death toll of communism vs capitalism

[The Vegan Marxist]

(07-28-2010 10:38 PM)bailey_187 Wrote:  

(07-28-2010 10:32 PM)The Vegan Marxist Wrote:  

(07-28-2010 10:03 PM)bailey_187 Wrote:  Amartya Sen did some good research into India post-indepedence and IIRC the conclusion was that ~100million died from hunger or preventable diseases.

I think the idea of totalling up death tolls creates a false caricature though. Capitalism has improved more lives than destroyed. The same for Communism.

I would have to disagree with this. Capitalism has only brought a better life to those of the few. The vast majority of this world is within third world countries. I seriously doubt Capitalism has been there to make their lives "improved".

It has. Most countries in the 20th century saw rises in living standards, albeit not as much as is possible nor equally between regions.

I forgot one thing though, most ex-socialist countries have not seen an improvement from capitalism.

I would definitely agree with that:

Quote:Why Estonia Was Better Off With Communism, Not Capitalism
by BJ Murphy

I’ve been doing research on a particular incident that was mentioned by someone, where according to him, the Soviets, or for what he sees in its entirety as the fault of Communism, turned his country, Estonia, practically towards the stone age. Well, I think if one really looks into the history of Estonia during its time under the rule of the Soviet Republic, then you’ll probably see quite the opposite, with some authoritative times taking place, but for those I’ll show logically why such things took place.

First of all, the claim that the Soviet Union brought Estonia to a stone age-like spot, I’d have to completely disagree to where, statistically speaking, Estonia was practically within the stone age before the Soviets took control, & soon then they became far less towards the stone age & more along the lines of an industrialized nation with low unemployment, for how bad unemployment was back then that is. I’ll provide a graph below that shows what happened within a few years left within the Soviet Union rule, then what had happen after Estonia gained independence, & where it is now.



If you look at the graph above you’ll notice that, given that the Soviet Union had fallen in 1991, during the times when the Soviet Union was in place & had control over Estonia, the unemployment rate was going down at a pretty good rate, along with labor demand as well. This puts in an interesting statistic, because it shows that Estonia was so industrialized & that people were getting more jobs than before at such a rate that the labor demands began to fall gradually at the same rate as employment began to rise during the Estonian Soviet Republic. Now, if you look back in history, Estonia claimed independence away from any Soviet command by 1988, 3 years before the Soviet Union fell. Looking back at the graph above, we begin to see something different precisely by 1988. The unemployment begins to rise as the labor demand begins to rise. Though, at the time, the labor demand was still thankfully lower than the unemployment, or at least keeping up with unemployment at a gradual rate.

Now, if you look at the link provided ( http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/Estonia.aspx ) in the ‘Economy’ section, it shows how in 1991 they began privatizing everything that was nationalized, in other words, Estonia began embracing Capitalism. The thing about Capitalism is that, like we Americans have known for a long time now is that the ‘American Dream’ is merely the beginning of Capitalism. It brings about a big boom of employment, wealth, etc. But, like every other dream, they begin to fade away when it starts to become too good to be true. The labor demand within a Capitalist system starts rising & becomes larger than the employment/unemployment rate. And when this happens, the unemployment begins to rise once again, but the difference from back in the 70′s & 80′s to what was happening starting in 1998, the labor demand increase like before, but this time it’s above the unemployment rate instead of below it. What this tells us is that the labor demands had become the main reason why the unemployment rate started increasing.

I can’t help but notice the similarities taking place there when comparing it to how America has gone through from one stock crash to another. Of course, things began to crash in Estonia after the ‘american dream’ of Capitalism withered away (comparing this with the first Great Depression for America), & of course recoveries were being made & were successful for a while, but then, like comparing to what had recently taken place in America a year ago as we are still suffering from it, Estonia then crashed once again, but this time it’s not letting go. All of this can be seen in the graph given up above. Unemployment began sky rocketing along with the labor demands as well – given that (a) is the consequence of (b) – A = unemployment; B = labor demand.

Now, let’s look at another graph given below:



What this simply shows is the prerequisites of life for the general population through the Soviet Union – which this consists of Estonia, along with many other areas that became conjoined with the Soviet Union – with a comparison to how the prerequisite of life was towards the same areas after the Soviet Union had fallen. As you can see, the prerequisites of life during the control of the Soviet Union was rising very fast in record numbers, but once they had fallen, the prerequisites of life began falling as well.

Now, when it comes to what all was going on during the times of when the Soviet Union was fighting against Nazi Germany – such incidents like annexations, deportations, etc. We’ve got to understand that during the times when Hitler was rising fast with his Nazi forces, it wasn’t the best times for anybody, & drastic measures had to take place if anyone was to survive against them. One thing Estonians need to realize is that if the Soviet Union didn’t take control then Nazi Germany would have, & given to what all was going on within the territories run by Nazi Germany, Estonia was safe with the Soviets. The annexations were justifiable, given that if the Soviets didn’t merge Estonian territories with the Union, then Germany would’ve simply invaded it & would’ve made things a lot more difficult for everybody. When it comes to deportations & executions, these were made against those that were once in command of Estonia before the Soviets took control. Estonia was within dark times before the Soviets came in the picture, & corruption was very much present during those times. Once the Soviet Union took power, they, unlike many others failed to do, decided to bring justice to those that made life to the Estonian people horrid. They were executed & deported. Please also keep in mind that during these times, execution & deportation was the norm of those times, even to the Americans. Just because it’s seen as unnatural to us now, doesn’t mean it was back then.

So, to claim that Estonia started falling back to the stone age because of ‘Communism’ is completely false. If one would just simply look back into history, look past all the propaganda, & actually apply real science towards history, you’ll begin to realize the truth behind the lies. If there was anything that brought Estonia back to the stone age, it wouldn’t have been Communism, it was Capitalism. And to say otherwise, then you’re going against science & you’re going against history.

http://redantliberationarmy.wordpress.co...apitalism/

[Boboulas]

Quote:It has. Most countries in the 20th century saw rises in living standards, albeit not as much as is possible nor equally between regions.

Many improvements were gained by activism and shit actualy happening, i wouldnt lay it straight at the feet of capitalism.

[kcoll]

historicaly millions upon millions have died as both a result of comunism and capitalism.
history repeats itself till we learn from our mistakes
capatalism, self explanitory ;exploytation.
sweat shops ,
war ,
expansionism
corporatism/fasism
comunism , miss guided land reforms/ forced famin
forced labour
execution of so calld elite
war
expansionism
dictatorship

none of above are the way forward

[The Vegan Marxist]

^ half of that is bullshit! (hint: not the first half)

[Gezus]

seems correct to me... little odd way of laying it out but the end point is correct.. both are bad and have killed 100s of millions...

[The Vegan Marxist]

(07-30-2010 02:21 AM)kcoll Wrote:  Communism , miss guided land reforms/ forced famin
forced labour
execution of so calld elite
war
expansionism
dictatorship

none of above are the way forward

There were no mis-guided land reforms, nor were there "forced famines". You're absolutely fucking nuts if you believe that the famines that took place were forced by the leaders of Russia & China.

And yeah, the execution of capitalist counterrevolutionaries was an absolute necessity. If you're going to blame the necessity of war & expanding the proletarian struggle on deaths to "innocent people", you're absolutely insane & if you ever tried forming a revolution, you will never succeed.

And please don't bring this "dictatorship" bullshit in the mix. The people have always been controlled through class, not by merely one man. Everything you posted is so distorted & misleading, I don't even know where to begin.

[Gezus]

yea but war is correct. expansionism is correct. executions in itself is correct since many civilians were executed. those three things are enough to say its a bad form of government. which is why all forms of government tend to be bad or as i like to say an EPIC FAIL coz they usually have most if not all three of those things. so fuck both of them. both have a huge death toll. we know this. end of point. move on. do something about it instead of going on and on about which side has killed more. does it really matter to prove which had more when the numbers are in the hundreds of millions for both sides?

[kcoll]

The Holodomor (Ukrainian: Голодомор; translation: death by hunger) was a famine in the Ukrainian SSR from 1932–1933, during which millions of inhabitants died of starvation in a peacetime catastrophe unprecedented in the history of Ukraine.[1][2][3][4] Estimates on the total number of casualties within Soviet Ukraine range mostly from 2.6 million[5][6] to 10 million.[7] Primarily as a result of the economic and trade policies instituted by Joseph Stalin, millions of Ukrainians starved to death over the course of a single year
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor

Soviet famine of 1932–1933
The forced collectivization of agriculture is considered a main reason for the famine as it caused chaos in the countryside. This included the destruction of peasant activists possessions, the selling and killing of horses for fear they would be seized, and refraining from field work. Authorities blamed the agitation on the kulaks and kołchozom and accused them of sabotage. The authorities wrongly expected that as a result of the collectivization of agricultural production would increase because of plans for the export of agricultural products based on attempts to industrialize. The authorities maintain that the collapse is the result of buying grain crops by hidden peasants, and despite the requests of local authorities are not required to supply decreased quota.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_fami...%80%931933

Great Leap Forward
The Great Leap Forward of the People's Republic of China (PRC) was an economic and social plan used from 1958 to 1961 which ostensibly aimed to use China's vast population to rapidly transform the country from an agrarian economy into a modern communist society through the process of agriculturalization,[citation needed] industrialization, and collectivization. Mao Zedong led the campaign based on the Theory of Productive Forces, and intensified it after being informed of the impending disaster from grain shortages.


Chief changes in the lives of rural Chinese included the introduction of a mandatory process of agricultural collectivization, which was introduced incrementally. Private farming was prohibited, and those engaged in it were labeled as counter revolutionaries and persecuted. Restrictions on rural people were enforced through public struggle sessions, social pressure, and violence. Food rationing was introduced, in some cases leaving rural Chinese with less than 250g (half a jin, 8.82 ounces) of grain per day. The Great Leap ended in catastrophe, triggering a widespread famine that resulted in possibly more than 20 million deaths.[1]


An insider's view from the 1950s to the 1990s is detailed in the books of Harry Wu, including Troublemaker and Laogai. He spent 19 years from 1960 to 1979 as a prisoner in these camps for criticizing the government while he was a young student in college.[10] He almost starved to death, but eventually escaped to the United States.

In Mao: The Unknown Story, Jung Chang and Jon Halliday estimate that perhaps 27 million people died in prisons and labor camps during Mao Tse-tung's rule.[11] They claim that inmates were subjected to back-breaking labor in the most hostile wastelands, and that executions and suicides by any means (like diving into a wheat chopper) were commonplace.[11] Jean-Louis Margolin writing in The Black Book of Communism claims that perhaps 20 million died in the prison system.[12] R.J. Rummel puts the number of forced labor "democides" at 15,720,000, excluding "all those collectivized, ill-fed and clothed peasants who would be worked to death in the fields."[13]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laogai

Gulag
More than 14 million people passed through the Gulag from 1929 to 1953, with a further 6 to 7 million being deported and exiled to remote areas of the USSR.[10] According to a 1993 study of incomplete archival Soviet data, a total of 1,053,829 people died in the GULAG from 1934 to 1953.[5] More complete data puts the death toll for this same time period at 1,258,537, with an estimated 1.6 million casualties from 1929 to 1953.[11] These estimates exclude those who died shortly after their release but whose death resulted from the harsh treatment in the camps,[12] which was a common practice.[13] The total population of the camps varied from 510,307 (in 1934) to 1,727,970 (in 1953).[5]


Most Gulag inmates were not political prisoners, although the political prisoner population was always significant.[14] People could be imprisoned in a Gulag camp for crimes such as anti-government jokes.[15] About half of the political prisoners were sent to Gulag prison camps without trial; official data suggest that there were more than 2.6 million imprisonment sentences in cases investigated by the secret police, 1921-1953.[16] While the Gulag was radically reduced in size following Stalin’s death in 1953 and officially liquidated in 1960, political prisoners continued to exist in the Soviet Union right up to the Gorbachev era
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulag


these sorces are use for ease of acess. i suggest finding a decent history book. this is just a snap shot of stalins ussr and maos china,
both killed millions
both forced millions in to work (slavery) so much for freein the serfs.
russia admits to most , china still closed on every thing including tanamin square. they "re educate".
both relied on a secret police that targeted intelectuals (comy speak capatalists) to stop people having independant thought. i,e not the official party thought.
ussr built a wall to keep people in not out
stalin and mao are dicks.
policys and idealology should never be repeated.

[The Vegan Marxist]

Nice to know you're using wikipedia to find the facts passed the US propaganda.

---

(07-30-2010 03:50 AM)Gezus23 Wrote:  yea but war is correct. expansionism is correct. executions in itself is correct since many civilians were executed. those three things are enough to say its a bad form of government. which is why all forms of government tend to be bad or as i like to say an EPIC FAIL coz they usually have most if not all three of those things. so fuck both of them. both have a huge death toll. we know this. end of point. move on. do something about it instead of going on and on about which side has killed more. does it really matter to prove which had more when the numbers are in the hundreds of millions for both sides?

You're blaming Communism for this though. Which is wrong. There is no "government" in Communism. We have yet to even implement it. If you want to wage a revolution against the global elite, you better get use to war, to expand the struggle in all areas, & to kill who ever gets in your way. To blame an ideology on the flaws of man is absolutely illogical & wrong.

[kcoll]

^mostly agree . history shows us government bad. i saw some where that the state the biggest killer capitalist or commie. that what im gettin at stalin/maoism ant marx... im not against socialism just against totalitarianism. an.....

Quote:you want to wage a revolution against the global elite, you better get use to war, to expand the struggle in all areas, & to kill who ever gets in your way. To blame an ideology on the flaws of man is absolutely illogical & wrong

this is how my father explained socialism to me a few days ago, it ant right or wrong just the poor ant gonna take shit indefinitely ,are gonna take the land and

i just cant stand the glorification of tyrants tho. hardly rallys support, does it?

i know it wiki good history books hard to quote online. i tryed to find a torrent for collins history of the world but could not find one an wiki puts it midly to say the least . wiki ant my source like i said for more info get a decent history book.
but let me guess the stuff about communist societys propaganda but the stuff on vietnam , uk/us killings legit?
history can not be edited
peoples liberation army liberatedd...the gulags did not exist.
i put wiki for ease of acess . once u actually read up on quotes above it a lot worse than what i posted.is it hard to do a search?
for fuck sake mao had a purge of intelectualls during his continued revolution i.e any western educated even tho he told them to be educated in the west. dont tell me any of this shit justifyed then pretend you care about the oppresed.the reason he purged the intelectuals is because he wanted a nation of sheep. serfs were treated bad but forced labour camps are good? get a grip. real freedom in the ussr and china you got their. ask your self why was the berlin wall built,?
it people who glorify such acts that hamper the socialist movement.
any socialist i have met i.e mps uni graduates ,condones the ussr and mao. none were socialist....then i found this site. every thing propaganda except the tripe that recycled on this site by a select few.
once again do not take wiki as proof , go to a library or amazon or somthin . it just a base sorce

[Gezus]

then i guess "man is not meant to be ruled" --Gezus23

[The Vegan Marxist]

It's not about ruling though, it's about struggling. We've got to understand what the Socialist leaders brought us. Take Mao for example, him & the people of China fought together & died together. When they took over China through a people's war he brought his people a better life. They were still within the struggle, but they were struggling together in order to bring about a better life. 90% of the population had free health services during Mao's ruling. How many of you knew that? Or were you stuck listening to how he killed millions of unknown people with his bare hands? Not even the most respected historians believe in the "death tolls of communism" anymore. It's complete bullshit.

Ever heard of the Hearst Press? I'm pretty sure you haven't if you've remained strictly against Stalin. They were a top corporation in which made business with the Capitalists in America & the same with the Nazi's & made a big name out of themselves through their anti-communist propaganda, especially those towards Stalin. Yes, Stalin made mistakes. Though, we can't accept the lies made against him by capitalist propaganda. The "death tolls"? Please! No one can take that shit seriously anymore. Yes, he kicked people out of the country, yes he persecuted people that got in his way. But please tell me, if you were one country, among many, trying to fight for a greater life for your people, & the whole world was out for your throat, what the fuck would you do to protect the proletarian struggle? If it wasn't for Stalin & his glorious victory against the Nazi Third Reich, those workers that were building a better life than what the outside world ever witnessed would've fallen to Hitler's plan. Stalin tried doing what was absolutely necessary in order to protect what his people fought for so long for. If one is going to criticize Stalin, in which I do myself, then you need to do it properly. You've got to understand his lack of understand dialectics, in which is key observation through Marxist thought, in which led to the mistakes that Stalin did. For you guys to gain a better, more open minded view of Stalin, in which all the propaganda against him is debunked, but also he is fairly criticized for the real mistakes he committed, then I suggest you read "Another View of Stalin". Here's the link. Click the timer that says free download. Then, once the new page pops up, you'll see a countdown from a minute mark. Let it go to zero & then it'll show you a button for you to click to start your free download of this book.

Also, when it comes to these famines, I suggest you start doing more research. To blame man, first of all, for the weather conditions they faced during those times is absolutely absurd. When it comes to the famine in China, along with weather conditions, how many of you knew about how, just before the famine took place, the Sino-Soviet split took place first. All the industrialized production that the Soviet Union helped China with was snatched away by Khrushchev & his revisionist party. This made production VERY low & many supplies, from medical supplies, foods & goods, etc. After that event, the famine was inevitable. This was never an event that was ever intended to be. Mao never wanted to harm his people. But Mao took the step to stay under Marxist thought by calling it how he saw it. When Khrushchev gave his "secret speech", in which he started "de-stalinization" programs, the very programs that helped defend the proletarian struggle from both the Nazi forces & US imperialists, he then embraced the revisionist path by stating that Socialism must be achieved through peaceful negotiations with those that oppose them. This was strictly against Marxism, for it was a bowing to those that tried to dismantle the proletarian struggle. So Mao went against Khrushchev & his plans, & Khrushchev made sure Mao & his people would suffer because of it, in which they did.

I truly do hope you people understand what propaganda you're following & truly hope you start researching a bit more in the near future.