So I'm seeing some confusion here about the differences between Collectivism and Communism, and to me understanding this distinction is key to understanding why history has turned out the way it has.
There are many different versions of collectivism. Both Fascism and Communism, for example, would be types of Collectivism. In Collectivism, the group is given higher priority than the individual. We see traces of this in all societies. The question is -- is the balance point between individualism and collectivism achieved by force or by voluntary cooperation?
Both Communism and Fascism propose to better society by forcing individuals to sacrifice for the good of the community. The difference is what societal strata is given the reins (perhaps reigns is the right spelling here.) In communism, the business/educated/elite slice of society is considered rotten and corrupted, and they are therefore forcibly removed and replaced with those who supposedly are the value creators for society, which are the workers. That's why Mao and Pol Pot purged the educated and the elite.
In contrast, Fascism, which is every bit as collectivist and repressive towards the individual, believes that the educated and the successful deserve to be at the helm, so they co-opt all slices of society, from business to education, under government control, but also for the good of the people.
Communism and Fascism thus both represent totalitarianism, in that they propose total control of society for the good of society, but they propose to do this through group action rather than through individual control of society, which would be called either a dictatorship or a monarchy, or religious control of society, which would be a theocracy.
Because Communism and Fascism propose to have different classes of society in complete control of society, they are natural and intractable enemies of each other. That's why the USSR and Germany fought so ferociously, and why the Germans turned on the Jews, because they saw Communism as a Jewish invention that would destroy their society (and they were angry that Jewish shopkeepers had to keep raising their prices during the Weimar hyperinflation -- the society didn't understand how money works, which is why they couldn't see the link between printing money and declining value of the money, and their government was telling them that "speculators" and people raising prices were the ones to blame rather than those printing money.)
Truth be told -- the US is today a mostly fascist country. Government and elites have control over almost everything. But the workers are not in charge, which is why it is not communist.
Nice explanation. I would maybe add/discuss some details:
The communist believed their system was not authoritarian because "the working class rules" according to their leaders. They use the word democracy as well but with a different meaning.
Also fascism often gets associated with hierarchies that is why to some communists "everything to the right of Marx is fascism", that is also why we rather see Anarcho-Communists instead of Anarcho-Fascists, even tho I believe i found those as well on Steemit :D
Agree. And probably the part of communism that relies on that magical societal "unobtainium" is the idea that representatives of the working class given the reins of power won't themselves become elites. The "Some animals are more equal than others" thing. Just doesn't fit human nature, which is why it doesn't work. It's a great idea as long as you didn't try to get it to work with humans. Would work great for bees or the Borg, though.
It's funny -- you read the constitutions of these repressive totalitarian collectivist systems and they sound wonderful -- very much like our own. It's not like their constitutions say "we will scare the crap out of you with secret police and make your lives a living hell if you dare to resist our power." They make it sound like utopia. All of the bad stuff happens with respect to how they interpret the words, which is why the words don't actually mean a thing -- only the interpretation counts. Scary, actually.
Actually it isn't. That is a simplification (though understandable)
It really is a hybrid of a lot of things from the past. It does definitely have a lot of Fascist elements though. The sad thing is a lot of Anti-Fascists themselves are essentially Fascists these days. It's like two sheep arguing in a pasture about which one is really a sheep.
I thought I'd add... I really liked the comment. Had to up vote it even though my voting power is shot due to how much voting I've been doing.
Hah! Yeah -- read your post about adjusting to the hard fork. I'm new so still figuring out how it all works.
I think many people are confused these days. We have people shutting down free speech in the name of protecting free speech, arguing that government control is the only way that society can be free, and people thinking that separate but equal is the only way to achieve racial blindness.
Yikes.
Always enjoy the interactions!