Anti-Communism

[Susan]

Which regimes have killed more people: capitalistic or communistic regimes?

Have the ''mass killings'' by Communist countries been exaggerated by some people/authors/history books, etc? How many has Communism actually killed? Does Communism pose any real danger, etc.?

As you can see, there are several issues at hand...

[Mike Cl]

Which regimes have killed more people: capitalistic or communistic regimes?

Have the ''mass killings'' by Communist countries been exaggerated by some people/authors/history books, etc? How many has Communism actually killed? Does Communism pose any real danger, etc.?

As you can see, there are several issues at hand...

Not sure how to make any comparison that makes sense.  Must define the two terms--capitalism and communism-- before a comparison can be made.  For example, what is communism?  Have there ever been a govt. based upon Marx's definition? I don't think so off the top of my head.  I think each govt. that claims to be based upon communist teachings ends up being quite different.  Same with capitalism.  Do we have pure Adam Smith capitalism in this country?  Have we ever had it?  Seems we have a mixed bag of stuff we call capitalist which is mixed with socialism and corporationism.   

It would take a book to sort this all out--something I'm not going to do.

[Shiranu]

Which regimes have killed more people: capitalistic or communistic regimes?

Have the ''mass killings'' by Communist countries been exaggerated by some people/authors/history books, etc? How many has Communism actually killed? Does Communism pose any real danger, etc.?

As you can see, there are several issues at hand...

Without researching the numbers and going purely off the top of my head (i.e. - of zero worth)...

Capitalism has arguably killed and tortured more due to it being so intrinsically linked to imperialism (both "traditional" iron and shot as well as "soft" imperialism like corporate exploitation of the third world) and it's longer history, but given enough time and similar circumstances and communism likely would be equal.

Yes.
Who knows? Far too many for it to have any justification as a system, anyways.
Yes; any ideology that advocates for violence as a means to achieve it's goal inherently poses danger.

[Hydra009]

Which regimes have killed more people: capitalistic or communistic regimes?

Have the ''mass killings'' by Communist countries been exaggerated by some people/authors/history books, etc? How many has Communism actually killed? Does Communism pose any real danger, etc.?

As you can see, there are several issues at hand...

That's a *LOT* of ground to cover, and quite the combustible material to work with.

And I'll echo the calls to define your terms, since communism is commonly used as an epithet for literally anything someone doesn't like ("communism" ranges from Dr Seuss books to vegan meat to any instance of government regulation or taxation whatsoever) and capitalism is similarly somewhat nebulous (mercantilism?  laissez-faire?  welfare?  late-stage?)

But I will offer this: much is to be feared by the man of one book as well as a simplistic understanding of human nature and economics.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Yep, one's "just as bad as the other".

[Susan]

I am sorry that I am not keeping up with the thread, RL has been really tough this month or so. 😭

[LinuxGal]

Which regimes have killed more people: capitalistic or communistic regimes?

Have the ''mass killings'' by Communist countries been exaggerated by some people/authors/history books, etc? How many has Communism actually killed? Does Communism pose any real danger, etc.?

As you can see, there are several issues at hand...

My answer to the Argumentum ad Stalinum is to point out the genocidal dictators were also men, in every case, so the problem may be testosterone more than communism.  Correlation is not causation.

[Hydra009]

I mean, I think we can reasonably conclude that authoritarian/dictatorial governments are undesirable and that command economies don't work very well.  There's a reason why existing communist countries operate on a mixed market economy as do a lot of capitalist countries.

[Susan]

authoritarian/dictatorial governments

Not directly related to the questions made by me in the OP, but since I'm not American, I would like to ask you and/or the others: would it be correct to describe the Trump government (2017-2021) as "fascist"?

[Hydra009]

Not directly related to the questions made by me in the OP, but since I'm not American, I would like to ask you and/or the others: would it be correct to describe the Trump government (2017-2021) as "fascist"?

Yes.  And this would have been super obvious if the redcaps had been able to install Trump as an unelected ruler by overriding the rule of law and democracy through violence on Jan 6th.

[Susan]

Thnaks for the explanation.

[aitm]

I think capitalism existed for about 3 maybe 4 years sometime about the late 1600's around New England area, but mostly restricted to beaver trappers......

[Unbeliever]

I like beaver - oh, wait, you mean the animal... 🦫

[Susan]

What about Cuba? Is it a really bad country (as in, poor, etc)?

[Mr.Obvious]

Two of my colleagues are going there for holiday next week, for holiday, for a while. I´ll have them check it out ;)