Koko wrote:Maybe I should've kept my explanation in that post instead of expecting you to assume I had a reason for believing what I said. But whatever.
Well, I had reasons for believing what I did back then, too. And while mine may or may not have been as well thought out as yours, I think this is something that can change over time as well as we learn more.
I'm a socialist because I grew up in a poorer-than-most household in a primarily conservative province. This was the result of conservatism/capitalism, and most of my life the Conservative Party was the ruling party in Canada, so I experienced much of the damage a rightist government causes (second-hand mostly, but I would've been affected in some way too).
And what was the nature of that damage?
Even if I weren't affected by capitalism I would've read about the problems rightist views have caused in the past (imperialism, nationalism, militarism, capitalism mainly). And to get a good idea of real communism, there is the USSR even if it was more of a militarized totalitarian state. Economically it was left, yes, and that actually saved the state from the Depression (and people say communism is bad. Bah! This is a thing that makes me largely in favour of leftism, because communism actually worked instead of the capitalistic "solutions" the Conservatives and US made).
But how successful was that really? And was that due to communism per se or to isolationism combined with industrialization? Plus industrialization in the USSR at the time directly caused millions of people to die from famines in its rural areas.
But socially the state was too far right that people fail to see the economic advantages of communism, and I would even say that isn't totally unfair (most communist regimes and states are absolutely terrible examples of communism).
Sorry, I'm not sure what exactly you mean by that.