What are you reading? Books, articles or publications of any kind!

Oddjob

Merry fucking Xmas to you assholes
Yeah, I don't know about inherent distrust for socialists. Franco was no better than Caballero. Those that committed the White Terror and the Guomindang weren't socialists and neither was Pinochet nor the folk of the GW Bush administration, but I wouldn't trust any of those folk or many others. I find it easier to just not trust people in general, that way you don't miss anything.

I've got to get back and finish Beevor's book on Spain, got distracted at about page 300.
Oh don't get me wrong, there are creeps on all sides. But the Socialists/Communists/Soviets/Maoists/Naxalites are next level evil and just seem to stick around forever. The Fascists/Royalists/Catholics while very good at erasing people, just don't have that demonic stamina for sausage grinding over the long term.

The White Terror was shit but was little leagues compared to the great leap forward and the cultural Revolution. My parents saw China just as the Cultural Revolution ended and couldn't believe how desolate China was. And yet the CCP is still in charge.

Chiang's son introduced parliamentary democracy in Taiwan, and I was there to see the whole country turn out to honour him (voluntarily) on his funeral procession. The same sort of thing happened in Spain, Chile, Argentina, Portugal etc etc. I'm sure the historians have some sort of grouping for these countries like fascist light.

The Spanish civil war is confusing as fuck, the Beevor book tries it's best to make sense of it.
TLDR: one set of assholes want to take the levers of power from the old set of assholes. Unfortunately the new set of assholes have an inner circle of assholes white anting the less noisome new assholes. This allows the old assholes, who have an established pecking order to win.

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johnny

I'll tells ya!
Staff member
Oh don't get me wrong, there are creeps on all sides. But the Socialists/Communists/Soviets/Maoists/Naxalites are next level evil and just seem to stick around forever. The Fascists/Royalists/Catholics while very good at erasing people, just don't have that demonic stamina for sausage grinding over the long term.

The White Terror was shit but was little leagues compared to the great leap forward and the cultural Revolution. My parents saw China just as the Cultural Revolution ended and couldn't believe how desolate China was. And yet the CCP is still in charge.

Chiang's son introduced parliamentary democracy in Taiwan, and I was there to see the whole country turn out to honour him (voluntarily) on his funeral procession. The same sort of thing happened in Spain, Chile, Argentina, Portugal etc etc. I'm sure the historians have some sort of grouping for these countries like fascist light.

The Spanish civil war is confusing as fuck, the Beevor book tries it's best to make sense of it.
TLDR: one set of assholes want to take the levers of power from the old set of assholes. Unfortunately the new set of assholes have an inner circle of assholes white anting the less noisome new assholes. This allows the old assholes, who have an established pecking order to win.

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Don't disagree with a lot of that, except that I put the fascists/right in the same league as the soc/com left - fundamentalism and abuse of power is all the same in the end. I also think that there is a strong argument for the close relationship between Mao/Xi's China and fascism as they share a lot of characteristics, such as autarky, extreme nationalism, righteous violence, racism/othering, cult-like leadership, etc. etc. My hunch is that if I knew more about Stalinism, I'd probably feel the same way.
 

Oddjob

Merry fucking Xmas to you assholes
Don't disagree with a lot of that, except that I put the fascists/right in the same league as the soc/com left - fundamentalism and abuse of power is all the same in the end. I also think that there is a strong argument for the close relationship between Mao/Xi's China and fascism as they share a lot of characteristics, such as autarky, extreme nationalism, righteous violence, racism/othering, cult-like leadership, etc. etc. My hunch is that if I knew more about Stalinism, I'd probably feel the same way.
Your hunch would be correct.

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A recent (now distant memory) holiday allowed me some serious reading time

The Witcher - The Last Wish
The Old Man and the Sea
For Whom the Bell Tolls

all great reads
 

johnny

I'll tells ya!
Staff member
For whom the bell tolls has been mocking me from the shelf for two years now. Have to get to it one day.
 
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beeb

Dr. Beebenson, PhD HA, ST, Offset (hons)
This was the last book I read and was absolutely great (Australian author too).

Fiction/novel - rough jist is it's set in a post-apocalyptic earth and dark-angels roam the earth looking to kill the last survivors. Small pockets of humans still survive (mostly) underground. Intertwines the lives of many different characters, very sharp observation of human character and how different ones interact, and the dialogue uses subtle variations of current language to mimic how language evolves over centuries, and there's some subtle references to Australian topography/flora in the general description of scenery which is a nice touch for our audience. Slow starter but incredibly thoroughly thought out.
 

pink poodle

気が狂っている男
The Old Man and the Sea
For Whom the Bell Tolls
Both solid books. Have you read fiesta? That's my pick of his works.


For whom the bell tolls has been mocking me from the shelf for two years now. Have to get to it one day.
Do it. Then back it up with some refreshments and a listen to ride the lightening.



I'm currently reading a japanese ski resort guide book from 1992. It's interesting seeing how the ski industry has changed and learning a little history about some of the areas I go to. It's also interesting seeing how people organised holidays before the internet.
 
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