Thankfully, the PSL is not deluded enough to be engaging in “revolutionary electoralism.” Their candidacy is viewed firstly as a party-building effort (rather than a direct path to proletarian power) and secondly as a mechanism for heightening the contradictions inherent to bourgeois democracy: that the Republicans and Democrats worked together to kick them off the ballot in swing states – Pennsylvania and Georgia – serves to underscore the futility of bourgeois democracy and prime the public for a proletarian alternative.
As a back-of-the-envelope calculation? When at least a third of the populace, and half of the military ranks, have enthusiastically endorsed socialism over capitalism. There are no shortcuts. Jumping straight to firebombing a military base is adventurism.
Half the US military? We’re talking about the same fascist military that either committed or supported the largest atrocities in modern history? The Amerikkkan military that is on the ground, right now, protecting a genocide in order to create a pretext to invade Iran? The Amerikkkan military that is currently trying to provoke a nuclear war with Russia?
Not in the next one hundred years will half your military and 30% of your population stop being nazis. That will never happen before you either 1) decay and collapse into civil war, 2) get everyone else killed, 3) force the rest of the world to destroy you, or 4) the earth becomes uninhabitable. Amerikkka is an imperialist colonial project that should not exist. You cannot reform it. If you care about the rest of the world, you should be burning your fascist empire to the ground to give the rest of us some breathing room and let occupied countries burn your military bases for you.
Ok. I’d love for you to walk us through your analysis of how doing that could be organized and carried out, and then what the likely responses would be. Otherwise, you’re just an armchair revolutionary advocating for people to be either killed or spend their lives in prison for… what, exactly?
I’ve met many a soldier who upon leaving service becomes horrified at the realization of what they have done. They can become potent forces for change or just propaganda. Even the most irritating centrist doesn’t scoff at military service; something that us leftists are pretty much unique for. If you don’t see how that has it’s own uses…not really sure what else to say.
Most people going into service have three options. Be a shithead and drop out in basic. Internalize and consume every piece of propaganda or try their best to maintain their humanity, dignity and morals in an environment designed to break those and mold them into something else. It’s no wonder that until they get out most of them don’t realize what they’ve done. Does this excuse them? No. Most of them are too far gone. However, we have ex-military here on Hexbear and Lemmygrad. Plenty of people have no idea what communism is at 18; conveniently another option to take is either extremely expensive education, wage-slave, or join the service…to which then you are under contract.
The military recruits poor and hungry as a tactic. Afterwards, a good chunk of them shoot themselves. Most of them are ticking time-bombs ready to go. A lot of analysis of what they’ve done, theory to help understand why and actual emotional appeal can turn them into sympathetic, military-trained comrades. Once again…if you don’t see how that his it’s own uses…
A lot of the organizing I’ve done has been with ex-military. I’ve heard some horrible fucking shit. I raise a question to you though, what do you think Lenin felt when ex-Whites joined the revolutionary cause? It’s something I’ve asked myself a lot.
I raise a question to you though, what do you think Lenin felt when ex-Whites joined the revolutionary cause?
It’s hard to think of a successful revolution that didn’t have at least some former members of the group they were fighting against. It’s a political struggle, which means changing people’s minds. You have to have some means of letting people who change their minds into your movement, or your movement will stay perpetually small and never accomplish anything.
There’s also a major contradiction between the “all amerikkkan troops are irredeemable” thread of leftist thinking and the thread along the lines of “people who commit serious crimes can change, your brain doesn’t even fully develop until your mid 20s.” You can’t on one hand say a guy who did a violent crime at 18 and who sincerely attempts to turn his life around at 25 is reformable, then on the other hand say joining the military at 18 is some indelible sin. Either people who do bad things can change, or they can’t.
This is a flippant comment, but let me try a serious response.
If you want to start an armed struggle, you need people who are willing to die in that struggle. You need people you can trust to not immediately get everyone around them killed. You need money, you need equipment, you need an organization that people will trust with their lives. You need a strategic plan (what is your end goal, what are the steps between it and attacking some base), you need a million different tactical plans (which base? how are you going to get into it?). You need a high degree of agreement among your members on all of the above.
All this doesn’t materialize out of the ether. It comes when you have sufficiently desperate people try peaceful change first only to discover it doesn’t work. Then the people and organizations that were radicalized by the crackdown on peaceful attempts have at least the start of all those things you need for an armed struggle. There’s no shortcut for this.
Thankfully, the PSL is not deluded enough to be engaging in “revolutionary electoralism.” Their candidacy is viewed firstly as a party-building effort (rather than a direct path to proletarian power) and secondly as a mechanism for heightening the contradictions inherent to bourgeois democracy: that the Republicans and Democrats worked together to kick them off the ballot in swing states – Pennsylvania and Georgia – serves to underscore the futility of bourgeois democracy and prime the public for a proletarian alternative.
So how many more contradictions until you burn down a military base? Asking for a friend.
As a back-of-the-envelope calculation? When at least a third of the populace, and half of the military ranks, have enthusiastically endorsed socialism over capitalism. There are no shortcuts. Jumping straight to firebombing a military base is adventurism.
Half the US military? We’re talking about the same fascist military that either committed or supported the largest atrocities in modern history? The Amerikkkan military that is on the ground, right now, protecting a genocide in order to create a pretext to invade Iran? The Amerikkkan military that is currently trying to provoke a nuclear war with Russia?
Not in the next one hundred years will half your military and 30% of your population stop being nazis. That will never happen before you either 1) decay and collapse into civil war, 2) get everyone else killed, 3) force the rest of the world to destroy you, or 4) the earth becomes uninhabitable. Amerikkka is an imperialist colonial project that should not exist. You cannot reform it. If you care about the rest of the world, you should be burning your fascist empire to the ground to give the rest of us some breathing room and let occupied countries burn your military bases for you.
Ok. I’d love for you to walk us through your analysis of how doing that could be organized and carried out, and then what the likely responses would be. Otherwise, you’re just an armchair revolutionary advocating for people to be either killed or spend their lives in prison for… what, exactly?
Yes. Aaron Bushnell was service.
I’ve met many a soldier who upon leaving service becomes horrified at the realization of what they have done. They can become potent forces for change or just propaganda. Even the most irritating centrist doesn’t scoff at military service; something that us leftists are pretty much unique for. If you don’t see how that has it’s own uses…not really sure what else to say.
Most people going into service have three options. Be a shithead and drop out in basic. Internalize and consume every piece of propaganda or try their best to maintain their humanity, dignity and morals in an environment designed to break those and mold them into something else. It’s no wonder that until they get out most of them don’t realize what they’ve done. Does this excuse them? No. Most of them are too far gone. However, we have ex-military here on Hexbear and Lemmygrad. Plenty of people have no idea what communism is at 18; conveniently another option to take is either extremely expensive education, wage-slave, or join the service…to which then you are under contract.
The military recruits poor and hungry as a tactic. Afterwards, a good chunk of them shoot themselves. Most of them are ticking time-bombs ready to go. A lot of analysis of what they’ve done, theory to help understand why and actual emotional appeal can turn them into sympathetic, military-trained comrades. Once again…if you don’t see how that his it’s own uses…
A lot of the organizing I’ve done has been with ex-military. I’ve heard some horrible fucking shit. I raise a question to you though, what do you think Lenin felt when ex-Whites joined the revolutionary cause? It’s something I’ve asked myself a lot.
It’s hard to think of a successful revolution that didn’t have at least some former members of the group they were fighting against. It’s a political struggle, which means changing people’s minds. You have to have some means of letting people who change their minds into your movement, or your movement will stay perpetually small and never accomplish anything.
There’s also a major contradiction between the “all amerikkkan troops are irredeemable” thread of leftist thinking and the thread along the lines of “people who commit serious crimes can change, your brain doesn’t even fully develop until your mid 20s.” You can’t on one hand say a guy who did a violent crime at 18 and who sincerely attempts to turn his life around at 25 is reformable, then on the other hand say joining the military at 18 is some indelible sin. Either people who do bad things can change, or they can’t.
This is a flippant comment, but let me try a serious response.
If you want to start an armed struggle, you need people who are willing to die in that struggle. You need people you can trust to not immediately get everyone around them killed. You need money, you need equipment, you need an organization that people will trust with their lives. You need a strategic plan (what is your end goal, what are the steps between it and attacking some base), you need a million different tactical plans (which base? how are you going to get into it?). You need a high degree of agreement among your members on all of the above.
All this doesn’t materialize out of the ether. It comes when you have sufficiently desperate people try peaceful change first only to discover it doesn’t work. Then the people and organizations that were radicalized by the crackdown on peaceful attempts have at least the start of all those things you need for an armed struggle. There’s no shortcut for this.