Sir, your response to my post about anticommunism was deep in the archivbes, so I decided to post a response up here in the hopes that more people would read it. The equation of fascism and communism is worse than ludicrous. Fascism has far more in common with liberalism than with communism; the two are polar opposites. Communism stresses brotherhood and human equalkity, denies the existence of races or national types, places the means of production in the hands of the people and in general draws democracy out to its highest form- economic and social as wella s political democracy. Fascism is anti-democratic and anti-human in its core, and places power in teh ahdns of a business elite; it also states that natioanlism and war are permanent aspects of the huamn condition. Please do not betray the philosophical and histprical realities in order to make your point. Communism and democracy have been clsoely associated through most of tehir history, and as the AUS found out in Nicaragua, India, Zimbabwe, Burkina Faso, Guatemala, Chile, and numerous other places, to destroy one is to destroy teh other. Anti-communsim, on the other hand, to qupte teh progressivce Labor Party "leads invariably to fascism". As was seen in Chile, Uruguay. El Salvador, Indonesia, and a multitude of otehr countriues.
As you can probably tell, I oppose anti-communism as an ideology, but clearly thsi is an issue on which reasonable and decent people can disagree. You seem to minimize the persecution fo communists, merelky by pointing out that tehy were not "persecuted" in teh States, merely exposed fro being communists. Number one, plenty of non-communists were lumped together with the communists. Number two, teh McCarthyist leadership clearly abrogated freedom in thsi country by declaring communsim illegal under teh Smith Act. Number three, teh prohibitions on communists immigrating to America or on communsit literature in olibraries were an affront to everything America ever stood for. As EArl Browder said, "Communism is Twentieth Century Americanism."
More importantly hwoever, look at teh record of how the communsist were persecuted in country after country. This si a good segue into a point-by-pooint discussion of teh countreis that you cited in teh post below.
Nicaragua. We've been through this, and apparently come to a deadlock. The sources that i regard as objective and valid state that Nicaragua's Native American population was treated better than virtually any other (under a white government) in the hemisphere. Certainly far better than our Indiaqn population, or Brazil's (both teh victims of large scale genocides carried out inb teh name of capitalism.) For a nation which treated its natiev population like we treadted our s to criticize Nicaragua is obscene. Nicaragua's Miskitos, after brutally subjugating the Sumo and Rama tribes, began to feel left out under decades of Hispanic rule, and soem disaffected elements volunetered to eb used by the CIA. In violation of all international norms, they began attacking and sabotaging health clinics and other civilian targets. Some FSLN cadres initially responded overly severely, but the leadership quickly rectified its errors, and granted teh Miskitos an autonomy that far surpassed anything the US had ever done for its Indians. Instead of congratulating tehm or learning from their exa,mple, teh Reagan cabal stepped up its efforts to destablizie teh Sandinista experiment inb democracy. Go figure.
El Salvador. So D'Aubison was necessary to keep out the communists? Firstly, tehre is no evidence that teh FMLN, had they come to pwoer, woudl have impsoed anything other than communist democracy- teh mdoel that was followed in Kerala, in Burkina Faso, in Zimbabwe, in Chile, in Nicaragua. Second of all, to say that D'aubisson was the appropriate countermeasure, is, to quote Bob Dylan, "like saying idf you've got a cold you take a shot of malaria."
indonesia. What is wrong with teh communists using teh genocide in East Timor as a weapon against teh capitalist dictatporship that oppresses Malaysia? America, after all, used teh treatment of religious people oin Russia as a wepaon against tehg Brezhnev administration. The communists' claim is quite correcty- taht a regime fpoudned on anti-communsim, nationalism and capitalism subjugation liek indonesia's can never be democratic or non-tyrannical.
Peru. uyes, teh Shining Path were murdering opportunists. there are plenty of other factions within peruvian communsim. The MRTA freedom fighters took up arms to protest teh repression and murdrer carried ourt by peru's conservative govbrenment. During their seizure of teh Japanese embassy, tehy killed no one, let almost everyone go, and asked only for the release of tehir comrades who ahd been unjustly imrpisoned. They ahd teh loyalty to demand release even fro a young girl from Boston who was imrpisoned fro having had the gall to try and help teh oppressed of Peru. tehy were rewarded by being brutally murdered while unarmed and off gaurd, while begging to surrender. Fujimori will win the plaudits of the world, but he will aslo burn in hell for his murder of those 14 bright-eyed youth.
Guatemala. 93% of the genocide committed by teh right wing government, 4% by teh communsits., Enough said.
Communsim, in short, has very little to be ashamed of. The bloodiest of the supposedly leftist mass murderers, Mao, Stalin and Pol Pot- none of tehm can be seriously called communsit, for reasons I've explained before. Neither can North Korea, for that matter. If Commusnim gave the world soem degree of repression in Vietnam and East Germany (I WILL call thsoe states communist) it also gave the world First World health care in Cuba; 90% literacy, First World birthrates and an end to caste division in Kerala; Africa's highest life expectancy in Zimbabwe; freedom and dignity in Burkina Faso; garssroots democracy, superior in many ways to teh American "democracy", in Nicaragua; hope and democracy in Nepal; concern for the plights of workers and peasants in Bengal; national independence in Chile; economic democracy in Yugoslavia; I coudl go on and n. Suffice it to say that communsim has proved itself as adept at ensuring political democracy and teh rights of amn as an otehr system, and far superior to any otehr in the realms of social welfare and economic democracy. Do not forget that of the 5 greatest genocides of teh century, mesured by % of national population murdered, 4 were committed by avowed right-wingers in teh name of capitalismn, and one was committed by a so-called leftoist (Pol Pot) who disavowed communism both in name and in practice. Oh and one last thing; more Americans fled America after the Revolution than fled Vioetnam after the Liberation of Saigon in '75. (As a % of population).
