How did my communist family get it so wrong? Because politics was their religion | Martin Kettle

Marxism gave my parents faith to last a lifetime and helped them deny reality. The left today looks as if it’s also developing into a church

The first public event I can remember took place in 1953. I was three years old. But I don’t remember the Queen’s coronation, as other children of my age may have done. What I remember was my mother reading from the Daily Worker about the death of Stalin. This tells you a lot about what it was like to grow up in a communist family, even in a not particularly doctrinaire one like mine. We lived in a different world from normal people.

Related: The role of communist thinking in today’s world | Letters

Related: Party Animals: My Family and Other Communists by David Aaronovitch – dark memories of Marxism

This left of today looks suspiciously as if it is developing into another church to me

This left too seems happiest as a fellowship of true believers, dismissive of all those who remain sceptics

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