The issue is really deception. The next generation has not been coached well on the dangers we were in in the cold war and what happened behind the Iron curtain.
Growing up in a public school in Bangor Maine, when we were taught about communism, it was on rare occasions and often the commies were treated in a positive life.
EXAMPLE: Vietnam war. I don't think we even were taught anything about atrocities committed by the North Vietnamese and the Viet Cong. We mostly heard only that American GIs were killing civilians and that the South Vietnamese were persecuting their own people. While its true RSVN had a kleptocratic and corrupt government that needed reform the North Vietnamese were far far worse and far more brutal!
The teachers made it look like the North was really morally superior to the south and the US soldiers.
ANOTHER EXAMPLE: we were taught in high school the old lie that the USSR never practiced true communism. A deceptive lie to hide their failure. It failed because it wasn't true communism, if it did, it would've been true communism.
Also, when dealing with the cold war, there is little said of the aggressions of the USSR and Warsaw pact, the US and NATO are portrayed more as the aggressors egging on Russia to nuke everyone.
Rarely of course did we bring up communism vs capitalism, and we were never ever taught that Fascism like under Hitler, Mussolini and Franco is a form of Socialism. At least Franco toned it down a bit.
Of course most of our info about communism came from pop culture and Hollywood. The reds were the good guys, the American backed regimes in Central America, Southeast Asia and elsewhere were poor helpless and exploited.
Nikita Khrushchev wasn't kidding when he said the USSR would bury the USA without firing a shot.
I’m going to date myself here but I had the exact same problem in a 1966 social studies class. The teacher went as far to tell us no recorders were allowed. She was afraid she was going to get reported to the school board. Her views were the same as you experienced.