Why I Am a Socialist

There are several reasons why I became a socialist. Growing up in the South, I saw immense poverty wherever I went. There were people who had worked for textile factories for over 20 years forced to leave because companies moved their factories to places more primed for profit at workers’ expense. There were kids from my high school putting their lives at risk in the military because there was no hope to give them more job security than Iraq or Afghanistan.

It couldn’t just be that my friends and neighbors had a sustained bout of bad luck. So I began to look at history to try to explain what was happening. In this, I found that these conditions were not just confined to my locale and time but that they were a systemic product of capitalism – the rich get richer and the poor and working class foot the bill. I saw that now and throughout history, the Democrats were just as guilty as the Republicans, both being in the pockets of corporations.

Socialism revealed itself to me as the only way to fight back for working people against capitalism’s exploitation. I became a socialist to fight back for my community, a fight inseparable from the fight for a better future worldwide.