The "Communist Manifesto" serves to divide, not to unite.

What I am obligated to try and prove more convincingly than you can disprove is this: The "Communist Manifesto" is more divisive than helpful. The "Communist Manifesto" does more harm than good. I specified those two things in my opening statement and those two ends are my only obligations. You accepted that when you accepted the debate. And, because of my approach, I feel like it would be unfair not to accept, the "Communist Manifesto" does *more* dividing than uniting. Let's start with that. 1. "The "Communist Manifesto" divides more than it unites." Marx wanted communists to work with every other political party who opposed the existing societal structure, but of course only with the purpose of extending the communist agenda. From the Communist Manifesto, "the Communists everywhere support every revolutionary movement against the existing social and political order of things." Realistically, how many people do you think that will set against one another? Do you think that serves to achieve the simplistic proletarians against bourgeoisie war and that's it? All section 4 of the Manifesto has to declare is, ‘Communists support war! War in Switzerland, war in Poland, war in Germany, war in France, war is good, war is necessary, it's inevitable, communists like war!' All that could ever lead to is mass division, and it did. So therein, 2. "The Communist Manifesto is more divisive than helpful." --"What you see in the doctrine of the "Communist Manifesto", whether you agree with it or not, is an attempt to unify the poor masses against the wealthy few. Since we're uniting a lot against a lot, there will always be more unity inspired than division…"-- You could only agree with that train of thought if you agree that the Manifesto really only serves to plot those two classes together and nothing else. To see it that way, you'd first have to believe that the world is only made of two classes and two opposing sets of goals… So Geek, is all of humanity and society explained in saying, "There exists the oppressor and the oppressed and that encompasses all." No? Then what the revolution is actually going to achieve is more division than unification. Plus, it's clear the only reason for anybody to unite under this philosophy is for the purposes of war in the first place… Great, let's everybody get together and start a world war! "Law, morality, religion, are to him [the proletariat] so many bourgeois prejudices, behind which lurk in ambush just as many bourgeois interests." – Communist Manifesto. Alright, let's attack all of the above mentioned concepts and see how much good comes of that. I just don't see it leading to peace, but instead leading to desperation for peace which leaves an even more vulnerable mass of people to exploit. Which explains why 3. "The Communist Manifesto does more harm than good." Moving on. "Continuing, my opponent talks about how Marx and Engels spend a lot of time telling people "what they should believe history really means". This implies that they are manipulating people into seeing history in a certain light. But this isn't true…" I would like to retain the right in this debate to clarify what I'm saying all by myself, thanks. What I mean to bring into question are the conclusions Marx and Engels make based on how they see history. Let me explain… In Marx's world the only important thing in history is economic relations. His THEORY of history is very narrow and exclusive. I say this because he doesn't seem to find things like religion, culture, ideology or individual human beings historically significant at all… In fact, he doesn't seem to find the above mentioned things important to humanity whatsoever. Clearly stated, "...Communism abolishes eternal truths [such as freedom and justice] it abolishes all religion, and all morality..." So he's predicting what's going to happen in the future (the war he's describing is inevitable) by selectively choosing what he thinks is most important in the past to pay attention to. It's important to look at this closely because if a person were to reject Marx's interpretation of what history means to our future, then all of a sudden we're given back our free choice in where this world is headed and our personal significance as well. Lastly (I'm tired of typing) there's this from Geek here. "Now look at the "Communist Manifesto". What is it trying to do? It is trying to unite these various factions against one common enemy. Even if you don't agree with Marx's and Engels philosophy, you cannot deny that it serves primarily to unite. It tries to tell these various groups that they shouldn't be fighting each other; that they should be uniting against the oppression of the bourgeoisie." Back that up. The Manifesto in question *talks* a lot about uniting, but *serves* primarily to divide. That is what this debate is about and it's more interesting this way anyway. Why try to make this into a debate about semantics and literal interpretations? That's boring as hell and a waste of my time.