The False Doctrines of Socialism

     Friedrich Hayek, in his prophetic work The Road to Serfdom (1944), cautioned us about the perils of socialism. He warned that when governments, under the guise of progress, deliberately transform scientific distinctions into economic divisions, the path to the communist state is already underway.[1] Why must society intimidate its wise and wealthy, those who build and innovate, in the name of creating a better order? And why is it treated as a sacred duty to glorify those who foolishly believe that central socialist planning can architect the perfection of society? For socialism, in truth, is built upon this very act of deception and coercion.
 
Communism is a paradoxical creed — it both terrifies and seduces. And when it falls into the hands of the corrupt, the disaster becomes “gilded ruin,” suffering wrapped in shining slogans. It is a boundless Atlantic of misery without horizon or shore. The naïve utopians who once believed soon collapse into despair, and that despair becomes permanent. The twentieth century alone is testimony enough: the Soviet famine of 1932–33, Mao’s Great Leap Forward (1958–62), Pol Pot’s Cambodia (1975–79) — these were not accidents but systemic outcomes of a creed that sought to build heaven through central decrees.[2] Yet the “true socialist” refuses to learn, endlessly pursuing a dream never capable of life.
 
In fact, socialism was never born of the poor. It was the degenerate children of the nineteenth-century middle and upper classes who fashioned it — as though constructing a confessional booth of the Church. “Equality” became their chamber of absolution, where instead of a priest, their own guilty conscience presided. They gained piety by weeping over the plight of the oppressed, but without ever lifting a hand to truly better their lives.
 
This coercive state-system continues until it collapses into a veritable Sodom. And when failure arrives, it does not repent; instead, it blames individuals, scapegoating them, rather than confronting the flaws of its own design. Thus the Marxist devotee spends his days in bitterness, nursing a corrosive hatred against all that is normal, balanced, and beautiful. Naked children, ragged women, human misery — these become his food, his aesthetic, his theology. For such people, nothing good for society can emerge. Their contribution is little more than empty interrogations: why idol worship, why meditation, why faith? Against the cultural instincts of humankind, they wield their pseudo-science like a whip. Yet with equal fervor, they bow before Lenin, Stalin, Mao — saints of destruction. They know only how to break; they know not how to build. Their dream is forever an impossible utopia, glimmering like a mirage in the desert.
 
Perhaps one day, in the dictionary, the definition of “Marxist” will read: A man who, having learned nothing from thousands of years of civilization, of human nature, of economy, or history, is condemned to repeat the same errors endlessly, while waving the banner of human rights.
 
We cannot entrust our fate to mere “good men.” For even if good men exist, the corrupt will tempt them with wealth and power. What we must rely on instead are systemic checks and balances — institutions that prevent both the noble and the wicked from seizing absolute dominion. The system must restrain leaders, not empower them with unchecked visions. For otherwise, they ascend to power with “imagined noble purposes,” seize the state, and sip endlessly from the intoxicating chalice of authority — until they are bloated with riches, their veins throbbing with the narcotic of domination.
 
Patrick Henry, in one of his sharp essays, noted that once the theoretical case against socialism had been made, empirical evidence followed quickly. Time and again, when socialism failed, its apologists declared: “the method was wrong, the idea remains pure.” Yet the evidence is overwhelming: socialism belongs to the dustbin of failed experiments. Still, it trudges forward, directionless, propelled by its strange allure — a siren song, drawing the naïve against the rocks.
 
Even today, these wandering souls remain standard-bearers of comic-book utopias. They are impervious to rational argument. Darwin has already given his verdict: survival of the fittest is no negotiable law. Marxism, being unscientific, must fail, however gilded its package. The failures of socialism can be counted in arithmetic: the tens of millions starved under Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot are not “errors,” but results. Only the half-witted still shovel manure upon its corpse, pretending it breathes. It is like a meeting between a lunatic and a drunkard — delirium embracing delusion.
 
To the disillusioned progressives who despair at such critiques, Henry advised: let them study socialist governments with open eyes. Let them tally the Soviet purges, Mao’s famines, the prison camps of Cuba, the starvation of North Korea, the collapse of Venezuela. Let them make their own grim “Olympics of Death,” where nations compete in killing their own citizens. Only then will the so-called service of socialism be revealed as a grotesque betrayal.
 
If you choose to study Marxism’s history, be warned: the revelations will strip you of illusions. For whenever a society embraces this system of administration, the barbarism that Hayek foresaw always follows. And yet, the modern “two-rupee communists,” who flood social media with slogans, never study history. That is why their criticisms of democratic governments ring hollow, laughable, absurd.
 
They will insist: “It need not have ended so. In a cultured society, socialism could succeed.” But remember: it was cultured Germany that enthroned Hitler. Civilization is no guarantee against barbarism. In fact, barbarism wears the mask of civilization most convincingly.
 
Hayek understood this. He had seen socialism’s red terror in Europe, and he recognized its roots spreading even in England. He knew that man’s deepest hunger was liberty, not bread. For hunger passes, but bondage corrodes the soul. He foresaw that if liberty were seized, government would become a monster, immovable, consuming all. Hence, the false doctrines of socialism must be exposed and destroyed before they root themselves — especially in nations like India.
 
In India, for decades, family dynasties cloaked themselves in socialist rhetoric while plundering the state. Even long after independence, millions lacked food, clothing, shelter. Through sama, dana, danda, bheda — persuasion, bribe, punishment, and division — liberty was chipped away. One family, wearing democracy’s mask, looted votes and clung to power, aided by propagandist intellectuals. Ironically, the patriarch of that dynasty — hailed as “Father of the Nation” — remained in his loincloth, while the masses remained equally impoverished.
 
This land is soft, too soft. That is why pseudo-socialism and dynastic politics find fertile ground here. Genuine socialism — Maoist or its pale “Meowist” cousin — can take root easily in such soil. Hayek’s warning resounds: such lands, long governed by decayed dynasties, become the nurseries of Marxism’s poison. Vigilance against these false doctrines is not optional — it is survival.
 
In the end, it is, as the English proverb says, a choice between the Devil and the deep blue sea. Only if we keep our minds awake, our eyes upon history, can we avoid this doom.
 
Footnotes & References
1.     Friedrich Hayek, The Road to Serfdom (1944)
2.     Robert Conquest, The Harvest of Sorrow (1986); Frank Dikötter, Mao’s Great Famine (2010).
3.     Anne Applebaum, Gulag: A History (2003).
4.     Orlando Figes, The Whisperers: Private Life in Stalin’s Russia (2007).
5.      Johan Norberg, In Defense of Global Capitalism (2003).