(10-26-2011, 09:07 PM)FireIceTalon Wrote: I thought I made the post crystal clear. What is there not to understand about it? Democracy and Totalitarianism are fundamental opposites (I think all can agree on this). For a true communist society to exist, democracy must be present first (there is no debating this either, unless you just jump on the popular bandwagon without actually reading Marx's work, but then one has no credibility in such a case). If a state is Totalitarian, then it isn't communist, or is so only in name, but certainly not in practice. I fail to see how this does not make any sense. Rosa Luxemburg was Communist (she valued equality, freedom, democracy, and the rights of workers, and no or minimal state control), Stalin was Totalitarian (he valued complete state control and his own personal power, nothing else). If this doesn't make sense, then I don't know what does.
You can spend your days fluttering around with definitions if you like. The rest of the world is interested in Communism. That is to say, the political movement. The historical phenomenon. The parties, countries, and individuals who have identified themselves as Communist. Saying only Rosa Luxemburg was a Communist, and that Lenin, Castro, Stalin, Trotsky, etc... weren't, is like saying Mother Teresa is history's only Christian. It makes it impossible to talk about it sensibly.
What you are talking about is no more sensible, or relevant, than the bickering that goes on at the fringes of religious movements about who is a "true" Christian, Muslim, Zoroastrian, whatever.
No true scotsman. There is no faster way to render your argument specious and meaningless, than emptying the set to preserve its purity - if there are no Communists, then nobody cares that Communism never killed anyone. You might as well say that all Communists live on the moon, or that Communism comes with whipped cream and sparkles, because nobody can contradict you.
-Jester