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Originally Posted by TLAM Strike
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Newsflash #4: in the real world, most people would prefer life under the worst of regimes to no life at all.
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"Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!"
-Patrick Henry, Speech in Virginia Convention, Richmond (March 23, 1775) |
Patrick Henry, however, was a man fighting a "constitutional" (not really, perhaps parliamentary would be a better term) monarchy of the same general national origin and far, far milder goals. Had he lived through Stalin's time, I wonder what he would have said.
I think it's equally sad that Americans and those following their ideological basis - naturally given their history - look at the rest of the world and are in shock at how all these people aren't hot for the fundamental ideology of liberty, democracy and all the other nice things. I mean, how could they?
But think of it the same way as your reaction to when people - like some on this forum - accuse America of imperialism, your president of being a terrorist, and other nasty things of the sort. I go to Russian forums occasionally, and you'd be surprised at the sort of stuff they say about America!
But why do they? Very simple. Just as you can't see why they don't buy these high enlightened ideas of liberty and democracy, they can't understand why you buy something so superficial and unreal. People live in very different worlds. And there are billions of people in this world who'd rather have some potatoes than liberty.
Having seen the issue from both sides, I really do have sympathy for both alike. But one thing I have learned from growing up in tough circumstances of a different country is that the world is real and one really shouldn't underestimate how the fulfilment of basic biological needs will always trump the fulfilment of basic ideological needs - when it comes down to that choice. People are very easy to break. The NKVD had made a science of it back in the day.
I'll put my bottom line to everything: no -ism or -y is worth the life of even one innocent person. Fundamentally, WWII was thought for Nazism by Germany; but for survival by people of the USSR. There is absolutely no question about this. Maybe that's part of why the Soviets won.
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PS - Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness is, essentially, right. But only in that order. Happiness means nothing without liberty, and liberty means nothing without life. Sure Hitler's regime gave happiness. But what does a Russian care for that happiness if he's not allowed to live?! Likewise, what's liberty in public life to anyone if they can't put food on the table?