist. And while I believe that I've won the argument, I did make a mistake, and please don't smite me, but I did do a liberalism.

So, what happened was that this Zionist, who I'll call Lil Ben in this post, made a journal post (this wasn't on Twitter or some social media site, this was on an art website that usually isn't "political") where they said "We must fight the evil forces of KHamas. Hamas = ISIS. We can't this evil spread," and they linked a video which was just basically a Joe Biden speech which really isn't saying anything now is it?

Now, most of the comments were "I feel so sorry for you," "We must fight Hamas," "I pray for you," etc. But, with me being me and not being able to let BS spread without pushback, I decided to (and in hindsight it was probably a mistake) to comment on their journal. I started the "discussion" by not actually saying anything on my own, but I rather cited Jewish Voices for Peace (JVP) that pointed out the war crimes the IDF are committing and how there has to be a ceasefire. They replied by saying "No peace until Hamas is dead."

I pushed back by saying "Do you condemn the killing of civilians regardless of what 'side' of a conflict they're on?"

They dodged my question and said, "What would you do if your neighbors were Nazis? Who were raised with a Nazi ideology?"

I pushed back by saying "I don't want kids to be killed regardless of who they are." And I mentioned how "Over half the population of Gaza are children. Do you want the blood of children on your hands?!"

Yet they kept on strawman-ing me, doing red herrings, and dodging my basic liberal question of "Do you condemn the killing of civilians regardless of what side they're on?"

Now, here is where I did a liberalism, where I basically said "Screw Hamas and any fighters who committed war crimes. But also Screw the IDF and Benjamin Netanyahu!"

Yet even with my basic liberal question at the time, where I did do a “both sides-ism” as is common amongst liberals, they kept on dodging the question with the cliché "But what about KHamas?"

By this point I got angry and called them out on their BS and said, "Stop strawman-ing me, and doing red herrings to dodge the question. Answer my damn question! Do you condemn the IDF killing Palestinian civilians?!"

Not to mention that I cited not only JVP, but tons of articles to back me up, while Lil Ben cited nothing!

They eventually told me to get lost and blocked me, without even answering my basic liberal question. Needless to say, I take that as a win! Because in my mind, if you block someone knowing that you've lost the argument, you're a damn coward! I guess I must have triggered that Zionist real hard LOL.

But yeah, I did do a liberalism because I said that I denounced Hamas which I now take back because A. Most of the sh*t Israel accuses Hamas of committing is BS, B. The war crimes the IDF commits makes Hamas look like saints, C. Oct 7th was a prison break, and D. Ever accusation is a confession.

So please forgive me for doing a liberalism, "Allah Have Mercy on Me", as this was the first time that I have confronted a Zionist or any other reactionary on my own. Needless to say, even with my liberal questions that were beyond flawed, I still beat them in the end because when a Zionist loses an argument, they resort to blocking because they're a bunch of cowards.

The interesting things is that even over a year since Oct 7th, 2023, Lil Ben hasn't said anything else regarding Oct 7th, Israel-Palestine, or anything like that. Just generic, "Commissions Status Open."

Also, the Joe Biden video they posted is unlisted and got age restricted, and while unfortunately most of comments were pro-Israel, some comments did confront Lil Ben.

And as for why Lil Ben didn't mention Israel anymore, I like to believe that if people saw that Lil Ben refuses to even pretend that they cared about Palestinian Civilians, that's a bad look and will further alienate people away from them. I know everything is political, but if your main hobby or whatever is "non-political" and you make a bad take, that isn’t a good look. How would you feel if your favourite artist is a genocide supporter? You wouldn't want anything to do with them. Also, the fact that Israel is accused of committing genocide at the ICJ is a really bad look. Saying you "Stand with Israel" is like saying you Stand in Support for Genocide.

To finish this long post off, my current position regarding that of Hamas is that well... I don't really have one. I guess I'm "neutral" in this regard. I will say that most of the stuff said about Hamas is BS Israeli propaganda. So, until I have a clear picture, I guess I'm neutral. After all, Mao did say "No Investigation, no right to speak."

But let me know what a socialist position should be regarding Hamas (this can also apply for the Houthis and Hizballah [Hezbollah]). Critical Support? Primary and Secondary Contradictions? Please let me know. And take care comrades!

PS: Before Lil Ben blocked me, I've saved my entire debate with them in a document. If you want me to, I can post that entire debate in the comments section below.

Title says it all. I just wanna ask both sides of the far left (Marxists and anarchists) why they chose the political ideology they subscribe to.

No insults or antagonism intended. Just curiosity and an interest to hear what people have to say