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Why Was Communism So Cruel

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What is communism? Over the years, we have been taught that communism is bad. We have fought multiple wars over it, such as in Vietnam and Korea. Major world leaders like Joseph Stalin of the Soviet Union and Mao Zedong of China have successfully killed and starved their own people under a communist system. Was communism really created to be so cruel? In reality, the tragedies that occurred under communism weren’t meant to happen at all. In fact, true communism was simply supposed to eliminate class struggles and equalize the work force (Schmoop). Furthermore, two major political figures that aided communist uprising were Vladimir Lenin and Karl Marx. Lenin was the leader of the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 and founder of the Russian Communist Party. Marx, …show more content…

The goal was to steady the food supply and free the rural work force. However, it resulted in massive casualties because many starved, as the state didn’t properly distribute food supply, and farmers who did not cooperate with collectivization were sent to exile in the Gulag (Stalin history). If Stalin took a progressive approach to collectivization and didn’t murder his own citizens, communism wouldn’t have started off on the wrong foot. In 1949, another world super power, China, adopted a communist system. Mao wanted to add his own twist to communism by introducing mass mobilization of the labor force with the goal of improving industrial and agricultural production (BBC). This had the exact opposite effect because it created a decline of output and, therefore, led to poor harvests and starvation (BBC). His careless dictatorship resulted from steering away from the true objective of communism. Marx’s idea of communism was meant to be positive by expressing concerns for the working classes, yet practice of it became oppressive under the leadership of early communist leaders such Stalin and Mao

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Throughout Russia’s history, there have been many rulers that tried to manage their country in different ways. Even though, all of these rulers had their own unique ways of ruling, all of them were seen as terrible by the people. This eventually led to a tipping point for the Russian citizens and the Russian Revolution took place. The goal for these people was to gain freedom from their oppressive czar but instead, they got an even worse leader. Joseph Stalin was a leader of the Soviet Union from 1929 to 1953 and he was known for his ability to strike fear into people.

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Simply put, In a Communist system, individual people do not own land, factories, or machinery. Instead, the government or the whole community owns these things. The ultimate goal of communism is to create a classless society and creating a dictatorship (A government in which one ruler has complete control over a country.) For nearly 35 years, the Cold War took place between the Soviet Union and the United States. The war was referred to as cold because there was never any physical fighting between the two countries.

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Communism, a political theory advocating social war, was born in the 19th century, farthered by Karl Marx and later took a toll on the rest of the world. The Bolshevik Revolution took control over the Soviet Union and communism began to rise in Russia and everywhere else for that matter. Communism sparked rebellion and believers. In the novel Anthem, the author Ayn Rand recreates history using connection, characterization and tone in a fictional futuristic dystopia. Anthem is a society based on collectivism, basically where there is no such thing as “I”, “me”, or any type of selfish pronouns.

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So to kill capitalism would essentially be killing all of the hope left within the laborers for a better tomorrow. The system may stifle the chances of economic mobility, but the death of capitalism would make this a definite reality eliminating all chances for change. However, at this time there were two poor classes: the laborers and the farmers. For the farmers, a switch to communism seemed to be the perfect solution to ending their poverty as this would put them on the same playing field as big businesses and industries. However, as for the laborers communism would only establish their poverty stricken position as permanent.

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There was also communism and the more radical version of it, Marxism. Marxism, which was created by Carl Marx and Fredrich Engels when they wrote the communist manifesto in 1848. Marxism was a direct response to the industrial revolution and capitalism. It was a form of government that would give power to the working people and abolish private property. Communism plays a huge role in World War II which

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Communism builds on the idea that everyone is the same and should earn the same amount of money regardless of their profession. The most important with communism is that there should not be any class distinctions. China, Laos, Cuba and Vietnam

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Although World War I was to soon come to an end, a wave of fear of radicals and communists emerged throughout the United States in 1917. The hysteria lingered as Russia was taken over by a communist group in 1917 known as the Bolsheviks. From the moment this Russian Revolution occurred, there was a widespread fear of possible communist uprisings in the United States. Communism is a political system that pairs a socialist or command economy with a totalitarian government. Within a communist system, there is no private ownership of businesses or property.

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War communism had a devastating impact on the peasants and proletariat in Russian society between 1918 and 1928. However, the New Economic Policy that followed the Civil War effects was opposite, raising living standards and reinstating support for the Bolshevik party. Vladimir “Lenin” Ulyanov, known as the head of the notorious Bolshevik party, introduced War Communism (1918-1921) and the NEP (1921-1928). As Martin McCauley states “If War Communism was a leap into socialism then the New Economic Policy was a leap out of socialism” The aims of War Communism and the NEP were both successful in a large number of areas, however, the effects of both policies were not all favourable.

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Andre Abi Haidar PSPA 210 INTRODUCTION It is always difficult to write about and discuss Karl Marx, or more importantly the applications of Marx’s theories, due to the fact that he inspired and gave rise to many movements and revolutionaries, not all of which follow his theories to the point. Although Marx tends to be equated with Communism, it might not seem righteous to blame him for whatever shortcomings occurred when his theories were put to the test; Marx passed away well before the revolution in Russia, and he played no role in the emergence of the totalitarian regime at the time. When discussing Marx, however, Vladimir Lenin is one of the biggest highlights when it comes to studying the outcomes of Marx’s theories.

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Karl Marx talks about the role of communism and his conjecture of underlying this type of revolution. He speaks of two different class struggles, the "Bourgeoisie and Proletarians". Bourgeoisie are the people with authority, the ones who own production and are bosses of wage labor while the proletariat are the individuals with no authority, no ownership and are giving up their own power to the Bourgeoisie in order to survive. Societies began to separate and became hostile and aggressive classes. It all became about social ranking because of the increase and need of production.

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Marx saw capital and liberal democracies as the fundamental reasons for the low standards of living and the low social conditions of workers. Karl Marx in particular is especially concerned with the political assumptions behind these two ideologies. According to him, these two types of government should be replaced by communism, since communism would provide a more equal and socially just society. Although this statement may seem unusual, since we tend to associate communism with Stalin and China, the type of communism implemented in these countries is different from the communism that Marx and Engels envisaged in their Communist Manifesto. Marx and Engels’ vision of communism is based on the principle of equality among the people and freedom

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Karl Marx was a German philosopher and economist in the 18th century. He is known for his book the Communist Manifesto that was published in 1848. Marx believed that a revolution of the working classes would over throw the capitalist order and creates a classless society. The Industrial Revolutions led to the proletarianization; his partner Friedrich Engels explained why the changes created by the proletarianization of the worker would develop into a huge problem for industrial societies. I do believe that Karl Marx’s vision of communism in the Communist Manifesto could re-emerge as a popular and workable philosophy of social, economic, and political organization.

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Karl Marx (1818-1883) considered himself not to be a sociologist but a political activist. However, many would disagree and in the view of Hughes (1986), he was ‘both – and a philosopher, historian, economist, and a political scientist as well.’ Much of the work of Marx was political and economic but his main focus was on class conflict and how this led to the rise of capitalism. While nowadays, when people hear the word “communism”, they think of the dictatorial rule of Stalin and the horrific stories of life in a communist state such as the Soviet Union, it is important not to accuse Marx of the deeds carried out in his name.

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