Conservadores e Comunistas

Tories and Communists, por Chris Dillow:

This might seem odd to those who remember Conservatives’ attacking Communism for its appalling human right record. But those attacks were always hypocritical. Many right-wing cold warriors variously supported Macathyism; Pinochet’s murder of dissidents; the slavery that was the draft and National Service; the brutal repression of homosexuals; and the denial of the most basic rights of self-ownership to women – marital rape was not criminalized in England until 1991. And they were deplorably silent about apartheid’s denial of basic human rights.

What Tories objected to in Communism was not its denial of freedom generally, but rather the denial of a particular form of freedom – the freedom of a few bosses to make money at the expense of others. Because China grants this freedom, Tories have no gripe with its form of Communism.

From this perspective, Conservatism and Communism have much in common. Both support inequalities of power which deny autonomy and self-determination to workers.  (...)

The main difference between Communists and Conservatives is not one of principle but of degree: Conservatives applaud centrally planned economies within companies, but Communists think it should be extended to the whole economy.