I'll admit it, I'm a no-theory brainlet

Trotsky always defended the USSR

Tankies are basically socialist zionists with the USSR as their Israel and they cannot handle any criticism of the Soviet Union beyond "it didn't bounce on Stalin's dick hard enough".

Tankyism still still struggles with the fact that "really existing socialism" no longer really exists.

In addition, Trotskyists have been more popular in the West than they have, and they have the dual forces of envy over the popularity of Trotskyism and a hipster smugness over being in a more fringe ideology, usually with claims of being the purer socialists despite the fact that Stalin was actually more moderate than Trotsky.

Trotskyism is only "more popular" because the CIA wanted it to be. Same with anarcho-liberalism. It's time to let them die.

That's quite the bold claim you're makin, I don't suppose you would have any fucking p r o o f

CIA supported everyone who criticized USSR. Why does it surprise you that it includes trots?
theawl.com/2015/08/literary-magazines-for-socialists-funded-by-the-cia-ranked/

CIA WAS NAZTROT GANG

Unironically though this doesn't make Trotsky's argument any more or less compelling, seeing it was only convenient for the CIA to fund it.

this , and also his theory of a degenerated workers state/state capitalism is fundamentally idealist.

Wrong again, bucko

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funny i had the exact opposite experience moving from a teenage anarchist to more sympathetic to state socialism as an adult

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Nice straw man

Yes, but arguing against USSR in public ended up hurting socialist cause and it keeps hurting it now.

The USSR didn't collapse because there wasn't enough Western support for it

One french Magazine from the 1930's being funded by the CIA does not proof of Trotskyism being supported by the bourgeosie make.

Nice strawmen.
My point was that criticizm of USSR by trots largerly destroyed communist parties in the west and divided communist movement, which in turn strengthened US.

If by 'USSR' you mean his idealized vision of it, then sure. In reality he wrote about how shit the USSR was because the big bad bureaucracy caste were all lying scumbags.

Trots were never super popular in america. For some reason american communists latched onto Maoism. They didnt want to be associated with the soviet union at all during the cold war.
During the 1960's and 70's peak of revolutionary chic maoism was way in.

But it eventually lost popularity.

The big difference between trotskyists and stalinists is basically

stalin - revolution in one country

Trotsky- revolution in all countries

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Also gramsci called him "puttana dei fascisti"
This literally means whore of the fascists

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I admire what he did for the ussr, but he was also brutal to his soldiers, and in a way aggravated the civil war by fucking up at brest litovsk.

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It’s failure is undeniable for the simple reason that it no longer exists. Take what lessons you can and move on instead of clinging to a set of ideas and policies that history has swept away.

Well one reason Trotskyism was popular in WE was because it advocated entryism: which was engaged with (See UK Militant Tendency); however the US had no party to engage with entryism so it had no real means of doing anything.

No, irrationally clinging to a failed experiment is what will hurt the socialist movement. I find I have far more luck convincing people when you tell them that you don’t want to re-create the USSR, since 90% of their arguments boil down to pointing out its failures anyway. I still defend its successes, but I don’t delude myself into thinking it wasn’t an overall failure.

The moment you agree to liberal talking points you lose the argument. It wasn't a failed experiment, as evident by what happened in Russia after the fall of the USSR. Any time you draw comparisons with Russia under socialism and under capitalism socialism comes on top. Of course it would be difficult to convince politically illiterate American, who was getting spoon-fed that America is the land of freedom and Communism is the world's evil since birth.

Can't one respect Trotsky for his contributions to the Revolution while disagreeing with his later stance on the USSR?

Forgive my english as its not my first language. I'll try to explain.

Trotsky is like the Hillary to Stalin's Trump: That is, while Stalin is portrayed (justifiedly or not) as a man who was "down with the people, as proved by his support by unions and the rural working class, was more of a patriot than internationalist (he promoted Socialism in one country, was a noninterventionist and stalled all attempts of war with Germany), and came from a traditional working class background. He, although Georgian, did embody many of the russian stereotypes, including the fact that he was a man with an imposing body and prescence.

Trotsky, on the other side, was much more unorthodox, starting from superficial aspects: He was a jewish intellectual. He was more well-travelled and educated, matching Lenin in how formidable his intellect was. Not to say Stalin was dumb, but Trotsky was a genius, and aware about it, which allowed him to wield his power and carry his plans with confidence. His military prowess was something else, and Winston Churchill terrified of him coming to power, because he believed Trotsky would eventually turn Europe red if allowed to do so. Read on his exploits during the October Revolution. This made him the unofficial leader of the Moscow intelligentsia after Lenin's death.

But he was not a charismatic man. He read books during meetings because he didn't think they had anything of worth to tell him. He openly disdained Russia and thought it was a backwards country and that only through internationalism and intervention in other countries would socialism truly come to be (to be fair Lenin also thought so but he wasn't a prick about it). He was ready to invade Poland and go to war with Germany and Britain if needed, even at a time when most of the party thought that reconstruction needed to be done first. He didn't have many friends within the party and he was not savvy at politicking because he was kind of autistic. People saw him as a snobby, uppity jew with a superiority complex, and it doesn't help that antisemitism was rampant during those times. So Stalin exploited that and vanished him without much trouble.

Those who support him believe he would have killed Nazi Germany in it's roots and brought communism to Europe in it's genuine form rather than the Stalinist bureaucracy we got.
Personally I believe that, as much as people rag on Stalin, a lot of it was because of war, and had Trotsky come to power, he would have been much more brutal and ruthless since he was convinced he was always right, and would have brought the USSR an early death, but not before burning Europe to the ground.

People shit on USSR: Collapses
People shit on USA: Nothing happens

Were slave societies failures because they no longer exist? Were feudal societies? Was rome a failure because it doesn't exist?

Doesn't matter that a system can last for centuries and bring millions out of poverty and integrate them into civilization, they no longer exist and are thus failures!

MEGA BRAIN.

Fucking this
Should also be noted that Trotsky vs Stalin wasn't the only dynamic: Bukharin was also a major bloke.
Think about it this way, post-Lenin's death there were three major factions in the RCP(b):
The Continuators: bukharin, wanted to continue the NEP, communism will expand through sponsorship of parties in first world, pluralism okay, foreign policy of mutual relations, neither openly hostile but not cooperation.
The Developmentalists: Stalin, introduce central planning for rapid industrialisation, the home of communism must be secured before expansion, unity in party line required, foreign policy to secure continued existence of USSR.
The Expansionists: Trotsky, NEP must evolve into an openly anti-bourgeois state, communism must be actively spread through all means possible in all directions possible, democratic centrism must be kept to but factions can exist, foreign policy of open conflict (although not actual war) with bourgeois states.
When you look at it this way, you can see how the conflict of post-Lenin 1920s USSR played out and how the USSR could have diverged into these three paths. Honestly I think the Continuators had a better chance of power than the Expansionists, and if they had done so it is quite possible communism would have spread to either Germany or France through electoral means. How this would affect WWII I do not know, but the USSR would have had an ally. The downside however is that continuation of the NEP, while leading to industrialisation, would have not let the USSR have the SAME capacity it did in WWII. Yet, with resources being spent on propagating communism throughout Europe it might have not needed that same capacity

Regardless, this is historical analysis, the meaningful point is how we take it forward into the future.

Stop with that "Anti SJW" shit. Liberal= Adam Smith. Fuck the yankee vocabulary. Social Justice is good. Brainlet or not, complaining about SJWs is never a good thing. Yeah, Trotsky was a traitor, or perhaps in a different timeline he wasn't. Idgaf. Just drop that retarded anti SJW shit because it makes you look like a reactionary lapdog.

It is easy for nothing to happen when some pretty fucked up stuff DOES HAPPEN, that is, the terrorist invasions by the yankee army against Vietnam, Best Korea, Iraq and the terrorism against the third world in general.

ah yes becoming a world superpower means nothing
no shit it collapsed, that doesn't mean it's a complete failure

esjayuus aren't really that big of an issue, yes, but they're usually still liberals (well, neoliberals)
thinking you can't criticize a group without being "like a reactionary" is foolish
idpol should not be placed before class

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he was a small man with smallpox scars, a bad arm and a limp. maybe presence, but not body

And yet he outdid Trotsky in every way imaginable. Really makes you think.

u wot?

Going by the yankee vocabulary is fucking disgusting though. SJWs are not necessarily neoliberals.You are adopting a shitty term created by a bunch of subhuman reactionaries from fucking burguerland.

i was quibbling over a small point, i'm not making an argument over which was better

Those societies weren’t failures because the established themselves and became the dominant modes of production. The Soviet Union failed to usher in socialism as the dominant system, and thus as a socialist experiment it was a failure.

I didn’t say it was a total failure, I said it was an overall failure. There is a difference.

t. Hilldawg

if they support capitalism but mistakenly believe it can be "fixed" by quotas or whatnot, they're liberals, or socdems, or whatever
in burgerville, they typically are just basic bitch liberals, at least from my interactions with them, and mistakenly identify the root of problems as racism/sexism and not class inequality
racism and sexism are a problem, yeah, but they're not the root cause, they're a symptom
"muh SJWs" are more of a boogeyman than anything, though, and the term is a tad silly, but just because you don't like idpol shit doesn't make you a reactionary

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This is also another retarded meme by you silly burgers. No one actually cares about Hillary outside of those stupid yanks who chose her over Bernie for whatever autistic reason.

Good, just call the socdems or (Adam Smith's version) of liberals. It doesn't make you reactionary, it still means you feed from the idioms provided by the reactionary culture. Don't do that. Don't spread Carlgon of Mossad's neologisms.

boomers

well yeah, I already call them liberals
so do most people here

it was boomers and idpol people who wanted a woman president
that's it

.
Boomers
I gotta lurk more. Last time I heard that, I was playing L4D.

Stalin really didn't want to wage war against Germany until push came to shove and was forced to. Trotsky was willing to be interventionist and he blamed nazism on Stalin for not supporting socialists in Germany.

Stalin did support them, the revolutions in germany failed and then he ordered them to make common cause with the SPD but the SPD were retarded and let Hitler rise to power. Ironically many in the KPD actually supported Hitler at first.

That's why USSR offered protection to Czechoslovakia, and to join the Allies, right?

you forgot your picture

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I-IT WAS LEON'S TURN!!! LENIN WANTED TROTSKY TO SUCCEED HIM!!! ONLY DUMB UNEDUCATED LUMPENPROLES LIKE STALIN!!! NOT REAL DEMOCRACY!!!

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he betrayed papa makhno.

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Trotsky created neoconservatism.

Ah, yes, I remember how the goal of communism was having a large armie and many tanks, and not silly things like equality, social justice, the end of commodity production, the end of alienation.

Bet Karl Marx woulda fucking loved Saddam Hussein!

I guess getting killed by Nazis is one way to end alienation - because that would have happened if they suspended on the military industry.

Because he promoted revisionism, wrecking and a myriad of other crimes, thankfully based Stalin had him dealt with

no

Most people here are, don't feel bad about it.
Trotsky is mostly hated by tankïes who are still butthurt about his opposition to Stalinism, though anarchists also are resentful of him for crushing the Kronstadt rebellion.
Well, I'm sure the same could be said about any Soviet figure — so it's not really all that helpful.
Trotsky was for all intents and purposes a Leninist, though he opposed the NEP as a semi-capitulation of sorts. He was a steadfast internationalist, which is why he reviled the stalinist concept of "socialism in one country". He described the USSR under Stalin as a deformed workers' state, that is a properly socialist republic where workers' control of the means of production had been seized back by a bureaucratic clique. He also tried to explain why socialist revolutions had happened in backward shitholes but not in fully-developed capitalist regions, contrarily to what Marx had predicted.
I've never come across a liberal who actually knew anything about Trotsky beyond the fact that he opposed Stalin.

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Trotsky was the name of my hamster from when I was 8 or 9. They told me it's breed was russian (pic related) so I wanted to name it after a russian guy. Trotsky was the only name of a russian guy I could come up with, for some reason.

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cybernetic planned economy=/=bureaucracy my dude

yeah whatever uncle joe

The xorrect answer for bith qiestions is the fact that he's jewish

trot groups being sneaky collaborating bastards has nothing to do with the body of thought of Leon Trotsky.