Once again, this is an actual question; and I'm hoping to broaden my horizons and have a good conversation or two. I'm relatively new to commie subs, still trying to read political theory to figure out which one I like the most, so this might come off as uneducated. But why am I seeing so many positive posts about Stalin, followed by some comments that boil down to "Stalin was good, if you think he wasn't, that's just western propaganda" I'm thinking of the post that mentioned the 1921 Soviet Famine as a specific example.
I know that Stalin didn't create the famine, it was a byproduct of almost a decade of war, unrest, and a ton of other factors. But Stalin did do some bad shit. Things like sending 14 million people to gulags to work as slave labor, and killing millions more in his purges. I would argue that he used communism to become an authoritarian. Similar to how Putin is ruling now, stuffing ballot boxes, starting wars, and pushing propaganda. (I realize that we get pushed propaganda, too in the form of faux news, MSNBC, and most media outlets. I don't wish to have a discussion that boils down to "we do it too, you just don't see it")
As other have pointed out those numbers are way off but also i think its worth pointing out that Stalin didnt invent gulags (or political purges) it was a long standing system by then fuck Lenin was sent to one before the revolution, he and many other people in positions of power in the early USSR just used the tools they knew and were available.I think there are a lot of situations where socialists in the past have done things that are wrong but only in the sense of they should have been better rather than merely the same as capitalist and thats just a fucked way of thinking because they WERE better in so many other places. Also no one is saying Stalin was literally flawless but compared to what he is accused of he might as well be.
I dont think you can compare Lenins exile to gulags. Lenin had a generally chill time and enjoyed his exile. Gulags were not so pleasant.
Gulags were a continuation of the Tsarist Katorgas. The katorga camps weren’t some vacation.
They were starved of resources, employed forced labor for the empire, and inmates could be sentenced there for anything from common crimes to revolutionary beliefs (even common liberalism).
From the turbulent times post-revolution to post-WW2, the Gulags were a tool of their era to keep the country afloat while handling counter revolutionaries, actual Nazis, and common criminals.