NationStates Jolt Archive

In an age of propaganda and pseudo-democracy, the strongest opponents of imperial power are subject to the most ferocious attacks. One result of this is that many of the firmly held opinions about democracy in Cuba and in the United States of America bear an inverse relationship to relevant knowledge. As the Canadian scientist William Osler said, “the greater the ignorance the greater the dogmatism”.
Source: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=5609

I thought I would take this opportunity to start a discussion on the nature of ''democracy' and the different approaches to it worldwide, modern liberal democracy stresses competition and partisanism to be true democracy, but if you read Plato or Aristotle, who lived in the society that first invented democracy, they clearly state that democracy is not about competition but harmony and shared common lives within the polity, and it brings up a relevant point that many scholars make that liberal democracy creates a anti-consensus hostile 'two-camps' system rather than that of cooperation.

Here is another source on the Cuban democracy for reference: http://www.newhumanist.com/geiser.html

...but if you read Plato or Aristotle, who lived in the society that first invented democracy, they clearly state that democracy is not about competition but harmony and shared common lives within the polity.
Not that I agree on many things with either Plato or Aristotle, but if you do read their works you’ll find they both regard democracy as a dangerous and terrible system of governance.

Indeed, Aristotle viewed democracy as a perversion of constitutional government.

Not that I agree on many things with either Plato or Aristotle, but if you do read their works you’ll find they both regard democracy as a dangerous and terrible system of governance.

Indeed, Aristotle viewed democracy as a perversion of constitutional government.

Well Aristotle classified the governmental systems, in which constitutional government was a mix between oligarchy (rule of the rich) and pure democracy (rule of the many).

The US has run a powerful and illegal economic blockade against Cuba for almost 50 years

If an author makes such a serious factual error by the first line of the second paragraph, I stop reading.

Didn't you post this before? I remember reading this before.

I lol'd then, and I lol now.

lol

Well Aristotle classified the governmental systems, in which constitutional government was a mix between oligarchy (rule of the rich) and pure democracy (rule of the many).
And the extremes of both he, rightly, despised.

As to the thread’s title, which is needles if you wish to discuss democracy as opposed to Cuba, we’ve been through many times the concept that, yes, Cubans may enjoy certain democratic social institutions and universal healthcare unavailable to Americans, but they live in a system that severely curtails their freedoms of speech, movement, assembly, etc.

This thread is made of fail.

Democracy is the worst form of government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time. -- Winston Churchill

I admit its been awhile since I read either Aristotle or Plato but I don't recall democracy being something championed by either. So I don't get your point.

I admit its been awhile since I read either Aristotle or Plato but I don't recall democracy being something championed by either. So I don't get your point.

Its AP. Since when has his threads ever have a point?

From my recollections, Plato and Aristotle were not of the opinion that absolute democracy was the best system available. Plato, for example, witnessed the excesses of a democratic system firsthand, when one of the greatest minds of the ancient world was condemned to death simply for personal-political reasons: Socrates. Aristotle supported restricted constitutional systems, as he recognized that vagaries of public opinion, and the dangers inherent in public passion. He realized the populace could be just a cruel and capricious as any individual tyrant, and he advocated a system that would guard against such.


Beyond that, your sourced article is little more than sniveling propaganda, written by an apologist for an authoritarian regime. The author openly attempts to vilify the prisoners of conscience in Cuba, such as the detained librarians, as political lackeys of the United States government. This couldn't be further from the truth. They were arrested and detained for various reasons discussed by Nat Hentoff in this article (http://www.peaceworkmagazine.org/pwork/0403/040307.htm).

Furthermore, the article claims that Cubans are able to openly and freely express themselves, a claim that those Busheviks at the Human Rights Watch would rather disagree with. (http://hrw.org/englishwr2k7/docs/2007/01/11/cuba14886.htm) They go so far as to single Cuba out as the only country in Latin America that still partakes of that folly that is political repression. Something that the eeeeevil capitalists left behind decades ago.

I didn't read beyond that third paragraph or so, because your article is so incredibly worthless. It's not worth my time and effort, but I could certainly go on throughout the entire article blowing it straight to hell.

From my recollections, Plato and Aristotle were not of the opinion that absolute democracy was the best system available. Plato, for example, witnessed the excesses of a democratic system firsthand, when one of the greatest minds of the ancient world was condemned to death simply for personal-political reasons: Socrates. Aristotle supported restricted constitutional systems, as he recognized that vagaries of public opinion, and the dangers inherent in public passion. He realized the populace could be just a cruel and capricious as any individual tyrant, and he advocated a system that would guard against such.


Beyond that, your sourced article is little more than sniveling propaganda, written by an apologist for an authoritarian regime. The author openly attempts to vilify the prisoners of conscience in Cuba, such as the detained librarians, as political lackeys of the United States government. This couldn't be further from the truth. They were arrested and detained for various reasons discussed by Nat Hentoff in this article (http://www.peaceworkmagazine.org/pwork/0403/040307.htm).

Furthermore, the article claims that Cubans are able to openly and freely express themselves, a claim that those Busheviks at the Human Rights Watch would rather disagree with. (http://hrw.org/englishwr2k7/docs/2007/01/11/cuba14886.htm) They go so far as to single Cuba out as the only country in Latin America that still partakes of that folly that is political repression. Something that the eeeeevil capitalists left behind decades ago.

I didn't read beyond that third paragraph or so, because your article is so incredibly worthless. It's not worth my time and effort, but I could certainly go on throughout the entire article blowing it straight to hell.

And a reinforcement of my comment that this thread is made of fail.

Oh, and let's not forget who the successor to Fidel Castro is: His brother. Folks, to me that sounds a lot more like monarchy than democracy to me.

Oh, and let's not forget who the successor to Fidel Castro is: His brother. Folks, to me that sounds a lot more like monarchy than democracy to me.

No, the Cubans voted, and decided that their votes didn't matter.
So it's really democratic.

Beyond that, your sourced article is little more than sniveling propaganda...


And? What... propaganda can't also be true?


...written by an apologist for an authoritarian regime.


Come now.. if you've done ANY debating you know you can't write-off a source on that basis.


The author openly attempts to vilify the prisoners of conscience in Cuba, such as the detained librarians, as political lackeys of the United States government. This couldn't be further from the truth. They were arrested and detained for various reasons discussed by Nat Hentoff in this article (http://www.peaceworkmagazine.org/pwork/0403/040307.htm).


So... your attack on the article is... another article?


Furthermore, the article claims that Cubans are able to openly and freely express themselves, a claim that those Busheviks at the Human Rights Watch would rather disagree with. (http://hrw.org/englishwr2k7/docs/2007/01/11/cuba14886.htm)


I've heard it claimed that Americans are able to openly and freely express themselves. I've also heard arguments that say this is only true to a certain point, and that such rights are abridged as and when convenient... relegating expression to certain places or times, and actively acting against certain forms of expression.

Oooh a blogger is a wonderful source of information

A true democracy, where the whims of the majority rule, is a system few would truly want to live under.

You are essentially arguing a straw man- there are few, if any, people in the democratic world who actually support the institution of democratic government, where 51% of the population can decide to have the other 49% shot.

Rather, when we talk about modern Western democracies, we are really talking about a representative form of government where the actions of the majority and the government are constrained by a constitution (in the American model) or hundreds of years of tradition and laws (in the case of the British system).

The genius of the system created by the American Founding Fathers is that it acknowledged that too much power in the hands of the majority and the government is a dangerous thing- for a "democratic" system to work in the long-term, there have to be serious limits placed on the tyranny of the majority.

Any claims of Cuban democracy is a farce. The government has unlimited power, and the rights of the citizenry, especially the rights of dissidents, exist only to the extent permitted by the government.

It is mystifying that articulate, intelligent and educated people in the West are unable to see through the tired Communist rhetoric and see Cuban for what it truly is- a repressive, one-party dictatorship with an appalling human rights record. The only reason Western liberals give it a pass, in my opinion, is because the Castro government still mouths anti-American platitudes (while holding Western liberals in utter contempt- "useful idiots," indeed).

A true democracy, where the whims of the majority rule, is a system few would truly want to live under.

You are essentially arguing a straw man- there are few, if any, people in the democratic world who actually support the institution of democratic government, where 51% of the population can decide to have the other 49% shot.

Rather, when we talk about modern Western democracies, we are really talking about a representative form of government where the actions of the majority and the government are constrained by a constitution (in the American model) or hundreds of years of tradition and laws (in the case of the British system).

The genius of the system created by the American Founding Fathers is that it acknowledged that too much power in the hands of the majority and the government is a dangerous thing- for a "democratic" system to work in the long-term, there have to be serious limits placed on the tyranny of the majority.

Any claims of Cuban democracy is a farce. The government has unlimited power, and the rights of the citizenry, especially the rights of dissidents, exist only to the extent permitted by the government.

It is mystifying that articulate, intelligent and educated people in the West are unable to see through the tired Communist rhetoric and see Cuban for what it truly is- a repressive, one-party dictatorship with an appalling human rights record. The only reason Western liberals give it a pass, in my opinion, is because the Castro government still mouths anti-American platitudes (while holding Western liberals in utter contempt- "useful idiots," indeed).

More conservative twaddle and lies.

More conservative twaddle and lies.

What an insightful response. Such eloquence.

More conservative twaddle and lies.

I am truly astounded by your astute observations and mental capabilities! Your debating skills are truly formidable.

Well, here's the deal then, next time someone on NSG talks about bringing 'democracy' to Cuba, let me correct themselves by saying that they infact want to bring a representative constitutional US-style republic based on capitalism to Cuba.

How about some of you actually read the articles, you may learn something.

And? What... propaganda can't also be true?

It can be, but in this instance it is entirely baseless.

Come now.. if you've done ANY debating you know you can't write-off a source on that basis.

I don't see the point in dealing with a source that is so phenomenally baseless and inaccurate that it's mind boggling.
So... your attack on the article is... another article?

How else am I to describe what has been done to the Cuban librarians? How about a wikipedia article? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_Cuba#Contemporary_Cuba)

I've heard it claimed that Americans are able to openly and freely express themselves. I've also heard arguments that say this is only true to a certain point, and that such rights are abridged as and when convenient... relegating expression to certain places or times, and actively acting against certain forms of expression.

Certain manners of the expression of political speech are regulated to a degree, protests on public property for instance, are regulated under the same laws that govern any other type of public gathering. They are regulated not because they are a form of political speech, but because they are a public gathering, legally treated not very differently from tailgate parties at football games.

If that was conservative twaddle and lies that you refuse to see the sense in, then I condemn this as more communist propaganda.

After all, Communism has only killed 100 million people. Let's give it another chance!

How about some of you actually read the articles, you may learn something.

The first couple of paragraphs don't exactly give a good impression, in fact, they're filled with inaccuracies and distortions. Why should I continue onwards in such a futile activity?

Perhaps you ought to think outside of the little ideological box that you've constructed for yourself. You might learn something.

Well, here's the deal then, next time someone on NSG talks about bringing 'democracy' to Cuba, let me correct themselves by saying that they infact want to bring a representative constitutional US-style republic based on capitalism to Cuba.

Would you call the Iraq government to be a US style? We brought "democracy" there after all, did we bring our own system to that country?

How about some of you actually read the articles, you may learn something.

answer my question from before. Why should I waste my time reading someone who makes such a serious factual error as refering to a legal american embargo as an illegal blockade considering they are extremely different things.

How about some of you actually read the articles, you may learn something.

Why don't you go to Cuba if it's such a great democracy, and America is not, and you seem to desire so badly to live in one?

Thing is, the facts show otherwise. I know people down in Miami - they are going to close schools the day news of Castro's death gets out because of celebrations. What about all those boatloads of refugees that keep coming that show up on the news once every so often? Cuba used to be one of the richest countries in Latin America, and now it's the flat-out poorest. Period.

Even with America's embargo, America's economic production only is a sixth of the entire world's. So your potential excuse about "the US's illegal embargo waa waa, waah" is a bunch of shit. Try again.

Why don't you go to Cuba if it's such a great democracy, and America is not, and you seem to desire so badly to live in one?

Thing is, the facts show otherwise. I know people down in Miami - they are going to close schools the day news of Castro's death gets out because of celebrations. What about all those boatloads of refugees that keep coming that show up on the news once every so often? Cuba used to be one of the richest countries in Latin America, and now it's the flat-out poorest. Period.

Even with America's embargo, America's economic production only is a sixth of the entire world's. So your potential excuse about "the US's illegal embargo waa waa, waah" is a bunch of shit. Try again.
Lol, Miami, sorry I don't want to engage in debate with that den of drugs, criminals, terrorists and other undesirables.

As Castro said, 'They did not embrace the spirit of the Revolution, we do not want them, we do not need them'.

Communism has killed 100 million people? That was very violent of it. What did it do - 'the-means-of-production-in-the-hands-of-the-workers' them to death?

Let's see. *drumroll please* Pol Pot, Stalin, Che, Kim II, Mao, the gulag and etc.

After all, Communism has only killed 100 million people. Let's give it another chance!

Communism has killed 100 million people? That was very violent of it. What did it do - 'the-means-of-production-in-the-hands-of-the-workers' them to death?

Communism has killed 100 million people? That was very violent of it. What did it do - 'the-means-of-production-in-the-hands-of-the-workers' them to death?

Take note of the capital C placed in the middle of a sentence. It's a proper noun, specifically a reference to such wonderful folks as the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, the Communist Party of the Peoples Republic of China, the Communist Party of Kampuchea (Cambodia), The Communist Party of Korea, etc., etc., etc.

They're racked up a mighty death toll in those countries, borne of direct political and ethnic persecution, or the abject failure of misguided economic polices.

Lol, Miami, sorry I don't want to engage in debate with that den of drugs, criminals, terrorists and other undesirables.

As Castro said, 'They did not embrace the spirit of the Revolution, we do not want them, we do not need them'.

"Agree with me or leave"

Wait, didn't some Republicans say that during the leadup to the Iraq War?

Lol, Miami, sorry I don't want to engage in debate with that den of drugs, criminals, terrorists and other undesirables.

As Castro said, 'They did not embrace the spirit of the Revolution, we do not want them, we do not need them'.

You still haven't answered why you haven't moved to Cuba yet.

The spirit of the Revolution promises equality, no? Well, I guess you're half-right in that it spreads equal poverty.

It can be, but in this instance it is entirely baseless.


Not a good enough answer. "It's worthless, 'cause I said so" is not a valid debate tactic.

One could argue that every statement or speech issued or uttered by any government or representative... is propaganda. Like any other source, it must be evaluated based on it's content, context, and corroboration.

Not "well, I don't like it".


I don't see the point in dealing with a source that is so phenomenally baseless and inaccurate that it's mind boggling.


That's your choice as a private citizen. On the other hand, if you want to make any pretence of having a political clue, or any semblence of being able to debate in real terms, you might want to correct that.

A source is neither more or less valid because of it's origin, EXCEPT as corroborated or contradicted by other sources.


How else am I to describe what has been done to the Cuban librarians? How about a wikipedia article? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_Cuba#Contemporary_Cuba)


That would be better. At least, that would be a second source. And the really valuable thing here, would be the references.


Certain manners of the expression of political speech are regulated to a degree, protests on public property for instance, are regulated under the same laws that govern any other type of public gathering. They are regulated not because they are a form of political speech, but because they are a public gathering, legally treated not very differently from tailgate parties at football games.

I think this is a matter or opinion on your behalf. When you designate zones that must be free of political opposition, I'd say that is a specific attack on free speech. Specific to political speech.

Lol, Miami, sorry I don't want to engage in debate with that den of drugs, criminals, terrorists and other undesirables.

As Castro said, 'They did not embrace the spirit of the Revolution, we do not want them, we do not need them'.

This from a country that seems to enjoy screwing its citizenry at every turn and including the words "or death" in its motto. Dismiss all those who risk their lives to leave that country if you want but you are hardly helping your arguement by doing so. If it was so great in Cuba then why did they leave that "real" democracy to come to America and its faux democracy? Can't blame them if embracing the Revolutuion means embracing poverty and oppression.

This from a country whose motto includes "or death". Dismiss all those who risk their lives to leave that country if you want but you are hardly helping your arguement by doing so. If it was so great in Cuba then why did they leave that "real" democracy to come to America and its faux democracy? Can't blame them if embracing the Revolutuion means embracing poverty and oppression.
Yes it's true no one is rich in Cuba, but it it that way for a reason, the system was built around the fact that money, wealth and luxury corrupts politics, it's easy to rally for 'democracy' when your getting US state department money. Cuba has a devolved socialist system which works for them, why people left the country 50 years ago? Well Revolutions are usually quite bloody, whether it be the America, French or whatever Revolution, they usually aren't pleasant, but to judge Cuban socialism by the amount of blood spilled to institute itself is ludicrous, compare deaths and people fleeing in the American revolution please. Anyways I don't want to go on too much, I think the articles I posted accurately describe the Cuban socialist system. The political system is not based around greedy economy incentive, it is based around selfless community based support and patriotism.

This from a country whose motto includes "or death". Dismiss all those who risk their lives to leave that country if you want but you are hardly helping your arguement by doing so. If it was so great in Cuba then why did they leave that "real" democracy to come to America and its faux democracy? Can't blame them if embracing the Revolutuion means embracing poverty and oppression.

I'm not sure if you even want to bother arguing with this guy, mate. He'll just sink you to his level and beat you with experience. Thing is, him and his kind do enough to set back the causes of tolerance, reason, and sanity more than Fred Phelps ever could.

Would it satisfy you ego if I said it was 100 million deaths committed in the name of Communism?

More conservative twaddle and lies.

Wow, what a deep and insightful response.

Here, let me post a reply that's on your intellectual level: I know you are, but what am i?

Not a good enough answer. "It's worthless, 'cause I said so" is not a valid debate tactic.

One could argue that every statement or speech issued or uttered by any government or representative... is propaganda. Like any other source, it must be evaluated based on it's content, context, and corroboration.

Not "well, I don't like it".


That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that the piece is entirely baseless in its claims. It fails to truthfully address several key points in the first three paragraphs, and based off of that, there is no evidence that I should continue onwards to "find out more"


That's your choice as a private citizen. On the other hand, if you want to make any pretence of having a political clue, or any semblence of being able to debate in real terms, you might want to correct that.

A source is neither more or less valid because of it's origin, EXCEPT as corroborated or contradicted by other sources.
Said source is contradicted by many, many other sources. I'm not just randomly saying "LOL Idunna lak it! I's not gunna reed it!" I'm saying that the source is flawed. The author either misrepresents the facts, or lies outright on several key points.



That would be better. At least, that would be a second source. And the really valuable thing here, would be the references.

Except, I'm fairly well informed on the matter myself> I've read several books, as well as journal articles regarding civil rights in Cuba. Beyond that, I don't really feel the need to track down countless other sources to contradict a fundamentalist ideologue like AP, whose only response sometimes is to call something "Conservative lies".

Why don't you get on his case for such a blatant instance of what you are, incorrectly, decrying me for, oh, wait, he agrees with you. That's why.



I think this is a matter or opinion on your behalf. When you designate zones that must be free of political opposition, I'd say that is a specific attack on free speech. Specific to political speech.

There is no requirement that they be free of political opposition, as they are fully permitted to be held there. Equally applied rules, though, restrict the use of public spaces, regardless of one's intent, political or otherwise.

Take note of the capital C placed in the middle of a sentence. It's a proper noun, specifically a reference to such wonderful folks as the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, the Communist Party of the Peoples Republic of China, the Communist Party of Kampuchea (Cambodia), The Communist Party of Korea, etc., etc., etc.

They're racked up a mighty death toll in those countries, borne of direct political and ethnic persecution, or the abject failure of misguided economic polices.

So... nothing to do with communism, then. Poor, corrupt, or malign government may account for fatalities. (Which is equally true whether the destructive government is communistic, capitalistic, or any other economical-istic). It seems unlikely that an economic ideology alone has ever directly done so.

I wonder... are you saying that "The PeoplesFreedom" is your puppet? Otherwise... I don't really see how you can claim inside knowedge of meaning. Regardless of which, "Communism, with (or without) a big C" refers to an economic model, rather than any specific parties, governments, or collections thereof.

So... nothing to do with communism, then. Poor, corrupt, or malign government may account for fatalities. (Which is equally true whether the destructive government is communistic, capitalistic, or any other economical-istic). It seems unlikely that an economic ideology alone has ever directly done so.

People acting in relationship to ideologies have, though. And as we all know, motive plays a role in prosecuting a crime. In this case, their motive was their ideology.

I wonder... are you saying that "The PeoplesFreedom" is your puppet? Otherwise... I don't really see how you can claim inside knowedge of meaning. Regardless of which, "Communism, with (or without) a big C" refers to an economic model, rather than any specific parties, governments, or collections thereof.

One might easily argue that these deaths were the results of the failed implementation of a certain ideology.

Oh, and don't forget, no true scotsman...

How about some of you actually read the articles, you may learn something.

I did. If I want lies and propaganda, I can go watch al Jazeera.

You seem relatively intelligent- do you really buy the BS the articles are selling? Or are you just a cynical shill who only cares about poking Uncle Sam in the eye?

Let's see. *drumroll please* Pol Pot, Stalin, Che, Kim II, Mao, the gulag and etc.

Well done. Google is your friend. On the other hand, you've done nothing to show how communism was responsible for a single death.

If all you have is death-tolls from corrupt governments... well, we can put paid to the idea that 'communism' is the culprit if we can find even one representative of a corrupt government (or one that has occured large numbers of internal casualties) which is not communist.

Well done. Google is your friend. On the other hand, you've done nothing to show how communism was responsible for a single death.

If all you have is death-tolls from corrupt governments... well, we can put paid to the idea that 'communism' is the culprit if we can find even one representative of a corrupt government (or one that has occured large numbers of internal casualties) which is not communist.

like, oh, I dunno, Hitler

Well done. Google is your friend. On the other hand, you've done nothing to show how communism was responsible for a single death.

If all you have is death-tolls from corrupt governments... well, we can put paid to the idea that 'communism' is the culprit if we can find even one representative of a corrupt government (or one that has occured large numbers of internal casualties) which is not communist.

So I guess because all those deaths were caused by Hitler and his bag of thugs, it wasn't true Nazism? Oh, right, according to your logic, it was Hitlerism, not Nazism... :rolleyes:

If all you have is death-tolls from corrupt governments... well, we can put paid to the idea that 'communism' is the culprit if we can find even one representative of a corrupt government (or one that has occured large numbers of internal casualties) which is not communist.

Does this mean fascism is also free from guilt?

Yes it's true no one is rich in Cuba...

It's just that (http://cuba.romanvirdi.com/plaza-lobby.jpg) some are more equal than (http://www.guije.com/links/blogse.jpg) others. (http://www3.worldisround.com/photos/13/92/301.jpg)

I did. If I want lies and propaganda, I can go watch al Jazeera.

You seem relatively intelligent- do you really buy the BS the articles are selling? Or are you just a cynical shill who only cares about poking Uncle Sam in the eye?

Lol, the fact that you think al Jazeera is propaganda tells me to ignore you, because if you have ever seen Al Jazeera English you'll know it is an immensely informative and objective media outlet. You should watch it on Youtube.

Well done. Google is your friend. On the other hand, you've done nothing to show how communism was responsible for a single death.

If all you have is death-tolls from corrupt governments... well, we can put paid to the idea that 'communism' is the culprit if we can find even one representative of a corrupt government (or one that has occured large numbers of internal casualties) which is not communist.

You shall know them by their works- You can come up with a few minor exceptions, I'm sure (I doubt the Swedish Communist Party has killed anyone), but the evidence from the last century is that when Communist movements and parties come to power, the result is gulags and mass graves.

You can't simply hand wave the evidence away by saying that Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Ho Chi Minh etc. etc. weren't "real" communists. If that's the case, who does that leave in the "real" Communist column, the English department at Yale?

The last one's link is broken, although I'm sure there are plenty of images of run-down slums, 50 year old cars or empty stores floating around.

That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that the piece is entirely baseless in its claims. It fails to truthfully address several key points in the first three paragraphs, and based off of that, there is no evidence that I should continue onwards to "find out more"


Saying it, and proving it... very different things.

Also - going back and reading your initial response... that isn't what you are saying. It might be what you were meaning, but NSG doesn't actually tally telepathic responses yet.


Said source is contradicted by many, many other sources. I'm not just randomly saying "LOL Idunna lak it! I's not gunna reed it!" I'm saying that the source is flawed. The author either misrepresents the facts, or lies outright on several key points.


Then present the sources, and prove the 'lies' to be lies.

Otherwise, it's an opinion piece, and should be treated as such.


Except, I'm fairly well informed on the matter myself> I've read several books, as well as journal articles regarding civil rights in Cuba.


Which is all completely irrelevent. I don't care how much you 'know'... only what is present in the debate.

This is a debate, not a pissing contest. If you have ability and material to disprove the claims made, do so. It really is a put-up-or-shut-up situation.


Beyond that, I don't really feel the need to track down countless other sources to contradict a fundamentalist ideologue like AP, whose only response sometimes is to call something "Conservative lies".


Then why waste time presenting an argument that is equally baseless?


Why don't you get on his case for such a blatant instance of what you are, incorrectly, decrying me for, oh, wait, he agrees with you. That's why.


How does he 'agree with me'? I've not said Cuba was a democracy, or that the US is not 'democratic'. I've merely called you on your approach to the debate.


There is no requirement that they be free of political opposition, as they are fully permitted to be held there. Equally applied rules, though, restrict the use of public spaces, regardless of one's intent, political or otherwise.

The great thing about free speech is - it protects your right to be as wrong as you like.

"Free speech zones are created by the Secret Service for President George W. Bush and other members of his administration.[1] The stated purpose of free speech zones is to protect the safety of the dignitary, or the protesters themselves. Critics, however, suggest that such zones are "Orwellian",[2][3] and that authorities use them in a heavy-handed manner to censor protesters by putting them literally out of sight of the mass media, hence the public, as well as visiting dignitaries. The Secret Service denies specifically targeting protesters, but, on a number of occasions, these denials have been contradicted by local police officers who have stated under oath that Secret Service agents specifically ordered them to target protesters."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_speech_zone1

Yes it's true no one is rich in Cuba, but it it that way for a reason, the system was built around the fact that money, wealth and luxury corrupts politics, it's easy to rally for 'democracy' when your getting US state department money. Cuba has a devolved socialist system which works for them, why people left the country 50 years ago? Well Revolutions are usually quite bloody, whether it be the America, French or whatever Revolution, they usually aren't pleasant, but to judge Cuban socialism by the amount of blood spilled to institute itself is ludicrous, compare deaths and people fleeing in the American revolution please. Anyways I don't want to go on too much, I think the articles I posted accurately describe the Cuban socialist system. The political system is not based around greedy economy incentive, it is based around selfless community based support and patriotism.

Right I'm sure that all those poverty stricken people thank Castro for the system that denies itself money. Uh-huh. And I never said a thing about judging a revolution by the amount of blood spilled. I don't know where you are getting that unless you are simply purposefully ignoring and twisting what I posted.

Many Cubans are risking the crossing of the Gulf on the flimsiest of materials, their lives very much in danger, to get to Florida to escape Cuba and you want to ignore that. You are claiming that it is a real democracy and America isn't so I wonder why so many seem to not be happy with it? Perhaps you should get away from your communist propaganda and realize that hey, maybe the people of Cuba aren't living in harmony, happy in their lack of money because they have their patriotism and.. *cough* community support.

Lol, the fact that you think al Jazeera is propaganda tells me to ignore you, because if you have ever seen Al Jazeera English you'll know it is an immensely informative and objective media outlet. You should watch it on Youtube.

And that fact that you consider al Jazeera as anything more than a mouthpiece for terrorists and their apologists leads me to conclude that you must live on Bizarro World and have somehow ended up on this message board through a weird hole in space and time.

Does this mean fascism is also free from guilt?

Fascism is not an economic model.

Fascism is free from guilt in theory. It is only in application that it might acquire guilt.

Fascism can be argued to merely mean 'unity'. Looking at basic tenets such as strong border policy, protectionism, and/or concerted efforts at promoting a militantly strong 'national identity', 'fascism' can be argued to include a lot of our western cultures.

Is Castro’s Cuba a socialist society? (http://www.socialistworker.org/2002-1/408/408_07_IsCubaSocialist.shtml)

You'd be right, to an extent. It would be entirely possible to run a nation with a 'Nazi' government that did NOT have huge death tolls.

Sure, assuming that there were no Jews, Slavs, gypsies, homosexuals or communists living in such country, or any neighboring countries.

You sure you want to go down this road?

So I guess because all those deaths were caused by Hitler and his bag of thugs, it wasn't true Nazism? Oh, right, according to your logic, it was Hitlerism, not Nazism... :rolleyes:

You'd be right, to an extent. It would be entirely possible to run a nation with a 'Nazi' government that did NOT have huge death tolls.

It's just that (http://cuba.romanvirdi.com/plaza-lobby.jpg) some are more equal than (http://www.guije.com/links/blogse.jpg) others. (http://www3.worldisround.com/photos/13/92/301.jpg)

I guess that whole luxury corrupts politics must be a load of bull. Who'd of thunk it?

You shall know them by their works- You can come up with a few minor exceptions, I'm sure (I doubt the Swedish Communist Party has killed anyone), but the evidence from the last century is that when Communist movements and parties come to power, the result is gulags and mass graves.

You can't simply hand wave the evidence away by saying that Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Ho Chi Minh etc. etc. weren't "real" communists. If that's the case, who does that leave in the "real" Communist column, the English department at Yale?

It isn't a matter of 'real' communism.

Stalin would have killed swathes of people if he was the head of the Rainbow Alliance, or the Standing-At-The-Back-Dressed-Stupidly-And-Acting-Stupid Party.

And that fact that you consider al Jazeera as anything more than a mouthpiece for terrorists and their apologists leads me to conclude that you must live on Bizarro World and have somehow ended up on this message board through a weird hole in space and time.

No, I just prefer to see news from all perspectives, rather than just the Cavuto 'Terror Alert' on Faux you seem to love, you say terrorist, I say freedom fighter.

It isn't a matter of 'real' communism.

Stalin would have killed swathes of people if he was the head of the Rainbow Alliance, or the Standing-At-The-Back-Dressed-Stupidly-And-Acting-Stupid Party.

Lenin and Stalin were implementing the logical end result of Communist theory. They were true believers in Communist ideology, and they had no problems with using whatever means were necessary to implement those goals.

The fact that you are too squeamish to support their actions doesn't mean that they weren't true Communists- it just means that you are not as devoted to that ideology as they were.

People acting in relationship to ideologies have, though. And as we all know, motive plays a role in prosecuting a crime. In this case, their motive was their ideology.


No - motive might be used as evidence... or it might be used to mitigate or enhance during sentencing.

If anything, you could say their 'ideology' lessens (or increases) the crime.


One might easily argue that these deaths were the results of the failed implementation of a certain ideology.


One might argue that. But, if one is talking about people like Pol Pot or Stalin, it would be a pretty ridiculous argument to make.


Oh, and don't forget, no true scotsman...

Irrelevent?

Fascism is not an economic model.

Fascism has its own form of economic model that is a mix of socialist and capitalist elements. It certainly uses economics as a tool to advance its own aims, just like Communism.

However, that's sort of irrelevant because the majority of deaths due to Communism had nothing to do with economics, they had to do with political terror. It was the political side that was responsible for all the killings (although collectivization killed a good number on its own).

Fascism is free from guilt in theory. It is only in application that it might acquire guilt.

The same with communism. Does that mean you would support a fascist society because it isn't guilty in theory? I don't think it's a good idea to risk a return to fascism because the theory itself isn't guilty of any crimes.

Fascism can be argued to merely mean 'unity'. Looking at basic tenets such as strong border policy, protectionism, and/or concerted efforts at promoting a militantly strong 'national identity', 'fascism' can be argued to include a lot of our western cultures.

That's because fascism lies in a middle ground economically between socialism and capitalism, and between democracy and totalitarianism in politics (since almost all successful fascist regimes are mass movements with the support of the people behind them). As a result, a lot of the things it supports are perverted versions of their more docile forms that exist in democratic capitalist societies of all forms. It's rather similar to the way Communism (big c) perverts the tenets of communist ideology and mass democracy.

Dictators who call themselves communist=communism?:confused:
In that case let me get to calculating the amount of deaths caused by capitalism, hold on I could be quite a while.

Sure, assuming that there were no Jews, Slavs, gypsies, homosexuals or communists living in such country, or any neighboring countries.

You sure you want to go down this road?

Knock yourself out. 'Nazism' doesn't have to equate to killing anyone. Even Jews, Gypsies, etc...

You'd be right, to an extent. It would be entirely possible to run a nation with a 'Nazi' government that did NOT have huge death tolls.

Considering that the Nazis wanted to homogenize the German people of the "true" pure race and so on how exactly would they have taken care of the unpure and the Jewish conspirators who is dragging Germany down without bloodshed? Besides, Naizism is basically Hitlerism isn't it? The two are basically the same as the system comes largely from his beliefs.

No, I just prefer to see news from all perspectives, rather than just the Cavuto 'Terror Alert' on Faux you seem to love, you say terrorist, I say freedom fighter.

Yawn. Nice try with the Fox News jab, but I haven't watched it in a couple of years.

"Freedom fighter?" Sure, when I think "freedom fighter" I think of guys who saw the heads off of bound civilians, stone women for the "crime" of adultery, and murder schoolchildren. What freedom are these gents fighting for, pray tell? The freedom to murder infidels?

Your support for such people shows you for what you really are- a dhimmi at heart.

Stalin would have killed swathes of people if he was the head of the Rainbow Alliance, or the Standing-At-The-Back-Dressed-Stupidly-And-Acting-Stupid Party.

Stalin would not have been able to come to power like he did without the Communist system. It was inherently open to the kind of manipulation and centralized control that allowed him to commit those crimes in the first place.

(And, of course, the regime itself resisted change. They booted Khrushchev out for daring to attempt another, more communist, path for the country from the centralized socialism that was its ultimate undoing.)

Dictators who call themselves communist=communism?:confused:
In that case let me get to calculating the amount of deaths caused by capitalism, hold on I could be quite a while.

The purest form of capitalism we have seen in the past century or so was Hong Kong before the Chinese takeover in 1997. As far as I know, Hong Kong didn't have any gulags or mass graves for dissidents, but I could be wrong.

The purest form of communism in the past century? Take your pick- the USSR, China, Cambodia, Vietnam, North Korea?

Still want to compare death tolls between the two systems ?

You'd be right, to an extent. It would be entirely possible to run a nation with a 'Nazi' government that did NOT have huge death tolls.

Well, in theory. Assuming everyone was six feet tall, blonde hair, blue-eyed Aryans. Even then, they'd probably find some reason to kill each other. Maybe they aren't German enough, or they are trying to weed out the lesser ones... an extreme example of imposed Darwinism. Thing is, we don't know what would happen, and thankfully we probably won't have to find out the hard way.

Fascism has its own form of economic model that is a mix of socialist and capitalist elements. It certainly uses economics as a tool to advance its own aims, just like Communism.


Fascism can have it's own form of economic model that is between poles, but it is - at heart - a political or social construct.


However, that's sort of irrelevant because the majority of deaths due to Communism had nothing to do with economics, they had to do with political terror. It was the political side that was responsible for all the killings


Political terror. It kills people no matter if it is wrapped in sickles-and-hammers or stars-and-stripes.


...(although collectivization killed a good number on its own).


This is, perhaps, the argument that should have been being made. Once again, I have to thank you for providing the reasoned response. Collectivism could much more easily be directly linked to application of 'communist' principles. Of course, people have starved under capitalistic models, also.


The same with communism. Does that mean you would support a fascist society because it isn't guilty in theory? I don't think it's a good idea to risk a return to fascism because the theory itself isn't guilty of any crimes.


I wasn't advocating adopting any theory... historically 'guilty' or no.

I will say, however, that I'm not sure it is so cut and dried...


That's because fascism lies in a middle ground economically between socialism and capitalism, and between democracy and totalitarianism in politics (since almost all successful fascist regimes are mass movements with the support of the people behind them). As a result, a lot of the things it supports are perverted versions of their more docile forms that exist in democratic capitalist societies of all forms. It's rather similar to the way Communism (big c) perverts the tenets of communist ideology and mass democracy.

Maybe, maybe not. Fascism can bounce around throughout a pretty big spectrum on both the political/social and economic axes, if taken as a central theory.

Castroism at forty: the dead-end of petty-bourgeois nationalism (http://www.wsws.org/articles/1999/jan1999/cuba-j20.shtml)

Not a few middle class intellectuals find comfort in Fidel's paternalistic role, guiding and controlling the masses, rewarding and punishing, carrying out his well-known personal interventions to "set right" this or that manifestation of the immense and intolerable deficiencies in Cuban society. Typical of this school is an essay published recently in an Argentine middle class radical newspaper, describing the Castro regime as "a brilliant and even glorious effort to maintain Latin American independence and dignity just 90 miles from the empire."

Hmm....

Considering that the Nazis wanted to homogenize the German people of the "true" pure race and so on how exactly would they have taken care of the unpure and the Jewish conspirators who is dragging Germany down without bloodshed? Besides, Naizism is basically Hitlerism isn't it? The two are basically the same as the system comes largely from his beliefs.

The root doesn't necessarily define the fruit.

It would be entirely possible to start a Nazi party in the US today, that actually killed no one, and that wouldn't even necessarily have to even ostracise any internal elements.

Dictators who call themselves communist=communism?:confused:.

I guess because Mussolini called himself a fascist, he's a fascist. D'oh. Try again.

Well, in theory. Assuming everyone was six feet tall, blonde hair, blue-eyed Aryans. Even then, they'd probably find some reason to kill each other. Maybe they aren't German enough, or they are trying to weed out the lesser ones... an extreme example of imposed Darwinism. Thing is, we don't know what would happen, and thankfully we probably won't have to find out the hard way.

1) Nazism isn't a 'German' thing. It could happen anywhere.

2) Killing each other for not being 'value x' enough isn't peculiar to Nazism.

3) I'm not talking about alternative pasts... I'm talking about what could happen, now.

The root doesn't necessarily define the fruit.

It would be entirely possible to start a Nazi party in the US today, that actually killed no one, and that wouldn't even necessarily have to even ostracise any internal elements.

Sure, its economic beliefs, the nationalism/militarism would be fine but a large part of the ideology is its belief that a certain group is superior to another. How it can treat the "subgroups" in any way that wouldn't eventually lead to killing is hard for me to believe. I also understand they don't care for their racial group to be seperate from the state so will demand unification with nations that they believe is part of their master race. Hardly a system that will avoid violence in the end.

1) Nazism isn't a 'German' thing. It could happen anywhere.

2) Killing each other for not being 'value x' enough isn't peculiar to Nazism.

3) I'm not talking about alternative pasts... I'm talking about what could happen, now.

1 - I'll give you that any day of the week. Aryan Nations, skinheads in Germany and Russia, the new ring busted in Israel, etc...

2 - A lot of ideologies do that, yes. But how many of them actually make extermination part of their platform? ("Any plan must include the complete extermination of the Jews..." for example).

3 - It wouldn't be the original Nazism, but it could certainly be a variant or a derviative (ex. Stalinism -> Maoism).

Lenin and Stalin were implementing the logical end result of Communist theory.


Lenin and Stalin were not in complete accord... thus, they can't have been applying 'the logical end result'... only 'an end result', and not necessarily the most logical. I notice you completely overlook Trotsky, also.

And, the simple fact that Stalin steered the situation in his own direction, suggests there was not the unity of vision you presuppose.


They were true believers in Communist ideology, and they had no problems with using whatever means were necessary to implement those goals.


Again, Lenin and Stalin can certainly be argued as having different approaches to execution. Specifically 'execution', in Stalin's case.


The fact that you are too squeamish to support their actions doesn't mean that they weren't true Communists- it just means that you are not as devoted to that ideology as they were.

Wow - you said a mouthful there. I'm not arguing whether or not they were 'true communists'. I'm arguing that they would have racked-up deathtolls with or without a red flag.

I'm also not claiming to be 'devoted to that ideology'... now am I?

Lastly... what makes you think I am "too squeamish to support their actions"?

Stalin would not have been able to come to power like he did without the Communist system. It was inherently open to the kind of manipulation and centralized control that allowed him to commit those crimes in the first place.

(And, of course, the regime itself resisted change. They booted Khrushchev out for daring to attempt another, more communist, path for the country from the centralized socialism that was its ultimate undoing.)

The Communist system... as it existed. The Communist Party was open to that kind of manipulation, especially once people started falling over with nasty cases of being-dead. Not all communist models would require the kind of centralisation that was seen in the USSR. A lot of what made Stalin able to cleave such a swathe of blood, is the fact that he was so instrumental in shaping a nascent 'state'.

Source: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=5609

I thought I would take this opportunity to start a discussion on the nature of ''democracy' and the different approaches to it worldwide, modern liberal democracy stresses competition and partisanism to be true democracy, but if you read Plato or Aristotle, who lived in the society that first invented democracy, they clearly state that democracy is not about competition but harmony and shared common lives within the polity, and it brings up a relevant point that many scholars make that liberal democracy creates a anti-consensus hostile 'two-camps' system rather than that of cooperation.

Here is another source on the Cuban democracy for reference: http://www.newhumanist.com/geiser.html

The first article fails to acknowledge the true American democracy: local politics, and the direct control of the people on a local level, which short of a totalitarian regime (aka Cuba) has more effect on the daily lives of the citizens.

I'm reading through it piecemeal, because it's late and I have class tomorrow, but the first article is a perfect example of selective information. He calls Castro the "President of Cuba's Council of Ministers" who cannot do much of what our president currently can; and yet the people seem powerless to prevent his continued rulership. What appears to be a democracy on paper fails in reality; this much has been demonstrated by observing Cuban politics and policies. Where is the freedom to leave the country at will? Where is the freedom to speak out against the government at home? Where is the practical exercise of political power at the hands of the governed? An assembly, elected at gunpoint, is hardly representative of the will of the people. I understand that many do in fact like Castro, and it is certainly the case that his most vocal opponents are those that are in the US. If the situation is such that the people want to avoid removing a permanent president in power, to be succeeded by his relative, then such a system should not be considered democratic. Toleration and genuine support should be differentiated here; the latter appears to be the case within Cuba and the former the political talking points of the Party.

Is Castro’s Cuba a socialist society? (http://www.socialistworker.org/2002-1/408/408_07_IsCubaSocialist.shtml)


Clearly, we don’t side with Bush and the other anti-Castro fanatics. But socialists don’t have to settle for Castro’s fake "socialism" either.

A socialist society is about giving workers a say over the priorities of society--not leaving them in the hands of state bureaucrats.


Unfortunately, the majority prefers to not see the fnords. As liberty frightens them, they prefer to waste their existence in pointless and silly "Socialist" vs. "Capitalist" internet debates while the bureaucrat clerics of the various socioeconomic religions carry on. Holy Fathers Bush and Castro carry the day.

Giving the "workers a say over the priorities of society" might be "socialism," but to see the fnords is liberty.

Unfortunately, the majority prefers to not see the fnords. As liberty frightens them, they prefer to waste their existence in pointless and silly “Socialist” vs. “Capitalist” internet debates while the bureaucrat clerics of the various socioeconomic religions carry on. Holy Fathers Bush and Castro carry the day.
Ahh, but polarised debate is so much easier than genuine, meaningful argument.

Rather than noting that there are many different interpretations of Marx’s writings, ranging from authoritarian dialectical materialism to autonomous libertarian Marxism and beyond, we can just shout, “Commie!!!” and start the witch hunt.

Rather than noting that there are many different interpretations of capitalism, ranging from market fundamentalism to centralised, socialistic capitalism and beyond, we can just shout, “Capitalist Pig!!” and line them up against the wall.

...or the Standing-At-The-Back-Dressed-Stupidly-And-Acting-Stupid Party.
Yaay for Blackadder reference!

Ten points to you, sir.

Source: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=5609

I thought I would take this opportunity to start a discussion on the nature of ''democracy' and the different approaches to it worldwide, modern liberal democracy stresses competition and partisanism to be true democracy, but if you read Plato or Aristotle, who lived in the society that first invented democracy, they clearly state that democracy is not about competition but harmony and shared common lives within the polity, and it brings up a relevant point that many scholars make that liberal democracy creates a anti-consensus hostile 'two-camps' system rather than that of cooperation.

Here is another source on the Cuban democracy for reference: http://www.newhumanist.com/geiser.html

I'd like to point out that the US is a Republic. :D

Saying it, and proving it... very different things.

Also - going back and reading your initial response... that isn't what you are saying. It might be what you were meaning, but NSG doesn't actually tally telepathic responses yet.

It was eleven o'clock at night, and I had been up at six that morning, and was up at six this morning.



Then present the sources, and prove the 'lies' to be lies.

Otherwise, it's an opinion piece, and should be treated as such.

Because it's a fucking internet forum, not the floor of the Senate, so quite your nagging. You picked my posts because my opinion is the one most directly contrary to your own opinion, as well as the most well researched rebuttal presented. You're trying to invalidate my points not by confronting my points, but by nagging me on my methods. Quit it, it's like Grammar Nazism, irritating to the max.



Which is all completely irrelevent. I don't care how much you 'know'... only what is present in the debate.

This is a debate, not a pissing contest. If you have ability and material to disprove the claims made, do so. It really is a put-up-or-shut-up situation.

Except for the fact that "debating" with Andaras Prime isn't what you call debating. He ignores facts, glosses over information that disagrees with him and shows an utter disdain for rational thought when confronted by evidence. I've seen it time and time again. Why would I waste my time trying to convince someone who cannot be convinced?


The great thing about free speech is - it protects your right to be as wrong as you like.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_speech_zone1

Maybe it's because of lessons learned. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WTO_Ministerial_Conference_of_1999_protest_activity)

Rather than noting that there are many different interpretations of Marx’s writings, ranging from authoritarian dialectical materialism to autonomous libertarian Marxism and beyond, we can just shout, “Commie!!!” and start the witch hunt.

Rather than noting that there are many different interpretations of capitalism, ranging from market fundamentalism to centralised, socialistic capitalism and beyond, we can just shout, “Capitalist Pig!!” and line them up against the wall.


Once the fnords are seen, it becomes readily apparent that "socialism" and "capitalism" are extremely similar. Especially at the two ends of the Social Libertarian/Authoritarian axis. Which is why the political compass is more appropriately a tall oval, rather than a square.

In my country for important changes (like modifications to the constitution), you need an exceptional majority and that’s 75% of the votes.

So yes, in theory 75% could decide to kill-out 25%



A true democracy, where the whims of the majority rule, is a system few would truly want to live under.

You are essentially arguing a straw man- there are few, if any, people in the democratic world who actually support the institution of democratic government, where 51% of the population can decide to have the other 49% shot.

Rather, when we talk about modern Western democracies, we are really talking about a representative form of government where the actions of the majority and the government are constrained by a constitution (in the American model) or hundreds of years of tradition and laws (in the case of the British system).

The genius of the system created by the American Founding Fathers is that it acknowledged that too much power in the hands of the majority and the government is a dangerous thing- for a "democratic" system to work in the long-term, there have to be serious limits placed on the tyranny of the majority.

Any claims of Cuban democracy is a farce. The government has unlimited power, and the rights of the citizenry, especially the rights of dissidents, exist only to the extent permitted by the government.

It is mystifying that articulate, intelligent and educated people in the West are unable to see through the tired Communist rhetoric and see Cuban for what it truly is- a repressive, one-party dictatorship with an appalling human rights record. The only reason Western liberals give it a pass, in my opinion, is because the Castro government still mouths anti-American platitudes (while holding Western liberals in utter contempt- "useful idiots," indeed).

Yaay for Blackadder reference!

Ten points to you, sir.

I wondered if anyone would get it. Kudos. :)

More conservative twaddle and lies.

Care to back that up with some evidence?

answer my question from before. Why should I waste my time reading someone who makes such a serious factual error as refering to a legal american embargo as an illegal blockade considering they are extremely different things.

Expecting an answer from AP is impossible.

Lol, Miami, sorry I don't want to engage in debate with that den of drugs, criminals, terrorists and other undesirables.

I am sure some are druglords and criminals. However, most of them just want to overthrow the corrupt dictatorship of Cuba and bring about real change and freedom to their own people.

As Castro said, 'They did not embrace the spirit of the Revolution, we do not want them, we do not need them'.

And we all know that Castro speaks truth :rolleyes:

Yes it's true no one is rich in Cuba, but it it that way for a reason, the system was built around the fact that money, wealth and luxury corrupts politics, it's easy to rally for 'democracy' when your getting US state department money. Cuba has a devolved socialist system which works for them, why people left the country 50 years ago? Well Revolutions are usually quite bloody, whether it be the America, French or whatever Revolution, they usually aren't pleasant, but to judge Cuban socialism by the amount of blood spilled to institute itself is ludicrous, compare deaths and people fleeing in the American revolution please. Anyways I don't want to go on too much, I think the articles I posted accurately describe the Cuban socialist system. The political system is not based around greedy economy incentive, it is based around selfless community based support and patriotism.

You have a problem in that people are still fleeing the Cuban Dictatorship. You also have a problem in that the Castro regime is very corrupt. The only people getting rich are high government officials.

I guess because Mussolini called himself a fascist, he's a fascist. D'oh. Try again.


Benito Mussolini was first a socialist, he was a member of the Partito Socialista Italiano.
In those times that party had an extreme Marxist wing.

He was anti-militaristic in his younger years.

The racism was introduced rather late, at the end of the 30ties.

Btw, he was almost at war with a the young Nazi Germany.

The Germans killed the Austrian Bundeskanzler Engelbert Dollfuss in an assault. Engelbert was a personal friend of Mussolini and in a reaction, Italy mobilized the army.
Germany, not able to fight, drew back.

While Mussolini was the leader of the fascist party, historians are still fighting to decide if he was a fascist for real or just by opportunism.

It was eleven o'clock at night, and I had been up at six that morning, and was up at six this morning.


And? I'd been up since 7 that moring, was up till 4am last night (after the driver went off the road just opposite), and was up again at 07:30 this morning, to see if the firecrews needed any help. (Our firefighters are volunteers, round here).

None of that is an excuse for faulty debate practise.


Because it's a fucking internet forum, not the floor of the Senate, so quite your nagging. You picked my posts because my opinion is the one most directly contrary to your own opinion, as well as the most well researched rebuttal presented. You're trying to invalidate my points not by confronting my points, but by nagging me on my methods. Quit it, it's like Grammar Nazism, irritating to the max.


You get annoyed by people pointing out when your 'debate' is flawed? You might want to consider a site that isn't a debate forum.

I'm not trying to "invalidate [my] points not by confronting [my] points, but by nagging [me] on [my] methods", much as you might like that idea. You points are not valid. They are unsupported or simply bad. If you want to present mere opinion, you should expect it to be treated as such.

Comparing someone pointing out that you have failed completely to really debate... to 'grammar nazism' is laughable. Grammar and spelling are important to presentation, but hardly central or essential to a case for debate. On the other hand, avoiding blatant logical fallacies is prety basic.

Also - I'm wondering what you mean by: "my opinion is the one most directly contrary to your own opinion"? Which opinion do you think that is?

Last thing - "the most well researched rebuttal presented" is a matter of conjecture. Sure, you seem very convinced by your own brilliance, but you presented nothing.


Except for the fact that "debating" with Andaras Prime isn't what you call debating. He ignores facts, glosses over information that disagrees with him and shows an utter disdain for rational thought when confronted by evidence. I've seen it time and time again. Why would I waste my time trying to convince someone who cannot be convinced?


So - your own argument can be worthless, because you think that of your opponent is?


Maybe it's because of lessons learned. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WTO_Ministerial_Conference_of_1999_protest_activity)

And? We can remove or abridge 'rights' based on whether or not we like how they have been historically used. Not sure that is a precedent I like the idea of having applied.

Wow - you said a mouthful there. I'm not arguing whether or not they were 'true communists'. I'm arguing that they would have racked-up deathtolls with or without a red flag.

We can talk about alternative history if we want, but the fact of the matter is that Stalin, Lenin, Mao and their ilk were all Communists. They didn't come to power as Western liberal democratic capitalists. It's very telling that Communism was the most attractive ideology for guys like that.


Lastly... what makes you think I am "too squeamish to support their actions"?

I kind of assumed you were a decent human being.

We can talk about alternative history if we want, but the fact of the matter is that Stalin, Lenin, Mao and their ilk were all Communists.


It's nothing to do with alternative history. There is nothing to show that all those leaders were barbaric because communism was causative.

Indeed, were they really communists, or was communism a mask?

They didn't come to power as Western liberal democratic capitalists. It's very telling that Communism was the most attractive ideology for guys like that.


You mean, in the wake of a swing towards communist revolution, some people who wanted to be swept to popular acceptance chose to be identified with communist movements?

We don't know that communism necessarily WAS 'the most attractive' ideology for 'guys like that'. It is just as likely it was just most convenient.

And, of course, what IS very telling, is that you ignore any coup or revolt that happened before the red revolution, or that didin't involve a 'communist' movement seizing power.


I kind of assumed you were a decent human being.

How does that connect?

I dont agree with the way Fidel handles the boat loads of Americans flocking to his wonderful democratic utopia...

That the US is not a democracy is an outrageous suggestion. I read the article you linked to. It twists reality in the US, while constructing blatant lies about Cuba*.

True, capitalism in the US has resulted in mass media conglomerates. However, these conglomerates can and do attack the US government. And the article writer completely ignores writers - both of books and of blogs - many of whom think Bush is worse than Hitler. In fact, he ignores himself.

In fact, the US has some of the strongest protections on free speech in the world. Many European countries prohibit hate speech or speech that is likely to incite violence. The US? We can arrest you if your speech actually leads to violence, but only after the violence has occured.

I could walk up to the White House fence, and start blathering about how Bush intends to use his emergency powers to become a dictator, and the most the Secret Service could do is say "Shut up!". In Cuba? I'd be in jail very quickly.

No democracy can function without an opposition. Cuba has no legal opposition. It is therefore not a functioning democracy.

And regarding Communism/Socialism & massacres. I can name two Socialist leaders who did NOT routinely send dissidents to prison. One was Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Premier of the USSR. The other was David Ben-Gurion, the first Prime Minister of Israel.

* - except for the stuff about healthcare. I will give Cuba credit for their healthcare system, and for sending doctors abroad. They also get kudos for sending troops to oppose apartheid.

It's nothing to do with alternative history. There is nothing to show that all those leaders were barbaric because communism was causative.

I can look at the evidence of the 20th Century. There are a couple of exceptions, most notably Hitler and Turkish genocide of the Armenians, but the worst death tolls were caused by Communist leaders. It's tough to get away from the sequence of events which went: 1) Communist party overthrows existing government, 2) Communist party massacres people by the train car load.

Whatever the positive aspects of Communist ideology, whenever it has been implemented as the ruling ideology of a nation, the end result has been human misery on a large scale. The argument of whether this is because Communism is causative, or because Communism is attractive to murderous individuals is kind of irrelevant in this context.

And, of course, what IS very telling, is that you ignore any coup or revolt that happened before the red revolution, or that didin't involve a 'communist' movement seizing power.

Human history is full of brutality, of course. But I can't think of any other ideology (other than Nazism) where, without fail, it's taking power in a country has led to murder on a massive scale


How does that connect?

I assumed we were both on the same page that wholesale murder is kind of a bad thing. Anyone who does not agree with this, and who supports the actions of guys like Stalin and Mao, is not a decent human being.

I hat these Cuba versus the USA threads, or their retarded ugly sisters: the Venezuela versus USA threads.

The USA has had a long history of democratic governance stemming from local communities.

Cuba has had a long history of imperial governance stemming from colonial rule.

The United States is a developed nation with a strong economy.

Cuba is a developing nation with an economic system that is antithetical to the current global system.

The USA is a large land with many resources and the infrastructure required to use these resources.

Cuba is a small island with limited infrastructure.

I could go on and on with comparisons that show how foolish it is to compare the two countries. Expecting democracy to flourish in Cuba in a manner that is remotely comparable to the USA is absurd. Even the concept of democracy is different in the two countries.

Why does no one do a thread about Cuba versus Haiti?

I hat these Cuba versus the USA threads, or their retarded ugly sisters: the Venezuela versus USA threads.

The USA has had a long history of democratic governance stemming from local communities.

Cuba has had a long history of imperial governance stemming from colonial rule.

The United States is a developed nation with a strong economy.

Cuba is a developing nation with an economic system that is antithetical to the current global system.

The USA is a large land with many resources and the infrastructure required to use these resources.

Cuba is a small island with limited infrastructure.

I could go on and on with comparisons that show how foolish it is to compare the two countries. Expecting democracy to flourish in Cuba in a manner that is remotely comparable to the USA is absurd. Even the concept of democracy is different in the two countries.

Why does no one do a thread about Cuba versus Haiti?

Small minds rarely comprehend the intricacies of proportional (logical) comparison.

Not that I agree on many things with either Plato or Aristotle, but if you do read their works you’ll find they both regard democracy as a dangerous and terrible system of governance.

Indeed, Aristotle viewed democracy as a perversion of constitutional government.

Plato, most certainly. He's the one who gave us Res Publica and the Philsopher King.

Aristotle is a little more ambiguous. He favored restrictions on the decision making power of the majority, but off set such with the equivalent of a welfare state.

He classified governments according to whose interest they were run. Governments run in self-interest were described with the Greek root Kratos, which means power, strength or even violence. He didn't like these government forms at all, and autocracy, aristocracy and democracy were to be avoided.

Positive governments were described with the root archos which means rule. These governments ruled in the interests of the whole (a contradiction, I know). Thus we have monarchy, oligarchy and curiously polity, as the positive foil to democracy.

Lol at communism ftl....


Post +1!

Meh, I might as well just respond like that. No one's ever going to read this.
Certainly more productive than trying to explain why Athenian Democracy isn't a great model in the first place.

If that was conservative twaddle and lies that you refuse to see the sense in, then I condemn this as more communist propaganda.

After all, Communism has only killed 100 million people. Let's give it another chance!

Don't ge me wrong (I'm not a communist) but have you ever thought about how many people were killed through capitalism/indirect-democracy? How many thousands Africans die every day? How many Asians die every day? How many hundreds of South Amercans die every day? How many Europeans die every day How many North Americans die every day?

In total it'll be well over 100 million, but you probably close your eyes and shut your mind when you here or see those things.

Khaban;13043524']Don't ge me wrong (I'm not a communist) but have you ever thought about how many people were killed through capitalism/indirect-democracy? How many thousands Africans die every day? How many Asians die every day? How many hundreds of South Amercans die every day? How many Europeans die every day How many North Americans die every day?

Lots of all of these people die every day, but how do you tie such deaths to capitalism?

Given the choice....

I would much rather live in the Authoritarian, Corrupt country of the U.S. than in the Democratic, Uncorrupted country of Cuba, but that is just me.

Lots of all of these people die every day, but how do you tie such deaths to capitalism?

I don't know, maybe POVERTY. And maybe, just maybe it came because some capitalist multinationals like money more than human lives, so they just let people die and/or live in poverty so that they can keep their huge profits to themselves.

*the OP*
I'll be honest. That's maybe the most retarded thing I've ever read.

I would much rather live in the Authoritarian, Corrupt country of the U.S. than in the Democratic, Uncorrupted country of Cuba, but that is just me.

Has anybody ever voluntarily immigrated to Cuba post-Revolution? I mean, hell, East Germany had nearly 400,000 people immigrate (and around 1 million leave) before the wall was built. I don't think anybody migrated to Cuba at any time in its history.

Of course, given the choice, I'd choose Stasiland any day.

Has anybody ever voluntarily immigrated to Cuba post-Revolution? I mean, hell, East Germany had nearly 400,000 people immigrate (and around 1 million leave) before the wall was built. I don't think anybody migrated to Cuba at any time in its history.

Of course, given the choice, I'd choose Stasiland any day.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_citizens_granted_political_asylum_in_Cuba

If the U.S. did not make it illegal to visit Cuba, more people would visit and stay there as well.
For African descendants and Native Americans (sic), the U.S. has not been the heaven on earth promised in the brochures...

* - except for the stuff about healthcare. I will give Cuba credit for their healthcare system, and for sending doctors abroad. They also get kudos for sending troops to oppose apartheid.

You mean the same soldiers that were sent to Angola to support the so-called "revolution"?

I mean, hell, East Germany had nearly 400,000 people immigrate (and around 1 million leave) before the wall was built.
It was more like 2 and a half million leaving, according to official figures, which was a bit of a shame, to be fair.

I can look at the evidence of the 20th Century. There are a couple of exceptions, most notably Hitler and Turkish genocide of the Armenians, but the worst death tolls were caused by Communist leaders.


'Communism' is the revolution du jour. It really doesn't take much research to find out that there has been quite a history of violence, and that certain banners are held highest during certain periods. For centuries, mass butchery wrapped itself in robes of the Church. It is debatable whether or not Crusading is true to 'the spirit of Christianity'.


As another thought - death tolls are a problem anyway. The information can be so unreliable, when it is even available.

How many people (have) died under Castro - as a direct result? You can find estimates as low as a couple of thousand, and as high as maybe a hundred thousand. It depends on how reliable you consider the source material, and how much evidence you require to consider a death connected to the regime.

How many people died under Duvalier? Again - figures run from a couple of thousand, to maore than half a hundred thousand.

How many died in the Spanish Civil War? Figures vary to such an extent that some historians have claimed hundreds of thousands, with the 'Right Wing' inflicting ten times as many casualties as the 'Left'.... others have suggested somewhere in the 150,000 range, with the division of guilt about equal... some have argued a little over a hundred thousand, with the 'Left Wing' having killed about twice as many as the 'Right'.

How many people died in World War One? The Congo Crisis? Both are examples where we really have no clue. We think it was probably a lot... but any figures will be total guesswork. The Ottoman Empire was basically utterly destroyed... how do you even set about trying to record fatalities? We have 'guess work' to rely on, little more. And this is still just discussing deathtolls for the last hundred years, give or take.

Even if we look at just one set of death tolls, numbers differ. How many people died 'under Communism' after the Russian revolution?

Before Stalin, 'communism' is often blamed for as many as 10 million deaths. Closer examination shows that some sources place the largest single burden for this on a series of bad harvests, with the Volga Famine responsible for as much as half. The lion's share of the rest seem to be casualties in war. (And - yes, you could try to blame the revolution for the famine.. except that the same basic thing also happened in the early 1930's, and had happened in the early 1890's. It's a cyclical phenomenon).

How many died, 'under' Stalin? I've seen figures as high as 60-something million... and I've seen numbers lower than 10 million. I've even seen sources that cite figures as low as maybe 3 million. I've seen other sources that blame more deaths than that on just hunger, or just labour camps.

How do you reconcile the figures?

To be honest - the highest figures are probably gross over-exaggerations. If Stalin really had killed of (what would have amounted to basically) one in every three people, it seems unlikely the other great butcher (by which I mean Hitler) of the time would have been so hard pressed to crush Russia.

Similarly, the sources I've seen that claim deathtolls in the hundreds-of-thousands, and all of those counter-revolutionaries, seem similarly unlikely. But - to be honest... how CAN you really tell? Is it not at least POSSIBLE that less than a million died, and that they were basically 'terrorists'?


Deathtolls are always a problem. Short of bodycounts, there are just no reliable statistics.

It's tough to get away from the sequence of events which went: 1) Communist party overthrows existing government, 2) Communist party massacres people by the train car load.

Whatever the positive aspects of Communist ideology, whenever it has been implemented as the ruling ideology of a nation, the end result has been human misery on a large scale.


I don't think this is true. There are even peaceful communist groups in the US... Christian Communists, no less.

You are confusing violent revolution with implementation of the ideology.

The argument of whether this is because Communism is causative, or because Communism is attractive to murderous individuals is kind of irrelevant in this context.


It is irrelevent, anyway. People are murderous with or without communism... to try to suggest it's an either/or situation where either a) communists become killers or b) killers become communists... is just ludicrous.

Finding one non-communist killer, or one non-killer communist, would (at the very least) call the assumption into question.


Human history is full of brutality, of course. But I can't think of any other ideology (other than Nazism) where, without fail, it's taking power in a country has led to murder on a massive scale


"I can't think of..." is probably the most important qualifier, there.

(I can't help thinking of the relatively few deaths under Colonial rule, counterpointed by the (maybe) 100,000 deaths caused by the 'American Revolution'.)

What about the 'Congo Free State'? As many as 21 million deaths. The ideologies involved... annexation by a monarchy... capitalistic interest in resources... a claimed interest in 'humanitarian objectives' by Leopold.

What about the Armenian Massacre? As many as a million and a half Armenians dead in the wake of the Young Turk revolution. The 'ideology'? Hard to say - but the revolution made the Ottomon Empire a 'consitutional monarchy', with an elected parliament.

Just because you don't know much about it... doesn't mean it didn't happen.


I assumed we were both on the same page that wholesale murder is kind of a bad thing. Anyone who does not agree with this, and who supports the actions of guys like Stalin and Mao, is not a decent human being.

Like the old saying goes: "You can't make an omelette without brutally butchering a few million people".

Lots of all of these people die every day, but how do you tie such deaths to capitalism?

That's funny. Anyone that dies in a 'communist' state you seem willing to blame on 'communism'... but don't hold to the same standards when any other economic model is considered.

They also get kudos for sending troops to oppose apartheid.

What about the ones who helped the MPLA try and take over Angola at the end of the colonial times when they basically just held the capital city and the main airport, and thus prolonging the angolan civil war from about 6-9 months to 20 yrs.......

How many docs and health workers has Cuba sent to Angola to help with the victims of land mines, many of which were supplied by Cuba....

In furtherance to another comment about Cuba getting rid of the opponents of the revolution, how comes nearly 50 years after the revolution, the opponents are still floating across to the US on rafts.

Lastly, the US embargo DOES NOT prevent Cuba from trading with the the other 198 countries on the planet

Lastly, the US embargo DOES NOT prevent Cuba from trading with the the other 198 countries on the planet
They damned well close to.

Khaban;13043577']I don't know, maybe POVERTY. And maybe, just maybe it came because some capitalist multinationals like money more than human lives, so they just let people die and/or live in poverty so that they can keep their huge profits to themselves.

Capitalism created poverty? Since the spread of capitalism and the industrial revolution in the 19th century, we've seen living standards, quality of life and life expectancy increase pretty much everywhere in the world.

Are you really going to try and make the argument that life has gotten worse for the average human being since the spread of capitalism?

Yes, corporations aren't perfect. But despite all their faults, they tend not to kill people intentionally. Killing your customers isn't a great business model.

Governments, on the other hand, especially communist government, seems to be good at only one thing- increasing human misery.

I am so sick of people treating Plato and Aristotle as infallible!

That's funny. Anyone that dies in a 'communist' state you seem willing to blame on 'communism'... but don't hold to the same standards when any other economic model is considered.

I still haven't seen anyone actually propose a capitalist death count. Unless you maybe want to count people who die in car accidents as "victims" of capitalist corporations.

And, no, I don't want to blame the death of anyone who dies in a Communist state on Communism. Most deaths in the Soviet Union probably came about from natural, everyday causes.

But there were tens of millions who were directly murdered by the Communist state as part of the implementation of Communist ideology and the crushing of any dissent thereto. There is simply no corresponding capitalist death toll.

Capitalism created poverty? Since the spread of capitalism and the industrial revolution in the 19th century, we've seen living standards, quality of life and life expectancy increase pretty much everywhere in the world.

At the expense of the now-poor. A lot of the US and Europe's capitalism is at the expense of millions, and potentially billions today, of Africans and Native Americans. When one rises, another falls.

At the expense of the now-poor. A lot of the US and Europe's capitalism is at the expense of millions, and potentially billions today, of Africans and Native Americans. When one rises, another falls.

Not at the expense, they just use the poverty which was already there to their advantage. In doing so, they actually make them at least less poor then before.

Not at the expense, they just use the poverty which was already there to their advantage. In doing so, they actually make them at least less poor then before.

Uh...no. The villages and kingdoms of Africa were much better off than they are now and just after colonialism. They had plenty of wealth for the time period, as well as food. Now, you're lucky to have either. You sound like a Social Darwinist: I expect better from a known NSGer.

Given the choice....

I would much rather live in the Democratic, Uncorrupted country of Cuba than in the Authoritarian, Corrupt country of the U.S., but that is just me.

fixed

Uh...no. The villages and kingdoms of Africa were much better off than they are now and just after colonialism. They had plenty of wealth for the time period, as well as food. Now, you're lucky to have either. You sound like a Social Darwinist: I expect better from a known NSGer.


I wasn't aware that colonialism was the same as capitalism. Oh wait it isn't, whether the empires had capitalist, socialist or mixed economies, I doubt any of this would have really changed the effects of colonialism.

Uh...no. The villages and kingdoms of Africa were much better off than they are now and just after colonialism. They had plenty of wealth for the time period, as well as food. Now, you're lucky to have either. You sound like a Social Darwinist: I expect better from a known NSGer.

Uh...yes. Colonialism is not the same as capitalism. It is sort of funny too, even as the socialists get angry at capitalists for lumping them in with the soviet union, they still scream that nationalist colonialism is the same as laissez-faire capitalism.

I wasn't aware that colonialism was the same as capitalism. Oh wait it isn't, whether the empires had capitalist, socialist or mixed economies, I doubt any of this would have really changed the effects of colonialism.

Colonialism is because of the Industrial Revolution, which is capitalism.

Colonialism is because of the Industrial Revolution, which is capitalism.

No, colonialism existed before the Industrial Revolution, just think about the Americas.

No, colonialism existed before the Industrial Revolution, just think about the Americas.

That was a different colonization that was still related to proto-capitalism.

Uh...no. The villages and kingdoms of Africa were much better off than they are now and just after colonialism. They had plenty of wealth for the time period, as well as food. Now, you're lucky to have either. You sound like a Social Darwinist: I expect better from a known NSGer.


I'm a Social Darwinist, I suppose. It all boils down to this: I don't care. It's emotional and those people deserve sympathy, but I'm not going to make excuses for another's abject disposition. If you want hard facts, the poorest African nations are at least on par with the average European serf in the Middle Ages. And what happened? Initiative. Drive. The system was changed from the inside out. Complaining about the horrors of capitalism is more a story of success for those who had the fortune or ability to rise with it.

You say they were better off before colonialism. I challenge that assumption. What wealth did conquered tribes possess? What food that was not gathered or hunted, and of that very little, especially by today's standards. It is assumed that, in response to the mercantilist and, now, capitalist policies, the white man must display a proportional amount of guilt for having destroyed the Eden-like conditions of pre-colonial Africa. Strife, famine, disease, death--none of this is new. What medicine did tribes possess? What opportunities were available for those with the desire to become something other than another tribal member? None. Colonialism opened Africa up to the world, and while there are definitely problems, there is definite hope.

Uh...no. The villages and kingdoms of Africa were much better off than they are now and just after colonialism. They had plenty of wealth for the time period, as well as food. Now, you're lucky to have either. You sound like a Social Darwinist: I expect better from a known NSGer.

If anything, the colonial powers practiced mercantilism and colonialism rather than capitalism. Even with that being said, Western colonialism was generally a boon to the average African. "White Man's Burden" was certainly patronizing and racist, but it did have the positive result, especially in British colonial areas, of bringing in some degree of rule of law, justice, medicine, stability, education, peace and prosperity.

After colonialism many (most?) of Africa's newly independent nations adopted disastrous Communist, Maoist and god-knows what else other stupid economic systems. You can't blame their failure and subsequent chaos on Western-style capitalism since, frankly, few if any, of Africa's governments actually adopted capitalism post-independence.

On the other hand, the greatest post-colonial success stories are places like South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore and Hong Kong, all nations that adopted capitalist economic systems.

If anything, the colonial powers practiced mercantilism and colonialism rather than capitalism.

"It wasn't real capitalism...."

;)

And? I'd been up since 7 that moring, was up till 4am last night (after the driver went off the road just opposite), and was up again at 07:30 this morning, to see if the firecrews needed any help. (Our firefighters are volunteers, round here).

None of that is an excuse for faulty debate practise.

Except perfect d


You get annoyed by people pointing out when your 'debate' is flawed? You might want to consider a site that isn't a debate forum.
Except for the fact that this isn't a debate forum, this is a General forum. There is no dictate to the proper forms of debate, there is no dictate that we back up our points to the level that would be required in, say, an academic paper. It's a leisuretime activity.

I'm not trying to "invalidate [my] points not by confronting [my] points, but by nagging [me] on [my] methods", much as you might like that idea. You points are not valid. They are unsupported or simply bad. If you want to present mere opinion, you should expect it to be treated as such.

Comparing someone pointing out that you have failed completely to really debate... to 'grammar nazism' is laughable. Grammar and spelling are important to presentation, but hardly central or essential to a case for debate. On the other hand, avoiding blatant logical fallacies is prety basic.

Then why don't you try to bring sources on the matter yourself? Or perhaps encourage Andaras Prime to confront my points. Instead you are simply saying "You should have more sources." There's hardly room for that in this discussion.

Also - I'm wondering what you mean by: "my opinion is the one most directly contrary to your own opinion"? Which opinion do you think that is?
Operating from assumptions formed from your past opinions on Latin American leftists, your point of view is already known.

Last thing - "the most well researched rebuttal presented" is a matter of conjecture. Sure, you seem very convinced by your own brilliance, but you presented nothing.
I presented substantially more, from more varied and diverse sources than anyone else in this thread, including the OP. Yet you have chosen to single my response out, why?



So - your own argument can be worthless, because you think that of your opponent is?
No, because trying to convince AP to change his opinion is not worthwhile, because he does not change his opinions.



And? We can remove or abridge 'rights' based on whether or not we like how they have been historically used. Not sure that is a precedent I like the idea of having applied.

The state has a duty to protect peoples rights, those include both rights to property and rights of expression. In this case the right of expression is not seriously impeded if limited steps are taken to protect other individuals property from potential criminal behavior.

Colonialism is because of the Industrial Revolution, which is capitalism.

The bulk of the large colonial empires were in place well before the Industrial Revolution or capitalist. The Americas were colonized starting in the 15th century, and basically all of the nations in North and South America were independent by the first decade or so of the 19th century, before the Industrial Revolution was out of its infancy.

India became a British possession mostly in the 18th Century. Russian colonialism in Siberia happened well before that country industrialized.

The only area that was colonized during the industrial revolution was Africa, but that had to do more with technological reasons.

"It wasn't real capitalism...."

;)

It's more along the line of lumping the Czarist system with Communism. Different systems based on different ideas. I certainly don't blame Lenin and Stalin for the Romanov dynasty's incompetence and mismanagement of Russia.

Capitalism created poverty? Since the spread of capitalism and the industrial revolution in the 19th century, we've seen living standards, quality of life and life expectancy increase pretty much everywhere in the world.


Surely the big difference would be the 'industrial revolution' part, there? After all - that was the point at which the migration from largely agricultural to largely metropolitan existence began.


Yes, corporations aren't perfect. But despite all their faults, they tend not to kill people intentionally. Killing your customers isn't a great business model.


Customers aren't actually the only people that exist.


Governments, on the other hand, especially communist government, seems to be good at only one thing- increasing human misery.

Especially communism?

Surely the big difference would be the 'industrial revolution' part, there? After all - that was the point at which the migration from largely agricultural to largely metropolitan existence began.

Capitalism and the industrial revolution mostly go hand in hand. The combination of the two in the 19th century led to a dramatic increase of standards of living worldwide.

Especially communism?

The butcher's bill from the last century supports my argument, yes.

Surely the big difference would be the 'industrial revolution' part, there? After all - that was the point at which the migration from largely agricultural to largely metropolitan existence began.

The industrial revolution would not have happened without the increasing power of merchants and capitalists in the cities and their ability to promise a higher quality of life than what one would expect in the countryside. This allowed them to seize power from the existing aristocrats in the countryside. The industrial revolution is closely linked to the development of capitalism.

Capitalists spawned the industrial revolution, and the industrial revolution gave birth to more capitalists.

The bulk of the large colonial empires were in place well before the Industrial Revolution or capitalist. The Americas were colonized starting in the 15th century, and basically all of the nations in North and South America were independent by the first decade or so of the 19th century, before the Industrial Revolution was out of its infancy.

India became a British possession mostly in the 18th Century. Russian colonialism in Siberia happened well before that country industrialized.

The only area that was colonized during the industrial revolution was Africa, but that had to do more with technological reasons.

Whilst I don't necessarily disagree with the majority of your post, you might want to reconsider the point about India considering that it was technically owned by the East India Company before being formally drafted into the British Empire, which was owned and operated for profit. A capitalist venture, no?

I still haven't seen anyone actually propose a capitalist death count. Unless you maybe want to count people who die in car accidents as "victims" of capitalist corporations.


Your inattention is no one's fault but your own.

I presented more than one 'deathtoll' for regimes that were 'capitalist'.


And, no, I don't want to blame the death of anyone who dies in a Communist state on Communism. Most deaths in the Soviet Union probably came about from natural, everyday causes.


Again, this is actually referring to an argument I have already made.


But there were tens of millions who were directly murdered by the Communist state as part of the implementation of Communist ideology and the crushing of any dissent thereto. There is simply no corresponding capitalist death toll.

Again - a simple mater of inattention, coupled with unsupported assumption.

If anything, the colonial powers practiced mercantilism and colonialism rather than capitalism. Even with that being said, Western colonialism was generally a boon to the average African. "White Man's Burden" was certainly patronizing and racist, but it did have the positive result, especially in British colonial areas, of bringing in some degree of rule of law, justice, medicine, stability, education, peace and prosperity.

After colonialism many (most?) of Africa's newly independent nations adopted disastrous Communist, Maoist and god-knows what else other stupid economic systems. You can't blame their failure and subsequent chaos on Western-style capitalism since, frankly, few if any, of Africa's governments actually adopted capitalism post-independence.

On the other hand, the greatest post-colonial success stories are places like South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore and Hong Kong, all nations that adopted capitalist economic systems.
It brought all that good stuff for the minority European colonists, not the locals, who were oppressed greatly.

Those are Asian...what do you expect? Also, the colonialism was at a much lesser extent than in Africa. They became powerhouses after World War II when Japan had its power reduced. Africa was not freed until 1960s for the most part. Some into the 80s.

The industrial revolution would not have happened without the increasing power of merchants and capitalists in the cities and their ability to promise a higher quality of life than what one would expect in the countryside. This allowed them to seize power from the existing aristocrats in the countryside. The industrial revolution is closely linked to the development of capitalism.

Capitalists spawned the industrial revolution, and the industrial revolution gave birth to more capitalists.

What on earth do you think you are responding to?

I'm keenly aware that 'capitalism' is no recent phenomenon - indeed, that was a central assumption behind my response.

What I was addressing was the simple fact that it was not 'capitalism' that caused the big swing, but industrialisation.

Your inattention is no one's fault but your own.

I presented more than one 'deathtoll' for regimes that were 'capitalist'.

To claim that there is a capitalist or communist "death toll" is ridiculous. For some reason, it is popular to blame ideologies on actions of people, disregarding the fact that people of completely different beliefs do the exact same thing. The incentive behind beating strikers or abusing natives is the same one behind purging the Party, and it's neither capitalism nor communism.

Capitalism and the industrial revolution mostly go hand in hand. The combination of the two in the 19th century led to a dramatic increase of standards of living worldwide.


I'd say 'capitalism' predates industiralisation by quite some time, in some form.

The 'dramatic increase of standards' could have happened with or without capitalism... but was reliant on industrialisation.


The butcher's bill from the last century supports my argument, yes.

Strangely, almost all of the deaths in Soviet Russia, between 1918 and 1938 can be linked to pre-war Communism (or parties claiming communist ideology, or persons claiming to be acting on the behest of parties claiming communist ideology).

The point is - if you are going to finesse your argument until it becomes true, it is of little worth to begin with.

The majority of deaths in the past century could be better laid at the feet of industrialised militaries and corrupt governments, than at any particular economic model. Machine guns are just SO much more efficient than slingshots.

To claim that there is a capitalist or communist "death toll" is ridiculous. For some reason, it is popular to blame ideologies on actions of people, disregarding the fact that people of completely different beliefs do the exact same thing. The incentive behind beating strikers or abusing natives is the same one behind purging the Party, and it's neither capitalism nor communism.

I agree.

This is actually a point I've been making.

Except perfect d...from potential criminal behavior.

I'm not going to bother responding.

Your position seems to be "it's not a real debate, so I can pretend mere opinion is valid"

Knock yourself out. If you are incapable of real debate, I'll certainly not waste time pretending you are.

What on earth do you think you are responding to?

I'm keenly aware that 'capitalism' is no recent phenomenon - indeed, that was a central assumption behind my response.

What I was addressing was the simple fact that it was not 'capitalism' that caused the big swing, but industrialisation.

And I'm arguing that without the evolution capitalism and the urban capitalist class your "big swing" does not happen, because industrialization does not happen. Capitalism is a cause whose effects brought about further effects.

I'm not going to bother responding.

Your position seems to be "it's not a real debate, so I can pretend mere opinion is valid"

Knock yourself out. If you are incapable of real debate, I'll certainly not waste time pretending you are.

Then we're on the same page, as that's how I am treating Andaras Prime. It's not real debate, because there will be no actual debate. There will be no recognition of points, and there will be no response from him to any points, other than to declare it "lies". So while I am capable of debate, and I have shown it time and time again on this forum and in real life, I don't feel that Andaras Prime is worthy of being treated with such respect as one would treat an opposing debater.

As for your opinions of my debating skills, knock yourself out. If you are incapable of real debate, I'll certainly not waste any more time pretending you are.

And I'm arguing that without the evolution capitalism and the urban capitalist class your "big swing" does not happen, because industrialization does not happen. Capitalism is a cause whose effects brought about further effects.

Wait... you think urbanisation preceded industrialisation?

Oh, and GnI, because you're such a stickler for sourcing of claims...

Un (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_Revolution)
Deux (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrialisation)
Trois (]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mill_town)
Quatre (http://www.pinkmonkey.com/studyguides/subjects/worldhis/chap8/w0808301.asp)

etc., etc., etc.

...So while I am capable of debate, and I have shown it time and time again on this forum and in real life, I don't feel that Andaras Prime is worthy of being treated with such respect as one would treat an opposing debater.
...

I don't see any reason to believe you. Sorry. There are a number of other people here... some of whom might have been able to handle a 'real' debate, even if you and Andaras seem to have resigned yourselves to calling each other names.

You seem to have chosen not to elevate your game above mudslinging, or you are simply incapable. You were given opportunities, and even shown where your weaknesses lie.. yet you still hide behind your 'he started it' defence.

It's your opinion. That is fine, and I support your right to have it.

It just ain't worth shit.

Wait... you think urbanisation preceded industrialisation?

No, they occurred simultaneously. Technological advancements in agriculture increased the availability of unskilled labor at the same time that the technological developments that led to industrialization occurred. So, while there was immense surplus agricultural labor, there would have been no reason for them to go to the cities if the demand for such labor didn't exist. Because of technological advancements, and advancements in city life for Burghers (and the resulting surplus available to them) there was a demand for this excess labor in the cities.

I don't see any reason to believe you. Sorry. There are a number of other people here... some of whom might have been able to handle a 'real' debate, even if you and Andaras seem to have resigned yourselves to calling each other names.

You seem to have chosen not to elevate your game above mudslinging, or you are simply incapable. You were given opportunities, and even shown where your weaknesses lie.. yet you still hide behind your 'he started it' defence.

It's your opinion. That is fine, and I support your right to have it.

It just ain't worth shit.

Much as your opinions on the matter are.

In fact, all you seem to be willing to do in this thread is to burst in, randomly assault one poster for not taking it as seriously as you'd like him too, all the while avoiding the actual content of the thread. I really don't come here for serious debate, I come here to vent, to test ideas or to learn something new. I get enough debate at work and school. Why would I want to drag all that rigid structure into a place I come to for fun.

Source: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=5609

I thought I would take this opportunity to start a discussion on the nature of ''democracy' and the different approaches to it worldwide, modern liberal democracy stresses competition and partisanism to be true democracy, but if you read Plato or Aristotle, who lived in the society that first invented democracy, they clearly state that democracy is not about competition but harmony and shared common lives within the polity, and it brings up a relevant point that many scholars make that liberal democracy creates a anti-consensus hostile 'two-camps' system rather than that of cooperation.

Here is another source on the Cuban democracy for reference: http://www.newhumanist.com/geiser.html

Lol I love how you use opinion sites as sources.

Customers aren't actually the only people that exist.





Bottom line: Some corporations doing bad things is better than an entire government doing bad things.

Bottom line: Some corporations doing bad things is better than an entire government doing bad things.

It is?

Isn't bad... well, bad?

Much as your opinions on the matter are.

In fact, all you seem to be willing to do in this thread is to burst in, randomly assault one poster for not taking it as seriously as you'd like him too, all the while avoiding the actual content of the thread. I really don't come here for serious debate, I come here to vent, to test ideas or to learn something new. I get enough debate at work and school. Why would I want to drag all that rigid structure into a place I come to for fun.

The OP presented an argument. I haven't actually agreed with argument, I'm not sure if you noticed that - you keep seeming to suggest I did.

Some people insulted that poster. Some rubbished him (him?). You presented what you suggested was a rebuttal. I called you on that - and now you are whining about how it doesn't need to be a 'real' rebuttal, because this isn't a 'real' debate.

I'd have to say - if this isn't a 'real' debate... that is because you have failed to make it such. I illustrated your logical fallacies, and pointed out where you failed to support your claims.

As a matter of interest... what I really wanted to see was what you had. I'm not really on either side in the 'Cuba debate'... but it was automatically assumed that the OP was false, and that's not good debate practise. You presented yourself as the strong candidate of opposition... and you completely failed to make any impression.

The OP presented an argument. I haven't actually agreed with argument, I'm not sure if you noticed that - you keep seeming to suggest I did.

Some people insulted that poster. Some rubbished him (him?). You presented what you suggested was a rebuttal. I called you on that - and now you are whining about how it doesn't need to be a 'real' rebuttal, because this isn't a 'real' debate.

I'd have to say - if this isn't a 'real' debate... that is because you have failed to make it such. I illustrated your logical fallacies, and pointed out where you failed to support your claims.

As a matter of interest... what I really wanted to see was what you had. I'm not really on either side in the 'Cuba debate'... but it was automatically assumed that the OP was false, and that's not good debate practise. You presented yourself as the strong candidate of opposition... and you completely failed to make any impression.

Then let's source:

An article critical of both US policy towards Cuba, and of the repressive mechanisms of the Cuban state: http://hrw.org/english/docs/2006/12/22/cuba14925.htm
A wikipedia article discussing the problems of the Cuban government before and after the rise of Castro: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_Cuba
The HRW 2006 report on Cuba: http://hrw.org/englishwr2k7/docs/2007/01/11/cuba14886.htm
The Amnesty International country report on Cuba (brief): http://web.amnesty.org/report2005/cub-summary-eng
US State Department Discussion of Cuban human rights issues: http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2006/78887.htm
A wikipedia article on a pro-democracy movement in Cuba, and the Castro governments response: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varela_Project

This sort of stuff goes on and on. I could also cite economic figures, but I don't think that's entirely relevant to the debate over the democratic nature of Cuba.

It is?

Isn't bad... well, bad?

Well theres a difference between being bad and being terrible and in this case one government being bad is worse than some corporations behaving badly.