Does Greece have the highest percentage of Horrible People in the world?

[SATW]

If we're doing this by how many people vote for f'cking awful parties, then Russia is a lot worse in this (UR+CPRF+LD+Rod.)

(And now I hate myself for mentioning Russia in a BRTD thread)

I'm talking about in real elections, not sham ones.

-They are real elections.

Please stop. I've learned to respect a lot of your insights - even if they are somewhat trollish and I disagree w/ them - but you can't seriously believe Russia has a legitimate political system.

[Chunk Yogurt for President!]

Greece>Minnesota.

[(Still) muted by Kalwejt until March 31]

If we're doing this by how many people vote for f'cking awful parties, then Russia is a lot worse in this (UR+CPRF+LD+Rod.)

(And now I hate myself for mentioning Russia in a BRTD thread)

I'm talking about in real elections, not sham ones.

-They are real elections.

Please stop. I've learned to respect a lot of your insights - even if they are somewhat trollish and I disagree w/ them - but you can't seriously believe Russia has a legitimate political system.

-What do you mean by "legitimate political system"? It's about as legitimate as that which prevailed between 1816 and 1822 in the U.S.

Russia's presidential election results line up with the opinion poll results. Voter fraud is more common than in the U.S., but it does not seriously impact major election results.

Russia runs on the basis of consensus politics, much like Japan or Singapore, not closely-contested elections like the U.S.. It is also much more a government of men and not of laws than the U.S. That makes the issue of who will be Putin's successor a much thornier issue than who will be Trump's.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

It is pretty amazing how successful the KKE is, all things considered. I mean most Stalinist cults in Europe are a) edgy social democrats or b) exclusively voted for by old people, but the KKE has power. Like, even amidst that weird period where Samaras was PM and people thought Syriza was the bee's knees, they still managed to beat Syriza lists in things like the official student union election.

As to whether their voters and cadre are terrible people, meh. Obviously the cadre that remained with the party rather than eurocommunist KKE (int) were pretty dismal and idealogically blinkered, I wouldn't call the whole voter base bad. It's a ludicrous, yet harmless cult.

[NOVA Green]

Absolutely bizarre that BRTD now has an obsession with the Communist Party of Greece....

Apparently he is unaware of the history of Europe under the resistance against Fascism and Nazi occupation, where the Communists were actually the Freedom Fighters that actually stayed and fought back, instead of fleeing to their comfortable villas elsewhere in "Free Europe"....

So by this standard, the legacy Communist parties of France, Italy, Spain, and Portugal are now also a bunch of murderous thugs, as opposed to the collaborators and Fascists within these respective countries?

It's extremely easy to create a fake more equivalency using the political standards and values of 2016 America without any understand or realization of the historical context of the countries and origins of the political Left, and why there are still vestiges of the Euro-Communist movement of the '50s-70s...

Jesus Christus.... Greece was a Fascist dictatorship at the time when my mother and father were marching against the Vietnam war out of college in the late '60s....

Typical BRTD epic fail post.....

First of all, LOL at the idea I don't know anything of communist resistance in WWII.

Second of all that's literally the same type of argument Oldiesfreak makes.

Third of all for not criticizing fascists I mentioned Golden Dawn in that very post.

And fourthly LOL at the KKE being "Eurocommunist". As noted they are actual Stalinists.

1.) My apologies for implying that you are unaware of the history of the KKE and the tens of thousands of lives lost in resistance against Fascism/Nazism and the local Fascist collaborators. Obviously then, you are also aware that after the Liberation of Greece in '44, that the US and UK opposed free elections in Greece, and British troops opened fire on a mass protest in Athens that triggered the Greek Civil War in December of '44.

The aftermath of the Greek Civil War, was extreme repression of the Left, including over 3,000 murders of Communist Party members, 100,000 people forced into detention centers or exile, and massive rape, physical and property violence.

Of course, as a freedom loving individual, you no doubt support the critical role that the KKE played in the resistance against the military Junta of '67 installed by the same puppet dictator that the Brits and CIA installed under a reign of bloodshed back in '44....

Not sure if have ever watched the movie "Z", but if so I would certainly recommend it, since apparently you are a keen follower of Greek Politics and History.

2.) Haven't seen OldiesFreak post on this thread, so I'll pass and check on his posts maybe on the International Elections thread, since I have no comment nor involvement in that debate to date.

3.) I don't believe I ever said anything about you "not criticizing Fascists", what I did say was a false moral equivalency between Neo-Nazi and Fascist street gangs murdering and assaulting people at will in the cities, towns, villages, and rural areas of Greece (With a nod-nod wink-wink from their Fascist political overlords), versus a political party that gave up the armed struggle and resistance as part of the post Junta Democratic era.... despite that hundreds of thousands of KKE party members faced systematic discrimination in employment, criminal records not lifted, etc until 1989!!!!

4.) The PCF and PCI in France and Italy respectively were considered Euro-Communist in the 1970s, despite both political parties still technically having "Marxism-Leninism" as part of their party platforms. Although the PCI did split off earlier from taking their dictates from Moscow and the Kremlin, the PCF was a "Stalinist" Party and even entertained Erich Honecker a short period of time before the Berlin Wall collapsed as a result of mass demonstrations in Leipzig, and one of my favorite neighborhoods in Berlin, Prenzlauer Berg, where I lived for four months shortly after the fall of the Berlin wall.

It's easy to sling around terms like "Stalinist" and "Marxist-Leninist", and although the KKE is not necessarily "reconstructed Communists" of the PCI late '80s variety or the PCF of the early '90s, you are really setting up a strawman using emotionally loaded terms for maximum rhetorical effects, but dude your original posting title set it up that way....

For the record, I have always found you an extremely interesting and versatile poster over the past eight years I have been on the Forum, so not a hater, but got to call out what I see especially if it involves somehow a comparison between legitimate Left-Wing political parties with a long history of fighting back against Fascism and a political party that that is part of the new Euro-Fascist "stealth movement" to mainstream Fascist ideology. .

Although you didn't mention it, I'm sure we both agree that the KKE's party platform on LGBT issues is backwards, opposition to the Civil Rights Partnership bill proposed by SYRIZA, but just like the Democratic Party in the United State only a few years back, this will undoubtedly change in the very near future, as younger activists defect to alternative Left-Wing parties and convince their aging parents and grandparents that really this is the right thing to do, and that political ideology is more than just based on economic doctrine but also the New Social Movements are part of a comprehensive platform in coalition with other political parties to move forward on social & economic policy based upon the concept of "Peace, Freedom, and Equality".

[NOVA Green]

BRTD just further proves that he is a simplistic bigot.

Being against Nazis and communists is bigoted?

So to play my own devil's advocate, your position on this item reminds me of classic Scottish "Peace Punk" anthem from the late '80s/early '90s, from one of my favorite bands of that genre (Their name is actually a pun on the Greek linguistics)....

Oi Polloi---- Song tilted "Commies and Nazis"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6W6afR920B8

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oi_Polloi

In the event, that direct posting to YouTube is not allowed in the Forum, and my sincere apologies if I have violated any ToS agreements, people can simply YouTube Oi Polloi: Commies and Nazis...

[Kingpoleon]

BRTD just further proves that he is a simplistic bigot.

Being against Nazis and communists is bigoted?

No, considering >50% of people, who disagree with you politically in a major way, Nazis or communists, is at lest idiotic if not downright bigoted against people who disagree with you.

[they don't love you like i love you]

Absolutely bizarre that BRTD now has an obsession with the Communist Party of Greece....

Apparently he is unaware of the history of Europe under the resistance against Fascism and Nazi occupation, where the Communists were actually the Freedom Fighters that actually stayed and fought back, instead of fleeing to their comfortable villas elsewhere in "Free Europe"....

So by this standard, the legacy Communist parties of France, Italy, Spain, and Portugal are now also a bunch of murderous thugs, as opposed to the collaborators and Fascists within these respective countries?

It's extremely easy to create a fake more equivalency using the political standards and values of 2016 America without any understand or realization of the historical context of the countries and origins of the political Left, and why there are still vestiges of the Euro-Communist movement of the '50s-70s...

Jesus Christus.... Greece was a Fascist dictatorship at the time when my mother and father were marching against the Vietnam war out of college in the late '60s....

Typical BRTD epic fail post.....

First of all, LOL at the idea I don't know anything of communist resistance in WWII.

Second of all that's literally the same type of argument Oldiesfreak makes.

Third of all for not criticizing fascists I mentioned Golden Dawn in that very post.

And fourthly LOL at the KKE being "Eurocommunist". As noted they are actual Stalinists.

1.) My apologies for implying that you are unaware of the history of the KKE and the tens of thousands of lives lost in resistance against Fascism/Nazism and the local Fascist collaborators. Obviously then, you are also aware that after the Liberation of Greece in '44, that the US and UK opposed free elections in Greece, and British troops opened fire on a mass protest in Athens that triggered the Greek Civil War in December of '44.

The aftermath of the Greek Civil War, was extreme repression of the Left, including over 3,000 murders of Communist Party members, 100,000 people forced into detention centers or exile, and massive rape, physical and property violence.

Of course, as a freedom loving individual, you no doubt support the critical role that the KKE played in the resistance against the military Junta of '67 installed by the same puppet dictator that the Brits and CIA installed under a reign of bloodshed back in '44....

Not sure if have ever watched the movie "Z", but if so I would certainly recommend it, since apparently you are a keen follower of Greek Politics and History.

2.) Haven't seen OldiesFreak post on this thread, so I'll pass and check on his posts maybe on the International Elections thread, since I have no comment nor involvement in that debate to date.

3.) I don't believe I ever said anything about you "not criticizing Fascists", what I did say was a false moral equivalency between Neo-Nazi and Fascist street gangs murdering and assaulting people at will in the cities, towns, villages, and rural areas of Greece (With a nod-nod wink-wink from their Fascist political overlords), versus a political party that gave up the armed struggle and resistance as part of the post Junta Democratic era.... despite that hundreds of thousands of KKE party members faced systematic discrimination in employment, criminal records not lifted, etc until 1989!!!!

4.) The PCF and PCI in France and Italy respectively were considered Euro-Communist in the 1970s, despite both political parties still technically having "Marxism-Leninism" as part of their party platforms. Although the PCI did split off earlier from taking their dictates from Moscow and the Kremlin, the PCF was a "Stalinist" Party and even entertained Erich Honecker a short period of time before the Berlin Wall collapsed as a result of mass demonstrations in Leipzig, and one of my favorite neighborhoods in Berlin, Prenzlauer Berg, where I lived for four months shortly after the fall of the Berlin wall.

It's easy to sling around terms like "Stalinist" and "Marxist-Leninist", and although the KKE is not necessarily "reconstructed Communists" of the PCI late '80s variety or the PCF of the early '90s, you are really setting up a strawman using emotionally loaded terms for maximum rhetorical effects, but dude your original posting title set it up that way....

For the record, I have always found you an extremely interesting and versatile poster over the past eight years I have been on the Forum, so not a hater, but got to call out what I see especially if it involves somehow a comparison between legitimate Left-Wing political parties with a long history of fighting back against Fascism and a political party that that is part of the new Euro-Fascist "stealth movement" to mainstream Fascist ideology. .

Although you didn't mention it, I'm sure we both agree that the KKE's party platform on LGBT issues is backwards, opposition to the Civil Rights Partnership bill proposed by SYRIZA, but just like the Democratic Party in the United State only a few years back, this will undoubtedly change in the very near future, as younger activists defect to alternative Left-Wing parties and convince their aging parents and grandparents that really this is the right thing to do, and that political ideology is more than just based on economic doctrine but also the New Social Movements are part of a comprehensive platform in coalition with other political parties to move forward on social & economic policy based upon the concept of "Peace, Freedom, and Equality".

1) Well yeah. Now what does that have to do with voting for Stalin lovers today?
2) Oldiesfreak keeps raving about how the Democrats were the party of slavery and more opposed the Civil Rights Act than Republicans. That has zero relevance today. He seems to think it does, and is the only person who does. Voting for Stalinists because of events in the WWII when the Democrats were the party of segregationists is just as logical.3
3) The point is that both are godawful genocidal thugs. Golden Dawn are causing more problems now, sure, but the KKE would engage in genocide if they ever somehow took power. As for the latter part, uh, not really bothered. I wouldn't want to hire people who support Stalinist gulags and the NKVD either.
4) Well yeah, "Eurocommunism" was largely a sham in general. That's why I don't support any communist parties like the ones you mentioned. Still point remains, KKE is a party full of people who think Stalin was a good man, and would've been just as friendly to Erich Hoeckner too if the issue came up. There is simply no way in f[inks]ing hell to justify that.

[Antonio the Sixth]

4) Well yeah, "Eurocommunism" was largely a sham in general.

What the hell do you mean by that? A sham against whom? Was Berlinguer playing 12-dimensional chess when he went to Moscow and praised democracy in a speech (whose text had been rejected) to a bunch of Soviet apparatchiks? Tell me, what were his true goals?

[Devout Centrist]

45.9% makes the US hard to beat (troll option)

[Crumpets]

If we're doing this by how many people vote for f'cking awful parties, then Russia is a lot worse in this (UR+CPRF+LD+Rod.)

(And now I hate myself for mentioning Russia in a BRTD thread)

I'm talking about in real elections, not sham ones.

-They are real elections.

Please stop. I've learned to respect a lot of your insights - even if they are somewhat trollish and I disagree w/ them - but you can't seriously believe Russia has a legitimate political system.

-What do you mean by "legitimate political system"? It's about as legitimate as that which prevailed between 1816 and 1822 in the U.S.

Russia's presidential election results line up with the opinion poll results. Voter fraud is more common than in the U.S., but it does not seriously impact major election results.

Russia runs on the basis of consensus politics, much like Japan or Singapore, not closely-contested elections like the U.S.. It is also much more a government of men and not of laws than the U.S. That makes the issue of who will be Putin's successor a much thornier issue than who will be Trump's.

One of the things that confuses me most about Putin's election shenanigans is that he doesn't need them. I'm pretty convinced that even if Russia had Norway-levels of electoral integrity, Putin would still be elected president in a landslide, and United Russia would still have a solid majority in the Duma. Why weaken his legitimacy both at home and abroad with ballot stuffing and silencing political opponents?

[they don't love you like i love you]

4) Well yeah, "Eurocommunism" was largely a sham in general.

What the hell do you mean by that? A sham against whom? Was Berlinguer playing 12-dimensional chess when he went to Moscow and praised democracy in a speech (whose text had been rejected) to a bunch of Soviet apparatchiks? Tell me, what were his true goals?

Al kind of summarized it well here:

You'd figure Gustaf would at least be familiar with Eurocommunism.

Familiar enough to know that it was a sham? By the time the "idea" was dreamed up, the PCI was well on the (extremely long) road to becoming a standard-issue European Socialist/Social Democratic (use whatever term thee be more comfortable with) party, while the Iberian parties were slowly drifting away into irrelevence and the PCF (led by a man who would have made a better comedian than a politician) was busy sowing the seeds of it's own dramatic electoral destruction.
And I seem to recall reading that some Soviet money was used to help it on it's way, but that might just be libel.

The wiki article on it is sh*t, btw.

And he did make a point once that despite such window dressing as you describe above, such parties never really broke with the Soviet Union.

[Antonio the Sixth]

4) Well yeah, "Eurocommunism" was largely a sham in general.

What the hell do you mean by that? A sham against whom? Was Berlinguer playing 12-dimensional chess when he went to Moscow and praised democracy in a speech (whose text had been rejected) to a bunch of Soviet apparatchiks? Tell me, what were his true goals?

Al kind of summarized it well here:

You'd figure Gustaf would at least be familiar with Eurocommunism.

Familiar enough to know that it was a sham? By the time the "idea" was dreamed up, the PCI was well on the (extremely long) road to becoming a standard-issue European Socialist/Social Democratic (use whatever term thee be more comfortable with) party, while the Iberian parties were slowly drifting away into irrelevence and the PCF (led by a man who would have made a better comedian than a politician) was busy sowing the seeds of it's own dramatic electoral destruction.
And I seem to recall reading that some Soviet money was used to help it on it's way, but that might just be libel.

The wiki article on it is sh*t, btw.

And he did make a point once that despite such window dressing as you describe above, such parties never really broke with the Soviet Union.

How the hell do you find these decades-old posts?

"Well on the (extremely long) road to becoming a standard-issue European Socialist/Social Democratic party" is a gross oversimplification of the PCI's history that I'm sure Al wouldn't stand by today. And even if that were the case I don't see how it makes its ideological project in the 1970s a "sham".

And I can't believe you think going unscripted at a Congress of the Soviet Communist Party is mere "window-dressing".

[Intell]

Euro-communists were not social democrats, they were for a communist state, throug a ballot box, and a society that enjoyed liberal freedoms.

KKE, is not euro-communist, as they are literally stalnist worshippers rather than SYRIZA when it was formed, or the pre-SYRIZA parties, which condemended the Soviet Union and its dictatorial nature and lack of freedom and rights, and persued euro-communist, or popular socialist platforms and ideals.

[RFayette]

If I lived in a society with that level of unemployment (especially youth unemployment), I'd be pretty crazy too.  You have to judge people in the context of their circumstances.

[they don't love you like i love you]

So...high unemployment would make you a Nazi or Stalinist?

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

So...high unemployment would make you a Nazi or Stalinist?

It is, in fact, one of the only ways to create significant numbers of Nazis and Stalinists.

[they don't love you like i love you]

Did the US have more than a tenth of the population being a Nazi or Stalinist in 2008?

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

BRTD, I'm interested to know what about Greece, if not its historical, political, cultural, and economic circumstances, you think leads to these good results for extremist parties.

[RFayette]

Did the US have more than a tenth of the population being a Nazi or Stalinist in 2008?

No, but the US did not have an unemployment rate of 28% in 2008.  And if the US had a multiparty system during the Great Depression with comparable unemployment rates, I have no doubt there'd be a substantial proportion of radicals.  

My point is that the society is in real trouble.  There's plenty of room for debate for why that is, but it seems hard to argue that the nation's tough economic times aren't a big reason why their political situation is so messed up.

[AtorBoltox]

Why is BRTD so wilfully obtuse?

[they don't love you like i love you]

BRTD, I'm interested to know what about Greece, if not its historical, political, cultural, and economic circumstances, you think leads to these good results for extremist parties.

The point isn't so much those, but the fact you'd have to be pretty horrible to support such a party regardless of any circumstances.

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

BRTD, I'm interested to know what about Greece, if not its historical, political, cultural, and economic circumstances, you think leads to these good results for extremist parties.

The point isn't so much those, but the fact you'd have to be pretty horrible to support such a party regardless of any circumstances.

Okay...? I don't know what you're trying to demonstrate. Why do you think Greece has such a high concentration of these people? Is it something in the water?

[Chunk Yogurt for President!]

BRTD, I'm interested to know what about Greece, if not its historical, political, cultural, and economic circumstances, you think leads to these good results for extremist parties.

The point isn't so much those, but the fact you'd have to be pretty horrible to support such a party regardless of any circumstances.

Okay...? I don't know what you're trying to demonstrate. Why do you think Greece has such a high concentration of these people? Is it something in the water?

Maybe he believes that Greeks are an inferior race.

[Antonio the Sixth]

BRTD seems to be under the impression that individuals exist in a vacuum isolated from any kind of social influence (which, interestingly, is usually a right-wing assumption).