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Socialist Russia was an environmental disaster. https://www.gchumanrights.org/preparedness/the-environmental-scenario-in-the-post-soviet-region-reflections-on-c

by jdross 3mo ago

Socialist Russia was an environmental disaster. https://www.gchumanrights.org/preparedness/the-environmental-scenario-in-the-post-soviet-region-reflections-on-challenges-to-justice-and-sustainability/ https://www.gchumanrights.org/preparedness/the-environmental...

someonebaggy 3mo ago
There are many things that are not either capitalism or Russia.
- buellerbueller 3mo ago
  The grandparent of your post, however, blamed capitalism for the destruction of the environment, as though other economic systems would not do the same. So your comment isn't really that relevant if the parent to your post is just offering a counterexample. I get it, you don't like capitalism, but jumping every time capitalism is mentioned--particularly when your point isn't really relevant--doesn't really win others to your side.
  - someonebaggy 3mo ago
    The destruction of the environment that has actually occurred in our capitalist countries has been because of capitalism. It's like saying desktop enshittification has been caused by Microsoft. This is true in our timeline, even though if Apple had owned the desktop for 30 years they also would have enshittified it.
sevenzero 3mo ago
Yes yes socialism also made mistakes so capitalism must be better!!
- theultdev 3mo ago
  so if it's socialism/communism destroying the environment it's a mistake. but if it's capitalism it's by design? nothing other than the prosperity that capitalism generates is inherently bad for the environment. yeah if you pull people out of poverty their carbon footprint will probably increase. but the alternative is them living in poverty and starving under a communist system (like always) the amount of goods and services capitalism has generated has saved so many lives. we have huge amounts of excess food we send across the world.
- inglor_cz 3mo ago
  I lived under both systems. Yeah, socialism was abandoned precisely because capitalism was better. By the 1980s, residents of Central Europe could quite clearly compare and saw that their western neighbours were richer, healthier and enjoyed cleaner air and water than those of the "Camp of Progress". Market economy + democracy beats top-down enforced utopian intellectual projects like a Marxist-Leninist state by a difference of a league. We tried that on our own people so that you don't have to.
  - sevenzero 3mo ago
    You prefer capitalism because you live privileged and weigh short term wealth higher than long term effects of capitalism. Personally I'd much prefer not exploiting 3rd world countries to fund first world consumerism.
    - inglor_cz 3mo ago
      > privileged Yeah, being born in rust belt of the former Eastern Bloc was a privilege like hell. You don't know what you are talking about. If you visit places like Chisinau, you'll get a glimpse of Ostrava cca 1994. What are the long term effects of the systems that you push? Can you even model them? Long term effects of Soviet-style Communism were ghastly. Dried lakes, poisoned rivers, mass graves, all in the name "of the people". Non-market economies can only be sustained by constant violent repression and censorship, and the incentives in such systems where prices aren't serving as a signal are totally out of whack, resulting in extreme waste on one side and constant shortages on the other. The absolutely worst thing that liberated African and Asian countries did was to introduce Marxist economies. Fortunately most of them already realized just how deep that hole goes. Economic liberalization in India alone will likely lift a billion people out of poverty in mere 20 years or so.
adrian_b 3mo ago
The so-called socialist economies were just the extreme form of monopolistic capitalism. As a child, I experienced the reality of "socialism", where every word used by the ruling elites meant something very different from what it was claimed to mean. Unfortunately, already for more than a quarter of century USA and most "capitalistic" countries every year become more and more alike to the former socialist countries, from all points of view, like great wealth inequality, markets dominated by quasi-monopolies, non-existent political opposition, mass surveillance of the population, confusing propaganda in all mass-media, less and less chances to afford to truly be the owner of many kinds of things, like houses, cars or computers. If your car or your computer or your smartphone or your TV set do whatever their vendor or the government want, instead of doing what you want, then obviously you are not their owner.
- theultdev 3mo ago
  fancy way of saying "communism has never been done properly before." yeah well that's because the execution matters and turns out when you give people power to choose who gets what, they abuse it. go figure.
  - KronisLV 3mo ago
    Maybe it’s never been done properly cause human nature will never allow it to be, e.g. it’s an ideology that’s incompatible with humanity. But surely there’s a more sane option than under regulated capitalism with a problematic wealth distribution and fucked up incentives that encourage short term profit at the expense of society, environment and all else?
    - theultdev 3mo ago
      then it's a terrible system to govern humans under. your system should work with human nature or it will never work. capitalism exploits greed to generate prosperity. socialism falls under greed. and no there's not a better solution, or at least it hasn't been found yet. if it was it'd still be a form of capitalism, not the other side of the spectrum. but we disagree on the effects of the current system. capitalism has not been at the expense of society, the opposite in fact. we've had so much prosperity due to it. same with the environment really. communist countries don't really have better air quality, worse in fact! US has the money from capitalism to develop clean tech.
ImPostingOnHN 3mo ago
This line from your article really stood out to me: "It was typical to use natural resources extensively without considering the effects on the environment." Because, per the article, the environmental disasters under "Socialist Russia" seem to match many of the ones in "Capitalist America". The thing in common between the two seems to be rich oligarchs controlling government, and leveraging their power to extract profits, with little regard given to the proles or the environment. Crazy how much the supposedly "pro-capitalist" right wing mirrors the supposedly "Socialist Russia" sometimes.

by jdross 3mo ago

someonebaggy 3mo ago

There are many things that are not either capitalism or Russia.

buellerbueller 3mo ago
The grandparent of your post, however, blamed capitalism for the destruction of the environment, as though other economic systems would not do the same. So your comment isn't really that relevant if the parent to your post is just offering a counterexample. I get it, you don't like capitalism, but jumping every time capitalism is mentioned--particularly when your point isn't really relevant--doesn't really win others to your side.
- someonebaggy 3mo ago
  The destruction of the environment that has actually occurred in our capitalist countries has been because of capitalism. It's like saying desktop enshittification has been caused by Microsoft. This is true in our timeline, even though if Apple had owned the desktop for 30 years they also would have enshittified it.

sevenzero 3mo ago

Yes yes socialism also made mistakes so capitalism must be better!!

theultdev 3mo ago
so if it's socialism/communism destroying the environment it's a mistake. but if it's capitalism it's by design? nothing other than the prosperity that capitalism generates is inherently bad for the environment. yeah if you pull people out of poverty their carbon footprint will probably increase. but the alternative is them living in poverty and starving under a communist system (like always) the amount of goods and services capitalism has generated has saved so many lives. we have huge amounts of excess food we send across the world.
inglor_cz 3mo ago
I lived under both systems. Yeah, socialism was abandoned precisely because capitalism was better. By the 1980s, residents of Central Europe could quite clearly compare and saw that their western neighbours were richer, healthier and enjoyed cleaner air and water than those of the "Camp of Progress". Market economy + democracy beats top-down enforced utopian intellectual projects like a Marxist-Leninist state by a difference of a league. We tried that on our own people so that you don't have to.
- sevenzero 3mo ago
  You prefer capitalism because you live privileged and weigh short term wealth higher than long term effects of capitalism. Personally I'd much prefer not exploiting 3rd world countries to fund first world consumerism.
  - inglor_cz 3mo ago
    > privileged Yeah, being born in rust belt of the former Eastern Bloc was a privilege like hell. You don't know what you are talking about. If you visit places like Chisinau, you'll get a glimpse of Ostrava cca 1994. What are the long term effects of the systems that you push? Can you even model them? Long term effects of Soviet-style Communism were ghastly. Dried lakes, poisoned rivers, mass graves, all in the name "of the people". Non-market economies can only be sustained by constant violent repression and censorship, and the incentives in such systems where prices aren't serving as a signal are totally out of whack, resulting in extreme waste on one side and constant shortages on the other. The absolutely worst thing that liberated African and Asian countries did was to introduce Marxist economies. Fortunately most of them already realized just how deep that hole goes. Economic liberalization in India alone will likely lift a billion people out of poverty in mere 20 years or so.

adrian_b 3mo ago

The so-called socialist economies were just the extreme form of monopolistic capitalism. As a child, I experienced the reality of "socialism", where every word used by the ruling elites meant something very different from what it was claimed to mean. Unfortunately, already for more than a quarter of century USA and most "capitalistic" countries every year become more and more alike to the former socialist countries, from all points of view, like great wealth inequality, markets dominated by quasi-monopolies, non-existent political opposition, mass surveillance of the population, confusing propaganda in all mass-media, less and less chances to afford to truly be the owner of many kinds of things, like houses, cars or computers. If your car or your computer or your smartphone or your TV set do whatever their vendor or the government want, instead of doing what you want, then obviously you are not their owner.

theultdev 3mo ago
fancy way of saying "communism has never been done properly before." yeah well that's because the execution matters and turns out when you give people power to choose who gets what, they abuse it. go figure.
- KronisLV 3mo ago
  Maybe it’s never been done properly cause human nature will never allow it to be, e.g. it’s an ideology that’s incompatible with humanity. But surely there’s a more sane option than under regulated capitalism with a problematic wealth distribution and fucked up incentives that encourage short term profit at the expense of society, environment and all else?
  - theultdev 3mo ago
    then it's a terrible system to govern humans under. your system should work with human nature or it will never work. capitalism exploits greed to generate prosperity. socialism falls under greed. and no there's not a better solution, or at least it hasn't been found yet. if it was it'd still be a form of capitalism, not the other side of the spectrum. but we disagree on the effects of the current system. capitalism has not been at the expense of society, the opposite in fact. we've had so much prosperity due to it. same with the environment really. communist countries don't really have better air quality, worse in fact! US has the money from capitalism to develop clean tech.

ImPostingOnHN 3mo ago

This line from your article really stood out to me: "It was typical to use natural resources extensively without considering the effects on the environment." Because, per the article, the environmental disasters under "Socialist Russia" seem to match many of the ones in "Capitalist America". The thing in common between the two seems to be rich oligarchs controlling government, and leveraging their power to extract profits, with little regard given to the proles or the environment. Crazy how much the supposedly "pro-capitalist" right wing mirrors the supposedly "Socialist Russia" sometimes.