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OP how much of today's markets and politics are definited by Oligarchs and the rich? Can you really say that a plutocracy isn't it's own kind of dictatorship?
Even more so, many westerners have been fooled by culture to think this is natural, inevitable, and good.
In terms of per capita rates, the Irish Catholic Church was incarcerating more of Irelands population than Stalin did to Russia during his reign.
Just two companies; The British East India company and the Belgian Rubber plantations of the Congo killed more people than Stalin or Mao (especially if you factor out the deaths from Lysenkoism, which wasn't a part of communism).
So early Capitalism and Colonialism killed far more than Communist dictatorships have....
And finally there is this to say - Communism is an economic system designed to interrupt plutocratic rule. It's not a governmental system of elections and checls and balances....
...and if we are to be the most up to date with this: China and Vietnam have Socialist Oriented Market Economies. The one in Vietnam, has almost eliminated homelessness entirely. Is that a dictatorship compared to the woes of the west's housing crisises?
Early systems from both economic models - Capitalism/Colonialism and Communism - both had events of mass killings. Both have seen dictatorships... You only focus on these things in the Communist model, because of your background. Likewise, someone from China or North Korea might hear more about the famines, deaths and genocides of the Capitalist and Colonial corporations I've mentioned above.
P.S. Are Cancer deaths from chemicals Capitalists kept on the "safe" list indicative of a dictatorship by the wealthy? What about the deaths and famines from weather disturbances in the climate? If we're counting the famines under Communism, then why not these things to? It's because of a hidden Western ideology/indoctrination culture.
Authoritarians everywhere: “You need my boot on your neck, because the other guy’s boot will be even worse!”
True, but when one system becomes sufficiently crushing, it's best to popularize an alternative so the guy in the boot has to focus on other things for a moment.
If the boot changes colour and doctrine, and becomes crushing again, I'll happily advocate for a free market system to distract him again...
Or perhaps some third system such as a mix of communitarianism, distributism, and Georgism. I'm not going to be particularly ideological in this.
...and the Truth is we're speeding towards a techno-feudalism (it's no longer Capitalism when places like Amazon dictate prices and promotions to both producers/sellers and consumers/buyers, that's not Capitalism anymore), so unless you like licking that particular boot, your noted point may not actually serve anything than a heavier foot.
I think it’s more helpful to identify that the issue is boots on our neck, not who is wearing them. What’s the point of fighting for a new government that’s hardly better than the last?
Even if there’s no clear alternative focused on human liberation today, it’s better to build consciousness so that one can be created than tug of war back and forth between tyrants with different colored flags.
The road to autocracy is paved with people who meet every criticism of the system with, "But look at how bad this other system is!"
It's really not. It's mostly nepotism and reproducing the an untouchable ruling class that creates an autocracy. Put simply; when one system goes too far into autocracy, you should entertain the values of another system.
Condemning that is approving of the current autocrats. But perhaps you're a particular fan of Trump/Musk.
It really is.
And all along the way, people protecting the budding autocracy from criticism by diverting attention to the faults of some other system in some other place and/or time.
Um... sure. But that's neither what you were doing nor what I was criticizing, so it's not relevant.
So... condemning people trying to shift attention away from the current autocrats by bitching about some totally different aurocrats is protecting the current autocrats?
Are you even trying to make sense any more, or are you just desperately stringing together random claims?
Just desperately stringing together random claims. Got it.
How so? Lysenkoism was wholely a result of the political ideology (environment determines wholely a crops' yield), supressing scientific results (genetic differences exist).
No where in Communism does it say to fake one's scientific results in order to simulate higher crop yields. That's not part of the doctrine. That's why it became known as Lysenkoism, because it came down to one con man.
Had the same man been born into the position under a different system, a similar result could emerge. If he were a UN director for farming undee Capitalism a similar result could occur.
Was it an inevitable byproduct of Communist doctrine that would have occurred no matter who Stalin picked? No. Did it happen in Vietnam and Cuba because of the doctrines there? No. So whilst Stalin chose him because he was told he was a good working class lad, doesn't make Lysenko's deceptions part of communism. They're not written into it anywhere.
It happens all the time. Take Theranos as an example.
The famine and millions of death are a consequence of the communist doctrine of not having different ideas compete, and have market forces reward the better ideas. Instead they took Lysenko's ideas as true, implemented it nationwide, forbidding competing ideas, because it was politically agreeable. That is communist doctrine.
I'd argue it always takes ignoring reality, favouring faulty wishfull and selective thinking, to be communist.