>>> Jacob Segal <jsegal at mindspring.com> 06/08/99 06:22PM >>>
The Russian and Chinese revolutions were "good things?" Compared to what?
Were the Bolsheviks better then the Czarist reign or better than a
socialist democracy under Kerensky? I fail to see how any revolution that
leads to Stalin and the collectivization of the peasant or Mao and the GLF
and the Cultural Revolution can be deemed positive events, unless you make
some argument about the alternative. The crimes of neo-liberalism hardly
constitute a defense of communist crimes.
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Here Jacob Segal makes a good point that preceding regimes and actual alternatives must be discussed to make this analysis. What was the alternative to the Wilson regime in the U.S. at the time of the Russian Revolution of 1917 ? The working class movement was being jailed for opposing WWI by 1918. So the Wilson regime was using dictatorial methods to crush that alternative.
Then, in his last sentence, he fails to see that neo-liberalism (capitalism) and communism are inherently in comparison as alternatives in this debate and in world history. The crimes of neo-liberalism mean we must look at the only alternative which is socialism. Thus, we must determine whose crimes are worse.
Those on this thread who try to hide the crimes of capitalism, including those of its current Clinton regime, are exactly avoiding Jacob Segal's alternatives analysis.
Charles Brown