When I was in the fifth grade (nobody’s best year I’m sure) I was sitting in the science classroom waiting for the teacher to come in. A few of the guys in class were throwing around this little foam football.
A friend of mine threw it and knocked a couple of beakers and test tubes onto the ground and they shattered.
And of course, that’s when the teacher arrived. He was pissed. “Who did this?” He asked. And I’m telling you, this 12 year old kid, my friend stepped forward without hesitation and said, “I did, sir.”
It’s not everyday you see an example like that, someone with courage and character at the age of 12.
Today, that kid is 27. And he is a socialist.
Socialism, like any other “ism”, is a broad term. Conservatism can mean believing anything from “kings should have absolute authority” to “marriages should be between one man and one woman”. Feminism can mean believing anything from “women are sovereign individuals with human rights” to “men aren’t”.
Likewise, socialism is an “ism” where adherents define it one way – as an economic system focusing on the advancement of society as a whole and striving toward equality among all its members – and detractors define it a different way – as an economic system focusing on singular totalitarian control of production and distribution.
Both definitions are historically precedented and both are valid ways to use the word. Which is the main reason, as far as I can tell, that it makes for such a heated debate.
For a long time in this country, “socialist” was a dirty word like “Nazi” or “slaveholder.” So that debate wasn’t happening at all. And now that it’s finally out in the open again, we are finding it difficult to shed the black and white perspective on the topic and have a balanced, nuanced, and productive conversation.
Some cling to the “socialism is evil” propaganda without understanding a single socialist principle and some insist that there is no relationship between the principles of socialism and the catastrophes of the Soviet Union and Maoist China. In the name of balance, nuance, and productive conversation, today, and for the next several weeks, I’m going to talk about socialism. Today I’m going to talk about why it is a good philosophy and why, in the most important ways, we are all socialists.
If you dig past all the policies and politics and divergent designs and systems within socialism, you arrive at a very simple and very universal core philosophy:
We’re all in this together. With a focus on unity and justice, humans can make the world a better place for everyone.
When we are united, we have the power to overcome so much of the darkness in the world. Maybe we can’t make short kids taller, but we can make sure they have access to a box to stand on. We can’t always make the sick well, but we can make sure they have access to modern healthcare. We can’t guarantee that everyone be good at a job, but we can guarantee them a roof over their heads and food in their bellies if we work together. That is socialism.
Economic success should not lead to the unequal application of justice. But it does. And that’s a problem. It’s a complicated problem and different socialists have different prescriptions in mind to combat this problem but I’m sure we can all agree that it’s a problem. It’s a problem when people can weasel their way out of paying for their crimes just because they’re rich. It’s a problem that some communities are being ruled by wealthy criminals and corrupt politicians and police forces. That’s a problem that needs a solution. That is socialism.
When free markets are set loose, some people fall behind and they should be helped up and some people fly ahead and they should not be allowed to walk all over us. And this is the core of socialism. And by this definition, almost all of us are socialists.
Socialism arose explicitly as a moral rebuke of the capitalism of the industrial revolution. As freedom and liberty and markets took over the globe, some of the worst elements of human nature were allowed to flourish. Socialism is the response of decency in the face of the evil that humans are capable of.
When Marx and Engels were writing, it was standard to work 16 hours a day 7 days a week; people in manual labor jobs were working 24 hour shifts. The factories would be hot and dry and filled with poisonous fumes. 6, 7, 8 year old kids were loosing limbs and, sometimes, their lives climbing inside of running machines to clean and maintain them. Every member of a family would have a job and, by pooling their wages, they would still barely have a place to live and food to eat.
And every step of progress between then and now has been led by socialists. Socialists like Eugene Debs and Helen Keller are why we have 8 hour work days, why we have overtime pay, why we have workman’s comp, why we have child labor laws. Socialism has already made the world a better place. And it will continue to do so.
That is why I am a socialist.
