Chairman Trump: A Thinkpost on Maoism

My parents are avid consumers of dissident Chinese blogs. These are news blogs that circumvent the government sanctioned censorship, and tell stories factually (or in fact, tell the story at all if Beijing has swept it under the rug). These days, the hot new topic is the rise of Trump and his (while likely unintentional) parallels, not to Nixon, or fascism, or Hitler, but to China's very own, illustrious Chairman Mao.

I don't really want to spend too much time talking about how it is that Mao came to power, the Great Leap Forward, and the subsequent Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. American schools dedicate pretty much zero time to teaching this subject, but there are historians and journalists far more qualified you can learn from. I've linked some of those articles below. To give you a summary, I start by quoting directly from Wikipedia:

"During the early 1960s, Mao became concerned with the nature of post-1959 China. He saw that the revolution and Great Leap Forward had replaced the old elite with a new one [from his own party establishment]. He was concerned that those in power were becoming estranged from the people they were to serve. Mao believed that a revolution of culture would unseat and unsettle the 'ruling class' and keep China in a state of 'perpetual revolution' that, theoretically, would serve the interests of the majority, rather than a tiny and privileged elite."

[To note, the Great Leap Forward was essentially an industrial and agricultural revolution, spearheaded by Chairman Mao, that caused cyclical natural disasters and a famine so dire, an estimated 45 million people died. Yes. You read that number right.]

Sound familiar? It keeps going.

Mao launched the Cultural Revolution, many say as petty revenge for people who spoke out against his Great Leap Forward program. He deemed intellectuals (aka educated middle to upper class citizens) "class enemies" and exiled them into rural parts of China to "learn" from the peasants. In case it wasn't clear what happened here, he sent them to labor camps. Mao was a master manipulator of propaganda, distributing "Little Red Books" that had cryptic quotes in it that even my parents can still sing or recite to this day, declaring that he will be sovereign for "10,000 years." He created a personality cult and mobilized millions of youths, disgruntled with the status quo, who perpetrated unspeakable crimes on his behalf.

Again, all sound familiar?

Now, I don't want to oversimplify the nuances of either the Cultural Revolution or the election of Donald Trump. There are plenty of differences between Trump and Mao. Trump is a fascist (I call it like I see it). By definition, Mao is *technically* a Marxist with fascist tendencies. Also, I don't want to give Trump that much credit. Mao Zedong was an incredibly intelligent, cunning person; his every move was a thorough calculation. Trump is a clear idiot.

Even as I'm rambling on about this, I'm not confident I know was my point is. So I'm going to leave you with this in the hope you mull this post over and make your own conclusions on what immigrants can teach us:

America is fond of repeating, not just it's own history, but the history of other countries because it has never given non-white immigrants a seat at the decision making table.

My parents survived a mass purge. We're talking, Real Life Hunger Games, where people got picked off the streets by brainwashed nationalists and beaten to death for being "enemies of the state." 8 million would die at the end of it all. My mom worked in a grain mill; my dad, construction in the mountains (dynamite and pick-axe style). They didn't get to be freshman in college until they were 24. Historians call my parents "China's Lost Generation." My mom still doesn't like to talk about it.

The rest is cliche. They came here with a suitcase of pots and 30 bucks between the two of them, looking for the American Dream. They raised a badass bitch (that's me!) largely on cans of beef stew and buy one, get one free Whoppers from Burger King. They fought for their life and their place in America. They fought for me.

So now, I fight for them.


Links for reference:

• Wikipedia
• China's Cultural Revolution Explained - The New York Times
• The Maoism of Donald Trump - The New Yorker