why do people think of communism as bad??

[mia wallace]

why does everyone act as if communisam is something bad?? <_<
what is wrong with people?? :blink:

for example - this pissed me off few days ago:
in the school we were having a ethic class and the teacher started the subject of good and evil... whilst she was talking she mentioned marx and communism and every damn time it was like that is the worst thing that can happen. then, my friends - when i mention that i like communism very much they look at me as if i went nuts...
the best thing is that i&#39;m sure that at least half of them don&#39;t know what&#39;s communism about.
i said this once before already - (in my country) the most people (my age or near that) don&#39;t know what communism (but not only communism; the other political terms too) are about. in school we learned some definitions that are so stupid and you can&#39;t understand anything from them. you can only learn them by heart. we was told that those terms are vary bad, you could almost say evil, and people took it for granted...

i don&#39;t quite get it... :huh: :unsure:

[Intifada]

some people dont think for themselves, they just take what others tell them as the truth.

there&#39;s one guy in my school who said we should have gone to war with iraq because saddam had wmds and was a threat to britain. i said there arent any wmds. he said yes there is because the intelligence and blair said there were and that that was enough proof to go to war.

it drives me crazy&#33; <_<

[Pedro Alonso Lopez]

Its because people are exposed to the propaganda of theior own system first of all. In the US communism was a major threat this in order to guarantee the youth didnt see the good parts of communism they emphasised the bad parts through their education system.

It&#39;s just how the world works and some people are guided rather than independant, in fact that counts for the majority.

It is up to you to educate as many as you can.

[Lardlad95]

It&#39;s because you are right, most of them (more than half...more than 75%) DON&#39;T KNOW WHAT COMMUNISM IS&#33;&#33;&#33;

The thing is, cold war propaganda, coupled with the fall of the soviet union has given unlimited foder in their attack against the left. You see most people haven&#39;t read marx, or barring that most people don&#39;t understand what communism is supposed to be. Certainly those who understand communism wont attack it saying that it is evil, they will attack it on it&#39;s economic, social, and philosophical base. However the average person thinks it&#39;s a tyrannical state, as opposed to a classless utopia.

Most people are confused about what socialism, communism, and Marxism are.

[mia wallace]

Originally posted by [email protected] 8 2004, 04:46 PM
It&#39;s because you are right, most of them (more than half...more than 75%) DON&#39;T KNOW WHAT COMMUNISM IS&#33;&#33;&#33;

The thing is, cold war propaganda, coupled with the fall of the soviet union has given unlimited foder in their attack against the left. You see most people haven&#39;t read marx, or barring that most people don&#39;t understand what communism is supposed to be. Certainly those who understand communism wont attack it saying that it is evil, they will attack it on it&#39;s economic, social, and philosophical base. However the average person thinks it&#39;s a tyrannical state, as opposed to a classless utopia.

Most people are confused about what socialism, communism, and Marxism are.
yes, exactly&#33;
i didn&#39;t want to say anything to my teacher yet cause communism wasn&#39;t the subject and this is my first year in high school so i don&#39;t want people to avoid me before they get to know me, but my teacher was talking of communism, when she mentioned it, as if it&#39;s exasctly a kind of a tyrranical state as you&#39;ve said. she didn&#39;t said &#39;communism is evil&#39; but it was in that sense.
and when she was once before telling us how she consider a perfect world she described my view of a communist state... i didn&#39;t get at all when she talked next week of communism in a bad sense. i doubt she doesn&#39;t know what&#39;s it about... :blink:


It is up to you to educate as many as you can.
yeah... i realised that and i&#39;m trying hard to spread communism among my friends. :D it&#39;s getting well, but damn slow <_<

[Wenty]

i remember seeing a picture of Marx when i was young and being told he was evil, it irritates me too but any half intelligent person when they grow up realises marxism and 20th century communism are different.

Its your duty to energetically retort and lambast people who say these things.

[redstar2000]

What I remember was hardest about arguing politics in high school was that no one (including the teachers) knew a damn thing about the subject...whatever it was.

For example, how about that old "devil" Karl Marx?

Did we ever talk about what Marx actually said or did?

Hah&#33; The man was just plain evil...just look at his picture, doesn&#39;t he look evil?

The fact is, if you read even one serious book about communism, you have jumped light-years ahead of your classmates and teachers.

And that&#39;s a big distance to overcome. One way that sometimes works is to just ask sharp questions that shed light on the ignorance of the person who is babbling.

E.g., "Exactly what did Marx say that you object to?"

"How do you know he said that?"

"What do you think his reasons might have been for saying that?"

"Were they good reasons...did they make sense?"

Not to mention (if provoked), "Is it in your own best interests to babble about something that you actually know nothing about?"

You can always send them to www.marxists.org to see what Marx and Engels had to say for themselves.

But, as Mark Twain put it so well, "It ain&#39;t what people don&#39;t know that&#39;s the problem; it&#39;s the things they know that ain&#39;t so."

:redstar2000:

The RedStar2000 Papers (http://www.anarchist-action.org/marxists/redstar2000/)
A site about communist ideas

[Don't Change Your Name]

Propaganda and "common sense" assumptions to shorten words (example: calling the USSR "communist" just because that&#39;s were Lenin stood for, just to make things simple).

Both things related, and wow, people is scared of those "red nazis".

Something like that happens to Anarchism. Oh well, peopel is so stupid sometimes...

[Soviet power supreme]

I found a good website on propaganda recently

http://www.propagandacritic.com/

[New Tolerance]

I think that people first start believeing (when they are young and don&#39;t know much about Communism yet) that Communism is bad because of conformity, they think it&#39;s bad because that&#39;s everyone around them say. (They think: If everyone says it then it&#39;s got to be true)

And after they get older they start to look at the idea more and start look at facts about Communism, and realize that it&#39;s not all bad, but in fact the idea sounds pretty good.

But...

They have been believeing that Communism is bad for their whole life, and to change their views would be rejecting their old views. This would however, mean that they had been fools up until this point to think that communism is bad.

Further more, they would see Captialism ruling the world, which they at first thought was a good thing. To change their views toward Captialism would mean shifting their view that the world is safe and good, to - the world is in fact unequal and messed up. Which would make them feel unsafe and depressed.

So they see all of this and has to make a choice: Do I renounce myself (who believes captialism) and embrace this good new idea of Communism? Or do I not to do it and keep my dignity and reject Communism?

Most people decide to keep their dignity (because they are egotistical) and say: "You know what, I&#39;m sure there&#39;s something wrong with Communism, all I have to do is to find it. That way I wouldn&#39;t have to renounce my current ideas, which means that I&#39;m not a fool."

And they start looking for failures of "Communism" in USSR and other messed up so called "Communist" countries. They will find some good facts, but they will downsize the good things they find, and extragrate the bad things they find, because now they simply want to believe that Communism is bad.

This is sad.

To summarize: Why do they think Communism is bad? Because Captialism got to them first.

[mia wallace]

that&#39;s sad. :unsure:
i hate when people consider communism as a sinonim for USSR or when they talk about communist state cause in communism there&#39;s no states&#33;
i can&#39;t believe that my teachers don&#39;t know anything bout communism cause they were in yugoslavia before so they should at least know a little bout the subject...

i&#39;d like to spread communist views among larger masses but am not sure how to do that... do you guys have any advice? :huh:

[New Tolerance]

A little bit of optimism here.

With the Cold War over and the US (in its current form) domiance over the world waning, the idea of Communism should be able to eventually spread itself. All we have to do is to give it a bit of time.

Actually the US is projected to become kind of like Europe by the 2020s, it will be spending about 24% of it&#39;s GDP on social programs vs. the now days&#39; below 10%.

[monkeydust]

People still can&#39;t dissasociate communism with evil, it&#39;s a great shame. Like you say many teachers, especially in America harbour contempt for communism and are more than willing to pass it down through generations. Like everyone&#39;s already said, they don&#39;t know what they&#39;re talking about, even so they have the comfort that so many people agree with them that they feel they &#39;must be right&#39;.

I think there&#39;s a strong argument for us to actually abandon the term &#39;communism&#39; and to give a new name for our ideals, as much as would not like to.

[New Tolerance]

People these days don&#39;t "think" about Communism, they "feel" Communism. It&#39;s like a social norm is believe that Communism is bad....


person1: "Communism is bad"

person2: "Communism is bad"

person3: "Communism is bad"

person4: "Communism is bad"

person5: "Communism is bad"

person6: "No, Communism is not bad, just take the time and study the idea, I&#39;m sure you will be able to--"

Everyone else: "STFU&#33;&#33;, stay with the flow *****, stay with the FLOW&#33;"

[mia wallace]

People these days don&#39;t "think" about Communism, they "feel" Communism. It&#39;s like a social norm is believe that Communism is bad....
you&#39;re right. this will sound silly, but i remember when i was younger i thought about a world with no money and where everyone do sth for themselfs and then share it whit the others. i didn&#39;t know that it&#39;s in fact communism until i searched the net to find sth bout che... :che:
el che vive&#33;&#33;&#33; :D


I think there&#39;s a strong argument for us to actually abandon the term &#39;communism&#39; and to give a new name for our ideals, as much as would not like to.
that&#39;s (unfortunately) a quite good idea and it might just work, but...

[Al Creed]

You&#39;re from Croatia, right?

To give you a history lesson that I am sure you know, Croatia used to be a part of Yugoslavia. After 1945, Yugoslavia adopted a Soviet-Style form of government, under Tito, which, like the USSR, was labled (whether by the west or by themselves).

Being historically unbiased, Tito did keep the state unified, until his death. After his death, stability crumbled, and Yugoslavia fell apart.

Now, I may be just some Westener, but what I am hypothosizing is that, in a reaction of "what used to be," your current political structure is hostile to any form of "Communism" (both real and/or Soviet Style), and go out of its way to indoctrinate the children into thinking this way.

Luckily, there are people like you that are naturally resisiant to such indoctrination;)

[mia wallace]

Originally posted by Al [email protected] 9 2004, 08:14 PM
Now, I may be just some Westener, but what I am hypothosizing is that, in a reaction of "what used to be," your current political structure is hostile to any form of "Communism" (both real and/or Soviet Style), and go out of its way to indoctrinate the children into thinking this way.

Luckily, there are people like you that are naturally resisiant to such indoctrination;)
hehe:)
anyways, i guess you&#39;re right, but it&#39;s wrong to tell people sth that&#39;s not truth because you think it&#39;s better that way. communism is a great idea and it shouldn&#39;t be considered as something bad... <_<

[Al Creed]

Oh, of course it&#39;s wrong, most definately. It&#39;s censorship.

But people, like those who make up your government, only care for the stability of their rule, and not the betterment of mankind. Anything that threatens their rule, they seek to destroy. The only way to fix this problem, is to strkie back in any way you can.

I know, I&#39;ve made it known in the past that I prefer non-violence, but that is only when other oppertunities are available. Violence is Right, ONLY when absolutely needed.

[mia wallace]

i absolutely agree with you about violence and... well everything else you&#39;ve wrote.
but it seemes too damn slow to turn people to communism. i told some people what is it about, but they seem to be thinking like: &#39;yeah, right... whatever&#39;.... <_<

[iloveatomickitten]

Marxism can be interpreted as a justification of mass murder. And well with western hypocritical morality this makes the communist evil incarnate.

[mia wallace]

yeah... it seems to me that&#39;s everything&#39;s evil but capitalism...? it&#39;s not really like we have a choice... and capitalism is just great <_<

[Misodoctakleidist]

Originally posted by [email protected] 10 2004, 10:19 PM
Marxism can be interpreted as a justification of mass murder. And well with western hypocritical morality this makes the communist evil incarnate.
ooooooooooh you&#39;re such a rebel.

[iloveatomickitten]

Originally posted by Misodoctakleidist+Feb 10 2004, 10:26 PM--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Misodoctakleidist @ Feb 10 2004, 10:26 PM)
[email protected] 10 2004, 10:19 PM
Marxism can be interpreted as a justification of mass murder. And well with western hypocritical morality this makes the communist evil incarnate.
ooooooooooh you&#39;re such a rebel. [/b]
Well sorry but I was simply stating part of my view as to why communism is portrayed as evil.

[little_cinderella]

Communism is evil you&#39;re all going to hell.

[RedAnarchist]

thank you for that last post. Such an epitome of wit, intelligence and mature debate. <_<

Can you say troll?

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Communism is evil you&#39;re all going to hell.

To be frank I&#39;d rather go to Hell than Heaven... Heaven&#39;s full of annoying Christians.

There are also more interesting people in Hell. It&#39;d be nice to play strip poker with dictators, heretics, non-christians and porn stars.

Maybe if I ask nicely that Old Serpent the Devil, I could join his Legions of The Damned :lol:

[mia wallace]

Communism is evil you&#39;re all going to hell.

To be frank I&#39;d rather go to Hell than Heaven... Heaven&#39;s full of annoying Christians.

There are also more interesting people in Hell. It&#39;d be nice to play strip poker with dictators, heretics, non-christians and porn stars.

Maybe if I ask nicely that Old Serpent the Devil, I could join his Legions of The Damned

you&#39;re right... i&#39;d really be more interesting. just imagine all the people who&#39;d be there&#33; besides, all the commies are evil so i suppose they r in hell and that should mean we&#39;d have a great time... splendid :D

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by [email protected] 11 2004, 06:27 AM
Communism is evil you&#39;re all going to hell.
I love it when you talk dirty&#33;

:redstar2000:

The Redstar2000 Papers (http://www.redstar2000papers.vze.com)
A site about communist ideas

[Postteen]

Well I feel really lucky because my mom is a communist and I never thought communism is something bad.My friends have no idea what communism is about;maybe they&#39;ve heard from their parents that it&#39;s something evil.I think the americans have created the whole idea that communism is evil because all the rich people there will lose their posessions.I dunno.... :unsure:

[mia wallace]

Originally posted by Beatle [email protected] 19 2004, 07:50 PM
Well I feel really lucky because my mom is a communist and I never thought communism is something bad.My friends have no idea what communism is about;maybe they&#39;ve heard from their parents that it&#39;s something evil.I think the americans have created the whole idea that communism is evil because all the rich people there will lose their posessions.I dunno.... :unsure:
unfortunately not just americans...
i wish my parents were communists... :rolleyes:
it&#39;s not like the yhave anything special against it, by they think it&#39;s too idealistic and it&#39;ll never work since we don&#39;t live in ideal world.

p.s. you&#39;ve got cool avatar :cool:

[Postteen]

My dad is not a communist at all&#33;My mom has not a job because of the fact that she&#39;s a communist(well there are some other reasons too)so he doesn&#39;t want me to be like her.But I have my own opinion and noone can change it.(thnx&#33;i love the beatles u see) :)

[Mr_Thick]

Originally posted by New [email protected] 8 2004, 09:42 PM
I think that people first start believeing (when they are young and don&#39;t know much about Communism yet) that Communism is bad because of conformity, they think it&#39;s bad because that&#39;s everyone around them say. (They think: If everyone says it then it&#39;s got to be true)

And after they get older they start to look at the idea more and start look at facts about Communism, and realize that it&#39;s not all bad, but in fact the idea sounds pretty good.

But...

They have been believeing that Communism is bad for their whole life, and to change their views would be rejecting their old views. This would however, mean that they had been fools up until this point to think that communism is bad.

Further more, they would see Captialism ruling the world, which they at first thought was a good thing. To change their views toward Captialism would mean shifting their view that the world is safe and good, to - the world is in fact unequal and messed up. Which would make them feel unsafe and depressed.

So they see all of this and has to make a choice: Do I renounce myself (who believes captialism) and embrace this good new idea of Communism? Or do I not to do it and keep my dignity and reject Communism?

Most people decide to keep their dignity (because they are egotistical) and say: "You know what, I&#39;m sure there&#39;s something wrong with Communism, all I have to do is to find it. That way I wouldn&#39;t have to renounce my current ideas, which means that I&#39;m not a fool."

And they start looking for failures of "Communism" in USSR and other messed up so called "Communist" countries. They will find some good facts, but they will downsize the good things they find, and extragrate the bad things they find, because now they simply want to believe that Communism is bad.

This is sad.

To summarize: Why do they think Communism is bad? Because Captialism got to them first.
I totally agree with what you said. In the capitalist society people are forced to believe that capitalism is the best/only way of governing. Capitalists are brainwashing the people to conform to their way of thinking. I think that is total bull ****&#33;

[MiDnIgHtMaRaUdEr]

Originally posted by [email protected] 11 2004, 07:27 AM
Communism is evil you&#39;re all going to hell.
http://www.imageshack.us/files1/godbeatup.gif

[SittingBull47]

Originally posted by [email protected] 8 2004, 02:42 PM
some people dont think for themselves, they just take what others tell them as the truth.


Exactly. It&#39;s cold war propaganda. People think it&#39;s bad because they don&#39;t know/care enough about their future to find out for themselves. It&#39;s "cool to hate communism", it&#39;s "the norm"

[sh0cker]

The biggest problem is that people think real communisam is Stalinisam which is not even close to real communisam and to communisam ideas.
And immediatly they convert communisam to something very bad..
Communisam had really good situations for spreading all around the world, but mostly Stalin damaged it.
And now days it is very hard to bring it again.. We all people are right but in wrong time&#33;


sh0cker

[leon_Trotsky]

I think that the reason why alot of people think that communism is evil is beacause we(people born in the 80&#39;s) were educated after the cold war. Most people when say that communism don&#39;t work because of the USSR collapse. But I think USSR had collapse beacause of the USA not because of the communism.

[ComradeRed]

It is because people fear communism, that is why they hate it so.

Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to the dark side....

[mia wallace]

Originally posted by [email protected] 27 2004, 08:28 AM
It is because people fear communism, that is why they hate it so.

Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to the dark side....
:lol:
let te force be with you comrade... :D


I think that the reason why alot of people think that communism is evil is beacause we(people born in the 80&#39;s) were educated after the cold war. Most people when say that communism don&#39;t work because of the USSR collapse.
most people i know who are born in the 80&#39;s aren&#39;t communists and they don&#39;t know any other communist country but the USSR. and they also don&#39;t know what communism is about... that&#39;s just sad :(

[VukBZ2005]

Originally posted by [email protected] 11 2004, 11:27 AM
Communism is evil you&#39;re all going to hell.
Then you don&#39;t know much about Communism and Socialism. Just because i&#39;m a Socialist, does&#39;nt mean i&#39;ll go to hell. If anything - it may be you that
will go to hell.

By the way, why are you using a Linux Avatar with Tux on it?

[God of Imperia]

I guess there are a few reasons why people associate communism with evil:

- they were learned to do so
- the have a false or incorrect image of what communism is
- they think stalinism is an example of communism
- they love their capitalistic ways
- ...

but you know, there is always an opposite side, if not, the world would be a boring place

[EL CHICO ROJO]

well i have seen the full effects on being a socialist(i m a very far left socialist closer to communist than social democrat) my father who grew up in cold war america is a right winger ( still love him though)who looks at me like im insane. my mother is a pacifist and a libertaian who supports my ideas. she was born and raised in Ecuador a country not really effected by the cold war.She is against communism though cause of some story from some cuban immigrant. some of my friends are socialists ,anacho communists or greens but my best friend is non political he hates bush though because of his policy towards test bombing puerto rico.
i have gained some political support in my school which is in a rather wealthy naiborhood ( alot of punk anarchists)
i LIVE IN A POORER NIEBORHOOD (brooklyn)THOUGH and am considered a urban revolutionary by friends I educate alot of people you wouldn&#39;t think would be interested(dropouts thieves and gangsters)in marxism and socialism
My ideas really piss off my teachers though
but suprisingly overall i have alot of support(probably caus of the fact that my neiborhood is blue collar lower middle class nieborhood )

[DarkAngel]

I live in brooklyn too. Bensonhurst, not relevant, but whatever

[apathy maybe]

Originally posted by Soviet power [email protected] 9 2004, 07:30 AM
I found a good website on propaganda recently

http://www.propagandacritic.com/
This website is very good. I recomend that people at least glance through it. It details what is propaganda and how it is used. Very good reading.

[CCCP]

Haven&#39;t really had anyone tell me Communism is evil up here in Canada. However, when I went to Italy for Spring Break this year the Americans I met there were giving me dirty looks and asking me alot of questions when they saw my t-shirt. :D The Italians however were quite friendly and I received only encouragement and free gelato due to the shirt. (This was at a large peace rally in Rome tho.. ) Not gonna make any conclussions simply because you cannot judge a group of people based on a few, ever, but it was interesting to meet people that were bothered I had different views.

[VukBZ2005]

Originally posted by [email protected] 2 2004, 04:39 AM
I live in brooklyn too. Bensonhurst, not relevant, but whatever
I Live in Brooklyn also - Bushwick (Irelevant to subject)

[BuyOurEverything]

The other day, my history told the class that that Black Panthers (the original ones, not the new ones) were terrorists who wanted to kill all the white people in the government and replace them with black people. In my next class, my English teacher told the class that in China, if a woman is pregnant with a girl, the Communist regime forces her to have an abortion. Generally, students assume that their teachers are not lying to them, so when they do, it naturally follows that the students are going to end up with very skewed perceptions of the world.

[VukBZ2005]

Originally posted by [email protected] 5 2004, 01:52 AM
The other day, my history told the class that that Black Panthers (the original ones, not the new ones) were terrorists who wanted to kill all the white people in the government and replace them with black people. In my next class, my English teacher told the class that in China, if a woman is pregnant with a girl, the Communist regime forces her to have an abortion. Generally, students assume that their teachers are not lying to them, so when they do, it naturally follows that the students are going to end up with very skewed perceptions of the world.
It is true - these teachers want to revise history and twist kids minds...

[Eastside Revolt]

Originally posted by [email protected] 8 2004, 03:46 PM
However the average person thinks it&#39;s a tyrannical state, as opposed to a classless utopia.

Most people are confused about what socialism, communism, and Marxism are.
It seems to me most people think communism is a country of idiots who belive they are in a classless utopia, but instead a tryrannical state.

Most people are actually confused as to what politics are :lol:

[Disguise]

Some people are just plain ignorant. The teacher at my old high school kept saying that the USSR fell because they didn&#39;t have democratic elections and that communism was evil because lots of communist dictators kill people.

At the time I beleived him. But now, I think differnetly. No one can say communism is evil or communism will not work because nothing has ever come close to it in this world. Also, alot of people associate communism with Stalinism and Maoism. As for not being democratic, who needs to choose leaders when the workers govern themselves?

[VukBZ2005]

Originally posted by [email protected] 5 2004, 10:43 AM
Some people are just plain ignorant. The teacher at my old high school kept saying that the USSR fell because they didn&#39;t have democratic elections and that communism was evil because lots of communist dictators kill people.

At the time I beleived him. But now, I think differnetly. No one can say communism is evil or communism will not work because nothing has ever come close to it in this world. Also, alot of people associate communism with Stalinism and Maoism. As for not being democratic, who needs to choose leaders when the workers govern themselves?
That is true - these teachers are Indoctrinating children
with lies about Communism and etc. The List goes on and on....