Monarchs have been killing each other and their rivals to the throne, often including women and children and family members, for literally thousands of years, but no-one cares when they do it.
But noooooo, when a COMMUNIST does it, it's suddenly the worst thing ever?
Countless worker and peasant children died in brutal conditions prior to the revolution, and to care less about them than a few spoiled Russian princelings is myopic. That's what I'd say to a liberal.
But we're communists here. Or at least we say we are. We should strive to learn from and overcome the atrocities of the past, not repeat them. Certainly not revel in glorifying them.
Communism would be recognizing the material conditions that lead to revolution and understanding that any situation that results in a storming of the palace will necessarily produce the violence which kills the royal family (or whoever sits atop the political hierarchy). Morality is not a factor in understanding the unfolding of history
Morality is not a factor in understanding the unfolding of history
Insert the Marx quote about changing the world rather than simply interpreting it here.
Insert the Paulo Freire quote about how without liberatory education the oppressed dream of becoming oppressors beneath it.
Look, the Romanov kids are a century dead and no amount of monday-morning quarterbacking will change what happened. And if it had to happen for the political or military survival of the revolution, then so be it. But I'd like to think that people nominally comitted to creating a better world would engage with what happened and try to think of how things could be done better next time, instead of just gleefully celebrating kids' deaths or saying, "well that's history for you."
I keep trying to write out long and thoughtful responses but I just keep coming back to the fact that that’s bourgeois morality. A mass class political action will form its own moral boundaries separate from what you envision is acceptable in this time and moment. And I don’t even necessarily disagree with you along moral lines, but I’m also a subject of petty bourgeois morality so of course I don’t. In a moment of revolution the proletariat will decide their moral lines in the moment and we will have no voice to tell them one way or the other
A mass class political action will form its own moral boundaries separate from what you envision is acceptable in this time and moment.
Of course it will, and for the record I'm not even condmening the soldiers who did the killing. I understand it was done in the context of a chaotic moment, and that none of us have any way of knowing what was going through the soldiers' heads as they confronted these living embodiments of their oppression.
What frustrates me about this post is that it doesn't seem to be about understanding those soldiers in that morally complicated situation, it seems to just be about celebrating violence for violence's sake. I know we're all powerless and tramautized and would all love to shove our bosses feet-first into a woodchipper, but I'd like to think there's a difference between celebrating kings getting theirs and kids getting merked.
In a moment of revolution the proletariat will decide their moral lines in the moment and we will have no voice to tell them one way or the other
We are the proletariat, man. I really hope that if any kind of revolution happens in our lifetimes, our moral lines will exclude killing Jeff Bezos' grandkids.
Edit: Unless those grandkids are old enough to be scumbag billionaires in their own right, in which case :gui-better: :gui-better: :gui-better:
Fair solution. "Bozos" is probably too on the nose as far as name changes go, maybe "Bes?" That sounds like a name some Greek working class immigrant would be forcibly given at Ellis Island.
:cat-confused: are we really going to do this? A proletarian revolution will not be fascist in nature despite its actions solely because it will be on the behalf of the proletariat, rather than in service of bourgeois or petty bourgeois social formations. Hate to break it to you but Parenti was right that a secret police are necessary regardless of anyone’s moral disagreements to them. Torture is terrible and yet it’s still happened across most every given historical socialist project. Disavowing a socialist project because it doesn’t fit your moral sensibilities is just carrying water for imperialism
The revolution will not solve all of society’s ills by the next day. You will never live to see your perfect imagined society even if you somehow live to see the global people’s revolution
Killing? The far worst part is the generations of pedophilia and incest.
Shit like the Habsburgs should be the only proof of how primitive and disgusting these supposed "enlightened" individuals actually were.
The gene pool eventually became so small that the last of the Spanish line, Charles II, who was severely disabled from birth, perhaps by genetic disorders, possessed a genome comparable to that of a child born to a brother and sister, as did his father, probably because of "remote inbreeding".
Few things make me more angry then thinking about how there was a time humanity looked up to and endorsed(regardless of choice) these monsters. Talk about primitive stupid monkeys. Ugh.
Worse it was probably an improvement.
A fully inbred king could be controlled by his court pretty well. Probably allowed them to check some of their worse impulses by giveing them a sugar sculpture to eat
Pretty sure it just meant you had an even more unstable tyrant.
Source: I've had a fuckton of really stupid and abusive bosses.
Sure until they collectively decide the 52yo bed ridden King suffering from multiple genetic diseases should fuck his 10yo sister because they are all anxious there is no heir yet...
I feel that when it comes to running a country a committee made by degenerates and mostly old incompetent men are about as useful as some random old guy that can't count to 10.
The kids didn't do anything to deserve any punishment, but I can place the blame solely on their parents. They used the kids as a sort of human shield for feudalism, as all royals did.
But weren't there tsarist forces still fighting? They would have gladly hopped back on the throne if they could have
Yes lmao. I'm so confused and delighted by the person stanning for the tsars in this thread. The internet is amazing.
"We're transporting you, it isn't safe here."
proceeds to transport them to a small room where you slaughter them like the monsters they are
:troll:
Imagine being the revolutionaries who discovered this.
"Wow that took like twice as many bullets as it should have why was that - oh what the fuck - diamonds? FUCKING DIAMONDS? My family has been starving for months so they could literally wear robes made out of diamonds? Pytor, grab more bullets! im not done yet."
He got too many breaks, that was part of the problem. Old Rasputin was trying his best tho, gosh darn it.
Perhaps creating a system of power based off of bloodlines wasn't a good idea. Something to think about if you ever have kids and aspire to be a monarch
every time you're overthrowing a monarch you either kill potential heirs to the throne or run into the possibility of someone challenging your legitimacy in a few years. there's even passages in The Prince, by Machiavelli that goes over this.
remember that this was in the early 20th century, in a largely agrarian country and as the world's first worker's revolution. they needed to be as paranoid/careful as they could to succeed.Trotsky, I know you're still salty about things, but damm why you gotta do the state departments work for them?
yes, but there is a difference between someone who the people have been told their entire lives is entitled to power by god and some random fuck the bourgeoisie and foreign powers decided to back as their counter-revolutionary leader. one can be done with much more ease and speed while the other takes longer and needs actual political work. nobody cares about a thirds cousin fuckwit, but the king's child? that's someone people can rally behind.
of course counter-revolution is a constant for a proletarian State, but there's no need to do the reactionaries' work for them. there's no way keeping them hostage would have been any better optics (the soviets kept the Romanov children hostage for decades while torturing them and using them as bargaining chips!!!!!!!!)
no one cares about the Romanov family except for monarchists (lmao) and leftists, this is literally a non-issue.you really think that if the Romanovs were to be in the custody of the bolsheviks for a while that the torture accusations wouldn't pour in? you might think it wasn't necessary to minimize the chances that someone with a direct claim to the throne shows up, but leading thinkers of taking power against monarchies, like Machiavelli, would disagree.
i'm saying no one cares about what happened to them now, back then, as futures heirs to the throne, it was a very different story. to say that a post satirizing the killing of aristocrats is specifically talking (and gloating!) about killing children and hyperfixating on it is arguing against something that only exists in your head, at best, and being dishonest, at worse.
I mean, empires have been sustained off the legitimacy of a 5-year old
The people who did it could have easily imagined one of those kids decreeing the massacre of their families
You're right and also I don't think this person studies history lol
I don't say it to dunk on them, and the killing makes me really uncomfortable. I think the issue is not seeing the situation as real, not living in their present day in the midst of all the history that came before it.
I think anyone would understand shooting down like, a German bomber that the Nazis decided to put a couple of babies in.
yes, and when neolibs drone strike children, they imagine those children will grow up to be terrorists. perceived threat and actual threat aren’t the same thing.
I mean, one of those is significantly more realistic. You make some other good points though
no no worries, sorry the thread is kinda hostile, and you might be right about it being really useless. I still think if it was cut and dry, it's just a trolley problem, but you made good points that it might have been excessive and counterproductive. Either way it sucks, and someone is guilty for creating that situation, either directly or indirectly
<3 to murder children <3 <3
<3 to lick boots of dead monarchs <3 <3
edit: :bootlicker:
It was some grunts who did it, too
Based. More evidence that self-organizing power structures deliver good results.
Also I applaud getting blind drunk before yeeting the rich.
not searching for an alternative optimal strategy
love to focus group solutions to ending monarchism for maximum syngergy in the marketplace of ideas in the middle of a people's revolution lol
i honestly shouldn’t have picked a fight with you, you’re clearly too stubborn
:fidel-si:
Batista also was not a hereditary monarch operating under a centuries old divine right to rule, meaning his kids mean fuck all to anyone compared to the Romanovs.
If you're gonna do a lazy comparison to anything, at least do it to Puyi and the Chinese revolution so theres some kind of point that doesnt fall apart in the basic definitions.
The tsar did not willingly go into the custody of the Bolsheviks, he abdicated to the Provisional government and when the October revolution happened the royals simply had no resources to do anything about it.
And its very easy to theorize about possible alternative strategies but most would probably just have been seen as impractical or ineffective, holding the tsars kids as hostages would probably have lead to the white armies attempting to "call the bluff" or just not caring in the face of eradicating bolshevism, as well as moving them being a risky proposition due to the possibility of collaborators or spies making a move when not in a fortified position.
I don't know who started this trend of pretending every unfortunate but considered necessary action that one's side performs is actually cool and awesome.
Real "Slay Queen Madeline Albright 500000 Kids" energy.
Wherent some white forces getting closer than usual that week ? Yeah they probably got drunk and made that decision but presenting it some "i just woke up and decided to kill the tsar family for no real reason" is missing some context
Yes and "tHeY KiLLeD tEh rOmAnOv KidDeRiNoS nOoO" is also a longstanding anti-communist talking point, so it's fucking hilarious seeing it pop up here.
there has never been a more just execution in the history of the world than that of the tsar
The documentary movie "Anastasia" tells me that was not what happened. Checkmate gommunists. 😎
movie “Anastasia
Wow I don't think I really saw more than a couple minutes of that as a kid, and I just spent the last 30 minutes reading about it and watching scenes. What a fucking shitshow
Rasputin was the main reason I loved that movie as a kid, especially his song when he explains his plans.
If the children were still aware they were 'entitled' to the throne I think their existence is still a threat. I think they didn't make it out.
Yeah it's not good hey?
also, love being on a sub that describes deaths of kids as cringe hahaha <3 you guys
Eh, regardless of if it was ultimately necessary or not, I just can't bring myself to outright celebrate kids getting killed.
Their parents? Sure. They were adults and knew full well exactly what they were doing, but with the kids the best I can do is grim acceptance.
Capital punishment useually doesn't deter crime.
However, I'm pleased if it causes any leader a moment of doubt knowing that if they go to far someome might whipe their entire bloodline off the map.
