Not scared, but angry. I grew up with the reality of post-communist Eastern Europe, and with the stories of my parents and grandparents and so on on how idiotically oppressive and broken and corrupt the old totalitarian regime was. It took me a very long time to decouple that from the idea of communism, and to really internalize that someone (a person, a regime, whatever) can say something, use a certain language, but in reality not have much to do with it. Unlike a lot of y'all western kids here, the totalitarian regime has had impact on my life. I still low key get angry when people around here defend some of the worse sides of the USSR and adjacent countries, just so they can show how communist they are.
I've never had any actual conversations about this with her, but my sister-in-law grew up in the aftermath of communist czech and has said that she hates people that are anticapitalist bc they don't know the reality of communism. I'm not really sure what to say to her, but I do feel like you can't judge communism by what it's like after it falls y'know? anyway I'd love to hear more of your thoughts about this
Given how deeply pervesavie and ingrained propaganda used to be, it is very, very difficult for people to separate communism from whatever the regimes back in the day were doing. With the fall of communism, and the advent of capitalism, we did get some things that are pretty important - the freedom to listen to whatever music you want to, to wear whatever clothes you want to, to move around freely, to say bad things about the ruling class, etc. things like that, that it turns out are pretty important for people, and even though by the late years of the regime, the material condition of people wasnt very good, capitalism brought a sense of hope and improvement. People also often fail to undestand how reactionary and conservative these regimes were, lgbtq rights were nonexistent, and being gay or trans seen as mental illness that would require being put in an institution. With all the talk about liberation of women, women were still expected and pushed to do their full on wifely and home duties in addition to working, and sexism, love for hierarchy and so on were (and still are) deeply ingrained. Having someone live through this, have their closed ones taken by the secret police and questioned, cause they watched the Terminator on a bootlegged VHS, or something, having your career path ruined cause a party official didnt like you are things that will sour your experience of the system. And then suddenly being allowed to do all the things you were forbidden. Seeing the objectively greater freedoms the West enjoyed, definitely made it seem like capitalism is much better. The dark side of it would only become apparent later on. And at that time, and to a large extend today as well, these freedoms are seen as inherent to the capitalist system, instead of as actually the results of pushback by the left against it. So the key becomes figuring out how to make someone understand, that secret police, basic rights, jeans and pizza are not things that are inherent to one economic order, or the other, but to the way different bureaucracies work. And it is important to show, that those things were not particular, or inherent to the socialist regimes, that capitalist regimes are using them just as much...
Not scared, but angry. I grew up with the reality of post-communist Eastern Europe, and with the stories of my parents and grandparents and so on on how idiotically oppressive and broken and corrupt the old totalitarian regime was. It took me a very long time to decouple that from the idea of communism, and to really internalize that someone (a person, a regime, whatever) can say something, use a certain language, but in reality not have much to do with it. Unlike a lot of y'all western kids here, the totalitarian regime has had impact on my life. I still low key get angry when people around here defend some of the worse sides of the USSR and adjacent countries, just so they can show how communist they are.
I've never had any actual conversations about this with her, but my sister-in-law grew up in the aftermath of communist czech and has said that she hates people that are anticapitalist bc they don't know the reality of communism. I'm not really sure what to say to her, but I do feel like you can't judge communism by what it's like after it falls y'know? anyway I'd love to hear more of your thoughts about this
Given how deeply pervesavie and ingrained propaganda used to be, it is very, very difficult for people to separate communism from whatever the regimes back in the day were doing. With the fall of communism, and the advent of capitalism, we did get some things that are pretty important - the freedom to listen to whatever music you want to, to wear whatever clothes you want to, to move around freely, to say bad things about the ruling class, etc. things like that, that it turns out are pretty important for people, and even though by the late years of the regime, the material condition of people wasnt very good, capitalism brought a sense of hope and improvement. People also often fail to undestand how reactionary and conservative these regimes were, lgbtq rights were nonexistent, and being gay or trans seen as mental illness that would require being put in an institution. With all the talk about liberation of women, women were still expected and pushed to do their full on wifely and home duties in addition to working, and sexism, love for hierarchy and so on were (and still are) deeply ingrained. Having someone live through this, have their closed ones taken by the secret police and questioned, cause they watched the Terminator on a bootlegged VHS, or something, having your career path ruined cause a party official didnt like you are things that will sour your experience of the system. And then suddenly being allowed to do all the things you were forbidden. Seeing the objectively greater freedoms the West enjoyed, definitely made it seem like capitalism is much better. The dark side of it would only become apparent later on. And at that time, and to a large extend today as well, these freedoms are seen as inherent to the capitalist system, instead of as actually the results of pushback by the left against it. So the key becomes figuring out how to make someone understand, that secret police, basic rights, jeans and pizza are not things that are inherent to one economic order, or the other, but to the way different bureaucracies work. And it is important to show, that those things were not particular, or inherent to the socialist regimes, that capitalist regimes are using them just as much...