Capitalists and Communists By Darren Baker

česky

I grew up in a household dedicated to capitalism. Case in point was my stamp collection. One day, when I was about ten, I had a chance to double my collection for the price of three dollars. I didn't have the money at the time, but my brother, who was three years older, offered to lend it to me. The only condition was that I pay it back in a week with 25% interest. It was loansharking, plain and simple, but in those days he was the only bank that would do business with me. So I took the money, got the stamps, and then set out to pay off the loan.

I managed to earn only two dollars by the end of the week, but no problem. Family was family, my brother told me, so he offered to refinance the remaining $1.75 under the original conditions (one week to pay, 25% interest). Once again I was short by the end of the week, once again my brother offered to refinance what I owed him. These transactions continued for a month when, after having paid him nearly $5 (most of which was interest), I was forced to surrender my stamp collection to him to settle my debt. So he takes my collection...and sells it to a friend for $10. I felt robbed but couldn't complain to my parents about it. Apart from looking like an utter fool, they would have reminded me that things could be worse. We could be living in a Communist country!

As things turned out, I came to live in a post-Communist country. At first my family was suspicious. True, the Berlin Wall had come down, but had them Commies really changed? Sure, I told them. Under the coupon privatization program, former state companies were being bought up by small groups of investors, plundered of their assets, then left to rot afterwards. That was good news across the Atlantic. The Czechs had not only embraced capitalism, but the Anglo-Saxon style of capitalism.

Some suspicions, however, never go away. On my first trip home, I brought along my girlfriend (who, incidentally, grew up on a street named after Karl Marx). Everything was going well until my mother ruminated how awful it must have been to be a pioneer during Communism. The uniforms, the parades, the propaganda. My girlfriend replied that it was one of the best times of her life. Her troop went camping, they sang songs and ate sausages. They even went on a trip to Moscow. "To Moscow?" my mother asked, unable to believe her ears. "Sure," my friend answered. "I even got to see Lenin."

In the US, the pioneers were always stigmatized as a starting ground for future members of the Communist Party. It didn't matter that America has always had a similar organization of its own called the scouts. In my day the scouts were supposed to love nature and do good things like help old ladies cross the street, whether they wanted your help or not. I didn't have much use for either nature or old ladies, but I loved the blue uniform and yellow scarves worn by the scouts. Better yet, I loved the badges and recognition of achievement that went with them. So when I joined a scout troop at the age of nine, I went right to work on earning my first badge, the wolf's badge.

The problem was I had to complete a book full of tasks in order to get it. A thick book too, with such mundane tasks as building a fire and making a slingshot. After each task would be completed, my mother was supposed to sign off on it in the book. Perfect. I could just see myself asking my mother to come outside and look at the fire I had just started. Or at the window I had just broken with my new slingshot. There was also the fact that she was a working mother with very little time to herself. Taking all that into consideration, I thought I would do everyone a favor by signing for her. So I took a sample of her signature, opened the book and started signing her name.

This Little Boy's Mother...This Little Boy's Mother...This Little Boy's Mother....

My scout troop was in awe of me when I turned in my wolf's book in record time. It was even decided to present my badge to me at a banquet held to honor some of the older scouts. There I was, a young kid receiving the applause of people who thought they were looking at a future president. No less than the head scout himself presented me with my next assignment, the bear book, and wished me, on behalf of all those present, that I finish it in record time as well. No problem, I assured him.

This Little Boy's Mother...This Little Boy's Mother...This Little Boy's Mother....

And then it all came to an inglorious end. Someone finally noticed that my mother's signature looked like it had been made by a little kid and I was forced to confess in front of the whole scout troop. My wolf's badge was taken from me and I was officially expelled from the troop for a year. They told me I could ask to re-join when the year was up, but I didn't bother. By that time, I had discovered the joys of stamp collecting.