Why, because the USSR was guilty of many atrocities? If that's the case, we need to give the same treatment to the good ol' Stars and Stripes.
I can understand hating the Soviet Union and resenting the delusional "Tankies" out there who pine for a return to the imagined "glory days". But I also understand people who hate America and resent our long history of injustice and Imperialism, which carries on to this very day.
The Soviet Union and the United States are so very similar - both born in righteous revolution, but then in fairly short order forced to compromise of their high ideals by the rigors of surviving in a world hostile to their very existence. Both countries have long histories of unjustifiable conquest and Imperialism. Both claimed to represent the common man, but grew rich and powerful by exploiting the poor to elevate privileged elites. Both were rife with intolerance and bigotry, systematically repressing minorities, fostering racism at every turn, committing unspeakable crimes against entire peoples whom they viewed as inferior...
If you're going to get so worked up about "communist" flags because of the abuses and corruption of the Soviet Union, it'd be hypocritical not to take a fairly similar stance on "capitalist" flags due to the abuses and corruption of America. The Soviets were certainly worse in many ways, but often not by very much. And there are even some areas in which the Soviets were actually quite a bit better than America - for example, women and homosexuals were historically much better treated, until very recently.
My point is that both countries have long, complicated histories full of both good and bad. Both are deeply flawed societies which committed many truly terrible crimes while also ostensibly championing very high ideals of human progress. You can't really boil either of them down to a simple verdict of "virtuous" or "evil", to the point that you could honestly compare their flags and icons to those of the Fascists. It's not even remotely comparable - and even if it were, you'd still be a hypocrite for condemning the flag of the one but not the flag of the other.
@Verloren two evils do not make good. USSR however was empire built on lies, corruption and murder from the very beginning. Communism is evil ideology which always led to destruction of human lifes, and USSR was based on the idea that certain classes of people must be physically destroyed - for example, Poles from Polish minority in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_Operation_of_the_NKVD, which were oppressed and killed en masse (about 10% of Polish minority was shot!) solely based on the fact that as Poles they sure would be agents of foreign powers. In my own country people from opposition were disappearing right into 1989 and many those disappearances were never explained, and communist crimes were mostly never judged.
The main difference is however USSR presided over expulsions of millions of people and genocide in the previous century - my family was expelled from what is now Belarus, from example. Comparing the utter evil of murdering millions of your own citizens with the USA is like saying "well, nazis were bad and murdered millions, but USA mistreated Blacks, so if you hate nazi symbols you must also hate US flags", that is: stupid. COmmunism is as evil as fascism and should be treated as such.
They want to set fear on the hearts of the Ukranians.
ReplyDeleteSLAVA UKRAINI
Thay dont have air superiority!! They are using improvised cammo!! They are afraid of fire from the sky!!
ReplyDeleteBrandishing red rags and other communist symbols should be treated by the world the same as brandishing swastikas.
ReplyDelete@szopen
ReplyDeleteWhy, because the USSR was guilty of many atrocities? If that's the case, we need to give the same treatment to the good ol' Stars and Stripes.
I can understand hating the Soviet Union and resenting the delusional "Tankies" out there who pine for a return to the imagined "glory days". But I also understand people who hate America and resent our long history of injustice and Imperialism, which carries on to this very day.
The Soviet Union and the United States are so very similar - both born in righteous revolution, but then in fairly short order forced to compromise of their high ideals by the rigors of surviving in a world hostile to their very existence. Both countries have long histories of unjustifiable conquest and Imperialism. Both claimed to represent the common man, but grew rich and powerful by exploiting the poor to elevate privileged elites. Both were rife with intolerance and bigotry, systematically repressing minorities, fostering racism at every turn, committing unspeakable crimes against entire peoples whom they viewed as inferior...
If you're going to get so worked up about "communist" flags because of the abuses and corruption of the Soviet Union, it'd be hypocritical not to take a fairly similar stance on "capitalist" flags due to the abuses and corruption of America. The Soviets were certainly worse in many ways, but often not by very much. And there are even some areas in which the Soviets were actually quite a bit better than America - for example, women and homosexuals were historically much better treated, until very recently.
My point is that both countries have long, complicated histories full of both good and bad. Both are deeply flawed societies which committed many truly terrible crimes while also ostensibly championing very high ideals of human progress. You can't really boil either of them down to a simple verdict of "virtuous" or "evil", to the point that you could honestly compare their flags and icons to those of the Fascists. It's not even remotely comparable - and even if it were, you'd still be a hypocrite for condemning the flag of the one but not the flag of the other.
@Verloren two evils do not make good. USSR however was empire built on lies, corruption and murder from the very beginning. Communism is evil ideology which always led to destruction of human lifes, and USSR was based on the idea that certain classes of people must be physically destroyed - for example, Poles from Polish minority in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_Operation_of_the_NKVD, which were oppressed and killed en masse (about 10% of Polish minority was shot!) solely based on the fact that as Poles they sure would be agents of foreign powers. In my own country people from opposition were disappearing right into 1989 and many those disappearances were never explained, and communist crimes were mostly never judged.
ReplyDeleteThe main difference is however USSR presided over expulsions of millions of people and genocide in the previous century - my family was expelled from what is now Belarus, from example. Comparing the utter evil of murdering millions of your own citizens with the USA is like saying "well, nazis were bad and murdered millions, but USA mistreated Blacks, so if you hate nazi symbols you must also hate US flags", that is: stupid. COmmunism is as evil as fascism and should be treated as such.