[MD] The End of Faith - Spirituality

[skutvik at online.no]

Platt

On 21 Feb. you wrote:

> Do you agree that both communism and fascism glorify social authority
> and willingly sacrifice individuals for the greater good? (Also, see
> comment below.)

Originally, as an intellectually constructed political system 
communism did NOT glorify authority, it rather emphasized 
collectivism, a system of that they believed was more democratic 
than the parliamentary one. And the wiping out of the the 
landowner class (the kulaks) in Russia was not sacrifice in the 
sense of individuals freely giving up property and/or lives for a 
cause they shared. This is why Bolshevism was such a dread for 
the middle class Germans and brought Hitler to power. However 
as WW2 broke out communism turned national (a social pattern) 
with all the attributes you mention. And communism never 
recovered, as the cold war took over it remained a national social 
system and the rest is history.     


Platt on USA:
> Yes, much too much interference of government, a steady loss of
> freedom since Wilson and SOM intellectuals were appointed to run
> society. 

All levels are supposed to regard its parent level as "bad"; life 
despises inorganic death, society abhors biology's "jungle laws" 
...etc. Yet, there is also a paradise lost element. The Fall Myth 
may be society's longing for biology's a-moral innocence, and 
intellect has it's own yearning for the social "participation" past. If 
your complaint about government interference reflects this 
nostalgia for the closer knit small-town USA of the past     ... or?? 
This may be another answer for question you didn't ask ;-).  

Bo