by MC5
A review of recent events and struggles has led the party to think over what has been happening and issue some new directives for the party's agitational work and its relationship to the Revolutionary Anti-Imperialist League (RAIL). To do so involves a self-criticism of MIM's previous agitational practice and relationship to RAIL.
Two problems in particular sum up the need for this document. The main thing is that MIM has often over the past few years veered into publicity for timeless events unconnected to generating people's movements in connection to partial demands that can be won under capitalism. The second thing is the purge of a recent party liaison to RAIL.
MIM has always opposed the "Spark" model of organizing, which is so named after a Trotskyist group. This organization appeared to us to run the same historical lectures every year and do a good job publicizing them, but because the events were historical and involved what are now timeless questions, the organization came off as dogmatic and sectarian. Examples would be "Europe in 1848" as a lecture. We don't know if Spark did anything else, because we are not too interested in Trotskyism, but what we call the "Spark model" is clear enough just the same.
Today, MIM is coming off in the same fashion while tarnishing both MIM's and RAIL's name to do so, something Spark would not do, because events were in its own name. Events which advertise only films concerning historical events are disproportionate in MIM's work. Sometimes events get organized in the name of RAIL that address only such broad topics as "education."
New rules of agitation
All agitation has in common its focus on current demands, whether already existing amongst the masses or initiated for the first time by the party.
1) The party branch cannot hold more than one public event every three months unless the event is party agitation defined below. Hence, an event on Stalin cannot be followed by an event on the Cultural Revolution within three months in a locale unless they are connected to a current demand which is the focus. Theory magazines must be sold at agitational events and such timeless infrastructure is what separates Leninist agitation from anarchist agitation, but agitation is not education on timeless topics. People who cannot separate theory and agitation work must be mercilessly removed from leadership roles in agitation. MIM does not produce theory magazines and timeless web pages because agitation is unnecessary.
2) RAIL continues to have its choice of how much agitation and how much timeless work it does, but MIM will not encourage RAIL to run timeless events and even less so will MIM use the RAIL name to run timeless events.
3) To qualify as an agitation event, an event must meet at least one of the three criteria listed below. The operational definition of agitation will be as follows until we are a stronger organization.
a) Petition drive or letter-writing. This excludes writing to allies such as prisoners, but includes letters to newspapers explaining the campaign in the local language necessary for that newspaper. Branches can still call semi-public organizational meetings (to write to prisoners for example) or invite the masses to stay on after agitational events to help with such tasks, but organizational tasks cannot dominate agitational events or the publicity for them (see 4 below).
b) Talk , presentation or film directly about a current petition drive or letter-writing campaign. When we say "about a current petition drive," we mean "currently about" (see 4 below).
c) Talk or film organized on a current event for which at least five non-MIM affiliated mass organizations were contacted and struggled with to co-sponsor the event. If no non-affiliated mass organization co-sponsors the event, the event loses its status as agitation. We recommend that agitators know the mind frames of mass organizations and go prepared to win them over to signing on to a MIM initiated event.
In the event of failure to qualify as agitation under the above rules, the party may hold its event if it fits under the three month rule or it may cancel the event.
4) All publicity distributed by MIM will subordinate timeless resources and organizational tasks to agitation. "Free Mumia" is perfectly fine to campaign for, but a poster titled "History of the Black Panthers" will not be acceptable. A film about the history of the Black Panthers may only be shown AFTER a talk concerning a current movement concerning something in connection to the Black Panthers. The main event will be to collect signatures for Mumia or stop censorship in XYZ prison and publicity will clearly subordinate timeless resources accordingly, as something of secondary mention, in the fine print.
5) The party shall have no limit to the amount of agitation it does in its own name, if that agitation is such that it is a very lucky combination of things concerning our cardinal principles. For example, the party may lead agitation to demand that Harvard University Press retract its erroneous mortality figures concerning Stalin and Mao in ITAL The Black Book of Communism. END Such involves a struggle of the current time period that has to be initiated and led and which obviously affects our cardinal principles.
6) One difference between the party and RAIL is that party members should be able to detonate and understand why it is necessary to detonate a movement on any subject. Agitation should often be principal over science production. Certainly we already know scientifically that imperialism causes world war and starvation. That should be enough to agitate about right there.
7) We ask all people to help us to implement the above thinking and to review with us our recent successes and failures with regard to these principles. Not all MIM work has failed to be agitational, so it is important not to exaggerate self-criticisms or criticisms. We ask the RAIL branches to write up reviews of what the party has suggested to RAIL and to what extent the party used the RAIL name for timeless events -- for publication in MIM Notes.
Opportunism and small-circle thinking
Much of the weakness in MIM's agitational work and its relationship to RAIL comes from opportunism. It became a fad to hold historical films, such as "Eyes on the Prize" or films on the CIA because certain films attracted good crowds numerically speaking.
When an event fails to draw a crowd for agitation, the reason is that leadership did not agitate correctly prior to holding the event. Agitation means grabbing a hold of people and talking to them verbally, with petition or literature in hand. Agitation is not putting up posters for timeless events; although that is also necessary.
Party members who cannot face their failures as agitators like to put up posters for timeless events and call themselves "RAIL." Failure means having to face the people and learn that they don't like what you have to say. The ideological wimps among us will never overcome the fear of being rejected by the masses and hence they can never lead.
If the people do not turn out for an agitational event, they probably also did not sign the petitions in advance. The correct answer is to listen to the impact of one's own words in talking with the people. In all likelihood it means getting some sharp phrases on the tip of one's tongue and writing and rewriting agitational petitions and literature numerous times, after learning how to have the most impact through struggle and re- thinking. It does not require watering down. It requires knowing what is most life-and-death about what one is doing and getting that in to short phrases so as to be ready to talk to people as they go by. That is best accomplished by listening to the masses. Even in failure, there will be those common questions that the masses ask most frequently. To whatever extent possible, change your petitions and approaches to answer those questions or speak in such a way as to direct the masses toward pithy challenges.
Many people have innumerable excuses for why they cannot lead an effective campaign in their locale. We cannot listen to any of their excuses. People who have such excuses will not be allowed to lead and if they disagree we request their resignation from any liaison to RAIL and we also ask that they not sully the party name as MCs.
Even a small minority in this country is capable of generating large-scale audiences for auditoriums, period. In actual fact, the problem MIM is having is not a lack of recruits. A steady stream of people volunteer to help. The problem we have is a question of quality of leadership -- the level of skills and umph such that we can capitalize on the steady stream of people who do volunteer to work with us. If we cannot agitate, we have no choice but to learn how to do it. There is no other way to win but by improving. Failure to do so would certainly mean that the proletariat does not deserve to rule, and hence the world will end in imperialist barbarism. We have no choice but to submit our minds and maybe our bodies to the cauldron of class struggle and coming out stronger somehow.
There is nothing wrong with doing preparatory work over months and even years to lead to such large events, but the focus must be concrete demands that do not require complete scientific mastery of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism. One difference between theory magazines and agitation is that in agitation, the same facts must be stated and re-stated over and over again until the people are familiar with them and the people who state them.
Unity comes in agitation and action. Substituting theory for agitation results in intellectualism and all kinds of vacillations. Only very rare people can achieve increasing unity principally on theoretical bases. Most people have to unite with us in demands.
The rules above will help us filter out those who are weak leaders. Weak leaders will recognize their weaknesses and seek to improve them. Those who are too weak and cannot agitate at all will not lead party events. They may still participate in PIRAO, study-group or MIM Supporters Group events until they get the umph to go back into agitation. What they must not do is leave a bad impression of RAIL or MIM.
Lizard-thinking
Part of opportunism and small-circle thinking is the inability to understand the relationship of partial demands to the proletariat and its allies. A "partial" demand is one that might be solved under imperialism or that can obtain proletarian unity without being a communist. In the most "pure" agitational campaign -- one directly led by the party -- there may be people who want to correct the historical record regarding Stalin and Mao only for bourgeois academic reasons. Others may be appalled at the state of math teaching in the United $tates and France and sign up with the party drive for an erratum on the ITAL Black Book of Communism END only for that reason. That is all fine and good. Those are not our reasons for campaigning for an erratum, but they are plenty true and good enough for relative unity, so even in a party campaign, there is a basis of unity with non-party people.
RAIL is a concrete embodiment of the fact that a persyn does not have to be a party member to agree with the party at some level less than 100%. Even party members do not agree with the party 100% and individuals disagree with themselves as their views change or they forget them. Biologists talk about the unsophisticated brains of lizards, which may only be able to think "run forward" or "run backward" or "turn this way" or "turn that way." People able only to think in yes/no terms cannot lead the RAIL. We need people who can think in percentages, as a minimum level of sophistication. As a whole slew of Harvard University Press writers and editors have proved, it is not easy to find people who have a mind for percentages all the time. It's ridiculous, but that is the state of affairs in the United $tates.
When the lizard would-be party leader sees the masses, he or she is pushing them to be party or nothing. Hence, these lizards tend to adopt the most superficial kinds of opportunism like calling an event a RAIL event instead of party event or tagging RAIL's name on to a party event. This is a kind of unconscious recognition that the comrade has failed to unite people around partial demands, and so it is necessary to throw a bone to the masses by renaming a party event a RAIL event. That is small-circle thinking connected with lizard-thinking. Such people simply cannot think of any appealing reasons for the masses to unite with us, so they throw superficial bones out to the masses. Probably they need to listen to the masses more and figure out how their thinking relates to ours in regular patterns. Once one recognizes the patterns in the masses' thinking, it becomes possible to unite with them. Recognizing those patterns is connected up with theory.
False egalitarianism
Connected with lizard-thinking where everything is either 100% party or nothing at all is the idea of false egalitarianism. Many reason that since in principle anyone can be in the party, that everyone can be in the party now and should be. It's an ultra- leftism that dilutes the party and destroys agitation. Agitation can only succeed where the pole of the proletariat is set up by the party and where the leadership recognizes bases for partial unity in percentage terms, not either/or terms.
False egalitarianism also says that all people are equal agitators in all the same situations. In fact, it is much easier for a student to stay up in a dorm all night struggling for students to sign up in a campaign, than for a middle-aged persyn to stay in that same dorm. Likewise, prisoners who see each other every day are better at organizing prisoners than outsiders are. There is a division of labor and the ultra-left idealists like to overlook that fact.
Similarly, this ultra-left thinking tries to turn all agitation into theory work. The ultra-left fails to recognize that respect for theory includes the theory of how to agitate and organize a united front. Agitation is not putting up timeless web pages or writing MT articles. Successes in those areas do not require liquidation of agitation work! Quite the contrary! Agitation feeds the demand for theory and theory improves agitation!
Leadership question
Because leadership is very important, we must mention at least at a secondary level the purge of a recent RAIL leader. Somehow a womyn who did not believe in her own political effectiveness or that of the party became part of the central leadership of RAIL! Such a failure reflects poorly on the party, right up to the top, because MIM's relationship to RAIL is pivotal.
The purged leader felt an ideological compulsion to agitate for a few months at an MC level but saw no effectiveness in her work. This is at best a model of Christianity, a question of pleasure and pain, where painful abstinence is considered virtue. This comrade became an MC because she saw it as her "duty," her "cross to bear" for the international proletariat, not because she saw party work as the most effective work she could do to end starvation, war, etc. We have unity with many such progressive Christians, but we cannot allow them to call themselves upholders of Lenin's scientific party principles; hence we had to purge someone we had relative unity with. It is better to be a forthright anarchist than not to believe in one's own work in a Leninist party. We wish our former liaison to RAIL luck in her future endeavors.
MIM is not a virtue-production device. MIM does what is expedient for revolution. If doing what is expedient for revolution makes you feel good, then you have achieved the lucky status of complete ideological unity with science, such that there is no difference between science and ideology. Those of us in imperialist countries with Christian hangovers can not achieve this status. Perhaps no one does completely, but science must be predominant over subjective feelings produced by imperialism, wherever there is a gap. If we allow science 50% of the time and subjective feelings produced by imperialism 50% of the time, we oscillate in the manner of the petty-bourgeoisie. People who do not believe science can rise above our subjective states are welcome to be post- modernists or religious mystics, but they should not be calling themselves in agreement with MIM's cardinals. In fact, they consciously disagree.
Honorary Comrades
MIM has created the role of Honorary Comrade (HC). Such comrades do not have to live the full democratic-centralism and commitment of one's life to the proletariat. We are still hopeful that HCs can exert a positive influence on the party itself by adhering to scientific principle.
We have many people in our circles who believe scientifically in what MIM is saying in terms of cardinal principles, but they would not put it above finding a girlfriend or boyfriend or a bourgeois career. Many HC level people have left the party upon grievous loss of a girlfriend/boyfriend or upon finding a really good boyfriend/girlfriend. Such people should not be considered beyond HC status. For this reason, MIM has a "Control Commission" to prevent promotion into the party MC status before it is due. In general there is nothing wrong with being RAIL, MSG, PIRAO or HC for life.
HCs should not initiate events in the name of the party. People who cannot "enjoy" the revolutionary movement to a sufficiently obsessive degree should not attempt to recruit to the party if they do not believe they are effective. Those HCs who do give recruiting a go should have a backup recruiter for their recruits approved by the Central Committee. We now have a new rule that each recruited persyn should have two recruiters, especially to make sure that recruiters are listening and explaining theoretical points that address the patterns in recruits' political thought.
Implementation
1. We ask all RAIL people to review and write in to rail@mim.org.
2. We want all people being recruited to the party to have two recruiters, including at least one approved by the Central Committee for that purpose. There is nothing worse than to be recruited by a lackadaisical or theoretically backwards recruiter. No one should let that happen.
3. Party leaders should go before the masses at their next event and explain this criticism and self-criticism and also invite input. MIM apologizes here and now for any poor impression left with regard to agitation. We are not dogmatists. We pride ourselves on the work we put into the concrete details of agitation.
4. Above all we ask for the initiation of true campaigns of agitation! Good luck!
Contact MIM by writing mim@mim.org