this post was submitted on 15 Aug 2023
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Pro-Soviet (no longer exist) ≠ pro modern Russia
Against continued war in Ukraine ≠ pro Russia
Okay. But that's worse. You do know that's worse, right?
pro-socialism is worse than pro-fascism?
What is worse, a brutal authoritarian empire which tries to occupy Eastern Europe and Central Asia or one that actually does it?
Take a deep breath. As someone who's been in your shoes, this may not click right away.
Every single thing you've ever heard, learned, watched, or read about another country that was ever an enemy of the united states has been some version of an exaggeration or a lie. You live in the most intense propaganda machine that has ever been created. You live in the most intense surveillance state that's ever been created. You live in the biggest, richest empire that has ever been created.
The Soviet Empire directly occupied every constituent "Republic" as colonies, as well as occupied the Warsaw Pact countries as satellite vassals, and used military force to put down any rebellion from their puppet nations in the Warpac. They denied the people any say in government, subverted unions into agents of the state instead of advocates for the workers, and systematically crushed any domestic political dissent using secret police.
As to whether I'm okay with consistently applying that? Sure. The last time the US fought a military conflict in order to annex a nation into empire was 1902. The Soviets did it consistently throughout their empire's existence.
Much of what you're claiming is undermined by the fact that the vast majority of Soviet people voted to keep the USSR. How could that have happened if people had no say in the government, and if the SSRs were just colonies? It's also undermined by facts like the early USSR letting some former Russian vassals become independent (e.g., Finland), successive Soviet constitutions granting more and more power to SSRs and national groups, and the steady rise in living conditions under the USSR/the sharp decline in living conditions after its dissolution.
And if you're serious about applying those same standards to every country, you'd see the U.S. as one of the most evil countries in the world. Our treatment of black Americans and American Indians was literally a model for the Nazis, and eclipses the scale and severity of even the most fevered anti-communist propaganda. We've fought wars of aggression all over the Global South. We've strangled popular anti-colonial movements in their crib and kept them down by backing murderous dictators. We illegally monitor as much of our citizens' communications as possible, have extrajudicially assassinated opposition leaders, have attempted to blackmail opposition leaders into killing themselves, violently repress even peaceful left-wing protests (while providing police escorts for Klan rallies and Proud Boys), hell, the Chicago PD was running a black site torture operation.
But I'm guessing you don't take that part seriously, otherwise you'd have questioned whether such an evil country -- that's militantly opposed every communist movement since before the USSR even existed -- is a reliable source on the shortcomings of communist states.