with Marxism?
Like a recurring skin condition that lays dormant, Marxism lurks behind the surface until favorable conditions enable it to ascend. Despite its followers claiming it’s the way to social harmony, Marxism and its various iterations are routinely used to justify hatred, bigotry, and violence. In its modern “woke” form, Marxism primarily targets white, heterosexual, Judeo-Christian, male, capitalists—the purported power centers of society.
So how do white, heterosexual, Judeo-Christian, powerful capitalists like Bernie Sanders avoid being smeared by Marxists? Is it by simply claiming to be a “Democratic” Socialist, despite owning multiple properties and having a net worth in the millions? The hypocrisy of Marxists, whether flaming communists or tepid socialists, is astounding.
But that’s for future post.
Historically, Marxism is the belief that capitalism (where production is privately owned and focused on profit), is unfair to those who are admittedly an integral part of that production—the workers. Marx believed that private ownership should be replaced with “state” (collective worker) ownership—not for profit but for the benefit of the worker. We know this as socialism, the first step toward, communism—the complete elimination of capitalism.
For purposes of this post, it’s important to understand a bit of Marx’s life to grasp his philosophy.[1]
Born in Prussia in 1818 to Jewish parents, Marx was one of nine children. His father, an attorney, converted the family to Christianity to avoid the restrictions placed on Jews in society, including the practice of law. Thus, raised in Lutheranism, Marx fully embraced his newfound religion. At the age of 17, as a requirement for graduation from Trier Gymnasium (High School), Marx wrote a devotional commentary on abiding in Christ. By all accounts he and his family were practicing Lutherans.
Yet this was short-lived. Upon entering college, Marx’s Christian affections would quickly die—as is the case even today with many raised in the Church.
He began at the University of Bonn, studying law and philosophy. When his father discovered his son was not taking college studies seriously (he was a bit of a partier), he transferred him to the University of Berlin where Karl was introduced to the writings of Friedrich Hegel.[2] This, combined with a concern about how average workers were being treated in Europe, as well as an intellectual partnership with Friedrich Engels, resulted in the ideology of Marxism.
Marx and Engels published a number of writings, most notably the Communist Manifesto and Capital. Collectively these works focused on class warfare, the bourgeoise (those in power) versus the proletariat (those without power) and were involved in several revolutionary movements, which leads to an important point about modern Marxism.
As voluminous and detailed as Marxist theory can be, ultimately, it’s about power.
It makes sense, therefore, that in our current culture of identity politics, wokeism, and anti-western ideals, Marxism would find another platform upon which to assert its influence. Some of these movements, such as Black Lives Matter and Antifa, are unapologetically Marxist. Others, such as the pro-Palestinian, LGBTQ+, anti-police, and progressive politics movements are more clandestine in their Marxist affections.
If it’s about a power shift from “oppressor” to the “oppressed,” it’s rooted in Marxism.
And what happens historically when the formerly oppressed come to power? They oppress, of course. There is no social harmony, no freedom, no hope. Fueled by retribution and control, the newly crowned oppressors simply revert to the very system they claim to disdain—bigoted, racist, socio-economic oppression. Nn easy litmus test to discern Marxist activity is to ask, “Is this about class warfare—the powerful versus the powerless?”
Too simplistic? Consider this from Marx himself:
“For the revolution of a nation, and the emancipation of a particular class of civil society to coincide, for one estate to be acknowledged as the estate of the whole society, all the defects of society must conversely be concentrated in another class, a particular estate must be the estate of the general stumbling-block, the incorporation of the general limitation, a particular social sphere must be recognized as the notorious crime of the whole of society, so that liberation from that sphere appears as general self-liberation.”[3]
In plain English, Marx contends that the grievances of a small group of disenfranchised people, real or imagined, should become the ethos, the central concern and identity, of the whole society. We certainly see that today as we increasingly bow to the demands of those who disdain the very system of freedom in which they operate. Modern Marxists adds to this the elimination of individual responsibility, meritocracy, and objectivity. Instead, we are a collective of either oppressed or oppressors, not valued individuals.[4]
Just how would those Marxists function in a society in which personal rights and freedoms were taken away, where no one is personally responsible for their beliefs and actions? Ask the millions of immigrants from socialist, communist, and Muslim countries pining to join our nation. They live under oppressive authority, and at great risk and material cost do whatever is necessary to find a free and just society elsewhere, which is overwhelmingly the United States.
To deter such clarity of definition, Marxists and Marxist-driven groups do two things:
- With a dismissive roll of the eyes, they convince people that labels such as “Marxist” are merely a mythical boogeyman used by conservatives to scare people.
- They brand opposition to their views as evil—not simply another viewpoint, but wholesale wickedness. As I’ve written elsewhere, the primary social formula at work today is, “If you disagree with me, you hate me. Because you hate me, you are evil. Because you’re evil, we can do whatever is necessary to ruin your life.”
Marxists use these tactics to great effect, with over 100 million people dead (and counting), and countless lives subjugated, ironically, to those “not in” but somehow possessing power—the “pigs on their hindlegs,” as Orwell so poetically wrote.
It’s objectively true that there are no successful examples of Marxism in human history—none. The attribution of “socialism” to Scandinavian countries, often used to justify Democratic Socialism, is erroneous. These countries are fully capitalist, with an emphasis on social welfare. That’s not Marxism. The closest examples of Marxism are totalitarian regimes that suffocate their people for the benefit of those in power—the “pigs on their hindlegs.”
So, what’s the big deal about Marxism? It foundation, framework, and objective is NOT to enrich but to enslave the “worker” with the mistaken belief that, as the entrance to the Nazi death camp, Auschwitz, declared, “Arbeit macht frei”—“Work makes you free.” The “work” today is to promote and permit hatred, bigotry, racism, antisemitism and other ills in the name of “It’s okay as long as it’s the oppressed against the oppressors…as determined by us!”
Much of the anarchy we see in the U.S. today is Marxist-driven; sometimes overtly, sometimes covertly. It’s focused on destroying American values such as personal freedom, universal justice and equality, objective truth and reality, etc. It’s about pitting one group against another, using sweeping generalizations such as “All [whites, law enforcement, Jews, Christians, Republicans, etc.] are malevolent people who must be abolished!”
Sound familiar?
Trust me. Marxists and Marxist-driven groups want power over, not equity with, others. And most tragic of all, they blindly work toward a society that will in turn enslave them in their own ideology.
FOOTNOTES
[1] A thorough biography of Karl Marx can be found HERE.
[2] Although influenced by Hegel, Marx often disagreed with Hegel’s Dialectic as being too theoretical.
[3] A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right at https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1843/critique-hpr/intro.htm
Pondering 