My dad called me one last week. I told him I’m not even a communist, just a moderate social democrat who likes Soviet symbols for the shock value. (Not true, I’m a Marxist-Leninist, but gotta keep the peace with family, IYKYK.) But now I’m wondering, is “Stalinism” even a thing? Are any of you bears “Stalinists”?
I don’t say that exact line, I just say “Stalinism doesn’t exist, that’s what Trotskyists call Marxist-Leninists.” And I don’t use “Reaganism” as a term either, I call it what it was - Cold War Christianity in an ecumenical alliance with American Civil Religion, and the rise of the Religious Right.
I’d say that the only person who’s ever called me a Stalinist to my face probably doesn’t actually know what that term means. He doesn’t know why the Nazis were bad, either, and he doesn’t know what a communist actually is.
I’d say by your definition I’m definitely not a Stalinist. I think that the excessive power of the bureaucracy and the gulag system were some of the black marks on the USSR’s history that socialists should learn from and not repeat, while also learning from the USSR’s successes, so. Yeah. Definitely not a fan of “Stalinism”.
‘Reaganism’ is what they called neo liberalism cause he (for all intents and purposes, I know carter did get the ball rolling) started it.
Oh, that. I’ve never heard or used that term. I just call it neoliberalism.