Tag: Dear Commie

  • What is a liberal?

    What is a liberal?

    Dear Commie,

    What is liberalism (apart from infuriating) and what’s the difference between liberals and socialists? Is it wrong to dunk on the libs all the time and, if so, why does it feel so good? 

    Sincerely,

    Can’t Quit It

    Dear Dunkin’,

    Liberalism is an ideology: a worldview and a logic that serves a particular purpose. When people wanna dunk on libs, it’s usually because they’re perpetuating a set of assumptions and proposals that are all ordered through liberalism. Let’s break that down.

    First, we have to understand that liberalism has a history. It became the dominant ideology at about the same time that capitalism started to overtake feudalism, and the bourgeoisie fought the old aristocracy (kings, nobles, and the church) for leadership of society. Marx explains that “The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force.” Why? Because every society where a minority class rules over the rest of society has to be able to explain why it is that they get all the power and good stuff while other people are exploited. Under feudalism, the aristocracy justified its rule as imbued with divine authority, so the Church played an important role in explaining why everyone was where they were in the social order and why that was okay: God said so. 

    When the bourgeoisie started to become dominant, they brought in their own ideas to explain why they are the rulers, and made that the common sense for everyone. The tenets of classical liberalism are based on the capitalist’s need to protect private property and profit: the separation of church and state, individual rights, representative democracy (limited as much as possible to property owners). That’s not to say these things are bad, but their purpose in liberal ideology is to make sure that there aren’t restrictions on the ability for capitalists to make profit (the church was an obstacle under feudalism; the bourgeoisie don’t generally want a king to make a sweeping law – they prefer to work out among themselves with elections and voting).

    If you live in a society that claims to be democratic, how do you justify so much inequality? Liberal ideology explains this as a rational thing: meritocracy. The best and brightest rise to the top. The people who are in charge are there because they’re the smartest, the most qualified, the best at what they do. “Elect your betters.” Democrats in particular lean into this, claiming to solve political problems with technical solutions and frothing at the mouth whenever Republicans put forward some kind of faux populist, since they’re “not educated” or “they’re idiots” or whatever (this is simultaneously attacking the idea that working people can rule). The reactions to George W. Bush, Sarah Palin, Trump, and countless others are to be outraged at “incompetence”, as though these people who have been through elite schools and top levels of governance are completely unaware of what they are doing and don’t have powerful, calculating people behind them.

    What it shows is that liberalism is actually an anti-democratic ideology: people aren’t smart enough to understand the world or rule themselves, so they need liberal experts to make decisions for them rather than succumb to “mob rule”. It’s not the same as it was in 1800, where the vote was only for property owners, for men, for whites, etc. While the rich may not say that they prefer only to enfranchise white, propertied people now, we’re not all that far off from where we were: even without all the restrictions on your ability to vote, the poorer you are the less likely you are to vote.

    In liberalism, you understand the world as being split into three realms: politics (the state), economics (the market), and sociology (civil society). In reality, there’s no distinction between how economics drives people’s lives and politician’s priorities (or vice versa), but in liberal ideology these are separate: The state shouldn’t really interfere with the market, which is this natural self-regulating entity — sometimes there may be a hiccup that needs fixing, but on the whole don’t touch it. Economics are the realm of experts, who talk about the market with special jargon and say that normal people can’t understand it. Social problems are the result of people, not state policy or economic forces: “A culture of poverty” is the problem, suggests liberalism. Homeless people are all addicts and not serious about getting a job. Anyone can be rich if they work hard enough. These are ideological constructions to preserve class rule: the reason these people are at the bottom is because of their individual failures, not because capitalism sucks wealth from the working class like a vampire.

    That takes us to two things: understanding problems and liberal solutions. Liberalism views conflict in society as the product of ideas and essentialisms: one idea about what’s best for developing downtown confronts another idea — who’s to say what’s right? This obscures the relationships at play: ideas come from your experiences, your class, race, gender, etc. There’s power involved, but unequal power isn’t a concept to the liberal. They view your social positions as “differences”, and all should be “respected” equally. It gets absurd when class, for example, is viewed as just a difference that needs to be respected, not a relationship of power that needs to be overcome. “We should make space for the unfortunate, we hear you, we see you”….as liberal politicians go on doing the same shit in service of the wealthy.

    Its essentialist in that it flattens out all of the conflicts between people in various social groups, as though all women, all people of color, all queer folks, all immigrants, are of one singular mind about every issue and don’t have different interests among us. What this usually does is allow for bourgeois representatives of a group to act as leaders and put forward a class vision as though it represents all people in their constituency universally. (It doesn’t.) An example of this is the assumption that as a woman President Hillary Clinton would have advanced an agenda that was positive for all women, when in reality she would likely have advanced an agenda that was positive for the ruling class, with mixed and even negative results for working class women.

    The solution to every problem is the same in liberalism: vote. Elect someone else. If only the right person was in office, all of these problems could be solved. Conflict in society can all be resolved by representatives in government, and that’s the most civilized way to do things. This limits politics to government only, when people live politics in their everyday lives: the politics of the workplace, of your neighborhood, your kid’s school, your commute, your interaction with the police, your walk down the street, and so on. This is a largely a class idea: it contains struggle to the ballot box. It views society as a collection of individuals, and once we win their hearts and minds with better ideas all will be well. It’s why you can have “radical liberals” – people really pissed about awful conditions, but they end up doubling down on the solutions being elections and expertise.

    Where does that leave us? Socialists aren’t (or at least shouldn’t be) liberals. Socialism is about the extension of democracy to every facet of life. The working class has to liberate itself, and socialism can’t be given to us by benevolent leaders. Working people are more than capable of understanding the world and managing our own lives, provided we tear down the obstacles placed in our path. A socialist understanding of the world is rooted in materialism — where liberals focus on ideas being the force that determines politics, socialists see social and class position as the key factors: being determines consciousness. Socialists view collective action, organization building, and class struggle as what shifts the balance of forces in society and the main thing that wins changes we want to see. Elections can be a useful tool, but capitalism wasn’t voted in and socialism won’t be either.

    Is it okay to dunk on liberals? Sure, within reason. We have to distinguish between well-meaning working class people as against liberal functionaries, politicians, nonprofit leaders, and spokespeople. Some people have a material interest in liberal solutions based on their social and class positions, and when it comes to them, dunk away! For regular folks who like some kinda liberal solution about raising the minimum wage in the future because it’s the only thing out there, don’t be so quick to denounce these people. Class consciousness is uneven, it’s not just about “good ideas” winning — people’s consciousness develops rapidly when they take collective action and feel their power, when they get a sense of mass movements changing the balance of forces in society, making new things possible. Those are the moments that really educate people. 

    Don’t call me a liberal,

    Andy

  • How do I vote in this hellscape election?

    How do I vote in this hellscape election?

    Dear Commie,

    My absentee ballot arrived and I can hardly bring myself to look at it. I know that Donald Trump is a POS monster from hell, but unlike my liberal friends I am unable to delude myself into thinking that Joe Biden is a decent human being, much less a good political leader. Over the past few months, he’s gone out of his way to make it clear that he doesn’t support the policies we desperately need, from a Green New Deal to Medicare for All. Furthermore, he flat out said that anyone who believes Tara Reade shouldn’t vote for him. The idea of voting for him makes me physically sick to my stomach with shame and rage and I’ve considered writing in a third party candidate. But when I think about four more years of Trump, my bowels turn to liquid. Commie, I’m in a gastrointestinal electoral hell. How are you going to vote this year?

    Sincerely, 

    Filled With Loathing

    Dear Highly Relatable Human,

    Your question is tricky in that you will get a different answer depending on which socialist you ask so we’ve featured two opposing perspectives here, with the recognition that even this offering does not encompass the myriad views of socialists on this question.

    We deserve better, is all I’ll say.

    With love,

    Dayna Long

    From Peter Jurich, who will be voting for Biden

    I joined DSA when Joe Biden swept Super Tuesday.

    That the Democratic establishment would try to hand feed me yet another milquetoast candidate prompted me to seek a group that fully represented my socialist values. Biden’s policies are weak, his positions on important social issues have been too variable, and there are sexual assault allegations that he has yet to confront publicly.

    And yet, he will get my vote Nov. 3.

    I want to be clear: This essay is mainly for my white comrades. People of color who don’t support Biden have a rationale I can’t fully know and, frankly, far outweighs mine. That said, I don’t think a third party vote is a waste or that it’s a vote for fascism. However, I do think there’s a great deal of unchecked privilege that comes with the willingness to even consider a third-party vote a viable option. It’s a privilege that looks like a lack of urgency to change the circumstances we are in today. It’s a privilege that comes with being able to wake up on the day after Trump’s reelection and say, “I wish this were not the outcome, but my life is not threatened by it.”

    What I value is impact. I’m looking to have the biggest impact on the election that I can with the options available. Not once since the 1854 creation of the two-party system as we know it now has a third-party candidate won the presidential election — or has even come close to winning. They’ve averaged only about 5 percent of votes since the 1970s and have only won any electoral votes in 12 out of the last 45 presidential elections1. These are pretty unreliable odds for anyone looking to make an impact. With there being a positive correlation between Donald Trump’s election and the increase in hate crimes, I cannot in good conscience offer my vote to something with a 0 percent success rate.

    Data from the General Social Survey (GSS) shows that, while third party voting has been rising since 2012, it still only represents around 5 percent of the population. Even then, the survey combines third party voting with “Other”, which really just means any candidate that isn’t Democrat or Republican. So unless every single one of those votes are write-ins for Mickey Mouse, I don’t see enough organization in the numbers that suggests escaping the two-party system anytime soon. In Wisconsin in November 2016, for example, Donald Trump won by less than a percentage point. It was the same with the swing states of Michigan and Pennsylvania. Frustration with the Democratic Party political establishment is very real2, but how many people would still be alive today had Donald Trump not become president?

    Voting third party is an exercise in white privilege and the data back that up. Of the total number of people who responded to the question of party affiliation on the GSS, 7 percent who answered third party/other were White and 2 percent were Black3, a 250% difference.

    I despise the two-party system. Republican and Republican-lite are terrible options and I look forward to a day when anything else isn’t stigmatized as an angry protest vote. Unfortunately, today is not that day. In voting Biden, I at least have some hope that it’ll come a little faster. (Or at least it won’t come slower). Simply put, too many of our friends won’t survive another Trump presidency. I’d love to someday look at my ballot and feel inspired and proud to cast the vote I do — shout out to Nada Elmikashfi! — but I’m willing to hold off on that and settle when the stakes are so high. A Biden presidency is going to bring its fair share of challenges, but all I can promise is that I’ll support him up until November 3. And on November 4, we hit the streets (while maintaining a 6-foot distance, of course).

     1. The most successful run was that of Alabama governor George Wallace in 1968. He won 46 electoral votes on a platform that appealed to racist animosities.
     2. A 2016 study in the journal American Politics Research by Jeffrey Koch says that “high-aggregate levels of distrust” are necessary for strong support in third parties. I find it telling that the votes are grounded more in dissatisfaction for one candidate rather than full enthusiastic support for another.
     3. A third race category, “Other,” exists in the GSS data, but does not break it down into specifics. I assume because each number within that category was so small, despite representing 9 percent of voters.

    From Tessa E., who will not be voting for Biden

    I will not be voting for Biden this November. I can tell you are already angry, fuming with smoke pouring out of your ears, perhaps wondering, “How could they? How could they let Trump win?” 

    But I’m not the one that is ‘letting’ Trump win. The Democratic Party establishment, the Democratic National Committee, has done everything it can to limit the rise of progressive ideas in the party, ideas that are held by the majority of citizens of the United States. The DNC just recently voted against adding universal healthcare to their party platform, because what is in the best interest of the DNC is not what is best for working class people in this country. The DNC voted against adding universal healthcare to their platform in the middle of a worldwide pandemic because of the money they get from donors who support and benefit from the current for-profit healthcare system. Don’t make the mistake of thinking the Democratic Party is the party for the working class of the United States. 

    The Democratic party uses the fear of the ‘right’ to pull people in line, saying, “Look at these terrible things the Republicans are doing! If you don’t support us, you support them.” But that’s not true. I don’t support the Democrats or the Republicans, I support an election with three or more options. I never want to vote for the lesser of two evils: If it’s evil, it’s evil. There is no less evil or better evil, it’s just a different evil. 

    Everyone will tell you this is the most important election of your lifetime. But I’ve heard that every single election of my lifetime. This one isn’t the most important. I know what the most important election of my lifetime looks like. It looks like more than two parties on the ballot. It looks like no electoral college. It has ranked choice voting. It looks like a real choice and it has actual policies that will change the class structure in the United States. It will  take on the root of racism and sexism in this county and abolish it. 

    I believe we can make that election a reality, but not if we continue to fold to the Democratic Party and fall prey to their fear campaigns. We have to build a people’s party outside of the Democratic establishment. We have to organize, not just vote. And we have to stop voting for the lesser evil and push past this current system.

    I also want to acknowledge that Joe Biden is a uniquely repugnant Democratic candidate. He has been accused of sexual assault by Tara Reade, whose account is well corrborated. On top of that, seven other women have accused him of touching them in ways that were inappropriate and made them feel disgusted, ashamed, and upset. Even people who have voted for Democrats in the past will struggle to make a choice in a race between two candidates who are accused rapists. For many, especially for many survivors, voting for Joe Biden is not an option. 

    I will not be bullied by the Democratic Party into accepting the horrible conditions of modern-day capitalism. If they know we will break and vote for their candidate, then what incentive do they have to change? You can be mad at me, but it would be more productive to think about the people who put us into this position, and how we can work to change that.

  • Are Small Businesses Better?

    Are Small Businesses Better?

    Dear Commie,

    I feel like I’m supposed to love small businesses for not being Wal Marts but while “Not Wal Mart” is good, I’m still not sure that makes small businesses great. What do socialists think about small businesses? Are they better or different than the big businesses?

    Sincerely,

    Big or Small, I Kind of Hate Them All

    Dear Hater,

    “Small business” has a romantic image in the United States. When “small business” thrives, people tend to see a confirmation of the American Dream: ordinary people can, with a little determination and perseverance, become their own boss. So socialists often get asked: What do you think of these ordinary people, and of this American Dream? The answer is hardly simple.

    I’d say there is no reason to romanticize small businesses, though there is no particular reason to demonize them either. On one hand, small business owners employ workers and by definition exploit those workers for profits just like the owners of big businesses. On the other hand, they are often anchored to communities, including working-class communities, in ways that big businesses are not. 

    These contradictory elements make small business an interesting problem for socialists, and as a result of these elements, small business owners face a choice of allegiances when conflict heats up between the working class and the big capitalists. Do small business owners see themselves first as owners of capital and throw in their lot with the big capitalists against the working class? Or do they side with their community, mostly made up of working people, against the big capitalists?

    First, small isn’t always beautiful. The basic constraints on the small business owner are the same as they are with any other business owner. Under capitalism, business owners need to keep the cost of inputs as low as possible in order to have the best return on their investment. They have many “fixed” input costs, which are often very difficult to affect, especially for smaller businesses. Labor costs are often the easiest to minimize. One can fire some people, overwork others, manipulate the schedule for maximum flexibility and so on. It should come as no surprise that average earnings at small businesses tend to be lower than those at large ones, and lower than the economy-wide average. 

    These constraints are present no matter what — “good” bosses and “bad” bosses have the same “bottom line.” However, bosses’ personality traits often matter more for workers at small businesses. Unlike at big businesses, workers may interact with the owner on a regular, even daily, basis, unmediated by layers and layers of management. The employer/employee relationship is overlain with a personal relationship. 

    There are millions of small business employers in the United States, and they are all kinds of people — generous or selfish, caring or callous, gentle or abusive. All have considerable power over their employees and enormous leeway in how they choose to wield it. For those 30% of workers employed by a small business, only luck-of-the-draw decides whether they work for a decent person or a tyrant.

    Additionally, small businesses are politically weird. They depend both on worker submission and community support. Most small businesses fail, even in good times, within five years of getting started. Their owners, who had hoped to become wealthy, sink back into the ranks of the working class that they tried to escape. This “caught-between” position has historically put small business owners all over the political map. 

    Under certain conditions, small business owners may become radical right-wing extremists. Some historians of fascism, for instance, have noted the high degree of support for Nazis among small businessmen, who saw the party as a means to put down a restive working class, restore order and allow them to get back to business. In other conditions, small business owners may align themselves with an embattled working class. In the United States, for example, small business owners have occasionally offered material support to striking workers. 

    This outward show of solidarity is partly due to the fact that those workers spend their wages at the local shops, of course, but a genuine sentiment of support may come along with the material interest as well. To me, the political volatility of the small business class poses tactical questions for socialists and working-class organizations about coalitions and alliances that are generally not posed when big business is concerned.

    The COVID-19 pandemic has led to an unprecedented uncertainty for small businesses. Some part of the right-wing Reopen demonstrations seems to have been led by small business owners concerned about the impact of the shutdown on their business. State and local governments have also caved to the interests of this group by prematurely lifting pandemic repression measures in cities with the result that cases are increasing more rapidly than ever.

    If the federal government had guaranteed to cover the payroll expenses of small businesses so that they could continue paying workers through the shutdown, the Trump Administration might have easily been able to unify small business support and greater support of the working class behind the 2020 reelection campaign. Instead, officials allowed tens of millions of newly-unemployed workers to face an unprepared unemployment insurance system and left most small businesses to fend for themselves. The small business class alone is not sufficiently powerful to win the aid needed to survive the pandemic.

    Thanks to these various contradictory elements, small business owners may now respond to the COVID pandemic by bringing about uglier labor conditions — putting workers in increasingly dangerous situations, forcing workers to bear the burden of self-isolation without the benefit of paid time off and so on. However, there is a chance that small business owners will make the bold demand that the federal government has the responsibility to bail out the “real” economy, not just Wall Street. For this to happen, though, a resurgence of the working class will have to lead society through the storm.

    Sincerely,

    Michael Martinez

  • A Forever Losing Streak?

    A Forever Losing Streak?

    Dear Commie,

    Have socialists ever won anything? Or is being a socialist just getting kicked in the teeth over and over while holding fast to the idea that a better world is theoretically possible?

    Sincerely,

    My Teeth Hurt But I Still Believe

    Dear Hurt Chompers,

    These days it certainly seems like we’re getting hammered. First, let’s be clear: there are many things socialists have won. We can go back to the “ancient history” of the 19th and early 20th century where our achievements include:

    • Socialists won the 8-hour day
    • Socialist-feminists won women’s suffrage and created International Women’s Day
    • Socialists and communists built industrial unions (unions where everyone was welcome, regardless of their skill, race, or country of origin), and laid the groundwork for the modern union movement in the 1930’s
    • Socialists fought against Jim Crow laws and supported the Civil Rights movement that ended legal segregation
    • Socialists organized against the war in Vietnam and helped end the war.

    My own journey to becoming a socialist started when I realized that all of the projects and fights that inspired me were led by socialists.

    And of course there have been revolutions. We could name off a laundry list of everything from the Paris Commune in 1871 (which inspired Marx in his vision of what socialism might look like)  to more recent uprisings like the Arab Spring in 2011. While we can debate the character of them, and whether we think they’re socialist or not, revolutions have upset the path of history, and they inspire us to think beyond the slow drudge of daily battles for reform.

    In the US more recently, socialists helped build the reform caucus in the Chicago Teachers’ Union (CTU) that led to some of the most important wins for workers in the last forty years: in 2012 and again in 2019 CTU teachers struck and won on demands not just for themselves but for their students and families in Chicago. That took socialists who had a vision and understanding that things wouldn’t change without a push — and that paid off big. In Seattle, Kshama Sawant was able to push for a $15 minimum wage as part of her socialist campaign, starting well before it was in the popular consciousness or part of Bernie Sanders’ campaign. 

    Reading this, it’s probably clear that the line between what “socialists have won” and the victories of workers and oppressed people is somewhat fuzzy. After all, there isn’t one singular socialist party that we use to measure whether or not socialists have won things. However, we can see how socialists have contributed to important fights and played roles to push the movement forward and avoid traps we’ve learned about through history. Marx lays this out nicely in the Communist Manifesto:


    “The Communists do not form a separate party opposed to the other working-class parties. They have no interests separate and apart from those of the proletariat as a whole. They do not set up any sectarian principles of their own, by which to shape and mould the proletarian movement.”

    In short, socialists get kicked in the teeth because we share the fate of our class. The things socialists have done to help build the movement and see past the confines of the present day have been beautiful, inspirational, and actually effective. 

    Planting the seeds of tomorrow,

    Commie

  • Dear Not Commie

    Dear Not Commie

    This edition of Dear Commie is actually a back-and-forth between comrades about use of the word “commie.” Warmest thanks to Chuck of Rock River DSA for his willingness to share his thoughts with Red Madison. 

    Dear Comrades,

    I was pleased with the new look of the Madison newsletter, congrats! But when I saw the column, “Dear commie,” I both laughed and cringed. I believe using ‘commie’ is a mistake.

    There are two reasons for this, the first being related to age. I’m 65 and a founding member, having been in the New American Movement (NAM), one of two groups that merged to create DSA. While I’m pleased that younger folks no longer feel the stigma of ‘commie,’ something we predicted with the fall of the Soviet Union, many of my cohort are still nervous about ‘socialism,’ let alone ‘communism.’ This is true even in our fledgling OC.

    The second has to do with the broader socialist movement. There is very good reason for identifying ourselves as ‘democratic’ socialists. We promote the expansion of democracy, both in our organization and the wider society. Communism is still associated with Stalinism, a tendency I hope all of us agree is harmful to that mission. There was a time when many of us were optimistic about China, but that time has long past. Many still associate ‘communism’ with Leninism and Trotskyism. Though both are authors are worth reading, such organizations share with Stalinism a horrible, top-down ‘democratic-centralist’ model of organizing. The genius of DSA is its emphasis on local autonomy. In our communities. we seek ‘organic’ relationships broader social movements, we do not tell them we have ‘the correct line.’

    I’m not saying we should be ‘anti-communist,’ just that we should be careful how we use the term. While I do think we should promote Marx, like him I am not a ‘Marxist.’ We should promote and translate his ideas, applying them to the American experience (one of the major goals of NAM), carefully explaining to those who are ready what he meant by ‘communism.’ At the same time, we should recognize the history of other socialist forms of organizing here in the US, particularly in Wisconsin.

    The major point I am trying to make, following Gramsci, is that we are engaged in a culture war. We must win the hearts and minds of many others, old and young, far and center-left, social democrat, liberal or otherwise. To do our best at this, we should not use the ‘hammer and sickle,’ rather we should be proud of the ‘fist and rose.’

    sol,

    Chuck Ogg
    Co-Coordinator of the Rock River DSA (Rock, Jefferson and Walworth Counties of WI)

    —

    Dear Chuck,

    As you know, I disagree that we should avoid associating ourselves with communism.

    For one thing, we can’t avoid it. Forces on the right call everything to their left “communism.” Even President Barack Obama couldn’t escape the label, and he’s not even a progressive. Our foes will call us socialists and communists whether we do or not. I don’t think worrying about it is a productive use of our time. I also think that rejecting these labels with a lot of arguments about how we’re not like this country or that microsect misses the larger point we should be making right now: we are opposed to capitalism, and capitalism has done more harm and cost more lives than any other type of society in human history. Better to keep our sights on the enemy of working people around the world – capitalism – than to police ourselves for traces of the red menace.  

    As for actively adopting the label as we have done for the purpose of our Dear Commie column – well, it was a little bit tongue and cheek. To answer questions about socialism in a way that’s readable, we’re making allusion to “Dear Abby” columns in their Q&A advice format, and “Commie” slides in nicely. Saying “Commie” also acknowledges what people will already say about us and takes the power away from the label by having some fun with it ourselves.

    And, speaking for myself, just one of the Dear Commie writers, I also mean it sincerely: we are not wishy washy in our commitment to overcoming capitalism, and staking out that ground where sometimes “socialism” is a word that can mean everything and nothing is important.

    You argue that age is a defining factor in our disagreement and I couldn’t agree more. Younger people no longer feel the sting of association with the Soviet Union. We are less familiar with and therefore less afraid of red baiting. More than that, the conditions of our lives mean that many young people are radicalizing fast and coming to revolutionary conclusions.

    I’m 31 years old. The United States has been at war for most of my life. Capitalism has dimmed the prospects for my entire generation. We will never attain the wealth and security of our parents’ generations (which itself was always insufficient). Due to pollution and contamination and corrupt food systems, we will have worse health outcomes than our parents, which spells ruination and debt in the for-profit healthcare system. That’s only if we survive to middle and old age – we also know that capitalism will destroy the planet within our lifetimes if we do not stop it. The solution offered to us by the establishment this year is Joe Biden, an accused rapist who has no intention of enacting the policies that could save our lives, like a Green New Deal or Medicare for all, and who could not be bothered to speak for the entire first week of the current COVID-19 crisis. 

    To be honest, I’ve never felt more enthusiastic about communism in my entire life. I believe in organizing to upset the whole capitalist apple cart. I want a complete transfer of power and control from the ruling class to the only class with the ability to enact a democratic society – the working class.

    I’m not ashamed or nervous about being associated with communism of the past, either. Even in the United States, there’s a lot in the tradition of communists and socialists to be proud of and to embrace. Communists have had a profound influence on social movements of American history, including the labor movement and the civil rights movement. I don’t want to hold myself apart from that history, and I don’t want future generations to lose sight of it either. We should learn from it and carry the tradition forward – even in DSA. 

    Solidarity,

     Your Commie-rade
    Dayna Long, Madison Area DSA

  • European History: Who Cares?

    European History: Who Cares?

    Dear Commie,

    Why is everyone obsessed with 19th and early 20th century European politics and should I care even a little?

    Sincerely,

    Over the Eurocentrism

    Dear Understandably Over It,

    Should you care? Yes. 

    Before I explain why this history matters, I first want to share my very real sympathy for your exasperation. There’s something about being told that the key to understanding the world lies in the writings of some old, dead, European men that sure does chafe! And Western socialists frequently and unfortunately overlook historic movements outside of Europe and Russia to our own detriment. 

    That said, the history you’re referencing is the context in which Marx and Engels were first able to develop, test, and further develop their theories about materialism, capitalism, and the potential for socialism. And in the early 20th century, in Europe and Russia, socialists engaged in lively debates about how to put the theories of Marx and Engels into practice in their current conditions, tested their conclusions, and developed even more theory that is rife with lessons for 21st century socialists, like what material conditions give rise to fascism, why international solidarity is so important, and how we can most effectively organize ourselves. 

    While it would be a mistake to assume that we can simply apply the analyses of the Bolsheviks in 1917 (for example) to 2020 conditions in the United States, learning about the times that past generations of socialists lived through, their analysis of their conditions, and the debates that emerged from the challenges they faced is a way to sharpen our ability to assess our own conditions and figure out the best way forward. It’s a practice that has been embraced by socialists all over the world for well over a hundred years. This includes the socialists behind the movements and histories you actually care about. I understand your reticence to dig in, but think of it as a jumping off point that will help you more fully appreciate the history and the theory you’re really interested in.

    This doesn’t have to be limited to just 19th and 20th century European histories, though. You can practice applying historical materialism on any social movement, whether it’s the Zapatistas in Mexico, the Black Panthers in the USA, or the recent mass-demonstrations in Hong Kong and Kashmir. Whatever you choose to dig into, it’s always a good idea to learn alongside fellow socialists. Read with comrades! Find relevant movies! Discuss current events! Mine the internet for resources (WeAreMany.org is a treasure trove of socialist talks about history and many other topics)! At the very, very least, your expanded knowledge means you won’t have to take the word of a dude-bro descendent of old Europeans the next time these histories come up. 

    Good luck,

    Giant History Book Addict

  • Socialists vs Progressives

    Socialists vs Progressives

    Dear Commie,

    What makes socialists different from super progressives?

    Yours, Figuring it Out

    Dear Figuring it Out,

    The big difference between a socialist and a progressive is that while socialists and progressives may want some of the same things in the short term (raise the minimum wage, better environmental controls, taxing wealth), socialists see the problems of society coming from capitalism. From a socialist perspective, we’ll continue to have these problems as long as we’re in capitalism.

    Socialists point to how capitalism is about creating profit, not about taking care of people or social problems. The goal of capitalism is not to create prosperity for everyone in society. It is always to create more wealth for capitalists – there’s never an end. A capitalist as an individual doesn’t have to be a greedy, shitty person, because as long as you’re a player in the game, you must grow or die. That is the rationale of the system, and capitalist society is built to protect it.

    Progressives usually don’t have a problem with capitalism itself, they think that we can have a reformed capitalism that works for everyone. Socialists disagree; we want to overcome capitalism. We want the world to be run democratically, and that also means the economy and energy systems must be run democratically by the people who make them work.

    There’s more of course, but that’s it in a nutshell.

    Class strugglingly yours, Commie.

  • Bourgeoisie?

    Bourgeoisie?

    Dear Commie,

    How do you pronounce bourgeois? What’s up with this word?

    Thanks, Bad with Words

    Dear Bad with Words,

    “Bourgeois” is pronounced like boo-jwah. Maybe you’ve heard someone call something expensive “bougie”? Same thing. It comes from the word “bourgeoisie” (boo-jwah-zee), which originally referred to merchants and other businesspeople who lived in cities in the Middle Ages (“burghers”). In Marxism, bourgeoisie and “capitalist class” are often interchanged, because Marx explained how feudalism turned into capitalism as the bourgeoisie became the dominant class in society. Usually we just say capitalist class these days.

    Yours, Commie.