According to Osho, socialism sacrifices the supreme value of freedom by enforcing artificial equality through state control. Humans are unique, not equal; forcing sameness cripples creativity, genius, and religion. He favors laissez-faire capitalism as a natural growth that honors individual talents. Poverty should end, but socialism equalizes misery, driven by jealousy; true justice is equal freedom to be uniquely unequal.
People are different like flowers; letting them grow freely works better than cutting them to the same size, which only makes everyone poor and dull.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Another friend has asked: Osho, what is the relationship between the method of meditation and jati-smaran (recollection of past lives)?
But the one who becomes skilled in this—who can fully awaken any day’s memory up to the age of five—will find that the memories begin to awaken completely. And you should test it. As today passes, note down some events and lock them up. After two years, try to recall today. Most of it will have been forgotten. Then remember—and after remembering, break the lock and compare whether what you recalled matches what you had written. You will be amazed—astonished—that besides what you wrote, many more details have come back which you did not even note at the time. They will all be there in memory. Buddha called this alaya-vijnana. There is a corner of the human mind he called the storehouse of consciousness. Like a junk room in the house where we keep all the odds and ends, there is a storehouse that collects memories—where everything from birth after…
Osho, when answering the following you would be speaking to about half a million radio listeners in europe; most of them may not have heard anything about you yet. If one of the listeners to this program is devoted to socialism, what would you tell him? If one of the listeners is a practicing catholic, what story would you have for him? If one of the listeners is a potential seeker, what message would you have for him? However, if your message is silence, how would you convey this silence on radio?
My effort here is to help you to discover your original face, so whether you are a practicing Catholic or a Protestant or a Hindu or a Mohammedan, it is all wrong. Love Christ, but don't be a Christian. Love is a totally different phenomenon. If you become a Christian you are addicted with Christ, you become dependent on Christ. If you are a Christian you are bound to be anti-Buddha, anti-Mahavira, anti-Lao Tzu, anti-Zarathustra, anti-Patanjali.Just choosing Christ and becoming anti to all the other great awakened individuals who have walked on the earth is becoming poor, unnecessarily poor. When you can claim the whole heritage of humanity, when all the Buddhas, all the awakened ones can enrich your being, why narrow down your consciousness? Why become focused and obsessed with Christ or Buddha or Mahavira or Krishna? A Catholic means he is obsessed with Christ, a Hindu means he…
What are your ideas on socialism?
Socialism, to me, is a very non-psychological way of thinking. There is a longing to be equal, but that longing only shows that human beings are not equal in any dimension. They are unequal; the inequality is a fact. The concept of equality is only a fiction and whenever society hankers after a fiction, it falls into a chaotic way of life. So socialism is not possible. It is an impossibility. It can only be possible if two conditions are present. The first is if the human mind is destroyed and man becomes a human automaton instead. Then socialism becomes possible because machines can be equal. And socialists will go on trying to do this. They have been trying to wipe out the mind. Freedom of the mind will be the first target for socialism to clear away because freedom of the mind basically creates inequality.
So all that is unnecessary to teach and waste time, should be optional. Or for what libraries exist? People should go -- if they have an interest in geography and history, they look in the library. But more basic things... And whenever you create something, when your rose bush brings beautiful roses, you have a certain happiness that destruction cannot have. So education should be divided. A part we certainly need, but that too will not be a slave. But the major part should be made creative, he should not be dependent on anybody. Students should be supported in making communes, not factories owned by one individual. The commune owns everything and the commune provides everybody's need. This is my conception of an authentic socialism. VEDANT: SINCE YOU MENTION SOCIALISM, I HAVE A QUESTION. IS SOCIALISM VIABLE, AND IS SOCIALISM RELEVANT TO INDIA?
Another friend has asked; he asks: Osho, why does capitalism exploit the worker?
Some notions, if they are proclaimed long enough, we simply pick them up and forget to ask whether they are true or false. Capitalism does not exploit the worker. In fact, under capitalism the price of everything is set by its demand and supply. If in a village there are ten laborers but fifteen are needed, those laborers will get higher wages—ten are available while fifteen are required. But if there are fifty laborers and only ten are needed, wages will be low, because there is an excess supply of labor in the market; the buyer will buy cheaply. Capitalism fixes the price of each thing according to its scarcity, its rarity. And there is no other sane way to set prices. God does not send price tags with things—how much wheat should cost, or what the Kohinoor diamond should be worth. There is only one Kohinoor diamond, so its…