When social life is organised for the production of commodities people will start identifying with their their commodities. Once they tie their personal value to that of their commodity, such as a house, an assault on the value of their property is seen as equal to an assault on their person.
Communist countries invested in people over capital. If a person fled west they took their investment with them so to speak.
Funnily enough, racism trumped anticommunism. Many potential migrants from VN & China were discouraged because westerners didnt recognise their degrees. (That probably changed in the past decade ).