• Aatube@kbin.melroy.org
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      5 months ago

      My point is that the United States is indeed much less authoritarian. Saying that there’s no such thing as a state that’s more authoritarian or less authoritarian is denying reality.

      • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmy.mlOP
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        5 months ago

        US incarceration rate is higher than what USSR had during Stalin’s purges. It’s hard to think of a better measure of how authoritarian a state is than the percentage of the population it keeps behind bars.

      • ☭ 𝗖 𝗔 𝗧 ☭@mastodon.social
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        5 months ago

        @Aatube @yogthos @NoiseColor

        [Saying that there’s no such thing as a state that’s more authoritarian or less authoritarian is denying reality.]

        To clarify, that’s not what I said. I said that there is no such thing as a non-authoritarian state because states are authoritarian by nature, not that there aren’t varying degrees of the level of authoritarianism among different states. America is in many ways less authoritarian than the USSR, but it’s still authoritarian nonetheless.

        • Aatube@kbin.melroy.org
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          5 months ago

          Hmm, I understand what you meant to say now. However, by all common discourse and even the term’s very original definition, the United States isn’t “authoritarian” enough to be considered authoritarian.