Once Again—Setting the Record Straight on the Revolutionary Communist Party’s Role in Ferguson 

July 31, 2015 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

 

 

There are people within the movement who are spreading slanderous distortions of the Revolutionary Communist Party’s views and strategy for an actual revolution.  These people claim that the RCP is engineering confrontations with the police in order to “kick off” a revolution. This is shameless fearmongering about both the revolutionaries and the youth who have played such a courageous role in Ferguson and Baltimore.  Right now they have made these claims in an attempt to repudiate and undercut the Stop Mass Incarceration Network, in which the RCP works with many other individuals and forces, from holding a demonstration in Ferguson that would commemorate and protest the outrageous murder of Michael Brown (and the Department of Justice report that lied about this), uphold the heroic resistance that went on last year, and call for the movement to go forward.  In our view, such a demonstration must be part of the whole mix of the Ferguson weekend activities—for the actions of those youth and many others who stood with them, in the face of repeated police assault, actually played a critical role in inspiring people from all sections of society to take up this struggle, and to begin to challenge the whole direction of things in a way not seen for a long, long time.

Some of these people have spread lies and fabrications which are identical to lies which appeared on racist, right-wing websites, which we won’t even dignify by repeating.  Shame on them!  Both this kind of distortion and these outright lies most of all serve the police and forces of repression and must have no place in our movement.

These slanders take the fact that the RCP is in fact working for an actual revolution and then claim that the “party provokes confrontation in order to start the revolution.”   We do see building this resistance as a crucial element of building up the forces for revolution—a revolution that must be made by the masses in their millions, as conditions for that revolution develop from a combination of the workings of the system, the actions of the rulers and the struggle of the people.   Anyone who sincerely wants to get even an inkling of what this means should check out the statement from the RCP, “On the Strategy for Revolution.”  If you do, you will find that that strategy is very different from some cartoon stereotype of  trying to “kick off a revolution” by supporting a demonstration to call out Michael Brown’s murder for what it was ... to uphold the masses who defied calls to obey the rules in order to demand justice ... to build on all that.  Such demonstrations should be welcomed by all who really want to put an end to these police murders.  Such demonstrations are absolutely necessary to build the struggle against the relentless onslaught of police murder that has continued since Michael Brown.  This—actually STOPPING this genocidal new Jim Crow—is a goal which our Party supports and has been actively working to make happen.  AND we, the RCP, participate in all this as part of preparing the ground, preparing the people and preparing the vanguard—to get ready for the time when millions can be led to go for revolution, all-out, with a real chance to win.   Do we really want to fight these same battles 60 years from now?  Or do we want emancipation?  And if you say you want emancipation, then what are YOUR answers??

In fact, these lies and distortions began last August. There were of course attacks from law enforcement and right wing and mainstream media.   But in a truly outrageous manner, those attacks were echoed from some who were supposedly on the side of the people.  There was even some ugly collaboration with the police during demonstrations to effect the arrest of leaders like Carl Dix.   These attacks and lies were answered in depth at revcom.us last fall.

The heart of these lies and attacks is that rather than act as the system’s firemen, dousing the people’s anger with calls for standing down in the face of vicious repression by the state, the people associated with the RCP and the Revolution Clubs stood with the people and said that they had right on their side and should keep up the struggle in the face of all that was thrown at them.  And just  for the record, the revolutionaries—along with members of the Stop Mass Incarceration Network—were tear gassed, shot with rubber bullets, and arrested along with many, many others in Ferguson in the days immediately following the murder of Mike Brown.

Principled differences and debate is vital for any movement.  But that is very different than deliberately distorting people’s positions in ways which create an atmosphere where the authorities feel a freer hand to attack.   People should sharply speak out against such distancing tactics whoever they are directed at.

The powers that be have worked overtime to change public opinion in this country to be negative about Ferguson over the past year.  They are very fearful of the example, the inspiration and the beginnings of Black people standing up and bringing everyone else in on it.  Attacking revolutionaries is part of that package to reverse the verdict that it was right for people in Ferguson to rebellion, whatever the stated intentions of the people spreading these slanders.

The defiant ones who stood up in Ferguson and Baltimore, especially the youth, who were then joined by many others all over the country—they did what was right.  For our part, we will neither turn away from the fight to finally be free of this nightmare once and for all, nor from the very critical struggle right now to STOP this genocidal onslaught of police terror and murder.  The RCP will keep working for an ACTUAL revolution for which it has a REAL strategy which anyone can read at revcom.us.  From that perspective, we are working now to unite with many, many others who hold different views but who are also determined to make a major leap in the struggle to stop police terror during RiseUpOctober including in New York City on October 24.

Chicago Branch, Revolutionary Communist Party, USA

 

 

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