Uncle Joe wasn’t too long dead (though not so mourned as VI Lenin) when at a camp for young leaders in a respected American institution (with red in its name) I learned the following rousing song.

Red fly the banners, O!

What is your eight O?

Eight for the Eighth Red Army!

Seven for the sins of capitalism!

Six for the Peekskill martyrs!

Five for the years in the five-year plan!

Four for the founding fathers!

Marx! Engels! Lenin! Stalin!

Three, three the rights of man,

Keep singing!

Two, two the lily white hands

Working for the party O!

One is workers’ unity

And ever more shall be it SO!

Exciting song. Colorful. Militaristic. Contains sins and martyrs. Lauds the patriarchal fathers. Names heroes, praises white hands and party-worker unity. All the things you’d want in a system generally opposed to all those things. 

But not important in a bigger scheme where moving forward excuses some contradictions and requires a few broken eggs to make an omelet. 

As I, some years later, walked up multiple flights in a unified worker utopian apartment complex, eggs were hard to come by. No elevator. No omelet. Healthier, right? 

But, who was I, a mere flyspeck, to question a larger purpose, especially when doing so could bring unwanted, unwelcome attention.

What a person holds true and believes one decade is apt to shift (little or much, depending) with experience. In my early teens photos and accounts of Auschwitz fascinated and compelled on a level quite different from that felt days of wandering (when one was free to do so) empty wood barracks designed for 80+ horses or 2,000 workers. 

The place sounds less awful in Polish, Oswiecim. Despite that, the facts remain grim. State-sponsored genocide. Reprehensible? 

Not to those supporting and conducting just that all across the north of Africa. The incarcerated, destined to sooner or late die there, met fate alone or in groups finding no comfort that escaping extermination in Morocco they found it elsewhere as part of someone’s plan of a greater good. It took me a while to learn “Run like hell” when greater goods are mentioned. Run! Quickly! Run!

Not to say thought at 60 is better than that at 30 or 15, though it is apt to be different, including a 15 version more satisfactory than elder forms. 

Plus the process might bounce back and forth, mightn’t it? 

Ego favors the current and popular, for what that’s worth. It’s often satisfied me to think I’ve done well or well enough. Comforting and nice of me to think so, but how does what I’ve done intellectually stack against people who made the committed effort to raise and support a family? 

Having a family requires sacrifice and compromise I’ve not been up to. Couldn’t do it. Did other things. Not that. Wasn’t up for that.

Following your own drummer, so t’ speak, fulfills a social role existing outside the bounds and demands of family life. There’s only so much time, energy. What to skimp on? Being a spouse? Being a parent? Completing a book? Each person selects. 

A grandly successful author might be able to hire staff to help, but the choices remain. (Ask Milne, aka Christopher Robin, who seems never to have got over his father’s huge success.) (Ask the many who found success more lethal and confounding than struggle.) 

A thing I observe fairly often is devilishly human perversity. We speak for and laud what we will not countenance in fact. Our diversity tends toward aggregable, mutually supportive, conformist diversity. 

I’ll skip giving examples in favor of you providing your own. Many a popular bandwagon proclaiming peace and plenty goes at the goal by murder and starvation of any-all seen as in the way. 

This trick (excuse the pejorative) is useful manifold ways. Crime can be hugely reduced by decriminalizing, not arresting and not prosecuting. Paper successes sound convincing. How’s a poor person to understand?

Myself, I often rely on skepticism as better than belief. A statement or claim isn’t an established fact. ‘Nother words, where and what is the proof? 

The great reformers who came after Uncle Joe had a thing in common. From first in 54 to current in 2024, from those we mocked to those we viewed with sympathy, each-every was a committed to-the-core believer and follower of Marxist Leninist Communism. Same currently with Putin. 

It’s not entirely the fault of communism that dictatorship of the people promotes dictators to arise. Any system suffering an accumulation of power will see the powerful unwilling to let go. They hang on. They’ll say circumstance requires it, the people demand it or a deity supports it. 

There is always a god-good very good reason to stay in power. Except George Washington bucked that flow, though his other flaws can be seen as wiping that away.

Hucksters, of course, we pride ourselves on being savvy-wise enough to avoid. “Didn’t catch me! Ha-ha!” But if my experience means a drop I’ve been quite able to convince and hoodwink myself. 

Going along not causing ripples is an excuse, along with lack of energy to deal with the baggage galore. If, in a contest with unreason, which side takes on the greater burden and to no avail? How much time-energy do you want to invest talking to unyielding opponents? Can’t win. Why try? Call it what it is and take the best steps you can.

Red fly the banners ho! A great theme of hopeful progress. Look at that, not at the too real too often red coloration comes from those bleeding underfoot. A popular movie assured, “Ideals are peaceful. Reality is violent.” But, no. Ideals can be hostile. 

On that, I try to moderate myself, not because of cancel fears. Rather, I see little point arousing ire without purpose or judicious intent. Example, I question the big T not because I reject Trans folk. 

Rather, I see a movement erasing, nipping in the bud, so t’ speak, seeking to fix young gays and lesbians. 

Compassion is one source of challenge and check.