tanks comrade :)

Thanks! Was just about to ask for the red sails article.

Depends on the subject, but my favorites are Jason Hickel’s 2 posts on approval rates and whether they are reliable, as well as Roland Boer’s 2 books Socialism with Chinese Characteristics: A Guide for Foreigners and Socialism in Power: The History and Theory of Socialist Governance.

Here’s a sample comment from my Lemmy.ml account:

It’s absolutely true. Public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy in the PRC, and the working classes control the state. For example, when looking at publicly owned industries, we can see the following:

Even checking Wikipedia, data from 2022 shows that the overwhelming majority of the top companies are publicly owned SOEs. This is China’s strategy, they’ve been honest about it from the beginning. The private sector is about half cooperatives like Huawei or farming cooperarives and sole proprietorships, with the other half being small and medium firms. As these grow, they are folded into the public sector gradually. This is China’s Socialist Market Economy.

As for the state being run by the working classes, this is also pretty straightforward. Public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy, and the CPC, a working class party, dominates the state. At a democratic level, local elections are direct, while higher levels are elected by lower rungs. At the top, constant opinion gathering and polling occurs, gathering public opinion, driving gradual change. This system is better elaborated on in Professor Roland Boer’s Socialism in Power: On the History and Theory of Socialist Governance, and we can see the class breakdown of the top of the government itself:

Overall, this system has resulted in over 90% of the population approving the government, which is shown to be consistent and accurate. If you want to learn more, while not nearly as in-depth due to time limits as Roland Boer’s work (and mostly focused on the Xi Jinping era), Red Pen’s A Summary of Xi Jinping’s Governance of China can be a good primer! There’s also This is how China’s economic model works: Explaining Socialism with Chinese Characteristics by Geopolitical Economy Report.

Socialism is not the absence of private property, but the transition between capitalism and communism, indicated by public ownership as principle. Collectivization of production and distribution is a gradual process, and to dogmatically apply this to secondary and small industry before markets naturally centralize them and prepare them for public ownership isn’t necessary.

Only major thing I need is a source backing the breakdown of the CPC beyond just an image.

yeah completely! again, as other commenters have pointed out many of these people are difficult to convince since they both dont have as much of a short term interest in overthrowing capitalism like impcore citizens/other petit bourgeoisie or reactionaries, and some are just plainly approaching in bad faith or are really so incapable due to indoctrination to imagine literally any other alternative to capitalism

there’s a lot to be said about the debate culture we’ve propagated that even in lib discussions is completely banal if not detrimental, since it makes unnecessary compromises by even treating fascist and other destructive ideologies as deserving of respect.

in this sense it also extends to those who adamantly push against the historical facts to be anti-communists. once more, if you sense anyone is being adversarial and inflammatory and unwilling to learn actually about communism, don’t waste your time on them!! yes misinformation hurts to see spread (i have a ventpost about this exact scenario where i also reacted visibly to such lies being fed) but at that point, if you can’t fix that situation and will expend energy trying to do so, try to find ways to cope! honestly, online spaces with comrades/people of similar tendencies does actually help + finding people irl especially even if it’s hard/impossible.

this isn’t to say you’ll never interact with a non-communist/anti-communist who cant be reasoned with, sometimes it’s worthwhile to pursue it, but honestly at this time focus on yourself, and really your own pursuit of better political education so one day you can dismantle these arguments easily in less time. i am rooting for you!!!