Maoism
“”With eight hundred million people, how can it work without struggle?
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— ![]() |
Maoism, also known as Mao Zedong Thought, is a rural version of Marxism-Leninism that advocates the violent rebellion of peasants and betrayal of the family and other close allies and affiliates. Ironically, the Chinese communists do not really understand Marxism-Leninism.
Lin Biao said that there were very few
CCP members who had really read the works of
Marx or
Lenin. The public considered
Qu Qiubai to be an ideologue, but he admitted to having read very little of Marxist-Leninist theory.
Maoism is economically far-left,
totalitarian, and
culturally far-left. Maoism and Mao Zedong has committed countless atrocities, degenerated the
morals of future generations, and destroyed
China’s five-thousand year long traditions and culture.
History
Founding & Early Days
The founder of the CCP, Chen Duxiu, was an intellectual, that disliked violence and wanted to keep good relations with the
Kuomintang. But the
Party didn’t want and need peace. So came the labeling as a right-wing, then came a more violent leader, a more characteristic leader, a leader that suites the Party:
Mao Zedong.
Maoism started to formulate in the 1930s, inside the unrecognized country that is the Chinese Soviet Republic. Mao focused on the rural areas, recruiting and creating revolutionary bases, and filled the people with empty promises.
The leader of the Kuomintang,
Chiang Kai-shek, began to eliminate the communists, for he saw right through their sugarcoated phrases and saw them as who they really are: corrupt bandits. The Chinese Civil War between the Nationalists (KMT) and Communists/Maoists (CCP) began. The KMT almost eliminated the CCP multiple times, and the Maoists had to retreat to
Yan'an.
The CCP tried to paint their stay at Yan’an like a revolutionary holy land, but it was more like a holy hell. Most people were not happy with how they lost so bad to the Nationalists, so Mao lunched the “Rectification Movement”, to root out what he called “petty bourgeoisie toxins”. Everybody had to list all of their acquaintances since birth, all their important life events, and all social activities they had ever participated in, with an emphasis on their personal thought processes during the social activities. And they have to confess any thoughts or behavior that oppose the party (if that’s not
culty I don’t know what is). Yun’an was called the “place of purging human nature” during the Rectification, and former comrades in arms did not dare interact with each other because everyone was turning against each other. Those who lied, flattered and insulted each other were promoted. Humiliation became a factor of life in Yun’an - it was either to humiliate others or humiliate oneself. These things became a core part of Maoism and the
Party, especially later on in more of Mao’s terrible campaigns.
Takeover in China

In 1937, Japan invaded China. The CCP called out to the KMT to "resist Japan together". While the KMT did the actual fighting, the CCP just grew their power and fake fought Japan. Many of the CCP's "achievements" in WWII are overexaggerated. The Maoists only had 70,000 soldiers before the War Against Japan, but had more than 900,000 after, plus is being supported by the powerful
Soviet Union. Plus, the KMT was greatly weakened after the War, and all those factors combined together allowed the Maoists to overpower
Chiang's forces, who fled to
Taiwan. The CCP has been trying to "liberate" Taiwan ever since.
Rule in China
See also:
Maoist China
Mao’s reign was brutal, and reflected the violent nature of
Communism. Maoist propaganda were everywhere, and everyone was either killed or brainwashed. Around 40-80 million people died due to Maoism in China. Mao and the
CCP seized all the means of production, taking over all farmland, and turned all private companies into state-owned enterprises. This created a communist paradise, where everyone was equal… equally miserable, that is.
Land Reform & Eliminating the Landlord Class
Barely three months after the founding of communist China, the CCP, under Mao, called for the elimination of the landlord class, as one of the guidelines for its nationwide Land Reform program. On the surface, land reform appeared to advocate an ideal similar to that of the
Heavenly Kingdom of Taiping: All would have land to farm. But it was really just an excuse to kill.
Tao Zhu (陶铸), who would later rank fourth in the CCP, had a slogan for land reform - "Bloodshed in village, struggle in every household" — indicating that in every village the landowners must die.
Land reform could have been achieved without killing. It could have been done in the same way as the Taiwanese government implemented their land reform by purchasing the property from the landowners. However, as the CCP originated from a group of things and lumpenproletariat, all it knew was robbery. Fearing that it might suffer revenge after pilfering its victims, the CCP naturally needed to kill them and stamp out source of potential trouble.
The most common way to kill during the land reform was known as the struggle session. The Communists fabricated crimes and charged the landlords or rich farmers. The public was asked how they should be punished. Some undercover Party members or activists who were already planted in the crowd would shot, "put them to death!" And then the landlords and rich peasants were executed on the spot. At that time, anyone who owned land in the villages was classified as a local "tyrant". Those who often took advantage of the peasants were called "mean tyrants" those who often helped with repairing public facilities and donated money to schools and for natural disaster relief were called "kind tyrants," and those who did nothing were called "still/silent tyrants". Such classification was meaningless, however, because all the "tyrants" ended up being executed right away regardless of what category of "tyrant" they belonged to.
The Party’s slogan “land to the tiller” indulged the selfish side of the landless peasants, encouraging them to struggle with the landowners by whatever means and to disregard the moral implications of their actions. The land reform campaign explicitly stipulated eliminating the landlord class and classified the rural population into different social categories. Twenty million rural inhabitants nationwide were labeled
landlords,
rich peasants,
reactionaries, or bad elements. These new outcasts faced discrimination, humiliation, and loss of all their civil rights.
As the land reform campaign extended its reach to remote areas and the villages of ethnic minorities, the CCP’s organizations also expanded quickly. Township Party committees and village Party branches spread all over China. The local branches were the mouthpiece for passing instructions from the CCP’s central committee and were at the frontline of the class struggle, inciting peasants to rise up against their landlords. Nearly one hundred thousand landlords were killed during this movement. In certain areas, the CCP and the peasants killed the landlords’ entire families, disregarding gender or age, as a way to completely wipe out the landlord class. In the meantime, the Mao Zedong and the CCP launched their first wave of propaganda, declaring that “
Chairman Mao is the great savior of the people” and that “only the CCP can save China.” During the land reform, landless farmers got what they wanted through the Mao’s policy of reaping without laboring and robbing without concern for the means. Poor peasants credited the CCP and Mao Zedong for the improvement in their lives, and so accepted the Mao’s propaganda that the Party worked for the interests of the people.
For the owners of the newly acquired land, the good days of “land to the tiller” were short-lived. Within two years, the CCP imposed a number of practices on the farmers, such as mutual-aid groups, primary cooperatives, advanced cooperatives, and people’s communes. Using the slogan of criticizing “women with bound feet” — meaning those who are slow paced — the CCP drove and pushed, year after year, urging peasants to dash into socialism. With grain, cotton, and cooking oil placed under a unified procurement system nationwide, the major agricultural products were excluded from market exchange. In addition, the CCP established a residential registration system, barring peasants from going to the cities to find work or dwell. Those who were registered as rural residents were not allowed to buy grain at state-run stores, and their children were prohibited from receiving education in cities. Peasants’ children could only be peasants, turning the 360 million rural residents of the early 1950s into second-class citizens.
Eliminating the Capitalist Class
Another class Mao wanted to eliminate were the
bourgeoisie, who owned capital in cities and rural towns. While reforming China’s industry and commerce, Mao told everyone that the capitalist class and the working class were different in nature: the former was the exploiting class while the latter was the class that did not exploit and opposed exploitation. According to this incorrect logic, the capitalist class was born to exploit and wouldn’t stop doing so until it perished; it could only be eliminated, not reformed.
Maoism used both killing and brainwashing to “transform” capitalists and merchants. If you surrendered your assets to the state and supported the CCP and Mao, you were considered just a minor problem among the people. If, on the other hand, you disagreed with or complained about Maoist policy, you would be labeled a reactionary and become target. During the reign of terror that ensued during these reforms, capitalists and business owners all surrendered their assets. Many of them couldn’t bear the humiliation they faced and committed suicide.
Chen Yi (陈毅), then mayor of
Shanghai, asked every day, “How many paratroopers did we have today?” — referring to the number of capitalists who had committed suicide by jumping from the tops of buildings that day. In only a few years, Mao Zedong eliminated private ownership in
China.
Campaign to Suppress Counter-Revolutionaries
In March 1950, the Communist Party announced its Orders to Strictly Suppress Reactionary Elements, which is historically known as the Campaign to Suppress Counterrevolutionaries. Unlike the emperors who typically granted amnesty to the entire country after they ascended to the throne, the CCP began killing the minute it gained power.
Mao Zedong said in a document, "There are still many places where people are intimidated and dare not kill the
counter-revolutionaries openly on a large scale." In February 1951, the central CCP said that except for
Zhejiang Province and southern
Anhui Province, "other areas which are not killing enough, especially in the large and mid-sized cities, should continue to arrest and kill a large number and should not put an end to it too quickly." Mao even recommended: "In rural areas, to kill the counter-revolutionaries, there should be over one thousandth of the total population killed… In the cities, it should be less than one thousandth." Being that the population of China at that time was approximately six hundred million, this "royal order" from Mao would have caused at least six hundred thousand deaths. Nobody knows where this ratio of one thousandth came from. Perhaps, on a whim, Mao decided these six hundred thousand lives should be enough to lay the foundation for creating fear among the people, and thus ordered it to happen. Whether those killed deserved to die was not the CCP's concern.
The People's Republic of China Regulations for Punishing the Counter-Revolutionaries announced in 1951 that those who "spread rumors" could be "executed at will." While the Campaign to Suppress Counterrevolutionaries was being hotly implemented, Land Reform was also taking place on a large scale. In fact, the CCP had already started land reform within its occupied areas in the late 1920s.
By the end of 1952, the CCP-published number of executed "reactionary elements" was about 2.4 million. But in reality, the total death toll of landowners and former KMT government officials below the county level was at least 5 million.
Crackdown on Religion
Mao decided to committed another atrocity with his brutal suppression of religion and complete ban of all grass-roots religious groups, following the founding of the People’s Republic of China. In 1950, he instructed his local governments to ban all unofficial religious faiths and secret societies. He stated that those “
feudalistic” underground groups were mere tools in the hands of landlords, rich farmers, reactionaries, and special agents of the
Kuomintang. In the nationwide crackdown, the government mobilized the classes they trusted to identify and persecute members of religious groups. Governments at various levels were directly involved in disbanding such “superstitious groups,” such as communities of
Christians,
Catholics,
Taoists (especially believers of
I-Kuan Tao), and
Buddhists. They ordered all members of these churches, temples, and religious societies to register with government agencies and to repent for their involvement. Failure to do so would mean severe punishment. In 1951, the government formally promulgated regulations stating that those who continued their activities in unofficial religious groups would face a life sentence or the death penalty. Mao has officially set
Communism as the state religion of China.
The Great Famine
The Great Chinese Famine was the worst famine in history. Several reasons caused the famine, and all can be traced back to Mao.
Firstly, Mao Zedong saw that the big players
were all producing loads of steel, so he wanted China to do the same, and industrialize quick. But, instead of taking the proper measures and precautions, he dragged farmers out of their lands to produce steel. The farmers and many other ordinary people had to burn all their belongings (including their house) to keep a fire going for a makeshift furnace. The conditions were poor, just like the steel that was produced. The “steel” was just a bunch of mixed metals that can’t even be used because no one actually knew how to make steel.
Secondly, Mao Zedong thought the sparrows were eating the crops, so he set out a campaign to kill as many sparrows as possible. But the sparrows were actually the ones eating all the locusts, and with them gone, the locusts thrived and decimated crops.
Thirdly, the provincial governors all wanted to please and earn favor of Mao, so they report their grain and food production numbers higher than reality. This caused the governors to collect more and more food, and when that’s not enough, they demanded citizens’ private food, and when that wasn’t enough, they raid people’s homes of the vegetables and potatoes and every other food. This caused a lot of places to starve.
All these factors combined together, created a devastating famine. Some 30-42 million people died in three years. People had to eat bark off of trees and grass off the ground. And when that’s all eaten up, they had to eat the corpses of the deceased, and when that is all gone too, families had no choice but to take their children’s lives and consume them. Despite all the suffering clearly caused by Mao, the CCP blamed it on “natural disasters” and “bad weather”.
The Cultural Revolution
WIP
After Mao's Death
Mao Zedong died in 1976, only then did his reign of terror end. Since then, Maoists have been seen as
dissidents against the new
Dengist regime. On the surface, the new regime still praises Mao. But, the many new Maoist movements were crushed with an iron fist.
Maoism in Other Countries
WIP
Beliefs & Practices
Maoism is a violent ideology. He believes that only through violent struggle can a nation achieve communism, which is in line with
Marxism-Leninism, in which Maoism can be seen as both a continuation and split of it.
Mao, throughout his
Marxist revolution in China, formulated 5 new primary additions to Marxism-Leninism, being the Mass Line, Protracted People's War,
New Democracy, the theory of Cultural Revolution and the theory of the Three Delineated Worlds.
Five Black Classes
WIP
Struggle Sessions
Struggle sessions (批斗大会), or denunciation rallies or struggle meetings, were violent public spectacles in Maoist China where people accused of being "class enemies" were publicly humiliated, accused, beaten and tortured, sometimes to death, often by people with whom they were close. No one was spared from the possibility of being struggled against, not even Party members and
famous revolutionaries. These public rallies were most popular in the mass bloody campaigns immediately before and after the establishment of the
People's Republic of China, and peaked during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976).
Struggle sessions were usually conducted at the workplace, classrooms and auditoriums, where students were pitted against their teachers, friends and spouses, who were pressured to betray one another, and children were manipulated into exposing their parents, causing a breakdown in interpersonal relationships and social trust. Staging, scripts and agitators were prearranged by the Maoists to incite crowd support.
The Maoists would hang a rope around the victim’s neck tied to a giant board, with all the accused "crimes" written on it in big letters. The person’s neck would be bent low to the weight of the thing and the persecutors would shout and wave red flags and Mao's little red book around his face. Then the person would be kneeled down, and large crowds of people would raise their fists and shout accusations of misdeeds, such as being a “ counter-recolutionary” or a “bad element”, even if the victim is a disciple of
Mao. Sometimes dunce caps were put on the victim, sometimes they shaved their hair, and then the Maoists would beat the person up brutally, usually resulting in death.
Quotes
“ | From great chaos we have returned the country to order, but in seven or eight years, we will need another round. | ” | |
“ | There are still many places where people are intimidated and dare not kill the counter-revolutionaries openly on a large scale. | ” | |
Relations
同志们 (Comrades)
Left-Wing Populism - WE WILL WAGE THE PEOPLE'S WAR! If we don’t starve them all to death.
Stalinism - You are 70% good and 30% bad. On the one hand, you were a successful revolutionary and a great influence to me and assisted me in the civil war. However the way you collectivized agriculture was idiotic even though my way killed more people.
Revolutionary Progressivism - BURN DOWN THE OLD WORLD, THOSE WHO GET IN THE WAY, AND CREATE A NEW ONE!! REVOLT MAKES TRUTH AND REVOLUTION MAKES RIGHTEOUS!!! (破旧立新,放眼世界;革命无罪,造反有理!)
Shōwa Statism - I pretended to fight you during WWII to tire
him out. Thank you for invading China and allowing me to grow my army to win the civil war.
Mao even thanked you in public.
统一战线 (United Front)
Dengism - I appreciate you continuing my violent tendencies, but your reforms are
bourgeoisie. We are incompatible, but we still have to pretend we are to the public. Also most of my modern followers hate you
Three Represents - Even though you are greedy cronyist, you continued my legacy of destroying morals and religion. Good job on violently persecuting that
reactionary cult.
LGBTQ+ - I used to dislike you, but my modern adherents are kinda split on the issue of LGBT rights.
走资派 (Capitalist Roaders)
Reactionaryism - One of my favorite labels I use on anyone I want dead. And I will destroy all traditional Chinese culture so you have no way of success.
Conservatism - CULTURAL REVOLUTION! NOW! PUBLICLY BEAT HIM TO DEATH!
Traditionalism - I WILL WIPE YOU CLEAN OUT OF CHINA!! WITH THE FOUNDATION GONE, I CAN ESTABLISH MYSELF A NEW CHINA!
Moralism - To rid of the old customs and culture of China, you must be dropped. Violence without mercy is the way to a new and prosperous China.
Chiangism -
Reactionary, I totally did all the fighting against
Japan! And what can I say, I guess people just love me more then you so they joined me against you
and totally not because I implemented spies to make dumb decisions for you and bring down your reputation!
How to draw

Maoism has a drawing rating of easy.
- Draw a ball.
- Fill it with red.
- Draw a yellow star at the top left corner.
- Add Asian eyes and you’re done.
Color Name | HEX | |
---|---|---|
Red | #DF2507 | |
Yellow | #FFDF00 |
Gallery
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Fight with Chiangism