Wanna Socialism without Terror
There is a sea of difference in the circumstances in which the early utopian or scientific socialist ‘seers’ lived, preached and practiced and the present space age in which all elements of both progress and reaction are developed to an unprecedented degree. At that time “there were no railways, no motor cars, no electricity generation and no large scale steel industry. Radio had not yet been invented.” The classes and class struggles talked of in the Marxian times are no longer relevant or acceptable this day when so many other social groupings overlap against the mostly economic classification envisaged in those times. Capitalism did not boil down to the two-class model but has given rise to more variegated classifications and developments. So what is the meaning in sticking to the outworn phrases and irrelevant ideals of those times? This is the question often posed by angry and educated youth who are not favourably disposed to Socialism. We do recognize the elements of truth in their scornful contentions but at the same time point out that there are also some things – some priniciples, some social customs and some ethics which are viewed or desired to be constants for any meaningful social progress. Most of the people even today are theists, adhering to sundry religions and accept the sermons from their preachers about the age-old ethical and religious ‘good’s. Likewise the ideal of individuals composing a society, cutting across the barriers of caste, status, class and even religion, rising above ‘self’ and working for the social good in a system mainly of socialized means of production, carefully planned and efficiently operated for equitable distribution resulting ultimately in the individuals’ all-round development, also has its virtue of constancy. It has also a quite modern ring and is certainly better than the greedy, callous and ruthless mindset generated by untrammelled capitalism to which the present globalizaiton processes are degenerating. However, the means to be followed by the change-desiring sections and classes of people have also to be in consonance with the high ideals and they should take cognizance of the changing needs and circumstances of the people, shunnig from mindless violence, especially indiscriminate terrorism, in their just struggles for social transformation. In short, we need a socialism without terror and with a human face, and not the naked gods of Howard Fast or terror molochs of Ayodhya or Bombay communal fanatics either §§§
