Sometimes the simplest explanation is the best explanation. You cannot understand Vladimir Putin and his war against Ukraine unless you understand that he is a Marxist-Leninist.
God damn, this is written worse than shitposts on Hexbear.
His entire argument is Putin is from USSR and here are some random quotes.
Now I'm inspired to write an article on "Putin the Joseph Smith-ite" or "Putin the Neo-Platonist" and submit it to a conservative journal.
Amazing. I would order the physical copy of "Putin the Neo-Platonist".
I said it more as respect for the level of rigor on Hexbear than anything.
This guy writes like shit but is a Ph.D. and "leading historian". Fuck me.
Not necessarily. I didn't mean it like that. I don't think a Ph.D. means you are intelligent, but it should reflect some skill and it always creates greater job access. It's a class difference. This guy went through various levels of higher education and writes like crap but can still land a job writing and keep it, in part due to having a Ph.D. and in part due to anti-Communist grift, while there are some posters here who aren't at the same educational level and might have some working class job but write excellent mini-disserations on radical history on the regular totally without financial benefit. That's what I meant.
Man being a conservative grifter is so easy. I wish I was paid what that guy is just to make stuff up.
I've thought about doing it for the laughs, just make up the most ridiculous stuff and just the word China all over it and the Chinese flag. Make it rich.
"A leading Russian historian writing about 17th-century Russia indicted it with this telling phrase: “The state swelled and the people shrank.” The same portrait is true of present-day Russia and its president in perpetuity, Vladimir Putin."
17th century Russia? The big famous communist country?
its like asking a 12 year old how Communism started as an ideology. “Uh it was a long time ago and it was something to do with Russia”😂
"He ... moved to Moscow to join the Yeltsin administration."
Wow, he MUST be a communist. I mean, to join the Yeltsin administration...
He was born in the 50s, lived in Soviet Union while it was still around, so no shit he’d do all that. What do they expect?
Mao Zedong, whom Putin surely read, wrote: “Every communist must grasp that political power grows out of the barrel of a gun. . . . In fact, we may say that the whole world can be remolded only with a gun.” This is the ideology that molded Putin.
Surely…
Mao Zedong, whom Putin surely read
Here we have the usual conservative anti-intellectualism on full display. If you are a statesman, you should be well read, especially in political theory; and if you are at all serious, you will have read authors whom you disagree with. Having read Mao doesn't make Putin a Maoist, any more than Stalin having read John Locke makes him a liberal. Many of us here have read authors like Julius Evola and Mueller van den Bruck in order to better understand the fascist position -- does that mean we're about to emigrate, join a mercenary group, and Slava Ukraini ourselves into Kinzhal-induced oblivion? Of course not.
But this is how we Americans get politicians and public figures who, apparently out of some desire not to be tainted by Evil Commie Ideas, have read Democracy in America (final chapter only) and nothing else.
I've had people tell me they're afraid of reading Marxist theory because they say just a few pages could be so enticing it would brainwash them.
What they're saying is they're afraid that Marxism makes too much sense. They prefer to stay ignorant, that way there is no risk of having their views changed by an evidently more correct theory of how the world works.
we’re about to emigrate, join a mercenary group, and Slava Ukraini ourselves into Kinzhal-induced oblivion?
😂
But seriously, a lot of liberals tend to believe exactly that whatever you read will automatically program you.
a lot of liberals tend to believe exactly that whatever you read will automatically program you
Basically admitting that they're passive consumers of propaganda, and that they apply this mindset to everything. Which is a massive self-own, given that liberals are usually the ones trying to lecture everyone else on "bias" and the importance of "critical thinking."
No shit, Sherlock... if you'd read another thing on Mao Zedong, in this context, you would realize he was a major military commander of the CPC in 1927, and with Jiang Jieshi and later the Japanese on his trail, of course, he would emphasize the importance of it...
Doesn't seem necessarily Communist to me... look at the United States of America and Tsarist Russia, do you think it got all its land by asking the Natives to politely leave and commit suicide... (guns had to be drawn, ye know)...
Edit: oh wait, you are a tovarisch, thought you were a Lemmy li b...
Conservatives out there imagining the best world possible (and framing it as a bad thing) as always. If only they were right...
I'm having a deja vu tingle. Wasn't there an article like this, like, a year ago already?Oh, it's the same one."KEY TAKEAWAY" 2 is sus...well, for a couple of reasons, but especially due to Memorial being driven out of Russia. Putin's populism doesn't appreciate loud yelling about "victims of communism". Disentenglment from the Soviet legacy has been a big pain in the ass in general for the Kremlin libs.
Man, these people are convincing me we have a chance to change Putin’s mind.
Former Distinguished Fellow in Conservative Thought
Opinion rejected
