Wrenching
On Building Coalitions
David I. Backer
In the movie Independence Day, terrifying aliens show up to take
over the earth, but something amazing happens: all the peoples of the
planet join together--despite their differences--and successfully fend off
the threat. We don't get a good look at this coalition, or how it forms,
but it appears to encompass a vast swath of the spectrum of difference:
race, gender, class, nation, religion, language...
It was a rainbow coalition, right out of Fred Hampton's playbook--except
the enemies were colonizing aliens rather than colonizing capitalists. (The
metaphor is pretty good, however.) Other examples of such coalitions
include the Communist Party's organizing in the Black Belt in the 1930s, as
well as the Young Lords' work in Chicago in the 1970s.
What do these coalitions show us about emerging forms of solidarity as we
build the Left now? Specifically, what gets in the way of rainbow
coalitions? One answer is that folks belonging to various social categories are
wrenched apart by the categories themselves. The best-known case is race
and class. When it comes to race and class in the US, as Adolph Reed has
long argued, the ruling class wins when race wrenches workers apart.
Racism is thus a tool the ruling class uses to make sure workers don't get
together and get rid of them. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor has articulated the
same insight in reference to the Black Lives Matter movement and the recent
Women's Marches.
But that phenomenon--wrenching--can and does happen in many struggles, both
between and within many social categories. Wrenching is one of the things
that can keep the Left from getting together and warding off threats to the
planet.
The Question of Hierarchy
An Interview with Colin Jenkins
Brenan Daniels
Social hierarchies still exist because they are a natural extension
from the more tangible/structural economic hierarchy. The dominant culture
in this type of society needs such social norms. The Marxist theory of base
and superstructure is useful in this regard, and I think I get into some of
this in the piece. A materialist conception of history tells us that
society is constructed on an economic base, or is based on the modes of
production, because it is this fundamental arrangement that ultimately
determines how people fulfill their basic needs. Everything else builds off
of that arrangement. In a capitalist system, a large majority of the
population is forced to rely on wage labor. This is an incredibly fragile
and unstable existence because we are at the complete mercy of a privileged
minority that we are forced to rely on to fulfill even our most basic
needs. This is why Frederick Douglass recognized that a "slavery of wages
[is] only a little less galling and crushing in its effects than chattel
slavery." Hence, Marx's focus on exploitation and alienation. This
structural oppression created by capitalism explains the need for a Welfare
State, because societal unrest would be inevitable without the state
supplementing these inherent and widespread inequities.
So, according to this analysis, there is a superstructure that builds from
this unequal base, and this includes social, cultural, and political
realities. Naturally, the superstructure mimics the base, while it also
helps to maintain it. In doing so, these corollary developments tend to
take on the same characteristics as the base, which, as already noted,
consists of a high degree of alienation and exploitation. This basically
means...
Striking While the Iron Is Hot
Trump and the Antifa Resistance
Brenan Daniels
I thought that Trump was too unpolished and goofy to beat a career
politician of Clinton's caliber. It seemed to me at the time that his
ascendency to RNC nominee was the result of in-fighting and disarray
within the GOP. I never imagined he'd win the presidential election.
I don't think that anything Trump does is particularly strategic on his
part. Even when it is apparent he's trying to stick to a narrative, he
still seems to go off-script, and delve in to bizarre and perverse
tangents. I think the man is totally untethered to objective reality.
I think he is popular for the same reasons right-wing, racist,
proto-fascist demagogues are ever popular. Namely, the combination of
socio-economic despair and a chauvinistic dominant culture. My
intuition is that, those who are deeply invested in the narratives and
affirmations of the dominant culture, resolve the emotional and
cognitive dissonance of their socioeconomic predicament within the
culture as well as dissent against it...by going deeper in to their
nationalist fairytales and faulting scapegoats and/or
lack-of-purity/faith as to explain the present conditions.
Trump's utter stupidity, incredulity and narcissism allowed him to say
and declare things that a more strategic and refined politician
would-not. I think this allowed him to out-flank his opponents in the
GOP and DNC alike.
Resistance, Anarchism, and the Black Bloc
An Interview with Lacy MacAuley
Peter Schmidt
The black bloc is certainly not under some sort of hierarchy or
leadership structure, as a rule. Most black blocs are really just people
who are temporarily masking themselves because they fear retribution -
either now or at some point in the future - due to their fighting
injustices. The political philosophy of many, but not all, of the people who
participate in the black bloc is the political philosophy of anarchism.
That is why people associate anarchism with disorder or violence. That is
really far from the truth of what an everyday anarchist actually practices
and believes. Anarchism is based on mutual consent, and the so-called violent aspect of
black blocs and anarchism really needs to be understood. I mean, can you
really commit an act of so-called violence against a window, or is an act
of violence something that you commit against a person? What most people in
the black bloc would say is that it is not violence to break a window. The level of militancy will go up while we see our government, at this
moment, actively impinging upon the rights of everyday people. We have
already seen the U.S. government make reality policies like the Muslim ban,
a "military operation" that enforces immigration law, and violation of
trans youths' rights. To a lot of people, the only logical response is to
make a strong stand against that.
