Anti-communism – what is it?

March 2024 Forums General discussion Anti-communism – what is it?

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  • #207144
    alanjjohnstone
    Keymaster

    An interesting article by the ex-SWP Richard Seymore on the psychological battle we face with convincing a section of the right.

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/sep/26/communist-enemy-nationalist-right-trump-us-bolsonaro-brazil

    “Why should anti-communism be so amenable to such racist, conspiracist, and apocalyptic thinking? Perhaps because it works in a similar way. In “black-hole anti-communism”, as Joel Kovel dubbed it, everything that is perceived as threatening can be compressed into a single, treasonous, diabolical enemy: just different tentacles of the same communist kraken. Rather like a racial stereotype, “communism” figuratively represents systemic crises as something external, a demonic plot. It works through what Freud called dreamwork, wherein a single dream image comes to stand for thoughts that cannot otherwise be acknowledged. Those labelled “communists” are thus blamed, not just for the reforms that they demand, but for the crises that call for reform.”

    #207145
    alanjjohnstone
    Keymaster

    Another bit of related news

    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/capitalism-teaching-school-racism-violence-democracy-gavin-williamson-b625480.html

    “…Schools have been banned from using teaching material that calls for the end of capitalism because it is an “extreme political stance”…Even material that is “not extreme” has been outlawed if it has been produced by organisations on the banned list, because that could “imply endorsement”…Also outlawed is “the encouragement or endorsement of illegal activity, a failure to condemn illegal activities done in their name or in support of their cause, particularly violent actions against people or property.”

    #207165
    ALB
    Keymaster

    A further attempt by the present Vote Leave government to emulate Trump and place its supporters in a position to pursue its agenda:

    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/boris-johnson-paul-dacre-ofcom-charles-moore-bbc-b627465.html

    I know you don’t like the BBC, Alan, but you’re going to like it even less.

    #207172
    alanjjohnstone
    Keymaster

    Perhaps i’ll watch Andrew Neil’s new GB News

    #207185
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    Nothing new, they have implemented the same things in other countries. There was a time when anybody reading or carrying books written by Marx, Engels, Lenin, Mao,  or Stalin were taken to jail or killed by specific instructions given by the USA ambassadors, and nobody was allowed to travel to the Soviet Union, Cuba, China and North Korea, one president said that the real president of the country was seating in the USA embassy. Shortwave radio was not allowed, and communist parties and their newspapers were clandestine. McCarthyism has always existed in the USA, and Donald Trump is reviving it again in order to be elected

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