There is this thing I’ve had for a long time now, the seed of an idea not yet fully formed. When I try to put it on paper it comes out all wrong. When I try to connect the dots in the way my spirit understands, it comes out all wrong. It’s something deep inside me, this I know. It’s intangible, indescribable, a knowledge of a universal brotherhood and kinship of all humankind, as cheesy as it sounds. It’s like a fire that in spite of whatever happens to me, whatever I feel or think or experience, cannot be extinguished. And put here now, not even death can put it out. I know of many things both good and evil, and the darkness of the human soul is not able to deter my beliefs. It’s an amalgam of radically different, often seemingly contradictory aims and ideals that, when put together, form something, or begin to form something beautiful. It’s a raw selection from different books, movies, essays, and TV shows. Now, I am putting this here to elaborate on later. For a post on Red Liberty I am aware it is quite disorganized.

Reds (1981)

Describing Jack Reed: “He took a tremendous jump forward from there on. He became a revolutionist on the workers’ side, and he had no more illusions about people like Wilson. We all have problems. You can’t escape having problems, don’t you know? But to take on the problem of all humanity, to save all humanity, my God, that was too big even for Jesus Christ. Don’t you know he got himself crucified? How the hell do we expect to do those things?”

Eugene V. Debs

A hard-bitten socialist told me once, “Gene Debs is the only one who can get away with the sentimental flummery that’s been tied onto Socialism in this country. Pretty nearly always it gives me a swift pain to go around to meetings and have people call me ‘comrade.’ That’s a lot of bunk. But the funny part of it is that when Debs says ‘comrade’ it is all right. He means it. That old man with the burning eyes actually believes that there can be such a thing as the brotherhood of man. And that’s not the funniest part of it. As long as he’s around I believe it myself.”

-Heywood Broun, quoting an unnamed socialist in It Seems To Me, 1925-1935 (1935), p. 38

Star Trek: The Original Series (Bread and Circuses, S02E25)

[Prison]

(Spock and McCoy carry Flavius into a cell.)
KIRK: Tell Merikus I’d like to see him.
MAXIMUS: The first citizen? Why would he bother with arena bait like you?
KIRK: Tell him it’s Jim Kirk. Perhaps a friend.
MAXIMUS: Perhaps?
KIRK: Well, if I am a friend and you don’t tell him, do you really want to risk that?
(They are locked in and left alone. McCoy tends to Flavius’s head wound.)
KIRK: But if there have been slaves for over 2,000 years, hasn’t there always been discontent, runaways?
FLAVIUS: Long ago there were rebellions, but they were suppressed. And with each century, the slaves acquired more rights under the law. They received rights to medicine, the right to government payments in their old age, and they slowly learned to be content.
SPOCK: Even more fascinating. Slavery evolving into an institution with guaranteed medical payments, old-age pensions.
MCCOY: Quite logical, I’d say, Mister Spock. Just as it’s logical that twentieth-century Rome would use television to show its gladiator contests or name a new car the Jupiter Eight.
SPOCK: Doctor, if I were able to show emotion, your new infatuation with that term would begin to annoy me.
MCCOY: What term? Logic? Medical men are trained in logic, Mister Spock.
SPOCK: Really, Doctor, I had no idea they were trained. Watching you, I assumed it was trial and error.
FLAVIUS: Are they enemies, Captain?
KIRK: I’m not sure they’re sure. When the slaves began to worship the sun, they became discontent again. When did all this happen?
FLAVIUS: Long ago. Perhaps as long ago as the beginning of the empire. The message of the sun, that all men are brothers, was kept from us. Perhaps I’m a fool to believe it. It does often seem that man must fight to live.
KIRK: You go on believing it, Flavius. All men are brothers.
(The guards return.)
…

> [Bridge]

KIRK: And strong personal feelings, he obeyed the Prime Directive. His temporary blackout of the city below resulted in no interference with the society and yet saved the lives of myself and the landing party.
SCOTT: Thank you, Captain.
(Scott leaves as McCoy and Spock enter the Bridge.)
KIRK: Gentlemen.
MCCOY: Captain, I see on your report Flavius was killed. I am sorry. I liked that huge sun worshiper.
SPOCK: I wish we could have examined that belief of his more closely. It seems illogical for a sun worshiper to develop a philosophy of total brotherhood. Sun worship is usually a primitive superstition religion.
UHURA: I’m afraid you have it all wrong, Mister Spock, all of you. I’ve been monitoring some of their old-style radio waves, the empire spokesman trying to ridicule their religion. But he couldn’t. Don’t you understand? It’s not the sun up in the sky. It’s the Son of God.
KIRK: Caesar and Christ. They had them both. And the word is spreading only now.
MCCOY: A philosophy of total love and total brotherhood.
SPOCK: It will replace their imperial Rome, but it will happen in their twentieth century.
KIRK: Wouldn’t it be something to watch, to be a part of? To see it happen all over again? Mister Chekov, take us out of orbit. Ahead warp factor one.
CHEKOV: Aye, sir.

The Sunshine Makers (2015)

“I went to Billy Hitchcock and asked him whether he had ideas for a distribution channel. Because Billy had all kinds of social contacts, all over the psychedelic scene. And he introduced me to the Brotherhood of Eternal Love, also known as the Hippie Mafia.”

“The mafia rules by fear. The Brotherhood ruled by love. LSD made freethinkers out of people. The grip that all governments have on people was going to probably end. I know it sounds ridiculously naive. But if you’ve ever sat and really seen the golden light, and really went deep inside yourself… it ain’t all that far out.”

“They were actually stickup men. And they all dropped acid. And they threw their pistols away. And they said, we’re going to form the Brotherhood of Love. And we’ll be working with psychedelics and we won’t be sticking up people anymore. Our aim was to turn the world on.”

God is Love

“Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.” 1 John 4:7-8

See also:

Patriotism A Menace to Liberty, an essay by Emma Goldman (http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/anarchist_archives/goldman/aando/patriotism.html)