Man not a free agent in communist philosophy

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Part of The Carolinian

Title: Man not a free agent in communist philosophy
Language: English
Source: The Carolinian Volume XV (Issue No. 9) October 1951
Year: 1951
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Fulltext: ROTCHATTER (Continued from page 14) sent were high military officials and sponsors of the different corps. All in all the evening was wonderful and delightful. A series of radio programs will be regularly presented by the Cadet Corps twice a month. As a starter, a radio program was aired last week and among the participants were Mr. Danny Holganza popular radio songster and Staff Sergeant Romeo Sta. Cruz of the USC Unit. Songs, light comedies, humorous anecdotes and portrayal of ROTC personalities and news usually form the repertoire. Cebu City's ROTC units have been requested to participate in these programs. They have been sponsored to ap praise the people of the importance of the ROTC training of our youth and to bring the masses closer to our Armed Forces. As part of the ROTC orientation training, the Supreme ROTC Frater nity spearheaded by Frank Borro meo, agreed to have an observation tour to neighboring provinces to ob serve the doings of other ROTC units. If plans do not miscarry the trip will be pushed through some time in December. HERE'S NEWS FOR THE SAD-SACK: Coming from the Commandant's office is on order requiring all cadets to wear proper uniforms whether they are in or out side the parade grounds. OD's and FOD's are given instructions to check on these sloppy cadets and give them demerits. An other special order is that beginning next semester squad leaders will have additional duties aside from being squad leaders. They will have to attend special classes to orient themselves with the different phases of commands and to enhance their efficiency in leadership. The USC "sad socks" will no longer go straight to the drill grounds without attend ing mass on Sunday. The problem of cadets not attending mass was solved by the De partment with the requirement that Sunday drillers shall hove to attend mass on Sun day or be dropped from the roster of cadets. Officiating on these special Sunday masses is Rev. Father Schonfeld. NEWSETTES ON THE SIDELINES: From among the oomphious sights we made out all the luck in the world when a 19 years young. Miss Celeste Rubi, obligingly stood up to her full five-feet-four and winsomely honoured us with her con WHAT IS RUSSIAN . . . (Continued from page 34) "Because the graves are for our dead heroes," indignantly shot back the young woman. With biting logic the American shot back, "Well, you said Com munists haven't any souls, and so sent to be this year's ROTC Corps Sponsor. Miss Rubi from the Sec retarial stools shied from her inter viewers but missed to hide the sur face fact that she possesses about everything that ought to get this man's army clicking. So simple and unaristocratic, she will remain in an enviable pedestal before the boys and we won't be surprised to get a report one of these days about a guy in the ranks who broke his arm on that rifle just trying to im press her! We are proud to introduce here our Rose among the "sponsorial" array: Miss Rosario Mercader, 2nd Battalion. When we landed our first sight on her, Spain suddenly re vealed herself before us. And the 1st Battalion is coloured by a cute little package of heart ache in the person of Miss Editha Po. (Did I hear a moan?) Because of her cadet elbowed the man be side him and asked, painfully: Why weren't you born a pretty dame? Amen, brother, we say to you. Miss Luz Evangelista graces the Corps Stall. That feminine air, that look in her eyes, those cheeks, and . . . uhhh, that figure. Pardon me, but if you insist, she has also that frame of mind that'll floor you. The boys need that, especially in those times when blank is blank. And here, a declaimer in her own right, is Miss Dahlia Cadell, 3rd Battalion. M'gosh, fellahs, why don't you just get busy and hunt them up rather than screw me tight for adjectives. I ain't no Shakespeare! WHAT DO YOU THINK . . . (Continued from page 8) • Mr. Manuel Baylosis, College of Law, says: Get a load of this: Orator: ( remonstratingly ) Dear ... Wife: After everything, don't master your art on me. I've just about got my right foot home to mother. Orator: But dear . . Wife: Not a word from you! Orator: But . . Wife: Shaddup or I'll . . Orator: Lord, even unto mine home, cans't Thou bless me with peace?—Now what are we talk ing about? these heroes were just animals. Horses and heroes both fought and died for your Revolution. Both, ac cording to you, were animals. Why not erect- tombstones over both?" The young girl shrugged her shoulders—the argument was over Man Not a Free Agent In Communist Philosophy If there is no spiritual element in man, he is not a free agent. Free will is simply an illusion and a de lusion. If man is but an aggregate of material atoms, obeying the ne cessary laws of matter, he exercises no more freedom than the sun or the moon, than a plant or an irra tional animal. And since man, ac cording to Marxist philosophy, has no free-will, why all this invective against capitalists, who are no more responsible for their exploitation of the workers than is the lion -that devours a lamb, or the fire that burns grass? Why all this haran guing of workmen, of the proletariat, to struggle against the "bourgeoistic" or capitalists, since workmen in any case are following blind ne cessity and inexorable laws of matter and can make no free effort to liberate themselves from slavery or oppression? Why, the whole phi losophy and practice of Communism is a ridiculous contradiction of the very principles it so blatantly lays down! If man is not a free agent, but must, of sheer necessity, obey the blind laws of materialistic evolution, let Communists cease to air any grievances or advocate any effort, and supinely allow nature to take its course, for they can do nothing whatever to divert this course. Deny free-will, and human life becomes an absolute farce. Morality Fundamentally Impossible In The Communist Scheme According to their own "prin ciples" Communists must admit that there is no such thing as morality, and, indeed, we read in Lenin's own writings the following candid state ment: "In what sense do we deny ethics, morals?" "In the sense in which they are preached by the bourgeoisie, which deduces these morals from God's commandments. Of course, we say that we do not believe in God. We know perfectly well that the clergy, the landlords, the bourgeoisie all claimed to speak in the name of God, in order to protect their own interests as exploiters. Or, instead of deducing their ethics from the commandments of morality, from the commandments of God, they de duced them from the idealistic or semi-idealistic phrases which in substance were always very similar to divine commandments. (Continued on next page) October, 1951 Page 35 WHAT IS RUSSIAN . . . (Continued from page 35) USC IN THE NEWS (Continued from page 31) Miss LINDA DALOPE SECRETARIAL STUDENTS' PREXY CELEBRATES 18TH BIRTHDAY Linda Dalope, president of the secretarial students' organization, tendered a party at the Dalope re sidence on the occasion of her 18 th birthday celebration last September 16. Present during the affair were some USC instructors and a host of Carolinians. Miss Dalope is the only child of the Dalopes, owner of one of Cebu's leading business establishments. COLLEGE OF EDUCATION TO SPONSOR FIFTH ANNUAL DECLAMATION TILT The fifth annual declamation con test will be sponsored by the Se niors of the College of Education on October 7. This contest is open to all colleges and departments of the university. Each college is to be represented by two contestants while one representative for every department may participate in the tilt. Prizes will be awarded to the four best deciaimers. These prizes will be solicited from prominent ci tizens in the city. Judges for the contest will be selected from leading educators in the city. LIBRARY, RECIPIENT OF DONATIONS Gift books have been lately re ceived by the USC Library fromthe U.S.I.S., the Kellog Foundation, and Burlingame Toastmasters Club. From USIS, 24 volumes of books and a number of pamphlets were "We deny all morality taken from superhuman or non-class con ceptions. We say that this is a de ception, a swindle, a befogging of the minds of the workers and pea sants in the interest of the landlords and capitalists. "We say that our morality is wholly subordinated to the interests of the class-struggle of the proleta riat . . . "That is why we say that a morality taken from outside of hu man society does not exist for us; it is a fraud. For us morality is subordinated to the interests of the proletarian class-struggle" (Religion, pp. 47 & 48). "The ethics of Communism," writes Monsignor Fulton J. Sheen, "are the natural sequence of its ma terialistic belief. The Communist' theory of ethics is that all moral standards grow out of certain eco nomic conditions. 'All moral theories are the product in the last analysis of the economic stage which society has reached at that particular epoch' (F. Engels, Anti-Duhring). Morality as consonance with the Eternal Law of God reflected in conscience is denied, since it is not God but eco nomics which makes morality. There would logically be a repu diation of both the Jewish belief in a Divine Law as expressed in the Ten Commandments and the Greek view of a Divine Order expressing itself in purpose and fixed behavior, once one translated Hegel's idea of a flux in the world of ideas to flux in the world of reality and history. Then there can no longer be any transcendent order, but only the his toric process itself which moves by dialectical necessity to a classless society. If a man is a member of the Communist class he is predes tined as was the Calvinist of old, except that his heaven will be the classless kingdom on earth. If, however, a man belongs to the 'ex ploiting class,' then he is historically received. The Kellog Foundation of the United States sent its don ations through the Bureau of Pri vate Schools. Fifty volumes were given to the USC Library. The donations of the Burlingame Toast masters Club, Burlingame, Califor nia, came in the form of CARE (Committee of American Remittances to Europe) book package contain ing 9 books, valued at $50, most of them pharmacy books. doomed" (Communism and the Conscience of the West, p. 65). The fundamental principle, the only principle, of Russian Bolshevist "ethics" has been boldly and baldly stated by E. Yaroslavsky: "What coincides with the interests of the Proletarian Revolution is ethical" (Red Virtue, p. 12). Since the Com munistic State is the infallible organ which decides the tactics to be adopted in order to attain its end, we may say, in the last analysis, that all "morality" in the Communist code comes from this State, and that the Red Dictator is the supreme, infallible teacher of Communists' "morality." In a word, the Com munist masses, in "morality" as in other matters, are "dictator-deter mined." Let me now refer to a second pamphlet from the able pen of Fa ther Raymond T. Feely, S.J. (Com munism and Morals, Paulist Press). In a passage entitled Gangster Ethics, Father Feely writes: "Perhaps this subtitle is parti cularly apt, as Stalin's earlier life is a perfect illustration of the doctrine we have been examining. Money was needed for the work of the re volutionists. He turned gangster and robbed a bank to supply the neces sary funds. " ’The end justifies any means' is the commonplace phrasing of Com munist ethics. "The end' is the per petuation of Lenin's or Stalin's dic tatorship: 'the means' — 'whatever is necessary.' Most readers who are interested in the subject of Russia have read W. H. Chamberlin's Rus sia's Iron Age — the classic on the subject. He recounts there the wellknown incident: "When Lady Astor, in company with Bernard Shaw and Lord Lo thian, met Stalin in the summer of 1931, she blurted out the unconven tional question: 'How long are you going to continue killing people?' And Stalin, possibly taken a little by surprise, shot back the retort:’-As long as it is necessary.' (p. 152). "There you have bluntly," con tinues Father Feely, "the whole ethical system of Communism. The criminal who kidnaps a babe, the gangster who mows down a fellow gangster with a machine gun, the pervert who ravishes a child, all are practicing the same philosophy. 'The end' — money, or power, or satisfaction lust; 'the means' — mur der or theft or rape." (To be Continued) Page 36 THE CAROLINIAN