External hostility often pushed socialist regimes toward authoritarian measures. For example, the USSR faced significant opposition from capitalist countries, which influenced its militarization and political centralization. This external pressure created a siege mentality that undermined the potential for democratic governance.

This is something that I wish more people who talked about this would acknowledge and engage with. I get it, authoritarianism isn't good. It's not like we want that. It's not the goal. But it's really easy to sit on the sidelines from a relatively cushy life in the imperial core and judge all the people out there who are dealing with the historical reality of colonialism and feudalism and the current reality of imperialism. They are actively engaged in the practical task of liberating themselves from forces, both external and internal (old power structures/privileges) that seek to violently return them to a condition of servitude. The decisions they made have to be viewed through the lens of that context.

That doesn't mean we can't discuss and criticize them, but it's worth engaging in the nuance of the history rather than out of hand dismissing their attempts as inherently illegitimate, evil, and/or misguided. What were the conditions they were operating under? What dangers did they face? Were their actions the best strategy for achieving the future they wanted? Was what they gave up too great? Did they have the capability to take a more open path? Have/had their decisions irreparably led them astray or were/are they still on the path to that eventual communist society on some time scale?

If you think they're wrong for what they did, you still have to be able to answer the question of how you protect your revolution from forces that will spy on you, sabotage your industry, fund right wing militias to terrorize people, sanction and blockade you, or even invade you? Or if you think the path wasn't even violent revolution in the first place, what is your answer to how you get to where you want to be when the power structure that would need to allow this is also invested in not allowing this? It's a bit harder to see how this is made difficult or even impossible in liberal "democracies," but it should be uncontroversial to acknowledge that some kind of force was necessary to escape from illiberal systems like Feudalism in Russia/China or from colonial regimes like in Vietnam.

The one thing I'd push back on from your comment is about the welfare states of Europe. That's not really what socialism is about. They've made life better for people in their own country, yes, but it's on the backs of those exploited in the third world. That's why communism is inherently internationalist. "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." You need to be able to build a movement that can work to lift everyone up with you, or at least not drag them down for your own benefit. I'd be interested to have more of a discussion on this, but that's the standpoint I'd start from.

Goddammit.

Understandable. It got pretty frustrating for me too at various points. I'm kinda bad at this kind of combat in general. Most of what motivates me to push through it in games like Dark Souls or Tunic is being interested in the world. But sometimes not even that's enough.

Tunic.

The one thing I think is worth “spoiling” just to save you some pain:

I also second Outer Wilds.

Aside from doing the work to maintain and update your own engine, there is also the problem of onboarding new hires. If you use a standard you can go out and hire people already experienced with working on the engine. If you use your own, you have to teach a new hire to use it before they can be any help.

I read that this caused a lot of development woes on Halo Infinite for example.

The question that is an irrelevant tangent from the original discussion? The one that assumed something about my point that wasn't anywhere in the text? What do you even want out of this conversation? You aren't even engaging with the argument.

You haven't answered my question. You provided a suggested solution, but with nothing to back it up in relation to the question. If all you have to say is "The New Deal was good," that isn't pertinent to the discussion unless you can show how it was related to a mass voter movement. Instead of doing that you just started a different argument with an imaginary opponent.

Also for whatever it's worth:

"Tell me why we shouldn't have a CCC and a WPA as a start."

"It’s not like I was trying to say ND programs were bad."

Assuming your question is "Weren't ND agencies good? Do you not want them?" Then I answered that. That was never a point of contention in the argument. You're getting mad at nothing.

It’s a shame. Seeing the bullshit companies have done to games for the sake of profit ought to be a pretty easy on-ramp to anti-capitalism. But just like in the real world, racist shit distracts them from any of that.

Well at this point it seems like half this thread is just people not being clear what they mean or misunderstanding someone else.

I was responding to the assertion that there was some time when most people voted and participated in the system and that time was good because of that. You offered the New Deal as an example of this. I was showing how that didn’t really match up to the voter participation rate.

It’s not like I was trying to say ND programs were bad. Just that they weren’t the product of mass voter mobilization and didn’t change anything fundamental about the relationship between workers, capital, and the state.

That’s all. I’m pushing back against the idea that American democracy itself has somehow fallen from grace from some mythical period of mass democratic participation. That’s just never been what the country was. If you want to get to that point, you have to start by acknowledging that the old system wasn’t what you wanted to preserve. Otherwise you just keep ending up in the same place.

Imagine all the cool stuff we could be doing if we weren’t wasting the time of hundreds of engineers figuring out how to shove ads in people’s faces.

Ah yes, because what I want when I tell my computer to stop playing audio and video is for YouTube to play some audio and video of some random thing I didn’t ask for at like 3x the volume of the video I just paused. Thanks google. Such an innovative company!

There is no punishment horrible enough that we could inflict on oil execs, especially the ones that have known about this since the 70s and chose to fight for the status quo, that would make up for what they’ve done to us.

It's crazy how successful they've been off just making and selling a good indie game. They're still doing free updates AND they can afford a $200k donation?