PugJesus

Capitalism is simply a system where the ownership of capital is primarily by an investor class using limited liability corporations in a market system.

Given insufficient restraints, the investor class will act in their own interests - that is to say, calcifying their control over capital through the use of clientism and legal force, just as pre-capitalist aristocracies did, up to and including detachment from the market. Capitalist elites do not care about capitalism. Capitalism is the ladder (however unfair and cruel that ladder is, mind you) that they pull up behind them once they achieve success.

Elites always want to become an aristocracy, and given enough time and power, they will become an aristocracy in a society that refuses to confront them, and dismantle capitalism - again, itself not exactly a humane system - to implement an even more oppressive apparatus in its place.

Unfortunately, dismantling capitalism is easier than dismantling an aristocracy. If they succeed, the task of left-wing anticapitalists becomes harder rather than easier.

Me, a contractor, warily eyeing the skeleton next to me:

Yeah, don't fucking come here. Not now, not in the future. We can't be trusted again for a very long time - longer than just an election or two.

Fantastic idea, I hope it becomes mainstream. I've been meaning to try plant-based meat alternatives for a while, for environmental reasons.

What’s the public mood? It’s a big country and everyone is affected differently. Those who joined army in '22 are drained because there is no end date to their service. Those who found themselves a job that has protection from mobilisation can live more or less normal live, except for sleepless nights due to shahed bombings. Those who are falling into mobilisation group are highly nervous and generally try to avoid going out of home unless needed.
Exhaustion is high, but what’s an alternative? I don’t see the will to accept surrender.

Understandable. Thank you for your insight into the matter.

All my hopes are for an eventual Ukrainian victory leading to a lasting and just peace.

I think that no country should impose the death penalty in its domestic court systems.

I think that there should be international courts who can still do so 😊

I just want to see fascists swinging in Nuremburg again, is that really so much to ask for?

What bizarre creatures autocrats are.

Sorry for condemning genocide denial?

Where does db0 deny and aprove of genocide?

Don't worry, just like the admins leaving up Holodomor denial, I'm sure that you think it's not a 'real' genocide.

Not to be rude but like, was your major in alt history? You clearly need a heavy refresher on the German revolution before you’re qualified to talk about this, so I’d suggest you start with that before responding. To be clear, I’ll downvote and move on if your next response isn’t at least mostly rooted in fact.

Sorry that you don't like your own source being quoted to contradict you?

Nope

Yep

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_Wels

On 9 November 1918, the date of the proclamation of the republic in Germany, Wels spoke to the Naumburg rifle brigade at their request to explain the political situation following the collapse of the German Empire at the end of World War I. The brigade was one of the units considered especially loyal to Emperor Wilhelm II that had been brought into the city as reinforcements against revolutionary activity. Wels convinced the soldiers that to avoid a civil war they should not use their weapons. At the end of his speech, the brigade went over in a body to the side of the supporters of the German Revolution. Buoyed by his success, Wels spoke at other barracks so persuasively that he was credited with keeping the death toll that day to just fifteen.[4]
Also on 9 November, Wels became a member of the revolutionary Workers' and Soldiers' Council of Berlin. He advocated successfully for the Independent Social Democratic Party (USPD) – a more leftist and anti-war group that had broken away from the SPD in 1917 – to be represented equally with the SPD on the Council. The next day, he was made military commander of Berlin.[5]
The Volksmarinedivision was the revolution's main military unit in Berlin and as such under Wels' control. In December 1918, the Council of People's Deputies, Germany's temporary government, ordered the division to move outside Berlin and reduce the number of its soldiers. When they refused, Wels withheld their pay to force them to comply. During the week before Christmas, he attempted to negotiate with them, but when no progress was made, they detained and maltreated him.[6] Assaults on the division's locations at the Berlin Palace and Neuer Marstall by regular troops loyal to the government – the 1918 Christmas crisis – failed to dislodge the mutineers. Negotiations led to a compromise under which the Volksmarinedivision, in exchange for receiving its back pay and remaining a unit, vacated the Palace and Marstall and freed Wels, who was forced to step down from his position as city commander.[7]

No “coup” (“revolution” makes a lot more sense as a label) yet.

"It's a revolution because I like this attempt to prevent democratic elections"

The army thing is referring to this:

As mentioned and quoted above, it's not "a dispute over backpay"

Eichhorn would be subsequently dismissed, not for anything you stated but because he wouldn’t “reliably” immediately resort to deadly force against fellow leftists.

"It's okay if a police chief approves of military forces taking politicians hostages if I really agree with them"

Because the people Ebert called the army on were the navy servicemen. They knew firsthand how ghoulish that asshole really was.

"Ghoulish is when the civilian government doesn't allow the military to make its own orders and take hostages whenever it likes"

If you think my position is unnecessarily prejudiced against the uprising and not worth responding to, that's fine. But I think you're really downplaying the connection between the Bolsheviks and the thinking of the leadership of the Spartacist Uprising.

Then I thought the folks against db0 were ok, but turns out they approve of genocide A and deny genocide B.

I'm ardently against the Palestinian genocide, despite the attempts of certain users to assert otherwise.

And then say we’re the assholes for defending ourselves from the slander and insults.

Top tier projection from my favorite fan, as always.

We can't expect God to do all the cooming

Projection of the finest degree right here.

lmao, my favorite stalker is back. Gonna spend another year talking about me, lover? I know how much you adore spreading easily disproven bullshit.

I’m not sure if you’re misremembering or making things up, but many of your claims aren’t historically supported at all. Also when I say KPD that’s a shorthand for the uprising leadership in general, because those guys weren’t all KPD.

I'm well aware; that doesn't change their goals or idolization.

Enough demonstrators supported the uprising to force the KPD’s hand in starting/continuing it. The uprising petered out due to a divided leadership unable to seize the momentum, not because the demonstrators were uninterested in a second revolution to overthrow the bourgeoisie.

Further on you chide me to read the wikipedia article, yet demonstrate that you have no interest in the parts of the Wikipedia article that contradict your narrative.

KPD leader Liebknecht, initially against the advice of Luxemburg, supported the plan to unleash a civil war. The Council of People's Deputies was to be overthrown by force of arms and the elections to the National Assembly scheduled for 19 January prevented.

The mass of the working class followed the call for a general strike to prevent a counterrevolution, but it did not want to have anything to do with military struggles. On the contrary, they continued to demand the unity of the socialist forces and, at a large meeting in the Humboldthain Park on 9 January, demanded the resignation of all the leaders responsible for the "fratricide". Both the Ebert government and Ledebour and Liebknecht were seen as responsible for the situation. Numerous resolutions from the factories called for an end to the street fighting and the creation of a government in which all socialist parties would be represented.[15] In the view of historian Sebastian Haffner, the executive committee of the Berlin USPD and KPD had failed the uprising, which was "entirely the spontaneous work of the masses of Berlin workers who had made the November Revolution; the masses were overwhelmingly Social Democrats, not Spartacists or Communists, and their January uprising was no different than their November revolution had been."[4]

The interest in bringing down the government was not the revolutionary abolition of the newborn Weimar government, but the resignation of Ebert's government in a parliamentary sense.

True, but irrelevant. Using Bolshevik actions to morally implicate the KPD is fallacious logic. The uprising was meant to create a socialist and democratic society in the form of a council republic, not replicate everything the Bolsheviks did. If you have criticism of the KPD, criticize the KPD; everyone worth having this conversation with already knows the Bolsheviks were terrible people.

Oh, okay, I should just ignore the coup's leadership openly idolizing the Bolshevik process because they weren't literally the Bolsheviks themselves. I'm sure that their attempt to prevent democratic elections was completely holsum and that they would've been utterly unlike the Bolsheviks in victory.

Again, that is literally not what happened. The uprising was a spontaneous affair emerging from SPD repression that the KPD attempted to control after the fact.

"SPD repression" is a very curious way to say "The SPD responding to a police chief kidnapping a politician to hold as hostage"

If the goal was to prevent elections, they would’ve never negotiated with the SPD*.

"Put us in a better position to seize power and we'll think about allowing electoins"

Wow much negotation

Even if we accept your claim, though, your position only makes sense if you view bourgeois parliamentary democracy as exceptionally democratic and worthy of preservation compared to socialist forms of democracy. Would you condemn an uprising to overthrow a constitutional monarchy and establish a republic in a similar manner?

Yes, abso-fucking-lutely? If the UK is having elections in two weeks, those elections look free and fair, and Labour says "Instead of participating in elections, we want to have a coup", that's a pretty damning admission that they don't think they can fucking win free and fair elections.

"But a Republic would be better!" Yes, a republic would be better - but if your opinion is that a republic would be better even against the wishes of the majority of the population, maybe you aren't such a believer in the basic idea of a democratic republic to fucking begin with.

You should read the Wikipedia article before responding.

I have. As quoted parts contradict your arguments, I must question if you have as well.

Compromise left rather than rightward. If they could work with literal fascists, they could’ve seen what the KPD had to say.

As you yourself admit, negotiations were had. They saw what the KPD had to say - and one of their core demands was to restore to power someone who had taken leftist politicians hostage for being insufficiently leftist.

Also, not using the army to attack their supposed allies

Their supposed allies who were attempting a coup? This leads back around to the idea that the SPD should've rolled over and fucking died.

Fuckin wonder why.

Because the navy was extremely left-wing at the time?

You’re misrepresenting/misunderstanding the cause of the Spartacist uprising. The uprising wasn’t planned to prevent the democratic elections (the split in the party leadership was about electoralism vs direct action); it kind of just happened as some saw an opportunity where none existed and everyone jumped the gun.

That the uprising wasn't planned, and that the KPD turning it into an uprising was intended to prevent the upcoming elections are not mutually exclusive positions; that it was unplanned is apparent by the reaction of the vast majority of the protesters who initially sparked the KPD's insane idea that they could take over - the vast majority of protesters were, themselves, trade unionists who did not desire a coup, and did not join the attempted uprising.

Also note that the KPD wanted to establish a council republic similar to what the Bolsheviks had set up, which was flawed but not inherently authoritarian; Bolshevik authoritarianism came through corruption of a democratic system with winning the war as their excuse.

As I mentioned, the Bolsheviks had already shown their true colors in dissolving the democratically elected legislature the year before for not returning a sufficiently Bolshevik legislature. They did not prevent it from meeting because it was the 'wrong kind' of democracy - only once it was apparent that they had not won the elections and the resulting representatives were unwilling to bend to their wishes did they opt to dissolve it. Furthermore, at this point, purges of leftist groups on the Bolshevik side had already begun - and, on top of that, the entire point of the Bolsheviks was that they were believers in an anti-democratic Vanguardist state. That was the point of the split with the Mensheviks.

Point being: The uprising was a bad idea in hindsight, but you’re seeing malice on the part of the KPD where there’s none.

I think that seeing malice in an attempt to stop elections from occurring is not unwarranted, especially considering what party they sought to imitate. Even at that early point, the Bolsheviks were not exactly friends of democracy.

I see your feelings are hurt when your bullshit is called out, as per usual.

Funnily PJ did show his hand, by claiming out that he has anarchists that he gets along with. And then pointed out to people who just discovered anarchism less 1 year ago.

"Showing your hand is when someone asks you to name one (1) anarchist you speak to, and you do, musing that you could name more and that the question was pretty fucking stupid"