The difference is that communists accept the need for censorship and are open about why some ideas need to be suppressed.

Because some ideas are so destructive to your whole model that they have to be suppressed, because these models in their practical application are often sort of un-defendable, and so the only option is to have secret police running around shooting dissidents.

It doesn't mean that liberal democracies don't fall into the exact same pattern, to some extent large or small. It is in the nature of human power struggle. It's not innate to any particular political system (or it is innate to all of them because they're all made of people). The difference is that we don't celebrate it or make excuses for it. We publish books about what a lie the government is telling, we have a constant struggle between the forces of freedom in the streets and the government trying to stamp it out. Sometimes different factions get the upper hand, or it switches.

The difference, as you brilliantly demonstrated here, is that some of the most thickheaded of communist supporters get themselves turned around sufficiently that they start supporting the government trying to stamp it out. Most sensible people, when the government tells them that some ideas need to be suppressed, and they need to imprison or shoot anyone who's opposing their power, can figure out that's a bad thing. You apparently cannot.

The difference is that we don’t celebrate it or make excuses for it.

Except you do constantly make excuses for it, as you brilliantly demonstrated here. You want to pretend that you support more freedoms than communists, but in practice you just champion your own set of capitalist values.

Okay, this is clearly going to be a waste of time. Tell you what: You're clearly never going to admit that you're wrong about this, and obviously I can't force you. It seems like you're actually sort of enjoying how easy it is just to keep typing "freedom is an illusion anyway and that's why I had all the opposition shot and that makes perfect sense" and similar things and no one can stop you.

Let's do this: Tell me a format within which we can have this conversation, and get some kind of feedback or judgement about who it is that's able to prove their case. If you want to propose a framing of some sort, and go within that, I'm happy to talk about it with you. If not, I think it's just going to be you insisting that Stalin-style/Trump-style governance is justified until I get bored or frustrated and abandon the conversation.

I'm not a debate pervert. I've made my point clearly here already. I don't need to convince you of anything. The fact that you use Trump and Stalin in the same sentence shows profound ignorance on your part. There is no point attempting to have a discussion with people who have strong opinions on subjects they have no understanding of. I'll leave you with what the CIA had to say on the subject. I would hope you'd use this as an opportunity to educate yourself, but I know that you will not.

cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-R…

I'm not a debate pervert.

I mean it definitely sounds like you are lol

The fact that you use Trump and Stalin in the same sentence shows profound ignorance on your part.

They both aspire to throw their domestic enemies into a network of shadowy prison camps or kill them outright, they both claim the establishment opposition needs to be disposed of, they both claim that censorship is necessary because some ideas are wrong and the leader needs to be in control so he can keep the wrong ideas away. There are some important differences, too, but certainly they belong in the same sentence. Trump's just a lot less effective, is actually the main difference I see.

There is no point attempting to have a discussion with people who have strong opinions on subjects they have no understanding of.

Sounds good! Let me check your qualifications, that's a really good point, I did have a sense that there was no point to having this conversation with you, and this sort of gets to the heart of why lol.

• What did Stalin have done to most of the KPD members who fled Hitler to the Soviet Union?
• Why did the USSR ultimately collapse? What should be done differently to raise up the next massive wonderful communist state? Or nothing, they did everything fine?
• Which direction did people generally flee across the Berlin wall? Why?
• How would you characterize China's modern government, in one or two words? Marxist, communist, gangster-capitalist, what?

It's okay if you don't know! I think you do, though, at least most of these answers you are probably aware of. I'll make them simpler so there's no time needed to put together a little essay or anything (which is probably better anyway, since it'll be less subjective). One or two word answers.

• What did Stalin have done to most of the KPD members who fled Hitler to the Soviet Union?
• Which country currently embodies what you'd like to see, as the successful Communist model to emulate?
• Which direction did people generally flee across the Berlin wall?
• How would you characterize China's modern government, in one or two words?

I know, I know, you don't want to participate. It's easier just to talk down to me and soapbox, and from that format you can really easily refuse to analyze things that you don't want to analyze that undo your mental models if you do analyze them. But there's no reason you would be unwilling just to admit the answers, since your model is super-correct and I'm the wrong one.

Up to you

I just love how you keep acting like these questions haven't been answered time and again. As if you came up with some novel line of questioning nobody has ever thought before. Go read a book for once in your life. Here's one you can start with. welshundergroundnetwork.cymru/…

And here's how people who actually live in China characterize their modern government in one or two words. If you spent as much time educating yourself on the subjects you wish to debate instead of making a clown of yourself in public, you wouldn't have to ask questions like this and em brass yourself.

• newsweek.com/most-china-call-t…
• csmonitor.com/World/Asia-Pacif…
• bloomberg.com/opinion/articles…
• web.archive.org/web/2023051104…
• tbsnews.net/world/china-more-d…
• web.archive.org/web/2020122913…

You're like a living embodiment of the Dunning-Kruger effect.

Studies have shown that China is more democratic than the United States, Russia is nearby, and Ukraine is “at the bottom”

No matter how American politicians and the media criticize “totalitarian” China, there are far more people among US citizens who consider their country undemocratic.

^{ignatova (English News front)}

Were you under the impression I thought I was the first person to come up with these ideas or questions? In history? No, the point is that you don't want to answer them, not that they were somehow untouched by scholarship.

I'm happy to make the same offer for you, you can try to expose the flaws in my thinking by trying to ask questions I really don't want to admit the answers to or am just unaware of.

But like I say, it's clear that you prefer soapboxing to that sort of interactive discussion (even the Playskool version of it with one word answers). I wonder why...

The point is that I, and many other people, have answered these questions many times. If you're personally ignorant on the subject, then spend the time to educate yourself. You can start with the materials I've provided you. It's not my job to educate you. I perfect having interactive discussion with people who understand the subject they're discussing and want to have a discussion in good faith. It's very transparent that you are not.

I'll let you have the last word here which you so desperately need.

Bye.