María Oropeza’s Brutal Capture Shows Gen Z Where Socialism Leads

AIER

Commentary

Every time I hear a young person romanticize socialism, I picture that person trying to explain it to someone who’s actually lived through it. The pitch is predictable—free rent, free health care, free education, correcting capitalism’s inequities—and especially tempting in a world where everything feels more expensive by the day. But we know how the story ends: not in utopia, but in control, censorship, fear, and far too often, violence.

A March 2025 survey from Cato and YouGov found that six in 10 New Yorkers between 18 and 29 now have a favorable view of socialism. That’s not a fringe campus fad—it’s a political movement gaining real traction. In some places, like New York City, democratic socialists are rising to power on promises of frozen rent, government-run grocery stores, free bus tickets, and a $30 minimum wage.

To Gen Z, it sounds like compassion. Like justice. Like the answer to capitalism’s “failures.” But to anyone who’s watched socialism play out in the real world—not the classroom, not TikTok, not a campaign poster—it’s the same opening chapter of a story that has taken millions of lives and freedoms.

And I can’t help but imagine those young supporters trying to defend it to someone who has lost freedom overnight because of it—including my friend, María Oropeza.

She Was Taken in the Middle of the Night

On Aug. 6, 2024, María Oropeza—a 30-year-old lawyer, activist, and chapter leader of my organization, the Ladies of Liberty Alliance (LOLA) — was abducted from her home in Portuguesa, Venezuela, by Nicolás Maduro’s regime. No charges. No trial. Just taken in the middle of her livestream. Her crime? Daring to speak out against the socialist dictatorship that has destroyed Venezuela from within.

This month is the first anniversary of her devastating abduction.

María had been working on the presidential campaign of opposition leader María Corina Machado—who, despite winning the 2023 primaries, was banned from running for office and targeted relentlessly by the Maduro regime. As one of her staffers, the younger María became a target too.

For two months, her family didn’t even know if she was alive. When they finally got word, it was to learn that she was being held at El Helicoide—Latin America’s most notorious torture center.

Even after the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights issued precautionary measures for her safety, the regime not only ignored them but doubled down—releasing eerie videos of María’s capture and using psychological tactics to silence the international outcry.

She is still there today.

The Problem With Giving Government ‘More Power to Help’

This is what happens when you give the government more power to “help.”

When it’s trusted to run industries, set prices, own your wages, dictate your rent, and promise you a life that looks “affordable,” you’ve given government control over every part of your life. And here’s the reality: A government capable of giving you everything ... can take everything away.

María’s story isn’t a rare exception. It’s a chapter in the same book every socialist experiment has written. It always starts the same way—with promises of fairness and “free stuff”—and always ends the same way: with less freedom, more control, and a state that punishes dissent with prison ... or your life.

Gen Z needs to recognize the two red flags that signal socialism is taking root. Every socialist system begins the same way—with these two moves:

1. Punishing the “rich” to correct the supposed wrongs of capitalism—redistributing their wealth to “compensate” the poor.
2. Letting government take over industries deemed “too important” for the free market—health care, housing, college—offering them “free” to the public.

Why is this so dangerous? Because the only way to pull it off is by giving government more power. And while it often begins small, even with democratic approval, it never stops there. Power given to government is power it almost never gives back.

And nothing the government “gives” you it hasn’t already taken from someone else. Government cannot create wealth—it only redistributes it, destroying much of its value in the process, until there’s nothing left to take. Then comes the shock: no new producers to tax, no innovation to drive progress, and an economy stripped of life.

No central authority can run entire industries successfully. Why? Because no single institution can ever hold all the knowledge, incentives, and feedback the free market naturally provides. Without that, the result is inevitable: failure—both human and economic.

At its core, socialism is about government ownership. And when the government owns everything, you own nothing—not even your voice.

Socialism Is a Matter of Life or Death

To the Gen Zers idolizing socialism because it sounds “anti-corporate” or “pro-people,” I urge you: Learn the history. Talk to those who’ve lived through it. María’s story is not fiction. It’s not political theater. It’s happening right now.

We’re at a dangerous crossroads, and movements like Mamdani’s in New York City are not as innocent as they seem. They are part of a growing ideology that romanticizes government power under the banner of compassion—without ever accounting for what happens when that power is abused.

María Oropeza is a name you may have never heard before. But she represents millions. Millions who once believed in the promises of socialism ... and paid for it with their freedom.

Let’s stop falling for the same lies, packaged with better design and flashier slogans modernized to today’s youth.

Socialism isn’t just a trendy political idea on TikTok and in campaign slogans. In the real world, it’s a matter of freedom or slavery, of life or death.

From the American Institute for Economic Research