Telling the Truth When the Hour Is Late

Very early on, in the extremely important and timely talk 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, Bob Avakian says:

I am going to say what needs to be said about the way things are, why they are that way, where things are headed, and what needs to be done to radically change this in a positive way—and, as part of that, I am going to bluntly speak some truth that is bound to offend some people.  I do this because the stakes in all this are so high, and (to refer to a line from Bob Dylan) the hour is getting late, and there is no time to speak falsely now.  But I do this, not out of a sense that people are so deeply caught up in, that they cannot break with, ways of thinking and acting which serve to perpetuate their own oppression and degradation, and that of others as well.  No, I am doing this precisely out of the understanding that masses of people not only need to, but can, make a profound break with this—that they can radically change themselves as part of, and in the process of, radically changing the world, in an emancipating way.

These past days have brought home once again just how high those stakes are: the future of humanity… including whether humanity is to have a future at all!  With Russia’s war against Ukraine—and with the dangerous wave of mindless pro-USA chauvinism now being whipped up by this system’s mouthpieces—revolutionaries and in fact anyone else who cares about humanity need to sharply go against what most people spontaneously think about this, and how they are being led and conditioned to think. This issue gives you the tools to understand and the tools for you to “say what needs to be said“ to people.

We start with the war. During this past week, Russia moved to even more violently bring Ukraine under its domination, bombing, terrorizing and murdering innocent men, women and children—exactly as the U.S. did in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan and, yes, as it is doing today in the covered-up war that it is supporting in Yemen (for more on the war in Yemen, go here and here). The United States and its military alliance NATO have upped their military aid to Ukraine. And the president of Ukraine made a highly hyped speech to a joint session of the U.S. Congress, demagogically calling on Biden to “lead the world,” invoking the pacifist Martin Luther King Jr. to pressure the U.S. to risk nuclear war with a “no-fly” zone (go here to find out about the extreme danger of “no-fly” zones), and succeeding in getting more highly lethal weapons. Each of these “players” uses highly emotional rhetoric to mobilize their people and do political warfare with others in the service of agendas that are not only highly brutal and exploitative but that play dice with the very existence of humanity (go here for our article on what a nuclear war could mean and how it could grow out of the war now going on). And each deploys their lapdog media—media which are essentially propaganda mouthpieces of the ruling classes—as bullhorns to amplify their lies.  So, in this issue, we give you the background to understand the war in Ukraine , including in the analysis of an important organization of Afghan communists.

Most important of all, we give you Bob Avakian’s newest hard-hitting truth-telling about what is happening and why it is happening and how you and millions of others are being lied to, manipulated, and conditioned to go along with a monstrous agenda and betray the interests of humanity (“Forces of Brutal Oppression, Hypocritical Apologies for Genocidal Murderers: WHAT SHOULD BE ‘CANCELED’”), as well as powerful earlier pieces. Also very importantly, we are including an excerpt from Why We Need an Actual Revolution and How We Can Really Make Revolution, in which Bob Avakian (BA) goes into why capitalism-imperialism must continually breed these wars; and an excerpt from the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America, authored by Bob Avakian, which lays out some of the key elements of how an armed force defending the new socialist state we are aiming for would carry out defense—including how it would refuse to build or use nuclear weapons and would instead work for their elimination.

But the war in Ukraine was not the only monstrosity unfolding before us last week.  The assault on abortion rights continued to mount.  Vicious laws, designed to condemn women to the enslavement of forced childbearing if they become pregnant, were passed in a number of states—all in anticipation of the highly possible overturning of Roe v. Wade (the Supreme Court decision that recognized the right of women to control their own decisions on childbearing in 1973) this spring. We cover those (see here and here), along with news from a powerful International Women’s Day in Mexico, reported on by revolutionary communists there. 

We also include a talk from Sunsara Taylor, the revolutionary communist and follower of Bob Avakian who initiated Rise Up 4 Abortion Rights, on The RNL—Revolution, Nothing Less!—Show. In this talk, Sunsara gets into the importance of the demonstrations on March 8, International Women’s Day for abortion rights, and she lays out the next steps: important days of action on April 8 and 9.

Yet here too the struggle over not only what but how people think is the most critical and decisive element in determining what they will do. Again from Bob Avakian, from a very important new article we are featuring in this issue, THE FIGHT AGAINST OPPRESSION, THE NEED FOR REVOLUTION—AND OVERCOMING “WOKE” OBSTRUCTION:

In this critical situation [of the assault on abortion rights—ed], various “woke” forces have actually attacked and attempted to undermine the crucially needed efforts by Rise Up 4 Abortion Rights to mobilize women, and others, in massive numbers to defeat the attacks on the right to abortion. They deny that forced motherhood—robbing women of control over their lives and their very bodies—is in fact female enslavement; they demand that this not be raised because, according their warped outlook, this means that you are somehow downplaying the enslavement of Black people in this country!  They insist that you should not graphically illustrate the terrible ways that women died from desperate attempts at self-abortion when abortion was illegal, because this “triggers people.”  Some argue that abortion rights is a “white” concern, when in fact it is Black and Latina women who suffer the most from the denial of abortion rights and access to safe and legal abortion.  These are among the ridiculous and outrageous arguments and other means with which “woke” opportunists seek to sabotage a real fight to defend the right to abortion.

What an exposure of the bankruptcy of such “woke” fools! What a clear demonstration of the need for the fight against oppression to break free of the confines and overcome the obstruction of “wokeness.”

BA goes on to make this crucial point:

“Wokeness” and its “cancel culture” is a stark reflection of so much that is wrong with this whole system of capitalism-imperialism and its dominant culture:  the pompous posturing and puffed-up hustling for position...the eager bloodlust to tear into vulnerable individuals (whether rightly or wrongly accused) while avoiding, and attacking, the fight against the system that is the root of massive suffering...the paltry vision that cannot see beyond pitiful reforms that do nothing to stop the horrors...the seeking of illusory “safety” in the sandbox of “identity,” with its petty politics, childish games and infantile tantrums.   All while the world is burning and people’s lives are being destroyed...All aiming to “get your place at the table” within this people-destroying system... All grasping for “your share” of this country’s worldwide plunder...All with the great harm this does to the masses of human beings throughout the world, and humanity as a whole.

Those are the stakes. This is the struggle that must be waged.

Take this issue. Deepen your grasp of what is going on. Go here and here to find out what revcom comrades on the Get Organized for an Actual Revolution Tour are doing. Then go out and do ideological battle with people everywhere, breaking them out of the mental shackles imposed by the representatives of this system and those “activists” who want nothing more than a share of the spoils of this parasitical empire and winning them to actively fight the power, and transform the people, for revolution. Wake them up to the dangers in Ukraine and mobilize them to take up the fight for abortion rights.

We cannot let monsters play dice with the future of humanity. We cannot let people just be caught up in madness, backbiting, passivity or despair while this is going down. We cannot fail to carry through on what was begun on March 8 and we cannot fail to be “tense” and mentally prepared for sudden escalations of the situation in Ukraine—including the real possibility of a wider, far more horrific war.  The articles and graphics and videos in this issue are part of carrying through with what is most needed going forward: the transformation of how people think and what they do, with the aim of bringing forward a revolutionary people in their millions.

Included in this issue:

* New from Bob Avakian

• Forces of Brutal Oppression, Hypocritical Apologies for Genocidal Murderers: WHAT SHOULD BE “CANCELED”
• The Fight Against Oppression, the Need for Revolution—and Overcoming “Woke” Obstruction

* Ukraine

• The Ukraine War… The Horror—and the Heightened Risk—of Nuclear War
• Nuclear War: An Unprecedented Threat to Humanity and Our Planet
• THREE QUESTIONS
• Message from the New Communism Movement of Afghanistan (JAKNA) to the Ukrainian People in the Line of Fire of an Imperialist Invasion and War!
• From the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America: An Entirely Different Kind of Military with an Entirely Different Purpose, Structure and Ethics
• Biden Calling Putin a War Criminal
• Department of STFU: Yes, Brittney Griner Must Be Freed. No, Hillary Clinton, You Have No Right to Speak on This.
• Deptartment of STFU Part 2: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Some People Have the Moral Authority to Congratulate Russian Protestors. You Are NOT One of Them.
• Other material that gives crucial background

* Fight for Abortion Rights and Liberation of Women

• Rewards for Rapists’ Families, Jail Sentences for Doctors, Potential Death Sentences for Women: As Possible End to Legal Abortion Looms, States Prepare Extreme And Perverse Punishment
• NY Times Article Lulls Readers Into Hitting the Snooze Button While a Tsunami Bears Down
• From Revolutionary Communist Organization, Mexico: This March 8, the Fury of Women Shakes Up the World Again
• Sunsara Taylor, from The RNL—Revolution, Nothing Less!—Show
• Rise Up 4 Abortion Rights calls for important days of action on April 8 and 9

* Field Reports from the Revolution Clubs: Sharp Jolts, Organizing a Revolutionary People

• Watching The RNL Show, Confronting Reality, and Forging New Collective Strength
• Fueling The Fire And Getting Organized for Revolution: Watching The Revolution Nothing Less Show After International Women’s Day (updated 3/21/22)

* Check It Out: Lynching Postcards: “Token of a Great Day”