Maoists in London?

This BBC story about some folks who held three women as slaves for 30 years in London is making me scratch my head with both hands:

London Slavery Case: Suspects ‘Former Maoist Activists’

A married couple suspected of holding three women as slaves for more than 30 years are former Maoist activists Aravindan Balakrishnan and his wife Chanda, the BBC understands.

According to national Marxist records they were leading figures at the Mao Zedong Memorial Centre in Acre Lane, Brixton, south London, in the 1970s.

Now just stop right there.  England keeps “national Marxist records”??  What kind of records are these?  Does it have data on the fastest dialectical reversal?  More importantly, could these folks fix HealthCare.gov?  More:

They lived together as a “collective” after two of the women met the man through a “shared political ideology”. . .

Records of the Communist Party of England (Marxist-Leninist) show Mr Balakrishnan was suspended from the organisation in 1974.

He set up a splinter group in the same year called The Workers’ Institute of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought. . .

Professor Dennis Tourish, from the Royal Holloway University of London, said followers of Marxism often committed their lives to their beliefs.

“They develop a number of organisational rituals of which communal living is one,” he said.  “The people they are working with and recruiting commit all their resources, including their time and money, and in a sense their souls to supporting the aims and objectives of the group.”

Criminal psychologist Dr. David Holmes said the details appeared to suggest a “kind of political cult” or “enforced commune” was in effect holding the captives “almost in a psychological cage”.

Sound like perfect recruits for Obama for America.  The only thing more farfetched than zombies would be Maoists.  Though to be sure, it is hard to tell them apart.  Cue Warren Zevon for a remake of “Werewolves of London”. . .

JOHN adds: England has been consumed by this slave story. Suffice it to say that there is nothing ironic or surprising about the slaveowners turning out to be Communists. They were just committed to their ideology.

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