kowalskil
Member
Boshevik Morality
1) Several years ago I wrote a short book (with 54 references) entitled “Hell on Earth: Brutality and Violence Under the Stalinist Regime.” It is now freely available online. Let me show you the content of Section 3.7, devoted to a very peculiar kind of “morality.” It might lead to an interesting discussion.
2) ... According to Lenin and Stalin, morality should be subordinated to the ideology of proletarian revolution. Denying the validity of religion-based morality, they wrote: what is useful to us is moral, what is harmful to us is immoral. Morality is a weapon in class struggle. Party and Komsomol members were drilled to accept that position, and to act accordingly. The justification was simple. The world is full of injustice and immorality. We want to replace it by a much better "scientifically designed" social structure -- communism. That is why what we do is right, by definition. ...
3) Closely related to morality is the issue of convictions. To a true Bolshevik convictions are determined by the will of the party. Here is how this was explained to a friend in 1932 by an old Bolshevik, Juri Pyatakov (31): "Since you do not believe that people's convictions can change in a short period of time, you conclude that our statements ... are insincere, that they are lies. ... I agree that people who are not Bolsheviks, the category of ordinary people in general, cannot make an instant change, a turn, amputating their own convictions. ... We are not like other people. We are a party who make the impossible possible. ... And if the party demands it, if it is necessary or important for the party, we will be able by an act of will to expel from our brains in twenty-four hours ideas we have held for years.... Yes, I will see black where I thought I saw white, or may still see it, because for me there is no life outside the party or apart from agreement with it."
4) It is ironic that in 1937 Pyatakov was accused of antiparty activities and executed at once. The same happened to Bukharin in 1938. In big show trials both men confessed. Were they tortured or were they persuaded to willingly serve the party for the last time?