revcom.us, May 31, 2021 through June 6, 2021 (#702)

Voice of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/694/a-declaration-a-call-to-get-organized-now-for-a-real-revolution-full-en.html

FROM THE REVCOMS (REVCOM.US):

A DECLARATION,
A CALL TO GET ORGANIZED NOW
FOR A REAL REVOLUTION

| revcom.us

 

Let’s get down to basics: We need a revolution—nothing less!

To everyone who can’t stand this world the way it is ... who is sick and tired of so many people being treated as less than human ... who knows that the claim of “liberty and justice for all” is a cruel lie ... who is righteously enraged that injustice and inequality go on, and on, and on, despite false promises and honeyed words from people in power (or those seeking power) ... everyone who agonizes about where things are headed and the fact that to be young now means being denied a decent future, or any future at all ... everyone who has ever dreamed about something much better, or even wondered whether that is possible ... everyone who hungers for a world without oppression, exploitation, poverty, and destruction of the environment ... everyone who has the heart to fight for something that is really worth fighting for: You need to be part of this revolution.

This revolution is not just “a good idea”—it is actually possible.

Is this for real? Are we serious about this, and can we back it up? YES. We are not here to repeat garbage that may be “popular” or to spread the lies we are constantly told by the people in power and their mouthpieces in the media and elsewhere. We are here to bring the truth. So here are some basic truths that we need to understand and live by.

1. The system we live under, the system of capitalism-imperialism destroys lives and crushes spirits. It is the source of endless horrors for the majority of people in this country and all around the world, and it is increasingly threatening the very existence of humanity. The military of this country is not carrying out an “honorable service”—and it is not some “bad ass” force that people should respect. It is doing the same thing around the world, on a massive scale, that the police are doing here: carrying out the cowardly killing and terrorizing of people in the service of the biggest oppressors in the world, the rulers of this country. And it is a major cause of the destruction of the environment.

It is a hard but basic truth: For the masses of people, and ultimately for humanity as a whole, there is no future, or no future worth living, under this system.

But there is a way to a world and a future that is worth living, and is worth fighting for right now: revolutiona real revolution, not playing around with a few changes that leave this system in place and in power, while benefitting only a small number. A revolution means a force of millions, drawn from many different parts of society and organized for an all-out fight to overthrow this system and replace it with a radically different and much better economic and political system, a socialist system, based on meeting the needs of the people and carrying forward the fight for a communist world where there will finally be an end, everywhere, to the exploitation, oppression, and destruction of the environment that is built into this system of capitalism-imperialism. Anything less than this revolution will completely fail to deal with the root of all the problems or lead to the actual solution.

2. Revolutions are not possible all the time, but are generally possible only in rare times and circumstances, especially in a powerful country like this. This is one of those rare times and circumstances. This system is in real trouble, caught up in crisis and conflicts for which it has no easy or lasting solutions. Throughout this country the workings of this system have given rise to deep divisions which cannot be resolved under this system. Society is being ripped apart. Those who rule are locked in a bitter fight among themselves, and they cannot hold things together in the way they have in the past. Although there are a lot of bad things connected with this and it could lead to something really terrible, it is also possible that we could wrench something really positive out of it—revolution, to put an end to this system and bring something much better into being.

We have seen the potential for revolution powerfully demonstrated just last summer when millions of people, of all races and genders, all over this country, and all around the world, rose up together against racist oppression and police murder. We have seen this potential in the mass outpourings of women, in countries all over the world, refusing to put up with being abused and degraded. This potential is also revealed in the deep distress being expressed, by scientists and millions of ordinary people, about the continually worsening climate crisis and the threat this poses to the future of humanity—a crisis this system cannot solve, but can only make worse. But, with all this, right now only a small number of us have recognized the need for this revolution and are acting to make it happen. So there is crucial work that must be done now to win people to understand the need for revolution and act to make it real—to turn the potential for revolution into a powerful movement and organized force for an actual revolution.

3. To make this revolution a reality, we need leadership with the scientific method, the strategy and program that can shine a light through the madness and chaos that this system is constantly creating and can lead in carving the path forward out of this madness to the radically new world we need. AND WE HAVE THAT LEADERSHIP—IN BOB AVAKIAN (BA). BA is the architect of a whole new framework for the liberation of all oppressed people and the emancipation of all humanity: the new communism. We are followers of BA. And you need to become followers of BA too. There never has been a leader like this in this country and there is no other leader like this in the world now. We cannot afford not to follow this leadership if we ever want to get free and put an end to this madness.

4. We need to urgently change the situation where not nearly enough people know about this revolution and are with it. We need to get this revolution, and its leadership, known everywhere. We need to challenge and seriously struggle with people right around us, and all over the country, to do something that, yes, requires real heart and will make a positive difference for real—become part of this revolution, and follow this revolutionary leadership. We need to organize more and more people into the ranks of the revolution.

Organizing people into this revolution means reaching out to all sorts of people—not just where there are protests and rebellions against oppression and injustice, but everywhere throughout society—spreading the word about revolution and getting people together (in real life and online) to grapple with why an actual revolution is necessary, what such a revolution involves, and what kind of society this is aiming for. This will enable people who are new to the revolution to themselves become organizers for this revolution and to recruit more and more people to do the same. On this basis, and through the growing ranks of the revolution acting together as an increasingly powerful force, it will be possible to attract and organize the necessary numbers, and build up the necessary strength, to be in the position to do what needs to be done.

We need to struggle hard with people to take up the orientation and strategy, the values and goals, for this revolution, and dedicate themselves to working for this revolution, while we unite growing numbers to fight the abuse, brutality and destruction perpetrated by this system, and through all this get thousands and then millions of people prepared and steeled to do away with this system that brings so much hell to people. We need to wield this growing revolutionary force to stand up to this system and its murderous enforcers and to change the whole “terrain” (the political, social and cultural situation and “atmosphere”) throughout society, in order to weaken the hold of this system over people, win people away from acting to strengthen and enforce this system, and create the best possible conditions for this revolution to succeed.

To come back to basics: We need revolution—a real revolution. We cannot afford to waste these rare times and circumstances that could be ripened into a real chance to make revolution. We cannot afford to squander the rare and precious leadership we have for this revolution. We have to get busy, build the movement and the organized forces for revolution all over the country, and work together tirelessly for this revolution, to actively prepare for the situation where this system can be brought down and something much better brought into being.

To get more of the tools and the knowledge you need to become part of this revolution, and to go to work building for this revolution, get with those representing for this revolution right now, become part of the Revolution Clubs around the country, go to our website revcom.us regularly, and watch The RNL—Revolution, Nothing Less—Show every week.

If you want to know more about this, right now, keep reading: here is further knowledge about these basic truths.

One. This system of capitalism-imperialism rules and profits by exploiting and oppressing, using and abusing masses of people, including children, all over the world; by treating whole groups of people as less than human; by slaughtering people who get in its way; by threatening people with its arsenals of mass destruction; by destroying the environment. Regardless of who is in the positions of power, this is the only way this system can operate, and under this system things can only get worse. All this is why we need a revolution. Bob Avakian (BA) has put this very clearly: “We have two choices: either, live with all this—and condemn future generations to the same, or worse, if they have a future at all—or, make revolution!

To make it very clear once more: By revolution we mean nothing less than overthrowing this whole system—defeating, disarming and dismantling the murderous armed power and other institutions that enforce this system—completely abolishing this whole system and replacing it with something radically different and much better, a new society built on an entirely different foundation. And this new system we need is socialism—an economic and political system that is set up to meet the needs of the people, not the profit and power of exploiters and oppressors—a system that moves to do away with all exploitation and oppression, and supports people everywhere fighting against exploitation and oppression, in order to get to a communist world, where all this madness will finally be ended, for real, and people all over the world will be able to work together for the common good. Don’t be fooled by talk about how communism is no good and will make things worse. That is just talk that helps to keep this system of capitalism-imperialism going, with all its horrors for the masses of humanity and its growing threat to our very existence. In the works of BA, and other works you can find at revcom.us, you can learn the real truth about communism and the way BA has further developed communism into an even more powerful and liberating science of revolution: the new communism.

Two. This is one of those rare times and circumstances when revolution becomes possible, not just because this system is always a horror, but because the crisis and deep divisions in society now can only be resolved through radical means, of one kind or another—either radically reactionary, murderously oppressive and destructive means or radically emancipating revolutionary means. Those who have ruled over us, for so long, with their Republican and Democratic parties, are now caught up in bitterly fighting each other over how to hold this country together, keep this system going, enforce its rule over the people it exploits and oppresses, and maintain this country as the world’s top-dog oppressive power. The Republicans are moving to exercise this rule through fascism: discarding the pretense of “democracy for all,” relying on naked brutality and trampling on people’s rights, to enforce undisguised, aggressive male supremacy, white supremacy, xenophobia (hatred of foreigners and persecution of immigrants, especially from non-white countries) and crude “America first” chauvinism. The Democrats are trying to keep things together with more disguise and deception, with the claim that what exists in this country is a “great democracy” representing “the will of the people,” and for this reason it deserves to be, and needs to be, the most powerful force in the world. But, in reality, both of these ruling class parties are working to maintain the violent oppressive power, the dictatorship, of this capitalist-imperialist system, with all the horrors for humanity this involves.

These divisions and conflicts have ripped big holes in the camouflage of this system, further exposing its real nature and the lie that this is “the greatest country in the world,” the “shining light of freedom” and “leader of the free world.” All this is very likely to become more and more intense, tearing apart the bonds that have held things together under this system and further deepening the divisions throughout society, including within the institutions of power. This could lead to something very bad—or something very good, IF we act in the way we need to in these rare circumstances and fight to take things where they need to go.

As BA has emphasized, in a powerful New Year’s Statement (A New Year, The Urgent Need For A Radically New World—For The Emancipation Of All Humanity), the fact that the fascist Trump was voted out of office is important but it only “buys some time” and time is not on the side of the fight for a better future for humanity. So the time there is must not be wasted by going along with this system. We will never get where we need to go by being a tail on the Democratic donkey (and, obviously, not by siding with the Republican fascists). No, we need to break out of acting on the terms, and within the confines, of this system, which has all this murderous oppression and destruction built into it. We need to be actively working to radically change the “alignment of forces” in society, to where things are more favorable for overthrowing this whole system.

These days there is a lot of talk about another civil war, especially from fascists, in government and the broader society, who think they could just carry out a one-sided slaughter of those they hate, including Black people and other people of color, “illegal immigrants,” “uppity women” and those who don’t conform to “traditional” sexual and gender relations and “norms.” This situation needs to be radically changed, to where there are masses of people prepared to defeat these fascists and to do so as part of getting rid of this whole system, which has bred these fascists, along with all the other horrors it continually perpetrates.

What we need is “repolarization for revolution—making real revolution an active and increasingly powerful force of first thousands, and then millions, of people organized to work for and win more and more people to this revolution—radically changing the “terrain” on which the revolution will be fought.

Today, there are not only many fascists in the murderous police forces, but more than a few in the military as well. But it is a fact that, at the high point of the 1960s, the strength of the radical liberation movements at that time reached into and strongly influenced every part and every institution of society—including the armed forces of this system, where more of the soldiers looked for leadership from the Black Panther Party and other revolutionary-minded forces than from the president of the United States (the so-called “commander-in-chief” of the armed forces). Even with the differences between then and now, creating this kind of situation—where a revolutionary movement based on the new communism and the leadership of BA is impacting every part of society and key institutions—this is achievable, and is a very important part of preparing the ground for the seizure of power, when the time is right. This will make it possible to have the best fighting chance to take revolution all the way, and not be beaten back down into yet more horror.

And the potential for this revolution is real. There is the ever intensifying climate crisis—and it is a scientific fact that this system of capitalism-imperialism cannot solve this crisis, but can only make it worse. At the same time, over the past few years, literally millions of women, all over the world, have demonstrated their outrage at the murder and rape, the attacks on their right to abortion and birth control, and the all-around brutality and abuse they are continually subjected to, as a result of the male supremacist relations that are built into this system of capitalism-imperialism, and all systems that are ruled by exploiters and oppressors. And last summer, when millions of us, of all races and genders, rose up all over this country in righteous rebellion in response to the vicious murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor by police, this powerfully demonstrated the potential for revolution.We were supported and joined by millions more in countries all over the world. And, at the height of this, the whole country, the whole world was compelled to recognize and to talk about the long and continuing chain of these racist murders and big questions about the whole history and nature of this country. Yes, this powerful rising was, in the short run, misled into dead-ends by people working for meaningless petty reforms and seeking funds for themselves and positions within the structures of this system. But that does not change the fact that what was demonstrated was the possibility and potential for something much greater and far better—an actual revolution.

Three: Bob Avakian (BA) came forward as a revolutionary and developed into a communist leader through the mass revolutionary upsurge of the 1960s. He is an old white guy—yes, deal with it! Unlike so many who considered themselves revolutionaries at that time, BA has never given up, never departed from the road of revolution. He has continued to advance on this road and to confront the problems and difficulties in making revolution. He has drawn crucial lessons from the historical experience (positive and negative) of revolution throughout the world, and from many other aspects of human society and human endeavor. He has deeply studied how this system of capitalism-imperialism actually works, and what are the defining contradictions of this system that constitute the basis for overthrowing it. It is through all this that he has brought forward a whole new framework for the liberation of all oppressed people and the emancipation of all humanity: the new communism.

BA is providing ongoing leadership for this revolution, and he has a whole body of work that contains the scientific method to analyze the problem and the solution, the strategy for the revolution to bring down this system, and the vision and concrete plan for that radically different and much better society, on the road to emancipate all of humanity from every form of oppression and exploitation, and to enable humanity to become fit caretakers of the earth. He’s even written a Constitution (the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America) that concretely maps out what to do starting right after the seizure of power, so we can actually work on building up that whole new emancipating society. It is simply true: There never has been a leader like this in this country and there is no other leader like this in the world now, and we cannot afford not to follow this leadership if we ever want to get free and put an end to this madness.

Four: Many of the people who can be won to this revolution are not “into this” now and are not acting in accordance with the methods, principles, and goals of this revolution. And there is still way too much trying to get over on each other and attacking each other, which only brings more heartbreak and misery. This revolution is in the interests of all people who catch hell under this system and all those who hunger for or dream about a world where an end to exploitation, poverty, inequality, injustice and oppression is not a bitter joke but a liberating reality. Instead of fighting each other, we need to be uniting everyone with a heart for justice and protecting and defending each other from the criminal, brutal and murderous actions of “official” forces and fascist forces with the power to do us the greatest harm. We need to be working together to build up the ranks of the revolution and prepare to defeat the forces, of any kind, that would keep this system going and make its madness even worse.

And, in working to change the world in this way, people can change themselves—they can be united with in refusing to put up with injustice that no one should accept, and struggled with to see that revolution is the way to put an end to all this—that revolution is what we should live for and fight for. The basis for making this real is concentrated in the guideline: Fight the Power, and Transform the People—for Revolution.

To do this, people need to break with this system’s ways and take up radically different and emancipating methods, principles and goals, and a radically different and far better culture, morality and way of relating to each other. With the revolution it’s not “everyone out for themselves and against everybody else”—it’s all of us together who can’t stand to live like this and hunger for something much better, something truly emancipating.

At the same time as leadership and guidance for this revolution is being provided, in an ongoing way, through our website, revcom.us and through The RNL—Revolution, Nothing Less—Show, and while paying attention to the necessary health measures in light of the still continuing COVID pandemic, we are reaching out directly (in real life) to people around the country, to bring the liberating message of this revolution, to win growing numbers of people to this revolution and organize them into the ranks of this revolution.

All over the country, in every neighborhood, every school, every place and every institution where there are people sickened by the way things are, or questioning whether things have to be this way, revolutionary organization needs to be built, as part of the nationwide revolutionary movement. This revolution and its leadership need to increasingly become the authority that people look to and the leadership they follow, setting the standard and providing the direction for how people see things, and how they act.

Through all this, growing numbers of people can be working together to shape the political situation, winning masses of people to revolution and strengthening the organized revolutionary forces for the all-out fight for revolution when the conditions for revolution have been ripened.

To come back, once more, to basics: We need a revolution—a real revolution. And this revolution is possible. To everyone who hungers for an end to oppression and injustice, and everyone who has the heart to fight for something that is really worth fighting for: You need to get into this revolution, become part of the organized forces for this revolution, and work tirelessly for this revolution, so that we can have a real chance to win.

 

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Follow: @TheRevcoms
Read: www.revcom.us
Watch: youtube.com/TheRevComs

 

Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

Get a free email subscription to revcom.us:



 


 

Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/700/a-call-to-all-who-want-a-better-world-en.html

A Call to All Who Want a Better World...

June 12, 2021 MARCH!

From Southwest College, Los Angeles to the LA County Sheriffs

Show the World:
We Are Getting Organized Now For
REVOLUTION, NOTHING LESS!

| revcom.us

 

The LA County Sheriffs—like the other police forces and the military—“serve and protect” THIS SYSTEM—the system of capitalism-imperialism. The system that rules this planet. The system that destroys lives and crushes spirits... that treats all kinds of people as “less than human”... that hunts down and drives down our youth in so many ways... and that threatens the very existence of humanity.  

This system must go! So, Let’s Get Down to Basics: We Need A Real Revolution!

On June 12, people from around the Los Angeles area will march on the LA County Sheriff’s Station in Westmont to proclaim:

 

WE ARE FIGHTING TO EMANCIPATE ALL HUMANITY –

For a World Free of All Oppression and Exploitation
No More Antagonistic Divisions Among the People

THIS SYSTEM CANNOT BE REFORMED—
IT MUST BE OVERTHROWN!

June 12, 2021, 2:00 p.m.

March will start at the corner of Los Angeles Southwest College on Western Ave. and Imperial Hwy. March to the South Los Angeles Sheriff’s Station, 1310 W. Imperial Hwy.

 

A Declaration, A Call To Get Organized Now For A Real Revolution says:

...For the masses of people, and ultimately for humanity as a whole, there is no future, or no future worth living, under this system.

But there is a way to a world and a future that is worth living, and is worth fighting for right now: revolutiona real revolution, not playing around with a few changes that leave this system in place and in power, while benefitting only a small number.

This revolution will “overthrow this system and replace it with a radically different and much better economic and political system, a socialist system, based on meeting the needs of the people and carrying forward the fight for a communist world where there will finally be an end, everywhere, to the exploitation, oppression, and destruction of the environment that is built into this system of capitalism-imperialism.”

We have the leadership for this revolution in Bob Avakian, BA.

BA is the architect of a whole new framework for the liberation of all oppressed people and the emancipation of all humanity: the new communism. We are followers of BA. And you need to become followers of BA too.

This revolution is possible. We are in a rare time when this really could be. But only if we get organized.

Organizing people into this revolution means reaching out to all sorts of people—not just where there are protests and rebellions against oppression and injustice, but everywhere throughout society— spreading the word about revolution and getting people together (in real life and online) to grapple with why an actual revolution is necessary, what such a revolution involves, and what kind of society this is aiming for. This will enable people who are new to the revolution to themselves become organizers for this revolution and to recruit more and more people to do the same.

To Everyone who wants to see an end to oppression and injustice... To Everyone who has a heart to fight for something really worth fighting for –

Become part of the ORGANIZED Forces for this Revolution –
so that we can have a real chance to win a whole new world!

To read the full Declaration and Call, go to www.revcom.us. To learn more and get connected:
YouTube/therevcoms           Revcom.us           @therevcoms

The RNL—Revolution, Nothing Less—Show

Episode 51: Revolution: The Possibility is Real! Getting Organized Now; Bob Avakian on the New Society; May 1, 2021

Episode 55: "How soon can we sweep this system away?" Bob Avakian on Tulsa; June 12 MARCH for Revolution

youtube.com/therevcoms

What Is the Revolution Club?

Who Should Check Out the Revolution Club, Run with It and Join?

What Does It Mean To Join? And How Do I Get Started?

"Everyone who can't stand this world the way it is ... who is sick and tired of so many people being treated as less than human ... everyone who has the heart to fight for something that is really worth fighting for: You need to be part of this revolution"... and get with the Revolution Club!

Find out more...

Download, print and spread this call (PDF):
Front | Back

June 12 Marches in Other Cities

New York City
2 pm
Start @ Marcus Garvey Park, 123rd & Madison Ave., Harlem
March to NYPD 28th Precinct (123rd & Frederick Douglass Blvd.)
Contact: Revolution Club, NYC
@NYCREVCLUB

Chicago
3 pm
March to the 7th District CPD station in Englewood at 1438 W. 63rd
Starting from 63rd and Halsted (near Whole Foods and Halsted Green Line)
Download flyer (PDF)
Contact: Revolution Club, Chicago
312-804-9121 revclubchi@gmail.com @revclubchi

Download, print and spread this Poster (PDF):

 

Follow: @TheRevcoms
Read: www.revcom.us
Watch: youtube.com/TheRevComs

 

Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

Get a free email subscription to revcom.us:



 


 

Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/june-12-why-we-all-need-to-march-en.html

| revcom.us

 

A Call to All Who Want a Better World...

June 12, 2021 MARCH!

From Southwest College, Los Angeles to the LA County Sheriff's

Show the World:
We Are Getting Organized Now For
REVOLUTION, NOTHING LESS!

Read more
(includes info on the LA march and marches in other cities)

 

Q&A with Bob Avakian: What would you say to youth who have been cast out by this system?

Q&A with Bob Avakian: On Mistakes and the Arc of One's Life

LOS ANGELES SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT: Racist Murdering Thugs in Uniform and Nazi-like Prison Guards; Murderous Enforcers of THIS System

 

Follow: @TheRevcoms
Read: www.revcom.us
Watch: youtube.com/TheRevComs

 

Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

Get a free email subscription to revcom.us:



 


 

Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/633/bob-avakian-a-radically-different-leader-en.html

BOB AVAKIAN: A RADICALLY DIFFERENT LEADER—A WHOLE NEW FRAMEWORK FOR HUMAN EMANCIPATION

Bob Avakian (BA) is the most important political thinker and leader in the world today.

| revcom.us

 

Bob Avakian is completely different than the endless stream of bourgeois politicians who are put forward as “leaders,” whose goal is to maintain one variation or another of this system of capitalism-imperialism that is founded on and perpetuates itself through cruel and literally life-stealing exploitation, murderous oppression, and massive destruction, in all parts of the world. BA is a revolutionary who bases himself on the scientific understanding that this system must finally be overthrown through an organized struggle involving millions of people, and replaced with a system that is oriented to and capable of meeting the most fundamental needs of humanity and enabling humanity to become fit caretakers of the earth.

Bob Avakian is the architect of a whole new framework of human emancipation, the new synthesis of communism, which is popularly referred to as the "new communism."

BA is the author of the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America, an inspiring application of the new communism—a sweeping vision and concrete blueprint for a new socialist society, whose fundamental goal is to bring about a world without classes and class distinctions, a world without exploitation and oppression, and without the destructive divisions and antagonisms among people: a communist world.

Ardea Skybreak, a scientist with professional training in ecology and evolutionary biology, and a follower of Bob Avakian, speaks to the importance of what he has brought forward:

Bob Avakian ... on the basis of decades of hard work [has been] developing a whole body of work—theory to advance the science of communism, to advance the science of revolution, to more deeply explain where the problems come from, what the strategy is for getting out of this mess, what the methods and approaches should be to stay on track and actually build a better world, to build a society that most human beings would want to live in. (From Science and Revolution, On the Importance of Science and the Application of Science to Society, the New Synthesis of Communism and the Leadership of Bob Avakian, An Interview with Ardea Skybreak)

BA is a leader who is firmly convinced, on the basis of a consistently scientific method and approach, that the goal must be nothing less than all-out revolution, and who at the same time has emphasized:

the new communism thoroughly repudiates and is determined to root out of the communist movement the poisonous notion, and practice, that “the ends justifies the means.” It is a bedrock principle of the new communism that the “means” of this movement must flow from and be consistent with the fundamental “ends” of abolishing all exploitation and oppression through revolution led on a scientific basis. (From Breakthroughs: The Historic Breakthrough by Marx, and the Further Breakthrough with the New Communism, A Basic Summary)

As a revolutionary leader, BA also embodies this rare combination: someone who has been able to develop scientific theory on a world-class level, while at the same time having a deep understanding of and visceral connection with the most oppressed, and a highly developed ability to “break down” complex theory and make it broadly accessible.

A leader like this has never before existed in the history of this country, and this leadership is of tremendous importance for the emancipation of all humanity.

What is urgently needed now is for continually growing numbers of people—in the thousands, and ultimately millions—to become conscious and active followers of BA, building the revolutionary movement, based on the new communism, for which BA provides this unprecedented leadership.

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So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/665/bob-avakian-for-the-liberation-of-black-people-en.html

BOB AVAKIAN FOR THE LIBERATION OF BLACK PEOPLE
AND THE EMANCIPATION OF ALL HUMANITY

| revcom.us

 

One of the things that comes through most powerfully in Bob Avakian’s memoir1 is that a profound hatred for the oppression of Black people has been a defining part of Bob Avakian’s life from the time, as a teenager, he learned about the lives of the Black people with whom he developed deep ties of friendship. Never feeling that, because he is white, “it is not his place” to be involved in the struggle against this oppression—but, on the contrary, determined to contribute whatever he could to this struggle—Bob Avakian (BA), from the time he worked closely with the Black Panther Party in its revolutionary days in the 1960s, has made the liberation of Black people a defining part of his life’s commitment and work. As he developed as a revolutionary communist, and emerged as the foremost revolutionary leader and thinker in the world, this commitment has become even deeper and has been strongly interwoven with a dedication to the emancipation of all humanity from every form of oppression and exploitation.

As BA has written about his life’s work:

Why was I doing the work I was doing? Once again, we’re back to for whom and for what. I wasn’t doing this work for myself. When I was young, in middle school and then even more so in high school, my life got changed in a very major way by coming into contact with people that I hadn’t really known that much before, in particular Black people. I started learning about their situation and how that relates to what goes on in this society as a whole. I was drawn to the culture—not just the music and the art overall, but the whole way of going through the world—of the Black people who became my friends, and the world they introduced me to. And I came to the point of recognizing: these are my people. Now, I knew they had a different life experience than I did. But these are my people—I don’t see a separation—it’s not like there are some other people “over there” who are going through all this and somehow that’s removed from me. These are my people. And then I began to recognize more deeply what people were being put through, the oppression they were constantly subjected to, the horrors of daily life as well as the bigger ways in which the system came down on them. And as I went further through life and began to approach the question of what needs to be done about this, and was introduced to taking up a scientific approach to this, I realized that my people were more than this. I realized that my people were Chicanos and other Latinos and other oppressed people in the U.S.; they were people in Vietnam and China; they were women...they were the oppressed and exploited of the world...and through some struggle, and having to cast off some wrong thinking, I have learned that they are LGBT people as well.

These are my people, the oppressed and exploited people of the world. They are suffering terribly, and something has to be done about this. So it is necessary to dig in and systematically take up the science that can show the way to put an end to all this, and bring something much better into being. You have to persevere and keep struggling to go forward in this way. And when you run into new problems or setbacks, you have to go more deeply into this, rather than putting it aside and giving up.

So this is why I’ve been doing the work that I’ve been doing.2

Bob Avakian grew up in Berkeley, California. Unable, because of a life-threatening illness, to be directly involved in struggles taking place against racial oppression for several years after graduating from high school in 1961, BA nevertheless closely followed and strongly supported the civil rights movement in the early 1960s, and at the same time was influenced by and supportive of the militant stand and role of Malcolm X. This was reflected in an article that BA wrote at the age of 19 in 1962 supporting the struggle of Black people. (This article was submitted to the liberal magazine Saturday Review. Although the article was not published, the editor-in-chief of the magazine, Norman Cousins, personally replied—indicating that, although the magazine had chosen not to publish this article, he recognized that the article spoke, in a strikingly compelling way, to very important questions.)

Having recovered from his illness, in 1964, BA became actively involved in the Free Speech Movement at the University of California in Berkeley, where he was a student. The central issue of this movement was the right of students to carry out activity on the campus in support of the civil rights movement. BA was among the 800 who were arrested during the occupation of the university administration building, which was the high point of the movement and led to winning its demands.

As the civil rights movement increasingly gave way to a more militant Black liberation movement in the second half of the 1960s, BA was strongly influenced by this. He left the university and dedicated his life to working for radical change. As a result of direct contact and discussions with Huey Newton and Bobby Seale, the founders of the Black Panther Party, and getting to know Eldridge Cleaver (who also became a leader of the BPP), BA worked closely with the Black Panther Party from its earliest days and at the height of its revolutionary role and influence.

In 1967, BA attended rallies, and spoke at one of the rallies, held by the BPP in North Richmond to protest the killing there of Denzil Dowell, part of the long and continuing chain of murders of Black people by police.

In 1968, when Huey Newton was facing murder charges as a result of a shoot-out with Oakland cops, BA spoke—along with a number of key figures in the Black liberation movement, including Stokely Carmichael, Rap Brown, James Forman, and leaders of the Black Panther Party— at a Free Huey rally held in the Oakland auditorium on the occasion of Huey Newton’s birthday.

BA worked tirelessly to build support, including among white people, for the demand to “Free Huey!” At a “Free Huey” rally at the courthouse in Oakland where Huey Newton’s trial was being held, BA was arrested for “desecrating” (burning) the American flag.

During this time, at the invitation of BPP leaders, BA wrote a number of articles for the Black Panther newspaper.

At a rally of thousands, led by the Black Panther Party, on May First, 1969, BA spoke of the need for revolution and called on white people in particular to more actively take part in movements for revolutionary change in the U.S., and to support such movements throughout the world.

By the beginning of the 1970s, millions of people in this country were in favor of some kind of revolutionary change, but they faced profound challenges. How could this revolution be made—or was it even possible to make a revolution here, up against such powerful forces of oppression and repression? Which were the key forces that had to be mobilized to have a real chance to carry out such a revolution? What kind of leadership was needed, and what methods and approaches should that leadership be based on? The difficulties in confronting and seeking the answers to these hard questions, combined with brutal and often murderous repression by the powers-that-be, led many revolutionary organizations, including the Black Panther Party, to split and end up departing from the road that could lead to real revolution.

By this time, partly because of the influence of the Black Panther Party, which had popularized the “Red Book” of quotations from the Chinese communist leader Mao Zedong, BA had become convinced not only that revolution was necessary, and was possible, but that it had to be led by a vanguard force that based itself on the scientific method and approach of communism, as it had been developed initially by Karl Marx, then further developed by V.I. Lenin, the leader of the Russian Revolution in the early part of the 20th century, and then in turn further developed by Mao, who led the Chinese revolution and the new, socialist society in China, until his death in 1976. BA led in the formation of the Revolutionary Union at the end of the 1960s, with the aim of working toward the establishment of the vanguard party of revolution, based on the science of communism. During the first part of the 1970s, BA was both the practical leader and the leading theoretician of the Revolutionary Union, writing much of the essays and polemics for its theoretical journal Red Papers. This included major articles, particularly in Red Papers 5 and 6, that involved groundbreaking scientific materialist analysis of the situation of Black people, historically and down to the present—how and why their particular conditions of oppression had changed, from the time of slavery to the present era, and how this objectively put Black people in a potentially powerful position to be a driving force not only for their own liberation but for the communist revolution whose fundamental aim is the abolition of all oppression and exploitation. These articles included powerful polemics, arguing against positions and programs that would not lead to, but would actually work against, this liberation and the revolutionary transformation of the world as a whole.

In 1975, with BA’s leadership, the Revolutionary Communist Party was founded, with the aim of being the vanguard force for the revolution that was, and continues to be, profoundly necessary. Over the decades since then, BA has fought to keep that Party on the revolutionary road and to bring forward new revolutionary forces to revitalize and strengthen the vanguard forces for the revolution that is now, all the more urgently, required. While continuing to provide practical guidance to the revolutionary forces, BA, through summing up the experience (positive and negative) of the communist movement, and drawing from a broad range of human experience, has brought forward a new synthesis of communism (also referred to as the new communism) which, most decisively, has established communism on an even more consistently scientific basis. As BA’s Official Biography explains, the new communism “is a continuation of, but also represents a qualitative leap beyond, and in some important ways a break with, communist theory as it had been previously developed. It provides the basis—the science, the strategy, and the leadership—for an actual revolution and a radically new society on the road to real emancipation.”3

A defining part of this new communism is the emphasis it gives to the struggle for the liberation of Black people, and the relation of this to the ending of all oppression. And this has continued to stand out in BA’s leadership role and work over the decades, up to the present.  At revcom.us there is a special section, Bob Avakian on The Oppression of Black People & the Revolutionary Struggle to End All Oppressionwhich contains clips from films and selections from the writings of BA on this question. The following are just a few examples of important works and leadership by Bob Avakian, over the past few decades, that speak to this decisive question.

The book Reflections, Sketches & Provocations, written by Bob Avakian during the 1980s, contains a number of commentaries, speaking in a number of dimensions to the oppression of Black people and the struggle against this oppression, including support for rebellions following the murder of Black people by police. This book begins with the essay “Hill Street Bullshit, Richard Pryor Routines, and the Real Deal,” which powerfully exposes how terror against Black people, and other oppressed people, is “part of the job” of the police—and is “a reward” for carrying out the role of maintaining the “law and order” that keeps the oppressed in their desperate and miserable conditions. Going deeper, it speaks to how this is rooted in this system of capitalism-imperialism, which has had this oppression built into it from the very beginning.

In the 1990s, BA raised the idea that there should be a day, every year, when people mobilized to protest police brutality, mass incarceration and repression by the government. This proposal was taken up and a broad coalition, including family members of people killed by police, was formed to initiate, in 1996, the National Day of Protest to Stop Police Brutality, Repression, and the Criminalization of a Generation. At its height, over the next decade, this National Day of Protest, held every October 22nd, rallied thousands of people in dozens of cities across the country. And activities by people who have been part of this coalition have continued since then.

During the past two decades, BA has given a number of filmed speeches, and written articles, essays and books, in which the liberation of Black people and its crucial relation to the communist revolution, aiming for the emancipation of all humanity, has been a major question.

BA’s 2003 speech Revolution: Why It’s Necessary, Why It’s Possible, What It’s All About, begins with a searing exposure and condemnation of lynching, and speaks to the horrific reality of slavery and the oppression of Black people down to today, including the continual murder of Black people by police.3

In 2006, BA gave a series of 7 Talks, in which once again the oppression of Black people, and the struggle for their liberation, is a major theme. One of these 7 Talks, Communism and Jeffersonian Democracy, begins by speaking to the experience of Black people in this country; and the question of slavery and the overall oppression of Black people is, of course, a major part of this talk. It is in Communism and Jeffersonian Democracy that the following is clearly stated:

There would be no United States as we now know it today without slavery. That is a simple and basic truth.

(This is also the very first statement in BAsics, from the talks and writings of Bob Avakian, the handbook for revolution.)3

At the beginning of BA Speaks: Revolution—Nothing Less!, in 2012, this point is stated emphatically:

Let’s start with just one great crime of this system: police murder—after murder—after murder—of Black people and Latinos, especially youth.3

This is part of the powerful exposure in this speech of the role that continuing murders by police play in enforcing this monstrous system of exploitation and oppression, the system of capitalism-imperialism.

At the beginning of his October 2017 speech The Trump/Pence Regime Must Go! In the Name of Humanity, We REFUSE To Accept a Fascist America, A Better World IS Possible,  BA speaks powerfully to the horrors of slavery in this country—including the rape by slavemasters of huge numbers of enslaved women. This speech shows how the murderous oppression of Black people, continuing down to today, is one of the main roots of the fascism that has come to power in this country with the Trump/Pence regime; and, in this speech, BA repeatedly returns to the critical importance of the fight against this oppression.3

BA’s 2018 speech Why We Need An Actual Revolution And How We Can Really Make Revolution begins this way:

In 2012 in Revolution—Nothing Less! I talked about the outrageous murder of Ramarley Graham earlier that same year—shot down in his own house in the Bronx by the New York City police. He was only 18 years old. Do I have to tell you what “race” he was?! His mother kept saying: “This has to STOP!” And his father repeated over and over: "WHY did they kill my son?! WHY did they kill my son?!" New York cops then loudly rallied around their fellow pig who murdered Ramarley in cold blood, viciously taunting Ramarley's family and loved ones, demonstrating yet one more time the ugly truth that, in the way this country has been built, and for the powers-that-be in this country, the humanity of Black people has never counted for anything—they have never been valued as human beings, but only as things to be exploited, oppressed, and repressed. Six years later, and with cold-blooded murders by police continuing in an unbroken chain, I will say again what I said then: How many more times does this have to happen? How many more times do the tears and the cries of anguish and anger have to pour forth from the wounded hearts of people?! How many more times, when another of these outrageous murders is perpetrated by the police, do we have to hear those words that pour gasoline on the already burning wounds: “justifiable homicide, justified use of force” by police?! How many more?!3

In that 2018 speech, BA not only powerfully exposes once again the horrific oppression that this system of capitalism-imperialism inflicts on Black people, and on other oppressed people in this country and throughout the world, and the grave danger this system poses to the very future of humanity; he also lays out in this speech (and in a more recent article A Real Revolution—A Real Chance To Win, Further Developing the Strategy for Revolution3) the strategic approach that could make it possible for this system to be finally overthrown through a revolution in which millions and millions of people are led to fight to put an end to this system and bring a radically different and much better system into being.

In the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America, authored by BA, a sweeping vision and concrete blueprint for that radically different and much better system is set forth. And the principles and means for finally putting an end, at long last, to the oppression of Black people is a major part of that Constitution.3

This year (2020), BA has written as many as 30 articles in which this decisive question—the oppression, and the struggle for the liberation, of Black people—is a recurring subject.3

In the speeches and writings of BA overall, there is not only powerful, penetrating exposure and uncompromising condemnation of brutal and murderous oppression but, even more importantly, there is scientific analysis of how all this is rooted in this system of capitalism-imperialism and of the need, the possibility, and the means for making revolution to overthrow this system and finally put an end to all the outrageous and unnecessary suffering that the masses of humanity are continually subjected to under this system.

***

It is a very precious thing for the oppressed of the earth when they have a leader whose life is dedicated to their emancipation, and who has the determination, and the scientific method, developed over decades, to point the way, and continue to carve out the path, to achieving that emancipation. BA is such a leader. As emphasized in the article Bob Avakian: A Radically Different Leader—A Whole New Framework For Human Emancipation:

As a revolutionary leader, BA also embodies this rare combination: someone who has been able to develop scientific theory on a world-class level, while at the same time having a deep understanding of and visceral connection with the most oppressed, and a highly developed ability to “break down” complex theory and make it broadly accessible.3

One of the things that most distinguishes BA’s role as a revolutionary leader is his willingness—indeed, his insistence—on telling people the truth, even when they may not want to hear it. This comes through in the way BA exposes and refutes unscientific ways of thinking—all kinds of “conspiracy” theories and superstitious ideas—that lead people, including the most bitterly oppressed people, away from understanding the world as it actually is, and keep them from seeing not just the need, but the possibility, of radically changing the world, in a way that will lead to ending oppression. A big problem that BA has taken on, straight-up, is the role of religion as a mental chain on the masses of Black people, and other oppressed people, and the need to break this chain in order to most powerfully wage the struggle to finally be free of all oppression. BA has repeatedly emphasized that, in order to end oppression, “you have to want revolution badly enough to be scientific about it.”

Science means judging whether something is true, or not, by whether there is evidence that it actually corresponds to reality—and not believing something because it makes you feel good to believe it, or not refusing to believe something because it makes you uncomfortable. In the article Conspiracy Theories, Fascist “Certitude,” Liberal Paralysis, Or A Scientific Approach To Changing The World, BA has spoken directly to this problem:

many of the basic masses, who are bitterly oppressed under this system, also are suspicious of and even are inclined to reject science and scientifically-grounded analysis. But this also leaves you vulnerable to all kinds of unfounded “conspiracy theories” and other wrong and harmful ideas, including the notion that nothing people do will make a difference because “it’s all in god’s hands.”3

In the 2014 Dialogue with Cornel West (REVOLUTION AND RELIGION: The Fight for Emancipation and the Role of Religion), which took place during the upsurge of protest and rebellion in response to the murder of Mike Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, while speaking to the importance of uniting people broadly in the struggle against oppression, including people who hold religious views, BA also emphasized that the revolution that is needed to finally put an end to oppression must be led with a scientific, not a religious, outlook and method.3

From the start of the article Bob Avakian On Emancipation From Mental Slavery And All Oppression, written this year (2020), BA does not hold back in speaking to these critical questions:

In 1863, mid-way in the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln finally issued the Emancipation Proclamation and, as a result of the Civil War, Black people were formally freed from literal, physical slavery. But today the question is: When, and how, will Black people finally be free from all forms of slavery and oppression? And this poses straight-up this big question:

When will Black people finally emancipate themselves from the mental slavery of religion?!....

Once more, the question is sharply posed: How can Black people be finally and fully emancipated from centuries of oppression, and how does this relate to ending all oppression, of all people, everywhere?

The answer is that the possibility of this is real, but it can happen only on the basis of a scientific approach to changing the world and the scientifically-grounded understanding that this oppression is rooted in and caused by the system of capitalism-imperialism—the same system that is viciously exploiting and murderously oppressing people not just in this country but all over the world and is plundering the natural environmentand that this system must and can be overthrown through an actual revolution and replaced by a radically different and far better system: socialism, whose final goal is a communist world, without any oppression or exploitation of anyone, anywhere.3

****

From his early years, forging close personal ties with Black people and increasingly learning about their lived experience, to his development as this rare leader who has brought forth the most advanced scientific revolutionary theory with the new communism—a defining part of the life and work of Bob Avakian has been the liberation of Black people from centuries of oppression, and the understanding of how this relates to, and is a crucial driving force in, the communist revolution to finally abolish every form of oppression and exploitation, everywhere.

BA himself has expressed this in the following poetically powerful statement:

There is the potential for something of unprecedented beauty to arise out of unspeakable ugliness: Black people playing a crucial role in putting an end, at long last, to this system which has, for so long, not just exploited but dehumanized, terrorized and tormented them in a thousand ways—putting an end to this in the only way it can be done—by fighting to emancipate humanity, to put an end to the long night in which human society has been divided into masters and slaves, and the masses of humanity have been lashed, beaten, raped, slaughtered, shackled and shrouded in ignorance and misery.

 


1. From Ike to Mao and Beyond, My Journey from Mainstream America to Revolutionary CommunistA Memoir by Bob AvakianInsight Press, 2005. [back]

2. Bob Avakian, THE NEW COMMUNISM: The science, the strategy, the leadership for an actual revolution, and a radically new society on the road to real emancipation, Insight Press, first printing, 2016, pp. 321-22. In addition to THE NEW COMMUNISM, in other recent works by BA—in particular Breakthroughs: The Historic Breakthrough by Marx, and the Further Breakthrough with the New Communism, A Basic Summaryand Hope For Humanity On A Scientific Basis, Breaking with Individualism, Parasitism and American Chauvinism—the oppression and the struggle for the liberation of Black people, and its relation to the emancipation of humanity as a whole, is a prominent subject. These works are available at revcom.us.  [back]

3. All of these works are available at revcom.us. (Information about how to acquire the print and e-book editions of BAsics can be found at revcom.us. Audio of the 7 Talks is available in BA’s Collected Works at revcom.us; and Communism and Jeffersonian Democracy has been published in a print edition, the text of which can also be found in BA’s Collected Works at revcom.us.)

The film of the Dialogue between Cornel West and Bob Avakian, REVOLUTION AND RELIGION: The Fight for Emancipation and the Role of Religion, is also available in BA’s Collected Works at revcom.us.

The article Conspiracy Theories, Fascist “Certitude,” Liberal Paralysis, Or A Scientific Approach To Changing The World (longer and shorter versions) is available at revcom.us as well.

The importance of Bob Avakian as a revolutionary leader, who has further developed communism as a consistently scientific method and approach, is a central theme in SCIENCE AND REVOLUTION: On the Importance of Science and the Application of Science to Society, the New Synthesis of Communism and the Leadership of Bob Avakian, An Interview with Ardea Skybreak. Ardea Skybreak is a scientist with professional training in ecology and evolutionary biology, who is also the author of the important book THE SCIENCE OF EVOLUTION AND THE MYTH OF CREATIONISM, Knowing What’s Real And Why It Matters. Each of these books by Ardea Skybreak is published by Insight Press, and the Interview with Ardea Skybreak (SCIENCE AND REVOLUTION) is also available at revcom.us

The following articles, written by Bob Avakian this year (2020), which speak to the oppression of Black people and the struggle to end this oppression, are available as well at revcom.us:

Donald Trump—Genocidal Racist (Parts 1-10) 

Racial Oppression Can Be Ended—But Not Under This System

Police And Prisons: Reformist Illusions And The Revolutionary Solution

Anything But The Truth—Bob Avakian Exposes Lies, Distortions, Distractions and Evasions About the Murderous Oppression of Black People

Lynching, Murder By Police—Damn This Whole System! We Don’t Have To Live This Way!

Bob Avakian On Emancipation From Mental Slavery And All Oppression

Colin Kaepernick, LeBron James And The Whole Truth

Donald Trump Isn’t “Tough,” He’s A Bloated Bag Of Fascist Feces

Bloated Bag Of Fascist Feces Trump Isn’t “Tough”—Part 2: Who Really Has Heart?

Trump And Pigs: A Racist Love Affair

Fucker Carlson, Fascist “Fox News” And The Broadcast Of White Supremacy

Bob Avakian on Black Trump Supporters: What If Jews Had Supported Hitler?!

Bob Avakian On: A Beautiful Uprising: Right And Wrong, Methods And Principles

On Statues, Monuments, And Celebrating—Or Ending—Oppression

Fascists Today And The Confederacy: A Direct Line, A Direct Connection Between All The Oppression

Patriarchy And Male Supremacy, Or Revolution And Ending All Oppression

Sounding Like Southern Segregationists: It’s Not Just Trump—It’s Democrats Too

Bob Avakian Brings Out the Truth: Barack Obama Says Police Murdering Black People Should Not Be Normal—Unless He’s President

Bob Avakian On Ugly Words & Phrases

Bob Avakian On Tulsa Racist Mobs

A Real Revolution--A Real Chance To Win: Further Developing the Strategy for Revolution

[back]

Get to know BA

Bob Avakian (BA) is the most important political thinker and leader in the world today.

Get Into BA »

 

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Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/683/the-more-i-engaged-ba-i-could-not-wait-to-get-out-of-prison-en.html

"The More I Engaged BA, The More I Could Not Wait to Get Out of Prison"

by Joe Veale, revcom, former member of Black Panther Party

| revcom.us

 

Editors' Note: We received the following from Joe Veale.

I’ll start like this. I “knew” BA even before I met him. We grew up in the same city, in Berkeley, California. The Black Panther Party had started in Oakland which was right next to Berkeley. I knew a lot of the rank and file Panthers, once they got going. They were telling me what they were doing—they had developed this organization and they were trying to make revolution to overthrow the system and to put an end to the oppression of Black people. They were straight up about the fact that racism went with the capitalist system, working to overthrow the system and not working within the system. And they made it clear to me that they was trying to build the revolution not only among Black people, they was trying to build support for it among whites, you know, support for this among whites as well as other different races and nationalities. And in that context, BA’s name always came up. It was “Bob Avakian.”

I hadn’t met him yet, I wasn’t a Panther yet, but I knew about him. That’s what they were saying—this is the main person who supported them when they first began. Then when I started to go to Panther rallies, that’s what I would see on the stage with these Black revolutionaries, Black militants—BA would be right up there speaking with them about Black liberation and revolution, and supporting the Panthers.

Joining the Panthers

Then when I joined the Panthers—it was in Richmond, California, that’s the branch I went in. BA and the Revolutionary Union, which he led, were also there as well. I didn’t know this at the time, but they were in Richmond doing their political work. They were answering the call from the Panthers and others to take revolutionary politics out to poor whites. He talks about it in his Memoir (excerpts from the Memoir available here).

Richmond was a proletarian city of different races and nationalities. So out in Richmond, I would see him come by the office to talk with the Panther leadership. At times I’d have assignments at the National Office in Berkeley and I’d see him come through there talking to some of the national leaders and everything.

I remember on one occasion it was at this community college, Contra Costa College. BA talks about doing work there and the Panthers did work there also. This is when I first ran into BA face to face. And one of the things that really struck me, because up to this point, I had never met anyone who was white that was so passionate about Free Huey! Huey Newton and Bobby Seale were the two founders of the Black Panther Party. Huey was facing a murder charge for a shootout with Oakland police and they were trying to put him in the gas chamber. BA had Free Huey buttons all over his clothing—it was really striking to me. He also had Mao Tsetung buttons all over him.

You know, the Panthers were into popularizing Mao’s Red Book, but BA was just as passionate, if not more so, about Mao and revolution. I hadn’t met anybody—anybody white, to be frank—who was so passionate about Black liberation and communist revolution.

Then I found out that me and BA, we had some of the same friends. He talks about one of these friends—Billy Carr, who was also a friend of mine. Billy was a very good athlete, and a really nice person—he was a little older than me. Billy ended up being in “the life”—I had gotten into it too and I kinda idolized Billy.

But he was a friend of BA’s that he knew really well. BA was struggling with Billy trying to get him to do something else with his life. He wasn’t blaming Billy for being in the situation that he was in, he was blaming the system and trying to get Billy to see that. He really understood and he had a lot of real affection for people like Billy generally. When I realized that and I learned that BA had genuine friends like that, that they had potential to do something great with their life, this had a big impression on me—I just have to be straight up about it.

Studying Revolution in Prison, Going Up Against Identity Politics

In the early ’70s when I was sent to federal prison, these revolutionary prisoners (seven prisoners known as Leavenworth Brothers) struggled with me to read BA’s writings. Because I was really angry like [another person in this discussion] was talking about. I was cocky and angry, and nobody could tell me shit. I had a certain attitude towards other prisoners: “y’all trying to win a longevity contest but you need to be out here trying to make revolution.” Anyway, some people were struggling with me: “if you’re really serious you got to read BA.” The first thing they had me read was Red Papers issues #5 and #6, both issues were about the Black National Question or Black liberation. I knew BA had wrote these.

I had already read, studied, and listened to Malcolm X, all of his speeches/recordings over and over. I had read Franz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth. I had read all this stuff from the Panthers and the Panthers’ leaders about this contradiction—the oppression of Black people—and what’s the solution to it. But when I read Red Papers 5 and 6, I recognized that I had never seen this kind of approach, this kind of systematic and scientific approach that BA took to understanding and analyzing it: from the time of slavery, to sharecropping and Jim Crow, to moving into the urban cities, into the proletariat still facing discrimination, segregation, and police terror—the implications of all that for revolution. Black people was now potentially in a more powerful position to contribute to communist revolution to emancipate humanity. I had never read anything like that.

But at that time some people were saying (at least some people that I knew—it was one of the things that was in the movement at that time): “don’t read anything from somebody white that’s trying to tell you about the struggle of Black people or any other oppressed people because its social chauvinism.” It means they are trying to take over “your” struggle. They are trying to “own” it. No! If it is true and scientific it is getting to the root of the problem so that this oppression can be uprooted and overthrown.

You hear a lot of this today in identity politics lingo—it’s white privilege, white racism, therefore white people are automatically disqualified and they have no business in here trying to tell you about what is real or not real. That is bullshit! It’s a way of avoiding the central point which is whether what anybody says is true or not, does it correspond to reality or not? You can determine that by taking the evidence-based scientific approach.

It’s bullshit on another level. I knew BA, and I knew where his heart was.

And then when I got to reading his writings—I got to know his method of thinking, his thinking process, how he went about engaging reality. When I received that pamphlet while I was in prison, Revolutionary Work in a Non-Revolutionary Situation, I thought it was a masterful grasp of the dialectical materialist method—understanding how a thing of one quality can be transformed into a whole different kind of quality. How a non-revolutionary situation can be transformed into a revolutionary situation.

I was in prison and we had our Marxist study group. We were comparing all these people that were saying they were communists and communist leaders. You had different ones—October League, League of Revolutionary Struggle, Communist Workers Party, Black Workers Congress—all these different organizations. You had ’em all, they were all around. We were looking at all of them, what they were saying in relationship to what BA and the RU were saying, as well as comparing it to how Mao, Lenin, and Marx took up the scientific method, how they engaged reality, and who here came the closest to that. Even at that time BA stood out.

The method that he was applying, even though he has developed it and made different ruptures since that time—but you could see, if you was looking for it, that there was some real systematic and a scientific way of getting to the roots of things. He did not put forward or say something just ’cause it was something to make people feel good, he just told people the truth whether they liked it or not. It was something I really appreciated. He applied this to everything including the oppression of Black people and how it had changed over the years.

Getting Out of Prison and into the Movement

The more I engaged BA, I could not wait to get out of prison. Before that, I didn’t give a fuck whether I got out or not. Before that I was saying: if I only live five more minutes it’s going to be on my terms, whether I’m in here or whether I’m out there—fuck it! But once I started getting into... I wanted to get out. I wanted to get with the leadership of BA. I wanted to meet him, I wanted to get with the Revolutionary Communist Party because I thought: hey, we have the leader and the leadership to really make revolution that we was trying to do in the ’60s.

When I came out of prison in the late ’70s, what immediately happened was the Bob Avakian and Mao Tsetung Defendants court case. He was part of a demonstration in DC that was viciously attacked for defending Mao and revolution in China and was calling out the capitalist coup after Mao’s death. BA himself was facing hundreds of years in prison. Because I knew that we had something special here in terms of a leader, I volunteered immediately to go to DC to be one of the volunteers. I said: we can’t allow BA to be snatched away from us. I’ll go anywhere, do anything politically, to prevent that from happening. And 200 of us volunteers went to DC. We went there to politically “turn DC upside down”—again, this is in BA’s Memoir. We were passionate about that, even as we were just beginning to grasp what we have in the leadership of BA.

I was brand new. I had just got out of prison, my parole had just ended the day before and the very next day I was on the plane to DC as a volunteer. So, I’m there, and I think it was a speech BA had just given to the volunteers. I’m standing in the back talking to somebody, he comes up to me. He starts talking to me about some of things we were all studying at that time about the Collapse of the Second Communist International. We studied why during Lenin’s time, Lenin was the only one who led the masses to go for revolution. They had other parties that were bigger and had even greater influence but were capitulating and leading the people in different countries to take up guns to defend the fucking imperialist fatherland and shit like that, during World War 1.

BA just walked up to me and started talking to me about that and some of the lessons that we should draw from that. I was just kinda... I have to say I was kinda taken aback because he came up and was talking to me. But BA was so genuine, he had no airs, he was just so genuine. I was just talking to him... even though he’s this really advanced world-class leader, when you’re talking to him it’s like you’re talking to your best friend, it’s like talking to a friend—that’s just how he comes off to me, which again, just really struck me. This always has struck me about him.

Back to what I was saying about his friend Billy, even the thing with the Panthers, when I listen to BA talk about it, he understands it better than I do. I was in the Panthers, I went through it, but he understands it. When I went to prison that’s why I was so angry because of what had happened to the Panthers. But BA had a rational and a scientific understanding about why they split apart, and departed from the road of revolution. Again, not blaming them, appreciating the very brutal and murderous repression they faced—but more so, recognizing how they didn’t make the leap to become scientific about revolution.

Nobody in the ’60s came up with a real strategy that can lead millions and millions to defeat and overthrow this system, what to replace it with, what kind of leadership do we need, what kind of methods and approach does that leadership needs to be based upon.

So it’s the same thing like what I was saying about Billy or with those youth in Chicago when we showed them the video clips of BA Through the Years. BA resonates when people hear him, especially the basic masses, as well as others. When they hear him it resonates so profoundly because he understands their situation, what they are going through, and what is the way out—better than you do.

You may be going through and suffering in this way, but it is like going to a doctor, a good doctor. You’re the one suffering but they understand what the solution is to put an end to that suffering better than you do and better than you can. Because he has done the work. People need to engage this work and become followers of BA.

“There has never been a leader like this”

But these are some of the things that have really always struck me about BA. It always struck me on a real personal level. Anytime I was ever able to talk to him, and then read and study his works, it’s so striking that there has never been a leader like this. I think it’s really rare. Especially when I was in prison, and other times, I would just hope that we could get a leader that could really lead the masses to get out of this shit and really navigate through all the twists and turns. Because in any revolution there are always difficulties, there’s always unanticipated things that pop up, but you got to have a method and approach that allows you to be able to work through that and not be thrown by that. And that’s what I see with BA.

When I was in my prison cell, I used to think that either I was going to do something crazy when I got out or I was just going to go to China and live because Mao was still alive at that time. But I hated this system, I hated what it was doing to the masses, not just here but all around the world. But I didn’t think we could get that leadership on that level of a Mao, a Lenin, or a Marx. Then I started realizing that we had it, we have it. And now, it’s developed more beyond what it ever had been in the history of the communist revolution, because BA has made this science much more thoroughly and consistently scientific, to be in synch with reality and how it is changing, and how it CAN be changed to emancipate humanity.

I would read some of things from the first wave of the world revolution—Marx making the first great breakthrough in our understanding in the struggle for human emancipation—but there were definite limits and weaknesses in the first stage of communism. Sometimes I would read those things and get to a place where I’d say, “oh yeah, now we can relax because there’s a kingdom of peace and forever harmony”—that’s a vision would come to my mind. But I don’t ever get that from BA.

Through this revolution humanity can surpass being divided into antagonistic groups—but there’s always going to be matter in motion, there’s always going to be struggle, even if it’s not always antagonistic, that’s just reality. That’s what’s so fucking refreshing. Because when I was in prison people would talk... some of these people, they was eloquent, they’d been studying Marxism—but it was really dogmatic. And I’d listen to them talk and my jaw would just drop because they’d be talking about how the working out of history is pre-determined, that feudalism would be negated by capitalism, and capitalism is going to be negated by socialism—and it was all a kind of worked out in a one/two-step harmony. Real dogmatic and shit like that. Some of that was in that first phase of communism, and BA has gotten rid of all of that with his new synthesis of communism. You don’t find none of that religiosity, religious mantra and shit like that in it and stuff. To me, that’s why I think we can do this—with him, and with his leadership, because of that.

 

BA Through the Years 1969,1979, 2003

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During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/699/bob-avakian-on-fascist-lunacy-and-woke-folk-insanity-a-new-two-outmodeds-en.html

Bob Avakian On
Fascist Lunacy and "Woke Folk" Insanity: A New "Two Outmodeds"

| revcom.us

 

A number of years ago, drawing from the title of a book by Benjamin Barber, I referred to one of the main confrontations taking place in the world as Jihad vs. McWorld/McCrusade. (“Jihad” here refers to Islamic fundamentalist terrorism, and “McWorld/McCrusade” to increasingly globalized western imperialism, infused with a poisonous sense of “the superiority of Western Christian Civilization.”) As I wrote then:

What we see in contention here with Jihad on the one hand and McWorld/McCrusade on the other hand, are historically outmoded strata among colonized and oppressed humanity up against historically outmoded ruling strata of the imperialist system. These two reactionary poles reinforce each other, even while opposing each other. If you side with either of these “outmodeds,” you end up strengthening both.

While this is a very important formulation and is crucial to understanding much of the dynamics driving things in the world in this period, at the same time we do have to be clear about which of these “historically outmodeds” has done the greater damage and poses the greater threat to humanity: It is the “historically outmoded ruling strata of the imperialist system,” and in particular the U.S. imperialists.1

Today, these “two outmodeds” still have real importance, but it must be said that there is, in addition, a new kind of “two outmodeds,” which is particularly pronounced in the U.S.: fascist lunacy and “woke folk” insanity.

I have written and spoken extensively about the viciously deranged, anti-scientific mangling of reality and truth that characterizes fascism as a powerful force contending for power—aiming to institute a more blatant and overt capitalist dictatorship, which would gut and pervert the rule of law, brutally suppress the rights of masses of people and carry to even greater extremes the exploitative and oppressive relations of this system of capitalism-imperialism and the threat to human existence through destruction of the environment and the danger of nuclear war.

But there is another kind of insanity that is becoming a major destructive force in politics and society: the increasing move to tear down everything and everyone that does not, and cannot, meet the tortured, anti-historical and anti-scientific “test” of conforming to the often arbitrary standards of “wokeness.” There are numerous and multiplying instances of this—including, for example, situations where someone (say, an artist) who is white does something powerful to expose the oppression of Black people... and instead of this being appreciated for its contribution to the understanding of and struggle against this oppression, the person is attacked for alleged “cultural colonization” (supposedly “appropriating” the exposure of and struggle against this oppression). This is crazy, and worse than crazy. As others have pointed out, carried to its logical extreme, this kind of “identity politics” wokeness—with its insistence that only people who directly experience something can legitimately say anything about it—would, among other crimes, put an end to, or at the least would seriously restrict and vitiate, literature and art. And overall, this does great harm to the struggle against oppression and the kind of society we should want to live in. Yet, like an out-of-control virus, this madness is continually expanding in its scope and mutating in its particular forms, as it becomes more and more extreme, and more and more unhinged from a sane approach to reality.

The Actual Struggle Against Injustice and Oppression, and the Perversion of Poisonous “Cancel Culture”

In A Beautiful Uprising: Right And Wrong, Methods And Principles, in examining different trends that were evident in the mass outpouring against police terror and institutional racism last summer, I emphasized these basic points of method and principle:

It is crucially important to identify what, in any given phenomenon (a system, a movement, a person), is the main thing (the principal aspect), which defines the essence of that phenomenon at any given time, and overall. For example, both Nat Turner and John Brown, who led heroic (if ultimately defeated) rebellions against slavery, were highly religious—and it is not wrong to see each of them as a kind of religious fanatic. But their religious zealotry was in the service of fighting the main (the most egregious) form of exploitation and oppression of that time—slavery. We cannot condemn Nat Turner or John Brown because they did not recognize that, to lead the struggle to do away with all oppression, it is necessary to cast off the mental shackles of religion and take up a consistently scientific method and approach—just as we cannot condemn them for not fighting against what is today the main system of exploitation and oppression subjecting the masses of humanity to horrific suffering, the system of capitalism-imperialism, because in their time the most decisive immediate question was not (yet) the abolition of the capitalist-imperialist system and the ending of all relations of exploitation and oppression, but the abolition of the system of outright slavery. That was the main (principal) contradiction being confronted. And the main (principal) aspect of what they did, in rising up against slavery, was overwhelmingly positive, even with certain definite secondary shortcomings (including the fact that, in the rebellion led by Nat Turner, they killed not only the adults but the children of slave-owning families).2

The cancerous “cancel culture” carried out in the name of “wokeness” tramples on these crucial methods and principles. In “A Beautiful Uprising” I pointed to the fact that, in some cases it is actually clear, right away, what is right and wrong—things that should be upheld, and things (such as Confederate monuments) that should be repudiated and removed—while in many cases the situation is more complex. But “woke folk cancel culture” rejects the distinction between what is more immediately clear and what is more complex—and rejects rational discourse and serious, scientific exploration of and grappling with questions that may in fact be complex, replacing this with knee-jerk reactions, in accordance with whatever have become the momentary imperatives of “identity politics wokeness.” As I emphasized in Hope For Humanity On A Scientific Basis:

where people have committed real crimes and outrages they should be held accountable; but there is also the need to look at the arc of someone’s life and what is the principal and defining aspect of their life. Is it the mistakes they’ve made, or even a really terrible thing they’ve done at some point? Is that the essential aspect of their life and what defines it? Or has their life involved real transformation, where what has come to define what they are about are the positive things that they have done and the positive trajectory to their life overall?

What is involved here is a very wrong and harmful approach of “canceling” people—indicting them (in the realm of public opinion if not legally) and canceling them out—which is different than holding people accountable for serious acts of oppression or other outrages that they’ve committed but then also looking at the whole arc and main content of what their life has been about. (And this is made all the worse by the fact that it is often amplified through “trial in the media and social media,” with neither any prospect nor even any pretense of due process or any real attempt to get at the truth, fueled by the dangerous notion that a mere allegation is enough to condemn someone and make them a permanent pariah, and marked by a refusal to apply any measure of proportionality, to make any distinctions between different kinds and degrees of wrongdoing.)3

It has to be said—and cannot be overstated—that, in the world today, there can be no just society without the rule of law; there can be no rule of law without due process of law; and there can be no due process of law without the presumption of innocence (and that presumption of innocence must be real—and not a farce, as it is in this society). That is why so much emphasis is given to these principles in the new communism, including specifically the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America, which I have authored.4

It also has to be said that there can be no justice, and great harm will be done, where “trial in the media and social media” is treated as equivalent to, or a substitute for, due process—and this is especially so when what is involved are accusations not against representatives of state power, like the police, but against “ordinary people,” even wealthy and/or prominent ones. Yet “trial in the media and social media”—where mere accusations are treated as proof of guilt and there is a marked lack of proportionality (and at times even a refusal to recognize or accept the outcome of serious investigation and genuine due process)—this is what is clamored for and practiced with the cancerous “woke folk cancel culture.” This is just another version of the extremely harmful notion that “the ends justify the means” (that any means are justified if the goal is, or is proclaimed to be, righteous), something that is firmly rejected by the new communism and should be rejected by anyone who aspires to a truly just society.

But this kind of madness is what happens when petty bourgeois narrowness and cynicism—which is marked by (real, or artificial and fashionable) outrage at instances of social injustice but at the same time by a dismissal or outright rejection of any real attempt at bringing a truly just society into being, and which is often molded and manipulated by ruling bourgeois forces—is carried to fanatical extremes, unmoored from and in opposition to a rational, scientific method and approach. And this is made all the worse by the powerful influence of the extreme individualism that is promoted throughout this society, with its poisonous component of constantly seeking to “tear down” others (which has become a perverse “national sport”).

And, among other things, “cancel culture,” in primarily targeting individuals, is an approach that tends to ignore, downplay and fail to really fight against the institutions and the whole system which constitute the deeper root and source of these outrages. Rarely, if ever, does this approach aim at “canceling” the whole system!

All this is also an expression of “woke entrepreneurialism”: It treats oppression and opposition to oppression as “capital”—and seeks to “own” and “leverage” it—instead of fighting to abolish the oppression.

Now, as with the original “two outmodeds,” it is important to have a definite understanding about which of these new “two outmodeds” represents the greater danger and does, by far, the greater harm. Clearly, it is the fascist lunacy, and not the “woke folk” insanity. But, at the same time, as with the original “two outmodeds,” these new “two outmodeds” also reinforce each other even while opposing each other, and this, too, is a dynamic that must be broken with, in rejecting and opposing both of these new “two outmodeds.” (And those who deny that “woke folk” insanity and “cancel culture” is a real and serious problem—insisting instead that what is involved is merely holding people accountable for wrong-doing—are refusing to look at, or are seriously distorting, reality. They are akin to those pseudo “leftists” who have tried to prettify Islamic fundamentalist terrorism by characterizing it as “political Islam” and even in some cases have tried to portray this as a positive force against western imperialism.)

These New “Two Outmodeds”—Death Throes of This Moribund System—and the Revolution That Is Urgently Needed to Overthrow This System

In my New Year’s Statement (A New Year, The Urgent Need For A Radically New World—For The Emancipation Of All Humanity), I pointed to the fact that, while they invoke very different political objectives, the fascists and the advocates of “identity politics” wokeness have much in common in terms of their epistemology (their approach to knowledge and truth). Both treat “truth” as something that conforms to subjective inclinations and prejudices, rather than to objective reality.5 And it has to be said that, in its social effect, “woke folk” insanity actually serves to reinforce and strengthen the fascist forces, which are quite capable of seizing on especially the most egregious expressions of this “wokeness” not just to mock and ridicule “woke” people but to deny very real oppression and obstruct the struggle against it, while in an overall way this “woke folk” insanity constitutes a diversion and evasion from—and actually does great harm to—the struggle against the oppression and exploitation of masses of people, here and throughout the world, and the need for revolution to abolish and uproot the basis for this oppression and exploitation.

It is this revolution—an actual revolution, to overthrow and completely abolish this system of capitalism-imperialism and bring a radically different and much better society into being, on an entirely different foundation—which must be urgently built for now, through applying the scientific method and scientifically-grounded principles of the new communism, in opposition to everything that serves to enforce and reinforce this system of capitalism-imperialism, which embodies the most horrific oppression and which increasingly poses an existential threat to the very existence of humanity.

 

1. Discussion of these “two outmodeds” (Jihad and McWorld/McCrusade) can be found in a number of works by Bob Avakian, including Bringing Forward Another Way, which is available at revcom.us, BA’s Collected Works. [back]

2. The article Bob Avakian On A Beautiful Uprising: Right And Wrong, Methods And Principles is also available at revcom.us. [back]

3. Hope For Humanity On A Scientific Basis, Breaking with Individualism, Parasitism and American Chauvinism is available at revcom.us, BA’s Collected Works. [back]

4. The Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America is available at revcom.us. [back]

5. New Year’s Statement By Bob Avakian, A New Year, The Urgent Need For A Radically New World—For The Emancipation Of All Humanity, is available at revcom.us. [back]

Click to read.

CONSTITUTION For The New Socialist Republic In North America

Click to read and download (PDF)

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/supplementary-excerpts-en.html

Supplementary Excerpts

| revcom.us

 

Editors’ Note: The following excerpts from works by Bob Avakian (which are available at or can be ordered through revcom.us) are relevant to the article Bob Avakian On Fascist Lunacy and “Woke Folk” Insanity: A New “Two Outmodeds” and generally to the phenomena of “identity politics,” “wokeness,” individualism, parasitism and American chauvinism.

See Further Supplementary Excerpts here.

 

From Breakthroughs, The Historic Breakthrough by Marx, and the Further Breakthrough with the New Communism, A Basic Summary (ebook edition, 2021).

And then there’s BAsics 4:10:

For humanity to advance beyond a state in which “might makes right”—and where things ultimately come down to raw power relations—will require, as a fundamental element in this advance, an approach to understanding things (an epistemology) which recognizes that reality and truth are objective and do not vary in accordance with, nor depend on, different “narratives” and how much “authority” an idea (or “narrative”) may have behind it, or how much power and force can be wielded on behalf of any particular idea or “narrative,” at any given point.1

This is extremely important as well—the relation between relativism and “might makes right.” Say, for example, that you are part of an oppressed group. You have a narrative about your oppression. But if the very righteous and just struggle against this oppression—against the police murder of Black and Brown and Native American people, for example—is reduced to a matter of narrative, to a matter of what amounts to a subjective view of the world (“We know what this means, we know where it comes from and what to do about it because we experience it, as part of our particular group identity”)—if that’s the epistemology that you’re putting forward, well, then, what happens when you run into a group with more power than you? Like the police—they’ve got their epistemology and their narrative too: “You are all a bunch of animals, you have to be confined; and if you in any way provoke us, we have the right to kill you.” That’s their narrative. This racism is written right into the law of this society and its bourgeois dictatorship. What do I mean by that? Well, what does the law say in most states? If the police have “a reasonable fear” of either harm to themselves or someone else, they have a right to use force, including deadly force. Well, then, you’ve got racism written right into this, because almost all police regard Black people, particularly young Black males (not only them, but particularly young Black males) as a threat, as a danger. So the rationale for police killing Black people is built in, they’ve written racism into the law. That’s their narrative—and their narrative has the backing of the state, which is why they almost never get indicted, let alone convicted, of these murders, time after time after time.

And then there’s the military of this system. They’ve got a narrative, too, about how they’re a force for good in the world, and they need to wield this force to impose order because that is for the greater good. And they’ve got their military power to back up that narrative. So, if it’s all a bunch of narratives, then whoever’s got the most power behind their narrative is going to ultimately prevail.

This gets to a point from Mao that is important in its own right and also has important application here. Mao said that striking a pose to intimidate is a very common tactic among certain people. In confronting the enemy, he pointed out, it’s absolutely useless, and among the people it does great harm. Think about this: If you’re in these narrow circles where the currency is identity politics, maybe you can get over by insisting on your narrative over somebody else’s. But in the broader world, and in particular up against the enemy, the ruling class, they don’t give a damn about your narrative, they don’t give a damn about your identity. They’ve got their interests and they’ve got a lot of force behind their interests, and your posturing with your identity is absolutely useless, it’s worthless, up against that. And this is all the more the case with the fascist regime that is now [in 2019] in power. Of course, it is not the case that fascism arose and came to power because of identity politics and the corresponding epistemology. The point is that these fascists want to reinforce and intensify the oppressive relations that identity politics is seeking to address in a distorted and ill-founded way, and these identity politics disorient and disarm people ideologically and render them less able to deal with this. Such identity politics, and in particular the posturing that all too often accompanies it, is only “useful” among people who will be intimidated by this, and in fact such intimidation does a great deal of harm. That’s what Mao meant when he said this kind of thing does great harm among the people. Intimidating people rather than winning them to a scientific understanding of reality, and what needs to be done about it, can only do harm among the people, and it’s absolutely useless against those who have real power.

So, once again, there is a great deal that is concentrated in BAsics 4:10 in terms of the relation between epistemology and advancing beyond a state in which might makes right. To further illustrate the important questions of principle and method that are involved, let me cite the following from my “Discussion with Comrades on Epistemology” drawing from the historical experience of the communist movement:

One of the big questions is “are we really people who are trying to get to the truth, or is it really just a matter of ‘truth as an organizing principle’?” Lenin criticized this philosophically—“truth as an organizing principle”—and you can criticize it to reject religion and opportunism which you don’t find particularly useful, but you can end up doing this yourself in another form....

I’m talking about a new synthesis—a more thoroughly materialist epistemology. Lenin wrote Materialism and Empirio-Criticism where he argued against these things [like "political truth," or "truth as an organizing principle"] but sometimes the practical Lenin got in the way of the philosophical Lenin. The political exigencies that were imposed contributed to a situation where some of the way Lenin dealt with contradictions had an aspect of Stalin.* There are many examples of this in The Furies [a book on the French and Russian revolutions by Arno Mayer]. In some instances, the Bolsheviks had a kind of "Mafia" approach in some areas, especially during the civil war that followed the October 1917 Revolution. In some cases, when people would be organized by reactionaries to fight against the Bolsheviks, the Bolsheviks would retaliate broadly and without mercy. Or they would kill people not only for deserting the Red Army but even for dragging their feet in fighting the civil war. While sometimes in the midst of war, extreme measures may be necessary, overall this is not the way to deal with these contradictions....I read Lenin on this and thought, "this is not right." There’s epistemological stuff bound up with all this as well. [Bob Avakian, “Bob Avakian in a Discussion with Comrades on Epistemology: On Knowing and Changing the World,” in Observations on Art and Culture, Science and Philosophy. p. 56, p. 55]

*Note added by the author: The reference here to “an aspect of Stalin” is a shorthand way of speaking to the negative side of Stalin—in particular his tendency, in dealing with what were very real and often acute contradictions, to rely on state repression, including capital punishment, instead of ideological struggle (combined with an insistence on adherence to discipline, and lesser punishment for violation of discipline, in situations where that was required).

And here we see the close interconnection between epistemology and morality. The orientation and principle that “Everything that is actually true is good for the proletariat, all truths can help us get to communism” is not only extremely important itself but is also closely related to the fact that the new communism thoroughly repudiates and is determined to root out of the communist movement the poisonous notion, and practice, that “the ends justifies the means.” It is a bedrock principle of the new communism that the “means” of this movement must flow from and be consistent with the fundamental “ends” of abolishing all exploitation and oppression through revolution led on a scientific basis.


1.   BAsics, from the talks and writings of Bob Avakian, RCP Publications, 2011. An ebook version can be downloaded for free with a link at revcom.us/avakian/ba-important-works-en.html. [back]

 

 

From Breakthroughs.

The goal of this revolution is not revenge and the reversal of the positions of oppressed and oppressor (“the last shall be first, and the first shall be last”). Here it is very relevant to refer to a statement by Lenin who said that all those who approach revolution with the orientation, “They had their chance, now it’s my turn to have a go at it”—all those who approach revolution in that way do so from the point of view of the petite bourgeoisie. And it hardly needs saying that the approach of the petite bourgeoisie is not going to lead to the achievement of the “4 Alls”2 and the emancipation of humanity. Even though at times the practical/political Lenin got in the way of the philosophical Lenin, in the sense discussed earlier, this is a very important statement by Lenin, because what he refers to as the point of view of the petite bourgeoisie is a powerful spontaneous pull, even on people who are not in the petite bourgeoisie. You see it over and over again—the goal becomes revenge, it becomes something short of transforming all of society. It becomes, “get mine if I can, or if I can’t, at least I can tear somebody else down.” That’s very pronounced in this society, particularly at this time, and even struggles which are dealing with very real and profound contradictions and relations of oppression can be turned toward that kind of outlook and approach by the powerful pull of spontaneity and the prevailing relations in this society. [Emphasis— boldface—added here]

This goes back to the point that even movements which start out highlighting very important outrages and injustices, and carrying out struggle against them, can only continue to go in the direction they need to go in, ultimately—and all these different forces in society that are opposing various forms of oppression can only be united in a lasting and forward moving way—on the basis of a scientific communist approach and what it reveals to be the solution to the profound problems that the present society embodies and enforces. With the outlook of the petite bourgeoisie you’re never going to get there. What is needed is—in a non‑reified sense, in the communist sense—the outlook of the proletariat, the outlook and approach that corresponds to the fundamental interests of the proletariat, which involves the recognition that only by emancipating all of humanity can any one section of the exploited and oppressed be emancipated.

In contrast to narrow and petty motivations and aspirations for things such as revenge and “my turn to have a go at it,” the goal of the communist revolution is, as emphasized in THE NEW COMMUNISM,3 “getting to a different world where all these horrors for the masses of people don’t go on any longer.” The goal is the emancipation of humanity—the abolition of all exploitation and oppression, and the corresponding antagonisms among human beings, and the uprooting of the soil out of which they arise, with the achievement of communism, throughout the world.


2. The “4 Alls” refers to the statement by Marx that the communist revolution aims for the abolition of all class distinctions, all the production relations on which those class distinctions rest, all the social relations that correspond to those production relations, and the revolutionizing of all the ideas that correspond to those social relations. [back]

3. Bob Avakian, THE NEW COMMUNISM, The science, the strategy, the leadership for an actual revolution, and a radically new society on the road to real emancipation, Insight Press, 2016 [back]

 

 

From Breakthroughs.

The ruling class repeatedly seeks to pit different sections of the people against each other and, contrary to the illusions of “intersectionality,” the ruling class has many powerful ways to do that if you’re not proceeding from the point of view of the emancipation of humanity as a whole.

There is a whole history of different sections of the people being pitted against each other. You have the egregious example of the Buffalo Soldiers after the Civil War—Black soldiers who fought to put down and kill off the Native Americans and steal their land—while in the Civil War, among the different Native American peoples, there were some who sided with the northern Union while others sided with the southern Confederacy, based on their narrow perception of their immediate interests. Only coming from the point of view of communism can you unify the masses of people to overcome every manifestation of oppression and achieve the “4 Alls.” [Emphasis—italics—added here.]

 

 

From Hope For Humanity On A Scientific Basis, Breaking with Individualism, Parasitism and American Chauvinism, 2019.

Virulent Individualism and Oblivious Individualism

These are two broad categories of individualism, which have some different particular characteristics but also have in common the basic focus on and preoccupation with the self. Virulent individualism is an extremely poisonous variation of this. It’s basically the view that “I’m out to get everything I can for myself and fuck everybody else. And if I have to trample on everybody else to get what I want, that’s just the way it is and I’m gonna do it the best I can, so I can get everything I want—I want it all and I want it now.”

Oblivious individualism is individualism that may not have those particular aggressive characteristics and may not even have a consciously hostile attitude toward other people in general, but involves going along pursuing one’s particular interests, aspirations, or “dreams,” without paying attention to the larger things that are going on in the world and the effect of this on masses of people throughout the world and indeed on the future of humanity.

So there are these different kinds, or two broad types, of individualism (with many gradations, obviously). But what is the unifying element in them? Self. The self. As I pointed out in the Dialogue with Cornel West in 2014,4 the “selfie” is a perfect iconic representation of this whole outlook and this whole culture. It’s not that every “selfie” is in and of itself bad, of course. But there is a whole culture around it, even to the point where people go to a beautiful place in nature and what are they preoccupied with? Taking a “selfie” of themself instead of taking in (and yes, taking photographs of) the vast beauty that’s stretched out before them. The important thing, with this outlook, is: “Here I am, look at me.” It’s the “look at me, look at me, look at me” ethos that is so predominant in both these forms of individualism, even in the one that’s not consciously virulent but is nevertheless strikingly oblivious.

Oblivious individualism may seem more benign (or, in simple terms, less “nasty”) but it is nonetheless marked by being inexcusably ignorant of, or consciously choosing to ignore, what is happening in the larger world, beyond the self (and the narrow circle around oneself), and the consequences of this for the masses of people in the world, and ultimately for all of humanity—or paying attention to this only as it affects oneself in immediate and narrow terms.

Now here let me be very clear: There are people in the world, masses of people in the world, whose lives are so chaotic and whose suffering is so terrible that it’s very difficult for them even to engage, let alone learn about, much of what’s going on in the world. I’m not talking about those people whom the operation of this system grinds down and subjects to so much horror that, on their own, they are really deprived of even the opportunity to learn about and to engage the larger world. I’m talking about people who have every opportunity to do so but, either with a malignant (or virulent) mentality, or in a more “benign” but nevertheless oblivious way, choose not to pay attention to these things. I’m not necessarily opposed to people watching some videos or YouTubes of cats playing the violin (and similar things on the internet), but if that kind of thing is your preoccupation—let alone if snark and tearing down other people on the internet is your preoccupation—then, obviously, this is something any decent person should be very concerned about and strongly oppose and struggle sharply against.


4. REVOLUTION AND RELIGION: The Fight for Emancipation and the Role of Religion; A Dialogue Between CORNEL WEST & BOB AVAKIAN (2015). The film of this dialogue is available at revcom.us/avakian/ba-important-works-en.html. [back]

 

 

From Hope for Humanity on a Scientific Basis

Parasitism, American Chauvinism, and Individualism

Interestingly, in an article about privacy and the problems that the internet poses for people in terms of having any privacy (“Just a Face in the Crowd? Not Anymore”),5 the authors of the article, Woodrow Hartzog and Evan Selinger, refer to this as a “status‑obsessed culture,” and they particularly talk about how this is a problem in terms of people having any privacy because people want to use the internet to boost their status all the time: “Look at me doing this, look at me doing that,” and so on, and so forth. But this phrase, I think, is very apropos, is a very relevant and meaningful phrase: a “status‑obsessed culture.” This is what’s been continually encouraged through the major institutions of this society, and it is a particular variant, obviously, of the widespread individualism, both virulent and oblivious.

And this goes along with the coupling of individualism and commodification, a phenomenon whose essence is captured very well in the incessant promotion, the undisguised and unapologetic promotion, of the “brand.” Everywhere you turn you hear: “Oh, this is really gonna be good for developing her ‘brand’”; “Oh, they really have been very creative in how they’ve pumped up their ‘brand.’” You can’t turn around anywhere without hearing the word “brand” used in this kind of way. And this goes along, of course, with the glorification of entre‑manure‑ialism—which objectively amounts to the attempt to get in on the exploitation of people, becoming part of the overall process resting to a large degree on super‑exploitation of masses of people, including children, in the Third World.

All this is very much bound up with the parasitism of American society, which (as explained in Breakthroughs...) refers to the fact that an increasingly globalized capitalism:

...relies to a very great degree for production and for maintaining the rate of profit on a vast network of sweatshops, particularly in the Third World of Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and Asia, while capitalist activity in the capitalist‑imperialist “home countries” is increasingly in the realm of finance and financial speculation, and the “high end” of (not the production of the basic physical materials for) high tech, as well as the service sector and the commercial sphere (including the growing role of online marketing). As Lenin phrased it, this puts “the seal of parasitism” on the whole of societies such as the U.S.


5. Woodrow Hartzog and Evan Selinger, “Just a Face in the Crowd? Not Anymore,” New York Times, April 18, 2019. [back]

 

 

From Hope For Humanity On A Scientific Basis.

Identity Politics and Individualism

As pointed out in “All Played Out,”6 there is the “politics of ‘identity’ that really comes back down to me.” We see all the time that, even while this identity is associated with a group, in fundamental terms it’s really about “me” and “mine”; it is posed, at least objectively and often consciously, against other people, even other bitterly oppressed people, in a way that smacks of disgusting individualism and petty rivalry based on that outlook. Along with this, there is the whole phenomenon of “woke” parasitism and seeking “safe” privileged enclaves within, and on the basis of, the depredations and exploitation by this imperialist system of the masses of people of the world as well as the environment.

“Identity politics” distorts, corrupts, misdirects and undermines the exposure of and the needed struggle against what are, in fact, horrific forms of oppression. In this connection, let’s contrast experience in the 1960s vs. today’s phenomena of “triggering” and trauma.

Back in the 1960s, drawing from my own experience, I remember that, in the Free Speech Movement in Berkeley in 1964, the culmination and the high point of that struggle was when there was a massive sit‑in, in the administration building on the Berkeley campus. Hundreds of people sat in and refused to leave until their demands were met. Ultimately, 800 were forcibly ejected from the building and arrested when the governor (the Democratic Party governor) of the state called out not only the local police, but the county sheriffs and the state police to come in and roust us out of the administration building. We were confronted with these police who were roughly arresting people—grabbing people, particularly women, by the hair and throwing them down the stairs as a way of evicting them from the administration building. Well, it strikes me now, in looking back on this, that the one thing we forgot to do, in the face of this, was to say: “Wait, you’re triggering us. You can’t do this. You’re causing us trauma.” I’m sure that would have worked to prevent the police from acting in that brutal manner.

Or, when Huey Newton and Bobby Seale, together with others who made up the first members of the Black Panther Party, carried out their armed patrols against police brutality and murder, and they encountered police who threatened them and demanded that they put down their weapons (which the Panthers were legally carrying), well then, Huey and Bobby should have said to those pigs: “Stop—don’t you know you’re triggering and traumatizing us!” Yes, I’m sure that would have made the pigs back off.

Or, we can think about “Stop the Draft Week,” when thousands of people went to demonstrate at the Oakland induction center at the height of the struggle against the Vietnam war, in the effort to shut down the induction center (where people were conscripted—forced—into the U.S. military). People sat in, to block the doors. And the Oakland police, who are known for their racism and brutality going back generations, came in and brutally attacked people, and dragged them away in the most vicious manner. Well, it strikes me now that the real failing at that time was that, as those people were sitting in and the police were approaching, they should have said: “Stop! You’re triggering us.” I’m sure that would have stopped the police from brutally rousting people away from the doors.

And there are many other examples. Think about People’s Park in Berkeley, when, at its high point, there was a massive demonstration of tens of thousands in support of the seemingly modest demand to have a park in an area that the university wanted to turn into a parking lot. During the course of this struggle, people were shot by police and one of the demonstrators, James Rector, was killed as part of a police attack on a demonstration. And in addition to people being shot, the National Guard had been called out, and there were a number of us, hundreds, who went to the fence that the university and the authorities had put around the People’s Park area. The National Guard was stationed inside the fence, and many of us were at the fence, shaking it. Well, because the National Guard was armed and was being ordered to be prepared to shoot—that was very clear—the question for us was: Should we tear down this fence and face the fusillade of bullets coming at us for doing so? And people decided, in those circumstances, that this wasn’t the right thing to do. But obviously we were completely mis‑directed in those circumstances. We should have said to the commanders of the National Guard: “Not just pointing those guns at us, but just having those guns near us, is triggering us. You can’t do this. You have to stop this right now!”

Now, obviously, I’m being ironic here. But the point that comes through—and these examples are deliberately ludicrous to make the point—is that in any real struggle to deal with any real oppression, up against powerful enforcers of that oppression, you are going to have to face the prospect of real sacrifice, including the prospect of being physically attacked. And if you think that you can carve out little safe enclaves, and that this is somehow going to lead to any kind of significant change in society, you are full of illusions and delusions.

So, this is something important to understand. The trauma that results from directly suffering horrific forms of oppression and degradation is very real, and no one should deny or underestimate that—but, instead of an individual “turning inwards,” this needs to be transformed into anger and determination to be part of a collective struggle to put an end to all the atrocities, everywhere, whose fundamental source and cause is this system of capitalism‑imperialism. And, yes, this will require struggle and sacrifice. But it’s worth it, it’s what needs to happen.


6. “All Played Out,” a spoken word piece by Bob Avakian, with musical accompaniment by William Parker (Centeringmusic BMI, 2011) is available at revcom.us/avakian/ba-important-works-en.html and at soundcloud.com/allplayedout. [back]

 

 

From The Problem, the Solution, and the Challenges Before Us, 2017.

While it is right and necessary to unite with people broadly in opposing the injustices and outrages committed by those who rule this country, and while this has taken on heightened importance with the coming to power of the Trump/Pence fascist regime, it is a basic truth that without breaking with American chauvinism—without confronting the very real horror of what this country has been, and what it has done, here and all over the world, from its founding to the present—and without coming to deeply hate this, it is not possible, in the final analysis, to retain one’s own humanity and act in the highest interests of all humanity. [emphasis added here]

 

 

From The Truth About Right‑Wing Conspiracy...And Why Clinton and the Democrats Are No Answer, 1998.

[Bill] Clinton represents an attempt to deal with these acute and potentially explosive contradictions by giving a certain expression to "inclusiveness"—to "diversity" and "multi‑culturalism"—while retaining and fortifying the white supremacist and male supremacist relations that are an integral and indispensable part of the structure of U.S. capitalism‑imperialism. In line with this, Clinton has promoted a less absolutist version of the "traditional values" and the "Judeo‑Christian tradition" which has justified and reinforced the exploitative and oppressive relations on which this system is built.

But, in the view of Clinton's conservative and particularly his fundamentalist opponents, Clinton's program will not work and will only undermine the historically established girdings of the system, both in its economic base and in the superstructure of politics, culture and ideology—it will lead to the unraveling of the legitimating social "consensus" and social "cohesion" necessary to maintain this system. And the fact is that there are today in the U.S. broad numbers of people who, yes, participated in or were influenced by the movements of the '60s and have a corresponding commitment to social justice and equality, and who are unwilling to go along with the notion that America has some inherent moral right and obligation to bully its way around the world and impose a world order under its domination. At the same time, there is the phenomenon that, in some important aspects, the "recovery" of the U.S. economy that has taken place during the Clinton administration, and the more highly "globalized" and "flexible" production that has been a marked feature of this "recovery," has also contributed to "undermining the traditional family." And it has fostered the florescence of an outlook, particularly (though not exclusively) among more highly paid professionals, that involves no small amount of self‑indulgence and, related to that, a weakening of some "traditional values," including old‑style patriotism and the willingness to sacrifice for the officially defined and proclaimed "national interest." [Emphasis—italics—added here]

In some significant ways, what was written 150 years ago in the Communist Manifesto, concerning the consequences of unfettered bourgeois commodity relations, is assuming a pronounced expression among sections of the U.S. population in the context of today's "post‑Cold War" world capitalism. The following phrases from the Manifesto have a particular and powerful resonance: "the bourgeoisie, wherever it has gotten the upper hand...has left remaining no other nexus between man and man than naked self‑interest, than callous `cash payment.' It has drowned the most heavenly ecstasies of religious fervor, of chivalrous enthusiasm, of Philistine sentimentalism in the icy water of egotistical calculation. It has resolved personal worth into exchange value....In a word, for exploitation, veiled by religious and political illusions, it has substituted naked, shameless, direct, brutal exploitation." There is a great irony here: the very "triumph" and "triumphalism" of capitalism in today's circumstances has produced effects and sentiments which tend to undermine, among significant sections of the U.S. population, the willingness to make personal sacrifices for "god and country"—that is, for the interests and requirements of the imperial ruling class, within the U.S. itself and in the world arena. In reaction to this, the "conservatives," with the Christian Right playing a decisive role, are attempting to revive and impose precisely "the most heavenly ecstasies of religious fervor, of chivalrous enthusiasm, of Philistine sentimentalism"—to resurrect a situation where worldwide exploitation that is unsurpassed in its brutality is at the same time "veiled by religious and political illusions."

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/avakian/new-years-statement-2021/bob-avakian-new-years-statement-2021-en.html

 

NEW YEAR'S STATEMENT BY BOB AVAKIAN

A New Year,
The Urgent Need For A Radically New World—
For The Emancipation Of All Humanity

 

1In my statement of August 1 of last year, I put forward the analysis that, in the particular circumstances of this presidential election and the truly profound stakes it posed, if the Trump/Pence regime remained in power at the time of this election, it would be necessary and important to vote for Biden to deliver a decisive electoral defeat to the fascism represented by this regime. At the same time, I emphasized that simply relying on voting would likely lead to disaster, and that it was vitally important for masses of people to take to the streets, in nonviolent but sustained, and growing, mass mobilization with the demand that this fascist regime must be OUT NOW!, as called for by RefuseFascism.org.

As it turned out, masses of people did vote in large numbers to oust this fascist regime—and, in doing so delivered a decisive enough electoral defeat to the Trump/Pence regime that its increasing, and then massively violent, attempt at a coup has been more difficult to pull off and has finally been defeated, with Trump forced to leave (while still refusing to acknowledge his loss in the election), even as Biden had to be inaugurated in a capital city that was a locked-down armed camp.

In immediate terms, the catastrophe has been narrowly averted that would have occurred if this fascist regime had been re-elected (or in some other way remained in power) and on that basis further consolidated its fascist rule and been more fully emboldened and unleashed to implement its horrific program. The fact that the Trump/Pence regime has had to leave office is of great importance and something in itself worth celebrating! Yet the reality is that, not only in relation to this election but throughout the four years of this regime’s rule and its mounting atrocities, there has not been the massive nonviolent mobilization called for by Refuse Fascism to drive out this regime—and, in the aftermath of the election, the streets were dominated by fascist mobilizations, and not by opposition to fascism. This has resulted in a situation where, despite the Trump/Pence regime’s loss in the election, the forces of fascism are still in many ways being strengthened, and the opposition to this has remained much too passive and reliant on the terms set by the Democratic Party.

The reality has to be confronted that, as expressed through the election, nearly half this country has passionately, aggressively and belligerently embraced what is represented by “Trumpism.” The unavoidable truth is that this country, the much-proclaimed “Shining City on a Hill,” is full of fascists!—in the government at all levels and in large parts of the society as a whole. And a defining characteristic of these fascists is their fanatical allegiance to demented distortions of reality, which is extremely difficult (and in many cases impossible) to penetrate with reason and fact, because these distortions serve to reinforce their sense of threatened entitlement and render long-standing prejudices and hatreds even more virulent. This fascism is deeply rooted, in the underlying dynamics of the capitalist-imperialist system that rules in this country and in the whole history of this country, from its founding in slavery and genocide. Related to this is another critical truth: Biden will fail miserably in his attempt to bring about “healing” and “unite the country.” As I have written previously:

Biden and the Democrats cannot “bring the country together,” as they falsely claim, because there can be no “reconciliation” with these fascists—whose “grievances” are based on fanatical resentment against any limitation on white supremacy, male supremacy, xenophobia (hatred of foreigners), rabid American chauvinism, and the unrestrained plundering of the environment, and are increasingly expressed in literally lunatic terms. There can be no “reconciliation” with this, other than on the terms of these fascists, with all the terrible implications and consequences of that!

There is no question that many of the policies of the Biden/Harris administration will be different than the blatant atrocities of the Trump/Pence regime, and things will definitely “feel different” with Biden and Harris, but the way they will try to “unite the country”—in line with the interests and requirements of this system of capitalism-imperialism—is something that no decent person should want, or be part of. In seeking to re-establish and reinforce “stability” at home, and to maintain the U.S. as the world’s number one oppressive power, Biden, Harris, and the Democrats (as well as other “mainstream” institutions, such as the New York Times and CNN), will make determined attempts to keep the masses of people who have righteously hated the fascism of the Trump/Pence regime, and who aspire to a more just world, firmly tied to this system—restricting their political vision, and activity, within the confines of this system, preventing them from acting in their own fundamental interests and those of humanity as a whole. And to the degree that things are maintained within the limits of this system, this will actually have the effect of furthering the horrors for humanity that are built into this system, while also reinforcing and giving further impetus to the underlying economic—and the social and political—forces that will strengthen the fascism that has already shown great strength in this country (and a number of others).

2Even as it is critically important that the voting in this election has resulted in a decisive defeat for the Trump/Pence regime and its attempts to more fully consolidate fascist rule, this must not be allowed to obscure this crucial truth: The polarization, between Democrats and Republicans, as expressed through the electoral process in this country, involves contention over how to uphold and pursue the interests of the capitalist-imperialist system and rule by the capitalist class. It does not represent the fundamental divisions in society and the world, nor the fundamental interests of the masses of people, in this country and in the world as a whole. Nor can the profound problems confronting humanity be solved—in fact, they can only get worse—within the confines of this murderously oppressive and exploitative system and the chaos and destruction it will continue to unleash on a massive scale, so long as it continues to dominate the world.

This is fact-based, scientifically-established truth. Ignoring, denying, or trying to pursue individual escape from this reality will only make things worse and hasten disaster.

The electoral defeat of the Trump/Pence regime only “buys some time”—both in relation to the imminent danger posed by the fascism this regime represents, and more fundamentally in terms of the potentially existential crisis humanity is increasingly facing as a consequence of being bound to the dynamics of this system of capitalism-imperialism. But, in essential terms, time is not on the side of the struggle for a better future for humanity. So the time there is must not be squandered—mired in oblivious individualism and political paralysis or misspent on misdirected activity that only reinforces this system which perpetuates endless horrors for the masses of humanity and has brought things to the brink of very real catastrophe.

A profoundly different polarization must be brought about, in line with the potential for a radically different and better world, representing the actual interests of the masses of people and ultimately all of humanity. A radically different approach to understanding, and acting on, the relations and problems of society must be taken up—a thoroughly and consistently scientific method and approach.

3Among many who have been outraged by the way Trump has consistently engaged in both pathological and purposeful lying, there has been a great deal of emphasis on the importance of science and truth, on facts and evidence-based reasoning. This has focused to a significant degree on the criminally anti-scientific approach that Trump and Pence have taken to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the encouragement of this anti-scientific madness among the fascist “base” in society at large—all of which has led to at least tens of thousands (or even hundreds of thousands) of unnecessary deaths as well as unnecessary hardship and suffering for masses of people. This emphasis on science and the scientific method is vitally important, but it is also necessary to emphasize the real need and great importance of being consistent with this, and following scientifically-determined truth wherever it leads, in order to correctly understand reality, in every sphere of life and society.

This means fully breaking with and moving beyond an approach of merely embracing truths—or supposed truths—with which one is comfortable, while rejecting, dismissing, or evading actual truth which may make one uncomfortable. One important dimension of this is rising above and repudiating methodologically the philosophical relativism of “identity politics,” which does a great deal of harm through its own version of reducing “truth” to partial, unsystematized experience and subjective sentiment (“my truth”...“our truth”...) in opposition to real, objective truth, which is correctly, scientifically arrived at through an evidence-based process, to determine whether, or not, something (an idea, theory, assertion, etc.) corresponds to actual material reality. While politically this “identity politics” may be proceeding from a desire to oppose various forms of oppression—even if this is often characterized, and vitiated, by people of different “identities” seeking to claim “ownership” of opposition to oppression—in terms of epistemology (the approach to understanding reality and arriving at the truth of things) “identity politics” has a lot in common with the reliance on “alternative facts” (assertions that are in opposition to actual facts, often wildly so) that is the hallmark of the fascists. Even as it is important to recognize the political distinctions involved, the situation is far too serious, and the stakes far too high, to allow ourselves to fall into, or conciliate with, any form of opposing the scientific method and its pursuit of objective truth about actual reality.

To understand why we are confronted with the situation we are, it is necessary not merely to respond to—and in effect be whipped around by—what is happening on the surface at any given time, but to dig beneath the surface, to discover the underlying mainsprings and causes of things, and arrive at an understanding of the fundamental problem and the actual solution. This means coming to the scientific understanding that we are living under a system, and what that system actually is (the system of capitalism-imperialism); working to grasp the deeper relations and dynamics of this system and how this is setting the framework for how different sections of society spontaneously think and react to events in society and the world, and what is the possible way forward to transforming all of this in the interests of the masses of humanity and ultimately humanity as a whole. A crucial part of this is a scientific understanding of major changes, resulting from the very dynamics and functioning of this system, that have led to upheaval in society and have in significant ways fed this fascism: changes in the capitalist-imperialist economy and correspondingly in the social structure and “social composition” within this country, as well as internationally, which have undermined “traditional” forms of oppression without, however, leading to the ending of this oppression but establishing and enforcing it in new forms, while provoking what is truly a deranged, sadistic and often violent reaction on the part of the sectors of society who have identified their interests, and in effect their very being, with the traditional forms of oppression.

As an introduction, and overarching point, in regard to some of these important changes, it is important to emphasize that these changes, and especially those that have occurred in the last few decades, are bound up with the heightened parasitism of capitalism-imperialism in the contemporary world. As I explained in Breakthroughs: The Historic Breakthrough by Marx, and the Further Breakthrough with the New Communism, A Basic Summary, parasitism refers to

the fact that an increasingly globalized capitalism relies to a very great degree for production and for maintaining the rate of profit on a vast network of sweatshops, particularly in the Third World of Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and Asia, while capitalist activity in the capitalist‑imperialist “home countries” is increasingly in the realm of finance and financial speculation, and the “high end” of (not the production of the basic physical materials for) high tech, as well as the service sector and the commercial sphere (including the growing role of online marketing).

Since the end of World War 2 (75 years ago), the situation of Black people has dramatically changed. These changes were initially based in increased mechanization and other transformations in agricultural production, and the economy overall; they were driven by a powerful upsurge of struggle of Black people, wrenching concessions out of the ruling class in this country that was anxious to maintain its image as “the champion of democracy” and “leader of the free world,” especially in its confrontation with the Soviet Union for a number of decades after World War 2. As a result of these and other factors, Black people’s oppression is no longer centered around brutal exploitation in the rural south, in conditions of near slavery (and in some cases actual slavery) backed up by Ku Klux Klan terror, but instead involves a situation where masses of Black people are segregated and concentrated in urban areas throughout the country and subjected to systematic discrimination and continual brutality and murder by the police. Over the past several decades, due to heightened globalization and automation of production, interacting with continuing discrimination, there has been the elimination of a great deal of factory employment which provided Black men (and some women) with better-paying jobs in the urban areas. At the same time, as a result of the civil rights and Black liberation struggles of the 1960s/early ’70s, and other factors, there has been the growth of the Black middle class. But there has also been an increase of the so-called “underclass,” concentrated and contained in urban ghettos and more or less permanently locked out of regular employment in the “formal” economy.

Unable to provide a positive resolution to acute contradictions bound up with these changes—unable to end systemic racism which involves degrading discrimination against even economically better-off sections of Black people—unable to integrate large numbers of Black people into the “formal” economy—the ruling forces in society have responded to this situation with mass incarceration of millions of Black males (and growing numbers of females) with arrests, trials, convictions and sentences embodying yet more discrimination and injustice, and by unleashing and backing systematic police terror, which is especially directed against Black people in the inner cities but can target any Black person, anywhere, at any time. The attempt to brutally enforce “law and order,” given that a more just solution is impossible under this system, heightens the volatility of this whole situation, leading to further upheaval—including completely justified and righteous protest and rebellion—which, in turn, is seized on by fascist forces in promoting their grotesque white supremacist portrayal of the masses of Black people as “criminals” and “uncaged animals.”

The fact that, with all these changes, and regardless of who is occupying the seats of power, systematic discrimination and murderous oppression has persisted, has led some Black people to conclude that the Democratic Party is the problem, since it has consistently sought the support of Black people but has repeatedly acted against their interests. Even as the Republican Party has become the vehicle of overt and aggressive white supremacy, it is true that the Democrats, and not just the Republicans, have presided over the oppression of Black people. But what is the actual reason for that, and what is the real answer to it? The reality is that white supremacy is built into this system of capitalism-imperialism, and neither of these ruling class parties could put an end to this, even if they wanted to. The answer is not rallying to the fascist Republican Party, or trying to play these bourgeois parties against each other, or embracing “Black capitalism” and begging for a better “seat at the table”—all of which will only reinforce the existing system of oppression and perhaps benefit a few at the expense of the many. The answer is revolution, and establishing a radically different society that has the basis as well as the orientation to uproot and abolish white supremacy, and all oppressive relations.

There have been profound changes in the situation and social position of large numbers of women, both within this country and internationally. To cite one important dimension of this, much of the sweatshop labor in the Third World involves women, forced to work under horrific conditions. In this country, changes in the functioning and structure of the economy (as part of the increasingly globalized world economy) have led to extensive employment, and exploitation, of Black women (and other women of color), in the service and retail sectors in particular. At the same time, not only is there more opportunity for large numbers of women (especially white women, but some women of color as well) to find positions in the professions and in business, but this has also become a necessity in order for their families to maintain a “middle class way of life.” This situation where greater numbers of women are employed outside the home, including a significant increase in the number of women in better-paid middle class positions, has seriously strained and significantly undermined the “traditional” patriarchal (male-dominated) family and patriarchal relations in society overall.

All this has provided more favorable conditions for, and has been significantly influenced by, the struggle against the oppression of women, which was powerfully expressed as part of the overall radical upsurge of the 1960s and has continued in various forms since then. As I spoke to in Away With All Gods!:

Through the upsurge of the ’60s, many things were called into question—not just in the realm of ideas, although that was extremely important, but in practice, in the realm of political struggle—things that are foundational to this society. And many changes were brought about, partly as a result of mass political struggle and partly because of the changing features and needs of the economy. Once again, one of the most important dimensions of this was in relation to the role of women, particularly among professionals and other sections of the middle class, where it became both possible and necessary for women to work full time, in the effort to maintain a middle class standard of living. When you combine that with political and ideological expressions of feminism, and other movements that came forward out of the ’60s, this did pose a very direct challenge to traditionally institutionalized forms of oppression in this society.

Yet the elimination of male supremacy is impossible within the confines of this system. This is true because male supremacy has been deeply woven into the fabric of this society, and because this system is based on capitalist commodity relations and exploitation—things are produced to be exchanged (sold), through a process in which masses of people work, for a wage or salary, to create profit that is accumulated by capitalists who employ them and control their work—a system in which the patriarchal family unit remains an essential economic and social component and requirement, even as it is being put under increasing strains. And the fascist section of the ruling class has, over a number of decades now, waged a relentless attack on Constitutional rights, and mobilized their social base of religious fundamentalist fanatics, to forcefully and often violently assert “traditional” patriarchal oppression—with the assault on the right to abortion, and even birth control, a major focus of this attempt to essentially enslave women. What I wrote, 35 years ago, is today more true than ever:

Over the past several decades in the U.S. there have been profound changes in the situation of women and the relations within the family. In only one of ten families is there the “model” situation where the husband is the “sole breadwinner” and the wife a totally dependent “homemaker.” With these economic changes have come significant changes in attitudes and expectations—and very significant strains not only on the fabric of the family but of social relations more broadly.... The whole question of the position and role of women in society is more and more acutely posing itself in today’s extreme circumstances—this is a powderkeg in the U.S. today. It is not conceivable that all this will find any resolution other than in the most radical terms and through extremely violent means. The question yet to be determined is: will it be a radical reactionary or a radical revolutionary resolution, will it mean the reinforcing of the chains of enslavement or the shattering of the most decisive links in those chains and the opening up of the possibility of realizing the complete elimination of all forms of such enslavement.

What has gone along with all this has been an increased possibility and “space” for the assertion of gender “identity” and relations that run counter to the traditional oppressive gender relations—and, once again, there has been the often violent attempt to reassert and reinforce the traditional relations and to suppress anything that does not conform to this.

Religion, and especially religious fundamentalism, is a powerful factor promoting and reinforcing the patriarchal subordination of women, as well as other “traditional” forms of oppression. Here is an important insight by Kristin Kobes Du Mez, who grew up in a town in Iowa that was filled with white Christian fundamentalists (which she refers to as “white evangelicals”) who are the backbone of present-day American fascism. In her book Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation, she writes:

White evangelicals have pieced together this patchwork of issues, and a nostalgic commitment to rugged, aggressive, militant white masculinity serves as the thread binding them together into a coherent whole. A father’s rule in the home is inextricably linked to heroic leadership on the national stage, and the fate of the nation hinges on both. [emphasis added here]

Given the tight connection between militant patriarchy and fascism, it is not surprising that some (though clearly a minority of) Black and Latino men have been drawn to support for Trump, despite his overt white supremacy. (This includes some who are or have been prominent in rap music. While there have been positive forces and elements in rap and Hip Hop overall, what has been increasingly promoted is a culture that is full of, not to say dominated by, misogynistic degradation of women, as well as admiration for the kind of hustler gangsterism that is one of Trump’s defining “qualities.”) It is also not surprising that even significant numbers of women (mainly white women but also some Latina and other women of color) have been drawn to this fascism, as the phenomenon of the oppressed clinging to “tradition’s chains” that oppress them is unfortunately all too common. (Think of the mothers in the fatherland, written about by Claudia Koonz in her book with that title—women who actively worked for the aggressively male supremacist Hitler and the NAZIs in Germany during the rise of fascism there in the 1930s. Or listen to the words today of Black female fascist Candace Owens, who has praised Hitler for his efforts to “make Germany great”: “There is no society that can survive without strong men.... In the west, the steady feminization of our men at the same time that Marxism is being taught to our children is not a coincidence. It is an outright attack. Bring back manly men.” Of course, for fascists like Owens “strong” and “manly” men are those who embody and enforce traditional gender relations, exercising domination over women who submit to this domination—and men who do not conform to traditional gender roles and relations, men who support equality between men and women are somehow “weak,” “effeminate,” “emasculated.”) And for white women who are part of this fascist phenomenon, in which virulent male supremacy is a defining and cohering element, there is also the fact that these women can join in with the white supremacy which, particularly in a country like the U.S., is also a defining and decisive element of this fascism and is closely intertwined with the virulent male supremacy—as reflected in Kristin Kobes Du Mez’s formulation: aggressive, militant white masculinity.

As a result of the intensifying climate crisis, war and repression—and, as a driving force in all this, major changes in the capitalist-imperialist dominated world economy, including the further growth and increased impact internationally of corporate agribusiness and labor-displacing technology, increasingly monopolized control of seeds and chemicals, greater monopolization of marketing, and vast land-grabbing investments—there is massive dislocation and upheaval, particularly affecting people in the global South (the countries of Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and Asia—the Third World). An important feature of all this is mass urbanization: more than half of the world’s population now lives in urban areas, with huge shantytown slums, involving more than a billion people, in the urban areas of the Third World, even as tens of millions of people from the Third World have been forced to migrate to the U.S. and countries in Europe. And the situation has developed where, in some of these countries—with the U.S. a prime example—the economy could not function without the exploitation of large numbers of immigrants, while many are subjected to the constant threat of deportation, which also makes them even more vulnerable to extreme exploitation.

The ruin of much of traditional small-scale farming in Third World countries and the dramatic increase of an urban population there (as well as in the U.S. and some other imperialist countries) which in large numbers is unable to find work within the “formal economy”—this has also fostered the growth of an illegal economy and of gangs (and, particularly in Third World countries, cartels) based on this illegal economy, in particular the drug trade, but also the trafficking of human beings, especially women and girls viciously victimized in prostitution, the “sex industry,” and literal sexual slavery.

This dramatically changed and often highly volatile situation has also been a major factor in the rise of religious fundamentalism, in the Third World and notably in the U.S., where Christian fundamentalism is a powerful negative social and political force. Interconnected and interacting with these economic and related social changes in a way that has contributed to the increased influence of religious fundamentalism, particularly in the Third World, has been the defeat, or abandonment, of movements in the Third World led by communists or revolutionary nationalists against old-line colonialists and neo-colonial oppressors, above all the U.S., in the period after World War 2—with the greatest setback being the reversal of socialism and the restoration of capitalism in China in the 1970s, which transformed China from a powerful socialist country and a beacon and bastion of support for revolutionary struggle throughout the world, into a rising imperialist power and itself an exploiter of masses of people in Africa and other parts of the Third World.

The rise of religious fundamentalism has occurred together with, and in opposition to, the increase of secularism (people who are not religious, or at least not part of traditional religions), especially among the more educated urban populations. This secularism is not in itself conceived or intended as an attack on people who continue to hold religious beliefs, but it does objectively undermine religion—and it is taken as an attack “on everything holy” by religious fundamentalists who refuse to even attempt to reconcile religious belief with the results of scientific inquiry, as strongly reflected in their irrational attack on the solidly established scientific fact of evolution.

What is essentially involved in this division is the acceptance, or the denial and rejection, of evidence-based rational thought, including the importance of critical thinking, that has, in a broad sense, been the extension of the Enlightenment, which arose in Europe (in particular France) several centuries ago. In that time, and since, the advance of science and important discoveries this has brought forward have given impetus to the questioning of religion in a way that was not really possible before, since many of these scientific discoveries clearly contradict long-entrenched religious scripture and dogma, and the scientific method rejects the recognition of things as “real” if concrete evidence for their existence cannot be shown, in the real material world. And, as emphasized by Ardea Skybreak, author of the very important book The Science of Evolution and the Myth of Creationism: Knowing What’s Real and Why It Matters, science provides plenty of evidence that human beings have invented every religion that exists anywhere in the world. (In a book consisting of an interview with Skybreak, Science and Revolution, she also emphasizes that, although at times “bad science” has been used for very negative purposes, including to promote racism, the actual scientific method itself provides the means for refuting this: “you can use rigorous scientific methods to prove that was all bad science.”)

It is true that science itself cannot put an end to religious belief, as shown by the fact that there are large numbers of religious people who consider themselves advocates of enlightenment and accept the discoveries and conclusions of science (up to a point at least) but insist that there is a realm of existence—involving a supernatural being, or beings—which is beyond the scope of science. And it is a fact that in general the representatives of the ruling class in this country, whether they are “liberal” or “conservative”—and whether they themselves personally believe in god or not—definitely regard religion as a crucial part of maintaining the “social cohesion” of the country on a capitalist basis, and work to promote religion, in particular Christianity, in one form or another. (They are all essentially practitioners of the statement attributed to Napoleon: society is impossible without inequality; inequality is impossible to maintain without a morality to justify it; and such a morality is impossible without religion.) Nevertheless (to paraphrase an important statement by the physicist Steven Weinberg), although science itself does not eliminate religious belief, it does provide a basis for people not to believe in god and to reject religion. This is in conflict with those who believe religion is necessary for an orderly and “moral” society, and all the more so with those who insist on a religious fundamentalism that is wildly out of keeping with reality and with a rational approach to reality.

Yet, while it is true that, in order to win their full emancipation, the masses of people in the world will ultimately need to cast off religious belief in general, it is important to emphasize that, in the world today, the polarization does not simply come down to those who have rejected religion in the name of enlightenment vs. those who cling to religious belief. An important polarization now is that between what can rightly be called decent people (including large numbers of religious people) who are opposed to injustice, and on the other hand those who are determined to revive and enforce traditional forms of oppression. In regard to all this, one of the important questions is whether people come to embrace, or reject, two distinguishing qualities: largeness of mind and generosity of spirit.

4All this provides an important foundation and “backdrop” for understanding what happened in the recent election, why, and what are the implications of this, now and in terms of the future. The following, from a November 9, 2020 article by Leonard Pitts Jr (“The election of 2020 has ended at last, but the celebration has caveats”) contains some important insights. The result of this election, he writes, “strips bare all the glossy claims about who we are as a country, underscoring the fact that in a meaningful sense, we are not one country at all anymore, but two sharing the same borders.” He continues:

The last time that happened [with the Civil War], it took four years and 750,000 lives to force us back into some semblance of oneness. Even then, the seams of the fracture were always visible.

Unlike that break, this one is not starkly geographic: South versus North. No, this one is city versus country, college educated versus high school educated and, most significantly, future versus past. Meaning that yesterday, this was a nation where white people were the majority, and tomorrow it will be one where they are not.

Although Pitts is correct that the division today is more rural vs. urban than strictly South vs. North, it is the case that the old (and new) Confederacy—and in particular rural white southerners—remain the anchor for an ill-founded and ill-intended attempt to restore the past (in the name of “Making America Great Again”). As I pointed out in the 2017 talk The Trump/Pence Regime Must Go!:

There is a direct line from the Confederacy to the fascists of today, and a direct connection between their white supremacy, their open disgust and hatred for LGBT people as well as women, their willful rejection of science and the scientific method, their raw “America First” jingoism and trumpeting of “the superiority of western civilization” and their bellicose wielding of military power, including their expressed willingness and blatant threats to use nuclear weapons, to destroy countries.

At the same time, the divide, and the clash, between the past and the future goes deeper than demographic changes and the prospect of a majority non-white U.S. population. The forces fighting for the past are aiming to reverse, with a vengeance, even the modest concessions that have been made to the fight against social injustice and institutionalized inequality and oppression, and to enforce a form of capitalist dictatorship that is overt and unrestrained by the Constitution and the rule of law (or which turns the Constitution and the rule of law into merely instruments of fascist tyranny and atrocity).

As I put it in my August 1 Statement, fascism is “open and aggressive dictatorship, trampling on and perverting the rule of law, relying on violence and terror, on behalf of the predatory capitalist system and as an extreme attempt to deal with profound social division and acute crises (both within the country and in the global arena).” While this might hold things together, in an extremely negative way, for a certain period, in the final analysis this cannot succeed—cannot indefinitely preserve this system of capitalism-imperialism, and cannot lead to any future but one of horrors for humanity, if indeed we have a future at all. And the supposed “alternative,” as represented for example by the Democratic Party in the U.S., involving a “more democratic” means of exercising the rule of this system, will also continue to embody and enforce terrible and completely unnecessary suffering for the masses of humanity and pose an existential threat to humanity as a whole, even if not always through the same brute and unmitigated juggernaut of horrors as the fascist form of capitalist dictatorship.

What was expressed through this recent election—what, in fact, is expressed through all elections under this system—is not “democracy” and “the will of the people” in some abstract sense but specifically a choice that is made between different representatives of this system of capitalism-imperialism, which is the only “realistic” choice that is, or can be, offered under this system. In this particular, extraordinary situation, that choice—between fascist and bourgeois democratic capitalist rule—actually made a real difference, to the point where it was right to support one side, the Democrats, in order to deliver a defeat to the attempt to more fully consolidate fascism. But that does not change the fact that this was a vote on the terms of the very system that has produced this fascism and will continue to provide fertile soil for this fascism at the same time as it continues to generate horror after horror for humanity—horrors that are hidden only from those who do not, or will not, look. The “liberal” (or “mainstream”) version of this system’s rule involves the enforcement of the exploitation and oppression of masses of people in this country and throughout the world (including the more than 150 million children in the Third World who are cruelly super-exploited in sweatshops and mines). Enforcing all this, and defeating attempts by rivals to gain a larger share of this plunder and to replace the USA as the world’s dominant power—that is what “liberal” (and other) representatives of this system mean when they speak of the “national interests” of this country. And this is the foundation for the “progressive” approach of allowing for some more “diversity” and “inclusiveness” for previously excluded sections of this society, and the promotion of certain aspects of science, on the basis of and especially for the purposes of this international plunder, of people as well as the environment.

5To emphasize this crucial point once again: It is necessary to confront the fundamental reality that there is no future worth living for the masses of people and ultimately for humanity as a whole under this system—which has given rise to a powerful fascism; which is the source of horrendous, and unnecessary suffering, not only for masses of people in this country but for billions of people throughout the world; and which poses a growing threat to the very existence of humanity, through its massive stockpiles of nuclear weapons as well as its accelerating destruction of the environment. It is true—an important truth—that the Trump/Pence regime (and others like it, for example the rule of Bolsonaro in Brazil) has made the environmental crisis far worse—has, so to speak, accelerated the acceleration of environmental destruction. But the dynamics and requirements of this system are driving the climate crisis toward the point of no return, regardless of which particular person or regime is acting as its dominant political representative. Capitalism is often extolled for being a “dynamic” system, constantly bringing about changes. But this is a “dynamism” based on exploitation for privately-accumulated profit, and driven by anarchy (and anarchic competition between capitalists), and that very anarchy is rapidly propelling things toward an existential threshold—past which humanity could well be irreversibly hurtled—if this system of capitalism, in its imperialist globalized expression, continues to dominate the world.

Given how much the fascist social base in this country has been conditioned to falsely and ridiculously identify the Democrats (even “centrist” Democrats like Biden) as “radical socialists” (or even “communists”) and to viscerally hate them on that basis—largely because of the Democrats’ limited concessions to the struggle against racial and gender oppression, to the need to address the climate crisis, and to a reckoning with the real history of this country—it is highly ironic that it is only a powerful movement aiming for actual socialism, as a radically new and emancipating society and the transition to the fundamental goal of communism on a global scale, that could create the basis for significant numbers of those, and in particular youth, who have been caught up in this fascism to break with that and become part of the struggle aiming for a positive resolution of the contradictions that this system of capitalism-imperialism continually intensifies. (As any rational person can readily determine, the relatively small number of “democratic socialists” who are part of the Democratic Party are in no way “radical socialists”—or really socialists at all—but are social-democrats who are aiming not for the abolition of the capitalist system and its replacement by a socialist system, but for reforms within the capitalist system which would not change, or significantly affect, its basic nature and functioning.)

The fact is that there is no bringing back (or newly bringing into being) an idealized way of life that supposedly existed in the late 19th century and the first part of the 20th century in this country, no return to an imagined idyllic America, characterized by “traditional values” which somehow fairly rewarded “virtues” such as hard work, and where people occupied the place in society they deserved (or were intended by god to occupy)—something which has really existed only in the minds of those who seek an illusory “restoration” of this, and who have been conditioned to irrationally hate everyone and everything that has supposedly destroyed it. And there is no bringing back the situation that existed for several decades after World War 2 where large numbers of people (especially, though not only, white men) without a college education could have jobs in major industries like auto and steel at a wage that made possible a “middle class standard of living.” That there is no basis for this is true not because of conspiracies by “satanic liberals who drink the blood of trafficked children” but, once again, because of the workings of this system of capitalism-imperialism, which have led this world to be shaped as it is, and to be heading for the environmental disaster it is rapidly bringing into being, if it does not first extinguish humanity through nuclear war unleashed by the powerful possessors of massive nuclear arsenals.

And no one should want to go back to the actual past: to a world marked by massive poverty and disease, even beyond the terrible toll this takes today, especially in the Third World; with the horrendous destruction and suffering brought about through two world wars in the 20th century, in which tens of millions of people were slaughtered, and atomic bomb attacks were unleashed by the U.S. on two Japanese cities at the end of the second world war, immediately incinerating hundreds of thousands of Japanese people and ushering in the “nuclear age”; with the USA marked by open, institutionalized segregation, discrimination and “second class” status for people of color and women, and a brutally suppressed existence for LGBT people, and Black people in particular subjected to continual terror, marked by repeated lynchings and other depraved acts accompanying them. The future lies not with the (real or imagined) past but in going forward, to an actual socialist society, and ultimately a communist world, where the fundamental orientation and practical policy are geared to meeting the material, intellectual and cultural needs of the people, while giving increasing scope to individual initiative, on the basis of and within the framework of the collective and cooperative foundation and ethos of society, where age-old economic and social relations of exploitation, inequality and oppression are surpassed, and no longer does the well-being of some rest on the misery of others.

It should be clear that the present polarization and the profound problems that must be faced cannot be solved by trying to “adjust” things within the confines of this system. The example of the “Occupy” movement of the last decade is another illustration of this. This attempt to in effect repolarize the 99 percent against the 1 percent of super-rich failed, in significant part because social relations (such as the oppressive relations between different “races” and genders), and not just economic relations, are powerful material forces, and a good part of that “99 percent” is determined to maintain those unequal and oppressive social relations from which they benefit (or strongly believe they benefit), especially in this capitalist society which sets people against each other in often ruthless competition.

It is only on the foundation of a radically different economic system—a socialist economic system (mode of production), where society’s productive resources are collectivized, marshaled and utilized, in a planned way, to meet the material, intellectual and cultural needs of the people, on a continually expanding basis—that there can be a favorable basis for uprooting and transforming social relations that embody oppression, and the ways of thinking that go along with and reinforce that oppression, moving beyond the situation where (as Lenin so aptly put it) people are not merely encouraged but are compelled to calculate, with the stinginess of a miser, what their position is in relation to others.

6All this strongly points, once again, to the need not simply to “face reality” but to consistently apply the principle that science matters and truth matters, and therefore to seriously engage the scientific analysis (which I have outlined here) of the problem facing humanity, and the solution: where the world is heading now, under the domination of this system, and the radically different direction it needs to, and can, take. It calls for a willingness to apply this same approach—that science and scientifically-determined truth matter—to communism and the historical experience of the communist movement, and in particular to the new communism which has resulted from decades of work I have carried out. This new communism is a continuation of, but also represents a qualitative leap beyond, and in some important ways a break with, communist theory as it had been previously developed. Unlike those who slander and condemn, or simply ignore, communism and the historical experience of the communist movement, I myself have done, and have led others in doing, extensive, serious scientific, study—investigation and analysis—of the history of the communist movement and the socialist societies it has brought into being (as well as countries that have called themselves “socialist” but in fact are not, such as Cuba since 1959, Venezuela in recent decades, and the Soviet Union and countries of Eastern Europe, where capitalism was restored and has reigned for more than 60 years, well before they became openly capitalist countries a few decades ago). This scientific approach has led to the conclusion that with the actual socialist societies that have been brought into being, with the leadership of communists, first in the Soviet Union and then in China (before capitalism was restored in the former in the 1950s and in the latter after the death of Mao in 1976), this experience of socialism has been mainly—and in the case of China overwhelmingly—positive, while secondarily there have also been significant, in some cases serious or even grievous, errors.

Drawing from this historical experience of the communist movement and a broad range of human endeavor, the new communism, as its defining method and approach, emphasizes the critical importance of science and applying the scientific method to everything—to society as well as nature. It firmly rejects any approaches that amount to applying and justifying the bankrupt and extremely harmful notion that “the ends justify the means,” and that “truth” is just an “instrument” of desired objectives, rather than what it actually is: a correct reflection of objective reality.

It is this same method and approach that has been applied to continually deepen the understanding of the nature and functioning of the system of capitalism-imperialism that continues at this point to dominate the world, with terrible consequences and implications for humanity and its future. And this work is continuing as an important part of developing the revolutionary movement that is needed in order to finally abolish this system and bring a radically different and much better world into being. While much remains to be done and many challenges remain to be met, a scientific analysis and synthesis of fundamental questions relating to the situation facing humanity and the possibility of human emancipation can be found—in both more concentrated and popular forms and in works of considerable depth—in talks and writings of mine and other materials that are available at revcom.us. And a sweeping vision and concrete blueprint for a radically different and emancipating society, on the road to the final goal of a communist world, is set forth in the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America, which I have authored.

It is a fact that, nowhere else, in any actual or proposed founding or guiding document of any government, is there anything like not only the protection but the provision for dissent and intellectual and cultural ferment that is embodied in this Constitution, while this has, as its solid core, a grounding in the socialist transformation of the economy, with the goal of abolishing all exploitation, and the corresponding transformation of the social relations and political institutions, to uproot all oppression, and the promotion, through the educational system and in society as a whole, of an approach that will “enable people to pursue the truth wherever it leads, with a spirit of critical thinking and scientific curiosity, and in this way to continually learn about the world and be better able to contribute to changing it in accordance with the fundamental interests of humanity.” All this will unchain and unleash a tremendous productive and social force of human beings enabled and inspired to work and struggle together to meet the fundamental needs of the people—transforming society in a fundamental way and supporting and aiding revolutionary struggle throughout the world—aiming for the final goal of a communist world, free from all exploitation and oppression, while at the same time addressing the truly existential environmental and ecological crisis, in a meaningful and comprehensive way, which is impossible under the system of capitalism-imperialism.

Far too many have rejected this—or, more often, failed or refused to even seriously engage it—because of ignorance and prejudice which have their ultimate source in the distortion relentlessly propagated by guardians of the present order, and which serve to reinforce this highly oppressive order. Here, it has to be said (and can be readily demonstrated) that the “liberal” bourgeois attack on communism is, in its own way, as ludicrous and outrageous—crudely in violation of the scientific method and blatantly in opposition to the actual facts—as the fascist mangling of truth which the “liberals” are forever decrying. This does great harm to humanity: Refusing to apply, and acting in opposition to, an honest, scientific approach to communism, the actual history of the communist movement, and the development of the new communism contributes to closing off the only real alternative to this truly monstrous system of capitalism-imperialism—the only viable alternative that represents the fundamental interests and a future worth living for the masses of humanity and ultimately humanity as a whole.

The road to a better world is not, and will not be, an easy one—this cannot be accomplished without determined struggle and, yes, great sacrifice. But continuing on the current course, under the domination of this system of capitalism-imperialism, means a continuation of the horrors already being perpetrated in the world today, the far worse horrors that are immediately threatening, and the very real existential danger that is increasingly looming.

In the face of the fascist juggernaut that is still threatening and gaining strength, large numbers of us who are deeply sickened and outraged by this, and who aspire to something much better, have raised and rallied to the call that science and truth matter and must be our guide. Let us now be brave enough, and bold enough, to apply this in an unhindered way, determined to seek the truth and follow the truth wherever it leads, overcoming all obstacles to this, including any cherished illusions and ingrained prejudices that run counter to reality and scientifically-established truth. Let us dare to act to make a reality of what science reveals as possible: a radically different and far better world and future for humanity.

 

Download PDF of this statement (English):    Booklet    |    8.5x11 sheets


In Spanish:

Download PDF in Farsi:

(This translation reposted from the website cpimlm.org)

 

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/avakian/science/31ba-science...internationalism-en.html

The Science...Actual Revolution title image

Excerpt from the sections:
Internationalism and an International Dimension

and

Internationalism—Revolutionary Defeatism

Download PDF of entire work

Editors' note: The following is an excerpt from the new work by Bob Avakian, The New Communism. In addition to excerpts already posted on revcom.us, we will be running further excerpts from time to time on both revcom.us and in Revolution newspaper. These excerpts should serve as encouragement and inspiration for people to get into the work as a whole, which is available as a book from Insight Press. A prepublication copy is available on line at revcom.us.

This excerpt comes from the section titled "III. The Strategic Approach to An Actual Revolution."

From the section:
Internationalism and an International Dimension

In addition to what has been said about how, when it comes down to the struggle for the seizure of power, there will be aspects of a civil war between two sections of the people—and in addition to what has been emphasized about the need to deal with the problem of encirclement, suppression and pulverization—another dimension of this that has to be taken into consideration is that this will not only be a struggle that must be internationalist in its basic orientation, but it is also likely to have a significant aspect of being international. The point has been made that the borders of this country are anything but sacred to us. If you look at the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic, specifically in regard to what is now the Southwest of the U.S., you can see that it is taking account of the close interconnection—historically, in the present time, and looking to the future—between what goes on in (what is now) the U.S., and what goes on to the south. And, given that, when it comes down to it, there would almost certainly be, in significant measure, the interconnection and interpenetration of revolutionary struggle in (what is now) the U.S. and revolutionary struggle to the south, strategic thinking and work needs to be carried out, in terms of the international dimension of this.

 

From the section:
Internationalism—Revolutionary Defeatism

What do I mean by revolutionary defeatism, and why is it so important? Revolutionary defeatism means that you oppose the actions of your own government and ruling class in carrying out their wars, which are wars for empire. It means that you welcome any setbacks they suffer in those wars, because that weakens their oppressive hold over masses of people, here and in the world more generally. Now, we do have to recognize that we have a different situation than back in the day with the war in Vietnam. In those days, the National Liberation Front (NLF) in Vietnam was a revolutionary organization of the people in South Vietnam who were waging the fight, along with the government and people in North Vietnam, against the U.S. imperialists. And the leader of that struggle, until he died in the late 1960s, was Ho Chi Minh, who called himself a communist but was actually more of a revolutionary nationalist. Beginning soon after the end of World War 2, Ho Chi Minh led the armed struggle of the Vietnamese people to drive out the French, who had colonized Vietnam, and then to drive out the Americans, who, beginning in the 1950s, attempted to replace the French as the colonial master of Vietnam. Now, back in those days we used to go to demonstrations and people would march through the streets chanting, “Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Minh, NLF is gonna win.” It felt very good, and it was right to do it. It was right to be on the side of the Vietnamese people and Ho Chi Minh leading them. It wasn’t just that you wanted your government to lose the unjust war it was waging, you could actually be on the side of the people fighting against your government, because those people represented a righteous cause, they represented a real struggle against imperialism. They weren’t going around attacking civilians. They were fighting against the military of U.S. imperialism that had invaded their country and was bombing it massively. So, in those days, you could actually be with the people fighting against the U.S. government, the U.S. imperialists.

Today, unfortunately, the situation is different and not as favorable in the short run. Nobody coming from a decent place should want to root for these reactionary Islamic jihadists who are in fact also enforcers of brutally oppressive relations—particularly, but not only, horrific patriarchal relations—and who, in the service of that, carry out all kinds of depraved slaughter of ordinary civilians. So you cannot, if you’re coming from the right place, identify in any way with these forces and support them. Now, there are some people around the world who call themselves leftists or even communists or Maoists, people like this guy Ajith, who try to put a pretty face on these Islamic fundamentalist jihadists and insist that they are anti-imperialists, that they’re waging an anti-imperialist struggle. But the fact is that, while they may fight against the U.S., they do not represent a positive, progressive, let alone a revolutionary force; and where they have succeeded in exercising power, their rule is brutally oppressive. That has been shown repeatedly in the real world. In your mind, you can try to make these people into something other than what they are, but that can only do a great deal of harm, because in the real world they are not a positive force, even while, coming from where they’re coming from, they’re opposing U.S. imperialism, to some degree, although not in any thoroughgoing way and not toward any positive end.

This makes for a difficult situation because, especially given how parasitic U.S. society is—where significant sections of the people, particularly among the middle strata, receive some share of the spoils from imperialist domination and plunder in the world—when the U.S. government is able to point to the continuing atrocities carried out by these Islamic fundamentalists, this reinforces the tendency for people to side with, or at least not to seriously oppose, their own country and government in the wars it is waging against these Islamic fundamentalists. It makes it easier for people to go along with what is, and take the position: “I don’t really like these wars, but look at these other people; we have to do something about groups like ISIS.” Never mind the fact that Saudi Arabia, a big ally of the U.S., beheads a lot more people than ISIS does, and embodies and enforces all kinds of horrendous oppression, against women and others. But still, people can say, “Well, look at these people, like ISIS.” This makes it easier for people not to do the hard thing of going up against their own government in the wars it is waging.

Yes, it is true: the Islamic fundamentalists who are opposing these imperialists are no good, they don’t pose a positive alternative. But that does not make the wars of empire being fought by this government just wars. This situation has gone on way too long and needs to be frontally and deeply challenged. These are wars for empire. These are unjust wars. They are carried out with massive means of destruction, killing civilians in the hundreds of thousands, torturing people in the service of these wars. This should be opposed and opposed strongly. It is not acceptable that people just take the stand, “Yes, I wish those wars would be over with, but we gotta do something about these Islamic fundamentalists.” It is crucial that people come to see what the nature of these wars being waged by their government actually is, and why these wars have to be actively opposed; and even if you can’t, and shouldn’t, support the other side, you still have to have the basic approach of welcoming the defeat of your own government in the wars it is waging. The defeat of these imperialists should be welcomed because, number one, their wars are unjust, even if the people opposing them are also unjust. And, two, every such defeat weakens this system and its ruling class and brings closer the time when people can actually bring it down and bring something liberating into being in its place.

 

Contents

Publisher's Note

Introduction and Orientation

Foolish Victims of Deceit, and Self-Deceit

Part I. Method and Approach, Communism as a Science

Materialism vs. Idealism
Dialectical Materialism
Through Which Mode of Production
The Basic Contradictions and Dynamics of Capitalism
The New Synthesis of Communism
The Basis for Revolution
Epistemology and Morality, Objective Truth and Relativist Nonsense
Self and a “Consumerist” Approach to Ideas
What Is Your Life Going to Be About?—Raising People’s Sights

Part II. Socialism and the Advance to Communism:
            A Radically Different Way the World Could Be, A Road to Real Emancipation

The “4 Alls”
Beyond the Narrow Horizon of Bourgeois Right
Socialism as an Economic System and a Political System—And a Transition to Communism
Internationalism
Abundance, Revolution, and the Advance to Communism—A Dialectical Materialist Understanding
The Importance of the “Parachute Point”—Even Now, and Even More With An Actual Revolution
The Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America
   Solid Core with a Lot of Elasticity on the Basis of the Solid Core
Emancipators of Humanity

Part III. The Strategic Approach to An Actual Revolution

One Overall Strategic Approach
Hastening While Awaiting
Forces For Revolution
Separation of the Communist Movement from the Labor Movement, Driving Forces for Revolution
National Liberation and Proletarian Revolution
The Strategic Importance of the Struggle for the Emancipation of Women
The United Front under the Leadership of the Proletariat
Youth, Students and the Intelligentsia
Struggling Against Petit Bourgeois Modes of Thinking, While Maintaining the Correct Strategic Orientation
The “Two Maximizings”
The “5 Stops”
The Two Mainstays
Returning to "On the Possibility of Revolution"
Internationalism—Revolutionary Defeatism
Internationalism and an International Dimension
Internationalism—Bringing Forward Another Way
Popularizing the Strategy
Fundamental Orientation

Part IV. The Leadership We Need

The Decisive Role of Leadership
A Leading Core of Intellectuals—and the Contradictions Bound Up with This
Another Kind of “Pyramid”
The Cultural Revolution Within the RCP
The Need for Communists to Be Communists
A Fundamentally Antagonistic Relation—and the Crucial Implications of That
Strengthening the Party—Qualitatively as well as Quantitatively
Forms of Revolutionary Organization, and the “Ohio”
Statesmen, and Strategic Commanders
Methods of Leadership, the Science and the “Art” of Leadership
Working Back from “On the Possibility”—
   Another Application of “Solid Core with a Lot of Elasticity on the Basis of the Solid Core”

Appendix 1:
The New Synthesis of Communism:
Fundamental Orientation, Method and Approach,
and Core Elements—An Outline
by Bob Avakian

Appendix 2:
Framework and Guidelines for Study and Discussion

Notes

Selected List of Works Cited

About the Author

 

 


 

Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/426/from-vietnam-war-vet-us-troops-are-not-heroes-but-murderers-and-baby-killers-en.html

From a Vietnam War Vet:

We Were Baby Killers for U.S. Imperialism

Originally posted February 15, 2016 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

 

Over fifty years ago, in January 1967, the U.S. troops occupying Vietnam began a major military offensive against Vietnamese forces fighting to liberate their country. The heroic struggle of the Vietnamese people, combined with upsurge of opposition within the U.S., would lead to the defeat of the U.S. imperialists in Vietnam. The war in Vietnam is part of a whole bloody history of U.S. wars, invasions, and aggression against countries and people fighting for their liberation. There’s a responsibility for people in the U.S. to understand that “America was NEVER great” and oppose all the crimes carried out by the U.S. imperialists around the world.

We are reposting this piece from a Vietnam War vet, who was not yet in Vietnam in 1967 but has important things to say about the massacres and other horrors that the U.S. committed during the war against the Vietnamese people.

 

I am writing to revcom.us/Revolution because this is the one place that consistently stands with the people of the world against all forms of oppression and for a radically different and far better world. The reason for this letter is the current wave of patriotism, using America’s soldiers and veterans to justify every conceivable crime and atrocity being carried out by the “troops,” i.e., the U.S. military.

I speak from a whole lot of experience—from both sides of the political battles—supporting and defending U.S. wars and then serving in Vietnam, where I began to learn the truth about America’s bloody, genocidal history.

Right now there is a major campaign to raise millions of dollars in the Wounded Warrior Campaign, for medical care for the wounded veterans of America’s current wars around the globe. Now, let’s set something straight first—they are not heroes but murderers and baby killers. Nowhere in American mainstream media and culture do you find the people we are killing, torturing, droning, raping—the people of the world do not matter in the path of America’s march across the earth. There is no honor in being a soldier in the U.S. military that has invaded every corner of the world and nearly every country on the planet. There is no pride in torturing people across the globe, invading people’s homes and beating up the occupants in the name of the “War on Terror.” The U.S. is actually carrying out a “War OF Terror” against the people of the world. In fact, it can be said with historical certainty that the wholesale slaughter of tens of millions of people is “The American Way” and that, except for the Civil War, there has never been anything honorable about serving in the U.S. military. As I tell youth when I go into high schools as part of the We Are Not Your Soldiers Campaign, you are going to be part of a military that is about killing the people of the world for profit and empire!

You can be sure that whenever there is a stepped-up campaign of patriotism and flag waving, there are also stepped-up military actions that need to be supported by the unthinking and the privileged, while the rest of us are supposed to shrink back, and not speak the truth, as atrocities are carried out in our names. Right now all over Africa and the Middle East there are and have been hundreds of secret military operations, assassinations, kidnappings, and murders galore by special operations teams, while the myth is promoted that “there are no ground forces” in those places. These are American “death squads,” all with the story that this is what is needed to protect “us from the terrorists” when the truth is that the United States is the biggest terrorist on the planet.

Villagers massacred by U.S. Army troops at My Lai in Vietnam, March 16, 1968.Villagers massacred by U.S. Army troops at My Lai in Vietnam, March 16, 1968.

GIs refuse to go out on patrol, AK Valley, Vietnam, September 1969
GIs refuse to return to combat, AK Valley, Vietnam, September 1969.

What I am saying here is not my opinion, but history and, yes, science. Because this is not a case of human nature, or bad people, or even the nature of being in the military. No, I learned, through bitter lessons in Vietnam and back here in the American empire, that we live in a capitalist-imperialist system that will go to any length, commit every crime imaginable, to defend and spread this empire of profit and exploitation across the globe. From the banana fields in Guatemala, to the sweatshops in Bangladesh, to the oil of the Middle East, the U.S. has over 700 military bases ringing the globe to defend what the monsters who run this empire call “our interests.” To do that, the military and the powers that be need the bodies and minds of young people, mainly men and some women, to carry out the crimes. So, how do they do this?

They do this in many different ways, and especially through the racism, lies, manipulation, and fear that are a normal part of American culture and education. This is reinforced by a brutal and cruel brainwashing of the young soldiers called “basic training” to instill in them blind obedience to orders, concern only for American lives, and a “shoot first and kill all” mentality in these young brains. Then, when these soldiers return home, they are used again, and especially the wounded ones, these killers for empire, as sympathy and pity for them is drummed up to justify continued murder and torture. The message that is driven home is that the only lives that matter are American lives.

Now I know that some people will say that these soldiers are victims too of this imperialist system. My answer is that these soldiers and vets have a choice: they can cross over to the side of the people of the world and tell the truth about what they saw and did or forever face the world’s condemnation as the baby killers and murderers they are.

It is true that today’s generation born after 9/11 have no real memory of the turmoil of the 1960s and how tens of millions came to oppose the war in Vietnam and the American empire in many different ways, including massive opposition to the war right in the U.S. military. For this same generation, what happened in Vietnam 50 years ago is as ancient history to them as was my growing up listening to WW2 veterans tell their stories. After the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center (the murder of 3,000 innocent people by a group of terrorists in the name of Islamic fundamentalism), the United States used them to carry out and justify the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, thousands of drone killings in many countries in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East, and torture and murder by the military and the CIA at prisons and “black sites.” This is the reality of the world we live in today and lessons from the past must really serve helping to end all this madness. No more stupid and meaningless “war stories.”

The process of how I came to end up in Vietnam is instructive because today’s young soldiers and vets can see similarities to how they have been manipulated and lied to. Back then, in my schooling, the only ideas I learned about America’s wars were the necessity and the wonder and glory of fighting them. On television I learned to cheer for the cowboys as they killed multitudes of Native Americans, while the war movies portrayed Americans as right and justified in defending our way of life. Watch the movie Purple Heart and the racist portrayal of the Japanese. In the 8th grade I won an American Legion Americanism award for an essay I wrote about patriotism. In high school my history teachers, Mr. Gavigan and Mr. Murphy, had the maps that showed communism as evil and taking over all of Asia, especially Vietnam. I even worked for Barry Goldwater after high school when he ran for president in 1964. I was at the first antiwar demonstration in New York City in spring 1966—to stand on the side in support of the war. I joined Young Americans for Freedom, a right-wing campus group.

So while most of the youth in this country are trained in blind patriotism and kept ignorant of history and the nature of the system we live in, I was political at an early age, and I thought I knew American history and why the country was worth defending. I joined the U.S. Air Force and ended up guarding nuclear weapons in the U.S. at small bases on the East Coast. But, I told myself that I could not be alive at this time and not follow my generation’s calling and go to Vietnam. I arrived there just in time for the Tet Offensive of 1968—a military operation by the Vietnamese revolutionaries against all the major U.S. bases in Vietnam. After four of my fellow soldiers and friends died in that attack, my whole world view fell apart because I began to realize that nothing I had been taught or believed about the nature of U.S. reasons for being in Vietnam were true. I knew nothing about the Vietnamese people, culture, and history. We called the people all sorts of racist terms and nowhere did they count as human beings. I spent my next 11 months coming to oppose the war, to see the humanity of the Vietnamese people and beginning to oppose this lie that Americans are the best people in the world. I owe a tremendous debt of gratitude to Davis and Johnson, two of the many Black guys in my unit who refused to salute the American flag (when a movie was shown on our base), and argued with me about the war, Black history, and that they were talking about coming back home to America to make revolution.

Protest against the Vietnam War, Washington, D.C., April 24, 1971. Photo: Leena Krohn via Wikimedia Commons
Vietnam veterans marching against the war, Washington, D.C., April 24, 1971. Photo: Leena Krohn via Wikimedia Commons

After Vietnam, I joined the Vietnam Veterans Against the War and became one of its national leaders. And it was here, along with other veterans and the growing soldiers’ movement in the U.S. military worldwide, that we all learned to not just oppose the war but actively resist it. This is where I learned the truth of U.S. history, and not just Vietnam but what America has always been about. I learned about the Sullivan Expedition in the summer of 1779—where Gen. George Washington (yes, that one—the slaveholder) orders a genocidal attack on more than 40 Iroquois villages—destroying the people, buildings, and crops. This became a standard practice of the U.S. military in the following 300 years of wars against the Native peoples of the western U.S., in the Spanish-American war in the Philippine Islands in 1898, to the use of insects and chemical and biological agents in the Korean war in 1950 to 1953, to the American invasion of Vietnam and all its horrors. Research many of these crimes on revcom.us, and you can also find on the Internet several lists that document the hundreds of military invasions, occupations, “small-unit actions,” aerial and offshore bombings, almost 300 years of U.S. military actions around the world.

The veterans and soldiers I was meeting and organizing were studying U.S. history, about the history of slavery, the lynchings and oppression of Black people, talking about how this was an imperialist way of life—killing people for profit and empire. And I met many who were openly talking about why revolution seemed to be necessary to stop all this horror that we were inflicting on the people of the world. We marched for 70 miles through small towns in New Jersey in a simulated search-and-destroy mission to graphically portray “to the heartland” that what we were doing in Vietnam was massacring and torturing the people. Then, we took 125 combat vets to Detroit in 1971 to the Winter Soldier Investigation where vets testified for three days about mass rape of Vietnamese women, mass murder, destruction of villages and crops, napalm, chemical poisoning of the land and people, and yes—the deliberate murder of kids by the soldiers. While there are many powerful and important examples of resistance and opposition by soldiers and veterans to imperialist wars, this was the first time in history that they were self-organized with two goals: to tell the truth about what they had seen and done, and then to call on the American people to stop the crimes.

Throwing medals back onto the Capitol steps, Dewey Canyon III, 1971.
"For a full week in the spring of 1971, we camped out on the National Mall in front of the U.S. Congress and we named it Dewey Canyon III—'an invasion into the country of Congress.'” Above, throwing medals back onto the Capitol steps as part of the Dewey Canyon III protests.

Before Winter Soldier, I thought I understood the scope of what we had done in Vietnam, but after three days of hearings I was devastated by how deep was the betrayal of our youth, our ambitions, and our minds, that we were really nothing more than killers and cannon fodder for empire. After Winter Soldier, we knew we had to do something that would put Vietnam Veterans on the front page of the newspapers, something dramatic that would send a message around the world, that while we were the baby killers, we were beginning to understand who and what was really responsible. For a full week in the spring of 1971, we camped out on the National Mall in front of the U.S. Congress and we named it Dewey Canyon III—“an invasion into the country of Congress.” After a whole week of demonstrating everywhere, doing guerrilla theater portrayals of how we treated and murdered the Vietnamese people, on the last day 800 to 1,000 vets lined up outside the Capitol to walk up the Capitol steps and throw their medals back at the U.S. Congress and the rulers of America. Some of the comments from the vets as they threw their medals over a fence marked “trash” were: a Black vet who said, “This is my opposition for the policies of this country against the non-white peoples of the world”; “My name is Peter, I got a purple heart here and I hope I get another one fighting these motherfuckers”; “We don’t want to fight again, but if we have to it’ll be to take these steps.”

Then, in the summer of 1971, I was selected by VVAW to represent the organization on a peace delegation to Hanoi—the capital of North Vietnam—“the enemy.” As the first Vietnam veteran to go to North Vietnam on a peace mission, with two other activists from Women Strike for Peace and the War Resisters League, I did not think twice about going. We spent eight days in Hanoi, traveling to Haiphong Harbor and witnessing the lives of a people whose whole history and culture is embedded with the ethos of resisting foreign invaders. This is when I completely went “over to the other side” and became an advocate for the victory of the Vietnamese against the U.S.

I say that today because while there is not an equivalent nation or group that can be supported right now against the crimes the U.S. is carrying out, everyone, and especially the soldiers and veterans of these wars, can and must speak out for the people of the world and against U.S. crimes. This means NOT supporting the troops, because the troops are murdering people. I really hate the slogan “Support the Troops, Not the War” because it makes what these wars are about is American lives, and the humanity of the people we are killing is secondary or nonexistent.

Finally, for those who can only see the power of the empire to manipulate and control the population into either being blind flag wavers or docile opposition, I want to say how important it is to tell the truth, to call on others to do so and to fight for the interest of all humanity. After all, I was witness to something that many people today cannot imagine: I saw a large segment of the former baby killers and murderers of my time turn against the empire on the side of humanity.

 

 

 


 

Permalink: https://revcom.us/avakian/science/there-is-an-urgent-need-en.html

There is an urgent need...

revcom.us

 

The new synthesis of communism brought forward by Bob Avakian represents a qualitative advance in the scientific approach to making revolution and emancipating humanity

There is an urgent need for this new synthesis to be taken up, broadly, in this society and in the world as a whole: everywhere people are questioning why things are the way they are, and whether a different world is possible; everywhere people are talking about “revolution” but have no real understanding of what revolution means, no scientific approach to analyzing and dealing with what they are up against and what needs to be done; everywhere people are rising up in rebellion but are hemmed in, let down and left to the mercy of murderous oppressors, or misled onto paths which only reinforce, often with barbaric brutality, the enslaving chains of tradition; everywhere people need a way out of their desperate conditions, but do not see the source of their suffering and the path forward out of the darkness.

— Bob Avakian
THE NEW COMMUNISM
The science, the strategy, the leadership
for an actual revolution,
and a radically new society
on the road to real emancipation

 

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The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

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So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/698/bob-avakian-breakthroughs-ebook-now-available-en.html

| revcom.us

 

EBOOK NOW AVAILABLE!

From the book:
A Brief Explanatory Preface

In what follows, many of the concepts that will be gone into are of necessity dealing with things on a high level of theoretical abstraction. I have done my best to make this accessible to people who do not yet have even a basic familiarity with these concepts, in order to provide them with a “way into” what is alluded to in the main part of the title, while for those already familiar with and partisan to this, the aim is to deepen the grasp of this and the ability to work with and wield this in contributing to the revolution, and the ultimate goal of communism, which this theory points to as possible, necessary, and urgently required for a profound leap in human emancipation. This is, in one important dimension, an elaboration on The New Synthesis of Communism: Fundamental Orientation, Method and Approach, and Core Elements—An Outline.1 At the same time, as indicated in the title, it is a “basic summary,” because, even as a comprehensive exposition of much of what is addressed here is contained in the book THE NEW COMMUNISM 2—and important elements of this are included in the selections in BAsics,3 which can, in important ways, serve as a handbook for revolution—there is also a need for a distilled discussion of the theory, strategic orientation and objectives of the communist movement as this was developed from the time of Marx and with its further development and synthesis with the new communism. It is also a “basic summary,” rather than an attempt at a complete and final summary, because the development of the new communism is a work in progress, an important part of which is continuing to learn from and further synthesize what has come before, in the first great wave of communist revolution, beginning with the historic breakthrough by Marx.


1. Bob Avakian, The New Synthesis of Communism: Fundamental Orientation, Method and Approach, and Core Elements—An Outline, Summer 2015. Available at revcom.us and thebobavakianinstitute.org. [back]

2. Bob Avakian, THE NEW COMMUNISM: The science, the strategy, the leadership for an actual revolution, and a radically new society on the road to real emancipation (Insight Press, 2016). Also available as an eBook. Also available at revcom.us and thebobavakianinstitute.org. [back]

3. Bob Avakian, BAsics, from the talks and writings of Bob Avakian (RCP Publications, 2011). Available as a free eBook at revcom.us. [back]

 

 

Follow: @TheRevcoms
Read: www.revcom.us
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Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/701/bob-avakian-commodities-and-capitalism-a-basic-explanation-en.html

COMMODITIES & CAPITALISM—AND THE TERRIBLE CONSEQUENCES OF THIS SYSTEM
A Basic Explanation

by Bob Avakian

| revcom.us

 

In a number of works, including Breakthroughs1 and The New Communism,2 I have examined the basic contradictions of the capitalist economy (mode of production) and the terrible consequences of the fact that the system of capitalism-imperialism continues to dominate the world. Here I want to offer a more brief, basic explanation of the contradictions inherent in (built into) this mode of production and how this leads to these terrible consequences.

Capitalism is the system where commodity production and exchange is generalized. A commodity is anything that is produced to be exchanged (sold). This is different than when someone produces something for their own use (and doesn’t exchange it with someone else). Understood in this way, a commodity can be either a good (such as clothes) or a service (such as health care). Under capitalism, goods and services are commodities.

Commodities have a basic contradiction built into them: the contradiction between use value and exchange value. Use value relates to the fact that, in order for a commodity to be exchanged for something else (sold), there must be someone (or numbers of people) who find this particular commodity useful (something they need or desire). Exchange value refers to the fact that the value of anything, as a commodity to be exchanged, is equal to the amount of socially necessary labor time that is required for the production of that thing. In illustrating this, I have used the example of a candy bar and an airplane. The reason that an airplane is much more valuable—contains much more exchange value—than a candy bar is fundamentally because the amount of socially necessary labor time that goes into producing an airplane is much greater than that required to produce a candy bar.3

In discussing this kind of thing, I have also used the example of chocolate chip cookies.4 If you make chocolate chip cookies with the idea of selling them, but no one finds them useful—people prefer other cookies or, for some reason, nobody wants cookies—then you will not be able to exchange (sell) them. In that situation, the exchange value of these cookies (what they can bring in return—money or some other commodity) cannot be realized, and the money you have spent in order to get the ingredients to make the cookies will be a loss for you. If this keeps up, you will go heavily into debt and eventually be forced to give up trying to sell your cookies (you will have to go out of business).

Here we see the basic contradiction between use value and exchange value being played out. Something must have use value in order to be exchanged; and if it does not have use value (if people do not find it useful, or find some other version of the same commodity, or some other commodity more useful), then it cannot be exchanged, and the owner of that thing (commodity) will suffer a loss.

As noted at the beginning, the capitalist system involves the generalization of commodity production and exchange. Overwhelmingly in capitalist society, things are produced to be exchanged (sold). And another defining feature of capitalism is that labor power (the ability to work in general) is also a commodity: People who are employed by others exchange this commodity of theirs (their labor power, their ability to work) for another commodity: money (a wage or salary) in order to live—in order to have the basis to buy still other commodities, such as food, clothing, etc.

The “secret” of capitalist development is that labor power is a special kind of commodity: It can create more wealth (value) in its use (by the employer—the capitalist) than the amount of value that is equal to what is paid to the worker in the form of a wage (or salary). So what, in its outward appearance, seems to be “an equal exchange”—a wage or salary for work—is actually an unequal exchange. The person employed does not work only the amount of time in which they produce value equal to their wage (or salary); they must work a number of additional hours producing additional value—surplus value—which is accumulated (appropriated) by their employer, the capitalist. If they are not willing to do this, they will be fired—or not hired in the first place.

This is the source of capitalist profit, and it represents the basic exploitative relation of capitalism—a system in which ultimately billions of people are employed by a relatively small number of capitalists, with corporations and other big associations of capital dominating the economy and accumulating huge amounts of profit every year. And this exploitation is part of the fundamental contradiction of capitalism—the contradiction between socialized production and private appropriation—the fact that production is actually carried out in a highly socialized manner, often with thousands of people working together in various workplaces to produce the commodities that are to be sold (whether food, clothes, shoes, cars, soccer balls, or other products) which, in turn, is part of an overall system of production involving millions and ultimately billions of people, while the products of this labor (the commodities) are appropriated privately and sold by capitalists who do not carry out the labor to produce these commodities but employ others to do so.

This relation between the capitalists (the bourgeoisie) and those they exploit (the proletariat) is one of the driving forces of the capitalist system. The other, even more decisive, driving force is the anarchy of this system. This goes back to the basic contradiction between use value and exchange value. In order to carry out the production of the products they aim to sell, the capitalists must spend money (invest) in buying labor power (employing people for a wage or salary), as well as raw materials, machinery and other means of production. Yet, even with all their “market studies” and other attempts to calculate how to “realize a profitable return” on their investment, these capitalists are in competition with other capitalists, and there is no guarantee that they will be able to achieve a profitable return on, or even that they will be able to “recoup” (get back an amount equal to) what they have invested. This is why they spend huge sums on advertising, in the attempt to convince “consumers” that their product is the most useful. And if they do not succeed in convincing enough “consumers” to buy their product, then they will not be able to realize the exchange value embodied in their products—they will fail to get a “profitable return,” or perhaps even to “break even,” on their investment; and if this continues, they will lose out to other capitalists, and may eventually “go under” altogether. This is the driving force that leads the capitalists to constantly seek out situations where they can exploit people even more intensely—employing people at lower wages, such as the actual (or near) starvation wages they pay people, including children, that they employ in sweatshops and mines in the Third World (Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and Asia).

The fact that competition among the capitalists, and the anarchy involved in it, takes place now on a massive scale—involving production and exchange on a global level, with the capitalists needing to constantly find cheaper sources of “inputs” (including people to exploit as well as raw materials) regardless of the cost to human beings and the environment—this means that the destruction caused by this is also on a massive, and continually expanding, scale. And, as explained by Raymond Lotta in a very important article:

The heightened imperialist globalization of production refers to the fact that a qualitatively greater share of industrial production serving the profit‑making requirements of imperialist capital is carried out in wider parts of the world, outside the “home” (the domestic) market of the imperialist economies—even though the national‑home market remains the single largest market and is the base of the national‑imperialist capital of countries like the U.S., Japan, Germany, Russia, etc. This heightened globalization is an expression of the expand‑or‑die logic of capitalism‑imperialism and the rivalry among imperial powers.5

In turn, the defining contradictions of this system of capitalism-imperialism, including rivalry among imperialist powers, leads repeatedly to wars. This includes wars by imperialists to subjugate countries in the Third World (such as the U.S. war against Iraq), in order to achieve (or maintain) control of key sources of raw materials and people to exploit, domination of strategic parts of the world and a dominant position in the world as a whole. There are also “proxy wars” in which rival imperialist powers back other, less powerful countries in such wars. And the possibility cannot be ruled out of war between rival imperialist powers themselves, with all the destruction this would involve, and the very real threat to the existence of humanity.

With all the complexity involved, all this is ultimately grounded in that basic contradiction inherent in commodities—between use value and exchange value—and the ways this finds expression with the capitalist mode of production that leads to terrible consequences for humanity and its future. It is this basic contradiction, and everything bound up with it and flowing out of it, that the socialist revolution, with its final goal of a communist world, can put an end to, by moving to eliminate the private ownership of the means of production and private appropriation of the products of production, and bringing about the eventual elimination of the production of things as commodities—and, in place of that, marshaling the productive forces of society, in a socialized and planned way, to produce things on the basis of what is useful in meeting the needs of the masses of people and ultimately all of humanity, and distributing this to the people on the basis of need, not on the basis of exchange value.

This will make it possible—this will provide the material foundation—for a whole new era in human history, with whole new relations among people, fundamentally based on cooperation not competition, and with the corresponding ideas and values.

 

1. Breakthroughs: The Historic Breakthrough by Marx, and the Further Breakthrough with the New Communism, A Basic Summary, by Bob Avakian, published as an eBook by Insight Press (insight‑press.com), is available online at Amazon, Apple Books, Barnes & Noble, Kobo and other major retailers (EPUB, MOBI, PDF). It can also be accessed at revcom.us. [back]

2. The book by Bob Avakian, The New Communism: The science, the strategy, the leadership for an actual revolution, and a radically new society on the road to real emancipation, is also available through Insight Press. Excerpts from this book are available at revcom.us. [back]

3. The reference here (with the example of the different values of an airplane and a candy bar) is to Making Revolution and Emancipating Humanity, by Bob Avakian, Part 1: “Beyond the Narrow Horizon of Bourgeois Right,” in the section “Marxism as a Science—Refuting Karl Popper.” [back]

4. This example of chocolate chip cookies, in explaining the basic dynamics of capitalism, is found in the 2003 talk by Bob Avakian, Revolution: Why It's Necessary, Why It's Possible, What It's All About. The film of this talk is available at revcom.us/BA’s Collected Works. [back]

5. Imperialist Parasitism and Class‑Social Recomposition in the U.S. From the 1970s to Today: An Exploration of Trends and Changes, by Raymond Lotta, is available at revcom.us. [Italics in the original, underlining added here.] [back]

THE NEW COMMUNISM

The science, the strategy, the leadership for an actual revolution, and a radically new society on the road to real emancipation, by Bob Avakian

Download PDF of book here

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/701/revolution-books-nyc-100-years-since-the-tulsa-massacre-en.html

| revcom.us

 

"I could smell the smoke and hear the screams"*

100 YEARS SINCE THE TULSA MASSACRE

These Racist Horrors Must End,
Get Organized Now For a Real Revolution

A Major Talk by Carl Dix
at Revolution Books, Harlem
Malcolm X Blvd @ 132nd St, NYC

Tuesday, June 1, 7:00 pm

In-store and live-stream event.
Masks and distancing required in-store. Watch the livestream on YouTube or Facebook Live.

*107-year-old survivor of the Tulsa Massacre who recently testified before Congress

The 100th anniversary of the massacre will be marked at Revolution Books with a special in-person and live-streamed talk by revolutionary leader Carl Dix, along with a stunning short documentary film on the suppressed story of the Tulsa Massacre, followed by audience discussion (in store and virtual).

Watch the livestream on YouTube or Facebook Live.


100 years ago, on June 1, 1921, a racist white mob burned down the vibrant Greenwood community of 10,000 Black people in Tulsa, Oklahoma, known as Black Wall Street. Over 1,000 businesses, homes, schools, churches, a hospital and a library were destroyed. Firebombing was carried out from the air. Black WWI veterans organizing armed self defense were overrun by the lynch mob which included National Guard troops, deputized white merchants, and 150 Tulsa police, incited by the supposed insult of a white woman by a young Black man.

At the end, over 300 Black people were murdered and thousands had fled for their lives. How fitting that Trump chose Tulsa in June 2020 for the ugly mass Nazi-KKK-style rally to launch his presidential campaign.


Come to Revolution Books on June 1st – or tune in – because:

~ The flames of the Tulsa massacre have burned for 400 years in America, with horrific attacks like this perpetrated on Black people since the first Africans were dragged to these shores in slavery chains. The Tulsa survivors have fought for justice for 100 years now and been denied at every turn.

~ Carl Dix will speak to why these attacks happen repeatedly and how they can indeed be ended, but not under this system. And why revolution can end this horror, and other horrors of this system.

~ You will find out about Bob Avakian (BA), the leader who has broken through in how to end these horrors once and for all through the revolution to overthrow this system and create a far better society and world.

~ You can get connected to the movement for this revolution that Bob Avakian leads to make that happen.

Revolution Books is where we get into the roots of the injustices and horrors of Amerikkka... and the revolution to emancipate humanity.


Carl Dix is an advocate of the New Communism developed by Bob Avakian, and part of The National Get Organized for an ACTUAL Revolution Tour. Carl has been on the front lines of the fight against America's imperial wars and police murder and mass incarceration of Black and Latino people.


Give to Revolution Books —
Bookstore for a whole new world

Give here with credit card OR
• Venmo @RevBooksNYC
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Revolution Books / Libros Revolución
437 Malcolm X Blvd @132nd Street, New York, NY
We are OPEN! Tues, Thurs, Fri, Sat, Sun, 2pm to 7pm
revolutionbooksnyc.org | 212-691-3345

 

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Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/631/american-crime-case-12-the-1921-tulsa-massacre-en.html

American Crime

Case #12: The 1921 Tulsa Massacre and the Destruction of Black Wall Street

| revcom.us

 

Bob Avakian has written that one of three things that has “to happen in order for there to be real and lasting change for the better: People have to fully confront the actual history of this country and its role in the world up to today, and the terrible consequences of this.” (See “3 Things that have to happen in order for there to be real and lasting change for the better.”)

In that light, and in that spirit, “American Crime” is a regular feature of revcom.us. Each installment focuses on one of the 100 worst crimes committed by the U.S. rulers—out of countless bloody crimes they have carried out against people around the world, from the founding of the U.S. to the present day.

American Crime

See all the articles in this series.

Oklahoma’s statehood in 1907 coincided with the discovery of oil, and the boom years that followed saw its population grow from 10,000 in 1910 to 100,000 a decade later. This included a significant number of Black people, looking for a better life, and hoping to escape the worst of Jim Crow Mississippi, Georgia, and other states of the Old South. In 1921, Tulsa was strictly segregated; Black people could work in town, but all Black residents were required to live and shop in the Greenwood District of Northern Tulsa. In time, Greenwood’s segregated economy, self-contained and self-sufficient, was so successful that it became known nationally as the “Black Wall Street.” About 11,000 Black residents lived in the Greenwood neighborhood. Black-owned grocery stores, banks, libraries, hotels, restaurants, movie theaters, and more lined Greenwood Avenue.

THE CRIME

On May 30, 1921, Dick Rowland, a 19-year-old Black shoe shiner working downtown, entered the elevator of the only building with a restroom Blacks could use in the area. Sarah Page, a white 17-year-old, was the elevator operator. When the door closed, Page cried out, and Rowland ran off. The most common explanation is that Rowland just stepped on Page’s foot. But Rowland was alleged—without evidence—to have assaulted Page. He was arrested the next morning and held in a jail cell above City Hall.

That afternoon, the Tulsa Tribune ran the headline “Nab Negro for Attacking Girl in Elevator,” suggesting that Page had been raped, and editorialized: “To Lynch Negro Tonight.” Within an hour of the paper hitting the streets a lynch mob in the hundreds descended on the courthouse.

Word spread throughout Greenwood that whites were storming the courthouse and Rowland was in danger. After debating how to respond, at 9 pm a group of 25 armed Black men, some veterans of World War 1, drove to the courthouse determined to stop the lynching. They got out with their rifles and shotguns, and offered their support to the local authorities. Their offer was refused, and they left.

But the white mob was incensed, and grew into the thousands in no time as word spread, more and more coming with weapons. At 10 pm a group of 75 Black men returned to the courthouse after new rumors that a lynching was imminent. They marched single file to the courthouse steps. Again, their offer of help to protect Rowland was refused. A white man approached an armed Black army veteran and demanded he turn over his gun. A fight broke out, and a gun went off.

Historian and author Scott Ellsworth wrote: “While the first shot fired at the court house may have been unintentional, those that followed were not. Almost immediately, members of the white mob—and possibly some law enforcement officers—opened fire on the African American men, who returned volleys of their own. The initial gunplay lasted only a few seconds, but when it was over, as many as a dozen men, both black and white, lay dead or wounded. Out numbered more than twenty-to-one, the black men began a retreating fight toward the African American district, with armed whites in close pursuit.”1

“They tried to kill all the black folks they could see,” a survivor, George Monroe, recalled in the 1999 documentary The Night Tulsa Burned.

Shortly after the fighting broke out at the courthouse, a large number of whites—many who’d been part of the lynch mob—gathered outside police headquarters nearby. There, as many as 500 white men and boys were sworn in as “Special Deputies” and told to “Get a gun and get a nigger.” Weapons were passed out by other deputies from a sporting goods store across the street. White rioters began firing on Blacks and setting fire to Black-owned homes and businesses late into the night.

“Tuesday night, May 31, was the riot, and Wednesday morning, by day break, was the invasion.” (Unidentified observer to a reporter)

As dawn approached, thousands of armed whites—some estimated as many as 10,000—gathered in three locations on the edges of Greenwood. A siren sounded at daybreak, and the mobs of white terrorists launched their invasion.

These armed white mobs included over 150 Tulsa police. They set about systematically killing, looting, and burning the entire district of Greenwood, block by block. Armed whites broke into Black homes and businesses and forced the people outside, where they were led away at gunpoint to internment centers set up by the authorities. Anyone who resisted was shot. If guns were found inside, the occupant was shot. The homes and businesses were looted, then set on fire with torches and oil-soaked rags. House by house, block by block, Greenwood was demolished. Airplanes were used to shoot Black people from the air and drop kerosene bombs on buildings, setting them ablaze.

Throughout this assault, Black Tulsans, while tremendously outnumbered, fought back. Riflemen took positions atop the belfry of a newly built church to temporarily halt the advance of the white invasion. But the church was burned to the ground. These attempts at resistance could not be maintained because the deputized police and the National Guard units arrested 6,000 Greenwood residents. Black Tulsans did not go down without a fight, but they were out-gunned and out-numbered. “Survivors recounted black bodies loaded on trains and dumped off bridges into the Arkansas River and, most frequently, tossed into mass graves.”2

By noon on June 1, these white mobs had murdered more than 300 Black Tulsa residents. They had turned 40 square blocks of Greenwood into a scorched wasteland. This included 1,256 homes destroyed, along with virtually every other structure—including churches, schools, businesses, even a hospital and library. “Not one of these criminal acts was then or ever has been prosecuted or punished by government at any level, municipal, county, state, or federal.” (Tulsa Race Riot: A Report by the Oklahoma Commission to Study the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921)

After order was restored, the Black people who’d been detained were released, but only if signed for by a white person, who also had to agree to accept responsibility for that detainee’s subsequent behavior. More than 10,000 residents were left homeless. Thousands of Black Tulsans spent the winter living in tents. Many left for good, having had enough of Tulsa, Oklahoma.

THE CRIMINALS

The racist mobs of thousands of white Tulsans were directly responsible for the horror inflicted on the people of Greenwood.

The Tulsa police chief and Tulsa deputies had a direct hand in arming, deputizing, and directing the mobs from the very start of the killing of Black Tulsans.

The Tulsa city officials played a decisive role by refusing to take any action to stop the racial massacre. And shortly afterwards, these same officials passed a zoning ordinance that made it too expensive for the Greenwood residents to rebuild their homes.

The local units of the National Guard, by arresting every Black resident of Tulsa they could find and taking them into “protective custody,” left Greenwood property unprotected and aided the “special deputies” who came to burn it. The after-action reports by the local guardsmen show they saw their job not as protecting the people of Greenwood, but putting down the supposed “Negro uprising.”

The Oklahoma State Troopers did not arrive from Oklahoma City until the annihilation of Greenwood was over; arriving earlier could have prevented some of the worst crimes from taking place.

The governor of Oklahoma, from the very start, treated the events in Tulsa as a Black “insurrection.”

The extent of the Ku Klux Klan’s involvement and possible lead role in this heinous act of terror hasn’t been proved, but “Tulsa’s atmosphere reeked with a Klan-like stench that oozed through the robes of the Hooded Order.” (Tulsa Race Riot report.) At that time many of the city’s most prominent men were Klansmen, including the lawyer assigned to represent Dick Rowland. Photographs of the Tulsa massacre were made into postcards, including a close-up of a charred Black body; and another of the Greenwood District in ruins.

THE ALIBI

The blame for the Tulsa Massacre was, from the very start, fully put on Greenwood’s Black residents—calling it a “Negro Uprising,” or “Insurrection.” A grand jury investigation organized by Oklahoma’s governor in the days after the massacre concluded:

We find that the recent race riot was the direct result of an effort on the part of a certain group of colored men who appeared at the court house on the night of May 31, 1921, for the purpose of protecting one Dick Rowland ...There was no mob spirit among the whites, no talk of lynching and no arms. The assembly was quiet until the arrival of armed Negroes, which precipitated and was the direct cause of the entire affair.

THE REAL MOTIVE

The economic success of the people of Black Tulsa—including home, business, and land ownership—fueled resentment, fear, and jealousy within the white community. Many of Greenwood’s Black residents were living more successful lives than white Tulsans. In a community, and a country, where white supremacy was taken for granted—and counted on—the success of the people of Greenwood was seen as a provocation.

The Tulsa Massacre, and the 1919 “Red Summer” of anti-Black violence that preceded it (see American Crime Case #15), took place at a time when the U.S. rulers needed to maintain the brutal oppression of Black people and white supremacy under changing conditions. The beginning of the Great Migration saw Black people leaving the rural South to find work in the cities of the North. Among them were Black veterans of World War 1, returning with a defiant spirit and less willingness to put up with open Jim Crow degradation and terror. Those in power faced the “need” for Black people to be beaten into submission through terror, their defiant spirit suppressed, and white people (including oppressed white people) enlisted to serve and identify with the exploitative, white supremacist order.

Resources:

 


1. “The Tulsa Race Riot,” by Dr. Scott Ellsworth, an essay in Tulsa Race Riot: A Report by the Oklahoma Commission to Study the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921.  [back]

2. Washington Post, September 18, 2018.  [back]


Systematic killing, looting, and burning of the entire district of Greenwood during Tulsa Race Massacre, 1921.


House by house, block by block, Greenwood, Tulsa was demolished.


A black man being burned on a bed of lumber during the Tulsa Race Massacre, 1921. Photo: Unsourced Archive


Mt. Zion Baptist Church burns during Tulsa Race Massacre, 1921. Photo: Historical Society and Museum

 

 

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So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/701/rnl-show-episode-54-en.html

| revcom.us

 

Episode 54 of The RNL—Revolution, Nothing Less—Show!

1 Year Since Police Killed George Floyd; 100 Years Since the Tulsa Massacre; Now: Organize for Revolution!

 

It's been one year since police murdered George Floyd. It's been 100 years since the Tulsa Massacre and Destruction of Black Wall Street. No More! Now is the time to join with the Revcoms in organizing for REVOLUTION, NOTHING LESS!

In Episode 54 of the RNL – Revolution, Nothing Less – Show:

** Bob Avakian speaks searingly to why it is impossible to abolish white supremacy without overthrowing and abolishing capitalism-imperialism and summons us to revolution to make this real in an excerpt from his film, Why We Need an Actual Revolution and How We Can Really Make Revolution.

** Andy Zee takes you to a press conference by the Revolution Club at a hated Sheriff station in South Central Los Angeles announcing a march being called by the Revcoms on June 12 to “Show the World: We Are Getting Organized Now For REVOLUTION, NOTHING LESS!” and to declare: “WE ARE FIGHTING TO EMANCIPATE ALL HUMANITY – For a World Free of All Oppression and Exploitation. No More Antagonistic Divisions Among the People. THIS SYSTEM CANNOT BE REFORMED—IT MUST BE OVERTHROWN!”

Featuring interviews with Noche Diaz, national spokesperson for the Revolution Club, and Michelle Xai of the Los Angeles Revolution Club.

** Sunsara Taylor discusses the real lessons of the one year since the police murder of George Floyd and the beautiful rising that brought together people of all races and genders across this country and around the world and how this revealed the potential for a real revolution.

** American Crime #12: THE TULSA MASSACRE AND DESTRUCTION OF BLACK WALLSTREET. A powerful short video documentary created by filmmaker David Zeiger for The RNL Show exposing the largest white racist massacre of Black people in U.S. history. This segment was produced in 2020 when Trump went to speak in Tulsa on Juneteenth and is being re-broadcast now on the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa Massacre.

For more on this American Crime, go here.

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/why-we-all-need-to-march-for-revolution-on-june-12-en.html

Why We ALL Need to March for Revolution on June 12

| revcom.us

 

Editors’ Note: These are excerpted and edited transcripts of on-the-spot agitation from a member of the National Revolution Tour at a meeting last week, which we thought would be helpful to share with revcom.us readers, as part of building for the June 12 actions nationally. This is inspired by and seeking to implement what is called for in A DECLARATION, A CALL TO GET ORGANIZED NOW FOR A REAL REVOLUTION, from the revcoms. They have been edited for accessibility to readers, with links where necessary.

If you look at just what’s going on and the divisions in society—it looks very bad on first sight.

You have these fascists, Republican-fascist or Trumpite white supremacists; then you have these others on top like Biden and the Democrats. They don’t—none of them—have any answers; right now, they’re still doing this shit, massacres in Palestine. They’re still fucking people over at the border. They doing these assaults on the rights of women (see here and here), of gay people, of trans people. They’re ruining the environment and endangering humanity.

But even a small group for a real revolution right now like us—there’s a lot of initiative that we could actually take because we DO have an answer. Because we do have an answer that nobody else does that actually is in line with reality, that actually speaks to the aspirations that so many people have to be done with this, where people don’t want no more.

On June 12 we’re planning to march to the LA County Sheriff’s station on Imperial. We know these people are brutal. These motherfuckers organize gangs and they get their tattoo and they get to join the gangs when they go kill a Black or Brown person.

And some people in the neighborhoods are terrified about all this, “terrified.” That’s cause people don’t know their own potential power, but that changes when they start to see reality, see the cracks inside the wall of the system, and how we could widen all that and bring this whole thing down, a real revolution.

That’s what Bob Avakian, the most important leader today, shows you. How we organize ourselves, how we reach out to millions, bring this system down and put something much, much better in its place.

People Don’t Know Their Potential Strength!

But people don’t know that we could actually change that. They don’t know that there’s a way out. Not enough people know about this revolution and they aren’t with it now. People gotta get with it. They don’t know about this leader. We got a leader that can lead the way out, he’s been at this since the ’60s and never given up, but people don’t know that and they need to know what he’s saying and who he is.

So, we’re going out there and we’re calling on everybody else to come out there and to march with the revcoms:

If you want to see that fear being broken from people, those blinders on people’s eyes being broken—then you’ve gotta march with the revcoms.

If you want to see a different situation, if you’re tired of the way this system treats people as less than human, if you want to fight for something that’s really worth fighting for—then you march with the revcoms.

If you’re tired of seeing all these youth killing each other for some streets that they don’t own or control for “respect” or “face” or whatever you want to call it—then you come and march with the revcoms to show them that there’s an alternative, there’s something that’s really worth fighting for: a plan and a strategy and leadership that could actually get all the way out of this.

If you’re tired of all this potential where people are rising up and then they get pulled into puny reforms—for body cameras or to vote for this lying-ass politician or that lying-ass politician or for defund the police or abolish the police, all unrealistic goals that are a fantasy that actually don’t deal with the problem that the system requires the police to murder people that they can’t fucking use anymore—then you march with the revcoms to show people that there is an alternative, that there is something for them to get with that’s actually in line with reality, that requires real sacrifice, real heart, but is actually possible.

On June 12th we plan to, from the call for June 12th:

Show the World: We Are Getting Organized Now For REVOLUTION, NOTHING LESS!... that WE ARE FIGHTING TO EMANCIPATE ALL HUMANITY—For a World Free of All Oppression and Exploitation, No More Antagonistic Divisions Among the People

June 12 Is Carrying Out a Strategy to Win

That’s what we’re marching with people to do and that’s part of how we could actually break things open—this is how we start to actually change what people are thinking about, where their sights are set. Some of our people are really confined by what they see in front of them in this system and what they hear from the media and all of that. But if we’re actually calling out their—the system’s—murderousness and their illegitimacy and we’re saying and showing here’s a force that right now that has to grow and can grow... that there’s a way out that has a leadership for that—then we could start to transform all of that.

What this Declaration and Call lays out right there is a strategy to actually go to work on that and that’s what we have to call on people to do, to spread the word all the way into there and then after that to actually make that real.

That’s what June 12th is... carrying out the strategy that’s in this Declaration that is laid out right there, the actual plan to get the forces we need to make revolution, laid out by Bob Avakian... make an impact with the numbers we got now to get more people wanting to know about this and get in on it... and go from there, “acting together as an increasingly powerful force”... “attracting and organizing the necessary numbers” until we get to that situation—that’s where we’re aiming for, where we actually have a real chance to win—at a time when the system is in deep shit, in crisis. That’s what it really comes down to—a real chance to win.

If you want that chance not just to fight but to really win, bring down this system for a whole different world...and you’re ready to be part of making that real...then you need to march with the revcoms on June 12.


Read more

Download, print and spread this call (PDF):
Front | Back

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/what-are-they-afraid-of-en.html

What Are They Afraid Of?!

Editors' Note: On June 3 the LA Sheriffs reversed themselves and granted the march permit. Go here for the news flash.

| revcom.us

 

LA County Sheriff's Deny Permit for Revolution Club March on June 12

The Revolution Club Says this March Will Go Forward

People Begin to Raise Their Voice to Demand the Permit Be Granted

As plans are coming together in Los Angeles for the Revolution Club March on June 12, “Show the World: We Are Getting Organized Now For REVOLUTION, NOTHING LESS!,” there has been an outrageous attempt at political suppression by the LA County Sheriffs who have arbitrarily and unjustly denied the permit.  This is unacceptable, this march will go forward and a range of legal and political voices are raising the demand that this permit be granted!

This march will start at Southwest College in the Westmont neighborhood of South Central, it will march through the neighborhood and arrive at the LA Sheriff Station South, and it will send the basic message: “WE ARE FIGHTING TO EMANCIPATE ALL HUMANITY—For a World Free of All Oppression and Exploitation! No More Antagonistic Divisions Among the People. THIS SYSTEM CANNOT BE REFORMED—IT MUST BE OVERTHROWN!”

The Revolution Club received a formal denial signed by head Sheriff Alex Villanueva with the bogus reasons given that, 1. this Sheriff's station “does not have a sufficient number of patrol deputies... without inhibiting normal police protection to the rest of the unincorporated region nearby” and that 2. “Past demonstrations within the last year at South LA Station became unruly, which ultimately resulted in injury to persons and property.”

First of all, the only reasons these protests became “unruly” is because of the wanton brutality from the pigs themselves. After these Sheriffs murdered 18-year-old Andres Guardado and 29-year-old Dijon Kizzee, in the wake of the murder of George Floyd, there were a series of protests at this Sheriff’s Station. These protests were met with vicious brutality—the Sheriffs tear-gassed legally assembled protesters, including young children at a press conference; they shot rubber bullets aimed at injuring protesters, aiming for people's groins, hands and faces, and arrested dozens of people. Second, the basic right of the Revolution Club to deliver this urgent political message is not dependent on how many pigs they can dispatch to direct traffic!

The Revolution Club chose this political target because, “The LA County Sheriffs—like the other police forces and the military—‘serve and protect’ THIS SYSTEM—the system of capitalism-imperialism. The system that rules this planet. The system that destroys lives and crushes spirits... that treats all kinds of people as ‘less than human’... that hunts down and drives down our youth in so many ways... and that threatens the very existence of humanity.”

The LA Sheriffs terrorize people throughout LA County, murdering at least 330 people since 2000. After killing people, they stalk and aim to silence the families of victims of police murder who speak out about the killing of their loved ones. There are open white supremacists within the LA Sheriffs, with organized gangs that get special badges and tattoos for murdering Black and Brown people.

With this rejection, the Sheriffs are making clear that they cannot tolerate the people getting organized to deliver this message. And in this, they are showing the NEED for this march in the first place: because their violent repressive force is illegitimate. The Call for June 12 says, “This system must go! So, Let’s Get Down to Basics: We Need A Real Revolution!” This march is about standing up to this system and raising a beacon that there is an organized force here in this country that is serious about revolution and a whole better world. “This revolution is possible. We are in a rare time when this really could be. But only if we get organized.” This is urgently needed!

The Revolution Club is not only not backing down—but is reaching out throughout all of society, to all those—coming from a range of political backgrounds and perspectives—who “want a better world,” and who see the need for the basic right of people to make this political statement.

In the face of this attempt at political suppression, a range of people coming from different perspectives have signed a letter demanding the LA County Board of Supervisors (which oversees the LA Sheriffs) reverse this denial and grant a permit. Those who have signed include Marjorie Cohn, the former president of the National Lawyers Guild; Mike Davis, professor emeritus, U.C. Riverside and author of books that have exposed the brutality of the LA police; Jim Lafferty, the executive director emeritus of the National Lawyers Guild, LA Chapter; Jorge Rodriguez, co-chair of the 50th Anniversary of the Chicano Moratorium Planning Committee; Stephen Rohde, an interfaith activist and retired First Amendment lawyer; and Rev. Frank Wulf, pastor, Echo Park United Methodist Church.

The Revolution Club will be holding a major press conference this Wednesday, June 2, at 11 a.m. to demand this permit be granted, and will be involving people throughout Los Angeles and across the country who recognize the justness of this basic demand.

"What is the message that has gotten these LA Sheriffs all shaken?

"June 12th ... a force that is getting ready to actually get rid of this system!"

Comments from Noche Diaz, national spokesperson for the Revolution Clubs, at the June 2 press conference.

Read more

STATEMENTS DEMANDING THE LA SHERIFF GRANT THE REVOLUTION CLUB A PERMIT TO MARCH ON SATURDAY, JUNE 12, 2PM, SOUTHWEST COLLEGE THROUGH THE WESTMONT NEIGHBORHOOD TO THE LA SHERIFF'S STATION SOUTH

 

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Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/la-sheriff-department-murderous-racist-repressive-and-putrid-en.html

The LA Sheriff's Department Is Just as Murderous, Racist, Repressive and Putrid as the System They Enforce

| revcom.us

 

Like the system of capitalism-imperialism they “serve and protect,” the LA County sheriffs are straight-up murderers—killing in cold blood Andŕes Guardado, Latino, and Dijon Kizzee, Black, from South Central last summer—just two out of 300 murders by the sheriffs since 2000. Of course, they are just one cog in a worldwide machinery of death and destruction that murders people and endangers humanity.

Like the system they enforce, the sheriffs are racist—they have white-supremacist gangs who give their members tattoos when they murder someone Black or Brown. Of course, the cowards who run this system have always relied on racist gangs and Klans to do their dirtiest work. White supremacy is built into this system, like it’s built into its pig departments.

Like the system they desperately defend, these pigs try to repress what politically threatens them—last summer they viciously attacked people, including young children, for “crimes” like demonstrating in the streets or holding a press conference. And 50 years ago they infamously killed four people at the largest Chicano march against the Vietnam War ever held.

Because the system they enforce has no answers for our youth—no real jobs, no good education—they pack people into jails by the tens of thousands, mostly Black and Latino. Just like the system they serve, with its more than two million prisoners, they turn those jails and prisons into inhuman pens.

When you get right down to it, these pigs are cowards—running in packs, shooting people in their backs. What are they afraid of? The people—once they stand up.

In all this, they are perfect representatives of the system they enforce: capitalism-imperialism. They are puffed up now… until we, the people they oppress and repress, get organized, for revolution and move, when the time is right, to defeat and dismantle the whole machinery of violent repression this system sits on.

And we ARE getting organized, now. Join us.

June 12: March

GET ORGANIZED NOW FOR A REAL REVOLUTION

The Revcoms


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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/white-supremacy-and-nazi-like-cruelty-rule-over-inmates-en.html

LOS ANGELES SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT: Racist Murdering Thugs in Uniform and Nazi-like Prison Guards; Murderous Enforcers of THIS System

Part 2: Inside LA Jails: White Supremacy and Nazi-like Cruelty Rule Over Inmates

| revcom.us

 

If the Los Angeles sheriffs don’t outright kill you, you still have a good chance of ending up in their clutches because they run the LA County jail system. In the jails, the white supremacist, sadistic, neo-Nazi sheriff’s deputy gangs that are rampant throughout the entire Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department (LASD) exercise even more terrifying power. Here are just a few examples:

Enforcing White Supremacy

In 1989, Clydell Crawford, a 21-year-old Black youth, was incarcerated at the Peter J. Pitchess Detention Center, then known as the Wayside Honor Rancho. Deputies there had a gang called the “Wayside Whities” that targeted Black inmates, especially those who challenged white authority.

On December 2, Crawford got into a fight with a white inmate and came out on top. Soon after, a deputy came into his barracks, handcuffed him, and put him against the wall. Other officers gathered around. Crawford recounted to Knock LA:

“...he just said he’s going to teach me about beating up on white guys. And that’s when they all started. They had a Black officer there, he didn’t help me up. Then they targeted my leg and they were yelling ‘Wayside Whities.’” The deputies beat Crawford with their flashlights, striking over 30 blows to his head, torso, and legs. They continued to beat his leg until it was broken. “I remember that flashlight kept hitting me in the same spot over and over and over until it started bleeding and snapped,” he says. “[The deputy] was making sure I was going to feel his wrath, making sure I was going to understand wherever it was, that the Wayside Whities were here.... I thought I was going to die that night.”

Crawford survived, and his legal team reported the incident to the LASD, the District Attorney, the LA Board of Supervisors, and various judges. Knock LA reports that “it’s unclear” if any of the deputies involved were ever disciplined. The Internal Affairs Bureau declared that the “Wayside Whities” didn’t even exist, that it was just a mocking term made up by Black inmates for white guards.

In 2012, the ACLU filed a lawsuit (Rosas v. Baca) regarding conditions at the Men’s Central Jail where two other deputy gangs were active. The lawsuit detailed accounts of deputies shouting “racial slurs against Black people, including the N-word and ‘monkey,’” and of “slamming the inmates’ heads into walls, punching them in the face with their fists, kicking them with their boots, and shooting them multiple times with their tasers,” resulting in fractured eye sockets and blindness, broken legs, shattered jaws, collapsed lungs, and nerve damage.

Torturing and Killing the Mentally Ill

In 1998, according to a report from Loyola University, a deputy gang called “the Posse” was formed to oppose policies that were supposed to treat mentally ill inmates more like patients. On August 29, deputies at Twin Towers Correctional Facility beat Danny Smith to death while the mentally ill man was still handcuffed. Nine days later, “eight members of the Posse beat another mentally ill inmate so severely that he was left with flashlight marks on his back and boot prints on his side.1

In 2011, The Appeal reported that a rookie deputy claimed that a supervisor ordered him to beat up a mentally ill prisoner. In 2012, the Los Angeles Times reported on how mentally ill prisoners, who then accounted for 15 percent of the jail’s population, bore the brunt of roughly a third of deputies’ use of force incidents.

In 2014, S.A. Thomas, a mentally ill man, held for a month at LA County Jail, was denied medication daily, causing him to suffer hallucinations and live in a state of fear. Even on a day that he was scheduled to be in court, he claimed, he was not given medication, rendering him less able to competently testify in a federal civil rights lawsuit against the department.

Beatings of Relatives and Visitors:

In 2013, reports surfaced that even families and other visitors are not safe:

The Los Angeles Times reported that “Three visitors were taken to a deputy break room, which could not be seen by the public, and beaten” by the sheriffs. Deputies were reprimanded “for not using force on visitors” who failed to show respect to the jailers. One of those visitors, Gabriel Carrillo, who was visiting his brother2, had his arm broken by the sheriffs while he was handcuffed.... In another incident, an Austrian consulate official, when visiting an Austrian inmate, was arrested and handcuffed despite not committing any crime and despite the fact that foreign diplomatic officials are supposed to be immune from prosecution due to their legal status in the country....

After they carried out the beatings, the sheriffs discussed how to keep their stories straight and conspired together in writing reports that falsely accused the beating victims of assaulting sheriffs. Imagine the terror of going to visit a loved one and being brutalized yourself. And imagine the impact this has on discouraging people from visiting, thus giving the Nazi guards even more freedom to carry out their crimes.

And Nothing Has Changed!

In spite of numerous lawsuits, investigations, newspaper exposures, NOTHING HAS CHANGED! In fact, a 2016 report showed that deputies’ use of force against inmates increased by 40 percent from 2014 to 2015, with many orbital (eye socket) injuries and hand fractures. And LA County has paid out millions of dollars to settle claims of excessive force against inmates.

Then in 2018, the Guardian reported that deputies, “supported and protected by senior officers up to the sheriff himself, were found to have engaged in systematic beatings of prisoners, helped smuggle drugs and other contraband in and out of jail on behalf of White Power gang leaders, and worked to conceal aspects of the scandal from the FBI.”

 

Coming Soon: Part III of this exposure on the LA Sheriff's Department... follow revcom.us

 

1. Those deputies were fired but not charged with a crime, and other members of the Posse remained on the job at Twin Towers. [back]

2. Gabriel Carrillo’s brother Franky was framed on a murder charge by LASD when he was 16 years old, even after someone else confessed. He was finally released when almost all the witnesses who had been coerced into testifying against him recanted—after he had served 20 years in jail! [back]


The LA Sheriff’s deputy, Samuel Aldama, who murdered Donta Taylor (see Part 1) testified that he and up to 20 other deputies have a deputy gang tattoo (see above) on his calf depicting a skull with a rifle encircled by flames and a Nazi-style helmet with the letters CPT, for Compton. Photo: John Sweeney


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The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/701/los-angeles-sheriffs-department-part1-en.html

LOS ANGELES SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT: Racist Murdering Thugs in Uniform and Nazi-like Prison Guards; Murderous Enforcers of THIS System

A History of Casual Murder, with No Restraints under This System

| revcom.us

 

Editors’ Note: As we approach June 12 and the march to Show the World: We Are Getting Organized Now For REVOLUTION, NOTHING LESS, we thought it helpful for our readers to have some background of the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department (LASD), its history, and its role as a concentrated manifestation of the murderous enforcers of this system.1 (In LA, the June 12 march goes from Southwest College to the South Los Angeles Sheriff's Station.)

June 12 represents planned political actions of the revcoms in relation to impacting the terrain and accumulating forces for revolution:

We need to wield this growing revolutionary force to stand up to this system and its murderous enforcers and to change the whole “terrain” (the political, social and cultural situation and “atmosphere”) throughout society, in order to weaken the hold of this system over people, win people away from acting to strengthen and enforce this system, and create the best possible conditions for this revolution to succeed. (From A Declaration, A Call to Get Organized Now for a Real Revolution)

 

For at least 50 years, oppressed people in LA County have grown up with a terror of the LA Sheriffs—the kind of terror that you hear about from older Black people who came up in the South when KKK torture and lynchings were a constant fear.

David Diaz, a 69-year-old lifelong resident of East LA, told the Guardian that he and almost every man in his family has been arrested and booked by the sheriffs, and that at least nine friends had been killed by police. Diaz says this dates all the way back to the time of the Chicano Power Movement of the 1960s and ’70s when sheriffs seemed to be competing to arrest as many people as possible. That was a time when Mexican-Americans were starting to rise up against constant racist humiliation, discrimination, and oppression they faced as a people. On August 29, 1970, this took expression in the Chicano Moratorium, a peaceful march of about 30,000 Chicano people against the Vietnam War, which was violently attacked by hundreds of LA Sheriffs and LAPD cops, leading to the deaths of four people. Prominent Chicano journalist and Los Angeles Times columnist Ruben Salazar was sitting in a café when a deputy fired a tear gas canister at his head, killing him. (We will have more on this in Part III of this series.)

Paul Rea’s mom, Leah Garcia, recalls that in 2008, when Paul was only seven, cops pulled them over for a traffic stop and Paul began screaming “Please don’t take my mom.” By that time Leah had already lost the father of another child to the sheriffs. Eleven years later, in June 2019, Paul was the passenger in a car pulled over for allegedly running a stop sign. Deputies threatened to kill the driver. Paul took off running. One deputy opened fire, killing Paul.

A year later, on June 18, 2020, a sheriff shot Andres Guardado, an 18-year-old Salvadoran-American, six times. A whistleblower in the LASD reported that this killing was done to gain approval from one of the white supremacist gangs that are a powerful element of LASD.

Then less than two months later, in August 2020, deputies shot Dijon Kizzee, a 29-year-old Black man, 15 times in his back, continuing even after he was lying still. They suspected him of violating vehicle codes while riding his bike.

These killings were nothing new. Just a small sample, an example of the murderous enforcement of this system, of its institutionalized white supremacy and police terror, brutality, and murder:

In August 2018, deputies fired 13 shots into the back of Anthony Vargas, and then lied that he was charging at them with a gun.

On June 6, 2019, deputies shot Ryan Twyman, a 24-year-old father of three, 34 times as he sat, unarmed in his car. That same day law enforcement killed three other people in LA.

In 2016, they chased down 31-year-old Donta Taylor and shot him a dozen times alongside a canal because they said he was wearing “gang colors.” He was unarmed and not even suspected of a crime.

In January 2016, they shot Nicholas Robertson, 28-years-old, 33 times, firing, reloading and firing again as Nicholas tried to crawl away. Then they left his body lying out uncovered for 13 hours.

If you’re Black or Brown, even a position of wealth or authority won’t protect you. In August 2020, Aja Brown, the Black mayor of Compton was driving with her husband and her infant daughter when sheriffs pulled her over for an alleged traffic violation. At least seven sheriff’s vehicles descended on the scene. Brown was ordered out of the car and searched as her daughter screamed. Brown said “They terrorize the community...” In July, Jermelle Henderson, a successful restaurant owner, was pulled over at gunpoint and handcuffed, detained in the patrol car and then released without any explanation.

Since 2000, LASD has killed at least 330 people.

Out of all these killing, there has been one deputy indicted!

The rulers of this system give LASD the responsibility to “maintain order,” and especially to keep control of the most oppressed, marginalized, and rebellious sections of people. LASD has been given the power of life-and-death over the people, and it has shown, time and again over many decades, its willingness to wield that power with complete ruthlessness and outright sadism. They behave straight up like an occupying army of racist murderous thugs... which is exactly what they are!

And the system backs them up, virtually every time—for they are a manifestation of the murderous enforcers of this system.

 

Coming Soon: Parts II and III of this exposure on the LA Sheriffs Department... follow revcom.us

 

1. Background: With an annual budget of 3.3 billion dollars, 9,000 deputies and 13,000 other paid employees and civilian volunteers, the LA County Sheriff’s Department (LASD) is the largest sheriff’s department in the U.S. It patrols 42 cities and 153 unincorporated areas in the 4,751 square miles of LA County, home to millions of people, mainly Latino, Black, Asian, and Indigenous. It also runs the largest jail system in the world, with 200,000 people held at some point every year. [back]


August 29, 1970, about 30,000 Chicano people took part in the Chicano Moratorium, a peaceful march against the Vietnam War, which was violently attacked by hundreds of LA Sheriff’s deputies and LAPD cops, leading to the deaths of four people.


In August 2020 deputies shot Dijon Kizzee, a 29-year-old Black man, 15 times in his back, continuing even after he was lying still. They suspected him of violating vehicle codes while riding his bike.

 

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Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/701/bob-avakian-lee-evans-black-liberation-and-revolution-en.html

LEE EVANS, BLACK LIBERATION,
AND THE REVOLUTION THAT IS URGENTLY NEEDED
TO EMANCIPATE ALL HUMANITY

by Bob Avakian

| revcom.us

 

Reading the “Remembrance from a Reader” about Lee Evans (“Lee Evans—Track Great and Humanitarian”)* not only heightened my own sense of sadness in learning about Lee Evans’ death, but also took me back again to the times when Lee Evans was part of a very broad radical upsurge that swept the world in the late 1960s/early 1970s.

As that “Remembrance” points out, Lee Evans was a world-class track athlete. For a number of years, he held the world record for the men’s 400 meters. He was the men’s 400 meter champion at the famous 1968 Olympics in Mexico, where he was also part of a protest, particularly among African-American athletes, against the oppression of Black people.

I remember a conversation I had with Lee Evans shortly before that Olympics, when we both happened to be at the apartment of a mutual acquaintance in San Jose, California, where Lee Evans was then training. Knowing that there was talk and debate among Black athletes about boycotting the Olympics—and having a sense of what a powerful blow this would be against this system that was murderously oppressing Black people in this country, people in Vietnam and other people throughout the world—after some casual back and forth, I asked Lee straight up: “Are you guys going to boycott the Olympics?” He answered: “We’re thinking about it.” “You better!” I blurted out. Lee repeated that they were seriously considering it, and we went back to more casual conversation.

As it turned out, there was not a widespread boycott of the Olympics, although Lew Alcindor—now Kareem Abdul Jabbar—and (as I recall) Mike Warren (who also played basketball at UCLA) did actually boycott. And there was the well-known powerful action by Tommie Smith and John Carlos, raising their gloved fists on the victory stand. Lee Evans also protested, by raising his fist on the podium after his 400 meter victory while wearing a Black beret—part of the uniform of the revolutionary Black Panther Party, and broadly a symbol of Black liberation. Those protests—which were carried out in the face of serious threats and then severe reprisal by the authorities in sport and more generally—made a significant contribution to the radical upsurge of that time.

As powerful as those radical movements were—involving large and diverse sections of the people, particularly youth, who were motivated by revolutionary sentiments—there was, however, no revolution in this country at that time. But some of us who came forward through the great radical upsurge of that time have persevered on the road of revolution and dedicated ourselves to forging the path forward on that road. A great deal has been learned in the time since then—including from the experience, positive and negative, of revolutionary struggles throughout the world and the historical experience of the communist movement—and, of crucial importance, through the work I have continued to do there is a further development of the scientific method and approach to revolution: the new communism. Now, when the contradictions of this system are taking an acute and increasingly extreme expression, and this is one of the rare times and circumstances when revolution is actually possible in a country like this: for those of us who were part of, and all those who have been inspired by, the radical movements and revolutionary sentiments of those times—and for all those, young and old, who yearn for the kind of radical emancipating change that so many in those times were striving for—it is up to us to act, together, to bring about the revolution that is urgently needed, and is possible, in order to open the way to the actual liberation of Black people and all the oppressed people of the earth, aiming for the emancipation of all humanity from all relations of oppression, exploitation, degradation, and the destruction of people and the environment.

 


* The article “Lee Evans—Track Great and Humanitarian, Remembrance from a Reader” is available at revcom.us. [back]


Lee Evans after winning gold in the 400m at the 1968 Mexico Olympics. Photo: U.S. Olympic Archive

 

Follow: @TheRevcoms
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Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/701/lee-evans-remenbrance-en.html

Lee Evans—Track Great and Humanitarian

Remembrance from a Reader

| revcom.us

 

I was saddened to learn about the recent death of track great Lee Evans, who I saw run many times. Besides being one of the greatest 400 meter runners of all time, Lee was a humanitarian, who cared about the people of the world.

Lee ran track at San Jose State with Tommie Smith and John Carlos. Along with them, he was a founder and organizer of the Olympic Project for Human Rights (OPHR) that advocated the boycott of the 1968 Olympics to protest the oppression of Black people in this country. The boycott did not happen, and all three ran in the Olympics. Smith and Carlos were thrown out of the Olympics after raising black-gloved fists on the 200 meter victory stand. Carlos advised Evans to stay and run his 400 meter race. This was a bit controversial, as some Black activists felt Evans should have left with Smith and Carlos. About that, Evans told sportswriter Dave Zirin, “I had a tough time because Black people thought that I didn’t do enough and the whites were just mad. I got it from both sides.” Evans won the Olympic 400 meter race in a world record time. On the victory stand, Evans raised a clenched fist and wore a black beret to signify his support for the Black Panther Party. He received death threats for his actions prior to and during the Olympics.

It was after his running career where Evans should be most remembered. He was a true humanitarian. He was a Director of Athletics for the Special Olympics International. His greatest desire was to work with athletes who did not have the opportunities that he had as a world-class runner, so he went to those countries that needed a track coach. He coached the national teams of Qatar, Cameroon, and Nigeria. In his interview with Zirin, he said, “As soon as I learned about what Jim Crow meant and I found out that my ancestors were Africans, I wanted to go back to Africa. So that’s what I did.”

Lee stayed in Nigeria and was coaching high school track when he died on May 19. During the 1980s, he worked on the Madagascar Project, which includes providing a fresh water supply, power, electricity, farming, and transportation for people in Africa. In 1991, he was a recipient of a Nelson Mandela Award given to those who “stood for the values of equality and friendship and respect of human rights, against apartheid and any form of racism.”


Lee Evans after winning gold in the 400m at the 1968 Mexico Olympics. Photo: U.S. Olympic Archive

 

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Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/take-the-real-texas-values-quiz-en.html

A challenge from the Revcoms:

Take the "REAL Texas Values" Quiz

| revcom.us

 

Governor Greg Abbott boasts that he is a “conservative leader who fights to preserve Texas values like faith, family, and freedom.” But what is the truth about “Texas values”? What do Abbott and others like him hold dear? What is the state’s history and current reality? How have these Texas values developed and been expressed over 200 years? It is important to know the history of this—so take a look, take the challenge—take the “REAL Texas Values Quiz.”

 

1. The Alamo is:

  1. A sacred shrine to the heroes of Texas independence, the “cradle of Texas liberty.”
  2. A white supremacist monument to enslavement of Black people, genocide of Native Americans, and theft of a large part of Mexico.
  3. The name for numerous tamale shops across the state.
  4. Spanish for cottonwood tree.

Answer.

 

2. The Texas Rangers are:

  1. Courageous defenders of liberty and freedom.
  2. Featured in a TV show starring Chuck Norris that glorifies police brutality.
  3. A pack of racist murderers who began as Indian killers and slave hunters, and in later years carried out atrocities including murder, rape, arson, and theft against people of Mexican descent along the U.S.-Mexico border.
  4. A professional baseball team.

Answer.

 

3. True or False: In 1998, decades after the reign of lynch-mob terror had supposedly ended, and 133 years after the end of the Civil War, a Black man was savagely lynched in the East Texas town of Jasper.

Answer.

 

4. La Matanza (The Massacre) was a systematic slaughter of people of Mexican descent in West and South Texas in the early 1900s. How many people are estimated to have been murdered?

  1. About 400
  2. Between 700 and 1,000
  3. About 5,000
  4. Less than 100

Answer.

 

5. What event from 1916 in Waco was scheduled to be commemorated with a state historical marker on May 15, 2021?

Answer.

 

6. Mirabeau B. Lamar:

  1. Was the second president of the Republic of Texas.
  2. Is considered the “Father of Texas Education”; a university in Beaumont and schools across the state are named after him.
  3. Instituted a system of rigidly segregated public schools.
  4. Called for and led genocidal campaigns of “total extinction or expulsion” of Native Americans who had been living in what became Texas for hundreds of years before whites arrived.

Answer.

 

7. True or False: Police in Dallas put a gun to the head of a 12-year-old boy and blew his brains out in their police car.

Answer.

 

8. Paris, Texas has a 20-foot statue of “Jesus in Cowboy Boots” as one of its most prominent landmarks. What else is Paris known for?

Answer.

 

9. In the mid-1960s to the mid-1970s, Houston Police:

  1. Shot a barrage of over 5,000 rounds into the men’s dormitory of Texas Southern University, a historically Black college.
  2. Assassinated 21-year-old Carl Hampton, leader of Peoples Party II, at its headquarters on Dowling Street (now Emancipation Avenue).
  3. Had open KKK members in its ranks.
  4. Savagely beat José Campos Torres, a young Chicano vet, and threw him in Buffalo Bayou, where he drowned.

Answer.

 

10. True or False: Texas has, by far, more people behind bars than any other state.

Answer.

 

Download PDF of the Quiz

 

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Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/may-30-update-from-the-emergency-campaign-en.html

May 30 Update from the Emergency Campaign to Free Iran's Political Prisoners

"Unbearable"—The Lives of Iran's Political Prisoners Hang in the Balance
Global Outcry Urgently Needed—We Must ACT Now!

| revcom.us

 


Composite photo of dual nationals being held as prisoners in Iran.

 

“Unbearable.” That’s the title of Reza Khandan’s gut-wrenching Ms. Magazine report from Iran’s Qarchak prison for women. Khandan is the husband of attorney Nasrin Sotoudeh, who is imprisoned there for the “crime” of representing activists for human and women’s rights.

What is so “unbearable”? “Entering these cells is like being transported back to the Middle Ages,” Khandan writes, into a dungeon “of overcrowding, under-feeding, torture and rape” that inmates call “the end of the world.”

“Unbearable” doesn’t just apply to Qarchak. It applies to all Iranian prisons, the country’s entire “judicial” system, and the dire situation facing ALL its political prisoners.

“Unbearable” is a cry from the heart—and a call to ACT!

June 13—A Moment to Act!

On June 13, a group of political prisoners will appear in court in Tehran, possibly for sentencing. This must be met by an international outcry demanding their immediate, unconditional release—in Germany and England where two of these prisoners are citizens, and in the U.S., which has contributed so mightily to the suffering of the Iranian people, from the bloody CIA coup in 1953 right up today through America’s killer sanctions and threats of war.

The group will reportedly include Nahid Taghavi (a German-Iranian dual citizen) and possibly Mehran Raoof (a British-Iranian dual citizen) and/or a number of other women political prisoners.

Any sentences they receive would be totally arbitrary and illegitimate—just as their arrests and imprisonment.

“These people do not belong in jail in the first place,” states the director of the Center for Human Rights in Iran, Hadi Ghaemi, speaking of Taghavi and Raoof. Amnesty International has declared these two prisoners of conscience. They could be charged with the catch-all “spreading propaganda against the state.” That is, thought crimes or comments critical of Iran’s regime of medieval theocratic fundamentalists. Taghavi has been transferred once again to the general population at Evin Prison after months in solitary. By the time he appears in court, Mehran Raoof will have been in solitary confinement for eight straight months—a blatant form of torture.

Iran’s Judicial System—An Illegitimate, Criminal Machine for Enforcing Theocratic Terror & Tyranny

Iran’s judicial “process” is no more about justice than an inquisition “court” in which a woman’s ability to survive an attempted drowning is deemed proof she’s a witch.

Iran doesn’t hold trials in any meaningful or recognizable sense of the word.

If you’re arrested, you aren’t considered innocent until proven guilty, just the opposite. A defendant rarely has access to a lawyer and is at the mercy of the interrogator. Forced “confessions” under torture are a routine feature of these Islamic fundamentalist courts, used to prove the victim’s “guilt.” Amnesty International documents that those tortures are “widespread” and include “beatings, floggings, electric shocks, stress positions, mock executions, waterboarding, sexual violence, forced administration of chemical substances, and deprivation of medical care.”

Iran’s lawyers generally don’t get case files until right before court hearings, and are then prevented from waging any serious defense. They are often under threats or jailed themselves for defending political dissidents, as has happened to Nasrin Sotoudeh.

Nahid Taghavi’s lawyer, for example, was only given access to her case file four days before her first court appearance on April 28, 2021, and she could not even meet with him.

(For a chilling description of how drastically Iran’s Kafkaesque judiciary restricts defense attorneys, see “Walking in a Minefield Without a Map: The Life of an Iranian Human Rights Lawyer,” Center for Human Rights in Iran, April 15, 2021.)

The guilty verdict is usually already decided before the court date. The hearing might last 10 minutes and the sentence is generally determined by the prosecutor/interrogator more than the judge. “What we have is interrogators working on behalf of security agencies who bring the charges—and the judges have no independence,” Hadi Ghaemi explains. “They just rubberstamp the indictment brought by the prosecutor working with interrogators, and even the sentences are based on what interrogators tell them.”

Iran’s judiciary, like the rest of the IRI’s theocratic/misogynistic regime, consistently singles out women for the most vengeful punishment if they resist their oppression and revolt.

Prisoners are routinely sentenced to medieval punishments, like lashings, and more than 200 were executed last year.

Lashes is a sanitary and clinical word for the barbaric ripping of human flesh. A January 2017 report by Amnesty International, “Iran: Wave of Floggings, Amputations, and other Vicious Punishments,”  documents how widely these depraved punishments are carried out in Iran.

Nasrin Sotoudeh’s case is one outrageous example: she was sentenced to 78 lashes for daring to defend the “girls of revolution street”—women who refused to wear the hijab (head covering) and protested in public.

If this doesn’t shock your conscience, what will?

The Lives of Iran’s Political Prisoners Hang in the Balance—We Must ACT Now

All this underscores the urgency of signing and very widely circulating the Campaign’s Emergency Appeal: The Lives of Iran’s Political Prisoners Hang in the Balance—We Must ACT Now.

This Appeal needs to be published soon and we call on all those who have not signed it to do so, and all who have signed to circulate it.

Go to our website for a beginning list of signatories, and watch for upcoming calls for funds, support, and further plans leading to June 13. There you can also sign up to volunteer for the Emergency Campaign, find ways to help, and encourage others to do likewise via the new What We Can Do tab.

We must make our outcry heard around the world including inside Iran.

Our demand to Iran’s regime—free all the political prisoners NOW!

To the U.S. government—no war threats and lift the sanctions!


Meet some of the women and men who've been jailed in Iran for peaceful actions. #FreeThemAll

Forced "confessions" under torture are a routine feature of these Islamic fundamentalist courts, used to prove the victim's "guilt." Amnesty International documents those tortures are "widespread" and include "beatings, floggings, electric shocks, stress positions, mock executions, waterboarding, sexual violence, forced administration of chemical substances, and deprivation of medical care." Photo: Amnesty International

The Persecution, Re-Persecution, and Heroic Resistance of Narges Mohammadi

Narges Mohammadi is a defiant, courageous, and world-renowned representative of the Defenders of Human Rights Center in Iran. Her case captures the tyrannical, fascist character of Iran’s legal system.

She was recently released after having been imprisoned for nearly six years of an original 16-year sentence. During her imprisonment, she was brutalized and sexually assaulted. She describes one incident in which the prison doctor was so brutal that her interrogator had to leave the room. Yet she continues to courageously resist. (See her new interview in Farsi describing in gruesome detail the “white torture” of prolonged solitary confinement. An unofficial/rough English translation by a campaign volunteer is linked here.)

Now, suddenly, on May 22, she was sentenced once again—to two and a half years in prison, two fines, and 80 lashes! Her crime? Reportedly propaganda against the regime “for campaigning against the death penalty and participating in a sit-in in prison in December 2019 to protest the killing of anti-government protesters a month earlier,” according to news reports. In an Instagram post, Mohammadi said one of her charges was having a party and dancing while in prison. She declared she will not “accept any of these sentences.”

Her treatment portends the possible horrors all other political prisoners face, and her courage should inspire all of us to fight for her and all Iran’s political prisoners.

 

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Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/701/natl-revolution-tour-fund-drive-page-en.html

Donate to the National Tour to Get Organized for an ACTUAL Revolution

| revcom.us

 

“Let’s get down to basics: We need a revolution—nothing less!”

— Declaration from the revcoms:
A Call to Get Organized Now For a Real Revolution

 

Revolution will not happen without financial support from the people themselves – those who catch the most hell under this system, and all those who are sick and tired of living in a world where people are treated as less than human.  If you want to get free... if you want humanity to get free... you need to be part of taking responsibility for this.  This means contributing funds and raising funds from others for the revolution necessary to bring a whole new world into being.

Funds are needed to print materials, for transportation, advertising, support for the frontline revolutionary fighters who are currently on a National Tour, now focused in LA, to run the revcom.us website and to produce the weekly YouTube show, The RNL – Revolution, Nothing Less! – Show which are providing national leadership and guidance for this revolution.

There's nothing more important to contribute funds to than the work being done NOW to organize forces for real revolution.

For ways to donate, go HERE

Family Members of People Murdered by Cops
Call on You to:
DONATE GENEROUSLY TO THE NATIONAL REVOLUTION TOUR!

Read more

New Donor Statements

Updated May 19, 2021

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Downloadable posters for the National Fundraising Week now available

Find them here

 

FUND THE REVOLUTION: Fundraising Livestream for the National Revolution Tour

  • Venmo: “@RevolutionTour”
  • CashApp: $revtour
  • Send a check or money order,
    payable to RCP Publications,
    memo line: National Revolution Tour.
  • Mail to:
    RCP Publications
    Box 3486, Merchandise Mart
    Chicago, IL 60654-0486

 

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/bob-avakian-the-racist-tulsa-massacre-en.html

THE RACIST TULSA MASSACRE: THE MOST PROFOUND LESSON

by Bob Avakian

| revcom.us

 

This year is the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa massacre in 1921, in which armed mobs of racist white people, including many police, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, slaughtered hundreds of Black people, terrorized thousands, and burned down a thriving Black community, with its churches, hospitals, homes, schools, libraries, and businesses. And this kind of murderous oppression is still going on, in many horrific ways, under the rule of this system—in this country and worldwide.

CASE CLOSED. This system, from the start, and right down to today, is guilty of the most atrocious crimes against humanity.

It will never stop doing this—it can never stop—so long as it is in power and in effect. That is a lesson that we need to firmly grasp—and act on!

The question is not whether this system of capitalism-imperialism needs to go, but how soon it can be swept away by the revolutionary struggle of millions of people who are sickened and outraged by the reality that things like the Tulsa massacre are not some kind of “exception” but the “rule”—a concentration of what this system is all about and how it treats masses of people not only in this country but all over the world.

 

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/bob-avakian-the-racist-tulsa-massacre-part-2-en.html

THE RACIST TULSA MASSACRE—
PART 2: SOME IMPORTANT QUESTIONS
AND A DEFINITE CONCLUSION

by Bob Avakian

| revcom.us

 

With the 100th anniversary this year of the Tulsa massacre in 1921, in which armed mobs of racist white people, including many police, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, slaughtered hundreds of Black people, terrorized thousands, and burned down a thriving Black community, with its churches, hospitals, homes, schools, libraries, and businesses—these questions cry out:

How many politicians at the time, of either the Republican or Democratic Party, condemned this racist massacre?

In the face of this massacre, and everything it was part of and concentrated, how many of these politicians did not continue proclaiming: “This is the greatest country in the world”?

The answers are obvious.

And how about now:

In spite of everything that has been brought to light about the reality of this country and its actual history, how many of these ruling class politicians today do not keep on calling this “the greatest country in the world”?

This answer, too, should be obvious.

And here is the obvious, definite conclusion: This system is guilty of the most monstrous crimes—and so are its representatives, functionaries, and enforcers, including those who say things like, “Yes, we have the ‘original sin’ of slavery, and we still have problems like systemic racism, but this is the greatest country in the world, and we are working to become a ‘more perfect union.’”

BULLSHIT!

Your system has always committed, and right now is committing, horrendous crimes against humanity and war crimes against masses of people here and the masses of humanity everywhere. 

And, as I said in Part 1 (The Tulsa Massacre: The Most Profound Lesson): This system will never stop doing this—it can never stop—so long as it is in power and in effect. That is a lesson that we need to firmly grasp—and act on!

And:

The question is not whether this system of capitalism-imperialism needs to go, but how soon it can be swept away by the revolutionary struggle of millions of people who are sickened and outraged by the reality that things like the Tulsa massacre are not some kind of “exception” but the “rule”—a concentration of what this system is all about and how it treats masses of people not only in this country but all over the world.1

 


1. The Tulsa Massacre: The Most Profound Lesson, by Bob Avakian is available at revcom.us.  [back]

 

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/statements-demanding-la-sheriffs-grant-permit-to-march-june-12-en.html

STATEMENTS DEMANDING THE LA SHERIFF GRANT THE REVOLUTION CLUB A PERMIT TO MARCH ON SATURDAY, JUNE 12, 2PM, SOUTHWEST COLLEGE THROUGH THE WESTMONT NEIGHBORHOOD TO THE LA SHERIFF'S STATION SOUTH

TO "Show the World: We Are Getting Organized Now For REVOLUTION, NOTHING LESS!"

| revcom.us

 

Editors' Note: On June 2, a press conference was held in front of the Los Angeles Sheriff's Station South to demand that the Sheriff's Department reverse their outrageous decision to deny a permit for the Revolution Club to march on June 12. The march will start at Southwest College, LA and march through the neighborhood to the Sheriff's station. The press conference was MC'ed by Michelle Xai of the Revolution Club and featured a number of speakers: Noche Diaz, national spokesperson for the Revolution Clubs (see edited excerpts from his remarks here); Rev. Nathaniel Martin, president of the National Action Network, LA Chapter; Rev. Frank Wulf, pastor, Echo Park United Methodist Church; and Emanuel Padilla, activist. Below are statements from a number of people who were not able to attend the press conference (Emanuel Padilla read his statement at the press conference).

From Sequarier McCoy, aunt of Dijon Kizzee, killed by LASD in 2020

I am in favor of RevCom getting their permit! We don't need the police to cover the event or events in the future. We, the community, have and will continue to use our First Amendment rights. I am asking the Board of Supervisors to please grant us our rights without the control of the police. Most of the violence in our neighborhood is from the police killing us. Please let us speak freely, walk freely, and express freely. Since my nephew was murdered, that's the best coping I can practice until justice is served.

 

*********

From Stephen Rohde, Civil rights activist, retired First Amendment lawyer, and author of American Words of Freedom and Freedom of Assembly

THE LA SHERIFF’S DECISION TO DENY PERMIT FOR LAWFUL PROTEST IS AN OUTRAGEOUS VIOLATION OF THE FIRST AMENDMENT

The LA Sheriff’s decision to deny a permit for sound and road closures for the June 12 ‘Show the World: We Are Getting Organized Now For REVOLUTION, NOTHING LESS!’ is an outrageous violation of the First Amendment guarantees of Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Assembly, and the Right to Petition the Government for Redress of Grievances. 

This is a blatant act of prior restraint, which attempts to unconstitutionally silence protected political speech even before it is spoken.

In the Rights of Man in 1791, Thomas Paine celebrated the right “to speak, write, and publish freely” and affirmed that “speech is one of the natural rights of men always retained” against every government.

The Sheriff is doing what repressive regimes are doing all around the world.  This should not be happening in the United States of America. 

The Sheriff and/or the LA County Board of Supervisors must overturn this unconstitutional and arbitrary denial and grant the full permit immediately.

 

*********

From Elly Levy, Attorney-at-Law and Anti-Fascist Activist

I stand in support of the Revolution's Club's right to have its march permit granted without undue hinderance or delay. The LASD's blanket reasons supporting the permit's denial appear utterly spurious to me given the Sheriff's ability to over-police the relevant part of the county with ample human resources on any given day—prospective "unruly" activity is precisely the kind of activity that the Department is expected, and should be able, to manage.

One will be hard pressed to find a single instance where any march held by the Revolutionary Club was ever blemished by violence or property destruction. The Sheriff's denial letter fails to cogently articulate exactly how a relatively few units otherwise attendant to the proposed peaceful march would inhibit normal police protection to the outlying area. The Department fails to articulate, with particularity, the specific evidence it has to support a finding that specifically on the proposed date, that this specific group, with its planned non-violent march, would lead to the likelihood of violence or destruction to property.

Given the lack of specificity and cogent articulation as to why the contemplated march will exact an onerous burden on the Department and why it is likely to be unruly despite no evidence of same, such being warranted to restrict an exercise of free speech, I am left to surmise that the Sheriff's department is simply providing all-catch excuses so as to be able to discriminate against the content of the speech anticipated at the march that simply does not sit well with the Department.

In short, the denial of subject permit is nothing less than an unconstitutional and deliberate infringement on the right of a fairly small group with a a not-so-popular political opinion that does not curry much favor with the Department.

The Sheriff's Department should be reminded that it is precisely those not-so-popular types of speech that our constitution's first amendment was contemplated to protect.

 

*********

From Isabel Cardenas, American-Salvadoran / U.S. Citizen and Community Activist since 1960

I’m with you all the way… we all understand the LA Sheriffs are trying to stop the Revolution Club from doing what they have the right to do, march under the banner of “Revolution, Nothing Less.” This is the only organization that has the chutzpah, the courage, to say it like it really is – what is really going on. All of us who have signed the Demand Letter know what this is about. This is a protest – they can’t stop us. I’ve seen the cops brutalize people who have been protesting – tackling people and smashing their faces. And it’s the LA Sheriffs who do this... We have talked in progressive religious circles about the mass incarceration and police murder going on for years and years and years! When is this going to stop!?

 

*********

From Emanuel Padilla, Activist

LASD’s excuse for not granting permission to protest is as ridiculous as when they show up in military gear for a bunch of citizens with protest signs. We have seen time and again that the only manner they respond in is with violence and intimidation. When I was falsely charged and placed in jail last year on trumped up charges, it was clear that their intention was to intimidate all of the people of Los Angeles into backing down from any further protest against police brutality. But I nor any of my fellow protesters will be deterred from exercising our first amendment rights. At times like these I am reminded of the saying, all that is required for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing. What can we as good people do when evil is protected by unjust laws and a badge? As civil rights icon John Lewis would say, get in good trouble.

*********

"What is the message that has gotten these LA Sheriffs all shaken?

"June 12th ... a force that is getting ready to actually get rid of this system!"

Comments from Noche Diaz, national spokesperson for the Revolution Clubs, at the June 2 press conference.

Read more

Letter from the ACLU of Southern California "Re: Reversing Los Angeles Sheriff's Department's Denial of Event Permit for the Revolution Club."


Click here to download PDF of complete letter.

A Call to All Who Want a Better World...
June 12, 2021 MARCH!

From Southwest College, Los Angeles to the LA County Sheriffs

Show the World:
We Are Getting Organized Now For
REVOLUTION, NOTHING LESS!

 

 

Follow: @TheRevcoms
Read: www.revcom.us
Watch: youtube.com/TheRevComs

 

Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/what-is-the-message-that-has-gotten-these-la-sheriffs-all-shaken-en.html

What is the message that has gotten these LA Sheriffs all shaken?

June 12th ... a force that is getting ready to actually get rid of this system!

| revcom.us

 

Editors' Note: These are edited excerpts of comments by Noche Diaz of the Revolution Clubs at the June 2 press conference held to protest the denial of the permit by the LA County Sheriff's Department for a march by the revcoms on June 12. Upon review, Noche made some additions to the remarks he made at the press conference.

I’m Noche Diaz, I’m a national spokesperson for the Revolution Clubs. I’m going to start off by expressing appreciation for those who have come, those who have been part of signing this statement demanding a reversal of this denial of the permit—Reverend Wulf, Reverend Nathaniel, Emanuel, and all the other people who have signed this letter that has been sent. And I want to say a couple of things about June 12th.

What is the message that has gotten these LA Sheriffs all shaken?

June 12th, we’re going to be starting at LA Southwest College, LA on Western and Imperial. We’re going to be marching through this neighborhood, and ending at this sheriff’s station. This march is open to everyone who wants to see a different world. Everyone who cannot stand the way things are and has the heart to fight for something worth fighting for.

What we have already heard about these sheriffs—the murder of Dijon Kizzee and Andŕes Guadardo, and the other 300 people they have killed over the last 21 years, the day in, day out terror that they inflict on the people in this neighborhood who describe feeling as if they’re going through their lives hunted like animals—this would be reason enough for us to be marching on June 12th to demand “Revolution, Nothing Less,” to show the world that we are getting organized for revolution, nothing less. Unfortunately, though, it is not the only reason we are marching.

The fact is that today, very literally we can say, there may be no future at all, and certainly there is no future worth living for, if we continue to live under this system. But on June 12th, we’ll be marching these streets to show everyone that there is a purpose and a future worth living and fighting for—revolution, nothing less. On June 12th, we will not be marching here to beg these oppressors to murder us a little bit less or to be a little bit nicer as they carry out their oppression and terror. We won’t be doing that because we understand, and people more broadly need to understand, that these sheriffs and the police just like them, not only in this city but across this country, and the military of the United States around the world, enforce a system of capitalism-imperialism, of oppression and madness, here and throughout the world. People need to understand that, and people need to be and people need to see a force that is fighting for a whole different world. A future without white supremacy, male supremacy, the demonization of immigrants, the wars for empire, and the destruction of the environment and the planet we live on.

People need to become, and people need to see, a force that is preparing, that is building strength and organizing forces, for a time when millions can go up against this system, bring it down through a revolution, and dismantle and defeat the violent instruments and tools that enforce this system. We’ll be marching on June 12th through these streets to show people we don’t have to look to and follow the leaders that are trotted out in front of us, that keep us playing around for centuries, with changes that help only a few while keeping this whole thing going.

We’ll be letting people know there is leadership to look to and follow if you want to get free, and that’s Bob Avakian, who’s got a way to end all this madness. Recently, Bob Avakian commented on the 100-year anniversary of Tulsa, Oklahoma, the white racist riot and massacre of Black people in Tulsa, Oklahoma. And looking at that incident and the whole history of this country, Bob Avakian said, the question is not if this whole system needs to go, it’s how soon can we get rid of it. And June 12th, we’re bringing those days closer.

June 12th, we’ll be marching these streets because people need to be, and people need to see, a force that is getting ready to actually get rid of this system. And this is totally legal. What we are doing June 12th is not only very legal, it’s very needed. We are training people now to be a disciplined and determined force, to not get provoked into foolishness that these sheriffs will try to start. We are training people to be disciplined and determined to not back down or back off from this goal of emancipating all of humanity.

As our Points of Attention in the Revolution Club say, Number 6, we are serious about an actual overthrow of this system and a whole better way beyond the destructive and vicious conflicts of today. And because we are serious, at this stage, we do not initiate violence, and we oppose all violence against the people and among the people. And I say this because the reasons that these sheriffs have given to deny us a permit for June 12th are ridiculous. The idea that they don’t have enough resources and police to police people to allow them to be able to speak out, is ridiculous on its face. It’s embarrassing to even talk about here. And two, the idea that over this last year, they talk about “unruly” protests—let me tell you about unruly, how people and property were destroyed.

Dijon Kizzee was murdered, first of all. And people who came out to protest the violence of these sheriffs were met with more brutality and more terror. A comrade in the Revolution Club was urinating blood for days after marching in these streets and being hit by rubber bullets and being attacked by these police. And for them, to be able to declare any protest against their violence as “unlawful assembly,” to attack it the way they did, and then to use their violence to declare that people don’t have the right to march in the streets any more, is not just hypocrisy, it is deadly fascist logic that we all need to oppose.

Nobody should accept this bunch of unruly, out-of-control white supremacist, gang-infested LA Sheriff's determining who gets the right to march around. Nobody should accept a future that people like that are trying to bring into being where people’s rights are shredded or essentially made meaningless by this kind of circular logic of an open dictator and oppressor. And we, all of us, should refuse to accept slavery in any form, and be organizing to put an end to all oppression. And June 12th, that is why we are going to be marching in the streets. That is why this permit should be granted… because we’re not just going to be in a corner somewhere, or giving them excuses to attack people who march, when they see people who they brutalize every day marching in the streets together with people from all over the city, demanding a whole different world. We can’t allow them to use any excuse or pretense to attack that, when people are already beaten down so much already. When they lift their heads, everyone should be at their side and at their back and say, we are standing together. And this march should go through these streets. And we should be loud, and we should have a truck. And we should take the streets.

So June 12th, this is the message, this is what we are doing. And this is why we demand a reversal of the decision to deny the permit for the Revolution Club marching on June 12th. In fact when we seize power, people who oppose our rule will have every right to march, to protest against us—and the opposition against us will even be funded—look at the Constitution of the New Socialist Republic of North America, authored by Bob Avakian. There has never been a founding document like this on history. 

But coming back to this June 12th—under this system: This is why we express our appreciation and thanks to everyone who has stood together with us in demanding a reversal of this decision—not just for our right to speak, but for what kind of future and what kind of society, and what kind of means we’re going to have to even fight for a different world. Thank you, sisters and brothers.

A Call to All Who Want a Better World...
June 12, 2021 MARCH!

From Southwest College, Los Angeles to the LA County Sheriffs

Show the World:
We Are Getting Organized Now For
REVOLUTION, NOTHING LESS!

 

When we seize power, it's going to be radically different...

Bob Avakian on Constitutions, law, dissent, intellectual and cultural ferment, and the right to protest... for a radically different world!


Editors' Note: Bob Avakian (BA) has done tremendous work, and forged breakthroughs on what the law needs to enshrine in principles for a just society. Here are just a few samples:  


Some excerpts by and about BA on Law, Justice, and Ending Oppression and Exploitation

1. From the NEW YEAR’S STATEMENT BY BOB AVAKIAN: A New Year, The Urgent Need For A Radically New World—For The Emancipation Of All Humanity

[In regard to the Constitution for a New Socialist Republic in North America, which he authored, BA writes:]

It is a fact that, nowhere else, in any actual or proposed founding or guiding document of any government, is there anything like not only the protection but the provision for dissent and intellectual and cultural ferment that is embodied in this Constitution, while this has, as its solid core, a grounding in the socialist transformation of the economy, with the goal of abolishing all exploitation, and the corresponding transformation of the social relations and political institutions, to uproot all oppression, and the promotion, through the educational system and in society as a whole, of an approach that will “enable people to pursue the truth wherever it leads, with a spirit of critical thinking and scientific curiosity, and in this way to continually learn about the world and be better able to contribute to changing it in accordance with the fundamental interests of humanity.” All this will unchain and unleash a tremendous productive and social force of human beings enabled and inspired to work and struggle together to meet the fundamental needs of the people—transforming society in a fundamental way and supporting and aiding revolutionary struggle throughout the world—aiming for the final goal of a communist world, free from all exploitation and oppression, while at the same time addressing the truly existential environmental and ecological crisis, in a meaningful and comprehensive way, which is impossible under the system of capitalism-imperialism.

2. From Bob Avakian On Fascist Lunacy and “Woke Folk” Insanity: A New “Two Outmodeds”

"It has to be said—and cannot be overstated—that, in the world today, there can be no just society without the rule of law; there can be no rule of law without due process of law; and there can be no due process of law without the presumption of innocence (and that presumption of innocence must be real—and not a farce, as it is in this society)."

3.

 

Follow: @TheRevcoms
Read: www.revcom.us
Watch: youtube.com/TheRevComs

 

Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/news-flash-permit-granted.html

News Flash: Permit Granted for LA June 12 March

| revcom.us

 

We just learned that the LA County Sheriff's Department reversed itself and granted a permit to the Revolution Club to march on June 12 to “Show The World: We Are Getting Organized NOW For A Real Revolution.” While lawyers working with the Revolution Club are checking for loopholes, this does seem to mark an important initial victory for the Revcoms and for the right of the people to organize and manifest for revolution.

We are calling on all people who want this march to go forward to maintain their vigilance. And we are especially calling on people to come out to this march, and marches in unity with it in other cities! 

 

Follow: @TheRevcoms
Read: www.revcom.us
Watch: youtube.com/TheRevComs

 

Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

Get a free email subscription to revcom.us:



 


 

Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/rnl-show-episode-55-en.html

| revcom.us

 

Episode 55 of The RNL—Revolution, Nothing Less—Show!

"How soon can we sweep this system away?" Bob Avakian on Tulsa; June 12 MARCH for Revolution; and More

 

100 years since the white racist Tulsa Massacre, the truth must be confronted: This system cannot be reformed. It MUST be overthrown! This underscores the importance and urgency of the June 12 March in South Central LA (with support marches in NYC and Chicago) to show the world: “We are getting organized now for revolution, nothing less!” Everyone who dreams of a better world has a role to play.

On this week's episode of The RNL Show:

* Bob Avakian’s new statement, “THE RACIST TULSA MASSACRE—THE MOST PROFOUND LESSON,” on the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa Massacre and Destruction of Black Wall Street, as read by Carl Dix at Revolution Books in Harlem, New York City.

* “June 12: MARCH! Show the World: We Are Getting Organized Now For REVOLUTION, NOTHING LESS!” Andy Zee will take you to a press conference outside the LA Sheriff’s Office in South Central Los Angeles and bring alive the political fight that has been waged to reverse their denial of a permit to march to the Revcoms on June 12th.

The press conference featured Revolution Club National Spokesperson, Noche Diaz; a letter signed by a broad range of public figures; and statements from Rev. Nathaniel Martin (National Action Network, President, LA Chapter), Rev. Frank Wulf (Pastor, Echo Park United Methodist Church), and Emanuel Padilla (activist). Also, voices from members of the Revolution Club who have been out organizing for June 12th in the neighborhoods.

Newsflash. Victory! In the face of the many voices who raised the demand, the LA County Sheriff's Department has now granted a permit for the June 12 march. For more info go to revcom.us.

* Bob Avakian answers the question: “What would you say to youth who have been cast out by this system?” From the 2014 dialogue between Bob Avakian and Cornel West called “Revolution and Religion: The Fight for Emancipation and the Role of Religion.”

* There’s nothing more difficult, audacious, needed, or inspiring than a real revolution in this, the most powerful empire in the world. What gives us the nerve to dare—and how do we go about—organizing people into this revolution?

Sunsara Taylor will bring you segments from an important meeting of the Revolution Tour and others in Los Angeles, featuring segments of a speech and Q&A by Andy Zee. Andy draws from “A Declaration, A Call to Get Organized Now for A Real Revolution” to give guidance on how we need to—and can be—winning masses of people now to step into this revolution.

* In the face of a barbaric and woman-hating abortion ban in Texas, high school valedictorian Paxton Smith threw out her prepared and approved speech and used her platform to deliver a courageous speech decrying this assault on women. We bring this to you and insist: ABORTION ON DEMAND AND WITHOUT APOLOGY!

* “THE RACIST TULSA MASSACRE—PART 2: SOME IMPORTANT QUESTIONS AND A DEFINITE CONCLUSION,” by Bob Avakian as read by Andy Zee and Sunsara Taylor.

 

Like, Share, and Subscribe: youtube.com/therevcoms
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Donate and become a patron at patreon.com/TheRevcoms 

 

 

 

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Permalink: https://revcom.us/a/702/la-sheriff-tries-to-deny-permit-to-revcoms-sheriff-loses-en.html

LA Sheriffs Try to Deny Permit to the Revcoms to March on June 12... and the Sheriffs LOSE!

Updated | revcom.us

 

Editors’ Note: The following communiqué reports on an important development last week in the battle around the June 12 march in Los Angeles to “Show the World: We Are Getting Organized Now For REVOLUTION, NOTHING LESS!” Revcoms are going all out in the coming week to build for June 12. If you’re in the LA area, join the march (or marches happening in New York City and Chicago in conjunction with the LA march, if you’re in those areas). Get the word out to everyone you know. Check revcom.us every day to catch up on the latest developments and news on June 12 itself.

The Revcoms have called for everyone who cannot stand the way the world is, and have the heart to fight for something worth fighting for, to march Saturday, 2 p.m., June 12 to show the world we are getting organized now for Revolution—Nothing Less!

The LA Sheriffs tried to deny a permit for this march, but after an outpouring of protest they were forced to back off. Last week, the Revolution Club received a formal letter denying a permit for this march, signed by head Sheriff Alex Villanueva, with the bogus reasons that, 1. This Sheriff's station “does not have a sufficient number of patrol deputies... without inhibiting normal police protection to the rest of the unincorporated region nearby” and 2. “Past demonstrations within the last year at South LA Station became unruly, which ultimately resulted in injury to persons and property.”

First, the idea that they could deny the right of people to march and speak out because the sheriffs don’t have enough resources to shut them up is ridiculous on its face. Enough said about that.

Second, let’s talk about “unruly” and “injury to persons and property.” Dijon Kizzee was murdered by the LA Sheriffs. And people who came out to protest the violence of these sheriffs were met with more violence from the sheriffs, who shot tear gas and rubber bullets at gatherings for days, hitting children and sending people to the hospital. If they got away with this, they’d be able to declare any protest against their violence as “unlawful assembly,” viciously attack people the way they did last year, and then use their own violence to declare that people don’t have the right to march in the streets any more. This is not mainly hypocrisy, it is deadly fascist logic.

And by the way, when the revolution comes to power, people who oppose us will not only have every right to march and protest against us—that opposition against us will even be funded! Look at the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America, authored by the revolutionary leader Bob Avakian at revcom.us.

Nobody should accept these unruly, out-of-control, white supremacist gang-infested LA Sheriffs determining who gets to march, shredding up people’s rights, or making those rights meaningless. And a diverse group of voices DID come together to demand the march permit, including reverends, lawyers, professors, musicians, well-known actors, health care workers, activists, as well as people from South Central… Go to revcom.us for the full list. And WE WON!

Why Were the Sheriffs Shook... Why Did They Back Off… What Are the Key Lessons?

In short, one of the things common to all the brutes enforcing oppression is that they rely on keeping the people that they oppress most viciously feeling surrounded and powerless. The diverse voices speaking up showed the potential of different kinds of people from different parts of society coming together against the arbitrary authority of these sheriffs.

It also needs to be understood, the brutes enforcing this system FEAR the people they oppress. Yes, read that again. THEY. Fear. YOU. The system they enforce has no future—no way to END white supremacy, male supremacy, demonizing of immigrants, wars for empire, or the destruction of the environment—and they fear that millions of those who they have no answers for, and no future for, could have a real shot at ending this whole system if they get connected with Bob Avakian and the Revcoms, and started working together now for revolution.

Even when it seems like we’re all too fucked up, too busy going along with the way things are, or too busy fighting each other… the oppressors see, and fear that potential. Bob Avakian (BA) sees that potential too, he understands what the masses of people are capable of, fighting to emancipate all humanity… and far from fearing that potential, BA has dedicated his life to making that potential a reality.

This is especially true right now, when we live in times where society is tearing apart, and an opening for revolution could be seized on through this. We can’t afford to waste these rare times, and we can’t afford to waste the rare leadership we have in BA. June 12th, YOU need to march with the Revcoms. People need to be, and people need to see, a force of people fighting for a whole different world. People need to be, and people need to see, a force that is preparing conditions and building up strength, to get ready for when millions can be led to go all-out for revolution, dismantling and defeating the violent institutions that enforce this system.

A Call to All Who Want a Better World…

Saturday, June 12, 2 p.m. MARCH!

From Southwest College to the LA County Sheriffs

Show the World: We Are Getting Organized Now For REVOLUTION, NOTHING LESS!

March will start at the corner of Southwest College on Western Ave. and Imperial Hwy.

March through the neighborhood, to the South LA Sheriff’s Station, 1310 W. Imperial Hwy.

And to all those who want a better world, who want people to be able to raise their sights to a better world: YOU need to be there too on Saturday, June 12!

Download 11X17 flyer here (PDF)

Go Here for More Coverage of June 12

 

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Together, WE passed $40,000 in revcom's Winter fundraising campaign to “Transform Revcom.us’ Web Technology and Presence”!

Reaching this goal is a real achievement and a victory for the people of the world, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the dedicated efforts of many people working creatively and collectively to meet this pressing need: those who donated whether large or small contributions, who fundraised, who spread the campaign, who sent statements, who raised comments, questions, criticisms or suggestions – and of course those who worked so hard on modernizing and upgrading our web technology and presence. It all made a difference!

The Ongoing Need for Sustainers

During this four month fund drive, Revcom.us continued to incur thousands of dollars of costs each month for our office, maintaining our existing site and other expenses. But thanks to our existing monthly sustainers we were able to meet these expenses and use all the funds raised in the drive to transform the website.

So we encourage all our donors and those who’ve not yet donated to become monthly sustainers at whatever level you can afford.

Remember, humanity’s fate truly hinges on millions taking up the revolutionary science, strategy, and new communism brought forward by Bob Avakian which they can find at revcom.us.

You’ve read this article and now you need to be part of making sure revcom.us is able to make an urgently needed leap and transformation.

 

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