Western Democracy’s Only Purpose Now Is To Serve Capitalism!
Generally, we hear western democracy being defined as a Government of the people, by the people and for the people. However, the bitter truth is that under western democracy, the government is of the capitalists, by the capitalists and for the capitalists.
By Dr. Sawraj Singh
Generally, we hear western democracy being defined as a Government of the people, by the people and for the people. However, the bitter truth is that under western democracy, the government is of the capitalists, by the capitalists and for the capitalists.
Under western democracy, the gap between the rich and the poor in every country has widened and the gap between the rich and the poor countries has also widened. Western democracy concentrates wealth and resources in a few hands. The vast majority of people are relatively deprived of the full benefits of the resources.
It is true that western European countries have provided more benefits to their citizens as compared to the U.S. However, the general rule of concentration of resources applies to all capitalist countries. The fundamental motivation of capitalism is not to serve the interests of the people, but to generate profit for the capitalist class. Capitalism always puts economics above ethics. The fair distribution of wealth and resources is a question of ethics and not economics.
Another fact which should be remembered is that what we see in western European countries today is not the original form of capitalism. We should read the accounts of nineteenth century writers of Europe. A very cruel, horrible, and filthy picture of capitalist Europe emerges. The struggle of the working people in Europe forced capitalists to guarantee the same rights to their people.
The U.S. continues the super-exploitation of poor white and minority workers, particularly blacks and Hispanics. Historically, the U.S. capitalists rose by the super-exploitation of black slaves and illegally and forcibly taking away vast tract of lands from the Native Americans. The plight of the Cherokee Nation and the Trail of Tears is symbolic of the exploitation and betrayal of Native Americans at the hands of a democratic government: after the passage of the Indian Removal Act in 1830, the Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall ruled in favor of the Cherokee Nation in Worcester v. Georgia (in 1832), but President Andrew Jackson’s administration blatantly refused to enforce or even abide by the Supreme Court’s ruling, thereby doing nothing as the Native Americans were forced off of their lands and relocated. The U.S. has a rare distinction among the capitalist countries of continuing to practice slavery past the mid-nineteenth century; hundreds or thousands of years after slavery was abolished in other countries. England abolished the Slave Trade in 1807. To avoid being arrested by the British Navy, American slave ship owners upon seeing British patrol ships, would push the slaves off of their boats to either drown or be eaten by sharks, which learned to follow the ships as sick and dead slaves were thrown overboard. Similarly, in no other country have men been hunted like animals in the nineteenth century as was done in the US. Lynchings of black men were seen as important social events in which families would dress up well, watch the lynching, and then have their photographs taken with the murdered man’s body. This can be compared to cannibalism, practiced in other societies hundreds and thousands of years ago. As if their crimes against their own minorities were not enough, they went on to commit similar crimes in Latin America.
I feel that the students who are asking for a western-style democracy in Hong Kong should read Chinese history to find the truth about war and the western style democracy for the Chinese people before the Revolution of 1949. In 1900, during the Boxer Rebellion (Yihetuan Movement), Western countries and especially America, the champion of democracy and human rights, sent troops to brutally suppress the rebels. They should read about the street cleaners in Shanghai who collected hundreds of bodies every morning of people dying of starvation, about people eating worms and maggots from drains, and of people selling their daughters when faced with imminent death from starvation.
Western democracy and secularism started as hypocritical and deceptive movements. The western capitalists wanted neither democracy nor secularism. They just wanted to grab power from the Church. However, Christianity played a far better role than the western capitalists. Christianity laid the foundation of western civilization, which is now being destroyed by western capitalism. Christianity brought order, discipline, and real progress to Europe. Christianity was a religion of the downtrodden, oppressed, and deprived people. It worked for the uplift and betterment of such people until it was overthrown and hijacked by the western capitalists under the false slogans of democracy and secularism.
The western capitalists overthrew the Church and grabbed power in Europe. However, they hijacked Christianity outside Europe and used it to enslave other nations. It is ironical that Christianity, which helped to free Roman slaves, was used by the proponents of western democracy to enslave other people.
Under the false pretext of exporting western-style democracy to third world countries, the western capitalists have actually robbed these countries of their resources. They have practiced the principle of uneven exchange to rule these countries. Let us look at the exchange rate of a Rupee versus Dollar (the same is true for other western currencies). In the fifties, one Rupee was almost equal to one Dollar. Now, one Dollar is worth more than 60 Rupees.
The only elements that benefitted from the export of western democracy in countries like India are those who joined the western capitalists in the exploitation of their own people. While the vast majority of Indian people have been mostly deprived of the benefits of a western-style democracy, some are joining the ever-growing list of billionaires.
The biggest challenge to the fake western democracy and its beneficiary, the western capitalist class, is coming from Latin America. The biggest reason for this is that in this region, Christianity has revived its traditional role of uplifting and benefitting the downtrodden and oppressed people. Christians and Marxists have joined hands to expose the sham western democracy of the western capitalists and are trying to bring real democracy.
It is no wonder that the present Pope has stood up for downtrodden, oppressed, and exploited people. He is becoming increasingly vocal against the crimes of western capitalism. The Pope comes from Latin America, where the philosophy of Liberation Theology emerged. It is clear that unlike Europe and other places where the western capitalists have mostly made Christianity ineffective by their false and deceptive slogans of democracy and secularism, the Christians in Latin America are reviving the original spirit of Christianity. We can only hope that the Pope is able to revive the true spirit of Christianity in other parts of the world. It is very important to save mankind and the world before western capitalists, under their false and deceptive slogans of western democracy, actually push the world and mankind to the point of no return. Under these slogans, they have already caused enough chaos, disorder, disharmony, and anarchy. They have increased the gap between haves and have-nots to almost the breaking point.
Dr. Sawraj Singh, MD F.I.C.S. is the Chairman of the Washington State Network for Human Rights and Chairman of the Central Washington Coalition for Social Justice. He can be reached at [email protected].
