“Well we could immediately escalate any conflict to end human civilization” is not the boast you think it is.
Look at the current war in Ukraine – the closest we’ve come to direct conflict between two nuclear superpowers. Nukes are useful only to the extent they make the other side think twice about a large, conventional invasion. If you actually use them against someone who can retaliate, you lose.
I can believe that a lot of what we call laziness is really something else, but I’m not in the maximalist “lazy does not exist” camp. Whatever your goals are in life, you need at least some ability to buckle down and do those necessary things you’d rather not do. All else being equal, some people are better at that than others.
It’s tne drop rule but for capitalism
It’s also helpful to highlight the relationship between imperialism and fascism. Fascism can be described as turning the tactics and violence of imperialism (that are initially reserved for the periphery) inwards, on “undesirable” parts of the imperial core. Usually this follows on the heels of closing imperial horizons.
no puns
A lot of that had to be karma farming
Egalitarian ideals are very new compared to Christianity
Run that one by Jesus and I think he’d be surprised
No one is buying your bullshit. If you have a more informed opinion besides Communism Bad, let’s hear it.
If you have a more informed opinion besides Communism Bad, let’s hear it.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/14/world/middleeast/israel-gaza-military-human-shields.html
After Israeli soldiers found Mohammed Shubeir hiding with his family in early March, they detained him for roughly 10 days before releasing him without charge, he said.
During that time, Mr. Shubeir said, the soldiers used him as a human shield.
Mr. Shubeir, then 17, said he was forced to walk handcuffed through the empty ruins of his hometown, Khan Younis, in southern Gaza, searching for explosives set by Hamas. To avoid being blown up themselves, the soldiers made him go ahead, Mr. Shubeir said.
https://www.cnn.com/2025/03/12/middleeast/israel-gaza-human-shields-investigation-intl/index.html
In an interview with CNN late last year, an Israeli soldier said his unit had forced a Palestinian man to enter a building ahead of troops…
The exact scale and scope of the practice by the Israeli military is not known. But the testimony of both the soldier and five civilians last year indicated that it was widespread across the territory: in northern Gaza, Gaza City, Khan Younis and Rafah.
One of the civilians, Mohammad Saad, age 20, told CNN that IDF soldiers had detained him in Rafah.
“They would ask us to do things like, ‘move this carpet,’ saying they were looking for tunnels,” he said. “‘Film under the stairs,’ they would say. If they found something, they would tell us to bring it outside. For example, they would ask us to remove belongings from the house, clean here, move the sofa, open the fridge, and open the cupboard.”
https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/israeli-soldier-palestinians-human-shields-gaza/
Tommy [an anonymized name] said his commander ordered his unit to use Gazan civilians to search buildings for explosives instead of dogs…
Breaking the Silence has acted as a watchdog body over the Israeli military for more than 20 years. It said it had corroborated Tommy’s account with other soldiers.
Multiple eyewitness accounts from both sides, and stories from anonymous sources match up with each other, as well as with stories of named sources.
So you haven’t actually read about the topic. You just have a vague notion of “Communism Bad” that no one around you has ever seriously questioned. When a specific topic (career choice) comes up, you feel free to make up negative claims that reinforce Communism Bad instead of putting in the work to have an informed opinion (or simply acknowledging that you don’t know!). You couple this with thought-terminating cliches (whataboutism!) to avoid anything that might upset the conclusion you’ve already reached – Communism Bad.
I brought up the comparison of career choice under capitalism because the fundamental question is which political system is better.
…you actually believe the USSR was executing… someone… if a particular woman didn’t get a science degree?
I think you just made that up.
Besides, living standards and life expectancy in the former USSR are just now recovering back to levels they were at when the USSR broke up. It makes complete sense why people would look at the last 30 years and conclude things were better before.
How do you think unnecessary deaths and imprisonment in the Soviet Union were related to its egalitarian approach to education?
bolshevik states aren’t famous for freedom of career choice
What is your basis for this opinion? Have you read any books, articles, or interviews on this topic?
And how much career choice do I have, really, under capitalism? Tons of jobs don’t even pay a subsistence wage, to say nothing of a wage that would let someone do basic things like own a home and raise a family. A bunch of other career paths are blocked by various types of non-merit barriers. If you do find a job that pays decently, you have very little control over the actual work and can usually be re-assigned to a different task with no recourse.
forcing Japan into an unconditional surrender, instead of conditional
And this part didn’t even work – the big Japanese demand was keeping the Emperor, and they were allowed to keep him.
An organization that would not have existed without U.S. support.
they could just go awol or force their resignation and go to jail
“I’m going to invade another country instead of going to jail” is not a sympathetic choice.
If I grew up poor and joined a gang because I didn’t have a lot of good options, how much slack should I get for killing someone?
The answer isn’t zero, but it’s also not “these innocent troops were forced to do horrible things and none of it is on them.”
“Essentially no different” is overselling it. “A lot less difference than there should be” is better.