MrNobodyWhy do you think so many people on the Marxist left defend Stalinism?
foodandartI would wager it’s as they don’t read actual historical documents of those who witnessed and survived Stalin, is why. Dude was bloody-minded as fuck, and in a tweenaged subset of the population, death, misery and degradations are “cool”.
The political flip side are the right-wing chuds that join ICE so they can tear families apart and “own” the left.
Any recommended reading that isn’t The Gulag Archipelago?
Off the top of my head, no. (It’s been decades since I’ve thought about any of this, TBH…)
What you can do is branch out and read up on the people he had around him in government, like the Deputy Chair of the Soviet secret police, Lavrentiy Beria. (Now that’s a dark hole to look in to, he was feared more than Stalin.)
Stalin was a thug at heart. Angry and conniving, but surrounded himself with even worse people. (Gee, who can we see as a mirror of that today? Yikes…)
Who he chose to do his bidding, that’s where the full scope of the horror of Stalin can be found.