There’s nothing wrong with being proud of a specific province/city/community, but any differences in human society can be used for reactionary division. Flags can be used for other purposes than as a symbol of national sovereignty, but a flag is also probably the most identifiable symbol of independence or separatist movements precisely because it can be seen as a symbol of national sovereignty. I think the political significance of flags outweigh any other aspects, if any.

At the end of the day, there’s nothing inherently wrong with having regional flags, but I oppose it.

In China, only the Special Administrative Regions (SARs) of Hong Kong and Macau have regional flags. We’re not like the US where each state has their own state flag, and I do not appreciate the idea of each province of China having its own provincial flag. If there could be provincial flags, there could be flags for every city/town/district/village, for every administrative region at each level, and if we want to be extreme, there could be flags for each family and for each individual.

While I am using a slippery slope argument of extreme individualism to oppose provincial flags, you can probably understand why this “individuality” has to stop somewhere.

Thanks for cross-posting this, so that I could point this out to the original author, which I left as a comment there:

Is that the flag for the “East Turkestan independence movement” in the third panel? As a Chinese I’m asking you to not use the flag of a separatist movement as though it is legitimate, especially when you’re comparing it to Israel and Palestine, where Israel is a genocidal settler state and Palestine is a sovereign state.

Xinjiang (what the separatists claim to be “East Turkestan”) is a part of China, the ETIM flag does not represent the people of Xinjiang and thus should not be used in this context.

There seems to be debate around mutual aid and political power in the comments. Let us recall this famous quote from Mao Zedong: 枪杆子里面出政权 “Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.” Other quotations that might be relevant can be found here: https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/works/red-book/ch05.htm

Mutual aid must be sustained with resources, but more importantly it must be protected by an armed force. Do not forget the lessons paid in blood by revolutionaries throughout history. The history books are not even needed, because genocidal Zionists and their imperialist accomplices are reminding us continuously that one does not have to be communist to be a target for eradication.

PSA: Comrade Nguyễn Phú Trọng’s surname is Nguyễn, not “Trong”, his first name is Phú Trọng, not Trong.

NYT also made the same mistake, by referring to him as “Mr. Trong”: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/19/world/asia/nguyen-phu-trong-dead.html

This would be like referring to Mao Zedong as “Dong” or “Mr. Dong”.

I thought this was a mistake, but according to Vietnamese customs “Mr. Trong” or “Trong” is indeed a valid way to refer to Comrade Trong. This is a humiliating display in lack of investigation by myself.

The point about Mr. Dong still stands for Chinese names.

Mr. Trong

American “journalism” folks.

I thought this was a mistake, but according to Vietnamese customs “Mr. Trong” or “Trong” is indeed a valid way to refer to Comrade Trong. This is a humiliating display in lack of investigation by myself.

Here’s another way to put it, a child might think parents are “communist” because they give food and shelter whenever needed, but how do the parents afford this food and shelter, by honest labour or by pillaging? You cannot single out a sector of the economy and label it something so antithetical to its relation within the overall economy.

So in the example of a “communist sector” such as healthcare in the UK, who produces the medicine and equipment, who funds the research and personnel, who builds the pharmacies and clinics/hospitals?

I think you might be referring to the Communist Youth League (CYL) of China.

I thought we were talking about socialist revolution, these are examples of military aid for independence and liberation of African countries. China is still training African soldiers today, are we seeing socialist revolutions anywhere?

Do you have any sources for this?

Can you explain where and when did China export armed revolution? If you are referring to Vietnam and DPRK, those were military aid to existing socialist states and not exporting armed revolution.

I don’t think China’s involvement in BRICS is a big role currently, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is probably China’s biggest international contribution in terms of common development for proletariats across the world.

Depends on what you mean by exporting revolution. I think the “exporter” should not be hierarchically above the local communist party, something like Comintern’s leadership relation with respect to the CPC in the early years should be avoided as it will lead to many problems, like misunderstanding the local conditions. The CPC maintains relations with various parties (both communist, like Cuba’s PCC and Russia’s CPRF, and non-communist like Russia’s United Russia party) on equal terms, that’s probably good enough until international conditions change.

I occasionally see comrades debate about whether China should support political movements/revolutions in other countries, the answer is an obvious NO when you look at history. The CPC has had its own share of lessons from left-deviationists that follow the Comintern and Stalin. Mao Zedong wasn’t always the revered leader as his emphasis was on peasants in rural areas, unlike the “classical” thought of cities and working class.

Even if you disregard history, foreigners are not as informed about local conditions as locals, so it would be arrogant for China to attempt to guide or lead the political struggles in another country. It’s even more inadvisable when you consider the leftist infighting that exists in various western countries.

I wrote a joke answer because such comparisons are stupid. So what if China’s model is better than USSR’s, can it be copy-pasted onto the currently non-existent USSR? If USSR used China’s current model back then, would the China in that version of history have developed as quickly as it did? How would such a model even look like when used by the USSR, such a question can only be answered by first analyzing the conditions of China and the USSR. Countries have relations with each other and different models will result in different relations.

Of course we can attempt to compare models/policies/theories using certain outcomes like per capita GDP/life expectancy/etc., but that doesn’t automatically turn the winning model into a blueprint that everyone can use. This is why we emphasize that Marxism must be adapted to every nation’s specific conditions, the process that links theory to praxis cannot be copied wholesale.

1. China good, USSR bad.
2. China bad, USSR badder.
3. USSR good, China gooder.

I have covered all possible comparisons from across all ideologies, pick your answer.

The translation is wonky, but basically the five books recommended by Mao Zedong cover Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin.

• Marx/Engels, Communist Manifesto
• Engels, Socialism: Utopian and Scientific
• Lenin, Two Tactics of Social-Democracy in the Democratic Revolution
• Lenin, “Left-Wing” Communism: an Infantile Disorder
• Stalin, History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviks) Short Course

He mentioned them as part of a speech at the 7th CPC National Congress on May 31, 1945: (I omitted a large section in the middle as translating the colloquial phrases is hard)

(DeepL translate, corrections in brackets) (12) The question of theoretical work

We have to absorb all the experiences of foreign parties and the Comintern, a question that was discussed last time. At least five books should be read in order to strengthen our theoretical studies, and I recommend them to you: The Communist Manifesto, [Socialism: Utopian and Scientific], [Two Tactics of Social-Democracy in the Democratic Revolution], [“Left-Wing” Communism: an Infantile Disorder], and [History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviks) Short Course], where the books of [Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Stalin] [are all included]. If 5,000 to 10,000 people have read them and have a general understanding of them, that would be good and useful. […] We should also pay close attention to the manifestos and programs of foreign parties published in the newspapers and see what they do. In the past the Comintern was of great help to the Chinese proletariat and the Chinese people, helping the Chinese proletariat to create the [Communist Party of China], and it had a great deal of merit, as was stated in our party decision when the Comintern was dissolved.

Where did dogmatism come from? Did it come from [Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Stalin]? No. They often remind us in their writings that their doctrine is a guide to action, a weapon, not a dogma. What they say is not a dogma, but we read it and it becomes a dogma, and this is because we have not read it through and we do not know how to read it, so can we blame them? Many people do not attach importance to theoretical work, as if this work does not matter. It is not right to waver in one’s view of theoretical work. We should look up to those who are engaged in translation work and those who write theoretical articles, and we should talk to them more often. We can’t read foreign- books without those who engage in translation work, and they are very meritorious in translating foreign books, even if they have translated only one book in their whole life. It is not good that others do not attach importance to the idea of this work; it is equally not good that the comrades who do this work have themselves wavered in their understanding of it. Some people have more than once asked for a change of profession, saying that [the work is unpopular] and asked for other work. Don’t belittle the comrades who are engaged in translation. If we don’t engage in a little bit of foreign stuff, how can China know what Marxism-Leninism is? In Chinese history, there was also translation work. The Tang Monk was a great translator, and he set up a translation center to translate Buddhist scriptures when he came back from the scriptures. The first page of the first volume of the Complete Works of Lu Xun, there is a preface written by Cai Yuanpei[37], in which a few sentences are well written. He said that Lu Xun was both an expositor and a very modest man, translating the works of many foreign literary figures; the translations accounted for half of his complete works. Therefore, it is not right to belittle this work or to waver in it.

I put the whole speech through DeepL and found the second part of the speech to be the interesting part:

Well, I’d like to tell you this: my ministers have quoted all the figures they could quote, so I’m not going to tell you. I’m just going to give you one thing. Just one thing for you. This country has spent four years. In fact, since the coup against President Dilma, this country has been like an old truck going downhill without control. This country stopped making social policy. How many houses were built after we left government? How many houses for the poor? Today we build houses for the poorest people and people on Bolsa Família and BPC don’t pay for the house, because the state has the right to guarantee people the right to housing. It’s in the Federal Constitution of this country. If we want to make a revolution in this country, Pacheco, we don’t have to read a book by Marx. We don’t have to be Leninists. We don’t have to be Mao Zedong. We don’t have to be Fidel. Read the Brazilian Constitution and let’s regulate all the rights of the Brazilian people that are there. And that’s what we’re doing.

I’ve found hundreds and hundreds of paralyzed hospitals in this country. Hundreds and hundreds of paralyzed UPAs. Almost 6,000 kindergartens paralyzed in this country. I found 87,000 Minha Casa, Minha Vida houses abandoned. The other day I went to Ceará to inaugurate a house that should have been inaugurated in 2018. Because this plague of locusts that has swept through this country in recent times has only come to destroy, not to build anything.

When we came into government, they sent away the More Doctors that Dilma had brought in. They sent them away. Do you know how many doctors there were when we arrived in this country? Anyone who works in healthcare here should know. There were only 12,500 doctors. Today we have 26,000 doctors covering the health of the poor people of this country, in cities that often can’t even afford a doctor, because doctors are expensive. So I said to you: I want to be president again. I had already been president. I had already been, you know, it was like, but I wanted to come back to teach a lesson to the people who don’t like us.

This country has always been governed by only 35% of the population. It never reached 40%. It has always been governed. The poor were only seen at election time, because at election time, every candidate speaks ill of bankers and embraces the poor. When the elections are over, to hell with the poor and they go and look after the bankers they despised during the elections. And I wanted to prove that politics can be different. I, for example, think that bankers have to make money, because if they don’t, the government is obliged to do what Fernando Henrique Cardoso did with PROER. Twenty-something billion to save the banks. I want businesspeople to earn money, because if businesspeople earn money, they’ll invest, they’ll hire workers, they’ll pay wages, wages will turn into consumption, consumption will go to commerce, commerce will grow, stores will buy more things, industry will produce and people will eat more. That’s the country I want to build. And it can be built.

Now, as this country was governed with only 35% of the population in mind, we decided to include the people in this country. In other words, the people have to be taken into account, because the people who are poorer are not poorer because they want to be poor. Nobody chooses to be poor. I choose to be a doctor, I choose to be an engineer, I choose to be a lawyer, I choose to be a teacher. The only thing we don’t do is “I want to be poor, I want to eat badly, I want to live badly, I want to dress badly”. There’s no such thing. We want to eat well, we want to dress well, we want to live well. We want to have the latest television, we want to have good cell phones, we want to go on vacation, we want to go to the beach, we want to eat meat like people who eat meat. Why do we have to be trampled on all our lives?

Then someone asks me, a journalist: "But, Lula, don’t you think they’re spending too much? The minimum wage has already been increased twice. Good heavens, the minimum is the minimum. The name says it all. There’s nothing lower than the minimum. Now, how can I discuss, make a fiscal adjustment, over the minimum of the minimum. What I wanted to do was make a fiscal adjustment to the profitability of this country’s bankers, who make money speculating on the stock exchange, speculating, you know, every day. I’m not going to touch the humblest people. The humblest people, the state has to take care of them, because a middle-class citizen doesn’t need the state. The guy who has a house, the guy who has a car, the guy who is well married, the guy who has a family, his children studying at a good school, he doesn’t need the government. The government needs to look at those who need it, like a mother. I always say this: governing is about putting a mother’s heart in our heads so that we learn to take care of everyone, on equal terms, and to take more care of the most fragile, the most dependent. This is the country we’re going to build, people. This is the country I’m proving it’s possible to build.

I’d like to say to the deputies and senators. I wanted to say something to you. I’d like to say to the vice-governor, to my companion who is perhaps the oldest person here, apart from me. I want to say the following: I doubt, and the press is here, there must be a lot of intellectuals here, I doubt that there was a day in the state of Minas Gerais that a President of the Republic came to announce the number of things that I came to announce here. I doubt it. I doubt it.

And we’re going to build the BR-381, because we’ve already tried to hold an auction once, and the auction was empty. There’s a stretch near Governador Valadares that’s very complicated. So I said to my minister: “Minister, here’s the deal: whatever the businessman doesn’t want to do, which is to gnaw on the bone, the government will gnaw on the bone and we’ll make this road”. That’s what’s going to happen in Minas Gerais.

And so I forgot to tell you, but there’s going to be an institute in Barreiro. There’s going to be an institute. All that’s left is for the mayor to sign the document. I hope that Camilo and the mayor agree to sign it, because what I want is to educate these people, because people who are well educated, people who have a profession, go ahead and nobody needs the state. And that’s what I’m going to build. And I’ll say it again, I said it here: I want to be president again to prove that we can take care of poor people. And I want you to know: I’m going to take care of you the way I take care of my son, the way I take care of my granddaughter, the way I take care of the things I love, because I’m only where I am, I’m only what I am, an illiterate northeasterner who’s only trained as a lathe operator, to become president of the Republic. There are two things: the work of God and the work of the courage of those of you who had the pleasure of electing me.

Video subtitles:

If you want to make a revolution in this country, Pacheco, we don’t have to read any book by Marx, we don’t have to be a Leninist, we don’t have to be a Mao Zedongist, we don’t have to be Fidel. Read the Brazilian constitution and we will regulate all the rights of the Brazilian people.

For reference: Brazil’s constitution

Did some searching and found the full speech: https://www.gov.br/planalto/pt-br/acompanhe-o-planalto/discursos-e-pronunciamentos/2024/pronunciamento-do-presidente-lula-durante-anuncio-de-investimento-do-governo-federal-para-minas-gerais

Here’s the entire paragraph that includes the part shown in the video at the end:

Bem, eu queria dizer para vocês o seguinte: os meus ministros citaram todos os números que poderiam citar, então não vou dizer, não. Vou apenas dar uma coisa para vocês. Apenas uma coisa para vocês. Esse país passou quatro anos. Na verdade, desde que deram o golpe na presidenta Dilma, esse país parecia um caminhão velho descendo ladeira abaixo, sem controle. Esse país deixou de fazer política social. Quantas casas foram feitas depois que nós saímos do governo? Quantas casas para o pobre? Hoje a gente faz casa para as pessoas mais pobres e as pessoas do Bolsa Família e o BPC não paga a casa, porque o Estado tem o direito de garantir o direito de moradia para as pessoas. Está na Constituição Federal desse país. Se a gente quiser fazer uma revolução nesse país, Pacheco, a gente não tem que ler um livro de Marx. A gente não tem que leninista. A gente não tem que ser Mao Tsé-Tung. A gente não tem que ser Fidel. Leia a Constituição Brasileira e vamos regulamentar todos os direitos do povo brasileiro que está lá. E é isso que nós estamos fazendo.

(DeepL translate) Well, I’d like to tell you this: my ministers have quoted all the figures they could quote, so I’m not going to say it. I’m just going to just give you one thing. Just one thing for you. This country has spent four years. In fact, since the coup against President Dilma, this country has been like an old truck going downhill, with no control. control. This country has stopped making social policy. How many houses were after we left government? How many houses for the poor? Today we build houses for the poorest people and the people on the Bolsa Bolsa Família and BPC don’t pay for the house, because the state has the right to to guarantee people the right to housing. It’s in the Constitution of this country. If we want to make a revolution in this country, Pacheco, we don’t have to read a book by Marx. We don’t have to Leninist. We don’t have to be Mao Zedong. We don’t have to be Fidel. Read the Brazilian Constitution and let’s regulate all the rights of the Brazilian people that are there. And that’s what we’re doing.

What does it mean to be a Marxist-Leninist? Answer this question first.

The population of China in 1949 was around 542 million, there were about 4.5 million CPC members at the time, around 0.83% of the population. Is every CPC member a Marxist-Leninist? How many people were MLs but not CPC members? Are you automatically ML if you support the CPC’s policies? Are there MLs who aren’t CPC members and don’t believe in Marxism?

The population of China as of 2023 is about 1.41 billion, there are 99.185 million CPC members, around 7% of the population. The same questions asked above can be asked here. How many MLs are there in China?

Here’s a long Chinese article about what it means to be a Marxist according to Mao Zedong: http://dangshi.people.com.cn/n/2013/1225/c85037-23943401.html