Marxist Nostalgia

The virus lives, and mutates:

It sounds like the University of Washington student Senate is struggling to make some progress. After turning down a memorial to a notorious World War II Congressional Medal of Honor awardee, alum "Pappy" Boyington, they are now considering a more general memorial. At least this time they are getting it all wrong in a different way.

The real problem seems to be the students' "carefully taught" inclination to "massification" -- the tendency of liberal institutions, in the nocturnal twilight of Marxist collectivism, to insist on memorials to classes of people, not individuals. The kiddie Senate is now trying to figure out just how to word a memorial resolution that will be as "inclusive" as possible -- in other words, one memorial for a class of heroes. For example, since 1998 there is a nice memorial to the alum who fought with the largely Communist Abraham Lincoln Brigade in the Spanish Civil War.

On this basis Statuary Hall in the Capitol and every the halls of every other state capitol would empty of their individual statues overnight and be replaced by single statues to The Statesmen, and a plaque on the wall with hundreds of names on it.

No memorials to Kit Carson, but one to The Pathfinders; none to Sacajawea, or Sitting Bull, but one to The Native American. Let's get rid of all the statues to MacArthur, Eisenhower, or Thayer on the Plain at West Point, and replace them with a nice memorial to The American Soldier.

On that principle, at least, we could regain a terrific amount of space from unnecessary statuary all over the United States.

Thus we replace admiration and public memory of great men for abstract concepts, thus undermining the minting of more great men in favor of encouraging lukewarm aspiration to coghood. Leftism is a parasite intent on destroying its host.