I dont mean to detract from your point at all here… In fact, PSL is my favorite org in recent memory, but I have yet to join out of fear.
I hope this comment doesn’t come across as FUD because I certainly don’t want to steer people away from organizing, but… do you ever fear that getting your name on paperwork in one of these orgs could jeopardize your safety? Shit is happening so fast in America right now that I am straight up afraid of organizing. Im thinking of a scenario where PSL headquarters gets raided, and everyone who shows up on an active members list gets shipped to El Salvador.
Kind of a disjointed reply, but I guess all I really wanted to say is that shit is getting really scary right now, and I’m not even part of a vulnerable group. I’m afraid.
Maybe the answer is that, yes, joining a leftist organization during fascist descent does incur massive risks, but that is the necessary burden that American leftists must take for the sake of the people we are oppressing? Maybe now is the time to be brave?
You bring up my first intuition on the matter. If the federal government wanted to destabilize counter movements, they most certainly would take three approaches: (1) propagandize the organizations leading those movements, (2) attack the organizations leading those movements, and (3) attack the members of the organizations leading those movements. Look no further than the history between the US and their workers unions.
However, this perspective is unfair. It doesn’t quite justify the alternative, because the alternative seems to be: “don’t join the organization, alleviate the risk from yourself.” That’s just inaccurate positing from the fears mentioned here. The truth is, doing nothing has risks that you can’t predict. Though, you can approximate your risks by asking yourself: “what if I was on a green card right now?” Doing that, at least, lets you view the problem as though it’s already at your doorstep — and this gives justice to the inherent risk we all face during a fascist takeover. Fascists only start with minorities, as they develop the infrastructure necessary to target anyone they please.
Your concerns are natural and you’re already being brave by asking yourself these questions. I’d like to add that there are big risks to you security by not organizing too, given recent developments.
Your fears are 100% valid. PSL has a strong public-facing presense as its own shield, it’s the honesty and integrity of PSL that keeps the public more on its side. However, there’s also the Action Network, an informal, secondary level of membership with minimal requirements that means you just volunteer when the opportunity arises, and aren’t a disciplined cadre. This is also a valid form of organizing, both the mass organization and the dedicated cadre are necessary!
there’s a STRONG trend of black and brown social media influencers warning people not to get involved if they have too much melanin for american standards and learning about the black panthers and the night of the long knives (coupled with my anecdotal experiences with white-passing family members) makes me think that they’re right.
some small part of me hopes that my contributions to the greens and psl are so long ago that that i’m no longer on their rosters.
I mean, the Black Panthers murdered by the state are heroes in my eyes, ya know? That seems like a strange argument. As bleak as it is to mention, I feel I must point out that having only the fear of future violence while others must face violence presently is a privilege. The good thing is that getting involved in organizing is also a privilege, the other side of the coin I guess you could say. Way I think about it, you’re gonna live with the fear of state violence already, so the fear from organizing is marginal, possibly negligible.
I’d rather be alive than be your hero. Black and brown people in the US already face violence without voluntarily painting targets on their backs. If people want to stick their necks out, good for them. But it’s kinda ballsy to try to shame black and brown people in the current USA for avoiding violence from some “place of privilege “
Alright. Privilege is still relative. Being defensive is not going to change that.
The fear of “sticking your neck out” is still very individualistic thinking. The goal is to learn and organize so WE can stick our necks out together. My lionizing of former martyrs is not an attempt to shame you. I still think that “don’t be like the people who actually induced change because they were martyred” is a terrible take.
If that day comes, do you really think that the absence of your name on a roster is going to stop them? Obedience in advance only teaches authority what it can get away with. The capabilities of authority generally are much less far-reaching than what they lead us to believe. Oppression breeds resistance and struggle, whereas the state would have us believe in the fantasy of unilateral control and suppression of dissent.
You owe it to yourself to study revolutionary history beyond just the most shocking events that scare you away from organizing. In the words of the late assata shakur; It is our duty to fight. It is our duty to win. We must love each other and support each other. We have nothing to lose but our chains.
thanks, but don’t be; i’m convinced that i would be yet another liberal doomscrolling my life away, embittering myself further by the day because of the deep ignorance from the western propaganda like it is for some of my siblings/cousins/nephews/neices who turn to alcohol, drugs and other self destructive coping mechanisms.
i’m convinced that my dark skin; my queerness; and my nuero-divergence have forced me to develop tools that have proven themselves useful in thwarting the asshattery that life in this late stage capitalist world throws at me.
i’m a liberal because most of the leftist theories requires a shit ton of reading and self education, which is going to take me decades to complete at my pace
That’s the indomitable human spirit at work, we develop the tools we need. We may not live in a just world, but we live in one where we can and will win.
This is the sole thing that keeps me down. My spouse is a first generation American with brown skin in a Republican state. If any attention is drawn to us, her, her parents, her autistic brother, the lady that cuts my hair, the grocery we visit down the road, half the parents in our neighborhood, I’m the only person in my community that isn’t currently represented in the ICE victim pool. If I rock the boat every single person I care about gets a plane trip to a foreign prison.
Every day it gets worse. Eventually, it won’t be plane rides, it will be ditches. Even if I don’t attract the attention of the government, it’s cultists yell racial slurs in as they drive lifted trucks past my community. They gnaw at the bit for a chance to cut loose and remove this stain from their white city.
I’ve seen the local protests, 10 people with signs on a busy intersection a mile from the courthouse. The police point and laugh as commuters throw drinks at them from their cars for thinking that human rights belong in a red state.
What the fuck do I do? What can I, standing here, actually do to change anything? There isn’t a single action that I can take that does not threaten to burn down my community and leave my child an orphan, and even still I’m here asking how I can solve this problem.
Organizing is the only way to protect them. If you do nothing, and it continues on this path, you will not be safe, regardless of your actions. If we can all join together and stop this NOW we can prevent that.
My wife is here on a green card. My employers are as well. Because they are fellow humans, I will die to defend them. I will fight tooth and nail. I will not be cowed by a fat orange blob who diddle kids. I will not be frightened by a mob of egomaniacal imbeciles. Their attempts to emulate fascists of the past is sloppy and will fail if put to any sort of test.
This is great, this is what I like to here, but where is the how? What do I actually do to make a difference? That’s the part everyone stops at and I’m beating every bush in this county to try to shake loose the one persone with a clue.
You’re represented even if you don’t look brown. I can’t find the story in the deluge of other similar stories, but they arrested a San Diego cop’s/sheriff’s British wife, and deported her. They were basically done getting her citizenship, and had been working on it for years at that point. Of course the idiot voted for Trump, not that it matters in CA.
I say I’m not represented because my family has been getting kicked about in these parts since the 1800s. As far as I’ve seen in the news they haven’t arrested the straight, white, male, American, partners of all the people they pick up.
Not to say I’m safe, they’ll make their way to traitors like me eventually, but right now I don’t get the luxury of getting black bagged with my wife in a traffic stop, I just get to sit at home while the life we built falls apart.
I dont mean to detract from your point at all here… In fact, PSL is my favorite org in recent memory, but I have yet to join out of fear.
I hope this comment doesn’t come across as FUD because I certainly don’t want to steer people away from organizing, but… do you ever fear that getting your name on paperwork in one of these orgs could jeopardize your safety? Shit is happening so fast in America right now that I am straight up afraid of organizing. Im thinking of a scenario where PSL headquarters gets raided, and everyone who shows up on an active members list gets shipped to El Salvador.
Kind of a disjointed reply, but I guess all I really wanted to say is that shit is getting really scary right now, and I’m not even part of a vulnerable group. I’m afraid.
Maybe the answer is that, yes, joining a leftist organization during fascist descent does incur massive risks, but that is the necessary burden that American leftists must take for the sake of the people we are oppressing? Maybe now is the time to be brave?
You bring up my first intuition on the matter. If the federal government wanted to destabilize counter movements, they most certainly would take three approaches: (1) propagandize the organizations leading those movements, (2) attack the organizations leading those movements, and (3) attack the members of the organizations leading those movements. Look no further than the history between the US and their workers unions.
However, this perspective is unfair. It doesn’t quite justify the alternative, because the alternative seems to be: “don’t join the organization, alleviate the risk from yourself.” That’s just inaccurate positing from the fears mentioned here. The truth is, doing nothing has risks that you can’t predict. Though, you can approximate your risks by asking yourself: “what if I was on a green card right now?” Doing that, at least, lets you view the problem as though it’s already at your doorstep — and this gives justice to the inherent risk we all face during a fascist takeover. Fascists only start with minorities, as they develop the infrastructure necessary to target anyone they please.
Your concerns are natural and you’re already being brave by asking yourself these questions. I’d like to add that there are big risks to you security by not organizing too, given recent developments.
I get your point and share your worries, but I ended up concluding that I will regret more aiding the descent to fascism than being a casualty of it.
Think of all the people that survived Nazi Germany while being a collaborator and seeing all the horrors their cowardice helped occur.
I don’t think this people would have happy lives after that, I know I wouldn’t.
Furthermore, I believe that if I don’t act now when is somewhat safe, I will act latter down the line and would definitely get killed.
Is your choice.
Your fears are 100% valid. PSL has a strong public-facing presense as its own shield, it’s the honesty and integrity of PSL that keeps the public more on its side. However, there’s also the Action Network, an informal, secondary level of membership with minimal requirements that means you just volunteer when the opportunity arises, and aren’t a disciplined cadre. This is also a valid form of organizing, both the mass organization and the dedicated cadre are necessary!
there’s a STRONG trend of black and brown social media influencers warning people not to get involved if they have too much melanin for american standards and learning about the black panthers and the night of the long knives (coupled with my anecdotal experiences with white-passing family members) makes me think that they’re right.
some small part of me hopes that my contributions to the greens and psl are so long ago that that i’m no longer on their rosters.
I mean, the Black Panthers murdered by the state are heroes in my eyes, ya know? That seems like a strange argument. As bleak as it is to mention, I feel I must point out that having only the fear of future violence while others must face violence presently is a privilege. The good thing is that getting involved in organizing is also a privilege, the other side of the coin I guess you could say. Way I think about it, you’re gonna live with the fear of state violence already, so the fear from organizing is marginal, possibly negligible.
I’d rather be alive than be your hero. Black and brown people in the US already face violence without voluntarily painting targets on their backs. If people want to stick their necks out, good for them. But it’s kinda ballsy to try to shame black and brown people in the current USA for avoiding violence from some “place of privilege “
Alright. Privilege is still relative. Being defensive is not going to change that.
The fear of “sticking your neck out” is still very individualistic thinking. The goal is to learn and organize so WE can stick our necks out together. My lionizing of former martyrs is not an attempt to shame you. I still think that “don’t be like the people who actually induced change because they were martyred” is a terrible take.
If that day comes, do you really think that the absence of your name on a roster is going to stop them? Obedience in advance only teaches authority what it can get away with. The capabilities of authority generally are much less far-reaching than what they lead us to believe. Oppression breeds resistance and struggle, whereas the state would have us believe in the fantasy of unilateral control and suppression of dissent.
You owe it to yourself to study revolutionary history beyond just the most shocking events that scare you away from organizing. In the words of the late assata shakur; It is our duty to fight. It is our duty to win. We must love each other and support each other. We have nothing to lose but our chains.
I’m sorry you have experienced that, comrade. I can only say that the goal is such a society where this kind of bullshit will be a thing of the past.
thanks, but don’t be; i’m convinced that i would be yet another liberal doomscrolling my life away, embittering myself further by the day because of the deep ignorance from the western propaganda like it is for some of my siblings/cousins/nephews/neices who turn to alcohol, drugs and other self destructive coping mechanisms.
i’m convinced that my dark skin; my queerness; and my nuero-divergence have forced me to develop tools that have proven themselves useful in thwarting the asshattery that life in this late stage capitalist world throws at me.
The fact that you’re still a liberal after witnessing the raw face of the empire means you haven’t fully woken up yet.
i’m a liberal because most of the leftist theories requires a shit ton of reading and self education, which is going to take me decades to complete at my pace
You can start here before reading.
Are We The Baddies?.
Why Is The US Always At War?.
How The US Took Over The World.
Socialism for Absolute Beginners.
Debunking every anti-communist talking point
What Exactly is Liberalism? (no, it’s not about being “woke”).
“We need a mixture of Capitalism AND Socialism” - BULLS#*T.
Why Social Democracy Isn’t Good Enough.
What Should New Leftists Do? A Guide. (Highly recommended)
Non-Theory books(Page count in Brackets):
Podcast:
Blowback (Highly Recommended)
The Deprogram (Recommended)
RevLeft Radio
Red Menace
That’s the indomitable human spirit at work, we develop the tools we need. We may not live in a just world, but we live in one where we can and will win.
Not the indomitable spirit; simply A LOT of ass artificially bouying my spirits. Lol
Both can be true!
This is the sole thing that keeps me down. My spouse is a first generation American with brown skin in a Republican state. If any attention is drawn to us, her, her parents, her autistic brother, the lady that cuts my hair, the grocery we visit down the road, half the parents in our neighborhood, I’m the only person in my community that isn’t currently represented in the ICE victim pool. If I rock the boat every single person I care about gets a plane trip to a foreign prison.
Every day it gets worse. Eventually, it won’t be plane rides, it will be ditches. Even if I don’t attract the attention of the government, it’s cultists yell racial slurs in as they drive lifted trucks past my community. They gnaw at the bit for a chance to cut loose and remove this stain from their white city.
I’ve seen the local protests, 10 people with signs on a busy intersection a mile from the courthouse. The police point and laugh as commuters throw drinks at them from their cars for thinking that human rights belong in a red state.
What the fuck do I do? What can I, standing here, actually do to change anything? There isn’t a single action that I can take that does not threaten to burn down my community and leave my child an orphan, and even still I’m here asking how I can solve this problem.
Organizing is the only way to protect them. If you do nothing, and it continues on this path, you will not be safe, regardless of your actions. If we can all join together and stop this NOW we can prevent that.
My wife is here on a green card. My employers are as well. Because they are fellow humans, I will die to defend them. I will fight tooth and nail. I will not be cowed by a fat orange blob who diddle kids. I will not be frightened by a mob of egomaniacal imbeciles. Their attempts to emulate fascists of the past is sloppy and will fail if put to any sort of test.
Help me to break them.
This is great, this is what I like to here, but where is the how? What do I actually do to make a difference? That’s the part everyone stops at and I’m beating every bush in this county to try to shake loose the one persone with a clue.
https://en.prolewiki.org/wiki/Category:Guide_to_organizing
I am going to be volunteering and trying to network. Find like minded people. I really don’t have answers beyond burn down town hall.im sorry.
You’re represented even if you don’t look brown. I can’t find the story in the deluge of other similar stories, but they arrested a San Diego cop’s/sheriff’s British wife, and deported her. They were basically done getting her citizenship, and had been working on it for years at that point. Of course the idiot voted for Trump, not that it matters in CA.
I say I’m not represented because my family has been getting kicked about in these parts since the 1800s. As far as I’ve seen in the news they haven’t arrested the straight, white, male, American, partners of all the people they pick up.
Not to say I’m safe, they’ll make their way to traitors like me eventually, but right now I don’t get the luxury of getting black bagged with my wife in a traffic stop, I just get to sit at home while the life we built falls apart.