Interesting Reading
The site I'm about to discuss no more reflects the opinions of all conservatives than the most extreme "Bush is responsible for everything from 9/11 to the Lindberg Baby Kidnapping" site reflects the opinions of all liberals.
Nevertheless, I found this site (link) to be a frightening example of why I think it's safer for this country and it's citizens to remain in the center, rather than at the fringes in either direction.
It is a link to "Human Events Online", subtitled "The National Conservative Weekly", and it is a list of the ten "most harmful" books of the last 200 years.
In their defense, they do not advocate banning or burning any of the books in question, but still I think it's interesting the books that they list as "harmful". The list contains the "top ten" and then the "honorable mentions".
Some make sense. Mein Kampf, for example. But I'm curious as to the justification for calling the Kinsey Report, Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil or even Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique harmful. And under the "honorable mentions," Darwin's The Origin of Species (which they incorrectly call "The Origin of THE Species") and Ralph Nader's Unsafe at Any Speed are also questionable. Darwin was presenting a scientific theory, nothing more. And the only real damage I can see coming out of Nader's book is that it made him enough of a household name that he was able to parlay that into a platform from which to make even the most left of eco-liberals look crazy.
The answer, of course, is that these books opened up people's eyes and minds to alternative ways of thinking that run contrary to the "correct" view of the world, in the minds of the conservative extremists who came up with the list.
The thing is, I feel insufficiently informed to even write this, because what I'd really like is for the site in question to go into some detail as to WHY each book was considered harmful. I might re-think my label of "extremist" if they had spent a bit of time explaining. Each book has a paragraph describing the book, but as written, it isn't always obvious what they found so objectionable about the tomb in question.
For anyone who doesn't want to follow the link, the top ten list is:
1) The Communist Manifesto
2) Mein Kampf
3) Quotations from Chairman Mao
4) The Kinsey Report
5) Democracy and Education
6) Das Kaptital
7) The Feminine Mystique
8) The Course of Positive Philosophy
9) Beyond Good and Evil
10)General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money
Obviously, a significant number of these deal with the topic of Communism. Can anyone tell me why Communism is still the ultimate bogeyman to the Right, a word to frighten children and send shivers down the spine? Where is the inherent evil in the suggestion that people should live together in harmony, each providing what they can to the group?
Sure, it's in conflict with the tenets by which we run our capitalist country, but so is the asceticism of Zen and I don't see anyone having palpatations over THAT philosophy.
Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of reasons why Communism can't work on a scale larger than that of a large family, but it is no more inherently evil than Capitalism is.
Anyway, whether you are driven to the same negative response by some of the books or not, it's definitely instructive to see what books one very conservative groups think are "harmful".
Enjoy.
Copyright (c) June 1, 2005 by Liam Johnson. http://www.liamjohnson.net
posted by Liam at 6/01/2005 02:07:00 PM
4 Comments:
Communism doesn't work. It is as simple as that. It is a very seductive idea, however.
Thursday, June 02, 2005 1:07:00 AM
I agree, Ralph. If for no other reason than the whole "from each by ability, to each by need" thing stops working when one no longer knows or cares about the people they're sharing with. That's why Communism works well in families. That's really what a family is. Take the stereotypical 1950s family. Dad works, he brings in money that they all share. Mom stays at home and cooks and cleans, but they all share the fruits of her labors. The kids to chores and such according to their abilities. Mom and Dad are definitely donators in this system, the kids are definitely receivers. But because everyone knows and loves each other, they each do their job and don't complain about the inequity.
Similarly, the hippy communes of the 60s could work for much the same reason. They all cared about each other. And, they could kick out of the commune anyone who may have been contributing less to the collective than they were able.
But on a large scale, human beings just aren't capable of working hard when the benefit to hard work isn't to themselves but to other people, people whom they largely don't know.
But the question is why the C-word is treated with such awe by the Right wing. The way it's thrown about, it's got the same evil "gonna getcha!" aura surrounding it that words like Nazi and al Qaida have, and I think that's insane. It's just a philosophy. One which doesn't work on a large scale, but I'll say again, it's no more inherently evil than Capitalism.
It's just that Capitalism works better on large scale models.
Liam.
Thursday, June 02, 2005 8:38:00 AM
Capitalisam raises the level of the individual performance, encourages free and independent action and innovation. Communism lowers the level of the individual, discourages independence and innovation. Whether as a correlation to these effects or not, evil flourishes under communism and struggles under capitalism.
Thursday, June 02, 2005 11:13:00 AM
I still don't get why it's such a bogeyman word, though.
And I'm not so sure, given some of what's currently going on in Iraq, Guantanamo Bay, Afghanistan and other places under our watch, it's really all that fair to say that evil is struggling at all under Capitalism.
I'm not arguing in favor of Communism. I've said, clearly, that I don't believe it can work on a large scale, because it suppresses the urge to work hard, as well as making it fairly easy (apparently) for a small number to take ultimate power at the top.
But there are a lot of philosophies people ascribe to that don't work or don't make sense. I just don't understand why the Communist witch hunt.
Liam.
Thursday, June 02, 2005 11:27:00 AM
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