Comment by sien
15 hours ago
It's remarkable how quickly Communism collapsed in Eastern Europe the moment Soviet support went.
Despite decades of intense propaganda, killings of people in uprisings and the methods of Stasi as described in the article.
Even with all that effort most people didn't believe in the regime.
So it's hard to say whether the Stasi's tactics worked. Only people in the regimes like Ceausescu and Honecker actually thought people liked it. And perhaps not even them.
As for your last point, Solzhenitzyn said something memorable about that -
'We know that they are lying, they know that they are lying, they even know that we know they are lying, we also know that they know we know they are lying too, they of course know that we certainly know they know we know they are lying too as well, but they are still lying. In our country, the lie has become not just moral category, but the pillar industry of this country.'
It makes you wonder if 'disinformation' actually works if the mass propaganda of totalitarian regimes fails so dramatically.
There is an interesting book called 'Not Born Yesterday' that points out that people are pretty skeptical .
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/45358676-not-born-yester...
Russian disinformation campaigns the past 20 years have been outrageously effective.
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In our time, the lie has become the pillar industry of the internet.
I love it how Americans point to such quotes without realizing that this is how most corporate jobs function.
Any large, hierarchical organization is likely to end up resembling this, be it public or private.
By the way, this American is Norwegian and didn't even set foot on US territory until my early twenties... :)
A thousand big companies is still better than one gigantic state company. I’d prefer a million small companies though
If people believed in the regime, they wouldn't have needed a Stasi to impose it upon them.
Soviet support? More like Soviet control.
And also intimidation and threats. All of the the regimes collapsed swiftly once Gorbachev declared there will be no Soviet military response, like there was in 1956 and 1968. One wonders what would have happened if Poland in 1981 didn't feel like the Soviets will repeat that; there are some reasons to believe they would not.
As someone from a post-Communist country, unfortunately it didn't, exactly. The former ruling class just switched colours and looted the country during the "privatisation" phase of democratisation. People were never properly educated on democracy and stuff, and most of the parties that sprung up were just pure garbage interested in looting.
30 years on, the political landscape is still a disaster. Media is a shit show in the hands of a few. A lot of the older people (40+) long for the "good old days". A lot of the young have ran away for better opportunities. Democratic participation is very low.
The fall of the Communist regimes and subsequent liberalisation and democratisation were managed incredibly poorly in most of those countries. Yes, standards of living are much better, but if you ask a lot of the people, things are worse (because they're incapable of introspection, have been fed propaganda on Facebook and shit media, etc).
The communism collapsed because it was no longer possible to keep the knowledge of the 80s American supermarket hidden from them. That's it. If the communist regime provided what CCP does now - there would be absolutely no collapse.
And yet the CCP won't allow any elections.
If the CCP did, how many of them would get elected ?
You know, USSR had elections, and people actually went and voted.
Actual support from the people was not wanted or needed by these regimes. They were content with having support by their party lapdogs, the kinds of people with no skills or personality, that would inform on their peers and magically become the factory's overseer. Those people owed everything to the system and they were the key to it continuing.
Everyone else was just kept in line. They set up both positive and negative incentives. Be neutral and you can live an OK life. Be a good communist and you can climb socially. Meet your West German uncle too often, or don't show up to the Labor Day parade and get a threatening talk. Actually voice your opposition to the regime and you may well find yourself in a Stasi torture prison.
Socialist doctrine said that socialism would be so good that people would soon(TM) embrace it organically. Of course they didn't, because it never delivered on anything and some western media still made it behind the iron curtain. Seeing a western supermarket shelf while you had to bribe someone to get spare parts for your washing machine is stronger than any propaganda.