Comment by Tech-Noir | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Tech-Noir | Hacker News Reader

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> You wrote this, not me.

I'm not sure what point you're missing here. If you invade another country, particularly with the intention of commiting genocide there, and you get killed for doing so, you are not a victim of the country you were trying to wipe out, or its ideology, you're a victim of your own actions.

> Yes, I noticed, you seem to think that as long as you and yours are fine, it does not matter if millions of other people are killed.

Okay, explain how the lives of the majority of people in Russia would have been improved under Nazi occupation than under Communism.

> Are you saying that those who had killed more people are perfectly fine, as long as they were killing people you do not particularly approve of?

"Communism" has not killed more people. That's simply a fantasy based on an absurd publication denounced as fictitious even by its own authors.

> communists, who did kill more people

So you keep insisting. Who are you trying to convince, me or you?

> you do not consider those killed to be people [...] worth counting.

I don't believe people who were not killed by Communism should be counted as being killed by Communism.

> What does it have to do with anything?

What does any of this thread have to do with your incorrect insistence, supported by no credible source, that the famine of 1921 was a "forced famine"?

> I have heard there are quite a few people who do not think that many Jews were killed by nazis. And there are different numbers, too

And do you accept any of their different numbers?

> Who, do you think, those people really do not like to associate with?

This is you being not cagey again, I presume.

> I'm not sure what point you're missing here. If you invade another country, particularly with the intention of commiting genocide there, and you get killed for doing so, you are not a victim of the country you were trying to wipe out, or its ideology, you're a victim of your own actions.

You do realize that it was the USSR (or Soviet Russia, depends on timing) that invaded Baltics, Western Ukraine, Central Asia, etc. etc. You may want to stop arguing about your fantasies and try talking about something that has basis in actual history.

> Okay, explain how the lives of the majority of people in Russia would have been improved under Nazi occupation than under Communism.

Ethnic makeup of survivors would be different. It is very much uncertain if the numbers would be much different. You do realize that mortality in Soviet prison camps during peace time was same or higher than in German labor camps (obviously not extermination camps) during the war?

> "Communism" has not killed more people. That's simply a fantasy based on an absurd publication denounced as fictitious even by its own authors.

Sadly, it is a basic fact, arguments are only about by how much exactly. Saloth Sar alone did ~1/10th of what Nazis did, and that without even invading anyone.

Bleatings of "Marxist historians" or useful idiots like Chomsky do not qualify as valid criticism anywhere.

> So you keep insisting. Who are you trying to convince, me or you?

I am just stating an obvious, well-attested fact.

> I don't believe people who were not killed by Communism should be counted as being killed by Communism.

Are you going to play the well-tired card of "but Stalin (Mao, etc. etc.) were not real, proper communists?

> What does any of this thread have to do with your incorrect insistence, supported by no credible source, that the famine of 1921 was a "forced famine"?

Taking the last grain, including seed grain, from, peasants (e.g. Prodrazverstka; you may want to look in Lenin's collected works for details) is exactly that -- forced famine.

> And do you accept any of their different numbers?

No, should I? You seem to be perfectly happy to take any number that makes your murderous heroes look good.

> This is you being not cagey again, I presume.

(sigh)

> You may want to stop arguing about your fantasies and try talking about something that has basis in actual history.

You may want to start taking your own advice. Try here first:

https://www.google.com/search?q=operation+barbarossa

> It is very much uncertain if the numbers would be much different.

No, it's extremely certain the numbers would be very different, since we know what the Nazis had planned for Eastern and Central Europe. So when you've finished with the above link, move on to this one:

https://www.google.com/search?q=generalplan+ost

> arguments are only about by how much exactly

Each author, by pulling a different number out of thin air, is saying the other author of the same book is wrong. Which would be laughable if some people didn't pretend take such nonsense seriously.

I say "pretend" because I don't believe for one second anyone using those numbers sincerely believes them, any more than they sincerely care about any of the actual, genuine victims beyond using them to score political points.

> Are you going to play the well-tired card of "but Stalin (Mao, etc. etc.) were not real, proper communists?

No, I'm going to say, again, that if someone wasn't killed by Communism they should not be counted as being killed by Communism.

What's interesting is that most of the victims of Stalin's purges were "proper Communists", a fact that right-wingers who cry crocodile tears over them always forget to mention for some reason.

> Taking the last grain, including seed grain, from, peasants (e.g. Prodrazverstka [...] is exactly that -- forced famine.

Prodrazverstka is not at all that:

    Bolsheviks borrowed the idea from the grain razvyorstka
    introduced in the Russian Empire during World War I, in 1916.

    [In 1918] the reserves of grain ran low, causing hunger among
    the urban population [...] In order to satisfy minimal food
    needs, the Soviet government introduced strict control over the
    food surpluses of the prosperous rural households.  

    Lenin believed that prodrazvyorstka was the only possible way
    to procure sufficient amounts of grain and other agricultural
    products for the population of the cities during the civil war.

    Prodrazvyorstka allowed the Soviet government to solve the
    important problem of supplying the [...] urban population

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prodrazvyorstka

> No, should I?

Then why accept any of the different numbers, that the authors themselves can't even agree are accurate, in the Black Book of Communism?

> (sigh)

If you're Jewish then just say so; don't imply it, whether it's true or not, to try and score points in an argument.

1. Because these are the best numbers available for crimes of communists. And really, arguing whether communists killed 5 times as many people as nazis, or only 3 times as much might be an important discussion, but not in this context.

2. It should not matter. And really, I just do not want to associate with people who think it should.

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