50th anniversary of the publication of first volume of "The Gulag Archipelago"

"Engineers," in the academic sense, aren't men who drive trains, but the people--99% male--who understand the laws of physics and strength of materials, and thus are able bring dreams to reality.

Most of you will be surprised to learn that the Russian Alexsandr Solzhenitzyn--famous as the author of "The Gulag Archipelago"--was originally an engineer.  He writes,

I had grown up among engineers, and I could remember the engineers of the [1920s] very well indeed: their open, shining intellects, their free and gentle humor, their agility and breadth of thought, the ease with which they shifted from one engineering field to another, and, for that matter, from technology to social concerns and art.
  They personified good manners and taste; well-bred, measured speech that was free of uncultured words; one of them might play a musical instrument, another dabble in painting; and their faces always bore a spiritual imprint.

Most Americans know almost nothing about science.  Look around you:  Who among your friends knows real science (as opposed to being a blowhard poseur)?  If you don't know science, you don't realize that the laws of nature--physics and all science--pay no heed at all to politics.  So when evil men want to rule others, and decide to command the laws of nature to obey them, what do you think the result will be?

If you have an IQ over 90 you'd instantly (and correctly) guess "not good."

As should be obvious, the true intellects of the Soviet Union weren't the power-hungry political types, but the men Solzhenitsyn described.  They instantly recognized that the communists were attempting to warp reality to advance themselves (and their cause).  And most of the engineers--not realizing how thoroughly the communists were spying on everyone--incautiously wrote letters to their friends criticizing the regime.

They all ended up in the gulag, where most died.  Some were executed, some "merely" worked to death, starved to death.  Of course young Americans know nothing of this--by design.  If you have kids (even 25 or 30 years old), ask 'em.

So what's the relevance to you, eh?

There is a force loose in the world today.  It wraps itself in the cloak of wise guidance: "Do as we say if you want to be saved."  But in truth the core pushers of this evil want to rule, eating steak while you and your children are limited to eating bugs.  They want you to walk to the store in your "15-minute cities" (look it up) while they're free fly their private jets to the world's most exclusive resorts.

They're using every psychological con to get you to submit to their rules.

“Every act of resistance to the government required heroism.  [Under Stalin, giving shelter to an orphan of someone the regime had declared an enemy of the people was suicide.] Nonetheless, many took such children in and saved them.”

“All you leftists in the West think my work is a waste of effort, but some day you will suddenly understand it--when you yourselves hear ‘hands behind your back, citizen!’"

Of course you don't believe he knew what he was saying, eh?  "Dis not possible here, citizen!"

After "The Gulag Archipelago" was published, American and European "intellectuals" were united in dismissing it as fiction.  Couldn't be true!  "Socialism is kind, benevolent, tolerant."  Oh, you bet.

Some socialists were more sneering: "Can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs, eh?"

Roll that around for a minute.

In 1978, after Archipelago’s publication, at Harvard Solzhenitsyn blasted the leftist professoriate for “a decline in courage, particularly noticeable among the ruling groups and the intellectual elite."

He added that there are many courageous individuals, but because the rulers and Media are all leftists, the courageous ones have no influence on public life.

In 2004 the future Pope Benedict XVI wrote "Marxism claimed it had to dispense with ethical principles--just temporarily, of course.  It used terror because terror--in their hands--was necessary to achieve their 'noble' ends."

When the Berlin wall fell and the human devastation of communism became visible, even for a moment, the communists went undercover, burrowing into universities and government posts, but still working to bring about the socialist utopia.

Residents of the West refuse to recognize evil, and hence refuse to confront its manifestations until no choice remains. That defect usually causes needless suffering and death.  See, for example, WW2.

Meanwhile the majority of American men "lead lives of quiet desperation," keeping their heads down and saying nothing, to avoid being fired--or sentenced to prison for 22 years for walking into the capitol on Jan 6th.

Source.

https://thefederalist.com/2023/12/28/50-years-ago-gulag-archipelago-unveiled-a-haunted-world/