A Lesson Yet to Be Learned – Folha de S. Paulo, November 7, 1977

 

by Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira

 

Despite the immense transformation that communist methods of advancement have undergone in recent decades, much of the general public still harbors the old nightmare in their imagination, of bloody social revolutions carried out by hordes of ragged people with guns, attacking residences of heads of state and their ministers at night, invading neighborhoods of the upper and middle classes, looting, beating, or killing terrified families, entering churches to desecrate the Blessed Sacrament, altars, and images, murdering defenseless parish priests, and so on. In short, scenes from the French Revolution, slightly updated by changes in costumes and extras, as well as by the abolition of the saber and the spear and the advent of the revolver.

The evil of this nightmare lies not only in its anachronism. In reality, it serves to expand communism. For those who allow themselves to be hypnotized by these novelistic—I would almost say folkloric—visions, a disconcerting inability to admit that the communist offensive has changed its methods and turned this type of social revolution into a veritable relic is generally evident.

With no sign of the legendary hordes of ragged beggars on the horizon, people obsessed with this nightmare feel completely safe. They do not take terror seriously, believing it attacks only the stars of finance or politics. Nor do they believe any warnings about the camouflaged and bloodless advance of the terrible adversary. In this way, they contribute to creating this climate of general unpreparedness, a conditio sine qua non for the success of communism today.

This lack of foresight is not limited to Brazil. It is evident even in countries with the longest political traditions.

The British Labour Party is one of the areas where this lack of foresight has had the most significant impact.

As everyone knows, Labour is the only truly influential left-wing movement in the United Kingdom.

Its political clientele consists mainly of two types of English people. First and foremost, a large mass of unionized workers who wish—often rightly so—to substantially improve their living conditions. They naively imagine that this can be achieved by plundering the ruling classes, as if the depredation of those who lead were the surest way to benefit those who are led.

This illusion, which is more or less understandable among the less educated, is absolutely unforgivable among the other contingent of the Labor Party—the classic minority comprising sophisticated intellectuals, gangrenous lords and high finance “toads” (with their docile entourage of industry and commerce “tree frogs”), opportunistic politicians, artists in need of a leftist claque, and, finally, “hippified” clergymen or those in the process of becoming so. All these dregs seek to take advantage of the support of the unionized masses for the benefit of the little people who comprise it—and they succeed, albeit only in small measure. However, they think that, in matters of political prestige, a little is better than nothing. And they content themselves with that, as they would otherwise have more difficulty standing out.

The driving force behind laborism is therefore the often well-founded (and sometimes misguided) desire for material improvements among certain sectors of the population.

However, it would be wrong to imagine that British laborism is nothing more than a cover for communism. In fact, among the labor masses, this aspiration for improvement has little in common with the inflammatory style of social demands that rage in continental European countries. To understand the meaning of “masses” here, one must take into account that there are conservative masses in the United Kingdom, roughly equivalent in number.

While a desire for absolute equality undoubtedly permeates some working-class circles, it is less a defined program than a pleasant utopia. Highly pragmatic, the English use their utopias — when they have them — only as they do tea, whiskey, or a pipe: to soften the hours of leisure. Highly conservative, they tend to keep everything in its place, including the monarchical and aristocratic apparatus that characterizes the nation. The labor contingent was perhaps as large as the conservative one among the crowds that gathered to applaud Queen Elizabeth II as she rode in a golden carriage from Buckingham Palace to St. Paul’s Church on the occasion of her recent jubilee.

In fact, this is nothing more than a faint remnant of the working-class conservative mentality—whether laboring or not—in the days of George V.

Consequently, a condition for labor to win was that it be categorically anticommunist. Labor would quickly lose support if its electorate suspected that its aspirations and demands would reverse all the values, hierarchies, and traditions it admired and loved.

In view of this situation, what was the Communist move?

For starters, opponents of communism almost always play into the hands of its mentors, thereby removing them from the most perplexing impasses. For over a hundred years, English society and the English state have been engaged in a slow but relentless process of eroding British convictions and traditions of yesteryear. By the reign of George V, they already seemed singularly faded compared with what they had been under Queen Victoria. In turn, English values and traditions have been fading even more rapidly throughout the 25 years of Elizabeth II’s reign (let us skip over the turbulent period of George VI, almost entirely occupied by war). This is especially true among the ruling classes.

The impact of this fact on unionized workers is clear. The balance that once existed between aspirations for socioeconomic improvement and traditional anticommunism is becoming increasingly precarious. By their very nature, socioeconomic discontent tends to intensify today. If, at the same time, cultural restraints are weakened, the moment is approaching when they will no longer be able to contain revolutionary impulses.

Communists waited patiently for this moment to arrive. They pretended to be weak, even insignificant. In electoral calculations, they were always the defeated pygmy. How could anyone fear them? Carefree, the ruling classes openly indulged in the favorite pastime of all decadent people: sawing off the legs of the chairs they were sitting on. A fortiori, the shift to the left among the working masses also took place without fear, since a communist regime seemed so distant…

Now comes the big news. According to the daily press, a “right-wing” (?) faction of the labor movement is denouncing the infiltration of the party’s steering committee and several of its bodies by communists. Representatives from foreign communist parties are increasingly numerous at Labour’s international congresses, while socialist representation is dwindling. Communism no longer provokes as much rejection among the electorate as a whole, and it is advancing.

In other words, the Trojan horse has entered the labor citadel and, ipso facto, England.

You don’t need to be a great prophet to know what will happen next. Just look up the story of the fall of Troy in any little book of legends.

Unless the denunciation of the right wing of the labor movement is taken seriously or unless some other healthy reaction emerges in society, how likely is that?

The reader can judge for themselves. But above all, don’t limit yourself to judging only what happens there.

Try to learn a lesson, for evil fairies hover everywhere.