The Intelligent Woman's Guide to Socialism, Capitalism, Sovietism and Fascism

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A thought-provoking classic of political propaganda exposing the excesses of capitalism—entertaining, lucid, and relevant to today's social movements I also made it quite clear that Socialism means equality of income or nothing, and that under socialism you would not be allowed to be poor. You would be forcibly fed, clothed, lodged, taught, and employed whether you like it or not. If it were discovered that you had not character enough to be worth all this trouble, you might possibly be executed in a kindly manner; but whilst you were permitted to live you would have to live well. As a lifelong socialist, Shaw believed that economic inequality was a poison destroying every aspect of human life, perverting family affections and the relations between the sexes. According to him, all British institutions were "corrupted at the root by pecuniary interest"—and idealism, integrity, and any piecemeal attempts at political reform were futile in the face of the gross injustice built into the Empire's economic system. Begun in 1924—the year of the British Labor Party's first period of office under Ramsay MacDonald (who hailed it as "the world's most important book since the Bible")—and first published in 1928, this guide draws on Shaw's decades of activism.