The PRC infamously censors a fair amount of stuff, and I don't mind that. I have my disagreements and criticisms, but I'd much rather give up some libertine behaviors in media than have all the shit that happens when you dont censor things.

But like...what are the actual policies?Besides "don't advocate for the overthrow of the government."

For instance, I recently picked up "Sultans Game," which is a very good game. But it's also very sexual. It has artistic nudity and makes constant references to sex, homosexual relationships, and rape. It's not super explicit, but it's still a lot more than i would've expected when told "this game was made in China." [Although i am playing outside of China, so maybe the version in China is censored]. But games like Genshin Impact and certain animes are censored for lewd content fairly regularly, to my knowledge.

There's also books. For instance "I love my mom" is banned [despite appeals] while other books with sexual content aren't banned [to my knowledge. Also i haven't read that aforementioned book, so if it's just an exception for extreme nature, let me know]. Or how one of Hong Ying's works literally references the Tianenmen Square "massacre?" I'm unsure if it's published in China, but I would have assumed that she'd be blacklisted for that.

The last question i have is, what's the point of banning something if you're allowed to have it anyway? For example, hearts of iron 4 is banned in China. But also it's not? Tbh the language barrier makes figuring out this stuff hard, whether something is banned or not or if that thing is just going through a Different service or what.

Roland Boer's Socialism with Chinese Characteristics: A Guide for Foreigners offers a comprehensive and insightful exploration of China's unique path to socialism, emphasizing the centrality of Marxist philosophy in understanding the nation's development. Boer argues that to truly grasp China's trajectory, one must engage with Chinese Marxism, particularly as it has evolved during the Reform and Opening-Up period initiated by Deng Xiaoping. He critiques Western perspectives that often misinterpret China through the lens of Western liberal frameworks, advocating instead for a deeper understanding rooted in the research and perspectives of Chinese Marxist scholars.

I understand that there was still much good about the Soviet/Eastern Bloc system and shortages and all didn't always happen and revisionism would eventually cause all sorts of issues. However, I'm looking for a detailed answer (feel free to send links too) to what actually caused the infamous economic struggles that many people faced (which apparently isn't just completely bourgeois propaganda) in the Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact nations (particularly in their later years).

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/40108657

In this very special edition of the ‘Decline & Fall’ show we speak to Gabriel Rockhill about his new book ‘Who Paid The Pipers Of Western Marxism’. We explore the cold war origins of wester Marxism, the heavy investment in it by the CIA and why we need to see cultural institutions as a mechanism for reinforcing ruling class power.

We also look at how the pro-imperialist left were used to undermine the USSR and why this work has continued into the era of the color revolution.

The book: Who Paid the Pipers of Western Marxism?

Who Paid the Pipers of Western Marxism? offers a crash course in the history of imperialist propaganda, as well as in the Marxist method for analyzing culture and ideology. Author Gabriel Rockhill demonstrates the explanatory and transformative superiority of a dialectical and historical materialist approach, while elucidating how the world of ideas is a crucial site of class struggle. He then engages in a meticulous counter-history of the Frankfurt School—which made a foundational contribution to Western Marxism—by situating it within the global relations of class struggle and the imperialist war on actually existing socialism. With the explicit and direct backing of powerful elements in the capitalist ruling class and the world’s leading imperialist state, the Frankfurt School developed a widely promoted form of compatible critical theory as an ersatz for dialectical and historical materialism. The volume concludes by bringing to the fore the positive project that serves as the guiding methodological framework for the work as a whole: a thoroughly anticolonial and anti-imperialist Marxism dedicated to building socialism in the real world. Drawing on extensive archival research to pull back the curtain on ruling class machinations, Rockhill’s book elucidates how the intellectual world war on the socialist alternative has sought to shore up and promote a “compatible left” intelligentsia while misrepresenting, maligning, and trying to destroy the revolutionary left.

This is something that's always confused me, but I've put it off since it's always "later." But Marx and such talks about how a communist society wouldn't have alienation or a division of labor ["In a higher phase of communist society, after the enslaving subordination of the individual to the division of labor, and therewith also the antithesis between mental and physical labor, has vanished; after labor has become not only a means of life but life's prime want; after the productive forces have also increased with the all-around development of the individual, and all the springs of co-operative wealth flow more abundantly – only then can the narrow horizon of bourgeois right be crossed in its entirety and society inscribe on its banners: From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!"- Marx, Critique of the Gotha Programme] . But like...how? He's using the division of labor the same way I am right? [That being, multiple people make individual parts of a thing and therefore have better throughput but no one has a concrete connection to the thing they're making?] But I don't understand how you necessarily get rid of that. Maybe this is basic but this confuses me

I've had the displeasure of happening upon some ultra-leftists talking about Gramsci and they blamed him for eurocommunism [without a source, of course]. But I'm a little confused on how he even got associated with it. I can only think of his writings one war of position vs war of maneuver, but even that feels like a very big stretch. And otherwise I feel like Gramsci, with his revolution against Capital and all, would be the exact opposite of Eurocommunism.

hello hello, hoping this is the right community to post something like this in!

anyhow, see title. i'm not completely unfamiliar with the subject matter, i've tried to do some reading on the matter with the resources i have on hand, but theory on this is rather hard to find in English, from my experience — in addition to the classic problem of most English language sources on central and inner Asia having an annoying anti-communist bend somewhere, because Muh peaceful buddhism, soviet empire blah blah blah and such things. Sad.

regardless, my point is this: i'm interested in sources detailing the development of feudalism in the nomadic steppe societies of Asia, and would appreciate a focus on pre-1921 Mongolia, but i'm aware this might be asking a bit much considering. sorry if any of this is worded oddly/unclearly, and thank you in advance!

Has anyone read this book? If so, would you recommend it for the purpose of helping "normies" dispel their anti-Soviet misconceptions and myths about WWII? Based on this review the book sounds like it could be interesting and useful as a resource:

"The book is a long read but that is because it is the fruit of a long time: Carley has spent thirty years in the archives of the countries involved. Stalin’s Gamble is the first of a trilogy that covers the period from Hitler’s seizure of power in 1933 to his invasion of the USSR in 1941, This volume takes us to 1936 and the signing of a France-USSR pact (much weakened by the French apparat and, in the end, ineffective) and Hitler’s occupation of the Rhineland. Because of his labours in the archives, Carley has command of all sides of the issue.

The central theme and, no doubt, a complete surprise to most of its readers, will be that the the conventional story has got it exactly backwards: Stalin was not Hitler’s co-conspirator. He understood four things: 1) the previous good Moscow-Berlin relations were gone forever, 2) Hitler was a threat to all around him, 3) Hitler would break any agreement as soon as he could, 4) the only response was an agreement of Germany’s neighbours to block him. “Collective security” they called it: only together could Hitler be stopped; individual agreements just encouraged him to push somewhere else. This volume retails, meeting by meeting, the efforts of Soviet diplomats to get their interlocutors to grasp this and to construct an anti-Hitler resistance arrangement. They were not unsuccessful: important people in France, Britain (even the anti-Bolshevik Winston Churchill who met the Soviet Ambassador often), Romania and Czechoslovakia agreed with Stalin’s appreciation of the situation but they could never quite push their governments over the finish line.

The last flicker of Moscow’s attempts would be extinguished with an absurdly lethargic and powerless French-British military mission to Leningrad in August 1939; Stalin now understood that his Plan A was dead and the USSR was on its own. So, to buy time, he accepted Hitler’s offer of a non-aggression pact, grabbed territory to the west and buckled up for the inevitable war. But his timing was wrong and Hitler attacked, as David Glantz has observed, at exactly the worst time for the Soviets.

Hard as it may be for many in the West to admit, Stalin’s appreciation of the situation was completely correct and the alliance that could have deterred Hitler never happened.

This interview with Carley describes the trilogy. https://www.thepostil.com/of-collective-security-an-interview-with-michael-jabara-carley/"

I was reading about Mao's early guerrilla campaigns in Hunan and such, and the incorrect Li Lisen and Chen Duxiu lines. Despite there being massive losses taken during both the reconcilitory and adventurist periods, Mao never split from the CPC and that seemed to work pretty well.

Conversely, Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknect [along with many other members] didn't split from the SPD to form the KPD until the start of the German Revolution, and arguably this contributed to their downfall.

Obviously the SPD is an extreme example, but still. Is there a good way to tell when a split should occur, and the best way to do it?

A little while ago I was scrolling through 1dimes Twitter [because i hate myself i guess] and saw a post he retweeted saying something like "Venezuala was better under Hugo Chavez, but Maduro is just a comprador [for the russians and chinese]" or something like that.

But...is there really much difference between the two? I mean I don't follow Venezualan internal politics religiously, but from what I can tell Chavez and Maduro are fairly similar. But like I said, I could be wrong.

In the US, the ottomans aren't really talked about that much outside ww1 [and even then, just barely] so I dont really know where to look for histiographic sources on the topic. I don't need like a full analysis in the replies, just any sources relating to the matter would be fine. Thank you in advance.

I know presenting this in a binary like that is not great, but previously I had assumed, given both what I've seem on the grad second hand and the previous answers i had received to other questions, that this space held the same view as the CPC on the cultural revolution, that it was misguided. But my previous question asked here had answers that gave off the impression that the cultural revolution was good and even necessary.

I'm not arguing against that position, I'm just surprised by apparent turnaround is all, and would like further explanations to this conclusion.

What I mean is that I get the general ideological beliefs behind the cultural revolution, but how did so much chaos occur in the first place, backed by both the party and a lot (even if not the majority) of people?

Obviously there was the famine after the GLF and a general sense of paranoia politically given both that and the conflict between China and basically all of its (major) neighbors like india, the USSR, and the capitalist east Asian countries along with American meddling in the area.

However, reading about it honestly reminds me a lot of the French revolution (not 1:1 Obviously, just a general feel of chaos and intensity and paranoia and such), but it had been 16 years since the liberation of China.

So my question basically boils down to why both the party and a lot of people were so willing to engage in the cultural revolution.

Obviously intially places like the GDR and Cuba didnr immediately become bastions of lgtbq rights, but overtime they definitely developed a lot in that respect. I can understand the intial roll back of these rights right after a revolution (like on Cuba), and then gradually reexpanding over time. The idea being that homosexuality is viewed as Bourgeois decadence because the Bourgeois wouldn't be punished (as much) for that behavior, so instead of getting rid of the law they apply it equally across society. Of course this is wrong and eventually the people choose to give more rights to lgbtq people.

China and other Asian countries also kinda had this issue, but it seems to be more of a general conservatism and indifference, depending on where you are. So Vietnam is generally pretty positive, China in the middle and the DPRK closer to Russia and such.

So I'm just curious why the USSR and it's constituent states were and are so against the idea. Not in a moralist "omg I can't believe it" way, just that the incongruence confuses me. Sure, after the USSR collapse and the focus against western imperialism, I can definitely see why they're this way because of imperialist pink washing. But why was this never changed during the cold war, while in East Germany it was?

The work is good and from what I can tell, the points about the discussion on the State (which is the basis for Lenin's thesis in State and Revolution), seem solid. But a lot of the family stuff seems...I don't know. I was never taught that stuff and I really have no anthropological background to begin researching such stuff, and I know Engels wrote it based on the very start of (respectable) anthropology.

Basically what I'm asking is, is it still accurate and just not accepted by most people because Marxism (Similar to the LTV and such), or is it outdated? And if it's the latter, is there a more up to date source, and what does it change about Marxist thinking of pre-capitalist society?

If so, is it more similar to the previous marxist histiography in France and the USSR in the 1900s or more similar to the more modern works, like the modern Oxford History of the French Revolution (Side note, I haven't read that yet. Can anyone here give a reccomendation on it)?

I asked this question a long, long time ago on reddit, but now I cant find it and also we've all matured and learned a lot since then, so id like to ask the question again.

I was also inspired to make this post after seeing an anarchist whine about socialist states teaching people how to read, saying "they keep in place the systems that make illiteracy a bad thing." I obviously am not taking them seriously, but it did get me thinking.

Anyway, what i mean by the question is that poverty in non-socialist countries is dehabilitating, causes people to get diseased, both physically and mentally. It's also extremely isolating and usually requires people work harder to actually remain alive.

But would this be the same in a socialist country? When people in pre-reform china were impoverished, what was their standard of living like compared to people making a similar income elsewhere? Yes technically they didn't make that much money a day, but did they need money to have a home or food? If they were impoverished was it possible to get a job? What would the likely-hood of drug addiction be compared to impoverished people elsewhere. And how consistent did this remain throughout the reform period to today (obviously extreme poverty has been mostly eliminated in China today, but still).

This isn't to say, in any case, reform and opening up was a bad policy. Even if the poor were somewhat happy, they (and china) were still poor, and the improvement in living standards from reform and opening up outweighs any theoretical and/or moralistic gain from poverty. However I am just curious. (This also goes for other countries like the DPRK to)

Basically, I was reading Gramsci's work again and reread his thing on caesarism/bonapartism. He places Julius Caesar and Bonaparte the actually competent as progressive caesarist/bonapartist, and then places Napoleon the stupid and...Bismark(?) as regressive caesarist/bonapartists.

If I'm understanding him correctly, the idea is that two forces, progressive classes (such as the proletariat now and Bourgeoisie then) and regressive classes (landowners then and the Bourgeoisie now) essentially don't have the ability to overthrow each other or to end the conflict, so a Bonapartist enters the scene and gives the slight nudge needed to either side to tip the balance and resolve the conflict.

I...do have a couple questions I can't figure out myself.

1.Did Caesar succeed or fail? What were the progressive classes at the time? The small landowners? The proletarii? Did the roman economic system change between before he came to power and after he came to power? If he did fail, what would have success look like? How did the roman class system survive for several hundred years after him, if the class system didn't change?

2.Did Napoleon help reestablish the Bourgeois dictatorship in France over the Feudal manoralists, or did he simply "solidify" the victory after taking control from the thermidorians? Would it have mattered if he did or did not?

3.Bismark? I don't really get this one.

(P.S, is Putin a modern bonapartist or no? If so, reactionary or progressive?)

A very relevant piece given how confused of a state the western left finds itself in at the moment. Lenin's work cuts through the fog of opportunism and brings ideological clarity to the topic of revolutionary agitation and organization. If we want to succeed we must learn the lessons of history and creatively apply them to our own distinct historic conditions.

Chapter 2 article 35: Citizens of the People’s Republic of China shall enjoy freedom of speech, the press, assembly, association, procession and demonstration.

ARTICLE 125: In conformity with the interests of the toilers, and in order to strengthen the socialist system, the citizens of the U.S.S.R. are guaranteed by law: — (a) Freedom of speech; (b) Freedom of the Press ; (c) Freedom of assembly and of holding mass meetings; (d) Freedom of street processions and demonstrations.

I'm not going to sit here and be like "urmagod china ussr is a 1984 dictatorism" but I do just want to know what this actually means. For instance, both countries engaged in very obvious censorship and banning of materials. I'm not saying these actions were right or wrong, but just (at least on the face of it) contradictory to the previously stated articles. Presumably there have been court cases in both of these countries that actually helps outline what they mean.

This isn't to say Bourgeois countries follow freedom of speech either (I will leave proving this as an exercise to the reader. And by exercise I mean a slow walk to the other side of the room), but I think my main question is why include them so broadly, or at all really, if they [at least from what I remember] haven't really been enforced

A lot of people on here talk about how GDP isn't a good statistic for measuring economic output. And I don't disagree, but it does make me wonder why I've never seen a different form of statistics developed by a socialist country. If there is a better way to measure economic output in terms of socially necessary labor or such then I would think that some economist or ministry would make one after 100 years of existing socialism around the world in some for or another

Obviously there are proletarian revolutions, and bourgeois revolutions, but I've never heard of a Feudal revolution.

This is obviously going off of classical histiography of like, Engels's Origin of the Family, so maybe it's changed since then and the feudal-slave society split isnt really a thing.