Tzadikim
11th September 2009, 11:28
I have recently 'converted' one of my very best friends, a former dockworker who was laid off by Ingram's Barge Company (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ingram_Barge_Company), to the cause of international socialism. He is not, 'by nature', a socialist; he holds many reactionary social positions; and yet he agrees with me on the essential necessity of an international movement of the proletariat.
Whether this 'conversion' holds once he again finds employment remains to be seen. But I will record here the gist of what I told him: I emphasized the fact that, under a socialist schema, he himself would have had a say in the long process of restructuring that, under capitalism, resulted in the loss of his job. He was highly receptive to council communism and the idea of direct worker control over industry.
My goal here, to wit, wasn't to necessarily convert him to any one socialist credo - I myself don't hold to any particular 'tendency'. It was, rather, to get him to understand the basic socialist point-of-view, and find his own thoughts within it.
Perhaps emphasizing the 'industrial democracy' aspects of socialism might be useful in raising class consciousness?
Whether this 'conversion' holds once he again finds employment remains to be seen. But I will record here the gist of what I told him: I emphasized the fact that, under a socialist schema, he himself would have had a say in the long process of restructuring that, under capitalism, resulted in the loss of his job. He was highly receptive to council communism and the idea of direct worker control over industry.
My goal here, to wit, wasn't to necessarily convert him to any one socialist credo - I myself don't hold to any particular 'tendency'. It was, rather, to get him to understand the basic socialist point-of-view, and find his own thoughts within it.
Perhaps emphasizing the 'industrial democracy' aspects of socialism might be useful in raising class consciousness?