Was Stalin right, after all?

The Marxist creed that Stalin and his people recited painted a picture perfect landscape - in the end, social equality would prevail and society's hierarchies - which, mind you, are both natural and useful, would be annihilated.

And yet, the promise of an egalitarian society was but a regurgitation of the immemorial myth - the ‘utopic’ state. By now, almost a century later, we ought to have reckoned the dangers that such prospect conceals - not only because social egalitarianism goes against the fundamental precepts of nature - by nature animals divide themselves hierarchically, but also because it is psychologically undesirable for man to dwell in an uncompetitive society. As the Russian novelist Dostoevsky pointed out in his work 'Notes from underground', "what can be expected of man since he is a being with such strange qualities?" – precisely, what can be expected of man, a creature, who, utterly infatuated by the prospects of ‘success’ and greatness, is unable to live in a non-hierarchic society as a result of his intrinsic ‘nature? Man is a creature who requires a dragon to slay, so to speak - a creature that is biologically and psychologically moulded in such a way so as to climb the social scale. When there are no scales left to climb, no targets – chaos erupts - what Marxism seems to have targeted, and which it seems to have successfully achieved. Seen from this perspective, Dostoevsky’s words become a direct critique of utopic aspirations: by highlighting mans 'strange qualities', Dostoevsky is in reality criticising mans' excessive hope in an egalitarian paradise and his delusional obsession with social egalitarianism, a state which, he writes, would be both unrealistic and undesirable,

“Shower upon him every earthly blessing, drown him in bliss so that nothing but bubbles would dance on the surface of his bliss, as on a sea...and even then every man, out of sheer ingratitude, sheer libel, would play you some loathsome trick. He would even risk his cakes and would deliberately desire the most fatal rubbish, the most uneconomical absurdity, simply to introduce into all this positive rationality his fatal fantastic element...simply in order to prove to himself that men still are men and not piano keys.”

Grant people what they want, or even, what they need, and they still, Dostoevsky writes, would find a way to inflict ‘chaos’, if only to prove they are not mere ‘piano keys’, that is, not mere puppets. Put differently, Dostoevsky here is contending that the human being is ever satisfied only if he is also partially dissatisfied: man is not meant to live in a ‘hierarchic-less society. That being said, I do not intend to shun ‘equality of opportunity’, this has nothing to do with equality of opportunity, what I am criticising is - equality of outcome; usually sought through the destruction of social hierarchies, that is, the destruction of competition.

Be that as it may, it is not what one wishes for that is mostly dangerous, though in the case of the Soviets' it was, but how one attains what they wish for - the means. "All’s well that ends well" are unfortunately the words that most often come to direct the actions of those driven by a dream of greatness. And yet, one ought to ask, what exactly propelled the ‘communists’ to champion such a 'noble' cause?

The cause championed, at first glance, appears noble: however, history proves otherwise.

It was not compassion that drove the authoritarian ‘socialists’ to help the poor, it was resentment for the rich - the spirit of Cain, metaphorically speaking, and this is delineated sharply by both Solzhenitsyn and Orwell in novels such as - 'the Gulag archipelago' and ‘The road to wagon pier', Orwell writes “On the other hand you have the intellectual, book trained socialist, who understands it is necessary to throw our present civilisation down the sink and is quite willing to do so”. Those in authority, “the book trained socialists’ to use Orwellian diction, rarely ever come to practice their ‘teachings’ - the prospect of sovereignty becomes so great that it obscures the intended aim; compassion is overridden by the hungry beast within, so to speak. Such was what happened in Soviet Russia and, numerous other countries. The violent deaths of over 60 million people, including the murder and rape of the KULAKS; whom were 'wealthy' farmers and whose death resulted in the starvation of circa 6 million Ukrainians, show clearly that what lied behind the glistening cloak of egalitarianism was not social equality - but jealousy and resentment. The state in which Mao's China, Hungary and Vietnam found themselves in was not much different either.

As a result of these events, what had been championed by many started losing its lustre - communism, all of a sudden, became something unspoken and unheard of. Its atrocities concealed. Its murmurs forgotten. It was concluded that Stalin and his dream where, in fact, wrong.

Or so it appears.

The spectre of communism might not dwell amongst us in the image of Stalin or Lenin now, but that doesn't mean it is dead.

It is not dead. It is very much alive. Difference being, nowadays, it is no longer social egalitarianism which is being idolised but ethical egalitarianism, gender egalitarianism and, cultural egalitarianism. It is no longer a battle between the Proletariat and the Bourgeoisie; today, society is divided, dissected vis-à-vis the vicious game of identity politics, into the oppressed and the oppressors; the victims versus the ‘sexists’, ‘homophobes’, ‘islamophobes’; a game which, at its very basis, rejects the Judeo Christian belief in the autonomy of the individual by clamping everyone into ‘groups’.

But how did this happen?

‘A text remains […] forever imperceptible’, Derrida concludes, a statement which, I would contend, to a certain extent, is true. According to Derrida, “what we get when we read a text is not an objective account of logos or even what the author really meant, but our present interpretation or understanding of the text itself. This understanding becomes so to speak, our own [text] of the text.” (Quoted by Ozmone & Craver in the Philosophical Foundations of Education, p368.). Because nothing ever comes to us in a pure state, without being under- or overwritten with textual ideas or literal texts, it becomes difficult for us to make claims of objectivity. And yet, such a statement is only true insofar as it is directed towards literature, once one starts appropriating such philosophy to matters such as ethics, for instance, it is when things start erring. Nowadays, we seem to be living in a world where one cannot, by any means, claim that one interpretation is better than another. It has become a sacrilege to describe certain acts as objectively wrong. However, it is one thing saying that the world or text could have a numerous amount of interpretations, of which are all subjective, and another that all interpretations are ‘equal’. For if one had to adhere to such policy he would be thrown in to a morass of wholesome doubt – by destroying the possibility of an objective interpretation of the world, one simultaneously destroys the value hierarchy. As a result, values, ethics and the concepts of right and wrong become but petty opinions and meaningless statements; rationality is thrown out the window and, objectivity shunned.

Without a value hierarchy, even the possibility of redemption falters. Killing a child and feeding a homeless woman become equivalent. Telling the truth and lying, too. If we are to hold that objectivity is but an illusion and that all statements are by nature, equal, everything becomes justified.

Moreover, Derrida’s claim that social ‘categorisation’ ought to be perceived as a form of oppression, is also wrong. Of course it is true that ‘categorisation’ categorises, it does so, by definition; but such ‘categorisation, one must not forget, is also the basis for cognition and morality. When one chooses, he is implicitly ‘categorising’; regarding one act as being ‘better’ than the other. Stating that Islam, for instance, is fundamentally antithetic to the foundations upon which Western civilisation is built, should not be looked down upon; it is simply true. In the West we have established a firm distinction between the state and the church – a distinction that the Islamic religion does not reckon. In addition to this, it ought to be noted that the law itself acts as a conceptual border: it prevents people from robbing you, amongst other things. Without it society would not be able to function harmoniously. This is all to say that if categorisation were to be abolished completely, not only would values become meaningless, but society itself would stagnate as a result of its descent in to chaos, into utter undifferentiation.

Be that as it may, this article was not written with the intention of championing any form of extreme: the Apollonian spirit of order, when taken too far, mutates and becomes rigid in the same way how that of Dionysius, when heralded with fervour, becomes rigid. Borders are important because they maintain order, and yet, growth is rarely ever attained without novelty: the ideal would be a balance between both - a synthesis. A state where society’s’ fundamental cornerstones are safeguarded whilst, at the same time, some aspects of order are sacrificed for the sake of change and, non-stagnation.

We mustn’t fall in to the trap that, King Midas, to bring one example, fell into. Extremes are wrong irrespective of the safely they appear to bring about. For, they might induce psychological comfort, they might provide one with ‘answers’, yet, simultaneously, they also blind one from seeing the bigger picture, that is, the truth. And the truth is never one sided