[Joyous Thirst goes political 😉 ]
On a teaching blog I read every week, a commenter left this comment on a post about the purpose of learning (“Why Do I Have to Learn This?“):
“Whereas the rules of capitalism said that if there were ten people on a riverbank and one boat moored nearby, they had to fight until one of them got the boat, the rules of Marxism said they all had to get into the boat at once, even if it sunk.” (kvennarad)
First, I had to laugh at the truth of the statement–capitalism does allow fighting for the boat while Marxism insists that everyone must sink together, since sinking is the only fair choice. Perhaps staying on the bank is another option, but theoretically no one wants to stay on the bank and everyone wants to get in the boat and so we must all get in the boat at the same time because taking turns presupposes an inequality. And above all things there must be equality.
My second thought was “wait, there’s a third option.” This is actually a false dilemma. There is something better than equality to be gained and to be practiced, and this something is “value” or “honor.”
Let me state it a bit more simply: it is possible for 10 people to not fight over the boat but to use to boat to help one another get to the other side. This helping one another is something that Marxism rules as improbable and therefore rules it out completely. This helping one another is something that is completely outside the domain of capitalism. I mean, capitalism does not and cannot dictate the morals of those that use its system. It’s only an economic system, after all! It can be practiced with disregard for others or it can be practiced with the principle of “do unto others as you would have others do unto you,” or better yet: “Love thy neighbor as thyself.”
See, if the people on the bank with the boat treat each other with honor, then they begin to think “how can we all get across the river without sinking the boat . . . and in the most effective, least time-consuming way?”
And if they treat each other with value, they begin to evaluate their own and each other’s strengths (who here knows how to manage a boat?), weaknesses (does anyone get seasick?), and needs (you’re a doctor on your way to deliver a baby? we need to get you across right away!). They also evaluate their assets (the boat) and liabilities (the river, the stormy night, and the limited capacity of the boat).
This allows them to use the capitalistic system of inequality in a way that benefits everyone. And yes, it is a system of inequality because, as kvennarad pointed out, complete equality either gets us nowhere or kills us all.
Joyous Thirst 
7 comments
November 14, 2011 at 1:46 am
Sam Kriss
i think this is something of an oversimplification. the free association of workers for their mutual benefit is a cornerstone of communism. marx never advocated absolute uniform equality.
November 14, 2011 at 11:06 am
missjoyous
You are right, Sam, this is an oversimplification. The concepts contained in Marxism are much more complex than I have stated them. Nor is capitalism all about fighting over who is on top. It is a system of individual choices, and individual choices will always be complicated! However, sometimes it is beneficial to reduce things to simpler terms in order to see them a bit more clearly, to step back and look at an aerial view so that we know where we are.
Thank you for pointing out/clarifying that Marxism does not advocate absolute equality. Marx had a lot to say about the oppression of the worker class by the wealthy class, something that the world has always struggled with. But “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need” only works in a society of individuals who truly love one another and care for one another’s well-being. And since his plan could not legislate morality, the only way to rectify the situation was to make everything equal for everyone. As George Orwell’s classic _Animal Farm_ illustrates so very clearly, living by Marxist principles leads to a greater inequality and injustice than before because of the lies that must keep Communism in place in the public mind. We have seen this in Communist countries the world over and will continue to see it because Communism does not deliver the promised land it guarantees.
November 14, 2011 at 12:08 pm
rhemingway
I’ve just started reading that blog, too! I really like it!
November 14, 2011 at 3:51 pm
Sam Kriss
well, george orwell was a communist himself. even so i wouldn’t take animal farm as the groundpoint for a critique of actually existing socialism; it’s a trotskyite polemic rather than an objective examination of the soviet union. communism has had many successes in practice, i think accounts of its inequality and injustices are to some extent overblown in the popular consciousness. i agree that sometimes simplification can allow for a clearer perception of an issue but it’s important to make sure that it doesn’t lead to outright distortion, as is the case in animal farm.
November 16, 2011 at 12:08 pm
joyousthirst
Thanks for checking my facts on Orwell, Sam. I hadn’t been completely aware of his personal political leanings, so it was high time I looked them up =) In doing a little research, I see that he was what he called a “democratic socialist” but he had been turned off to communism by the way that communist revolutions (and dictators) tended to use and abuse the working class that they purported to defend and avenge.
I do agree that communism must be judged more by its real-world actions than by the ideology-based fiction of Orwell. His tale of the betrayal of the workers by those that became the new “bourgeois” does reflect what happened in the Bolshevik revolution in Russia, though Orwell’s personal experiences in Spain reveal that Russia was not the only communist instance of this.
The real-world examples of communism’s inability to live up to its own ideology that I find the most telling, however, come from China:
Tiananmen Square (http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/june/4/newsid_2496000/2496277.stm) , of course, which was mentioned by Reagan in a speech delivered in China and then eliminated from the version of the speech published by the Chinese afterwards (_What I Saw at the Revolution_ by Peggy Noonan).
And then the fact that China allows limited and controlled forms of capitalism to bolster its economy.
Both of these reveal to me that communism cannot live with itself in honesty and openness; that Marx’s system for solving the evils of the world isn’t really a solution at all.
November 16, 2011 at 11:52 am
joyousthirst
RH: so glad that you’ve enjoyed Siobhan’s blog, too–it’s been great to get in on the teacher discussions again!
btw does Millie still have a teaching blog?
January 12, 2012 at 1:07 pm
joyousthirst
Just a correction to my previous reply to Sam Kriss:
Reagan did not mention Tiananmen Square in his speech, but the Chinese government does, nonetheless, act as though the event did not occur