• TheDialectic [none/use name]
    ·
    5 months ago

    He had an 1800s education and he lived in the first half of the 1900s. I am not sure by what metrics we consider him a modern person.

    Good info on the rest of it though

    • Vncredleader [he/him]
      ·
      5 months ago

      pre-modern is not exactly a relative term. Stalin lived firmly in the Late Modern Period, not early modern. When you say someone is a "pre-modern person" that indicates a specific time in historical periodization, one prior to the second industrial revolution. In terms of history Stalin is a modern figure. I don't think we need to say Stalin wasn't modern to defend his stance here. There is no exact science, but generally the contemporary period is post-WW2. Stalin is modern, but not contemporary.

    • YearOfTheCommieDesktop [they/them]
      hexagon
      ·
      5 months ago

      not modern as in "past 20 years", modern as in modernism, if I had to guess https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modernism

      Which pretty much lines up with his lifespan actually

      • Vncredleader [he/him]
        ·
        5 months ago

        Yeah and post-modernism is first said in 1949, which makes Stalin firmly modern. When talking about history we are dealing with a scale so vast that modern is a century ago.