This year’s Halloween comes at a terrifying time for the ruling class, with the world economy descending deeper into crisis, and the masses on the march. Capitalism has only tricks, and no treats, to offer workers and youth. We need a revolution.
This All Hallow’s Eve – when all through the night the masses stir – the Tories and bosses will be lying awake in their beds. For of late, a frightful spectre has been stalking the land: the spectre of communism.
The capitalists thought that they had exorcised this ghastly ghoul decades ago. But now, the old world is dying, and the new world is struggling to be born. Now is the time of monsters.
Indeed, it is not paranormal activity that is terrifying the bourgeoisie this autumn, but the very real activity of the working class, who have been moving into struggle on a scale not seen in decades.
With capitalism’s crises bearing down on workers’ living standards, and this zombie Tory government provoking economic turmoil, the stage is set for social explosions in the coming period.
Revolutionary mood
All of this is reflected in the rise of revolutionary feelings – particularly amongst the youth.
According to a 2021 study by the right-wing Institute of Economic affairs, over two-thirds of young people in Britain say they would prefer socialism over capitalism.
What’s more, a survey by the European Broadcasting Union found that over half of young people in Ireland would take part in a “large-scale uprising” against the powers that be.
While those at the top may scratch their heads at this sweeping phenomenon, the explanation for this is very simple: this generation of young people have grown up knowing nothing but crisis, instability, and climate catastrophe.
Everywhere we look, we see war, hunger, poverty, and oppression.
The cost-of-living crisis is hitting young people too: caught between the millstones of sky-high tuition fees and exorbitant rents, more and more students are being forced into working low-paid precarious jobs just to make ends meet.
Gone is the optimism and stability of the past. Gone is the hope of owning a home, having a stable career, or retiring with a comfortable pension. Young people today can see that they have no future under capitalism.
“We are the future”
But far from sinking into doom and despair, the youth are fighting back across the world.
In Iran, for example, students and youth have been at the forefront of the protests against the theocratic regime of Ayatollah Khamenei.
Sparked by the murder of a young Kurdish woman at the hands of the hated ‘morality police’, these protests have spread into a far-reaching mass movement almost overnight – shaking the regime to its core.
In one viral video, schoolgirls in the city of Karaj can be seen tearing off their hijabs and chanting “death to the dictator!” while chasing their pro-regime principal off the school premises.
Such fearlessness in the face of brutal repression brings to mind a remark made by Lenin back in 1906: “We [the Marxists] are the party of the future, and the future belongs to the youth […who are] always the first to undertake a self-sacrificing struggle.”
Communism on campus
It is therefore no surprise that across the world, the Marxists have been able to connect with this revolutionary mood.
As students have returned to university campuses, the International Marxist Tendency has had its biggest-ever freshers mobilisation, stretching from Indonesia and Pakistan, to Canada and the USA.
In Britain, the Marxist Student Federation has planted the red flag at 50 universities up and down the country. Over 3,700 students have signed up to join the fight for socialist revolution.
Many people are approaching the MSF already calling themselves communists, simply asking “where do I sign?”. Dozens of meetings on ‘Why we are communists’ have been held by Marxist societies this term, drawing hundreds of young people to the ideas of Marxism.
Capitalism’s gravediggers
This is a bad omen indeed for this decrepit system and the bloodsuckers who uphold it.
And it is capitalism itself which is responsible for the crisis and instability that is pushing the youth towards revolutionary ideas.
In the timeless words of the Communist Manifesto: “What the bourgeoisie therefore produces, above all, are its own gravediggers. Its fall and the victory of the proletariat are equally inevitable.”
