Private lands were confiscated for the use of the state Pat, so no personal property.
Private lands that rich people owned and used serfs were taken by the state.
What about the thousands of workers that died during the 5 year plans?
Alright...Like I said, I don't like the guy for people being killed.
Or the thousands of peasants who were sent to gulags for being unwilling to give up their land to create collective farms?
Thousands of peasants. My point exactly. Over 20 million people were killed. Very few poor people were killed. Stalin took a lot of the rich's money and gave it to the poor.
Why do you respect someone for "experimenting" with communism if it led to the deaths of millions?
I respect his courage to try something while the most powerful country (US) begged them not to turn communist. I also think Lenin could've worked the USSR. What did the US expect after Bloody Sunday? Honestly. Nicholas the II killed protesters and the Bolshevik Revolution was less than a year later. If hundreds of farmers went to the White House and asked Bush for more benefits and Bush ordered them to be shot, would you no rebel?
Originally posted by Cancerkitty:
[quote]He let the serfs "keep their farms"? Isn't communism about state ownership of the land? Private lands were confiscated for the use of the state Pat, so no personal property. What about the thousands of workers that died during the 5 year plans? Or the thousands of peasants who were sent to gulags for being unwilling to give up their land to create collective farms? Why do you respect someone for "experimenting" with communism if it led to the deaths of millions?
Actually Pat's partially right on this one. Stalin did allow, eventually, a small number of peasant kolektivs keep their farms. They were not individual ownerships, but the never were even prior to the Bolsheviks. They were originally run by the Mir, which is kind of a communal farming co-op. Stalin allowed a few of these to exist because they worked better than the sovkhozs farms and he didn't want violent uprisings during the war. [/quote]Yes--Stalin made 2 state owned farms. The farmers in the one were paid based on sales and production and the farmers in the other one were paid with wages.