The Threat of Communism

Communism (from Latin communis - common, universal) is a revolutionary socialist movement to create a classless, moneyless, and stateless social order structured upon common ownership of the means of production, as well as a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of this social order.[1] This movement, in its Marxist–Leninist interpretations, significantly influenced the history of the 20th century, which saw intense rivalry between the "socialist world" (socialist states ruled by communist parties) and the "western world" (countries with capitalist economies).
To many people today, "communism" is just an old bugaboo -- something crazy people used to fear some 50 years ago. Crazy people like Joe McCarthy. Or crazy people like John Nash in the movie Beautiful Mind. In that movie, Nash's insanity was manifested in the belief that communists were spying on him. (The real-life Nash's schizophrenic hallucinations were of the more garden variety "space alien" type.) Hollywood has given us several films about the bad old days of the Cold War, from The Front and The Way We Were to The Majestic, and Good Night, And Good Luck.

You get the idea: communism was not the heavy; anti-communism was. Anti-communism was a form of insanity, gripping an entire nation and leading us to the very brink of nuclear annihilation.

So let us review. Let us examine the myths and realities of communism and anti-communism, and see if our fear really was inordinate. Were we fighting a phantom menace? Was the only thing we had to fear our own fear? Let's start at the beginning.

Myth: The Communist ideal is quite innocent, for example, "to each according to his needs, from each according to his abilities."

Fact: "The theory of the Communists may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property. ... Abolition of the family! ... Communism abolishes eternal truths, it abolishes all religion, and all morality ... this cannot be