What is Marxism?

[SetFree]

I well understand what Marxism is, and its theories.

But do YOU as a Christian know? And do you realize WHY you and your children should know?

 

[SetFree]

I'm surprised no one has commented on this yet.

Marxism supposedly originated from the theories of Karl Marx, a German journalist, economist, philosopher, who lived in 1800's. The Communist Manifesto pamphlet and Das Kapital were his main thesis. Marx was a materialist. His Das Kapital is a work against the ideas of capitalism.

Regardless of where one lives today, we all have been bombarded with Marxist ideals, it has been that intrusive in people's lives, and unknowingly with most. This is why it is important to understand what Marxist-Communism is about.

If I could sum up what Marxist-Communism is, using the Biblical sense, I would describe it as Satan's master world-plan to bring in his future ten horns, seven heads, and ten crowns beast kingdom at the end of this present world. It is atheistic, opposes ownership of property (thus anti-capitalist), is against the idea of the family, has collectivism as one of its main systems, is murderous in nature, and is revolutionary with the goal of overthrowing all governments and rulers.

What took me the longest time to understand about Marxist-Communism, is that it has been initially established by wealthy westerners. Trotsky who helped foment the 1917 Russian revolution left New York city with $10,000 in his possession, and he had no job at the time. He was stopped by the police in Nova Scotia on his way to Moscow, and that's how the money was found on him. The powers in London told Nova Scotia to let him go. Lenin also left Switzerland with funds for the Russia revolution. Georgetown University history professor Carrol Quigley revealed British Socialists often worked with Communism, and had no problem doing so. The creation of the United Nations organization had as its ultimate goal the establishment of a "one world government". And its charter was designed so Communist nations like Russia or China could veto anything they didn't agree to.

Sixteen year ex-FBI agent Cleon Skousen in his 1958 book The Naked Communist, exposed 45 strategic points that the Soviet Communists have for taking over the United States. A simple read through those points reveals many of them having been fulfilled, with some of them in the works even still today. His book ought to be a must read in all American schools.

 

[jswauto]

Yes, we see it! Without the Lord, the outcome is obvious!
When we look at Dan 2:

31Thou, O king, sawest, and behold a great image. This great image, whose brightness was excellent, stood before thee; and the form thereof was terrible. 32This image's head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass, 33His legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay.

We can see that the feet of iron and clay are the nations today: a mixture of democracies (clay) and dictatorships (iron).

Marxism and Religion​

“Religion is the opium of the masses” is one of Marx’s most quoted phrases. However, the full quote is almost always neglected, which explains the position of Marxism far more adequately. Marx explains that religion fills the soulless void found in class society, and, in a sense, even indicates the need to protest against the injustice of this world. However, by seeking mystical and otherworldly explanations and solutions to the injustices of the real world, it plays the key ideological role in maintaining class society.

Marxism is about achieving the full realisation of humanity’s powers, the unfolding of our nature without diversion into obscurantist fetishism, be that the fetish for money or for religious symbols. But we can only cast aside these illusions when we directly control our fate, and to do that we need to put the productive forces of society under social control. In other words, we need socialism and a revolution. Religion cannot be overcome by recourse to pure, rational arguments; we must instead attack its social foundation.

Marxists are in favour of religious freedom and do not set up barriers to religious workers joining in the struggle for socialism. However, we are irreconcilable atheists and materialists in our own world outlook, and we are in favour of the radical separation between religion and the state.

 

[jswauto]

One little part of their plan:

It's Critical if you wish to promote Racism, Anarchy, Repression, Communism and become part of Antifa. It's a major Marxist Tennant

Critical race theory is a modern approach to social change, developed from the broader critical theory, which developed out of Marxism. Critical race theory (CRT) approaches issues such as justice, racism, and inequality, with a specific intent of reforming or reshaping society. In practice, this is applied almost exclusively to the United States. Critical race theory is grounded in several key assumptions. Among these are the following:

• American government, law, culture, and society are inherently and inescapably racist.
• Everyone, even those without racist views, perpetuates racism by supporting those structures.
• The personal perception of the oppressed—their “narrative”—outweighs the actions or intents of others.
• Oppressed groups will never overcome disadvantages until the racist structures are replaced.
• Oppressor race or class groups never change out of altruism; they only change for self-benefit.
• Application of laws and fundamental rights should be different based on the race or class group of the individual(s) involved.

In short, critical race theory presupposes that everything about American society is thoroughly racist, and minority groups will never be equal until American society is entirely reformed. This position is extremely controversial, even in secular circles. Critical race theory is often posed as a solution to white supremacy or white nationalism. Yet, in practice, it essentially does nothing other than inverting the oppressed and oppressor groups.

From a political standpoint, critical race theory closely aligns with concepts such as communism, Marxism, nationalism, progressivism, intersectionality, and the modern version of social justice. Strictly speaking, the Bible neither commands nor forbids Christians regarding specific political parties or philosophies. However, believers are obligated to reject any aspect of a philosophy that conflicts with biblical ideals. Critical race theory is deeply rooted in worldviews that are entirely incompatible with the Bible.

Spiritually, some have attempted to apply critical race theory principles to Christianity. This even includes suggestions that the Christian church must adopt the critical race theory approach to society, or else it is not really preaching the gospel. In applying critical race theory to faith, some have gone even further, suggesting that “whiteness,” defined in a unique sense, is a type of sin and incompatible with salvation. In other words, critical race theory implies that those in certain ethnic/social economic groups must “repent” of such status, above and beyond other sins, in order to be truly Christian. Less inflammatory uses of critical race theory echo older claims that biblical faith is often presented as a “white man’s religion,” or that Christianity ought to follow a progressive theology, especially with respect to gender and sexuality.

While not necessarily embracing critical race theory, some Christian groups have embraced the modern approach to social justice. This raises the concern that non-biblical preferences will crowd out legitimate commands from Scripture. While critical race theory is not identical to social justice, the two philosophies are closely linked in modern American culture. Christian organizations that speak about social justice should be cautious about the terms and assumptions those discussions entail.

So far as it applies to faith, Christianity, or spirituality, there is no truth whatsoever to critical race theory. This is not to say that self-labeled Christians have never perpetrated racism. Nor does it mean every Christian in America is innocent of overlooking suffering people. It certainly does not mean that believers in the United States have no need to self-examine or seek change.

Critical race theory entirely violates a biblical worldview, however, by suggesting that people are essentially defined by their race or class, rather than by their individual acts and attitudes (Jeremiah 31:31–34; Revelation 20:11–13). Critical race theory incorrectly emphasizes intersectional categories such as gender, race, sexual preference, and economic status above and beyond a person’s own choices and responsibilities (Galatians 3:28). Critical race theory also conflicts with a biblical approach to objective, absolute truth. In no small part, this includes suggesting that an “oppressed” person’s feelings matter more than what the “oppressor” has actually done or intended (1 Corinthians 4:4; 10:29).

As applied to spiritual matters, critical race theory effectively replaces an individual, personal relationship with God with a tribalistic, ethnocentric, collectivistic system. It also greatly overemphasizes material and social concepts to the detriment—or even the exclusion—of the true gospel. When and where prejudices are found in the church, they should be addressed according to sound doctrine, not according to an inherently unbiblical approach such as critical race theory.

 

[Frankj]

Most people mix up Marxism and Communism which is easy to do but not exactly correct.

Communism already existed as a political movement prior to Marx getting involved with it (along with Engels) Marx was mostly an 'Ivory Tower' type of academic who wrote social and political theory and Engles was the more socially active of the two being involved in various social and political movements of the time. I've always been of the belief that it was Engles who was actually responsible for the Communist Manifesto (people should read that critically and compare it to today's American politics) and Got Marx to sign off on it, but others will disagree about that.

FWIW, in either Marxism or Communism (Maoist or Marxist) the individual is seen as no more than a functionary of the collective State in which they exist, and both oppose religion because they do not recognize anything higher than the collective of the State as a supreme organism in itself.

Marxism fails because it does not recognize human nature as the driving force behind all human action and believes the individual is controlled instead by outside social forces acting on him, social forces which can be directed to create a greater and more equal society with everyone just contributing their work selflessly for the common good and without a socioeconomic hierarchy involved.

That is something that has never and most likely never will work, not before the return of Christ at least and I doubt that it will be a Marxist society that he brings with him when he returns.

The way I see it.

 

[jswauto]

Here's another institution for communist take-over:​

What do we really mean by ‘diversity, equity and inclusion’?​

With rapidity and stealth, diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) ideology has come to replace the classical liberal values of merit, fairness and equality (MFE) in the academy, professional organizations, media, government and large technology companies. DEI bureaucracies have mushroomed. Many operate behind the scenes with ambiguous DEI definitions, goals and policies.

This is a significant cultural and ideological revolution, one that has been accomplished with almost no debate or operationalization of terminology. Who originated DEI? Why DEI and not another set of laudable values? Does “equity” refer to opportunity or result? How do those of mixed race fit in diversity assessments? Is the goal of racial representation proportionate to that of the population, the history of marginalization, or something else? DEI terms are defined so obtusely that they can refer to a spectrum of policies from mere platitudes to radical agendas including litmus tests and racial quotas.

In its most radical forms, DEI is derivative of neo-Marxist identitarian ideologies that attribute virtually all average group differences — from arrest rates to medical school admissions — to systemic discrimination. However, average group differences in outcomes can reflect a variety of factors (see Jared Diamond’s “Guns, Germs and Steel”). The unexamined acceptance of DEI, however defined, is surprising in a free society where critics are encouraged to challenge and debate significant social changes. The time for a national debate over the conflicting values of DEI and MFE is long overdue.

For example, one-fifth of the advertisements for higher education faculty jobs (and more for prestigious posts) require applicants to write statements of allegiance to DEI. Academic employment often depends on DEI relevant presentations at scholarly conferences and publications in scholarly journals. Increasingly, scholars are required to explain in advance how their research supports DEI. Such litmus tests are traditionally associated with totalitarian regimes and, in America, with McCarthyism. We all know how well those turned out.

Professional organizations such as the American Psychological Association, the American Bar Association, and even the more moderate American Political Science Association are adopting DEI initiatives, embracing empirically contested concepts such as implicit bias and endorsing legally questionable hiring and admissions policies that utilize de facto racial quotas.


In the academy, DEI and other identitarian orthodoxies are often mandated to be taught in student orientations and required courses, and enforced by campus DEI bureaucrats who now outnumber history faculty. By categorizing virtually any criticism as “prejudiced,” DEI bureaucracies can chill free speech and have empowered some college presidents to slander their critics as bigots and then terminate them. Program renewals for academic departments, and thus continued employment for professors and graduate students, are increasingly tied to embracing DEI rhetoric and goals.

DEI in many respects is a revolutionary ideology. But it is winning. This is in part due to fear of ostracism, censorship or termination — but also because you can’t beat something with nothing.

Enter University of Chicago Professor Dorian Abbot’s DEI alternative, merit, fairness, and equality (MFE), which is consistent with traditional Enlightenment and scientific values. Under MFE, academic decisions are based primarily on academic merit, well validated standardized test scores, grades and, for faculty, publication and teaching records. Individuals are primarily evaluated on their achievements, not by their group identities. This respects individual dignity and promotes the primary mission of research in higher education: the production of knowledge.

MFE also accords with public opinion. The Pew Research Center found that more than 90 percent of Americans want high school grades to influence college admissions and more than 80 percent want standardized testing to play a role. Seventy-five percent of Americans believe that gender, race or ethnicity should not factor into educational admissions decisions. As Kenny Xu points out in “An Inconvenient Minority: The Attack on Asian American Excellence and the Fight for Meritocracy,” MFE would actually increase demographic diversity by ending the unfair quotas against Asians at elite schools. One study found that at Harvard an Asian American applicant with a 25 percent chance of admission would have a 35 percent chance of admission if Caucasion, a 75 percent chance if Hispanic, and 95 percent if Black.

But the powerful avoid debating their critics. Just as Alabama segregationist governor George Wallace never debated Martin Luther King, DEI backers with institutional power show no enthusiasm for defending their ideas in real debates. Without vigorous open and civil debate, DEI bureaucracies will continue to impose doctrinal training programs, litmus tests, censorship and discrimination. Unless this is challenged, we risk entering a new era of institutionalized McCarthyism.

 

[jswauto]

45 Communist goals for America​

It was Jan. 10, 1963, that Congressman Albert S. Herlong. Jr. from Florida read the list of 45 Communist goals for America into the Congressional Record. The purpose of him reading this was to gain insight into liberal elite ideas and strategies for America that sound awfully familiar today.

The list is attributed to Cleon Skousen, researcher and author of "The Naked Communist."

On Wednesday's episode of "Pat Gray Unleashed," Pat and producer Keith revisited Cleon Skousen's book and compared it to the current state of affairs in America and to the Democratic Party's platform.

Do any of these hit close to home?

Here's the list:

1. U.S. should accept coexistence as the only alternative to atomic war.
2. U.S. should be willing to capitulate in preference to engaging in atomic war.

These encapsulate the Kennan Doctrine, which advocated for the "containment" of communism. Establishment figures supporting the amoral containment policy at least implicitly worked with the communists in scaring the wits out of the American people concerning atomic war.

3. Develop the illusion that total disarmament by the U.S. would be a demonstration of "moral strength."

The nuclear freeze advocates supported a freeze on

4. Permit free trade between all nations regardless of Communist affiliation and regardless of whether or not items could be used for war.

5. Extend long-term loans to Russia and Soviet satellites.

6. Provide American aid to all nations regardless of Communist domination.

7. Grant recognition of Red China and admission of Red China to the U.N.

8. Set up East and West Germany as separate states in spite of Khrushchev's promise in 1955 to settle the Germany question by free elections under supervision of the U.N.

9. Prolong the conferences to ban atomic tests because the U.S. has agreed to suspend tests as long as negotiations are in progress.

10. Allow all Soviet satellites individual representation in the U.N.

11. Promote the U.N. as the only hope for mankind. If its charter is rewritten, demand that it be set up as a one-world government with its own independent armed forces.

There are still American intellectuals, and elected members of Congress, who dream of an eventual one world government and who view the U.N., founded by communists such as Alger Hiss, the first secretary-general, as the instrument to bring this about.

World government was also the dream of Adolf Hitler and J.V. Stalin. World government was the dream of Osama bin Laden and the 9/11 hijackers.

12. Resist any attempt to outlaw the Communist Party.

13. Do away with loyalty oaths.

14. Continue giving Russia access to the U.S. Patent Office.

While the idea of banning any political party runs contrary to notions of American freedom and liberty, notions that are the exact opposite of those held by the left-wing communists themselves, nevertheless these goals sought to undermine the constitutional obligation of Congress to investigate subversion. The weakening of our government’s ability to conduct such investigations led to the attack of 9/11.

It is entirely proper and appropriate for our government to expect employees, paid by the American taxpayer, to take an oath of loyalty.

15. Capture one or both of the political parties in the U.S.

In his book "Reagan’s War," Peter Schweizer demonstrates the astonishing degree to which communists and communist sympathizers have penetrated the Democratic Party. In his book, Schweizer writes about the presidential election of 1979.

16. Use technical decisions of the courts to weaken basic American institutions, by claiming their activities violate civil rights.

This strategy goes back to the founding of the American Civil Liberties Union by Fabian Socialists Roger Baldwin and John Dewey and Communists William Z. Foster and Elizabeth Gurley Flynn among others.

17. Get control of the schools. Use them as transmission belts for Socialism and current Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers associations. Put the party line in textbooks.

18. Gain control of all student newspapers.

19. Use student riots to foment public protests against programs or organizations that are under Communist attack.

The success of these goals, from a communist perspective, is obvious. Is there any doubt this is so?

20. Infiltrate the press. Get control of book review assignments, editorial writing, policy-making positions.

21. Gain control of key positions in radio, TV & motion pictures.

22. Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all form of artistic expression. An American Communist cell was told to "eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings," substituting shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms.

23. Control art critics and directors of art museums. " Our plan is to promote ugliness, repulsive, meaningless art."

24.Eliminate all laws governing obscenity by calling them "censorship" and a violation of free speech and free press.

25. Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity in books, magazines, motion pictures, radio and TV.

26. Present homosexuality, degeneracy and promiscuity as "normal, natural and healthy."

This is the Gramscian agenda of the "long march through the institutions" spelled out explicitly: gradual takeover of the "means of communication" and then using those vehicles to debauch the culture and weaken the will of the individual to resist.

Today those few who still have the courage to advocate public morality are denounced and viciously attacked. Most Americans are entirely unwitting regarding the motives behind this agenda.

27. Infiltrate the churches and replace revealed religion with "social" religion. Discredit the Bible and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity, which does not need a "religious crutch."

This has been largely accomplished through the communist infiltration of the National Council of Churches, Conservative and Reform Judaism, and the Catholic seminaries.

28. Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the grounds that it violates the principle of "separation of church and state"

Replacing belief in the creator with belief in the earthly man-controlled State.

29. Discredit the American Constitution by calling it inadequate, old fashioned, out of step with modern needs, a hindrance to cooperation between nations on a worldwide basis.

And replace our nation of "laws, not men" with royal decree emanating from appointed judges and executive orders. Replace elected officials with bureaucrats.

30. Discredit the American founding fathers. Present them as selfish aristocrats who had no concern for the "common man."

31. Belittle all forms of American culture and discourage the teaching of American history on the ground that it was only a minor part of "the big picture." Give more emphasis to Russian history since the Communists took over.

Obliterating the American past, with its antecedents in principles of freedom, liberty and private ownership is a major goal of the communists then and now.

32. Support any socialist movement to give centralized control over any part of the culture – education, social agencies, welfare programs, mental health clinics, etc.

Public ownership of the means of production, the core principle of totalitarianism.

33. Eliminate all laws or procedures which interfere with the operation of the Communist apparatus.

34. Eliminate the House Committee on Un-American Activities.

35. Discredit and eventually dismantle the FBI.

36. Infiltrate and gain control of more unions.

37. Infiltrate and gain control of big business.

Turn America into a socialist police state.

38. Transfer some of the powers of arrest from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand or treat.

The Soviets used to send "social misfits" and those deemed politically incorrect to massive mental institutions called gulags. The Red Chinese call them

39. Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose communist goals.

Psychiatry remains a bulwark of the communist agenda of fostering self-criticism and docility.

40. Discredit the family as an institution. Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce.

Done! The sovereign family is the single most powerful obstacle to authoritarian control.

41. Emphasize the need to raise children away from the negative influence of parents. Attribute prejudices, mental blocks and retarding of children to suppressive influence of parents.

Outcome-based education, values clarification or whatever they’re calling it this year.

42. Create the impression that violence and insurrection are legitimate aspects of the American tradition; that students and special interest groups should rise up and make a "united force" to solve economic, political or social problems.

This describes the dialectical fostering of group consciousness and conflict, which furthers the interests of authoritarianism.

43. Overthrow all colonial governments before native populations are ready for self-government.

The results of this successful campaign are increasingly obvious in the world today.

44. Internationalize the Panama Canal.

45. Repeal the Connally Reservation so the U.S. cannot prevent the World Court from seizing jurisdiction over domestic problems. Give the World Court jurisdiction over domestic problems. Give the World Court jurisdiction over nations and individuals alike.

 

[jswauto]

Most people mix up Marxism and Communism which is easy to do but not exactly correct.

Communism already existed as a political movement prior to Marx getting involved with it (along with Engels) Marx was mostly an 'Ivory Tower' type of academic who wrote social and political theory and Engles was the more socially active of the two being involved in various social and political movements of the time. I've always been of the belief that it was Engles who was actually responsible for the Communist Manifesto (people should read that critically and compare it to today's American politics) and Got Marx to sign off on it, but others will disagree about that.

FWIW, in either Marxism or Communism (Maoist or Marxist) the individual is seen as no more than a functionary of the collective State in which they exist, and both oppose religion because they do not recognize anything higher than the collective of the State as a supreme organism in itself.

Marxism fails because it does not recognize human nature as the driving force behind all human action and believes the individual is controlled instead by outside social forces acting on him, social forces which can be directed to create a greater and more equal society with everyone just contributing their work selflessly for the common good and without a socioeconomic hierarchy involved.

That is something that has never and most likely never will work, not before the return of Christ at least and I doubt that it will be a Marxist society that he brings with him when he returns.

The way I see it.

You failed to explain the differences between Marxism and Communism, didn't you?

 

[jswauto]

Remember this great Communist take-over plot:

ESG By Any Other Name Would Smell Just As Bad​

The New York Post led an article last week with the headline “Texas yanks $8.5B from Larry Fink’s BlackRockBLK +1.1% in ‘massive blow against the scam of ESG’”. On the same day, Executive Director of Consumers Research Will Hild tweeted that BlackRock "was simultaneously trying to destroy the domestic oil and gas industry while managing funds that depended on royalties derived from that very same industry. A more flagrant violation of fiduciary duty is difficult to imagine.”

Mr. Fink is CEO of BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager with over $10 trillion under management. He is the man most responsible for making “environmental, social and governance” criteria the ruling ideology astride the investment world. A “flagrant violation of fiduciary duty” is a serious charge on any financial advisor. That is why Mr. Fink said last June that he didn’t want to use the politicized term “ESG” anymore. A recent Bloomberg article notes that the term is fast becoming a “loathed monicker.”

For Larry Fink, who forecast in late 2018 at a New York TimesNYT +1% conference that “the demand for ESG is going to transform all investing…”, it is not ESG these days, it is “transition investing”. Avoiding the loathed monicker, BlackRock is all about investing in “infrastructure” that “will help speed the transition from fossil fuels.”

The ESG Colossus Stumbles

ESG investments have grown rapidly over the past decade, and the amount of professionally managed portfolios that have integrated key elements of ESG or “sustainable” criteria exceeded $17.5 trillion globally in 2020 by some estimates. According to leading accounting firm PWCPWC +0.8%, global assets under management in 2021 totaled $127.5 trillion, of which $18.4 trillion or just under 15% were described as ESG funds. By 2026, the upbeat assessment by PWC expects ESG funds to constitute 21.5% of global assets under management. In 2021, Bloomberg came out with even more bullish forecasts, suggesting that global ESG assets are on track to exceed $53 trillion by 2025, representing more than a third of the $140.5 trillion in projected total assets under management. Commitments from large institutional investors and regulatory pressures were expected to drive this strong growth in “sustainable” investing.
The past two years have not been kind to the ESG cause. This has been a result of a combination of factors including the boomeranging impact of the Western sanctions on Russia on energy security, the collapse of “clean” energy stocks, and the widespread backlash against “woke capitalism” and climate change regulations in Europe and the U.S. In 2022, investors pulled more money out of “sustainable” or ESG funds than they put in for the first time in more than a decade.

Last year was the worst on record for ESG investing, leading Jon Sindreu of the Wall Street Journal to speculate that “it might never recover”. Mr. Sindreu also found that mentions of the hated ESG monicker have dropped by almost 60% in company analyst calls from their peak in 2022, mirroring a similarly steep fall in online searches for ESG investing according to Google Trends.
The S&P Global Clean Energy index, which lists leading global solar and wind energy companies such as First SolarFSLR +8.5% Inc., Vestas Wind Systems AS, Orsted and Suzlon Energy Ltd. among its largest constituents, has lost almost 60% since its peak in January 2021. Over the same period, S&P’s 500 stock index for U.S. equities gained over 30%.

Oil and Gas Fights Back

While the ESG acronym covers the range of issues across the environmental, social and corporate governance dimensions in company performance, concerns over the “climate crisis” have become the focus of attention. In his annual letter to CEOs in early 2020, Mr. Fink said: “Climate change has become a defining factor in companies’ long-term prospects … The evidence on climate risk is compelling investors to reassess core assumptions about modern finance… I believe we are on the edge of a fundamental reshaping of finance.”

In the urgency to “save the planet”, ESG promoters have primarily one target in sight: the fossil fuel industries, namely coal, oil and natural gas. ESG and sustainable investing funds align with the “net zero (emissions) by 2050” climate policy targets of the Paris Agreement. It is no surprise that the ESG and the “sustainable development” movement has elicited political opposition and legislative responses particularly in Republican states in the US which are important producers of coal, oil and gas production.

Last year, a coalition of 19 states, led by Florida’s Republican Governor Ron DeSantis, signed an open letter declaring their opposition to the use of ESG criteria in government investing and outlined legislative priorities to that effect. According to the joint statement, “The proliferation of ESG throughout America is a direct threat to the American economy, individual economic freedom, and our way of life, putting investment decisions in the hands of the woke mob to bypass the ballot box and inject political ideology into investment decisions, corporate governance, and the everyday economy.”

According to one count, there are currently 61 anti-ESG bills introduced to state legislatures or pending in committees in Oklahoma, South Carolina, Missouri, West Virginia and elsewhere. Texas and Florida have already restricted some ESG-oriented financial institutions from business with state-linked pension and other institutional funds. The widely-reported withdrawal of $8.5 billion by the Texas Permanent School Fund was only the most recent divestment from BlackRock for its persistent discrimination against the state’s oil and gas business.

Last week, the annual CERAWeek event gathered the world’s business and political leaders in Houston to discuss key issues impacting global energy. The backlash against ESG and the so-called “energy transition” was palpable. Daniel Yergin, S&P Global Vice Chairman and host of the convention, said in an interview that he was “sick” of talking about quick “energy transitions”: “It sometimes loses touch with economic history and reality. If you look at the history of energy transitions, they all last for over a century. To try and make change happen in 25 years, or even half of that time is highly unlikely.”

Amin Nasser, the CEO of Saudi Aramco, the world’s biggest oil and gas company, called the so-called energy transition a fantasy: “We should abandon the fantasy of phasing out oil and gas, and instead invest in them adequately, reflecting realistic demand assumptions, as long as essential…peak oil and gas is unlikely for some time to come, let alone 2030.”

In an interview with Fortune magazine last month, Darren Woods, the CEO of ExxonMobilXOM +1%, the largest investor-owned energy company, said of the energy transition: “The dirty secret nobody talks about is how much all this is going to cost and who’s willing to pay for it.” At the CERAWeek conference, he doubled down on this message, stating that his company — which will continue to invest in its core oil and gas business — “is not keen on building a business based on government subsidies.”

BP was among the first major international oil and gas companies to declare in 2002 that “We need to reinvent the energy business. We need to go beyond petroleum.” In 2020, the company’s CEO, in a shock announcement, promised to slash oil and gas production by 40% and boost capital spending on low-carbon energy tenfold to $5 billion a year – a plan that “even Greenpeace is cautiously praising.” Yet, to the disappointment of climate-focused investors in BP, CEO Bernard Looney revised the company’s strategy in February last year by scaling back climate targets with new plants to produce more oil and gas for longer.

Following BP’s move, its rival Shell announced a weakened 2030 carbon reduction target and cancelled a "perilous" 2035 objective earlier this month. It cited expectations for strong fuel demand and uncertainty in the energy transition last year as many governments around the world slowed down the roll out of climate policies and delayed targets amid soaring energy costs and supply concerns.

Veteran energy commentator David Blackmon saw little change in the overriding theme of this year’s CERAWeek conference from last year’s, “one of a pressing need for the industry and nations to place more focus on matters of energy security than on phasing out fossil fuels.”

 

[jswauto]

Remember this attack:

Zombie Marxism Dec 17, 2021 15 min read
COMMENTARY BY
Mike Gonzalez
@Gundisalvus
Angeles T. Arredondo E Pluribus Unum Senior Fellow

Mike is the Angeles T. Arredondo E Pluribus Unum Senior Fellow at The Heritage Foundation.

The Soviet Union may have been defeated, but Marxism is resurgent. Unfortunately, its resurgence is not just abroad but here in the United States.
The Black Lives Matter movement has created the environment to undermine and replace American values and institutions.
Many Americans have begun to grasp all of this intuitively and have begun to rise up and oppose Marxist ambitions. To succeed, however, they will need support.
Copied
This December we celebrate the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the communist superpower Ronald Reagan rightly named the “Evil Empire.” Yet everywhere today, Marxism still stalks humanity. Indeed, today we can paraphrase Karl Marx and write that its specter haunts not just Europe, but the entire world.
We must understand this as a global threat. Since its birth in the 1848 Communist Manifesto by Marx and Friedrich Engels, communism has been a call to arms that knows no borders. But we must also understand—as the Kremlin in its time certainly did—that the big fight is over the United States. Once Marxists seize that most elusive jewel in the crown, they have the world. That’s why this essay will focus mostly on the U.S.
Before we catalog the dangerous state of play with communism, we should remember the good news. Marxism may be resurgent, but it is being vigorously confronted by the same force that defeated the Soviet Union: the American people. They have joined what some may dismiss as “culture wars,” but is really a consequential battle of ideas. Surveys show Americans, writ large, reject these ideas, and are starting to discern the stakes.
We need discernment because Marxism’s breakthroughs today are the result of different strategies and tactics. Gone are frontal military threats, such as along the Fulda Gap in Germany, or in the actual wars in the fields of Central America in the 1980s. Just as we face constant mutations of the Coronavirus, today we face a different, mutant form of Marxism.
Yes, today’s ascendant American Marxists have their supporters in the halls of power in Beijing and Caracas. But it would be a mistake to see them as Chinese or Venezuelan agents, as some of their predecessors were Soviet stooges in the 20th century. The leaders of Black Lives Matter groups, the creators of the 1619 Project, and the architects of critical race theory may be internationalists who believe in the Manifesto’s call for world revolution. But they are a very American phenomenon. We must understand and confront them in those terms.
Much is different today from the last time America faced a concerted communist threat. Communists now realize that domestic revolutions to overthrow the bourgeoisie are not viable in every place, if they are possible in any place. Today, revolution comes at the end, not the beginning. It must be preceded, or replaced, by the arduous work of 1) organizing people, 2) indoctrinating them, and 3) convincing them to become domestic agents of cultural replacement. That’s the mutation we confront.
The current efforts to besmirch the American story—indeed to change its origin story itself, as we see with the New York Times’ 1619 Project—amount to a campaign to transform America’s societal structure that has been underway for at least three decades. It rapidly accelerated after BLM was founded in 2013, and then it exploded into society after the George Floyd riots of 2020. The result? The critical race theory indoctrination that has so angered parents.
>>> Why We Should Never Forget the Crimes of Communism
The architects of the 1619 Project and the academics who created CRT are equally part of the effort to replace America’s narrative. (The term “white supremacy,” which is meant to replace such ideas as “Land of the Free,” appears no fewer than 38 times in the foundational text of CRT). It was BLM, however, that created the propitious environment to replace America’s narrative, and it is on these organizations that we must focus.
Once we do, we discover that the founders of the Black Lives Matter organizations are at the center of the destructive unrest that led to the hacking of our cultural software. They are not just “trained Marxists,” as BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors labeled herself and another co-founder, Alicia Garza (in a video that has now disappeared from public view). But they were recruited and trained by Marxists steeped in this new view of how to build revolutionary consciousness through recruitment, organizing, and indoctrination.
The Gramscian Moment
Today’s Marxism can be tailor-made to each circumstance. This adaptability has replaced the rigid ideas expressed in the Communist Manifesto. Today’s successful Marxists understand that, no, the economy does not determine all of man’s actions, as Marx once wrote, and, no, the internal contradictions of capitalism will not constantly produce revolutions.
These are Marxists who have boned up on the lessons of the 1920s Italian communist leader Antonio Gramsci, or the theoretical works of his German contemporaries at the so-called Frankfurt School, which produced critical theory (of which critical race theory is an American offshoot). It was these Europeans who incubated the mutant strains.
Gramsci’s basic theory was simple, even if the ramifications were complex. Writing in the 1920s and ‘30s, after the failure by Italy’s workers to set up a communist state in 1918, Gramsci said the proletariat was consenting to his own enslavement. How so? He buys into the cultural trappings of his bourgeois oppressor—the church, the family, the nation-state, etc. As a result, in countries with rich civil societies, such as those in Western Europe and the United States, communists needed to undertake a “war of position.” This involved a long-term effort to organize the masses and indoctrinate them into Marxist ideas.
The German Critical Theorists, for similar reasons, came up with a similar explanation: the worker had bought into a consumerist conceptual superstructure and was unaware of his own crushing oppression. Both concluded that intellectuals had to give the workers revolutionary consciousness.
Gramsci and the Critical Theorists did not repudiate Marx and Lenin so much as expanded on their beliefs. Marx may have written that revolutions would inevitably come when “the material forces of production in society come into conflict with the existing relations of production.” But to Gramsci, “‘popular beliefs and similar ideas are themselves material forces.”
Applied Gramsci
According to Harmony Goldberg, a Gramscian cultural anthropologist, Gramsci merely made “several important innovations” on the ideas of Marx and Lenin. As Goldberg put it in her 2015 “brief introduction” to Gramsci’s ideas:

Gramsci upheld the assertion that a successful revolution would ultimately require the overthrow of the bourgeois state…However, because the capitalist hegemony does not function through state violence alone but that it also mobilizes civil society in order to promote oppressed peoples consent to and participation in the system, a successful revolutionary movement would first have to engage in a long-term effort to undermine that consent.

Goldberg is not just any Gramscian anthropologist. In 1996 she founded the School of Unity and Liberation (SOUL). This is the same place where, seven years later, Black Lives Matter founder Alicia Garza, then 22, began her Marxist training.

To Goldberg, the efforts to undermine the American worker’s endorsement of the American way of life today “must go beyond participation in trade union struggles reform; revolutionaries must root their struggles in all arenas of social life and—centrally—must engage in the battle for ideas.” The ruling bourgeois will always be trying to convince workers that they have a stake in preserving capitalism. This is why “Revolutionaries would themselves have to engage in the long-term battle of ideas in order to clarify the need for revolutionary transformation.” All-out ideological war is needed. A crisis can be used to overthrow a society, but the long-term subversion of a culture must come first.
A multi-class alliance, which Gramsci called a “historic bloc,” would be needed, in Goldberg’s words, “to move history forward” by indoctrinating society into the new “national-popular collective will”—the cultural counter-hegemony. But it is important to bear in mind that “in every historic bloc there is a single class that plays a leading role and serves as a cohering force,” according to Goldberg’s interpretation of Gramsci. The job of the cohering force was to organize other classes and instruct them on the need to replace the existing order with a socialist one.

 

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Zombie Marxism Part 2

Garza thus learned from master theoreticians how to apply the Gramscian rules. We can also now fully grasp what Garza meant when she told Maine liberals in 2019, “We’re talking about changing how we’ve organized this country….I believe we all have work to do to keep dismantling the organizing principle of this society, which creates inequities for everyone, even white people.” What she was trained to seek was a total transformation. The ultimate object, of course, is getting rid of capitalism, since Garza says that “it’s not possible for a world to emerge where black lives matter if it’s under capitalism.”

Garza’s connections to Goldberg’s creations have endured. Today Garza is on SOUL’s board. In 2012, a year before Garza co-founded BLM, Goldberg was publishing Garza on the web platform she founded, Organizing Upgrade, as we can see with Garza’s reporting on Brazil’s Marxist landless movement. The two have also crossed paths over the past two decades in such Marxist groups as the National Domestic Workers’ Alliance. That group sent Garza to Ferguson, Missouri in 2014, after the killing by police of Michael Brown. There, she helped create the nationwide coalition of the hard left that has been key to BLM’s success. The two also work with LeftRoots, whose activists “challenge capitalism, imperialism, white supremacy, and hetero-patriarchy.” All these groups provide access to different constituencies whom they can first organize and then indoctrinate.

Patrisse Cullors is at least as important as Garza in building the main organization, Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation. She underwent similar training at the hands of a similarly committed communist visionary. In her case, the ideological mentor was Eric Mann. He is a former member of the Weather Underground who founded the Labor-Community Strategy Center in LA (which Mann jokingly calls “the University of Caracas Revolutionary Graduate School”).

Mann devotes detailed attention to the hard work of creating a multi-class alliance. This will instill Marxist revolutionary consciousness into the population, to overthrow what he calls the “imperialist, settler” state that is America. He narrows Gramsci’s cultural focus to racial issues. Within the cultural sphere, it’s race-related matters that Mann sees as “the material forces” that create the fault line to be exploited.

In a 1996 essay that was later revised, he wrote:

Given the social formation of the U.S. as a settler state based on virulent white supremacy, the racialization of all aspects of political life operates as a material force in itself—shaping and infecting every aspect of the political process. Thus, any effective Left movement must confront the major fault lines of the society…In a racist, imperialist society, the only viable strategy for the left is to build a movement against racism and imperialism.

His version of the historic bloc is black and Latin American. But he calls for “an agreed-upon Black priority” with African Americans as the “cohering force” in the struggle against capitalism. In the key area of fighting law and order measures—so central to his, and BLM GNF’s, revolutionary strategy—“the leadership clearly came out of the black community,” he notes. Blacks, to people like Mann and Goldberg, will be the revolutionary agents, and the struggle to make the U.S. a socialist state will be fought in the name of black justice.

Early on, Mann settled on Los Angeles bus riders as more easily organizable and indoctrinated than factory workers. They were more destitute, more black, Latino, and Asian, and more female, than the average worker. “At a time when many workplaces have 25 to 50 employees, an overcrowded bus has 43 people sitting and from 25 to 43 people standing,” he wrote. “Ten organizers on ten different buses can reach 1,000 or more people in a single afternoon,” That’s why his Center pioneered the creation of a Bus Riders Union.

It was precisely at the BRU that Cullors was trained after Mann’s Strategy Center recruited her, and where she combined organizing training with ideological instruction. “I read, I study, adding Mao, Marx, and Lenin to my knowledge of [bell] hooks, [Audre] Lorde and [Rebecca] Walker,” she wrote in her 2017 memoir When They Call You a Terrorist. The organizers were trained, according to Mann, to “go beyond narrow ‘trade union’ or ‘bus’ consciousness to build a movement based on a more transformative, internationalist consciousness” and create a “united front against U.S. imperialism—rooted in the strategic alliance of the multi-racial, multi-national working class.” This is what he called “the explosive combination of deep ideological framing and grassroots organizing.”

In his 2011 “organizing manifesto,” Playbook for Progressives—written two years before Cullors reached fame by helping to found BLM—Mann already identifies her as “gifted.” In 2006, Cullors helped found the Center’s Summer Youth Organizing Academy “to recruit and train a new generation of high school youth.” At the time of the book’s writing, adds Mann, Cullors “teaches classes on political theory and organizing.” She was at the Center for over a decade, as other sources have confirmed.

To be sure, a much bigger revolutionary payoff for all training by Mann would come when Cullors founded first BLM, and then BLM GNF, and began in earnest the work of dismantling the American cultural narrative (or hegemony in their language) by getting many Americans, especially the young, to believe that they should destroy their country and culture because it is white supremacist at its core. Not for nothing does Cullors tell us herself that she is a “trained Marxist” and that the only reason she does not use the term communist is that it’s gotten a bad rap.

Other important battles in the war to dismantle America have been won because of Mann’s training of BLM leaders. For instance, Black Lives Matter succeeded in pressuring the Los Angeles School Board to cut the LA Schools Police Department’s $70 million budget by 35 percent on June 30, 2020, after a full month of riots and destruction following Floyd’s death. Afterwards, Mann took a victory lap. Writing on August 21, 2020, Mann cast the victory in Gramscian terms:

We know of no other Defund the Police campaign in a major U.S. City that has made such a major political and material breakthrough…Our campaign was also a major ideological victory. It delegitimized the very existence of police in the public schools and affirmed the experience and demands of the most militant and conscious Black students.…Dozens of angry, articulate, and organized Black students—many from Students Deserve—testified that the very presence of police in the schools was a racist and anti-Black attack on their racial identity, self-worth, self-confidence, and academic performance. Dr. Melina Abdullah, co-chair of Black Lives Matter L.A., testified that all three of her children suffered police abuse in the schools while her son’s first experience of anti-Black police brutality was at the age of six. She described in painful detail how every aspect of a Black child’s life is criminalized and why the demand for No Police in the Schools was a life and death issue for the Black community. (Italics in the original)

That this Marxist-inspired effort to reduce police forces, which followed the determined indoctrination of people, has succeeded to such an extent is bad enough. Without law enforcement, a future crisis like the one precipitated by the killing of Floyd could lead to even greater violence and destruction than we experienced in 2020. Even with police, it was the costliest civil unrest in U.S. history, according to the Insurance Information Institute, and we experienced a 30 percent spike in homicides in 2020, according to the FBI.

“A successful revolutionary movement,” Goldberg explained, “would first have to engage in a long-term effort to undermine that consent” Americans have given to their system. And this campaign to present the counter-narrative to America’s story began very quickly after BLM was launched by Garza, Cullors, Abdullah, and others. This is what BLM and the 1619 Project do today through the curricula they send to the nation’s 14,000 school districts. It’s also what CRT “anti-racism” trainers do in all aspects of our lives.

Zach Goldberg, a doctoral candidate at Georgia State, detailed in the Tablet in August 2020 how much the media began to sell after the BLM GNF narrative following Zimmerman’s acquittal in July 2013. Prior to 2013, the terms “white,” ”racial privilege(s),” ”of color,” and ”racial equity,” were hardly ever used, wrote Goldberg. Things began to radically change that year, however.

 

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Zombie Marxism Part 3

The Need for a New Grand Strategy

Why expose all this? My hope is to make it plain why schools are teaching children these new ideologies, and why workers are being subjected to what can only be described as Gramscian, consciousness-raising struggle sessions at their places of work, and why even the military and the churches are following suit. Revolutionary theoreticians recruited and trained the founders of the BLM organizations. After eight years of existence, they have brought America to the brink of societal change. Once we understand this, we can start to envision a grand strategy that will defeat their efforts.

What that strategy will look like is the subject of an entirely different essay—or hopefully many essays. The purpose of this one is to say, on this 30th anniversary of the collapse of the Evil Empire, that we have a new problem.

A grand strategy to confront the new Marxist threat would need to understand the mutation. It would need to grasp the fact that the new threat relies on organizing people in different environments and then indoctrinating them. It takes place on buses, domestic work, schools, or neighborhoods about to be gentrified. A grand strategy must grasp what is at stake. It’s nothing less than the replacement of the key American idea that “All Men Are Created Equal” with the lie of white supremacy. Such a strategy would have to reckon with what is happening in our schools. It would need to understand that violence will remain central to Marxist success. Dismantling police forces, the prisons, and the court system itself (which Patrisse Cullors calls for in this video) is part of an effort to leave society defenseless. Once enough people are converted, then the revolutionaries need only wait for a moment of crisis.

We will need to understand what people like Goldberg have in store:

In societies that have a vibrant civil society, revolutionary strategy cannot be based on a pre-given Marxist formula in which a moment of crisis makes the oppressive nature of the capitalist system clear and sparks an insurrectionary struggle that smashes the capitalist state and establishes socialism. Gramsci argued that crises are important, but that they do not ensure that oppressed people will believe in the need for a new economy or that they will have the power to wage a successful revolutionary struggle. To Gramsci, an insurrectionary moment will only succeed if it follows a long-term effort to win oppressed people over to a transformative vision and if it builds working class power over time.

Many Americans have begun to grasp all of this intuitively and have begun to rise up and oppose CRT. To succeed, however, they will need our support

 

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Repression and executions under communist dictatorships​

HoC Editor
November 30, 2024

Communist dictatorships in the 20th century were characterized by brutal repression, mass killings, forced labor camps, and executions of political opponents and civilians seen as threats to the regime. The total death toll is estimated at over 100 million people across communist states like the Soviet Union, China, Cambodia, North Korea, and Eastern Europe. These regimes maintained power through secret police, propaganda, violently silencing dissent, and a massive apparatus of repression and terror.

Soviet Union Under Stalin​

The Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin from the 1920s-1953 saw some of the worst repression and mass killings in history. Key elements included:

• The Great Purge (1936-1938): Stalin unleashed a wave of terror, involving show trials, mass arrests, torture, and executions of Communist Party members, government officials, and military officers. Estimates of the death toll range from 700,000 to 1.2 million executed.1
• Gulag forced labor camps: Millions of Soviet citizens were sentenced to forced labor in the brutal Gulag camp system. Inmates faced starvation, exposure, exhaustion, and summary executions. Estimates of total deaths in the Gulags range from 1.5 to 1.7 million people.2
• Collectivization and terror-famine (1932-1933): The Soviet state’s forced collectivization of agriculture and seizure of crops and food led to a man-made famine killing an estimated 7 to 10 million people, mainly in Ukraine (the Holodomor). Stalin used the famine to crush peasant resistance and nationalism.3

Historian Robert Conquest called Stalin’s Soviet Union “a regime of unrivaled cruelty and total negation of human rights” that “far exceeded even Nazi Germany in the scale and range of its physical terror and torture, executions and mass murders.”4

China Under Mao​

Under Mao Zedong, the Chinese Communist Party carried out massive repression and caused the deaths of tens of millions through executions, labor camps, and man-made famines:

• Land Reform and Campaign to Suppress Counterrevolutionaries (1949-1953): Mao launched violent campaigns to seize land and eliminate landlords and perceived enemies of the revolution. An estimated 1 to 4.5 million landlords were executed.5
• The Great Leap Forward (1958-1962): Mao’s crash industrialization and collectivization campaign caused economic collapse and the Great Chinese Famine, killing an estimated 15 to 55 million from starvation and overwork.6
• The Cultural Revolution (1966-1976): Mao unleashed the Red Guards to violently purge perceived capitalist and traditional elements, killing up to 20 million and subjecting countless others to public torture, humiliation, and labor camps.7

Mao proclaimed “We have a very good solution called execution. With the death of one, many may live.”8 His rule turned China into a land of paranoia, repression and death on a colossal scale.

Cambodia Under the Khmer Rouge​

From 1975-1979, the communist Khmer Rouge under Pol Pot carried out one of the worst episodes of mass killing in the 20th century, causing the deaths of 1.5 to 2 million people, around 25% of Cambodia’s population.9

• Executions and torture: The Khmer Rouge executed hundreds of thousands of perceived enemies, including intellectuals, Buddhists, and ethnic minorities. Prisoners were tortured into giving false confessions at sites like Tuol Sleng prison before being brutally executed.
• Forced labor and starvation: Millions were forced into agricultural labor camps and subjected to starvation, overwork and disease. Countless died from the nightmarish conditions.
• The Killing Fields: The remains of over 1.3 million victims, many executed, have been uncovered in over 23,000 mass graves known as the Killing Fields across Cambodia.10

Historian Ben Kiernan stated the Khmer Rouge’s rule “ended up killing over one quarter of the country’s population, through execution, starvation, and overwork. It was one of the worst holocausts in modern history.”11

Other Communist Dictatorships​

Repression and executions occurred across other communist regimes as well:

• North Korea: Has operated a brutal system of repression since the 1940s, with 400,000 believed to have died in labor camps and 25 million estimated to have starved.12
• Eastern Europe: Stalinist terror gripped Eastern Europe in the late 1940s and early 1950s, with hundreds of thousands killed, imprisoned or sent to labor camps. The Soviet invasions crushed uprisings in East Germany (1953), Hungary (1956) and Czechoslovakia (1968).
• Cuba: Thousands were killed by Fidel Castro’s regime, especially in the early 1960s, and many thousands imprisoned for political dissent.13

Conclusion​

The historical record shows that communist dictatorships were responsible for repression, executions and deaths on a massive scale, causing immense human suffering. These regimes ruled through fear, violence and the crushing of individual freedom – the antithesis of their hypocritical promises of liberation and equality. The staggering death toll is a tragic testament to the lethality of totalitarian communism. As Stéphane Courtois stated in The Black Book of Communism, “Communist regimes did not just commit criminal acts…they were criminal enterprises in their very essence, on principle, so to speak, in the name of an ideological project.”14 Communism’s legacy of repression and mass killing must never be forgotten.

 

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An excerpt from "Gulag Archipelago" by Alexander Solzhenitsyn:

The Soviet Gulag: A Historical Indictment of Communism

Communism, as implemented in the Soviet Union, promised liberation, equality, and justice. What it delivered instead was a sprawling apparatus of repression, fear, and death. Between the 1920s and 1950s, the Soviet regime constructed a vast network of forced labor camps known as the Gulag—a system that became the embodiment of ideological tyranny. Millions of lives were shattered not by war or invasion, but by their own government, in the name of building a classless society.

Arrests Without Justice

The Soviet justice system under communism was a façade. Arrests were often arbitrary, driven by quotas rather than evidence. During the Great Purge of 1936–1938, Joseph Stalin ordered mass arrests of party members, military officers, and ordinary citizens. The NKVD, Stalin’s secret police, operated under directives that encouraged the arrest of “enemies of the people.” These enemies included anyone who voiced dissent, failed to meet production targets, or had the misfortune of being denounced by a neighbor.

Over 1.5 million people were arrested during the Great Purge alone, and at least 700,000 were executed. Others were sent to labor camps where survival was unlikely. The purges decimated the Soviet officer corps, intellectual class, and even loyal party members.

Torture and Show Trials

Interrogations were brutal. Sleep deprivation, beatings, and psychological torment were standard procedures. The NKVD used these methods to extract confessions, which were then used in show trials designed to legitimize the regime’s actions. These trials were public spectacles, where the outcome was predetermined and the accused were forced to admit guilt in front of the nation.

In 1938, Nikolai Bukharin, a prominent Bolshevik and former ally of Lenin, was tried and executed after a forced confession. His trial was emblematic of the regime’s willingness to destroy its own revolutionaries in pursuit of absolute control.

Life in the Camps

Once convicted, prisoners were shipped to labor camps scattered across the Soviet Union. The journey itself was a form of torture. Packed into unheated cattle cars, deprived of food and water, many died before reaching their destination. Those who survived faced forced labor in some of the harshest environments on Earth.

The Kolyma region in northeastern Siberia became notorious for its deadly conditions. Prisoners mined gold in frozen ground, enduring temperatures that plunged below –40°C. They worked with primitive tools, wore rags for clothing, and received starvation rations. Guards routinely beat or shot inmates who slowed down. Death was constant, and bodies were often buried in mass graves or left in the snow.

The Gulag system reached its peak in the early 1950s, with over 2.5 million people imprisoned. Between 1930 and 1953, an estimated 1.6 million people died in the camps due to starvation, exposure, disease, and execution.

Economic Exploitation

The Gulag was not only a mechanism of repression—it was an economic engine. The Soviet leadership used prison labor to build infrastructure, extract resources, and support industrialization. During Stalin’s Five-Year Plans, prisoners constructed railways, canals, and factories. The White Sea–Baltic Canal, completed in 1933, was built almost entirely by forced labor. Tens of thousands died during its construction, and the canal itself was so shallow it was nearly useless for navigation.

This exploitation was justified by ideology. The state claimed that prisoners were being “reeducated” through labor, transforming enemies of socialism into productive citizens. In reality, the camps were death sentences disguised as rehabilitation.

World War II: Catastrophic Losses

The Soviet Union suffered the highest number of fatalities of any nation during World War II. Estimates vary, but most historians agree that between 26 and 27 million Soviet citizens died as a result of the war2. This includes:

• 8.7 million military deaths, including those killed in action, died of wounds, or perished in captivity
• 15.9 to 17.4 million civilian deaths, caused by famine, disease, massacres, and forced labor under German occupation
• Over 2 million deaths among civilians deported for forced labor in Germany

The Siege of Leningrad alone resulted in the deaths of over 1 million civilians due to starvation and bombardment. In Belarus and Ukraine, entire villages were wiped out. Mass graves became common, and millions remain unidentified to this day.

These losses were compounded by the regime’s own brutality. During the war, Stalin ordered the execution of thousands of Red Army soldiers for “cowardice” or retreat. Entire ethnic groups, such as the Crimean Tatars and Chechens, were deported en masse under suspicion of collaboration, resulting in tens of thousands of deaths during transit and exile.

Ideology Over Humanity

Communism in the Soviet Union demanded absolute loyalty. The state was infallible, and dissent was treason. Teachers denounced students. Children informed on parents. A 12-year-old boy was praised as a hero for reporting his mother’s private criticism of Stalin. The regime replaced morality with dogma, and truth with propaganda.

Religion was suppressed, intellectuals were silenced, and ethnic minorities were targeted. These actions were not aberrations—they were central to the regime’s vision of a homogenized, obedient society.

Resistance and Redemption

Despite the horror, there were moments of resistance. Prisoners staged hunger strikes, wrote secret diaries, and supported each other in quiet acts of defiance. Some maintained their faith, others clung to poetry or philosophy. These acts of resilience were rays of humanity in a system designed to extinguish it.

After Stalin’s death in 1953, the Gulag system began to unravel. Hundreds of thousands of prisoners were released, and the camps were gradually dismantled. But the scars remained. Families were shattered, communities destroyed, and generations traumatized.

A Warning to the World

The history of the Soviet Gulag and the staggering death tolls of the Stalinist era and World War II are a warning to all societies. They reveal how communism, when enforced through centralized power and ideological absolutism, leads to systemic abuse. They show that promises of utopia can mask a reality of surveillance, torture, and death. And they remind us that freedom, once lost, is not easily regained.

This is not just a story about one country or one era—it is a universal lesson. When ideology overrides humanity, when the state becomes the arbiter of truth, and when dissent is treated as treason, the result is always suffering. The Gulag is not a relic of the past—it is a mirror held up to any system that values control over compassion.

 

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A glimpse of the Lord's doings:

Faith in the Furnace: Christianity’s Survival in the Soviet Union (1920–1980)

From the moment the Bolsheviks seized power in 1917, Christianity in Russia was marked for extinction. The Soviet regime, founded on militant atheism and Marxist ideology, viewed religion as a threat to the state’s absolute authority. Churches were shuttered, clergy were executed or exiled, and believers were branded enemies of progress. Yet, through six decades of terror, Christianity did not die. It endured in whispers, in prisons, in underground gatherings—and in miracles that defied the iron grip of the Soviet state.

The Early Assault: Lenin’s War on Faith

Vladimir Lenin wasted no time in dismantling the Russian Orthodox Church, which he saw as a pillar of the old regime. In 1918, the Decree on Separation of Church and State stripped the Church of legal status and property. Monasteries were raided, icons desecrated, and priests publicly humiliated. Thousands of clergy were executed during the Red Terror, and religious education was outlawed.

Yet even in these early years, faith persisted. Secret baptisms were held in basements. Icons were hidden behind cupboard doors. In rural villages, grandmothers whispered prayers to children, passing on the faith like contraband. The Orthodox Church, though crippled, refused to vanish.

Stalin’s Gulag and the Underground Church

Under Stalin, persecution intensified. The 1930s saw mass arrests of clergy and believers, many of whom were sent to the Gulag—an archipelago of forced labor camps stretching across Siberia. In these frozen hells, Christianity found unlikely soil.

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, in The Gulag Archipelago, recounts how prisoners clung to faith as their only hope. Orthodox priests conducted liturgies in whispers, using bread crusts for communion. Baptists and Pentecostals sang hymns in the dark, their voices rising above the howling wind. In one camp, a group of believers carved a cross from scrap wood and buried it in the snow, returning nightly to pray.

Georgi Vins, a Baptist pastor, was imprisoned multiple times for preaching the gospel. In his memoir My Testimony, he describes how believers in the camps formed underground churches, memorized entire books of Scripture, and baptized new converts in icy rivers. Guards tried to break their spirit, but many testified to divine strength and peace that surpassed understanding.

Miracles in the Midst of Madness

Despite the regime’s efforts to stamp out Christianity, stories of miracles and divine intervention abounded. In one Siberian camp, a prisoner suffering from gangrene prayed fervently for healing. With no access to medicine, he was expected to die. Yet within days, the infection vanished, leaving doctors baffled. Fellow inmates called it a miracle.

In another account, a group of believers in a remote village prayed for protection as authorities prepared to raid their secret church. That night, a blizzard struck, blocking all roads. The raid was canceled, and the believers worshipped in peace. They saw the storm not as coincidence, but as the hand of God.

Prophetic dreams were also reported. One woman, imprisoned for teaching children about Christ, dreamed of her release. She saw herself walking through a field of wheat, free and joyful. Weeks later, she was unexpectedly released and taken to a village surrounded by golden fields—just as in her dream.

These stories, preserved in memoirs and oral histories, were not isolated. They formed a tapestry of divine presence woven through decades of suffering.

The Siege of Silence: Khrushchev and the Scientific Offensive

After Stalin’s death in 1953, Nikita Khrushchev launched a new campaign against religion—not through executions, but through ridicule and propaganda. Churches were closed, religious publications banned, and believers mocked as backward. The regime promoted “scientific atheism,” teaching children that God was a myth and religion a disease.

Yet even in this climate, Christianity adapted. Underground seminaries trained pastors in secret. Believers met in forests, barns, and apartments. Hymns were sung in hushed tones, and Bibles were copied by hand. The KGB infiltrated churches, but faith proved resilient.

In one case, a group of Pentecostals in Ukraine prayed for healing for a child born blind. After days of fasting and prayer, the child opened his eyes and saw. Word spread, and dozens came to faith. The authorities tried to suppress the story, but it became legend among believers.

The Baptist Movement and International Pressure

By the 1960s and 70s, the Baptist movement had grown into a formidable underground network. Despite arrests and harassment, pastors like Georgi Vins continued to preach, baptize, and organize house churches. Their courage drew international attention.

In 1979, after years of imprisonment, Vins was exiled to the United States in a prisoner exchange. His release was a victory for religious freedom and a testament to the power of global advocacy. His writings inspired believers worldwide and exposed the brutality of Soviet religious policy.

The Orthodox Church: Compromise and Courage

The Russian Orthodox Church, heavily infiltrated by the state, walked a delicate line. Some clergy collaborated with the regime, while others resisted quietly. In monasteries, monks preserved ancient liturgies and prayed for the nation’s soul.

One monk, known only as Father Seraphim, was arrested for refusing to denounce Christ. In prison, he ministered to fellow inmates, offering confession and communion. He died in captivity, but his legacy lived on in the hearts of those he touched.

In the 1970s, a revival stirred within the Orthodox Church. Young people, disillusioned by atheism, sought spiritual truth. Secret baptisms increased, and icons reappeared in homes. The flame of faith, long hidden, began to glow again.

The Spirit Moves: Healings and Prophetic Fire

Throughout the Soviet era, stories of divine healing and prophecy circulated among believers. In one Siberian village, a woman dying of tuberculosis was prayed for by her church. She recovered fully, and her healing sparked a wave of conversions.

In another account, a pastor imprisoned for preaching received a vision of revival sweeping across Russia. He saw churches filled, Bibles printed freely, and believers worshipping openly. Decades later, after the fall of the USSR, his vision came true.

These miracles were not just signs—they were lifelines. They reminded believers that God was present, powerful, and faithful.

Conclusion: Faith Unbroken

From Lenin’s gulags to Khrushchev’s propaganda, Christianity in the Soviet Union faced relentless assault. Yet it survived—not through political power or public platforms, but through quiet courage, underground fellowship, and divine intervention.

 

[jswauto]

How China became great!

Communist Horrors the China way​

The communist takeover of China, led by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) under Mao Zedong, marked a significant turning point in the country's history. We will explore the events leading up to the takeover, the evils associated with communism, and the death toll through history, including wars and other significant events up to the present time.

The roots of the communist movement in China can be traced back to the early 20th century, when the country was plagued by internal strife and foreign invasions. The CCP was founded in 1921, and it quickly gained support among the peasantry and working class, who were disillusioned with the ruling Nationalist government. The CCP's promise of land reform and social equality resonated with the masses, leading to a surge in its popularity.

The Chinese Civil War (1945-1949) was a pivotal conflict that ultimately led to the communist takeover. The war was fought between the Nationalist government, led by Chiang Kai-shek, and the CCP. Despite initial setbacks, the CCP's guerrilla warfare tactics and support from the Soviet Union helped them gain the upper hand. In 1949, the Nationalists were defeated, and the People's Republic of China was established with Mao Zedong as its leader.

The evils of communism in China became apparent soon after the takeover. One of the most notorious policies was the Great Leap Forward (1958-1962), an economic and social campaign aimed at rapidly transforming China into a socialist society. The campaign led to widespread famine, resulting in the deaths of an estimated 15-45 million people. The collectivization of agriculture and the establishment of communal kitchens disrupted traditional farming practices, leading to a catastrophic decline in food production.

The Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) was another dark chapter in China's history. Initiated by Mao to reassert his control over the CCP, the movement aimed to purge capitalist and traditional elements from Chinese society. Millions of people were persecuted, tortured, and killed during this period. Intellectuals, artists, and perceived political enemies were targeted, leading to widespread fear and chaos.

The death toll associated with communism in China extends beyond these two major events. The Korean War (1950-1953) saw China intervene on behalf of North Korea, resulting in significant casualties. The Sino-Indian War (1962) and the Sino-Vietnamese War (1979) also contributed to the death toll. Additionally, the suppression of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests resulted in an unknown number of deaths, with estimates ranging from hundreds to thousands.

In recent years, the CCP has continued to maintain a tight grip on power, with human rights abuses and censorship being prevalent. The treatment of ethnic minorities, such as the Uyghurs in Xinjiang, has drawn international condemnation. Reports of mass detentions, forced labor, and cultural suppression have emerged, highlighting the ongoing human rights violations under the CCP's rule.

In conclusion, the communist takeover of China and the subsequent policies implemented by the CCP have had devastating consequences for the country. The Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution, and various wars have resulted in millions of deaths and widespread suffering. The evils of communism in China are evident in the historical and ongoing human rights abuses, making it a cautionary tale for the world.

In conclusion, the communist takeover of China and the subsequent policies implemented by the CCP have had devastating consequences for the country. The Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution, and various wars have resulted in millions of deaths and widespread suffering. The evils of communism in China are evident in the historical and ongoing human rights abuses, making it a cautionary tale for the world.

 

[jswauto]

Faith Under Fire: Christianity’s Survival in Communist China

In the crucible of communist China, Christianity was not merely suppressed—it was hunted, humiliated, and declared obsolete. From the rise of Mao Zedong to the modern surveillance state, believers have endured decades of persecution. Yet through imprisonment, torture, and propaganda, the church did not die. It grew. It adapted. And in many cases, it flourished—fueled by miracles, prophetic visions, and a quiet defiance that refused to bow to the gods of ideology.

The Rise of Repression: 1930s–1950s

Even before the official founding of the People’s Republic in 1949, the seeds of persecution were sown. Foreign missionaries were expelled, churches were closed, and Christian schools dismantled. By the early 1950s, Mao’s regime had launched a full-scale campaign to eradicate religion, branding it a tool of imperialism and superstition.

The Three-Self Patriotic Movement was created to control Protestant churches, demanding loyalty to the Communist Party over Christ. Those who refused were labeled counter-revolutionaries. Catholic bishops were imprisoned. House churches were raided. Pastors disappeared.

Yet even in these early years, faith endured. In rural provinces, believers met in caves, fields, and homes. Bibles were copied by hand. Children were taught Scripture in whispers. And in the face of ideological terror, miracles began to surface.

One such account, preserved in God Is Red, tells of a woman in Yunnan province who was arrested for preaching. In prison, she prayed for healing for a fellow inmate dying of tuberculosis. Within days, the inmate recovered—without medicine, without explanation. The guards were stunned. The woman was beaten, but her faith spread among prisoners like wildfire.

The Cultural Revolution: 1966–1976

The Cultural Revolution was Mao’s final purge—a decade of chaos aimed at destroying the “Four Olds”: old customs, culture, habits, and ideas. Christianity, rooted in tradition and spiritual authority, became a prime target.

Red Guards stormed churches, burned Bibles, and forced believers to renounce their faith. Clergy were paraded through streets in dunce caps. Crosses were smashed. Seminaries were shut down. Public worship was forbidden.

Yet underground, the church refused to die.

In To the Edge of the Sky, Anhua Gao recounts her imprisonment for being a Christian. She was starved, beaten, and forced into hard labor. But in the darkest moments, she experienced divine comfort—dreams of freedom, unexpected provisions of food, and the strength to endure. Her prayers became lifelines, not only for herself but for others who began to believe.

During this period, many Chinese Christians reported prophetic dreams and visions. In The Heavenly Man, Brother Yun describes receiving a vision of revival sweeping across China. He saw house churches multiplying, Bibles flooding the land, and believers marching westward to evangelize unreached nations. At the time, such a vision seemed impossible. But Yun held fast—and the vision began to unfold.

Miracles and Healings: Signs in the Shadows

Miraculous healings became a hallmark of the underground church. With no access to hospitals or medicine, believers turned to prayer—and God responded.

In Jesus in Beijing, David Aikman documents how entire villages converted after witnessing healings. In one case, a child born blind was prayed for by local Christians. Days later, the child could see. The news spread, and dozens came to faith.

Another account tells of a woman paralyzed for years who was healed during a secret worship gathering. She stood, walked, and danced—causing even Communist Party members to question their atheism.

According to Religion in China: Survival and Revival, as many as 80–90% of Protestant converts in China cite healing experiences as their reason for embracing Christianity. These were not isolated events—they were widespread, consistent, and transformative.

Prophetic Movements and Spiritual Fire

The underground church was not merely surviving—it was thriving. Prophetic movements emerged, often led by uneducated farmers and laborers who claimed visions from God. These leaders preached with boldness, planted churches, and endured imprisonment without fear.

Brother Yun, one of the most prominent figures in this movement, escaped from a maximum-security prison in Henan province—without human help. According to his testimony, the prison doors opened, guards looked away, and he walked out unhindered. The event was witnessed by others and remains one of the most astonishing escape stories in modern Christian history.

These prophetic leaders often spoke of a “Back to Jerusalem” vision—a call for Chinese Christians to carry the gospel westward through hostile nations, retracing the ancient Silk Road. Despite persecution, this vision galvanized believers and birthed a missionary movement from within the most repressive regime on earth.

Post-Mao Reforms and Continued Surveillance

After Mao’s death in 1976, China entered a period of economic reform. Religion was cautiously tolerated, but only under strict control. State-sanctioned churches reopened, but underground churches remained illegal.

Surveillance increased. Pastors were monitored. Worship gatherings were infiltrated. Yet the church continued to grow.

By the 1990s, estimates placed the number of Christians in China at over 60 million—most of them in unregistered house churches. Despite arrests, fines, and harassment, believers met in homes, factories, and fields. They baptized in rivers, preached in whispers, and memorized Scripture to avoid confiscation.

In God Is Red, Liao Yiwu interviews believers who endured decades of persecution. One man, imprisoned for 20 years, emerged with a radiant faith and began preaching immediately. Another woman, tortured for refusing to renounce Christ, became a leader of a thriving house church network.

The Modern Era: Digital Persecution and Spiritual Resilience

Today, China’s repression of Christianity continues—now with digital tools. Churches are monitored via facial recognition. Online sermons are censored. Children are forbidden from attending religious services.

Yet the Spirit moves.

In recent years, reports have emerged of revival in rural provinces. Entire villages have come to faith. Miraculous healings continue. Dreams and visions are reported among youth. Despite the regime’s efforts, Christianity is growing—quietly, powerfully, and irreversibly.

One underground pastor said, “They can take our buildings, our Bibles, even our freedom. But they cannot take the fire in our hearts.”

Conclusion: The Unquenchable Flame

From the ashes of persecution, the church in China has risen—not through political power or public platforms, but through suffering, prayer, and divine intervention. Miracles, healings, and prophecies have sustained believers when all else failed. The Communist Party declared war on faith—but faith endured.

Christianity in China is not a relic. It is a revolution of the Spirit. And its survival is one of the greatest testimonies of endurance in modern history.