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Voltaire once joked that the old Holy Roman
Empire
was neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire.
These days, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
could also fit that jibe.
Even so, Karl Marx isn't quite ready for the dustbin of history. His theories appear to be victorious here in capitalist America.
This is not about the occasional Marxian history
professor whose tenure horrifies pure-minded state
legislators. Instead, consider that Marx argued that man
was in essence an economic creature, to the exclusion of
all other interests -- religion was the opiate of the
masses,
families represented bourgeois sentimentality,
etc.
I would like to think that Marx was wrong, that we're a lot more complicated than that, that we're not just creatures who think about nothing but economic matters.
But what I'd like, and what I see when I read a newspaper or watch the news, are two different matters.
When we get a whole winter's worth of snow before Dec. 1, do they talk about the serene beauty of white-capped peaks and snow-clad prairies? Any talk about how it might be fun to sit home on a cold night, shove more wood in the stove, and play board games with the family? Even a mention that there can be some joy and exhilaration in strapping waxed boards on your feet and sliding down a hill? No, it's how lift-ticket sales are soaring and how national exposure of a Denver blizzard means more resort reservations -- strictly economic concerns, as if Marx were right, and that's all that matters.
The Christmas season? I stay current, so I can tell you
that metro retailers are worried because there was snow to
deter shoppers on the day after Thanksgiving, the biggest
shopping day of the year. Thanksgiving was late this year,
so there are fewer shopping days, and the average family
will spend $320 on gifts this year, down from $340 last
year. Those are the 1991 American version of good
tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.
Marx predicted that capitalism invariably led to a society with only two classes: a rich bourgeois, and a poor proletariat. At one time, American capitalism proved him wrong -- we had a large and growing middle class.
After a decade of hard-core Reagan-Bush capitalism, our middle class continues to shrink. The income disparity between rich and poor is greater than at any time since 1946. The richest 20 percent of America -- those who make more than $105,000 a year -- make as much as the rest of us put together.
We may be heartened that the pernicious theories of Karl Marx have lost out in eastern Europe and the old Soviet Union. But here and now, money is all that matters, and society is splitting into bourgeois and proletariat. America, of all places, seems intent on proving that Karl Marx was a prophet.
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