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Old 05-26-2017, 02:57 PM
 
1,104 posts, read 916,696 times
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This is written in a way that is sympathetic to both new readers and hopefully some experienced people on the subject.

In 1975, a curious dictator came to power in Asia. His army, the Khmer Rouge ("the Red People") were backed by new Communist states, neighboring China and Vietnam, filled with young people who had no education, but were born and shaped only by violence.

After the Monarchy's collapse by its own incompetence, Pol Pots' Communists and their Khmer Rouge army seized power. There were brief celebrations in the streets. But then the soldiers evacuated the capital and their people to doom.

What concerns me is what Pol Pot's exact intention was. It seems antithetical to Communism itself. He was so violent and extreme that the Viet Cong didn't wait and overthrew him themselves.

True to Marx, he outlawed freedom, family, and friendship. The motivation for this was that Marx's dialogues proved that Communism was the highest possible level of human development. People were to be destroyed as individuals and re-made as drones with the mentality of insects.

The regime caused a despicable famine. But the Army enforced its policy of national self-reliance towards its own produced goods. People were to be treated as almost worthless. If you ate wild plants, grass, or dead human flesh instead of what was strictly administered to you, you would either be killed, or tortured then killed. "Keeping you is no benefit, losing you is no loss."

The country's own army went to war with its own people. Torture was administered intensely, and meaninglessly. While criminals were barely found, many admitted to being them. They were then executed. The death and killing were pointless for their own sake.

Usually, Communism is associated with work, technology, and progress. This is where it gets tough.

Even in its wildest fantasies, Communists usually aspire that their ideas will bring relief to the workers through technological rehabilitation and advancement, and that it will happen no matter what. The bourgeouis are overthrown and each person loses their liberty, and all become super-equals, where the best of all what is human is empowered through modern Revolutionary thought.

But I don't understand where Pol Pot went after that. Sure, even after taking power, his propaganda repeatedly celebrated technology and progress on radio and print. Except in reality, there was only a highly specific instruction of total destruction: where not only society reversed and broke down, but objects, ideas, and humanity itself were to become equal - equally meaningless.

It is known that Pol Pot spent his adult life masquerading behind the scenes, hiding away in ancient temples, living in darkness. But I don't understand the motivation for his brutality. What exactly did he want to build? And what did it require so much destruction for? What was so worth it that human beings didn't need to be human beings any more?
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Old 05-26-2017, 02:59 PM
 
Location: By the sea, by the sea, by the beautiful sea
68,300 posts, read 54,222,946 times
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I think looking for purpose in the doings of mad-men can only end up being an exercise in futility.
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Old 05-26-2017, 03:01 PM
 
7,447 posts, read 2,822,733 times
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PP operated on an extreme anti elitist philosophy whereby he exterminated a large amount of doctors, engineers and other high skill professionals. He believed they were the root of society's problems... but he was an idiot, they were actually the glue keeping it all together. A good example of what can go wrong when you purge "all them uppity smart folks" from a society. He didn't intend to destroy his society, it is an unintended result of culling the right hand side of the bell curve.
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Old 05-26-2017, 03:12 PM
 
Location: Madison, WI
5,299 posts, read 2,346,196 times
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People can't handle power over others, and some are worse than normal. There are studies showing that political power is more addictive than cocaine, and it's also been said that you start seeing people as inhuman, or that you're superior to them. That's just with normal people, so imagine what more sociopathic types are like...people are just their pawns. It's like the old kings who thought they were gods.

Get someone in power like that, and all that's left is to spin it to their subjects as making the nation strong, or doing it for the common good, or creating a great society. They convince people that the ends justify the means, and that if they're obedient they will create a utopia together.

When you're in that position, you can do some crazy things that don't make sense...the same way drug addicts do.
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Old 05-26-2017, 03:21 PM
 
Location: Live:Downtown Phoenix, AZ/Work:Greater Los Angeles, CA
27,606 posts, read 14,527,197 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by zzzSnorlax View Post
PP operated on an extreme anti elitist philosophy whereby he exterminated a large amount of doctors, engineers and other high skill professionals. He believed they were the root of society's problems... but he was an idiot, they were actually the glue keeping it all together. A good example of what can go wrong when you purge "all them uppity smart folks" from a society. He didn't intend to destroy his society, it is an unintended result of culling the right hand side of the bell curve.
That was the reason that the Soviets built the Berlin Wall, to prevent the inevitable brain drain from the bourgeoisie who didn't want their earning potential lowered
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Old 05-26-2017, 03:24 PM
 
7,447 posts, read 2,822,733 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by FirebirdCamaro1220 View Post
That was the reason that the Soviets built the Berlin Wall, to prevent the inevitable brain drain from the bourgeoisie who didn't want their earning potential lowered
Yea PP just skipped the bleed out and actively exterminated the smart people.
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