Thomas_More
Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
May I suggest we transfer to a new thread on religion and scrap the name of this thread which could confuse some?
Mao banned Beethoven because the composer had criticised the tyrant Napoleon – another of Mao’s heroes and likewise a suppressor of free thought and the press, who brooked no opposition and sent death squads beyond the borders of his control.
” Some historians have argued that capitalism could have been born first in Chinarather than in England.”
Developments were taking place as early as the Sung dynasty.
” which Mao wrongly called feudalism.’
The Chinese education system still promotes Mao’s fallacy, which misinterprets the whole of Chinese history from Chin Shih Huang to modern times.
It was Mao who imposed falsehood on China, just as he attempted to erase Chinese art, literature and history through the destruction of books, artefacts, temples, paintings, and smash the rights of anyone who wished to enjoy and learn from them. Just like Mao’s hero, the iconoclastic tyrant and fellow book-burner Chin himself!
Child labour in today’s China.
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2011/aug/27/disney-factory-sweatshop-suicide-claims
Economic miracle? For whom?
(Wages drop to $100 a month).My turn to quote from AI, but for the specific purpose of referring Grandpa to the assessment of Têng by Frank Dikötter the sinologist (NOT a member of our party!):
“Historian Frank Dikötter challenges the traditional narrative of Deng Xiaoping as the sole “architect” of China’s economic rise and political transition. His work—particularly in his book China After Mao (2022)—presents several core arguments regarding Deng:
• Grassroots Initiative vs. Top-Down Reform: While official Chinese Communist Party (CCP) history credits Deng’s “Reform and Opening” policies starting in 1978 with lifting hundreds of millions out of poverty, Dikötter argues that the true architects were ordinary Chinese citizens. He maintains that people in the countryside began breaking up communes, running underground factories, and operating black markets on their own initiative during the final years of the Cultural Revolution, forcing the hand of local authorities.
• Protecting the Party Legacy over Truth: Dikötter notes that after Mao Zedong’s death, Deng was central to the decision not to fully reckon with Mao’s crimes. Deng argued that criticizing Mao too harshly would mean criticizing the party itself and damaging its legitimacy, leading to the preservation of Mao’s image and the codification of the “Four Cardinal Principles” (including holding up Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought).
• No Political Liberalization: Dikötter emphasizes that political reform was never part of Deng’s agenda. Western hopes that economic opening would naturally lead to democracy proved misguided, as Deng maintained a rigid, authoritarian single-party state.
• A Cycle of Quick Fixes and Crises: Rather than a smooth “economic miracle,” Dikötter characterizes Deng’s economic era as a turbulent and winding road marked by unintended consequences, abrupt policy reversals, internal power struggles, and patches applied to a fundamentally dysfunctional planned economy.
Read more about his perspective and research through the academic review on Oxford Academic or an interview summary on The Diplomat.
Democracy Paradox
Frank Dikötter on the History of China After Mao
Frank Dikötter He is both the Lenin and the Stalin. So, there’s not a lot you can do about him. So, that’s the key point and Deng Xiaoping says this very clearl…
The Diplomat – Asia-Pacific Current Affairs Magazine
Frank Dikotter on How China Changed (and Didn’t) After Mao – The Diplomat
In his book *China After Mao*, Frank Dikotter, author of *The People’s Trilogy*, focuses on China’s economic reform era, which began in the late 1970s under Den…
Asia Society
Historian: China’s Economic Reforms Actually Started During the …
The great shift that catapulted China from economic stagnation to more than three decades of breakneck growth is generally attributed to the top-down “Reform an…
Sage Journals
Frank Dikötter, China After Mao: The Rise of a Superpower
Abstract Path to China’s economic transformation is best described as alternating between periods of success and periods of constraint. To fully comprehend Chin…
Oxford Academic
China after Mao: the rise of a superpower | International Affairs
Extract Many western observers of China hoped that, following Deng Xiaoping’s opening up in 1978, economic liberalization would lead to political liberalization…
YouTube·Hoover Institution
3m
Empire of Illusion: Frank Dikötter on Why China Isn’t a Superpower”(Notice I put the AI material, as always when I refer to it, between quotation marks.)
And he is also supporting the Great Man Theory of history.
I began studying modern China from the age of 12 when I worked on a school project. I had the advantage of books written before the state propagandas, on all sides, became available. I didn’t even come across any SPGB sources until well after my learning was well developed. As well as books by British sinologists I obtained sources from both Peking and Taipei. Sifting different sources of information I used DISCERNMENT, as one ought to, not blind following of any ideology, adolescent phases aside, which we all have but then grow out of.
Ciudanado, can you tell me which is the work where Stalin shows he knows what real socialism is? Is it “Marxism and Problems of Linguistics”?
He doesn’t bother to read our links because he assumes we slavishly follow what the SPGB says, although we are the SPGB, not followers. He also never refers to our points in our own posts here, no matter how much energy and effort we put in to replying to him. It is rude, actually.
He supports the capitalist class, not his own, working class, witness his praise of Têng Hsiao-p’ing who butchered workers.
And I already know what you’re going to say – and I didn’t get my knowledge of modern Chinese history from the SPGB.
In this case your response is even callous.
You associate us with Leninist atrocities, yet it is evident here that you not only put the interests of the capitalist class above those of your own class, you also support one-party dictatorship and are against democracy.
