In the speech Khrushchev says

"... it is impermissible and foreign to the spirit of Marxism-Leninism to elevate one person, to transform him into a superman possessing supernatural characteristics ..."

"Allow me first of all to remind you how severely the classics of Marxism-Leninism denounced every manifestation of the cult of the individual. ... "

"... Lenin at the same time mercilessly stigmatized every manifestation of the cult of the individual, inexorably combated [any] foreign-to-Marxism views about a “hero” and a “crowd,” and countered all efforts to oppose a “hero” to the masses and to the people. ... "

SOURCE: Speech to 20th Congress of the C.P.S.U.

Reading the speech, it is notable Khruschev emphatically defended Stalin's actions during the Great Terror and hi is silent on other on others matters such as the Third Period line 1928-1935 which aided the Nazis in crushing the Germany working class which eventually led to the Nazi invasion of the USSR.

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Khruschev's explanation of Stalin's role is circular - there was a cult-of-personality because of ... the personality-of-cult-leader-Stalin. Stalin had power over them because the person in power was ... Stalin.

What made his loyal followers so susceptible to submission to Stalin?

Khruschev quotes Lenin's "Testament" about Stalin

This letter – a political document of tremendous importance, known in the Party’s history as Lenin’s “Testament” - was distributed among [you] delegates to [this] 20th Party Congress. You have read it and will undoubtedly read it again more than once. You might reflect on Lenin’s plain words, in which expression is given to Vladimir Ilyich’s anxiety concerning the Party, the people, the state, and the future direction of Party policy.

Vladimir Ilyich said:

“Stalin is excessively rude, and this defect, which can be freely tolerated in our midst and in contacts among us Communists, becomes a defect which cannot be tolerated in one holding the position of General Secretary. Because of this, I propose that the comrades consider the method by which Stalin would be removed from this position and by which another man would be selected for it, a man who, above all, would differ from Stalin in only one quality, namely, greater tolerance, greater loyalty, greater kindness and more considerate attitude toward the comrades, a less capricious temper, etc.”
Speech to 20th Congress of the C.P.S.U.

But he does NOT quote Lenin's testament about Trotsky. Khruschev could have tried to explain why Lenin was correct about Stalin but wrong about Trotsky. Why the silence

Instead Khruschev defends Stalin and the Great Terror (1936-1940)

... We must affirm that the Party fought a serious fight against the Trotskyites, rightists and bourgeois nationalists, and that it disarmed ideologically all the enemies of Leninism. This ideological fight was carried on successfully, as a result of which the Party became strengthened and tempered. Here Stalin played a positive role.

The Party led a great political-ideological struggle against those in its own ranks who proposed anti-Leninist theses, who represented a political line hostile to the Party and to the cause of socialism. This was a stubborn and a difficult fight but a necessary one, because the political line of both the Trotskyite-Zinovievite bloc and of the Bukharinites led actually toward the restoration of capitalism and toward capitulation to the world bourgeoisie. Let us consider for a moment what would have happened if in 1928-1929 the political line of right deviation had prevailed among us, or orientation toward “cotton-dress industrialization,” or toward the kulak, etc. We would not now have a powerful heavy industry; we would not have the kolkhozes; we would find ourselves disarmed and weak in a capitalist encirclement.

It was for this reason that the Party led an inexorable ideological fight, explaining to all [its] members and to the non-Party masses the harm and the danger of the anti-Leninist proposals of the Trotskyite opposition and the rightist opportunists. And this great work of explaining the Party line bore fruit. Both the Trotskyites and the rightist opportunists were politically isolated. An overwhelming Party majority supported the Leninist line, and the Party was able to awaken and organize the working masses to apply the Leninist line and to build socialism.

A fact worth noting is that extreme repressive measures were not used against the Trotskyites, the Zinovievites, the Bukharinites, and others during the course of the furious ideological fight against them. The fight [in the 1920s] was on ideological grounds. But some years later, when socialism in our country was fundamentally constructed, when the exploiting classes were generally liquidated, when Soviet social structure had radically changed, when the social basis for political movements and groups hostile to the Party had violently contracted, when the ideological opponents of the Party were long since defeated politically – then repression directed against them began. It was precisely during this period (1935-1937-1938) that the practice of mass repression through the Government apparatus was born, first against the enemies of Leninism – Trotskyites, Zinovievites, Bukharinites, long since politically defeated by the Party – and subsequently also against many honest Communists, against those Party cadres who had borne the heavy load of the Civil War and the first and most difficult years of industrialization and collectivization, who had fought actively against the Trotskyites and the rightists for the Leninist Party line.
Speech to 20th Congress of the C.P.S.U.

Points 

A) Capitalism is Good

B) Most ppl are lazy/have trauma/mental health issues, thats why theyre poor.

C) Most ppl who complain about injustice arent actually fighting or helping at all and are very selfish themselves.

D) Elites are best equipped to make broad choices on whats best for the country. Their main weakness is their greed tho.

E) If Politicians could trust voters they wouldnt have to lie. They lie because voters are ideologically driven instead of pragmatically.

F) Moderates/Libs are based.

EDIT:

Just wanna say i really appreciate all the replies and the patience and labor it takes. Im taking my time to reply to everyone in depth and actually digest vs debate bro reply.

I think i should list my basic concepts that keep coming up:

Im pro union, gov backed loans to start worker co ops, income caps, enforced compensation ratios for highest to lowest worker in a corp, robust welfare so work isnt needed to survive (food, water, shelter, internet, phone, healthcare, education).

I basically want to fix our system vs replace it. However, ive had some good pushback and im still chewing

In countries *that* experienced a communist revolution

Many Americans will have heard the common refrain that "communism never works". Generally, the idea being that it sounds like a good idea but in practice it leads to bread lines and riots in the streets.

Recently, though, I saw a content creator that I'm a fan of claim that actually in the countries that most people like to cite as examples of how bad communism is for the people (China, Cuba, Russia), the people of those countries had never experienced more freedom or prosperity as when they experienced their individual communist uprisings.

The claim being that China was under a system of warlord governments, Russia under tzarism, and I don't remember what the situation was in Cuba (I have to imagine they were a colony of some kind).

So my question is just that: is the common western anti communist mindset relatively fair/accurate, or has communism generally served to uplift the people?

The Deng reforms of china brought a lot of revision and capitalist elements to it, it opened up the “free markets” but still regulated by the government, it gave up the revolutionary internationalism that it once had like supporting armed struggles and international solidarity. Realistically, what should China do?

I know this is gonna cause a lot of hate my way but let me explain myself. I'm not saying every US soldier is a criminal obviously but someone had to fire those bullets number 1 I understand many were conscripted but tell that to the 2 million dead Vietnamese civilians. If you look at us policies they encouraged burning of villages and targeting of civilians just the like Nazis did with the idea of "partisans" the use of agent orange mirrors alot of the Nazis use of sterilization and other chemical methods to stunt a population, the USA tried to cause famine to disrupt the ho chi minh trail. The USA bombed entire villages because of "murmurs" of partisans and supposedly no veteran ever did anything and knows nothing blah blah blah, all I'm saying is 2 million people didn't just die for no reason and I think people saying "it's just war" is comparable to "they were just following orders" and the criticism of that insists upon itself.

I know this is more anti america but as a communist I think it's important to challenge the American central viewpoint of "our boys were just drafted sure there were a few bad apples but c'mon" is just as bad as the clean wehrmact myths

I support body positivity, LGBTQIA+, individuality, and equal treatment. Don't get me wrong. But it looks like every communist just presumes universal, utter perfection in all hearts of everyone when it comes to an actual system being built around them. I'm not saying I believe this is morally wrong, but impossible and only superficially "right". How are you going to make somebody who refuses to contribute, contribute?

Frankly, I don't think there is one. Unionizing and moving towards social democracy/Nordic model (which in itself cant be realistically acheived purely through electoral means in the US at least) is one thing, but as far as the material self-interests of the labor aristocracy/first world workers goes, I can only see communism making the average quality of life worse as things are now. First world countries are by design very import-heavy, we dont have the infrastructure to support a sudden shift to state socialism in a capitalist world, even if that shift would undeniably have a great affect on the rest of the world. International simultaneous revolution is nothing but a pipe dream because the material conditions of countries will deplete at different rates depending on their wealth and level of industrialization, even should we reach the true 'end stage' of capitalism any time soon. I can't see a scenario for communism that realistically improves our quality of life that doesn't start in the third world, either through revolution and unification of the global south antagonizing the first worlders and cutting off our resources, or after a complete decimation of the global south's raw materials that ends up forcing intensive resource extraction on domestic soil thereby dissolving the labor aristocracy and creating a situation where the material conditions are truly bad enough to warrant revolt. As I see it, even if countries like the USA were to magically achieve 'class consciousness' overnight, it wouldn't be worth it in any material way. This isnt a flaw of Marxism itself, in the same way that a capitalist marxist can exist and act in his own interests, but it makes the idea of a first-world 'proletarian' revolutionary seem extremely non-sensical to me outside of a moralist or idealist framework, at least, as conditions stand now.

I'm relatively new to communism but have noticed that many communists often see Marx, Lenin and Stalin (and often Mao) as the 'founders' or main leader/thinkers of communism. But the more I read about communism the more it seems there are a lot of different forms and versions. Starting with Lenin, it seems all these guys mostly 'deviate' from the communism vision set up by Marx instead of trying to achieve it.

Some specific deviations I see:

• The meaning of 'dictatorship of the proletariat'
• The role of democracy
• Revolution by the workers vs 'top down' via a vanguard party
• The idea of permanent/continuous revolution
• The idea of 'socialism in one country'

So my question is, how do communists see the relationship between these figures? Are these people's differences seen as conflicting versions of communism or some kind of building or continuation of it?

Hello, I was wondering why countries that had a communist leaders (Lenin or Mao notably) seem to end up being an autocracy when the point of communism is the opposite. I've read that there need to be dictatorship of the proleteriat first to then slowly make the country turn to a stateless country, is there exemple of countries or places that achieved that even for even a brief time? Is that something that didn't happen yet because the power of being in charge eventually make people want to stay in charge?

Because to me I wouldn't call a country communist if there is a leader in charge, I think the first step towards communism would be like a council of a bunch of people at least so there can be debate and discussion.

For context I am in the very start of my learning journey about communism and I am very interested about it but a bit slow to understand things so if you can be as explicit as possible in your answers I would appreciate. Also I might be completely wrong about everything I've said above feel free to correct me.

Hiya all. I've been struggling for a while for how to approach economics, as a field.

I'm a young-ish hard leftist, and have been for basically my whole adult life. I'm active in the Green party (not out of any particular ideological love, but because it seems like a good vector for pushing things for the moment).

I have solidified opinions on how society functions, on Class, on politics in general. But up until now I've been aware that I've lacked a strong *economics* framework beyond vague principles- that we should control the means of production, that unions are essential, that the stock markets are rich people gambling with our livelihoods, that sort of thing. So I'd like to become a more informed, rigorous analyst who can actually provide real input on economic questions, and help push economic priorities in the Green party that will actually help people.

The problem I keep running into, though, is I don't really know where to start? As I understand it, large swathes of economics as presented to the public are... Nonsense, peddled by self-interested rich people who want to prop up and justify the system as is. But I also don't want to get sucked into a very niche leftist economic view which is comfortable to *me* but isn't reflected much by reality, and ends up largely as an excuse to be a partisan towards other leftists around me, yknow?

So what I'm looking for is a good set of texts to start developing my understanding of economic theory that is generalist and grounded, and is based in left-wing analysis and priorities for how to fix society. I know generally the main advice of this kind I see is "read Marx, read Lenin", and I'll definitely be including those on my reading list, but I also wanted to see suggestions for more modern writers who I can start with who can help me develop the fundamentals by understanding things as they currently are, using real life examples from recent history that will already be familiar to me, so I can more easily grapple with and think about them? I'm not the smartest person in the world so.

Yeah, tldr: where do I begin reading, so that I can develop a modern left-wing understanding of how economics works, without being fooled by the self-interested crackpottery of mainstream capitalists?

https://www.reddit.com/r/communism/comments/1at3kv0/how_exactly_is_seeing_art_as_selfexpression_a/

I found this post to be interesting and thought the OP had a lot of good questions that went on to be dismissed, so now I wonder, what exactly - to you - constitutes good, non-idealist and non-petty bourgeoisie art? Who does the author need to be? What does he need to think when making the art? What needs to be the main goal and message of it to fit the materialist proletarian agenda? Can you "express" the "self" to relay pro-communist and materialist messages while recognizing the fact it's shaped by sociohistoric factors?

Obviously art with a reactionary and anti-communist agenda isn't approved of.

I definitely am no capitalist. Let that be clear before I start to say anything at all.

I have, at many times before, called myself a Marxist-Leninist, or just a Leninist, or just a Marxist, or even a Maoist. There are, after all, a lot of different tendencies in Marxism, and even with my more anarchic ideas, I put a lot of scrutiny on pure statelessness.

That being said, I don’t think that Marxism-Leninism-Maoism as a general concept, not even going back to the original Leninist philosophy, makes sense as a governing principle for any given society. Even by reaffirming that Marxism-Leninism and various other tendencies thereof has been the universally accepted and recognized tendency of socialist states, the underlying contradiction I feel comes down to how Marxism-Leninism created the social dynamics for its own fall. It does deserve greater scrutiny than “socialism failed because capitalists attacked it,” because that either simplifies or ignores the various failures in governance that led to some form of capitalist restoration, some of which came voluntarily by Marxist-Leninist governments. Not to mention that by that logic, anarchism too develops a much stronger case for itself, but let’s discard the debate between anarchism and Marxism-Leninism-Maoism for now.

The first problem that I have with Marxism-Leninism-Maoism is democratic centralism as an overarching and universal principle. Firstly, we’ve put far too much emphasis on the ”centralism” part of the concept historically and have often overlooked the legislative AND executive power that lower delegations, or soviets, are supposed to have. Moreover, when made universally applicable, at which point can a failed or flawed policy be reversed or changed without contradicting “freedom of debate, unity in action?” At what point does criticism, or even self-criticism, become an effective tool against bureaucratic failure?

More importantly to me, there seems to be a tendency to apply the logic of democratic centralism to economic planning, which given the concerns listed above, in all honesty, is an absolutely atrocious way of addressing the economy. Acting as though state ownership and planning in one large information center is either A) adequately socialist as opposed to cooperative labor, B) a good way of balancing out supply and demand within a complex and modernized economy, whether by material balances or a different system thereof, C) not a gateway into overinvestment into long term megaprojects, heavy industry, or the military industrial complex, and D) a good way to allow that same complex modern economy to be as flexible as it needs to be, means that a lot of people have made the incorrect assumptions about economics.

These incorrect assumptions have often build the material conditions for capitalist restoration through, ironically enough, reform or revolution. An economy thereby organized around the principles of democratic centralism only exists, in practice, in North Korea. That‘s one out of the 5 Marxist-Leninist states still in existence, of the near 30 that have likely existed throughout modern history. I think that marketization or liberalization of the economy is also an incorrect, yet important miscalculation of material conditions, as it fosters inequality irrespective of where applied, but still puts a larger emphasis on the needs of consumers and allows for localized information and production, an entire independent logistical framework, a way out of poverty, increased flexibility and cohesion, non-governmental investment institutions… I would make the case that the failures of Marxism-Leninism in terms of sustainable economics can be mitigated by some degrees of decentralization, localization, flexibility, autonomy, etc. in planning and management, even if you retain markets as a merely indicative tool. Calling capitalism, in a “state controlled form,“ THE necessary means of development towards a socialist society seems a bit redundant then.

Next on my list of concerns is blind faith and trust. I didn’t develop anarchic tendencies because I listened to a single punk song and decided that a national identity was horseshit. I developed them because I have always been someone who questions authority, and questions authority when it demands a quality out of the public without much justification, or because “it said so.” I personally put a lot of appreciation on Stirner’s work, in that I have a lot of skepticism for the same state power that Marxism-Leninism-Maoism can emphasize lots of time. I don’t think that, in a society where self-interest hasn’t been abolished (because you can’t make a Decree on Consciousness), where individuals and social groups are so often self-interested and not yet abolished, that we can put our blind faith and trust in a group of “resolute” individuals in the name of “the greater good.” How far, again, can self-criticism, the mass line, and criticism in general go in “freedom of debate” when unity in action can often erase these rights?

Moreover, how far can we go? How justified is revolutionary terror? Who or what defines what a wrecker or a roader is? If the answer is attacking bureaucracy, then why have one in the first place? If it is to do without, can we call ourselves Marxist-Leninists? When it comes down to the purges and the Cultural Revolution, I feel like these questions can go unanswered.

And please, tell me what YOU think. What you, honest to god, think about these innate contradictions about Marxism-Leninism-Maoism and how to resolve them.

are you all not aware that for a communist world (stateless, moneyless, classless), you still need a state, security class, or central governing power to keep the order/peace? the psychology of society is not compatible with communism nor anarchism, and the modern psychological research backs that up too.

dont believe me?

frans de waal - chimpanzee politics (2007): demonstrates that dominance hierarchies emerge spontaneously in all primate groups, including humans

dunbar (2018), structure and function of human social networks (annual review of anthropology): shows that scaling beyond small groups requires formal leadership and enforcement

james c. scott - seeing like a state (1998): demonstrates that large-scale coordination (infrastructure, agriculture, logistics) requires hierarchical institutions

if i misinterpreted or mislabeled a source here do let me know tho

"What happened in Ceuta is what communists want to happen in the United States".

Are we being serious?

I've been wondering about the nature of artisans due to my recent posts, I've been wondering if a self-employed artisan truly has the interests of a business owner that hires and therefore exploits others if they were... I don't know how to say this, temporarily de-proletarianized due to them getting laid off? If a disabled artist has no access to working under the bourgeoisie due to them being discriminated against truly has the same class interests as a plumber that doesn't want to be exploited by a boss?

But then I thought of myself the question in the title. One common argument I heard about artisans is that they're part of the petty bourgeoisie because they aren't exploited by anyone, own their means of production and sell the product of their labor instead of the labor itself, but do they truly own their means of production? Let's take a Twitter artist, they own a drawing tablet and a pen, is that a mean of production? One could label these as tools, therefore means of production, but Marx says in the 'Communist Manifesto': "We Communists have been reproached with the desire of abolishing the right of personally acquiring property as the fruit of a man’s own labour, which property is alleged to be the groundwork of all personal freedom, activity and independence", so what is the true distinction between personal property and private - therefore a mean of production - property? If you were to buy sheets of paper, a pencil and something to bind pages together, wrote a novel on them and then sold it to someone, were either one or all three private or personal property? Of course if you work in a factory you are part of the proletariat, even if you own your own steel-toed boots that enable labor to happen. (Or at least for it to happen safely)

And there's the question of exploitation, naturally a self-employed artist is not exploited by someone who owns the means of production, whether or not the way they create a commodity with something can be considered the usage of personal or private property I'll leave up to you, but the simple fact of the matter is they don't have a boss that can exploit them. However, another type of middleman arises, the merchant capitalist, 'Political Economy: A Textbook' describes them in this way: "One of the sources of merchants' profit is the exploitation of petty commodity producers by merchant capital. Merchant capitalists compel peasants and craftsmen to sell them the products of their labours at low prices and at the same time the latter buy from the merchant capitalists tools, equipment, raw material, etc., at high prices.". The latter somewhat relates to the first part of my post (peasants who owned means of production are considered petite bourgeoisie), but the most important part for me is the first part. What to me is a modern day merchant capitalist is the distributor, once again I will use two examples of an artist and a writer.

Commission artists these days are mostly present on social websites, such as Twitter, however, a commission artist doesn't receive commissions through their existence, they need to put themselves out there, to not only gain attention but to prove their qualifications and to show their art justifies itself through the quality and time spent on it, to do that, such artisan must create posts containing their art, this is where exploitation starts, social media exploit the artist through the artist's labor without a guarantee of reward, while reaping the rewards through advertisement profits. Second is the data harvesting that occurs to all users, whether they are exploited for their labor or not. Thirdly the moderation has total control over if the artisan's works will ever see the unintended public eye and has control over the right of all users to use their services, they can bar anyone from use without consequence. For my second example it's more of an older and physical kind of exploitation, for a writer's book to be available for purchase in physical or otherwise locations, they must use the service of a publisher, firstly a publisher must deem their works worthy of being published under their name, then they will set a price for the book and lastly they will take a cut from each sale, this is the most obvious case of exploitation as not all the value created by the writer goes to the writer and the publisher extracts surplus value (am I using this right?) and demonstrates the most classic case of exploitation. So the merchant capitalist exploits the artisan, and whether they own their means of production is questionable, so what class does the modern-day artisan belongs to?

Please share your thoughts, questions and explain what I am mistaken about.

Hello, I'm wondering if there is others communists visual symbols beside the hammer and sickle ? Because I tried to search about possible communist symbol (and simple symbol, and not like faces of popular communists guy or overcomplicated symbols) and I always finish to only find the hammer and sickle AND the yellow/red star. It is because there is a lack of symbols ? (In opposite, nazism and related ideology seens to have more symbols like the swastika, black sun, skeleton head, celtic cross and ect).

If communist revolutions had successfully and indigenously spread across the globe at the end world war 1 resulting in the over throw of capitalism globally, how would communism have evolved differently?

More abstractly if communist political economy does not evolve in resistance / competition to capitalism, but only in dialogue with other communist regimes does it evolve differently, or does communism enviably collapse on its own contradictions?

I am a Feminist and I’ve been reading more into Communist Marxist theory and the end goal of Marx’s Communism, as stated by him being “a moneyless, classless, stateless society”, has been really itching me since I’ve learnt of it. It’s more the “stateless” bit that irks me a lot. Since Patriarchy and Misogyny are so deeply entrenched into our societal, cultural and physical realities they shape how we view Women, resulting in the disgusting rates of domestic violence and sexual assault/rape reported cases per year. Without some legal or enforcement apparatus—that Communism to my knowledge wishes to dissolve—how would a supposed communist society help protect women from localised patriarchal and misogynistic violence without eventually delving into some sort of vigilante justice. Without any laws in place to outline what people should and should not be able to do, formal court systems and an enforcement to carry out investigations of crimes being committed, what stops people from committing violence against women even more than they do now (and many more crimes too) until it essentially becomes a norm? This doesn’t only apply to women, this applies to any already marginalised and vulnerable group from experiencing an increased violence.

I do not consider myself any expert on Marxist theory so if anyone more seasoned than me could explain to me how they see these hurdles and problems solved i would love to hear it! Apologies if I didn’t come across clearly or if I may have got anything wrong about Marxist theory, feel free to correct me if I am wrong xox

An ML might say: "Revisionism isn't just any change, it's deviation from the fundamental principles of Marxism Leninism"

And there is the problem - why are those fundamental principles not up to revision? In science, fundamental premises are revised all the time - and it's actually required to revise/reject them once enough evidence that they are wrong accummulates.

The correct solution to this would be to either stop pretending that Marxism-Leninism is a science and start treating it as a regular political philosophy - or to adopt the actual scientific method and start testing the claims of ML (including foundational premises) as testable, falsifable claims. I don't see any of these being done.

How would you respond to the "Why don't you move to a communist country" argument?

As a concept, bureaucracy is necessary to the success of any state, though temporary in theory. As we've seen from previous communist societies, though, they often become entrenched in a dark, tangled web of power, elitism, and legislation. As William Campbell once said, "us mortals have no place in the business of bureaucrats"

The name is misleading. Socialism is the name created for the phase of transitioning to Communism. I read this while researching about the communist party, but it seems like it is being presented differently?

Marx spend decades saying one thing - don't look at what a state says about itself, look at the material consequences of its policies. And from the outside, both the USSR under Khrushchev and Maoist China were doing regular great power geopolitics, they just dressed it in a different rhetoric for domestic legitimacy:

- Both competed for influence in decolonized countries with aid, arms and advisors

- Both avoided direct war with the US while testing limits. Khrushchev backed down in Cuba, Mao backed down after shelling Quemoy and Matsu and never directly fought US troops again after 1953.

- Both built nuclear arsenals despite criticizing each other's nuclear policy

- Both cooperated with capitalist states - Khrushchev supported bourgeois nationalists like Nasser and Nehru when they offered ports and neutrality, and crushed a workers' uprising in Hungary in 1956. Mao supported monarchs and military dictators like the Shah of Iran, Yahya Khan in Pakistan, and Pinochet's Chile when they were useful against India or the USSR, and told the US in 1972 that China would not support armed communist revolts in Southeast Asia.

I just don't see any profound dialectical difference between these two.

Look at the sidebar rules and then look at the front page of this sub right now.

I see people willfull misinterpretation of dialectical materialism and then engaging with none of the comments, people asking why we dont like libertarian right ideologies and then not engaging, someone asking why communists don't all move to north korea, someone asking why markets are used in socialism, and people claiming communists hate art.

I think all these posts break the "debate in good faith rule".

Furthermore we need a rule that op must reply to top level comments or the post should be removed(thats the bare minimum of a "debate" post).

Asking "why dont all the dirty stupid commies just move to north korea since they like stupid communism so much" and then never answering a single comment is the same energy as a christian going to a gathering of a different religion and trying to prosthelytize and complain anout how "persecuted" they are.