A rare tale of the heroism of many, from a time we have all dismissed .... its a rather traumatic account of one man and his families struggle against the evil that was state socialism in Eastern Europe. I would urge anyone to read it and watch the BBC iPlayer TV version while they are still up, because its easy to forget what the world was really like for millions of people, whose children live amongst us today .
We have quickly dismissed memories of the evils of Communism from our collective minds, and even though recent events in the Crimea have evoked ghost like memories of what it was like, most of us have forgotten the evil done under the communist and state socialist banner. The torture, the Gulags and perhaps most insidious of all, the constant surveillance, with its promise of arrest or blackmail for any infringement of thought or word.
Mr Bugan wasn't trying to instil a creed worse than that in place, which has often been the case in the Arab spring, where bad secular regimes are often being replaced by even worse Islamic ones, but rather to simply have free elections, and to live a life without fear of arbitrary arrest or imprisonment ....
I have blogged before about how tolerant we in the West have been about the politics of the extreme far left, with a large numbers of left wing 'socialist' parties (which often had their roots in the post World War II political settlement), while vilifying any who espouses 'right wing views (which includes many US Republicans, outside of the USA).
Its interesting to note that the brave, but rather mild Mr Bugan, would undoubtedly be considered a 'class enemy' by many of the left wing political parties which are allowed to agitate for 'socialism' in the UK ... its a funny world.
We have quickly dismissed memories of the evils of Communism from our collective minds, and even though recent events in the Crimea have evoked ghost like memories of what it was like, most of us have forgotten the evil done under the communist and state socialist banner. The torture, the Gulags and perhaps most insidious of all, the constant surveillance, with its promise of arrest or blackmail for any infringement of thought or word.
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| The Chains Of The Past - Still Weigh Heavy |
Mr Bugan wasn't trying to instil a creed worse than that in place, which has often been the case in the Arab spring, where bad secular regimes are often being replaced by even worse Islamic ones, but rather to simply have free elections, and to live a life without fear of arbitrary arrest or imprisonment ....
I have blogged before about how tolerant we in the West have been about the politics of the extreme far left, with a large numbers of left wing 'socialist' parties (which often had their roots in the post World War II political settlement), while vilifying any who espouses 'right wing views (which includes many US Republicans, outside of the USA).
Its interesting to note that the brave, but rather mild Mr Bugan, would undoubtedly be considered a 'class enemy' by many of the left wing political parties which are allowed to agitate for 'socialism' in the UK ... its a funny world.
We seemed to just forget the evils of communism overnight, once the Berlin Wall fell. I suspect that's because so many of Europes left wing and media were 'fellow travellers' who just wanted the whole thing forgotten.
ReplyDeleteIf the truth is ever let out by a genuinly democratic government taking over in Russia, a lot of reputations will be destroyed.
I always remember hearing that many European politicians in the 50's and 60's were terrified that old SS papers would turn up from some salt mine somewhere, because so many were either Nazi collaboraters or communists.
Brushed from history .... seems to be the way we treat events now.
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