Communism and Really Existing Socialism: A Reading List for Post-Millennials
Cf. also: Notebook: Discussion of "Communism" and Related Subjects
What should someone coming of age in 2020 or so--someone post-millennial, who has no memories of all of any part of the twentieth century--learn about communism, and really existing socialism?
It is, I think, very clear by now to everyone except the most demented of the herbal teabaggers--and it should be clear to all--that communism was not one of the brightest lights on humanity's tree of ideas. Nobody convinced by the writings of Marx and his peers that a "communist" society was in some sense an ideal who then achieved enough political power to try to make that vision a reality has built a society that turned out well. All, measured by the yardsticks of their time and geographical situation, were either moderately bad, worse, disastrous, or candidates for the worst-régime-every prize. None attained the status of:
a prayse and glory that men shall say of succeeding plantations, “the Lord make it like that of New England.” For wee must consider that wee shall be as a citty upon a hill...
Continue reading "Communism and Really Existing Socialism: A Reading List for Post-Millennials" »