I suppose it was only a matter of time. What with all the movement hacks from the Left Coast making their cameo appearances here since SB1070 passed, I was a little surprised that we hadn't yet heard from one of the worst of the worst: the self-described "Revolutionary Communist Party". Naturally, no sooner had I evoked his name but the devil himself appeared.So now the RCP's been sniffing around Phoenix, hoping to prey on well-meaning warm-blooded anarchists in order to get their necrotic vampire hands on the movement here. The dead require fresh blood to live, they say. Naturally then, PCWC was approached by a cadre looking for support for their shenanigans. Of course, we told them an unequivocal and unqualified "Hell, no!" And not just because they're an authoritarian cult! There is no way that we would work with the RCP and there's no reason that anyone who believes in human freedom and equality ought to either.
Not only that, but the RCP obviously hadn't done their research. PCWC is composed of members who cut our teeth at mass actions in LA in which the RCP revealed their sketchy manipulations and anti-anarchist skulduggery. These types always come from outside. It was in fact our experiences with the fallacy of the big leftist tent that taught us to be deeply skeptical of the authoritarian left. They talk a big game about all being in for the same thing, but the truth is anything but! Of course, looking to the history of anarchist-authoritarian communist relations only reinforces that.
No doubt the RCP will whine about how we're being divisive for calling them out and refusing them aid. But do we call the prisoner who fights her jailer "divisive"? Of course not! We won't bend to this bullshit fake logic. We are under no obligation to show them any quarter. It is the authoritarian communist, after all, who has to answer for the crimes, lies and distortions of her ideology. We, having been for so many decades on the shit end of that stick should have to offer no further explanation than that we will not continue the pattern of abuse.
Naturally, being PCWC, we will of course offer further explanation. It is our firm commitment that the left -- especially the authoritarian left -- is in fact an impediment to revolutionary struggle. After all, it's always they who swoop in at the last minute and save capitalism. Or who impose bureaucratized state capitalism. Or who sell out the wildcats. Or who imprison the militants. Or who argue for the popular front. Or who build the labor camps. None of which takes us a centimeter closer to the revolution that the RCP's creepy leader, American ex-pat Bob Avakian, claims to want in his Left Bank pontifications. On the same note, we always believed that the one good thing Arizona had going for it was no left to speak of and a strong libertarian bent amongst the right.
Since learning the true nature of these left fascist bastards, you can imagine our frustration at the massive flood of them that has followed the celebrity of SB1070. One parasitic leftist operation from out of town after another has parachuted into the Valley of the Sun and proceeded to lecture the locals on who we should be working with and why, to seek to impose their myopic, petty and narrow view of our conditions and struggle, and to generally make a nuisance of themselves, trampling over legitimate local projects and organizing in the process.
So, because of that, I'm announcing a week of anti-RCP posts here on Fires Never Extinguished. We'll have something for you pretty much every other day for this week. Essays, links, media, even a book (the poster above should fit on a 8.5" by 14" sheet of paper). Things that will help you understand what the RCP is, why it should not be welcomed here and, in the broader sense, to help you develop a critique of Leninism so that you can stand up to these revisionist creeps.
Long live anarchy!
18 comments:
well said i had to give the heads up to Phil Freedom they been squatting on his couch
PCWC,
You may find this "blast" from the past instructive:
http://illvox.org/2007/06/mythology-of-the-white-led-vanguard-a-critical-look-at-the-revolutionary-communist-party-usa/
One thing you can mention to them when they come around is that their own chairman specifically told the membership, both in writing and in his Revolution talk dvd, to:
- NOT "jam ideology down people's throats".
- Get away from 'relgiousity' when it comes to spreading his message.
- Accept that there other revolutionary forces out there that may not take up "Marxism-Leninism-Maoism", but have come to similar conclusions.
Marx defined the "vanguard" basically as the most disciplined, organized sections of the workers led by the radicalized intelligencia, i.e. - the petit-bourgeois who reject their class of origin.
In the U.S. and 1st world nations generally, it is this sub-culture that is the majority of what tries to pass itself off as "the proletariat", when we all know who the real proletariat is (hint: they are generally NOT white, they generally do NOT speak English as a 1st language, and are usually employed in some type of manual labor).
One thing in pointing out the contradictions of the RCP is that ones analysis hopefully isn't just limited to organizations who call themselves "Marxist", "Leninist", or "Maoist", or purportedly run based upon "democratic centralism".
I can tell you from personal experience that so-called "anti-authoritarian" affinity groups can also fall victim to organizational cultism.
Symptoms watch for include: opportunism, political backwardness (to due to arrogant ignorance towards ones own profound ideological 'blind-spots' or that of the group), dogmatism, rigidity, social-imperialism/left-wing white supremacy, profound alienation from the very community they claim to be working with (or speaking for), and a stubborn adherance to tactics, strategies, and principles that seem to originate more in the teachings of Makavelli (and I don't mean Tupac), as opposed to that of Marx or Bakunin.
Joseph McCarthy would be proud
@ Alfonso:
I think you're going to have to do better than that. That kind of amateur-hour right-baiting doesn't float around here.
@Alfonso,
Unlike the PCWC, I harbor no hostility to the RCP-USA. The same cannot be said for their attitutde towards me, or anyone who dares to openly disagree with their "correct line". Go google Mike Ely's site "Kasama Project" see how the RCP acts when one of their own defects (he's the former editor of their newspaper)and goes solo.
If I was to come to Phoenix to do political work on this issue, I would seek out those who have been involved already (like PCWC), deferring to the most directly affected (the undocummented) on questions of strategy and presentation.
The RCP does NOT do this. Or they do this in an unprincipled way.
Few can get past their anti-social "socialism", so their actual political line becomes a moot point. Their practice(s) in the real-world speak louder than anything Chairman Avakian has to say.
I'm pretty sure Mike Ely was a snitch. Just sayin'.
Also, this: http://betterredthancred.blogspot.com/2010/07/yep-were-actually-vampires-says-rcp-you.html
Comrade Yankee,
Suddenly you create a blog on this subject exclusively? One that calls out a dissenter from the RCP as a "snitch"? Really!? Very suspect!
Mao said that "all reaction comes from within the party". He was refering to the period of socialism, but based upon your demonstration, we can see it begin to unfold right before our eyes!
Here, once again, and as Mike Ely has pointed out, and in direct contradiction of what Avakian himself has said to his followers about being willing and able to accept and learn from criticism from the people, we see your pathetic example of the OPPOSITE of what Mao teaches, while at the same time you try to uphold the RCP's line and practice using satire; which would be funny, except that you miss the point the PCWC is trying to make: the PCWC are already 'in the trenches' doing the work of confronting the the anti-immigrant forces and supporting those who are victimized by those forces. How can the RCP "add-on" to this?
"Vanguard leadership" is not about yak, yak, yak when there's a specific incident to rally around, but about show and prove in the community everyday!
If the RCP, or anyone else on a mission to spread the gospel of their prophet(s) to the poor and unwashed masses comes in and destroys the work they have done and/or the relationships they have built with the most directly affected, PCWC has grounds to punish them for "counter-revolutionary activity" (keep in mind Arizona is an 'open carry' state)!
I want to see the RCP and the PCWC succeed. And most importantly, I want those who are most directly affected by kkkapitalism and white supremacy to succeed! Get that thru your thick skull and stop trying to characterize criticism of those who proclaim to be the "vanguard" as negative.
By virtue of taking a position of "we are the vanguard!", the RCP and similar organizations open themselves up to that; as do anarchist groups who find themselves in leadership positions within actions and movements.
The only "people" afraid of criticism and open debate amongst thhe people are opportunists and reactionaries.
So, which one are you?
@ Comrade Yankee:
I checked your site but opted to post my comment here since dialogue is already taking place.
While I appreciate satire and have a thick enough skin to take a few cheap and uncreative insults to my collective, I can't help but notice that you cannot reply in seriousness to the criticisms. That is telling.
But, after all, what can you say to someone who calls the RCP an authoritarian communist cult? Not much and remain truthful.
Also, I should point out that you are quite wrong that we see communists as a bigger threat than capitalism (and despite the satire you attempt to use to cover it up, it's a poor arguing technique that verges on straw man). If you read our stuff, you will see that we denounce authoritarians of all stripes. I think we consistently say fuck them both.
I mean, it's interesting that we criticize and attack capitalism constantly in our organizing and in our writings and the one time we call out the RCP, people like you reduce opposition to the RCP to a failure to oppose capitalism. This is faulty logic indeed and reeks of the worst kinds of vanguardist thought.
The problem is that authoritarian communists have proven over and over that they preserve rather than destroy capitalism. Therefore, since we want Capital demolished, the RCP clearly offers nothing but recuperation and is not, in fact, anti-capitalist.
We will not shy away, however, from letting people here know who the RCP is, what they want, where they come from and what is fucked up about them. If we're just some tiny, un-influential sect here in Az, as you insinuate in your piece, then I'm a bit baffled by why the RCP approached us specifically and why you feel so hurt by our criticisms of it. What's the big deal?
I wonder if Comrade Yankee also thinks we're not anti-capitalist because we challenge the National Socialist Movement and oppose the "national anarchists"...
Ought we have solidarity with them as well as with the RCP merely based on their supposed anti-capitalism, or can we concede that we are allowed to have criteria about who we ally with within the anti-capitalist movement? I'm still getting a kick about this support the RCP or you're not anti-capitalist nonsense that CY is spitting. Hilarious!
By the way, APTTP, thanks for all the links and the kind words of support. I always appreciate your comments on our site. You are astute to point out that Arizona is an open-carry state. I wonder if a lot of the out of state activists are aware of what this can mean for dealing with the reactionary opposition. It ain't like the Bay, or even LA, is all I'm saying.
I haven't been back here in a while but here are a few things to say:
-I was wrong to throw out the accusation the Ely was a snitch, without knowing the facts - it was based on hearsay - for that, I take responsibility.
-It's interesting that someone who calls a group a cult without seriously engaging with its politics (beyond "you advocate a state! Ew gross!") can also criticize my satire for the same purpose.
-It's doubly interesting that, in criticizing it, you only criticize the point that I said about considering communists to be a bigger threat than capitalism. There was muuuuch more to that article that you chose not to address. I wonder why?
-If you seriously examined the backbone of anarchist praxis, it assumes that the State as a concept is the root cause of oppression - a good look at human history proves otherwise. The state arose as a way to escalate, regulate, and solidify both the already-existing relationships of production (like patriarchy) and the imperial conquests needed to continue those relationships.
PCWC's critique of the RCP simply appeals to proto-nationalist fears about losing the sanctity of their "community", when the community itself is at tension with itself due to centuries of white-supremacy and patriarchy. PCWC conveniently ignores this fact in favor of appealing to 1950's McCarthyist rhetoric (whether or not you actually call yourselves right-wing is irrelevant, you should know that) about everyone going to a gulag for the Party or whatever.
You criticize capitalism, yet work to convince racist libertarians to not be quite as racist as they would normally be.
It's cool that you're getting some of them to reject the NSM but that is nowhere near the same as analyzing and critiquing white-supremacy as a social force.
There's a very clear contradiction between upholding libertarian individualism and simultaneously attacking capitalism and property-relationships. Eventually anarchists will have to choose between the two - they're irreconciliable.
@ Comrade Yankee:
First off, I don't think you understand our intervention into the libertarian right. It is rooted in attacking white supremacy, not in convincing them to be less racist. And it has had concrete effects in terms of turning one wing that was hypocritically pro-sb1070 into its unlikely opposition such that it was the libertarian right that almost stopped SB1070 from getting out of committee -- not the weak-kneed left. This is a fracture in white supremacy that is very important here in this state, but I think it's something you have to be from here to appreciate (which goes to the validity of defending our community's struggle against outsiders who will manipulate and impose their own agenda).
So, getting the libertarian right to come out against the NSM andSB1070 is to get them to come against capitalism, whether they know it or not, by nature of their attack on the overall binding structure of Capital in the US, namely, white supremacy.
Secondly, I don't think that anarchists can be reduced to the crass anti-state critique that you allege here. It certainly doesn't go for PCWC, nor for any anarchist I know. Perhaps you mean the right anarchists that want a capitalism unfettered by the state. We are certainly not in that camp. Anarchists are broadly against hierarchies and, if you read our statement, we come out clearly against them in all forms.
Thirdly, I think you'll see that what we do (among other things) is intervene in white movements for the precise purpose of attacking white supremacy. In a way, it's following Malcolm's suggestion to whites: fight white supremacy in white communities. Our understanding of revolution in the US goes a little like this: white supremacy is the glue that holds capitalism together, turning one segment of the working class against another; weaken that glue and a broader struggle against the state and capital becomes possible. At the same time, we are political fanatics, which means that we seek to dissolve the middle ground, not to build it: we don't seek compromise, we seek polarization and to mobilize people around those poles.
So, I think your allegation about crass anti-statism doesn't hold on this count, either. Really, I don't think you understand what we do or how we do it. You reduce us to some caricature because its easier for you to propose some kind of historically bankrupt left popular frontism or broad left alliance. Of course, PCWC wants none of that. We seek allies outside this spectrum and, if we must within it, then we use our own criteria for determining those relationships. Authoritarian cults from out of the state who come in pushing their own agenda rather than supporting the ongoing struggle don't make the cut.
Nevertheless, I think it's hard to make an argument that the RCP's cultish Marxist-Leninist-Maoism would not tend to mirror that of its idols. Reminding anarchists who, unlike the RCP, are critical of the state, of this fact is completely fair. If the RCP doesn't like it, they ought to stop pursuing politics that would send us towards that end. Of course, then they wouldn't be MLM, in my opinion.
Also, I should say, to be fair, there are two more posts coming on this topic, and this post and the sign are just one part of that, so to judge it in that context isn't really fair.
About community: http://betterredthancred.blogspot.com/2010/07/on-community-and-left.html
Unfortunately, you still neglect to address the wealth of other points I made, in favor of finding things that you can critique (in a roundabout way).
Phoenix Insurgent, you fall back continuously on the "you're not from here so you don't understand why we lay in bed with the Right" ridiculousness - but are you really telling me that it's possible for a "white community" to break out of white-supremacy all by itself?
That's the most ridiculous conclusion identity-politics has led to in a while! But I applaud you for using the definition of "community" to justify tailing reactionaries into a critique of open white-supremacists.
It's similar to the scenario where every man in a village participates in castrating a rapist, while they all go on not criticizing patriarchy systematically.
I too criticize the RCP's relationship to its chairman as bad PR, but it's hardly a reason to use reactionary rhetoric to go on about how "un-Arizonan" (read: "un-American") communism is.
Besides, a real cult wouldn't go through the effort of systematically analyzing and understanding history and oppression - it'd be easier to just use mythology or conspiracy theory.
Communities, without communism, are merely nations-in-waiting.
you're basically telling me "listen, listen, I know we have these violent racists here, but they're our problem - let us try to talk them out of it"
as if there's no economic basis for white-supremacy? Come on. Even if every white person in America was an anti-racist anarchist, the economic relationships that hold whiteness as a superior identity will still remain intact without some sort of, oh, I don't know, organized, armed body of men with this analysis and the intention to break those relationships.
We call those states. Even if you call yourself decentralized (like the Zapatistas), you'll still need one.
Again, Comrade Yankee, you are arguing with yourself here. I have said none of those things. I did not advocate for chasing and convincing white supremacists, nor cosying up to them. I did not say that whites can attack white supremacy alone. I likewise never said anything about not needing armed people to confront fascists (which is funny because I actually carried my Glock at the Inglourious Basterds Bloc action against the NSM). These are your assertions which you then conveniently knock down. They are not my position or the position of PCWC.
I really suggest you read more of our articles, a good many of which (for example) deal with the anti-NSM stuff and the myriad ways that we intervene in that. I can repeat all that stuff, but what's the point when you can just go and read what we've already written.
By the way, you have a tendency which really bothers me, which is to make up quotes (see your "un-Arizona"/"un-American" assertion which you invent out of whole cloth and then run with). You should stick to what is said.
I have consistently said that I have a problem with people coming into the state and inserting their own politics, their own biases and their own agendas here. I have no problem with support which asks what is needed and then provides it. In order to be effective, you HAVE to listen to what locals say, if you goal is in fact to help the locals. I assert that this isn't the RCP's goal, hence their behavior. The fact that you do not understand the relationship between the racist right and the libertarian right in my state, for instance, tells me precisely that you ought to listen more and talk a bit less about what is going on in Arizona.
As to states, you have veered into questions of organization. States are a particular form of organization and if we are going to talk about them meaningfully, we had better stick to an agreed upon definition. To say, essentially, that all organization is state or statelike is false and further blurs the discussion.
Anyhow, my disagreements go quite beyond merely the authoritarianism of the RCP. As you will see in the upcoming posts, there is much for anarchists to disagree with beyond their cultish nature and dishonest and manipulative organizing methods.
I get the dangers of misquoting, but it should bother you more that you're using nationalist rhetoric with a left-wing veneer - Whether you're saying "un-Arizona" or "you have to be from Arizona to understand the police state" really makes no difference.
But as you suggested, I will read more articles and get back to you.
I have to point out that I never said "you have to be from Arizona to understand the police state", so it does make a difference. At this point you're just arguing with yourself -- having the argument with the anarchist that you perhaps wish I was, rather than the one I am. I don't feel necessary for that conversation to happen.
But I'm also not using nationalist rhetoric at all. I am pointing out several reasons why the RCP (and you, it seems) don't understand the political situation in Arizona, an understanding of which would come from more familiarity with the shared political and historical experience of Arizona and the people within it. Why you consider this at all controversial, or why it would be controversial to suggest that an outside group whose slogan is "...the leadership we have" would have these same weaknesses, quite baffles me.
I mean, they walk in here and tell us that the solution is their creepy leader, which is weird enough, but also that's the solution they give to EVERYTHING. If that's not fair to call out, then I don't know what is. You certainly give me no reason no to do so. Is what makes it nationalist is that I am attempting to deny them their predations on the people of Arizona? If so, that's weak sauce and comes off more as a knee-jerk and ill-thought out defense of them from a party member to me.
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