communism1 essays

communism1 essays Communism has failed in Europe because of its lack of care for the individual, its corrupt leaders and also because it went against human nature. Two novels that demonstrate this statement are the semi-autobiographical We the Living by Ayn Rand, and Julian Barnes' The Porcupine. According to Ayn Rand, Communists were pitiless. When Kira, the protagonist of the story, begged for help to save her lover's life, the only answer she received from the general was "Why - in the face of the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics- can't one aristocrat die?" (216). Communists say that they want everyone to be equal and have a good life, yet they contradict themselves in that they don't acknowledge each individual, which is the make-up of their so-called "collect." Since individuals didn't matter, people lived poorly. In Maria Petrovna's words, "'These are hard times, God have pity on us, these are hard times'" (27). Communism crushed people's hopes and it also broke them down. " 'We have no future,'" (27) said Simon. Barnes showed how people didn't matter in a Communist society by showing how people were exhausted. "People had been too busy, or too tired, to make love; that was another thing that had broken down...During the last statistical year, the number of live births had been exceeded both by the number of abortions and by the number of deaths" (63). Individual lives just didn't matter. Because people were so unhappy, they did not support the government. To maintain its standing, the government had to make sure that everyone lived in fear. This would decrease the chance of rebellion. In one of his articles, Steven Morewood talks about Gorbachev, a Communist leader. "Gorbachev concedes 'The totalitarian model had relied on dictatorship and violence, and I can see that this was not acceptable to the people'" (33) Neglect of the individual was not Communism's only fault. Corruption among its leaders was also very common. In We the Livin...