Thanks for taking the time to go through it. I don't see it as dismissive. You are definitely not obligated to go through each point I make. The further context gives me the impression that the primary issue here is not with Sakai's writings, but with the way some go about quoting them and using them to prop up what gets called "third worldism". The problem I have with this view (what I see of it through online) is not that it tries to analyze and take into account the nature of imperialism and settler-colonialism, and the impact that has (which is reasonable and important to do). The problem I have with it is the way in which I see it feeding into views revolving around fatalism, pessimism, and mechanistic inevitability.

More specifically, as an example, I take issue with language like this:

IIRC part of his thesis is that the white american worker has an unspoken agreement to be an obedient servant of capital in exchange for a place of privilege in the world. This exists separate from the actions of individuals or even large groups of individuals such as those at Blair Mountain.

I don't know if it is yours in the end or Sakai's but it makes no difference to me the who. The issue I have here is language like "unspoken agreement". This suggests a kind of unconscious treaty between capital and worker at the intersection of racism and colonization, but I've seen no evidence to suggest it is so mechanistic and hidden under the surface. If anything, I'd argue that when this happens, it is a very conscious choice, born of systemic racism and colonial thought, and like in other forms of caste, the betrayal is (for lack of a more marxist way to put it) a little something like the prisoner's dilemma. In that, in a room full of very racist people, if they don't betray the "non-white" people and instead stand in solidarity with them, and few others also do this, this can now isolate them and put them in a worse position than before, while also failing to be enough to properly stand up for the people in the caste below them. Combine this with genuine belief that the people down in caste are "lesser" and they may believe they don't even deserve rights, which motivates them to act for immediate selfish gain at the cost solidarity.

However, this kind of pressure is much more of a reality in the country's past than it is now. Over time, through a combination of hard-won legal protections and cultural pushing, it has somewhat reversed, to where being the openly racist person can damage your career (though the reactionary pushback against being "woke" has damaged it since it has no grounding in a revolutionary vanguard).

I'd further argue that it's not an agreement to be "an obedient servant of capital", rather it is an agreement to get a somewhat better life for themselves in the short-term, which in their minds is a victory over capital's hegemonic control of them. An "agreement to be an obedient servant of capital in exchange for a place of privilege in the world" seems more fitting for talking about US volunteer soldiers or cops.

And lastly, regarding the point of "unspoken", it removes some of the agency from the process and in doing so, the responsibility.

Further language like this concerns me as well:

Achieving worker solidarity that overthrows imperialism means giving up that place of privilege. I’m not going to pretend that isn’t scary to me, comrade. But I have to strive for it.

By framing the issue in this way, it starts sounding more like Christian ideas about sin and temptation, than a marxist analysis of material conditions; like there is this gravitational force drawing you toward bad behavior and you must exercise virtue to resist it, including making sacrifices, in order to overcome.

I think "giving up that place of privilege" is something of a misunderstanding in the first place. I don't think black people not being shot at by cops would be any kind of loss of privilege for me as a white person; in fact, I'd feel safer knowing they aren't shooting at people in general, and I'd feel more at peace in a culture where "whiteness" is a thing of the past. I don't think the people living on Turtle Island need to go into destitution or something in order to cease being imperialist. The geography of it is plenty capable of being self-sustaining. The process of transition won't always be pretty, but that's the case for anywhere in the world that needs to transition to a different system. In a post-imperial world, the majority of bumpiness for Turtle Island would probably be owed to all the outsourcing of industry and the time it takes to build that back; but this could be supplemented in the interim with friendly trade deals that are based in fairness rather than predation.