chapotraphouse

Very general comment because I lack specific knowledge of the subject (but I think this approach is very good for this kind of criticism of AES): I think it's useful to try to get to the root cause of the issue, not just trying to figure out if some historical event was "justified" or "not justified" (which are pretty meaningless categories unless you're trying to go to Heaven). Were the people of Kazakhstan deprived of their culture because communists despise multiculturalism? Or because the Soviet state's leadership made some mistakes that could've been avoided? Try to have a conversation with your friend about what they think the issues with the foundations of Soviet society were. If they take issue with the idea of trying to use the state itself as an instrument of liberation, then I think it's probably just a case where you have to accept you have a fundamental ideological difference (but they should learn to catch their Western bias, too, it's too often the case that Western anarchists criticize AES states for things they don't criticize liberal capitalist states for).

Then it's also useful to compare and contrast to capitalism, where even the most tolerant, liberal state you could imagine still necessarily washes away cultural diversity through alienation and the subordination of all people to capital. Hell, you can even try to find common ground and agree with them that there is a tendency for the state, generally, to homogenize people because states just prefer stability and homogeneity, it's useful to the state to erase all forms of individuality (this might sound like bourgeois individualism to some here, but I think it's true). After all, the point of socialism is to use the state to eventually reach a point where the state is no longer necessary.