How Soon We Forget
Amazing isn't it? A Russian autocrat setting the stage for the social rehabilitation of one of history's greatest tyrants. One who, most certainly, would qualify as the head of a nation responsible for gross human rights violations, ethnic cleansing, genocide, and war crimes under the definition the United Nations used to designate their 2005-enacted "Responsibility to Protect" doctrine.
Apart from the fact that Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili (aka Joseph Stalin) became a murderous dictator, intent on removing all political rivals to consolidate his single supreme rule over the Soviet Union, his regime of terror would have earned him supreme and ongoing censure from the world body had it existed at the time, and had the full extent of his crimes against humanity been known at the time.
His dedication to Communism and the Marxist state was almost equal to his dedication to his personal entitlement as supreme ruler of conquered and dependent nations whose resources he took great pleasure in absorbing as his own to do with as he would. Under his avuncularly cunning direction, tens of millions of people died, of various causes, including starvation and disease.
He singled out the intelligentsia, professionals, and kulaks alike for eradication, as presenting as nuisance elements restricting the expansion of the socialist ideal. The state would provide the basic necessities of life for its people, and the people would submit to the supremacy of the state, accepting the social rigours of objectification, and utter lack of independence as human beings.
Any who spoke out publicly against his implacable presence, including those who had the temerity to question the social/political direction of his regime of oppression and terror, if not murdered outright, found themselves living a slow and agonizing death in one of the slave-labour northern gulags.
After making common cause with Nazi Germany, Russia was faced with defending itself against its erstwhile Axis partner, and in the process, suffered a greater national death-toll than that of the entire world combined during World War II.
The forced collectivization of agriculture, inclusive of the forced starvation of Ukraine when all its harvests were denied its starving peasants and trucked into Russia claimed millions of lives. The rapid industrialization of the USSR exploited another kind of slave labour where people toiled with little say in how their lives were being wasted.
Agriculture failed, and so did the initially-successful industries simply because people who have no personal stake in their labour have no interest in labouring for the collective. During the nuclear age the Soviet Union presented as an evil empire to much of the world outside its union, as paranoid and troubling as its leader.
It was Nikita Kruschev who finally admitted to the world at large the monster that Stalin was. And the former president condemned Stalin for the monster that he was, for the immense and incalculable harm he did to millions of people. And now, after all this time, Moscow, led by its prime minister, is resuscitating the fond memory of that monster.
Vladimir Putin does not believe it is salutary for Russians to dwell on the unfortunate fact that over 26 million Russians died between 1941 and 1945, and that the nation should focus adoringly on the victorious leadership of Joseph Stalin, its wartime saviour. Re-writing realty.
Apart from the fact that Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili (aka Joseph Stalin) became a murderous dictator, intent on removing all political rivals to consolidate his single supreme rule over the Soviet Union, his regime of terror would have earned him supreme and ongoing censure from the world body had it existed at the time, and had the full extent of his crimes against humanity been known at the time.
His dedication to Communism and the Marxist state was almost equal to his dedication to his personal entitlement as supreme ruler of conquered and dependent nations whose resources he took great pleasure in absorbing as his own to do with as he would. Under his avuncularly cunning direction, tens of millions of people died, of various causes, including starvation and disease.
He singled out the intelligentsia, professionals, and kulaks alike for eradication, as presenting as nuisance elements restricting the expansion of the socialist ideal. The state would provide the basic necessities of life for its people, and the people would submit to the supremacy of the state, accepting the social rigours of objectification, and utter lack of independence as human beings.
Any who spoke out publicly against his implacable presence, including those who had the temerity to question the social/political direction of his regime of oppression and terror, if not murdered outright, found themselves living a slow and agonizing death in one of the slave-labour northern gulags.
After making common cause with Nazi Germany, Russia was faced with defending itself against its erstwhile Axis partner, and in the process, suffered a greater national death-toll than that of the entire world combined during World War II.
The forced collectivization of agriculture, inclusive of the forced starvation of Ukraine when all its harvests were denied its starving peasants and trucked into Russia claimed millions of lives. The rapid industrialization of the USSR exploited another kind of slave labour where people toiled with little say in how their lives were being wasted.
Agriculture failed, and so did the initially-successful industries simply because people who have no personal stake in their labour have no interest in labouring for the collective. During the nuclear age the Soviet Union presented as an evil empire to much of the world outside its union, as paranoid and troubling as its leader.
It was Nikita Kruschev who finally admitted to the world at large the monster that Stalin was. And the former president condemned Stalin for the monster that he was, for the immense and incalculable harm he did to millions of people. And now, after all this time, Moscow, led by its prime minister, is resuscitating the fond memory of that monster.
Vladimir Putin does not believe it is salutary for Russians to dwell on the unfortunate fact that over 26 million Russians died between 1941 and 1945, and that the nation should focus adoringly on the victorious leadership of Joseph Stalin, its wartime saviour. Re-writing realty.
Labels: Human Relations, Realities, Whoops
posted by Pieface @ 12:31 PM
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