This week we are witnessing mass protests taking place all over the world. The sight of seeing so many people expressing their outrage against the system of oppression is inspiring, but for those of us who want much more than an emotional lift, we have to ask the question; what's next? Its a critical question for all who know history. Mass demonstrations are nothing new, especially for the African masses. Just looking at the United States, our existence here has always been about resistance and fighting for our very dignity as human beings. We have been forced to shed blood here just to send our children to racist schools, live in decent housing, and sit down in a nasty department store to have a disgusting cup of coffee. That's our history and such history explains why we have come to this place today where we have to hit the streets in mass just to bring attention to obvious and continuous acts of police terrorism against our people. And the response to all of this is beautiful. Young and old. African. Proud. Determined. And, many other non Africans are out in the streets as well. This is clearly a very beautiful thing, but we mustn't make the error of underestimating the capitalist system. This is a police state. It always has been. Since reconstruction in the late 1800s when police departments were formed out of slave catcher posses, the system was set up to corral and repress African people. So, its important to understand that although we may be excited and emotionally overwhelmed by seeing people out shouting against the system, the system itself is prepared for this response. They have a political and military infrastructure that is trained to respond to these protests in every form imaginable. They regularly sit down to discuss how to respond to these protests the way you discuss what you are doing this weekend. They know that for most people in the streets, its mostly about letting off steam so a few hours, days, even weeks, they can tolerate that. They can tolerate streets being shutdown for a few hours. They can tolerate freeways being closed for a few hours. They can tolerate losing millions of dollars from those who refused to spend money yesterday. I would even be willing to bet that they factor in the losses in how they price their products. What's important to understand about the capitalist system is it's built like that long distance runner from Ethiopia, Kenya, or Djibouti. Their system is designed to weather uprisings and keep going. That's why as we sit here on Saturday morning, the day after Black Friday, we saw possibly hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions of people, demonstrate some level of support for resistance yesterday (in many different forms), yet today, it's business as usual in the capitalist system. And on Monday, most everyone will be back to their wage slave jobs, exploited for their labor, and police will continue shooting us down as if yesterday never happened.
So what's next? How do we expand beyond this repeated scenario where the people get upset, show mass protest, sometimes even evolving into a full blown slave uprising, only to have the national guard come out and restore capitalist order in a few short days and weeks? One thing is clear. We certainly cannot expect to defeat an organized enemy in power with only raw emotion. The street mobilizations are magnificent, but that is merely the initial phase of the struggle. The next steps are we have to engage the people who come to these protests and create a culture where we encourage them to stay engaged. I would boldly suggest that 75 to 80% of the people participating in the streets yesterday have no consistent method of expressing their energies towards this work, meaning they are not involved in organizational work. They just respond to calls to show up somewhere and protest. Its great they are there, but if we don't build bridges to plug those people in on a permanent basis, then once the street is cleared, then its to the bar/restaurant, and capitalism as usual. We have to build our street protests into a broader movement. An example is the Cuban revolution. They had massive street protests. In fact, they shut cities like Havana and Santiago down. Students were in the streets, women, elderly people, workers. Production stopped. Garbage wasn't picked up. Schools closed down. And, eventually, police refused to confront the protesters and actually began joining sides with the revolutionary forces. This didn't happen just organically though. There was constant work done by the mass organizations to organize all of those sectors of society in this direction, but that was because they had a clear focus on their mission on all levels. We have to develop that today. Movements are always about broad issues. So you have to understand that everyone isn't going to agree and this isn't a problem. The strength of movements is when organizers are savvy enough to create a vision that all can agree on, despite their specific focuses. A vision that reformists, socialists, nationalists, and anarchists all can agree on. Shutting the system down permanently because it doesn't work for the majority of people within it is an example of an inclusive vision. Then, having an organizational apparatus that can work with communities to supply for people's needs since the system won't be operational. This is a smart approach because by supplying for people's needs, you win their support, even if they are not in the streets initially.
This type of work is by and large not taking place because that overall focus isn't there. Far too much of this glorious movement is centered around personalities and not the mission. This has to change if we are going to win. And, the way it changes is we have to get more and more people involved and engaged and we have to develop an analysis of this system so that there is clear messaging to the masses. These things all sound like overwhelming levels of unattainable work, but we can accomplish much of this with just a little bit of organizing. Just making a commitment to get more people involved. Have a component where European people are encouraged to organize among their people. They are the most likely ones to stand in our way since they are programmed to be the protectors of the capitalist system so it makes sense to have people engaging them, door to door, etc., to help them understand what's going on while directing them to the right side of history. Promote that people need to be in organizations working to do this work. There should be a call for people to join organizations at every rally, and it should be repeated often. Organizations should be invited to come and participate and only organizations should be speaking to the masses to support the message of the mission not the individual. This approach will help create a culture where its no longer acceptable and cool to yell for four hours and then go see a movie and suffer under capitalism until the next Face Book invitation. We should have mass organizational summits where groups can get together and come up with collective agendas. These are not difficult things to do. Some of us are already doing them. We have a Local Organizing Committee here in Portland, Oregon that consists of several organizations and we are doing the type of work I'm describing here. Just last Saturday, we did work in the focus community we are doing our work in. This type of approach is needed everywhere.
So, great job to everyone who was out in the streets yesterday. Great job to everyone who didn't buy anything yesterday. Great job to everyone who thought about resistance yesterday. Our enemy doesn't oppress just some of the time though. If we are going to win, we are going to have to step up our game. Think about the issues raised here and if you cannot dispute the legitimacy of these ideas, figure out ways to include them in your communities. The protests are just the first part. The real work requires much more of a focus and commitment and we won't advance to the next level until we are ready to accept that and work towards that end.
So what's next? How do we expand beyond this repeated scenario where the people get upset, show mass protest, sometimes even evolving into a full blown slave uprising, only to have the national guard come out and restore capitalist order in a few short days and weeks? One thing is clear. We certainly cannot expect to defeat an organized enemy in power with only raw emotion. The street mobilizations are magnificent, but that is merely the initial phase of the struggle. The next steps are we have to engage the people who come to these protests and create a culture where we encourage them to stay engaged. I would boldly suggest that 75 to 80% of the people participating in the streets yesterday have no consistent method of expressing their energies towards this work, meaning they are not involved in organizational work. They just respond to calls to show up somewhere and protest. Its great they are there, but if we don't build bridges to plug those people in on a permanent basis, then once the street is cleared, then its to the bar/restaurant, and capitalism as usual. We have to build our street protests into a broader movement. An example is the Cuban revolution. They had massive street protests. In fact, they shut cities like Havana and Santiago down. Students were in the streets, women, elderly people, workers. Production stopped. Garbage wasn't picked up. Schools closed down. And, eventually, police refused to confront the protesters and actually began joining sides with the revolutionary forces. This didn't happen just organically though. There was constant work done by the mass organizations to organize all of those sectors of society in this direction, but that was because they had a clear focus on their mission on all levels. We have to develop that today. Movements are always about broad issues. So you have to understand that everyone isn't going to agree and this isn't a problem. The strength of movements is when organizers are savvy enough to create a vision that all can agree on, despite their specific focuses. A vision that reformists, socialists, nationalists, and anarchists all can agree on. Shutting the system down permanently because it doesn't work for the majority of people within it is an example of an inclusive vision. Then, having an organizational apparatus that can work with communities to supply for people's needs since the system won't be operational. This is a smart approach because by supplying for people's needs, you win their support, even if they are not in the streets initially.
This type of work is by and large not taking place because that overall focus isn't there. Far too much of this glorious movement is centered around personalities and not the mission. This has to change if we are going to win. And, the way it changes is we have to get more and more people involved and engaged and we have to develop an analysis of this system so that there is clear messaging to the masses. These things all sound like overwhelming levels of unattainable work, but we can accomplish much of this with just a little bit of organizing. Just making a commitment to get more people involved. Have a component where European people are encouraged to organize among their people. They are the most likely ones to stand in our way since they are programmed to be the protectors of the capitalist system so it makes sense to have people engaging them, door to door, etc., to help them understand what's going on while directing them to the right side of history. Promote that people need to be in organizations working to do this work. There should be a call for people to join organizations at every rally, and it should be repeated often. Organizations should be invited to come and participate and only organizations should be speaking to the masses to support the message of the mission not the individual. This approach will help create a culture where its no longer acceptable and cool to yell for four hours and then go see a movie and suffer under capitalism until the next Face Book invitation. We should have mass organizational summits where groups can get together and come up with collective agendas. These are not difficult things to do. Some of us are already doing them. We have a Local Organizing Committee here in Portland, Oregon that consists of several organizations and we are doing the type of work I'm describing here. Just last Saturday, we did work in the focus community we are doing our work in. This type of approach is needed everywhere.
So, great job to everyone who was out in the streets yesterday. Great job to everyone who didn't buy anything yesterday. Great job to everyone who thought about resistance yesterday. Our enemy doesn't oppress just some of the time though. If we are going to win, we are going to have to step up our game. Think about the issues raised here and if you cannot dispute the legitimacy of these ideas, figure out ways to include them in your communities. The protests are just the first part. The real work requires much more of a focus and commitment and we won't advance to the next level until we are ready to accept that and work towards that end.
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