Last week, we announced the December 13 release of audio and print versions of a major new talk from Bob Avakian (BA), revolutionary leader and author of the new communism. The title is:

SOMETHING TERRIBLE, OR SOMETHING TRULY EMANCIPATING:
Profound Crisis, Deepening Divisions, The Looming Possibility Of Civil War—
And The Revolution That Is Urgently Needed
A Necessary Foundation, A Basic Roadmap For This Revolution
by Bob Avakian, Revolutionary Leader, Author of the New Communism

This past Sunday, as we were preparing this issue of the website, Revolution Club meetings in four cities got a preview of the talk, began to get into it, and made plans to spread it, get into it, and apply it. As we said last week:

what is done with this talk by those who hear it, and read it, will be decisive in determining whether humanity will come out of these next heavily fraught years with something terrible… or whether it can wrench out of this madness something truly emancipating. For what lies beneath the surface of the accelerating horrible trends of today, what is not apparent in the swirl of the news, is something very rare: the real and rare chance to make revolution. WHY that is so… and HOW to go to work now on identifying, working to ripen, and then seizing that opportunity is what BA gets into in this talk.

The stakes of this came sharply home on Wednesday, December 1, when the Supreme Court held a hearing on a Mississippi law that drastically restricts the constitutional right to abortion and directly challenges Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court decision that established this right. The fascist justices who now command a majority—three of them appointed by Donald Trump—made clear their contempt for this right. If they go ahead with what they seemed to be strongly signaling—that they would overturn Roe v. Wade—this would rob women of their right to control their own bodies and fully participate in society. Yet the people who stepped out to protest were few, and those who speak for the so-called “reproductive rights movement” effectively signaled their surrender on this. We cover the importance and significance of what happened here, analyze the legal arguments here, and chart out what really needs to be done to defeat this attack and unleash women as a mighty force for revolution. 

What is concentrated in this attack has everything to do with the chance to make revolution. When a fundamental right such as the right of women to control their own bodies and lives is ripped away, this has a huge cost to the people and, especially if people are not led to fight it and seek the reasons why, can demoralize people. But attacks like this also have another effect. As Bob Avakian writes in This Is A Rare Time When Revolution Becomes Possible—Why That Is So, And How To Seize On This Rare Opportunity:

[A]s the “the normal way” society has been ruled is failing to hold things together—and society is increasingly being ripped apart—this can shake people’s belief that “the way things have always been” is the only way things can be.  It can make people more open to questioning—in a real sense it can force people to question—the way things have been, and whether they have to stay that way.  And this is all the more likely to happen if the revolutionary forces are out among the people shining a light on the deeper reality of what is happening, and why, and bringing out that there IS an alternative to living this way.

These articles on the Supreme Court hearing are part of shining this light. 

In this situation, the need for everyone to be preparing to get into the talk from BA coming out next week, discussed above—to listen to it, read it, discuss it with your comrades and friends and family and get with the Revolution Clubs (or, if there is no club around you, write to revcom.us at revolution.reports@yahoo.com)—stands out all the more. So again—mark December 13 on your calendar and… get ready.

A key part of organizing a movement that could actually seize on the ugliness we face and wrench a revolution out of it must be struggling with—and inspiring—those who most need this revolution, those who catch the hardest hell every day and whose lives hang in the balance every time they walk out the door, as well as those who can’t stand the oppression, the alienation and the lack of a future that confronts them in this world. These youth need to see and hear the video of “A Revolution Rhyme for This Historic Time.” That depends on you and us. Give us your ideas and your experience in getting this out there—in social media and on the ground.

Also of importance in this issue is a cluster of articles on the Omicron variant of the COVID-19 virus that has emerged, covering the basic facts of the virus (here), how the oppressive worldwide relations of this imperialist system has made the whole course of this virus significantly more horrific than it needed to be (here), and something from our “Department of Revolutionary Satire” on the “ommamoron virus.” We’re also re-emphasizing a number of articles that Bob Avakian wrote earlier this year struggling with people to confront the real truth about this virus, and their real responsibilities in the face of that, as well as an updated article we originally ran last August on how the socialist society this revolution would bring into being would handle this kind of outbreak.

This revolution is an internationalist one, fighting for a world without borders and struggling to overthrow and dismantle every trace of this imperialist system, in which a few “great powers” dominate and plunder the whole world, plunging the world into war after war, with threat of annihilation—either through nuclear combat or the destruction of the environment through this system’s normal workings—ever hanging over humanity’s head. A big part of fighting to bring that world community into being is our solidarity with the masses of people around the world in their struggles against imperialism and, in particular, the revolutionary movements representing their interests, where those movements exist. This week we again cover the ongoing struggle to defend political prisoners held by the reactionary Islamist regime in Iran, and we also feature an article from the Revolutionary Communist Organization (OCR), Mexico, on “Support the Migrants and Fight to End This Murderous System!”

December 4 began a four-week fund-drive for the movement for revolution. Go here for some great new organizing materials and here for some really good ideas from the Revolution Club in one city. Raising and giving funds is a key way that people can participate in the revolution—and right now, as we prepare to make a major push in implementing the soon-to-be-released new talk from BA, as this movement for revolution prepares to bring everything we know and understand to the monumental task before us, funds are more badly needed than ever—on a whole other level, really, if we are to have a chance at actually succeeding in the crucial task that history has set before us. Give generously, and help us raise what is so badly needed over these next weeks.

Finally, we always welcome correspondence from our readers. We learn from all of it  and often post what you send in. This week we highlight a correspondence from a National Revolution Tour member who went to a showing of the classic—and very relevant—documentary Sir! No Sir!, as well as a number of letters from prisoners who get Revolution inside the dungeons of this “shining city on a hill”—a “shining city” that imprisons more people than any other country on the planet, bar none. A “shining city” that is in fact a rotten, life-stealing system that must be overthrown.