The horse is dead

  • OgdenTO [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Wait, do you think the point of posting is to affect society?

  • vccx [they/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    China's success is single handedly one of the biggest propaganda tools you can use as a Communist. It makes a very strong case to those that are at least neutral toward China.

    • therealmove [none/use name]
      ·
      edit-2
      3 years ago

      China is seen as a miracle of capitalism, in how after liberalization it grew rapidly and brought many people out of poverty. Most people would laugh at you if claim China's economy is communist. Like try talking to people outside the leftist bubble. Try telling chuds, liberals, or even market socialists that China is proof that communism as in planned economies work.

      • BynarsAreOk [none/use name]
        ·
        edit-2
        3 years ago

        China is seen as a miracle of capitalism,

        The narrative you just proposed is real: "China is a miracle of capitalism, obviously then we should emultate them because Capitalism FTW baby yeah."

        The actual narrative: "Evil Communist authoritarian CCCCCCCCPPPPPP genociding muslims we must do something to stop communism from ruling the world."

        This narrative that most people see China as a "miracle of Capitalism" certainly does not align to anything you can find online. Maybe in real life you can find some neckbeard on the back of a trailer that believes China is great because of Capitalist but that is certainly not the narrative being pushed by the western media.

        At the very least, if people thought China was the shining beacon of capitalism they wouldn't be so hell bent on hating it and I can't imagine the double think required to be a neoliberal zealot while simultaniously believing that China is the capitalist dream, sorry miracle on earth.

        If you want to claim that most westerns have zero clue how the Chinese economy works and couldn't explain the difference between China and the west, then sure that is fair.

        But I am reasonably sure most people believe the Chinese government controls everything including the economy(that is their definition of authoritarian) and that most corporations are corrupt. If they accept that China is capitalist at most they'll also point out it isn't true capitalism because something something evil authoritarian CCP.

        • therealmove [none/use name]
          ·
          3 years ago

          No seriously, talk to people irl. Try telling them, "I support planned economies because it works in China". And see for yourself how people react.

        • therealmove [none/use name]
          ·
          3 years ago

          Evidence of what? That state involvement is good? How is that supposed to help the communist argument, unless you think that communism is when the govt does everything.

        • Pezevenk [he/him]
          ·
          3 years ago

          Lol yeah go ahead and try when the vast majority of people just hate China and the other ones don't know shit about it and they're gonna start hating too if they Google about it. Even if they were mostly neutral they just wouldn't give a shit. Like, what part of China's program would you even be willing to implement? Trains? Wait until they hit you with any more specific questions. Most people don't even want to implement anything resembling China's program, so what is the point? A huge point of contention in the US was universal healthcare, except China doesn't have that. Strong labour unions? Nope, they don't have that either, they have a single massive labour union which is largely controlled by the state and collaborates with employers. There is absolutely no good propaganda except maybe idk, urban planning or something? Unless you think having to argue with everyone about whether or not the Uighurs are being genocided is good propaganda (it isn't).

          • vccx [they/them]
            ·
            edit-2
            3 years ago

            Dissociating communism from poverty, rebuking the primacy of free markets, openly using the state as a tool of class warfare, Huawei as an example of a worker co-op surpassing private enterprises like Apple, pointing to the successes of both their nationalized heavy industry, state champions and SOEs to disprove the idea that the private sector is more efficient (or the only efficient form of organization) and pointing to China's massive economic growth as an example of what the Soviet Union could have replicated if it wasn't isolated from world markets.

            People are tired of stagnant wages, even just pointing out how much wages in China have grown builds resentment toward Capitalism.

            I am not American, I focus on radicalizing disillusioned young people and people of color. Capitalism is going to kill us all -> Planned economies are the only alternative -> China is a surviving example of a planned economy and transitionary state with heavy state intervention in the economy.

            It doesn't matter so much what you think China is but rather what they want China to be and therefore what the Soviet Union could have been. That is the strategy I use to radicalize young people concerned about the climate and disillusioned with capitalism. It doesn't have to be 100% coherent as in a debate club or research paper, people are emotional, the point is to wear down faith in capitalism and getting them to come around to the viability of socialism as an alternative.

            The Uyghur conversation doesn't have to be bad either if you have the credibility can turn it into a discussion about imperialism and the false pretenses of American interventionism.

            What do you use to win people over? I don't think there's any better tools that the successes and victories of existing or formerly existing socialist projects.

            • Pezevenk [he/him]
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              edit-2
              3 years ago

              People are tired of stagnant wages, even just pointing out how much wages in China have grown builds resentment toward Capitalism.

              China literally did capitalism to achieve that growth. Not exactly the neoliberal conception of capitalism but capitalism nevertheless. If that's what you want to advocate for, there is plenty more examples to pick from than just China.

              China is a surviving example of a planned economy

              China is not a planned economy and hasn't been for a long time. China is just more interventionist than most western countries.

              I have no idea why someone would chose the most controversial country possible that isn't even doing what you are advocating for for your propaganda.

              The Uyghur conversation doesn’t have to be bad either if you have the credibility can turn it into a discussion about imperialism and the false pretenses of American interventionism.

              Yeah totally, it's definitely not like it's gonna end up with you looking like a creepy genocide denier or whatever. Look, I've seen people try that stuff. I've seen the kinds of people who go around campus telling people how cool and misunderstood Stalin was and I've seen how badly it goes. If you wanna talk about some of the good aspects of China specifically, go ahead but if your propaganda is "haha hey I'm a socialist and China is also cool socialists, look how cool they are", it's gonna maybe work on 5 people and the rest are just gonna think you're a bunch of creeps.

              • vccx [they/them]
                ·
                edit-2
                3 years ago

                The growth is occurring under a dictatorship of the proletariat, wherein 70% of all heavy industry was nationalized and the state exerts a level of control, intervention and open class warfare far beyond Keynesian capitalist states.

                Sure they have that large state union but laborers are still conducting strikes and wildcat strikes at a significantly higher rate than in union strongholds, and those radicals are much more likely to be literal Maoists than limp social democrats.

                They are explicitly attempting to correct for the pitfalls of the Soviet Union, namely capitalist encirclement, autarky, and the overwhelming of the planning apparatus for as long as possible. They are also adapting to the reality of the world without the Soviet Union, wherein socialism is no longer a world power and concessions must be made to avoid being destroyed in the same manner.

                On your last point that isn't what I do. At least 40% of young people identify as socialists and I go based on their concerns. China is one of the best propaganda tools if you know how and when to use it. It's an existing socialist project that is wildly successful. It's not in second place like the Soviet Union was.

                If you want to see what a state capitalist nation looks like when the Bourgeoise are in control, you can look at Russia.

                • therealmove [none/use name]
                  ·
                  3 years ago

                  Im not going to elaborate to avoid a struggle session, but China is not a DotP. Its a state capitalist country where the working class is exploited and actively oppressed. Nationalization is not proof of socialism, eg Norway, Azerbaijan etc. And executing billionaires is not evidence of classwarfare. Class war is something the proletariat does independently, not something a bourgeois state does in favor of national goals. Even Hitler persecuted finance capital.

                  • Punk [he/him]
                    ·
                    3 years ago

                    What use is it to just state China isn't a proletarian dictatorship like it's a fact? Marxism Leninism has been called state capitalism since time immemorial so these arguments have been played out thousands of times. Until someone demonstrates a better way of instituting a proletarian dictatorship these quibbles are pointless and ignore the material reality of how hard it is to change an entire mode of production.

                    • therealmove [none/use name]
                      ·
                      3 years ago

                      The question here is not about implementation, its about the very class character of the state.

                • Pezevenk [he/him]
                  ·
                  3 years ago

                  If I respond to this it's gonna become another silly China struggle session. But I don't buy for a second that you are actually effectively utilising China as a propaganda tool in a western country beyond just specific stuff. Unless maybe you are talking to people who never really paid any attention to international politics whatsoever.

              • summerbl1nd [none/use name]
                ·
                3 years ago

                you could make an eco-accelerationist argument that the maturation of capitalism in densely populated developing nations on a resource limited planet will much more quickly expose its inherent contradictions and is going to get us all killed decades ahead of schedule. but i'd imagine the easiest answer from most people would be to just kill all the poors, capitalism in one country, etc.

              • bottech [he/him]
                ·
                3 years ago

                Kind of? Apparently only employees of the company can own stock in it though there still remains the question of how equitably these stocks are distributed

            • Pezevenk [he/him]
              ·
              3 years ago

              70% of the population working outside of the conditions of wage labor.

              That... That's not happening in China.

              • vccx [they/them]
                ·
                3 years ago

                They are confusing that stat with the percentage of heavy industry currently nationalized in China.

                • Pezevenk [he/him]
                  ·
                  edit-2
                  3 years ago

                  Um

                  You know that public sector employees are doing wage labour right?

                  (Also idk how this is calculated, but these stats are mostly wrong and not just for China. Perhaps it is the way they are counted? )

                    • Pezevenk [he/him]
                      ·
                      3 years ago

                      If you define wage labor as just working for a wage, then yes

                      A critical element of wage labor is that workers are paid in wages.

                      Um yes?

                      If what you are being paid is not determined by the market, it is not a wage, and you are not doing wage labor.

                      Do you think there isn't a market deciding prices? Do you think it makes any difference if a business nominally belongs to the state? I've never heard anyone argue that working at the public sector isn't wage labour, ever. And what you said is not the defining feature of wage labour. The defining feature of wage labour is that you sell your capacity to work.

                      Why do you think the numbers are wrong?

                      Because I noticed other countries that I know about and the numbers were silly. For China in particular they offer a bunch of completely different estimates and enormous fluctuations that don't make sense. For instance they have a source from the Business Insider which gives it at 50% and another which gives it at around 30% (although that is from some years ago). I think it has to do with whether or not they count mixed owned enterprises as public? I don't know but something weird is going on with these figures.

                        • Pezevenk [he/him]
                          ·
                          3 years ago

                          Stop. Go read wage labor and capital if you want to talk about this. Because I’ve described wage labor from marxist definitions.

                          Yes, I have read it, and it doesn't follow from anything in there that public sector workers aren't doing wage labour.

                          Their surplus labor value is not being stolen from them.

                          How? Do you think in order for exploitation to happen a business has to be private? That's not at all true.

                          Profit is reinvested for the common good.

                          If there is profit there is wage labour and exploitation. It may be better than privately owned enterprises for a number of reasons but it is still very much wage labour.

                            • Pezevenk [he/him]
                              ·
                              edit-2
                              3 years ago

                              But they do, they do have wage labour, this is not at all at odds with Leninism.

          • disco [any]
            ·
            3 years ago

            They don’t even have universal healthcare? Can somebody remind me why we like them so much?

              • Pezevenk [he/him]
                ·
                3 years ago

                Well yeah although the counterpoint is 1) Cuba and 2) they used to have more or less universal healthcare before the market reforms.

            • vccx [they/them]
              ·
              3 years ago

              Wages rising 12% every year from the CPC throwing their weight around in the economy, income tripling or more in the poorer regions across the board, a highly effective dictatorship of the proletariat, massive infrastructure projects designed to uplift the poorest regions of China and poorest nations in the world, and being overtaking the USA as the most successful and prosperous nation while broadcasting communist ideology and disassociating communism from poverty and stagnation.

              They're also the primary trading partner for both the remaining orthodox socialist nations and those under siege by American imperialism.

              • therealmove [none/use name]
                ·
                3 years ago

                Economic development is not evidence of socialism. Countries like Japan or SK industrialized even faster than China.

            • Pezevenk [he/him]
              ·
              edit-2
              3 years ago

              Because anti imperialism/antiamericanism, greater degree of interventionism in the economy and the possibility of them supporting leftists in other countries. I kinda understand it, these are legitimate in general. But I don't understand why someone would use them for propaganda.

              Also some people hold the hope that since nothing else works China will come in and press the socialism button one day for everyone.

              Also it's not just that they don't have universal healthcare, their healthcare is actually significantly worse than the US. Which is somewhat understandable since they are very poor comparatively, however even poorer countries do better a lot of the time.

              • summerbl1nd [none/use name]
                ·
                edit-2
                3 years ago

                in china, patients murder doctors instead of the other way around

                generally, issues that can be solved by going to the ER in the US are much cheaper in china. it's when you get into more capital intensive illnesses that you become just as fucked as an american (if not more so). the systemic problem is that doctors are generally less motivated to provide quality service since their salaries are so incredibly low that they get more returns on being good paper pushers and taking bribes than being good doctors. increased rule of law (read: actual consequences) has the bribery on a steady downward trend.

                the government has been unwilling to further subsidize doctor salaries (they've actually been on a downward trend for a while now), and the 'solution' in recent years has been to promote public/private partnerships in the various departments in order to indirectly offload the cost on to the consumer in the form of diagnostics and other consumable tech, of which the doctors can get a cut. this has created a situation in which quality coverage has become more concentrated in capital-dense areas and people only ever go to the big name hospitals for anything. the government's response to this has been to throw money at the smaller public clinics to entice people coming in with easy fixes away from the bigger hospitals so that the specialists there can do specialist things instead of spending 90% of their time treating stubbed toes.

                tldr; complicated

                • Pezevenk [he/him]
                  ·
                  3 years ago

                  Yeah it's true that for minor things it is not as bad.

    • glk [none/use name]
      ·
      3 years ago

      success

      If success requires that much carbon emissions just launch the nukes right now

      • Gkalaitza [he/him]
        ·
        3 years ago

        China shouldnt have developed from third world levels in order to be able to not get fucked by the west and make its own path and better the lives of billion(s) cause carbon emissions. Go tell the African nations and proletariat next next, they better not develop to western levels materialy or be successfull ,. Sorry only the west is allowed to do so cause it did it before climate change was understood or analysed academicaly

        Also the world has much better chances of fighting climate change with China as the dominant world power than with america so China developing is indeed worth ot even for climate prospects. I guess they should have done it with solar power or something

        • glk [none/use name]
          ·
          3 years ago

          to reiterate: If development can only come at the cost of destroying the environment we should just end it now.

          Kerala, Cuba, and even maoist China succeeded in raising standards of living without the ridiculous carbon emissions that took place over the past thirty years.

  • Awoo [she/her]
    ·
    3 years ago

    I just want Hexbear Americans to realise that how they currently feel about China talk showing up too much is how the rest of the fucking world feels about America. Hope you're ready for it, the next 250 years is going to be China talk.

    • zifnab25 [he/him, any]
      ·
      3 years ago

      the next 250 years

      We reinvent the boogeyman inside every fifteen or twenty years. Hell, we whiplashed from OrangeMan to RussiaMan to ChinaMan inside the last four.

  • WIIHAPPYFEW [he/him, they/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    STOP POSTING ABOUT CHINA! I'M TIRED OF SEEING IT! MY FRIENDS ON TIKTOK START STRUGGLE SESSIONS, ON DISCORD IT'S FUCKING STRUGGLE SESSIONS! I was in a server, right? and ALL OF THE CHANNELS were just China discourse. I-I showed my champion underwear to my girlfriend and t-the tag I showed it and I said "hey babe, struggle sesh time HAHA DUN DADADUN DUUUN DUUN DUN DADADADAAA DUNN" I fucking looked at an ad for china cabinets and said “WOW BRO, HOT TAKE" I looked at my penis I think of the shape of the wine glass that Xi held and I go "PENIS? MORE LIKE XI-NIS!" AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

  • kissinger
    ·
    edit-2
    1 year ago

    deleted by creator

    • notthenameiwant [he/him]
      hexagon
      ·
      3 years ago

      Do that elsewhere, where you can get results, because you've wrung the China discourse dry. There's literally nothing to be gained by China posting. Half of the China posts are about Xinjiang at the point.

    • Utter_Karate [he/him, comrade/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      LIAR! China is actually really small. It's tiny. There is barely room to move. All the Chinese people were killed at Tianmen square. They're gone, folks. There are no Chinese people left. The only people left are Uyghur freedom fighters, and they're all dead too. All killed in concentration camps. There are no living people in China. Just tourists and honest journalists trying to spread word of their atrocities. The journalists have all been killed. They're dead and gone. The tourists have all been brainwashed. They're not even in China, they're back home spreading Chinese propaganda. No one lives in China. It's too small to live in anyway. DEBATE ME!

    • Totalscrotalimplosio [he/him,any]
      ·
      3 years ago

      Well look at Clifford the big Red CCP funded dog. Did he murder Big Bailey in a genocide camp? Dr. Reverend Adrian Zenz says yes.

  • glimmer_twin [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Western leftists are never gonna do a revolution in our own countries so all we have to do all day is argue about whether or not China is following the correct path to theirs lol

  • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Less stuff about Amerikkka and the "west" please. Everyone knows you're not effecting anything. The horse is dead. SocDem imperialists are useless. Post about work in the global south that actually effects something