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From: arlan@inuxm.UUCP (A Andrews)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Redbaiting and Bad Guys
Message-ID: <314@inuxm.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 8-Jan-86 17:16:33 EST
Article-I.D.: inuxm.314
Posted: Wed Jan  8 17:16:33 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 11-Jan-86 03:56:21 EST
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> > I have never expressed admiration for the Stalinist or Maoist
> > regimes.  Your redbating paranoia is showing.  [LARRY KOLODNEY]
> 
> > The first step in understanding any historical situation is to divide
> > the participants into Good Guys and Bad Guys.  Since the political
> > leaders of the above-mentioned communist countries are responsible
> > for these atrocities and economic disasters, it is beyond question
> > that they are Bad Guys.  Thus, if any policies of, say, the Cuban or
> > Chinese governments appear humane, enlightened, or constructive, this
> > is necessarily an illusion:  we know that these countries are run by
> > Bad Guys.  
> > 
> > I am currently trying to determine whether the Sandinistas are the
> > Good Guys or the Bad Guys in Nicaragua.  Any assistance will be
> > appreciated.  [RICHARD CARNES]
> 
> It's easy, Mr. Carnes.  If they're Marxists, they're Bad Guys.  There
> may be some humane, enlightened, or constructive policies they follow,
> but they're still Bad Guys.  They operate as if the whole country is
> an army in the service of some ideal, with each citizen a draftee in
> that army and entitled to no freedom to do other than serve the ideal.
> 
> Sure, there's redbaiting -- I'm engaged in it right now, Mr. Kolodney,
> as I write this.  How come I've never heard the words "Nazi-baiting"
> or "racist-baiting"?  Is it because the Nazis have killed so many,
> enslaved so many, tortured so many that we KNOW they're Bad Guys?
> Is it because the racists have lynched so many, enslaved and apartheided
> so many, sjambokked and imprisoned so many that we KNOW they're Bad Guys?
> Even if the South Africans removed press censorship, freed Nelson Mandela,
> recognized free black trade unions, and abolished capital punishment (all
> humane, enlightened and constructive steps), they'd STILL be bad guys
> as long as they endorsed apartheid and baaskaap (white supremacy).
> 
> So, Mr. Carnes:  Is their press censorship in Nicaragua (is there ANY
> non-government press in China, Cuba, or Vietnam)?  Are there free trade
> unions in these places?  Are there lots of political prisoners?
> Would you be pleased if the changes taking place in Nicaragua were
> taking place in YOUR home state?  If not, then the people running the
> Marxist states are Bad Guys -- regardless of the fact that the Czar,
> Chiang Kai-shek, Batista and Somoza were also Bad Guys.  The people
> of these countries are not guinea pigs, for use in some Grand Experiment
> to show how a New System can build a New Socialist Man.  They are human
> beings just like you and me, and if WE wouldn't like to live under such
> an experiment, THEY shouldn't have to, either.  And as long as the
> Marxists endorse the Marxist view of the purpose of man, they will be
> Bad Guys, like the South Africans.
> 
> I hope this helps.
> 					
> 					-- Matt Rosenblatt
> 					(matt@amsaa.ARPA)

*** REPLACE THIS LINE WITH YOUR MESSAGE ***
Well said, Mr. Rosenblatt, well said.  (And there are no shades of red,
either--you are or you aren't a believer in Marxism and the evils that
follow its attempted enforcement.)

--arlan andrews, libertarian