Al Ghurba

Al Ghurba

…the land of strangers…

by Marco M. Pardi

“There is only one sort of genuine socialism, the democratic sort, by which I mean the organization of society for the benefit of the whole people.” George Bernard Shaw

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While clouds of evil coronavirus obscure the thoughts in the minds of a growing number of Americans another cloud is gathering in the background. This cloud, arguably more deadly than covid 19, is both visible and audible; the problem is in its sinister ability to appear harmless, even benevolent. It is the cloud of disinformation, misdirection, and outright lies developing in the infected lungs and dissolving psyches of what is still mistakenly called the Republican Party as it prepares to solidify its hold on power in the Fall and bury the last vestiges of a democratic society.

Let’s be clear from the start: There is no international law governing what a state can call itself. Thus, we have The Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Do we really think these places are democratic? Of course not. I have frequently pointed to those State level societies which call themselves Communist and explained how true communism has never existed at higher than the Band level (up to about 80 members) of society. Yet, major population blocs have labeled themselves communist and some still do even as it is evident they are simply totalitarian states.

We in the Untied States are now moving into another era of misunderstanding and mislabeling: we are approaching another round of Presidential elections. One side of the traditionally two sided contest is already set; no one dares to challenge the supremacy, indeed the sanctity of the aging wannabe Mussolini doppleganger currently in the Casa Blanca. On the other side the contest seems to have come down to two aging possibilities: Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders.

Biden seems to be MOTS, More Of The Same while Sanders labels himself a democratic socialist. Probably intended to soften the term socialism, democratic socialist, like democratic republican (the U.S. calls itself a democratic republic), is a bit of an oxymoron. Each of them implies citizen participation in decision making but that participation can go only so far. The democratic socialist elects the government which makes the overarching, large decisions and the democratic republican elects the representatives who do the same. They are mirror images of each other with the exception of how intrusively they regulate and control such factors as private ownership.

But even such societal idols as the right of private ownership are hazed over. In the U.S. no one disputes your right to own a car; but there is a multitude of regulations governing how you can use that car. And this split between the right to own and the right to use symbolizes a fundamental reason why socialism, by whatever label, cannot succeed in a society like the Untied States. That reason, the very essence of what makes the U.S. what it is, is never stated in terms of why socialism would fail. That reason is: Diversity.

A fundamental defining element of a culture is language. According to the U.S. Census Bureau there are at least 350 languages spoken in the U.S. Many of these speakers do not yet speak English. Some never will.

Some sources say there are as many cultures in the U.S. as there are in the world. I have some experience with these as, during my career with CDC my degrees in Anthropology and my facility with languages brought me continuous domestic and international assignments for which linguistic and cultural skills were mandatory. In situations wherein I had neither the language nor a suitable lingua franca upon which to rely I employed basic anthropological tactics to communicate. But even then it was imperative that I knew to gear those tactics to what was culturally acceptable and appropriate.

My point here is that, far more fundamental than the “Conservative”, far-right fear mongering over what socialism would mean to your (read: their) bank account, socialism can work only in societies characterized by a strong sense of solidarity. Rudely put, people care about others who look and sound like themselves. People are willing to forego, even contribute a certain amount of personal capital for others they presume to share their values, life experiences, ethics, and dreams. But when that term – other – takes the form of Other the situation changes dramatically.

Consider this small example. You are driving along an Interstate highway. You have not seen a State Patrolman in hours, if at all. Over a rise in the land you see a disabled car on the road shoulder, a woman and two young children standing by it. They are Black. Further along you see another disabled car on the shoulder, and a woman and two small children standing beside it. They are White. Which group will be the first to experience a motorist stopping to be of help, or even a cellphone being lifted to report the problem? Now replay that scenario and put the woman in a hijab.

The U.S. has several federal and state laws regulating behavior which could be construed as discriminatory. We can regulate actions. We cannot regulate feelings. When idealistic people who dream and expound on the marvels of socialism cite examples such as the Scandinavian countries they fail to recognize, much less speak of one central characteristic: although they have small minority populations within them, they are overwhelmingly homogenous.

Unfortunately, people like Bernie Sanders who wave the flag of socialism, albeit sweetened with “democratic”, hand the most powerful tool possible to their neo-fascist opponents: a direct and personal threat to how people feel. Time and again we have seen how elections are won on feelings, not on considered intellectual choices. The 2016 presidential election was not won by the neo-fascists – aka Republican Party. It was won by the expert manipulation of feelings conducted by very highly trained Russian operatives, masters of reaching into the depths of the human psyche no regulations can touch. They know how to easily coax the unsophisticated American voter into conflating socialism with communism, socialism with loss of personal capital, and loss of personal freedom. As the saying goes, They know where, when, and how to push all the right buttons. And the domestic neo-fascists have studied and learned these lessons well.

We greet each other, we behave toward each other in the civilly prescribed manners, but we live in al ghurba – the land of strangers. And the voting booths will soon prove it.