Insightful commentary you have there comrade. The entire works of Karl Marx and Vladimir Lenin refuted by a sharp irony! The increase in the standards of living for millions of empoverished and exploited russians, chinese and cubans refuted by cylinder714 :-). I bet you also quote "Animal Farm" to refute the ‘The Single Greatest Educational Effort in Human History’ (https://www.languagemagazine.com/the-single-greatest-educati...) under communist China.
>increase in the standards of living for millions of empoverished and exploited russians, chinese and cubans
And to think, it only cost the lives of tens of millions of 'Russians'!
And that "educational effort" to steer children to denounce their own families and parents, commiting them to execution. That only cost tens of millions of Chinese lives too.
So despite your sarcasm, you seem to have provided exactly that information many already know: the achievements of communism are more important to communists than lives, but they are happy to use others lives both to justify their own actions and measure the success of communism!
Tens of millions of russians! Tens of millions of people die every year by capitalist exploitation. See, I can also give made up numbers.
In all seriousness, you can't make up numbers out of your ass. Do you know the lives of how many people costed to live under capitalism? How many died so we can have this computer, these clothes? The lives of how many exploited africans, asians and latinos it costed to make these things (computers, cellphones, clothes, but also grains, vegetables, food, oil, minerals)? How many millions die year by year because we live in a capitalist system, that values profit over lives?
The first world war was an imperialist war, where millions died because of a power struggle over African colonies. Thousands of workers were (and continue to be) killed protesting their working conditions. Millions of communists and suspected communists were killed in Indonesia and South America to defend capitalism.
The achievements of capitalism are more important to capitalists than lives, but they are happy to use others lives both to justify their own actions and measure the success of capitalism!
> How many died so we can have this computer, these clothes? The lives of how many exploited africans, asians and latinos it costed to make these things (computers, cellphones, clothes, but also grains, vegetables, food, oil, minerals)?
Not very many. Regarding Africa in particular, it's not actually a major mineral producer, it barely contributes anything [1].
Marxists insist that the global economy somehow depends on African children ineffectively toiling in cobalt mines, because they need to maintain their zero-sum moralistic vision of economic relations where African poverty explains the riches of the First World and vice versa. In reality, had Africans been richer, they'd have been able to develop their resources in a proper industrial fashion and invest into covering their own needs, to the common benefit of them and everyone else. The current state of Africa is undesirable for everyone. It's just that not every tragedy is a product of a conspiracy and exploitation by capitalists.
The Leninist policies are considered to have cost in the ballpark of 30 million lives. In the Tsarist rule ~1500 people were executed in a year at the extreme. In the communist days 1500 were killed in a day, but every day for 30 years.
The Moaists are considered to have killed 50 million.
"Capitalist Exploitation" - you mean businesses doing business?
Do you believe people will be exploited less under a different economic system? Why do you believe that?
> The Leninist policies are considered to have cost in the ballpark of 30 million lives.
[citation needed].
If you are considering transitory economic policies to be a condemnation of a whole economic and social system, then let me tell you about the Indian famines that regularly killed tens of millions of people on India, in a capitalist system, under the rule of a capitalist country (Great Britain). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_major_famines_in_I...
So there you have it, definite proof of the consequences of capitalist policies.
> The Moaists are considered to have killed 50 million.
Again, you can't just make numbers out your ass. Do you actually think that communists ordered the killing of 50 million people? Do you think that communists are just evil maniacs who like to kill people because communism means wanting to kill people? Are you really that ignorant or indoctrinated?
Maybe is projection. More than 1 million people were killed in Indonesia for the "crime" of being communists or communist sympathizers. The United States (a capitalist country) supported, financed, and celebrated those killings.
When anti-communists talk about "mass killings," it's all about projection: it was YOUR policies, not the communists', that killed millions of people. So they need to project onto others the crimes that capitalism is guilty of.
> Do you believe people will be exploited less under a different economic system? Why do you believe that?
Capitalism brought us to the point where we are now, on the brink of WW3, facing extinction from climate change, a demographic crisis in most countries of the world, pollution and contamination like never before, and the exploitation of millions of human beings so the top 0.1% can be more wealthy. Capitalism is not able to solve any of the existential and humanitarian crises that exist because it is the CAUSE of those problems. And the capitalist class profits from them. So yes, either we do a revolution and overthrow the capitalist class, or we face extinction, quite literally.
Wake up. Do you know what one revolution gets you? Back to where you started! But you cant see that, because its always someone else in the way of your success... the monarchs, the capitalist, the educated (said Pol Pot). Yes these pesky groups always keep you down and therefore they must be overthrown!
...but it also doesn't help to treat socialism and social-market-economy as synonyms. E.g. most Northern/Western European countries are not actually 'socialist', even though they are much more social than the "real socialist" countries of the Eastern Bloc.