Having a mix of people commenting with different viewpoints already contributes to this, but there’s also many people that scroll locally exclusively. There’s also differences in admins and moderators, their rules and preferences, etc. This itself forms its own culture. It isn’t the absence of culture, but the presence of a unique, blended culture, which isn’t inherently better or worse.

.world is widely federated, but it also selectively defederates from communist instances, and bans people for being too critical of Zionism. This influences Lemmy.world’s culture greatly despite relatively broad federation.

Interesting, I’ll have to give that a look!

Yep, that’s why language learning is such a useful skill!

Gotcha! For what it’s worth, neutrality doesn’t truly exist. What we think of as neutral is really that which conforms to our pre-existing beliefs. Our language, culture, norms, etc. reinforce this idea of what is “neutral,” which in reality is a comparison to these subjects. With that being said, I would think of it more in terms of what you want to see: broad federation, selective defederation, etc., as well as what each instance is like to browse locally. All have their own vibes, Lemmy.zip isn’t “vibeless” just because it is broadly federated.

Just a tip!

Yep! Been reading Gramsci lately, and he puts into words this phenomenon really well:

The widespread prejudice that philosophy is something very difficult because it is the intellectual activity of a specific category of specialist scholars or professional and systematic philosophers must be destroyed. To do this we must first show that all men are “philosophers,” defining the limitations of this “spontaneous philosophy” possessed by “everyone,” that is, of the philosophy contained in: (1) language itself, which is a totality of determined notions and concepts and not simply and solely of words grammatically void of content; (2) common sense and good sense; (3) popular religion and therefore also in the entire system of beliefs, superstitions, opinions, ways of perceiving and acting which make up what is generally called “folklore.”

Having shown that everyone is a philosopher, even if in his own way, unconsciously (because even in the smallest manifestation of any intellectual activity — “language” — is contained a definite conception of the world), we pass to the second stage, the stage of criticism and awareness. We pass to the question: is it preferable to “think” without having critical awareness, in a disjointed and irregular way, in other words to “participate” in a conception of the world “imposed” mechanically by external environment, that is, by one of the many social groups in which everyone is automatically involved from the time he enters the conscious world; [3] or is it preferable to work out one’s own conception of the world consciously and critically, and so out of this work of one’s own brain to choose one’s own sphere of activity, to participate actively in making the history of the world, and not simply to accept passively and without care the imprint of one’s own personality from outside?

Note 1: For his own conception of the world a man always belongs to a certain grouping, and precisely to that grouping of the social elements who all share the same ways of thinking and working. He is a conformist in relation to some conformity, he is always man of a mass or a man of a collective. The question is this: of what historical type is the conformity, the mass of which he is a part? When his conception of the world is not critical and coherent but haphazard and disconnected he belongs simultaneously to a multiplicity of masses, giving his own personality a bizarre composition. It contains elements of the cave-man as well as principles of the most modern and advanced learning; shabby, local prejudices of all past historical phases as well as intuitions of a future philosophy of the human race united all over the world. Criticizing one’s own conception of the world means, therefore, to make it coherent and unified and to raise it to the point reached by the most advanced modern thought. It also means criticizing all hitherto existing philosophy in so far as it has left layers incorporated into the popular philosophy. The beginning of the critical elaboration is the consciousness of what one really is, that is, a “know thyself” as the product of the historical process which has left you an infinity of traces gathered together without the advantage of an inventory. To begin, then, it is necessary to first compile such an inventory.

Note 2: Philosophy cannot be separated from the history of philosophy nor culture from the history of culture. In the most immediate and pertinent sense one cannot have a critically coherent conception of the world — that is, one cannot be a philosopher — without being aware of one’s conception’s history, of the phases of development it represents, and of the fact that any conception stands in contradiction to other conceptions, or elements of other conceptions. The correct conception of the world answers certain problems posed by reality which are very much determined and “original” in their actuality. How is it possible to think about the present — and a well-determined present at that — with a philosophy elaborated in response to the problems of a remote and often outdated past? If this happens it means that one is an “anachronism” in one’s own time, a fossil and not a modern living being. Or at least one is “composed” bizarrely. And in fact it so happens that social groups which in certain ways express the most developed modernity, are arrested in other ways by their social position, and so are incapable of complete historical independence. [4]

Note 3: Given that language contains the elements of a conception of the world and of a culture, it will also be true that the greater or lesser complexity of a person’s conception of the world can be judged from that person’s language. A person who only speaks a dialect or who understands the national language in varying degrees necessarily enjoys a more or less restricted and provincial, fossilized and anachronistic perception of the world in comparison with the great currents of thought which dominate world history. His interests will be restricted, more or less guild-like or economistic, and not universal. If it is not always possible to learn foreign languages so as to put oneself in touch with different cultures, one must at least learn the national tongue. One great culture can be translated into the language of another great culture, that is, one great national language which is historically rich and complex, can translate any other great culture, i.e. can be a world expression. But a dialect cannot do the same thing.

Note 4: The creation of a new culture does not only mean individually making some “original” discoveries. It means also and especially the critical propagation of truths already discovered, “socializing them” so to speak, and so making them become a basis for vibrant actions, an element of co-ordination and of intellectual and moral order. The leading of a mass of men to think coherently and in a unitary way about present-day reality is a “philosophical” fact of much greater importance and “originality” than the discovery by a philosophical “genius” of a new truth which remains the inheritance of small groups of intellectuals.

• The Study of Philosophy and of Historical Materialism

OK. Well I see that encouraging freedom of thought with you is, itself, a waste of time.

Genuinely curious what this means, considering I came to my own conclusions after researching this topic heavily. You encouraged nothing.

You mention a lack of poverty - as defined by an authoritarian regime that defines both who is poor as well as who can talk about it. Same with citing surveys of subjective experience that is objectively questionable at best as your only reference of people that enjoyed living under socialism.

All states are “authoritarian” in that all states represent a ruling class, yet you seem to only call states where the working classes have power “authoritarian regimes.” You never elaborate further. I gave many books and primary sources going far more into detail, yet you laser-focus on the nostalgia polling. Dishonesty on your part.

This is a list of one-party states. Not countries practicing socialism.

All of these countries have public ownership as the principal aspect, with the working classes in control of the state. Having a single party does not go against that, it strengthens them. Further, the PRC has 8 political parties in addition to the CPC, and the DPRK has 2 additional parties beyond the WPK, none have the influence of the CPC nor WPK because both are more popularly supported.

Vietnam and the DPRK are client states of China so that political class Boomers can stick it to each other using 60-year-old political stances. Cuba is a client state of Russia for the same reasons. Or maybe it’s socialism in that Gazprom sales to Europe used to keep the power running in Havana.

This is pure chauvanism, socialist countries having favorable ties does not mean smaller ones are “client states.”

I do want to say, I genuinely feel sorry for the people of Cuba. An entire nation used as leverage so that a few old guys can thumb their nose at a few other old guys. Every Cuban (not Miami Cubans, doctors across Africa) I’ve ever met was really quite nice. Weird Spanish and some definite clothing…choices… but they didn’t talk up Cuba’s success. It’s natural beauty, sure.

Personal anecdote doesn’t actually trump the fact that Cuba’s socialist system has delivered incredible results, including in healthcare, despite the intense embargo.

This is very much not the case. Basic bartering in a village where one farmer sells grain or sheep cheese dispels the notion that the a “worker class” is powerless without socialism.

This isn’t how modern capitalism functions, lmao. Capitalism isn’t simply trade, it’s an entire economic system backed by a tyrannical state to oppress workers. The existence of individual petite bourgeois worker-owners does not negate the dominance of megacorps and dictatorial states of capital.

How many suicides from the Chinese-authorized Foxconn building due to low wages and brutal working conditions? Who, exactly, did those workers have authority over? The state? Apple? The political class in China? The landlords they still need to pay with those low wages? Answer: they had authority over no one and nothing. Not even to cry for help. So they fucking killed themselves to end it all. And it’s not changed.

China is lower on the suicide rate scale than the US Empire and much of western Europe. This is why facts and statistics matter, not just how you personally feel.

There is no such thing as a “political class” either. The state is the representative of the ruling class in society, not its own unique and distinct class. Classes are relations with definite counterparts, like peasant/lord, worker/capitalist. The state does not exist outside of class struggle.

Seriously - you’re going to tell me that China is a successful model of socialism when it’s developed a middle class over the last 20 years to help propagate state-run businesses that exploit workers on behalf of capitalist companies? It’s not making class go away, it’s making MORE classes! It’s entrenching political class stratification and menial workers that serve them. Mao murdered a million landlords - but there’s still landlords in China, my friend. It’s just that the current landlords are part of the CCP.

Again, more bullshit. China is not creating new classes, you’re misrepresenting what class even is to begin with, thinking it’s related to income. There is no “middle-income class” nor “political class.” What has happened is the dramatic uplifting of the working classes, including a renewed focus on eradicating the rural/urban divide within the working classes.

China is the largest sponsor of capitalism and classism in the world. It’s economic model relies on capitalism entirely, at a global scale. It’s kind of funny you don’t or won’t see that. This is China’s success? Gaslight yourself all you want. No country listed in your 5 survivors is even marching towards some golden dawn where class ceases to exist. It’s a laughable claim.

More bullshit. The PRC’s economy is driven by public ownership of the commanding heights of the economy, with private ownership as secondary. The existence of private property and markets does not make a system capitalist if those elements form secondary aspects of the overall economy. Further, again, the class character of the state is proletarian. As markets centralize, private ownership is folded into the public sector and increasing degrees of public control are added. This is how socialism is built, on the basis of developed industry.

My friend, thanks for the chat, but whew…please, I beg you, go visit any of places where socialism failed and find out why. Five countries still doing it and literally dozens of failures. I’ve been to 17 countries that once tried socialism, and I always ask about it. Always a lively conversation with people!

Is it really so superior if the failure rate is more than 90%?

Not all countries are the same size, haha. The PRC alone has 1.4 billion people, and again, anecdote doesn’t replace facts and statistics. Socialism worked better than modern capitalism does in Eastern Europe, if you purely look at the fact that socialism dissolved without looking at how and why, and dogmatically assuming this is the case for any socialist state, you’re torturing your understanding of statistical analysis.

Buddy…for real. You’re into super fail sauce like this? Is it just to piss off your parents or something? It’s like Marxist-Leninist folks and Flat Earthers share some attribute about ignoring obvious evidence. I’ve never been so sold on the idea that socialism is maybe the silliest, worst thing people have ever tried. We can do better. It’s just time for something new, right?

The one in this conversation ignoring obvious evidence has been yourself, along with relying on anecdote and hearsay in place of facts and statistics. When you do bring up stats, it’s in a way that reveals a vulgar understanding of correlation and causation, betraying your own points.

Here - go find a failed socialist country near you and check it out:

Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Lithuania, Moldova, Latvia, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Armenia, Turkmenistan, Estonia, half of Germany, Poland, Czechia, Slovakia, Armenia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Albania, any former Yugoslavian country, Mongolia, Benin, Ethiopia, Angola, Mozambique, Tanzania, Guinea, Ghana, Congo-Brazzaville, Burkina Faso, Somalia, Mali, Algeria, Madagascar, Afghanistan, Cambodia, Yemen, Iraq, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, Sierra Leone, Zambia, Zimbabwe. I’m sure I’m missing a couple.

Checking out the devastation of capitalism to countries that by and large were far stronger under socialism only affirms my points. Further, Burkina Faso, for example, is currently going through a nationalist revolution drawing on its Marxist past, upholding Sankara. You even threw in semi-feudal anti-communists like Cambodia under Pol Pot to pad out your numbers, but it betrays you by pointing out that you’re willing to lie just to prove a point.

Have a nice day! (should I say “Have my nice day” because it’s socialism? I did work at making it nice, after all.)

I have no idea what your joke means, and given your love of lying, smearing me, and generally avoiding grappling with concrete reality, I’d say you failed at being nice if that was your goal.

Is the absence of socialism capitalism? Is the absence of capitalism socialism?

No. Capitalism is a mode of production and distribution where private ownership is the principal aspect of the economy and the capitalist class in control of the state. Socialisn is a mode of production and distribution where public ownership is the principal aspect of the economy and the working classes control the state. Feudalism is neither socialism nor capitalism, as an example of absence of both.

I’m asking you to take a higher level philosophical view of being tied to defending a human-made economic model.

All views are baked in our philosophy, whether we are aware of it or not. Everyone is a “philosopher,” based on their own values and experiences shaping how they view the world and their place in it. I follow dialectical materialism, which is how I view the world and attempt to understand it.

Why even waste the energy?

My energy isn’t wasted, in my opinion, because I’ve created many comrades that otherwise may not have come around to socialism.

Never mind the fact that socialism requires authoritarianism as the starting point.

All societies since primitive communism have been class societies, and thus all societies rely on the authority of the state to represent the ruling class. Capitalism requires the authoritarianism of capitalists over the working classes, socialism is superior to capitalism in that it is the authoritarianism of workers over capitalists, landlords, and fascists. Only once all class has been abolished through socialism into communism will the state wither away, leaving classless society devoid of such talk of “authoritarianism.”

You don’t even have many models of success to point to. Have even half of counties that tried socialism survived? It’s not much different than wearing a Confederate flag on your shirt and shouting “The South Will Rise Again!” Even China went to a hybrid system. Why spend you limited life defending a proven mediocre idea?

This is nonsense, the confederacy was a slave-driven economy that lasted 4 years on its own. Socialism in Europe lasted nearly a century, and today we still have the PRC, Vietnam, DPRK, Laos, and Cuba. China is not a “hybrid system,” it’s a socialist market economy. The backbone of the economy is in strong State Owned Enterprises, with marketization filling in the gaps left behind by the publicly owned commanding heights of the economy.

Socialism is the opposite of a “proven mediocre idea,” it has worked every time it has been implemented in achieving its broad aims. The largest ecomomy in the world by PPP is socialist, and the PRC shows no signs of this slowing down. The 21st century will be driven by decay of imperialism and the rise of socialism.

You don’t want countries to chose for themselves based on their own priorities? You really think you have it all figured out and should force it on everyone?

I agree with self-determination, I also believe that based on the facts at hand, capitalism is at the end of its existence and socialism remains the only path forward. I advocate for the formation of revolutionary parties to grow working class movements and establish socialism, not for tiny adventurist cells to try to coup governments. Establishing socialism only works with popular support.

This is just you turning a blind eye to the very real fact that the reason metrics collapsed with the adoption of capitalism and the dissolution of socialism is because critical safety nets were destroyed, disparity skyrocketed, and profit became king. I didn’t give you hard evidence of the successes of socialism for no reason, but to definitively point out why socialism’s absence and capitalism’s presence has been disastrous. Because this is inconvenient for you, you just try to shift it to a general “human problem,” even though the socialist system worked well up until the very end.

Regretting the fall of the USSR and stating that they live worse lives economically than under socialism doesn’t make them all fascists. There’s a collective yearning for a time when life was better, that doesn’t make every one of them fascist, and the fact that fascists try to take advantage of this fact to gain power does not mean that socialism was secretly worse. I demonstrated numerous ways how the dissolution of socialism was disastrous to back this up, which you called “fangirling” (which itself is misogynistic and misgendering) and unrelated.

And the really angry ones tend to be banned for some flavor of bigotry.

Simple, fascism always glorifies the past, but tries to twist it into a point of national pride rather than socialist pride, combined with the fact that the left was thoroughly de-rooted. I didn’t debunk literally every author, because the first one I saw was a Nazi and a fiction writer. I also gave you many books written by people living in the USSR giving a positive overview of the experience, something you said is rare.

The rise in the far-right in post-socialist countries is due to the systematic eradication of the left. These now capitalist countries are not democratic in any way, and their systems have largely been dominated by western finance capital.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn was an anti-semitic Nazi sympathizer, and was arrested as such. His fiction is based on the folklore of the gulag system, and archival evidence and historical texts paint a much clearer picture of the soviet prison system. He’s essentially Yeonmi Park but for the USSR.

Here’s a real quote:

The German army could have liberated the Soviet Union from Communism but Hitler was stupid and did not use this weapon.

From an excellent thread going over his many ideological failings:

In his 2003 book, Two Hundred Years Together, he wrote that “from 20 ministers in the first Soviet government one was Russian, one Georgian, one Armenian and 17 Jews”. In reality, there were 15 Commissars in the first Soviet government, not 20: 11 Russians, 2 Ukrainians, 1 Pole, and only 1 Jew. He stated: “I had to bury many comrades at the front, but not once did I have to bury a Jew”. He also stated that according to his personal experience, Jews had a much easier life in the Gulag camps that he was interned in.

According to the Northwestern University historian Yohanan Petrovsky-Shtern: Solzhenitsyn used unreliable and manipulated figures and ignored both evidence unfavorable to his own point of view and numerous publications of reputable authors in Jewish history. He claimed that Jews promoted alcoholism among the peasantry, flooded the retail trade with contraband, and “strangled” the Russian merchant class in Moscow. He called Jews non-producing people (“непроизводительный народ”) who refused to engage in factory labor. He said they were averse to agriculture and unwilling to till the land either in Russia, in Argentina, or in Palestine, and he blamed the Jews’ own behavior for pogroms. He also claimed that Jews used Kabbalah to tempt Russians into heresy, seduced Russians with rationalism and fashion, provoked sectarianism and weakened the financial system, committed murders on the orders of qahal authorities, and exerted undue influence on the prerevolutionary government. Petrovsky-Shtern concludes that, “200 Years Together is destined to take a place of honor in the canon of russophone antisemitica.”

His own wife called the Gulag Archipelago “folklore,” why on Earth are you listening to a rabid anti-semite and fiction author over actual historical evidence?

The USSR had steady and consistent economic growth, and provided free, high quality education and healthcare, full employment, cheap or free housing, and fantastic infrastructure and city planning that still lasts to this day despite capitalism neglecting it. This rapid development resulted in dramatic democratization of society, reduced disparity, doubling of life expectancy, tripling of functional literacy rates to 99.9%, and much more. Living in the 1930s famine would not have been good, but it was the last major famine outside of wartime because the soviets ended famine in their countries.

Literacy rates, societal guarantees in the 1936 constitution, reports on the healthcare system over time, and more are good sources for these claims.

The USSR brought dramatic democratization to society. First-hand accounts from Statesian journalist Anna Louise Strong in her book This Soviet World describe soviet elections and factory councils in action. Statesian Pat Sloan even wrote Soviet Democracy to describe in detail the system the soviets had built for curious Statesians to read about, and today we have Professor Roland Boer’s Socialism in Power: On the History and Theory of Socialist Governance to reference.

When it comes to social progressivism, the soviet union was among the best out of their peers, so instead we must look at who was actually repressed outside of the norm. In the USSR, it was the capitalist class, the kulaks, the fascists who were repressed. This is out of necessity for any socialist state. When it comes to working class freedoms, however, the soviet union represented a dramatic expansion. Soviet progressivism was documented quite well in Albert Syzmanski’s Human Rights in the Soviet Union.

The truth, when judged based on historical evidence and contextualization, is that socialism was the best thing to happen to Russia in the last few centuries, and its absence has been devastating.

Death rates spiked:

And wealth disparity skyrocketed alongside the newly impoverished majority:

Capitalism brought with it skyrocketing poverty rates, drug abuse, prostitution, homelessness, crime rates, and lowered life expectancy. An estimated 7 million people died due to the dissolution of socialism and reintroduction of capitalism, and this is why the large majority of post-soviet citizens regret its fall. A return to socialism is the only path forward for the post-soviet countries.

When you look at the US Empire and western Europe as having higher quality of life than the USSR, you are looking at the benefits of imperialism, colonialism, and neocolonialism and wishing the USSR also practiced this, instead of helping liberate colonies and the global south. Russia in particular was a semi-feudal backwater in 1917, and made it to space 5 decades later. The USSR was not the picture of wealth, but was for its time the picture of development and rapid progress.

The USSR was stable by the time it dissolved, it was dissolved from the top-down. It did not fail horribly, it was killed by a corrupt wing that had taken hold since Khruschev. It remained socialist until the very end, but by no means was it an inevitable failure, and modern socialist states have learned from it.

I’m not really sure what you’re referring to specifically, because by and large socialist countries have persecuted genuine fascists, capitalists, and those guilty of genuine treason.

You can browse an instance without an account to check it out.

Copying over @Marasenna@lemmygrad.ml’s comment, as you can’t see it due to being defederated from Lemmygrad.ml:

You can’t “transfer a user” to another instance but you can transfer your subscriptions (including blocked users, blocked communities, saved posts, saved comments) and account settings. Go into your settings page (probably lemmy.world/settings) and then, on the right hand side above the Delete Account button, you’ll see a section where you can Import/Export your settings as a .json file. Do that, then go to a new instance, create an account there, and then upload that .json file into the import box in the same area (the one that says Browse…) on your new account at your new instance and then hit import.

It’s super simple. I hope I explained it adequately.

Yep, agreed!

Your last paragraphs again prove my point of China and Vietnam progressing after having liberalised their economies. Of course, they didn’t become US or Singapore. But they had to let go of socialist doctrines.

Wrong. Both the PRC and Vietnam were rapidly developing prior to increasing marketization, and socialism was not abandoned, but strengthened. Marketization of secondary industries stableized growth, it did not create growth:

Secondly, the soviets stopped Russification from the Tsar. Stalin did not implement Russification, it was stopped by Lenin and Stalin protected that. Ethnic minorities were protected. As for Afghanistan, the legitimate government requested aid from the soviets, the soviets did not invade.

As for the protection of ethnic minorities in Xinjiang, none of what you said is true. Mandarin, for example, is taught while Uyghur language and culture is protected. You are sidestepping the mountain of resources provided to you to double down. Socialism is rising, and was not defeated. The USSR falling was a tragedy, but the PRC is the largest economy in the world by PPP and is driving the world forward, thanks to their socialist system.

Federation matters quite a lot, for example you cannot see anything on Hexbear.net or Lemmygrad.ml, because .world blocks communist instances. If you want a generalist instance, lemmy.zip is often recommended and more widely federated. Alternatively, find an instance that aligns with your interests and scroll locally as you like.

The USSR was not “Russified.” It was a federation of multi-national ethnicities, which were protected by the soviets. Tsarist Russification was stopped by the soviets. Advocating for a common writing system and language was done alongside vast literacy programs and protecting ethnicities and languages. National liberation was taken incredibly seriously by the soviets.

Tibet was a feudal slave society backed by the CIA. The PLA liberated Tibet. Friendly Feudalism: The Tibet Myth:

Drepung monastery was one of the biggest landowners in the world, with its 185 manors, 25,000 serfs, 300 great pastures, and 16,000 herdsmen. The wealth of the monasteries rested in the hands of small numbers of high-ranking lamas. Most ordinary monks lived modestly and had no direct access to great wealth. The Dalai Lama himself “lived richly in the 1000-room, 14-story Potala Palace.” [12]

Secular leaders also did well. A notable example was the commander-in-chief of the Tibetan army, a member of the Dalai Lama’s lay Cabinet, who owned 4,000 square kilometers of land and 3,500 serfs. [13] Old Tibet has been misrepresented by some Western admirers as “a nation that required no police force because its people voluntarily observed the laws of karma.” [14] In fact it had a professional army, albeit a small one, that served mainly as a gendarmerie for the landlords to keep order, protect their property, and hunt down runaway serfs.

Young Tibetan boys were regularly taken from their peasant families and brought into the monasteries to be trained as monks. Once there, they were bonded for life. Tashì-Tsering, a monk, reports that it was common for peasant children to be sexually mistreated in the monasteries. He himself was a victim of repeatedremoved, beginning at age nine. [15] The monastic estates also conscripted children for lifelong servitude as domestics, dance performers, and soldiers.

In old Tibet there were small numbers of farmers who subsisted as a kind of free peasantry, and perhaps an additional 10,000 people who composed the “middle-class” families of merchants, shopkeepers, and small traders. Thousands of others were beggars. There also were slaves, usually domestic servants, who owned nothing. Their offspring were born into slavery. [16] The majority of the rural population were serfs. Treated little better than slaves, the serfs went without schooling or medical care. They were under a lifetime bond to work the lord’s land — or the monastery’s land — without pay, to repair the lord’s houses, transport his crops, and collect his firewood. They were also expected to provide carrying animals and transportation on demand. [17] Their masters told them what crops to grow and what animals to raise. They could not get married without the consent of their lord or lama. And they might easily be separated from their families should their owners lease them out to work in a distant location. [18]

As in a free labor system and unlike slavery, the overlords had no responsibility for the serf’s maintenance and no direct interest in his or her survival as an expensive piece of property. The serfs had to support themselves. Yet as in a slave system, they were bound to their masters, guaranteeing a fixed and permanent workforce that could neither organize nor strike nor freely depart as might laborers in a market context. The overlords had the best of both worlds.

One 22-year old woman, herself a runaway serf, reports: “Pretty serf girls were usually taken by the owner as house servants and used as he wished”; they “were just slaves without rights.” [19] Serfs needed permission to go anywhere. Landowners had legal authority to capture those who tried to flee. One 24-year old runaway welcomed the Chinese intervention as a “liberation.” He testified that under serfdom he was subjected to incessant toil, hunger, and cold. After his third failed escape, he was merciless beaten by the landlord’s men until blood poured from his nose and mouth. They then poured alcohol and caustic soda on his wounds to increase the pain, he claimed. [20]

The serfs were taxed upon getting married, taxed for the birth of each child and for every death in the family. They were taxed for planting a tree in their yard and for keeping animals. They were taxed for religious festivals and for public dancing and drumming, for being sent to prison and upon being released. Those who could not find work were taxed for being unemployed, and if they traveled to another village in search of work, they paid a passage tax. When people could not pay, the monasteries lent them money at 20 to 50 percent interest. Some debts were handed down from father to son to grandson. Debtors who could not meet their obligations risked being cast into slavery. [21]

The theocracy’s religious teachings buttressed its class order. The poor and afflicted were taught that they had brought their troubles upon themselves because of their wicked ways in previous lives. Hence they had to accept the misery of their present existence as a karmic atonement and in anticipation that their lot would improve in their next lifetime. The rich and powerful treated their good fortune as a reward for, and tangible evidence of, virtue in past and present lives.

Regarding Xinjiang, the best and most comprehensive resource I have seen so far is Qiao Collective’s Xinjiang: A Resource and Report Compilation. Qiao Collective is a group of Chinese diaspora living in the west, and they compiled an extremely comprehensive write-up of the entire background of the events, the timeline of reports, and real and fake claims. The majority of their sourcing is western, and they cite official Chinese government writing and white papers when relevant. Uyghur culture is preserved.

I also recommend reading the UN report as well as (especially) China’s response to it, which eclipses it in size and detail.These are the most relevant accusations and responses without delving into straight up fantasy like Adrian Zenz, Christian nationalist and professional propagandist for the Victims of Communism Foundation, does. Zenz’ work has been thoroughly discredited, yet is supported by western media for its utility in fearmongering. An example is lying about 8.7% of new IUDs as 80%, to back up claims of “forced sterilization,” from this chart:

As for the socialist market economies of Vietnam and China, they are not liberalized, and are still socialist. Private ownership is secondary to public, and is relegated to small/medium firms, as well as highly competitive, non-critical industries like tech. The commanding heights of the economy are overwhelmingly publicly owned, while private ownership typically is found in secondary industries and highly competitive non-critical industries like tech. In China, the CPC often has controlling shares of private companies as well, especially the larger ones. As these private firms grow, they are socialized and often folded into the public sector. This is why public ownership is the principal aspect of their economies, and determines the nature of Vietnam the PRC’s path on the socialist road.

See also the stages of socialism presented by Chinese economists, like Cheng Enfu:

The character of the state is a dictatorship of the proletariat. Whole-Process People’s Democracy is the form of consultative democracy in China. Local candidates are directly elected, and then these ladder upwards in indirect elections. The top conducts many surveys and tries to find policy from the people via the Mass Line, while practicing democratic centralism and maintaining the ability to quickly respond to changing conditions. Long-term policy change is slow but positive as consensus is built, short-term crisis is quickly adapted to as needed.

Both Vietnam and China have similar systems with unique characteristics best fitting their conditions.

The soviets were not imperialist, and any socialist society will need to imprison fascists and deal with them as class struggle does not end overnight.

The soviets did not have any colonies. China did not colonize Tibet nor Xinjiang. Neither the PRC nor Vietnam liberalized their economies, they retained proletarian control of the state and public ownership of the commanding heights of industry. The expansion of markets was a complement to the socialist system, not a change in system.