I wish I had a person out there I could blame everything on. I wish I believed in an omnipresent Trotsky force who worked on me in a subliminal way, making me do all the awful things I do. I wish I had a scapegoat. Wouldn’t it be so much easier to justify your bullshit miserable existence if you had a scapegoat like Trotsky? Because then you never have to look within, you never have to ask: “Is what I am doing the right thing?”, you never have to question your own motives, you never have to question your behavior.
Point the finger. Trotsky did it!
Trotsky ended up being almost like Stalin’s imaginary friend. You know, that imaginary friend some of us had as kids, the ones you could blame stuff on. “I didn’t spill my milk! My imaginary friend did it!” In Stalin’s view Trotsky could be everywhere at the same time. Trotsky’s tentacles reached far and wide. He was omnipotent, omnipresent … he directed counter-revolutionary forces from afar. If he actually had been responsible for everything he was blamed for, he honestly would have been the greatest most powerful Superhero ever invented. He could leap tall buildings in a single bound. He could turn manure into gold with a wave of his hand. He could THINK something, and someone thousands of miles away in the outer reaches of Siberia could FEEL it, could FEEL Trotsky’s thoughts, and then proceed to blow up coal mines in a traitorous frenzy. Trotsky could orchestrate plots and sabotage from hiding places all over Europe, from exile. TROTSKY IS EVERYWHERE. He is the shared bogeyman.
Again, some of the stuff I’m reading would actually be funny (the “blame my invisible friend” theory came to me this morning) – if the consequences of it all hadn’t been so evil.
“I wish I had a Trotsky” is the best blog post title EVER.
hahaha
Wouldn’t it be awesome, though?
If you wanted to be a little more inscrutable, you could title it “I wish I had a Bronstein”.
I can’t be inscrutable. I’m too much of a prole.
Don’t be a tease.
And “the Left”. Sometimes I just laugh, listening to how much “the Left” is blamed for everything. And I put quote marks around those words on purpose – because sometimes I hear people talk about “the Left” this and “the Left” that, and they are actually talking about concepts … like “Trotskyism”, etc. – as opposed to any organization that is REAL.
Straw man. Bogeyman. Imaginary friend.
I would bet a lot of people commenting on this thread actually participate in that whole “The Left” thing – as a matter of fact, I KNOW they do – since I’ve seen it on their blogs.
So in no way shape or form should you all imagine that because I think Stalin was fucking evil do I also agree with your overly simplistic bigoted thinking. If you sit around talking about “the Left” or “the Dems” -in some sort of global general way – then you certainly won’t mind if I flag you as a fucking moron and someone not worth listening to.
For the record, if you are one of those who think there’s some Vast Right-Wing conspiracy (VRWC), then I also think you’re fucking deranged.
You may be a lovely person, but you won’t mind if I think, “Hmmm, that person is really not worth taking seriously, at least in terms of politics or philosophy.”
Don’t forget “Hollywood,” Sheila. Ever time some moron goes out and does something heinously bad or anti-social, some pundit wrings his keyboard about how they were clearly compelled to do so because of the movies. As if theaters send little electro-signals into the audience’s brains that remove any sense of civilization, self-control and good judgement that they might have possessed prior to viewing.
It’s a vast conspiracy to destroy American culture. Everybody’s in on it, especially the Joos.
Yeah, and you’ve got to put quotation marks around all of these things … that’s the whole point. Then Hollywood is no longer an actual location, but a concept, a conspiracy, something else altogether … sending out brain waves and secret signals that somehow make it impossible for people to turn the damn channel.
*tin-foil hat on*
“They” won’t get me!
Turn the damn channel – or accept any kind of personal responsibility for their own actions.
I remember after Columbine, people making this big deal about the fact that one of those little wankers was wearing a South Park t-shirt or something. Like after hearing Cartman say “screw you guys, I’m going home,” they had no bloody choice but to arm themselves like Rambo and start horrifically plugging their classmates.
I don’t doubt that some films can influence people’s behavior, style, etc. Some folks can be that maleable. But they do not, in any way, strip anyone of their ability to make choices.
There are countless examples, I suppose, of words standing in for concepts.
Steve Silver always talks about this phrase: “the liberal elite at their cocktail parties” – and how meaningless it is (on multiple levels) – and how overused it is. I think he even started counting how many times he saw that phrase used in op-ed columns etc.
“Cocktail parties” doesn’t REALLY mean “cocktail parties” in that context. The whole thing is a concept, an easily understood image and idea – shorthand.
Emily –
I learned that lesson the hard way a couple years ago, during my first Eminem frenzy.
I listened to The Eminem Show CONSTANTLY … and then one night, on the steps of a club here in New York, I have no idea what came over me … but I suddenly started pistol-whipping the bouncer. I couldn’t help myself.
Must have been the music. Eminem’s music is my Trotsky.
(Has that last sentence ever been said before? I think not.)
Okay, maybe this is totally stupid (it’s still early in the morning where I am) but someone with some drawing talent and a really twisted sense of humor could do the “Stalin Circus” (a parody of the “Family Circus”) where Trotsky would be the “Not Me” ghost-figure that the little-kid Stalin blames all the horrible stuff he does on.
heh. Little-kid Stalin. He’s probably still have to have the cookie-duster mustache even if he were wearing short pants and a striped t-shirt, just to keep him recognizable.
“Who sent all those intellectuals to Gulag?”
“Not me- Trotsky!”
I’ve always used Trotsky as my own personal Trotsky. If he’s good enough for Stalin, he’s good enough for me, and it’s fun to call people “Trotskyites”.