Of
Marx, Christ, And The Persecution Of Radicals: How Will Humanity Survive
The Capitalist Threat?
By Jason Miller
28 July, 2007
Countercurrents.org
A few days ago, one of my closest
friends hit me with a heavily loaded question.
“Are you a Communist?”
she queried.
To which I replied:
I do not belong nor militate
in any formal communist party in the U.S. Nor do I belong to any other
political entity or party. Furthermore, I do not subscribe to a specific
doctrine, ideology, or dogma. My allegiance is to my core principles
and values, which are premised on honesty, justice, humanity, responsibility,
critical thinking, open-mindedness, egalitarianism, compassion, a belief
in a Higher Power of my understanding, and many of the teachings of
Christ.
My personal beliefs aside,
communism is an incredibly loaded word. Our infinitely mendacious educational,
social, and media infrastructures begin inculcating reflexive rejection
of “all things communist or socialist” into US Americans
from the moment they draw their initial breath.
Why is the establishment
so desperate to vaccinate us against the “disease” of communism?
Because at its hopelessly
rotten core, capitalism, which is manifested most strongly in the United
States, is about exploitation, hyper-competitiveness, “rugged
individualism”, survival of the fittest, concentration of wealth
in the hands of the few, profits above all, property over people, greed,
and selfishness. Perhaps worst of all, this pyramid scheme masquerading
as a “moral” economic system inevitably leads to wars fueled
by its insatiable demands for new markets, more resources, and cheaper
labor. Why else would 350 million out of 6.5 billion people spend a
trillion dollars a year on a military that has the capacity to destroy
our planet thousands of times over, dwarfs the combined firepower of
the rest of the world, and plagues over 130 countries with its “benign”
occupations? We in the United States maintain a carefully crafted façade
as the “benevolent champions of democracy”, but will quickly
install ruthless tyrants and commit mass murder (euphemistically labeling
our victims as “collateral damage”) if sovereign nations
dare to resist our economic rape and plunder.
And for those who have swallowed the specious argument that “true
capitalism” doesn’t exist, you’re dreaming. Pinch
yourself hard enough and you may awaken before it is too late. Capitalism
is a cancer upon the sentient beings of the Earth and we are suffering
through its advanced stages. Finance capital reigns supreme, massive
oligopolies abound, wealth is increasingly accumulating in the hands
of the few, imperial wars to expand markets and attain resources are
increasing in frequency, and the insatiable greed driving this appalling
perversion is raping and destroying the Earth.
Some opine that if we could
just dismantle the “socialist” aspects of our socioeconomic
system in the United States, restoring an unbridled free market, the
world would be a much better place. Certainly our cynical plutocracy
would welcome such a transition. However, it is hard to envision too
many working people truly welcoming a return to ten year olds working
twelve hour days, company towns, death and dismemberment on the job
with no recourse against employers maintaining perilous work environments,
miserly wages that would make today’s working poor look relatively
affluent, blatantly monopolistic business practices, and wanton disregard
for the environment.
History has clearly demonstrated
that “free markets” are “free passes” for acquisitive
sociopaths who thrive on bullying and exploiting a large percentage
of the Earth’s sentient beings. And despite the ridiculously few
and relatively minor restraints that social unrest has forced the opulent
class to implement in the US, adept players in the deadly game of capitalism
have refused to surrender their “inalienable right” to fuck
the rest of the human race in their relentless charge to attain the
power and wealth they so desperately crave to distract them from the
existential agony of their spiritual emptiness.
[Note: If you don’t
find a historical perspective convincing enough, consider the deadly
machinations of the “free market” in China as it hurtles
headlong into the very bowels of capitalist Hell:
http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/07/26/
madeinchina.overview/index.html
Karl Marx predicted the inevitable
implosion of capitalism and theorized that a much more humane, egalitarian,
and democratic system would rise in its place. It is little wonder that
the bourgeoisie in the United States have striven so tenaciously to
inculcate the unwashed masses to despise, fear, and ridicule socialism,
communism, and nearly all aspects of Marxist thought. Sound bites, emotionally
evocative images, ahistorical presentations, fear mongering, jingoism,
advertising, and numerous temptations of instant gratification comprise
a vast array of highly refined and insidious propaganda that perpetually
hammers our minds to create a potent and effective false consciousness,
and an irrational fear of anything but capitalism.
Socialism and communism,
the political manifestations of Marxist ideas, have been grossly distorted
within the framework of this false consciousness. While it is true that
the implementations of Marx’s philosophies have yielded mixed
results (many of those outcomes are primarily due to the unwavering
hostility of the older, well established capitalist powers in the second
half of the 20th century, led of course by the U.S.), the chasm between
reality and the mind fuck we have received since birth is wide enough
to engulf Donald Trump’s ego, or most of it anyway. For evidence,
one need look no further than our Cold War nemesis.
Consider the pernicious myth
that the United States “defeated” fascism in Europe in WWII.
This lie persists despite the fact that a number of our very own uber-Capitalists
did business with the Nazi regime until the 1942 Trading with the Enemy
Act finally forbade it. Ironically, Prescott Bush, GW’s grandfather,
was amongst those profiting from Hitler’s rise to power. Further,
our ruling elite refused to intervene on behalf of a democratically
elected government in Spain against Franco, who ultimately rose to power
as a fascist dictator. Perhaps most importantly, the US lost about 500,000
people (almost all of whom were military personnel) in “defeating”
Germany. Russia, one of history’s most heavily vilified “communist”
nations, sacrificed 20 million people to ensure Hitler’s defeat.
Had it not been for those evil “communists”, we might be
speaking German right now.
Shortages of consumer goods
is another “communist failure” apologists for capitalism
love to trot out as “proof” that their beloved license to
plunder and conquer is inherently superior to a more just economic system.
Yet time and again they suppress the real reasons these shortages occurred.
Recognizing the existential threat that Marxist ideals posed to their
Anglo, imperial, and patriarchal plutocracy, the United States ruling
class and its allies circled the wagons and imposed crippling economic
sanctions on nations attempting to implement communism (i.e. Russia
and Cuba).
Domestically, communists
and socialists endured harassment, financial ruin, and prison. Witness
the Palmer Raids and the witch hunts of the McCarthy era. Thank God
our opulent overlords nipped potential revolutionary action in the bud.
It is a tremendous relief that such a small number of “richly
deserving” individuals acted to ensure the perpetuation of their
virtual monopoly on the wealth of our nation, particularly in light
of the existence of over a million homeless US Americans. Heartwarming
indeed.
Yet our intrepid profit-seekers
weren’t content to stop there. Realizing that the Soviet Union
had an economy that was roughly 1/8th the size of the United States
and was still largely agrarian all the way up to the Russian Revolution,
they decided to initiate a ruinous military escalation that eventually
culminated in the criminal nuclear arms race. Enabling obscene profits
for the military industrial complex (by way of raping the US American
taxpayer) and smothering communism in its infancy, the vampiric bourgeoisie
ensured the perpetuation of its abominable existence. Meanwhile, the
Ruskies faced the staggering tasks of industrializing a technologically
backward nation, rebuilding their devastated infrastructure, and meeting
consumer demands. So of course they didn’t have a McDonalds on
each corner or a new car dealer within a three mile radius of every
home. They were too busy bringing their economy into the 20th Century,
recovering from Hitler’s invasion, and matching the US warhead
for warhead.
Now, do I think that any
manifestation of a communist government to date is a utopia? No. I see
their flaws. But remember, those who have tried to implement socialism
or communism have faced a formidable adversary in the form of the rotten
bastards who comprise both our “elected” and our de facto
governments. Crushing those who dare to attempt alternatives to the
sacred cow of capitalism and trumpeting our “monopoly” on
virtue, we US Americans would benefit tremendously from some serious
soul-searching about our participation in a morally bankrupt mode of
being. What spiritual growth or substance could possibly flourish in
a system premised on greed, selfishness, and self-absorption?
Are we, the beneficiaries
of a relative degree of physical security and comfort (in exchange for
our complicity in crony capitalism, Neoliberal exploitation, and imperial
invasions), truly superior to the communists and socialists we have
been taught to fear and revile? How many invasions have Fidel or Chavez
EVER launched?
We the People are mere pawns
of our multimillionaires in Congress, the 10% who own 90% of our nation’s
wealth, massive corporations, and a group which includes in its ranks
both GW and other abject criminals like Cheney, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld,
Abrams, Negroponte, and many others who have acted with impunity dating
back to the Nixon era. There is a revolving door between our government
(including both “elected” and appointed officials) and major
corporations. Cheney and Halliburton represent exhibit A. Lobbyists
and special interest groups pull our legislators’ strings and,
in some instances, even write our laws, as was the case in the behind-closed-doors
deal that Cheney cooked for the energy corporations. And look at our
most likely Democratic Presidential nominee to be, Hillary Clinton,
whose conservatism is one of the best kept secrets inside the Beltway.
As a First Lady, she ostensibly fought aggressively for universal health
care. She has now sold us out by accepting nearly a million dollars
from the health care industry. Corruption, duplicity, mendacity, and
egregious criminal conduct are not the exception. They are the rule
in our vaunted capitalist system.
Our domestic politics, guided
and determined by the demands of our predatory socioeconomic structure,
are not alone in reeking of the fetid stench of profound moral decay.
Consider our malevolent foreign policy, including myriad CIA covert
operations, economic extortion, and outright imperial slaughter frequently
employed to crush efforts by sovereign nations to defy the capitalist
paradigm and implement socialism. For convincing evidence that we are
NOT wearing white hats and making the world safe for democracy, do a
little research on Chile and Salvador Allende, Cuba and Castro, Iran
and Mossadeq, Franco and Spain, Ho Chi Minh and Vietnam (we “only”
killed 3 million people there), Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, and
Nicaragua.
Here is a good starting point
(the entire website is excellent, but the page linked below gives a
condensed version of parts of our history the plutocracy doesn’t
want the masses to know– the mainstream media and textbook writers
have done a masterful job of shielding us from the truths displayed
on this site):
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com
/US_ThirdWorld/dictators.html
While it wasn’t his
intention at the time, David Starr Jordan (from Imperial Democracy,
1899, pp. 50-51 –cited in Monthly Review, September 2006, p. 53.)
penned an apt characterization of the despicable foreign policy of the
American Empire:
“First you push into
territories where you have no business to be, and where you had promised
not to go; secondly, your intrusion provokes resentment and, in these
wild countries, resentment means resistance; thirdly, you instantly
cry out that the people are rebellious and that their act is rebellion
(this in spite of your own assurance that you have no intention of setting
up a permanent sovereignty over them); fourthly, you send a force to
stamp out the rebellion; and fifthly, having spread bloodshed, confusion
and anarchy, you declare, with hands uplifted to the heavens, that moral
reasons force you to stay, for if you were to leave, this territory
would be left in a condition which no civilized power could contemplate
with equanimity or with composure. These are the five stages in the
Forward Rake’s progress.”
Having analyzed our vile
and reprehensible economic paradigm from many angles, I find it virtually
impossible to believe that a critical thinking, decent human being could
support our institutionalized rapacity, at least not once they pierced
the simulacrum so fastidiously maintained by the corporate media.
Fortunately, challenging
life experiences spurred me to undertake a spiritual and intellectual
journey that enabled me to break free of the prison of false consciousness.
While I tend to look at the world through a very eclectic lens, I derive
most of my principles, beliefs, and sociopolitical views from Marxism,
the Friends of Bill W, Christ’s teachings, and Buddha.
Together with many dedicated
and exceptional human beings, I am waging an intellectual/political
struggle for social justice, a reasonable degree of peace in the world,
a significant reduction in exploitation, a more equitable distribution
of resources, an end to the rising epidemic of unnecessary suffering,
the formation of a social structure based on our interdependence with
nature and each other, the obliteration of the moronic, sociopathic
American myth that individuality and personal rights supersede the well-being
of the collective, true justice for criminals and their victims, the
evisceration of corporate power, awakening people from their trance
of self-absorption and apathy, and an end to the hedonistic narcissism
manifested in obscene levels of consumerism. A number of factors indicate
that we are in a pre-revolutionary stage in the United States. Premature
revolutionary activity at this point would be suicidal folly, but meanwhile,
we have plenty of opportunity to implement radical solutions at the
personal level and to employ political education to win hearts and minds.
If you still tremble at the
notion of “Godless communists, socialists or Marxists,”
remember that though I am not a Christian, I am deeply spiritual and
derive tremendous inspiration from Christ and members of the Liberation
Theology Movement. Marxist thought is not antithetical to spirituality,
morality, or Christianity. In fact, I examined its synthesis with these
elements in some detail when I wrote “Jesus Wouldn’t Bomb
Anyone: Why are we waging war on the poor and oppressed?” at:
http://freepress.org/departments/display/9/2007/2526
No, I’m not the “communist
bogeyman” that Ronald Reagan (who was a far better actor in the
White House than he was in Hollywood) warned you about. How could I
be? Communists, socialists, and Marxists are only potentially threatening
to those amongst us who will waste eternity desperately attempting to
squeeze camels through the eyes of needles.
Forget worrying about the
“communist threat.” We need to turn the moneyed establishment’s
idiocy on its head and focus our energies on answering a question that
affects the 90% of us who aren’t obscenely affluent:
How will humanity survive
the capitalist threat?
Jason Miller
is a wage slave of the American Empire who has freed himself intellectually
and spiritually. He is Cyrano’s Journal Online’s associate
editor (http://www.bestcyrano.org/)
and publishes Thomas Paine’s Corner within Cyrano’s at http://www.bestcyrano.org/THOMASPAINE/.
You can reach him at [email protected]
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