>I think you'll have to back that up before I believe it.

I don't think it will be appropriate to start a debate about historical events but , my point was precisely same as yours, none of those claims about deaths caused by Stalin or any other communists has any proof. So do not use it as the argument.
the fact is that capitalists hate communists and it is obvious that they will invent any lies necessary to discredit it just like if you hate something at the level where your entire existence depends on that nobody with any amount of sanity will believe a single word that you say about what you hate.

>>The totalitarianism that is imposed to bring communism into being is that theory's own "fatal problem" in that nobody running the totalitarian state will ever come around to the point where they hand the power over to the people like they're supposed to.

you are talking nonsense because communism has no state by itself if there is a state it is not communism but socialism.
the name of communist just implies that this person hates state and seeks to abolish it. while socialist desires to keep the state and believes that state is a good thing.

it is the undeniable reality that you will not be able to exist without totalitarian state and all state with no exception are totalitarian because of that is the purpose of the state. it is necessary evil which forces everyone to obey rules.

You complain about a totalitarian communist state, but all states are totalitarian.

The idea of communism is that at some point state will become meaningless because there will be no laws left to enforce.

capitalism requires state because who else will track all that private property? you need some register which will track what belongs to what who is whose wife and child, who made a contract with whom. and it needs to have violent repression system to enforce all those property rights and contracts.

communism solves it all simply by abolishing all private property and contracts, so the state is no longer needed because it has nothing to do anymore there is nothing left to track or protect.

at most, we can still keep state for controlling another crime like vandalism, murder or violence, but there will be no way to complain about theft or breach of contract.

So as you see no totalitarianism is required for communism

it is precisely same as with this situation with art, you make something I take it if you complain nobody cares and just tells you that you are free just not to do anything because your property rights will not be respected.

we can extend it to the all aspect of the life like I can just come to your house and live there without asking you if you try to complain and kick me out I will fight to protect my right to live wherever I desire and you have the same right as well. I can use all your fruits of labor without asking or giving anything back.

Your only solution is not to work at all. just like with this art and nobody will give a damn about that but if you finally get bored to death and produce something everyone will grab it and use it if this is useful.

Of course, you still can trade but you can only trade work not some products we still can agree to cooperate like I make bread you make butter and then we combine that into sandwiches. but when we make them everyone around will come and start grabbing them as well so you will be forced to produce enough to satisfy everyone or else you will stay hungry.

>Until you convince everyone on earth that nobody actually has a right to own or trade anything, that nobody can claim an exclusive right to some object, then some form of capitalism will exist, even if it's underground to elude the clutches of an authoritarian state.


there is no need to convince anyone of anything like that the moment when the state will stop enforcing property rights with police violence property right will stop existing.

Again copyright is a perfect example when nobody gives a shit about your imaginary rights or your claim because there is no police which will come and put us in jail.

I can claim sun as my property with exact same success and demand you all to pay me for the light it produces. If I do that you just declare that I lost few screws in my head. I do same if you declare that something you made is yours.
How will you run that underground capitalism in that situation? how will you prove that something belongs to you and prevent people from using it?

Only if we have totalitarian state it can make us obey some arbitrary rules and pay for sunlight because some guy registered sun as his property.


>And this is the ironic thing, that you talk about how one's work is "valued" when this whole thread has come about because people like you do NOT value the work of artists, in any meaningful sense...


I don't see any problems in that the fact that your work is valued does not mean that you have to be compensated for that in any way. remember that you made it for yourself, not for us, and the fact that we like it is just coincidence, we did not request you to make anything. The work you produced is same as sunlight produced by the sun it is just there regardless if it is used or not.