Why does it suggest liberals are scared of this? Aren’t they okay with Projects for affordable housing? So liberals aren’t communists? Then, why are the red hat clowns so grumpy?
This place has become a far leftist/tankie haven. They hate liberals more than the conservatives hate those on the left. They do more harm in refusing to accommodate people who lean left than they do to help. It is so blatant at times, I wonder if they are on here just to sow discord.
We have a very simple purity test, don’t support genocide or wars on the global south and we have no issue with you. If you can’t agree on that much then there’s no reason why we should accommodate you.
Remember when Jane Byrne tried to vacation at Cabrini? Good times.
Famously Communist Vancouver, Canada: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vancouver_special
The government of the PRC is planning to build 200,000 new public housing appartments in hongkong, tyranny i tells ya
But at what cost???
why won’t something think of the
childreninvestors!!!???
wouldn’t liberals approve of this?
Honestly, the “commie blocks” are really good idea and should be built more often in areas with high homelessness and housing issues. Why should US taxes go to blowing up elementary schools/other people’s homes when it can go towards building homes and helping others in need?
We have those, they’re called projects.
You mean those criminally underfunded, means-tested and over-policed apartment blocks in red-lined cities?
Crazy that those weren’t as effective as rhe communist housing initiatives
The ones built on polluted land no one else wants, that have zero amenities nearby, leading to food deserts and lack of healthcare, and that have zero green spaces nearby? Yeah those resemble Soviet block housing in the same way a fart smells like a rose.
I’m just here for the comments…
identical apartments
Under Communism, we were forced by the government to live in Poor People Houses. It was illegal to tip your landlords. If you updated your wallpaper, the local Commissar would murder your first-born child and eat your dog.
Incredible.
Careful, If the communists are asian, white liberals will fully believe they’re open dog/cat eaters because they already believe that. Joe himself prob believes that asian people eat babies until they come on down to Californ-i-a and get nice big ol fake titties
Ever heard of those folks they found in the wild parts of Russia in the late 70s who never even realized the Second World War happened?
Fucking life goals there
IDK
They wore clothes woven from homegrown hemp, used birch bark for shoes, and routinely faced near-starvation (the mother, Akulina, starved to death during a crop failure in 1961).
I’ll take my chances. Plus those clothes and shoes sound durable and cheap.
Nobody’s stopping you, or Darwin
Flip side to the dudes in the Pacific who were still hunkered down
To be fair, being good enough isn’t the only reason for something to be in current use.
For real. It’s like living in a very old NYC apartment building and being like “It’s still standing, truly a testament to the politics of the robber barrons who built it!”
What do you actually know about soviet housing? I’ve done significant academic research on the topic. It’s not just a simple “they built a certain type of building”. The reason they all look so similar is that their construction method was pre-fab concrete panels. It was a revolutionary technology at the time, and allowed them to solve their housing crisis. They were called “Khrushchyovka” after whom you can guess. He made it his mission to solve the Soviet Housing crisis when he took over and was largely successful.
You have to keep in mind the historical context. The people moving into these buildings were coming from a pre-industrial society where they commonly had so electricity, dirt floors, and no insulation. These were a significant upgrade from the pre-USSR constructions. They started construction in the 1940s, and really took off in the 50s.
I think the main takeaways from them shouldn’t be “We should build these exact things”. and I don’t think that’s what people who support them are advocating for. I think what they are trying to point out is that if you standardize production, and use economies of scale, it is entirely possible to build tons of housing quickly and cheaply. And considering the way housing prices look these days I’d expect that to be an idea anyone can get behind.
If you are interested here is an article about how modern China is using similar practices: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/17/10695
Thats not really the ussrs fault tho, thats current capitalists government fault that they dont give a shit about making new public housing or taking care of the old ones
It just looks like ugliness is the point. Grow some fruit trees or community gardens or something so we don’t need to be surrounded by concrete and empty patches of grass.
Have you lived in one or seen one? Ive been raised in one and it was great, we had a park and it still is a peaceful neighborhood. Besides this, commie blocs where supposed to be temporary housing, but theyre still standing today after countless earthquakes and after so many years. It would be amazing if they gave it some maintenance, but thats not ussrs fault that the current government of any post soviet country isnt taking care of peoples houses. Besides this, theres an obvios point fhat people who dont like commie blocs just straight up ignore, these hoese where a massive upgrade to the majority of people at that time, the reason any post soviet country’s house ownership is so high is because of these houses, that is a huge deal and idk why people ignore it so much and just say “theyre ugly”, you might not like how they look on the outside but its just a regular apartment man, i live in the newer apartment now but let me tell ya, the old one is still good, i have more faith that the old one will last longer than this new one, because they skimp out on everything on the new ones, they dont care about safety, they just care about profit
Call me crazy, but I’ve had this thought about a lot of “boring” architecture. Why don’t we just say it’s an open graffiti spot, so that these large boring walls turn into something colorful on the outside? It’s most likely only gonna be as high as you can get a ladder, but I feel that’s better than nothing. Some people will certainly spray profanities on it, but graffiti spots already exist in some recreational areas, and those bits tend to get sprayed over by someone else, whereas more beautiful sections tend to remain far longer without being touched.
Everything is better with murals. Also plants, lots of plants.
I don’t care about the graffiti, I wish those ugly walls weren’t visible at all. Give me some green space
Yeah the soviet block housing is architecturally DEPRESSING. Not that they are the only ones who built joyless prison boxes.
You just compared people’s houses to prisons. I hope you didn’t mean it that way.
When it’s designed for pure efficiency, housing often starts to take on a more prison-like architectural style. After all that’s how they design prisons as well, just on a much more brutal level. It’s good that post-war civilians were saved from homelessness, but it’s not really an architectural style to emulate, and the fact that they’re still around isn’t a virtue in its own right.
I’m not saying the people who live there are in prison, but rather that it’s a bleak and inhumane way to design things. You see the same mindset in the design of many overpriced condo blocks in the US, they just dress it up with bigger windows, as well as kitchen islands, Murphy beds and other glitsy bullshit.
How is it bleak and inhumane to build free, strong, effective houses? HAVE YOU SEEN MODERN APARTMENT BUILDINGS IN USA?! I feel like I’m going crazy. The only people that like those new fuck ugly “mixed use” developments is rich old smarmy people who’s family left their home town 20 years ago. And they have the worst fucking interior taste I’ve ever seen it’s all white and sanitized and they got nothing on the shelves or walls. I don’t wanna hear shit from Americas about “inhumane design.” My house is sided with fucking asbestos.
How is it bleak and inhumane to build free, strong, effective houses?
That is obviously not what is being complained about. The chief complaints are:
- Large areas consisting of one or two buildings copied-and-pasted dozens of times.
- The area between buildings being more-or-less featureless.
The only people that like those new fuck ugly “mixed use” developments is rich old smarmy people who’s family left their home town 20 years ago.
I’m not sure what you mean by mixed use developments but if you mean this, then you are flat out wrong. Mixed use developments are the cornerstone of the kinds of urbanism that encompass walkable neighbourhoods and the 15 minute city, which is overwhelmingly preferred by the non-car-brained.
And they have the worst fucking interior taste I’ve ever seen…
Not really relevant since interiors can be ugly or not independent of the ugliness of the buildings.
That is the exact type of building I am talking about. I work in one. It was built by a company that is worth over 50 billion dollars. It has not made our city more walkable. It has made our city less affordable, less walkable, and they are building an identical “mixed use” building right across the street from it with competing businesses.
This building I work in used to have a clinic, it failed and is no longer there, a realtor office that failed and is closed, and my own boss tried to expand the restaurant I work in and failed spectacularly and has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars of his own personal money that he is now indebted to (it was probably the dumbest thing my boss could have done but you know business owners)
The Montessori school in this building complex is a private school that costs over 13 thousand dollars for one child K-12.
There is a section of “green space”, in the middle of the parking lot inside that is about 20-30 square feet of grass and about 4 cherry blossom trees. They are quite pretty to look at out the window while I’m working, but I would hardly classify it as an adequate green space.
What you are describing as an effective communal living area for all people (not just the rich) would be a commie bloc. These 5 over 1 buildings are cheap money grabs that do not function correctly, raise rent prices wherever they are placed effectively gentrifying entire neighborhoods, and are meant to serve a rich subset of capitalists thru “rent controlled” apartments that have a minimum wage requirement for you to even apply. That wage requirement is way higher than I make working in the same exact fucking building.
The areas between communist blocks are not “featureless”, and that is a hilarious accusation when trying to defend these money holes of a building. They are literally cheap imitations of commie blocks that are uglier, not made as well, and don’t work as well. These 5 over 1 buildings being “Cornerstone of urbanism” is the best joke I’ve ever heard about American infrastructure. Those pictures in the Wikipedia article you linked are perfect examples, those don’t have ANY green space. I bet for private residents in the back parking lot there’s a few square feet of grass. Is that what you want over this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sídlisko ?
Go and walk down the street in one of these gentrified neighborhoods and see how fun it is, buy a 16$ sandwich and 4$ coffee, have to walk a quarter mile to where you parked and by then your 2 hour limit is up so you got a ticket and now you gotta park where all the homeless people are. (that got pushed out by the development of this multi-million dollar building).
Not really relevant since interiors can be ugly or not independent of the ugliness of the buildings.
I don’t know about you but I actually like hanging out in the cafe to drink my coffee, these are “public spaces” and to you they are cornerstones of urban development, wouldn’t you want people to oh, I don’t know, spend time (and therefor more money) in the business and schools that this company paid millions of dollars for? No? Oh, so we’re only interested in mass housing/ending homelessness when it’s under a capitalist society and you can walk from your apartment to the cafe without going outside. And it has to LOOK SUPER NICE RIGHT AWAY. And we need THE TINIEST GREEN SPACE SURROUNDED BY A PARKING LOT! THATS THE KINDA GREENERY WE LIKEEEEE
You really think these buildings are better than the blocs because what, they look better to you? Solving homelessness isn’t aesthetically pleasing enough? I know a certain GERMAN political party that agrees with your sentiment…
What’s with all the downvotes? Tankies? I live in one, surrounded by more of those blocks and I find it horribly depressing.
Yeah some of them (especially older ones) are nice inside but why is the outside so neglected?
Every square meter is either asphalt, concrete or grass. Nothing grows there and there’s some lawnmower guy who needs to mow it all the fucking time so there’s no quiet during summer
why is the outside so neglected?
I wonder why the Soviets stopped tending to their infrastructure around 1991 surely nothing happened around that time?!?!
So you think they just came in and bulldozed everything? If they hadn’t done anything since then, it would look nicer
Ok so maybe I wasn’t clear that the housing built in a hurry to house people post war was left to rot and not modernised post 1991 as the soviet union collapsed this was followed by shock therapy and capitalists in power who don’t give a shit thus leaving the modern “commie blocks” in eastern Europe today ugly neglected and rundown.
When OP asked “why is the outside so neglected?” I believe you have interpreted the question as “why has the outside been neglected?” As in, the outside has been allowed to become ugly. What I believe they meant, however, is “why was the outside neglected?” As in, the people who designed it neglected to consider the outside. OP is arguing the blocks were ugly at inception, not just since 1991.
Perhaps but they appear to be talking about the current. Either way, the answer however is largely the same just reframed and rephrased. They were built to be functional and quick to deal with the fact hundreds of thousands if not millions would be homeless if nothing was done due to the destruction of fighting the Nazis. They then were not able to be maintained and modernised post 1991 for the reasons outlined.
The Soviet onion was horrible, but those are the few quite good things.
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Stalin ate all the onions with a comically large spoon, except for one. Sadly the last onion wasn’t very good.
That explains the famine
The Soviet Onion…
What would you say the difference is between soviet and western onions?
Soviet onions belong to us all, western onions only to a few, obviously
soviet onion is RED
The Soviet one is when no iPhone or something
Lol I wouldn’t brag on the blocs comrade, there are many problems with them.
despite all their issues, they are preferable to homelessness
Absolutely
People like you are being willfully stupid, imo. Why wouldn’t you, “comrade”, “brag on the blocs”? What’s not to brag about effectively working at solving homelessness in the 50s? That you think it looks ugly? You ever been to America buddy?
Yeah no shit. Literally everything has ups and downs. The USSR just got through a world war against a power that was trying to genocide and colonise their land. Entire cities were destroyed. Millions were made homeless. Commie blocks were a good thing and yet they’re shat on. Like what else were they meant to do?
It’s true, this is a much better solution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tent_cities_in_the_United_States
During great depression, they were called Hoovervilles. I say we bring it back, call them Trumpvilles
Looking at old pics of Hoovervilles is depressing. They were so much nicer than modern homeless encampments. I’m talking real wooden cabins, built on a grid, with stoves/chimneys, and even mailboxes/actual mail service. People who were homeless during the Great Depression were better off than people who are homeless now, because the larger community tolerated them rather than constantly sweeping them.
One has nothing to do with the other? I thought we were talking about blocs.
Nah this is praise lesser evils time
The OP is about how liberals react to public housing built in the USSR: with horror
Meanwhile their own political/economic system does not even attempt to supply all those in need with housing, and leaves its citizens to rot in tent camps or with even less shelter, exposing clear double standards and hypocrisy
Apologies that I missed the context then
Probably a good idea in the future to read both panels of a meme before jumping in uniformeduninformeduniformed
The uniform:
the Faircloth Limit as an amendment to the Housing Act of 1937, which limited funding for the construction or operation of all units to the total number of units as of October 1, 1999 and repealed a rule that required one for one replacement of demolished housing units.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsidized_housing_in_the_United_States
I mean, either you have a state that actually spend the resources to house people, or you get that.
What are you playing dumb?
How so?
Those damned Soviets haven’t done any maintenance on them since 1991
Vast majority of commie blocs don’t stand up today. Those who still do are incredibly riddled with issues.
They were cheaply built designed to keep the workforce next to the factories and nothing else. Living in them is miserable.
The “commie blocs” you see today for the vast majority were built after communism ended.
Vast majority of commie blocs don’t stand up today. Those who still do are incredibly riddled with issues.
So it’s an issue from the absence of communism.
They were cheaply built designed to keep the workforce next to the factories and nothing else. Living in them is miserable.
As opposed to living out in the street? In tent cities?
So it’s an issue from the absence of communism
Uh, no? These were shit during communism too. There was basically no maintenance or planning, the materials used were garbage.
As opposed to living out in the street? In tent cities?
As opposed to a properly built housing a factory worker could afford.
Like I get it y’all really love stacking humans in oversized rabbit hutches but the commie blocks were terrible, stop using them as an example.
As opposed to a properly built housing a factory worker could afford.
You know what? I agree. It’s actually really evil of the soviets that they did not build a Versailles for every single factory worker! It’s not like they couldn’t! Evil Stalin decided to just house people in bad houses because he’s evil, it’s really too bad they didn’t have a genius like you there to say “hey guys, how about we build nice houses instead?” You could’ve made it all so much better.
ah yes
Shitty run down unmaintained building that is rotting from the inside and the outside
Versaille castles
The only two options when it comes to building housing
Nonono I agree with you, why did they decide to construct pre-rundown buildings? Such fools!
As opposed to a properly built housing a factory worker could afford.
If you just ignore the historical context sure.
Maybe I’m just bitter about the boatload of money I paid for repairs only for the fucking elevator to work only 3 months of the year. I was on floor 13. I remember similar complaints from others.
So you’re mad that the Commies are no longer there to maintain and improve them and they’re instead left to rot so the capitalists can point at them and say communism bad.
Ussr can do good thing. Can also do bad thing.
Problem with bad things, like bad arguments, lack thought or think about self. Also call self reflection.
Ask self, apartments good, yes. Ask self, stalin good, on whole probably not. Ask self, authoritarianism good, on whole no is bad. Ask self, shit posting on lemmy good, depends.
The term authoritarianism is utterly meaningless because all governments rely on coercion to maintain their authority. The state is fundamentally an instrument that’s used by the ruling class to maintain its dominance. The whole notion that political systems can be neatly categorized into authoritarian or democratic binaries is deeply infantile.
The reality is that every government derives its authority from its monopoly on legal violence. The ability to enforce laws, suppress dissent, and maintain order is derived from control over police, military, and judicial systems. Whether a government is labelled authoritarian or democratic, the fundamental basis of its power lies here. Therefore, the only meaningful questions to ask are which class interests it represents, and to what extent can it be held accountable to them.
What ultimately matters is which class controls the institutions of state violence. In capitalist democracies, the government represent the interests of the economic elites who fund political campaigns, own media outlets, and control key industries. Western public lacks the mechanisms necessary to hold the government to account, and the ruling class is disconnected from the broader population. That’s precisely what’s driving political discontent all across western sphere today.
Ask yourself is guzzling western propaganda uncritically good, on the whole no is bad.
The term authoritarianism is utterly meaningless because all governments rely on coercion to maintain their authority. The state is fundamentally an instrument that’s used by the ruling class to maintain its dominance. The whole notion that political systems can be neatly categorized into authoritarian or democratic binaries is deeply infantile.
The reality is that every government derives its authority from its monopoly on legal violence. The ability to enforce laws, suppress dissent, and maintain order is derived from control over police, military, and judicial systems. Whether a government is labelled authoritarian or democratic, the fundamental basis of its power lies here. Therefore, the only meaningful questions to ask are which class interests it represents, and to what extent can it be held accountable to them.
I honestly think we should have a bot where anytime someone says the word authoritarian it just spits this out at them.
Seriously, I find there are just a handful of tropes libs regurgitate like trained parrots. You really can just have a templated response to them.
Every government is authoritarian, so the logical solution would be to abolish government altogether.
Signed,
An anarchistHow are you gonna defend your country from fascism if you won’t express authority on hostile invasions? You think Hitler was defeated by just chillin and giving up authority? I gotta stop taking the bait.
Going to copy paste my previous response:
With weapons, voluntary training programs (both in terms of participation and guidance), and organization.
If some group of bad actors try to coup your community, you don’t just lie back and take it.
That’s authoritarian
Edit: if you abolish the government already before this theoretical invasion there is no voluntary training, there is no organization because you need authority to back those systems up otherwise some Nazis are just going to act cool until you train them and then they’ll take all your shit. Or just come in and kill you while your random decentralized groups are training and organizing.
So now your back @ square one, no government, everything is decentralized (no one group of organizers because those who organize into hierarchy are authoritarian) Nazis took all your weapons, and I ask again, how are you going to defend your country which has now been violently invaded and destroyed by fascists?
Step 1: Abolish Government
Step 2: Establish absolutely no institutional infrastucture to ensure nobody else makes a new government. Because that would be authoritatian.
Step 3: Someone makes another government by establishing a monopoly on violence.
Step 4: Abolish Government… wait what?
Straw man
noun- An argument or opponent set up so as to be easily refuted or defeated.
- A doll or scarecrow (particularly one stuffed with straw).
- An insubstantial concept, idea, endeavor or argument, particularly one deliberately set up to be weakly supported, so that it can be easily knocked down; especially to impugn the strength of any related thing or idea.
Specify how what I described is different than what you’d do then. What mechanisms or institutions would you put in place to prevent step 3?
With weapons, voluntary training programs (both in terms of participation and guidance), and organization.
If some group of bad actors try to coup your community, you don’t just lie back and take it.
Say’s who? The community is supposed to just organically resist this? There’s no organizational structure? Because that would be a government.
Which the government’s supporters will promptly call you authoritarian for doing.
Capitalists aren’t going to let you abolish their rule without an organized violence that they will tell others is “authoritarian”.
You mean a revolution? In that case, I can agree with all but the very last word.
“Authoritarian” is (generally speaking) a word used to describe governments’ usage of violence or other means to either establish or maintain rule over their populace.
The capitalist class (or, more generally speaking speaking, the powerful elite) will more often use terms like “barbarians,” “rioters,” or similar language. They will reserve the word “authoritarian” as a separate method of propaganda to go to war with countries they want to steal natural resources from or to otherwise invade to expand their empire, though I’m not a historian by any means, so the idea of “regieme change” might be a bit newer than I’m thinking.
“Authoritarian” is (generally speaking) a word used to describe governments’ usage of violence or other means to either establish or maintain rule over their populace.
So all governments
“Authoritarian” is (generally speaking) a word used to describe governments’ usage of violence or other means to either establish or maintain rule over their populace.
That’s just every government. The word is completely meaningless using your definition, you can just say “state” or “government” or “regime”.
“A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is; it is the act whereby one part of the population imposes its will upon the other part by means of rifles, bayonets and cannon — authoritarian means, if such there be at all; and if the victorious party does not want to have fought in vain, it must maintain this rule by means of the terror which its arms inspire in the reactionists. Would the Paris Commune have lasted a single day if it had not made use of this authority of the armed people against the bourgeois? Should we not, on the contrary, reproach it for not having used it freely enough?”
― Frederick Engels
Is there a real world example of the bourgeois specifically calling revolutionairies authoritarian, or is that limited to theory?
Yes, see basically every revolution, but look at Cuba for a prime example
Cuba, China, Vietnam, USSR, DPRK, Soviet Afghanistan (The one where women weren’t slaves, which the US overthrew in favour of poppy-growing pedophiles), East Germany, Nelson Mandela, Venezuela, Chile, the list goes on. Similarly: Countries that do not have governments, they have “regimes”. They do not have Vice-presidents or deputies, they have “hand-picked successors”.
Western media regularly calls China and DPRK authoritarian.
Abolishing the government with a hostile world order that seeks to overthrow you is equally moronic as it is suicidal.
ohh, how cute, 5 year old learnt to use the internet.
How’s that working out for y’all?
Why are you writing like that? I looked at your profile; you’ve shown in other places you can write a coherent sentence. So is this some kind of affectation? What are you trying to convey by pretending to be illiterate?
Ask self, authoritarianism good, on whole no is bad. Ask self, shit posting on lemmy good, depends.
name a non-authoritarian country
This reads like this was written by a toddler.
What would the absence of ‘authoritarianism’ be called?
Now with suicide nets!
You confused commieblock with US Navy carrier.
I thought that was the China Foxconn propaganda: “they work 23 hour days and they are all 8 years old and they had to put suicide nets on the buildings because they try to flee out the windows from the men with whips loke rats from a sinking ship and their skin rots off from chemical exposure because China man too stupid for safety gear and too cheap, all money in communist society goes to the bosses and the elites while the people starve, anyway they built ghost cities for show and they’ll be BANKRUPT AND GONE in 10 years time” he confidently posted from the west
you must be confused, that’s the empire of japan and occupied korea that have giant suicide rates. booming western societies.
projection
oh boy liberal world comin out strong with the RuZziA BaD trope 🤣
source?
What this have anything to do with the meme?
As one would expect in a capitalist oligarchy.
