Afaik this happened with every single instance of a communist country. Communism seems like a pretty good idea on the surface, but then why does it always become autocratic?
Afaik this happened with every single instance of a communist country. Communism seems like a pretty good idea on the surface, but then why does it always become autocratic?
That’s fair, but frankly, in my experience, the average American’s idea of communism is “evil bad oppression big gubmint dictatorship”. I was never taught in school about the theory behind communism or the practical government of the USSR (regardless of how close they may or may not have been), so I have little understanding into how these systems actually work and whether it’s actually beneficial for those under them. I’m trying to rectify that on my own time but there’s many people who don’t care enough to do so and just parrot the same thought terminating cliches like “human nature”.
I’m almost finished listening to Blackshirts and Reds by Parenti, one of the books in the list that @Cowbee@lemmy.ml posted as a reply to your message. I think it’s been a great introductory book - brief and easy to understand.
It’s wide-ranging book even though it’s brief, and one of the things I found interesting about it was that he not only gave credit where it was due (ex: producing vastly more egalitarian society with all the benefits that come with that) but he also pointed out some shortcomings, such as the failure of centrally planning national economies, like someone else has pointed out in another comment here. I highly recommend the book.
Edit: I also wanted to say props to you for being open-minded and trying to learn and understand instead of just swallowing the narrative we’ve been fed our whole lives.