This made me think about comparing the experience with how it’s done in China. Most convenience stores have a small terminal where you can self scan and scan your phone to pay. There are probably cameras, but definitely no sign accusing people of stealing. Then again crime is less common in large part because of people having economic opportunities. That said, there’s nearly always someone there, and grocery stores generally don’t use an automated system.
Besides other western countries are finally losing the blind trust they had of the US. They still can’t do much about it, but they are increasingly recognizing that, as Kissinger’s famous dictum puts it: “It may be dangerous to be America’s enemy but to be America’s friend is fatal”
It’s every stage of capitalism. The cumulative waste and suffering inflicted by capitalism might be humanities greatest tragedy.
Economic growth itself is just a number, development is what matters. In addition and as a part of development I also specifically mentioned education and improvement of quality of life. You could add literacy, housing, levels of nourishment, and much, much more.
I won’t argue about history or its interpretations with you now. Just consider the path to development wealthy capitalist countries took, which involved slavery, colonialism, genocide, brutal worker suppression, and perhaps the worse working conditions in history during industrialisation.
You may attribute many horible things to communist countries. I might argue much of this is exaggerated by the media of the anti-comunist country you live in. Even if it is all true, developed capitalist countries did the same to themselves, and other peoples around the globe.
Then consider the development communist countries have had compared to undeveloped capitalist countries. People can have better lives, that is what matters.
Individuals in struggling societies don’t always atomize, many revolutions occurred due to degradation in conditions. When the cost of fighting for change is less than doing nothing you will fight, and you will fight with others, or else you will quickly fail and be forgotten.
Curious what your definition of facism is. With a few exceptions, communist inclined states have always lead to unprecedented economic development, education, improvement of quality of life, etc. If you take all cold war propaganda at face value, you can not deny the development seen in such states; when balanced by alleged atrocities, you see a stark contrast to colnialist nations that too committed atrocities but with little to show for it.
I find the surface level historical criticisms of communist states, even if applied at an equaly superficial level, is applied to capitalist states, you would find a staggering contradiction. Maybe you should read more. Add to your socioeconomic calculus the fact that no communist state benefited from the same starting point as colonizer countries, and try to be critical of this. Consider that none of these communist states had the benifits of colonization, and when compared to other developing countries did remarkably better.
The point is not about impact but intention. Evidently liberalism, for all its flaws, certainly has had a significant impact. The progressive forces 250 years ago where for the most part already proto socialists. Fundamentally liberalism has been reactionary, even in the case of feudalism and monarchy, liberalism has tended to air for maintaining monarchy; such as constitutional monarchies where one can find leberals having preference for this rather than republics. This can be observed in historical cases such as France where many liberals wished to maintain the monarchy, but the contradictions and progressive forces where too great. Rather than a progressive force, I would contend that liberalism tends to be reactionary to development and progressive forces. Today this can be seen in the liberal leaders of developing countries handicapping themselves and their sovereignty by maintaining economic relations to the benefit of the imperial core. See ECOWAS and ‘preserving democracy’ as of late.
Curious if you could elaborate. Authority is complicated. Perhaps you should read this relatively short text by Engels.
The point is that liberalism and facism are intrinsically linked. Liberalism does not seek to change the world and stems from philosophies instead seeking to explain it. Accordingly, liberalism is a philosophical justification for the capitalist status quo. As such, when contradictions in capitalism accentuate with time, such as those between classes, liberalism turns to fascism. Scratch a liberal and a fascist bleeds, because the liberal is a closet fascist when times are good; when class struggle poses a threat, it clamps down. You can see this throughout history.
That a poor, simplified explanation, but I hope it helps.
I know a wealthy Chinese family, their kid has US citizenship, but I can tell they are starting to have a crisis. They clearly recognize things are getting worse in the US, but they have invested a lot of time and money into the US, such as buying a house and getting green cards. Despite that, they have not opted to have their kid go to school in China. Even those Chinese people that are the most receptive to the US and it’s propaganda, those wealthy libs with vested interest, are recognizing it.