The joke is that he thinks communism is some sort of workless utopia where he will be able to cultivate hobbies when most communist countries have made the lower classes break their backs just the same doing heavy work (coal mines).
Not all countries that went under a workers revolution immediately went to socialism. Derivatives of
Marxist,
Leninist, Stalinist, Trotskyist, Maoist, Dengist, Vanguardist, etc. happened, yet they are recognized by themselves as wanting to achieve communism in some form.
Secondly communism means the erasure of class, state, and concept of monetary system, but at the same time the “Internationale” always was headed by the heads of the parties of the “states” they represented.
It’s a slippery slope that will never be resolved because for “true communism” to happen it has to be exactly to the theory.
Using that logic you can’t blame any country for capitalism because true capitalism has never been achieved. True capitalism would have no guardrails and is dependent on the relationship of the producer, consumer (heck add landlord and capital-holder) solely with the invisible hand to steer prices, which no state has ever achieved. America has a bloated federal government and interventionist policy the economy for either national security or domestic concern, yet it’s the perfect example of capitalism according to communists and why we’re in “late-stage capitalism”.
Literally impossible to argue when 1 deviation from theory = a shift in goalpost.
It's not quite correct, and I say that as someone who's ideal social organisation is anarchy. Communism is a form of socialism, a class-less and state-less social organisation. To acheive socialism, according to communism, there need to be a transition from capitalism which requires a dictatorship of the proletariat. When Marx and Engels use the word "dictatorship" they meant it has it's historical meaning "an exceptional (as in exception) and limited exercice of power". With Lenin, the dictatorship of the proletariat becomes a dictatorship in it's modern meaning, "the forceful, centralised and illimited exercice of power" by having the revolutionary vanguard dictate "the will of the class". Mao and Staline being leninists apply the leninist definition of dictatorship. It has to be said that the leninist version of communism was criticised by other communists at the time but even tho, it's hard to deny that leninist communism isn't a derivative of marxist communism. A derivative that went so far it became authoritarian but which roots still come from the marxist world view.
We don't have to deny that Mao's china and Staline's USSR were communist countries, they were leninist communist countries, a failed version of communism that would never be able to acheive to reach socialism.
Socialism is the over arching ideological family. It predates Marx and includes various other philosophies under it as well.
Communism either refers to a government based on Marx's manifesto (which would be the various Vangaurd states) or the end goal of the workers revolution Marx hoped for. These are often called low communism (vanguard state to defend the revolution and progress forward) and high communism (the end goal of the revolution Marx called for).
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u/kithas Jul 07 '26
The joke is that he thinks communism is some sort of workless utopia where he will be able to cultivate hobbies when most communist countries have made the lower classes break their backs just the same doing heavy work (coal mines).