This is the third chapter of my saga and I still haven’t left the 1970s. That was when a plethora (not a word I use often) of world events, societal upheavals, and personal experiences coalesced into a single irresistible force, urging me inexorably leftward. (Note: most of the sentences that follow will be simpler and far less pretentious. )
The social revolution of the 60s, the Vietnam War protests, and the Watergate scandal made challenging authority a generational imperative. A lonely and isolated rural childhood aligned my views and passions with those of the nascent environmental movement. (Al Gore wasn’t around then to claim authorship or we’d have had a lot more press.)
The final catalyzing event would close the door to conservatism behind me forever. My 10th Grade Social Studies teacher, whom I shall refer to only as Mr. G, introduced me, quite unwittingly, to the magic of Marxism.
Mr. G was an anti-teacher, one of those unfortunate folks who enter the teaching profession solely to degrade and humiliate their students. One could have applied any number of psychological diagnoses to him: narcissism, masochism, inferiority complex, insufferable jerk. It really doesn’t matter. Despite the pain and humiliation I suffered at his hands, I’ll always owe him my thanks for his unintended gift. Mr. G, in his infinite ineptitude, assigned us the Communist Manifesto to read (in English, of course).
I’ll never know exactly why he gave us that assignment. Perhaps he wanted to see how many parents would react with outrage. (If he did, he was taking his life in his hands, considering how well armed the local citizenry was. It was not unheard of for grudges to be settled by convenient “hunting accidents” or house fires.) I’m reasonably sure, however, that he never intended any of his students to react the way I did.
To be completely honest, I don’t remember any of our class discussions about the book, which just happened to be pocket-size and perfect for waving around at political rallies (or, it would have been, if I had attended any). Unlike all my classmates, I took Marx’s words seriously. Despite the fact that I was reading a translation, rather than the original German edition, I found the work inspiring in ways that the American political rhetoric of the day simply wasn’t. I discovered that, in addition to everything else by which I chose to identify myself, I was also a proletarian, a worker! My hated big corporations, who were despoiling the earth for a few extra dollars, were the bourgeois, a term that still sounds far too pretty to my ear for its meaning. There, between those two covers, on those very few pages, was a single, complete, and well thought-out system for addressing all the world’s ills, all of mankind’s iniquities. It was, in a word, perfect. Well, almost perfect.
By the time I reached the now-clichéd “Workers of the world, unite!” closing, I was ready to jump to my feet and scream the last line out loud. “YOU HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE BUT YOUR CHAINS!”
By the way, I’ve since learned that not all translations end the book with those exact words. The initial phrase is often written as, “Working men of all nations, unite.” and the final sentence is often omitted, which leads one to wonder that if Marx didn’t write it, who did?
Despite my elation, though, my leftward journey was far from complete. I still had questions and a few lingering doubts. Marx’s and Engels’ notion of the nature of man (often referred to as “species being”) and the permanent state of class struggle seemed pretty straightforward to me, even then at the tender age of 16. Those principles, at least,were observable. However, the requirement of a “dictatorship of the proletariat” gave me pause. This was not stated explicitly in the Manifesto, however, which spoke only of “the conquest of political power by the proletariat.” But, that phrase is commonly associated with the Manifesto, and sticks to it now like a tick on a dog. The word “dictatorship” stuck in my throat and launched me on a search, which would last decades, for a convincing rationalization.
Eventually, I came to learn that no rationalization was needed. The phrase simply refers to the transfer of power from the corporate oligarchs to the people, which seemed completely consistent with American political values as taught in American public schools. Nothing wrong with that, right?
Of course there was! Remember, all this was happening in the 1970s, during the Cultural Revolution and the height of the Cold War. Back then, the definition of “good American” was narrower than the line on an election ballot separating Democrat and Republican candidates. Words like “Communism,” “Socialism,” and “environmentalism” simply couldn’t fit through the gap. Declaring oneself a Communist, or merely hinting that you thought Socialism might not be such a bad idea, wasn’t just socially unacceptable and embarrassing. Slips like that could land you in real legal trouble. Imagine the possible reaction of the FBI agent who followed the Clearwater crews if, instead of singing benign little folk songs, I had stood on the deck and shouted verses of The Internationale at him while waving my dog-eared copy the Manifesto over my head! By now, I’d probably be one of the official (and permanent) greeters at Guantanamo.
So, I chose (wisely, I think) to keep my true political views to myself and focus instead of that other troika of the time: sex, drugs, and Rock-and-Roll (Well, like Meatloaf said, “two out of three ain’t bad.” I’ll let you guess which two I managed to check off my to-do list.)
But, this still isn’t the whole story. I haven’t even moved it out of the 1970s yet! No, there’s more to tell and I promise I’ll make the next chapter the last one in this saga. I’ll finish by telling you all how I came out of the political closet—and what it’s cost me.
Till next time,
Paul
