I often talk about popular advice that is unbelievably bad but passed on by people who aren’t well versed in the subjects they feel they at liberty to advise upon. Crap like ‘buy a house’ and ‘get a degree’.
One of the most insidious and widely spread lies is that socialism is the friend of the working man. It’s a lie that has been so carefully crafted that it has propagated itself effortlessly over the last 5 or so generations. Only today, driving into work, did I hear John Lennon singing his particular brand of ill-informed crap:
‘A million workers working for nothing
You better give ’em what they really own’
Now, long time readers of mine will no doubt know that one of my greatest loves is The Beatles. John Lennon is a childhood icon of mine, but I can’t let my emotion for the man cloud my judgement. He was a great musician, but great musician does not mean he knows anything above squat about anything other than how to arrange musical notes. Just cause the bass line to ‘Kinky Afro’ is fruity and sweet doesn’t mean I want Sean Ryder as my bank manager.
If Lennon spread the word that he was performing open heart surgery, he’d be rightfully denounced as an evil man. ‘Just ‘cause he can write a few tunes doesn’t mean he knows anything about open heart surgery’, we’d cry.
Well the same applies. I’d like to know how much time and effort Lennon put into studying before he started wearing his army jacket and calling people ‘comrade’.
I don’t know, but in the absence of anything from him but wild claims and rhetoric, I’d guess very little.
No, he just followed the crowd I am afraid. He was one of thousands who fell for the lie and gleefully propagated it. No different from the guys who wear Che Guevara T shirts, blissfully unaware that Che was in fact just a psychopathic murderer, a rapist and a killer of innocent people and children.
If I walked around with Hitler on my T Shirt I’d be lynched. But when it comes to Che, well he was ‘fighting for freedom’. The cunt ran a prison camp where he tortured peasants. He did very little fighting, barely if ever getting involved in any front line action. fighting for breath after a particularly heavy bout of blood purging maybe.
People are very big on having staunch opinions on subjects they haven’t bothered to study.
It’s the height of arrogance that people take on staunch political beliefs without doing their due diligence and requisite learning. Just like if I started offering to do open heart surgery. Just cause I’m good at picking up chicks doesn’t mean I magically know my atrium from my ventricle.
As I arrived at work today, I saw a group of working men, scaffolders, parking up at 8am to begin a day’s graft. They’re working men, paying around 40% tax to a state that uses the money to pay people like me, who work in destructive, failing organisations like the NHS. I know people at work who are driving top of the range Mercedes and I’ve audited their jobs. They’re on close to £100k for working 4 days a week shuffling paper.
Socialism benefits a political elite in that it draws power towards them. A few low earners get thrown some Government cheques to feed themselves – and the rest of us pay for it.
But the lie persists. Left always means ‘freedom’ and ‘good’. A man like Che is a cultural icon on the walls of 16 year old students all over the world. Because 16 year olds really know what they are talking about. Man, they’d be less offensive if they had a poster of Jimmy Saville beaming down on their bed.
Right always means ‘bad’ and ‘nasty’. The long standing myth that Hitler was ‘extreme right wing’ – despite 90% of everything he stood for being unbelievably left wing (centrally planned economy, strong labour unions, Government control of key industries, fostering of state control and dependency, public pensions, ideological collectivism).
The only right wing aspect of Hitler that I can see was that he was mildly supportive of the established classes – ie, Conservative. But no, he was racist so that means he was right wing, because obviously, if left means centrally planned economy, then right means racism. The opposite of central planning is err… racism.
The opposite of central planning is free markets. Thatcher was right wing. If Thatcher was any more right wing, she wouldn’t suddenly become racist. You don’t become so free market that racism is the next logical step.
I walked into the café for my daily coffee. I chatted as usual to the owner. A hard working man creating value and paying his taxes, so people can have a share of his money in return for contributing nothing.
What would Marx say? Did he envisage a society where the workers of the world would unite so they could then be forced to pay for the luxuries of the unproductive classes? It sounds improbable, but then, maybe so, because he was famously indolent, he never worked and sponged of Engels all his life. The current welfare state would be right up Marx’ street.
Marx was a real friend to the workers alright.
I took my coffee and thanked the owner. With friends like that, he sure ain’t gonna need many enemies.