Left Forum 2012

For people around the world–both activists and previously apolitical people–the explosion of revolt in 2011 from Tunisia, to Cairo, to Wisconsin, to Greece, Europe, Occupy Wall Street and beyond was a long time coming.

The Left Forum creates a space for the broad left to analyze and debate the political questions of our times.  This year’s Forum, with over 60 scheduled panels and workshops per session, will likely be the largest ever.

Registration is available through the beginning of the conference here.

I will be speaking on two panels.

The first is “Reclaiming our Comrades: The Omaha Two.”  Here, I and other activists, scholars, and journalists will discuss building movements to free political prisoners using our own experience fighting for freedom with Mondo we Langa and Ed Poindexter, known as the Omaha Two, who have been in prison now for nearly 41 years.  The second is “Occupy Greensboro: Report from a Southern City” where I will be discussing the relevance of Southern Occupy to the national movement.

Reclaiming Our Comrades: The Omaha Two (Panel Information)

A local Chapter of the Black Panther Party formed in Omaha, Nebraska in 1967. By 1968 the Party’s left wing leadership, Ed Poindexter and David Rice (AKA Mondo we Langa) of the National Committee to Combat Fascism, marked out a zone of defense for the African American Community from the oppressive habits of the local police force and larger white community. The NCCF and Black Panther Party asserted their political presence in the segregated community of North Omaha and boldly condemned the racism and the corruption of the local and national government, issuing a call to arms to the proletariat. All but decimated three years later, scholars and activists offer a critical analysis of the conspiracy by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Intelligence Unit of the Omaha Police Department to repress and in prison the local Party’s leadership. Today, more than forty years later, Mondo and Ed are two of the longest held political prisoners in the United States.

Speakers: Dr. Tekla Ali Johnson (Salem College), Michael Richardson (Journalist), Trish Kahle (International Socialist Organization), Tariq al-Amin (Nebraskans for Justice), Reynaldo Anderson (Harris-Stowe State University)

Occupy Greensboro: Report from a Southern City (Panel Information)

Occupy Greensboro began last October, like so many other occupations around the country. Using innovative tactics combined with regular long term strategizing, Occupy GSO has sustained itself and grown, securing an indoor meeting space and vastly expanding the number of working groups. While our success is not unparalleled around the country, Greensboro, with a population of around 250,000, has been incredibly successful in avoiding sectarianism and in sustaining a high pace of activity without burning out activists.In addition, it is critical to integrate the narrative of Southern occupations with the overall narrative of Occupy. Despite the long radical traditions of many Southern cities, activists in other areas of the country often look to the South as a backwards and reactionary region. The success of the Occupy movement is contingent of the deconstruction of such notions. The South, which because of low levels of unionization, right to work laws, and the persistence of racism, has the lowest wages in the country and is industrializing. Already it is showing signs of dramatically increased struggle—from fighting racist immigration laws, to labor and student struggles, to the upcoming party conventions—with Occupy being the link that holds all together. A South that propels the movement forward drastically changes the national narrative about what is possible which makes a panel discussing the roots, reality, strategy, and politics of Occupy GSO so pressing.

Speakers: Trish Kahle (International Socialist Organization), Michael Roberto (North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University), Cynthia Maddox (Occupy Greensboro)

In addition, there are many other excellent panels I would recommend attending if you’ll be at the forum, including: The Communist Manifesto Today, Pinkwashing: Israel’s Propaganda War, Education and Capitalism, Slavery and the Origins of American Capitalism, Can the Labor Movement and Occupy Wall Street March Down the Same Road? A Roundtable Discussion, Racism, Real Estate and Rebellion: Black Struggles for Housing Justice, Attica is All of Us, Roundtable: Occupy Wall Street: Where Did It Come From? Where Can It Go?, North Africa: Social Systems, Political Histories, Current Struggles and Prospects, Egypt’s Unfinished Revolution, Obama’s New Imperial Strategy, NATO and the G8: Architects of War and Austerity, Islamophobia, the NDAA, and the Attack on Civil Liberties, State and Revolution in the 21st Century: Is Lenin Still Relevant?, Labor, Occupy and social movements: The decline of labor and the potential for a revival

In addition, be sure to visit the International Socialist Organization’s table in the exhibition hall and check out the titles Haymarket Books have to offer!

Hopefully I’ll see you there!

Occupy and “Violence”: A response to Tina Dupuy (Updated)

*** I think there was a little bit of confusion. Without supporting Black Bloc tactics, I can say I support the right of Black Bloc people–or the crowds of which they are a part–to not be viciously attacked by the police. I also think that people who get incredibly angry about Black Bloc “hijacking” but then decry organization and accountability within Occupy–the best methods to have comradely responsibility to each other for our actions–as similarly being hijacking are hypocritical. Under the current model of horizontal leader-lessness, I feel such things will continue to happen.

My main point is that just because we disagree with Black Block tactics–and even actively argue against them within the movement, it doesn’t mean you denounce the whole Oakland movement, and it certainly doesn’t mean siding with the cops and calling their actions justified–because they’re not. That argument is akin to saying because you didn’t support Qadaffi, you had to support NATO. The answer is no, you don’t have to support either to oppose imperial intervention.  I do not support Black Bloc tactics, but neither do I support the police crackdown on Occupy Oakland because of Black Bloc tactics.

___

Tina Dupuy, managing editor of Crooks & Liars, wrote an article after the last round of police violence against Occupy Oakland, Why #OWS Needs to Denounce Violent Tactics On Display at Occupy Oakland.

The argument she presents is, quite frankly, wrong, but it is an argument pervasive in quite a lot of the tactical discourse surrounding Occupy.  I’d like to analyze and respond to her article here, pointing out its numerous logical errors.

She begins her article thus:

The Occupy Movement, “the 99 percent,” has, ironically, been hijacked by a small minority within its ranks. I speak of a small percentage of Occupiers who are okay with property destruction. As we saw in Oakland over the weekend: They’re okay with breaking windows, trashing city buildings and throwing bottles at the police. In short: They are not nonviolent. They are willing to commit petty criminal acts masked as a political statement.

There are several problems with this opening.  First, suggesting the movement has been hijacked by a small minority okay with property destruction distorts reality by implying 1) that the “hijackers” are illegitimately influencing the Occupy movement and 2) that property destruction takes place within a vacuum and was part of the “hijackers” original intent.  Second, she equates “not nonviolent” (in other words, violence) with “petty criminal acts” (i.e., things that are illegal).

The first set of problems have to do with questioning the “legitimacy” of the protestors, connecting back to the word “hijack.”  It is impossible to hijack something you have a legitimate right to steer.  Because Occupy has to this point eschewed electable leadership–or really anything beyond the horizontal leadership model–all participants are also decision makers.  As one occupier in Greensboro put it, “whoever shows up are the right people; whenever they get here is the right time.”  I’m not arguing that this method is necessarily the most desirable or the most effective–that’s another discussion entirely.  This is, however, the model we are using at the moment, the model that has “reached consensus.”  The people who were on the streets of Oakland that night made their decisions.  Perhaps Dupuy disagreed with their choices, but it’s hardly hijacking.

The second problem–the equation of illegality with violence–is perhaps one of the most dangerous fallacies I have heard within the Occupy movement.  People have varying definitions of what violence is (mine, for example, doesn’t include breaking glass), but it goes far deeper than that.  After all, it is a “crime” to walk across the street in an area where there is not a crosswalk.  Do we define that as violence?  Most certainly not.  In the 1850s, it was a “crime” to escape slavery or to harbor runaway slaves.  I dare you to find one person who classifies that as violence.  And what about the students who undertook lunch counter sit-ins in the 1960s–in violation of Jim Crow laws?  Laws are supposedly used to punish violence (again, that’s up for debate, since there are no laws against wars, poverty, hunger, etc.), but that is not their exclusive function.  Laws are supposed to serve as a way of encoding safety into our society (traffic laws, for example).  Most importantly, they also serve as a crucial form of social control for the ruling class and as the first line of protection for private property.  In fact, only a small portion of the things that are “illegal” would be considered “violent” by most people.

She continues:

These are Black Bloc tactics and they’re historically ineffective at spurring change. The now Gingrich-vilified Saul Alinsky in 1970 said the Weather Underground (the terrorist wing of the anti-war movement) should be on the Establishment’s payroll. “Because they are strengthening the Establishment,” said the “professional radical” Alinsky. Nothing kneecapped the call for the war to end quicker than buildings being bombed in solidarity with pacifist sentiments.

Here we have a combination of historic and semantic inaccuracies, combined with some anarchist baiting.  While she and I would agree that these “Black Bloc” tactics are not the most effective way to build a mass movement, neither is voting for Democrats an effective strategy for success, yet I don’t see articles condemning the participation of people who have voted Democrat and plan to do so in the future from Occupy.  It’s important to address sectarianism, adveturism, pranksterism, etc. within the movement, but Dupuy’s method is similarly divisive, ineffective, and lacking in good theory.

The historic/semantic inaccuracies (I’m not sure which it is, because I’m not inside her head) have to do with constructing the anti-Vietnam war movement as driven by “pacifist” sentiments.  I’m unsure if she is unfamiliar with the history or if she is equating antiwar with pacifism, but both are wrong.  There were certainly pacifist elements in the movement–both in the United States and Vietnam, but the movement as a whole was never pacifist in nature.  (For more on the Vietnam war, see Joe Allen’s Vietnam: the (Last) War the U.S. Lost, Marilyn Young’s The Vietnam Wars, Mark Phillip Bradley’s Vietnam at War and Home to War: a History of the Vietnam Veterans’ Movement.  If you are interested in more titles, please contact me.  I’ve got a shelf-full of recommendations.)

Dupuy then soapboxes:

Here’s the key point: Occupy is not an armed conflict – it’s a PR war. Nonviolent struggle is a PR war. Gandhi had embedded journalists on his Salt March. He wasn’t a saint. That was a consciously cultivated media image. He used the press and its power to gain sympathy for his cause. What he didn’t do is say he was nonviolent “unless the cops are d*cks,” a sentiment voiced at Occupy. Nonviolent struggle has nothing to do with how the cops react. In actual nonviolent movements they welcome police overreaction because it helps the cause they’re fighting for.

It seems a bit strange to claim that Occupy “is not an armed conflict” when people are daily being brutalized by hyper-militarized police forces for their participation in a movement that has sought at every turn to avoid violence.  Occupy is not a guerilla war.  It’s also not a PR war.  But it is an armed conflict.  A one sided one.  There are people with guns (and a vast array of other weaponry)–the police–and there are people without them–the protestors.  It is a ludicrous assertion to suggest that people hurling bottles at police who are tear gassing them and shooting flash-bang grenades at them are taking up arms.  And using corrugated metal to defend themselves from the onslaught–corrugated metal covered in peace signs at that?  That’s common sense.

Perhaps Gandhi had embedded journalists on his Salt March.  But Gandhi’s tactical decisions are not above criticism.  Snehal Shingavi has dealt with them far more eloquently than I can.  In addition, it’s unclear how useful having journalists embedded in Occupy would be–since they’re already there and 1) they get arrested whether they have press credentials or not and 2) the mainstream media has already avowed itself to ignore Occupy at best and slander it at worst.

Dupuy says protestors should not defend themselves and should welcome and submit to police brutality because that’s what Gandhi would do.  Is it what Malcolm X would do?  What the Vietnamese people would do?  History is filled with a diversity of tactics that have all been used successfully.  Nonviolence is a tactical decision, not a principled one–but again, that’s really another discussion, because I have a difficult time calling tearing down a fence and throwing bottles “violence.”  From the way Dupuy describes it, you’d think Occupy Oakland had armed themselves with RPGs.

Property destruction is not only a bad PR move (it costs taxpayers and small business owners money) it’s not constitutionally protected Free Speech. It’s also not what democracy looks like. The First Amendment specifically states the right to peaceably assemble to redress grievances.

Well, no, property damage is not Constitutionally protected speech.  Why would it be when the entire document is constructed to protect private property rights?  Essentially, however, this is just another form of the illegality = violence fallacy–constructed here as Constitution = framework for human rights.  While the Bill of Rights does (purportedly) secure some human rights which it is important to protect and fight for, to suggest that these rights are adequate for producing moderate social reforms (let alone revolutionary restructuring) is woefully misguided.  After all, draft-dodging, while peaceful protest, was not considered a protected right.  At Occupy, whether the action has been occupations of public space (which are Constitutionally protected) or property damage (which is not), the outcome has been the same–repression and brutality on the part of the state.

As a general rule, before one references the wonders of the Constitution, remember that it was a document so perfectly constructed that a Bill of Rights was an afterthought to the part delineating property relations and that it had to be amended to end slavery, give women the right to vote, and declare equal protection for all citizens.  It still grants almost no rights to immigrants, does not declare equal citizenship for women (by design) and renders invisible the oppression of LGBTQ people.

Moreover the destruction of property is exactly what Occupy is protesting against; it’s what the banks took from us. Occupy has pointed out the criminality of the banks and the seeming collusion with government to take wealth and property away from working people and give it to the wealthy. So protest property crimes, by committing crimes against property? It’s nonsensical.

Destroying property destroys moral authority. You can’t rail against Bankaneers while trashing a City Hall. You can but you lose. Then the cops look justified in their show of force. Being quiet is seen as consent and being in solidarity with Oakland is standing with their well-documented embrace of “diversity of tactics.”

Occupy should denounce violence and property damage. There should be a statement that Oakland doesn’t speak for the movement as a whole. Holding solidarity marches against Oakland police brutality is exactly what that sounds like. It sends the message that Occupy is happy to cost the Oakland taxpayers millions in damages. If Occupy is to succeed it has to purge the extreme (read: ineffective waste) elements now commandeering the movement.

Actually, this section is nonsensical.  First, Occupy is not about the destruction of property.  Addressing massive economic inequality?  Yes.  Fighting oppression?  Yes.  Ending foreclosures?  Yes.  Destroying property and taking it away are not the same thing.  Also up for debate is how much wealth and property working people had in the first place.  The focus of most anti-foreclosure work has not been around “property rights” but housing as a human right.

The second paragraph is equally nonsensical.  Saying that property destruction destroys moral authority is exactly like saying that protesters should welcome and submit to police brutality for good PR.  It’s liberal nonsense.  There is a strong argument that can be made against property destruction as a tactic in many instances, but it’s pretty hard to equate putting a brick through a window with the crimes of bankers–like, say, the way Goldman Sachs made immense profits on food shortages and let thousands on thousands starve to death.

And no, the cops do not look justified in their show of force.  Just like they didn’t look justified when Amadou Diallo pulled his wallet out and NYPD cops shot him 41 times.  Just like the United States doesn’t look justified in the occupation of Iraq when an IED explodes.  Tearing down a fence does not require bean bag rounds to protect society.  Burning a flag does not require hundreds of arrests.  There is no justification for such actions.  To take the side of the police in this situation–as Dupuy does–is reprehensible.  Which side is she on?  Not ours.

Even if we disagree with a tactical decision that has been made by other occupiers, nothing they did justified the police response against them.  Solidarity, in this instance, is the only option.  Dupuy openly calls for a purge of these “elements” which she describes as “ineffective waste.”  She says we should denounce the Oakland Commune.  If Dupuy is willing to throw people who throw bricks into windows under the bus–saying in essence that they deserved tear gas, bean bag rounds, and flash-bang grenades–what’s next?  The people camping who “provoke” the police by holding their ground?  This a classic “which side are you on” moment.  It’s very clear Dupuy has taken the side of the police and the state.

Dupuy finished her article with another frightening call for a purge.  I realize this critique has been fairly lenghty compared to what I usually write, but I felt it was necessary to dismantle her dangerous argument.  We cannot allow this baseless, vile rhetoric to divide us, to break our movement apart.  You don’t build a mass movement by moralizing before siding with the forces of repression.  You do it by building a united front, and you build a united front by living by the old labor cry: “An injury to one is an injury to all.”

***As mentioned above, I don’t see Black Bloc tactics as helpful to the Occupy movement–quite the opposite.  Here are some other articles from today that address dealing with obstructionist tactics in a way that is logical and grounded in good politics.

Alessandro Tinonga: The Backlash Against Occupy Oakland

Throwing Poor Women under the Bus

By now, the news has gone viral.  The Susan G. Komen “For the Cure” Foundation, will no longer be funding mammograms at Planned Parenthood or its affiliates.  The stated reason is issues of funding accountability, but the decision is the result of right-wing lobbying determined to prevent women from accessing abortion.

Consider the climate in which SGK made this decision.  Last year, more than 1,000 anti-choice bills–with the stated aim of limiting or eliminating access to abortion services–were brought forward in the United States.  In North Carolina, lawmakers attempted to institute a new waiting period for abortions, and they tried to require a woman to look at an ultrasound of the fetus or to have the fetus described to her before she was allowed to have an abortion.  Both of these measures were temporarily vetoed, but very well may have the vetoes overridden soon.  Last week, a GOP lawmaker called for a return to public hanging, with the first targets being abortion providers.  A recent New York Times op-ed highlighted the difficulties pregnant women face in trying to maintain their employment–and the difficulty they face finding another job after being pushed out of their old one.

But there is also a climate of growing resistance.  It had been several quiet years since the March for Women’s Lives before the eruption of the Slutwalks–which began in April after a Toronto police officer told women that in order to avoid being raped, they should avoid dressing like “sluts.”  The wildfire popularity and spread of the Slutwalks, which in a matter of months had then taken place in Boston, Greensboro, South Africa, Nicaragua, and more than a hundred places around the world, was a sign of a changing political climate–a climate of revolution, a climate that fostered that fostered an even faster growth and spread of the Occupy movement mere months later.  In the massive uprisings in the Middle East and the revolution in Egypt, women stood their ground demanding human dignity and political respect.  The assault of a female protester in Egypt resulted in a women’s march the next day–tens of thousands strong.

And this is the climate we must consider before analyzing what the Komen decision means–or rather, how to build opposition to it.

Planned Parenthood provides services to many women, but the majority of them are working and low-income women.  Many don’t have insurance.  For many, the health services they access at Planned Parenthood are the only regular medical services they receive.

On the other hand, middle and upper class women, who have insurance and can afford regular medical care and specialist treatment, are in a fundamentally different situation.  This decision will not impact their ability to access mammograms or any other health services, including abortion for most.

The divide that emerges is very similar to the one that broke up the women’s movement of the 1970s–one that mostly represented the interests of white, wealthy and middle class women, one that threw working women and women of color under the bus when it came to issues like welfare and maternity leave.  The question of fighting for the services Planned Parenthood offers–and pushing that fight further, for free abortion on demand, free birth control, and single payer healthcare–is not simply an issue about being pro-choice or anti-choice.  It’s a question of class interest.

For this reason, the existence of Occupy, and the re-emergence of class struggle in the United States, provides a promising alternative to an identity politics “solution”.  (It’s hard to call something that is bound to fail eventually a solution.)  Access to services at Planned Parenthood (as a very low baseline) is not just a women’s issue.  It is a working class issue–and a central one.  Just like welfare.  Just like maternity leave.

If we leave the Planned Parenthood issue as a women’s issue, the resistance to decisions like the Komen decision is bound to fail.  It’s an attack on women, sure.  But it’s a much stronger attack on working and poor women.  And as scrolling through the Komen page will tell you, the class divisions are already starting to emerge as some women urge others to not “abandon” the Komen foundation (which deserves some serious criticizing in its own right) and to “get their mammograms from another source.”

A working women’s movement–together with the rest of the burgeoning working class movement–has the real power to fight these attacks, and to make a better world for ALL women

 

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Against Cynicism

I am not going to claim to be at peace, nor will I charge myself with being serene.  I am neither of those things.  I am angry.  I am sick and tired.  I am a fighter.  I can be argumentative.

But  I am hopeful.

In just the last year, we–ordinary people–have overthrown dictators.  We have sent politicians running.  We have changed the direction of discourse, and we now fully intend to change the courses of action.  In Egypt, the struggle has taken over everything–from the squares to the factories.  Even Western leaders have resigned because they can sense their time has passed, and ours has come.  The victories may have been few, but they have been critical.  Attacks and repression have not weakened us, but instead tightened our lines and increased our numbers.

So how, in this context, can people say things like “I’m just impotent to fix the suffering around me, like everyone else?”  In the same year that workers took over the Wisconsin capitol, how can one say, “I see no struggles of the working class here in America?”  That someone can watch a world in revolt and come to these conclusions is astounding enough.  That they try to win others to these strange concepts and attempt to discourage activists in the fight and revolutionaries attempting to increase the level of mass political consciousness through agitation is despicable.

Certainly, reforms will not get rid of capitalism, but the struggles to achieve them can be fundamental in forming people’s political consciousness.  It is where we learn important lessons that will be used again.  And of course, even a reform-oriented movement can evolve into something much greater.  After all, who thought when a group of people in New York decided to Occupy Wall Street that it would set the spark on the first mass movement in the US in over a generation?  Who thought that the removal of Ben Ali in Tunisia through a massive revolt would lead to a worldwide uprising?  To this we received a reply that “I cannot make this movement revolutionary, for men make history, but not as they please.”  When Marx said the second half of that sentence, he was not suggesting inaction, but rather perpetual action for the relationship between humans and their conditions is a dialectical one.  We are influenced by our conditions but also have the power to alter them through struggle.  That is why Frederick Douglass said, “Without struggle, there is no progress.”  Progress comes when we are willing to upset the equilibrium of social conditions that capital imposes on us–or when we are ready to dismantle it entirely.  But to suggest that Marx was arguing for inaction until the revolutionary moment occurs is a perversion of the materialist method.

How will workers and oppressed people come to understand that not only should the system be overthrown, but that they are the agents of this revolution if they are not educated through the process of struggle to fight and to win?  Political consciousness is not spontaneous.  To assume it is–and to assume a socialist revolution is inevitable or a foregone conclusion–is hardly scientific.  It is a utopian fantasy not supported by the history of struggle and revolution at all.

This is hardly a time to be cynical or nihilistic!  More than any other time in my life, and the lives of many others, the world is filled with energy.  And it should be our goal to harness that energy and turn it into revolutionary possibility.  Marxism is not only the study of theory, but its implementation.  As Marx wrote, “Practice without theory is rudderless, and theory without practice merely academics.”  But taken together, they are the driving material force of history.

I am so incredibly hopeful, because I believe with all my heart that there is a persistence of song, that struggle is not fruitless, that victory is possible.  A coach of mine told me once, “I never started a race I didn’t believe I had a chance of winning.”  I didn’t take up this struggle because I thought I would lose.  I took it up because every fiber of my being believes that we can win a world without racism, without sexsism, homophobia, transphobia.  I believe another world, where people are put first, is not only possible…it’s worth fighting for.

Martin Luther King Jr.’s Radical Legacy

Today I’ll be marching in the Occupy contingent of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Parade.  In Greensboro, which was the epicenter of the sit-ins that began in February 1960 but has long been a hub of radical organizing in the South, the MLK Jr. Parade is one of the biggest events in the city all year, drawing upwards of 20,000 people out–often in sub-freezing temperatures.  After that, I’ll be leading a teach-in at Guilford College on building a movement to free political prisoners at an event that will also feature teach-ins by All of Us NC activists who are fighting the anti-family amendment that has been put on the May primary ballot.  If you live in the Greensboro area, I urge you to come out and commemorate King’s radical legacy by participating in today’s radical organizing with us!

 

I often wonder what Dr. King would think about his holiday, and especially what he would think about it being branded as a ‘National Day of Service.’

While it’s true that Dr. King was one of the great leaders of the Civil Rights movement, when the white government was looking for a Black person to give a holiday to, they chose him over so many others–Malcolm X, Angela Davis, Medgar Evers. And since Dr. King never once gave into white pressure or demands, we must ask ourselves why.

The surface reason–or what the white elite will give you for a reason–is that he was a great man (which he was) who promoted equality and peace (which he did). Then they proceed to pare down the life an extraordinary man to the one great speech, ‘I Have a Dream.’

The real reason they chose Dr. King to ‘honor’ was because they thought that over time, his struggle could be rebranded as something less dangerous. Half a century later, sit-ins and marches hardly seem that earth shattering to most people–mostly because the nasty parts where the police gassed, beat, shot, and killed activists are glossed over or left out entirely. In fact, they almost make it seem as though Civil Rights were in their plans all along, and Dr. King was really just their puppet. Anyone who understands the nature of Dr. King’s non-violence and civil disobedience knows that nothing could be further from the truth. But as fewer and fewer participants can give witness and the history books continue to ignore people’s struggles, we are in danger of losing the truth forever, of being left with the ‘dominant truth’–a ‘truth’ that is an outright lie.

And Dr. King’s militancy certainly presented an easier spin project than Malcolm X’s militancy. Instead of being portrayed as two great men whose ideas were coming closer and closer to convergence, King is propped up (as much as the white elite will ever prop up a empowered Black man) and Malcolm X is villified and made out to be a ‘terrorist.’ (Hmm…is this sounding a little too familiar yet?)

People’s political thought, like history, is not static.  King’s position on the systemic nature of injustice changed as he continued in the struggle.  But however he may have conceptualized it, it was always a struggle.  As Frederick Douglass had said more than a century earlier:  “This struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, and it may be both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.”

Which brings me to the ‘day of service’ notion.

Dr. King not only fought racial injustice, he fought poverty, imperialism, and capitalism. (But since those parts are ‘dangerous,’ we’re encouraged to ignore them if we’re taught them at all.) Considering this, I have a hard time believing that Dr. King would ever want us to commit ourselves in his honor and memory in service to a nation that half a century later is still racist, imperialist, and capitalist.

No. I think Dr. King would have us out in the streets marching, boycotting, and resisting today and everyday. It is a disgrace to his legacy and memory for us to become complicit in the system that he fought everyday. In the system that murdered him and so many others for their dissent and resistance.

If Martin Luther King, Jr. Day is really about serving our community–and not the government that oppresses us–then let’s do it. The best way to serve the people–and ourselves–is to fight for our own power.  With the advent of the Occupy movement–the first mass movement to emerge in the US in more than a generation, the possibilities are wide open.

Some people say we stand on the shoulders of giants, but that’s not how I think of it.  We are all marching forward through history–all of us, alive and dead.  Now that it falls to us to bring the banner of justice forward, our struggle is made easier because people like King, like Malcolm, like so many thousands of others who struggled, are the force at our backs.

 

 

Why Won’t The Media Call out Ron Paul?

Ron Paul is not very different from the other GOP candidates.  He’s a racist, sexist, homophobic radical free-marketist.  And he should never be allowed to set foot in the halls of power. But that’s not the Ron Paul being portrayed by mainstream media sources.  NPR called him a “maverick” (not again!).  Pundits left and right will jabber on about his “controversial” stances on foreign policy.  They mention his “libertarian values” every chance they get.   He seems to have escaped the media scrutiny he deserves.  For every Rick Perry racist family campsite, there’s a photo of Ron Paul like this one:

This is Ron Paul with former American Nazi Party member and current KKK Grand Wizard and Stormfront.org webmaster, Don Black.  Ron Paul also distributed racist newsletters that his campaign has tried to distance himself from–but there’s a snag: Paul’s name was in the newsletter title, which makes it somewhat implausible that he didn’t know about the content of the letter.  He also voted against renewing the 1965 Voting Rights Act and he claimed the Civil Rights Act violated the Constitution and undermined personal liberty.  Obviously, this doesn’t make any sense unless you’re a racist.  However, there’s an easy solution.  Anytime Ron Paul says “personal freedom” or “individual liberty” add on “of white people.”  That’s where he’s coming from.

Paul also has a long history of homophobia.  In 1994, he wrote: “[Gay] men don’t really see a reason to live past their fifties.  They are not married, they have no children, and their lives are centered on new sexual partners…they enjoy the attention and pity that comes with being sick.”  He’s tried to skirt around the question this election–knowing that Americans’ views on LGBT rights have dramatically shifted over recent years, but the record speaks for itself.  In 2004, he spoke in defense of the homophobic DOMA.  He then co-sponsored the so-called “Marriage Protection Act” which would have prevented legal challenges to DOMA.  In a 2007 article, he wrote that recognizing same-sex marriage at the federal level would be “an act of social engineering profoundly hostile to liberty.”  (The liberty he’s referring to is the liberty of the states.)  If you’re confused about how he’s managed to sell this as “individual liberty,” you’re not alone.

Because in Ron Paul world, not only are corporations people, so are the states.  In Ron Paul world, corporations and states have more rights than you–unless you happen to be a rich, white, heterosexual cis man.  In 2005, Paul introduced the “We the People Act,” which would have removed from the jurisdiction of federal courts “any claim based upon the right of privacy, including any such claim related to any issue of sexual practices, orientation, or reproduction” and “any claim based upon equal protection of the laws to the extent such claim is based upon the right to marry without regard to sex or sexual orientation.”  If you’re not sure how Ron Paul claims to be a strict constitutionalist while arguing that the Fourth Amendment is invalid, you’re not alone.

To continue the bizarro-states-rights line of bullshit, Paul has said of the death penalty, “Over the years I’ve held pretty rigid to all my beliefs, but I’ve changed my opinion of the death penalty. For federal purposes I no longer believe in the death penalty. I believe it has been issued unjustly. If you’re rich, you get away with it; if you’re poor and you’re from the inner city you’re more likely to be prosecuted and convicted, and today, with the DNA evidence, there’ve been too many mistakes, and I am now opposed to the federal death penalty.”  So basically, Ron Paul thinks it’s not racist if the state carries out an execution of a poor, Black man.  If you’re wondering if there is a planet where that train of thought actually holds any logic, you’re not alone.

But all this is sort of moot.  We already know Ron Paul’s a bigoted asshole.  What I think is worth noting is how much of this shit he gets away with.

Even though I’m of the opinion that every GOP candidate should be charged with hate speech, and the media clearly aren’t interested in that level of scrutiny, most of the other candidates have had to endure some fire over their bigotry.  So why does Ron Paul get a free pass?

The only reason I can think of is that he calls himself a libertarian, but no one will interrogate that.  As I’ve shown, Paul is for pretty much everything except personal liberty.  Did it never occur to any of the mainstream media dimwits to consider how someone who claims government should get out of everyone’s business also claims that the government belongs in a woman’s uterus? Somehow, Paul has managed to evade any real inquisition of his policies regarding same-sex marriage by shouting “STATES’ RIGHTS” at every available moment.  Some disillusioned liberals seem to have taken this as a sign of progressivism.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  States’ Rights are slavery.  States’ rights are Jim Crow.  Calling states’ rights is a tactic for stifling social movements from being able to demand national change and for preventing courts from issuing nationwide class action rulings like Brown v. Board of Education.

So, everywhere Ron Paul goes?  Call him out.  Call him out and shut him down.

MIC CHECK!

 

 

Having Non-Sexist Conversations with Women at the Gym: A How-To Guide

I approach my twice daily visits to the gym with a significant amount of dread.  Not because of the anticipated difficulty of my workouts, but because of the way the men there will treat me.

It’s easier when I’m in the pool, swimming.  First, I have my coach, who not only appreciates me as an athlete but also actively supports me in entering men’s races.  My teammates also accept me as an athlete they respect.  But that’s where the zone of comfort ends.  Almost without exception, every interaction I have with men in the gym–or even while I’m training or competing outside of it–is so laden with sexism that I’m–at best–infuriated and distracted, on other days, humilated and dehumanized.

I’m going to assume that you all–you know who you are–don’t know that you are being sexist pigs and that after I’ve shown you the error of your ways, your behavior will change overnight.

So here’s what I’ve composed to help you in your struggle: a how-to guide to having conversations with women at the gym that aren’t completely sexist.

Before you say anything:

1.     First–and believe me, I can’t stress this one enough–do not assume that a woman’s athletic prowess has anything to do with her sexuality.  A woman doing yoga is not an invitation to make comments about how that flexibility might come in handy in “other ways.” (Ugh.)  Or if she’s doing inclined sit-ups, you are not entitled to remark on how useful her core strength would be in a specific sexual position.  Similarly, if you see a woman running on a treadmill, refrain from connecting her stamina with your experience of sexual pleasure.  Believe it or not, these women are not at the gym to turn you on.  If a woman’s athletic prowess makes her sex more enjoyable, that’s great for her and none of your damn business.

It’s not just disgusting because you are (most likely) not these women’s sexual partners.  Women go the gym for different reasons.  Some are competitive athletes.  Others are staying healthy and fit.  That said, I don’t know any women who go to the gym to show off their bedroom moves to a stock of sexist pigs.  In all likelihood, the woman you’re objectifying is not interested in having sex with you and she certainly did not come to the gym for the purpose of arousing you. 

2.     Connected to the first tip, the second is this: whatever the woman you want to talk to is wearing, don’t think she wore it to impress you or that you have any right to comment on it.  Perhaps she wore it because she loves her body and wants the world to see it–that’s great.  The human body, in its many shapes, sizes, and colors is a really marvellous aspect of who we are.  Another plausible scenario is that the woman is wearing what’s comfortable.  Running in compression tights rather than sweats might make her legs less tired when she’s working the night shift at the hospital.  When it’s warm, wearing less clothing is more comfortable and a woman may opt to workout in only a sports bra.  Regardless of what she’s wearing or why she’s wearing it, you are not invited to stare at her or comment that you think her outfit is sexy, etc.

The other flipside of this is that you don’t have the right to make judgments about our bodies, which are all beautiful and are ours and ours alone.  This, despite what some people–including some people I know quite well–think: that the gym is a “meat market” where you (and especially women) display “what you have for sale” in order to attract a potential mate.  Gyms exist because we live in a concentrated, sedentary society and humans need exercise in whatever form it might take, at a gym or not, to stay healthy.  We have the right to wear whatever we want, look however we want or do, and the simultaneuos right to not have you say a fucking thing about it.  We really don’t need your judgments or snide remarks about our bodies shape or size.  Don’t even think this is an acceptable avenue of conversation to pursue.

Cool, Trish.  I think I’m ready to talk to her now:

3.     When you approach a woman at the gym to try and start a conversation not related to her sexuality or her body, remember to treat her like a human being.  Introduce yourself.  Ask her name.  Remember that you are not interested in just ogling her as she works out or imagining her during sex, you are actually interested in her as a human being–so fucking act like it.  How would a conversation like this go?  Let’s go to the tape.  Here’s one of the few non-sexist conversations I’ve had at the gym.  I had just finished my last set and was standing in the water letting my body cool down.  The man in the lane next to me stopped.

Man: Hey, are you Trish, the distance swimmer?

Me: Yeah.

Man: Cool, my name’s J.R.  I’m a triathlete.

Me: Nice.  I do triathlons too.  What distance do you do?

See how easy that was?  Not creepy (a lot of people at the pool know me by reputation, so while already knowing my name could have come off weird in a different situation, here it did not).  The conversation was thoroughly enjoyable.  We talked about swimming, work/family, and triathlons for nearly 20 minutes without mentioning sex.  Take note that he did not allude to finding my body sexually attractive.  This is a model to follow.

But what if you are attracted to her and want to ask her out?  Even if you find a woman attractive, she will probably figure this out when you ask for a phone number at some point after getting to know her as a person.  If you don’t intend to ask her out, resist the need to mention it.  It’s really not necessary.  There’s this strange myth that women enjoy nothing more than being told they look hot.  As a woman, I am here to tell you the golden fucking rule: there is nothing I enjoy more than being treated like a human being.

4.     If you are amazed by her athletic prowess, talk to her about it–and don’t talk about sex.  It’s totally fine to think a woman is an amazing athlete.  Actually, a lot of women are amazing athletes, so I’d encourgage you to be impressed by how much we kick ass.  And you know what?  If a woman is great at what she’s doing–better than you–ask her how she does it.  It’s not magic.  We have to work at being athletes just like you.

Shockingly enough, it’s possible to talk about a woman’s athleticism without also talking about having sex with her, explicitly or implicitly.  You know all those times on TV where they talk about how Michael Phelps is built to swim but they don’t talk about having sex with him?  Or when LeBron James attracts lots of attention for making a key drive to the basket and they don’t at all mention having sex with him?  It’s like that.  Let’s continue to play my conversation with J.R., a few more minutes in:

J.R.: What’s the longest race you’ve swum?

Me: 10K

J.R.: Wow.  We’ll you’ve really got the stroke for it.  You look like you’re almost seven feet tall in the water.  How many strokes does it take you to cover 25m?

Me: About 12.

J.R.: How are you able to lengthen yourself out like that?  I can’t make it in less than 18.

J.R. nails appreciating my athleticism without mentioning sex at all.

At all times:

5.  Think before you speak/act.  Ask yourself: is what I’m about to say or do objectifying/degrading/none of my business/sexist?  If the answer is yes, or you’re not sure, or there’s any question, DO NOT SAY OR DO IT.

That should be enough to get you started.  I look forward to a changed atmosphere at the gym promptly on Monday morning.

Regards, Trish.