The story of Paul Robeson is an American tragedy. One hundred years ago Robeson and numerous other black notorieties saw socialism as the escape from an America they saw as hopelessly racist and unwilling to give blacks a chance.
The fact that a number of blacks, even in the worst days of segregation, made successes of themselves was lost on Robeson.
Why he would champion a system like communism that oppressed people far worse than the segregated society he grew up in is a mystery. Sometimes the wheels of justice take a long time to turn, but turn they did. Robeson could not comprehend an American society where there was no segregation.
But why do young whites today, many of whom grew up under far better material circumstances than their parents, think socialism is the way to go?
For blacks under a communist society, it would have been out of the frying pan and into the fire.
Today the only injustices under law, like affirmative action aka affirmative discrimination are directed at whites.
