WHY COMMUNISM, DESPITE ITS FAILURES?

The Communists are out of the closet. With the coming of the Obama administration and the ascent of the liberals, people who had hidden their Communist leanings for years are now open about them.

And the question is not why they are open, for it is easy to understand they now feel their values are  accepted and acceptable. The question is why are there still so many of them, in influential positions, and why various Communist values persist even in those who do not consider themselves Communists, despite the failures of Communist governments in the Soviet Union, Cuba, China, wherever.

One answer is that these people, or their parents, became aligned with Communist ideals because their parents were either Communists or shared many Communist ideals. This is a partial answer, but a compelling one. We all continue to believe things we learned when we were young, and we all tend to identify with our parents. Thus, if Communists’ parents believed in Communist ideology years ago, before Communism’s failures were evident, their children would still hold them. Even in the face of reality? Sure. We all hold values contrary to reality.

But that still begs the question, which is why were the parents drawn to Communism?

First, let’s go back to Marx’s basics. The Communist credo is, “From those with the ability, to those with the need.” Sounds so OK, that in a survey of American high schoolers a few years back, many thought that came from the American Constitution, not the Communist Manifesto.

Many people are fine with that credo, until they are told the consequences of having it put into law. For one, all the Communist states have been totalitarian, not democratic. People do not want to be forced to share what they have worked for and accomplished for their offspring or their charities or whatever. People want choice.

The second thing that such high schoolers and political newbies are disturbed about is the economic consequence of that ideology: scarcity. Instead of abundance, as Marx predicted would occur, the result was scarcity. Scarcity of food, scarcity of cars, scarcity of creativity , scarcity of innovation, scarcity of freedom of expression.

So, again, why the allure in so many people in the first place?

Let’s start as we almost always do in PsychePolitics, with the human fundamentals. Humans are born with two fundamental behaviors: to survive and to reproduce. Without these, our species would die out, as would all species without the capacity to carry out these functions. We are born with genes that lead to these behaviors.

Once born, the human baby, born with the two fundamental behaviors programmed into it, is flexible, more so than newborns of any other species. It is social, influenced by others around it, most of all its primary caretaker, Mother, and its secondary caretaker, Father. Grandparents and other enter in and are sometimes primary. In any case, there is nearly always a primary caretaker, the one who takes care of the newborn most.

Fueling these behaviors is pleasure. We feel good when we do what it takes to survive and to reproduce. To survive, we must, among other things, achieve autonomy. It feels good; thus it fuels survival or reproduction or both.

In addition, the newborn, as it grows to the toddler stage, starts to identify with its caretakers. This also feels good and thus is consistent with survival or reproduction–or both.

Now we are getting close.

What do parents do, and what are they like? They are all powerful to the two year old, all knowing, etc. They have, from the toddler’s perspective, an infinity of ability. And one of the things they do is give to their children. Right?

There you have it! From those with the ability, to those with the need. The Communist credo right in the middle of the family. And the child/adolescent/adult who unconsciously continues to identifies with its parents in that way finds the Communist credo perfectly natural.

It is perfectly natural, of course–in the family. Parents must give to their children to make reproduction complete,to raise their children to be able to survive and reproduce,  to carry their genes on and on. From the parents to the children. From those with the ability (all powerful, all knowing, etc.) to those with the need (children, dependent, lacking enough autonomy and ability to survive on their own, the needy).

The problem is that this is all unconscious. It is not that identifying with parents is the most powerful force that drives us. It is because we are unaware of it that we cannot change. We cannot fight an enemy we cannot see. That is how Freud described it, and there is nil opposition to this concept.

That’s it, then. Many people find Communism’s basic doctrine alluring because they are identified with their parents, and they, too, are driven to give the needy, if they have the ability, and to receive from those with the ability, if they don’t. And while forcing this on an entire population doesn’t work, some people still strive to do so. Even though it fails, over and over.