Why are people in America so afraid of Communism?

Question

I'm not USA citizen, and searching in Yahoo Answers I've noticed people tends to be quite of an ignorant on issues regarding communism. They somewhat tend to believe that communism is directly relationed with a dictatorial government, which would cause them to lose their so called "Freedoms". They also don't understand the difference between an economic system (IK Capitalism, Communism) with a Government system (Democracy, Dictatorship, and others).
They even use Communism as some kind of insult. No, it's not an insult. It's more like the sum of all the worst things a person can be.. ever! (Communist = Terrorist, Killer, Thief, Pervy, Homophobic, Dictator, and others).
And what scares me the most, is that most people is very critic to communist while they haven't even read Marx nor the "Communist Manifesto" which does explain the basics of a communism system.
What do you think about it? Why is this prejudice caused? Why do they speak about it when they remain ignorant about the issue? Why do they actually believe Stalin was communist? Don't they understand the basics of communism?
I would prefer polite answers! But do as you please :)

? · Accepted Answer

1) Cold war, history sticks with people for a long time.
2) Democratic and Republic countries prevail far further and far more often then any Communistic country has (Refer to Cold War)
3) We are afraid of corruption in our own government, which is said to be "Controlled" by the working class, and with that we are afraid of what would happen is Communism took over via more "corruption"
These are same basic hunches and ideas to help you out, I rather not get to in depth with this.
4) Communism tells us to share everything we have. Sharing is hard for humans to do. Sharing everything is impossible.
5) Communism eliminates the dream of one day becoming rich.
6) The American dream is to have a house, a family, and a job to support your family.
The Communist dream is to have a working government and country while you may live in the streets working to do this.
It mostly comes out to Moral Balance vs Human Balance
The Rumor that we were taught to be afraid of Communism, even though we mentally pick up that fear in our teaching and what we see. 
It also comes out to triumphs vs losses and how much gained/lossed.
When Russias communism collapsed people were tearing down statues and drawing pictures of the old Anarchy that was assassinated, and creating books about capitalism, their once feared enemy.
Here's something you should do, ask a Communist why they fear Capitalism so much.

Stuart H · Answer

Under Marx concept a strong central government was to be created to gather together all the country's resources and redistribute them equally to everyone and then dissolve the central government.  This step was to last no more than two years.  The USSR stayed in this step from 1917 until 1991 and China has been stuck in this step for a long time also.  The problem with Communism is that people are greedy, when they get into power they will stay there until they die.  Communism is a bad idea, any government that says man is bigger than God is in trouble anyway.

Andrew · Answer

There are two reasons:

1. Most Americans can't name a Communist country that is not or was not run by a corrupt, dictatorial government. In particular, the Cold War still sticks in everyone's mind, and to include a current example, China is a communist country that commits many human rights violations.

2. Communism, as an economic system, is too far left of center in the political spectrum to gain widespread approval in America- in addition, it contradicts the "work for yourself" attitude that many people have.

Personally, I disagree with communism on economic grounds- such a system only works well when people can actually motivate themselves to work for the common good without gaining anything else in return, which is against human nature.

boomisbored · Answer

because of the U.S war against the USSR they demonized and bastardized communism but i belive that communism cannot succeed for this simple reason people always follow a leader and a class but also u spelled it URSS not USSR...because Lenin called it a communist government people thought that communism (when Stalin took power) was the real form of communism but it really is totalarianism but during the U.S's war against the USSR they called what they did and what they were doign was communism to tell people to fight the USSR and join the U.S as a democracy.....its just a bunch of propaganda that turned communism to what it is known as today but i fully belive in democracy but not the people in the government

Riley Lee · Answer

Like miss Jay said it's leftover from the propaganda from the Cold War. They wanted people to support the war so they used any means necessary (like posters, even cartoons and movies) to unite Americans against Communist countries. It got to the point where communism became a bad word. People were accused and investigated for any hint of Communist ties, promoting a mentality where it wasn't even socially acceptable just to learn about it. So to this day people just think "bad" even though they know nothing about it. Old habits die hard I guess.

Why are people in America so afraid of Communism?

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