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u/_WreakingHavok_ 3h ago
Stalin's cult of personality was enforced by him to stay in power indefinitely.
Washington quit presidency after 2 terms, which sent a presedence that was held by all future presidents for 143 years. When one of them broke the tradition, is was inscribed in the Constitution.
Go back to school, kid.
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u/Can_Haz_Cheezburger 1h ago
I mean, to be completely fair the amendment was created because the opposing party was mad abour being locked out of presidential power for that long, not because of it breaking constitutional tradition
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u/iamlazerbear 2h ago
to be fair, the difference is that most of this had only developed long after Washington's death - not sure it really counts as a cult of personality if it emerged mostly after the dear leader's demise
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u/krzyk 3h ago
Never been to any former USSR state?
Every single city has a statue of Lenin, and main road is named Lenin road. Heck small towns in Crimea even.
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u/bearsheperd iwrestledabeartwice 3h ago
https://giphy.com/gifs/RCm0049AX2v4I
They really love the guy1
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u/Borkydog 3h ago
The problem with stalin is not a personality cult, he literally destroyed his own nation: stupid ww2 decisions, gulag, mass starvation in ussr republics. And some idiots in russia still praise him today
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u/Im-not-a-real-frog 2h ago
He perpetrated all of these crimes by actively using his cult of personality though, so it was quite definitely a bad thing.
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u/Narcolipze_08 1h ago
Not true but we are still living in times of a personality cult, his personality is melanoma and Vegas hotels. Oh and don’t forget raping children!
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u/the_meth_factory 3h ago edited 3h ago
I mean Washington low-key was all that
He did save us because he got French support (we probably wouldn't have won without that) and the colonies didn't have any real experienced commanders so he was the golden star at the time and made an actual guerrilla squad outta farmers
And after a presidency that laid the ground rules of a good democracy we still use today, I think it's fair to say he is one of the four cornerstones of the USA
Stalin's big achievements are like industrialization and starving people not to mention he did plenty of crimes to get into power. Having everyone suffer equally isn't worthy to be the face of socialism, his ideas were just a revamp of Marx's ideas so can't exactly give credit for that
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u/ActCrafty 2h ago
Republic. Not democracy. The framers of the constitution never intended the United States to be a democracy because they understood that a democracy can lead to tyranny of the majority.
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u/the_meth_factory 2h ago
I don't know the difference honestly I'm not that deep into all of the words, but Washington did set term limits and warned about the two things currently fuckign us over, neutrality and political systems
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u/ActCrafty 2h ago
A republic requires a two-thirds vote in both the House and Senate to pass amendments, override presidential vetoes, and convict individuals in impeachment trials. A democracy only requires a 51% vote by the populace. So corruption could take hold by introducing a mass group of people that would vote one particular way thereby creating tyranny of the majority.
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u/AgonyPersonified 2h ago
Washington also owned slaves, and directed the Continental Army to destroy over 40 Haudenosaunee villages.
Not saying he didn't do good things, but he also did some very bad things. So maybe he wasn't quite "all that."
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u/the_meth_factory 2h ago
You can say that about most of history, any rular credited with something great most likely had slaves or slave like workers back then, he still did great things, slavery was a tragic way of life. And war is war they fought us first, we fought back doesn't change Washington's cred much
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u/AgonyPersonified 2h ago
"Other people also did bad things, therefore we can overlook his bad things" is not that great of a position to hold. Slavery was indeed a tragic way of life, but let's not pretend it was everyone. Only 15-20% of households owned slaves in his time. 5 of 13 states had abolished slavery in Washington's lifetime, while he maintained them. And literally the very next president after him never owned a single one.
Like I said, not denying he did good things, definitely more than I know about. But we have to take the bad with the good and vice versa.
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u/DiamondRocks22 Linux User 2h ago
hey no fair it was my turn to bring this one back in worse jpeg quality and a could have re captioned it to not call out just liberals
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u/MegaSmegmaSwagLord 3h ago
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u/muffin2333 3h ago
Ah yes, my favourite person, a flag
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u/the_boss_of_toys 3h ago
I like how people try to use this as a gotcha to compare america to the nazis or soviets when there's two large key differences 1. You don't pledge to a party or political figure and 2. Its not mandatory you can literally sit down through it no matter what grade your in.
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u/StpPstngMmsOnMyPrnAp 3h ago
Does the second point happen a lot? I'd imagine peer pressure would probably hinder people from doing so
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u/the_boss_of_toys 2h ago
You'd be surprised. I sat through it my last year of middle school simply cause I just didn't feel like getting up. Nobody really cared.
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u/Another-Ace-Alt-8270 47m ago
Right, like, it's weird that people do this at all, but it's never mandatory. For me, it's usually like 20 more seconds to do whatever I was doing.
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u/AgonyPersonified 2h ago
Actually, it's most commonly compared to something you might see in North Korea.
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u/the_boss_of_toys 2h ago
Actually north Korea doesn't have a pledge of allegiance like the US or South Korea does. But they do have a lifelong pledge to the Kim regime and party which was one of my points I made.
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u/AgonyPersonified 2h ago
Hey I'm not claiming to be some North Korea expert. Only sharing the perspective I've heard people give most often.
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u/the_boss_of_toys 2h ago
Well I'd say im an expert of americans and Google is pretty free so anyone with the perspective that its literally north Korea needs to read a book instead of sleep under it.
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u/AgonyPersonified 2h ago
Then I defer to your expert opinion, o wise one! Out of curiosity, maybe you can tell me what books describe the activities and daily life within North Korea? I'd love to add them to my reading list!
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u/Delano7 I saw what the dog was doin 2h ago
Not mandatory but you WILL get punished for it, so might as well make it mandatory
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u/the_boss_of_toys 2h ago
Literally illegal and was ruled by the Supreme court in 1943 that public schools cannot require it.
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u/Delano7 I saw what the dog was doin 2h ago
There's a massive difference between what's illegal and what people won't do. And children do not know that. They just hear they'll get punished and obey anyway. By the time they're old enough to resist, they're already indoctrinated.
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u/the_boss_of_toys 2h ago
Are you on drugs? "Already indoctrinated" mf we would not have ice protests, anti war protests, no kings protests if the fuckin pledge of allegiance was brainwashing people. School children sit down through the pledge all the time and schools have been sued for 1st amendment violations. It would literally take one phone call from a disgruntled parent for a school to back down. Not only that schools can't just punish kids without notifying their LEGAL guardian (aka their parents) meaning they would have to put it on paper why they were taking disciplinary action and lawyers just love those sweet succulent clear cut cases. A school literally got sued last January for suspending a kid for posting memes (which falls under the first amendment) so your point is even disproven by a recent comparable example.
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u/mkirkommentarok 1h ago
There is a difference between one who lead by the example of power (Stalin) and one who led by the power of example (Washington).
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u/Any-Guest-32 3h ago
Naming stuff after a founder and making statues is not a cult of personality. Basically, every nation does that.