How the phone won the Cold War

So I got into a discussion with my mother as to why I thought socialism would never work. I basically made it up as I went along, but I think I actually put out some very good ideas that I'd like to save before I forget them. After all, in case anyone wants me to sue them for stealing a thesis from me later on in their lives, I think it's a good idea to have a hard copy to save for court.

Anyway, the reason I said socialism would never work is because Karl Marx expected men to practice it. This is a completely unreasonable expectation - men at the very cores are selfish, self interested creatures that will enhance my ability, and the ability of my offspring, to survive. Consequently, this immediately degrades the presence of all others besides the individual person. Of course, circumstances and situations could certainly demand cooperation between individuals, working together towards common goals of survival, gathering food, building shelter, etcetera and so forth, but in the face of a predator or disaster, all individuals break down and find regard for their own being, and in certain circumstances, their immediate family.

Notice a word I deliberately used in that paragraph: individual. Not just "one person" or "being". Individual. The word holds profound meaning in the argument I present: the individual is alone, separated, apart from others. No matter how empathic or sensitive and individual is, the still retain those very primordial blocks within their psyche that intentionally walls them off from the others of their species. That's why the only time in the entire course of the natural world has social ever worked, it's been in hive environments, restricted primarily to insects. Should some sort of evolutionary quirk arise that allows mankind to develop the characteristics of a hive mind, then certainly, socialism would work and flourish.

But the fact of the matter remains that humans are not hive creatures, but individuals, and as such, are selfish, greedy and self interested. What results when you put the average person in a socialist system is predictable almost to the letter. A few unsatisfied individuals will begin to covet power for themselves, and assert that they hold the knowledge of improvement to the systems of lifestyle which exist. These few will rise to power, creating a communist form of government. Two branches of political thought develop: Conservative and liberal. Conservatives, the current aristocracy, cling to the past and the power they currently posses, fighting vigorously to maintain the status quo. Liberals are the closet aristocrats, rebels who preach improvement and a desire to rip the power away from the current rulers with the promise of making life better. Of course, the classic liberal (rebel) belief is that the only way to a better life is through the way that they themselves see it, logically demanding that they (the liberals) allocate all of the power to themselves.

My next point as to why socialism will never work in our world is simple and clichéd - technology. At the time of Marx's initial thought and publications, the Industrial Revolution was occurring. Mankind's progress to that point has been rather measured and plodding: An invention here, a development there, but nothing so dramatic as to change the course of life too much over the last two centuries or so. Marx wrote his works in a vacuum, believing that even if socialism didn't take when he presented it initially, things would remain fairly constant enough in terms of lifestyle that socialism would eventually succeed and flourish. What occurred in the century and a half after Marx's work, however, completely invalidated the basic tenants of socialism.

Before I delve further into my argument of technology further, however, I need to back up and explain myself. Marx saw socialism most effective in restricted communities, with a few people assigned to a few roles that everyone contributed to equally in a communal fashion. Ideally, these communities are small, say, of less than a thousand people, and are spaced out enough that it becomes difficult for any sort of central power system to develop to every really coordinate these communities in an effective manner. This, after all, reflected what most life in the mid nineteenth century was, farming communities that were just devolving as the factory lifestyle was picking up and cities began booming. Marx still held the belief that sedentary life could be revived under socialism, and the allure of sprawling metropolitans would fade away.

This is the point at which technology invalidates Marx's theories. The technological boom that followed Karl Marx's writing was almost completely unanticipated, since there had never been a boom similar to it in the entire course of human history. In the time following the initial proposal of socialism, telephones, cars, planes, television, the Internet, cell phones, personal multimedia devices, and uncountable more developments were made in only the twentieth century. All of these devices served to accomplish one purpose: Making the world smaller. Where a hundred mile trip was once a chore that made transporting goods inconvenient, the car made for rapid transportation of goods and people. Where traveling to another country was once only possibly by sea, for possibly months at a time, planes made the entire ordeal less than a day long. Sending a telegram took weeks, preventing anything from being time sensitive and allowing for tasks to be done at a leisurely pace. With the telephone and Internet, work was expected to be done not only by a certain deadline, but at the instant someone was told about it.

The world was made smaller, which allowed for much easier central control by a group of select individuals who had consolidated the bulk of power. A few businessmen and politicians effectively run the entire world through the use of a few technological devices. People are controlled with only a few clicks of a mouse, controlling the information they receive, the amount of money in their banks accounts, and the time of day at which they sleep. Of course, the response to the assertion I make is that mediums like the Internet allow for free discourse and ideas to develop (Much like this essay I'm writing) and that because of this, central governments can never really hold the power I claim. This is foolishness. These are quirks allowed for by the system. By giving the illusion of rebellion, of a possibility of freedom, the central bodies create valves which relieves pressure that is built up by the demands of the rebellious few. Eventually, as the rebels age and gain "common sense", conservatism sets in, and the aged rebels then seek to maintain the status quo.

The key linchpin in order to make socialism ever work would lie in having the population of the human race explode at an exponential rate, but then immediately fly off into the four corners of the universe. Note, I didn't just say the world: I meant the entire universe. Light years upon light years would have to separate pockets of people in order to keep them from falling under the influence of one centralized power group. Until that day comes, and who knows if it ever will, socialism will never work.