My communism

It was that Habia una vez when we had some sort of but certainly functional state. Many will say that she decently performed basic functions and still left her citizens, with some major exceptions, enough space to not feel... well, this is how we feel now. Eseferyot was doing a job for which she was paid.

What bothered us pro-Western youth, and we were more or less like that, was the "E" at the beginning. We never understood that socialism. As the imposition of some dogma, collectivism, it smelled a lot like Cuba, Solzhenitsyn's gulags and mustachioed majors. This does not mean that we were big fans of capitalism as such and that we did not see its bad sides. On the contrary. Our views on many things, practically all things outside the economy itself, were, in today's vocabulary, left-wing and very left-wing. Almost socialist. The only thing is that we called them liberal then. And we would be mortally offended if someone called us socialists or, God forbid, communists. Anti-clericalism, cosmopolitanism, feminism, human and minority first, anti-militarism, creative freedom were an unquestionable and fundamental part of our worldview.

At the same time, we knew that the free market, private ownership and private initiative with as little state interference as possible gives better results when it comes to money. Simply, countries with such a system were richer than those with some other systems. So, if you asked us then whether we are for socialism or capitalism, we would answer you with the words of the young activist Maria from The mystery of the organism Dušan Makavejev, of course in the spectacular interpretation of Milena Dravić - "Please, these are false dilemmas".

However, we, young liberals, made a very clear difference regarding certain issues within the leftist view of things. On the one hand were social justice, fair distribution and concern for vulnerable groups. On the other hand, there were the urges of state structures to oppress and mistreat individuals, manage all aspects of life and steal the honestly earned money from some and pass it on to others, and most often to themselves. In short, the first was called social-democracy, socialism, and sometimes communism in the original meaning of the word commune, and the second was statism, a blind infatuation with the state and an infantile expectation that the people who make up that state will solve all problems. Maybe they will, but their own. So - Sweden vs. USSR.

I, on the other hand, with apologies for the personal example, was among those who believed that the aforementioned statism, based on Marxist philosophy, and Western European-style liberalism, based on the free market and private property, were two irreconcilable antipodes. But at the same time, the commune and capitalism are absolutely compatible, natural allies. After all, the word commune comes from Latin How – together and murine - to build and the theory says that it is "an organized solidary group of people connected by common interests".

So, my communism is when Grandpa Viti takes over the shop on forty-sixth, and they also force him to continue coming to it as a worker, and he joins forces with his neighbors, artisans from the area, and together, at their own expense, they build a kindergarten for children in Hajduk Veljkova Street. That's Lewis Mumford, carried for months in a soldier's bag, when I look at him on guard duty and hear about the power of a commune of free people to make society more just and successful despite the state that would control and rob it on the one hand and the blind forces of the market on the other. That one The myth of the machine, it's an awfully serious book about the state mechanisms that keep people oppressed and powerless, and Mumford remains one of my favorite authors even though he was one of the harshest critics of capitalism, its wild versions, of course. It's Mumford Rage against the machine among writers, and every honest liberal can appreciate that, of course... Yes, perhaps most of all, my communism is when I defend the commune from communists and newly minted Marxists, because maybe you didn't know, they care about people, they attack the state.

With capitalism it is simpler. Capitalism is when you are left alone to work, you sell what you made on the free market and pay part of the earnings to the state to do some joint work. Capitalism to me is when peasants harassed by bandits give up waiting for the state and its law enforcement agencies to rescue them, and hire seven private security experts, Jules Brynner, Bronson, Steve McQueen and company, to solve their problem. Capitalism to me is when they never come, armed with paragraphs and/or machine guns, to rob you of what you have honestly earned thanks to your work, your intelligence, your talent or your courage and take it for themselves or share it with someone else, without asking your permission. That absence is my capitalism.