4 ms·

That's what most people, and especially leftists, don't get. If you look at it objectively, any ideology that offers an utopia is inevitably detrimental in the

by m0zg 6y ago

That's what most people, and especially leftists, don't get. If you look at it objectively, any ideology that offers an utopia is inevitably detrimental in the long run, be it Third Reich or Communist International. When the ends are utopic, they justify whatever means needed to get there, including killing millions of people. Fascism and communism are basically two sides of the same coin, with similar casualty counts. Both rely on total control of the populace and productive capacity. Both rely on total suppression of freedom of speech or dissent. Both won't think twice before lining up dissenters along a wall and executing them.

kibwen 6y ago
At the risk of spending my whole day just replying to comments with relevant quotes from the OP: "When one thinks of the cruelty, squalor, and futility of war – and in this particular case of the intrigues, the persecutions, the lies and the misunderstandings – there is always the temptation to say: ‘One side is as bad as the other. I am neutral’. In practice, however, one cannot be neutral, and there is hardly such a thing as a war in which it makes no difference who wins. Nearly always one stands more or less for progress, the other side more or less for reaction. The hatred which the Spanish Republic excited in millionaires, dukes, cardinals, play-boys, Blimps, and what-not would in itself be enough to show one how the land lay. In essence it was a class war. If it had been won, the cause of the common people everywhere would have been strengthened. It was lost, and the dividend-drawers all over the world rubbed their hands. That was the real issue; all else was froth on its surface."
lordnacho 6y ago
This is basically correct, imaginary worlds are so captivating for some people that the ends justify the means. They forget that it actually matters whether you attempt to reach utopia via the gulag, and you get a lot of excuses while it's being done. Wouldn't say people on the right are free from utopian thinking though, on that side it's more a blindness to the market potentially doing bad things.

by m0zg 6y ago

kibwen 6y ago

At the risk of spending my whole day just replying to comments with relevant quotes from the OP: "When one thinks of the cruelty, squalor, and futility of war – and in this particular case of the intrigues, the persecutions, the lies and the misunderstandings – there is always the temptation to say: ‘One side is as bad as the other. I am neutral’. In practice, however, one cannot be neutral, and there is hardly such a thing as a war in which it makes no difference who wins. Nearly always one stands more or less for progress, the other side more or less for reaction. The hatred which the Spanish Republic excited in millionaires, dukes, cardinals, play-boys, Blimps, and what-not would in itself be enough to show one how the land lay. In essence it was a class war. If it had been won, the cause of the common people everywhere would have been strengthened. It was lost, and the dividend-drawers all over the world rubbed their hands. That was the real issue; all else was froth on its surface."

lordnacho 6y ago

This is basically correct, imaginary worlds are so captivating for some people that the ends justify the means. They forget that it actually matters whether you attempt to reach utopia via the gulag, and you get a lot of excuses while it's being done. Wouldn't say people on the right are free from utopian thinking though, on that side it's more a blindness to the market potentially doing bad things.