Most large-scale attempts at communism were managed in a centralized way top-down by force.
One strong leader, usually with a cult of personality. Glorification of the military. Devaluation of individual life and emphasis on sacrifice for the common good. Suppression of dissent by violence.
You can see the parallels with fascism. I'd even argue that what we know as communism and fascism mainly differ in their approach to the economy.
On the other hand, capitalism exists and thrives in chaos. It doesn't exclude authoritarianism - actually it tends to produce it when capitalists capture the government. But some capitalist countries manage not to slide all the way and have been keeping up some kind of freedom for decades, so it kinda works.
Ah yes, the legendary capitalist freedom to go homeless and die of preventable diseases. And the awful authoritarian communism of providing full employment and eliminating poverty.
If you don’t think the USA is the most authoritarian country ever, your definition of authoritarianism is useless.
Let me guess, you're an American who has never been outside of the USA, never read anything about other countries, and believes 'Murica is the greatest one forever and only one that matters (even in evil)
Yeah, the legendary communist free world, where you went to gulag, if you dared to think of your own. And the awful authoritarian capitalists of bringing up the average quality of life that much since ww2. /S
By raw numbers obviously the US, followed by china with not too many less. Per capita El Salvador and Cuba are on the first two places. So what's your point? Per Capita and in raw numbers there is a capitalist country and a country which calls itself socialist on place one and two.
?
I really don't know what you are hinting at. In raw numbers the US will still be number 1 followed by China and per capita adding in countries with a lower incarceration rate and less people than the USA won't lift up the USA in the ranking.
The World Prison Brief at PrisonStudies.org is an online database providing free access to information on prison systems around the world. It is now hosted by the Institute For Crime & Justice Policy Research (ICPR), Birkbeck College, University of London.
It was previously hosted by the International Centre for Prison Studies (ICPS). It was a research centre at the University of Essex. It was launched at the House of Lords on 4 April 2011. Between 1997 and 2010 ICPS was based in King's College London and was launched formally by Home Secretary Jack Straw in October 1997. In July 2010 the International Centre for Prison Studies incorporated and registered as a charity with the Charities Commission of England and Wales. From the outset the Centre was independent of governmental and intergovernmental agencies, although it would work closely with them.
So who really knows what the quality of the data is without further investigation. But it seems to have been originally created by the UK’s military-intelligence-industrial complex.
Yeah, nice thing that everything not fitting your view is propaganda. I mean also what does not fit? If Wikipedia is just a pro US propaganda machine and the source they give, too: Why would the US still be on place one when looking at the absolute numbers?
Also the raw data is not from "NATOpedia", but from the source you gave. What even is your point? They are lying about China being second place in raw numbers or what? Feels a bit like killing the messenger before thinking about what he said.
I flubbed one stat that doesn't really move the needle on the point I was trying to make. I was thinking of world powers and didn't double check to make sure nations scorned by empire didn't barely hedge the US out of the top 5 on per capita (though another of its territories made it).
America is a remarkably "authoritarian" country by all standards whether they be prisons, police spending, or military spending.
I do agree with the US being quite authoritarian and that the US are a good example why capitalism in this form is very bad.
My only points are, that the world is not black and white. There may still be points where the US are doing good (national parks may come to ones mind) and China is surely no workers paradise.
Lenin is great, and Stalin literally saved the world. The USSR was a great success. It was as authoritarian as any western “democracy”. Prove me wrong bozo.
Damn revolution bad? I guess we should just lie down and accept how things are then. Better the death of millions of people, billions very soon, from the system that exists; than thousands from a revolution. You are very wise.
Have all of the revolutions you want, just don’t force others to live by your choices.
If you have the support, then good.
If not, go start your own thing.
Buy some land and start a community, support each other and grow larger through shared experiences and work.
If you get enough, you can start your own town.
Yeah you kind of still have to play by other rules as far as taxes, but you could be self-sufficient and off the grid.
Residential windmills and solar panels have come a long way, recycling would be easier, and if you get the right machine, you can actually burn trash for power.
Move in more people like yourself and you can probably go big enough to take over a county by sheer weight of legitimacy.
That’s probably as big as you could go though, the Mormons have kind of got Utah, but they’ve been working on that since like the 1850’s I think, and they still only have influence, a rather large amount of influence, but not control
Totalitarianism, AKA authoritarianism. Hannah Arendt came from wealth and so unsurprisingly was anticommunist. Her work was financially supported and promoted by the CIA. This is a bourgeois liberal, intentionally anticommunist construct that lumps fascism and communism in the same bucket.
U.S. and European anticommunist publications receiving direct or indirect funding included Partisan Review, Kenyon Review, New Leader, Encounter and many others. Among the intellectuals who were funded and promoted by the CIA were Irving Kristol, Melvin Lasky, Isaiah Berlin, Stephen Spender, Sidney Hook, Daniel Bell, Dwight MacDonald, Robert Lowell, Hannah Arendt, Mary McCarthy, and numerous others in the United States and Europe. In Europe, the CIA was particularly interested in and promoted the “Democratic Left” and ex-leftists, including Ignacio Silone, Stephen Spender, Arthur Koestler, Raymond Aron, Anthony Crosland, Michael Josselson, and George Orwell.