Communists

When I think of communists, I picture a 16-year-old kid who just read the Communist Manifesto and who thinks it might be cool to label himself a Marxist because it has shock value. Of course, Marxism is a relatively easy stance to take and to debate because its main tenets are derived from emotionally gratifying concepts like equality and brotherhood of mankind. Also, the “us and them,” proletariat-and-bourgeoisie, mentality of exclusivity gives the whole thing bandwagon appeal. I can understand how kids can go in and out of communist and other radical phases: it’s one of those teenage angst moves that does not actually reflect the individual’s beliefs, tastes or knowledge.
So, that being my mental image of a communist, it is interesting to see so many communists marching around here in Russia who do not fit into this mold. The members of the Communist Party here are almost all over 65. Yes, these champions of the working class, these Tom Joads, these cradle-to-grave Marxist-Leninists, are all retired. Really, the communists here are very similar to the AARP in America. In the U.S. of A, the Association for Retired Persons uses its tremendous political pull to channel federal funds towards pensioners. In Russia, the remaining communists are essentially trying to do the same thing by re-establishing the CCCP and getting their benefits back. The Russian counterpart to the AARP is the Communist Party!
This begs the question: are these individuals who march around Red Square with their Soviet Union flags and icons of Lenin really communists? I think not. I believe they are a combination of two things: (1.) angry because their pensions were cut or lost when the CCCP cracked, and (2.) nostalgic about the good old days.
The former, I can really sympathize with. Many people lost everything they ever had and were cast into great instability for years while Russia was recovering from the political and economic shakeup of the collapse. I would be upset too.
The latter though is an illogical and emotional condition found everywhere that seems to be innate in our species. People are always pessimistic about the present and the future, but remember their past as one eternal spring frolicking naked through a field of sunflowers in an opiate-like euphoria. Yes, most humans have a “grass-is-greener” complex in their rear-view. Returning to the Soviet Union would not make Russia any better, especially now, twenty years out. But, sorry about your pension.
Today I met a communist while I was riding the bus. He began talking to Shelli upon his realization that she was an American. She entertained his speech with big approving smiles- a Southern thing, you know- as he went off in Russian about how dramatically superior Marxism is to Democracapitalism. Our Russian friends were translating for us of course. The old man also went off about how black people destroyed America. A racist-communist. I thought those were supposed to be mutually exclusive? This maybe supports my theory of old communists not really being communists- just angry and dispossessed retirees.
As I have mentioned before, old people command a certain amount of respect in Russia. Young people immediately stand up on the metro when old ladies walk on; old women frequently chastise youngsters when they do something wrong (as I discovered firsthand*); young people avoid political debates with the old people even if they are spewing out blatant untruths that were fed to them by the political propagandists of yesteryear. In general, Russians my age are mostly apolitical. They care very little about today’s politics, and even less about the politics of the Soviet Union. I think that within a few years the last of the staunch communists will die off and that period of Russian history along with that political philosophy will be completely relegate to the history books.