Yet, if it be true that doctrines have naught to do with the spread of
terrorism, why is it that among many million socialists there are almost
no terrorists, while among a few thousand anarchists there are many
terrorists? The pressure of adverse social conditions is felt as keenly
by the socialists as by the anarchists. The one quite as much as the
other is a rebel against social ills. The indictment made by the
socialists against political and economic injustice is as far-reaching
as that of the anarchists. Why then does not the socialist movement
produce terrorists? Is it not that the teachings of Marx and of all his
disciples dwell upon the folly of violence, the futility of riots, the
madness of assassination, while, on the other hand, the teachings of
Bakounin, of Nechayeff, of Kropotkin, and of Most advocate destructive
violence as a creative force? "Extirpate the wretches!" cries Most.
"Make robbers our allies!" says Nechayeff. "Propagate the gospel by a
deed!" urges Kropotkin, and throughout Bakounin's writings there appears
again and again the plea for "terrible, total, inexorable, and universal
destruction." Both socialists and anarchists preach their gospel to the
weary and heavy-laden, to the despondent and the outraged, who may
readily be led to commit acts of despair. They have, after all, little
to lose, and their life, at present unbearable, can be made little worse
by punishment. Yet millions of the miserable have come into the
socialist movement to hear the fiercest of indictments against
capitalism, and it is but rare that one becomes a terrorist. What else
than the teachings of anarchism and of socialism can explain this
difference?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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