Since Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels made famous their manifesto in 1848, many nations today still ascribe to the communist theory that there is an association between the problems in society and an unequal distribution of wealth.

Supporters believe that revolution would be essential to bring about a communistic form of government since the wealthy would never willingly give up their wealth.

Last August, Victor David Hanson, commentator and military historian, wrote in a commentary that our nation is in the midst of a revolution and probably most don’t even know it. The woke elite, he said, told us to ignore for 120 days of the summer riots, looting and arson in 2020 since, in the words of the 1619 project architect and former New York Times reporter Nikole Hannah-Jones, “destroying property, which can be replaced, is not violence.”

With this thinking, torching a federal courthouse, a church or police precinct should not be a worry since it’s merely brick and mortar and the taking over a few city blocks is simply a trivial byproduct of “a summer of love.” Hanson also explained that “defund the police became a socialist slogan supposedly to remind us that “crime” is what the rich call going into a store to grab something they never fret about needing.

Some elected officials in conservative states are making sure that communist/socialist form of government is not being ignored in the classroom. Last week, Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey, directed the state’s board of education to update high school social studies academic standards to include a “comparative discussion of political ideologies, such as communism and totalitarianism, that conflict with the principles of freedom and democracy that are essential to the founding principles of the United States of America.”

Rep. Quang Nguyen, who fled communist Vietnam as a child, cited his upbringing in the country as a major factor in sponsoring a bill that pushes for change in the high school curriculum.

“Having grown up in Vietnam and survived three communist invasions, I have a deep love and appreciation for the United States and its freedoms, which are guaranteed to all,” Nguyen said in a news release. “This civics standards update will help ensure that our students are taught the brutal facts of oppressive communist systems and how they are fundamentally antithetical to America’s founding principles.”

Arizona is not alone in assuring that communist theory is taught in the classroom. A year ago, Florida upgraded its civics education to include instruction about communist and totalitarian governments.

The new law requires the development of a K-12 civics curriculum that, among other things, would include “portraits in patriotism.” The stories entail “first-person accounts of victims of other nations’ governing philosophies who can compare those philosophies with those of the United States.”

In a related action last week, Gov. Ron DeSantis signed the Victims of Communism Memorial Day, which designates Nov. 7 as a day Floridians can honor the more than 100 million people who have died under communist regimes and the 1.5 billion people who still live and labor under communism today.

“We want to make sure that every year, folks in Florida - but particularly our students - will learn about the evils of communism, the dictators who have led communist regimes and the hundreds of millions of individuals who have suffered and continue to suffer under the weight of this discredited ideology,” DeSantis explained.

Andrew Bremberg, president and CEO of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, applauded the governor, explaining that the commemoration not only honors those who have suffered, but it also helps educate American youth to have an understanding of communism and an appreciation for democracy.

In the U.S. Congress, Florida Congresswoman María Elvira Salazar introduced The Crucial Communism Teaching Act, (H.R. 6123) which would require the development and dissemination of a civic education curriculum and oral history resources regarding certain political ideologies. The bill is modeled after the Never Again Education Act signed into law in 2020 to create a program to educate American students about the Holocaust through the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Citing a report survey by the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation entitled “U.S. Attitudes Toward Socialism, Communism, and Collectivism,” Rep. Smucker, a Lancaster County Republican representing Pennsylvania’s 11th District district, said he’s very alarmed by the number of younger Americans who hold favorable views of communism. The survey, which explores perceptions of collectivist systems, such as communism and socialism, among Americans ages 16 or older, also showed that Marxism still has the highest favorability among Gen Z (30 percent) and millennials (27 percent) compared to other generations.

“The world knows communism is responsible for horrifying death and destruction throughout history. It is more critical than ever that we ensure our students are taught the history and the present dangers of this ideology,” Smucker stated in a news release last Dec. 7, a red letter date in itself.

That day marked the 80th anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the event which propelled the U.S. into World War II, bolstering Allied efforts to beat back the Axis powers’ (Germany and Japan) quest for totalitarianism and global expansion.

By Jim Zbick | tneditor@tnonline.com

The foregoing opinions do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editorial Board or Times News LLC.