Whenever I saw an Antifa protest or Bernie Sanders rally I just shook my head in utter disbelief. How can so many young Americans be so totally fooled by socialism? How can the idea of greater government control over the economy and virtually every other aspect of our lives be appealing to people who supposedly are for more personal freedom?

Then it dawned on me. The truth about socialism and its more virulent brand, Marxism, simply is not taught in our public schools and universities. I would bet it is not known or taught in many families either. So, without further ado, here are six “great” economic and environmental disasters brought to you by the Marxists.

1. The Destruction of the Aral Sea.

The Aral Sea in the former Soviet Union was once the fourth largest freshwater inland sea in the world. Back in the 1930s the Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin wanted more cotton for his troops (military always comes first with Marxists) so he had the area around the Aral Sea over-irrigated in order to grow cotton there.

Basically the water was drained out. The soil was depleted by the cotton plants, and an overuse of pesticides and weapons testing further destroyed the environment. Here is an excellent little video from the BBC showing what happened next. Just compare photos of the vastness of the Aral Sea in 1970 with today.

Socialists are so in love with the environment. Except when they are Marxists, apparently.

2. Famines in the Soviet Union, China, and North Korea.

Because of Stalin’s collectivization in the late 1920s, coupled with his executions and deportations of farmers who opposed having their lands stolen by the government, food production declined severely. The great famine throughout the Soviet Union in 1932-33 was the culmination of years of poor centrally planned agriculture.

Some 4 million Ukrainians and 2 million Kazakhs starved to death. (And Ukraine was considered the bread basket of Russia for centuries.)

It is interesting to note that there has not been famine or massive starvation in America for the past 400 years (since the days of the Pilgrims). Why is that? Because of all our collectivist communes, right? Or is it probably because most people have had the freedom to own their own property and sell whatever they want to whomever they chose? But whenever we see nations abandon free enterprise (as the Soviet Union and others did), we see famine and massive starvation.

We saw this in China during Mao Zedong’s genius “Great Leap Forward” in 1958. As a result of the collectivization of agriculture and the state planning everything, agriculture in China was hit hard. People were shot or imprisoned if they did not give up their farms “for the greater good of the collective.” Since so many were being beaten, terrorized, and tortured to work on communes, food production understandably went down. Not hard to figure out, is it?

How many Chinese starved to death? About 35-45 million Chinese died as a direct result of Mao’s bungled theories. Let that roll around in your head for a while. Thirty-five to forty-five million people died.

China’s industry and agriculture are doing quite well today, not because of collectivization, but rather because of their embrace (by and large) of free markets. However, the government still retains its totalitarian apparatus.

North Korea is in the news often. The Hermit Kingdom is known for its economy based on arms smuggling, drug smuggling, and counterfeiting.

The lack of food is so severe throughout the land that their soldiers regularly forage (and steal) among the civilian population. Newsweek reported many facts about current starvation in North Korea today.

This sort of thing has been going on for decades now. Stories of famine and mass starvation started leaking out in the 1990s. The North Koreans finally admitted they had a problem, but blamed it on bad weather (and probably the United States too). But they’ve been having really bad weather for the past 25 years? And the weather has been just plain awful only in the northern part of the Korean peninsula? The South Koreans live on the same peninsula and have been eating just fine for the past few decades. Why is that?

3. The Chinese Cultural Revolution (1966-1976).

This era in Chinese history is long and complicated, but essentially it was an attempt by Mao Zedong to renew his power in government after the disastrous Great Leap Forward.

He encouraged roving bands of young thugs known as the Red Guard to attack all who opposed him and his vision of a Marxist heaven on earth. Over the next ten years, the schools shut down, and industry and agriculture came to a standstill (as if it could get any worse). The Red Guard splintered into numerous factions, rioting, looting, destroying priceless artifacts of ancient Chinese history, and murdering innocent people.

No one knows exactly how many were killed by Mao’s gangbangers, but we do know that the Cultural Revolution devastated the country. Only Mao’s death brought about an end to this self-imposed civil war.

4. Soviet nuclear disasters and pollution.

I remember clearly some 32 years ago when the Soviet nuclear reactor at Chernobyl exploded.

Of course, we did not know it had exploded until days later when news slowly reached the West. The reactor exploded due to unsafe and incompetent testing. A radiation cloud containing the same amount of radiation of 500 Hiroshima bombs went out and covered northern Europe.

When the Soviets realized they could not control the reactor, word went out to all the high officials to evacuate their families. The peasants working the fields and factories were not told. It slowly dawned on them that some kind of exodus was taking place, and soon everyone started heading out of Dodge.

To this day, the city is basically a ghost town with barely 900 residents, and there is still a restricted area all around the abandoned nuclear power plant. An enormous building shielding the destroyed reactor has been built to contain the radiation leakage.

Oh, and that’s not all. The Soviet Union spent the last 50 years or so dumping their nuclear waste, along with old submarines still loaded with nuclear waste, into the Arctic Ocean. (And I thought Mikhail Gorbachev was a big protector of the environment.)

Don’t forget the mountain in North Korea that recently imploded because Kim Jung Un had his nuclear scientists continuously explode nuclear warheads underneath. Yep, the mountain … collapsed in April. Think of the radiation leaking out of that thing. I am sure China, which is close to this collapsing mountain of radiation, is not happy.

Maybe that is a reason (among many) that Kim Jong-Un feels pressured to get rid of his nuclear ambitions and make peace with the U.S. His masters in Beijing are not amused.

5. Zimbabwe.

What can you say about this poor country? I feel so sorry for these people. They have been ruled by the Marxist dictator Robert Mugabe for 38 years. His secret police stamp out virtually all opposition, there are no free elections, farm lands owned by whites have been confiscated without compensation, and the economy is a wreck.

Only 30 percent of the population has a job, the per capita income is $600, the average wage is $253 per month, and yet it is one of the most expensive places to live in Africa. Great job, Robert Mugabe! We can’t wait to see what the next 40 years of Marxist rule will do to your people! The New Republic explained why prices in Zimbabwe are as high as they are in New York City.

On top of all that, Zimbabwe no longer has a currency of its own due to hyperinflation. The nation uses currency from almost any other nation with a viable economy. But hey, at least everyone is equal — equally destitute — except Robert Mugabe, of course.

6. Venezuela.

Once a thriving, up-and-coming free government with a burgeoning economy, Venezuela is now marked by starvation, riots, secret police and censorship, and rationed toilet paper.

Skyrocketing inflation prevents average citizens from buying groceries now, according to CNN.

But thanks to Hugo Chavez (the one-time BFF of Sean Penn and Fidel Castro) and his successor Nicolas Maduro, Venezuela has descended into chaos and control by gangsters masquerading as “leaders of the proletariat.”

These are just brief examples of the wonders of Marxism. Hopefully the eyes of younger generations will see this article, and reject what Marxism truly offers.