Anti-communists when a capitalist acts like a capitalist: “That’s just corruption, not real capitalism. And if it is capitalism, that’s just human nature, so we can’t do anything about it.”
Anti-communists when a “communist” or “socialist” doesn’t act like a communist: “Why aren’t communists personally taking credit for what this person/party did and using it as reason to be ashamed of communism as a whole and never want anything to do with it.”
Side note, IIRC Parenti talks about this in Blackshirts and Reds. Not about Pol Pot specifically, but about the phenomenon of fascists using similar rhetoric to communists to garner popular support. But notably, they did not support people materially with bottom up power the way the communists did/do; the opposite, in fact. So it matters a lot to look at the practice of what a “communist” group is doing, not just what they have as an ideological line.
Anti-communists when a capitalist acts like a capitalist: “That’s just corruption, not real capitalism. And if it is capitalism, that’s just human nature, so we can’t do anything about it.”
Anti-communists when a “communist” or “socialist” doesn’t act like a communist: “Why aren’t communists personally taking credit for what this person/party did and using it as reason to be ashamed of communism as a whole and never want anything to do with it.”
Side note, IIRC Parenti talks about this in Blackshirts and Reds. Not about Pol Pot specifically, but about the phenomenon of fascists using similar rhetoric to communists to garner popular support. But notably, they did not support people materially with bottom up power the way the communists did/do; the opposite, in fact. So it matters a lot to look at the practice of what a “communist” group is doing, not just what they have as an ideological line.