After the Premieres:

Raising Big Funds and Spreading the DVD

by Andy Zee | Updated April 9, 2013 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

The following is a slightly edited text of a speech given by Andy Zee of Revolution Books at the BA Everywhere fundraising dinner in New York City on April 6, 2013. This talk followed the playing of the chapter from BA Speaks: REVOLUTION—NOTHING LESS! Bob Avakian Live titled: “Emancipating Humanity…Transforming Conditions & Transforming Human Nature” and the first half minute of the next chapter up to the sentence that Andy Zee begins with. At the end of the talk, Andy Zee incorporated some particular information for NY that pertained to some of the ways for people to get involved.  People are welcome to adapt this for upcoming fundraising dinners in other cities.

I’m going to begin where Bob Avakian ended in the section of BA Speaks: REVOLUTION—NOTHING LESS! Bob Avakian Live that we just watched: “We need to be busy in the struggle to build the movement for this revolution.” Why? Because it is possible to put an end to the unbelievable nightmare the majority of humanity in the world, including vast numbers of people right here in the U.S., endure every day under this vicious system which draws its lifeblood from ever more ruthlessly exploiting people and enforcing this and other forms of oppression with courts, police, prisons, and armies.

Humanity can do better than this. Watching the film you feel it. You feel BA’s anger at the way the world is that comes not just from the outrage at a system that says it is the "greatest of all" yet was founded on the genocide of the native people and the enslavement of Africans, and which continues a slow genocide of young Black and Latino men and women in the prisons of America. This is more than enough reason for great anger. More, the passionate intensity that strikes you in the gut when you listen to BA comes from a deep understanding that it is no longer necessary for human beings to live this way. There is a way out through revolution, and Bob Avakian has charted that course. Summing up the breakthrough experiences in the liberation of humanity in the first socialist revolutions in Russia and China, learning from their achievements and their shortcomings and why they were defeated decades ago, Bob Avakian has developed a new synthesis of communism, and a road map, or strategy, for revolution to get there. This is a future to fight for: when the long dark nightmare of exploitation and oppression will be ended and people all over the world will work and struggle together for the common good... where everyone contributes whatever they can to society and gets back what they need to live a life worthy of human beings... where there are no more divisions among people in which some rule over and oppress others, robbing them not only of the means to a decent life but also of knowledge and a means for really understanding, and acting to change, the world.

This really could be... because how the world is is not ordained by god, it is not determined by our genes—by a wrong notion of an unchanging/unchangeable human nature. It was not scripted by the Illuminati. We can understand why the world is the way it is and how it could be radically transformed by scientifically understanding reality and acting to change it through revolution—starting by getting into BA Speaks: REVOLUTION—NOTHING LESS! As one person put it coming out of the New York premiere of the film, “He doesn’t sugar-coat nothing, he gives it to you straight forward, this is what it is, this is how it’s going, and this is what we need to do.”

But there is work to do. Moving forward from the premieres around the country, Bob Avakian set forth “A Fundamental Point of Orientation, Approach and Objective”:

THIS MOVEMENT FOR REVOLUTION MUST NOW BECOME A REAL FORCE, POWERFULLY IMPACTING AND INFLUENCING ALL OF SOCIETY...bringing forward growing numbers of those this system has cast out and cast down, who must be and can be the driving force of the fight to put an end not only to their own oppression, but all oppression, all over the world...drawing in many others, from all walks of life, who are inspired to join this same cause...preparing minds and organizing forces, Fighting the Power, and Transforming the People, for REVOLUTION—NOTHING LESS.

I’ll say it again: “THIS MOVEMENT FOR REVOLUTION MUST NOW BECOME A REAL FORCE, POWERFULLY IMPACTING AND INFLUENCING ALL OF SOCIETY.”

Many Ways to Be Part of This Movement for Revolution

There are lots of ways for each of you to be a part of this. There is much to be fought, much to learn while struggling. There is a world to win. Every day, if you have access to the internet go to revcom.us—the website of the revolution. If you don’t have a computer to get on the internet try the library. And, each week you can get the print edition of the newspaper REVOLUTION and spread it around and read it with friends and colleagues. This website and newspaper is the lifeline and guide for the revolution—enabling people to understand what’s underneath all the shit that comes down, the stirrings of resistance from different sections of people the world over and the way forward through revolution. More, the website and paper brings all of us into the process of working on and solving the problems of making revolution.

You can connect up with the Revolution Club.

There are important struggles to join right now—to End Pornography and Patriarchy: The Enslavement and Degradation of Women, and to Stop Mass Incarceration. We cannot allow the degradation of women as sexual objects, to be plundered by men or to be virtually enslaved by having their basic right to control if and when they have children denied them. Nor can we allow the slow genocide of millions of Black and Latino youth through police terror and mass incarceration to keep crushing lives and spirit. You can join in and be a part of these movements. From the perspective of making revolution we recognize that these are fault-line vulnerabilities of the system and as such are key ways that we are applying the strategy for revolution, by Fighting the Power, and Transforming the People, for Revolution.

BA Everywhere Campaign

One of the key big things going for us in transforming people—enabling them to understand that things do not have to be this way—and what must be a leading edge in all our work, is the BA EVERYWHERE Campaign—a mass fund-raising campaign to make Bob Avakian known throughout society. Tonight, we are going to get down on some specific plans to spread the word about, to raise serious money for, to organize showings of, and for people to get into BA Speaks: REVOLUTION—NOTHING LESS! Bob Avakian Live.

Last year Bob Avakian did an interview with a younger generation comrade, What Humanity Needs: Revolution, and the New Synthesis of Communism, that goes deeply into how we are going build the movement for revolution and what it's all about. In that interview he says that the BA Everywhere campaign is a key way that we are aiming to influence millions

…to actually get the new synthesis and my leadership and body of work out there in a truly major way, with societal impact. That campaign is a key element of influencing millions of people now: getting the concept of this revolution and the scientific grounding underneath it, in a basic sense, out to millions, so millions of people are encountering it, so that people are debating it very broadly in society—so it's a point of reference. We have used the formulation "making BA a household name." What that means is not that people are gossiping about BA everywhere, but that the new synthesis of communism and what that represents is being engaged and debated broadly in society—some people agree, some people disagree, some people say, I like some of this and some not—but they're actually engaging what it is, the substance of it, at least in its very basic contours. There is a dialectical relation between all that and bringing forward a new wave of people fighting to bring about a new stage of the communist revolution—to take these ideas, this theory, and actually make it a living reality. We need to influence millions of people now. And we need to be bringing forward wave after wave of what we call these new initiators, these initiators of a new stage of the communist revolution.

Over the last few weeks hundreds of people across the country experienced BA straight up through this film. Most had never heard anything like this before; for others it put the whole thing together with a clarity of what is the problem humanity faces and that the solution is nothing less than revolution. We all were stirred by the challenge at the end to make this real. Everyone who left the theater said, “People need to see this.” Reaching tens and hundreds of thousands with massive promotion takes money. Lots of it.

What we saw tonight, what you experienced at the premiere, must not be something that only a few thousand people know about. Not if we are going to radically change the world. To do that, the whole BA vision and the framework for understanding the brutal reality we face and for how we could actually win and bring about a far better society and world requires that BA be known, that people are engaging and debating it in all corners of this city and country, even around the world. Again that takes money. Raising funds from penny jars in a housing project to being part of a team to go to middle class and wealthy people, giving them a way to do something really positive by donating the kinds of large funds to really change the world and that will make a society-wide impact possible. Selling the DVD of the film, showing it, and raising funds is a way to involve people in the movement for revolution.

This is necessary to reach and influence all of society—funds are needed for grassroots promo materials like stickers and palm cards, for street teams, and big funds needed for advertising on bus stops, subway cars, on the radio and internet to reach millions. Over the spring and summer and into the fall we need to aim for tens of thousands nationwide to see BA Speaks: REVOLUTION—NOTHING LESS! Bob Avakian Live.

Going Out Broadly and Boldly, Stirring Up Controversy

This will stir up controversy. You go out to someone and they say, “Nah, I’m good.” Well, just how good are you leaving this system intact when women—half of the people—face the real prospect of having their humanity stolen from them if they are sexually assaulted?

You saw the film, you left the theater full of hope wanting to get into what he said, determined that others need to see this. When we go out there with the film, we meet people who express a lot of love for what BA is bringing forward; we meet many people who agree with some of it and perhaps disagree with other parts but want to get into it more and who at the same time want lots of people to be checking this out and debating it and getting into it.

If you hate what’s being done to people here and around the world, if you have a conscience and just can’t go along with this shit and don’t want revolution swept under the rug, then BA Everywhere is for you. Because you can make a real difference: raising funds so that many, many more people find out about BA. This controversy can be positive because, if you think about it—BA is a concentrated focus of what humanity needs: a real, really radical and thorough revolution. Be a part of giving people a chance to relate to that. Some will want to get all the way in, others to learn more. If BA and this film are talked about, debated by people all over, it will make a really big difference. Let’s bring lots of people into raising the funds and watching, showing and spreading the film over the spring and summer, and make these times resonate with big dreams and a fighting spirit for fundamental change.

Raising funds and spreading BA Speaks: REVOLUTION—NOTHING LESS! Bob Avakian Live is a great way for people to get involved and make a real contribution as they are just beginning to learn about this. You’re out telling people about BA and the film, selling them a DVD or inviting them to a showing, and you’re watching it too. You're getting deeper into it, new questions are posed and you are starting a process where you are leading people to find out about revolution and BA—giving them a chance to find out that there is a way out, all the while you are learning from the film and engaging with them as well as people from the movement for revolution and the Party BA leads, the RCP, USA.

There’s room for everyone in getting out the DVD and raising funds. You already know many ways to do this. There’s a young brother who stopped everyone on the way out of the New York premiere to tell them that he doesn’t just accept one-dollar bills in the fund-raising basket. And, he did this in a way that conveyed it mattered.

Key Ways to Be Part of This

Here are some key concrete ways to be part of this:

• You can be part of the crews that are taking this movie out to colleges and high schools, and into the communities, doing film showings and selling it... and raising money at every showing.
• You can be part of the street teams that are going to all kinds of neighborhoods, including neighborhoods of people who are better off but still want to see a better world for everyone and can be won to learn about and support this movement.
• You can donate money yourself.
• You can get the "REVOLUTION—NOTHING LESS" T-shirts and buttons and the BA image buttons out to people you know and people you meet.
• You can just keep the DVD playing in your house or the place you work so that you are learning more about it and when people come over they are hearing this for themselves.
• You can come to and be part of setting up sessions where people watch a chapter of the film and then talk about it.
• You can run with the Revolution Club… people who believe that humanity needs revolution and communism, and who are committed to fighting the power, and transforming the people, for revolution.
• You can be part of Revolution Books—taking out and promoting the writings and talks of Bob Avakian and of the revolutionary movement as a whole, as well as many other interesting books and films from other points of view that people need to know about as part of understanding and changing the world.
• You can send correspondences to and volunteer to work on revcom.us and Revolution newspaper.
• And, let’s be stylin' while we are doing this—wearing the BA Speaks: Revolution—Nothing Less! T-shirts and buttons. These small pins—with the title of the film and the image of BA—could really become widely worn revolutionary fashion statements. 

This movement needs you. You don’t have to know everything about the revolution to participate. You don’t have to agree with everything about the revolution to participate. You just have to want BA’s voice to be out there in society in a big way, spreading his message and getting a hearing... and a following.

An Invitation

Bob Avakian extends this invitation to you:

Let's go on a crucial journey together—full of unity against oppression and lively struggle about the source of the problem and the solution. Pursue your own convictions—that the outrages that move you are intolerable—to their logical conclusion, and be determined not to stop until those outrages have been eliminated. And if this, as well as learning about other outrages, and ideas about how this all fits together and flows from a common source—and how it could all be ended, and something much better brought into being—leads in the direction of seeing not only the need for bold and determined resistance, but also the need for revolution and ultimately communism, then don't turn away from that because it moves you beyond your comfort zone, challenges what had been your cherished beliefs, or because of prejudices and slanders. Instead, actively seek to learn more about this revolution and its goal of communism and to determine whether it is in fact the necessary, and possible, solution. And then act accordingly.

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