China, France, Russia, the UK and the US said that a nuclear war "cannot be won and must never be fought," quoting Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev at what became the zenith of the nuclear arms race.
Gorbachev oversaw the destruction of USSR that was one of the greatest humanitarian disasters in history. Forcible conversion to capitalism cost 3-7 million lives, and I personally had to live through that horror. All I can say is fuck Gorbachev.
Gorbachev oversaw the destruction of USSR that was one of the greatest humanitarian disasters in history.
I don’t think I could reasonably dispute that it was a great humanitarian disaster. Or that Gorbachev was in charge at the time.
How was he responsible? Was he only responsible in a “well, he didn’t prevent it” sort of way? I’ve considered that a valid criticism of politicians I myself support… if you’re in office when it happens, it really is your fault. Sort of.
If so with Gorbachev, I’ll just leave it there and I guess I agree for as much as that’s worth.
Or is it more? Does he have more culpability even than that?
Gorbachev actively worked to undermine the system. He was responsible for the push for things like glasnost and perestroyka. He fostered the start of privatization which was ultimately what led to the disaster. He was an active driving force in creating that disaster.
Forgive me, it’s been a long time since the 1980s. Isn’t “glasnost” something like “freedom to criticize”? For that matter, wasn’t perestroyka “we don’t want to keep threatening mutual nuclear annihilation”?
How are those things bad?
The privatization I at least get, others have criticized it in various places and times before. Or is there some causal link I’m not seeing, where those things led to or caused the privatization?
Things aren’t always what they sound. Glasnost basically allowed private outlets to start pumping pro capitalist propaganda, and perestroyka paved the path towards privatization. None of this had anything to do with preventing nuclear annihilation. This is a pretty good discussion of what happened under Gorbachev.
Glasnost basically allowed private outlets to start pumping pro capitalist propaganda
Freedom of speech does allow assholes and idiots to make false claims, even to tell dangerous lies… something we’ve been reminded of just recently. But on what grounds should a government disallow propaganda, pro-capitalist or any other type?
Even if regrettable events result, is that not the right thing to do?
I will read more, I can’t really remember what perestroyka was supposed to mean… I would have been 11 or 12 at the time. In the literal sense, I think it was something like “thawing” as in the cold war itself, but I don’t really see the connection to privatization at least with what little I know of it.
On the grounds that certain speech is harmful to society. The reality is that no country has absolute freedom of speech. Calls for violence are illegal in most places, Germany bans glorification of fascism, and so on.
So, it’s not a binary question of whether freedom of speech is allowed or not, but rather what the right balance is. I don’t know on what basis westerners assume that they got this balance fundamentally right while everyone else got it wrong.
Perestroyka literally translates are restructuring. And the connection to privatization is that perestroyka was used to popularize the idea of shifting away from a purely socialist economy.
Reagan and Gorbachev are two of the worst people to have ever lived.
Yeah I was being sarcastic
I figured :)
Ok, I’m not saying I agree, but I at least understand why you’d put Reagan in there. Why would you lump Gorbachev in with him though?
Gorbachev oversaw the destruction of USSR that was one of the greatest humanitarian disasters in history. Forcible conversion to capitalism cost 3-7 million lives, and I personally had to live through that horror. All I can say is fuck Gorbachev.
full text https://sci-hub.se/10.1016/S0140-6736(17)33322-6
I don’t think I could reasonably dispute that it was a great humanitarian disaster. Or that Gorbachev was in charge at the time.
How was he responsible? Was he only responsible in a “well, he didn’t prevent it” sort of way? I’ve considered that a valid criticism of politicians I myself support… if you’re in office when it happens, it really is your fault. Sort of.
If so with Gorbachev, I’ll just leave it there and I guess I agree for as much as that’s worth.
Or is it more? Does he have more culpability even than that?
Gorbachev actively worked to undermine the system. He was responsible for the push for things like glasnost and perestroyka. He fostered the start of privatization which was ultimately what led to the disaster. He was an active driving force in creating that disaster.
Forgive me, it’s been a long time since the 1980s. Isn’t “glasnost” something like “freedom to criticize”? For that matter, wasn’t perestroyka “we don’t want to keep threatening mutual nuclear annihilation”?
How are those things bad?
The privatization I at least get, others have criticized it in various places and times before. Or is there some causal link I’m not seeing, where those things led to or caused the privatization?
Things aren’t always what they sound. Glasnost basically allowed private outlets to start pumping pro capitalist propaganda, and perestroyka paved the path towards privatization. None of this had anything to do with preventing nuclear annihilation. This is a pretty good discussion of what happened under Gorbachev.
Freedom of speech does allow assholes and idiots to make false claims, even to tell dangerous lies… something we’ve been reminded of just recently. But on what grounds should a government disallow propaganda, pro-capitalist or any other type?
Even if regrettable events result, is that not the right thing to do?
I will read more, I can’t really remember what perestroyka was supposed to mean… I would have been 11 or 12 at the time. In the literal sense, I think it was something like “thawing” as in the cold war itself, but I don’t really see the connection to privatization at least with what little I know of it.
On the grounds that certain speech is harmful to society. The reality is that no country has absolute freedom of speech. Calls for violence are illegal in most places, Germany bans glorification of fascism, and so on.
So, it’s not a binary question of whether freedom of speech is allowed or not, but rather what the right balance is. I don’t know on what basis westerners assume that they got this balance fundamentally right while everyone else got it wrong.
Perestroyka literally translates are restructuring. And the connection to privatization is that perestroyka was used to popularize the idea of shifting away from a purely socialist economy.