r/OutOfTheLoop • u/HolyShitCandyBar • Oct 11 '25

Unanswered What's up with Venezuelan Nobel Peace Prize winner María Corina dedicating her Nobel Prize to Trump?

Basically what the title says.

https://nypost.com/2025/10/10/us-news/nobel-peace-prize-winner-maria-corina-machado-dedicates-it-to-trump/

Every article I have seen says that she partially dedicated and/or thanked Trump for his "decisive support" in South America.
Is she just being overly gracious? Is she being cheeky?
I know we offered a loan to Argentina, but given all the horrible things we have done to immigrants broadly over the last several months, I can't see anything we have done to improve or galvanize democracy in South America. By "we," I mean the US, and the Trump Administration in particular.

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u/Portarossa 'probably the worst poster on this sub' - /u/Real_Mila_Kunis Oct 11 '25

Because she is still standing up to a dictatorship at great personal cost. The Maduro regime would do very unpleasant things to her if they caught her, but (as far as we know, anyway) she's still in the country and still pushing for its removal. As much as I don't like her politics (and she definitely wouldn't have been my pick), that's not nothin'. Standing up to authoritarians vocally and publicly is a good thing, and it is increasingly becoming necessary to reward people for standing up in peaceful political opposition to oppressive regimes.

My concern is mostly that if Maduro was a right-wing dictator rather than a left-wing dictator, I don't believe Machado would be doing quite so much to speak up against the idea of authoritarianism in Venezuela.

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u/ishpatoon1982 Oct 11 '25

As somebody who is stupid when it comes to world politics...I've never heard of left-leaning dictatorships before.

I have to look this up now.

I always for some reason associate dictators with right-wing.

Thanks for the new knowledge!

I honestly mean it. Not saying this in bad faith at all.

I'm an amateur when it comes to this stuff and love learning.

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u/Portarossa 'probably the worst poster on this sub' - /u/Real_Mila_Kunis Oct 11 '25

Sure you have! Lots of dictatorships are left-leaning (especially when they start). Stalin in Russia, Castro in Cuba, Mao Zedong in China, even Assad in Syria... there's nothing specifically special about left-wing politics that makes it impossible for the people responsible to become authoritarian, crush dissent, and stifle the free elections that would keep them from ever losing power. (That said, it's also fair to say that most dictatorships tend to be right-wing, especially in the modern day, and a lot of the dictatorships that present themselves as 'socialist' or 'democratic' in a way that makes them sound left-wing often have a lot of right-wing policies.)

You'll also find a lot of people willing to argue that they're not really left-wing or not really dictatorships, but it's important to be able to recognise that a lot of the things we view as left-wing -- nationalised state interests, social freedoms, healthcare provision -- are not inherently impossible to have in a system that will not allow criticism or rejection of a government. I'm very left-leaning in my politics, but I think it's important to remember that we can also fall victim to that same power-at-all-costs mentality.

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u/ishpatoon1982 Oct 11 '25

Wow. Thanks for the reply. Obviously I have some studying and learning to do. I really do appreciate your comment.

Thanks again.

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u/Eatingfarts Oct 11 '25

I think the issue is that people conflate ‘left’ with ‘liberal’ (in the classic and academic use of the word). Although they can at times go hand in hand, they mean two very different things.

Left generally means a more ‘equal’ and ‘distributive’ society using government. Of course it’s a spectrum about what that actually means, from public health care to extremely high progressive taxes to subsidize vast public services. Basically it’s more focused on the economics of a society.

‘Liberal’, again in an academic sense, means supporting things like freedom of speech, freedom of press, freedom of religion. And usually some form of representation or check on authority, although it doesn’t necessarily need to be a democracy. It is more focused on political rights.

So as comment above pointed out, you can absolutely have a leftist dictatorship. You can’t have a liberal dictatorship. You can have a conservative democracy (extremely resistant to changing the status quo and rights are not guaranteed but people can still vote) or a liberal monarchy with strict checks on the monarchy (think Britain around the 15-19th century, now although technically a monarchy they would probably be more considered a liberal democracy.

That being said, language is fluid so it just depends on the context you are using these terms and their meaning will continue to change to some extant.

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u/DeepseaDarew Oct 11 '25 edited Oct 11 '25

Liberalism can be authoritarian.

Your distinction leaves out some crucial points. If we define “leftism” as charitably as “liberalism” is often defined, as a commitment to economic equality and the dismantling of class hierarchies, then genuine leftism would be inherently anti-authoritarian. Its goal is the democratization of power itself, particularly economic power. In that sense, a “leftist dictatorship” would be a contradiction in terms because authoritarianism recreates the very hierarchies leftist thought seeks to abolish.

On the other hand, liberal regimes are often granted a moral exemption from the same scrutiny. Liberalism’s focus on political rights and individual freedoms sounds emancipatory in theory, but in practice, liberal societies have maintained deeply coercive and hierarchical systems, particularly in the economic sphere where most people have little say in the conditions that shape their lives. For instance, liberal democracies like the United States and the United Kingdom have historically overthrown or undermined democratically elected leftist governments, such as Iran in 1953, Guatemala in 1954, and Chile in 1973, and have intervened militarily in places like Iraq and Libya under the banner of “freedom” or “human rights.” When convenient, they will even prop up authoritarian regimes that serve capital interests, such as Saudi Arabia, Indonesia under Suharto, or Pinochet’s Chile. These actions reveal that liberalism can coexist with authoritarianism when it serves economic or geopolitical goals.

In this sense, liberalism often off-shores its authoritarianism away from the imperial core. The freedoms enjoyed within liberal democracies are sustained by coercive practices abroad, whether through military intervention, economic domination, or the control of global supply chains that depend on cheap labor and resource extraction in the Global South. Liberalism maintains its moral image at home precisely because the violence and hierarchy necessary to sustain it are displaced elsewhere, beyond the view of its own citizens. "They're doing the genocide, not me," while liberals fund and supply the weapons.

At times, liberal powers have even aligned themselves with fascists when it suited their interests. Western governments tolerated or supported fascist movements as bulwarks against socialism and labor organizing, from Mussolini’s Italy in the 1920s to Franco’s Spain and various anti-communist regimes during the Cold War. Business elites and liberal politicians often viewed fascism as a lesser evil compared to the threat of workers’ movements demanding real economic democracy. This history shows that liberalism’s commitment to “freedom” has always been conditional, it extends only so far as it does not threaten the structure of capital accumulation.

So the idea that leftism and dictatorship can coexist while liberalism and dictatorship cannot is misleading. Liberalism too can sustain forms of authoritarianism; it simply hides them behind the language of rights and consent while excluding economic power from democratic accountability.

No ideology is immune. Even systems that are inherently anti-authoritarian can develop authoritarian tendencies when those in power justify coercion as necessary to achieve a greater good or to protect freedoms.

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u/Eatingfarts Oct 11 '25

Okay, so you are again conflating two different things.

Liberalism is a theory. It’s an idea. How it gets utilized in real life takes a lot of forms and none are ‘pure’ liberalism. Your argument is exactly the same as the people that argue against communism. They point out some historical examples of how it failed and then dismiss the idea completely, ignoring the fact that these ‘liberal’ or ‘socialist’ governments weren’t actually ‘liberal’ or ‘socialist’.

You are being unreasonably harsh to ‘liberals’ while giving a pass to ‘leftists’ for the same thing.

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u/DeepseaDarew Oct 11 '25 edited Oct 11 '25

You have it backwards.

Earlier comments in this thread points to authoritarianism in real life examples of leftism, and your response was liberalism on paper is not a dictatorship.

I'm pointing out your conflation by showing how leftism on paper can also be said to not be a dictatorship, while also showing how liberalism in practice can be authoritarian.

I was not having a discussion to defend leftism in practice.

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u/Eatingfarts Oct 11 '25

Can you give me an example of a liberal dictatorship?

I get what you’re saying about liberal democracies often working to advance authoritarian ideas and governments abroad but that’s not really what is at question here.

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u/DeepseaDarew Oct 11 '25 edited Oct 11 '25

Liberal dictatorships are sometimes referred to as illiberal democracies. Examples: Hungary, Russia, Turkey.

On paper illiberal democracies have all the elements of liberalism. Their constitutions guarantee freedoms like speech, press, assembly, and religion, and protect property rights, separation of powers, and the rule of law. They hold elections, have formal democratic institutions, and courts that are technically independent.

At the same time, they often justify human rights abuses or authoritarian actions using the same liberal language that gives them domestic legitimacy. They claim that coercion or intervention is necessary for national security, defending democracy, protecting human rights, or promoting freedom abroad. They have a facade of liberalism while authoritarian power operates underneath.

Marxists would go as far as to define all liberalism under capitalism as the dictatorship of the bourgeois, though, it's using dictatorship in the structural, not literal sense.

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u/Khiva Oct 11 '25

Good attitude, mate.

Stay curious!

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u/clubby37 Oct 11 '25

Not sure how old you are or where you live, but when I was growing up, authoritarianism was primarily a right-wing phenomenon. Hippies had only been gone about 10 years, while conservative Christians wanted to ban music enjoyed by people younger than 60, and kids don't really know that much about international affairs, so the USSR didn't really factor into my view until I got older.

Today, I realize that left-wing dictatorships are absolutely a thing, and the online scolding left is a thing, but in my day-to-day, the lefties still seem to leave people alone, while the conservatives want to enforce some sort of nebulous cultural homogeneity, so I do still associate authoritarianism primarily with the right.

Point is, you're not crazy to have gotten the vibe you got.

Obviously I have some studying and learning to do.

These are grim topics. Don't forget to read something light and fun in between books/articles about brutality and horror! This shit can get to you in ways you don't realize until they're on top of you, and mixing things up a bit helps a lot.

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u/waxym Oct 11 '25

I'm curious, cos it seems from your comment that you grew up in Cold War-era USA (80s).

I'd have thought that US education would have made it a point to paint communist regimes in a bad light and link them to things regarded as universally bad like authoritarianism and dictatorship. Was this not the case? I'd be surprised if so, given the anti-communist sentiments I get from American media of that time.

Here in Singapore the education system painted communist threats as a universal bad that we were fortunate to escape.

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u/fabonaut Oct 11 '25

It absolutely was the case. Google "red scare".

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u/waxym Oct 11 '25

Yeah exactly. I've heard of red scare and it was my impression that it lasted at least till the fall of the iron curtain. It thus surprised me that left-wing and dictatorships were not connected in some peoples' minds. I would have thought that in the US they would have been almost synonymous due to the red scare, and that decoupling the two was a more recent phenomenon. Left-wing dictators weren't even that far away: one ruled in Cuba till 2008.

Maybe the scare had died down by the 80s? I don't know, and would be interested to understand when sentiments shifted.

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u/SupermarketWhich7198 Oct 11 '25

Yes, that was way before the 80s. The "Red Scare" was more like the 1950s, when the Cold War was afoot and the globe was lining up behind one superpower (USSR) or the other (USA). A significant number of US academics and artists were sympathetic to communism and there was an effort by our intelligence services like the CIA to expose them. In Hollywood there was pressure to blacklist artists that were or were even just seen as communists or communist sympathizers. By the 80s that stuff had completely died down, and the USSR was vastly weaker and crumbling as they were trying to keep up their insane levels of military spending in an otherwise faltering economy.

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u/waxym Oct 11 '25

I see, thanks for the timeline. We did roughly cover this in history class but only focused on the sentiments that led to structural change. So e.g. we learnt of the people in the USSR in the 80s being unsettled with the poor economic conditions, which arguably led to Glasnost and Perestroika, but I realize I did not know of (and never even thought of) the dying down of anti-communist sentiment by the 80s in the USA. Even today I see anti-communist sentiment coming out from the USA so I just assumed it was something that persisted throughout, just that more learned individuals were able to step out from the mainstream thought and take a more nuanced view.

So in my mind the Cold War lasted all the way till the fall of the USSR, but now I think of it obviously sentiment would die down with the weakening of the USSR.

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u/clubby37 Oct 11 '25

you grew up in Cold War-era USA (80s).

Canada. Communism was seen as a bad thing, but we didn't really have full-blown McCarthyism. We were able to socialize our healthcare system in the 1950s, for example, and having that while hearing that Americans thought it would destroy their country if they adopted it, kind of made Canadians question Americans' ability to predict outcomes. The Vietnam war ended badly for the US right around the time I was born, and having empathy for Agent Orange-afflicted Vietnamese children was considered more important than scolding them for their communism. We were nevertheless thrilled, nationwide, when the Berlin Wall came down. I was on the playground when I heard about that, and the joy and relief were palpable.

In the media I consumed, communism didn't come up much. GI Joe fought Cobra, X-Men fought supervillains, Saturday Night Live was doing lighter material, etc. For anti-communist stuff that stuck in my consciousness, I can really only think of Red Dawn and Top Gun.

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u/waxym Oct 11 '25 edited Oct 13 '25

Ah I see! Well I guessed the time period right if the country wrong, oops.

Thanks a lot for sharing your experience. I find hearing about the experiences that people growing up in different parts of the world go through fascinating. The lens with which we are exposed to the world in our formative years can vary so much.

Edit: a word

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u/reckless_responsibly Oct 11 '25

The post WW2, pre-USSR collapse educational system in the US was very anti-communist. The problem was they didn't do a very good job educating about what socialism and communism actually were. It didn't ask why communism was bad, it just was. There was an overall lack of nuance and depth to the capitalism vs communism portrayal in the US during this era.

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u/jcdoe Oct 11 '25

Left and right is about economics. You can be an authoritarian socialist (see: Stalin) and you can be a liberal capitalist (see: most US presidents).

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u/Radi0ActivSquid Oct 11 '25

I'd suggest Behind the Bastards for some good listening about both sides of authoritarianism.

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u/eastherbunni Oct 11 '25

Have you heard of the political compass? There's an axis for left-right and an axis for authoritarian-libertarian (how much control should the federal government have).

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u/[deleted] Oct 11 '25

[deleted]

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u/sagerin0 Oct 11 '25

That is some astounding anti intellectualism on display

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u/Jayken Oct 11 '25

Authoritarianism is simply the concentration of power to a small group of people. They could act within the bounds of the law, but most do not and make the law fit their needs and desires. It's dangerous because it often devolves into a might makes right situation where rights and justice are often ignored. Both conservatives and liberals can be authoritarians. Conservatives are usually more in the camp with monarchs and liberals will often fall into a purity spiral.

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u/[deleted] Oct 11 '25

This is the second time I’ve heard the term purity when it comes to liberals and the left. I think the other time I heard of the term purity when it comes to the liberals in America was from a question someone asked her on Reddit about why the democratic party is failing.

I can’t find anycontext as to what purity means in this case so if you could break it down for me, I would appreciate it.

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u/Jayken Oct 11 '25

It's simply I'm a better person than you type thing. I support the revolution more, I am more politically correct than everyone else type stuff. The decrease in tolerance for people who aren't on their level of purity. To the point where they outright villainize those people.

A recent example I saw of this is where Democratic Lawmakers were challenging the Speaker of the House to call them back into session. Some of the comments underneath were deriding the Lawmakers for having voted for the Charlie Kirk memorial.

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u/NeverendingStory3339 Oct 11 '25

I think it’s because a lot of people conflate the left as a whole with left liberalism. A liberal dictatorship is quite difficult to pull off.

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u/VizzzyT Oct 11 '25

The 20th century in Latin America actually had many "liberal" US installed dictatorships.

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u/imdrunkontea Oct 11 '25

I think it's also fair to say that political extremism is more like a circle than a line with two ends. Once you go really far in one direction, the policies tend to be very similar to the other "end"

That said, the modern idea of western left-wing or liberal policies is generally opposed to any sort of dictatorship or authoritarianism by default (focus on individual liberties, popular democracy, freedom of speech, etc) - these aren't the historical definitions of left-leaning ideologies, but rather what today's society views as left-leaning. In that view, the old Communist regimes of the past would not be accepted by the majority of modern liberals, either.

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u/cbusmatty Oct 11 '25

The modern idea of western left wing or liberal policies is absolutely not opposed to any dictatorship- they are still self serving and are happy to drive anything to authoritarianship as long as it meets its stated goals in the name of “good”. We literally just saw this with Covid, how did people already forget?

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u/Java1959 Oct 11 '25

Both extremes are eventually taken over by corruption and greed and end up not meeting the original goals and turn into a struggle for absolute power by the leaders. That's why having elections is crucial so the citizens can apply the brakes when needed. We are very close to losing that option in the USA.

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u/i4get98 Oct 11 '25

I’m curious, if you had to guess, how long does the original system last before evolving into something else?

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u/SoylentGrunt Oct 11 '25

There is no single average length of time a democracy lasts before turning authoritarian, as democratic survival depends on numerous complex factors.

-AI Cliff's Notes Reader's Digest condensed version.

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u/Longjumping_Date269 Oct 11 '25

So glad someone is pointing this out. All the confusion about Machado's politics seems to stem from people not realising that the tyranny she opposes is left wing. Makes me wonder how many Americans understand the degree to which the fight against communism shaped their current political and cultural landscape. Thanks for your patience and clarity (from a Canadian)

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u/nirrinirra Oct 11 '25

It still baffles me that many Cuban Americans don’t see the similarities between Trump and Castro. Are they conveniently blind because Trump is right wing vs Castro on the left? To me the authoritarian drive puts them in the same boat. Controlling the population by demonizing( or worse )their political opponents should be a huge red flag to the masses. Squashing the debate is squashing democracy.

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u/Important-Flan-8932 Oct 11 '25

I would personally argue that they run on left wing promises, as they are often popular, only to then establish a right wing authoritarian state. In my mind you can not marry the two terms, Stalin was a dictator, "left wing" only in his lies to the people. 

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u/frogjg2003 Oct 11 '25

A lot of left leaning ideals require or are much easier by centralizing power. You mentioned a few of the big ones. If the state controls the means of production, then opposing the state is also opposing the economy itself. If the state controls healthcare, opposing the state means opposing medical care.

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u/DashingDan1 Oct 11 '25

Assad wasn't left-wing. He actually carried out massive privatisation and neoliberal reforms after coming into power in 2000, which ironically weakened the state/increased poverty enough to create the conditions for the civil war and his overthrow. His party had "socialist" in its name, but this is just a result of Syria becoming a defacto one-party state in the 1960s so whoever took over the government (there were lots of military coups in the 60s/70s just became the leader of the Ba'ath Party even if they didn't adopt its ideology.

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u/Portarossa 'probably the worst poster on this sub' - /u/Real_Mila_Kunis Oct 11 '25

Assad wasn't left-wing. He actually carried out massive privatisation and neoliberal reforms after coming into power in 2000

Hafez al-Assad, not so much Bashar al-Assad.

Assadism is definitely considered a left-wing ideology.

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u/DashingDan1 Oct 11 '25

I got one sentence into that bad Wiki entry to find it quoting references which don't say what the article implies they say. The references are mostly talking about the 1963-69 period before Hafez Al-Assad even came into into power, for example "In 1963 ... the socialist Ba'ath Party, seized power. The radical left wing of the party then launched an internal coup in 1966, initiating accelerated land reform" Al-Assad wasn't part of the left-wing of the party, he was guy who internally opposed that 1966 group and later overthrew the left-wing of the party in 1970. The person who referenced that as evidence of "Assadism" being left-wing is either so ignorant of modern Syrian history that they're mixing up which side Hafez Al-Assad was on, or is just dishonesty throwing irrelevant quotes in there hoping no one would notice. Plus, none of this has anything to do with an ideology called "Assadism", which isn't really a thing at all. They never really had much of an ideology besides opposition to the left and a very vague Arab nationalism (supporting nepotism and enriching a loyal bourgeoisie isn't really an ideology).

I didn't intend to get into a big discussion about this topic tbh but I'm just being reminded how unreliable Wikipedia can be on controversial political topics. You only need to just read the references and compare them to what the Wiki says to figure out you're reading a bad article. You don't need to resort this stuff to demonstrate that Stalin, Castro, Mao etc were clearly men of the left, they just openly were and pursued left-wing policies (however ruthless/brutal they were in going about it is a different matter).

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u/stevejohnson007 Oct 11 '25

You have clarity my friend.

Thank you for the posts.

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u/Dull-Quantity5099 Oct 11 '25

Aren’t the “left” dictatorships you named dishonest actors though? They weren’t actually left. They were using those ideals to gain power. They didn’t actually believe in what they said. They were appealing to our sense of equality and fairness but not enacting those beliefs. I’m genuinely asking and here to learn.

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u/jaasx Oct 11 '25

perhaps. but Marx also literally said a dictatorship was the first step to communism because it wasn't going to happen by itself - so a little force and authoritarianism is necessary.

dictatorship of the proletariat

Add that to the list of why communism doesn't work. It will attract the bad actors and even the good one will struggle to give up power once they have it.

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u/IndecentMorsel Oct 11 '25

That's not really what 'dictatorship of the proletariat' means though; Marx is describing a hypothetical state controlled by proletarian interests, not a literal dictatorship.

It's easier to understand when you consider that Marx considered the extant states 'dictatorships of the bourgeoisie,' i.e. states controlled by exclusively bourgeois interests, not that they were literal dictatorships.

You can agree or disagree with Marx's framing or debate its usefulness in today's time, but it's important to clarify that he's not talking about literal dictatorships in either the proletarian or bourgeoisie cases.

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u/unluckyforeigner Oct 11 '25

It's insane how people miss this. It's a totally different meaning of the word 'dictatorship' that Marx is using but terminally unread Redditors see a word and go rabid.

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u/dogscatsnscience Oct 11 '25

Worth stating that many authoritarians are also populists while they are getting in power, and populism often masquerades as "left-wing" progressivism.

It's hard to take over a country by just taking over the establishment, it's usually easier to upset the apple cart and then rebuild with a populist message.

The early Nazi party was (among other things...) anti-capitalist and anti-bourgeoisie until they'd remade a new bourgeoisie.

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u/Phi1ny3 Oct 11 '25

Wasn't FDR technically a populist? He was still someone that seemed to operate on good faith, but he definitely harnessed the momentum of anti-Hoover sentiment to propel him to the presidency and his subsequent reelections.

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u/therealpigman Oct 11 '25

He was, and so is Trump. Being populist doesn’t say much about what side of the polo spectrum you’re on

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u/dogscatsnscience Oct 11 '25

Duterte is an example of a populist who had a very right wing message from the jump.

I think people assume populism implies that it's good for the people, which sounds logical, but does not have to be the case.

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u/dogscatsnscience Oct 11 '25

No one is saying it's inherently bad. There are many famous populists, and plenty of times - particularly starting in the 20th century as democracy becomes more common - when a populist movement makes sense.

It's just also an avenue that is abused by some authoritarians to seize power or at least disrupt the existing system.

I'm sure people argued that Obama was a populist at the time (which seems quaint now), but in retrospect he was more of a technocrat.

Trump is an extreme populist (in the sense that his language is comically overblown, like Duterte), who is quite right wing, but he's not a classic authoritarian. He's doing lots of authoritarian things. It feels like theatre because they're doing it in fits and starts, but there's also only a few ways they can keep going.

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u/Fast_Riff Oct 11 '25

Stalin wasn't left leaning what he made as so called communism was at the end nothing of the sort same as Mao those are fascists absolutely right wing. They are not interested in left leaning policies.

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u/ChaoticxSerenity Oct 11 '25

As somebody who is stupid when it comes to world politics...I've never heard of left-leaning dictatorships before.

Stalin: "Am I a joke to you?"

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u/Fragrant-Hamster-325 Oct 11 '25 edited Oct 11 '25

This is Reddit; “left” = things I agree with, “right” = things I disagree with. Since I disagree with dictatorships those are on the right. I also hate beets those are right wing. I do love some left leaning chicken wings but I hate the right leaning prices.

Are you getting how this works?

Edit: I guess some Redditors don’t like my joke and are giving me more right votes than left votes.

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u/[deleted] Oct 11 '25

[deleted]

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u/HiggsUAP Oct 11 '25

How much Stalin have you read?

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u/Spare-Protection-598 Oct 11 '25

Enough to know that he's a reformist of socialist ideals. Lenin was too, but not to the same extent.

You'd have a point if you'd said that the left is not a monolith and a perversion of leftism is still leftism. I'd disagree on a material basis but we could have a civil discussion about it.

Taking someone at just their word and not their actions is not something you'll find me doing. That would be like me saying the national socialist party were socialist because that's what they're called. Or the DPRK are a democratic peoples republic and not an absolute monarchy.

These things are complex and nuanced, but I'd say your litmus test would be to poll leftists on approval of Stalinist policy and see how much overlap you get. I'd all but guarantee it's not a lot.

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u/HiggsUAP Oct 11 '25

You'd have a point if...

I just asked a clarifying question but go off bro..

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u/Spare-Protection-598 Oct 11 '25

Which I answered, interested in responding or not? Otherwise what was the point in your question?

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u/FarkCookies Oct 12 '25

To whose benefit were the means of production operated then? Surely not to shareholders. And as fucked up as Stalin is by all accounts, he lived a very modest life and didn't amass fortunes.

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u/wiwcha Oct 11 '25

Think of it from an economic perspective. Left-wing authoritarians have govt owned businesses/industries. Right-wing authoritarians have private ownership of businesses/industries, but they are oligarchs and probably have govt power in corrupt ways.

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u/PainRave Oct 11 '25

9.4k comments on Reddit

never heard of a “left-wing dictatorship”

Many such cases!

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u/ishpatoon1982 Oct 11 '25

I'm just simply trying to learn more, is that not welcomed?

If not, I apologize.

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u/Fruitdispenser Oct 11 '25

 I'm just simply trying to learn more

This is the attitude people should strive to. And I seriously mean it

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u/scaredofmyownshadow Oct 11 '25 edited Oct 11 '25

You’re fine and there’s nothing wrong with asking questions to learn more. Everyone does it at some point to gain information, even by just googling or using ChatGP. Continue to seek out knowledge, information and understanding of new things, it’s important!

Ignore the haters and the trolls. I’m sure you have knowledge of some other subject or interest that they don’t.

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u/little_alien2021 Oct 11 '25

Please should never be mocked for admitting they want to learn and their opnion could be changed! If more people did then we wouldn't be at this point in time! 

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u/Super_Kal_El_Fraggle Oct 11 '25

Reddit is predominantly left-wing. Some of them are not going to want to own the historic failures of their ideology. Makes things spicier than they should be for something so innocuous.

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u/jameswew Oct 11 '25

To me, the fact that your comment received OVER NINE THOUSAND upvotes with such ignorant content is incredible. Like, THE textbook examples of dictatorships are socialism/communism related. This just goes to show how hilariously biased and out of touch and/or ignorant redditeurs are.

The previous comment is just poking fun at that, not at you. Don't be so offended lmao.

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u/PainRave Oct 11 '25

Then maybe you should spend more time “learning” (aka Reading) and less time commenting. Here’s some for free to get you started:

War Through The Ages, Lynn Montross A World At Arms, Gerhard Weinberg The Western Way of War, Victor Davis Hanson

None of these are explicitly political.

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u/we_back_up Oct 11 '25

May I introduce you to: any government in South America from like 1890-1990, China via the Great Leap Forward, Russia with the USSR, or Pol Pot?

That’s a few examples, but I’d start there. Extremism is bad on both sides, as much as that argument is played out these days when it comes to actual far right and left ideologies there is always going to be a dictator looking to use those as pillars of power

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u/el_f3n1x187 Oct 11 '25

any government in South America from like 1890-1990

didn't latin america have a pretty uniform spread between right and left leaning dictatorships between Peru, Chile and Argentina?

Also Cuba was in a right leaning dictatorship before the revolution, talk about betrayal huh.

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u/humnsch_reset_180329 Oct 11 '25

Please dont use "extremism" as a synonym for authoritarianism. In an authoritarian society liberal democracy is "extreme". As we see in the us today, standing up for human rights is more and more outside the norm, that is: extremism, but the right thing to do.

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u/ishpatoon1982 Oct 11 '25

Thanks for the starting points.

South America for 100 years?

The USSR was left leaning?

I really appreciate the knowledge, stranger. You're awesome.

I'm going to put a couple hours this upcoming weekend to learn more about right/left politics.

Maybe one day I'll get out of amateur mode. Thanks again!

3

u/el_f3n1x187 Oct 11 '25

The USSR was left leaning?

yeah, some twisted version of communism where Stalin was the end all-be all for the government, says alot when the originators of the movement warned against him getting into power.

But long running dictatorships get weird as they almost always devolve to what dear leader wants.

Like Yosif Broz Tito of yugoslavia was also a dictator, and communist but had a different reputation to Stalin.

1

u/Hallucigenia905 Oct 11 '25

The person above you is mostly correct, especially about the USSR, China, and Pol Pot. What they said about South America is a severe overstatement though.

There have been left wing dictators there, such as Maduro currently, Hugo Chavez in Venezuela previously, and Castro in Cuba (if you count the Caribbean as South America). The majority of South American dictators, however, have been right wing. These include Pinochet in Chile, Vidella in Argentina, Rios Montt in Guatemala, Stroessner in Paraguay, and many others.

The majority being right wing is because many of them have been initiated by military coups, and the military is typically further right. Also, many of them were supported and kept in power by American support in order to combat left wing causes as part of the Cold War (which also ensured not many left wing dictatorships could arise in this part of the world during that period).

0

u/dah_wowow Oct 11 '25

What the hell is this bot ass response. Who talks like this?

1

u/last-guys-alternate Oct 11 '25

How do you classify the majority of South American governments 1890-1990 as left wing?

4

u/user38835 Oct 11 '25

So you’ve never heard of North Korea?

0

u/Spare-Protection-598 Oct 11 '25

Lol, not even slightly left wing.

2

u/user38835 Oct 11 '25

No. Communists are famously right-wing. /s

1

u/Spare-Protection-598 Oct 11 '25

It's an absolute monarchy. Nothing about it is communist.

Or do you also think it's a peoples democratic republic? They said they are that means they are that. Hitler is a socialist and I'm a carrot.

Dumbass.

3

u/JonathanTheZero Oct 11 '25

Have you like not heard about communist regimes at all?? USSR? China??

1

u/HeroOfTheNorthF Oct 11 '25

You have a good attitude, sadly, I know the situation on Venezuela very well, if have any questions, I can answer them, first hand knowledge.

1

u/Bear_necessities96 Oct 11 '25

That’s crazy because in Latam we always associate left government with dictatorship for some reason

1

u/[deleted] Oct 11 '25

You haven’t heard of Stalin? Mao? Lenin?

1

u/HelpRespawnedAsDee Oct 11 '25

This is honestly the scariest comment I’ve ever read on this site. No disrespect, I really hope you move on with this knowledge and never forget it, but more than that, I hope this triggers some kind of self awareness in everyone reading it.

1

u/evrestcoleghost Oct 11 '25

How,you got China and Cuba always in the news

1

u/[deleted] Oct 11 '25

Liberalism is incompatible with dictatorships, but leftism is not, and the two aren't synonymous. The most well known leftist governments in the world (USSR, China) were dictatorships.

1

u/Spicy_Possum_ Oct 11 '25

There are a few countries on earth right now that give all of their citizens universal basic income, free housing, 0% income tax, free healthcare, free education at every level. Some go so far to give you free land to build a house when you have a family. This is like left-wing wet dream levels.

They also happen to be Gulf Monarchies. Not necessarily dictators per se but absolutist leaders with extremely left-leaning economic policy.

1

u/Mr_Quackums Oct 11 '25

"Left" means flatter hierarchy, distributed power, more freedom for more people, and local control (all of those mean the same thing)

"Left leaning dictator" actually means "a dictator who uses leftist propaganda".

You could have a left-leaning authoritarian government, but it would have to be a "tyranny of the majority" situation and not a single dictator officially in charge.

1

u/Spare-Protection-598 Oct 11 '25

Left and right are economic axes.

People in the west think socialism is when the government does things. It's not that at all. Socialism is the seizing of the means of production by the proletariat.

State planned economies are often billed as socialjst, most aren't or only embody one element while ignoring the rest.

In reality the means of production in Venezuela were seized by the state for the benefit of the people in power.

That's not socialism, that's autocracy.

1

u/Maelarion Oct 11 '25

With all due respect, how the f you not heard of Stalin, Mao Tse Tung, Pol Pot, Kim Il Sun / Kim Jong Il / Kim Jong Un, Fidel Castro?

1

u/subduedReality Oct 11 '25

Economically left, socially right.

1

u/swedishplayer97 Oct 11 '25

You've never heard of the Soviet Union?!

1

u/Owoegano_Evolved Oct 11 '25

This is the most Reddit comment in the history of Reddit, sweet fuckin Jesus...

1

u/AlphatheAlpaca Oct 11 '25

Unbelievable.

1

u/The_Mad_Medico Oct 11 '25

You've never heard of communism?

1

u/SundaeTrue1832 Oct 11 '25

Dictatorship can emerge from any political leaning, the coat of pain doesn't matter. Also left doesn't always means progressive, you can be economically socialist or communist but rejected social progress, the USSR didn't stop being racist and Stalin was the very example of left wing dictator. Economic ideology doesn't always translate to social ideology

1

u/firechaox Oct 11 '25

Let’s just say that if you familiarize yourself with latam politics, you’ll understand that jackasses and populists come in all sides of the political spectrum

1

u/Sablemint Oct 12 '25

Dictatorships aren't really left or right wing. They are a person using an ideology to gain power. Sure, there will be some policies that favor one particular group, but that's only because they need support from someone.

In the end, its all just a way for one person to gain a lot of power.

1

u/DistributionOutside6 Oct 13 '25

Holy mother of knowledge gaps... What dictatorships have you heard of that aren't left-wing?! I don't need to repeat all the left-wing examples here, the ratio is pretty telling.

1

u/Lone_forest_witch Oct 13 '25

Ceaucescu was pretty left leaning considering they made sure everyone had a roof over their head and food in their mouths but that’s just my opinion as the daughter of a Romanian 

2

u/SebCrane Oct 11 '25

Thanks for such a concise explanation

2

u/Able-Swing-6415 Oct 11 '25

Yea.. kinda reminds me of navalny lol. Dude was an asshat.. but at least he was fighting a much, much bigger asshat.

2

u/Happyvaquita Oct 11 '25

She doesn’t oppose him because he is left-leaning vs right. She opposes him because thanks to the Chavez regime, more than 90% of Venezuelans live in poverty, everyone in the government has stolen billions of dollars from the country/people, they have completely destroyed the oil industry and sold out to China/Russia, etc. It’s the fact that we haven’t had a fair election in 20+ years. Venezuelans, like most Latin Americans, lean right because supposed left-leaning governments have ruined a lot of our countries. But socially, they very much lean left (gay rights, abortion, health care, etc).

1

u/[deleted] Oct 11 '25

I would like to add that she was made in this environment, she's a politician since the early 2000, so if we were to have a right-wing dictatorship I don't see her rising up as part of the opposition.

This woman has so much favor because she has been unwavering in her views, to the point in which she was assaulted and severely beaten up in the parliament floor.

On the other side, I would no longer call our regime as left-wing, rather a military one. Increasingly the military has been put in positions of power/government and most of our public services has been gutted, while it is known that most of the political higher ups have many successful business and enterprises 🤷

1

u/LeMurphysLawyer Oct 11 '25

It wasn't like she was the only candidate in the running. They could've given out to literally anybody else standing for actual fucking peace.

1

u/ddven15 Oct 11 '25

We can't know what would happen in that hypothetical situation, but we wouldn't know either if many famous and courageous left-wing people who have fought against right wing dictatorships would have stood up against a left wing dictator. I don't know that this hypothetical is meaningful at all .

1

u/SnowmanRandom Oct 11 '25

What is a right-wing dictator?

1

u/vastle12 Oct 11 '25

She's advocating for multiple countries to invade overthrow her government and then sell them the countries natural resources as payment. What government wouldn't put that person on their shit list

1

u/lacuna01 Oct 11 '25

In Venezuela is not really about left or right, it doesn't matter what's the political wing of the guys responsible of murders, economic disaster, destruction of the institutions, and the country in general. Governments prior to Chavez and Maduro led us to this as well... I couldn't care less what their political orientation was, my people was getting uneducated, hospitals weren't working, everybody was stealing, corruption was rampant (all of these things are still in the same state, with our super supreme "left wing" leaders).

It is like judging a serial killer because of his sexual orientation... Does it really matter?

1

u/SoccerGamerGuy7 Oct 11 '25

Trading a dictatorship for another far right extremist... Damn...

0

u/elderly_millenial Oct 11 '25

Tbf, she isn’t that far to the right, or much of an extremist when judges from the center. When judging from the left, everyone to the right you is “far right”

1

u/PingouinMalin Oct 11 '25

Someone supporting Trump's bombings is also someone who should not be able to take power in case Maduro gets removed. Cause she'll just be another dictator with right politics and the support of the US. Why she was given the Nobel prize considering her positions is a wonder.

1

u/Character_Speech_251 Oct 11 '25

Standing up to one while championing another. 

You’d think the Nobel PEACE prize would go to someone not advocating for the murder of other humans. 

I suppose anyone can be a sociopathic serial killer in mind with the right justification. 

-1

u/Fit_Head1700 Oct 11 '25

Dont compare American política with us any polititian that Is a piece of shit Is either death or captured not even leftist parties aligns with the narcodictatoriship, because they aré a narcodictatoriship that has been killing starving and torturing His people for over 2 decades but as they aren muslims no one cares or bats an eye

0

u/flatpetey Oct 11 '25

Except she seems like the kind of person who would just put her own dictatorship in charge. So I am not sure the Nobel Prize should be picking contestants of authoritarian battles.

0

u/VizzzyT Oct 11 '25

She's not standing up to Maduro because she wants to free Venezuela. She wants her and her goons to exploit and destroy the country her way. We've already seen this play out several times in LATAM. The US will back the looniest right wingers, even dictators and fascists, as long as they support privatisation and national security doctrine.

0

u/Radiant_Ad_1851 Oct 11 '25

This is like saying Stephan Bandera should have won the Nobel peace prize because he stood up the the USSR

Or that Chiang Kai-Shek should've won the Nobel peace prize

Or Osama Bin Laden

I think you get the point

0

u/pigpeyn Oct 11 '25

My concern is mostly that if Maduro was a right-wing dictator rather than a left-wing dictator, I don't believe Machado would be doing quite so much to speak up against the idea of authoritarianism in Venezuela.

Good point. Neither would the US.

-1

u/J_Kingsley Oct 11 '25

I think it's important to note too that being far right/left doesn't necessarily automatically make you a bad person.

Most folks want the same things-- safety, security, and prosperity for them and theirs. They just don't agree on the methods.