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Revolution #254, December 25, 2011
New Online:
(December 26, 2011) Supporting the BA Everywhere Campaign: A Reflection and a Challenge
Occupy at a Crossroads
A Call for Mass Action Against the Suppression of the Occupy Movement
These past several months have witnessed something very different in the U.S. People from many different walks of life came together to occupy public space in nearly 1,000 cities in the U.S. They stood up to vicious police violence, they broke through the confines of “protest as usual,” and in the middle of all that, they built community. Even in the face of media attempts to ridicule, distort, and demonize these protests, their basic message began to get through. People throughout the U.S.—and even the world—took notice of and took heart from these brave and creative protesters.
BAsics: from the talks and writings of Bob Avakian
You can't change the world if you don't know the BAsics
BAsics concentrates more than 30 years of Avakian's work on everything standing between humanity and complete emancipation into a single concise book of essential quotes and short essays.
BA Everywhere
Imagine the difference it could make
A GREAT BEGINNING... EXCITING STEPS TO COME
April 2011 marked the release of BAsics, a book by Bob Avakian, the revolutionary leader who has developed a new synthesis of communism. This book of quotations and essays speaks to essential questions of revolution and human emancipation. On this occasion, a range of artists, musicians, dancers and actors from a diversity of perspectives came together in a unique cultural event to celebrate revolution and the vision of a new world.
- Download PDF Poster of this article
- Supporting the BA Everywhere Campaign: A Reflection and a Challenge (Posted December 26, 2011)
Uprisings, Clashes Shake North Africa and the Middle East
Inspired by an uprising that drove out a hated imperialist-backed tyrant in the North African country of Tunisia, millions of Egyptian people defied the torture chambers and tanks of the Mubarak regime, driving him from power. For decades the U.S. considered Mubarak one of its closest and most important allies in the world, and provided his regime with billions of dollars in aid, even as they were fully aware of the Mubarak regime’s savage repression and robbery of the Egyptian people. The U.S. imperialists, through their tight ties with the Egyptian army, continue to work to repress the Egyptian people’s aspirations for liberation while maneuvering to contend with and control conservative and reactionary Muslim fundamentalist forces. Through twists and turns, the Egyptian people have continued to resist and look for ways to break out of the “options” offered by the current world order.
2011: Inspiring Outbreaks—Crucial Challenges
Protests, Repression and Resistance
Fighting the New Jim Crow of Mass Incarceration
A Lesson About Liars
In 2002 and 2003, the President of the United States, the Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense and Vice President insisted that Saddam Hussein’s Iraq was pursuing nuclear weapons, that it had chemical and biological weapons and a fleet of aerial drones to deliver them, and that it had ties with Al Qaeda and international terrorism, and was linked to the September 11, 2001 attacks. These claims were backed up by extensive “documentation,” “evidence,” and lengthy “intelligence findings.” The Iraq war, and revelations that emerged about what was going on in the White House at the time, reveal that these claims were total lies, cooked up to justify a war that the Bush regime had already decided to launch.
U.S.-Israeli Assault on Iran Escalates, Danger of War Grows
While the possibility of an Israeli military strike on Iran has hardly dented the headlines in mainstream U.S. media, it is ominously real, and growing. And ground is being laid in the daily headlines and statements by politicians of every stripe in mainstream U.S. politics to justify such an attack—with unsubstantiated assertions about Iran's nuclear program, and gross distortions about which of the clashing oppressive forces in the region is the dominant threatening oppressor and bully.
C-SPAN Broadcast of Carl Dix—Cornel West Dialogue at UC Berkeley
Between now and the end of the year, C-SPAN will be broadcasting the entire December 2 dialogue between Carl Dix and Cornel West at UC Berkeley—"In the Age of Obama... Police Terror, Incarceration, No Jobs, Mis-Education: What Future for Our Youth?" Thousands turned out for this extraordinary evening. One student called it "incredibly powerful." A UC administrator said it was "Fantastic, the best event ever at UCB. It was well-timed with what's happened, it was intellectually challenging, emotionally touched people and relevant."
BAsics for Prisoners:
GIVE THE GIFT THAT GIVES!
The Prisoners Revolutionary Literature Fund has received an additional $1,000, enough funds for 800 copies of BAsics for prisoners, of which 700 have already been mailed. Thanks to the generosity of people who have stretched to give—from $5 to $500—PRLF is advancing towards our goal of 2,000 BAsics to prisoners. $10 sends one copy of BAsics to a prisoner, including shipping. $12,000 will meet the goal of filling requests for 1,200 more copies.
Letter from Prisoner on Occupy Oakland
Salutation to all my revolutionary communistic brothers and sisters in arms, and in no uncertain way we want all opposition to know the symbol of change, and let them know it is definitely coming.
West Coast Occupy Port Shutdowns
December 12—Coordinated actions by West Coast Occupy movements disrupted, and in some cases shut down, ports up and down the West Coast. These actions by thousands and thousands were a significant continuation of resistance to the heartless and oppressive domination and way of life in this society. The actions also represented a powerful response by the Occupy movement to a coordinated nationwide effort by authorities to attack and crush the movement with police raids and brutality, and to coerce the movement into channels considered acceptable by the system.
On Choices... And Radical Changes
First, people don't make choices in a vacuum. They do it in the context of the social relations they're enmeshed in and the options they have within those relations—which are not of their own choosing. They confront those relations, they don't choose them.
Two, if people feel for whatever reasons that they want to choose to harm themselves and others, we're going to struggle with them—but we're not going to blame them. We're going to show them the source of all this in the system, and call on them to struggle against that system, and transform themselves in the process. Just because a youth "chooses" to sell drugs, or a woman "chooses" to commodify herself sexually, doesn't mean that they chose to have those choices. And there is no other way besides fighting the power, and transforming the people, for revolution that all this will change for the better. Blaming the masses for bad choices just reinforces the conditions that they are oppressed by.
In sum, people do make choices—but they make them enmeshed and confined within social relations that are not of their choosing. We have to bring into being different social relations and conditions so that masses of people can act differently and relate differently to each other. Fundamentally, that takes a revolution which is aiming for communism.
Bob Avakian,
Chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA
- Color PDF - 11x17"
- Color JPG for posting on web
BIRDS CANNOT GIVE BIRTH TO CROCODILES, BUT HUMANITY CAN SOAR BEYOND THE HORIZON
We are building a movement for revolution…
That movement needs a website…
We need your help to make it happen
This is a world crying out for revolution. Over a billion people on this planet live on less than $1 a day. The earth’s critically endangered ecosystem is under profit-driven assault. In one form or another, everywhere in this world women are degraded as commodities. Creativity is marginalized, coopted, or squashed. And killer police and unjust wars serve and protect all this…
COMMUNISM: THE BEGINNING OF A NEW STAGE
A Manifesto from the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA
Available in English, Spanish, Turkish, and Farsi from RCP Publications, P.O. Box 3486, Merchandise Mart, Chicago, IL 60654 $5 + $1 shipping.
A new draft translation in Arabic is now available online at revcom.us
The first Arabic draft translation is still available also.
We envision a movement of people working to produce high-quality accurate translations in many languages which can then be distributed around the world on the Internet and in print. We invite your comments. Send them to RCP Publications, Box 3486, Merchandise Mart, Chicago, IL 60654 or rcppubs@hotmail.com.
Some Principles for Building A Movement for Revolution
In each issue of Revolution, you'll find "Some Principles for Building A Movement for Revolution," by Bob Avakian, Chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA. The events covered in this issue of Revolution demonstrate the critical importance of these principles, and of proceeding from them.
- Poster (PDF)
Support... Sustain... Revolution
In this world of unjust war, unbearable suffering and environmental catastrophe… in these days of discontent, upheaval and questioning… it is critical that this newspaper—Revolution—publish! And that it continue to improve its content and look, and expand its readership.
A Statement from the
Revolutionary Communist Party
ON THE STRATEGY FOR REVOLUTION
Under this system of capitalism, so many in this society and so much of humanity are forced to endure great hardship and suffering, exploitation, injustice and brutality, while wars and the ongoing destruction of the natural environment threaten the very future of humanity. In the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America (Draft Proposal) our Party has set forth an inspiring vision, and concrete measures, for the building of a new society, a socialist society, aiming for the final goal of a communist world, where human beings everywhere would be free of relations of exploitation and oppression and destructive antagonistic conflicts, and could be fit caretakers of the earth. But to make this a reality, we need revolution.
- Poster (PDF)
THERE IS NO "PERMANENT NECESSITY" FOR THINGS TO BE THIS WAY
A RADICALLY DIFFERENT AND BETTER WORLD CAN BE BROUGHT INTO BEING THROUGH REVOLUTION
One of the more important statements in the Manifesto from our Party (Communism: The Beginning of a New Stage) is the quote from Marx: "Once the inner connection is grasped, all theoretical belief in the permanent necessity of existing conditions breaks down before their collapse in practice." This is not just a matter of abstract theory—it has a broader effect. That belief weighs heavily on people who don't like the way things are—they are weighed down by a belief in the "permanent necessity of existing conditions." Over and over we are confronted by the fact that people can't see beyond the way things are now.
What Is Communist Revolution?
It is this system that has got us in the situation we’re in today, and keeps us there. And it is through revolution to get rid of this system that we ourselves can bring a much better system into being. The ultimate goal of this revolution is communism: A world where people work and struggle together for the common good…Where everyone contributes whatever they can to society and gets back what they need to live a life worthy of human beings…Where there are no more divisions among people in which some rule over and oppress others, robbing them not only of the means to a decent life but also of knowledge and a means for really understanding, and acting to change, the world.
This revolution is both necessary and possible.
Who Is Bob Avakian, Chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party?
In Bob Avakian, the Chairman of our Party, we have the kind of rare and precious leader who does not come along very often. A leader who has given his heart, and all his knowledge, skills and abilities to serving the cause of revolution and the emancipation of humanity. Bob Avakian came alive as a revolutionary in the 1960s—taking part in the great movements of those days, and especially working and struggling closely with the most advanced revolutionary force in the U.S. at that time, the Black Panther Party. Since then, and while many others have given up, Bob Avakian has worked and struggled tirelessly to find the way to go forward, having learned crucial lessons and built lasting organization that could continue the struggle, and aim to take it higher, while uniting with the same struggle throughout the world. He has kept on developing the theory and strategy for making revolution. He played the key role in founding our Party in 1975, and since then he has continued the battle to keep the Party on the revolutionary road, to carry out work with a strong revolutionary orientation. He has deeply studied the experience of revolution—the shortcomings as well as the great achievements—and many different fields of human endeavor, through history and throughout the world—and he has brought the science and method of revolution to a whole new level, so that we can not only fight but really fight to win. Bob Avakian has developed the scientific theory and strategic orientation for how to actually make the kind of revolution we need, and he is leading our Party as an advanced force of this revolution. He is a great champion and a great resource for people here, and indeed people all over the world. The possibility for revolution, right here, and for the advance of the revolution everywhere, is greatly heightened because of Bob Avakian and the leadership he is providing. And it is up to us to get with this leadership…to find out more about Bob Avakian and the Party he heads…to learn from his scientific method and approach to changing the world…to build this revolutionary movement with our Party at the core…to defend this leadership as the precious thing it is…and, at the same time, to bring our own experience and understanding to help strengthen the process of revolution and enable the leadership we have to keep on learning more and leading even better.
Works by Bob Avakian (PDF)
Now available
The Ascendancy of Obama
and the Continued Need
for Resistance and Liberation
A Dialogue between
Cornel West and Carl Dix
This historic event took place in Harlem, N.Y. on July 14, 2009
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Add $5.00 shipping for 1-5 copies
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Video Available!
- Rough cut of the video without the audience Q&A;
- Rough cut of the of the Q&A; that followed the dialogue
- Click here for the audio only of the July 14 dialogue (mp3)
- Watch the Youtube video announcement of the July 14 dialogue
- Response to Obama's "No Excuses" speech at NAACP convention by Carl Dix (Part 1 / Part 2)
Go to YouTube for these must-see videos:
Inaugural issue now online! demarcations-journal.org
Demarcations
A Journal of Communist Theory and Polemic
Demarcations: A Journal of Communist Theory and Polemic seeks to set forth, defend, and further advance the theoretical framework for the beginning of a new stage of communist revolution in the contemporary world. This journal will promote the perspectives of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA.
¡FUERA CON TODOS LOS DIOSES! Desencadenando la mente y cambiando radicalmente el mundo
AWAY WITH ALL GODS! Unchaining the Mind and Radically Changing the World
Is believing in gods actually harmful? How has Christianity for centuries served as an ideology of conquest and subjugation? Why is the "Bible Belt" in the U.S. also the "lynching belt"? Why is there a rise of religious fundamentalism throughout the world? In the intensifying conflict between U.S. imperialism and Islamic fundamentalism, is the only choice to take one side or the other? Why is patriarchy and the oppression of women foundational to so many religions? Can people be good without god? These are just some of the questions explored in this provocative work by Bob Avakian.
