Darkschunt

Let’s talk about…Communism and Utopia.
So communism evolved from that whole socialist idea of Karl Max that everyone should have equal stuff and live equally so that nobody could be better off and the powers that be couldn’t rule unfairly. So we’d have justice and all the good stuff of the world.
Only thing wrong with communism is that the powers that be that took it on themselves to implement communism…namely, that Russian dude (was it Stalin? Or Lenin? I get mixed up) and Chairman Mao….did not follow communism. They did not distribute the stuff fairly. And therefore, communism did not work because what they were practicing was not communism at all!
I had a friend who once said she was a communist. Right. And she had all those big Goth rings and necklaces all over herself. Wasn’t the idea of a communist to reject capitalism and unnecessary adornment and live a good frugal life without the excesses that we don’t need? I don’t call big pseudo-skull rings a necessity.
The problem with all the good ideas in the world is that there is no good person to implement them. Look at Einstein who came up with the way to harness nuclear power. Look what the armies of the world did with that idea. Look at Karl Max and his socialist ideas and then look at what the Russians and Chinese did with his idea. Look at what all those good ideas that religions try to teach us and see what today’s world has done with it. Face it – the idea of utopia remains solely an idea until the day comes when we finally have someone who is perfectly good and unselfish who wouldn’t ever be corrupted with the power they hold in their hands. A lot of people would say that would never ever happen because everyone eventually gets corrupted with power…but I like to dream.
They say in communism that the bourgeois class will eventually be overthrown by the working class. Even if the working class overthrows the bourgeois class, we can already see what has happened – even the working class gets corrupted.
One of the reasons why I don’t think communism would work is because people wouldn’t want to have to give up things in order to have fair distribution. I mean, of course they would in the name of goodness and stuff, but a lot of people would hate to give up their little luxuries. Humans like having a little luxury and color in their life – it's human nature. And the lazy bums of society would still get their equal share whether they earned it or not because everything is supposed to be distributed fairly. Some might question the fact that no matter how hard they work they won’t get rewarded or recognized for this work, because it’s all for society. People get discouraged with that kind of treatment. What’s more, if everyone gets the same share of stuff no matter how hard they work, well, they might get lazy because it doesn’t matter how hard they work.
I like communism but I like culture more. I like the rich and colorful fabric of different cultures in human life and I don’t really like the idea of giving that up for the gray drabness of communism, no matter how fair and justified the idea of communism is. I think that capitalism is not a good idea, of course, but communism just wouldn’t work because it cuts out a lot of things that makes us human – things like our culture, our religions, our passions, loves, hates, insanities, joys, and so on. I’m not saying those are necessarily good things, like the barriers and power struggles that culture and religion and all has given us. But that doesn’t mean communism is the answer. One of the problems I think communism has is that it generally does not think of humans in a society as humans at all, but as mechanical parts of a working machine. And that is not us, essentially, that's not humans, and that's the whole point. Commuism is a sweet idea, but it doesn't bother to take in the fact that humans are, well, humans. There's this general idea in communism that everything should be efficient, practical, and, effective for the community. And that's not really a good idea, it's capitalism in that sense of thinking. And in that way, communism does not think of its human beings as human beings with different ideas, likes, hates, and happiness-ess who want different things. And in that way, communism imposes its ideas and values on its community in much the same way capitalism or tyrannical governments do. And that is not a good thing.
I think the answer, like the answer I’ve been giving for every problem in life, is that we have to find a balance. Damn. I hate it when I repeat myself this way.
In this case, however, I doubt anyone would want balance. There’s communism and there’s capitalism and neither are going to give way because they’d be losing too much. Anyhow, communism has become a sort of capitalism because it doesn’t matter who you put in charge in a communist society, they’ll eventually get corrupted with their power and live in luxury while the rest of the society lives rather badly off. Sort of like feudalism, really, which was the other object besides capitalism that Karl Max was trying to escape. Poor old Karl Max. He must be turning in his grave.
Communism really is a nice idea. We just have to work on the flaws a little. Sort of like those striving for utopia.
By the way, some people just don't like it when you try to enforce your ideas of utopia on them. Some people just don't want democracy, socialism, capitalism, republicans or anything like that. And some people just prefer to be free and wild. Everyone has a different idea of utopia.
We'll talk more about this but right now it's getting late and I have an appointment to meet in the land of dreams...