USSR demonstrably did not have a ruling class. If you look at the background of all the leaders of USSR they come from regular working class families.
Stalin’s father was a shoemaker and his mother was a house cleaner.
Malenkov’s father was a farmer and his mother was a daughter of a blacksmith.
Khrushchev’s parents were poor Russian peasants.
Brezhnev’s father was metalworker.
Andropov’s father was a railway worker and his mother was a school teacher.
Chernenko was born to a poor family of Ukrainian ethnicity in the Siberian village.
Gorbachev’s parents were peasants.
This clearly illustrates that USSR was a system of meritocracy where anyone could rise to the top through skill and work. And the reason this was possible was because USSR provided equal opportunity to all. Everyone had access to education, healthcare, housing, and work.
Did USSR not make millions of people die for the benefit of the ruling class or just plain old genocide so they can maintain their power?
USSR had no ruling class as I’ve explained above, and USSR did not make millions of people die for anything. Maybe try engaging with reality instead of regurgitating nonsense uncritically. The fact that you chose to argue about a subject you’re woefully ignorant about says volumes.
I did give you a very clear answer with examples. If you lack reading comprehension to understand it, that’s entirely a you problem.
I didn’t ask you about socio economic background of the first generation of the Communist elites.
These aren’t “first generation elites”, these are literally all the leaders of the USSR throughout its existence. All the people in the party came from regular working class background. Having an elite or a ruling class means having a group of people who are wealthy and separate from the working majority the way politicians in the west are. You clearly don’t even understand what basic terms like elites mean.
In later years, nepotism was also was wide spread where children of the connected enjoy privileged status for employment and career advances and small things like vacations subsidies.
Sure, USSR had corruption just like every human society. That doesn’t mean USSR had a ruling class which was your original attempt at an argument.
Mentioning that some guy was Ukrainian with in the regime while not mentioning Holodomor is OG 🤡
Sure, let’s look at the whole holodomor narrative of yours from a perspective of an actual historian who studied it. During the 1932 famine, the USSR sent aid to affected regions in an attempt to alleviate the famine. According to Mark Tauger in his article, The 1932 Harvest and the Famine of 1933:
While the leadership did not stop exports, they did try to alleviate the famine. A 25 February 1933 Central Committee decree allotted seed loans of 320,000 tons to Ukraine and 240,000 tons to the northern Caucasus. Seed loans were also made to the Lower Volga and may have been made to other regions as well. Kul’chyts’kyy cites Ukrainian party archives showing that total aid to Ukraine by April 1933 actually exceeded 560,000 tons, including more than 80,000 tons of food
Some bring up massive grain exports during the famine to show that the Soviet Union exported food while Ukraine starved. This is fallacious for a number of reasons, but most importantly of all the amount of aid that was sent to Ukraine alone actually exceeded the amount that was exported at the time.
Aid to Ukraine alone was 60 percent greater than the amount exported during the same period. Total aid to famine regions was more than double exports for the first half of 1933.
According to Tauger, the reason why more aid was not provided was because of the low harvest
It appears to have been another consequence of the low 1932 harvest that more aid was not provided: After the low 1931, 1934, and 1936 harvests procured grain was transferred back to peasants at the expense of exports.
Tauger is not a communist, and ultimately this specific article takes the view that the low harvest was caused by collectivization (he factors in the natural causes of the famine in later articles, based on how he completely neglects to mention weather in this article at all its clear that his position shifted over the years). However, its interesting to see that the Soviets really did try to alleviate the famine as best as they could.
The reality is that famines were common in Tsarist times, and they were a major drive for the revolution in the first place. After the revolution, lives improved dramatically and famines stopped.
Must he nice being a communist while enjoying benefits of western society lol
Tell it to the kulak victims of nkvd. They were all peasants / worker class but still got murdered because they didn’t want to get sovkhozes and kolhozes. And no famine wasn’t because of kulaks, only because Soviets kept selling best grain to the west. Much more than they really could - all they central office data were falsified and nobody dared to admit that they couldn’t sell that much grain to the west
Do you know that you need grain for damn reseeding? Soviets and their central planning by uneducated central pianists ( the educated ones got murdered during great purges ) caused they kept selling too much grain and nobody dared to question. One bad year of crops exactly caused the famine. Soviets sold all the existing grain because of the contracts with the west and after that they have started to search “traitors” in the worker / peasants class. Add it to the fact that lots of grain come from the Ukraine and many central pianists were against Ukrainians and we have the recipe for the great hunger. Central planists send NKVD to recollect even this what left for reseeding for the next year. In the next decades planists got educated ( after the Stalin terror ) but still the central planning of Soviets caused USSR to be lagging to the west. These are the facts and I could give you charts with the soviet export. Simply central planists has incorrect data because of the fear, bad planning and many other factors
Meanwhile in the real world. Russia went from a backwards agrarian society where people travelled by horse and carriage to being the first in space in the span of 40 years. Russia showed incredible growth after the revolution that surpassed the rest of the world:
USSR doubled life expectancy in just 20 years. A newborn child in 1926-27 had a life expectancy of 44.4 years, up from 32.3 years thirty years before. In 1958-59 the life expectancy for newborns went up to 68.6 years. the Semashko system of the USSR increased lifespan by 50% in 20 years. By the 1960’s, lifespans in the USSR were comparable to those in the USA:
Quality of nutrition improved after the Soviet revolution, and the last time USSR had a famine was in 1940s. CIA data suggests they ate just as much as Americans after WW2 period while having better nutrition:
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USSR demonstrably did not have a ruling class. If you look at the background of all the leaders of USSR they come from regular working class families.
Stalin’s father was a shoemaker and his mother was a house cleaner.
Malenkov’s father was a farmer and his mother was a daughter of a blacksmith.
Khrushchev’s parents were poor Russian peasants.
Brezhnev’s father was metalworker.
Andropov’s father was a railway worker and his mother was a school teacher.
Chernenko was born to a poor family of Ukrainian ethnicity in the Siberian village.
Gorbachev’s parents were peasants.
This clearly illustrates that USSR was a system of meritocracy where anyone could rise to the top through skill and work. And the reason this was possible was because USSR provided equal opportunity to all. Everyone had access to education, healthcare, housing, and work.
USSR had no ruling class as I’ve explained above, and USSR did not make millions of people die for anything. Maybe try engaging with reality instead of regurgitating nonsense uncritically. The fact that you chose to argue about a subject you’re woefully ignorant about says volumes.
Removed by mod
I did give you a very clear answer with examples. If you lack reading comprehension to understand it, that’s entirely a you problem.
These aren’t “first generation elites”, these are literally all the leaders of the USSR throughout its existence. All the people in the party came from regular working class background. Having an elite or a ruling class means having a group of people who are wealthy and separate from the working majority the way politicians in the west are. You clearly don’t even understand what basic terms like elites mean.
Sure, USSR had corruption just like every human society. That doesn’t mean USSR had a ruling class which was your original attempt at an argument.
Sure, let’s look at the whole holodomor narrative of yours from a perspective of an actual historian who studied it. During the 1932 famine, the USSR sent aid to affected regions in an attempt to alleviate the famine. According to Mark Tauger in his article, The 1932 Harvest and the Famine of 1933:
Some bring up massive grain exports during the famine to show that the Soviet Union exported food while Ukraine starved. This is fallacious for a number of reasons, but most importantly of all the amount of aid that was sent to Ukraine alone actually exceeded the amount that was exported at the time.
According to Tauger, the reason why more aid was not provided was because of the low harvest
Tauger is not a communist, and ultimately this specific article takes the view that the low harvest was caused by collectivization (he factors in the natural causes of the famine in later articles, based on how he completely neglects to mention weather in this article at all its clear that his position shifted over the years). However, its interesting to see that the Soviets really did try to alleviate the famine as best as they could.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/2500600
On top of that, the famine was exacerbated by the fact that kulaks slaughtered livestock rather letting it be collectivized https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kulak#Dekulakization
The reality is that famines were common in Tsarist times, and they were a major drive for the revolution in the first place. After the revolution, lives improved dramatically and famines stopped.
you are the living embodiment of the meme 🤡
Tell it to the kulak victims of nkvd. They were all peasants / worker class but still got murdered because they didn’t want to get sovkhozes and kolhozes. And no famine wasn’t because of kulaks, only because Soviets kept selling best grain to the west. Much more than they really could - all they central office data were falsified and nobody dared to admit that they couldn’t sell that much grain to the west
Kulaks got exactly what they deserved, and anybody who defends the kulaks can get fucked.
Do you know that you need grain for damn reseeding? Soviets and their central planning by uneducated central pianists ( the educated ones got murdered during great purges ) caused they kept selling too much grain and nobody dared to question. One bad year of crops exactly caused the famine. Soviets sold all the existing grain because of the contracts with the west and after that they have started to search “traitors” in the worker / peasants class. Add it to the fact that lots of grain come from the Ukraine and many central pianists were against Ukrainians and we have the recipe for the great hunger. Central planists send NKVD to recollect even this what left for reseeding for the next year. In the next decades planists got educated ( after the Stalin terror ) but still the central planning of Soviets caused USSR to be lagging to the west. These are the facts and I could give you charts with the soviet export. Simply central planists has incorrect data because of the fear, bad planning and many other factors
Meanwhile in the real world. Russia went from a backwards agrarian society where people travelled by horse and carriage to being the first in space in the span of 40 years. Russia showed incredible growth after the revolution that surpassed the rest of the world:
USSR doubled life expectancy in just 20 years. A newborn child in 1926-27 had a life expectancy of 44.4 years, up from 32.3 years thirty years before. In 1958-59 the life expectancy for newborns went up to 68.6 years. the Semashko system of the USSR increased lifespan by 50% in 20 years. By the 1960’s, lifespans in the USSR were comparable to those in the USA:
Quality of nutrition improved after the Soviet revolution, and the last time USSR had a famine was in 1940s. CIA data suggests they ate just as much as Americans after WW2 period while having better nutrition: