5. ELIMINATION OF FAMILY

5. ELIMINATION OF FAMILY

Elimination of family is the fourth main idea of all socialists. It is obvious that it is indispensable in order to erase the past from one’s memory and to turn it into tabula rasa (a clean board) to brainwash a younger generation without hindrance, and to hide the truth forever. The father and mother, grandmothers and grandfathers, when answering questions of curious children may reveal them the existence of other evil and other good that have nothing in common with the socialist dogmas, the truth about the past, that about the life of people in the past, about history, about real heroes and evil-doers.

Socialists are therefore willing to take away children from their parents from the smallest age. F. Engels' opinion was as follows:

'Education of all children, since the moment when they can do without the first maternal care, in public institutions and at the expense of the State budget. Education and production together'.¹ That is, from the age of 2-3 years, pursuant to F. Engels, it is necessary to take a kid away from the mother. Moreover, - nota bene! - to force the kid to produce goods. Now, that is quite a prospect for the poor kid! As regards me personally, everything turns upside down in me from such an idea because I remember how I rejoiced when my mother took me on her hands. Why, can one find many such mothers who will contentedly give away their kids to outsiders?!

However, it can be stated that this idea was not fully implemented in the USSR. Of course, not only men, but also women were forced to produce social wealth. In this regard, they lost their opportunity to devote much time to their kids. But, after all, children were not taken away for ever, viz., children most often came back to the families in the evening and also on days off and holidays after their stay in their nurseries, kindergartens, and schools during the daytime.

Sure enough, it was a deviation from the socialist ideal, but it was a deviation in a good direction, rather than in a bad one. However, it was likely to be a forced one in many respects, just like the New Economic Policy (NEP) in 1921. There are grounds to believe that an attempt to fully implement the socialist ideas regarding extermination of family could have resulted even more deplorable than that of military communism in economy. As a matter of fact, that idea is even less in accord with the national traditions. Moreover, even animals manifest an instinct to protect their young ones. Animals are known to be ready even to offer their lives in many cases to protect their younglings. It is an instinct. And, although it is possible that many instincts in man do not work as well as in animals, nevertheless, the instinct to love their kids and to protect them undoubtedly works well in most people. It is therefore easy to imagine what could have happened when attempting to implement that idea, viz., to take away children from parents. The revolts of Kronstadt and Tambov might have appeared as small freaks after that. Moreover, it may hardly be doubted that not all communists were ready to do so, viz., many rank-and-file communists certainly simply did not know about that idea of the classics of socialism and Marxism. Such individuals like Pavka Korchagin from the well-known novel by N. Ostrovsky As Steel Became Tempered might have used not only his fists, but his revolver as well in protecting his kid.²

Moreover, the State would have been simply short of resources in order to implement that project. You know, premises would have been indispensable for the taken-away children, a lot of premises. But where could they have been taken from? One would have had to feed the children? But where could one have taken food for them? One would have had to have children medically treated? But where could one have taken physicians? Children would have been in need of kindergarteners and schoolmasters. But one would have still had to have such personnel themselves properly trained at first because the available old personnel impregnated with the so-called bourgeois spirit were unsuitable. Well, in short, there was a sea of troubles to be tackled.

Meanwhile, after the revolution and civil war, at the beginning of the 20th years of the 20th century, a serious problem with homeless children already turned up. The things were at such a stake that the State has had to throw chekists, i.e., security officers, to solve the problem. Well, the situation began improving. But the country succeeded in coping with that shameful phenomenon of homelessness only on the eve of the war with Nazis. But children's colonies and communes of the NKVD, i.e., secret police, are known to have existed until the very war itself.

It is clear that, under such conditions, there were more important things to think about than to implement the socialist ideal in the field of elimination of family and taking-away children from parents. It therefore remained unimplemented. Moreover, it was somehow also forgotten. The people in the country gave their hearts to the classical Russian literature, in which a normal, Christian in its spirit, family, fidelity of spouses, and parents' care of children were depicted. And even from works by classics which were quoted and offered pupils and students for reading in the USSR this party of original socialism wasn't mentioned in those fragments. And that side of the genuine socialism was not even mentioned in those excerpts from the classics' writings that were quoted and proposed for reading in the USSR.

Then again, a certain role in the development in this direction was perhaps played by the personalities of Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin. It is very probable that they were not very fond of that part of the socialist and Marxist doctrine. Already Lenin in his letter to Inessa Armande dated 1/17/1915 obviously supported a serious love of man and woman, rather than a community of wives. Stalin went even further, viz., he completely rejected the idea of erosion of family bonds. As a result, an irreproachable family became very important even for a career of every communist. It was undoubtedly a revisionism and renegation in regard to one of the fundamental ideas of the previous classics of socialism and Marxism. But it is also beyond doubt that, in the opinion of every decent and virtuous person, one ought to praise both Lenin and Stalin, rather than to condemn, for this deed of valour because it was a retrieval of the traditional family.

However, it is indispensable for those who are eager to return to the pure socialist and Marxist doctrine to recall that side thereof. I remember how that idea shocked me when I read a six-volume selected writings by K. Marx and F. Engels, published in the GDR. 'Well, one still may to somehow understand Engels concerning that matter', I reflected, 'after all, he has never had a family, but Marx, he, a man of family, how could he concoct such an absurd and dirty idea as taking-away children from parents at the smallest age'?! Now I know an answer, viz., K. Marx was also a pantocrator of lunar dust particles.

1F. Engels Grundsätze des Kommunismus, 18-8 (my translation). In an official English translation entitled The Principles of Communism: ‘Education of all children, from the moment they can leave their mother’s care, in national establishments at national cost. Education and production together’, 18-(viii).

2By the way, I was always very fond of an episode therein in which he gave a good thrashing to a Soviet Don Juan.