Bernie Sanders, a self-identified socialist, is running for president. Though some socialists have taken issue with the man’s policies, his campaign has revealed an enthusiasm for socialist leadership not seen in the United States since the early 20th century.
This enthusiasm goes a long way in combating the stigma surrounding socialism in America. Largely fed by the Red Scares, this unanimous opposition was not always a fact of American political life.
Years before Joseph Stalin or Joseph McCarthy were household names, socialists could be found fighting for labor rights, working in politics, or in prison for speaking out against World War I (as was the case with five-time presidential candidate Eugene Debs).
The tide turned against American socialists with the Bolshevik Revolution. The public began to fear that a similar revolution would follow in United States. As is apparent with the benefit of hindsight, there was no revolution in the United States.
Regardless, this wave of resistance did not cripple socialism in the United States (far from it, as the Communist Party USA reached its peak membership in the early 40s).
Perception of socialism took another blow with the beginning of McCarthyism. Driven by the fear and paranoia surrounding the Cold War era and headed by Joseph McCarthy, the United States became swept up in a massive witch hunt.
By the end, thousands had lost their jobs and hundreds had been arrested on little to no evidence.
Though McCarthyism and the Cold War eventually ended, socialism is still rarely considered a viable system and often dismissed by even the most open-minded as a relic of the past.
Many young politically-minded people would no sooner consider advocating socialism than they would Italian fascism or geocentrism.
But that seems to be gradually changing.
However, if public perception of socialism is to be fully healed, the layer of mythos surrounding it must first be dissipated. With that in mind, I’d like to explore what socialism means to myself and to many others, while also addressing a number of misconceptions.
Socialism is the collective ownership of the means of production. This means that factories are owned by the workers themselves.
The rationale behind this system is that workers will be more content when not being held at the brink of deprivation and exploited for the worth of their labor. Able to claim the fruits of their labor as their own, workers would contribute to a society they felt truly connected to without concern for profit or fear of destitution.
Socialism isn’t the idea that citizens’ income should be pooled and evenly distributed among the population. Though some socialists have advocated for something like that, it is by no means a universally held sentiment.
Socialism is international. From Thomas Sankara to Che Guevara to Helen Keller, advocates for socialism can be found throughout the world.
Socialism isn’t a drab, bureaucratic hell. Oftentimes, when imagining a socialist world, people envisage a world of gray jumpsuits lining up at the factory. This image is chiefly a result of the misconception that the Soviet Union was the “ideal socialist state.”
In fact, the Soviet Union existed as a highly bureaucratic entity throughout its existence, isolated from the workers it claimed to represent.
While a number of socialists advocate a Soviet-style system of governance, it is by no means unanimous.
Socialism is, to me, the idea that no one has to wonder what overpass they’ll sleep under for the night.
Socialism is, to me, the idea that children don’t have to go to sleep hungry because their parents are paid a fraction of the value of their labor.
Socialism is, to me, the idea that, rather than shaking our heads at the agony in the world and dismissing it as an inevitable consequence of “human nature,” we can unite and effect change in meaningful and life-changing ways.
