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Some marxists say that Xi Jinping is a billionaire so China isn’t really socialist because it’s not a dictatorship of the proletariat. How to object to this?
EDIT: not billionaire but millionaire
I’d first ask them how they got to that conclusion. No doubt he holds some wealth but billions is way out there. Hell, the man earns around 22k dollars a year.
Remember, it’s not always up to you to refute bullshit. First, people have to back up their bullshit to do that.
Remember, it’s not always up to you to refute bullshit.
Unfortunately, I don’t think this is correct in the context of talking to people about socialism. It’s not a formal debate; it’s persuasion and rhetoric. Pointing out that they didn’t source anything can help, but it’s rarely enough to get anyone to change their mind.
The bar is higher for us because we are swimming against the current of a century of anti-communist propaganda.
Asking sincerely “where did you hear that” can sometimes get people to realise that they are just repeating a myth though, it should never be “I bet you can’t source that :smuglord:” but instead a “let’s go through and examine this claim together”. People get defensive when they feel they or their ideas are being attacked, but framing it as a “let’s explore and learn together” has a lot more success than “You’re wrong about that.” which will almost always be interpreted negatively, treated as a personal attack.
This might be a good resource https://redsails.org/china-has-billionaires/
Being rich doesn’t mean you’re bourgeois.
Not a popular opinion in ML spaces, but it’s true.
It’s your relationship to the means of production and how much control you have over it.
China is also a democracy and has extensive worker control, even in the private sector (which is curtailed in favor of the workers, though there are obviously some issues in a transitory state).