Utopia
- Aspects of Communist ideology related to Utopia:
- 1. The idea that humans are malleable and perfectible
- Humans can be perfected through science and technology
- The importance of education in re-shaping individuals
- New Soviet Man, Woman, Person
- 2. Prioritizing the collective over the individual
- The individual’s will is always subordinate to the “will of the collective” in communist systems
- 3. The future-oriented view of history
- Focus is on tomorrow; not today
- Emphasis on future generations; rather than current generation
- Historical process moving towards a goal (Utopia and Communism)
- The idea that history follows “scientific rules”
- 4. Final Phase of Communism when the state ‘withers away’
- 1. The idea that humans are malleable and perfectible
- Building a better tomorrow
- Communists espouse the idea of building a better future through collective labor
- 5-Year Plans in the Soviet Union
- The Enlightenment’s Influence
- Marquis de Condorcet
- Science and progress
- Secularism
- Human Perfectibility
- Sacrifice
- The Communists in every country display a willingness to sacrifice today’s human beings for the future generations
- The Communists in every country display a willingness to sacrifice today’s human beings for the future generations
- What is the connection between utopia and terror? Why do communists believe that the road to utopia can only run through terror? How far are communists willing to go to remake society and the individual?
- What does the historical record show about whether or not communist revolutions uphold their professed high-minded ideals or degenerate into brutality and the naked self-interested pursuit of power and greed on the part of the rulers? How does the lifestyle of communist rulers compare to that of the populations they rule?
- Communism is a form of utopian tyranny, which is distinguishable from authoritarian tyranny. The authoritarian tyrant seeks wealth and power for personal gain. The utopian tyrant seeks power to remake society and the individual in order to bring about a perfect future (or restore an idealized ‘Golden Age’). Compare and contrast communism with other forms of utopian tyranny, such as the Jacobins of the French Revolution and the radical Islamists of today.
- Is a philosophical problem presented when communists and other utopian tyrants claim that ‘the ends justify the means’?
- Is it possible to attain high-minded ends through violent and corrupt means, or will the use of corrupt means inevitably corrupt the ends? Does the use of violent and corrupt means prevent communists from ever reaching their professed goals?
- Is there truth to George Orwell’s observation that, for tyrants, “the means justify themselves provided they are dirty enough” (Collected Essays, Vol. 3 ‘As I Please’, p. 222)?
- Was George Orwell right when he wrote: “It is not merely that ‘power corrupts’: so also do the ways of attaining power. Therefore, all efforts to regenerate society by violent means lead to the cellars of the OGPU [Soviet secret police], Lenin leads to Stalin, and would have come to resemble Stalin if he had happened to survive.” (Collected Essays, Vol. 3 ‘As I Please’ at p. 240)
- Is it possible to attain high-minded ends through violent and corrupt means, or will the use of corrupt means inevitably corrupt the ends? Does the use of violent and corrupt means prevent communists from ever reaching their professed goals?
- The Soviet Union was built on the idea of creating a better, more perfect tomorrow, but is it moral or fair to sacrifice an entire generation for the sake of the ideals of a small group of people who want control in order to remake future generations? Will future leaders behave themselves or will their calls for ‘sacrifice’ on the part of the population never end?
- Is there something in human psychology that makes some people prefer to submit to tyranny than to remain free?
- Is there truth in what Dostoevsky wrote, that if you took the chains away from people, most people would ask for them back?
- If every human has twin impulses to submit but also to remain free, can the balance be tipped and society constructed in such a way to systematically produce a preponderance of people who prefer submission over freedom or freedom over submission? What meaning does the deliberate ‘dumbing down’ of education take on in this light?
- How does Barack Obama’s ‘Life of Julia’ 2012 campaign commercial use utopia as a persuasive technique?
- John Reed, Ten Days that Shook the World
- Reed, an American journalist and socialist, wrote this remarkable short book which is one of the only English-language eyewitness reports of the Russian Revolution. Reed provides a glowing overview of the stated goals and objectives of communism, particularly the utopian ideas. At one point, he writes of the utopic goals of communism: "On earth they were building a kingdom more bright than any heaven had to offer, and for which it was a glory to die." Clearly he was not an unbiased spectator, but instead saw the Revolution through his approving socialist lens. Despite Reed's lack of objectivity and his obvious pro-Bolshevik interpretation of the Revolution, his book remains an important part of the historical record of the beginning days of the transition to a communist government in Russia, in part because he had insider access to many of the key figures and was able to read and translate the revolutionaries' writings as the Revolution was unfolding. Students of communism's history will benefit from reading this short book and should pay careful attention to the use of propaganda, the lofty goals of the communist experiment, and the pervasive feeling among the early communists that they were building a better future and a more perfect world.
- Reed, an American journalist and socialist, wrote this remarkable short book which is one of the only English-language eyewitness reports of the Russian Revolution. Reed provides a glowing overview of the stated goals and objectives of communism, particularly the utopian ideas. At one point, he writes of the utopic goals of communism: "On earth they were building a kingdom more bright than any heaven had to offer, and for which it was a glory to die." Clearly he was not an unbiased spectator, but instead saw the Revolution through his approving socialist lens. Despite Reed's lack of objectivity and his obvious pro-Bolshevik interpretation of the Revolution, his book remains an important part of the historical record of the beginning days of the transition to a communist government in Russia, in part because he had insider access to many of the key figures and was able to read and translate the revolutionaries' writings as the Revolution was unfolding. Students of communism's history will benefit from reading this short book and should pay careful attention to the use of propaganda, the lofty goals of the communist experiment, and the pervasive feeling among the early communists that they were building a better future and a more perfect world.
- “Understanding Tyranny and Terror: From the French Revolution to Modern Islamism”, Walter Newell, Ph.D. Review by Alexandria Tea Party:
- Utopian Tyranny versus the Founders' Vision - In his excellent essay, “Understanding Tyranny and Terror: From the French Revolution to Modern Islamism”, Walter Newell, Ph.D., draws a sharp distinction between petty tyrants who want power for themselves and utopian tyrants who seek to remake society by first destroying it. Newell’s essay traces the history of utopian tyranny from its first incarnation (the Jacobins in the French Revolution) to the current totalitarian ideology threatening freedom around the globe (militant political Islam). Notions of “fundamental transformation” we’ve heard so much about in recent years come from the same utopian mindset. But, as Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot showed, utopians can’t get to where they want to go without first terrorizing the people and killing a good number of them. All of this stands in stark contrast to the Founders’ vision of limited government under the rule of law and their elevation of the individual born with and worthy of unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. ATP commends Newell’s essay to you. It’s 15 pages of pure gold.
- Utopian Tyranny versus the Founders' Vision - In his excellent essay, “Understanding Tyranny and Terror: From the French Revolution to Modern Islamism”, Walter Newell, Ph.D., draws a sharp distinction between petty tyrants who want power for themselves and utopian tyrants who seek to remake society by first destroying it. Newell’s essay traces the history of utopian tyranny from its first incarnation (the Jacobins in the French Revolution) to the current totalitarian ideology threatening freedom around the globe (militant political Islam). Notions of “fundamental transformation” we’ve heard so much about in recent years come from the same utopian mindset. But, as Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot showed, utopians can’t get to where they want to go without first terrorizing the people and killing a good number of them. All of this stands in stark contrast to the Founders’ vision of limited government under the rule of law and their elevation of the individual born with and worthy of unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. ATP commends Newell’s essay to you. It’s 15 pages of pure gold.
- Utopia and Terror in the 20th Century
Professor Vejas Gabriel Liulevicius Ph.D.
Lecture One – the necessary connection between utopia and terror
Lecture 10 – utopia, New Soviet Man & Woman, John Reed’s romanticized view of the Soviet Union, Zamyatin’s We.
On Zamyatin (from the Course Guidebook): “many humans find freedom unbearable
and embrace tyranny if it eliminates uncertainty, finding happiness in chains”
- New Soviet Man, Woman, Person
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Soviet_man
- On utopia and the perfectibility of human nature:
- Nathan Longfellow, “Obamacare and America’s Death Spiral” (American Thinker 2015)
- Nathan Longfellow, “Obamacare and America’s Death Spiral” (American Thinker 2015)
- Enlightenment philosophy and how Reason was twisted by some into central planning:
- Shonda Werry, “The Enlightenment Period’s Influence on Bolshevism”
- Shonda Werry, “The Enlightenment Period’s Influence on Bolshevism”
- Eric Hoffer, The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements
- Ch. 13, Factors Promoting Self-Sacrifice
- Ch. 14, part 92, on submission versus freedom
- Erich Fromm, Escape from Freedom
- Explores the psychology of and factors leading to submission versus the healthy, integrated personality that prefers freedom.
- Explores the psychology of and factors leading to submission versus the healthy, integrated personality that prefers freedom.
- Soviet Dystopian Literature
- Ayn Rand, We the Living. Ayn Rand’s autobiographical novel of life in Leninist Russia. The shattering climax drives home the point about individualism versus collectivism like nothing you’ve ever seen before. The Italian film adaptation, censored by authorities during World War II, is quite good.
- Yevgeny Zamyatin, We. From the Amazon review: “In the One State of the great Benefactor, there are no individuals, only numbers. Life is an ongoing process of mathematical precision, a perfectly balanced equation. Primitive passions and instincts have been subdued. Even nature has been defeated, banished behind the Green Wall. But one frontier remains: outer space. Now, with the creation of the spaceship Integral, that frontier -- and whatever alien species are to be found there -- will be subjugated to the beneficent yoke of reason.”
- Vassily Asyonov, Generations of Winter (Vintage International Press, New York 1995). Generations of Winter continues the story of the revolution where Dr. Zhivago left off. Literature, unlike much non-fiction, if well done, places the reader smack into whatever world is being portrayed. Generations of Winter captures the intellectual euphoria about the impending revolution and how those dynamic characters, by book’s end, lost everything. You see the characters in the round, not just as statistics. The book’s timeline follows Lenin and Stalin’s rule, complete with gulag sentences-for women too, even pregnant women.
- Ayn Rand, We the Living. Ayn Rand’s autobiographical novel of life in Leninist Russia. The shattering climax drives home the point about individualism versus collectivism like nothing you’ve ever seen before. The Italian film adaptation, censored by authorities during World War II, is quite good.
- For specifics on how communists methodically apply utopian transformationalism to various aspects of life, such as religion and the family, see ‘Transformation of Societal Constructs’ in this course outline.