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Reds
presenceofmind.net ^ | November 24, 2002 | Greg Swann

Posted on 11/24/2002 2:11:07 PM PST by Greg Swann

Reds

by Greg Swann

My son is a Cub Scout. A few weekends ago he had his yearly ScoutORama, a sort of Scout convention and trade fair. The theme of this year's event was 'American Heroes,' and it turns out that American Heroes, for the most part, build small catapults and cook in Dutch ovens. One Cub pack took the theme rather more to heart, with a huge display called 'Freedom In Unity'.

To an attending Cub Scout I said, "Is it conceivable to you that unity and freedom might conflict?"

After a moment's thought, he said: "Huh?"

As a father of an eleven-year-old, I fully expected this retort. Undismayed, I pressed on: "Isn't it reasonable to suppose that the quality best represented by the word 'freedom' is freedom from other people?"

"HUH?!

And my wife pulled me away, arguing, quite correctly, that it is unfair to expect children to regurgitate, much less competently defend, the horseshit they are force-fed by adults.

They do so eventually, of course, and thus become the adults who do the force-feeding of the next generation of helpless victims--unminded before they can be fully mindful, starved and stuffed at the same time, gorged forevermore on horseshit.

But: It's not the what, it's the where, the who, the how. And most especially: The why.

When the French, to pick an odorous example, rail against Individualism, we know what we're hearing. When radical feminists--or radical environmentalists, or radical vegans--heap scorn upon Liberty, it doesn't take much acuity to see right through them.

But to listen carefully--and I am cursed with the skill of listening carefully--to a Scout leader or a PTA president or a youth minister is to listen no less to the preachments of Herr Doktor Marx. Service and sacrifice, the sacrifice of all to any, any to all, with the only measure of virtue being elaborately effected egolessness.

It is everywhere. The National Honor Society, which by its name and its selection process is about nothing but selfish individual achievement, immediately demands of its honorees that they spit on their accomplishments and pursue instead endless collectivist sacrifice.

The real, genuine, actual purpose of the Knights of Columbus or the Elks Club or the Shriners is to provide a place where members can drink after hours and play poker unsurveilled. But the 'official' reason-for-being for fraternal organizations--for 'organized' activities of any kind--is charity. We will suffer the boys a snort and a draw to a straight, provided they dress it up with a sacrifice to the mob.

The country club, membership in which is the very hallmark of individual distinction and exclusivity, justifies its existence with ritualized charity balls and charity golf tournaments and cacophonous silent auctions for charity.

I could cite examples unending, and that's the point. I can think of almost nothing in the lives of ordinary Americans, nothing that is 'organized' or 'official', that is not thoroughly steeped in Marxism.

Is the youth minister a Communist? The PTA president? Emphatically, no--so much the worse. The theorists who lead the feminists and the environmentalists and the vegans know what they are doing--which is helpful, since their theory leads them to take stands so absurd that normal people are repelled. But when the Scout leader regurgitates the Marxist horseshit he was force-fed without even knowing it was Marxist horseshit, without even realizing he was being force-fed, without ever once thinking about what his words might mean--that man is the most effective recruiting agent the Communists ever had.

Oh, but the Soviets are dead and gone. And the Chinese are reforming. And Castro is a joke. And none of that matters. Communism--more properly Anti-Individualism--has never been healthier, death notices notwithstanding. Communism thrives not because some state waxes or wanes, but because its core philosophy is ubiquitous.

And in fact the West has never been safe. At times we have flirted with Individualism, but never openly, without shame or reservation. Our brother Cain was making Marx's argument and effecting Marx's murders long before Herr Doktor Marx rationalized Cain's pathology. And we have volunteered for millennia to despise our highest virtues in order to win, by bribery, the approval of the despicable--who we hope will spare us even as we tacitly concede that they have as much right as Cain to slaughter us.

But even this is not enough for Communism to triumph. So long as you have even one small place to go to be alone, to be a self, an ego, free and disunited--so long as there is even one little thing about which you can say, "This is mine and you can't touch it!--so long as there is even one tiny little corner in your mind that is not to be pawed, not to be mauled, not to be defaced and desecrated by all or by any--so long as there is anything in your life that is not to be shared, socialized, sacrificed--then Communism must fail.

And that is the why of the force-feeding Scoutmaster, why he spends all his time spewing unexamined Marxism, why he has been assiduoulsy indoctrinated to spend all his time spewing unexamined Marxism. He is not a Communist, but when he force-feeds that unexamined Marxist horseshit to innocent children, the PTA president and the youth minister smile. And they are not Communists. They are simply regurgitating the Marxist horseshit they swill everywhere--newspapers, magazines, television, the sermons and speeches they write by cribbing the same horseshit from other articles and sermons and speeches. If asked, they would deny that it is their claim that service and sacrifice are the only justifications for human life. If pressed, they would insist that they are not trying to destroy every redoubt of Individualism.

But we are what we do. They are the unwitting foot-soldiers, the useful idiots, of Communism. They're not coming for your guns; that's a distraction. They're coming for your children. They're coming for you.

Communism cannot triumph if you can repair to your family, if you can love your spouse or your children and not share that love equally with all or any. So the family must be destroyed. Undermined from within by feminism and divorce and the destruction of fatherhood. Undermined from without by films and jokes that demean the family and promote accidental, temporary relationships.

Communism cannot triumph if you can turn to your church, to a communion and consolation that is immutably private. So the church must be destroyed. Dismantled from the outside by ridicule and loathing, dismantled from the inside by the indoctrination of Marxism.

Communism cannot triumph if you can own anything. So ownership must be destroyed. Everything you own, from your house to your car to your things to your memories to your thoughts to your soul itself--everything you own becomes subject to review, to derision, to oversight, to criticism, to regulation, to confiscation.

Communism cannot triumph if you can escape it. One-world Communism doesn't require a global state. All that is necessary is for you to be unable to get away from it no matter where you go. To the church? To the school? To the country club? To the Elks club? To the legislature, even? There is nowhere for you to run, no place you can go where you are permitted to uphold your right to your own life as a matter of right.

But Communism cannot triumph if you can resist it. And that is the true battleground--your mind. They'll take your guns when they can, and your house soon after that, but the property they must take, in order to triumph, is your mind. That is why they took your church and your school and your family and every social organization you belong to and everything you see or hear about or read: In order to force-feed you Marxism and to leave you no alternative but to be force-fed Marxism.

You think they're beaten, but you're wrong. You watched it on television--a vast electronic rectum ceaselessly spewing Marxist horseshit--and you think they're defeated. You're wrong. The Soviets might be gone, but Communism--more properly Anti-Individualism--has never been healthier.

It's not a matter of controlling states or controlling weapons or controlling factories. The issue--the only issue--is controlling you. More properly, convincing you to surrender your self-control. To give up your mind and your body and your soul, to deny to yourself any right to the personal, the private, the not-to-be-sacrificed. To renounce your own ego because it is yours, because it can never be shared, because it is a treasure so precious it must never be pawed at by strangers. When they convince you to damn your own self for being a self, then Communism can triumph. The territory to be captured is you.

This is their goal, their only goal. They are relentless in pursuit of that goal, and they will not give up.

And they are everywhere...



TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; Editorial; Government; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: communism; communists; culture; education; marx; marxism; reds; religion
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http://www.presenceofmind.net/ (last updated 11/24/02)

Permission is explicitly granted to repost/reprint unmodified.

1 posted on 11/24/2002 2:11:07 PM PST by Greg Swann
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To: Greg Swann
The collectivists are a clear present danger to the US and should be eliminated.
2 posted on 11/24/2002 2:13:11 PM PST by Sparta
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To: Greg Swann
BS! We have been told we are an Army of One!
3 posted on 11/24/2002 2:18:57 PM PST by DainBramage
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To: Greg Swann
Now please reconcile the railing against charity with the Christian doctrine of the same. Could it be that a cub scout might be extolling Christian charity and brotherhood, rather than the Marxist kind? Is this also a bad thing? What Would Jesus Spew?

LTS

4 posted on 11/24/2002 2:21:28 PM PST by Liberty Tree Surgeon
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To: Greg Swann
Nice red banner you've got there on your web site, Greg.
5 posted on 11/24/2002 3:12:33 PM PST by SmithW
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To: Greg Swann
In the end, it is good for people to contribute for the good of the collective. This can be done voluntarily or it can be done through the force of law. The more it's done voluntarily, the less the socialists can make the case that it should be done through the force of law.

So, to me, the Scouts encouraging contribution to the group is a good thing. It actually prevents socialist encroachment by undermining the argument that individuals must be forced into doing what's good for the collective.

6 posted on 11/24/2002 3:59:48 PM PST by Yardstick
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To: Sparta
"...The collectivists are a clear present danger to the US and should be eliminated..."

Delivering collectivists up to death, whether singly or by the millions, is God's work.

A collectivist, by definition, is not a 'human being' and deserves none of the protections from harm that an authentic man or woman is decently entitled to.

7 posted on 11/24/2002 5:10:33 PM PST by DWSUWF
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To: Yardstick
You've missed completely the essence of this article. If, for instance, you are willing to turn over your guns so that the gungrabbers won't be able to confiscate them by force, you are still a supporter of the collective over the rights of the individual. You are an agnostic when it comes to individualism vs. collectivism. And that belies your collectivist soul.
8 posted on 11/24/2002 6:18:33 PM PST by Misterioso
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To: DWSUWF
Delivering collectivists up to death, whether singly or by the millions, is God's work.

I assume you are actively doing "God's work" then?

9 posted on 11/24/2002 6:25:39 PM PST by Texasforever
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To: Sparta
Collectivism is the final resort of the weak. Moral men must be eternally vigilant in the struggle against those that would violate their rights. Collectivists are spawned in childhood and will be forever with us. The rules of law are created to efficiently dispose of them.
10 posted on 11/24/2002 6:26:15 PM PST by Misterioso
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To: Texasforever
"...I assume you are actively doing "God's work" then?..."

LOL!

I wish!

That's a young man's job.

I DO enjoy hearing about or seeing examples of it though.

11 posted on 11/24/2002 6:29:30 PM PST by DWSUWF
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To: Sparta
So we are agreed, collectivism is bad
Ah, consensus , the ultimate goal of Marxist decision-making...
just kidding...hehehe
12 posted on 11/24/2002 6:29:41 PM PST by 45semi
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To: DWSUWF
I DO enjoy hearing about or seeing examples of it though

Yeah I would love to see daily reports of "God's workers" mowing down collectivist Cub Scout troops, PTA meetings and Church youth groups. Tell me is a militia also a collectivist group?

13 posted on 11/24/2002 6:32:47 PM PST by Texasforever
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To: Texasforever
"...Yeah I would love to see daily reports of "God's workers" mowing down collectivist Cub Scout troops, PTA meetings and Church youth groups..."

Being targeted for indoctrination is not the same thing as actively advancing the collectivist cause.

Is that difference too subtle for you?

14 posted on 11/24/2002 6:36:57 PM PST by DWSUWF
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To: Greg Swann
Speaking of Reds, red banners, marxists, and communists - go to this thread and specifically this post.
15 posted on 11/24/2002 6:37:31 PM PST by Spiff
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To: DWSUWF
Being targeted for indoctrination is not the same thing as actively advancing the collectivist cause.

What is the "collectivist cause"?

16 posted on 11/24/2002 6:38:18 PM PST by Texasforever
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To: Texasforever
"...What is the "collectivist cause"?..."

If you honestly don't know, you're too thick to be educable.

If you know, but simply want to argue, you're a waste of time.

Which category would you say fits you best?

17 posted on 11/24/2002 6:42:29 PM PST by DWSUWF
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To: DWSUWF
Which category would you say fits you best?

I am just a dumb old redneck trying to get an education from my betters. I guess you don't know what the "collectivist cause" is either especially in regard to church groups and the Cub Scouts.

18 posted on 11/24/2002 6:49:46 PM PST by Texasforever
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To: Texasforever
"...I am just a dumb old redneck trying to get an education from my betters..."

You may be a redneck, but you're probably not overly dumb.

You object to the depth of my contempt for communists and their ilk and you want to draw me out on the subject.

I can't see any profit in arguing with someone who doesn't consider a collectivist to be subhuman.

Thus our impasse.

19 posted on 11/24/2002 6:56:22 PM PST by DWSUWF
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To: DWSUWF
You object to the depth of my contempt for communists and their ilk and you want to draw me out on the subject.

What is communistic about the Cub Scouts, the PTA or Church groups any more than say the NRA or militia groups?

20 posted on 11/24/2002 6:59:44 PM PST by Texasforever
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