How Socialist Movements REALLY work

From Thomas Sowell, quoted by Berit Kjos,

"At the heart of the socialist vision is the notion that a compassionate society can create more humane living conditions for all through government 'planning' and control of the economy....

"The rule of law, on which freedom itself ultimately depends, is inherently incompatible with socialism. People who are free to do as they wish will not do as the economic planners wish....These differences must be ironed out by propaganda or power, if socialism is to be socialism. Indoctrination must be part of the program, not because socialists want to be brainwashers, but because socialism requires brainwashing.

"Idealist socialists create systems in which idealists are almost certain to lose and be superseded by those whose drive for power, and ruthlessness in achieving it, make them the 'fittest' to survive under a system where government power is the ultimate prize."[8]

That's what happened during the Russian revolution in 1917! Lenin, a communist organizer who tolerated no competition, soon crushed his idealistic co-revolutionaries who believed communism would bring peace and equality -- not slaughter and tyranny."


This reminds me of several points in history in both the 19th and 20th centuries with socialist-oriented people. Almost none of these were Chirstians and most were not even religious. Many were atheists. IFor example, in the anarchist movement of the late 19th century, the anarchists, mostly from Russia, were educated and looked down upon the very poor people they were supposed to be helping. When they tried to implement their goofy plans, the poor weren't interested. This was repeated in various socialists and communist movements in the 20th century. And almost everytime the response of the "enlightened socialit ones" was the same. They became angry at the very poor they vowed to help, and in some cases, tortured and killed some of them. So much for how socialism REALLY works. Today, we have our own problems in the emergent and Christian Left movement with the same muddled headed thinking in these movements being led by the very same types of people who led previous socialistic movements: educated liberal idealists. And the same thing will happen this time. The very ones they are trying to "help" will reject them. And then, the "loving liberal 'Christian' socialists" will do the very same their predecessors did--end up hurting the very people they said they were trying to help. This is why I keep saying here that these people and their goofy ideas will end up hurting the poor just as much as the previous liberal Protestant Christians and Marxist liberal Catholic theologians of the 1960s and '70s hurt them. Let the poor and their pastors, politicians, athletes, etc. help their own. Stop belittling them, feeling YOU are the answer to their dlemma. Frankly, I find that rather arrogant.