Screening as part of the 45th annual Cleveland International Film Festival
"
The Big Scary "S" Word"
**** (out of
****)
During our last presidential election Donald Trump and the Republican Party repeated, almost comically, their favorite rallying cry and scare tactic, calling their Democratic opponent a Socialist. It exposed the Republicans as completely incapable of running against Democrats on ideas without name calling. Joe Biden! A Socialist!
Even though the Republicans are out of ideas, their demonization of the word Socialist has been effective. How many times have we heard politicians says Socialism will never come to America? How many hearts were stricken with fear at the thought of Bernie Sanders as the next President? How many people shriek and hide in corners, trembling, just upon hearing the word "Socialist"? Some of you may even be scared simply reading the word (I hope you are sitting down).
Yael Bridge's documentary, The Big Scary "S" Word, is going to frighten Republican audiences. Not only because it is about Socialism (that's the "S" in the title) but also because the documentary dares to say Socialism is rooted in America. One talking head, the always entertaining Dr. Cornel West, says Socialism is as American as apple pie!
Clearly the objective here is to "normalize" the word Socialism. According to the documentary, and various news reports, fear of Socialism has become a generational divide. Those that lived through the Cold War have a more violent reaction to the concept, while those of us born in the 80s onward ('83 for me) tend not to be as intimidated by the word. Our generation hasn't been sufficiently programmed by society to react with terror.
The Big Scary "S" Word somewhat approaches the generational divide by following a Virginia politician, Lee Carter, who represents the 50th district in the Virginia House of Delegates. He is an avowed Democratic-Socialist. At age 33, Carter says the word "Socialist" isn't scary to him, conjuring images of the Soviet Union. This "normalization" can also be attributed to other factors such as both of Sen. Bernie Sanders' presidential runs, the popularity of Rep. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, and the living conditions of Millennials brought on by the de-regulation policies of the Republican Party and George W. Bush, contributing to the economic collapse in 2008 (the same year I graduated college). They haven't experienced any of the benefits of the "American Dream" only the debt it causes.
Looking at
The Big Scary "S" Word from this perspective it is quite an effective and provocative documentary lacking the "theatrics" of Michael Moore and the academic quality of something like
Inside Job (2010) thus making it more easy to digest for a broad audience. While it won't be able to persuade any Republicans, who are too far gone down the rabbit hole, it
might give the non-political something to think about, which may make it a threat to the Establishment.
The documentary traces Socialism in the U.S. going back to the 1840s in Wisconsin. In 1910 voters in Milwaukee elected Victor Berger to the House, the first Socialist ever elected to the House! Also in Milwaukee voters elected Paul Zeidler, a Socialist who served as the Mayor for three terms, between 1948 - 1960. There is brief discussion of Eugene Debs, who ran for president as a Socialist five times. In the 1912 election he received more than 900,000 votes. We are told the other candidates, Woodrow Wilson and Teddy Roosevelt, also had far left ideas, proving the popularity of Socialism. We are even told Franklin Roosevelt "stole" many ideas from the Socialist Party for his "New Deal" policies. Although not mentioned here, Roosevelt's Secretary of Agriculture and later Vice-President, Henry Wallace, was a leftist, establishing the Progressive Party and running for president on that party's ticket in 1948.
To further illustrate Socialism's roots in America, we are even told of famous people, we may not realize, that were Socialist, like Francis Bellamy, who wrote The Pledge of Allegiance. Katharine Lee Bates, writer of America The Beautiful, and Dr. Martin Luther King.
Of course whatever popularity Socialism or Socialist ideas had in the 1940s, quickly died after World War II and the beginning of the Cold War, these leftist ideas proved to be too much of a threat. One way to squash Socialism was to go after the Labor Movement. The Big Scary "S" Word tells us there has been a historical link between Labor and Socialism. With the 1947 Taft-Hartley Act (AKA The Labor Management Relations Act of 1947) restrictions were placed on Unions prohibiting political strikes and secondary boycotts. It allowed states to pass right-to-work laws and made union leaders sign affidavits stating they were not Communist.
This is contrasted to the political and social movements of the 1960s and 70s and finds its why to Occupy Wall Street and the Covid-19 pandemic, in relation to the need for a universal healthcare program. The point being, the working class and poor can only be ignored for so long until they begin to demand change. This might explain the rise of acceptance of the word "Socialism".
In the modern day The Big Scary "S" Word tells us about cooperatives, where workers own the company they work for. One laundry company in Ohio, Evergreen, is showcased and presented as a possible alternative to our current miserable workforce experience. It is suggested when workers have more of a say in the company, not only are they happier and productivity goes up.
This is Yael Bridge's first full-length documentary and she proves to be quite a talent. She was also a producer for the Netflix documentary Saving Capitalism following former Secretary of Labor (under Bill Clinton) Robert Reich. Clearly this is an issue important to her. Featuring Naomi Klein, Dr. Cornel West, and economist Richard Wolff, The Big Scary "S" Word is one of the year's best.
The Cleveland International Film Festival will be running between April 7th - April 20th. Ticket and streaming information can be found on their website. Please visit it by clicking here.
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