Letter writers featured in last week’s Boulder Monitor week had some useful insights, including: “When we dare to discuss the issues, we find our beliefs are similar.”
The above paraphrased writer also had this to say: “If you are trying to intimidate, make fun of, or put someone down, please stop.” And to that I would add: If you are trying to encourage someone to move to another country just because he or she defines socialism differently than you do, please stop.
What exactly is socialism? It has been defined variously: We are one body working to promote the health and welfare of each part. We facilitate that outcome by teaching youngsters in our human society to be astute, responsible, hard-working people, promoting their own health and the “general welfare of others.” And we pay our taxes willingly.
“No man is an island, Entire of itself. Every man is a piece of the continent, A part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea… Any man’s death diminishes me, Because I am involved in mankind, And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls, It tolls for thee.” – John Donne, 1624
Alas, historically, people found themselves in a “survival of the fittest world” in which harsh economic conditions were imposed on the weak. Some idealists promoted the notion that life could be improved if usurping tyrants were killed and their wealth confiscated. Alas, the new state became a usurping tyrant, starving its own people. That nefarious form of caring? Communism.
I know no one in the United States who endorses this brand of “socialism,” not even Bernie Sanders or millennials who voted for him. To suggest that anyone trying to secure affordable health care for all is unwittingly trying install a communist dictatorship is an attempt to misrepresent the truth that we promote the health and welfare of all, even our rich.
Saying that American compassion leads to communist oligarchy is fear mongering at its worst. Please stop, we are on the same side trying to rectify wrongs with good solutions that benefit us all. – Dean Grenz, Boulder
