[amw]

I don't think it's demonstrated that at all, simply that it was better than feudalism. But China has built 15000 miles of high speed rail in ten years, and has functionally eliminated homelessness by the admission of the World Bank (not a pro-Communist organization!). Cuba (and China) had its healthy life expectancy surpass the US for the first time (despite over a half-century of the worst sanctions regime on the planet, save perhaps the one imposed on Palestine). The USSR went from a society of peasants to beating the US in space milestones over five decades. All of these successes have happened over the backdrop of a massively hostile international capitalist presence--imagine how different it could all be if said capitalist societies felt like they should compete on making their citizens happy, rather than by building hundreds of military bases around the world and being involved in violent conflict all but a handful of years out of the last two centuries (the US has eight hundred military bases and spends almost a trillion a year on its military!).

Any time you hear about how terrible ("authoritarian! undemocratic! oppressive!") a society that gives socialism a shot is, remember that it is coming from a context that has baked Cold War propaganda into _literally everything_ we have consumed from it, our entire lives. Question it!