Media Circus when 5 cops die, blaming Black Lives Matter
Media Circus when 5 cops die, blaming Black Lives Matter
No individualism can solve the problems of a social class. It is only in comic books that a super-hero can save the day for the downtrodden. We agree with Trotsky’s 1938 statement “For Grynszpan!,” where Trotsky understands perfectly the motive leading to his solo attack with a handgun to make a symbolic act of reprisal against the Nazis:
“We Marxists consider the tactic of individual terror inexpedient in the tasks of the liberating struggle of the proletariat as well as oppressed nationalities. A single isolated hero cannot replace the masses. But we understand only too clearly the inevitability of such convulsive acts of despair and vengeance. All our emotions, all our sympathies are with the self-sacrificing avengers even though they have been unable to discover the correct road. Our sympathy becomes intensified because Grynszpan is not a political militant but an inexperienced youth, almost a boy, whose only counselor was a feeling of indignation. To tear Grynszpan out of the hands of capitalist justice, which is capable of chopping off his head to further serve capitalist diplomacy, is the elementary, immediate task of the international working class!” – “For Grynszpan”, 1939, Leon Trotsky[1]
Because capitalism requires the oppression of the poor, which in America means the active violent terrorization of the black and brown communities by the state and all its agencies including the police, the FBI and other “intelligence” outfits, the proceeding decline and decay of the capitalist economy promises more violence not less. This means more racist white supremacy not less, more terrorism against women’s health care providers, the LGBT community and immigrant workers, not less. Because there is no mass revolutionary workers party capable of defending the working class by organizing labor and the oppressed to end the system of exploitation, the pressure cooker of the decay and decline has no pressure relief valve that allows the revolution to cook and not burn, and not explode but emerge victorious. Because the pacifist preachers who come out and tell us to turn the other cheek have lost credibility and the years of protests from Oscar Grant’s execution until today have not reined in the blue terror, there is a new level of frustration that inevitably exploded in sniper fire in Dallas.
Capitalism and its enforcers brought Afghan veteran Micah Johnson’s attack down upon the gunmen in blue. Sniping at cops is not a solution that will end police terror, white supremacy or the capitalist system of exploitation. Although we do not agree with this violent tactic we can understand it and place the blame for it squarely on those misleaders of the labor movement and the oppressed who year after year try to draw progressive people and the working class into class collaboration. Class collaboration with the capitalist parties, in particular the Democratic Party which they demand we put our faith in, as well as an absurd faith in the ability of the system to be reformed. From The Nation to New Republic to The Progressive and the Bernie Bots and even the anarchists guided by Noam Chomsky, all the petty-bourgeois forces guide the oppressed and workers into the Hillary campaign. All these voices of the “left” oppose the independent political organization of the working class and thus impede the movement to overthrow the capitalist class, thus perpetuating its violence and in turn the angry and frustrated will be driven to tactics which do not serve the movement. Thus we have the ‘black bloc’ outbursts of window breaking youth and those who will take it one step further and snipe at cops.[2]
Not the Brightest of their bulbs…,
In Texas, several state officials, including Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, lashed out at the group (BLM), directly linking its tone and tactics to the killings. Mr. Patrick acknowledged that the demonstration in Dallas on Thursday night had been peaceful until the gunman struck, but he accused the movement of creating the conditions for what happened. “I do blame former Black Lives Matter protests,” he said.
We defend Black Lives Matter
We defend Black Lives Matter. Conceptually it is a summation of the ideas of the previous high-water mark of development of the civil rights movement before its demobilization in the phony ‘post-racial’ Obama era. We have big reservations about some of the self-proclaimed spokespersons who grandstand to get name-recognition for lives as career Democrats. Probably the highest profile of these is DeRay McKesson, who we see as ‘tomorrow’s Congressman John Lewis today,’ practically setting himself up for arrest in Baton Rouge, filming himself and copywriting the footage and his remarks and story for syndication. Fortunately, there are better and less conspicuous brains in the vanguard of this movement. If it is as yet somewhat heterogeneous, it is not incoherent; there is no particular penchant for running after bourgeois politicians and there is no agreement on class-collaboration of the McKesson variety. That more than 200 were arrested nationally on the 7/9-7/10 weekend of protest reminds us that the civil rights movement may have been put to sleep by many talking heads, but it never did die![3]
The ruling class politicians cannot and have no intention of reining in their terrorist police thugs; so when the response of anti-racist youth is self-organization and protest, the ruling class blames the organizers and youth activists for creating the charged atmosphere! Little do these lawyers realize how they appear, and how their remarks say that it is perfectly normal and acceptable for the police to step up the numbers of summary executions of non-whites.
What this bonehead Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and his ilk cannot get through their thick skulls is that the class exploitation and special oppression that sustains the ruling class and lackeys like himself has maintained a charged atmosphere for 500 years. Chickens always come home to roost. The one difference now is that as the frequency of the state murders increases, the U.S.A. becomes “national Ferguson.”
Robert F. Williams organized self-defense against KKK in North Carolina
The revolutionary road to working class survival!
We expect nothing from the bosses, the racist cops or their courts; just more of the same. Along with the politicians, they are just the operatives of the capitalist-0.1% they all serve! Those institutions exist to keep us down, not protect us! Only the multiracial working class Labor, Black & Brown mass mobilizations, united strike actions, Self-Defense Guards and multi-racial workers’ Tribunals organized by the Labor movement can bring these racist murderers to justice!
To the voices who say we call for violence we say our aim is to prevent it. Given the choice between pacifist acceptance of state violence and armed standoffs with the state or routing the fascists, we’ll always want the standoff and the rout and we’ll let holier people prefer the martyrdom and bloodshed
The CWG stands for uniting all forces that advocate for multi-racial self-defense by the workers and oppressed. We call for ejecting the Police and Prison Guards’ organizations from the Labor Federations. We call for workers assemblies and tribunals that fight for justice and to win safety for our class and all oppressed peoples. We think that convocation of workers assemblies for self-defense is the objective necessity of the moment and must be put on the agenda of the trade union and Black Lives Matter movements. Revolutionary socialists should call for and organize a campaign that moves labor to the forefront of the mobilization for self-defense. Otherwise, when oppressed people defend themselves they will be isolated and shot down again by the COINTELPRO, which we all know was never really dismantled.
We call for all black and brown organizations, Left and Socialist organizations, militant trade unionists, labor unions and the AFL-CIO/Change to Win labor federations and all those who wish to fight the white supremacy of the capitalist system, to organize and build for a national conference to create a national united front self-defense committee to organize labor, black and brown defense against racist terror. Such a committee would unite the resources and strength of our class and the oppressed communities in the best traditions of the labor movement, such as the International Labor Defense that defended the Scottsboro Boys, under the principle that “An Injury to One, is an Injury to All!”
Along with organizing militant, disciplined, and trained labor, black and brown self-defense guards, such a committee could coordinate and build the campaigns that are necessary; the labor political strikes against racist cop terror and the labor/oppressed mobilizations to drive the fascist and white supremacist organizations to ground.
Candle light vigils, police oversight commissions, ‘progressive’ politicians alongside the interfaith religious leaders only serve to keep the community actions limited to the acceptable participation in the very system designed by the capitalists to keep the working class and oppressed communities down.
WE NEED OUR OWN INSTITUTIONS TO ENFORCE JUSTICE
Teamsters Self Defense Guards 1938 that drove the fascist Silver Shirts from the Twin Cities
The working class must never forget Philando Castile, Alton Sterling, Mario Romero, Eric Garner, Oscar Grant, Michael Brown, Sandra Bland….
Remember all victims of racist cop terror!
No faith in the bosses’ courts!
Turn the mobilizations for justice into organizing and mustering to form up Labor Black and Brown Self Defense Guards and tribunals!
Build Labor Black and Brown strike actions to bring murdering racist cops and vigilantes to justice!
Communist Workers Group, 07/11/2016
[1] Leon Trotsky, 1939, “For Grynzpan”
https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1939/xx/grnszpan.htm
[2] New York Times, 07/10/2016, “Black Lives Matter Was Gaining Ground. Then a Sniper Opened Fire”
[3] New York Times, 04/11/2016, “DeRay Mckesson Won’t Be Elected Mayor of Baltimore. So Why Is He Running?”
