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The historian Eric Hobsbawm died in 2012. He was a Marxist, but people have said that his history books are great and you can't tell from his books that he was a Marxist. Is that your impression from reading his books?
What is it about Western European or American professors - why would they think Marxism is a good idea. Do they think people in the West would be happier than now if we went to Marxism? They don't know what it was like to live in China or the USSR? What am I missing?
The historian Eric Hobsbawm died in 2012. He was a Marxist, but people have said that his history books are great and you can't tell from his books that he was a Marxist. Is that your impression from reading his books?
What is it about Western European or American professors - why would they think Marxism is a good idea. Do they think people in the West would be happier than now if we went to Marxism? They don't know what it was like to live in China or the USSR? What am I missing?
I am by no means an anti-intellectual. Yet, at the same time, I've noticed a common thread in many academicians. They cannot understand why those with less education and -- by implication -- lesser brains do better in life in terms of earnings, status, and a host of other factors. While the average academic toils away in poverty in graduate school and his or her early career, others who go into the private sector enjoy higher earning power, etc. etc. I've heard friends who are college professors say that in so many words.
So rather than admit that those earning money are doing so for very good reasons that have nothing to do with an unfair system, but rather to the importance that society places on what they do, they need to jury rig together a social theory that makes everything even.
The problem is that Marxism is a terrible system, designed by people who never have spent a minute in the private sector in any position of responsibility. Further, its underlying premise is that people would support the state because it's the right thing to do. People don't do next to anything for a higher purpose for any length of time. They are looking out for their own interests.
Here's the litmus test of Marxism. Wherever it has been practiced, it has ultimately yielded authoritarianism and a lower standard of living for those dwelling within it. And, when it ultimately fails, its apologists are always trying to place the blame elsewhere besides the economic theory itself. Yet if an economic system truly requires such rarefied conditions to grow, is it a worthwhile pursuit? Meanwhile, all you need to do for capitalism to grow is to give it just the barely minimal conditions in the form of the rule of law.
Eric Hobsbawn was a very fine historian. I have read a number of his works. His preference for Communism can be seen if noting which matured political ideologies were available in his formative years(b.1917), his research into history , his experience of the world when capitalism, communism and fascism clashed and other factors I have not considered as of this response post. To an intellectual who is self aware and was raised in the rather strict British class system would note the unfairness of the structure to other talented individuals who did not benefit from a similar upbringing and those who were at the bottom tier of the system who lived in deprivation with slim chance of changing their station. The mature political ideologies of the era would lead an European to Marxism due to the inclusion of vanguardism which protected intellectuals yet included the participation other social levels based on the principle of equality and with allowances for performance based movement- party leaders, commissars, etc. Communism is akin to the ultimate Union and intellectuals and chosen workers would be the layers of leaders and spokespersons. It is an intellectuals dream to manage from a distance people as one would students.
Eric Hobsbawn was a very fine historian. I have read a number of his works. His preference for Communism can be seen if noting which matured political ideologies were available in his formative years(b.1917), his research into history , his experience of the world when capitalism, communism and fascism clashed and other factors I have not considered as of this response post. To an intellectual who is self aware and was raised in the rather strict British class system would note the unfairness of the structure to other talented individuals who did not benefit from a similar upbringing and those who were at the bottom tier of the system who lived in deprivation with slim chance of changing their station. The mature political ideologies of the era would lead an European to Marxism due to the inclusion of vanguardism which protected intellectuals yet the inclusion of other social levels based on the principle of equality and with allowances for performance based movement- party leaders, commissars, etc. Communism is akin to the ultimate Union and intellectuals and chosen workers would be the layers of leaders and spokespersons. It is an intellectuals dream to manage from a distance people as one would students.
Well my opinion.
It's a pretty good one. Especially the bolded part.
The historian Eric Hobsbawm died in 2012. He was a Marxist, but people have said that his history books are great and you can't tell from his books that he was a Marxist. Is that your impression from reading his books?
What is it about Western European or American professors - why would they think Marxism is a good idea. Do they think people in the West would be happier than now if we went to Marxism? They don't know what it was like to live in China or the USSR? What am I missing?
You can't tell from his books that he was a Marxist? That's strange. His books are what established him as Britain's leading Marxist historian.
What "it" is, is the progressivist Left Wing now controls the culture of the West. And they are forcing their ideas on the rest of us in the West via the stratagems of critical pedagogy and cultural Marxism. But, they are doing it on behalf of someone else I feel, because the idea is to impose authoritarian central economic control on a GLOBAL scale. Marxism isn't about economics, per se. It's an entire worldview and philosophy. A "religion" if you will. It's the religion of revolution and rebellion against all that the old West considered sacred.
And Marxism is being used by international forces (probably the central banking cabal led by the World Bank and BIS) to establish a one-world economy which they will control.... and hence control the world. The Marxists are themselves, being used as "useful idiots".
What "it" is, is the progressivist Left Wing now controls the culture of the West. And they are forcing their ideas on the rest of us in the West via the stratagems of critical pedagogy and cultural Marxism. But, they are doing it on behalf of someone else I feel, because the idea is to impose authoritarian central economic control on a GLOBAL scale. Marxism isn't about economics, per se. It's an entire worldview and philosophy. A "religion" if you will. It's the religion of revolution and rebellion against all that the old West considered sacred.
I've heard many times about Marx and his theory. But he lived in the nineteenths century, one hundred and fifty years ago. The life has changed greatly since then.
Can we suppose that modern Marxism accords with globalism, tendency to solve world problems without war (if it is possible), humanism, pacifism and equal rights for guys? And, the main detail, gradual attenuation of traditionalism?
why would they (college professors) think Marxism is a good idea. Do they think people in the West would be happier than now if we went to Marxism? They don't know what it was like to live in China or the USSR?
Good thread.. Personally I don't believe academia thinks Marxism is actually a 'good idea'; I think they value, and advance, Marxist ideas more for it's seditious power.
The deeper, & resulting, question for me then becomes, Why?. Professors who are enjoying the bounty and opportunities of free, capitalist Western societies.. poisoning young students with ideas that often demonize those same concepts and foundations. Teaching White guilt, engaging in never-ending criticism of traditional America, turning young Americans into one-dimensional, self-hating critics of a Western tradition that most are practical benefactors of.. It's weird and twisted to me.
Cultural Marxism in education really seemed to gain steam under the watch & guidance of Baby Boomers.. so again I wonder, what the Hell did the 'Greatest Generation' do, to give their kids (turned teachers & professors) a desire for cultural sedition ? And now that there are so few ppl active in society, who pre-date Baby Boomers, it seems all society hence has bought into cultural-Marxism.
Something to be said about the late Mr. Hobsbawm being a life-long communist. I mean it would seem one of the great historians of the 20th really wanted to see those Reds/Bolsheviks win.
He didn't run when communism 'lost' its way after the revolutionary days of '17.
He certainly had a radical view of history in the sense that his histories were allegedly 'from below' when looking at the events which defined 'history'. And he interpreted historical events as it affected the 'emancipation of humanity' taking in Marxian views of man , economies, labor and capital. That appears to be his historical outlook.
Thing is the fact that he was a Marxist didn't stop him from apparently writing history that was respected for its intellectual heft. He seemed to understand his bias when writing histories. Yet in my opinion there is a moral component to his work which I think is defused with him as he supported communism.
Being historically an old Bolshevik put him in direct opposition to Hitler's Fascism. He believed the Nazis should be destroyed and they were giving the triumph to Lenin's heirs. But I'm afraid he would appear to diminish the fact that communism is also another side of the totalitarianism coin and subject to bleak and terrible terrors as well. In that it's ironic how he can meld so called 'emancipation of humanity' with an 'ism' that just got tossed in the can.
In hindsight, even with his great intelligence we can say he backed the wrong horse. Just my take on the eminent scholar.
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What is Marxism in modernity
