Seriously how much more is it going to take?

[RadioRaheem84]

The US is really really unique in that despite all the pains, heartaches and troubles it's workers go through there is hardly any large scale mass organization of people around the country against the situation we face. It's the opposite in Europe, Latin America and Asia where people face tanks, rubber bullets and hoses protesting the austerity, filthy wages and government corruption. The French shut down whole cities, the Greeks aren't afraid to confront the riot squads and even in China protests can amass to several people.

We had the Occupy movement which started strong but ended up being an unorganized mess and was co-opted by the media and then ridiculed as a hippie homeless haven and not a serious movement.

Just what is it in the US psyche that has us so capitive to this status quo? Is it that we are all too scared to lose the little we have? Is it that we like thinking about inducing mass social change but are waiting for the guy next to us to do something?

The government at this stage declares that it cares more about big business interests than our interests, it spies on us and brazenly admits it, corporations wage slave us and tell us how to manage our money, News men say teachers make too much money, austerity measures abound, unemployment high, wages keep shrinking in lieu of COL in major cities, highest prison population in the world, private prisons distort the sentencing laws so it's easier to go to jail for trivial shit, etc. etc etc.

Just what is it? Just what the hell is it? Too many distractions? Fear? Life is not that bad? Too much positive thinking? People are finding ways to work their way around the recession? People pin too much of their hope on electoral politics and "awareness" campaigns?

And for the record, this isn't an Americans are too stupid to rebel thread. This is a thread to understand just what keeps Americans from not doing anything that will affect real change or teeter the status quo?

Why do we accept our situation more so than say the European, the Asian, the Latin American, etc? I truly want to know your insights and theories on this.

[BIXX]

My answer?
Liberals. They can range from fairly conservative to being somewhat left, but even if they sympathize with anarchism or communist or whatever, they always have a set of opinions that make it nearly impossible for revolutionaries to convince them, because they see themselves as "the rational middle ground".

I think the US has this problem more than many other countries.

[precarian]

I share your frustration, however this certainly isn't solely an American problem. Every developed country is the same, and I agree that it's probably because they're too scared to lose what little capitalism has bequeathed to them. Essentially, the middle classes have been bought off and the rest of the proletariat have been trained to aspire to middle class status. This has dealt a death blow to political radicalism.

[RadioRaheem84]

I do think that while liberalism helped during the golden age of capitalism to raise living standards during the 20th century, in this century it is a block on the masses to really do anything about their lot.

I don't know if it is true but Chris Hitchens once said that liberalism is looked at with some disdain in England (And I am sure the world) because it seems like a position that tries to have it's cake and it eat too. Liberals will create the illusion of their being these two "extremes" that operate as two sides of the same coin and that "rationality" and a moral middle ground, a pragmatism must prevail in the end.

They say go out there and protest and face the police but get pissed off when ever someone fights back at police brutality. Do they think the State is benevolent? That they will just sit there and let you protest them without consequences?

But you many have a point, the huge insistence that liberals = left in this country sure stifles real debate. Leftists have been amputated from the political discourse and so the real debate is between liberal (center) and right wing.

[Questionable]

Because the American working class lacks any sort of qualified revolutionary leadership, and has for many decades. Parties that consist of 30 people who hold up signs saying "CAPITALISM SUCKS" don't count, either.

But let it be known that I don't agree with this stereotyping of Americans as totally complacent. Most people I know are fully aware that the situation in this country is terrible, in fact I hesitate to think of a single person I know who won't admit the nation is in awful shape. They just lack the previously mentioned leadership to provide them with the correct Marxist explanations, so their frustrations manifest themselves in reformist or reactionary ways, and the few who do achieve some kind of revolutionary consciousness fall in with insignificant, fragmented parties with all the wrong strategies and tactics.

Liberalism is winning over the frustrated workers not because our workers are lazy or stupid or complacent, because it is one of the most organized ideological forces in this country. The Democratic Party pumps loads of political and financial capital into channeling social discontent against their own political enemies, as do the Republicans, although both parties appeal to a different stratum of the working class. Just look at how much manpower and money the Democrats are putting into turning Texas into a blue state. When was the last time you saw communists doing something like that?

What we need is real leadership that will attach itself to the working class, not isolated intellectuals as we mostly have now. Don't worry so much about numbers at first, worry about theory and action. If you build the correct programme, you will see results, and people will come to you then.

[Sotionov]

It's similar in my state (Serbia), but maybe that's just a subjective opinion everyone has about the movement in their country.

E.g. we had a comic in a popular daily paper couple of years ago about how in France milions of people are protesting because there was a tax increase on croissants, and in Greece because their 16th salary was abolished, and how in Serbia there is no milk, oil or salaries at all but we're just saying "eh, whatcha gonna do"

http://www.blic.rs/data/files/2010-10-06/1334_strip.jpg

[GiantMonkeyMan]

I think you're ignoring some of the amazing periods of struggle in recent American history. You had the Oakland Commune, the huge G8 protests in Seattle, some great May Day rallies, the Chicago G8 summit had to move for fear of civil unrest etc.

I wrote a big paragraph but upon reading back it was pretty much gibberish and I can't figure out a way to convey the potential for struggle that I see when I see things like the Chicago teachers rallies, the support for foreclosed homes and the unionisation of Walmart workers. What I will say is that those movements in the past such as Occupy weren't labour movements they were activist movements and it's labour that is the most powerful force on the planet.

[Brandon's Impotent Rage]

What's it going to take?

One word: bullets.


It's going to take a crowd of activists getting shot at by a troupe of either riot cops or national guard. Up until now they've been content with just pepperspray, rubber bullets and tazers.

But eventually they'll resort to live ammunition. That is when shit is going to hit the fan.

[SonofRage]

What's it going to take?

One word: bullets.


It's going to take a crowd of activists getting shot at by a troupe of either riot cops or national guard. Up until now they've been content with just pepperspray, rubber bullets and tazers.

But eventually they'll resort to live ammunition. That is when shit is going to hit the fan.

That's happened plenty of times is US history. Remember the Kent State Massacre?

I think it's a mistake trying to look for a magic bullet answer. There are many factors.

There's the fact that the US is the empire and there's such a high level of nationalism that comes with that.

There's the fact that the US pretty much has a permanent underclass: African Americans. The system of white privilege is this country leaves a deeply divided working class. I think this is key. When you look at US history, any time there has been a strong Black freedom movement we've seen gains for the working class as a whole. As a reaction, the state had done everything in it's power till destroy these movements.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 4 Beta

[Kingfish]

I believe John Stienbeck summed it up well with

"Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires"

The vast majority of people still think the system is workable and that the people who are negatively effected by it are only suffering due to personal choices rather than systematic faults. While that hope/prospect of success remains people are unlikely to oppose the system.

[Q]

The situation is not unique for the US. In many European countries the working class faces similar challenges. In the Netherlands for example, we have very little tradition of mass organisation outside the traditional stuff like unions and parliamentary parties.

It is up to communists to fight for such organisation. The working class as a class is not a spontaneous product of capitalist society, on the contrary. Mass organisations that do exist, often find their roots in communist attempts in the past, but became bureaucratised and part of the system.

Alas, the root cause of our class weakness needs to be found in the existing left: We face a crisis ourselves, sect ridden as the far left is, each group working as small "company" trying to conquer some "marketshare" in the working class movement by their "unique selling points".

What we need is a revolution within the revolutionary left: Only if we take up the task of organising our class as a class can we take up the challenge of political power. But for that we need to unite around the principles of democracy, internationalism and the independence of our class, guided by an accepted programme ... It's a simple idea, yet so hard to achieve.

[Philosophos]

I agree with Q, we really need to look at ourselves and then try to make a revolution.

At the same time what are you talking about? Greek people are not afraid? I've been making the same questions to myself: Why isn't Greece making any progress? You might see riots in Athens and other southern places but generally in north Greece there is little things going on.

Because there is no organization within the communist organizations. People say:
'We will make a revolution, but who's gonna start it? MEEE???' Ummm yes you with the help of other people that belong to the same organization as you do.

Simple enough I believe.

[VinnieUK]

The ability of the ruling class to hoodwink the working class has to be admired. The words 'Communism' and 'Socialism' have been turned into precepts of horror and hatred. They have linked these words with the horrors created by THEIR system; capitalism.
It has replaced religion. Try to improve your conditions and you will go to hell (communism)

The American working class see no alternative, they have never been presented with the REAL idea of communism. This has not been helped by people claiming to be 'communist' yet supporting the likes of Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin.

Such people need to stop the confusion. It is delaying the day of emancipation.

[piet11111]

We face a crisis of organization all our traditional organizations have been taken over by careerist elements that will fight tooth and nail to keep the status quo and would gladly sell the clothes off our backs to keep on the table of the bosses.

[SonofRage]

We also need to beyond our "traditional organizations." Not that we shouldn't learn from the past, but being stuck on the Leninist vanguard form, the anarcho-syndicalist form, etc. instead of looking at our own history and conditions is a mistake. Most self-proclaimed revolutionaries know more about the Russian Revolution or the Spanish Civil War than they do about the American Revolution or US Civil War.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 4 Beta

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

Correct Programme =/= Leadership

[Ele'ill]

I think even this opinion that americans are a mass of people not doing anything to rebel, held by americans, hampers americans from rebelling because it is false. There are revolts and rebellions quite often but I'm not going to say that any one of them or all of them together are an awesome showing of revolution for obvious reasons and I find that to be an unrealistic expectation anyways. Are we talking about mass clashes or cloak and dagger sabotage because there is quite a lot of the sabotage.

[RedMaterialist]

US workers have a very long way to go down, economically, before they will engage in any revolutionary struggle. There is no starvation, no mass shootings, no assassinations of political opponents. These things do occur in countries occupied by the U.S., but the media is now controlled so that very little of this reality gets through to the working class.

And, democratic change is still possible in the U.S. even though it is glacially slow. Obama is now on television apologizing for the Trayvon Martin verdict. Fifty years ago Nixon would have said Martin's death was a victory for law and order. The current explanation for capitalism is that there is no alternative (Thatcher.) Therefore, capitalists are sorry for the current conditions, they apologize for them. From domination to apology. I think the same cultural concept applies in politics as well as economics--sort of the base, superstructure idea.

But even more important is that the working class, as a class, is disappearing and is being transformed into a consuming class. The last historical working class will be those in the third world who now manufacture the goods purchased in the West. Instead of working to live we will live to "work" or live for our "passion," as they say now.

But that is a long way off. I agree with a previous poster who said it is up to the communists to describe the direction humanity is going, to describe the "line of march" as Marx and Engels said. The problem is that communists are almost invisible in the U.S. Even Angela Davis has renounced communism and now calls herself a socialist.

Is it possible that the next liberation movement, after race, sex, gender, will be communism? We need to March! Communist Hundred People March on Washington!! Celebrate Marx's 200 birthday in 2018. Demand that our voices be heard.

[RadioRaheem84]

I never meant for even any sort of massive violent revolt but outrage like what we've seen about Treyvon over the wages and living standars we're faced with.

I mean how much further do people have to sink?

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

My answer?
Liberals. They can range from fairly conservative to being somewhat left, but even if they sympathize with anarchism or communist or whatever, they always have a set of opinions that make it nearly impossible for revolutionaries to convince them, because they see themselves as "the rational middle ground".

I think the US has this problem more than many other countries.

What a lazy excuse of yours! My Aunt is a typical liberal and I cut her short of her positions every time I hear them. All it takes is vigilance from each and every single one of us my friend. Don't bother yourself about whether or not you are a comfortable person to be around.

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

Just what is it? Just what the hell is it? Too many distractions? Fear? Life is not that bad? Too much positive thinking? People are finding ways to work their way around the recession? People pin too much of their hope on electoral politics and "awareness" campaigns?

And for the record, this isn't an Americans are too stupid to rebel thread. This is a thread to understand just what keeps Americans from not doing anything that will affect real change or teeter the status quo?

Why do we accept our situation more so than say the European, the Asian, the Latin American, etc? I truly want to know your insights and theories on this.

I am from Germany and can tell you that the things which keep the workers down in Germany are the same as here, only the USA has a lot more oppressive social system where "whining" and "public moaning" and in general, criticism is not tolerated. Americans are very isolated, they do not speak up when they have a thought in their head. So many people in the US I have met lead such a strange life of pretending they have a great life on facebook, instagram etc. while in reality they are suffering from the wage system as much as any other person and know it.

What is the problem here? I tell you it is a profound lack of Worker Leaders and courage. This lack of courage to action and criticism that critical workers display the most blatantly in the US, has to do with being afraid of being an "outsider", losing social status etc. What is needed is organization and solidarity, and out of this strong leaders that tirelessly fight against the bourgeois media and ideology. We Communists have to remember that we exclusively have the solutions to the woes of our fellow oppressed workers; we need to first of all be friendly towards them, show interest in them and try to inspire them by showing what could be achieved together.

Don't listen to me though what practice is concerned. I have none.

[Ele'ill]

What a lazy excuse of yours! My Aunt is a typical liberal and I cut her short of her positions every time I hear them. All it takes is vigilance from each and every single one of us my friend.

exhausting and futile

[Jimmie Higgins]

Alas, the root cause of our class weakness needs to be found in the existing left: We face a crisis ourselves, sect ridden as the far left is, each group working as small "company" trying to conquer some "marketshare" in the working class movement by their "unique selling points".what is this monopolist party to be based on? If the left is divided currently on the basis of ideas or tactics, then what practical organization of existing sects could there be? If the "marketshares" we're combined we are still only speaking of parties of thousands in the us, uk, or most countries. It's not as if there is a mass radical movement of many groups representing real class forces and all we'd need to do would be to combine these forces.

IMO, ultimately, we need to look outward to existing class forces, not inward to our marginalized networks and affinity groups. How existing radicals orient themselves can help or hurt the chance at success, but it's real class forces that can make a difference.

[RadioRaheem84]

I hate to generalize but I think the US is unique in that Americans have been robbed of a holistic view of the problems. They sense
something is not right with the state of affairs but every time they have the thought that this problem is systemic they're bombarded with that asshole in the radio, the tv, the movie and the periodical that they're exhibiting foolish thinking and that the problem is with them and then only. They're the only ones to blame for their situation. Somehow they lack the Econ 101 lessons, they're thinking is feeble, they don't understand politics or whatever else the media tells them is the excuse for their lack of understanding reality. Every day there is a "myths" about the economy or government sort if story detailing how that thing you're feeling, that nagging sense that makes you think this is a systemic issue is wrong. You don't know so leave it up to the experts.

All you can fix is your own lot so listen to the religious, the positive motivational speakers, the politicians, and the right wing radio blowhards. Poverty is a mindset. It's just temporary.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

What is the problem here? I tell you it is a profound lack of Worker Leaders and courage. This lack of courage to action and criticism that critical workers display the most blatantly in the US, has to do with being afraid of being an "outsider", losing social status etc. What is needed is organization and solidarity, and out of this strong leaders that tirelessly fight against the bourgeois media and ideology. We Communists have to remember that we exclusively have the solutions to the woes of our fellow oppressed workers; we need to first of all be friendly towards them, show interest in them and try to inspire them by showing what could be achieved together.

I basically agree with this, except for one serious problem: We don't have the answers, let alone exclusively! If we want to come to the answers, we need to rigorously engage in the other things you suggest in this paragraph. By struggling tirelessly, and really working through things in struggle with people, we will arrive at answers collectively. Communists aren't prophets sent by god: we're a consequence of our circumstances like everybody else. Imagining ourselves to be exceptions is a recipe for coming up with a lot of wrong answers (and, practically, a recipe for building ineffectual microsects).

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

I basically agree with this, except for one serious problem: We don't have the answers, let alone exclusively! If we want to come to the answers, we need to rigorously engage in the other things you suggest in this paragraph. By struggling tirelessly, and really working through things in struggle with people, we will arrive at answers collectively. Communists aren't prophets sent by god: we're a consequence of our circumstances like everybody else. Imagining ourselves to be exceptions is a recipe for coming up with a lot of wrong answers (and, practically, a recipe for building ineffectual microsects).

Socialism is the answer and counter-position to "life just being tough". Struggle and activity is of course the solution.

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

exhausting and futile

If you want to actually change things, you have to give your whole person to the cause. Eventually people will sense that the cause is more important to you than you yourself, and then realize how little comparative conviction they have in their own dribble and start thinking.

[Strannik]

In US and former east block Europe the problem seems to be the same. People, even oppressed people do not view themselves as a class. They view themselves as singular individuals in a sea of uncontrollable forces. They don't organize, because they believe "I might make it, if I only stay away from others. Together we'll drown for sure". Not everyone thinks like this, but it's the dominating mindset. It's the most important propaganda tool of neoliberal capitalism - you might "make it" alone, but for all of you there's simply not enough.

When people go hungry, their first reaction is to blame themselves, never the system - because they believe there is no system in the first place. When explained, they might believe that their employer has exploited them personally, but in case of everybody else, it's the fault of those who were exploited. Workers have adopted the view of the bourgeois class - it's like society is made up of bourgeoise and lumpenproletariat (classless, "asocial" individuals). The section that could organize and assume the leadership position is simply missing.

I believe that this is because financial bourgeoise managed to become an international force in the seventies and it was easy for them to isolate and devastate locally and nationally based worker movements. As long as workers remain a nationalistically and culturally isolated force, they can't triumph over international bourgeoise. Hopefully, in EU there might appear a "wandering working class" that travels from country to country looking for jobs and learns that the problems are the same everywhere. Worker movement currently lacks the core around which it could build itself.

[Q]

what is this monopolist party to be based on? If the left is divided currently on the basis of ideas or tactics, then what practical organization of existing sects could there be? If the "marketshares" we're combined we are still only speaking of parties of thousands in the us, uk, or most countries. It's not as if there is a mass radical movement of many groups representing real class forces and all we'd need to do would be to combine these forces.
The solution is indeed not a combination of all the sects. As I commented in a blogpost yesterday (http://www.revleft.com/vb/blog.php?b=18939):


I do think the existing left has to unite. But it evidently can't unite on its current sect basis. The unity drive will not feature a get together of the different central committees and other leaderships of the respective groups, to work out the basis for unity.

No, the unity drive will consist of developments affecting the entire movement. In the case of the old CPGB, the Russian revolution put a strong incentive for the existing left to break with their sects and unite. Likewise, today we need the many good militants in the diverse groups to break with their loyalty to the group and make their loyalty to the cause appeal stronger. This is not an easy task, but possible and - as an uneven development, as we currently see with the SWP crisis - inevitable. For Marxists then, our task currently is to wage propaganda for this alternative.

Inevitable because sects can't cope with differences: They habitually lead to splits, walkouts, etc. With a Marxist line we can take much more out of such occurences. You could put a parallel between this and revolutionary crises which are an inevitable result of the way capitalism operates. However, we need a party to realise the potential inherent in such situations.So, we need then a cultural revolution in the revolutionary left, which is not an easy task, but necessary.


IMO, ultimately, we need to look outward to existing class forces, not inward to our marginalized networks and affinity groups. How existing radicals orient themselves can help or hurt the chance at success, but it's real class forces that can make a difference.The reason why we are marginal has to do with our sect-ridden landscape. We can pretend to be the only revolutionary group in existence, but any informed worker will always ask questions like "why don't you just work together, you share so much in common?". The working class will not be deceived like that. If we can however refound the left on a new bearing, let it break with their sectism, let them embrace the task of trying to build a class party (as opposed to a 'party' of their specific current), then no doubt hundreds of thousands of workers that currently sympathise with socialist ideas but see no reason to join anything, will flock in in a short time span. It would still be a minority party until the revolution, but it would be able to start building that mass party-movement we need.

In summary: I reject the idea that we'll build our party by recruiting ad infinitum to group x, y or z. Experience over the last decades shows quite clearly that this is a dead end. Communists however have been responsible for building mass movements in the past, we still see the social fossils of these today. To be able to do that again, we need to quit with our sect "unity on ideas" and embrace unity around a programme that describes how we envision to get to working class power and beyond that to communism. We further need a culture that radically democratic, something sorely lacking in the left today, besides internationalist and defending an independent position of our class.

[RadioRaheem84]

At the same time what are we a religion that's received some revelationary knowledge to share with the world? I came to leftism through a set of circumstances and constant nagging that something was not fucking right. Most if it due to a lot of free time between being a college student and being unemployed. SO how can we expect others working long hours to get it quickly? There is also a sense though where I do get frustrated at the working class for easily believing the media's take on nearly everything having to do with capitalism. There has to be some part of this that's their own fault? Capitalism doesn't just recreate itself everyday, we continue its cycle too. We willingly accept the mechanism partly out of fear of deprevation and partly because we think this is the best and only way life can be.

[precarian]

At the same time what are we a religion that's received some revelationary knowledge to share with the world? I came to leftism through a set of circumstances and constant nagging that something was not fucking right. Most if it due to a lot of free time between being a college student and being unemployed. SO how can we expect others working long hours to get it quickly? There is also a sense though where I do get frustrated at the working class for easily believing the media's take on nearly everything having to do with capitalism. There has to be some part of this that's their own fault? Capitalism doesn't just recreate itself everyday, we continue its cycle too. We willingly accept the mechanism partly out of fear of deprevation and partly because we think this is the best and only way life can be.

Yes! This is exactly how I feel. The more I experience life under capitalism, the more I simply cannot accept the notion that people are helpless products of society whose actions are wholly determined by the material conditions under which they live. Far too often the left excuses the inaction of the masses using arguments like this.

Essentially, living under this system means being led by the nose through life. It means being forced to participate in a farcical, harmful and completely unnecessary economic rat race in order to survive. The vast majority of our waking hours are stolen by a verminous employer, whose patronage we are supposed to beg for. The time required for the free development of our faculties is severely curtailed, which affects every aspect of our existence as social beings.

Honestly, I have no idea how ordinary folk can tolerate this. How the hell can people live through this idiocy without feeling that something is amiss!? How can they wade through the monotony of everyday life without intelligently critiquing their situation??

I'm perhaps adopting an individualist anarchist position on this issue, and I'm trying to pick my words carefully to avoid tainting this argument with bourgeois moralism, but the reality is that we have not seen any resistance to the socio-economic order because the vast majority of ordinary people are not interested in challenging it...and through their willful ignorance they effectively put the noose round all of our necks.

Honestly, as time goes on, I can't feel anything but pure revulsion for people who shuffle through life whilst turning a blind eye to the injustices present all around them.

[RadioRaheem84]

I try not to let it get to where I get repulsed by the working classes inability to do anything but yea there is frustration at the situation which allows people do do nothing.

[Prof. Oblivion]

If you want to actually change things, you have to give your whole person to the cause. Eventually people will sense that the cause is more important to you than you yourself, and then realize how little comparative conviction they have in their own dribble and start thinking.

lol, so is your aunt a commie now?

[Ele'ill]

If you want to actually change things, you have to give your whole person to the cause.

unless giving your whole person to the cause doesn't change things (it doesn't)



Eventually people will sense that the cause is more important to you than you yourself, and then realize how little comparative conviction they have in their own dribble and start thinking.

or they'll think you are another irrelevant walking opinion generator floating about the dead earth and they'll block you out or flat out disagree regardless of how they actually feel about their own 'dribble'

[littleredcircus]

In regards to the OP's question, we have pretty much the same problem in the UK. People are facing massive cuts in their living standards (1% cap on pay rise for all public sector workers until at least 2015), being stripped of benefits and having everything possible privatised, yet the majority of people are quite content to sit by and let this oppression of the working class to take place. There's been a few marches, and even a riot (NUS 2011) over the increase of tuition fees, but the fact of the matter is most people are not prepared to revolt against this vile government and capitalism. Instead a large portion of the population are turning to UKIP, (for anyone who doesn't know, these are more conservative than the conservative party) and lunatic things like the EDL.

Even the party that I'm part of (Labour) which should be the party of the working class is dominated by blairites and careerists who are obsessed with fighting for the "middle ground." This, coupled with the fact that 99% of the news and newspapers here are right wing doesn't help the situation. any time a bit of action takes place such as a strike etc it gets snuffed out by the media. The tories are playing a clever game of turing the working class against each other while they sit back in their ivory towers patting each other on the back.

Rather than looking towards racism, capitalism and fascism to sort out the problems. We need to educate people that communism and marxism are not evil but the only way to sort out this mess once and for all.

Just to show the pure arrogance of a lot of people where I live: Recently, A survey was taken in my area (south east england) and 79% of people considered themselves to be "middle class", 15% Upper Class and only 6% working class. I highly doubt that only 6% of the population work for a living. its more like 99% working class, 1% ruling class.

[Jimmie Higgins]

So, we need then a cultural revolution in the revolutionary left, which is not an easy task, but necessary.I agree, I think, but there are limits to what we can do subjectivly about that. Where is this new culture to develop from? Can a people of one culture produce a new culture by will? Again, I think the answer is outside ourselves, though we should do what we can subjectivly to improve things as much as we can. In Oakland, Occupy and some other political developments in and outside the town have created new ways for various forces to relate to eachother and there is a tiny bit of overlap between various political fights and so on. These sorts of concrete changes (if the small changes that have happend could grow and deepen and become more generalized) might produce new opportunities for new formations, new general agreements, new relationships between radical circles and broader networks of activists and workers.



The reason why we are marginal has to do with our sect-ridden landscape.
I think this is where our main conceptual disagreement is because I would flip this, we are sect-ridden because we are marginal. Without having a wider movement to relate to, our subjective range of activities is narrowed and can tend to produce a lot of in-fighting, sectarian (as opposed to political) competition, and a general inward focus on holding onto the pure ideas or "most radical" tactics. Where I agree with you I think is that right now there is no reason for inward-orientations or standing on the sidelines of struggle claiming to uphold the true politics or the best tactic. But the connections to the class and practical working connections with other political tradditions of class radicalism IMO can't just be willed into being, they have to be organically made and this might go quick or slow, but I don't think it is something that can be achieved just because we'd like it to be that way.


We can pretend to be the only revolutionary group in existence, but any informed worker will always ask questions like "why don't you just work together, you share so much in common?". The working class will not be deceived like that.Well I think this is a slightly different problem of sectarian-ism, not a condition of just being small and divided.

But if there is a large marxist formation of class-oriented revolutionaries, there will no doubt still be autonomists and horozontalists and so on who outright reject the entire idea of forming one group on principle. Won't worker's still wonder why smaller groupings of marxists and anarchists still exist? And furthermore, might there be a problem if a party is founded on the idea that sects are harmful for revolution, that this formation then takes a sectarian view towards "renegades" who don't join the party?


If we can however refound the left on a new bearing, let it break with their sectism, let them embrace the task of trying to build a class party (as opposed to a 'party' of their specific current), then no doubt hundreds of thousands of workers that currently sympathise with socialist ideas but see no reason to join anything, will flock in in a short time span. It would still be a minority party until the revolution, but it would be able to start building that mass party-movement we need.This is another conceptual disagreement I think. Maybe things are different in different regions, but I honestly don't think there are tens let alone hundreds of thousands of workers who would be revolutionaries if only we got our shit together. Better groupings, better and more open discussion among revolutionaries, a more outward orientation towards the class are essential in helping us relate to radicalizing workers, but I don't think they will create a connection to the class by itself. In other words, I don't think people aren't radicals because of ideas, but because they don't believe that it's possible and maybe not even desireable to have a revolution right now; I think class struggle will produce 10s and 100s of thousands of new revolutionaries - how the existing radicals relate to class stuggle is the subjective bit we can work on though.


In summary: I reject the idea that we'll build our party by recruiting ad infinitum to group x, y or z. Experience over the last decades shows quite clearly that this is a dead end.No disagreement there - only with the conclusion that recruitiung to sect Prime rather than X, Y, or Z is the answer. I think that the "class party" should be seen at this time as the "class movement" and out of such a movement one (or alternately several who have learned in practice how to work together to some extent) MASS grouping(s) might emerge. A class movement will help bring about certain main class demands or aspirations which radicals can rally behind and help rally people to.


Communists however have been responsible for building mass movements in the past, we still see the social fossils of these today. To be able to do that again, we need to quit with our sect "unity on ideas" and embrace unity around a programme that describes how we envision to get to working class power and beyond that to communism.But what is this programme based on in the absense of a class movement. In Egypt or Greece, something like this may be possible - uniting the existing aspirations and demands of rank and file workers with the political demands in a way which might help the existing class movement take leadership and stake out it's class interests in the wider crisis. But for even a large formation of radicals, without a connection to a class movement, to form a program is basically just propaganda, a selling point, because radicals can't actually achieve the programme themselves. In Spain or Russia there were existing class demands and existing class forces and so radicals could use the existing demands and desires to create a program around which argues that these things can be achieved but only if worker's break from the ruling class and make an independant push for the kind of society they want.


We further need a culture that radically democratic, something sorely lacking in the left today, besides internationalist and defending an independent position of our class.Where I agree with you in essence is the above: we need to orient towards potentially radicalizing workers and groups of workers and in the current time, this is more possible than anytime in the past few decades. To better relate to rising struggle and new class forces, we need to be outward, more collaborative, learn to "pick our political fights" withoutselves and broader opinions of workers and actives around practical things in an non-sectarian manner (rather than fights over political minuta or dogma), we should learn to work with eachother more, learn how to actually relate to existing class struggle (rather than lecture it). But, I just think these things are going to happen organically through trial and error and real material things in the class and class struggle, not by just re-arranging the exiting deck.

[scmarxist]

You are exactly right comrade. The poor and working class still want to believe in the dream and with drones, the NSA listening to every phone call and email, swat teams and control of the media, most of us are terrified to cross the powers that be. That's the way they like it. For profit coporate armies are next to keep us in line in my opinion as more people become radicalized.

[TooManyQuestions]

There are a number of reasons why people in the US are not being radicalized. One is a failed educational system that never teaches critical thinking skills. "Read this and repeat it to me."

Also present is a real addiction to consumerism and status. See the $120 for a plain white tee that Kanye West sells.

The media (of all stripes) tells the public that all our problems are the result of the 'other side' having too much power, and if you'd only support cause X we'll show them what for. The scapegoats might be the welfare recipients (read: all black people), illegals (read: all Mexicans), liberals (read: anyone who isn't a fucking Nazi), or rednecks (read: working class whites). People are all to eager to blame the scapegoat instead of the system.

There is also a big disconnect between those who would educate the workers about leftist politics and the workers themselves. When a rich college kid turns to Marxism because he hates his capitalist parents, he will never get the attention of a working class family that just wants to know why it is so hard to get along in life. These people represent the "typical left winger" stereotype, young, angry, full of big words, and dismissive of everyone and everything.

Add to that the social conditioning that tells people that liberal/progressive equals socialist, which equals Stalinist. Hence people who think a center left capitalist like Obama is going to lock them up in a gulag because he proposed a pro-corporate health care plan.

[OHumanista]

Aside from (and also together with) many other reasons mentioned I also think the whole false dualism of Democratic X Republican is a very important factor. Almost everyone in the US can only think politically in terms of that division. Either you're a republican or a democrat, everything else is considered to be absolutely irrelevant. And even the many who are disappointed with both parties still think there is no alternative but to keep choosing the "lesser evil" between them and hope for the best.
They literally envision anything else, and the political system and the media ensure that this remains true, always.