Monday, February 7, 2011

Why I call myself a socialist

by Wallace Shawn from War in Context. (You may want to skip the introduction and scroll down to the essay entitled, "Are you smarter than Thomas Jefferson?" in which he explains why he is a socialist.)

Wallace Shawn is an Obie Award–winning playwright and noted stage and screen actor. He is co-author of the film My Dinner with AndrĂ© and author of the plays The Fever, Aunt Dan and Lemon, The Designated Mourner, and Grasses of a Thousand Colors.
Our capacity to fantasize about other people and to believe our own fantasies makes it possible for us to enjoy this valuable art form, theater. But unfortunately it’s a capacity which has brought incalculable harm and suffering to human beings.