From observation it seems really handy for crushing all nuance, too. Who did the Holodumber? Stalin. By himself. WIth a big spoon. Don't ask why Ukrainian communist officials in Ukraine were genociding Ukrainians. Stalin did it, alone, by himself.
The cultural revolution? Mao did it. Just Mao. No one else was involved. We can condemn the entire country because the entire country is just one dude on a framed propaganda poster. Or like "we're going to sanction Saddam" or whoever, because sanctioning hte dictator is justifiable, whereas people might ask why we're pushing millions or tens of millions of people because we don't like the guy that supposedly single handedly runs the entire country.
From observation it seems really handy for crushing all nuance, too. Who did the Holodumber? Stalin. By himself. WIth a big spoon. Don't ask why Ukrainian communist officials in Ukraine were genociding Ukrainians. Stalin did it, alone, by himself.
The cultural revolution? Mao did it. Just Mao. No one else was involved. We can condemn the entire country because the entire country is just one dude on a framed propaganda poster. Or like "we're going to sanction Saddam" or whoever, because sanctioning hte dictator is justifiable, whereas people might ask why we're pushing millions or tens of millions of people because we don't like the guy that supposedly single handedly runs the entire country.