Conservapedia - User contributions [en]

Heterosexual

2007-03-25T19:07:16Z

Andrews Palop: New page: Heterosexuality is the opposite of homosexuality. According to the Bible, it's the way God meant us to be. (Summed up by the phrase: "God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.")

Heterosexuality is the opposite of [[homosexuality]]. According to the Bible, it's the way God meant us to be. (Summed up by the phrase: "God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.")

Talk:Pokémon

2007-03-25T19:03:57Z

Andrews Palop: Israel

In Mexico we call them El Chupacabra!

-Jesús Fernandez

==Should I delete this==

Should I delete the article or should I see if I can make it a factual article about the show, video game & card game and their popularity?[[User:NSmyth|NSmyth]]00:39, 21 March 2007 (EDT)

I think it should be kept. There is already a precedent for articles about games in [[Dungeons and Dragons]]. And also I think for a while there was a bit of a fundyfuss about Pokemon being satanic or something which might be of interest to Conservapedia readers. [[User:Sulgran|Sulgran]] 01:00, 21 March 2007 (EDT)
:Well, I think that someone should at least turn it into a viable article instead of this stupidity. I'm probably going to blank this in a second until I can find enough info about pokemon to make it into a good(or at least an "ok")article.[[User:NSmyth|NSmyth]] 01:02, 21 March 2007 (EDT)

this needs that fancy thing above the e but i dont know how to do it. Darth Vacatour

== Israel ==

In Israel, Pikachu is called Gohld. Its evolved from, Raichu, is Stein in Hebrew.

Tyrannosaurus

2007-03-25T18:39:26Z

Andrews Palop:

The '''Tyrannosaurus rex''', or T-rex, was a large carnivorous [[dinosaur]] with very small forelimbs, large hind legs and a long tail. It is one of the largest land carnivores to have ever walked the earth, measuring about 13 meters long and 5 meters high.<ref>Brochu, C.R. 2003. Osteology of Tyrannosaurus rex: insights from a nearly complete skeleton and high-resolution computed tomographic analysis of the skull. Memoirs of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology. 7: 1-138.</ref> Most mainstream scientists believe that the T-rex lived at the end of the [[Cretaceous]] period, approximately 65 million years ago. [[Young Earth Creationism|Young Earth Creationists]] on the other hand believe that they became extinct some 6-5,000 years ago, after [[Great Flood|Noah's Flood]] when the environment became too hostile for them, however this is backed up by no scientific evidence and is generally regarded as nonsense outside the Christian community.

==History==
The earliest find of a Tyrannosaurus rex occurred in 1892. In 1905, after additional discoveries of fossils, the president of the American Museum for Natural History named the dinosaur. Since then, more than 30 specimens have been found.

In 1990, amateur paleontologist Susan Hendrickson discovered the most complete Tyrannosaurus fossil yet. The fossil, named Sue, is also one of the largest Tyrannosaurus specimen discovered.<ref>Guinness World Records Ltd. (2003). 2003 Guinness World Records. pg 90.</ref>

==Alternate Theories==
[[Young Earth Creationism|Young Earth creationists]] have alternate theories to the existance of the Tyrannosaurus rex, that either it did not live, or that it lived at the same time as humans at some point in history. Also it has been suggested by some <ref>http://www.drdino.com/articles.php?spec=37</ref> that there may be some surviving dinosaurs including Tyrannosaurs in unexplored regions of the Earth.

==Diet==

T-rex had forward-facing eyes, which gave it binocular vision. Binocular vision is usually present in carnivores, as it helps them see their prey from far off, therefore it is very likely that Tyrannosaurus was a carnivore. Young earth creationists believe that the Tyrannosaurus, along with all other carnivores, was herbivorous in the [[Garden of Eden]] before the Fall, but afterwards a change occured that caused T-rex to be unable to digest plants and therefore had to kill and eat other creatures for food.

Some have suggested that T-rex was exclusively a scavenger. This may be partially true, since most carnivores today will happily scavenge available meat. However, it probably was not an ''exclusive'' scavenger, as most meat-eaters must also hunt in order to survive. T-rex's jaws were also quite adaptive to grabbing live prey, and probably used them in the same way most carnivores do: bit the throat to either crush the larynx and thus kill by suffocation or through blood loss. Also, the T-rex's large body probably required a great amount of food and therefore scavenging probably wouldn't be sufficient to support its high metabolism.<ref>http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3790/is_200103/ai_n8932547|</ref>

==References==

<references/>

Anarchism

2007-03-24T21:46:40Z

Andrews Palop:

'''Anarchism''' is a political philosophy advocating the removal of the State and the establishment of a society without government. The term is of [[Greek]] origin, meaning "without rulers".

Anarchist thought is similar to traditional [[Communist]] thought (though not practice) in that it rejects all authority. However, [[Individualist]] anarchists and [[Anarcho-Capitalists]] are ideologically closer to [[Libertarianism]] than Communism, however most anarchists of the communist type reject these as anarchists, as they consider them to be capitalists, and not anarchists. Some anarchists have been known to employ violent means in their endeavors, though other anarchists are non-violent. Many anarchist groups have been labeled by the U.S. government as [[terrorism|terrorist]] organizations.

Joseph Stalin

2007-03-24T21:46:16Z

Andrews Palop:

[[Image:Josephstalin.jpg]]

Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Dzhugashvili) (December 6th, 1878 (Julian: December 18th)-March 5, 1953) was the General Secretary of the [[Communist Party of the Soviet Union]] (CPSU) from 1922 until his death. He was the son of a poor Georgian cobbler and a former seminary student who became a Bolshevik and one of [[Lenin|Lenin's]] closest allies during the their take-over of the Russian Empire. During the [[Russian Civil War]] Stalin, who chose his name from the Russian word for steel, successfully defended the city of Tsaritsen on the Volga from counter-revolutionary forces. The city was later re-named Stalingrad in honor of his victory, and was the same city of [[Germany's]] massive defeat in [[World War II]].

==Rise to Power==

In 1917, the Commissariat of Nationalities was formed with Stalin as its Commissar (Minister). The Commissariat addressed the question of the nationalities of the Russian Empire, and helped integrate them into the [[Soviet Union]]. From 1919-1922 he was also the People's Commissar of the Workers' and Peasants' Inspection (Rabkrin, from the Russian), which was founded to be a check on the burgeoning Soviet bureaucracy.

In 1922, Lenin named Stalin General Secretary of the CPSU. In 1924 Stalin in turn created the "Secret Department," a unit of 94 of his personal functionaries that maintained the ''nomenklatura'', or a list of trusted individuals. He also appointed regional party secretaries who all, of course, supported Stalin. Through the Secret Department Stalin gained control of the [[Red Army]] after removing [[Lev Trotsky]] in 1925 and the OGPU (later, [[KGB]]) when its leader [[Felix Derzhinsky]] died in 1926. Lenin had foreseen all of this and had warned in his last testament that Stalin should be removed from General Secretary because the position's power was unlimited.

Stalin, however, did not allow this to happen. His most powerful rival, Lev Trotsky, who was the commander of the Red Army, was painted as a danger to the Revolution, because he continued to push the idea of international revolution; the "left opposition." Other Soviet leaders, like [[Zinoviev]], leader of the [[Comintern]], and [[Kaminev]], the head of the Communist Party in Moscow, were painted with the same brush because they supported Trotsky and did not wish to expel him from the CPSU in 1927. Later, he accused his ally [[Bukharin]] of being a member of the "right opposition," i.e. he was in favor of a more capitalistic economic system, as seen under the [[New Economic Policy]] of the early 1920s. Trotsky was murdered in exile in Mexico in 1940 by one of Stalin's agents, and Zinoviev, Kaminev, and Bukharin were the center of the famous "show trials" of the 1930s. All were put to death.

==Catch and Overtake==

In 1928 Stalin decided that the Soviet Union was not properly industrialized to enjoy a communist future, so he initiated the First Five Year Plan and the campaign to collectivize agriculture in order to "build socialism," and to "catch and overtake" the capitalist world. Stalin fanned the fires of collectivization, claiming that peasants had been hording grain and that they needed to be controlled. Under this program, rich peasants (kulaks), were exiled or killed for being enemies of the people, and peasants' land was taken in order to introduce collective farming to expedite grain appropriations. Many were called kulaks by jealous neighbors, while the peasants who remained were often the laziest and most ill suited to producing enough grain. Collectivization caused massive famine in Russia, particularly in [[Ukraine]], where Stalin ordered the Red Army to blockade certain regions and take grain by force. It is estimated that the famine of 1931-33 killed 6-7 million people, while 20 million starved.

The First Five Year Plan was a program of crash-industrialization. After [[World War I]] and the Russian Civil War Russia had an industrial capacity equal to that of its 1861 capacity. The only way for Russia to be able to break the "capitalist encirclement," Stalin declared, was to industrialize. Brigades of shock workers were formed to work faster and harder than the world had ever seen. Most of this, however, was pure propaganda, although the shock workers did set the record for concrete poured in a single shift. Compared to the capitalist world which was experiencing the Great Depression, Soviet growth was impressive. Between 1929 and 1937, 8,000 factories were constructed, average GDP growth was around 10%, and official unemployment was 0. In 1936, after the Second Five Year Plan, Stalin declared socialism "built." Nevertheless, the capitalist world lived better than the Soviet Union, despite the Great Depression. John Scott, an American witness to the Five Year Plans, notes this in his memoirs of that period "Behind the Urals." The legacy of the Five Year Plans (most of which Stalin declared "completed" in 4 years) injured the Soviet's production models, because the encouraged quantity and speed over quality. However, the planning of the 1930s enabled the Russians to defeat the Nazis in the 1940s.

==Stalin's Terror==

Between 1936 and 1938, [[Joseph Stalin]] launched his purges to rid the Soviet Union of "fifth columnists," or spies who were loyal to the [[capitalist]] world. During the Terror 3 million people were arrested on various and often made-up charges, while 750,000 were executed. Due to the interrogation techniques of the NKVD (later, KGB), which often were torturous, most of those arrested confessed and were sent to work camps, called the [[Gulag]] for 10 years and sometimes even 25. Here, prisoners were forced to labor in mines, to log forests, or to do construction. Few lived through their sentences.

The infamous show trials of former leaders of the Soviet Union occurred during this period, where they were accused of working with Trotsky or sabotaging the Soviet Union. Stalin also evicerated the high command of the Red Army, killing 90% of the leadership. The minions of oppression were not spared either; of the NKVD's 809 officials, 43 lived through the purges. The leadership of the communist party was persecuted as well. For example, in 1934 130 members of the 139-member Central Committee were arrested. The Terror forever made Russians afraid to speak out against the government, and also made sure that no one but Stalin could ever rule the Soviet Union as effectively.

==World War II==

To avoid war with [[Germany]], Stalin ordered the President of the Soviet Union, [[Molotov]], to sign a non-aggression pact with [[Adolph Hitler]], named the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, on 19 August 1939. The treaty detailed the agreement to split up [[Poland]] between Germany and the Soviet Union, give Stalin the Baltic Republics of [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], and [[Estonia]], and to allow the Soviets to wage war on [[Finland]], a war that ended in a humiliating Soviet defeat. Both sides, however, knew that they would eventually engage in hostilities.

It seems that Stalin anticipated this less than Hitler, who, in June of 1941 invaded the Soviet Union with the largest land army ever assembled. It consisted of 170 divisions, or 3.5 million troops. Stalin was caught off guard, and the [[Nazis]] blazed a path through the Ukraine and European Russia. Reaching [[Moscow]] in October 1941, the Nazis threatened Stalin and the entire Soviet Union with defeat. In only 6 months, the Nazis controlled one third of the Soviet economy, a total of 5% of the Earth's surface. Hitler's troops were defeated at Moscow during the winter of 1941-42 after Stalin appointed [[Yorky Zhukov]] as commander of the Red Army. A spy in the German embassy in Tokyo, Viktor Sorge, informed Stalin that Japan was not going to attack [[Siberia]], freeing thousands of winter ski-troops to move to Moscow to defeat the Nazis. It was during this time that Stalin famously invoked the name of [[God]] and allowed religious services to be conducted after 20 plus years of repression. Also, 1500 factories were evacuated and restored in Siberia and 12-15 million workers were moved east of the [[Urals]], where Soviet production was higher than Germany's in 1942, despite Germany holding some 50% of Soviet industry.

The Red Army went on the offensive after the defense of Moscow, but soon the Nazis gained the advantage and pushed to Stalingrad. More than one million troops fought on each side in urban combat. Hitler refused to allow surrender, and eventually the Nazis were encircled and routed. After turning the tide of war in Stalingrad, the 1943 [[Kursk]] tank battle was decisive in pushing the Nazis from European Russia. In two years, the Red Army pushed the Nazis all the way back to [[Berlin]]. Stalin used his control of Eastern Europe to extract concessions from [[President Roosevelt]] at Allied conferences, including control over the region. [[Winston Churchill]] warned against this very control, for he greatly feared Soviet hegemony in Europe. Victorious, Stalin named himself Generalissimo and became more popular than ever in the Soviet Union and more dangerous than ever to the capitalist world.

Over the course of World War II, around 25 million Russians died. Twenty million were in the armed services. The total number of 25 million reflects half of the worldwide losses of human life during World War II. The population did not recover until 1956. Many Soviet POWs, like famous writer [[Alexander Solzhenitsyn]], were sent to the Gulag after the war because they had fallen into German hands, and were accused of being spies. This swelled the prison camps by the thousands.

==Post-War Period and Death==

Similar to the 1930s, Stalin undertook a harsh campaign of industrialization, which hurt the Soviets as much as it helped them rebuild. Money was devalued to one-tenth of its previous value, 2 million German and Japanese POWs were forced to stay in the Soviet Union and rebuild the country, and 10% of investment from 1945-46 was from looted machinery. The crops produced by household plots were collected by the government to sell, and a famine in 1947 caused by drought and Soviet single-crop farming killed 2 million. The recovery was built on the Soviet subjects.

After World War II, Stalin's cult of personality emerged as the dominant force of Soviet life. He was credited as the savior of the Soviet Union and the architect of victory, though it was really General Zhukov who was responsible for most of this. The communist youth group, the [[Komsomol]], devoted songs to "the Father of All Nations" or "the Driver of the Locomotive of History." Party membership increased by one million people between 1945 and 1953. Books quoted Stalin as an expert in communism, while he was often photographed surrounded by children to make him seem friendlier. This all served to form a deep, personal connection with Stalin for many Soviets. Indeed, he was loved by the Soviets. When he died in 1953 an anxious mob at his viewing crushed and trampled some mourners to death. Dissidents like Sakharov, the man forced in a prison to build the Soviet atom bomb, cried upon hearing that Stalin had died, despite their intense hatred of him. Despite his terror, he had convinced millions that he was their father.

Following a stroke on 1 March 1953, Stalin died on 5 March after a period of declining performance. Between 1949 and 1952 Stalin increasingly took vacations and met with the [[Politburo]] less and less. When he died a short power struggle ensued, one which led to the execution of KGB head [[Beria]] as a spy. Eventually [[Khrushchev]] became the General Secretary of the CPSU and denounced Stalin's repressive tactics, his purges, gulags, and his cult of personality in the [[Secret Speech]] at the 20th Party Congress of 1956. Gulags were dismantled and the political climate was slightly less tense, but Soviet oppression still continued. The period following Stalin's rule is called the "thaw," the start of life again after a long winter.

==References==
Though this isn't footnoted, it is culled from the following sources:

Hosking, Geoffrey. The First Socialist Society: A History of the Soviet Union from Within. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992.

Kotkin, Stephen. Magnetic Mountain: Stalinism as Civilization. Berkley, CA: University of California Press, 1995.

Scott, John. Behind the Urals: An American Worker in Russia’s City of Steel. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1989.

Vladimir Lenin

2007-03-24T21:44:09Z

Andrews Palop:

Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (1870-1924) was the 1st Premier of the [[USSR]]
==Revolution==
In November 1917, Lenin, the great leader of the Communist Party, led a Proletarian Revolution to overthrew the Provisional Government that had replaced the Empire.

Lenin was one of the most influential persons in all of history. He was both a thinker and a revolutionary. He was an atheist and proud to be one. In 1889, he became a Marxist (as previously formulated by Karl Marx). He obtained a law degree shortly afterwards, and by 1895 was a subversive who was arrested and sent to Siberia as punishment. Once he served his time he left for Western Europe, where he developed his ideas further and became a leader of the Bolsheviks. He returned to Russia after czar abdicated in March 1917, and then Lenin led the Bolsheviks to power in the "October Revolution" (November in the Gregorian calendar). He then ruled the Soviet Union under Marxism-Leninism, until his death in 1924. [[Josef Stalin]] was the next Premier of the USSR. [[Category:Political people|Lenin, Vladimir Ilyic]]
[[Category:History]]

Joseph Stalin

2007-03-24T21:43:27Z

Andrews Palop: reverted vandalism

[[Image:Josephstalin.jpg]]

Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Dzhugashvili) (December 6th, 1878 (Julian: December 18th)-March 5, 1953) was the General Secretary of the [[Communist Party of the Soviet Union]] (CPSU) from 1922 until his death. He was the son of a poor Georgian cobbler and a former seminary student who became a Bolshevik and one of [[Lenin's]] closest allies during the their take-over of the Russian Empire. During the [[Russian Civil War]] Stalin, who chose his name from the Russian word for steel, successfully defended the city of Tsaritsen on the Volga from counter-revolutionary forces. The city was later re-named Stalingrad in honor of his victory, and was the same city of [[Germany's]] massive defeat in [[World War II]].

==Rise to Power==

In 1917, the Commissariat of Nationalities was formed with Stalin as its Commissar (Minister). The Commissariat addressed the question of the nationalities of the Russian Empire, and helped integrate them into the [[Soviet Union]]. From 1919-1922 he was also the People's Commissar of the Workers' and Peasants' Inspection (Rabkrin, from the Russian), which was founded to be a check on the burgeoning Soviet bureaucracy.

In 1922, Lenin named Stalin General Secretary of the CPSU. In 1924 Stalin in turn created the "Secret Department," a unit of 94 of his personal functionaries that maintained the ''nomenklatura'', or a list of trusted individuals. He also appointed regional party secretaries who all, of course, supported Stalin. Through the Secret Department Stalin gained control of the [[Red Army]] after removing [[Lev Trotsky]] in 1925 and the OGPU (later, [[KGB]]) when its leader [[Felix Derzhinsky]] died in 1926. Lenin had foreseen all of this and had warned in his last testament that Stalin should be removed from General Secretary because the position's power was unlimited.

Stalin, however, did not allow this to happen. His most powerful rival, Lev Trotsky, who was the commander of the Red Army, was painted as a danger to the Revolution, because he continued to push the idea of international revolution; the "left opposition." Other Soviet leaders, like [[Zinoviev]], leader of the [[Comintern]], and [[Kaminev]], the head of the Communist Party in Moscow, were painted with the same brush because they supported Trotsky and did not wish to expel him from the CPSU in 1927. Later, he accused his ally [[Bukharin]] of being a member of the "right opposition," i.e. he was in favor of a more capitalistic economic system, as seen under the [[New Economic Policy]] of the early 1920s. Trotsky was murdered in exile in Mexico in 1940 by one of Stalin's agents, and Zinoviev, Kaminev, and Bukharin were the center of the famous "show trials" of the 1930s. All were put to death.

==Catch and Overtake==

In 1928 Stalin decided that the Soviet Union was not properly industrialized to enjoy a communist future, so he initiated the First Five Year Plan and the campaign to collectivize agriculture in order to "build socialism," and to "catch and overtake" the capitalist world. Stalin fanned the fires of collectivization, claiming that peasants had been hording grain and that they needed to be controlled. Under this program, rich peasants (kulaks), were exiled or killed for being enemies of the people, and peasants' land was taken in order to introduce collective farming to expedite grain appropriations. Many were called kulaks by jealous neighbors, while the peasants who remained were often the laziest and most ill suited to producing enough grain. Collectivization caused massive famine in Russia, particularly in [[Ukraine]], where Stalin ordered the Red Army to blockade certain regions and take grain by force. It is estimated that the famine of 1931-33 killed 6-7 million people, while 20 million starved.

The First Five Year Plan was a program of crash-industrialization. After [[World War I]] and the Russian Civil War Russia had an industrial capacity equal to that of its 1861 capacity. The only way for Russia to be able to break the "capitalist encirclement," Stalin declared, was to industrialize. Brigades of shock workers were formed to work faster and harder than the world had ever seen. Most of this, however, was pure propaganda, although the shock workers did set the record for concrete poured in a single shift. Compared to the capitalist world which was experiencing the Great Depression, Soviet growth was impressive. Between 1929 and 1937, 8,000 factories were constructed, average GDP growth was around 10%, and official unemployment was 0. In 1936, after the Second Five Year Plan, Stalin declared socialism "built." Nevertheless, the capitalist world lived better than the Soviet Union, despite the Great Depression. John Scott, an American witness to the Five Year Plans, notes this in his memoirs of that period "Behind the Urals." The legacy of the Five Year Plans (most of which Stalin declared "completed" in 4 years) injured the Soviet's production models, because the encouraged quantity and speed over quality. However, the planning of the 1930s enabled the Russians to defeat the Nazis in the 1940s.

==Stalin's Terror==

Between 1936 and 1938, [[Joseph Stalin]] launched his purges to rid the Soviet Union of "fifth columnists," or spies who were loyal to the [[capitalist]] world. During the Terror 3 million people were arrested on various and often made-up charges, while 750,000 were executed. Due to the interrogation techniques of the NKVD (later, KGB), which often were torturous, most of those arrested confessed and were sent to work camps, called the [[Gulag]] for 10 years and sometimes even 25. Here, prisoners were forced to labor in mines, to log forests, or to do construction. Few lived through their sentences.

The infamous show trials of former leaders of the Soviet Union occurred during this period, where they were accused of working with Trotsky or sabotaging the Soviet Union. Stalin also evicerated the high command of the Red Army, killing 90% of the leadership. The minions of oppression were not spared either; of the NKVD's 809 officials, 43 lived through the purges. The leadership of the communist party was persecuted as well. For example, in 1934 130 members of the 139-member Central Committee were arrested. The Terror forever made Russians afraid to speak out against the government, and also made sure that no one but Stalin could ever rule the Soviet Union as effectively.

==World War II==

To avoid war with [[Germany]], Stalin ordered the President of the Soviet Union, [[Molotov]], to sign a non-aggression pact with [[Adolph Hitler]], named the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, on 19 August 1939. The treaty detailed the agreement to split up [[Poland]] between Germany and the Soviet Union, give Stalin the Baltic Republics of [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], and [[Estonia]], and to allow the Soviets to wage war on [[Finland]], a war that ended in a humiliating Soviet defeat. Both sides, however, knew that they would eventually engage in hostilities.

It seems that Stalin anticipated this less than Hitler, who, in June of 1941 invaded the Soviet Union with the largest land army ever assembled. It consisted of 170 divisions, or 3.5 million troops. Stalin was caught off guard, and the [[Nazis]] blazed a path through the Ukraine and European Russia. Reaching [[Moscow]] in October 1941, the Nazis threatened Stalin and the entire Soviet Union with defeat. In only 6 months, the Nazis controlled one third of the Soviet economy, a total of 5% of the Earth's surface. Hitler's troops were defeated at Moscow during the winter of 1941-42 after Stalin appointed [[Yorky Zhukov]] as commander of the Red Army. A spy in the German embassy in Tokyo, Viktor Sorge, informed Stalin that Japan was not going to attack [[Siberia]], freeing thousands of winter ski-troops to move to Moscow to defeat the Nazis. It was during this time that Stalin famously invoked the name of [[God]] and allowed religious services to be conducted after 20 plus years of repression. Also, 1500 factories were evacuated and restored in Siberia and 12-15 million workers were moved east of the [[Urals]], where Soviet production was higher than Germany's in 1942, despite Germany holding some 50% of Soviet industry.

The Red Army went on the offensive after the defense of Moscow, but soon the Nazis gained the advantage and pushed to Stalingrad. More than one million troops fought on each side in urban combat. Hitler refused to allow surrender, and eventually the Nazis were encircled and routed. After turning the tide of war in Stalingrad, the 1943 [[Kursk]] tank battle was decisive in pushing the Nazis from European Russia. In two years, the Red Army pushed the Nazis all the way back to [[Berlin]]. Stalin used his control of Eastern Europe to extract concessions from [[President Roosevelt]] at Allied conferences, including control over the region. [[Winston Churchill]] warned against this very control, for he greatly feared Soviet hegemony in Europe. Victorious, Stalin named himself Generalissimo and became more popular than ever in the Soviet Union and more dangerous than ever to the capitalist world.

Over the course of World War II, around 25 million Russians died. Twenty million were in the armed services. The total number of 25 million reflects half of the worldwide losses of human life during World War II. The population did not recover until 1956. Many Soviet POWs, like famous writer [[Alexander Solzhenitsyn]], were sent to the Gulag after the war because they had fallen into German hands, and were accused of being spies. This swelled the prison camps by the thousands.

==Post-War Period and Death==

Similar to the 1930s, Stalin undertook a harsh campaign of industrialization, which hurt the Soviets as much as it helped them rebuild. Money was devalued to one-tenth of its previous value, 2 million German and Japanese POWs were forced to stay in the Soviet Union and rebuild the country, and 10% of investment from 1945-46 was from looted machinery. The crops produced by household plots were collected by the government to sell, and a famine in 1947 caused by drought and Soviet single-crop farming killed 2 million. The recovery was built on the Soviet subjects.

After World War II, Stalin's cult of personality emerged as the dominant force of Soviet life. He was credited as the savior of the Soviet Union and the architect of victory, though it was really General Zhukov who was responsible for most of this. The communist youth group, the [[Komsomol]], devoted songs to "the Father of All Nations" or "the Driver of the Locomotive of History." Party membership increased by one million people between 1945 and 1953. Books quoted Stalin as an expert in communism, while he was often photographed surrounded by children to make him seem friendlier. This all served to form a deep, personal connection with Stalin for many Soviets. Indeed, he was loved by the Soviets. When he died in 1953 an anxious mob at his viewing crushed and trampled some mourners to death. Dissidents like Sakharov, the man forced in a prison to build the Soviet atom bomb, cried upon hearing that Stalin had died, despite their intense hatred of him. Despite his terror, he had convinced millions that he was their father.

Following a stroke on 1 March 1953, Stalin died on 5 March after a period of declining performance. Between 1949 and 1952 Stalin increasingly took vacations and met with the [[Politburo]] less and less. When he died a short power struggle ensued, one which led to the execution of KGB head [[Beria]] as a spy. Eventually [[Khrushchev]] became the General Secretary of the CPSU and denounced Stalin's repressive tactics, his purges, gulags, and his cult of personality in the [[Secret Speech]] at the 20th Party Congress of 1956. Gulags were dismantled and the political climate was slightly less tense, but Soviet oppression still continued. The period following Stalin's rule is called the "thaw," the start of life again after a long winter.

==References==
Though this isn't footnoted, it is culled from the following sources:

Hosking, Geoffrey. The First Socialist Society: A History of the Soviet Union from Within. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992.

Kotkin, Stephen. Magnetic Mountain: Stalinism as Civilization. Berkley, CA: University of California Press, 1995.

Scott, John. Behind the Urals: An American Worker in Russia’s City of Steel. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1989.

Vladimir Lenin

2007-03-24T21:42:32Z

Andrews Palop: removed POV, and also, Marxism is not a religion. Marxism-Leninism does not equal communism.

Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (1870-1924) was the 1st Premier of the [[USSR]]
==Revolution==
In November 1917, Lenin, the great leader of the Communist Party, led a Proletarian Revolution to overthrew the Provisional Government that had replaced the Empire.

Lenin was one of the most influential persons in all of history. He was both a thinker and a revolutionary. He was an atheist and proud to be one. In 1889, he became a Marxist (as previously formulated by Karl Marx). He obtained a law degree shortly afterwards, and by 1895 was a subversive who was arrested and sent to Siberia as punishment. Once he served his time he left for Western Europe, where he developed his ideas further and became a leader of the Bolsheviks. He returned to Russia after czar abdicated in March 1917, and then Lenin led the Bolsheviks to power in the "October Revolution" (November in the Gregorian calendar). He then ruled the Soviet Union under Marxism-Leninism, until his death in 1924. [[Josef Stalin]] then took power. [[Category:Political people|Lenin, Vladimir Ilyic]]
[[Category:History]]

White Army

2007-03-24T21:37:45Z

Andrews Palop:

The White Army was an army raised in Western [[Russia]] to oppose [[Vladimir Ilyich Lenin|Lenin's]] [[Red Guards]] and the [[anarchism|anarchist]] [[Black Army]].

Anarchism

2007-03-24T21:35:58Z

Andrews Palop:

Anarchism

2007-03-24T21:35:31Z

Andrews Palop:

'''Anarchism''' is a political philosophy advocating the removal of the State and the establishment of a society without government. The term is of [[Greek]] origin, meaning "without rulers".

Anarchist thought is similar to traditional [[Communist]] thought (though not practice) in that it rejects all authority. However, [[Individualist]] anarchists and [[Anarcho-Capitalists]] are ideologically closer to [[Libertarianism]] than Communism, however most anarchists of the communist type reject these as being capitalists, and not anarchists. Some anarchists have been known to employ violent means in their endeavors, though other anarchists are non-violent. Many anarchist groups have been labeled by the U.S. government as [[terrorism|terrorist]] organizations.

White Army

2007-03-24T21:34:27Z

Andrews Palop:

The White Army was an army raised in Western [[Russia]] to oppose [[Vladimir Ilyich Lenin|Lenin's]] [[Red Guards]] and the [[anarchism|anarchist]] [[Black Army]].

Communism

2007-03-20T21:25:52Z

Andrews Palop:

'''Communism''' is an economic system, social organization, and a political movement advocating the absence of personal ownership, and hence supporting a communal society. As a political movement, communism seeks to establish a classless society by prohibiting personal economic growth. It is frequently (incorrectly) equated with a [[socialist]] economy in which the state owns everything and the wealth is divided evenly among the citizens. Note that it is possible to operate a communist economic system under a variety of political systems including democracy, autocracy, and monarchy. The term communism has colloquially taken on several meanings and is often used to describe the doctrine developed by [[Karl Marx]] and [[Vladimir Ilyich Lenin| Vladimir Lenin]] which advocated the overthrow of capitalism by the revolution of the proletariat (the social group which does not control the means of production), followed by close state control of all sectors of the economy.

The most famous government to label itself "communist" was the [[USSR]] or the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics; the Communist Party controlled its government from 1922 to 1991. This government was officially atheist and attempted to suppress all religion. Like many authoritarian regimes, it tried to cultivate reverence for the state as a psychological substitute for religion. Left-wing critics of the USSR charged that it was communist in name only, and had betrayed the revolution which founded it. George Orwell expressed this viewpoint eloquently in his 1945 fable ''[[Animal Farm]]''.

A famous quote describing Communism, attributed to Karl Marx, is "From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs". Another by Marx was, "The theory of the Communism may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property."

==Early Christian sharing==

As described in the Acts of the Apostles, early Christians practiced some form of ''voluntary'' sharing for the common good:

:And all that believed were together, and had all things common; And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need. (Acts 2:44-45, KJV)

:Neither was there any among them that lacked: for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold,

:And laid them down at the apostles' feet: and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need.

:And Joses, who by the apostles was surnamed Barnabas, (which is, being interpreted, The son of consolation,) a Levite, and of the country of Cyprus,

:Having land, sold it, and brought the money, and laid it at the apostles' feet.(Acts 4:34-7, KJV)

Some modern preachers and scholars speak of a [[Social Gospel]], interpreting Jesus' teachings as radically materialistic rather than spiritual, especially referring to his support of the poor and his pleas to the rich to aid those who are impoverished.

However, the price for not giving every penny was steep. The Bible says, "But a certain man named Ananias, with Sapphira his wife, sold a possession, And kept back part of the price, his wife also being privy to it, and brought a certain part, and laid it at the apostles' feet. But Peter said, Ananias, why hath Satan filled thine heart to lie to the Holy Ghost, and to keep back part of the price of the land? Whiles it remained, was it not thine own? and after it was sold, was it not in thine own power? why hast thou conceived this thing in thine heart? thou hast not lied unto men, but unto God. And Ananias hearing these words fell down, and gave up the ghost: and great fear came on all them that heard these things. And the young men arose, wound him up, and carried him out, and buried him.

"And it was about the space of three hours after, when his wife, not knowing what was done, came in. And Peter answered unto her, Tell me whether ye sold the land for so much? And she said, Yea, for so much. Then Peter said unto her, How is it that ye have agreed together to tempt the Spirit of the Lord? behold, the feet of them which have buried thy husband are at the door, and shall carry thee out. Then fell she down straightway at his feet, and yielded up the ghost: and the young men came in, and found her dead, and, carrying her forth, buried her by her husband." (Acts 5:1-10)

This voluntary communal sharing among the early Christians has been described by Marxists as "communism"; Arnold Toynbee has pointed out,

:The passage in the Acts represents the philanthropy of the primitive Christian Society as flowing from a God-given grace which was the fruit of a belief in the divinity of Jesus. In other words, the charity which is here depicted as moving the primitive Christians to go—in their mutual concern for one another's welfare—to the extreme length of sharing all their worldly goods is not a mere love of Man for Man (which is the limited literal meaning of the word ‘philanthropy’), but is a spiritual relation to which God is a party as well as His human creatures. In fact, this Christian Socialism is a practical application, on the economic surface of life, of the fundamental religious truth that the brotherhood of Man is a consequence of the fatherhood of God - a truth which is driven home with special force by a religion which teaches that God is not only the father and creator of Man, but also his saviour who has been incarnate in human shape and has suffered, and triumphed over, Death.<ref>Arnold Toynbee, ''A Study of History'', Annex II to Vol. V, Part C (i) (c) 2, p. 585, ''Marxism, Socialism, and Christianity''.</ref>

Some small Utopian experiments and intentional communities, notably the Shakers.<ref>officially: United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing</ref> have successfully practiced similar kinds of sharing, but rarely for long.

==Modern Communism==
Between 1989 and 1991, many communist governments were overthrown. The [[Berlin Wall]] in [[Germany]], which had become a symbol for the division between the West and communist states, was torn down in 1989, and there was also a large revolution against Romanian dictator [[Nicolaie Ceausescu]]. In 1991, the USSR broke up into several countries. Some of these remained under autocratic governments, but some have embraced [[democracy]].

Although Communism's influence has decreased dramatically in Europe, around a quarter of the world's population still lives under Communist Party rule.

The most famous of those countries governed by a communist one-party system is [[China]], but others (such as [[North Korea]], [[Laos]], and [[Vietnam]]) remain. There is considerable debate as to the extent to which these governments actually implement communist policies. China has not democratized (note especially the crushing of the Tiananmien Square protests in 1989), but its economic policies have been called "red capitalism" by some commentators, as there is a growing sector that behaves in a less-regulated, free market style. China's economy manufactures a wide variety of products that are sold to non-communist countries, and there is quite obvious tolerance of economic inequality, with some provinces struggling with poverty while others prosper.

One of the only remaining Modern communist countries (cuba), is still kept under economic repression by the USA due to its communist beliefs. Despite over 100 UN countrys calling for an end to this highly illegal blockade of trade and services, however they are braindead communists and don't know the meaning of freedom. Damn ragheads!

==See also==

[[Communism for dummies| Communism for Dummies]]

==Notes and references==
<references/>

[[Category:Politics]]
[[Category:History]]