| Communism's Seeds of Death |
| by Richard Barnes |
March 2001 - We begin (without
seeking to offend our neo-Darwinian readers) with Darwin's Origin of the Species,
which purported to explain why some "races" are superior to others (this
purpose, actually in its original subtitle, is rarely mentioned today, and new editions
omit the subtitle). The book was published in 1859; its first 1,250 copies sold out
overnight. It was not the common folks, but rather the intellectual elite, which bought it
out and began to apply it, for it gave a patina of scientific support to the ancient
desire to divorce oneself from the claims of a Creator. Claims seen in many political
founding documents until then, such as the Declaration of Independence, which presupposed
that we are created men and women with God-given (inalienable) rights. (The authors of the
Declaration knew pagan history; they knew the pagan idea of the eternity of matter, of
ascending circles of existence. This preceded Darwin by millennia. Yet, though knowing
this, the authors rejected it. They knew that inalienable rights couldn't be grounded on a
la-la theory.)
Another 19th century seed, Karl Marx (1818-1883), first dedicated Das Kapital, to
Charles Darwin, who, in a rare fit of prudence, declined. Darwin could never fully shake
off his Christian heritage. His doubts pursued him to the grave. That was not the case
with Marx. For more on this monster, known for "howling gigantic curses", we
would recommend Johnson's Intellectuals. For our purpose, suffice it to mention
that this seed reaped a more overt harvest than Darwin and Nietzsche (see below). Darwin
and Nietzsche's harvests are obvious to anyone who pauses but a moment. But to see Marx's
harvest doesn't require a pause; it merely requires that one be sentient. His assertion
that man is a mere economic animal fits nicely, as intended, with Darwin's theory. In
either case, man is declared to be an animal.
The third seed, Frederick Nietzsche (1844-1900), whose most famous work was Thus Spake
Zarathustra, was grossly antichristian. His most salient ideas were a despising of the
weak, the mediocre, and the altruistic. He exalted war and chaos as a stimulus for energy
and the triumphant life. He was hostile to Christian morality. To him, each individual
defines his or her morality. But he did reach a morality of the Lords and a morality of
the Slaves. The former, a superior morality, is characterized by power and dominion; the
latter, a weak morality, is characterized by compassion, humility and patience. He died a
madman.
We hardly need to comment on the 20th century harvest of these seeds. The thoughtful
reader will recognize how the above philosophies prevail in today's political and
corporate life. We will simply summarize that harvest in terms of a basic rule: the good
tends to life; the evil tends to death. Clearly the harvest of the 20th century has tended
to death. The following statistics are conservative estimates. More data is now becoming
available which reflects numbers far higher than these. Nonetheless, the data below will
suffice for our purposes. It declares the 20lh century tale of deaths caused by deliberate
state policy:
Communist states--------95.2 million deaths; 477 per 10,000 population
Dictatorship------------20.3 million deaths; 495 per 10,000 population
Partially free-----------3.1 million deaths; 48 per 10,000 population
Free----------------------.8 million deaths; 22 per 10,000 population
The above figures exclude: the 40 million deaths caused by abortions since 1973 in the
United States and Puerto Rico; the 35.7 million deaths caused by 20th century wars; and
the 15 million deaths caused by the state- sponsored Ukraine famine of the early 1930s. Be
reminded: the first two state systems in the list above are/were atheistic, antichristian
systems, whose usual first order of business was to suppress the Bible and the Christians.
This is well documented and overt; but hardly ever stated in polite company. If the
Spanish Inquisition of a few centuries back deserves censure, then surely the regimes
alluded to above deserve opprobrium. But the public elite has never been known for
consistency.
The biggest characters (using that term deliberately) associated with the statistics
above, were ALL disciples of the ideas of Darwin, Marx, and Nietzsche.
But we remain optimistic for the 21st century because we have seen some good 20th century
seeds, imperceptible to most, but germinating nonetheless. We'll mention only one: the
great shift in education from a state sponsored function back to a father and mother duty.
From the state to the home. This is a tectonic shift back to first principles. We are
already seeing some impact, in that Harvard and Yale are actively seeking home-educated
children or at least those, whose education has been closely overseen by their parents. In
sharp contrast to the mindset of many since the mid-19th century, the late 20th century
mindset of many is that the child is on loan to the father and mother by God. And it is
the family's duty, not the state's, to educate him. We are convinced this shift tends to
life and, therefore, will result in a more compassionate and a more life supporting 21st
century.
May our children see that day!
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