"THERE were two “Reigns of Terror,” if we would but remember it and consider it; the one wrought murder in hot passion, the other in heartless cold blood; the one lasted mere months, the other had lasted a thousand years; the one inflicted death upon ten thousand persons, the other upon a hundred millions; but our shudders are all for the “horrors” of the minor Terror, the momentary Terror, so to speak; whereas, what is the horror of swift death by the axe, compared with lifelong death from hunger, cold, insult, cruelty, and heart-break? What is swift death by lightning compared with death by slow fire at the stake? A city cemetery could contain the coffins filled by that brief Terror which we have all been so diligently taught to shiver at and mourn over; but all France could hardly contain the coffins filled by that older and real Terror—that unspeakably bitter and awful Terror which none of us has been taught to see in its vastness or pity as it deserves." - Mark Twain

I doubt this person has spent very long considering the suffering of the peasants and instead decided that Mao was an evil wizard who cast a spell on the peasantry. In reality, there were regions in China just prior to the land reform where peasants were made to pay genuinely 9/10 of their harvest and weren't treated very well even beyond this, as they were often enough conscripted into various sorts of unpaid labor like construction, politically completely voiceless due to landlords dominating local governance, beaten even just for perceived disrespect (to say nothing of crimes of want), publicly humiliated, subjected to SV in various forms, trapped in debt via malicious usury, and sold their own harvest back to them at inflated rates during times of famine.

I strongly believe in rehabilitative justice. If I grew up in their position, I would not hesitate to demand the deaths of the monsters who inflicted this on myself, my family, and my fellows, so I think the fact that so many landlords survived is, if anything, a testament to the mercy and pragmatism of the peasantry.

Shit, how many kids saw their parents beaten to death by the landlords and bosses' men?