Today my son learned about three different societies: Democracy, socialism and communism. His economics teacher had a special monopoly game planned for the class.
When they started, the society was a democracy and the game played with the normal rules. Everyone could buy, sell or trade properties, including railroads and utilities. When they passed GO, they collected $200 and could gain a bonus amount by landing on Free Parking.
My son decided to trade for a railroad so that on his next turn, he could trade it to another kid who had the other three railroads. After everyone had build up their fortunes a bit, the teacher came over and proclaimed they were now playing socialist monopoly. All railroads and utilities were taken over by the government and thus anytime anyone landed there, they paid the government. When they passed GO, they collected $150 and landing on Free Parking got them nothing.
Things continued along and my son decided to compile his money into mostly $500 dollar bills… so as not to have so much cash. After a bit, the teacher came over again and declared it to be a communist society and all properties were controlled by the government and they seized all $500 dollar bills (lol). Everyone paid the government for landing anywhere on the board. Each player collected $100 for passing GO and was allowed to remove one property that used to belong to them so as to lower payments in the future. The only people protected from owing the government any money were those in jail. How ironic.
Eventually, the teacher came over and declared that the people overthrew the government and it was now a democracy again. Everyone distributed properties but not necessarily what they had before turning communist.
End of Game.
The lesson: the teacher explained that societies often start out as democracies and over time, turn to socialism and then eventually, right into communism. He said that our society is currently somewhere between a democracy and socialism right now because the people are not completely in control but instead share the control with the government.
My Opinion:
Our country is leaning more and more towards socialism as the government steps in and takes over different aspects of our society. They use the guise of bailing our citizens out of crisis after crisis. Often… truth be told… our government not only causes the crisis… but plots them out years in advance in order to gain more control of the people and take more away from us.
Do we really have to go through hundreds of years of these different forms of societies as my son’s teacher suggests may happen? Are we really so short sighted that we can’t see what’s happening before our very eyes? I think it could happen just because the average person (me included) doesn’t really know how one or two items can really change our society. “We’re just giving up a little bit of our freedom… just a tid bit of our rights… it’s no big deal”.
Really? No big deal to give up our rights so the government can become a looming force in our country? The government was created to protect the people… not control them. And NO… protecting me from my own mistakes is not a necessity of my government. Get out of my head, heart, home and family.
Sounds like that teacher should present the lesson to Pelosi, Reid, Obama, Hillary, Kerry – – – –
– – – – – oh, wait, forget it, they still wouldn’t “get it”.
How can it NOT be obvious? This teacher is telling the students that it’s a fact that societies go through this form of transition… the people have to get their asses handed to them before someone finally stands up and says enough is enough. Why do we have to go through it? It’s much like how we (as parents) try to give advice to our kids yet they have to make all the same mistakes anyway. I know we learn from experience but somehow we must learn from other countries and our own country’s mistakes… let’s not repeat them.