MIM(Prisons) is a cell of revolutionaries serving the oppressed masses inside U.$. prisons, guided by the communist ideology of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.
Under Lock & Key is a news service written by and for prisoners with a focus on what is going on behind bars throughout the United States. Under Lock & Key is available to U.S. prisoners for free through MIM(Prisons)'s Free Political Literature to Prisoners Program, by writing:
MIM(Prisons) PO Box 40799 San Francisco, CA 94140.
a communist attends a protest protesting the murder of Nasrallah by
I$rael in Sidon, in southern Lebanon
28 September 2024 – Protestors gathered across the world to mourn the
killing of Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, a founding member and leader for 32
years of Hezbollah (the Party of God) in Lebanon.(1) We know some
readers in U.$. prisons will be mourning as well. Nasrallah was the
strongest anti-imperialist voice among world leaders for a generation.
And the recent killings of Lebanese and Palestinian political leaders
have been significant victories for I$rael, at least in the
short-term.
Over 1,000 people have been killed, including Hezbollah’s top
leaders, and 6,000 injured by a series of attacks by I$rael on Lebanon
in the last couple weeks. These included exploding pagers and
walkie-talkies, as well as massive bombing strikes. Amidst these
attacks, the Communist Party of Lebanon has called for national unity to
focus on fighting I$rael, at a time when Lebanon faces its own crisis in
government. They pledged to not let I$rael (and the United $tates, we’d
add) separate the struggle of Lebanon in support of the Palestinian
struggle.(2)
Hezbollah, however, has been the lead party defending Lebanon and
Palestinians from I$rael for decades. They have proven there is still a
progressive role for bourgeois forces to play today, even in our
highly-developed imperialist world.
Nasrallah had a clear analysis of U.$. imperialism:
“America itself is the decision maker. In America, you have the major
corporations; you have a trinity of the oil corporations, the weapons
manufacturers and the so-called ‘Christian Zionism.’ The decision making
is in the hands of this alliance. ‘Israel’ used to be a tool in the
hands of the British, and now it is a tool in the hands of America.”
The Samidoun Palestinian prisoner solidarity network commented on
Hezbollah’s role in the liberation of political prisoners of I$rael:
“Sayyed Nasrallah’s leadership and struggle was also directly
connected to the prisoners’ movement and the liberation of the prisoners
of the Zionist regime. From the liberation of Khiam prison by the
victorious Lebanese resistance in 2000, liberating the torture dens of
the occupiers and their collaborators and turning it into a museum of
honour for those who struggled and sacrificed there, to the repeated
prisoner exchanges achieved by Hezbollah, the Lebanese Resistance,
including the 2004 prisoner exchange, which liberated 400 Palestinian
prisoners as well as 23 Lebanese, five Syrians, three Moroccans, three
Sudanese, one Libyan and one German-British prisoner jailed by the
Zionist regime. These exchanges, in which Sayyed Nasrallah himself
played a major role, illustrated once again that the only viable
mechanism available to liberate the prisoners in occupation jails is to
liberate the land and to achieve an exchange.”(3)
Hezbollah arose from the 1982 I$raeli occupation of Beirut. MIM
founders organized to oppose that 1982 occupation at a time when MIM was
just emerging.(4) The war in 1982 also forged the Joint
Leadership, in which the Democratic Front for the Liberation of
Palestine and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine joined
forces and attempted to further unite the Palestinian liberation
movement away from conciliation.(5) During the 2006 war between Lebanon
and I$rael, MIM condemned RCP=U$A, various alt media, and the U.$. state
department for attacking Iran and Hezbollah using gender.(6) In 2024,
the imperialists are circulating clips of Nasrallah making comments
calling for punishment for adultery and homosexuality. We salute the
“Queers for Palestine” in the United $tates who recognize the children
being bombed in Gaza and now Lebanon are a lot more gender oppressed
than any of us are here in the belly of the beast.
The history of the anti-imperialist united front in the region is
beyond the scope of this article. But the region has certainly
demonstrated the expediency of uniting classes on the basis of national
liberation to fight imperialist occupiers. Hezbollah has remarked in the
past that their alliances are closer to some Marxist groups than certain
Islamist groups. This shows the emptiness of those in the imperialist
countries who want to pit Marxism against Islam on principle. Nasrallah
also wrote that Muslims have the duty to provide charity support to any
Palestinian taking up armed struggle – Marxist, nationalist or any other
shade.(7)
A Hamas spokespersyn responded to the death of Nasrallah say that it
will not make I$rael any safer:
“Is Israel’s problem with armed groups with limited agendas that can
be eliminated by killing their leaders, or with peoples who have rights
that they have been striving to achieve for decades and have not stopped
or surrendered despite the killing of many leaders? Has any resistance
group disappeared after the assassination of the leaders?”(8)
Despite these recent losses by the oppressed nations in the Middle
East, Hezbollah won the war with I$rael in 2006, killing as many
soldiers as I$rael did without all the civilian deaths caused by I$rael
in Lebanon. Just as the war on Gaza, one year out, has not been an easy
victory for I$rael, further escalations into Lebanon will certainly not
be either. Hezbollah and Ansar Allah (Supporters of God) in Yemen
continue to be the front line of the struggle against genocide in
Palestine and against U.$. imperialism in general.
You can kill a revolutionary, but you can’t kill the
revolution!
The New Communist Party of Canada [(N)CPC] was formed by the Kanadian
communist group Revolutionary Initiative (RI) in early 2024. The RI
announced the (N)CPC through the journal Kites which it
co-publishes alongside the Organization of Communist Revolutionaries
(OCR), a communist group in the United States.
In February 2024 the OCR Issued a “red salute” to the (N)CPC
containing mostly praise. In May 2024, the journal Kites
disbanded, explained with reference to the unique circumstances in
Kanada vs. Amerika as well as unspecified ideological disagreements
between the two organizations.
While unity between the (N)CPC and the OCR may have appeared
unprincipled based upon the latter’s criticism of the former, this
polemic argues that they shared a rejection of two crucial political
lines: the labor aristocracy thesis and the significance of national
liberation struggles. To support these claims, first the Dawnland Group
examines the (N)CPC’s political program followed by the OCR’s response,
each published in Kites.
(N)CPC says natives
should ally with settlers
It is difficult to separate the influence of Trotskyism from its
settler-colonial baggage and the (N)CPC demonstrates this truth well.
The Political Program of the New Communist Party of Canada
opens with the (N)CPC’s two “innately linked” objectives: “a) establish
working class rule in the economic and political spheres of Canada; and
b) Usher in a new, non-colonial, equal and fraternal type of relations
between all nations which today remain forcefully and unequally united
within the Canadian state.”(1)
Alone, the second objective is agreeable. But the (N)CPC clarifies
how these two goals are interlinked, writing that neither “is likely to
be achieved in a lasting, meaningful way without the other.
Working-class power without national liberation and national equality
would have to be built on an illegitimate, coercive basis. National
liberation without working-class power would mean a mere reform of
Canadian law, or else create powerless statelets that would fall prey to
any of the multiple imperialist powers contending for domination and
survival in the world today.”
Despite claiming that equality and national liberation are necessary
for indigenous peoples, the (N)CPC supports this only conditionally,
demanding “working class” power come first. Charitably interpreted, the
(N)CPC can be read as considering the “proletariat” of indigenous
nations to be an important aspect of the Kanadian “working class”. In
any case, considering settlers proletariat as (N)CPC does, this would
make the Kanadian “working class” overwhelmingly settler.
Support of indigenous sovereignty contingent upon prior proletarian
revolution renders this support meaningless. Thus, when the (N)CPC
claims that “the only conceivable way to resolve the separate legal
status of Indigenous people without liquidating Indigenous nations as
legal entities is collective rights under the banner of the full right
to self-determination, up to and including secession” and the necessity
of “upholding of the right to secede by popular referendum for all
component republics of the Multinational Socialist Confederacy;” their
conditions render these rights null until proletarian revolution.
National Liberation is a value as much as a strategy. All peoples
have the right to autonomy and self-determination and these rights must
be supported without regards to the opinions of settlers.
Beyond values there are strategic concerns. This “alliance” is
directly risking the sustained colonization of indigenous groups by
“socialist” settlers. The Israeli Kibbutz movement historically
purchased lands form Arabic landlords, where they would evict
Palestinian tenants in order to create “communes.” Despite Kibbutzniks
being considered “left wing” and “socialist,” their settlements encircle
the Gaza strip and they have been used to condemn the October 7
resistance operation (2), the newest stage of the Palestinian national
liberation war. Here the Israeli “working class” has achieved power and
constitutes the main foot-soldiers of genocide. Demanding working class
power in exchange for indigenous sovereignty also neglects the inverse
possibility that national liberation of colonies will be prerequisite
for overthrowing the bourgeoisie.
As addressed in A
Polemic Against Settler “Maoism”, settlers have an inherently
reactionary class role.(3) While isolated settlers reject this role, the
vast majority occupy indigenous lands, stealing their resources and
cheap labor. The basis of settler-colonialism has never been a deceitful
bourgeoisie but their transparent alliance with settlers:
former-proletariat, offered petty-bourgeois class positions through the
redistribution of land acquired through theft and genocide. The (N)CPC
is wrong that the bourgeoisie is the only force standing in-between the
settler-workers and decolonization, and that through “excluding the
monopoly bourgeoisie from this process entirely,” Kanada can negotiate
more just treaties with the First Nations. Settlers are not deceived
by the capitalists against their better interest – a supposed alliance
with the indigenous masses. Settlers assume such a class role because,
with respect to the capitalist mode of production, it is their best
interest.
Settlers are knowing, willful participants in genocide as part of a
bargain with those capitalists in exchange for a petty-bourgeois class
position.(4) This is their best material interest as a class permitted
to escape proletarian existence through conquest. The bargain between
settlers and their bourgeoisie is not conceived via ignorance or
deception, it is the rational consequence of pursuing one’s material
interest within class society: ascension up class and/or national
hierarchy to positions of greater wealth and culpability in
oppression. Settlers fill niches where the bourgeoisie wishes to
expand private property and commodity production, dispose of surplus
populations and compete with other imperial powers. In exchange for
exterminating the original inhabitants, settlers are allowed free reign
of the land and resources of the dead.
There may be a more subconscious belief involved in apologizing for
settlers and manufacturing their innocence, namely that, although
settlers are indeed rationally pursuing their material interests, this
betrays their human interest to live in a world without
exploitation, and that communists can win over the masses of settlers to
this superior moral position.
As discussed in the Polemic Against Settler “Maoism”, there are
important differences between classes and individuals. It is possible to
successfully appeal to the morals and internationalist sentiments of
certain individuals from each class and nation. This will vary wildly
depending on the individual in question and their background. But at the
macro-level, only oppressed nations and classes have the material
interest in a world without oppression which has historically been
wielded to make revolution. Settlers are oppressors. As Black Liberation
Army soldier Assata Shakur famously says, “Nobody in the world, nobody
in history, has ever gotten their freedom by appealing to the moral
sense of the people who were oppressing them.” The (N)CPC suggests just
that failed strategy.
While morals are required to undertake communist revolution, morals
can never be abstracted from their class context. Settler morals,
including the belief that settlers’ working conditions are more
important than indigenous rights, were created with the rise of
capitalism in Europe whose surplus proletarian population was offered
overseas class roles similar to that of Auschwitz guards. The Nazis’
thirst for lebensraum, which slaughtered millions of Jews and Slavs
during the holocaust, was directly copied from manifest destiny and the
treatment of indigenous peoples on Occupied Turtle Island where between
10 and 15 million were murdered (5).
In their first few paragraphs of published writing the (N)CPC have
downplayed the Kanadian “worker” role in ongoing genocide of First
Nations, manufacturing a myth of innocent, deceived settlers. Further,
they dictate the terms of national liberation to the indigenous
communities of Canada in service of the more important “proletarian
revolution.” This is settler “Marxism” and Trotskyism.
Trotskyists believe that third-world revolutions are doomed to
failure without the aid of the more “advanced” proletariat of the
western nations, that socialism is not possible within one country. The
ideas are best summarized by the man himself, discussing how:
“A backward colonial or semi-colonial country, the proletariat of
which is insufficiently prepared to unite the peasantry and take power,
is thereby incapable of bringing the democratic revolution to its
conclusion. Contrariwise, in a country where the proletariat has power
in its hands as the result of the democratic revolution, the subsequent
fate of the dictatorship and socialism depends in the last analysis not
only and not so much upon the national productive forces as upon the
development of the international socialist revolution.”(6)
Thus, even if a colonial or semi-colonial country managed to seize
state power, it would fail if international “proletarian” revolution did
not quickly follow. This was as true for Trotsky in the USSR as it later
became for him in China, where he argued with extremely poor foresight
that alliance with the Koumintang had defeated the revolution and that
instead “permanent revolution” was necessary to liberate China.(7) To
the Trotskyist, the proletariat of these nations is insufficiently
numerically developed to lead a revolution. They forget the fact that no
(western) European nation – those initially with the greatest industrial
proletariat – has ever waged a successful struggle for state socialism,
and the fact that third-world national liberation struggles have
accomplished the most significant strategic advances towards communism
in history. Finally, as covered below, most of the populations in core
imperialist countries are labor aristocrats who hold petty-bourgeois
class positions despite receiving wages: they won’t be leading
revolution anytime soon.
Trotskyism is pervasive in Amerika and Kanada. Even without reference
to Trotsky, without explicit statements of the inferiority of national
liberation struggles, it is still perfectly possible for
“Marxist-Lenninist” and “Maoist” groups to uphold Trotsky’s ideas
through organizing settlers of an oppressor nation instead of organizing
the oppressed.
As discussed in the Polemic against Settler-Maoism, settler “maoism”
and Trotskyism share certain chronology with regards to national
liberation, another characteristic of belief that proletarian revolution
takes priority. The (N)CPC believes socialist revolution will
precede national autonomy for indigenous peoples:
“The only way to cut the proverbial Gordian knot is for the
Indigenous national struggle to link up with the proletarian struggle
for socialism in overthrowing the extant Canadian State. Once it
is overthrown, new agreements can be reached over the use of land,
resources and their sharing between nations. True sovereignty
can be enshrined in a new, multinational constitution. This sovereignty
can ensure full, distinct national rights without the need for
any”Indian status,” which would be replaced by full citizenship in a
sovereign nation. Full independence can be achieved by those
nations who want it and have the resources needed to sustain
it.” (Bold ours)
There are no legitimate “agreements” between settlers and indigenous
peoples, because the settlers have used genocide and theft to acquire
their negotiating assets. This is why DLG advocates for the Joint
Dictatorship of the Proletariat of the Oppressed Nations, which will
enforce the will of the oppressed nations at the expense of the
imperialist and settler nations, such as the Amerikan and Kanadian
nation, a process involving extensive redistribution of land and
resources as well as peoples’ tribunals for criminals against humanity.
Finally, the notion that settlers can decide if indigenous nations
“want” or are “ready” for independence, has been used by colonial powers
for centuries to continue oppressing their subjects.
There is a related issue throughout the (N)CPC political program of
advocating for a homogeneous Kanadian culture without the consent of the
indigenous peoples. Deciding autonomously on such a path long after
achieving independence and having received back all stolen land and
resources, plus some for interest from the settlers, would be a
consensual decision. Settlers should not be advocating for any such
cultural assimilation today. The (N)CPC writes that:
“The monopoly bourgeoisie and its State willfully confuse the
potential of Canada for its actual reality. Canada really could be a
brand-new type of country, one where national sovereignty is not the
preserve of a small parasitic class but is instead granted to the myriad
national groups that give it its rich cultural mosaic. We really
could all work together to preserve our respective cultures, develop our
economy in sustainable ways which benefit all working people, embrace
cultures and traditions originating from pre-colonial North America,
from Europe and now from the entire world. We could collectively take
everything that is old and make it into something new.” (Bold
ours).
Settlers have no right to advocate for the creation of international
cultures together with their colonial subjects. This reduces to an
argument for cultural integration which, in Kanada and the United
$tates, represents genocide through sterilization, kidnappings,
residential schools, and murder by colonial militias and police. Whether
or not they understand this, their language is overtly colonial,
advocating for assimilation and continued unequal relationships between
oppressed and oppressor nations. They need an explicit, unconditional
recognition of indigenous sovereignty or they are no different than
other settlers seeking to maintain unfair treaties with First Nations
without reparations or sovereignty.
The Dawnland Group (DLG) writes this polemic because the (N)CPC’s
understanding of indigenous sovereignty directly contradicts with DLG’s
support for New Democracy in Occupied Turtle Island. In 1940 Mao argued
that imperialism and feudalism prevented China from directly pursuing
socialism. Rather, New Democracy was required first, a dictatorship of
revolutionary classes over the country in order to liberate it from
outside domination, so that socialism may be constructed thereafter:
“The first step or stage in our revolution is definitely not, and
cannot be, the establishment of a capitalist society under the
dictatorship of the Chinese bourgeoisie, but will result in the
establishment of a new-democratic society under the joint dictatorship
of all the revolutionary classes of China headed by the Chinese
proletariat The revolution will then be carried forward to the second
stage, in which a socialist society will be established in China.”
To liberate China, the Communist Party led a united front with the
peasants, proletariat, petty-bourgeoisie and some national bourgeoisie
who sided with the communists against Japan in the war for national
liberation. Whereas in Europe, feudalism could be overthrown by the
bourgeois-democratic revolution due to the bourgeoisie’s antagonism with
the feudal mode of production, in colonies and oppressed nations,
imperialism is inclined to promote feudalism from without and thus a
broader united front is required. Despite the defeat of the Cultural
Revolution and the capitalist road taken in 1976, the strategy of New
Democracy liberated China from foreign domination.
Here Mao gives context as to how New Democracy applies to Chinese
conditions:
“Being a bourgeoisie in a colonial and semi-colonial country and
oppressed by imperialism, the Chinese national bourgeoisie retains a
certain revolutionary quality at certain periods and to a certain
degree… Since tsarist Russia was a military-feudal imperialism which
carried on aggression against other countries, the Russian bourgeoisie
was entirely lacking in revolutionary quality. There, the task of the
proletariat was to oppose the bourgeoisie, not to unite with it. But
China’s national bourgeoisie has a revolutionary quality at certain
periods and to a certain degree, because China is a colonial and
semi-colonial country which is a victim of aggression. Here, the task of
the proletariat is to form a united front with the national bourgeoisie
against imperialism and the bureaucrat and warlord governments without
overlooking its revolutionary quality.”
DLG views the application of New Democracy in Occupied Turtle Island
to mean that, in the oppressed nations, similarly to China, the
bourgeoisie may be an importantly ally in the national liberation
struggle. In the oppressor nations (Amerika, Kanada), not only is the
bourgeoisie entirely counter-revolutionary but this is true of the
petty-bourgeoisie and labor aristocracy as well due to benefiting from
and carrying out imperialism and settler-colonialism.
Most bourgeoisie and rich peasantry in China were less wealthy than
the petty-bourgeoisie and much of the labor aristocracy today on
Occupied Turtle Island. The petty-bourgeoisie and labor aristocracy of
oppressor nations in OTI have no great interest in being won over to a
communist cause, because most face no national oppression and are
bought-off from imperialist superprofits. Thus, DLG argues that the role
of the Amerikan/Kanadian communist vanguard is to treat these classes as
hostile and instead support the national liberation wars of the internal
semi-colonies and oppressed nations.
By contrast, the (N)CPC writes of the Kanadian situation that “an
Indigenous petty-bourgeoisie and intelligentsia have also been fostered
by the State as part of its counter-revolutionary strategy. The
revolutionary camp will have to cautiously navigate in building a class
alliance that unites the broadest interests of the Indigenous peoples
while isolating and struggling against these new reactionary classes.”
While imperialism promotes neo-colonial sections of each oppressed
nation’s ruling class who collaborate with the oppressor nation, the
(N)CPC is confusing this small segment of the indigenous (petty)
bourgeoisie with its entirety.
The (N)CPC argues the petty-bourgeoisie and bourgeoisie of the First
Nations must be struggled against but the labor aristocracy and
petty-bourgeoisie of the settler nation are important allies to the
revolution. This is a paradoxical reversal of New Democracy, in which it
is inapplicable in the oppressed nations where it was designed
and synthesized successfully, and yet it is applicable in the
core imperialist countries where it has never been employed. Concluding
on their views about national liberation, the (N)CPC recognizes:
“oppressed nations’ right to self-determination up to and including
secession. But we do not content ourselves with this: we recognize that
given the way Canada has been built, total separation between
its various nations is likely to be counterproductive.
Therefore, we intend to build a new form of political and economic
unity, a multinational socialist confederacy whose component parts
are not arbitrarily-drawn provinces, but really-existing peoples and
nations…” (Bold ours)
They provide no explanation for why “separation between various
nations is likely to be counterproductive,” although this is a
convenient platitude for settlers who wish to have an input about when
indigenous people are “ready” for independence, as the (N)CPC indicated
above. It is historically illiterate of the complicity of settlers in
genocide and naive in assuming somehow this time things will be
different and the settler-majority will solve the very contradiction
that their class exists because of.
The (N)CPC pitch must be confusing for First Nations, who have been
systematically slaughtered, expelled and forced onto reservations for
centuries not by capitalists but by settlers pursuing their material
interests. By contrast, a vanguard among the settler nation would be
formed through a revolutionary defeatist position, unequivocally bent
towards the destruction of the settler class role through the
repatriation of land, resources and sovereignty to First Nations via
revolutionary national liberation war.
The small chance of a vanguard position emerging in Kanada and
Amerika will be squandered so long as Trotskyism continues selling
indigenous peoples the promise of new negotiations with the same settler
class that has been occupying their lands and seeing their genocide
through for centuries.
Making proletarians
from labor aristocrats
The (N)CPC writes that,
“comprised of all those deprived of the means to produce and forced
to sell their labour power to survive, the proletariat is the largest
class in society, forming somewhere between 60 and 65% of the
population.”
There are two crucial Trotskyist components involved in viewing
Kanada as 60% proletarian. First is the view discussed above that
settlers can occupy revolutionary class positions; that they can still
be “workers”. Second is the view that labor aristocrats who are paid
above the value of their wages through super-exploitation of the global
south can be proletarian rather than petty-bourgeois. These ideas
closely overlap because the labor aristocracy on Occupied Turtle Island
is mostly settler and the settler nation (Amerika/Kanada) is
overwhelmingly labor aristocratic, save for a tiny minority who fall
into the lumpenproletariat including homeless and prisoners.
Throughout their political program, the (N)CPC rejects the labor
aristocracy thesis. The (N)CPC views the three main contradictions in
the world as
“(a) between the imperialists themselves, which means the struggle
for the re-division of the world is always in motion, albeit to varying
degrees; (b) between imperialist countries and oppressed countries,
which means imperialist exploitation and oppression, and the struggle
for self-determination and independent national development; and (c)
between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat in each country, which means
class struggle and the potential for socialist revolution.”
Contradiction (b), an important mention, is suspect based on their
treatment of oppressed-nation struggles within Kanada as shown above.
Because of their use of the term “countries”, it is unclear if they
believe this imperialist/oppressed dynamic plays out among the nations
internal to settler-colonies. Contradiction (c) however is wholly
incorrect as in Kanada and Amerika, the proletariat is numerically
insignificant. The vast majority are allied to the bourgeoisie as
settlers and/or Labor Aristocrats, making class struggle minimal on
Occupied Turtle Island at the present time.
The (N)CPC disagrees. They write that
“Through the housing market an ever-growing portion of workers’
paycheques are transferred back to the bourgeoisie in the form of rent
or interest. Either enslaved to mortgages or rents, workers are often
one step away from the streets.”
The term slavery is best reserved for slaves, not home owners. The
view that swaths of workers are “enslaved” to their rent via landlords
is subjective, equally so to being “one step away from the streets.”
In Occupied Turtle Island, these terms are overused as much as living
“paycheck to paycheck.” In the imperial core where minimum wages are ten
times that of the global proletariat, where public services provide the
vast majority with water, electricity and transportation, it is
chauvinistic to discuss “slavery” to anything. The global proletariat
often choose between extremely limited and poor quality food and
housing, or earns too little for this choice, subsisting parasitically
or dying prematurely. It should be clear that the (N)CPC is attempting
to minimize the wages of imperialism paid to the labor aristocracy
through super-exploitation of the global south. The Polemic Against
Settler-Maoism and MIM(Prisons)’s
study on the housing market (8) are invaluable demonstrations of the
growth of the labor aristocracy in Occupied Turtle Island
throughout the previous half century.
The (N)CPC’s specific examples of the proletariat exemplify another
Trotskyist approach:
“At its core are those who work in natural resources, manufacturing,
construction, transport, and logistics — labourers at the centre of
capitalist exploitation. They are key to the revolutionary movement
not only by their large number – around 4 million – but
because they are the producers of commodities and wealth… those working
in industries which allow labour-power to reproduce itself over time –
chiefly health care and education – totalling approximately 4 million
workers… those working to facilitate the circulation of capital –
primarily workers in retail and services with about 3 million workers.
Without these workers the bourgeoisie cannot maintain itself in the long
run or realize its profit. Together with the labourers, these sections
of the proletariat, totalling about 11 million people, hold the
potential to establish a new, socialist economy.” (Bold ours)
Here is a typical Trotskyist confusion of the “importance” of a given
trade to the economy for the revolutionary potential of the workers
therein, which the (N)CPC states as the
“principle of workers’ centrality. That is, the principle that the
workers at the centre of production – and found in great concentration,
specifically, the labourers in large-scale industry and the health and
education workers in the major service centres – form the heart of the
proletariat and the main force for socialist revolution in Canada. The
Party must therefore, first and foremost, establish and build itself
within these workplaces.”
As discussed in the Polemic Against Settler-Maoism, this is a
Trotskyist obsession with numbers and a mechanical application of the
conditions of other historical revolutions onto the imperial core,
assuming revolutionary insurrection will play out along similar lines
despite the bargain of the majority with imperialism. This follows
Trotsky’s belief in a quantity of “advanced” “workers” in capitalism as
prerequisite for socialism, a condition missing from “backwards”
(oppressed) nations.
This opportunistic error leads to mass work among a numerically
enormous yet counter-revolutionary base who benefit from imperialism.
This mass-work is ultimately not communist because improving the lot of
labor aristocrats is important to the bourgeoisie. Social democratic
policies greatly expanding the labor aristocracy were implemented during
the 1930s and 1940s across western Europe and Occupied Turtle Island in
order to compete with socialism in the USSR and materially dissuade
workers from communist politics. This strategy succeeded and that’s why
only oppressed nations have led communist vanguards in OTI since; there
is next-to-no more economic exploitation.
OCR “Revolutionary
Salute” to Trotskyism
All should salute the OCR for criticizing a major (former) partner
organization. A complete assessment of OCR line and practice is far
beyond the scope of our discussion – perhaps impossible during a human
lifespan given their volume of writing.
Unfortunately though, they must be criticized for their unity with
the (N)CPC as well as what this demonstrates: deeper held agreements
with a Trotskyist political formation. This should serve as cause for
reflection and struggle for OCR membership and readers.
Lets begin discussing some strengths of the OCR’s Red Salute.(9)
Readers will have noticed the (N)CPC does not even claim to uphold
Maoism as the most advanced science of the proletariat and the OCR is
correct to criticize them for this, although it is strange the latter do
not require Maoism for joint publications with other communist groups.
All the same, their section on the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution
in the Red Salute develops many interesting criticisms of the
(N)CPC not addressed in this polemic.
OCR criticisms of the (N)CPC’s betrayal of the labor aristocracy
thesis and their failure to recognize the class nature of imperialism,
as well as pointing out the ludicrous idea of a 60% proletarian Kanada,
are all strong. We praise their criticisms that college-degree
occupations including teachers and medical workers are petty-bourgeois,
and their criticisms of economism and “worker centrality” are good.
Yet, despite acknowledging that they are not Maoist nor sufficiently
anti-imperialist in their class analysis, the OCR still issues a
revolutionary salute to the (N)CPC. At first this seems odd, given the
significance of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution and mention of
labor aristocracy in the OCR Manifesto and within Kites 8.
Ultimately, DLG concludes that the unity of these two groups derived
from a shared lack of ideological commitment to national liberation and
the labor aristocracy thesis.
OCR’s soft Labor Aristocracy
thesis
Regarding the (N)CPC’s view that the labor aristocracy forms a mass
base for revolution, the OCR’s manifesto says those gaining from
imperialism in the United States include:
“the petty-bourgeoisie – people who own and operate small
enterprises or who possess skills and education that enable them to sell
their labor at a higher rate – as well as the labor aristocracy
and bourgeoisified workers, whose work is more proletarian in
character but who make substantial wages above what they need to survive
and have significant job security and health and retirement benefits…
However, among these middle classes and the ideological state
apparatuses and political institutions of the US, there is always
conflict and struggle with the bourgeoisie which at times becomes quite
acute.” (Bold Ours)
This concept is evident within Kites 8, the OCR’s most
significant work, an attempt to summarize all those communist parties
across U.S. history which they consider important. (10) They praise the
Revolutionary Communist Party(USA), saying that the latter “developed a
united-front-level program that addressed the key social faultlines of
the time and could unite, in a broad resistance movement, all those in
political motion who were objectively on the proletariat’s side of those
social faultlines.” Much like the (N)CPC, the OCR is claiming there are
segments of each class that can potentially be united to fight for the
proletariat.
Written by an OCR author named Kenny Lake in Kites #2, the
second article in the “Specter” series’s conception of proletarian
revolution is put similarly. Lake writes that:
“revolutionary civil war can only be initiated after the proletariat,
led by communists, has built up the organized forces for revolution
through a lengthy process of class struggle and creates and takes
advantage of favorable conditions for the launch of an insurrection.
The proletariat cannot do this alone, but must forge an alliance
of classes under its leadership by taking advantage of the conflicts and
struggles between the various middle classes and the bourgeoisie and
within the bourgeoisie’s ideological state apparatuses” (Kites
2, pg 36. Bold ours).
It is crucial to say that the proletariat “cannot do this alone.”
This is quite similar to the (N)CPC’s view of the petty-bourgeoisie, who
they claim is
“neither exploiter nor exploited…For a large part of this class, the
lower petty-bourgeoisie, living conditions are similar to that of much
of the proletariat…stuck between a rock and a hard place, we must win
this class to allying with the proletariat for a better life in
socialism. The proletariat must struggle to win them over under its
leadership in a united front against the bourgeoisie, as they can be
powerful allies, holding much influence in universities, trade unions,
media outlets, religious organizations and other such institutions.”
Thus, one explanation of the OCR’s unity with the (N)CPC despite the
latter rejecting the labor aristocracy thesis outright is because the
former hold a weak version of it. For the OCR, even though the
proletariat is the primary revolutionary class, the petty-bourgeoisie
and “various middle classes” still hold revolutionary contradictions
with the U$ bourgeoisie. As such, it may not matter if a struggle
revolves around the concerns of the proletariat or the petty bourgeoisie
or the labor aristocracy because there are advantageous contradictions
among each group.
It is true that actual oppressed classes and nations at times must
make alliances with others. The potential for progressive alliances
depends heavily on the class or nation in question. The OCR and (N)CPC
are misguided because the “middle classes” in Amerika and Kanada are
direct perpetrators of imperialism and settler-colonialism, and as
classes have conflicts with the bourgeoisie only over dividing
spoils.
National
Liberation and New Democracy on Occupied Turtle Island
As previously indicated, the OCR and (N)CPC “class alliance” theories
are an inverted application of the Maoist idea of New Democracy to the
United $tates / Kanada context, these countries being inundated with
settler-colonialism and labor aristocracy. Settlers have a
counter-revolutionary class position with regards to indigenous peoples,
and labor aristocrats have a counter-revolutionary class position with
regards to their nation’s imperialism.
The application of New Democracy to Occupied Turtle Island means that
revolutionaries in various nations have highly distinct
responsibilities. The Amerikan vanguard is distinct from that of
oppressed nation vanguards. The main role of the Amerikan vanguard is to
promote the formation of a Joint Dictatorship of the Proletariat of the
Oppressed Nations through the national liberation struggles of colonies
and internal semi-colonies on Occupied Turtle Island. Amerikan
revolutionaries will not liberate themselves because they suffer no
oppression or exploitation.
By contrast, labor aristocrats within oppressed nations hold certain
revolutionary contradictions by virtue of experiencing national
oppression. Their class can be organized towards the goal of liberation
for their respective nation. This is true for the petty-bourgeoisie and
some of the bourgeoisie of oppressed nations in Occupied Turtle Island
as well.
The same is untrue in the oppressor/settler nation. The few
revolutionaries who form the oppressor/settler vanguard take a
class-suicidal position, sacrificing and attempting to destroy their
petty-bourgeois class through supporting external national liberation
struggles. While the OCR agrees with us on paper with the attitude labor
aristocrat and settler revolutionaries should have regarding
self-sacrifice, they are incorrect to search for revolutionary
contradictions between these groups and their ally-bourgeoisie. If the
alliance is in each party’s mutual interest, there can be no
contradiction.
As identified in the Polemic Against Settler Maoism, the labor
aristocracy has grown wealthier from the 1960’s until the 2020’s. This
signifies to all settlers as well as those from oppressed nations the
opportunity for petty-bourgeois life through rejecting revolutionary
struggle. As such, only a small portion of people from these groups will
constitute a revolutionary vanguard rejecting their class status, as is
demonstrated by the historical record in the U$ and Kanada which shows a
very small amount of communist revolutionaries. Compare this to China in
which hundreds of millions joined the communist party. The bases for
this difference were national oppression and exploitation in China.
The OCR praise the (N)CPC for having developed a “creative” solution
to national liberation struggles through a “clear analysis.” There are
important examples of the OCR qualifying their belief in the
significance of national liberation struggles such that this praise
accords. In Kites 8, they write that:
“Labeling oppressed nations and nationalities in the US as internal
colonies, while morally justified, does not provide the analytical
foundation for such a strategy and program, instead suggesting separate
struggles to liberate each ‘internal colony’ perhaps linked by
solidarity and a common enemy. The “internal colony” analysis fails to
grasp that there is a multinational proletariat in the US,
disproportionately made up of people of oppressed nation(s) and
nationalities but also including white proletarians, which brings
together people of different nationalities who have a common class
interest and similar but variegated experiences of exploitation and
conditions of life, that is in the strategic position, as a
class, to lead the revolutionary overthrow of US
imperialism.”(11)
Submerging the national struggles of all oppressed nations into the
primary “multinational proletarian” struggle is a recipe for Trotskyism,
especially when combined with the implication that some whites hold
revolutionary class positions. It makes struggling with Trotskyist
groups such as the (N)CPC impossible. Having demoted national liberation
struggles compared to “multinational proletarian revolution”, how could
the OCR disagree that class struggle is more significant?
Despite their affirmation of the right of separate nations to their
own revolutionary organizations, OCR says that this trend
ideologically
“strengthened revolutionary nationalism and weakened the potential
hegemony of the communist world outlook over the growing revolutionary
movement. Practically, it meant that the best of the Sixties generation
were in separate organizational structures rather than combining their
strengths and debating out the crucial questions before the
revolutionary movement within one united democratic centralist
structure.”
This echoes the (N)CPC’s claim that it would likely be
“counterproductive” to have separate vanguards for First Nations,
despite the strong risk that white chauvinism will corrupt the formation
of a vanguard party as the OCR documents having happened to the
Communist Party(USA) and the Revolutionary Communist Party(USA) within
Kites 8.(12)
Towards the end of Kites 8 the OCR writes how US revolution
could hinge on developments in nations like Puerto Rico, the Dominican
Republic, Jamaica, Haiti, other Caribbean nations as well as countries
in Central and South America. They write that
“To maximize potential for revolutionary spillover, a communist
vanguard must carry out political work among the immigrant populations
in the US from the countries in question and link the struggles in their
homelands with the struggle in the diaspora.”
While we agree with the attention necessary towards these oppressed
nations, their value is not about “spillover” but about the necessity of
destroying imperialism before proletarian revolution can happen
on Occupied Turtle Island. Until this time, there will be almost no
proletariat whatsoever, but rather a mass of bought-off labor
aristocrats, even among the oppressed nations. The toppling of
imperialism and settler-colonialism will break the class basis for the
labor aristocracy and shift the tide in the favor of a Joint
Dictatorship of the Proletariat of the Oppressed Nations (JDPON). This
would allow the return of all First Nation lands and resources alongside
reparations for all internal semi-colonies. At such point, Amerika would
no longer be living parasitically from the Third World or oppressed
peoples and the class base of bought-off settlers and labor aristocrats
would disappear.
Conclusion
That the two organizations co-published Kites for over three
years and the disagreements we discuss above go unmentioned by the
(N)CPC raises the question if some aspects of their theoretical line
were discarded during party formation. As much is particularly suggested
by the Spectre series – originally published by Revolutionary
Initiative (RI), precursor to the (N)CPC – where a version of the Labor
Aristocracy thesis is employed to study the United States class
structure and locate the US proletariat.
It is the responsibility of the communist movement, particularly in
the imperial core where socialists far and wide are attempting to win
over the labor aristocracy, to establish firm boundaries of cooperation.
Although there is not a single correct method to determine such
boundaries, those claiming to be vanguard formations owe it to the
global proletariat to establish them transparently. Unity between groups
who supposedly disagree about fundamental principles is irresponsible
and deeply confusing to the masses. Here it raised the questions: how
did the RI and OCR cooperate for years to publish Kites without
struggling out some of these differences? Did the (N)CPC’s formation
include a (faction-based) ideological drift the OCR was not aware of? If
not the labor aristocracy thesis, Maoism or the importance of national
liberation, what is the basis for unity with the OCR?
Ultimately, we can only conclude that neither group considers these
lines dividing. Despite everything worth praise from the OCR and the
journal Kites, they need to develop higher ideological
standards and more explicit ideological lines. Although their recent
disassociation from the (N)CPC may be a positive change, the OCR must
allow no further opportunistic alliances to fester, internal or
external. Finally, they should struggle with DLG ideologically and
engage with the critiques we’ve laid out here.
This topic keeps coming up again and again and now I see it listed in
the USW campaign list. Let’s look at this from a practical perspective
and not from an ideological one.
Snitching is telling on people. It’s giving information on someone
else to a higher authority to act on it. We can all agree on that
definition. The more important question is to what INTENTION is someone
snitching, and this is what we should analyze as it pertains to our
struggle.
I’ve been reading in ULK about these “comrades” who snitch
on other prisoners because they claim it’s for the good of our struggle.
I call Bullshit. If you really care so much about the health of the
population, become a drug counselor or start a campaign to fight drug
addiction. But you’re not doing any of those things, which actually
involve WORK. Instead you sit in your cell and file these papers to
internal affairs or whoever using the same system you claim to be
opposing, and then you beg them to protect you. Disgusting.
The cops you are snitching on are not part of some larger conspiracy
to keep inmates addicted to drugs or control the population. That’s
absurd. These cops are actually our allies, and though they may be
motivated by profit, they are still facing the same risk and fate we now
find ourselves in. If it weren’t for these allies, we would never have
phones in prison which allow us to contribute to the struggle in ways we
otherwise could never do, not to mention the obvious connections with
our loved ones without police invasion of our privacy.
I understand you who snitch probably can’t afford a phone, and this
makes you angry and spiteful so you wish to do your “public service,”
right? Or maybe you are simply envious of the power and influence of
those who have the plugs. Sorry for that; prison is rough. But don’t sit
here and claim you do it because you just care about us all so much.
That being said, are drugs beneficial to the population? No, but
unfortunately sometimes that comes with it and we should spend our
efforts to make sure the right things are coming in and not the wrong
things. We don’t need to throw out the whole baby with the bathwater. In
fact, a lot of marijuana comes in too and personally this helps a lot
with my service-related PTSD. Shame on you or anyone trying to shut down
these precious lifelines using the guise of our struggle. Getting more
people locked in prison because of your personal misery does not help
the movement. You are not fooling me or any of the real ones out
there.
MIM(Prisons) responds: This comrade is largely
responding to an article in ULK 84, CA
Silences Reports of Drug Trade in Prisons. We can acknowledge the
added nuance in this situation. However, most of the articles we’ve
printed on this topic are comrades trying to get people to file
grievances against political repression or physical abuse by staff,
and other prisoners refusing because they “don’t snitch.” Such cases are
cut and dry. While we can’t rely on the imperialist state to police
itself, grievances and lawsuits are tactics that contribute to building
power. We must expose abuses of the state to combat them. So to say
“Stop snitching on pigs” as this comrade does is truly a reactionary
statement equivalent to saying “don’t resist oppression”.
What the comrade above says about running programs to fight drug
addiction is right on. Just reporting things to the imperialists is
never gonna change things on its own. We must build our own power and
our own independent institutions of the oppressed. That is when the
imperialists will really start to make moves to out compete us by
reforming their own institutions. As far as the state conspiring to
spread drugs, we need to understand the levels at which such things
happen. Just because every C.O. didn’t come together and discuss these
plans doesn’t mean it’s not intentional. To put
it another way, if the state wanted to stop drug use in prisons they
could. It wouldn’t even be that hard. Whether prescription meds or
illicit ones, we know this is a common tool of pacification in prisons,
as is digital media as the comrade
from Pennsylvania discusses.
We discussed with this comrade the loosening of old hierarchies,
staff shortages, and the opening of opportunities in prisons today. Some
of the old ways are going away. Mostly this has led to negative things
like more drugs and neglect so far. But it does create new
possibilities. And that is why we are printing this response. We do want
comrades to be trying to understand the changes where they are
imprisoned and thinking about how our goals can expand and work within
the existing motions of change. United fronts and temporary alliances
are necessary strategic tools.
by Simon of The Dawnland Group July 2024 permalink
UAW members creatively tie political repression on University of
California campuses to unfair labor practices, but an undercurrent of
exploiter-country economic demands remains
On May 13th, UAW Local 4811 voted to authorize a statewide stand-up
strike across University of California campuses. Though representing
largely class enemy strata, the United Auto Workers union (UAW) has, in
the past few years, been an innovator in strike tactics. “Stand-up
strikes,” as they are called, differ from traditional strikes by having
local branches be called to the picket by a central coordinator, as
opposed to having all members strike at once. This tactic reduces
burnout among the strikers by introducing “shift work” into the nature
of the picket, and psychologically attaches rank-and-file members more
closely to movement developments with anticipation of not knowing until
the day of whether it is their turn to strike.
The public response of the university administration has been
traditionally liberal. Unable to argue on the moral grounds of the
genocide and their active support of it, administrators displace the
discussion to either the process of dissent (whether it’s “through the
right channels”) or how the dissent affects the lives of settlers. After
failure to challenge the legal grounds of the strike, the UC office of
the President moved to pearl-clutching,
“UAW’s goals of ‘maximize chaos and confusion’ have come to fruition,
creating substantial and irreparable impacts on campuses and impacting
our students at a crucial time of their education.”
As of the writing of this article, all universities in the state of
Palestine have been destroyed in the genocide.
The UAW represents 5,000 workers at UC Irvine, 8,000 at UC San Diego,
and 3,000 at UC Santa Barbara, totaling 31,500 members for all six of
the universities affected by the strikes. According to an interview
conducted May 31st by The Orange County Register, “UAW Local 4811 is
asking the UC schools to give amnesty to all academic employees and
students who faced arrest or disciplinary actions for protesting at
campuses. The union also wants the students to have guarantees of
freedom of speech and political expression on campus and is asking for
researchers to be able to opt out of funding sources tied to the Israeli
Defense Force.”
Like much university faculty outrage across the country following the
student intifada of the past few months, faculty demands have been
animated by, and primarily center protecting students and staff from
criminal charges, less so the criminal slaughter of civilians by the
zionist entity. Even if driven by a racist instinct that the well-being
of their peers are of more value than the faceless masses of the Third
World, this is an interesting case study in how labor-aristocratic
elements may be leveraged as an auxiliary for genuinely progressive
ends.
This case study, and the many parallels of it across Turtle Island,
reinforces the need for approaching international solidarity work in the
imperial core with united front tactics. Were all actors on these
campuses concentrated into a single organization or coalition, outrage
over the arrests of students and faculty would have quickly gobbled up
all the air in the discussion surrounding Palestine. Though not
intentionally designed, the separation of student activists and union
organizations has contributed to the success of the student intifada. As
has the organic separation between faculty and students, though
sometimes muddled by unionized students in the UAW. This separation has
permitted, but not guaranteed, the more principled students to take
initiative in fighting their local foot-soldiers of ethnic cleansing.
Many have taken the opportunity to occupy key locations, destroy
property facilitating genocide, or symbolically renaming liberated
buildings on their campus after Martyrs slain in the liberation
struggle.
So long as the student radicals keep ahead of the social fascists
keen to rally around them, they can keep efforts centered on Palestine
and fix these tertiary elements into a supporting role behind their
initiatives, lest they be dragged down into drivel like the UAW’s
campaign to hijack the movement into unionizing
arms manufactures, as we reported last issue. This is only possible
if the students maintain organizational independence from the forces
which risk slowing them down. While united front tactics don’t guarantee
success – it’s up to the students to center the right lines and pick the
correct strategies to see their goals fulfilled, without it they will be
tackled at the starting line. As the next school semester approaches on
the horizon, we wish the student radicals the best of luck in their race
against backward elements.
MIM(Prisons) adds: The “social-fascism” thesis was
applied by Bolsheviks to Western Europe’s social-democracy of the late
1920s and early 1930s. Behind this thesis was MIM’s understanding of
social-democracy as not always based in a politically foggy sector of
the proletariat but usually in the super-profit bribed petty-bourgeoisie
known as the “labor aristocracy” –at least in the imperialist countries,
especially those long-established imperialist countries with colonies or
neo-colonies. The “social-fascist” term applied to social-democrats who
appeared socialist on the outside while serving fascism in content. MIM
applies this term to all those today who appeal to the economic
nationalism of the imperialist country labor aristocracy. Those calling
for closing the borders, import restrictions etc. and calling themselves
“socialist” or even “communist”–these are the social-fascists today.(2)
In a recent episode of the RevLeft podcast, a couple of
student leaders reflected on their experiences so far in the student
encampments demanding university divestment from I$rael. Here we will
briefly summarize some of their lessons learned and connect them to
similar experiences in the prison movement.
The biggest regret expressed by one of the students, and echoed as
important by the other, was conceding to closed-door negotiations with
the administration. A comrade once described a campaign that ended up
with a large group of prisoners being in a room with administration. The
administration expressed that they had heard their demands and would go
deliberate on them and let them know their decision. The comrade
correctly saw the risk of divide and conquer and kept everyone there
until the admin would commit to how they would actually address their
very reasonable requests. When making demands of the powers that be it
is important to mobilize the masses as fully as possible to participate.
Behind closed doors, individual negotiators, whether due to
inexperience, opportunism, fear, etc, will not get the same outcome.
A related demand that the admins often made of the student
encampments was to exclude community members from the struggle on
campus. This similarly helped to isolate students, potentially from more
experienced organizers in particular.
Another big critique one student made of eir group was too much
hemming and hawing over escalation of building occupations to the point
of losing the momentum they had.
The students discussed the varied interests of different parties
involved, whether on campus or off-campus students, staff with tenure or
not, income levels, etc. This is paralleled in prisons where people with
different amounts of time often have very different attitudes towards
things, and some groups are often granted privileges by staff in order
to divide and conquer. Related to this is the fact that many of the
students didn’t know each other at all, so there was a lack of trust and
familiarity. This might be easier to overcome in prison, but speaks to
the need for developing relationships with others and organization prior
to events like this.
The students mentioned how they should have studied the history of
how their institutions responded to similar events in the past more. We
offer the pages of ULK to document the history of the prison
struggle for others to study.
Finally, they self-criticized for succumbing to reformist language
that was coming from the administration in their own outreach. They
stressed the importance of going into a movement with established
principles in order to stick to the goals and the messaging when things
get hectic and confusing. They stressed how much language matters.
These are very universal lessons that we can all benefit from better
understanding. We encourage our readers to write in with more examples
of lessons learned from their experiences of fighting oppression so we
can all get better at what we do.
NOTES: Revolutionary Left Radio, 5 June 2024, Student
Encampments for Palestine: An Interview with Student
Organizers.
Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes 10 May 2024 PG-13
Spoilers
A main theme throughout both series of Planet of the Apes
movies is the question of whether Apes differ from so-called “humyn
nature.” In the first series (produced 1968-1972) especially, humyn
nature is blamed for the hubris of nuclear weapons that brings humyns’
downfall. In this latest movie of the new series (produced 2011-2024),
apes have been setback in this search for truth, but perhaps this can be
explained by the very existence of class struggle that they share with
humyns.
Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes (2024), the fourth film in
the modern Planet of the Apes film series, is the first to take
us into the future a few generations after the events that led apes to
become competitors with humyns for dominating planet Earth. In it we see
glimpses of the emergence of class society, in the form of slavery. But
it is a slave society that is shaped by a relationship to the formerly
dominant humyns that still reflects a colonial relationship in many
ways.
The Eagle Clan, who are the center of the film, live in a primitive
clan society, with elders who set the laws that are taught to the young
and passed down via tradition. Later in the film, we encounter a larger
ape society that is a kingdom led by King Proximus, that has absorbed
many clans and uses them as slaves. It is not clear that the slaves
produce material wealth for the slavemaster class of the kingdom, as the
film only shows them working to break into an old humyn military bunker
to extract the technology. But someone must be producing the food, tools
and weapons for the soldiers who run the kingdom.
Proximus claims to be the new Caesar. Caesar was the founder and
leader of the apes in the first three movies, and was also a king
figure. But Caesar was a benevolent leader who fought and worked
alongside the others. A virus gave Caesar super-ape intelligence to lead
the apes to liberation from humyn society.
Within 10 years of the events of Rise
of the Planet of the Apes (2011), Caesar had already begun to learn
that apes have the same tendencies as humyns as he had to ally with a
humyn to combat a rogue ape attempting to usurp eir control of ape city
to wage war on humyns.
We previously discussed the themes of integrationism in the newer
series, in contrast to the older series that takes a more scientific
approach to uniting humyns and apes through struggle and re-education.
While the inability of apes to build a a lasting harmonious society may
appear pessimistic, we’d say it is realistic; accurately reflecting the
myth of humyn or ape nature despite the producers’ intentions.
The original series (produced 1968-1972) ends with a humyn ally
remarking that the apes have finally become humyn after the first ape
murder of another ape. This story line is framed more as a biblical
original sin story than class struggle. But in both series the first
ape-on-ape murder occurs because of the struggle between the apes who
want to wage war to annihilate all humyns and those who do not. The
question the producers seem to be asking is do apes have a war-like
nature like humyns supposedly do. Despite the revolutionary themes of
the first series, it largely reinforces this concept of humyn
nature.
When we criticize the concept of humyn/ape nature, we are not
criticizing the “natural” we are criticizing the metaphysical view of an
unchanging phenomenon. In other words, “natural” itself is a myth in
many ways, in other ways “natural” could be dialectical materialism and
the scientific method that explains the world around us. As dialectical
materialists we understand all things to be in a constant state of
change motivated by the contradictions within that thing; the class
struggle in society being the prime example of this in Marxist
thought.
Observed by humyns in our reality, chimpanzees and gorillas have one
leader who is a male silverback. While bonobos have an alpha male role
as well, the alpha female plays the more determinate role.
Interestingly, the king Proximus is a male bonobo. Meanwhile orangutans
in real life tend to be more solitary, which is reflected in this film
with Racka being a loner and no other orangutans being part of
Proximus’s kingdom. As we know, and as Engels lays out in The
Origins of the Family, Private Property and the State, humyns have
gone through various social structures; from more collective matriarchal
societies to the more modern hierarchical patriarchal societies, and
these structures have changed to adapt to changing modes of
production.
In our world, we suspect humyn societies have changed more over the
last ten thousand years than other great apes, because their
relationship to the rest of the natural world has changed more through
gaining knowledge and technology. Therefore in the new series of movies
we would expect apes to go through a very similar evolution of
hierarchies and class society as humyns did as they change their
relationship to the production of their material needs. This is
reflected in the kingdom that operates as a primitive system of slavery,
the earliest class system of humyns as well.
However, the evolution of ape society is colored by the existence of
a previous, advanced humyn society. Learning from humyn books and
accessing humyn armories full of technology are ways that Proximus
attempts to make a leap in ape knowledge and technology. As ey does
this, Proximus maintains a line that humyns cannot be trusted, and apes
must work together, even though this is applied cynically as ey is shown
to happily sacrifice the lives of many apes in eir own attempts at power
through humyn technology.
The main character in Kingdom is Noa, a member of the Eagle
Clan, whose father was a master of training eagles. Noa learns about
Caesar for the first time from the last true follower of Caesar after
the rest of the Eagle Clan has been captured by Proximus. Before this,
Noa had no knowledge of the history of humyns or apes; perhaps because
of eir age. But Noa also states that eir elders did not want to know
such things and remained ignorant on purpose through isolation.
The major transformation that Noa makes is to reject the idea that
law is handed down from some higher power. Ey does this overtly by
rejecting the laws of the king, and more subtly by pursuing knowledge
eir elders forbid. This is the transformation of thought that humyn
society went through during its transition to capitalism, when
liberalism, plurality, democracy and the pursuit of scientific knowledge
rose to replace ways of thought that were more stagnant, based more in
idealism and following a god-king. So we see Noa make a shift towards
materialism, that we expect will transform the Eagle Clan as it rebuilds
its village. But Noa’s understanding of ape nature at the end of the
movie still seems behind that of Caesar’s, generations ago. We see this
type of pre-scientific thinking among our comrades today who believe the
white man is literally the devil and the Black man/humyn is god. Like
Noa, they’re on the right side, but are guided by idealist thinking that
can easily lead them astray. Of course, we all struggle with idealism
and subjectivism, which might be considered part of the “nature” of
beings that can reason with limited knowledge and perspective. Part of
the power of the vanguard party, as layed out by Lenin, is its ability
to produce a more scientific approach to social change by pooling
experience and knowledge production at group level for a whole
class.
In our review of Dawn
of the Planet of the Apes (2014) we compare the Caesar
loyalists to the Gang of Four in China, who were those in the leadership
who both understood and represented the Maoist line after Mao’s death.
The Orangutan, Raka, would be like a young persyn in China today who has
deeply studied Mao and Chinese history but has no real experience in
building socialism and no one to help em put it into practice. Proximus
might be compared to the revisionists in power in China, exploiting the
people while trying to strengthen China against the U.$. imperialists
all in the name of “Marxism” (or “Caesar”).
The problem that Noa faces in determining what the right path is, and
what Caesar was really about, becomes a question of trust and judging
what is morally right. In contrast, we can judge the correct Maoist path
by studying history, and putting science into practice. While Noa’s path
in this movie echoes Caesar’s in the previous one, this is only because
they both tried to help their own people. While serving the people is
part of the communist road, we must be more than do-gooders to end
oppression, we must have a scientific understanding of society, what
forces are at play within it, how it is changing and how we can shape
that change.
In practice it seems that Noa may have acted against the interests of
Apes overall by eir alliance with the humyn, Mae. Another sequel will
probably reveal this. This is where the colonial parallels come in. Mae
is part of a humyn society that is no longer dominant, but still
possesses historical knowledge and technology that gives them a great
advantage. The Eagle Clan parallels many primitive groups in humyn
history that have encountered colonialists and allied with them against
other known enemies, perhaps seeing the colonialists as friends and
allies, before being subjugated by them in turn. In this way Proximus
proves more correct in eir distrust of the humyns and calls for ape
unity, despite coming from an exploiter class perspective.
This is why in a United Front the proletariat needs its own party to
represent our class, and to act independently of other classes. It must
be a party based on science, that can see all sides of the situation. At
this slave stage of ape society there is no such leadership available
and therefore no basis for forming principled alliances with either the
humyns or the exploiter class of apes.
The movie ends with Noa asking Mae if humyns and apes can ever live
together in trust. The ending hints that such a future is far off to say
the least. A theme that was more prominent in the original series is the
political question of if the oppressed rise up against white Amerika,
will they wipe out white Amerika or live harmoniously side-by-side. In
the original series, we see many years after the ape revolution that
such a reality is still in the works. There is still distrust, as some
war-mongering humyns still exist in the city, and many apes remember the
past oppression by humyns. While we draw some analogies above about the
latest movie, there are no real revolutionary story lines like the
original series, which showed the joint dictatorship of other great apes
over humyns and discussed the need for a long period of transforming
society and its citizens to build the trust necessary for peaceful
coexistence. Of course, the dictatorship of the proletariat is not just
about trust building, it is about continuing the class struggle to
eliminate all class differences – the internal contradictions of society
that lead to oppressive relationships between groups. That is the only
basis upon which a true communist society can be built. Something none
of the Planet of the Apes movies have brought us to yet.
In ULK 84 we reported on a sharp
drop in donations from prisoners in 2023, and a gradual decline in
subscribers in recent years. We asked our readers to answer some survey
questions to help explore the reasons for these declines and to begin a
more active campaign to expand ULK in 2024. Below is some
discussion with comrades who have responded to the survey so far about
drugs, gangs, COVID-19, generational differences and more. If you want
to participate in this conversation, please respond to the questions at
the end.
Problems We’ve Always Had
A North Carolina prisoner on censorship: i pass my
copies around when i’m able, what i always hear is “Bro i wrote to them
but never received the paper.” Then there is a couple guys who were on
the mailing list who say they’re not receiving the paper no more.
MIM(Prisons) responds: The obvious answer to this is
the newsletter is being censored. Any prisoner of the United $tates who
writes us for ULK will be sent at least 2 issues, and if you
write every 6 months we will keep sending it. Censorship has always been
a primary barrier to reaching people inside, but we have no reason to
believe that has increased in the last couple years. Relaunching regular
censorship reports could help us assess that more clearly in the future.
A Pennsylvania prisoner on the younger generation: I
think it is these younger generation people who are coming into the
prison system or people who have been pretty much raised by the judicial
system, and the guards become mommy and daddy to them… They do not want
to or are possibly afraid to change the only life they have ever known.
I know some of these younger guys here who have gotten too comfortable
and think: “Oh, I am doing so good, I have a certain level of say-so
here, the guards are my buddies, they get me, et cetera.” When on the
outside they did not have that.
Also, on my block, many people are illiterate and cannot read. I know
this because I am the Peer Literacy Tutor.
MIM(Prisons) responds: Most of this doesn’t sound new.
Older prisoners have been talking about the lacking of the younger
forever. Illiteracy is also not new in prisons. There is some indication
that the COVID pandemic has impacted literacy in children, but that
would not be affecting our readership (yet).
A California prisoner: I think a lot of prisoners do
not want to hear negativity or incendiary language, we get enough of
that in here and I notice a lot of unity around positivity in here. I
suggest less dividing language and more unifying language. In
particular, the “who are our friends and who are our enemies” line could
certainly drop the “who are our enemies” part. Prisoners don’t want
someone telling them who to be enemies with, prisoners want to be told
who to be friends with.
I have trouble passing on ULK, natural leaders won’t even
accept it (I try to revolutionize the strong). As soon as I say “it’s a
communist paper”, the typical response is “I’m not a commie.” Any
suggestions??
MIM(Prisons) responds: Not sure if you’re leading with
the fact that it’s a communist newspaper. But when doing outreach, the
fact that we’re a communist organization will not come up until we’ve
gotten into an in-depth conversation with someone. We want to reach
people with agitational campaign slogans, hopefully ones that will
resonate with them. What in this issue of ULK do you think the
persyn might be interested in? Lead with that.
As far as who are our friends and who are our enemies goes – this is
actually a key point we must understand before we begin building a
united front (see MIM Theory 14: United Front where a prisoner
asks this same question back in 2001). We must unite all who can be
united around anti-imperialist campaigns. Our goal is not to have the
most popular newsletter in U.$. prisons; that might be the goal of a
profit-driven newsletter. Our goal is to support anti-imperialist
organizing within prisons. As we’ve been stressing in recent months,
prisons are war, and they are part of a larger war on the oppressed. If
we do not recognize who is behind that war, and who supports that war
and who opposes it, we cannot stop that war. If you see a group of
people that wants to carpet bomb another group of people as a friend,
then you are probably not part of the anti-imperialist camp yourself.
Prisoners who are mostly focused on self-improvement, parole, or just
getting home to their families may be willing to be friends with anyone
who might help them do so. But we must also recognize the duality
of the imprisoned oppressed people as explained by comrade Joku Jeupe
Mkali.
Problems That May Be Getting
worse
A Washington prisoner on the drug trade: Drugs and
gangs are the biggest threat to radical inclination in the system. Drugs
keep the addicted dazed and unable to focus on insurgency. Whereas the
self-proclaimed activist gang member who actually has the mental fitness
to actually avoid such nonsense has become so entrenched in a culture
aimed at feeding on the profit he gains in the process has forgotten his
true goal and would rather stand in the way of change to maintain
profit.
MIM(Prisons) responds: This is perhaps the biggest
shift we’ve seen in reports on conditions on the inside in recent years.
Of course, these are not new issues. But there are new drugs that seem
to be more easily brought in by guards and have more detrimental effects
on peoples’ minds. Meanwhile, the economics of these drugs may have
shifted alliances between the state-employed gangs and the lumpen gangs
that work together to profit off these drugs.
When we launched the United
Front for Peace in Prisons over a decade ago, it was in response to
comrades reporting that the principal contradiction was lack of unity
due to lumpen organizations fighting each other. In recent years, most
of what we hear about is lumpen organizations working for the pigs to
suppress activism and traffic restricted items. While Texas is the
biggest prison state and much of those reports come from Texas, this
seems to be a common complaint in much of the country as regular readers
will know.
Related to drugs is the new policy spreading like wildfire, that
hiring private companies to digitize prisoners’ mail will reduce drugs
coming into prisons and jails. Above we mentioned no known increase in
censorship, but what has increased is these digital mail processing
centers; and with them more mail returned and delayed. In Texas, we’ve
been dealing with mail delayed by as much as 3 months for years now. As
more and more prisons and jails go digital, communications become more
and more limited. Privatized communications make it harder to hold
government accountable to mail policies or First Amendment claims. There
is no doubt this is a contributor to a decrease in subscribers.
A Pennsylvania Prisoner reports a change in the prison system
due to COVID-19: The four-zoned-movement system has been
implemented here at SCI-Greene because of COVID. Before COVID,
everything was totally opened up. Now everyone is divided from one
another and it makes it that much harder for someone like me who is
constantly surrounded by an entire block full of people with extreme
mental health or age-related issues.
MIM(Prisons) responds: This is an interesting
explanation that we had not yet thought of. While we don’t have a lot of
reports of this type of dividing of the population in prisons into pods
since COVID, we know that many prisons have continued to be on lockdown
since then. An updated survey of prisoners on how many people are in
long-term isolation may be warranted. But even with the limited
information we have, we think this is likely impacting our slow decline
in subscribers.
This does not explain why donations went up from 2020 to 2022, but
then dropped sharply in 2023. However, we think this could have been a
boom from stimulus check money, similar to what the overall economy saw.
In prisons this was more pronounced, where many people received a couple
thousand dollars, who are used to earning a couple hundred dollars a
year. While we would have expected a more gradual drop off in donations,
this is likely related. In 2023, prisoners were paying for a greater
percentage of ULK costs than ever before. We had also greatly
reduced our costs in various ways in recent years though, so this is not
just a sign of more donations from prisoners but also a reflection of
decreased costs. We’d like to hear from others: how did stimulus checks
affect the prisoner population?
Like many things, our subscribership and donations were likely
impacted greatly by the COVID-19 pandemic and the state’s response to
it. Another interesting connection that warrants more investigation is
how the stimulus money may have contributed to the boon in drug
trafficking by state and non-state gangs in prisons. And what does it
mean that the stimulus money has dried up? So far there is no indication
of a decline in the drug market.
A California prisoner on “rehabilitation” and parole:
The new rehabilitation programs in CDCR are designed to assign personal
blame (accept responsibility). A lot of prisoners are on that trip.
“It’s not the state’s fault, it’s my fault cause I’m fucked up.” That’s
the message CDCR wants prisoners to recognize and once again parole is
the incentive, “take the classes, get brainwashed, and we might release
you.” I call it flogging oneself. But a lot of prisoners are in these
“rehabilitation” classes. It’s the future. MIM needs to start thinking
how to properly combat that.
MIM(Prisons) responds: The Step Down program in
California in response to the mass
movement to shut down the SHU was the beginning of this concerted
effort to pacify and bribe prisoners to go along with the state’s
plan.(1) As we discussed at the time, this is part of a
counterinsurgency program to isolate revolutionary leaders from the
rebellious masses in prison.
Our Revolutionary 12 Step Program is one answer to the
state’s “rehabilitation.” Our program also includes accepting
responsibility, but doing so in the context of an understanding of the
system that creates these problems and behaviors in the first place. Yes
we can change individuals, but the system must change to stop the cycle.
The Revolutionary 12 Steps is one of our most widely
distributed publications these days, but we need more feedback from
comrades putting it into practice to expand that program. And while it
is written primarily for substance abuse, it can be applied by anyone
who wants to reform themselves from bourgeois ways to revolutionary
proletarian ways.
In other states, like Georgia and Alabama,
parole is almost unheard of. The counterinsurgency programs there
are less advanced, creating more revolutionary situations than exist in
California prisons today. In the years leading up to the massive hunger
strikes in CDCR, MIM mail was completely (illegally) banned from
California prisons. Today, it is rare for California prisoners to have
trouble receiving our mail, yet subscribership is down.
Solutions
A California prisoner: Personally I would like to see
play-by-play instructions for unity. I saw something like that in the
last Abolitionist paper from Critical Resistance. A lot of us
want unity but don’t know how to form groups or get it done. I know
MIM’s line on psychology, however it has its uses. The government
consults psychologists when they want to know how to control people or
encourage unity among their employees. I suggest MIM consult a psych for
a plan on how to unify people, then print the play-by-play instructions
in ULK. It’s a positive message prisoners want to hear.
MIM(Prisons) responds: As mentioned above, building the
United Front for Peace in Prisons was a top topic in ULK for a
long time, so you might want to reference back issues of ULK on
that topic and MIM Theory 14. Psychology is a pseudo-science
because it attempts to predict individuals and diagnose them with
made-up disorders that have no scientific criteria. Social engineering,
however, is a scientific approach based in practice. By interacting with
people you can share experiences and draw conclusions that increase your
chances of success in inter-persynal interactions. This is applying
concepts to culture at the group level, not to biology of the
individual.
Again, the key point here is practice. To be honest, the engagement
with the United Front for Peace in Prisons has decreased over the years,
so we have had less reports. Coming back to the question of how to
approach people in a way that they don’t get turned off by “commie”
stuff, a solution to this should come from USW leaders attempting
different approaches, sharing that info with each other, and summing up
what agitational tactics seemed to work best. Comrades on the outside
could participate as well, but tactics in prison may differ from tactics
that work on college campuses vs. anti-war rallies vs. transit
centers.
A North Carolina prisoner: i look forward to receiving
the paper and i love to contribute to the paper. ULK is not
just a newspaper in the traditional sense of the word it’s more than
that. It’s something to be studied and grasped, and saved for future
educational purposes. In my opinion its the only publication that hasn’t
been compromised.
i think ya’ll should publish more content on New Afrikan
Revolutionary Nationalism (NARN) then ya’ll do. To be honest, the
ULK is probably the only publication that provides content that
elucidates NARN. Nonetheless, ya’ll keep doing what ya’ll doing.
MIM(Prisons) responds: We’ll never turn away a
well-done NARN article, so keep them coming. This is a newsletter by and
for prisoners of the United $nakes.
A Pennsylvania prisoner: As with everything,
“education” is a key factor. A lot of people really have a lack of
comprehension of the Maoist, Socialism, Communism agenda or actual
belief system is about. I have a general idea, but not the whole
picture. Many people are ignorant to what it is all about. … I was a bit
of a skeptic when I first began writing MIM(Prisons), but I no longer am
3 years later.
As I have continued to write and read all your ULKs I have
begun to realize what you stand for, and that is the common people who
are struggling to survive in a world full of powerful people, who do not
play by the rules. … Those powerful and wealthy who have forgotten what
it is like to be human. … When I get released from prison later this
year and get back on my feet I do plan to donate to MIM(Prisons) because
I strongly support what you stand for.
…It was word of mouth that got me interested in ULK, and
that is what we should use to spread the word. Sooner or later someone,
somewhere is gonna get interested.
MIM(Prisons) responds: We appreciate this comrade’s
continued engagement and struggling with the ideas in ULK. Eir
description of what we do is accurate. Though, the same could be said
for many prisoner newsletters. We recommend comrades check out “What is
MIM(Prisons)?” on page 2 to get an idea of what differentiates us from
the others; and to ask questions and study more than ULK to
better understand those differences.
A Washington prisoner: I believe there has not been
enough exposure of ULK in the prison system. I only happened on
it by chance. I sought out communist education on my own after not being
able to shake an urge that there was something incredibly wrong with the
political and economic structures in my surroundings. I believe we
should launch a campaign of exposure and agitation. Create and pass out
pamphlets and newsletters geared to helping people see the relevance of
communism and their current situation. For a start, I would like to
receive copies of the Revolutionary 12 Step Program pamphlets
to strategically place in my facility so prisoners can have access to
them.
MIM(Prisons) concludes: Expanding ULK just for
the sake of it would be what we call a sectarian error. Sectarianism is
putting one’s organization (one’s own “sect”) above the movement to end
oppression. The reason we are promoting the campaign to expand
ULK is that we see it as a surrogate for measuring the interest
in and influence of anti-imperialist organizing in U.$. prisons. As
comrades above have touched on, there is always a limitation in access
and numbers do matter. Most prisoners have never heard of ULK.
The more we can change that, the more popular we can expect
anti-imperialism to be within U.$. prisons and the more organized we’d
expect people to get there.
We are working on expanding our work with and organizing of prisoner
art. As they say a picture is worth a thousand words. More art that
captures the ideas of our movement can help us reach more people more
quickly. So send in your art that reflects the concepts discussed in
ULK. We also offer outside support for making fliers and small
pamphlets. What types of fliers and small pamphlets, besides the
Revolutionary 12 Steps, would be helpful for reaching more
prisoners with our ideas and perhaps getting them to subscribe to
ULK?
Another way to reach people in prison is through radio and podcasts.
We are looking for information on what types of platforms and podcasts
prisoners have access to that we might tap into.
We only received 4 responses to our survey in ULK 84 in time
to print in this issue. This is another data point that indicates the
low level of engagement with ULK compared to the past. Another
possible explanation for lack of responses is that this survey was more
difficult to answer than previous surveys we’ve done because it is
asking for explanations more than hard facts. Either way, in our attempt
to always improve our understanding of the conditions we are working in,
we are printing the survey questions one more time (also see questions
above). Even if your answer to all the questions below are “no”, we’d
appreciate your response in your next letter to us.
Have you noticed changes in the prison system that have made it
harder for people to subscribe to ULK or less interested in
subscribing?
Have you noticed changes in the prisoner population that have
made people less interested in subscribing?
Have you noticed/heard of people losing interest in ULK because
of the content, or because of the practices of MIM(Prisons)?
What methods have you seen be successful in getting people
interested in or to subscribe to ULK?
Do you have ideas for how we can increase interest in ULK in
prisons?
I have already taken measures to develop peace and unity between
factions here at the Bay Correctional Facility in Panama City, Florida.
As a basis here we are opposing oppression of prisoners and oppressed
people in general. Work has begun, and we will campaign around the
September 9th Day of Peace and Solidarity.
The objective this month is getting every organization on the
compound to make sure every member of their various organizations send a
short, one paragraph letter to the USW Council pledging allegiance to
the Runaway Slave Movement and making sure every member of the various
respective organizations are on MIM(Prisons) newsletter subscription
list.
MIM(Prisons) adds: Greetings to the Runaway Slave
Coalition and all associates in Florida that are working towards a
united front of the oppressed. This comrade wrote asking for
certification and official sanction for eir group. We do not certify
anyone who is not a member of MIM(Prisons). And no one locked in prison
can be a member of MIM(Prisons). United Struggle for Within (USW) is an
independent org working under our leadership. This means they should not
be promoting things that disagree with our 6 main points (see page 2 of
ULK) - if so, they are no longer USW as they have broken their
charter. Even if they are acting under the broad definition of USW as an
anti-imperialist prisoner organization, that does not mean we agree with
everything they say or do, and we do not have any say in their
day-to-day operations. In the case where someone reports a USW member
breaking USW policy, even then it is hard for us to investigate or
intervene.
Similarly many organizations have signed onto the UFPP, but that
doesn’t mean we agree with everything they say or do. We have only
pledged to agree to the 5 principles of the UFPP. This is how united
fronts work, everyone maintains organizational independence, while
uniting around common goals or principles (see MIM Theory 14: United
Front for more info).
Anyone can write to us to get Under Lock & Key in U.$.
prisons. Just because someone is distributing ULK or claiming
they have articles published in ULK does not mean that we
endorse them. Everyone should be judged by their actions. USW comrades
must be accountable to the masses. Ultimately it is the masses at your
locality that must judge the correctness of a USW leader or chapter, not
MIM(Prisons). We do our best to support comrades from a distance in
these endeavors.
I wanna add my voice to the ongoing conversation on Sex Offenders
(S.O.’s) and LGBTQ people from a revolutionary perspective.
One key hurdle I think has to be constantly attacked and can only be
attacked through criticism and self-criticism: so-called
revolutionaries, activists, and political prisoners self-identifying as
these things but still holding to the vestiges of their gangster,
reactionary world views that make them comfortable.
A political activist analyzes people, places, and things from a
political perspective. What is this person, place, or thing’s worth, or
lack thereof, to the political programs that political group/individual
is striving for? The military activist analyzes people, places, and
things from a military perspective, analyzing what will be most
advantageous to the military goals of their army, militia, unit,
etc.
Because of this, morals and standards in political and military
groups, among such people are constantly shifting. When one is on the
battlefield, even the most avowed racist, sexist, homo-transphobe, sex
offender bigot, will not allow their hate or disdain for the “other” to
cost them their lives. The primary concern for the soldier or military
commander would be can this person maintain discipline in battle, can
they perform under pressure, will they desert their comrades in battle
or go AWOL, are they reliable. If the S.O. or non-heterosexual was
saving your life on a battlefield, no one would say “let me die I don’t
like your kind” or “you’re irredeemable.” At that moment, the equality
of humankind will shine bright and true and all the self-gratifying lies
we tell each other will shrink in comparison with the truth.
I am not saying you should have no concern about the moral fabric of
comrades. Usually morality and politics overlap. What I am saying is
that a person/group’s political line and commitment should be of
deciding and primary concern if you yourself are indeed a political
activist or military activist.
How many times in prison have we seen the “rules” of organizations
bent for certain “stomp down” individuals. How many times have we seen
people look the other way when a member of their org partakes in sexual
gratification that the org prohibits or has a case that’s frowned upon
by the org? When this occurs it is usually because those in the org
recognize the person in question is a practitioner of violence and that
violent aggression is better with you than against you. So people make a
tactical or strategic decision to condone, accept what they would
otherwise attack or shun. For better or worse, this is political
maneuvering at its core and it’s done every day in every prison. I am
not promoting it, simply stating truths. The purpose of pointing these
truths is to say that if the apolitical populace can discern these
nuances then why can’t the politically do so when our causes are so much
more noble and worthy of forgiving of one another’s trespasses (real
& perceived).
Try a new way of relating to the people on the compound with you. If
we’re revolutionaries then we should be revolutionizing the
social relations and castes in prison. The prison culture fosters a
caste system based on criminal history, skin color, material wealth,
propensity for violence, and sexual orientation. As revolutionaries we
must check ourselves if we’re not actively establishing a new prison
culture and eliminating the hard-line caste structure. How? It starts
with building and maintaining relations based on ones level of
revolutionary ideology and practice.
Instead of greeting people with “Where you from, what you in for?” or
being concerned about who they’re attracted to or intimate with, your
greetings, concerns, and inquiries should be, “What are your politics?
What do you think about capitalism? How do you think we could organize
against the issues we face? Check out this political program, and tell
me what if anything you’d be willing to contribute to advancing it.” If
you aren’t doing that in some form or fashion you need to engage in
self-criticism, are you a revolutionary or a convict bound by the rules
and ideas of prison culture?
Lastly, the notion that any group, or person is exempt from recovery,
rehabilitation, or transformation is metaphysical, subjective, and thus
incorrect. Despite the subject matter, the universe and everything in
it, including one’s ideas and impulses, attractions, are in constant
movement and development. Nothing remains stagnant. This universal truth
is the only universal truth, that nothing remains the same. Therefore to
predetermine that anyone or anything is irredeemable is out of
compliance with reality and is therefore incorrect thinking, and merely
a reflection of one’s biased and narrow analysis. Another small point I
want to turn on from ULK #82, ‘Thugs
Are Sex Offenders Too’, where the writer says:
“The problem is that most transgender men-women in prison are sex
offenders, they are in for preying on children.”
This statement is obviously biased and subjective, and leads to
flawed analysis. It is possibly true that the trans people that writer
has encountered in prison are all S.O.’s, but it is the exact
opposite for my own lived experience. No transgender person I’ve
encountered has ever been locked up for a sexual offense, outside of
soliciting prostitution. Here’s what I mean by a purely subjective
analysis, one that is narrow and one sided relying on one’s own
experience only. The truth is that trans people are most often victims
of sexual predators in and out of prisons. Those who’ve become predators
themselves, whether trans or not, are most often victims of prior sexual
abuse. Though this may not align with the writers lived experience it is
the majority experience in society as told by polls and statistics. Yet
the metaphysical, subjective, nature of postmodernist philosophy has us
giving more credence to our own individual lived experience than that of
the society at large or a wide array of the population. If we’re in the
business of transforming society at large that sort of analysis will not
work well.
by a North Carolina prisoner September 2023 permalink
The No. 80, Winter 2023 edition of Under Lock & Key hosted an article titled “Sacrifice Behind Bars”, wherein a comrade expressed very heavy sentiments that I intend to magnify and address from a revolutionary perspective. The details of his mention were strikingly consistent with the circumstances and characters of the North Carolina prison system enabling an apparent conclusion that our obstacles as lumpen are, indeed, collective. To that extent I consider it necessary to re-evaluate our responsibilities as revolutionaries from within; as they are comparable to our revolutionary history as Marxist-Leninist-Maoists.
The central theme of the comrade’s message can be boiled down to one question he posed: “what are you willing to sacrifice?” The comrade illustrated his legacy of sacrifice to which he is honored and should know he’s not alone in that identical regard. However, for the new-coming comrade who may not understand his conviction yet and is attracted to his energy and posture; for the seasoned comrade who may be becoming burned out; for the growing comrade who may be struggling with understanding this political line; and for the critic, we must unify on the collective understanding of why sacrifice is necessary and how to measure the particular type of sacrifice to be offered for our revolutionary objective.
The author of that article asks the question of sacrifice to comrades on the streets and comrades within alike. Demonstrating his willingness to actualize guerrilla tactics amidst similarly situated individuals who have been compromised in exchange for goods supplied by the opposition makes it apparent that a revolutionary united front is diminished in that environment, to say the least. Essential to being compromised is the viewing that an individual – or a class – is not only without, but is desperate, moralless and to whatever degree, gullible. With respect to comrade’s mention of such individuals, we should not haste into judgment nor spring into belligerence without careful and scientific observation of our own perspective. It is not sound to conclude that it is an immaculate practice of social science for the opposition to infiltrate a mind that has never operated outside of its conditioning by that opposition. “Boy they got you good” etc. is not technically true if that person is underdeveloped morally, politically, and intellectually. Even if that person is from where you are from and have been through similar experiences. If you are a conscious revolutionary – conscious in the sense that you are aware of and intuit the frame of thinking employed by Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin and Mao Zedong – then you are unique: especially coming from capitalist-imperialist Amerikkka. That’s nothing to pride yourself on in arrogance nor egoism, its to empower your desire to fulfill your responsibilities to those unconscious. Therefore, to be ‘revolutionary’ in its most rudimentary expression is to redirect the impulses to be inhuman as you usher in humanism.
If one is morally sound, intellectually competent, and has a desire for general welfare of others, then from those perspectives that one is enriched, if he/she/they have not sequestered the abstract and subtle impetus of the capitalist-imperialist nature of his/her/their cultural (and political-economic) domicile then even with the above virtues, in those contexts, what will be is a repeat of what Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels called in The Communist Manifesto ‘reactionary socialism’; the remnants of feudal socialism. This is to the extent and in the regard of issuing counter-narratives in sole order to arouse sympathy in those who aren’t as ‘enriched’ as you to behave in a way that secures your sense of comfort. The motivations are not comparable in that example and the circumstances are as night and day by juxtapose. However, by principle and mentality its enough to say that one could be more creative from a revolutionary vantage point.
Sacrifice of any sort is rooted in the intention for a net-positive future occurrence. Therefore, the theoretical objectification of that sacrificial act bears no weight on the immediate circumstances one experiences. To add on to the comrade’s thoughts, what you are willing to sacrifice depends on your measure of awareness of what is to come of it. The knowledge of the accuracy of what is to come is based on your ability to identify with the material circumstances – emphasis on the conditions that define them – of that situation as it relates to your theory, essentially, of the world. From a revolutionary perspective ‘the world’ includes others, so when we speak of practice, i.e., sacrifice, it is necessarily unbalanced without theory.
If the masses, even in the prison setting, are viewed to be slumbering it is not for the revolutionary to wake them with a cacophony of political rhetoric, especially if their slumber is characterized by the fanaticals of capitalist production. So, we do place a high emphasis on practice. It is that practice must be guided by theory. Lenin stated:
“Without revolutionary theory there can be no revolutionary movement.” (V.I. Lenin, What is to be done?)
In his Selected Works Mao Zedong stated:
“Theoretical knowledge is acquired through practice and must then return to practice.” (Mao, On Practice: The Relation Between Knowledge and Practice, 1937)
Mao did not differ with Lenin in this regard, he magnified the principle of Lenin’s point. In real time this means to structure revolutionary practice in a manner that conveys the core principles at work in an action bound language that is interpretable to and for the observer all while being disciplined enough not to exaggerate your behavior as to make the demonstration unrealistic. The standard by which one can scale his/her/their proposed action is in one’s ability to become one with the reality of the situation; being cautious of personal biases and having rational and isolated conclusions about each component of the embodying manifest circumstance. The sum of this process is the base from which to determine what means of action to deploy. To that extent, we in prison have to be realistic without compromising our theory (i.e. political line), some of us have immense anger issues and if that is true for the proposed actor in a revolutionary demonstration then if the action to be had does require a use of force we must consider if that one is sufficient or not for the action. Use of force does not always mean complete annihilation or insurrection. Whatever is decided upon, the objective is to be clear and decisive. The actualizer must be disciplined enough to actualize the task without going too far and thereby jeopardizing the precision of the demonstration. Lenin and Mao actually had a revolution, so this frame of thinking is sound, its relevance here and now depends on our willingness to truly get with the program, i.e., Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.
The answer to the comrade’s question to the world of sacrifice, should be proportional to the details of your circumstance and the individuals and lives it would effect; from a revolutionary perspective. Only a matter of intelligence compels the conclusion that revolution is sustained by an environment prepared for it. The blaze does not come before strenuous economic, political, financial, social, cultural, and theoretical preparation. Let us take the time we DO have and align ourselves with the correct theoretical knowledge.
North Carolina IS in the building. We have recently birthed a movement – S.W.A.P. (Serving With A Purpose) – which I am proud and honored to be a founding member of. S.W.A.P. is a N.C. prisoner-led organizational base empowered by the literary guidance of MLM and in unity with the United Front for Peace in Prisons; a United Struggle from Within initiative. Our halls of learning are open for all sisters, brothers, and non-binary comrades to partake in our programs and we are dedicated to organizing with comrades abroad on the basis of theory and practice – being MLM distinguished. We currently do provide a bi-monthly newsletter called Voice of the Lumpen, by which comrades may submit articles to be published, we host a penpal mentorship program with at risk youth both in facilities and those on the streets, we provide a jailhouse lawyer legal program called “Blue Skies Legal Initiative” where comrades can learn how to utilize legal provisions in a manner that furthers our political line, and are developing more programs as time progresses.
