Robert F. Williams and Arming African-Americans during Civil Rights Struggle

[tachosomoza]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_F._Williams


The local NAACP was working to integrate the public swimming pools. They organized peaceful demonstrations, but some drew gunfire. No one was arrested or punished, although law enforcement officers were present.[4]

Williams had already started the Black Armed Guard to defend the local black community from racist activity. At a time when gun ownership was fairly common in the South, KKK membership numbered some 15,000 locally.[citation needed] Black residents fortified their homes with sandbags and trained to use rifles in the event of night raids by the Klan.[5] In Negroes with Guns (Chap 4), Williams writes: “[R]acist consider themselves superior beings and are not willing to exchange their superior lives for our inferior ones. They are most vicious and violent when they can practice violence with impunity.”[6]

Followers attested to Williams' advocating the use of advanced powerful weaponry rather than more traditional firearms. Williams insisted his position was defensive, as opposed to a declaration of war. He called it "armed self-reliance" in the face of white terrorism. Threats against Williams' life and his family became more frequent. In 1959, Williams debated the merits of nonviolence with Martin Luther King Jr at the NAACP convention. His local NAACP chapter threatened him with suspension for six months because of his outspoken disagreements with the national leadership. He said his wife would take over his position and he would continue his leadership through her.


Williams went to Cuba by way of Canada and then Mexico. He regularly broadcast addresses to Southern blacks on "Radio Free Dixie", a station he established with assistance from Cuban President Fidel Castro and operated from 1962-1965. During the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, Williams used Radio Free Dixie to urge black soldiers in the U.S. armed forces, who were then preparing for a possible invasion of Cuba to eliminate the Soviet nuclear arsenal, to engage in insurrection against the United States. "While you are armed, remember this is your only chance to be free. . . . This is your only chance to stop your people from being treated worse than dogs. We'll take care of the front, Joe, but from the back, he'll never know what hit him. You dig?" [8]

During this stay, Mabel and Robert Williams published the newspaper, The Crusader. Williams wrote his book, Negroes With Guns, while in Cuba. It had a significant influence on Huey P. Newton, founder of the Black Panthers. Despite his absence from the United States, in 1964 Williams was elected president of the US-based Revolutionary Action Movement. .[9] In 1965 Williams traveled to Hanoi, then the capital of North Vietnam. He advocated armed violence against the United States during the Vietnam War, congratulated China on obtaining its own nuclear weapons (which Williams referred to as "The Freedom Bomb"), and sided with the North Vietnamese against the United States.[10]

If more guys like this were around, stuff would have happened a lot faster.

[S.Artesian]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_F._Williams
If more guys like this were around, stuff would have happened a lot faster.

No doubt about it, he is an important figure. But just as important, more important perhaps, are the thousands of newly emancipated slaves who joined the Union League Associations in the deep South after the US Civil War; formed militias, trained and engaged in armed conflict with the night-riders of the Klan and other terrorist organizations.

The other point to keep in mind about Williams is that without that mass struggle, and without that mass struggle becoming a class struggle, all that's left is nostalgia.

[RED DAVE]

In the 1960s, to call for armed insurrection, in the absence of working class moblization was (a) demagogic and (b) likely to get you killed.

This is exactly what happened. In fact, Panther mythology to the contrary, the Panthers never gained a significant base in the working class, not even the black working class. In fact, their relationship to the black community was largely rhetorical and a matter of publicity. (I worked directly with the Panthers in New York in the Cleaver Campaign. They had no significant presence in the huge black working class in the city, either in Brooklyn, where they had a small storefront, or in Harlem.)

Organizing work inside the working class was accomplished by groups such as the League of Revolutionary Black Workers, Dodge Revolutionary Union Movement, etc., who actually did organizing work in the factories.

The Panthers were destroyed by the cops and their own internal bullshit (stemming partially from their notion of revolution based on the lumben proletariat). Those latter groups were eventually defeated by a combination of the decline in working class militancy during the 1970s, a defeat which encompassed, eventually, the entire Left in the US, and sectarian infighting/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/League_of_Revolutionary_Black_Workers

In toto, the armed urban insurrections at the time accomplished no progressive political end. The most concrete demonstration of this was the fate of the various urban insurrections in the USA, especially in Detroit in 1967.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_Detroit_riot

RED DAVE

[syndicat]

The Panthers were destroyed by the cops and their own internal bullshit (stemming partially from their notion of revolution based on the lumben proletariat).

in the cities of the north and west there were huge problems of structural unemployment. when the huge migration from rural areas of the south took place the people who migrated had often been farm laborers who didn't have skills suited to an urban labor market. they faced that problem plus race discrimination. so if a huge portion of the black population is unemployed...whole families...it is sort of understandable why the Panthers focused on that population.

on the other hand, the one Panther member i knew in L.A. was a worker...he worked in cement finishing and in gas stations, which is how i met him. there certainly was also a large black working class...and the Panthers were oriented to "community organizing" ignored that population.

they also were influenced by ML 3rd world guerrillaist methods & regimes and engaged in nonsense like having "Ministers" of this and that.

[RED DAVE]

The Panthers were destroyed by the cops and their own internal bullshit (stemming partially from their notion of revolution based on the lumben proletariat).
in the cities of the north and west there were huge problems of structural unemployment. when the huge migration from rural areas of the south took place the people who migrated had often been farm laborers who didn't have skills suited to an urban labor market. they faced that problem plus race discrimination. so if a huge portion of the black population is unemployed...whole families...it is sort of understandable why the Panthers focused on that population.There is a difference between unemployed sectors of the working class and the lumpen proletariat. In any event, the lumpen proletariat is unstable politically and to try to base revolutionary practice (and theory) on them is politically pissing in the wind.


on the other hand, the one Panther member i knew in L.A. was a worker...he worked in cement finishing and in gas stations, which is how i met him. there certainly was also a large black working class...and the Panthers were oriented to "community organizing" ignored that population.Individual Panthers were often working class, but the nonworking class orientation of the group was clear.


they also were influenced by ML 3rd world guerrillaist methods & regimes and engaged in nonsense like having "Ministers" of this and that.This.

RED DAVE

[Cory]

Another idea that would alienate the white working-class from the left. Great.

[thesadmafioso]

Class struggle does not rely upon or demand divisions of race for its success, as it is just that, a class struggle. If anything we should be attempting to move beyond these constructs in the name of fostering unity within the working class, not promoting efforts which are based upon them.

Glaring faults in political tactics and materialist analysis aside for just a moment, I could understand if he was calling for a broader proletarian based opposition to the perverse and deplorable discrimination and racism seen in the American South, but he did no such thing.

[S.Artesian]

Class struggle does not rely upon or demand divisions of race for its success, as it is just that, a class struggle. If anything we should be attempting to move beyond these constructs in the name of fostering unity within the working class, not promoting efforts which are based upon them.

Glaring faults in political tactics and materialist analysis aside for just a moment, I could understand if he was calling for a broader proletarian based opposition to the perverse and deplorable discrimination and racism seen in the American South, but he did no such thing.


Wait a minute-- you're criticizing Williams for not being a Marxist? OK, he wasn't a Marxist. But let's put this in historical context. Segregation still being the law of the land despite various court decisions, laws, demonstrations etc. Execution of civil rights workers taking place. Assaults on black people actually increasing.

The US labor movement... ah, well the AFL"talks" integration, walks segregation. The CIO unions? Certainly not much better. Class conscious movement among white workers taking the lead against racism? Articulating and enforcing equality in the work place and in the streets? Not in this United States.

He was, in essence, calling for the poorest, most exploited, most attacked people in the United States to defend themselves, to meet violence with violence. And you know what? That works. To a point. The Klan does not attack armed black militant organizations. It will not attack unarmed blacks when it knows retaliation is more than just a possibility.

Dividing the working class? Alienating white workers? The fact is the working class is divided-- but different historical evolutions within capitalism. The fact is many white workers were "alienated" by the fact they black workers appeared as competitors for jobs.

You want to criticize something? Criticize that.

And urging black soldiers not to follow orders and invade Cuba, but "turn the guns around"? That is exactly what every Marxist would agitate for among the enlisted troops.

[thesadmafioso]

Wait a minute-- you're criticizing Williams for not being a Marxist? OK, he wasn't a Marxist. But let's put this in historical context. Segregation still being the law of the land despite various court decisions, laws, demonstrations etc. Execution of civil rights workers taking place. Assaults on black people actually increasing.

The US labor movement... ah, well the AFL"talks" integration, walks segregation. The CIO unions? Certainly not much better. Class conscious movement among white workers taking the lead against racism? Articulating and enforcing equality in the work place and in the streets? Not in this United States.

He was, in essence, calling for the poorest, most exploited, most attacked people in the United States to defend themselves, to meet violence with violence. And you know what? That works. To a point. The Klan does not attack armed black militant organizations. It will not attack unarmed blacks when it knows retaliation is more than just a possibility.

Dividing the working class? Alienating white workers? The fact is the working class is divided-- but different historical evolutions within capitalism. The fact is many white workers were "alienated" by the fact they black workers appeared as competitors for jobs.

You want to criticize something? Criticize that.

And urging black soldiers not to follow orders and invade Cuba, but "turn the guns around"? That is exactly what every Marxist would agitate for among the enlisted troops.

I never said that this served to alienate white workers, just that it should be altered to include workers of whatever race they may be classified as. I only said that the fight against discrimination should be one undertaken by any and all politically conscious workers.

I am fully aware that workers of any 'racial' background can be led to the follies of racism by the dominant hegemony of capitalist culture, I just don't think that is an excuse to fight racism along lines so heavily defined by race. This is a struggle which is primarily one against false consciousness and the dissemination of bourgeois class interests and it transcends the rather simplistic barriers which you seem to of put forth for it.

And where exactly did I condemn the concept of revolutionary defeatism? I am perfectly in favor of soldiers disobeying orders to engage in imperialistic activity, I just don't think that as fluid and indefinable a construct as race should serve as the primary criteria behind its implementation. By saying that this is a valid approach, you are more or less buying into the legitimacy of the 'race' as it is imagined by the bourgeois intent on dividing the working class. If anything, I am embracing the idea of revolutionary defeatism on a scale much grander than the one which you seem to be supporting in this instance.

[S.Artesian]

I never said that this served to alienate white workers, just that it should be altered to include workers of whatever race they may be classified as. I only said that the fight against discrimination should be one undertaken by any and all politically conscious workers.

I am fully aware that workers of any 'racial' background can be led to the follies of racism by the dominant hegemony of capitalist culture, I just don't think that is an excuse to fight racism along lines so heavily defined by race. This is a struggle which is primarily one against false consciousness and the dissemination of bourgeois class interests and it transcends the rather simplistic barriers which you seem to of put forth for it.

And where exactly did I condemn the concept of revolutionary defeatism? I am perfectly in favor of soldiers disobeying orders to engage in imperialistic activity, I just don't think that as fluid and indefinable a construct as race should serve as the primary criteria behind its implementation. By saying that this is a valid approach, you are more or less buying into the legitimacy of the 'race' as it is imagined by the bourgeois intent on dividing the working class. If anything, I am embracing the idea of revolutionary defeatism on a scale much grander than the one which you seem to be supporting in this instance.

Right you didn't say that. I should have identified that as a response to Cory. But what you did say is:


Glaring faults in political tactics and materialist analysis aside for just a moment, I could understand if he was calling for a broader proletarian based opposition to the perverse and deplorable discrimination and racism seen in the American South, but he did no such thing.


And that just makes little sense to me, since I know what the historical context was, having participated in the civil rights movement. There are no glaring faults in "the political tactics" or "materialist analysis" in meeting the violence of Klan terrorists with violence. There's no failure because he "didn't call for a broader proletarian based opposition" There was no broader proletarian based opposition to appeal to.

[thesadmafioso]

Right you didn't say that. I should have identified that as a response to Cory. But what you did say is:



And that just makes little sense to me, since I know what the historical context was, having participated in the civil rights movement. There are no glaring faults in "the political tactics" or "materialist analysis" in meeting the violence of Klan terrorists with violence. There's no failure because he "didn't call for a broader proletarian based opposition" There was no broader proletarian based opposition to appeal to.

The temporary non existence of support doesn't mean that it should be forsaken. Yes, large swathes of the white working class were and in many cases still are fooled into adopting exceedingly racist tendencies as a result of the capitalist hegemony over culture. That is not to say the the entirety of the proletariat should of been ignored on the matter and that paramilitary opposition should be considered the most viable long term method in these matters.

I have to cede that it was a short term solution to preventing violence from groups like the KKK from spreading, that much is undeniable, but it still isn't one really worthy of anything beyond a limited and context dependent defense. There was no tie between this militancy and the working class and revolutionary Marxist theory was absent from these groups, thus they are really not much to marvel at from a materialist perspective.

[S.Artesian]

thus they are really not much to marvel at from a materialist perspective.

Maybe not from your perspective, but from a materialist perspective? mos def there was something to marvel at. I don't know where you were in the 50s and 60s, but there indeed was something to marvel at regarding the self-defense groups that were organized to defend the struggle of rural and urban black workers.

There was truly something to marvel at in the Lowndes County Black Panther Party for Self-Defense which predated the Oakland based BPP.

Any time, every time, the poor, the oppressed, the excluded defend themselves concretely is a time worth more than all the theoretically correct materialist perspectives combined.

That action, that organized defense is the only way class consciousness develops. The problem is not that poor blacks armed themselves, defended themselves without embracing the white proletariat, without articulating some "broader" class-wide perspective. The problem is that the white proletariat did not, would not, could recognize in those actions the only path to resisting what the bourgeoisie have inflicted upon workers everywhere for the last 35 years.

[thesadmafioso]

Maybe not from your perspective, but from a materialist perspective? mos def there was something to marvel at. I don't know where you were in the 50s and 60s, but there indeed was something to marvel at regarding the self-defense groups that were organized to defend the struggle of rural and urban black workers.

There was truly something to marvel at in the Lowndes County Black Panther Party for Self-Defense which predated the Oakland based BPP.

Any time, every time, the poor, the oppressed, the excluded defend themselves concretely is a time worth more than all the theoretically correct materialist perspectives combined.

That action, that organized defense is the only way class consciousness develops. The problem is not that poor blacks armed themselves, defended themselves without embracing the white proletariat, without articulating some "broader" class-wide perspective. The problem is that the white proletariat did not, would not, could recognize in those actions the only path to resisting what the bourgeoisie have inflicted upon workers everywhere for the last 35 years.

Pardon me if I prefer to stick to a more Marxist analysis of this matter and hold that paramilitary groups are not ideal organs of class interest. As has been previously stated, groups like the Black Panthers were based far too heavily upon the lumpen proletariat to be considered able to generate an understanding of class consciousness within the proletariat or to sustain a revolutionary movement.

Not only were they not focused on promoting class consciousness, they were without a proper understanding of Marx, meaning that they would hardly be capable of fostering it as they knew not of the workings of the concept to begin with.

Just the fact that you are dividing up the proletariat as the white and black proletariat shows a fundamental error in your understanding of this situation. This is a division which was fabricated by the earliest forerunners of the American bourgeois in the first British colonies on the continent, where the land and slave owners would use race as a means from preventing the predominately white indentured servants from allying with the primarily black slaves of the colony in the name of their collective liberation. The fact that you are operating under the presumption that this divide can be merely worked around in order to attain defensible long term progress is something which I find rather odd.

[S.Artesian]

Just the fact that you are dividing up the proletariat as the white and black proletariat shows a fundamental error in your understanding of this situation. This is a division which was fabricated by the earliest forerunners of the American bourgeois in the first British colonies on the continent, where the land and slave owners would use race as a means from preventing the predominately white indentured servants from allying with the primarily black slaves of the colony in the name of their collective liberation. The fact that you are operating under the presumption that this divide can be merely worked around in order to attain defensible long term progress is something which I find rather odd. __

The fact that you can make the above statement shows how little you know of the actual material development of US history, the US labor movement, and the US working class. The division of the working class into black and white was/is not a fabrication, but is the very material result of the material conditions you claim to regard as decisive.


There are specific differences in the historical development between white workers and black labor; slavery being one of those material differences, segregation being another, wage and job differentials being a third, opportunities for more skilled "craft"-type employment being another.

You can pretend all you want that "black and white unite and fight" manifests some sort of class consciousness. However, what is really contained in such an ideological, anti-historical prescription is an inability to apprehend the fragmentation of the working class by capitalism in its process of accumulation. This is not "false consciousness" we are talking about, but rather a real material difference in layers of the working class that immobilized some and propelled others.

Nobody needs to or has to glorify the Black Panther Party, or Robert F. Williams, but to criticize their calls for self-defense against racist attacks as anti-materialist, or "not appealing" to a wider proletarian base is to miss the point of the actual conditions of separation, exclusion, and aggrandizement of black labor that gave rise to this momentous, and essentially class, struggle.

[thesadmafioso]

The fact that you can make the above statement shows how little you know of the actual material development of US history, the US labor movement, and the US working class. The division of the working class into black and white was/is not a fabrication, but is the very material result of the material conditions you claim to regard as decisive.


There are specific differences in the historical development between white workers and black labor; slavery being one of those material differences, segregation being another, wage and job differentials being a third, opportunities for more skilled "craft"-type employment being another.

You can pretend all you want that "black and white unite and fight" manifests some sort of class consciousness. However, what is really contained in such an ideological, anti-historical prescription is an inability to apprehend the fragmentation of the working class by capitalism in its process of accumulation. This is not "false consciousness" we are talking about, but rather a real material difference in layers of the working class that immobilized some and propelled others.

Nobody needs to or has to glorify the Black Panther Party, or Robert F. Williams, but to criticize their calls for self-defense against racist attacks as anti-materialist, or "not appealing" to a wider proletarian base is to miss the point of the actual conditions of separation, exclusion, and aggrandizement of black labor that gave rise to this momentous, and essentially class, struggle.

I was only speaking to the initial formulation of the accumulation divide along racial lines, they have since taken up a material basis, but only as a result of this initial artificial division. I agree with your analysis beyond this point, but to ignore the importance of the role of this divide in the historical development which you described is simply foolish.

Though this is not to say that false consciousness is of no relevance to this situation, as it clearly is. The material divide between black and white workers is not substantial enough to justify their opposition to one another, as they are still members of the proletarian. This disunity and the value of any perception of substantial material divide is merely another result of false consciousness, as is the racist overtones which white workers use to justify such positions often times.

And I am not offering a unilateral rejection of self defense from violent racism, I am merely saying that paramilitary organizations are not a long term solution to such an intense state of reactionary thought and action. But the fact that these groups are generally based more around the lumpen proletariat as opposed to the actual proletariat makes them more or less insignificant to the larger class struggle.

[S.Artesian]

You locate the "initial divide" in the "separation" of the white indentured servants from black slaves, with that initial divide being a false consciousness.


First off, the white indentured servants were not slaves, were not chattel properly, could not be bought and sold in a commercial process, were not subject to a slave trade. In addition, indentured servitude was for a fixed period, at the end of which the servant was free. No such time limits existed in slavery. Moreover, children of indentured servants were not themselves indentured and could not be separated from the parent.

Most importantly, the importance of indentured servitude, the extent in space and time, is economically trivial in the development of the US economy. Not so the case of slavery which was absolutely essential to that development.

Those are the reasons that compel the conclusion that you know very little about material US history.

To the real material history of the development of US capitalism, and the different roles and functions of black workers and white workers you offer, not materialist analysis, but just the opposite-- the idealist notion of "false consciousness." False consciousness this and false consciousness that.

False consciousness is to the established "left" what "supply and demand" is to the established free marketeers-- the phrase used to describe everything and means nothing.

Anyone who thinks the BPP, warts and all, or Robert Williams, is "more or less insignificant to the larger class struggle" has no idea what that larger class struggle is.

[thesadmafioso]

You locate the "initial divide" in the "separation" of the white indentured servants from black slaves, with that initial divide being a false consciousness.


First off, the white indentured servants were not slaves, were not chattel properly, could not be bought and sold in a commercial process, were not subject to a slave trade. In addition, indentured servitude was for a fixed period, at the end of which the servant was free. No such time limits existed in slavery. Moreover, children of indentured servants were not themselves indentured and could not be separated from the parent.

Most importantly, the importance of indentured servitude, the extent in space and time, is economically trivial in the development of the US economy. Not so the case of slavery which was absolutely essential to that development.

Those are the reasons that compel the conclusion that you know very little about material US history.

To the real material history of the development of US capitalism, and the different roles and functions of black workers and white workers you offer, not materialist analysis, but just the opposite-- the idealist notion of "false consciousness." False consciousness this and false consciousness that.

False consciousness is to the established "left" what "supply and demand" is to the established free marketeers-- the phrase used to describe everything and means nothing.

Anyone who thinks the BPP, warts and all, or Robert Williams, is "more or less insignificant to the larger class struggle" has no idea what that larger class struggle is.

There is obviously a material difference between occupying the role of a slave and that of an indentured servant, but they shared a common interest in doing away with the same structure of power which oppressed those in both positions. Obviously slavery was a more dire situation, but that isn't to say that slaves could not of worked in conjunction with indentured servants against the ruling elites which repressed both classes.

The point still stands that much of the material difference as it exists along racial lines is the result of a deception of false consciousnesses as it was fabricated by the ruling class. This was an artificial barricade established to preserve the structure of power which allowed for indentured servants and for slaves to exist. It makes no sense to work around this barrier to unity in the proletariat, it is something which serves an inherently bourgeois purpose of solidifying their rule through cultural hegemony. It should be smashed in its entirety, not placated by working through organizations based along these racial frames.

Robert Williams might make for an interesting discussion on the demands on one particular historical era and a tactic with a limited sort of potential, but the actual theory which he practiced still refutes the core tenets of a Marxist analysis of historical development. How can he play a role in creating class consciousness and adding to the class struggle when he does not actually view history though the proper Marxist lens which allows for such to be examined and generated?

[ellipsis]

Off topic. Bring it back to Williams, or the thread will be closed. If you want me to split current disscussion to new thread, lemme know.

[S.Artesian]

Off topic. Bring it back to Williams, or the thread will be closed. If you want me to split current disscussion to new thread, lemme know.

This is definitely on topic-- it's about the his advocacy of arming African-Americans and whether that was part of raising class consciousness during the civil rights struggle or not.

You were expecting discussion of Williams' childhood? His hobbies? His favorite sports?

We're talking about historical personages here, people of some significance because they represent a current in a wider struggle, so of course we're going to enter into a discussion about the importance of race in the make-up and historical development of the working class in the US.

[ModelHomeInvasion]

ITT: People criticizing past black revolutionaries for not being inclusive enough of white people.

[thesadmafioso]

ITT: People criticizing past black revolutionaries for not being inclusive enough of white people.

I was actually criticizing these groups on the basis that they were just not revolutionary. Marx never really divided up the proletariat on the basis of race, so far as I know. The fact that minorities have been violently marginalized and oppressed doesn't mean that they can simply take up the mantle of revolutionaries on that basis alone; it doesn't give them the authority to do away with traditional materialist and class based analysis.

[ModelHomeInvasion]

The fact that minorities have been violently marginalized and oppressed doesn't mean that they can simply take up the mantle of revolutionaries on that basis alone
Tell me, what exactly gives you the right to tell them that they are not revolutionaries?

[thesadmafioso]

Tell me, what exactly gives you the right to tell them that they are not revolutionaries?

Um, I don't have that right as an individual and I never said that I did. All I did was analyze the structure of these organizations from a Marxist perspective. They are far too dependent upon racial lines in their programmes are simply far too based upon the support of the lumpen proletariat and minority racial groups for them to be considered organs of class interest.

[Dacaru]

First of all, Robert F. Williams advocated violence self-defence against the violent attacks of white racists, many of whom were working class. Who gives a fuck if they (white working class and black working class for that matter) were alienated by this? In actuality, many nonracist whites were not and offered much help to Williams. But of course this was not a final solution to oppression and inequality...
Second of all, I love Marx too. However, he is not my Jesus or Mohammed, I am certain he didnt want to be. He was never a Black person in America..., his simplification of everybody into proletarian and bourgieousie does not emcompass the complexity of differential MATERIAL development between races, genders, ethnicities and nations etc. These factors must be considered if we want to develop true revolutionary consciousness worldwide.
Lastly, under the new mode of flexible labor, the proletarian- lumpen proletarian categories are not as fixed as they are often made out to be. For example, I know people who didnt understand the exploitation of workers until they experienced prison labour in contemporary America, where they were given jobs for slave wages that they would not have been able to get when they were free. And they even noticed that those who held those jobs were also exploited...and even worse had their hours cut etc.

[mosfeld]

Another idea that would alienate the white working-class from the left. Great. I suggest you take a look at his book Negroes with Guns, which, very plainly, describes the tyranny that white people inflicted upon black people in the Southern U.S. Taking up arms was a mere act of self-defense against a white populace which had a deep seeded hatred for black people and almost absolute immunity from the klan-dominated jurisdiction and cops. I think that progressive minded people should realize the inalienable right of oppressed people to self-defense and their right to fight against those who oppress them, regardless if it supposedly alienates sections of white people.

[thesadmafioso]

First of all, Robert F. Williams advocated violence self-defence against the violent attacks of white racists, many of whom were working class. Who gives a fuck if they (white working class and black working class for that matter) were alienated by this? In actuality, many nonracist whites were not and offered much help to Williams. But of course this was not a final solution to oppression and inequality...
Second of all, I love Marx too. However, he is not my Jesus or Mohammed, I am certain he didnt want to be. He was never a Black person in America..., his simplification of everybody into proletarian and bourgieousie does not emcompass the complexity of differential MATERIAL development between races, genders, ethnicities and nations etc. These factors must be considered if we want to develop true revolutionary consciousness worldwide.
Lastly, under the new mode of flexible labor, the proletarian- lumpen proletarian categories are not as fixed as they are often made out to be. For example, I know people who didnt understand the exploitation of workers until they experienced prison labour in contemporary America, where they were given jobs for slave wages that they would not have been able to get when they were free. And they even noticed that those who held those jobs were also exploited...and even worse had their hours cut etc.

In the case of violent racism in the south, I have no qualms over it being met with violence in the case of self defense. I just view this is a temporary tactic born out of a very specific context. The tactics behind this sort of action are more or less without a place in the grander Marxist dialectic. It would be foolish to think that this model has any long term potential or even much relevance today, as the TC implicitly proclaimed, if I recall correctly. There is actually a difference between justified self defense from racism and theory which holds true to the concepts of materialist class struggle. The two of these are not equatable to the degree which they are being treated as being in this topic.

I think we are more in agreement on this matter than we are not, as I never really disagreed with the concept of self defense from racism. I just stated that this should not be confused as revolutionary action in and of itself.

And once more, the difference in material conditions between races is largely the result of a trend set forth by a bourgeois fabrication of race. Without it, such inequities in accumulation would not of been preserved to the extent to which it still exists.

The goal of abolishing the bourgeois elements of this construct should always be kept in mind when dealing with matters of this nature, and I can't help but feel that this topic is becoming mired in a very narrow interpretation of this question.

[mosfeld]

Class struggle does not rely upon or demand divisions of race for its success, as it is just that, a class struggle. If anything we should be attempting to move beyond these constructs in the name of fostering unity within the working class, not promoting efforts which are based upon them. In this interesting scenario, how feasible do you think it is to convince the lynched to unite with their lyncher, and vice-versa?

[thesadmafioso]

In this interesting scenario, how feasible do you think it is to convince the lynched to unite with their lyncher, and vice-versa?

Obviously when you cross over into this sort of extreme scenario the brunt of my analysis becomes invalid. But it is important to remember that this is still a sort of scenario which is not dominant in class struggle, and that it is one which is primarily a historical conflict more than anything. Not to say that racism no longer exists, but rather that racial driven violence no longer exists on a scale warranting the use of such drastic approach.

As I have said previously, far too narrow a view has dominated this topic for it to net any productive conclusions.

[S.Artesian]

I was actually criticizing these groups on the basis that they were just not revolutionary. Marx never really divided up the proletariat on the basis of race, so far as I know. The fact that minorities have been violently marginalized and oppressed doesn't mean that they can simply take up the mantle of revolutionaries on that basis alone; it doesn't give them the authority to do away with traditional materialist and class based analysis.
\
What Marx did not do is simply create categories like "working class" "proletariat" as abstractions, existing independently of the real historical circumstances that defined their material role in production.

So to say there's "a proletariat" or "one proletariat" or "Marx didn't divide the proletariat" are meaningless phrases apart from the concrete determinants of the black proletariat, the European-immigrant proletariat, the Asian proletariat in the US-- i.e. how they were formed, what their differing roles were in production, how they interacted with each other.

If you look at the history of the "white" labor movement in California, you will see that at no point in its first 60-70 years of existence was it free of anti-Asian bigotry; free from attacking Chinese and Asian workers; free from allying with the elements of the bourgeoisie, and indeed demanding that the bourgeoisie ally with them in the exclusion of, discrimination against Asian workers.

Telling the Chinese defense groups that sprang up in response to such attacks that they weren't being "class conscious" is not just pissing into the wind, it's actually being the wind blowing the piss on the Asian workers, who in defending themselves against racist attacks are demonstrating more class consciousness than all the white workers quoting Marx [and some did], proclaiming there allegiance to "socialism" [as many did] while they demand that all products made by Chinese labor be boycotted.

All you, comrade sadmafioso, are doing is taking an abstraction and turning it into an ideology, a talisman so you don't have to grapple with the actual development of the schisms in the working class, and how those actions of the most oppressed, most exploited to defend themselves is the only place that can nurture class consciousness.

In your ideology, the League of Revolutionary Black Workers "divides" the working class and impedes class consciousness. In material reality, the LRBW was the most important step taken by any section of the US working class in history.... and yes that means more important than the struggle for the 8 hour day, and more important than the CIO which was wedded body and soul, at its origin, to preserving the US government.

Oh... I can hear the howls now-- "Did he really say that the LRBW, a movement maybe of thousands, was more important than the CIO, a movement of millions?" You're fucking-A right I did. The CIO became the essential prop for US capitalism and WW2.

[thesadmafioso]

\
What Marx did not do is simply create categories like "working class" "proletariat" as abstractions, existing independently of the real historical circumstances that defined their material role in production.

So to say there's "a proletariat" or "one proletariat" or "Marx didn't divide the proletariat" are meaningless phrases apart from the concrete determinants of the black proletariat, the European-immigrant proletariat, the Asian proletariat in the US-- i.e. how they were formed, what their differing roles were in production, how they interacted with each other.

If you look at the history of the "white" labor movement in California, you will see that at no point in its first 60-70 years of existence was it free of anti-Asian bigotry; free from attacking Chinese and Asian workers; free from allying with the elements of the bourgeoisie, and indeed demanding that the bourgeoisie ally with them in the exclusion of, discrimination against Asian workers.

Telling the Chinese defense groups that sprang up in response to such attacks that they weren't being "class conscious" is not just pissing into the wind, it's actually being the wind blowing the piss on the Asian workers, who in defending themselves against racist attacks are demonstrating more class consciousness than all the white workers quoting Marx [and some did], proclaiming there allegiance to "socialism" [as many did] while they demand that all products made by Chinese labor be boycotted.

All you, comrade sadmafioso, are doing is taking an abstraction and turning it into an ideology, a talisman so you don't have to grapple with the actual development of the schisms in the working class, and how those actions of the most oppressed, most exploited to defend themselves is the only place that can nurture class consciousness.

In your ideology, the League of Revolutionary Black Workers "divides" the working class and impedes class consciousness. In material reality, the LRBW was the most important step taken by any section of the US working class in history.... and yes that means more important than the struggle for the 8 hour day, and more important than the CIO which was wedded body and soul, at its origin, to preserving the US government.

Oh... I can here the howls now-- "Did he really say that the LRBW, a movement maybe of thousands, was more important than the CIO, a movement of millions?" You're fucking-A right I did. The CIO became the essential prop for US capitalism and WW2.

I never stated that black political organizations were causing divides within the working class, I merely said that they are paying too much attention to them. They should not be embraced but rather begrudgingly combated out of necessity, as any conflict within the proletariat only slows the growth of a truly revolutionary class consciousness. I am not saying that one racial groups labor movement is better than the other, but rather that it is harmful to divide organizations or movements of labor up on that basis.

It would be nice if we could do away with the subtle insinuations that I am supporting racism as well, as I really don't much feel like trying to have a conversation with someone who is so quick to fall upon baseless and insulting accusations.

I don't know how many times I need to say this as well, but I have no issues with groups defending themselves from violent acts of racism either. Where you are getting this idea is quite beyond me.

Also, I never mentioned the CIO or any comparable organization. For what it's worth though, I don't actually support their historical role due to their class collaboration with the bourgeoisie.

[Thirsty Crow]

I never stated that black political organizations were causing divides within the working class, I merely said that they are paying too much attention to them. They should not be embraced but rather begrudgingly combated out of necessity, as any conflict within the proletariat only slows the growth of a truly revolutionary class consciousness. I am not saying that one racial groups labor movement is better than the other, but rather that it is harmful to divide organizations or movements of labor up on that basis.

You can honestly say that African American political organizations paid too much attention to the very real divides, with them being on the recieving end of structural and institutional racism embraced by sections of white workers, you can say that with a straight face even though you are probably aware (or maybe not) the extent of the before mentioned oppression, and its manifestation in actions of organizations of the working class of one skin tone?

And how do you combat this oppression if not by self-defense? By heightened rhetoric, appearing before the "labour fakirs" and speaking forcefully on the topic of working class unity, or maybe by publishing pamphlets and books?

[thesadmafioso]

You can honestly say that African American political organizations paid too much attention to the very real divides, with them being on the recieving end of structural and institutional racism embraced by sections of white workers, you can say that with a straight face even though you are probably aware (or maybe not) the extent of the before mentioned oppression, and its manifestation in actions of organizations of the working class of one skin tone?

And how do you combat this oppression if not by self-defense? By heightened rhetoric, appearing before the "labour fakirs" and speaking forcefully on the topic of working class unity, or maybe by publishing pamphlets and books?

I'm done with this bloody topic.

I have stated on numerous occasions that I support self defense against racism. I really don't know how many times I need to say that before it will actually sink in to the discourse of this topic.

No, I don't consider it ideal and I think it should be treated with reluctance, but that does not mean I oppose it when it is made necessary by a situation. I am fully aware of the massive scale of institutional racism which blacks were and in many cases still are met with in certain regions of the US, and I deplore such entirely. I just do not think that the formation of paramilitary outfits should be undertaken lightly and I believe such an approach to be somewhat outdated in this day and age.

[Thirsty Crow]

I'm done with this bloody topic.
I have stated on numerous occasions that I support self defense against racism. I really don't know how many times I need to say that before it will actually sink in to the discourse of this topic.

Well, what sinks in is that you seem to think that African American political orgs paid too much attention to the "divide in the working class", or in other words, to structural racism.
It's hard to see how that could be so when considering the extend and gravity of the concrete social conditions faced by those people. Care to elaborate on that (in fact, this was the thrust of my argument, not the self-defense; I probably worded it badly)

Also, you've stated that it's harmful to divide organizations or movements of labor up on that basis and you've chosen to disregard the fact that this was borne out of the necessity imposed on the working class by what I brought up above: structural, institutional racism. Also, how would you effect a unified labour movement, unified labour orgs, when, as other users have pointed out, a section of the anglo-american working class was pretty much in bed with the bosses and at the same time engaging in racism as an interested party who would stand to benefit from such an arrangement.

Also, you say, when asked about the prospects of the lynched to unite with the lynchers:

I mean, you're well aware of the scale and intensity of racism, but at the same time, you can't see how certain political results were a necessity in battling it, and instead bring up the idea of proletarian unity, which is a principle worth upholding of course, a normative idea which must be worked towards, but you bring it up as an abstraction from concrete historical conditions.

Also, I didn't for a second think you exhibited some sort of racism. Just to clear it up.

[thesadmafioso]

Well, what sinks in is that you seem to think that African American political orgs paid too much attention to the "divide in the working class", or in other words, to structural racism.
It's hard to see how that could be so when considering the extend and gravity of the concrete social conditions faced by those people. Care to elaborate on that (in fact, this was the thrust of my argument, not the self-defense; I probably worded it badly)

Also, you've stated that it's harmful to divide organizations or movements of labor up on that basis and you've chosen to disregard the fact that this was borne out of the necessity imposed on the working class by what I brought up above: structural, institutional racism. Also, how would you effect a unified labour movement, unified labour orgs, when, as other users have pointed out, a section of the anglo-american working class was pretty much in bed with the bosses and at the same time engaging in racism as an interested party who would stand to benefit from such an arrangement.

Also, you say, when asked about the prospects of the lynched to unite with the lynchers:

I mean, you're well aware of the scale and intensity of racism, but at the same time, you can't see how certain political results were a necessity in battling it, and instead bring up the idea of proletarian unity, which is a principle worth upholding of course, a normative idea which must be worked towards, but you bring it up as an abstraction from concrete historical conditions.

Also, I didn't for a second think you exhibited some sort of racism. Just to clear it up.

I never stated that these groups paid too much attention to structural racism, I was only referring to the language of the rhetoric mentioned in the initial post of this topic, which was focused heavily upon the formation of political groups on the criteria of race. I don't think that an issue as serious as institutional racism is something which can be effectively combated by accepting the premise of its formation, I believe it requires a united front of any and all class conscious individuals armed with truly revolutionary theory to be crushed in full. I understand why and how this sort of rhetoric would be applied, I even understand to a certain extent its appeal in particularly dire situations, but I cannot bring myself to accept it as solid theory.

I fully support these efforts to combat racism, as I don't think there was really much room for a substantial alternative at the time, but that is not to say that these measures should be preserved beyond there era of pertinence. They were the result of a particularly grim situation of intense racial violence and it does us little good to uphold them as much more than a necessary response which was undertaken out of defense.

Racism will not be regulated to the dustbin of history through the brandishing of arms, it requires a focused struggle on the field of cultural hegemony. And as these groups didn't seem to recognize as much, I am doing to take issue with such. Of course the physical defense from racism when it turns violent should not be forsaken, but that is not an excuse to ignore the larger fight against the structures of capitalist society which disseminate such thought in the first place.

[S.Artesian]

I never stated that black political organizations were causing divides within the working class, I merely said that they are paying too much attention to them.

Now that really is fucking hilarious. "See you're paying way too much attention to the fact that you are excluded from jobs, paid less for the same work, not entitled to the same legal protections. You're just being........selfish. " Yeah, that's the ticket.

[thesadmafioso]

Now that really is fucking hilarious. "See you're paying way too much attention to the fact that you are excluded from jobs, paid less for the same work, not entitled to the same legal protections. You're just being........selfish. " Yeah, that's the ticket.

That's a nice argument and all, but it's also quite the straw man. I was not referring to structural racism with that remark, but rather the validity of recognizing the role of racial division in the larger class struggle and in the organs which represent the aims and demands of the proletarian in this process. Obviously all of those glaring issues and the institutions which perpetuate them need to be combated, but this should be done by a much grander front not limited to one race.

In short, the existence of material separation between racial groups does not mean that such requires countermeasures also based along racial lines. This is but one of many instances of inequality and exploitation in the capitalistic system, and it requires efforts which are undertaken with this context in mind. It is simply nonsensical to think that any group which violently takes to combating racism without this analysis in mind can be considered to be revolutionary.

[S.Artesian]

In short, the existence of material separation between racial groups does not mean that such requires countermeasures also based along racial lines. This is but one of many instances of inequality and exploitation in the capitalistic system, and it requires efforts which are undertaken with this context in mind. It is simply nonsensical to think that any group which violently takes to combating racism without this analysis in mind can be considered to be revolutionary. Everytime you make one of your ridiculous statements and you get called on it, you backtrack with "that's not what I meant, I meant X or Y or Z." Amazing how you're never quite able to say what you mean the first time around.

There's no point arguing with someone who is obviously so committed to remaining ignorant of the actual history and development of US capitalism. Uh... no, it's not just one of many instances of inequality and exploitation. This, the role of black labor, is the axis around which US history and capitalist development has revolved-- from the 1820 Compromise to the Kansas-Nebraska Act, to the Civil War, the defeat of Radical Reconstruction, freeing federal troops to attack railroad workers, to the expanding industrialization in the WW1 period, to the mechanization of Southern agriculture in WW2 and the migration of black workers to the cities.

You simply don't know what you are talking about.

[thesadmafioso]

Everytime you make one of your ridiculous statements and you get called on it, you backtrack with "that's not what I meant, I meant X or Y or Z." Amazing how you're never quite able to say what you mean the first time around.

There's no point arguing with someone who is obviously so committed to remaining ignorant of the actual history and development of US capitalism. Uh... no, it's not just one of many instances of inequality and exploitation. This, the role of black labor, is the axis around which US history and capitalist development has revolved-- from the 1820 Compromise to the Kansas-Nebraska Act, to the Civil War, the defeat of Radical Reconstruction, freeing federal troops to attack railroad workers, to the expanding industrialization in the WW1 period, to the mechanization of Southern agriculture in WW2 and the migration of black workers to the cities.

You simply don't know what you are talking about.

It's not a matter of confusion on my part, it is rather an issue of misunderstanding on your own. I make well reasoned remarks and am forced in turn to elaborate on them further when you assail them using your own faulty reading of there content. Amazing how you're never able to comprehend the intent of my remarks the first time around would be a more fitting assertion in this situation.

I realize that it is a major historical issue and that it's relevance still remains today, I am simply stating that when you allow Marxist theory to be dominated by one aspect of capitalism's development that you are bound to be met with a conclusion fraught with folly. The historical role of this oppression should not lead contemporary revolutionary organizations astray with improper material analysis and outmoded philosophy. Obviously, we should place focus the material inequality faced by minorities in the US, but we should do so in a course led by the revolutionary theory of Marxism and not underdeveloped and purely race based politics.

You are simply applying far to limited a lens to this matter to properly assess it in an unbiased manner.