âYes, wherever bicycles are broken, or menaced by International Communism, Bicycle Repair Man is ready! Ready to smash the communists, wipe them up, and shove them off the face of the earth.â â Monty Pythonâs Flying Circus
There are times when you write something that you think is important, and you want to get it right. This is one of those times. I hope you find this post worthwhile.
A few weeks ago, a very good friend sent me an article. The article intrigued me, and I began to research the background of the article. What I found was stunning. The article itself is this (LINK), from Time® magazine, you donât have to click â Iâll summarize it below. Timeâ¢, Iâll note, very appropriately has a red border but they havenât added the hammer and sickle yet. Yet.
I found this article disturbing, but it really matched with the research that Iâd done up to this point.  There is a cultural shift of the Left, and the Left is moving ever farther, ever faster left. I wrote about that here (Civil War, Neat Graphs, and Carrie Fisherâs Leg), which is probably what made my friend send the link.
I read Tayari Jonesâ Time® magazine piece. I found it to be an example of the outcome of the most brutal form of programming and child exploitation that Iâve seen recently, though I will admit that I try to shy away from Disney® movies. In short, her parents were Black Nationalists (Her description, not mine.  âBlack Nationalistsâ refers to a group that wants to either repatriate to Africa or to carve out a separate nation for blacks in the United States.) that convinced a five-year-old that Gulf Oil© was responsible for killing black children in Africa so much so that the child, Tayari, would not ride in a car fueled by Gulf Oil® to the zoo. The piece ends with simplicity. All to the Left is joyous and moral. All to the Right is evil death.
Should we celebrate our tolerance and civility as we stanch the wounds of the world and the climate with a poultice of national unity?
Jones wants to further divide us, or destroy those who donât and wonât conform to her (undefined) viewpoints.  Also, the last time the word âpoulticeâ was used out loud was by Granny on the Beverly Hillbillies. But her title says it all, âThereâs nothing virtuous about finding common ground.â
That led me to wonder more about the author â what was going on in her head that led to this article? What are her ultimate goals? Featured prominently in the article was the Soweto Uprising, a 1976 confrontation between black students and the police, which appears in hindsight to be an unplanned 4th Generation Warfare (The Caravan: Warfare by Other Means) offensive. I hit Wikipedia to learn more. Then, there it was, the missing link.
âNo Middle Road,â an essay by Joe Slovo is listed as influential in the communist African National Congress (ANC) at that time.   The original title of the article by Jones, as enshrined in the URL, is telling: âMoral Middle Myth.â Obviously they are connected. Again, from Jones:
I find myself annoyed by the hand-wringing about how we need to find common ground. People ask how might we âmeet in the middle,â as though this represents a safe, neutral and civilized space. This American fetishization of the moral middle is a misguided and dangerous cultural impulse.
Okay. Now you have my attention. We have a person actively preaching division and implied violence whose suppressed essay title echoes an influential essay from 1976. My next question was simple: Who the heck was Joe Slovo?
Joe Slovo was communist, born Yossel Mashel Slovo in Soviet Lithuania who moved to South Africa with his family when he was eight. Slovo was a deeply loyal communist who admired Stalin. He was exiled from South Africa for 27 years and spent that time launching and orchestrating terrorist strikes in South Africa while abroad. His operations included bombings of civilians. Slovo did have some spare time to oversee the murder and execution of people thought to be traitors to the cause, often through putting a tire around their neck, filling it with gasoline, and setting it on fire. The nickname for this practice was ânecklacing.â Now Slovo didnât actually do these things himself, he merely planned them and was in charge of the organization that made them happen. See? His hands are clean.
Slovo was such a leftist, the only thing he on the right of is this picture.
Slovo had to be an influence on Tayari Jones. Understanding the influences can be important, besides, Tayari Jones didnât mention exactly what she wanted done with those she opposes. Maybe the essay she was influenced by would?
I decided to look for it on the Internet, where I can find out what was on TV on NBC® on a Sunday evening in June of 1983. I spent more time than Iâd like to admit spend sifting through Marxist websites, looking for the essay. I went to the second page of Google© results. Exhaustive research, indeed. I even found where Marxists who had previously posted a copy were looking for a copy to post. Itâs like the document had been purposely scrubbed from the web. Odd â once information hits the web, it normally flies free and multiplies. Not this.
I finally found that the essay was included in a book, Southern Africa: The New Politics of Revolution (Penguin/Pelican, 1976). Thatâs the only place I could find it. A seller on Amazon had a copy for less than $8, so I bought it. It took weeks to arrive. It was old â the pages were yellowing. It also looked like a socialistâs mind: it had never been opened.
What had I expected? The usual Marxist language designed to be confusing and cult-like.
Whenever anyone talks like this? They want you to nod and pretend you understand.
No. Slovo was very clear in his writing. Much of what Slovo writes are about conditions and history that are unique to South Africa. And, reconstructing and solving the problems and historical injustices of South Africa, real as they were and are now, is far beyond this post. But Slovo very clearly sets out a battle plan that is being used against the United States right now.
For instance, on page 118, Slovo states:Â âTo be born white means by definition to be born privileged . . . .â I hadnât heard of the concept of âWhite Privilegeâ until 2014 or so, and then it was related back to an essay (White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack) by Peggy McIntosh, who you can read more about here in this excellent essay on Quillette: (LINK).
The important idea is that McIntosh didnât originate this divisive concept â Slovo wrote about it in his 1976 essay.  It may be even older, but this is the earliest reference Iâve found. And Slovo specifically introduced it to open additional divisions in South Africa.
Slovo continues: â. . . the struggle to destroy white supremacy is ultimately bound up with the very destruction of capitalism itself.â In a further parallel with today, Slovo describes the history of struggle for liberation as âThe Resistanceâ as he builds a case that his dreamed-of communist state can only be brought about via violence, which he calls âarmed struggle,â rather than âkilling people I donât agree with, and also kids on my side, if we can get good pictures for the press.â
Slovo clearly expected and desired a war. In the time he lived, Slovo completely misread what happened in the communist takeover in Vietnam and he was thinking that the Vietnamese had won a military victory. They had not. The North Vietnamese and Viet Cong had been defeated in almost every engagement. The North Vietnamese won because they demoralized the United States and made the politicians feel the war was unwinnable â clearly a Fourth Generation warfare victory.
Ultimately the ANC realized, however dimly, that the deaths of black South Africans during the Soweto Uprising was their victory. They won by appearing to be the victims. And they won by creating a coalition of victims who would never feel that they could never be repaid for their pain â no reparations would ever be acceptable.
Page 205 contains the telling sentence: âThe struggle can no longer be centered on pleas for civil rights or for reforms within the framework of white dominance; it is a struggle for peopleâs power, in which mass ferment and the growing importance of the armed factor go hand in hand.â Slovo worked to use the ethnic divisions in the country to create a situation where raw power would end up in the hands of the communists.
There we have it: the end goal is not rights, or prosperity, or freedom, or liberty. The end goal is naked power.
Back to the United States, we find that could never happen here:
Nothing you have is yours. Let me be clear: Nothing you have is yours. Also, Let me be see through: Reparations are not donations, because we are not your charity, tax write off, or good deed for the day. You are living off of stolen resources, stolen land, exploited labor, appropriated culture and the murder of our people. Nothing you have is yours.
Reparations for us are not only necessary because we are economically harmed, exploited and stolen from â while the violence against us is never acknowledged â but because in order for us to create and move work for Black liberation, it requires resources and MONEY. We live in a white supremacist capitalist world, so ainât no spinning webs of lies around âmoney isnât the answer.â It is because money and exploitation and power are interconnected concepts of violence. Yâall spent hundreds of years selling, mutilating, raping and beating our bodies and labor but you think money doesnât matter to our freedom and liberation? Cute. Write me a check for this shade because it comes with 400 years of trauma.
We need housing, transportation, food, clothes, free space for meetings and work space; we need laptops, cell phones, encrypted systems for communication, solar power and LAND. Stop playing. Yâall really thought pulling up to the protest in your Hyundai was gonna be enough? Nah. You have to give us everything we need and more, because even if it means you go without â it doesnât matter because thatâs how we been living for 400+ years. Reparations will never be negotiable. So if youâre not willing to talk money, you are not here for #BlackLivesMatter as a movement or for us as individuals.
(H/T Libertyâs Torch (LINK)) Original that I tracked down is wearyourvoicemag.com.
I thought this quote was a parody until I found it at the website it was originally posted on. It appears that sheâs serious.  Thatâs from Ashleigh Shackelford, who seems really nice when talking to people that support her, as that passage above was a shout-out to her white supporters. I left her spelling, emphasis, and capitalization intact. Ms. Shackelford is the product of the same mentality of Marxist Joe Slovo and (Iâm assuming) Marxist Tayari Jones.
As I wrote about earlier (Senecaâs Cliff and You), itâs far easier to destroy something than to make something. In our culture, today, we actively have Marxists attempting to undermine the fabric of our society using a variety of weapons, and especially trying to create a majority coalition of disaffected people to destabilize society to create, in effect, an American version of apartheid to fight. This is one reason that illegal immigration is actively supported â it brings in people entirely unrelated to the current society. Outside of the future leftist votes, this group is used to help create additional fragmentation in the country.
Heâs going to have to work awfully hard.
One thing weâve seen â when this tactic works, ending it is difficult â look at the Protestants and Catholics in Ireland.  Once before in the comments on this blog people brought up the Irish Troubles and people started arguing about who was responsible in the comments. On this blog. In 2018.
I was certain that when the Soviet Union fell, that the world was safe. In my mind, it should have been clear from the horrors of Cambodia, to the people of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe winning their own freedom from oppression that the subject was closed. Even if people couldnât see that communism was evil, at least they could see that it didnât work, right?
No. Like Jason or Michael Myers communism keeps coming back. It appears that, like Freddy Kruger, communism will keep going as long as people like Slovo, Jones, and Shackelford will fight and kill (even kill people on their own side) for power. But only as long as there are people stupid enough to believe them.
Thankfully thereâs no one like that in the United States.
Slovo grave picture:Â Andrew Hall [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], from Wikimedia Commons
Keep fighting for the economic pie that used to be. Once you win all that will be left are a few crumbs. How does no one feel that arm up their ass, as they are being used as puppets by the bankers? Perhaps they are just stretched out too much from their head being up there. Great thing about fighting commies-they already self identified by political correctness. Thank you, Sir, for the deeper historical context. Always welcome and far too rare.
You know, the bankers feel like they’re in control, until the strong man sends the troops to round ’em up. Then they learn that lead is sometimes more powerful than gold.
Yes. At play are the two ancient philosophies battling. One espouses the Golden Rule, and one espouses Gun Control.
The Golden Rule: He who has the gold makes the rules.
Gun Control: He who has the gun is in control.
Gun Control is stronger than the Golden Rule. For a time, those with the gold can buy those with the guns. But the damnable fellows with the guns don’t stay bought, because proper control of one’s firearm makes it so easy to tell the people with the gold who they are going to give it to.
Well said.
Great article. Thank you. It is scary to think about our future.
It is, but when we look at it with our heads up, our hearts pure, and our eyes seeing the truth, we can make amazing things happen.
The lashing back against the far left has already started sooner than I thought it would. Now this is just a tiny little thing, it seems inconsequential, and it may be. I don’t think so though. The down vs. upvotes are remarkable to me and I think we wouldn’t have seen that even a year ago. Sure it’s a silly ad by a company practicing insanely stupid marketing practices (insult our customers!), but it also seems to be a massive repudiation of one of the core tenants of the left – to make men evil. To bring about communism you need to break up society, and to do that you need to break down their men. Gilette has been deleting comments all day and they still can’t stop the influx of incensed people, many of them women.
These communists might want to take a step back and look at what’s going on, or they’re going to be caught with their pants down (which is good for or side). They went from incrementalism, which was working, to going too fast and too far – and now a lot of sleeping people have woken up. The anger is palpable, and it’s just starting, I believe.
Stupid video: https://youtu.be/koPmuEyP3a0
I agree. They spiked the football too soon, assuming they could bluff their way to victory. Probably the biggest mistake they have made, turning the water temperature on the frog up just a little too soon.
I guess they have no choice but to try it here. can’t very well try to pull this crap in Romania now can they?
No, they can’t. Nor Poland. Nor Hungary . . . and I could keep going . . .
I liked the double-entendre as to the grave and marker. Great article.
Thank you! I’d like to say it was fun to write. But it was good to finish writing (it had been in my head since early November).
Trump’s presidency is the perfect opportunity or manufactured “crisis” to blanket the collective minds of the citizens of the US with distracting circus to move the national conscious further and further to the Left. It is so Machiavelli that they are actually using Putin as the Bogey man. Who could have anticipated this?
When I was a younger man (is it OK to say man?), I believed in our institutions and even gave the media a break here and there. My faith is now completely shattered. Brennan had Top Secret clearance? Really?
Obama was elected President. A man with no experience and a obfuscated background. No real press vetting took place. From that time forward, the press took off their masks. Now it is completely normal to have views like those of Tayari Jones. Such views are no longer just found in far left publications, they are the norm. Look how they are parading Ocasio-Cortez around.
Being the son of parents who fled communism, nothing will ever change my mind. I am reminded of it every day, 90 miles away.
The only good communist is a dead one. They tookmy father’s life. While he survived 5 years of hell and torture in Cuban jails and lived until last year, I have come to realize that they killed him in another way. And, they killed my grandfather’s legacy, a man who came from Spain as a poor child, a man who spent his entire life working to pass the fruits of his labor to his children.
I am most saddened today because there are very few people who are calling it what it is. The press have actually put a positive spin on the FBI pulling an investigation out of their arses to go after Trump because he fired an unamerican traitor Comey. The Russian collusion lie has bee pushed so much that there is no need for any evidence anymore. Evenpeople I know who I thought had half a brain believe it.
When 90 percent of the press push lies 24/7/365, is there anything we can do anymore? They just chip away and away slowly convincing and distorting.
Only another Reagan can save us.
Your comment is why I write. Thank you so very much.
Actual Communists?
Srsly??
You mean like Evita Guevara-Castro?
There’s an app for that:
https://i.imgur.com/W1E398r.jpg
I thought Google Play banned that one?
I totally agree with everything you say about today’s neoliberals. (I personally think they are the unwitting muscle for the globalist .1%ers, but I’m still working on proof).
The problem is…..the “conservative” camp hasn’t cornered the market on virtue. The neo-cons eternal war, mucking about in the middle east, Wall Street’s capture and manipulations of the market, etc., are just as much a danger to liberty, privacy, and (real, honest) democracy as are the neo-liberals. How can we tell someone to vote republican when many of the republican inner sanctum are just as corrupt and toxic as are the Feinsteins and the Pelosis of the world?
Steven – very valid points. In fact, often the GOPestablishment could be seen as the “Me Too, But Not As Much” party. The dangerous divide is that the average leftie voter is moving left, the average rightie voter is staying still, and common ground is gone. Mittens and Pelosi, I’m sure, are best of buds.