Never mix spices and honey. You will ruin both!
I was listening to playlist I made a while ago, and suddenly it started to play Lennon, Imagine. The playlist had mostly SOAD and POTF's songs, so Imagine came as a pleasant shock. I closed my eyes, and started mouthing the words. But, perhaps it came so out of context, that I became overtly critical of his lyrics. Midway, I realized that someone else had also said similar things. Someone famous, who's regime was tainted with corruption and blood. He was Lenin. This was Lennon. Was Lennon a communist too?
I quickly pulled out my Laptop, and started searching, hoping to find someone who would ridicule my notion. Nobody did. Over and over the webpages I read. Forums on philosophy, music, famous critics. His lines in the song,
Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people sharing all the world
were the first to make me realise how imprudent and stupid he was. He asks us to imagine a world of peace, set in a future without possessions, without a self? A life in a continuous oblivion, with no entity of one's own? What would such a peace pertain to? Each and every man working selflessly towards a common goal of institutional success, with his own life's measure no greater than that of another, or of no worth whatsoever? This utopian ideology, twisted to Animal Farm and 1984, was published years before Imagine by George Orwell. Other verses are no good either,
Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace
We can imagine there are no countries. Sure. But governance would require division of land into areas easily controllable. Any random selection is possible, but policy making would be efficient only if the local culture is taken into account. This should invoke a sense of belonging, and pride, and again a devotion to the motherland.
Unless.
There is no devotion towards one's self. So you can't appreciate or accept the traditions. This way, you wouldn't mind whatever policy the government imposes on you. You would neither have the will, nor the longing to preserve what you deem is yours. You are just living. You would be at peace, but you would survive as a living dead. It seems easy to believe such a brotherhood, but innate human nature is never accounted for. I don't think Lennon did that either. You would have to kill one's nature before you go on to implement a rule where habit would drive behaviour. In Life of Pi and A Clockwork Orange, we all see a Lion and the protagonist undergoing Behavioural Modifications to suit another's will. It doesn't seem a felicitous example, to quote from a work of fiction when trying to critic a great work of art, but it is true. A similar act on the part of the government would be required here too. That is perhaps the very thing Orwell showed in 1984. The act of thoughtcrime, to raise a spark of self even in one's thoughts, will have to be punished. It wouldn't be far fetched to say this song was inspired by The Communist Manifesto itself: From each as per his abilities, to each as per his needs. We all saw how it fared, when the mighty Soviet Union fell down in August 1991 (My friend always reminds me of this date. In the 12 years together that he has known me, he has never failed to remind me that it was on his Birthday that the great Soviet Union fell).
Lennon asked to Imagine a world with no posessions, no country, no self. So did George Orwell. But it is easier to believe Orwell's version than Lennon's.
Post Publishing Edit: Found this online. It is taken from The Communist Manifesto, Chapter 2:
The Communists are distinguished from the other working-class parties by this only: 1. In the national struggles of the proletarians of the different countries, they point out and bring to the front the common interests of the entire proletariat, independently of all nationality. 2. In the various stages of development which the struggle of the working class against the bourgeoisie has to pass through, they always and everywhere represent the interests of the movement as a whole.
I was listening to playlist I made a while ago, and suddenly it started to play Lennon, Imagine. The playlist had mostly SOAD and POTF's songs, so Imagine came as a pleasant shock. I closed my eyes, and started mouthing the words. But, perhaps it came so out of context, that I became overtly critical of his lyrics. Midway, I realized that someone else had also said similar things. Someone famous, who's regime was tainted with corruption and blood. He was Lenin. This was Lennon. Was Lennon a communist too?
I quickly pulled out my Laptop, and started searching, hoping to find someone who would ridicule my notion. Nobody did. Over and over the webpages I read. Forums on philosophy, music, famous critics. His lines in the song,
Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people sharing all the world
were the first to make me realise how imprudent and stupid he was. He asks us to imagine a world of peace, set in a future without possessions, without a self? A life in a continuous oblivion, with no entity of one's own? What would such a peace pertain to? Each and every man working selflessly towards a common goal of institutional success, with his own life's measure no greater than that of another, or of no worth whatsoever? This utopian ideology, twisted to Animal Farm and 1984, was published years before Imagine by George Orwell. Other verses are no good either,
Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace
We can imagine there are no countries. Sure. But governance would require division of land into areas easily controllable. Any random selection is possible, but policy making would be efficient only if the local culture is taken into account. This should invoke a sense of belonging, and pride, and again a devotion to the motherland.
Unless.
There is no devotion towards one's self. So you can't appreciate or accept the traditions. This way, you wouldn't mind whatever policy the government imposes on you. You would neither have the will, nor the longing to preserve what you deem is yours. You are just living. You would be at peace, but you would survive as a living dead. It seems easy to believe such a brotherhood, but innate human nature is never accounted for. I don't think Lennon did that either. You would have to kill one's nature before you go on to implement a rule where habit would drive behaviour. In Life of Pi and A Clockwork Orange, we all see a Lion and the protagonist undergoing Behavioural Modifications to suit another's will. It doesn't seem a felicitous example, to quote from a work of fiction when trying to critic a great work of art, but it is true. A similar act on the part of the government would be required here too. That is perhaps the very thing Orwell showed in 1984. The act of thoughtcrime, to raise a spark of self even in one's thoughts, will have to be punished. It wouldn't be far fetched to say this song was inspired by The Communist Manifesto itself: From each as per his abilities, to each as per his needs. We all saw how it fared, when the mighty Soviet Union fell down in August 1991 (My friend always reminds me of this date. In the 12 years together that he has known me, he has never failed to remind me that it was on his Birthday that the great Soviet Union fell).
Lennon asked to Imagine a world with no posessions, no country, no self. So did George Orwell. But it is easier to believe Orwell's version than Lennon's.
Post Publishing Edit: Found this online. It is taken from The Communist Manifesto, Chapter 2:
The Communists are distinguished from the other working-class parties by this only: 1. In the national struggles of the proletarians of the different countries, they point out and bring to the front the common interests of the entire proletariat, independently of all nationality. 2. In the various stages of development which the struggle of the working class against the bourgeoisie has to pass through, they always and everywhere represent the interests of the movement as a whole.
