Join us for our annual national gathering of young socialist activists this President’s Day Weekend, February 12-14, 2016, in New York. The conference, “Generation Left: Millennials Building the Next Socialist Movement,” will be held at the Mayday Community Space, 176 St. Nicholas Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11237. To register, click here.

A statement by the YDS Coordinating Committee, drafted by Kayla Pace.

History has shown us that fear-mongering and hatred towards certain minority groups is nothing new when it comes to political elections. Various societies over different periods of time have shown this to be true. A notable example is the hatred directed towards the Jewish community by the Nazis in Germany. Unfortunately, this year has proven that fear-mongering tactics are not for the history books but something we, as Democratic Socialists, need to fight in our current political climate. While many citizens across the nation are crying out for a Sanders presidency and the institution of more socialist policies, other more conservative Americans are crying out for Donald Trump. Young Democratic Socialists reprimands Trump’s strong anti-Muslim sentiments. In recent comments he has stated there needs to be surveillance of Muslim communities; this surveillance would potentially include a database to track them and specialized identification cards. These ideas are appalling to our ideology as socialists, and we must work tirelessly to dismiss his anti-Muslim rhetoric and show that the “values” he is spreading are not American. As a country, we should not support a candidate that is actively spreading hate among certain groups of American citizens.

A statement by the YDS Coordinating Committee, drafted by Jack Suria Linares.

Over the last few weeks, student activism across the country has generated a successful wave of protests over the continuation of micro-aggressions, global White Supremacy, and student debt.  The first protests at the University of Missouri ignited when University President Timothy Wolfe presented no action against the racial incidents occurring on their campus, including a swastika drawn on the wall with human feces. Following this, protests at Yale sparked as a result of email threads debating the effects and outcomes of cultural appropriation. At Harvard Law School, students woke up to hate crimes and defacing the portraits of tenured black professors.  In addition students, including members of Young Democratic Socialists (YDS), across the country at Ithaca College, the City College of New York, Hamilton College, William Paterson University, UC Riverside and UC Davis among others held demonstrations in solidarity with the racial justice protests occurring, but also to demand an end to student debt. Alongside the student protests, political violence has emerged all over the country in an attempt to impose fear.  In Minneapolis, five BLM organizers were targeted and shot by white supremacists. We live in a time of great crisis.