this post was submitted on 05 Nov 2024
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Not really the same thing at all. Tara Reade was an individual coming out, risking her reputation to do so, against someone who had a viable chance to acquire immense political power (and who subsequently did so and used it in service of genocide). Someone who also has a detailed past of horrible policies. This is vague "I heard a rumor" language being said about an entire party by an anonymous person on the internet, not even about the PSL candidates running specifically, and for candidates who have zero chance to win the presidency and a party that has virtually no political power thus far. The OP didn't even provide a case against PSL themself. They prompted a case to be made against them. Whether intentional or born from ignorance, this is one of the most common types of rumor-mongering, while trying to avoid having any responsibility put on the person who does it. "I heard that my neighbor Tom eats babies? Is this true? Just want to make sure if I should keep my children away from him."
Like take a step back from this particular issue for a moment and think about the framework of how this is being done. Because even if this is all true and PSL 100% deserves the flack and OP has the best of intentions trying to be a conscientious person, this is also a kind of approach that gets used for dishonest means. This cannot be the best we have for dealing with accountability and consequence, is reactively asking provocative questions on election day and shouting at each other about who is more principled in the face of accusations.
I read quite a bit of it. I must be missing something big for it to make any sense at all as a comparison. One is a national imperialist party, one of two parties who holds power in the world-spanning US empire, and is capable of carrying out genocide (and is doing so right now). One is a grassroots organization with very limited reach and influence. That doesn't change the fact that SA allegations need to be taken seriously, but it does make the timing and nature of allegations different. Also different is the way in which it has been done with this thread. This was not a thread compiling resources and providing sourced information to make a case against PSL for a specific, described purpose. It was a thread asking a leading question and letting the reader fill in the blanks with their imagination. And PSL is not an organization with immense power and a sparkling reputation in the public eye for millions of loyalists, which needs a dose of reality applied to it. It is a (relative to the existing power structures) tiny and struggling organizational effort in the core of the empire. And with it being in the core of the empire, it is especially vulnerable to both infiltration and the various imperialist tendencies in the very population it's trying to recruit membership from. If it is failing to be disciplined on those fronts, it deserves criticism for doing so; from fellow anti-imperialists and communists who are trying to make better happen. But there is a tendency for people to approach this kind of thing with individualist thinking, to view it not as an "us problem" but as a "them problem" and "I'm not part of it because I condemn it and I don't support them." Sexism happens in the most banal, everyday ways in a patriarchal society. The point there is not that it should be seen as normal and ignored—just the opposite if anything—but that, much like being anti-racist, opposing it means more than saying it's bad and saying people who are doing it are bad and should feel bad and you should be mad at them.
At some point, we have to actually develop processes of disciplined accountability. I don't see how anyone would even begin to do such a thing for a party like the democratic party, but it is possible to do so with communist or communist-adjacent orgs. That is one of the differences in comparing. It should be possible to approach this in a way that can get real results in accountability, with organizing efforts like PSL. With a party like the democratic party, it's more a matter of helping people understand how systemically unconscionable they are and how irredeemably captured by imperialist interests and all the oppressive isms tied up in that. It does us no good to apply the same approach to an org that is meant to have the potential to resist the empire, to only treat it as a hopeless endeavor in need of being putting on blast with tactless dismissal if any hint of bad behavior comes out of it. We can't afford to give up on orgs like this as victims of poor leadership.
I don't know if I'm making myself clear or not, but I'm kind of tangentially getting into a pattern that I see with US "left-leaning" orgs and how people talk about them. "This one is bad for this reason, this one is bad for that reason," okay, so what are we doing for alternatives then? Where are we leading people if the only options are bad? Is there no way to root out issues in any of these orgs? Is the only solution to tell people they are bad and to stay away from them? What does that accomplish for organizing?
I mean, I'm pretty sure theres a ton of empire challenging parties that are beyond help and arent worth advocating for. Trotskyist parties obviously. A big lesson people have been learning recently in the CPUSA is that trying to change the org from the inside just has not been working. The complete declawing of the anti-zionist DSA proposal shows that the right will assume power whenever something radical comes along. I'd argue both organizations are controlled resistance simply through the futility in engaging in liberalism and settler politics, CIA inflitration or not.
You could say the same thing about the green party as well. Hell, theyre not even self described socialist, following the party as a guide towards anti-imperial work leads you to doing electoralism without any kind of dual power building or smashing tentacles of imperialism beyond toothless protests.
PSL is largely funded by a few people who have a large say in the party, there's a tendency to burnout, abuse of power, a distinct lack of dual power building, transperancy, and settler cadre and policies to the extent that some native orgs (The Red Nation) see them a lost cause and do not work with them.
Where does that leave us? What's the point of condemning, to say that these parties aren't worth engaging in? In my opinion, "Something else" is a good enough answer. Native ML orgs exist that are doing the community organizing, education, and dual power building that really matters. Black defense groups and mutual aid orgs, hell anarchists feeding their communities and engaging in materially anti-imperialist actions are doing more than our American brand of protests or electoralism could ever bring.
Lastly, who are we organizing? Are we radicalizing, connecting, and orchestrating actions among the actual proletariat of America and its imperialist tentacles? (non-citizens, indigenous, racialized hyper-exploited populations) Or are we organizing the white labor aristocracy, petite bourgeoise, or otherwise settler population and arming them with marxist rhetoric and calling them the vanguard of the hyper exploited?
The fact is, this is America. In America, as long as imperialism produces a labor aristocracy, as long as coputulating to whiteness is in the material interest to the vast majority of this population, the revolution is not coming with just organizing, and certainly not in parties or power structures overwhelming controlled by settlers. The material conditions need to be created. The guide to action is cutting the tentacles of imperialism, building dual power to help the hyper exploited before and after the revolution, and bringing our number one export, suffering, home.
If PSL would rather care about the election of all things more than people feeling unsafe in their org, that's on them. I see the entire effort put towards getting them on the ballot to be fruitless and a waste of cadre time and money, and the wrecker allegations happen no matter what day the SA cases get brought up. Why do so many of you online sound like democrats upset you're not getting the marxist vote you're apparently owed, despite the fact there's literally nothing to gain but a symbolic number go up?
I'm sorry if I sound mad but Marxists should know that this election and this party does not matter as much as having the frank discussion and self-crit on what has happened in the PSL and what good can come from being in the org. What worries me is that not a single response has been "They recognized power abuse in the organization and addressed it and try and prevent it from happening in the future" but instead sweeping it under the rug, handwaving the issue, or saying that these many people were simply lying. If there's anything the election should be it should be an advertisement for the party and its policies, and the reactions to this post is capitalizing on that to say that even just asking if the party is an unsafe place for women and other vulnerable groups you are a "wrecker", it's a bad look for PSL and the Marxism-Leninism they claim to follow.
I was with you more or less until the last couple paragraphs when it turns into reductionist finger-pointing. When you say in one breath that you think PSL's strategy of putting time into elections is a waste and then in another breath, excuse the worst timing possible to bring up an issue like this—one which I seem to be being told has been around for a long time now—it becomes a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy that can help ensure it is wasted time by turning people against them as an org when they'd have the most visibility. As myself and others have said, I don't understand why this is being brought up specifically on election day, instead of bringing it up at a time when people can examine it more closely. I don't actually believe people like you are "wreckers" or something myself, I think that is a weighty thing to throw around without evidence, but I do think you have terrible strategic thinking and are inadvertently helping me understand one of the reasons the "left" struggles to gain traction in the US. Side note: You are the second person in this thread I've seen compare to democrats in a dismissive way, but neither of you have been able to explain what is remotely similar about the circumstances.
I will reiterate what I said here:
And that's precisely the kind of mindset I see espoused in your post. "They suck at being on 'my' side, so who cares if what people say messes with their efforts because their approach is bad and they're corrupt anyway."
You know what is a bad look for us? Being so out of the loop on the organizing efforts in our country (I say "our" assuming you are US-based like myself with how you are talking about this) that we have to ask leading questions on election day about a third party org, as if we just woke up from a coma. Do you really think if we all collectively responded to this thread with, "PSL is bad and here's why, and don't vote for them," that'd make people feel better about "left" efforts in the US? No, they're going to be saying, "Why in the hell did this org manage to get enough traction to even get on the ballots if they're so bad at living the values they claim to believe in? Is this really the best they have to offer?"
I mean, you spoke vaguely of:
But like, why is there not a single one under this magic good kind of communism umbrella that you're naming, that I've heard of. Am I myself out of the loop (should I know The Red Nation well? that's the only org you even named outside of ones you were criticizing). Are these orgs trying to be low profile for strategic reasons or are they just small? Why does this come out sounding so much like "it's only real communism when nobody has heard of it and it has little impact"? And continuing from that...
Is your position that we're going to be waiting on non-white communists to do a revolution and that white communists should sit on their hands? (considering you include the term "settler population"). I'm not asking that as a gotcha, I'm seriously trying to understand here. I understand that we can't blindly have western chauvinists do a socialism and pretend we've done something, but what exactly is the picture of success here? This is a point I've been meaning to ask somebody about anyway, so might as well ask how you view it.
Essentially I believe PSL is not the vanguard because leadership and cadre are largely not proletarian. I don't believe the settler population ought to be twiddling their thumbs, but they need to be led by the proletarian vanguard and PSL is largely led by fellow labor aristocracy and petite bourgeoisie.
I spoke vaguely of orgs because many are localized and focus on their specific communities because they simply do not have mass appeal under settler colonialism. The Black Panthers studied Juche for good reason as they were made up of the community they were trying to liberate. These orgs like Chunka Luta Network are housing and organizing the proletariat, having an active impact in their communities that PSL cannot say the same for.
The "left" in America has problems gaining traction for material reasons. To me it says a lot that this "left" we're referring to when it comes to PSL is not rooted in the communities its saying they are the vanguard of. I can think of a few orgs that are focused on protecting and aiding sensitive hyper exploited communities that have cut ties with PSL over anti-blackness, misogyny, and anti-indigineity (I am not listing them because of the orgs opsec but for my own, as they are local to me). These orgs and communities don't need a labor aristocracy to guide them on action, they're already doing more effective work even among the less theoretically advanced populace due to their material conditions.
There are settlers in these organizations, but they are guided by those with that material interest in liberation. What strikes me as particularly "labor zionist" about PSL is that they say they're speaking for people that have their own organizations, have their own communities, that they are not a part of and don't want them involved in. The theoretically objective analysis of material conditions is used to put the leadership above the people and disconnected from the actual struggling masses, of which the leadership should actively be a part of and not simply "speaking for".
Interesting, thanks for explaining your thoughts on it. In terms of the specific view that "hyper exploited communities that have cut ties with PSL over anti-blackness, misogyny, and anti-indigineity (I am not listing them because of the orgs opsec but for my own, as they are local to me)", I hope you will understand I have to take this with a grain of salt unless there are non-opsec-sensitive examples you can share sources on. I would not want you to put any org in danger just to prove a point to someone on the internet, but also, from my perspective, you can probably understand that simply taking your word for it that "hyper exploited communities have cut ties with PSL [because of prejudicial views/treatment]" is kind of vague as a thing to go on. One of the problems with it being that even if true in X instance, it doesn't say anything about the circumstances surrounding it; whether the treatment came from the top down, or from local PSL branches; what form it took; etc.