I'm not a socialist by any means (well, I have been called one by republicans...) but I've always hated this argument. The USSR and China are the only two I'm aware of that weren't massively screwed over in their infancy by the US, and/or (usually and) manipulated by the USSR.

[–] huge_clock@lemmy.world 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Then you shouldn’t go around saying it’s “empirically true” because at best there is no evidence.

[–] OurToothbrush@lemmy.ml -3 points 1 year ago

I've literally cited evidence before you left this comment lmao.

[–] OurToothbrush@lemmy.ml -2 points 1 year ago

The USSR was literally invaded in its infancy by France Britain and the US. Trust me the USSR was getting fucked with by bourgeois dictatorships since the beginning.

[–] OurToothbrush@lemmy.ml -1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Cuba, Vietnam, and Laos for starters China went from a century of humiliation to a superpower in less then a century thanks to socialism. The USSR was better than the feudalism before it or the dictatorships of the bourgeoisie that came after it by a wide margin. For a place much poorer than the US, they had similar nutrition, better education, more rights for women both legalistically and practically.

Oh, throw in east Germany too. Do you know what the Stasi did to the lgbt movement that they saw as subversive? Destroy it by ending discrimination against gay and trans people, including a massive education campaign to eradicate homophobia and transphobia and state funded gay bars. Compare that to how the US was treating gay people at the time.