Those four words should have been the motto of the Spanish Inquisition.
While a person screamed in agony being burned slowly alive, a cross was held in his face.
None of this was for sadism or revenge. The Inquisitors actually believed that they were doing it for the victim’s own good. They believed that the fire he was in was far less agonizing than the flames of Hell. And Hell, they sincerely believed, is forever.
There was the slightest chance that the dying man or woman would confess at feeling the flames, and the soul would be saved.
Today many Christians still believe exactly that, but they would never use it to justify burning a person alive with a cross in his face. But within the belief system of the Inquisitors, it was in fact for the heretic’s own good.
“To make an omelet,” Said Lenin, “You have to break eggs.”
Even most “intellectuals” have finally condemned Stalin. But Lenin is still their hero, a True Idealist.
“To make an omelet you have to break eggs” was the motto of the Red Terror that Lenin, not Stalin, put into action. The eggs were people, millions of them. If Lenin had not died when he did, he would have gladly killed tens of millions more:
“”It does not matter if there are half a billion people in the world or two billion people in the world, ” said Lenin, “It only matters that that half a billion are COMMUNISTS.”
Lenin cared less for a human being than a sane person would care about eggs. Stalin killed tens of millions of people, but Molotov, who knew both men intimately, said, “Compared to Lenin, Stalin was a pussycat.”
I believe him. I believe Molotov because Stalin was a thug, and Lenin was an Idealist. Even murderous thugs get tired. Idealists are tireless.
There is absolutely nothing an Idealist won’t do to you for your own good. Compared to the good of the world Lenin thought a single human being was less than nothing.
Everybody who lives to be my age remembers that the filthiest tricks ever pulled on them were done in the name of Righteous Indignation.
From breaking important promises to ruining your life, it is always moral indignation, or “for your own good” that is the excuse.
If you have a choice to be whipped by a sadist or by someone who is convinced he is doing it for your own good, pick the sadist. He will stop when his arm gets tired.
#1 by Jimbo on 08/31/2005 - 12:10 am
Bob,
I think you need to make some better distinctions here. As Sam Francis described, ideologies are projected as a way of attaining or keeping power. In the case of Lenin and Stalin, you have murderers who tried to justify their actions with ideals that were completely at odds with what they were doing.
There would be nothing worth living for if there were no idealists. The measure of an idealist is whether or not his actions are consistent with his proclaimed ideals. “By their fruits, ye shall know them” is a very under-appreciated claim. Jesus was a true idealist, who lived by his ideals.
You are an idealist, or you wouldn’t spend the time and effort you do trying to make your point. You could be sitting on the beach with a beer and not giving a damn. But you are typing away at all hours to try and get someone to see.
Liberals always wring their hands over Hitler, and how no one picked up on him until it was too late. How come no one ever wonders about how Lenin and Stalin and Trotsky made it past everyone. Granted, they came from a group where sociopathic behavior was more the norm, but did little Vladimir ever pull the legs off bugs when he was a tyke, or torture the dog, or show other signs of malice?
How many potential Stalins were thwarted in the old days because there were standards and people just wouldn’t tolerate things that didn’t jive with what was normal and decent. How many little asses got whupped, “for their own good” and for everyone else’s good as well, by some idealist?
#2 by Peter on 08/31/2005 - 12:30 am
I never knew anyone that did a dirty trick in the name of righteous indignation actually to believe it. The guilty just speak to the victim in the victim’s language in hopes of twisting the knife one last time. Or, they justify their crime to an audience to get away with it easier. They don’t actually believe that stuff about ethics and honor nor even seem to understand what all that means.