In the last week, comrades from the National Tour have been part of building for national protests on Sunday, April 2 to declare:

No U.S./NATO War with Russia!
Stop U.S. Threats Against China!

No World War 3!
It’s This System, Not Humanity, That Needs to Become Extinct!

We Don’t Accept Their Future—
It’s Time to Get Organized for a Real Revolution

We've been getting a sharper appreciation of the impact these protests and slogans can make—fighting to lead people to confront and act in relation to the urgent and dangerous situation, and doing so as part of getting organized now for an actual revolution. We've been learning about what people are thinking—and not thinking—when it comes to the U.S./NATO war with Russia in Ukraine, and the U.S.'s dangerous threats against China, and the contradictoriness in this.

Overall, we are working to provoke, challenge, inspire and organize people as part of repolarizing for revolution, and bring forward the forces for this revolution.

While it looks on the surface like everyone is either oblivious to what's happening, with the most vocal in support of what the U.S. is doing in Ukraine, if you go beneath the surface, you learn it's a much more contradictory terrain. There is a need to really confront people with the intensifying objective situation—the great danger and the revolutionary possibility—and challenge them to act.

Provoking Debate About This American Chauvinism

One of the major obstacles we face in making revolution is the widespread American chauvinism which leads people to think the interests of this blood-soaked empire are the same as their interests. In “Imperialist Parasitism and ‘Democracy’" the revolutionary leader, Bob Avakian, BA, has spoken deeply to “why so many liberals and progressives are shameless supporters of 'their' imperialism.”

But even this is full of contradictions.

Last week, a few revcoms went out to a crowded strip in Hollywood with a seven-foot A-frame on American Crimes. We were standing on the American and Russian flags, and encouraging people to walk on the American flag (which we placed right in the middle of the sidewalk). This became a scene of loud controversy, debate and some participation. (Download the signs to make your own A-frame HERE.)

The vast majority of people refused to walk on the flag, purposefully walking around it—including many who were still curious and took flyers. There were a number of rabid reactionaries who tried to get in our faces, or steal the flag from under our feet. A handful of people yelled that we must be paid by Putin, or a couple of people argued, “What about the Ukrainians.” But mainly, there was a lot of angry pro-U.S. sentiment.

There were some people who partially agreed with our critique but were still upset that we were standing on the flag. For many people, there's a visceral feeling of allegiance, even if they don't like things the U.S. has done around the world.

We think, in total, about five percent of the people passing by actually walked on the flag. That's obviously a small minority—but those who did, did so with real determination and anger. A few young women who came back twice to walk on the flag; several people who wanted us to take pictures of them standing on the flag; a young Black gay guy who sashayed on the flag; a woman with a pro-choice mask who angrily marched over the flag; another guy wanted to spit on the flag. All these people took flyers and many thanked us for being there. Some different folks were stopping to read the American Crimes list. There was one heavy scene where a Black father with his son, maybe 12-years-old, stopped and walked his son through the whole list, seriously taking all this in. (This A-frame has a QR code where people can scan to read the whole series at revcom.us, and several people took pictures of this.)

The dynamics will be more complicated and not so linear, but imagine if we were able to cohere even just half of that five percent? If people could recognize the need and stakes in them acting together—as a force—to call out the crimes of their government and stand with humanity. Think of how those people acting together—again, as a force—could cause many others to lift their heads out of the sand, and start questioning.

We were telling everyone to sign up on the info on the flyer and to act on April 2. And we were talking about the need to make good on their anger at this country—through acting on April 2, and getting organized to overthrow this whole system that America sits on top of. We did have a couple of deeper conversations where there was struggle, and where we drove people to get into the Bob Avakian Interviews.

But since then, we've thought more about what it means to be prepared to organize masses of people. What if we had a big QR code that took people to the Revolution Club's linktree highlighting ways to get organized for April 2 and overall with this revolution, that highlighted The RNL Show, the BA Interviews and again, pointed to key ways to get organized now? With this scene, we could've made a short, sharp basic challenge to all those who were walking on that flag to make good on that anger through doing two things right there: One, make a donation, and Two, scan that QR code and sign up.

There will be people who can and should go deeper and we should be organizing people into the Revolution Club as well—giving them the Points of Attention for this revolution, and letting them know about this force for revolution, what it's going to work on, and how to join it.

Again, we surfaced the anger, which matters. But we have to struggle with people to take that further, to take responsibility to act, and they have to be given some basic organized ways to do this—not just one-on-one, but in their masses.

Challenging “There's Nothing We Can Do”

Most people, when they do begin to confront the actual danger, throw their hands up. One woman we spoke to argued, “Russia's no good, the U.S. is no good, but really there's nothing we can do because these assholes might all blow up the world.”

But that's WRONG! We should challenge people who say that—sharply—“So then, you’re okay with the U.S. plunging the world into nuclear catastrophe, not to mention the environmental destruction already going on, to maintain this parasitic system? Because there IS something you can do about it!”

The danger of this situation underscores the reality that BA has argued that, “We can no longer afford to allow these imperialists to dominate the world and to determine the destiny of humanity. They need to be overthrown as quickly as possible.” And we are in a situation where this revolution has become more possible. Because while the U.S. is fighting to maintain its position as Number One oppressor in the world in contention with these other rival gangsters, the oppressive rulers are facing irreconcilable divisions. This is a volatile and complex dynamic which opens up more danger, but also more possibility to wrench out a revolutionary opening.

As part of building up the forces to make this revolution, people need to stand up now—not allowing the dynamics between these gangster imperialists to be the only thing setting terms for our planet, but fighting to set terms for the interests of humanity. This is what bringing people together to make a powerful national declaration with these slogans on April 2 can be part of.

The more we use the slogans themselves as the guide—walking people through this—the more we're stepping to people on the basis of this revolution, uniting people on that basis and bringing them into a process which ultimately needs to contribute to this revolution... even as they may be sorting themselves out in relation to that.

Inspiring People with What's Possible

Finally, in the face of such existential danger, we shouldn't underestimate the power of the positive vision that's also within the last slogan, “We Don't Accept Their Future, It's Time to Get Organized for a Real Revolution.” We are fighting—and getting organized—for a whole different future! BA put it this way a few years ago:

Only through the overthrow of this system, including in its greatest centers of power in the imperialist countries themselves—an overthrow carried out also with the aim of preventing these imperialists from launching an all-out war of annihilation—only in this way can we advance toward the goal of overcoming the divisions among human beings that embody exploitation and oppression, and lead to violent conflict, and finally make a reality of the aspirations of so many for a world without war.

With all this, it's not an “easy four step plan...” do one, then do the other, etc. These are different components of a fluid, dialectical process… but they all need to be going on. And these are just some of the key lessons we've drawn from what we're learning. We look forward to hearing from people across the country in this last week before April 2 with what your reflections are, what questions you're running into, your ideas and more.