you actually have to "go outside" and "build some communism" to learn how to be a communist. not all knowledge comes from books and articles, and you can learn a lot from IRL organising
seriously. it's not that big a deal. if people in gaza are still standing up to their oppressors every day then you likely have zero excuse for not doing more IRL shit (political reading and writing at home are good, but don't mean anything if you're not applying that theory as practice and then assessing the results and adjusting your practice accordingly).
all I've learned from IRL organizing is all the people who are really radical take like 5 days to respond to me when I text them and burn out every 3 months, and everyone else is a liberal
So I'm not saying that encouraging people to go outside is bad by any means, but I think finding out why people can't or don't want to go outside is something we could probably do better at as a community. I don't think saying "it's not that big a deal" is nearly as useful as having a good discussion/plan on how to overcome those issues that keep people stuck inside.
I literally did this and the answers for people are depression, the sheer suppression that the US specifically does to orgs, burnout caused by school and work, Covid, and overworking. Telling people to go organize seems… well it’s good, but until we start posting resources that can help with one or all of those issues, very few people will actually do it
If I can suggest a resource for one of these problems - COVID - for people like me who can't take on the risk of (re)infection/are already too disabled by COVID to do anything in person. Basically try joining a mask bloc or similar from the directory here, the people there should understand better than most your need for protection from plague https://linktr.ee/COVIDAdvocacy
This post was literally the push that got me to join an org, literally just now.
...Well, I started the process of joining an org just now - it's going to take a few days - but you get the idea.
By Jove, 2024 will be the year that I go from "Internet shitposter with good opinions" to "Proper Revolutionary". One of my resolutions for 2024 was in fact to join an org, but I've been trying to be a Stakhanovite with my one-year plans, going a bit ahead of schedule!
I think it's definitely too early to prepare for that. At most one would need to prepare physically for potential skirmishes at protests and manifestations, but even those can be avoided.
For what it's worth, I think an org should also have other activities. That means like a bowling night or something. Or a movie night, dinner night, or going out to a bar night. And, this might ruffle some feathers, it should also be a place where you can meet someone for dating, a fling, etc. That's how most people meet each other, through a shared activity (like school, a club, church, etc.). Democrats and Republicans meet each other in shared spaces like that all the time, but for some reason it's like the ultimate taboo to talk about it in leftist circles. But why? Just cuz some peeps here and there developed sex cult personalities? How many comrades of the past met each other through the Soviet Party or the Communist Party of China or in Cuba or Vietnam? Probably millions.
it's the sex pest problem, unfortunately. a lot of the women I know in local organizing circles - including myself - have been SAed by other organizers (usually dudes). I don't personally have a problem with dating in organizing circles but I know others do.
dating within an org is only a problem when more influential members date less influential members, the representative of a local chapter probably shouldn't start dating one of their members, it creates an imbalance of power, this isn't limited to socialist orgs though, it applies to any organisational structure.
I think this, and also your org needs to be large enough that it isn't dominated by a couple of de factor power players (it's easier to police official positions with power than someone with a lot of social clout). Otherwise any drama just kinda nukes the org.
the sex cult pattern isn't just a rare occurance unfortunately. it's practically inevitable in any organization which 1) asks that its members become deeply emotionally invested, 2) places emphasis on stability, unity, and not rocking the boat, and 3) concentrates real power in the hands of those few with the most time, energy, and charisma. Mainstream political parties notably give salaries to the people who keep the party actually running. This allows individual members to subsist on more than the good feelings they get from seeing their friends at meetings, as well staves off the fear that the entire organization might collapse if an abuser is challenged.
Yeah, it’s a huge problem just dealing with the widespread alienation we experience and the mental health problems it creates or makes worse. Trying to bridge that gap could do a massive amount of good.
The Chilean socialist movement that brought Allende to power worked because they had Party offices in the community where members of the community could go and socialize as well as learn! There are lots of stories of people who met their first dates at the party community centers, and so the social pressure forced people to become more based to fit in.
How many comrades of the past met each other through the Soviet Party or the Communist Party of China or in Cuba or Vietnam? Probably millions.
I would not be so sure. From what I have read party members in the Indochinese/Vietnamese Communist Party explicitly described themselves as having a sibling-like relationship with each other and sleeping around in the party would cause scandal. At least one man was executed by other party members when a woman comrade reported him, though there might have been some SA behavior going on in that case. I'm pretty sure that the CPC was similar in that regard too. I also believe Trotsky had somewhat of a "reputation" within the Bolsheviks for that sort of thing, which seems to indicate it wasn't that common there either (or that could have just been made up one of his many haters).
Not saying it never happened in history but ultimately people should be there to work and it's the same problems with dating at work, and those problems multiply when you're trying to run the party as an honest to marx people's liberation army. It did seem more acceptable later when those parties transformed into government bureaucracy though.
I'm pretty sure that the CPC was similar in that regard too.
I'm pretty sure Mao met at least 2 of his wives through the Party. Reading Red Star Over China makes it seem like that wasn't unusual for early CPC leadership either.
I have a long comment history of ripping into Evangelical Christianity. Sometimes I feel like I rail against it more than anyone on this site. I have a million issues with American Christianity that still get me angry when I think about them even though I left the religion almost a decade ago.
BUT… when I think about the time I spent with various young adult church groups or Bible studies, I still have a lot of fond memories. Or even going further back to when I was a kid, my small little church had a pretty healthy social life that I do think made a positive impact in my life. Churches understand that and they’re pretty good at it. All that social stuff you mentioned really does matter. We are so alienated and disconnected from each other. To be able to offer a salve for that I think will help draw people to the org as well as help meet those social needs we all have.
Figure out the communist and communist-aligned groups in your area, get on their mailing lists, turn out to do the things they ask of you sometimes. Try to make a compromise between good politics, successfully doing things in the real world, and being a larger org. Find out which orgs meet those criteria by going to their things. Once you're sure which org(s) are good, ask them how you can get more involved.
An org is just a group of people that do work together and have a name. It might be a political party, it might be a group focused on a specific thing that approaches it from a socialist perspective, it might just be four people trying to figure out what they want to do but they know it should be socialist.
You join one by talking to people and asking them if you can join.
An example would be joining the IWW. You pay dues, show up to meeting, talk about politics with people, and try to organize your workplace or help other people organize theirs.
A bunch of other orgs are basically like that, except instead of workplace organizing it might be electioneering or selling newspapers.
Not really something that is going to fly these days, you'll just look like a Jehova Witness. Especially in Poland, for some reason the amount of them has skyrocketed in my city. Since we are living in the internet age, organizations should definitely learn how to use it to their benefit. Adapting to the times and all that.
I joined the IWW and seeing the state of my branch i'm ashamed to ask anyone else to join. it's not particularly bad, it's just been dysfunctional ever since it was (re)established
Hmm interesting. So IWW is a union, and I can join it, and potentially get its support if my workplace decides to unionize?
I'm in education, but not an educator, and so not in a union. Its a small dept, and I doubt it'll ever unionize, the wage and benefits are probably the best in the state. I've never understood why the tech/office people in edu (in my state anyway) are always out of the union loop.
Gazans have a shared living experience. I have 2 gay men who are repeatedly "adopting" their niece's mistake children and work as feds for the Canadian military as neighbours.
Sucks living here 'cause all the bourgeois freaks from Ottawa are spilling out here to get the cheaper real estate while bringing their equally awful shitlib politics. So it's them and freakish Canadian QAnoner types.
I mean wasn't Russian literacy super fucking low pre-Lenin? Many of the greatest revolutions ever done were done by illiterate people. Reading theory is good, but some people here treat it as far too important.
Those trying to build up the socialist movement early on were all heavy readers though. They need to be. Most of us live in a country where the movement is in the infantile stages
If a revolution does ever come to America, 99% of participants will have never read a single communist book, yea
Back then, it would've been, like, the one guy at the factory who knows how to read, reading things to fellow workers, right? So reading theory would've been to a large degree a social activity back then, whereas now it's often a pretty lonely activity. Even if you aren't just reading alone, but are doing a book club or something... a book club isn't quite the same when it's 12 people from around the world on Discord, compared to when it's 12 people in the room with you. And even if you're going through the effort of making the information you learn more accessible to others, making an audiobook for the consumption of countless anonymous people online isn't quite the same as reading something to someone in person; nor is translating a work and publishing it online quite the same as actually going through the effort of making a translation in paper and giving it to someone.
Basically what I'm getting at is that "theory" can and should be praxis in itself, and this is achieved by changing the ways we interact with and think of "theory". That is, sharing information can itself be a productive, creative, and social activity grounded in our immediate surroundings, that builds the networks and skills to make us good revolutionaries, rather than just giving us explanations of why the world's kinda messed up so that we can debate with internet strangers to prove who's more well-read.
Just because people were illiterate or had low literacy levels doesn't mean they didn't engage in theory though. This is also why vanguardism was so important to historical revolutions.
But you only need one comrade who can read for a classroom sized group of people (or larger) to be able to learn and discuss theory.
Part of what Mao did so successfully was to convey complex ideas in theory in very simple to understand language. In fact, he was so effective in doing this that most of his writings manage to cross a vast linguistic gap in a very nimble way.
Theory isn't the be-all and end-all, of course. But a party or the masses without theory is like a ship without a rudder.
We should honestly have dedicated disabled socialist orgs. I've gone back and forth on this idea a few times but the thing that's hung me up on pursuing it is the fact that participation in any org no matter to what degree is very likely something the tories here would use to say you're capable of working and therefore should lose benefits.
In the U.S. you can lose disability by taking a volunteer position, or by doing volunteer work that Social Security decides is “substantial gainful activity.”
There's a lady who shows up at Palestine protests here who has the palestine flag attached to her wheelchair.
You do what you can. From each according to their ability and all.
Spiritually, disabled people can usually go outside/build communism. "Go outside" is really about logging off from your internet patterns and trying to have human interactions, which you can do from home in case a disability makes literally going outside uncomfortable or impossible.
Of course, with generalizations we should also understand that there will be exceptions but that naming them right away would prevent the call to action from being pithy. So if a person's disability precludes building socialism, I'm sure OP and others would understand.
Though I would say that there are many ways to build socialism, so even someone that thinks they can't might just be unaware of ways they could help out.
Tbf, I definitely do more organizing than reading. But lately I've realized I'm useless in certain groups and situations without a little more reading under my belt.
I don't have any organizations where I live and I'm certainly not brave enough to start one and face the ostracization that will inevitably come with it
Alienate your existing social circles and strangers with this one easy step!
I know I definitely could have handled it better, but coming out as Giving A Fuck Enough To Actually Do Stuff really fucked my social life up. People who would rather bitch from a place of comfort than make a difference even if it's uncomfortable seem to really not love it when you decide to stop bitching and do stuff.
I always thought though the advice was perhaps what one would want to do, it seemed more like the one who was advising was speaking platitudes. Without specific suggestions adapted to the conditions of the person being advised, such advice was idealistic in effect.
Like the Chad/Chaz zones in 2020? They tried already. Would have been cool to see that stay real just to see what would happen... But it got slaughtered by fear of differences. And I'm not saying this as a "communist". Fear, difference and lack of faith is murder of real freedom. And that's something we're all reminded of daily regardless of sides.
Chaz failed because it was a spontaneous uprising that devolved into a disorganised mess due to ideological incoherence which led to it having no proper resident organisational structure and thus no authority to administer or govern the pop up municipality without being capable of demonstrating a popular mandate of the residents. Not because autonomous zones are a bad idea.
If the ideological contradictions had been resolved then proper organisation could have occurred, a council could have been formed of the residents, and a real structure of authority built. This would have solved the vast number of problems that occurred as a result of the authority power-vacuum that formed.