Obama has won election to a second term. Most North American Africans asked nothing of him, only make sure he beat the white man whom they feared might bring the wrath of white supremacy on their behinds, as if Obama has lifted the whip the last four years. In truth, the economic crisis has devastated the entire community, no matter what class, nearly all have lost a great percentage of their basic wealth which was home ownership, others lost in the stock market and retirement funds, and most importantly, many have lost jobs or have been permanently unemployed and millions are incarcerated.
Though the future looks bleak, many of us voted for Obama as the lesser to two evils, though we agree with Glen Ford that he is the better of two evils. His black skin, though light, gives him a cover to hide his dedication to American world white supremacy. We have no agenda from black bourgeoisie, black liberals or black leftist. Even the dialogue that follows among Blacks on the Left offers little of substance, mostly it is a statement of ideological perspectives that have little meaning for the masses who are clearly caught up in the moment, and yet what clarity awaits them from their intellectuals that should be guiding them on the right path to, yes, national liberation?
Of course the Left has no consensus of what national liberation is so we cannot expect the masses to be clear on this. We have made no collective agenda for ourselves nor have we put one in the hands of President Obama. So it is no wonder our people simply voted because it seemed the right thing to do, especially since no alternative was offered them.
And no alternative was offered because the Left is splintered into ideological camps and the leaders in these camps only wish to pontificate at any and all gatherings for their own edification and glorification. Self determination leading to national sovereignty is a no, no, after all, we must now fear drones attacking any liberated land in the north or south. So after decades of neocolonial black officials, we are still dreaming a black mayor will come forth to save us while we have little or no evidence of this happening in the past. We support Bro. Chokwe Lumumba with our mouth and our money, but what are his possibilities? And yet it would be nice if we could move to Jackson to begin the establishment of the Republic of New Africa. After all, it would only be a matter of consciousness building, cultural, economic, educational and political institutional building. We have skilled persons in all these areas, whether they are black liberals or Leftists, surely they would answer the call of Nation Time!
Of course nothing shall happen until we on the Left gain some ideological clarity among ourselves, a consensus on what we mean by such terms as freedom, self determination, liberation, revolution, gender equality, multiculturalism, racism, Pan Africanism and a host of other terms that have led to the psycholinguistic crisis of the North American African. Don't leave out Communism, socialism, Marxism, religiosity, spirituality, etc. This is an urgent discussion that must happen before attempting to reach the masses, for it is pure arrogance to approach people who are confused when we are confused as well.
We must come out of denial that traumatic stress has damaged some of us severely and few of us can claim a clean bill of mental health or physical health. We cannot and shall not escape the need for mental health peer group sessions among revolutionaries and the masses. Only after some form of detoxing and recovery from the addiction to White Supremacy shall we begin to have the trust, faith, love and security within ourselves and with each other to begin the awesome battle that awaits us. Of course Fanon and Hare have told us the only way to regain our sanity is through the process of revolution or social action. In the absence of qualified mental health workers, the peer group is only a suggested first step on the road to recovery and liberation.
We appreciate the comrades for attempting to forge a United Front on the Left, if only to open a dialogue to consider critical issues facing the Crisis of Negro Intellectuals and Black people: Sam Anderson, Kali Acuno, Yusuf Nuruddin, Tony Vandermeer, Saladin Muhammad, Ajamu Baraka, et al.
--Marvin X
11/10/12
NYC
[TheBlackList] Fw: Fw: [The Black Movement is screwed again
Saturday,
November 10, 2012 12:17 AM
From:
"Yusuf Nuruddin"
To:
"TheBlackList@lists.riseup.net"
, "TheBlacklists@lists.riseup.net" , "Young Black
Intellectuals"
-----
Forwarded Message -----
From: Yusuf Nuruddin
To: "ahastudents@groups.live.com"
Sent: Friday, November 9, 2012 6:47 PM
Subject: Fw:
Fw: [BlackLeftUnity:6026] The Black Movement is screwed again
-----
Forwarded Message -----
From: Ajamu Baraka
To: 'tony
vandermeer' ; 'Yusuf Nuruddin' ; 'KA'
Cc: blackleftunity@googlegroups.com
Sent: Friday,
November 9, 2012 6:28 PM
Subject: RE: Fw: [BlackLeftUnity:6026] The
Black Movement is screwed again
Thank you brother Menelik for sharing that with us. You raise a
central question which it appears that folks are trying to get at – “ what are
the material conditions of our people and what work must be done to create the
shifts that’s needed in terms of our people’s consciousness and resistance to
oppression.”? Brother Yusuf’s powerful recapturing of the material, class
and ideological changes over the last few decades, while posed as a
clarification or corrective to brother kali, actually supports on a number of
points the insightful analysis that brother Kali provides. The point here
for me is that all of the exchanges over the last few days have illuminated
many issues for me and sparked my thinking as well as surfacing points of
unity, gaps and even points of disagreement, but the overall effect has been
positive. I mean how could we have less discussions at such a critical moment
and where else but in the context of a BLUN should discussions like this take
place? Building a unity process with the disparate forces that we have in
this country cannot mean that there will be agreement on all points but we
cannot build unity without knowing who is in the room and what are the real
points of unity and points of disunity that might emerge. You cannot build a
broad unity process behind closed doors among “advance” forces unless you are
building a limited unity front or a cult, or both, and for me I am not
interested in either one.
One last thing brother Menelik, while I don’t know in detail the
personal history of everyone involved in these discussions, the one thing that
I can assume based on the little I know is that no one involved appears to lack
some years of radical practice. And so you are right, something does not come
out of nothing, all of us are the sum total of our experiences in material
reality and since we are in constant motion and change along with material
reality, constant theoretical struggle in order to ensure that we
apprehend, at any given moment, the material reality that we occupy and are
attempting to transform through our practice, becomes a necessary component of
revolutionary practice. Yes there is something called theoretical practice!
Ajamu
From: blackleftunity@googlegroups.com
[mailto:blackleftunity@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of tony
vandermeer
Sent: Friday, November 09, 2012 3:29 PM
To: Yusuf
Nuruddin; KA
Cc: blackleftunity@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re:
Fw: [BlackLeftUnity:6026] The Black Movement is screwed again
In
Le Duan's Book, This Nation and socialism are one, He addresses this backward
conditioning of the masses and cadre after liberation. The party in
Vietnam had to address this phenomena. Nothing stays the same even with a
movement. So what are the material conditions of the our people and what work
must be done to create the shifts that's needed in terms of our
peoples consciousness and resistance to oppression? Otherwise we can end
up taking a defeatist attitude and blaming the people, while looking for
perfection in order to develop an organized and united initiative.
The Vietnamese used mass struggle, mass lines to wage ideological struggle
inside and outside of the party. All of us on this discussion developed our
ideas as a result of our practice of lack thereof, the point being we didn't
develop from nothing. Sam has proposed some initiatives which we need to
see if we can unite around. There is a national dialog call. We have a journal coming
out, a blog that is activated, and a face book page that is growing. Lets
figure out how to continue developing and supporting these efforts and build
unity around.
Menelik
---
On Fri, 11/9/12, KA <kaliakuno@gmail.com> wrote:
From:
KA <kaliakuno@gmail.com>
Subject:
Re: Fw: [BlackLeftUnity:6024] The Black Movement is screwed again
To:
"Yusuf Nuruddin" <yusufnuruddin@yahoo.com>
Date:
Friday, November 9, 2012, 2:43 PM
Comrade
Yusuf,
Most
of your analysis and proposals are directly or indirectly incorporated into
this initiative from NAPO/MXGMhttp://navigatingthestorm.blogspot.com/2012/05/jackson-kush-plan-and-struggle-for.html.
This
initiative is very much rooted in some aspects of the "common
understanding" that you refer to. But, we have to recognize, that even in
place like Jackson, there have been some major changes in the class
composition, social consciousness and generalized political program of our
people.
Let
me cite an example. One of the biggest challenges facing Chokwe in his run for
Mayor is what approach he/we are going to take regarding the possibility of
having to manage the repressive apparatus of the state, the Police. One of the
most fundamental issues in Jackson (a city over 80% New Afrikan) is
"crime". The popular sentiment is that whoever is the top manager of
the city government must take a proactive stance to reduce crime by getting
tough on criminals, which fundamentally translates into targeting working class
youth, putting more police on the streets, and enforcing and creating tougher
laws to keep the "criminals" off the streets. This is an agenda that
has its roots in the transference of political power from the white ruling
class to the Black petit bourgeoisie who were commissioned to protect the
formers interests to realize their own as they handed over the keys to the
local political kingdom in the 1980's and 90's in this case. But, it now has a
very broad resonance and electoral support within the Black working class in
Jackson, particularly amongst older segments of the population.
This
is just one example of the "right drift" I am referring to and how it
plays out in the ground in a "local" setting. And this is just one
dimension of it. The cultural and social dimensions of it are more severe I
would argue, when one considers how many of our youth are viewed by their
elders in the community, often with little contextualization regarding the
material and social transformations the youth have been reared in over the past
40 years. There is major disconnect, bordering on cultural war, that we have to
address and see for what it is. When one reflects that many of the criticisms
and charges now being directed at our youth by Black folks are identical to
those leavied against us as a people by settlers in earlier generations (and
their present day reactionary descendants now) how can we not describe and
understand this as a right drift?
More
soon.
On
Fri, Nov 9, 2012 at 1:44 PM, Yusuf Nuruddin <yusufnuruddin@yahoo.com> wrote:
My
understanding is that until the 1960s when the Freedom Struggle attempted to
dismantle segregation -- allowing token African Americans the mobility to be
educated, to earn a living, to reside and to spend leisure/recreational time in
previously all-white spaces, institutions and neighborhoods -- the black
community was a multi-class colony. In fact, some of the worst racist attacks
on the black community were precisely because of the emergence of a thriving
black middle class, whose very existence infuriated white supremacists who
wanted to put us "back in our place." This was indeed the case with
Tulsa, Oklahoma where the thriving black middle class business section of the
city was known as the Black Wall Street. As you well know, white supremacists
burned it to the ground in 1921, and some eighty-odd years later lawyers such
as Charles Ogletree were still seeking reparations for the victims. The
black workingclass is very aware of the history of white racism and realizes
that we are under attack not because we are workingclass, but "just
because we're black." Malcolm reiterated it, "We don't catch hell
because we are Baptist or Methodist or Muslim, . .. " When the black
community had a multi-class character there was a philosophy of racial uplift,
and although DuBois would later repudiate his Talented Tenth thesis, this
thesis merely articulated the idea that the more successful among us would be
the one's who would be the role models for the less fortunate and who would
break the glass ceilings in a segregated society allowing the rest of us
entry. The fact that much of this middle class betrayed their mission,
was well documented by E. Franklin Frazier in his study of the Black
Bourgeoisie, and of course Robert Allen, In Black Awakening in Capitalist
America, spoke to the issue of the black neo-colonialist class that arose
as a result of efforts of the ruling class to put an end to the urban
insurrections of the 60s. However, this has not always been the case and the
fact that there is so much stress on obtaining higher education ("A Mind
is a Terrible thing to Waste," etc.) demonstrates that the black
workingclass still believes that education is one of the main avenues to
freedom (and yes there are competing visions of freedom in our communities-- as
the black political scientist Michael Dawson and others have delineated-- but
the predominant vision is still economic success within the framework of the
prevailing system). Thus the workingclass strives to send its children to
college to become doctors, lawyers, engineers, businessmen, etc. While some may
adopt a "me generation" individualist attitude, most are imbued with
a philosophy of self-help and giving back to the community. This picture
is complicated by the view that quicker access to upward mobilty is available
thru the sports and entertainment industries. Either way the masses of our people
obtain vicarious reinforcement from the triumphs of the black middle class,
whether they are millionaire hip hop artists and basketball players or Johnnie
Cochrans or Ben Carsons or Oprah Winfreys or Barack and Michelle Obamas.
They see these people as heroes who have overcome barriers of white
supremacy and they understand that they are still under attack in spite of or
perhaps because of their success just as Tulsa's Black Wall Streeters . And, of
course, we live in a celebrity culture, where many of these heroes are
manufactured by the corporate media but many are authentic.
I
am stating the obvious here But there have been so many statements over
recent days which characterize this behavior as " irrational" or as a
"shift to the right" when indeed this has been the norm throughout
most of our history except for the short burst of revolutionary activity
circa 1965-1976. There is nothing irrational or difficult to understand.
Furthermore
we don't have a vision to offer the masses as we did in heyday of the black
Liberation Movement. You have an amorphous collection of scattered
goals, but no unifying vision We won't outrightly call for a
socialist America because we realize that anti-communism is rampant in this
society, and thus it won't catch fire. And I suppose all of us
revolutionary nationalists have realized that an autonomous black nation
state even in the South where you say 53% of our people reside is no longer
viable in an era or surveillance and drone attacks.
So
then what do the people have as a vision to animate and sustain a Black
Liberation Movement other than reforms of the existing system so that
their sons and daughter's might one day grow up to be Barack Obama's?
Not
saying at all that this is my vision. My vision is that we have to move toward
some level of self-autonomy even if it is limited self-autonomy, but that is
going to depend on creating a skilled sector of black people who are able to
build, maintain, and operate our own institutions. . . i.e., the people whom
you denigrate as the black middle class. Certainly we can have
worker-owned factories, but how would we launch our own health care facilities,
for example without Black MDs, though I am sure that black nurses could do the
bulk of the day to day operations. But where are we going? What is our
vision?
We
keep saying Black Liberation Movement but what is it?
-----
Forwarded Message -----
From: Saladin Muhammad <saladin62@aol.com>
To: yusufnuruddin@yahoo.com
Sent: Friday,
November 9, 2012 12:16 AM
Subject: Re: [BlackLeftUnity:6008] The
Black Movement is screwed again
The
Black petti-bourgeois was a late arrival in our domestic colonial oppression.
It, as did the Black bourgeoisie emerged on the basis of the oppression of the
Black working class, initially the agricultural workers and
sharecroppers. The only market and strata for their emergence was the
Black working class and communities. For a time with the exception of
cities like Atlanta, Ga, Durham, NC which rfepresent the highest stage of
development of the Black bourgeoisie with major insurance companies, the Black
bourgeoisie were mainly made up of the funeral home French and European history
than the history of the Chinese struggles.
When
you say we fight as a colonized people; what does self-determination and
national liberation mean in terms of the multi-class perspective that you
propose?
Saladin saladin62@aol.com
-----Original
Message----- From: Yusuf Nuruddin <yusufnuruddin@yahoo.com> To: KA <kaliakuno@gmail.com>; blackleftunity
<blackleftunity@googlegroups.com> Sent:
Thu, Nov 8, 2012 11:37 pm Subject: Re: [BlackLeftUnity:6008] The Black Movement
is screwed again
Re:
The people are no more united than the forces within these discussions:
Because
the nationalist impulse which is the heart and soul of the Black Liberation
Movement is being buried under a cold Eurocentric Marxist logic which fails to
emphasize our Africanity, our sense of nationhood, and the bonds of unity and
solidarity which transcend class distinction. The Black Radical Tradition
developed independently of and predated Marxism-Leninism. Yet we keep
getting answers from a Marxist-Leninst catechism as if it is the sole and final
arbiter about all issues which are being legitimately raised.
Furthermore the abstract social categories that are derived from
this catechism fail to capture the nuanced reality of The African American
community --it's aims, aspirations, heroes, sheroes, role models, etc.
The greatest failure in the exchanges on this listserv may be the failure to
grapple with the fact that our oppression and exploitation is first and
foremost as a colonized people not simply a proletariat. Derived directly from
that failure is our failure to deal with the psychology of colonialism and
oppression. And our failure to deal with the psychology of colonialism and
oppression, impacts on our inability to understand the masses of our people,
and in tandem with our over-reliance on a Marxist-Leninist catechism of answers
for every question, it perpetuates a fundamental disconnect and alienation from
the very people we purport to lead. And it is really a sad state of
affairs. We throw around names like Gramsci and base-superstructure relations
yet talk about a rightward shift of our people as if this was not the result of
cultural hegemony thru the skilled manipulation of mass media. We think that we
can organize people simply by calling people names like Obomber and
imperialist, and we can mobilize them thusly, without first engaging in both a
sustained level of political education and deprogramming as well as reliance
upon and promotion of cultural workers who can wage relentless
counter-hegemonic/ ideological warfare (yes as the cultural nationalists did in
the 60s and some of the hip hop artists do today) to combat the ideological war
that has been waged on us since the demise in the 70s/80s of the Black
Liberation Movement. We talk about the war that is being waged against
us, but the greatest war is ideological war. There are totally uneven levels of
political development and consciousness throughout the community and we have
failed to identify the various trends and strands because we use blanket Marxist
terminology. Thus we don't even analyze our people to see what kinds of
communication appeal to them, etc., and what doesn't. For example, why are our
young rebellious people far more comfortable embracing Afrocentricity than
embracing the Left?
From: KA <kaliakuno@gmail.com>
To: Baabasurya@aol.com
Cc: saladin62@aol.com; sekouche@yahoo.com; ajamubaraka2@gmail.com; blackleftunity@googlegroups.com
Sent: Thursday,
November 8, 2012 9:50 PM
Subject: Re: [BlackLeftUnity:6005] The
Black Movement is screwed again
Many
are speaking to the PEOPLE consistently. Talking to the PEOPLE in and of itself
is not going to solve these problems, as the PEOPLE are no more united than the
forces within these discussions.
On
Thu, Nov 8, 2012 at 7:57 PM, <Baabasurya@aol.com> wrote:
YES,
He said it WELL ORGANIZE , ORGANIZE , remember ? How
ever today comrades
seem
to have MANY ways THEY feel the ORGANIZING SHOULD
be done, and so it becomes
a
debate / discussion about HOW !!!!! WHEN WILL YOU speak
to the people ? surya
In
a message dated 11/8/2012 3:09:41 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, saladin62@aol.com writes:
Comrade
Osei,
I
hear the theoretical argument and the question of rectification. Part of
the rectification must recognize that capitalist restructuring requires new
points of concentration to build a revolutionary capacity to challenge
capitalism and imperialism.
The
deindustrialization in the midwest and north saw the increased
industrialization in the South. Yet during this major U.S. a nd global
capitalist crisis, most of the Black and broader left have not put forth a
view about the importance of strategic concentration in the South as a base of
contention against U.S. and global capitalism.
The
fact that 57% or more of Black people are located in the South, and in counties
where the Black left influence among the Black masses could build an
independent program and movement for Black majority political power in a number
of cities and counties. The Black left would hopefully see and try to
organize them as contending zones of power, that would include zones to support
the building of rank-and-file social movement unions in the workplaces within
these zones.
The
struggle around ideas is a necessary struggle within the left. However,
theories without regard to identifying points of intervention to turn things
around is abstract and only leads to endless debates around theories and never
to be tested, verified, refined or disregards by practice.
Is
our movement on the defensive because of the fragmentation, lack of strategic
concentration that can demonstrate real contention and resistance against
capitalist policies at the local levels, and some unclarity on how to challenge
the current state and stage of the U.S. and global economy and the imperialist
state. I say Yes!
Has
there been a level of defeatism among the Black masses that their support for
Obama was their hope of a new day for Black people in terms of national
political reforms. I say Yes! I feel that this level of national defeatism
may come across as having moved to the right.
Yes,
there has been reactionary culture that has been promoted by the record
companies that reflect a degineration in social consciousness. However,
there is a counter politics that have emerged among the rappers that again
gets little media coverage. They are part of the Black left,
but most have no particular ideological perspective.
The
deep poverty and the underground economy of dope dealers and markets
accompanied by murders, robberies and crimes that intimidate and threaten
the quality of life of an already oppressed people. Does the movement challenge
these elements. are we saying that they are one of the reasons that the cops
justify for occuping our communities and killing our people? Organizing
our communities and fighting to build them as strategic zones of power,
requires addressing these contradictions and forces that threaten our people.
What
level of unity is necessary for Black activists to unite to build a
national fightback campaign to Stop the War on Black America? Can we
identify challenging state repression as a basis for unity-struggle-unity?
We
have to include in our agitation for jobs not jail, and not drugs and crimes
against our people. The self-defense networks must enable our people
to see that they are not protecting the criminal element that grows out of the
poverty of the people and the racist society where Blacks are still in
many ways the last hired and the first fired now using to formerly incarcerated
status to try and justify the denail of jobs.
Comrade
Snodgrass is correct when he says we must organize our people in multiple
levels.
Saladin
-----Original
Message----- From: Sekou Osei <sekouche@yahoo.com> To: Ajamu Baraka
<ajamubaraka2@gmail.com> Cc: blackleftunity
<blackleftunity@googlegroups.com>; KA
<kaliakuno@gmail.com> Sent: Thu, Nov 8,
2012 2:11 pm Subject: RE: [BlackLeftUnity:6002] The Black Movement is screwed
again
Well
My Comrade Ajamu,
Our (perhaps older) comrades of the movement may have been the victims of their
own wishful thinking in relation to the masses and could not face the fact
oppression does not breed resistance. But only resistance is the flower of
consciousness. And two our community has been through and still are going
through a social and cultural decline in its social environment. At this point
in our history, I have seen a vast amount of social dysfunction as art form in
music and the language of African American popular culture. While not all
people or young people, but the young people that are socially stable who may
not be political or radical are a stark minority in the vast amount of young
people that I have encountered on a day-to-day bases. Who actually celebrate
prisoner style as fashion and whose public speech is fill with terms that are
angry term when one is about to confront in a hostile situation. They young
today is not the youth of the Black Panther Party, and we have to be honest
about that.
We have to be very frank that in this period our people young and old under
Obama has lost our moral and social compass by overly identifying with a Black
face in a high place, who is the captain of austerity and the smiley face
harlot of imperial crimes and strikes against the humanity of the world.
And now we are so far behind the eight ball of history, we are now
discussing how to keep Obama feet's to the fire since November 7th 2012. This
is just the character of political tailism plain-and-simple.
This always come when one just trades in slogans--militant--or other wise,
without seeking to provide a political analysis of the contenting forces within
our community and class.
The thing that the movement has fail is the question of clarity of ideas and
analysis and this was from the pragmatic character of the activism that
comrades were engaged in for a number of years. Our comrade never
participated in a struggle of rectification of our revolutionary theory. Meaning
theory as explanation, not further abstractions. Thus being an American
movement it found itself in bed with the American pragmatic approach of
validation, thus is became a numbers game of protests to validation who had
real political presence in the community.
Thus the Black movement level of theory was on the level of an eight track
tape. For without a theory base on real historical science, the best that could
be done was to struggle around the types of slogans that may catch the ears of
the Masses.
Thus a lot of the movement conferences were just sterile talk-fests of
militancy over a laundry list of concerns that would never consolidate into
anything with a real presence.
At some point, I will go through that history on paper, but not yet until I
organize my time
Malik ---
On Thu, 11/8/12, Ajamu Baraka <ajamubaraka2@gmail.com> wrote:
From:
Ajamu Baraka <ajamubaraka2@gmail.com>
Subject:
RE: [BlackLeftUnity:5988] The Black Movement is screwed again
To:
"'Saladin Muhammad'" <saladin62@aol.com>, kaliakuno@gmail.com, blackeducator@mac.com
Date:
Thursday, November 8, 2012, 1:13 PM
Brother kali’s analysis is correct on so many levels. It is not
a condemnation of the “masses” but a sober reflection of the result of a
systemic, multi-dimensional changes that have occurred over the last 30
years. And while I find it hard to understand why this is not obvious to
most of us who are seriously engaged in struggle and looking at objective
reality with open eyes, I will not suggest that those who don’t agree with my
assessment are somehow disconnected from the masses. However, not having a
better understanding of the subjective changes among our people does have its
representation in practice. And like all processes, the construction of
consciousness is contradictory. While the Obama phenomenon reflects a
significant consolidation of a rightest motion in place since the ascendency of
the black petit-bourgeois in the 70s and the repression and fragmentation of
the BLM during that same period, there is, however, a stronger element of
anti-capitalist, working class and socialist oriented Africans in this country
than ever existed before. The challenge is whether or not a BLUN can attract
and hold these elements as part of a process of building a new black left.
Ajamu
From: blackleftunity@googlegroups.com [mailto:blackleftunity@googlegroups.com?] On
Behalf Of Saladin Muhammad
Sent: Thursday, November 08,
2012 12:31 AM
To: kaliakuno@gmail.com; blackeducator@mac.com
Cc: sekouche@yahoo.com; blackleftunity@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re:
[BlackLeftUnity:5988] The Black Movement is screwed again
Comrades,
I
disagree that the Black masses have moved to the right over the past 30 plus
years. Comrade Kali's point about our people being compelled to march further
to the right for the various reasons he cited and measuring this by "their
enthusaistic vote for Obama."
First
of all, stating that our people believe in the "neo-liberal" agenda
contradicts the struggles and organizations that engaged millions of our people
at the local levels that the mainstream media refuses to cover. Struggles
against gentrification in all of the major inner cities where Black people
live, against the destruction of public housing, against charterization and
privatization of public education; against attacks on labor rights; against
environmental racism; against cuts in and the privatization of public services;
against the defunding of HBCU's; against women's rights, etc.
There
have been few efforts to organize these local struggles into national campaigns
that give expression to our peoples national political desires and will to
struggle. This view about the left have to face the realities of our
people, is a view where the left has been absent in organizing and politicizing
our people's struggles for a long time. Yes, there are some organizations
that are rooted among the people, but they seem unwilling or unready
to build united fronts because of capacity and some are sectarian and only
ready to be part of coalitions and united fronts that they initiate.
I
hear a view about our people, as if they are suppose to be spontaneously
anti-capitalist. Tell me where you find people who are spntaneously
anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist when there is no movement providing
anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist leadership. Has there been a lull in the
militancy of our peoples struggle nationally. YES! has there been
major national political discussion about the shortcomings of our movement
and what needs to be done since the World Conference Against Racism in 2001.
NO!
I
think its wrong to conclude that Black people see ourselves as assimilated
(incorporated) into the U.S. imperialist state. They see that even as
president, that Obama is not fully accepted by the white ruling class and white
America. I feel this is a time to show that Black people need
self-determination as a basis of mass based and transformative power
irregardless of who is president. While self-determination has been a
slogan for some Black activists, many have not applied it to the question of
building national Black united/democratic fronts, national coalitions around
key areas of Black struggle like agianst the various forms of state repression,
and currently around uniting the Black left. Many are also afraid to play real
leadership roles in trying to unite the Black left for fear of criticisms
leadership often gets the brunt of. Many are prepared to criticize, but
few are prepared to lead.
Yes,
we will run into some folks, but not mainly among the Black working class that
will support the neo-liberal line using the argument that you need education to
survive and advance in this society abd that its the people's fault if they
don't want the education.
I
think that we must not only do more investigation among the people instead of
listening to the polls taken, and also be willing to organize to not only
educate and mobilize our people, but also to politically test the sentiment of
our people who we say have moved to the right. I don't think trying to
arrive at agreement on where our people are at politically is the starting
point for our working together to initiate efforts suggested by Comrade
Sam. Making assessments about what issues we think people involved in
struggles around and if we can bore into these struggles with a goal of moving
them toward a national campaign, and national congress, etc are clearly
important, but are different than what it sounds like Comrade Kali is
suggesting as a starting point.
Comradely
saladin
-----Original
Message-----
From: KA <kaliakuno@gmail.com>
To: S E Anderson
<blackeducator@mac.com>
Cc: Sekou Osei
<sekouche@yahoo.com>; Saladin Muhammad
<saladin62@aol.com>; blackleftunity
<blackleftunity@googlegroups.com>
Sent:
Wed, Nov 7, 2012 11:22 pm
Subject: Re: [BlackLeftUnity:5980] The Black Movement
is screwed again
Sam,
I
think its more than just a "streak". Like the rest of the peoples' in
the empire, our people have elected to march or been compelled for various
reasons (some by compulsion, some by persuasion based on their material
interests) to move further and further to the right over the past 30 plus
years, to the point where folks will now enthusiastically vote for someone who
is more to the right of Reagan for President and deem it rational (and NOT just
cause his rival is even further afield, but because they believe in the
neo-liberal agenda themselves). This drift has been in motion for quite some
time and we have been largely unable to stop it, locally, statewide or
nationally.
Obama
in many respects, is a fulfillment of this right drift. But, the drift started
locally, at least at the ballot box, with the Black urban regimes (and the
Black petit bourgeois forces that gave them direction) of the 1970's, 80's and
90's progressively adopted the neo-liberal program of accumulation and
governance and instituted the destruction of public housing, the displacement
of Black working class communities, deindustrialization, the elimination of
social welfare programs, the aggressive implementation of the so-called wars on
crime-gangs-drugs, the privatization of social services like
education-water-electricity, etc. The material foundations of this drift are
firmly rooted in the class fragmentation (accompanied by a conscious program of
physical deconcentration as well as more and more of our folks strived and did
move on up and out of the hood to get their piece of the pie) that has occurred
within the Black community over this period, which has lead to increasing
levels of social and political polarization within its constitution as
well.
This
is what I was referring to, and this is a critical piece of the puzzle that we
have to understand how to strategically address if we're going to successful at
rebuilding a Black Liberation Movement (as opposed to a Black incorporation
movement) within the US settler-colonial project.
Finally,
in regards to Saladin's comments, I am not interested in promoting or upholding
a view that how one relates to Obama should be a dividing line, but starting
with the reality that in practice this question has been and remains such a
line. I think we have to start with that concrete realty and try to move from
there, and I'm concerned that if we don't address it, we'll be stuck at the
idealist level that comrade Osei laid out.
On
Wed, Nov 7, 2012 at 5:03 PM, S E Anderson <blackeducator@mac.com> wrote:
Brother
Osei,
What
do you concretely propose that we do to build Black Left Unity?
I
have made a suggestion on how we can forge Black Left Unity thru ORGANIZING
WORK around three ideas and dates in 2013. These are very simple, concrete and
doable actions that can help us rebuild and rejuvenate our disparate and
dysfunctional Black Left. I think the hardest part is the initial condition of
starting to work together on something that is tangible and quantifiable.
These
actions have no direct baring on one's position with Prez Obama. That is to
say, ones position around Obama is not the litmus test for joining in on this
unity-building project. But, at the same time, his administration obviously
will be implicated in the set of demands we would create for the 2013 March On
Washington and Black Solidarity Day. And, if there are Black Left forces that
cannot join in this work because of that, then they are most likely liberals
disguising themselves as "left"- which is easy to do when everything
has swung far to the right and the Left in general is decimated and
dysfunctional.
Below
I have placed the original 1963 demands. In the half century since these
demands first were made public, not one of them has been met. I think this is
powerful educating and organizing material that helps bring even the more
liberal organizations and Black public figures to join us in re-iterating these
demands with a 21st Century flava.
Brother
Kali senses a dominant moderate to conservative streak within Black America. I
think that sense will quickly evaporate as we change the African American
discourse around race, class, gender and the capitalist system... very much in
the same manner that the OccupyWallStreeters have done. We change it by
creating a discussion about Now What? How far have we come from 1863, 1963? And
just how much has not changed-- even with a Black president, mayors, and
congresspeople?
These
events/actions are also assessments of how well we- the Black Left -are doing
our organizing/mobilizing work. And it lays the foundation for the larger work
of rebuilding (or building) the US Revolutionary Movement against capitalism
within the US workingclass on the whole.
In
Struggle,
Sam
Anderson
[][][][][][][][][][][][][
The 10 Demands of the 1963 March on Washington
1.
Comprehensive and effective civil rights legislation from the
present Congress — without compromise or filibuster — to
guarantee all Americans:
Access to all public
accommodations
Decent
housing
Adequate and integrated
education
The right to vote
2.
Withholding of Federal funds from all programs in which
discrimination exists.
3.
Desegregation of all school districts in 1963.
4.
Enforcement of the Fourteenth Amendment — reducing
Congressional representation of states where citizens are disfranchised.
5.
A new Executive Order banning discrimination in all housing
supported by federal funds.
6.
Authority for the Attorney General to institute injunctive suits
when any Constitutional right is violated.
7.
A massive federal program to train and place all unemployed
workers — Negro and white — on meaningful and dignified
jobs at decent wages.
8.
A national minimum wage act that will give all Americans a decent
standard of living. (Government surveys show that anything less than $2.00 an
hour fails to do this.)
[The minimum wage at the time of the march is
$1.15/hour.]
9.
A broadened Fair Labor Standards Act to include all areas of
employment which are presently excluded.
10.
A federal Fair Employment Practices Act barring discrimination
by federal, state, and municipal governments, and by employers, contractors,
employment agencies, and trade unions.
amamamamamamaamamamamamamamaamamamam
On
Nov 7, 2012, at 3:40 PM, Sekou Osei wrote:
Hello
Comrade Saladin, I have no unity with uniting with tailing the pro-Obama
forces for a number of these forces are simply idealist or just trying to
achieve the position of broker-of-discontent at later date. and 2) all
idealism under the epic of imperialism only represents tendencies of
opportunism. It has to be noted these difference would come to a head working
in local struggle around the question of direction and consolidation. If a
force has unity with the Democratic party and President Obama, then we must
be honest those forces are not "left." We have to be clear history
is on our side, but, not time...
Malik Sekou Osei ---
On Wed, 11/7/12, Saladin Muhammad <saladin62@aol.com> wrote:
From:
Saladin Muhammad <saladin62@aol.com> Subject: Re:
[BlackLeftUnity:5947] The Black Movement is screwed again To:kaliakuno@gmail.com, instruggledrsnod@att.net Cc: blackeducator@mac.com, tmenelik@yahoo.com, sekouche@yahoo.com,blackleftunity@googlegroups.com Date:
Wednesday, November 7, 2012, 3:25 PM
Kali,
I
think we must struggle against a view that argues that the differences around
Obama should be a dividing line amongst the Black left in working together to
build a national movement that builds local power and that challenges state
power at the national level under the Obama administration.
I
think that it is important for those who have been perceived as being on one
side or the other of Obama administration and reelection to come out calling
for unity. I think pessimism only suggest that this is an almost
impossible hurdle. This don't mean that we should be dishonest to ourselves
about the challenges.
However,
like serious propagandists, we must call for forces and the masses to face
these challenges and to move forward.
Saladin
-----Original
Message-----
From: KA <kaliakuno@gmail.com>
To: Kenneth
Snodgrass <instruggledrsnod@att.net>
Cc: S E
Anderson <blackeducator@mac.com>; Tony Van Der
Meer <tmenelik@yahoo.com>; Sekou Osei <sekouche@yahoo.com>; blackleftunity
<blackleftunity@googlegroups.com>
Sent:
Wed, Nov 7, 2012 11:23 am
Subject: Re: [BlackLeftUnity:5947] The Black
Movement is screwed again
I
agree whole heartedly with what Sam say's here:
And No, the "Black Movement" did not tail the
Democratic Party.
Why? Because there is no "Black Movement" in 2012.
We are currently an amorphous, disparate, dysfunctional and dispersed group
of disunified organizations and individuals.
Our task is to rebuild the "Black
Movement" bigger and stronger from this political and social mess.
Look, like it or not, our varying orientations around Obama's
reelection and his regime, have been and are a dividing line amongst the
Black Left (but, obviously not amongst Black liberals and centrists are now
clearly the overwhelming majority of Black people in this empire). Can we
build a united Black Left platform and program, even if purely on a minimal
basis? From what I've seen the last four years, I think this remains to be
seen. Right now I think we could do a minimal program on paper, but I think
it would fall apart on questions of concrete praxis given our different reads
and understanding of what it means to "pressure", or "make
demands on", or "offer critical to" Obama. I think how we
approach issues like combating austerity and the "fiscal cliff" on
an immediate level are illustrative, not only in regards to how we relate to
each other, but how we relate to the Black masses, who voted clearly for 4
more years with no clear demands on Obama, let alone an independent, coherent
program.
This is what I think the next four years will look like as I
stated on Facebook last night.
What we are realistically looking at with Obama's reelection
is four more years of left division, fragmentation, and infighting;
progressives willing to sell the farm to accommodate the alleged
"pragmatic" concessions of the liberals; and liberals advancing a
program of neo-liberal austerity, international regime change, and creative
destruction on a global scale.
This is a rea
lity and an alliance that is at best only going to maintain
the status quo. We can and must do better if we're serious about realizing
self-determination, material and social liberation, and staving off
ecological catastrophe. For those of us who share this understanding and
vision, we are going to have to dig in our heals, get better organized, and
become more determined and focused in organizing people in the millions.
What I hope we can do and do better within this Network, at
the very least, is to continue to debate and discuss these issues and
questions out in a civil manner over the next for yours in the pursuit of
clarity and the ongoing struggle for unity and the rebuilding of the Black
Liberation Movement.
On
Wed, Nov 7, 2012 at 10:16 AM, Kenneth Snodgrass <instruggledrsnod@att.net> wrote:
I
Agreed with SE,
In
Struggle, Development and Unity
Kenny
Internal
change bases External, Qualitative change bring Quantitative, Universal
connection Opposites, Negation of Negation
Kenneth Snodgrass -
Author
of “From Victimization to Empowerment
The Challenge Of
African American Leadership
The Need of Real Power” website: www.trafford.com/07-0913
eBook
available at http://ebookstore.sony.com/search?keyword=Kenneth+Snodgrass
Author of “The World As I’ve
Seen It! My Greatest Experience!”
{ 12 x 12 Photo Book, 76 Pages & Over 205
Photos. By Kenneth Snodgrass }
KennySnod - Has 350
Video’s - over 112,280 hits, 4,400 hits a month @ www.YouTube.com/KennySnod
In
Struggle and Peace, Development, Advancement, and Revolution!
From: S E Anderson
<blackeducator@mac.com>
To: Tony Van Der
Meer <tmenelik@yahoo.com>
Cc: KA <kaliakuno@gmail.com>; Sekou Osei
<sekouche@yahoo.com>; "blackleftunity@googlegroups.com" <blackleftunity@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Wed, November 7,
2012 9:15:59 AM
Subject: Re:
[BlackLeftUnity:5939] The Black Movement is screwed again
Agreed.
•
We got tons of local struggles to build Black Left Unity around.
•
We got a lot of explaining/education to do among the masses of our
people around why we need to push Black Demands on the Obama admin... forcing
him to fiscally address three or four key issues affecting a depressed Black
America.
•
Just like the Occupy Wall Street Movement changed the discourse around
the economic disparities, we- The Black left -need to lead the change in the
discourse around race & racism.
•
We can do this by -in part- work on a broad national two-part Black
Mobilizing Project2013:
(1)
A major militant 50th commemoration of the 1963 March on Washington set
for late August 2013
(2)
Followed by a massive Day Of Absence on Black Solidarity Day on
November 4, 2013
This
kind of organizing work builds unity, helps us weed out the
"ultras"- both Left and Right, and begins to bring back the under
40 generations into the Revolutionary Center.
•
We also have to commemorate the 150th Anniversary of the Emancipation
Proclamation in January 2013. We cannot let the liberals and neoliberals
redefine this historic political move by Lincoln and his capitalist allies to
try to circumvent Southern cessation while maintaining the institution of
slavery. This can be the historical and teachable moment to roll out our
two-part Black Mobilizing Project2013 in major cities across
the US.
And
No, the "Black Movement" did not tail the Democratic Party.
Why?
Because there is no "Black Movement" in 2012. We are currently an
amorphous, disparate, dysfunctional and dispersed group of disunified
organizations and individuals.
Our
task is to rebuild the "Black Movement"
bigger and stronger from this political and social mess- not sit on the
sideline and snit & snipe.
In
Struggle,
Sam
Anderson
qpqpqpqpqpqpqpqpqpqpqpqppqqpqpqpqpqppqpqqp
On
Nov 7, 2012, at 8:03 AM, Tony Van Der Meer wrote:
I
think the question should be "How" do we overcome the
fragmentation? Also how do we relate to the masses of our people to develop
and push a program that forces the state to address?
This
will require that we began to relate to new forces and stop trying to
convince old heads with a headache about making Obama the central question to
unite around. As Mel King said, we have to stop complaining about the dirt on
the floor when we have the broom in our hands. Its time for the black left to
be more positive and collaborative with each other.
Menelik
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