Friday, 5/16/97 Try socialism again for the first time IDEOLOGY
Misinformed attacks based on ignorance, homophobia and lack of
perspective on subject
By Garrick Ruiz So I was sitting in class Tuesday and I opened
up Viewpoint and what do I find? An article by Dan Sharron of the
University of Washington titled "Socialism blocks path of
progress." "Oh boy," I think, "this ought to be interesting." The
article was even worse than I had imagined. At one point I actually
had to stop reading because I sort of had a little attack to think
that anyone could possibly put forth such ludicrous ideas. I hardly
know where to begin, but let’s try this: labor unions. Sharron
complains that labor unions have forced the price of labor up over
the past few years, causing the price of manufactured products to
rise. Actually, in the past few years labor costs for many
corporations have fallen. This is because so many companies that
were based in the United States have moved factories to places like
Indonesia, China, Vietnam and Mexico. In Indonesia, the minimum
wage is about $2.50 per day. These dramatic labor cost decreases
have not been transferred to the consumer. In many cases, labor
unions are ineffective because if the workers want too much money,
the company just moves to another country and they’re all out of a
job. All this is the result of capitalist, not socialist or
communist, pressures. Profit is the motive behind these moves.
Interestingly enough, Sharron constantly complains about high taxes
and yet believes that after six months, welfare recipients should
be forced to enter the military (this forced-draft thing was what
actually made me lose control of my body for a second time in
class). If Sharron is so concerned about taxes, then cutting the
military is going to be way more effective than cutting welfare.
Welfare in this country, I believe, adds up to less than $1 billion
a year. Certainly, it is less than the many billions of dollars the
federal government pours into the defense industry each year.
Another thing which would be more effective than cutting welfare
would be to cut corporate welfare; corporations receive more money
from the federal government than poor people do. Sharron again
defies logic when he likens opposing capital punishment to setting
a double standard. I didn’t realize that the belief that human
beings should not kill other human beings is a double standard. It
seems to me that a double standard is when someone says it is not
OK for an individual to kill another individual but it is OK for
the state (ostensibly made up of individuals) to kill an
individual. It truly saddens me that anyone still refers to
homosexuality as a perversion. Hopefully, it just makes him look
like even more of a fool. But one interesting thing about his
argument is that it is ironically so similar to the Revolutionary
Communist Party line. Both he and the RCP seem to think that
homosexuality is an ideological choice. The idea that who you sleep
with indicates ideology is foolish. Homosexuality is not a
socialist perversion, nor is it a capitalist disease. It simply is,
and it has been around for much longer than capitalism, socialism
or communism. Don’t try to tell me that any of them caused it. This
whole article just makes me sad. About 40 years ago, this same type
of rhetoric was being spouted by a man named McCarthy. Many
people’s lives were ruined by mere accusations and the whole
country was convulsed with a paroxysm of hatred and fear. Is this
where we are to return once again? Ruiz is a third-year American
literature student.