I also had a mistaken attitude towards certain comrades.

Host: The room smelled of smoke and wet wool, the kind of air that comes after a storm — half-cleansed, half-suffocated. A small factory office, its single bulb swinging slightly from the ceiling, cast weak light over the walls covered with old posters and torn manifestos.

Outside, rain tapped on metal sheets, the echo mingling with the soft hum of distant machines that never truly rested.

Jack stood by the cracked window, cigarette burning low, his reflection fractured by the rain streaks. Jeeny sat at the desk, a thin file of papers before her, eyes tired but steady — a quiet presence in the dim.

On top of the file lay a page torn from an old biography, where one sentence had been underlined in red pencil:

“I also had a mistaken attitude towards certain comrades.”
— Béla Kun

The words were small, almost buried among reports of ideology and failure — but they lingered, heavier than the air itself.

Jeeny: [softly, reading the quote] “Mistaken attitude toward certain comrades.” It sounds bureaucratic… but it’s confession hiding behind discipline.”

Jack: [smirking slightly] “Or guilt rewritten as procedure.”

Jeeny: [looking up] “You think it’s guilt?”

Jack: [inhaling smoke] “Of course it is. Men like him — revolutionaries, zealots — they never say I was wrong. They say I misjudged comrades. It keeps the ideology clean while the conscience bleeds quietly underneath.”

Host: The light above them flickered, throwing brief shadows across the room — the kind that stretch longer when the truth gets close.

Jeeny: [closing the file] “It’s tragic, isn’t it? All these men chasing purity — of vision, of belief — and then realizing too late that it demanded impurity of heart.”

Jack: [turning from the window] “That’s the curse of revolutions. They start with morality and end with management. The moment you start policing loyalty, you’re already burning your ideals.”

Jeeny: [quietly] “So what do you think he meant by ‘mistaken attitude’?”

Jack: [sitting down opposite her] “Maybe he turned against people who didn’t fit the narrative. Maybe they disagreed with him, maybe they saw too much. Or maybe he just followed orders — history’s favorite excuse.”

Jeeny: [softly] “And afterward, when the dream cracks, all that’s left is language to disguise regret.”

Host: The rain hit harder, drumming against the glass. Somewhere outside, a dog barked once and fell silent — as if remembering it was raining on ghosts.

Jack: [after a pause] “You know, the way he phrases it — it’s almost detached. ‘Mistaken attitude.’ Like he’s correcting a form, not a life.”

Jeeny: [bitterly] “It’s the language of distance. Political repentance, not personal one. Words made to sound responsible but stripped of remorse.”

Jack: [nodding] “Exactly. Real guilt would’ve sounded like blood. This sounds like paperwork.”

Jeeny: [leaning forward] “Do you think people like him ever truly realize the human cost? Or do they just catalogue it?”

Jack: [quietly] “I think they realize it too late. When the ideology collapses and there’s no crowd left to shout for them. That’s when conscience comes knocking — not out of morality, but out of loneliness.”

Host: The clock on the wall ticked unevenly, the sound loud in the quiet. The room felt like the aftermath of an argument history itself hadn’t finished.

Jeeny: [pensively] “Maybe it’s not just about comrades, though. Maybe it’s about every person we misjudge in the name of what we think is right.”

Jack: [curious] “You mean moral blindness — not political?”

Jeeny: [nodding] “Yes. Every time we justify cruelty because we believe our principles are pure. Every time we lose sight of faces because we’re protecting an idea.”

Jack: [softly] “And then we realize the idea didn’t need protection — people did.”

Jeeny: [quietly] “Exactly. But by then, it’s always too late. The comrades are gone. The apologies are tidy.”

Host: The wind rattled the window, and for a moment, the lamplight flared — revealing their faces, lined with reflection and fatigue.

Jack: [smiling bitterly] “Funny, isn’t it? Even tyrants want to be forgiven. They just don’t know how to say it plain.”

Jeeny: [softly] “Because plain words make the guilt real.”

Jack: [nodding] “Yeah. So they build a wall of abstraction. Mistaken attitude. Necessary action. Historical context. Anything but I was wrong.”

Jeeny: [after a long pause] “Maybe history itself is one long refusal to say sorry.”

Jack: [looking at her] “And yet we keep trying to redeem it — one story at a time.”

Host: The rain eased, thinning to a steady whisper. The city outside felt distant, like a world learning, again and again, the cost of forgetting faces in favor of flags.

Jeeny: [quietly] “Do you ever wonder, Jack, how many lives have been lost because someone had a ‘mistaken attitude’?”

Jack: [grimly] “Too many. And most of them never even knew they were being sacrificed for someone’s correction.”

Jeeny: [looking down at the quote] “And yet — there’s something human in it. Maybe he really did feel remorse. Maybe that one sentence is all the confession he could afford.”

Jack: [softly] “A single crack in the armor.”

Jeeny: [nodding] “Even if it came wrapped in the language of denial.”

Host: The lamp flickered again, then steadied — its filament glowing like a small, stubborn truth refusing to die.

Jack: [leaning back] “You know, maybe that’s what redemption looks like for people like him — not clarity, just the courage to admit confusion.”

Jeeny: [smiling faintly] “To say: I thought I was right, and I wasn’t sure how to stop.”

Jack: [quietly] “Yeah. The first honest thing after a lifetime of certainty.”

Jeeny: [gently] “And maybe that’s all any of us can do — admit our mistaken attitudes before they become someone else’s tragedy.”

Host: The rain finally stopped, leaving the air washed and clean, the silence dense but forgiving.

Jeeny: [closing the file softly] “You know, I think every generation has its own version of this quote. Different names, same regret.”

Jack: [nodding slowly] “Because the need to be right always outruns the need to be kind.”

Jeeny: [quietly] “And kindness doesn’t survive ideology.”

Jack: [softly] “No. But it survives confession.”

Host: The light dimmed, casting their reflections against the window — two weary figures in a world still negotiating between belief and mercy.

On the desk, Béla Kun’s words rested, fragile yet unyielding:

“I also had a mistaken attitude towards certain comrades.”

Host: Because history is not built from grand ideals,
but from small failures of empathy.

And when conviction becomes louder than compassion,
when ideology replaces intimacy,
we all risk building the same gilt cage of righteousness —
until the day we whisper, too late,
that our only true mistake
was forgetting to see the human
behind the comrade.