If that kills off Marx and his nefarious genocidal cult, then I'm very much for.
Rousseau was the main inspiration for Robespierre and his ilk. No Rousseau means no Jacobin terror. Could prevent the entire revolution, even, but if it doesn't, we see that constitutional monarchy becomes the likely result. Which means: no room for the extremists of OTL to rise to prominence and exploit the situation to propagate their ideas (which would be universally dismissed under regular circumstances). No Saint-Just. No Hébert. No Babeuf. No Buonarroti. No Saint-Simon. No Fourier. That's the main progenitors of socialism and communism wiped off the board, right there. Without Rousseau's influence shaping the events that in OTL led to (and guided) the revolution, none of these figures are in any way likely to gain a foothold.
As a consequence, we'd see no Blanc and no Blanqui and no Paris commune at all. At that point we've butterflied away Marx and Engels, but also Proudhon and Comte and Weitling and Cabet and Bakunin and Herzen and Most and Lord knows how many others of their kind
I'd even wager that Rouseau's absence would also mean no Morelly, so that would be the most prominent pre-Revolution proto-socialist gone, too. On that note, Rousseau's doctrine of the "general will" being gone also has major philosophical implications, since it's the direct basis for modern totalitarianism. When Napoleon usurps power with reference to his supposed representing of the people, that's Rousseau talking. When Hitler shrieks "
Du bist nichts, dein volk is alles!" -- that's Rousseau talking. In the latter case, of course, it arrives via Hegel. But guess what? Remove Rousseau, and you get rid of Hegel, too.
So. Yes. It's safe to say that removing Rousseau kills off Marxism. But not just Marxism. All of modern socialism and communism. Pretty much all left-anarchism. The whole basis of modern totalitarianism, which includes fascism and nazism as well, for instance. And beyond that, the whole thrice-accursed doctrine of positivism is strangled in the crib.
If I had a gun with two bullets, and I could fire them through time at any target -- I'd shoot Rousseau twice, just to be sure.
I wonder how would the world look like if I sicced a terminator on Klodwig of the Franks? Or Karl der Grosse? Both were in Tywinesque level of "cunt" territory.
Well, that's the basis of Western culture as we know it gone! One the one hand, I can hear my distant Saxon ancestors applauding from the far past. One the other hand, this would render the world so unrecognisable that I really can't say if it would be
better in any meaningful way.
Could go in any direction, really.