This is the second part to this post. You’ll likely need to read that for this to make sense.
Also, this post has anarchist apologia-adjacent rhetoric in it. You have been warned.
We are not comfortable. Many of us are more comfortable than the rest of the world, yes, but many more are not. The millions of people in US prisons exploited for slave labor are not comfortable. The desperately struggling black and brown communities in this country are not comfortable. We should at least be able to reach these people, but we have failed to. Why? I suggest a lack of empathy, and self introspection.
The United States socialist has become something of a disciple, a religious acolyte. Instead of seeing Marxism as a discipline to explain and understand this society of class conflict, they see it as a magic power they can channel with the pureness and devotion of their faith. And so, they begin to believe that the emotions of themselves and those around them ceases to matter, that they are surrounded by nonbelievers and heretics, and so any concerns or opposition to what they suggest is merely the baseless protests of the unclean.
This is a deeply maladjusted and flawed view of Marxism. And, more importantly, it completely stops the prospective revolutionary from truly organizing. When we assume that those who disagree with us are baselessly evil, or reactionary, or assume they are merely immature or idiotic, we completely cut ourselves off from an important line of questioning that is ultimately essential to socialism in the United States.
The average conversation between any two socialists in the United States has been reduced to a religious argument. When disagreement reaches a heated point, instead of acknowledging each other as simply needing a break or being overwhelmed, both treat the other as an enemy. To display this, I shall dissect the supposed greatest enemy of the United States socialist: the anarchist.
The anarchist is a person of great disdain to many socialists. Someone moralistically driven to dismiss tools necessary for the liberation of the proletariat. And this can certainly be true. But what many socialists and Marxists fail to even inspect is why the United States proletariat is so often drawn to anarchism. Instead of taking these people as coming from a legitimate perspective, these socialists simply assume that anarchism is the ideology of the privileged, or the labor aristocracy. But this doesn’t make any sense.
Merely being class conscious or aware of one’s oppression doesn’t automatically grant someone the ability to understand the true nature of class or class conflict, and especially does not grant an understanding of the best way to fight that conflict. The inverse is true, as well. In a vacuum, someone more isolated from the reality of class conflict would not necessarily automatically choose an ideology that is sub-optimal for fighting that class conflict. The decision becomes a purely abstract one.
In both situations, a dedicated anarchist is capable of being a dedicated anarchist without the influence of western propaganda.
So, we are left with only one recourse- Attempting to find out what the reason for that is. When we finally let ourselves ask this question, instead of constantly closing ourselves off to others because of a moralistic, vulgar perspective to Marxism, we can begin to inspect the material conditions of the United States proletariat from a different perspective, and start finding explanations for our lack of traction.
The United States itself, as part of it’s material conditions, has been a horrifyingly repressive and disgusting country, which has been unabashedly on the side of the bourgeoisie for most of history. We know this much, it is true of many capitalist countries. But the United States went much, much further, strictly controlling the lives of the proletariat with laws that enforced homophobia, prohibition, the moralistic Christianity of the region. Social control by the state is not merely a background, ambient crime of capitalism for the United States proletariat: It is an ancestral trauma that hangs over us to the present day. It is easy to see that this explains the popularity of anarchism among the United States socialists (I am aware of how ironic this is, given the United States supposed dedication to “freedom”).
We must keep in this in mind when engaging with the proletariat here. We cannot simply dismiss concerns of social control with accusations of propaganda and conspiracy, because the hyper-reactionary, socially controlling forces of the United States have used the exact same argument every time a new social movement has appeared (and, yes, this is true of some other western countries, but those countries have their own conditions that must be individually examined ).
So, this exercise in analyzing the United States anarchist, not from a moralistic, religiously ”Marxist” perspective, but from the perspective of actual history, has given us important insight about building socialism in the United States. We can’t just tell the proletariat that we aren’t going to oppress them, or that we are on their side while naively dismissing their concerns every time it is brought up. This is what the United States does to it’s own civilians. No, we need to prove that we are on their side by actually siding with the United States proletariat in this still ongoing element of the class war, and actively fight against the currently present forms of social control in the United States.
And, even more potently, it gives us a weapon to use against the hyper-reactionary, socially controlling elements. We can now understand that this is exactly what hyper-conservative elements have been exploiting, twisting the proletariat’s desire for freedom from social control against itself, trying to convince the proletariat that returning once again to control is social freedom. Once we begin to truly and consciously side with the United States proletariat on this, beyond simply doing so because “we’re leftists”, we will be able to turn this around on the reactionary elements. The proletariat will always side with us once they realize we are actually acting in their interests, a much more convincing and relatable reason to side with us than the reactionary’s false promises. For this reason, the queer struggle, the struggle of all racial minorities, and the struggle of all the people who have been oppressed by this nation’s extreme social control, should be prioritized and heavily focused upon by any socialists here. Not only are these people the ones to see the horror of capitalism in this country most directly, they are also the people most harmed by the United States’ social control, and therefore directly represent the United States proletariat’s efforts against social control.
But, this was merely an experiment. Hopefully, it should display the utility of examining the possible motivations and reasoning of those we disagree with. That is the purpose of this community, and I hope that we can do much more, together.
TL;DR: sectarianism bad, fatalism bad, black panthers good
Interesting read. I want to offer some of my thoughts on it.
You start out by saying this:
The approach that the United States, radical left has adapted is fundamentally flawed, as demonstrated by it’s almost complete lack of political power. Numerous explanations have been made for this, many of them rooting in the relative comfort of most United States citizens.
I do think this argument makes some sense, but that it doesn’t hold that much weight when inspected closer. If this were the main roadblock that socialism has encountered in the United States, I speculate that we would have a much higher portion of the less well-off (non-labor-aristocratic) proletariat participating in radically socialist politics.\
The part about the left in the US (and the West in general) not having successes and having a widely flawed approach is true, of course, but I think you dismiss the material condition which are its cause too easily at the start, and I think that, through your analysis, you circle back to basically that same point:The proletariat will always side with us once they realize we are actually acting in their interests
There are numerous factors at play but at a basic level the material conditions influence ideology a lot more than the other way around. People don’t join revolutions because they already believe in some ideology, they join revolution to feed themselves and their families, to lead better lives, to make a better future for their children. Your analysis is similar to Jones Manoel’s which is good but it definitely links to, and stems from the fact that the Western working classes are better off than the rest of the world.
We do see among the downtrodden more organizing and more radical movements but these haven’t been as prominent in recent years partly because pretty much all of the previous generation leaders (Black Panthers, etc.) have been killed or otherwise violently suppressed and similar things are still happening - just look at the arrests and police killing around the Stop Cop City movement. This will understandably scare some people away from joining such movements (while it can radicalize others) but the movements are still there. Pretty much all of the truly radical movements and theoretical developments in the West (since World War 2 at least) have come exclusively from marginalized groups (black people, colonized people, etc.) and their organizations.
A lot of people, especially the more downtrodden ones, already do agree that capitalism is bad and has many problems but they don’t consider there to be a viable alternative. As part of organizing we have to not just point out how capitalism is unsustainable or explain that socialism could be an alternative. We have to show the people that it has worked better and it does work better currently and that it can benefit them immediately (or soon enough and not only in a distant future). How susceptible people are to this varies and is determined by many factors but we should recognize that the material conditions of ones life are a very important factor.
This essay (which is quite similar in conclusion to yours) goes a bit into what we should do in these non-revolutionary times in the West and I definitely agree with you that we have to engage with all the struggles (gender, colonized, and working class) and not just limit ourselves as many of the Western movement have done. Domenico Losurdo stresses this constantly and his book Class Struggle is a very important one for (especially Western) Marxists to read.
Also, I don’t think your tl;dr really fits your text. Calling out “sectarianism” in general does nothing to further a genuine communist movement and sounds a bit too much like arguing about factionalism in general to me. Our movement should follow the ML line and should constantly analyze the ever changing material condition and form strategies accordingly. This will mean it will have to criticize and work with (or not) other movements as the condition change but should do so due to the merit of our theory, analysis and results and not just based on principle.
I will get to the rest of this later but,
Also, I don’t think your tl;dr really fits your text. Calling out “sectarianism” in general does nothing to further a genuine communist movement and sounds a bit too much like arguing about factionalism in general to me. Our movement should follow the ML line and should constantly analyze the ever changing material condition and form strategies accordingly. This will mean it will have to criticize and work with (or not) other movements as the condition change but should do so due to the merit of our theory, analysis and results and not just based on principle.
Isn’t the point of a tl;dr to explain what people should take away from a text without going into detail about it? Including all of this detail would defeat the point of that. Anti-sectarianism should be situationally applied, yes, but so should all schools of thought that have developed from and are associated with Marxism. When I say “sectarianism bad”, I mean it in the context that it is generally self-harmful and fruitless for the United States left.
On your other points, for now I will just say that I never intended to dismiss the influence of material conditions on whether or not people are able to agitated. What I do think is that what we have seen is not enough to cease organizing. We cannot allow ourselves to become fatalistic, merely waiting for the masses to become revolutionary. Otherwise, we risk making the same mistake Lenin himself so greatly criticized.
My criticism is that we have allowed our assumption that revolution in the West is “impossible”, to prevent us from understanding the motivations of the United States proletariat on a deeper level. This doesn’t mean that material conditions are subservient to ideology, quite the opposite- It means we should focus on understanding the material conditions of the United States proletariat in greater detail, instead of assuming they are a lost cause and therefore unworthy of further analysis.
Isn’t the point of a tl;dr to explain what people should take away from a text without going into detail about it?
Yes, but I guess I don’t think that’s really the core message of your text. What I got from your text was the need to reevaluate organizational practices in the light of current material conditions. Not a specific point about sectarianism either way. Besides, people should just read the whole text if they want to engage with it productively.
What I do think is that what we have seen is not enough to cease organizing. We cannot allow ourselves to become fatalistic…
This is not my point nor a point in any of the articles I linked. The point is precisely to organize and organize even more but to do it in a smart and strategic way with the current material conditions in mind and to include all aspects into our organizing (gender struggles, colonized peoples struggles, proletarian class struggle, etc.). We cannot just organize the working class into a revolution by ourselves. Our organizing can help guide the class conscious proletariat but a vanguard by itself cannot declare revolution. I’m not saying that revolution is impossible in the West in general but revolution is not happening here right now and probably not for quite some time. Our organizing has to keep longer term goals in mind.
We should not be slaves and tailists to the spontaneity of the masses but we also need to realize that we cannot just invent a revolutionary movement without seizing the moment and guiding the masses when they do rise spontaneously. In order to do this we need to have ready organizations that are active and involved with the masses.
It means we should focus on understanding the material conditions of the United States proletariat in greater detail, instead of assuming they are a lost cause and therefore unworthy of further analysis.
Exactly this is the point I’m trying to reinforce but I don’t think it stems entirely from the western leftist assuming a lost cause. I think it all stems from the fact that the western left is just as much impacted by living in the west as the rest of the proletariat is. There absolutely are some good organizations out there and they are doing good work but they are not the majority right now. As conditions in the West continue to deteriorate and the contradictions sharpen I think we will see a lot more class conscious workers and those organizations need to be there to guide them and to provide a correct theoretical and practical line that the class conscious workers can recognize and then these organizations can really start growing. Right now, in the “build up phase”, I think organizations need to build for themselves a strong theoretical core (while of course doing all the other practical organizing they should be involved in) upon which a revolutionary mass organization can be built.
I said what I said because I was clarifying my opinions, I do not believe you are fatalistic.
I do think that the approach the US Left has currently taken to building power is flawed, but the other post by another user in this comm covers that much better than I could have alone.
I also don’t think that the current issues are resultant entirely from us assuming it’s a lost cause- I think the fatalism has come after a large period of failure to create worker power here. The only reason I engaged with it at all was to emphasize that there are other things we need to change, and that there are things to be done despite our situation of being in the imperial core.
