Forum Post: The Pilgrims were NOT Socialists
Posted 12 years ago on Nov. 25, 2011, 7:03 p.m. EST by GirlFriday
(17435)
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
I was going to post this last night. Smack the bejeezes out of the next person that tries to spread this lie. http://thenewamerican.com/history/american/549
Since the modern socialist movement did not arise until the industrial revolution and as a direct consequence of the vast upheavals wrought by that change, it wouldn't seem very likely that the Pilgrams were socialists as they came to the western hemisphere more than two centuries before the industrial revolution.
Yes.
Don't forget that Jesus was a capitalist.
If there actually was an historical Jesus according to the Bible his Earth father Joseph was a carpenter and it was typical that a trade be passed down from father to son. The economic structure of ancient Rome was pre-capitalist.
There wasn't a historical Jesus. There were several people with the same name. No eye witness kind of blows that out of the water.
And really, really conservative.
Just making sure. We're being sarcastic right?
Cause if Jesus had been a conservative he would have not been crucified.
Yep. :D If he existed, he would have been a liberal.
Many of them lived on communes, similar in some ways to the Mennonites or Amish. That's just a simple fact. Whether you call that socialist or not is just a question of labels and semantics.
As to their relation with socialism, they certainly did have one. The 'grandfather of socialism' is widely considered to be a man named Robert Owens. Owens took a look at the religious communes in the States and believed that secular versions could be done, especially if industrialized. The religious communes in the States were financially very, very succesful (some of them even broke up because the adherents believed they had become too materialistic, and they had joined to live a life of religious austerity). One of Owens first experimental colonies was called New Harmony. Originally called Harmony, it had been the site of one of the many communal religious groups in the States, a German group known as the Rappites. This commune had been very succesful as a financial enterprise, but the Rappites decided to move on to bigger and better things, so they put it up for sale. Owens bought it and renamed it New Harmony, and set up a secular commune there (which, in the end, didn't do so well).
Anyway, Owens ideas caught on and a movement started which people called the Owenites. The early Owenites developed their ideas a bit and got away from Owens' ideas, so they wanted to dissociate themselves from Owens, because they had gone beyond what Owens was on about. So they took up a new name: Socialists.
Did you read the article?
They were not socialists. That is a simple fact.
Some Internet article can't overturn historical fact. Maybe if you clap and say "I believe!" three times it'll be more true, I don't know. That's just the history, it is what it is. Some of those communal groups are still around, you can actually go see for yourself. Everybody knows them, the Amish, the Mennonites, etc.
Historical facts: Mayflower=1620 Mennonite/Quakers=1680 The Amish 18th century.
Historical fact: The Puritans were not socialists and, therefore, the intentional lie that is deliberately espoused that they starved until capitalism is absurd.
Oh well your author is correct in saying that the Puritans weren't terribly communal (a few cases here and there but generally no), but there were literally dozens of other groups in the colonial period and early revolutionary period that were, from the well-known ones like the Mennonites and Quakers and Shakers, to a constellation of more obscure groups like the Rappites. 17th and 18th century America was literally swarming with religious communes.
The pilgrims were a cult.
Definitely "fringe".
Using inciteful language does not make an argument. Argument FAIL.
This is about facts.
They all say that. I have different information. ...but if it makes you feel better, GirlFriday.
Yeah, ok, go back to high school and allow your history teacher to beat you with a text book.
But I learned this from school. Oh, wait let me anticipate your answer: "then you must of went to the <wrong> school".
Do you think they charged, per-entry, every helping of mashed potatos? I mean, the technology of weights and measures was there. Why do you suppose they didn't?
dreaming, the Puritans were not socialists. Period. Somebody butchered the story with an ulterior motive.
Do you think they were capitalists? I doubt they would say it any more than they would say they're socialists. Don't get into conspiracy theories. Just kiss me and let's got on with it.
lolwut?
This article is representative of the Christian conservatives that can't stand the idea that Christians can be socialists too. They can & so were the Pilgrims. It's as obvious as the sun in the sky that they tried socialism & once they realized that it was killing them tried capitalism.
Our First Thanksgiving http://www.fee.org/seminar/our-first-thanksgiving/
No. They were not socialists. That is a lie.
They may not have called it socialism but they practiced it. It's all in Bradford's diary. His refuting of Plato as quoted in the New American article is taken out of context as the fuller version of his diary quoted in "our First Thanksgiving" shows.
Yes, I have Bradford's writings. The fact remains that the Puritans were not socialists. It is not ok to twist history.
But isn't the bottom line that they implemented what today we would call socialism? You keep saying they didn't without offering any proof. Here's my proof from Bradford's diary:
"For ye yong-men that were most able and fitte for labour and service did repine that they should spend their time and streingth to worke for other mens wives and children, with out any recompence. The strong, or man of parts, had no more in devission of victails and cloaths, then he that was weake and not able to do a quarter ye other could; this was thought injuestice. The aged and graver men to be ranked and equalised in labours, and victails, cloaths, &c., with ye meaner and yonger sorte, thought it some indignite and disrespect unto them. And for mens wives to be commanded to doe servise for other men, as dresing their meate, washing their cloaths, 8ec., they deemd it a kind of slaverie, neither could many husbands well brokke it. Upon ye poynte all being to have alike, and all to doe alike, they thought them selves in ye like condition, and one as good as another; and so, if it did not cut of those relations that God hath set amongest men, yet it did at least much diminish and take of ye mutuall respects that should be preserved amongest them. And would have bene worse if they had been men of another condition. "
They were applying the Marxist idea of ""From each according to their ability, to each according to their need" before he wrote those words, of course.
No. Go back and read the link.
Well, in order to use all of your terms just to make you happy. Let's just say that their first Thanksgiving was a social(ist) affair where all enjoyed the capitalistic rewards of the hard work of each.
Now, you happy, darren. Cloudy here today, but I will give you the benefit of the doubt regarding the "sun in the sky" statement.
And who says that socialism doesn't require hard work?
Heck anarchists take hard work to the extreme. According to them anybody who's not producing or providing a service is a parasite. Under the capitalist system you would call them "smart investors" or "managers" though