Say what you will about the Left, but their ecosystem maintains a healthy strike rate in peddling their narrative while the Right continues to be called out for it. All the while, the same shady and manipulative meshwork succeeds in labeling the NDA-led Right wing as propagandists, saffron terrorists, Goebbels worshipers and whatnot. In the Indian context, all this could be determined by prominent factors such as a large and established Marxist base, decades of Congress hegemony in national politics, unsettling poverty statistics (which continue to improve by the minute), and of course, correlating communal politics with economic policy for vote grabs in election season.
However, on a much bigger scale, one that’s unrestricted to South Asia, is a profound machine at operation which exploits one’s emotions and morals. Breeding mental turmoil to convince you that what sounds fair and just, is always what is right. The basis of the Left’s ideology must be approached not in the ways of sugar-coated paper paradigms; rather its practical application to national economic policy. Sure, equitable distribution of wealth sounds like a good idea, and the concept is indeed a good idea supported by everyone who believes in the principles of justice and equality, but the question remains- Is it realistic?
To answer your question, one must consider the evidences that no matter the century, decade or the year, socialism unadulterated i.e. absence of free market elements, has always failed. It happened with the Soviet Union’s communist regime; it happened with the People’s Republic of China which suffered a devastating famine and was forced to introduce economic reforms in 1978; and more recently we can take the example of Venezuela, which despite being an incredibly oil-rich country with an estimated capacity of 303 billion barrels, collapsed in on itself after the socialist leader, Hugo Chavez staged a coup against President Perez following the aftermath of an oil crash in the 80s. Their income redistribution policies, agricultural nationalization and high expenditure on social welfare programs, all the while the government was choking markets to death, led to a spectacle of riches-to-rags in the 21st century.
The desperation of pseudo intellectuals is unending, for they attempt to refute the claims of failure with the example of Norway by outright declaring Norway a socialist country. Although it is true that the nation has a successful track of resource redistribution and a high place in the happiness index too, what the socialist fails to acknowledge is that Norway is one of the biggest exporters of oil while relying on hydro-power itself, thus reducing its necessity to use up its own fossil fuels in excess.
Secondly, its population is 5.3 million. To put this in perspective, 20/28 states in India have a population greater than that. Large sums and few mouths are bound to make people happy. As to the question of large sums, where does the money come from beside exports? Here’s where the supposed socialist element comes into play. Left’s claim – Norway does all this while retaining control over their markets and industry. Fact check – False. Norway’s government owns large shares in incredibly successful indigenous corps and redistributes the money it earns from them in social welfare schemes, while allowing the companies to run freely without intervention. This socialist miracle is still an example of the success of capitalist elements.
The pinnacle of fiscal doom is what the average Leftist defines as class equality amongst people, while making excuses of foreign interference by the capitalist West in creating political instability by backing political rivals; yet they blissfully ignore pre-existing conditions of disharmony and economic claustrophobia created in the first place by political animals with a taste of their ideology. The grand machinery of the Left does not bury the truth, but molds lies into truth. This truth is sold to the people via social media and the press, which is quite ironic, considering they are essentially commoditizing with ‘quality assurances’ from their network of elitists with fancy degrees, doctorates and all kinds of laureates strategically placed in high-profile organizations consisting of both NGOs and UN backed groups like the UNHRC, UNICEF, WHO etcetera to provide convenient data and statistics. Now all that remains for the ready-to-sell commodity is a marketing team, which consists of social media influencers, actors and actresses, authors, musicians; you name it. These reel-life heroes become social justice warriors and champions of the oppressed within seconds of allying with the left.
Therefore, one can safely reach the conclusion that the selling points of idealism and jargonized variations of social justice, while holding a solid economic basis in the short term, are a recipe for a national doomsday. They appeal to the youth because of their morality and pious, holier-than-thou dispositions, and are therefore the easiest instruments to corrupt a young and developing mind into believing all kinds of propagandist agendas set by the very elites who claim to despise elitism. In the end, the more they fail, the more they complain about how it wasn’t done in a democratic country or how “it has never truly been tried at all”. But because their ‘marketing teams’ sell it right, people buy it.
The youth buys it and it continues to remain a symbol of hope, peace and harmony across the globe. And all those believe in this childish become pawns in a much larger game of authority, power and control over resources; for command of the resource is the sole determinant of power on this planet. It is truly, truly ironic how these leftists which label capitalism as the source of all evils, reach out to people through the power of free press and free markets, with methodology of commoditizing their ‘brand of truth’ to peddle enough propaganda for people to ‘buy’. But fret not, as the right’s slow yet steady advances in the digital world are soon going to put its competition – “Out of stock”.
