this post was submitted on 04 Sep 2020
0 points (NaN% liked)

Main

15764 readers
398 users here now

THE MAIN RULE: ALL TEXT POSTS MUST CONTAIN "MAIN" OR BE ENTIRELY IMAGES (INLINE OR EMOJI)

(Temporary moratorium on main rule to encourage more posting on main. We reserve the right to arbitrarily enforce it whenever we wish and the right to strike this line and enforce mainposting with zero notification to the users because its funny)

A hexbear.net commainity. Main sure to subscribe to other communities as well. Your feed will become the Lion's Main!

Good comrades mainly sort posts by hot and comments by new!


gun-unity State-by-state guide on maintaining firearm ownership

guaido Domain guide on mutual aid and foodbank resources

smoker-on-the-balcony Tips for looking at financials of non-profits (How to donate amainly)

frothingfash Community-sourced megapost on the main media sources to radicalize libs and chuds with

just-a-theory An Amainzing Organizing Story

feminism Main Source for Feminism for Babies

data-revolutionary Maintaining OpSec / Data Spring Cleaning guide


ussr-cry Remain up to date on what time is it in Moscow

founded 4 years ago
MODERATORS
 

I know this seems like an obvious attempt to start a struggle session, but I promise I’m asking in a good faith attempt to learn:) y’all are way smarter and better read than any group I’ve ever been a part of before tbh

I’m listening to the rev left Stalin episode and they’re discussing the holodomor. Clearly a lot of what I thought I knew is capitalist propaganda. However, there also seems to be a possible motivation here to gloss over some of the bad elements of the USSR? I also feel slight alarm bells going off at some parts but idk why really, probably bc it brings up feelings associated w Holocaust denial, even though I know they’re v different issues.

I’m kinda new to the left so I don’t feel like I have the knowledge or the critical thinking skills to tackle this issue on my own.

It seems to boil down to: did the holodomor happen? If yes, was it intentional? If no, was it avoidable?

I’m sure this discussion has happened before so feel free to just link me to stuff haha. Insight appreciated!

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] Mardoniush@hexbear.net 1 points 4 years ago

This is great. just adding a few points

There were mismanagement issues by the Soviets as well which exacerbated the issue.

Misreporting by local Kulaks or corrupt officials meant that initially the Soviets continued grain exports (grain being one of the only trade options the Soviets had to get much needed agricultural machinery, because the west had shut down Soviet gold and mineral exports. This created a catch 22 where they needed to export grain they didn't have, or they wouldn't be able to have a secure grain production.)

This in turn caused a bunch of issues up and down the chain of command, where starvation panic and Kulak revolts were conflated. Measures to bring what they thought was a simple withdrawal of food supply (rather than the destruction of the supply) under control resulted in them not taking adequate famine prevention measures quickly enough, and removing remaining grain from the area.

Once senior officials did realise the scale of the disaster, the response was rapid. Stalin's writings are not thrilled.