Loren Pechtel

Originally posted by moon
China

Certainly. Tibet. Vietnam.

USSR

Afghanistan.

North Korea

They tried to invade the south.

Loren Pechtel

Originally posted by Vorkosigan
China

C'mon, are you serious? Hello Tibet. Taiwan, and in the future, Mongolia. I live under their guns and missiles, moon.

Taiwan they regard as a renegade provence and thus you can't really call them expansionist in that regard.

We both missed Hong Kong, though. The lease that expired did *NOT* return all of Hong Kong to Chinese control. However, the rest of it was not viable without water from the part that had to go back. China was not willing to negotiate.

Selsaral

I've read the whole thread, but I don't think this question was ever fully discussed. Why do all the socialist/communist regimes implement a total crackdown on the press and institute complete and total state-run control over information? As Orwell wrote, information control is everything. You can rewrite history, you can completely revise the facts, and you can completely control a populace. For instance I've heard many accounts of the North Koreans under the impression that their country has a very high standard of living compared to the rest of the world etc.

I'm not trying to bust the balls of those who defend communism. Please let me know what you think of this.

moon

Your dishonesty seems to know no bounds.

Firs there is the thing about "workers paradises," a tired old straw man. Then there is the intentional misreading of what I wrote regarding expansionism. Expansionism is the desire of a country to take over territory by force. True communists have never advocated this, and indeed, fight against it, as in Lenin's thesis on the Right of Self-Determination. What communists stand for is solidarity with the workers of the world who are overthrowing their own bourgeoisie.

I knew you would attempt to link being pro-revolutionary with expansionism. I just wanted to see if you would be as dishonest as you are prone to. You didn't disappoint.


Regarding Cuba, the figures I presented were from the CIA World Fact Book, not the Cuban government. Please, stop your lying.

moon

They don't.

Selsaral

There was a free press in Soviet Russia? In modern North Korea? In modern Cuba? In any of the Soviet States? In China?

moon

What do you mean by a free press? Free for whom? Time Warner? Under what conditions?

Your statement was too broad. It is factually untrue that all socialist states have cracked down on the freedom of the press, although some have, mostly in response to threats to their existence. Keep in mind that that during wartime, capitalist states are equally as oppressive.

But, several socialist states have had a very free press: Yugoslavia and Nicaragua for example. In fact, when the U.S. started bombing Serbia in 1999, one of the first targets was the state media.

Grad Student Humanist

Why don't you address the points I made about Cuba, specifically the fact that no increase in the standard of living justifies a forty plus year dictatorship which tramples human rights and condemns dissenters to decades in prison?

moon

I disagree with your whole liberal-bourgeois premises. I also dispute your facts. For the vast majority of Cuban's, life is much better under Castro.

Most of the stuff you hear about the dissenters going to prison and the "dictarship" of Castro is just lies made up by the CIA and anti-Castro zealots. I can't take them too seriously.

Selsaral

I guess you just don't accept any western history of any kind? This isn't meant as an accusation or dismissal, simply a question. Everything I have learned shows essentially the exact opposite to pretty much everything you've stated in this thread, and particularly in regards to the press. Even during the gulf war, or the vietnam war, American publications could openly criticize the governments actions, speculate on current affairs etc. Unless you completely disregard all western history, this is nothing like the crackdown on the press seen in Soviet Russia or China, where ONLY state press exists and essentially no private press of any kind. I don't care about the New York Times, I care about small-scale publications that are often called 'fringe' or 'radical' but are still completely legal and common in this country, but utterly stamped out in Soviet Russia and China.