Survey Finds High Support For Communism Among Millennials

The Federalist – by Nicole Russell

History repeats itself, first as tragedy, the second as farce. — Karl Marx

If anyone needed new evidence that millennials have been deprived of a basic education, a new survey provides it with findings about their high acceptance rates of mass-murder-enabling ideologies such as socialism and communism.

Today, the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation (VOC) released a unique “Annual Report on U.S. Attitudes towards Socialism,” gauging Americans’ attitudes toward socialism, communism, and related ideas. Data firm YouGov conducted the polling, which informed much of the report. We’ve known millennials had a thing for Bernie Sanders’ brand of socialism for a while, but these numbers show a generation sadly misinformed about the historical and present realities of life under communism and socialism.

“An emerging generation of Americans have little understanding of the collectivist system and its dark history,” said Marion Smith, VOC’s executive director. “Unfortunately, this report, which we intend to release on an annual basis, confirms this worrisome impression.”

Youth Is Wasted on the Young

For decades, especially during the Cold War, Americans have broadly held a negative view of communism and socialism, and needed little prodding to speak against such ideologies. But that has changed. The millennial generation, born in 1982 and the two decades following, have sharply different views of communism and socialism than older Americans.

According to the study, just over half of millennials (55 percent) believe communism was and still is a problem, compared with 80 percent of Baby Boomers and 91 percent of elderly Americans. Only 37 percent of millennials have a “very unfavorable” view of communism, while 57 percent of the rest of Americans do. A surprising 64 percent of Americans agreed with the classic Karl Marx statement that underpins Marxist philosophy: “From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.

Before Sanders’ presidential campaign, I would have been shocked to learn nearly half of millennials (45 percent) say they would vote for a socialist. It all sounds so fair, so progressive, so hipster. It correlates with millennials’ absurd unemployment rate: 12.8 percent, double the national unemployment rate. And so more than half believe America’s economic system works against them and four in 10 call for a “complete change” of America’s economic system to ensure highest earners pay their “fair share.”

It’s clear millennials are uninformed about basic economics and global affairs. Socialists’ demands for the most productive citizens to pay for the bulk of Venezuelan taxes and other socialist measures has directly led to starving citizens waiting in bread lines to eat, looting stores, and killing each other in street brawls that include trampling children to death. History and current affairs provides more than enough evidence that the pleasant-sounding mantras of socialism and communism lead directly to death chambers, starvation, and mass graves. These are realities everyone, millennials included, need for the world’s sake to know.

I Like Karl Marx and I Cannot Lie

Of course, all these beliefs that 18- to 30-somethings hold didn’t come from nowhere. They stem from spending the first quarter of their lives in a public education system that would rather teach self-esteem than history. Many history courses have discarded or greatly paraphrased how and why the Soviet Union collapsed and the stark differences between living under a free enterprise system and say, surviving during the Cold War, when socialism peaked and the contrast looked black and white.

It’s the only way to explain why 1 in 4 Americans (26 percent) and one third of millennials (32 percent) falsely believe more people were killed under George W. Bush than under Joseph Stalin. Despite embracing ideologies communist leaders represent, however, many millennials are unfamiliar with communist leaders: 42 percent recognized Mao Zedong, 40 percent Che Guevara; 18 percent Joseph Stalin; 33 percent Vladimir Lenin; and 18 percent Vladimir Putin 18.

Of those who are familiar with Lenin, 25 percent view him favorably. Instead of being responsible for founding a totalitarian dictatorship, murdering countless millions, and, oh, I don’t know, massive human rights abuses, they think he’s just a champion of the working class, like good ole’ Bernie.

If education is the bedrock of society, consider it crumbling. When schools replace God and history facts with safe places and self-esteem, it produces a generation of adults with little historical perspective and general ignorance of the world.

“This report clearly reveals a need for educating our youth on the dangerous implications of socialist ideals. We will continue to work with educators to build curriculum to address this important need,” Smith said.

These Are Our Future Leaders

The biggest problem this study reveals, second only to the devastating effects of education that’s focused more on extracurriculars and encouraging self-esteem rather than math, writing and (accurate) history books, is the fact that these young people are on due course to be state and federal politicians, teachers, law enforcement, and business people.

In his 2006 pop hit, “Waiting on the World to Change,” John Mayer (a Generation Xer) crooned, “One day our generation is gonna rule the population / so we keep waiting, waiting on the world to change.” Not only is this generation going to rule the population, but these folks embrace an ideology they think will change the world. It will—but not for the better.

Oddly, an entire generation that embraced “The Hunger Games” (and its anti-socialism themes) with gusto is going ga-ga for an ideology that would have everyone living like Katniss Everdeen’s impoverished District 12. No, socialism and the millennials who love it will bring on the Hunger Games, but in reverse, and the odds are not in anybody’s favor.

Forget waiting on the world to change. It’s time to change it. This starts with teaching millennials the truth about socialism before they rule the population into ruin.

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Nicole Russell is a senior contributor to The Federalist. She lives in northern Virginia with her husband and four kids. Follow her on Twitter, @nmrussell2.

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