Comment on Hrmmmmm
Socialism_Everyday@reddthat.com 4 days agoThe Soviet Famine of the collectivization, which you inappropriately label “Holodomor” (scary word for a specific famine to make it sound like holocaust, I wonder if you have any other special scary words for other famines) is indeed an unfortunate event of Soviet History. Yet, you fail to see it in the bigger picture.
First of all, even during the famine, life expectancy remained higher than in Tsarist times, because of increasing access to healthcare and nutrition on average to peasants.
Secondly, the famine is an unfortunate consequence of the necessity of rapid collectivization and industrialization because of threat of external invasion. There was intense debate in the CPSU at the time regarding rapid collectivization and industrialization vs. progressive one, and ultimately rapid industrialization won because of the perceived threat of invasion by industrialized western powers with 100 years of industrialization behind their backs. Famously, in 1931, Stalin said in a speech that the USSR was 100 years behind and would have to make up for that difference in 10 years or they would be eliminated. Almost exactly 10 years later, Nazis invaded the Soviet Union.
By industrializing rapidly (15% yearly growth of GDP) thanks to rapid collectivization of agriculture, not only did the Soviet Union defeat Nazism and save every European nationality between Germany and the Urals from Nazi genocide (hence saving tens of millions of lives), but this rapid development managed to raise life expectancy from below 30 years old in 1929 to above 60 bu 1960, effectively saving tens of millions of lives more. By any demographic metric you use, compared to what came before (Tsarism) and what came after (capitalism), the USSR saved tens of millions of lives. Capitalism is the one that brought unemployment, hunger, drug abuse, violent crime, and a reduction of life expectancy after decades of progress.
Don’t believe me? Go check the data:
Warl0k3@lemmy.world 4 days ago
The word was used in print in the 1930s in Ukrainian diaspora publications in Czechoslovakia as Haladamor
Try again, buddy.
Socialism_Everyday@reddthat.com 4 days ago
And why exactly did that term stick in the west, only transliterated as Holodomor instead? And why is it overwhelmingly discussed since the 2000s? Maybe because the usage of the word is political in nature as I explained?
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As for the name of the famine broadly, in Wikipedia it appears as Soviet famine of 1930-1933.
Warl0k3@lemmy.world 4 days ago
Because that’s the name it was given by the Ukranian peoples that survived it? I’m not sure what your point is here when you agree that it’s a transliteration of the name.
It’s not exactly a disputed fact that things like the Holodomor didn’t gain much traction in western literature until after the fall of the soviet union, because that’s when western literature was able to access it.
Add to it that the soviets violently suppressed reporting on it within the USSR, which you can even see reflected in that graph, explains the lack of occurrence in non-western works. That seems, you know, pretty gosh dang basic.
Socialism_Everyday@reddthat.com 4 days ago
Then why don’t we use any Indian names for the very many famines in India due to British occupation? Why do we call them neutral names like “Bengal famine” and not “exterminatron 3000”?
Demographic extrapolations and comparative economics.