Ideological vacuum in the West

[Bacsi]

Hi, my VC friends! How are you doing?

I've lived in several countries and traveled to a few dozen all over the world. Drastically different cultures, languages, traditions, religions, races and ethnicities. However, I see so much common among all people in the world. Many of the observable differences are only superficial. The forms can vary considerably, but the contents and the underlying ideas I think are often quite similar. Human nature is universal.

Anyways, my subject is this. I can see that there is a decisive ideological vacuum in the West today. What I mean is that most people in the Western countries actually don't know what they live for. Or if they think they know what the purpose of their lives is, it is based on misconceptions. The main theme that I see in the West is survival and pleasures. Hedonism. I don't see any high moral goals of any kind whatsoever.

I don't see many strong, unifying and true systems of worldview anywhere in the world in general. Communism and Islam are the only such ideological systems I see today. Communism greatly undermined itself by indiscriminate use of violence. Islam is under unprecedented smear campaign in the West.

There are no realistic, tangible ideals worth living for in the West postulated in children's books or movies, in schools or universities, in politics or mass media. Such voices are absent.

Democracy, freedom, human rights etc. are abstract notions without any real meaning or not based on reality, used to justify any kind of ideas or actions, including most horrific.

This is my subjective opinion. Please share your thoughts, and I don't expect any of you to agree with everything I stated here.

Was it planned to bring people in the Western world to this condition? Is it in order to turn population into obedient slaves? Is it to stop people from thinking for themselves? Or is it the result of harsh war of the rulers of the Western world against any idea that can unite people and help them get rid of their masters? Or is it being done in order to push their Luciferian masonic religion?

I'm not from the West, I'm from communist Orient originally. So why would I bother? Well. It's simple. I care about our world. The Western civilization has been the de-facto creator, leader and master of the global civilization in the past so many centuries. This status quo remains today, even though the strong rival regional civilizations founded on the two above-mentioned ideologies are trying to resist and slowly gain a global lead.

 

[Colonel Valerio]

Capitalism creates empty vacant and hollow materialistic lives with the vast majority working in life sucking jobs we hate while parasitic rich people live lavish degenerate lives.

 

[Bacsi]

Capitalism creates empty vacant and hollow materialistic lives with the vast majority working in life sucking jobs we hate while parasitic rich people live lavish degenerate lives.

If we use strictly Marxist definition of capitalism, it doesn't exist today. We live in a post-capitalist world of global banks and trans-national corporations. This is a totally new reality not envisioned by Karl Marx who lived in an age of strong sovereign states. The global cartel of trans-national banks and corporations has been striving to destroy or subjugate independent states with great success. The few remaining islands of resistance are under vicious attack.

 

[Thunderian]

Capitalism creates empty vacant and hollow materialistic lives with the vast majority working in life sucking jobs we hate while parasitic rich people live lavish degenerate lives.

Capitalism puts food on my table. Communism is why my starving family left Ukraine.

If people want to have empty lives, that's really up to them. At least under a democratic, capitalist system, people have a chance.

 

[Bacsi]

Communism is why my starving family left Ukraine.

As usually, lies upon lies in the West. You guys know so little truth...

Capitalist trade embargo during a year of drought caused the famine in the Ukraine and other parts of the newborn Soviet Union, including my native Kazakhstan. The capitalist sanctions followed a harsh civil war that lasted 5 years, with intervention of Europeand and US armies.

As soon as the communist government, with some fast-acting drastic measures, established prosperity, peace and stability in all of the USSR, there was never ever shortage of food.

Famine was a common occurrence in the Tsarist Russian Empire before communism due to ineffective methods of agriculture and harsh climatic conditions in this vast mostly northern country.

 

[Red Sky at Morning]

Capitalism puts food on my table. Communism is why my starving family left Ukraine.

If people want to have empty lives, that's really up to them. At least under a democratic, capitalist system, people have a chance.

Communism fails because Marx believed man to be fundimentally good. If he had stuck with his original Christian roots, who knows what the politics of the world would have looked like during the 20th Century?!

His first written work is called The Union of the Faithful with Christ. There we read

these beautiful words:

"Through love of Christ we turn our hearts at the same time toward our brethren
who are inwardly bound to us and for whom He gave Himself in sacrifice."

Marx knew a way for men to become loving brethren toward one another—Christianity.

He continues:

"Union with Christ could give an inner elevation, comfort in sorrow, calm trust, and a heart susceptible to human love, to everything noble and great, not for the sake of ambition and glory, but only for the sake of Christ."

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/shortly-before-karl-marx-died-he-made-statement-which-russell

 

[Bacsi]

Communism fails because Marx believed man to be fundimentally good. If he had stuck with his original Christian roots, who knows what the politics of the world would have looked like during the 20th Century?!

You guys in the West truly know and understand very little apart from your very narrow worldview.

Communism in China is far from failing. The attempt at communism failed in the USSR due to the betrayal of the elite in 1953, then in 1991. The elite wanted good life for themselves. They naively beleived that it's possible to trust the "good will" of capitalist West.

During a trip to Soul, Gorbachev received a bribe of $100,000. Just think of the price he sold the lives of millions who died in the early 90s due to him destroying the USSR.

 

[Bacsi]

Capitalism puts food on my table.

Capitalism is no more. It's in the past. Today it's the rule of global banks and trans-national corporations. The GMO and chemicals induced food on the table of rich Western nations is stolen from 85% of the world by financial and military dominion.

This exploitation through aggressive dominance isn't going to last forever. The financial pyramid Ponzi scheme is nearing collapse. There's growing active and passive resistance of 85% of the world to the ruling 15%.

The Rome of the West will fall down, sooner or later. God will prevail.

 

[Bacsi]

His first written work is called The Union of the Faithful with Christ. There we read

these beautiful words:

"Through love of Christ we turn our hearts at the same time toward our brethren
who are inwardly bound to us and for whom He gave Himself in sacrifice."

Marx knew a way for men to become loving brethren toward one another—Christianity.

He continues:

"Union with Christ could give an inner elevation, comfort in sorrow, calm trust, and a heart susceptible to human love, to everything noble and great, not for the sake of ambition and glory, but only for the sake of Christ."

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/shortly-before-karl-marx-died-he-made-statement-which-russell

It's ignorant to equate communism to Marx and Engels alone.

There's been much theoretical and practical development after Marx. That's one of the reasons there was an internal struggle in the leadership of Russia in 1922-1939 that ended with a victory of Leninists.

The communism of Marx is very different from the communism of Lenin. Stalin created yet another version. Then came Kruschev and Brezhnev who updated it even more. Mao Tse Tung imported and implemented his own version.

It's like saying all of Christianity is Catholicism or Arminianism.

 

[Bacsi]

There wasn't communism anywhere on earth, perhaps maybe in the commune of the early Christian church described in the book of Acts of the Apostles. Communism is a system possible only on a global, never on a national or even regional level. The USSR claimed they acheived only the first stage of socialism, a social formation preceeding communism.

So when you guys in the West say that Russia or China or whatever were or are indeed communist, it's a mistake. They never claimed that. Only socialist, and in the beginning. Communists never expect communism to be established successfully unless the whole world embraces it.

 

[Bacsi]

Communism fails because Marx believed man to be fundimentally good.

I often hear this stated, but it's not true at all. Ignorance.

The practical versions of communism were never based on the premise that man is fundamentally good. They considered hard facts of life, not abstract ideas. Applied versions of communism implemented in Russia/China/etc consider man and society a work in progress. You teach people from very young age to be good through action. In the USSR, children were encouraged to help the elderly in "Timur's teams", to volunteer at school and in their neighborhoods. Productive, creative labour and close touch with nature were very important, and so kids were sent to study in training farms ("Young Naturalist Stations"). They talked about physical health as important in helping you to become a moral, contributing member of society. So staying active was important - workouts before each class at school, cold showers and even swimming in snow naked in childcare facilities etc. Engagement in any kind of sport was free of charge and greatly encouraged. Most importantly, people lived with a positive outlook at life and positive hope for the future.

In communist countries, they believed that as society evolves, so does the human being with it. They believed that when communism wins globally, people would be free of bad inclinations for exploitation and war not because they're fundamentally good, but because the causes for such behavior would be removed and because social evolution rushes in moral evolution of the human species.

The big mistakes that very not smart leaders of Russian communists post-1953 (Kruschev and Brezhnev) did, was proclaiming imminent arrival of communism in a decade or two. Like unfulfilled prophecies of Jesus' second coming, it caused great disillusionment and cynicism among the common people. It was a lie, practically and theoretically even according to the mainstream communist ideology.

I'm not a supporter of any particular version of communism, but I don't think it's good to talk grossly incorrectly about it. At the core of it, whether it's communism of Jesus or Mao, it's a wonderfully good Utopic idea.

 

[Red Sky at Morning]

I often hear this stated, but it's not true at all. Ignorance.

The practical versions of communism were never based on the premise that man is fundamentally good. They considered hard facts of life, not abstract ideas. Applied versions of communism implemented in Russia/China/etc consider man and society a work in progress. You teach people from very young age to be good through action. Children were encouraged to help the elderly in "Timur's teams", to volunteer at school and in their neighborhoods. Productive, creative labour and close touch with nature were very important, and so kids were sent to study in training farms ("Young Naturalist Stations"). They talked about physical health as paramount in helping you to be a good contributing member of society. So staying active was important - workouts before each class at school, cold showers and even swimming in snow naked in childcare facilities etc. Engagement in any kind of sport was free of charge and greatly encouraged. Most importantly, people lived with a positive outlook and positive hope for the future.

In communist countries, they believed that as society evolves, so does the human being with it. They believed that when communism wins globally, people would be free of bad inclinations for exploitation and war not because they're fundamentally good, but because the causes for such behavior would be removed and because social evolution rushes in moral evolution of the human species.

I'm not a supporter of any particular version of communism, but I don't think it's good to talk grossly incorrectly about it. At the core of it, whether it's communism of Jesus or Mao, it's a good Utopical idea.

Didn't Marx believe that man was fundimentally good?

Man's potential, for Marx, is a given potential; man is, as it were, the human raw material which, as such, cannot be changed, just as the brain structure has remained the same since the dawn of history. Yet, man does change in the course of history; he develops himself; he transforms himself, he is the product of history; since he makes his history, he is his own product. History is the history of man's self-realization; it is nothing but the self-creation of man through the process of his work and his production: "the whole of what is called world history is nothing but the creation of man by human labor, and the emergence of nature for man; he therefore has the evident and irrefutable proof of his self-creation, of his own origins."

https://www.marxists.org/archive/fromm/works/1961/man/ch04.htm

 

[Bacsi]

Didn't Marx believe that man was fundimentally good?

No.

Man's potential, for Marx, is a given potential; man is, as it were, the human raw material which, as such, cannot be changed, just as the brain structure has remained the same since the dawn of history. Yet, man does change in the course of history; he develops himself; he transforms himself, he is the product of history; since he makes his history, he is his own product. History is the history of man's self-realization; it is nothing but the self-creation of man through the process of his work and his production: "the whole of what is called world history is nothing but the creation of man by human labor, and the emergence of nature for man; he therefore has the evident and irrefutable proof of his self-creation, of his own origins."

https://www.marxists.org/archive/fromm/works/1961/man/ch04.htm

The quote is accurate and this is what all versions of classical communism hold. It doesn't imply that man is fundamentally good. Good or bad are idealistic abstract notions. Marxism isn't a metaphysical ideology and is not concerned with such concepts. It's about building a new kind of society free of exploitation, focused on productive labour for the benefit of all members of society. Therefore, fundamental nature of man is out of its scope and is never talked about. It's irrelevant.

What matters is your actions. If you do good, you are good. If you do bad, you are bad. So, in that sense, man is fundamentally capable of both good and bad. You can improve the general inclinations of man slowly, step by step, century by century, not immediately - mainly by removing circumstances that force man to act badly. The main condition is building a global communist system. As society evolves, so does man with it. Communists never reached even a half of their goals. They didn't build a global communist society. In their countries, they only reached the first stage of socialism at best.

To theorize, If you were to put a person from a communist society in distant future into environment of an exploitative society, they would certainly have to start acting according to the rules of that society in order to survive. (And in communist science fiction, that person would strive to stir a communist revolution, of course).

I don't know if you understand what I'm trying to explain. Christianity and Marxism are incompatible. Therefore to try and understand Marxism from a Christian standpoint is the same as trying to understand Chemistry with the language of poetry.

P.S. Some things that are permitted or even instituted by God in Christianity are grave "sins" in communism.

 

[elsbet]

It's ignorant to equate communism to Marx and Engels alone.

There's been much theoretical and practical development after Marx. That's one of the reasons there was an internal struggle in the leadership of Russia in 1922-1939 that ended with a victory of Leninists.

The communism of Marx is very different from the communism of Lenin. Stalin created yet another version. Then came Kruschev and Brezhnev who updated it even more. Mao Tse Tung imported and implemented his own version.

It's like saying all of Christianity is Catholicism or Arminianism.

Communism has *never* worked.

 

[Bacsi]

Communism has *never* worked.

Communist ideology has worked very well. Communism as a social formation has never been established in recorded history (except maybe in the early church of the book of Acts in the Bible).

Look at China: https://www.chinahighlights.com/travelguide/developing-china.htm

The fastest development rate in modern history in the USSR: https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/industrialization-soviet

Cuban healthcare system: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/salim-lamrani/cubas-health-care-system-_b_5649968.html

These are just random examples. In general, it's not a trivial conversation. Some attempts at communism were more successful than others.

 

[Sunshine]

Gee, Bacsi, by your consistent attempts to romanticize communism, I would guess you are pretty young. I know people who grew up in the USSR and some Iron Curtain countries, and there definitely were shortages, not just of food, but housing, clothing, etc. Example: everyone in the village was issued one pair of shoes per year, whether they fit or not. (All the same shoes, all the same size.) If you needed a new coat for winter, you went to a black market seller and risked getting arrested. Sounds fun, doesn't it?

If you chose to go to university, your choice of study, and hence, career, was controlled by local and national quotas. For example, "you want to be a doctor? No, sorry, we only have 5 openings for that in your district, and all five are taken. You are going to be bus driver. Those, we need 500." (I am quoting, here.) Not exactly a utopia if you can't even chose your field of study and occupation.

Mind you, I am an American, and all the Russians and Ukrainians and Poles and Czechs I know moved here at their first opportunity. One of my friends actually defected in the eighties, and if he were to read your arguments, he would straight up laugh in your face. I'l take his word over yours about the glories of living in a communist state.

P.S. Russia and Ukraine have been in conflict for centuries, so trying to blame their recent mutually inflicted turmoil on the US is like trying to blame the last guy to the party for trashing the fraternity house.

 

[Colonel Valerio]

It very well did and does.

Look at China: https://www.chinahighlights.com/travelguide/developing-china.htm

The fastest development rate in modern history in the USSR: https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/industrialization-soviet

Cuban healthcare system: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/salim-lamrani/cubas-health-care-system-_b_5649968.html

These are just random examples. In general, it's not a trivial conversation. Some attempts at communism were more successful than others.

Not to mention Vietnam is the best country in SE Asia, doing much better than under the South Vietnamese regime and it does not have the sex tourism problems like capitalist Malaysia.

 

[Bacsi]

Not to mention Vietnam is the best country in SE Asia, doing much better than under the South Vietnamese regime and it does not have the sex tourism problems like capitalist Malaysia.

Yep Malaysia or should I even mention Thailand...

 

[Bacsi]

Gee, Bacsi, by your consistent attempts to romanticize communism, I would guess you are pretty young. I know people who grew up in the USSR and some Iron Curtain countries, and there definitely were shortages, not just of food, but housing, clothing, etc. Example: everyone in the village was issued one pair of shoes per year, whether they fit or not. (All the same shoes, all the same size.) If you needed a new coat for winter, you went to a black market seller and risked getting arrested. Sounds fun, doesn't it?

If you chose to go to university, your choice of study, and hence, career, was controlled by local and national quotas. For example, "you want to be a doctor? No, sorry, we only have 5 openings for that in your district, and all five are taken. You are going to be bus driver. Those, we need 500." (I am quoting, here.) Not exactly a utopia if you can't even chose your field of study and occupation.

Mind you, I am an American, and all the Russians and Ukrainians and Poles and Czechs I know moved here at their first opportunity. One of my friends actually defected in the eighties, and if he were to read your arguments, he would straight up laugh in your face. I'l take his word over yours about the glories of living in a communist state.

P.S. Russia and Ukraine have been in conflict for centuries, so trying to blame their recent mutually inflicted turmoil on the US is like trying to blame the last guy to the party for trashing the fraternity house.

I hear you. I understand your shock and skepticism. It's a perfectly normal reaction from an American. Or from many ex-socialist folks. You think we didn't undergo the massive propaganda brainwashing since the fall of the block?? Sure as heck we did. Please hear me out with an open mind.

Surely there were problems, but not so grotesque as you describe. When the socialist block has gone down, there was a period of time when the countries were still socialist, but undergoing reforms to transform into capitalism with a terrible recession. The majority of people who you meet will describe the absolute horrors of those times. You know, there are Americans so critical of their country who will tell you they live in hell. Is it true? Some people hate their parents, hate their own selves. Many of those "native country bashers" have a strong inferiority complex and their bashing can be irrational and stem from deep psychological traumas, not fact. They often have a burning need of certain line of reasoning to justify their immigration, a highly stressful undertaking and not always very successful. Many subconsciously regret immigrating. Or they'll tell things that they think will satisfy their listeners, not what they truly think - conformism. I tell you all this from experience as I've met many, many immigrants from the ex-USSR, Yugoslavia etc. myself. Probably more than you'll ever meet. So I know. You have to take any such stories with a grain of salt and study truth by yourself from many sources.

I'm not young. I've seen it all. Grew up, studied, worked etc. It was good. Very good. In some ways, it was the best country on earth period. Some people were unhappy, because there are always people who are unhappy. Especially when the gov't promises you lots of rosy stuff for years and fails to deliver. If we look at the whole history, there were dark times of civil war and harsh political struggle. It's normal for nasty stuff to happen at such times in any country, unfortunately...

Also, you know, when someone judges about their past life, they look at it from a certain perspective that depends on your values then and now. My mom grew up at a time of war and shortages like you and I have never seen. She was playing in the fields where bloody battles had taken place with girlfriends and occasionally they'd stumble upon human remains... Does she complain? No. To her, it was the best time of her life with the sweetest memories.

It's a lie about Russia and the Ukraine having conflict for centuries. Americans know zero about true history of the region, but sure lots of false propaganda. Ukrainians and Russians are basically one people. Kiev is called "the mother of all cities in Russia" in ancient manuscripts. "The Ukraine" means "province" and even far east regions were called "Eastern Ukraine". The separation and hatred in Ukraine against Russia has its beginning in the Western parts of the Ukraine falling under the Austrian-Hungarian Empire. During the WWII, the majority of Ukranians fought courageously side-by-side with people of all nationalities. Even today, not all population of the Ukraine have hatred towards Russia: it's only a neo-nazi minority that grabbed onto power there in 2014. You'll see Ukranians themselves giving those fascist bastards a boot sooner or later. I worked in Kiev, I have family from the Ukraine, so... I think I'm a little qualified to talk about these things.

US orchestrating the Ukranian coup - lies or stating true historic facts? Are you mainstream kind of person? What are doing at VC? The USA is a puppet herself (Masonic). So I don't blame the US, really, but those dark figures who pull the strings around the world. The US is as much a victim as any other country.

 

[Colonel Valerio]

It's ignorant to equate communism to Marx and Engels alone.

There's been much theoretical and practical development after Marx. That's one of the reasons there was an internal struggle in the leadership of Russia in 1922-1939 that ended with a victory of Leninists.

The communism of Marx is very different from the communism of Lenin. Stalin created yet another version. Then came Kruschev and Brezhnev who updated it even more. Mao Tse Tung imported and implemented his own version.

It's like saying all of Christianity is Catholicism or Arminianism.

It would have been better if Trotsky had prevailed over Stalin, I wonder how an alternative history would have turned out.