News

Commemorating Black August

on August 31, 2021

Comrades,

We’d like to end the month of August by commemorating Black August, which honors the fallen freedom fighters of the Black Liberation Movement, and to call for the release of all political prisoners, abolition of all prisons, and to continue to build power for Black liberation.

Exactly 50 years ago on August 21, political prisoner George Jackson was assassinated by prison guards during a prisoner rebellion, which was a devastating loss to the movement. A year prior, his brother, Jonathan Jackson, led an armed attack as an act of resistance at the Marin County Courthouse to demand the release of his brother and two other prisoners. George Jackson was a field marshal of the Black Panther Party while incarcerated in San Quentin State Prison and was convicted of armed robbery 10 years prior to a term of “1-to-life”, nominally for robbing $70 from a gas station.

While the reasoning for his assassination was contested, it was clear from the beginning that this was a coordinated political attack. Novelist and activist James Baldwin famously wrote, “no Black person will ever believe that George Jackson died the way they tell us he did.”

With the commemoration of Black August expanding over the years, many observe it by wearing black armbands and reflecting on other struggles and milestones in the fight for liberation: the Nat Turner Rebellion, the Fugitive Slave Law Convention, the founding of the Underground Railroad, Emancipation of Caribbean Islands, the March on Washington, and the births of Marcus Garvey and Fred Hampton as well as the deaths of the Jackson brothers.

As abolitionists, we honor George Jackson and other political prisoners’ legacies as not only a symbol of resistance to the violent prison industrial complex, but to also recognize the overall importance of fighting against the white supremacist capitalist system, which hinders our journey towards liberation, on all fronts. We must also learn from the revolutionaries that are no longer with us on Earth while fighting for those held captive indefinitely, such as Mumia Abu-Jamal and many more.

Until all political prisoners are free, we will keep working to dismantle systemic racism and all of the other oppressive structures that uphold capitalism. If we can struggle together, we can win.

“They have learned that resistance is actually possible. The holds are beginning to slip away.” —George Jackson

Solidarity,

DSA SF Communications Committee

Join DSA Today!

Upcoming Events

? Wednesday, 9/1 (6:30 p.m.): Intro to DSA (Zoom)

? Friday, 9/3 (7:00 p.m.): Tenant Solidarity Documentary Screening (Zoom)

? Wednesday, 9/8 (6:45 p.m.): September Chapter Meeting (Zoom)

? Saturday, 9/18 (3:00 p.m.): Conflict in China: 1949 to Now panel discussion (Zoom)

For more events, click here.

Regular Chapter Meeting

Mark your calendars – the next regular DSA SF chapter meeting is Wednesday, September 8 at 6:45 p.m.!  Be sure to RSVP for the meeting here.

Announcements

Join the Black Liberation/Indigenous Sovereignty Priority Campaign!

Calling all comrades: Black Liberation/Indigenous Sovereignty Priority Leadership are searching for comrades interested in joining our Priority Campaign.
This work needs a variety of hands on deck!

We are currently looking for comrades to join us as:

  • Liaisons to the Labor, Electoral, Ecosoc, Justice, and AfroSOC committees.
  • Members of our political education crew, which is searching for comrades interested in political education work around anti-oppression, racial capitalism, Indigenous sovereignty, abolition training, and other related areas. The political education crew will work on building a curriculum, planning educational events, and incorporating Black liberation/Indigenous sovereignty into our chapter materials (Points of Unity, zines, Intro to DSA/socialism, etc).
  • DSA SF representatives to the DefundSFPDNow Campaign and the No New SF Jail Coalition

Are you more of an admin guru? Join us as a mobilizer and help us create a BLIS onboarding plan for our chapter and curate a calendar of events! Interested comrades should reach out to blis@dsasf.org and make sure to join our Slack channel #priority-black-liberation-indigenous-sovereignty

Intro to DSA is tomorrow!


Come learn what DSA is doing to build the socialist movement in San Francisco! Tomorrow, September 1 at 6:30 p.m. on Zoom, there will be an introduction to the mission of DSA, the socialist project, and what our organizers are doing locally. Join us and bring your questions and a friend! Register here.

Electoral Board Update: Join a Ballot Measure Committee!

The Electoral board wants you to get involved with a committee! We need people who are interested in fundraising, research, and outreach to help get our project off the ground. Committees are beginning to meet separately from the board as a whole – fill out a form and someone will tell you when the next one is.

The outreach committee will be meeting this Wednesday, September 1 at 6:00 p.m.Meeting details are on the internal calendar.

Conflict in China Panel: 1949 to Now

Join the Education Committee on Zoom on Saturday, September 18 at 3:00 p.m. for a panel discussion on the social and political conflicts that have driven China’s history since the 1949 Revolution to develop a stronger understanding of China today. Speakers will be from China, Europe, and the US, covering labor and feminist struggles in China since 1949, political developments, and the contemporary situation. Register for the event here!

Fill out the survey about our future office garden!

The DSA SF Ecosocialist Committee is working with two awesome high school seniors who are dedicating their senior project to setting up our office’s *brand new garden space.* Your opinions will be the basis of how this project will be structured and how it will operate. Please provide input here!

News

Solidarity with the people of Afghanistan 🌹

on August 24, 2021
DSA SF

Dear comrades,

Despite the media telling us the US military had been in Afghanistan to help the Afghan people, we know that’s not the case – the Afghan people have long suffered under US violence, and will now continue to suffer under the Taliban. The 20-year occupation – and the decades of interference and manipulation that preceded it – was profitable for weapons manufacturers, private military contractors and investors, and world banks, all at the grievous expense of Afghan lives and livelihoods.

That is why, as socialists, we must not only condemn US militarism, but also occupations, interference in foreign affairs, sanctions, and other unjust humanitarian practices. We must stand firmly in solidarity with the people of Afghanistan and call for an end to the Global War on Terror. We must also accept all refugees resulting from previous and current acts of war.

Read more in the latest statement by the DSA International Committee.

Please join us this Saturday, August 28 at 2:00 p.m. at Union Square, where we will make these demands and show our solidarity with the Afghan people. We hope you can join us!

Solidarity,

DSA SF Communications Committee

Join DSA Today!

Upcoming Events

? Wednesday, 8/25 (6:30 p.m.): Everything You Wanted to Know About Lenin But Were Afraid to Ask (Zoom)

? Thursday, 8/26 (7:00 p.m.): Introduction to the International Solidarity Organizing Committee (Zoom)

? Saturday, 8/28 (2:00 p.m.): Stop Killing Afghans Protest (in person at Union Square)

? Monday, 8/30 (6:00 p.m.): Ecosocialist Book Club: Dina Gilio-Whitaker’s As Long as Grass Grows (Zoom)

? Friday, 9/3 (7:00 p.m.): Tenant Solidarity Documentary Screening (Zoom)

? Wednesday, 9/8 (6:45 p.m.): September Chapter Meeting (Zoom)

For more events, click here.

Chapter Accessibility

As part of its plan of work this year, the Steering Committee identified accessibility as a long-standing chapter need. For accessibility concerns and accommodation requests, or if you would like to join the Chapter Accessibility Task Force to help us implement a chapter survey and accessibility guidelines, please email steering@dsasf.org.

Regular Chapter Meeting

Mark your calendars – the next regular DSA SF chapter meeting is Wednesday, September 8 at 6:45 p.m.!  Be sure to RSVP for the meeting here.

Announcements

Introduction to the International Solidarity Organizing Committee

Join the International Solidarity Organizing Committee (ISOC) for their first Zoom meeting this Thursday, August 26, at 7:00 p.m. to learn how you can get involved in international solidarity work. You’ll hear from the internal education, chapter mobilization, and external outreach leads on what they’re planning, and they’ll be having a discussion on the current situation in Afghanistan. Register here!

Fill out the survey about our future office garden!


The DSA SF Ecosocialist Committee is working with two awesome high school seniors who are dedicating their senior project to setting up our office’s *brand new garden space.* Your opinions will be the basis of how this project will be structured and how it will operate. Please provide input here!

Education

Everything You Wanted to Know About Lenin But Were Afraid to Ask


Join the Education Committee on Zoom on Wednesday, August 25 at 6:30 p.m. for an interactive discussion of the ideas and classic texts of Lenin. It’s perfect for newcomers, but also a great way to dig deeper into Lenin’s crucial contribution to socialism, Marxism, and why he remains an important touchpoint for us today. Register here!  

Ecosocialist Book Club: Dina Gilio-Whitaker’s As Long as Grass Grows


Join the DSA SF Ecosocialist Committee’s book club biweekly on Mondays in August! The last session is on August 30 at 6:00 p.m.. We’re reading and discussing Dina Gilio-Whitaker’s As Long as Grass Grows: The Indigenous Fight for Environmental Justice, from Colonization to Standing Rock. Open to all! Register now using the link here.

Update from Dean Preston’s Office

Have an idea or want to schedule a meeting with your caucus or committee with Dean’s office? Write either PrestonStaff@sfgov.org or lexvonklark@gmail.com with details, mention you’re with DSA, and we’ll schedule a day!

Free MUNI For All Youth Begins

This Sunday, August 15, household income limits were eliminated for the Free Muni for Youth program. Fares for all youth 18 years and under are totally free! No application or proof of payment/Clipper card is required to ride Muni vehicles with the exception of Cable Cars – simply get on and ride. Thanks to everyone who worked tirelessly to make this happen. As the first universal (i.e. non-means tested) free fare program in San Francisco, this marks a major milestone in our campaign for Free Muni!

Proof of Vaccine Required for Entry to SF Restaurants and Bars

As of August 20, proof of vaccination is now required for all patrons of SF bars, restaurants, clubs, gyms, and large indoor events. This Health Order update does not apply to those ineligible for vaccinations, like those under age 12. You can not use a self-attestation of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test. You must have proof that you are vaccinated. “Full Vaccination” means two weeks after your final dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. You can show your Vaccination Record Card (CRC) from the CDC, show an image of the card (if you have a picture on your phone), or use a digital COVID-19 vaccine record issued by the State of California. You can also use an approved private app to verify your vaccination status.

How are we doing?

Let us know how we can better communicate with the chapter. Submit your feedback about DSA SF communications, including newsletters, social media posts, or anything else published by the chapter. All feedback will be read and discussed by the Comms Committee.

News

DSA SF Moves Forward to Push For International Solidarity

on August 17, 2021

Comrades,

The chapter has been busy! At the August regular meeting, priority campaign leaders reported on what they’ve been working on, such as establishing subcommittees for the ballot measure campaign and presenting a plan of work for the next year to build a true multicultural working class. We also recently had an election to choose three leads for the International Solidarity Education and Mass Action campaign. Congrats to Mícheál M (International Education Lead), Bert K (External Outreach Lead), and Savannah K (Chapter Mobilization Lead) for getting elected to spearhead this effort!

Also, in case you missed it, we recently put out two explainers on the following topics: Israel-Palestine and the US Police State and Capitalism is An Engine, and We Are the Fuel.

More work from the chapter is underway – read on for more information and ways you can get involved!

In solidarity,

DSA SF Communications Committee

Join DSA Today!

Upcoming Events

? Thursday, 8/20 (7:00 p.m.): Tenant Solidarity Documentary Screening: Homeless First and Couper was Here (Zoom)

? Monday, 8/30 (6:00 p.m.): Ecosocialist Book Club: Dina Gilio-Whitaker’s As Long as Grass Grows (Zoom)

? Wednesday, 9/1 (6:30 p.m.): Introduction to DSA (Zoom TBD)

? Friday, 9/3 (7:00 p.m.): Tenant Solidarity Documentary Screening (Zoom)

? Wednesday, 9/8 (6:45 p.m.): September Chapter Meeting (Zoom)

For more events, click here.

Regular Chapter Meeting

Mark your calendars – the next regular DSA SF chapter meeting is Wednesday, September 8 at 6:45 p.m.!  Be sure to RSVP for the meeting here.

Announcements

Join Tenant Solidarity for two upcoming documentary screenings!


The next two Tenant Solidarity Working Group and East Bay SHOP documentary screenings are coming up! The next one is this Friday, August 20 on Zoom at 7:00 p.m., with a double feature: “Homeless First” and “Couper Was Here.” We will be joined by DSA SF Homelessness Working Group members, who will talk about distribution of N95 masks, KN95 masks, and DIY air purifiers in preparation for fire season, and will also answer questions about their work with Hotels Not Hospitals and Common Humanity Collective.

Then, on Friday, September 3 on Zoom at 7:00 p.m., come enjoy a night of five short films followed by a panel to answer questions afterwards. Register for both documentary screenings here!

Join our Ballot Measure Campaign subcommittees!


The Electoral Board is looking for members to join our Ballot Campaign Subcommittees! We want members who are interested in fundraising, outreach, and research to help us get this campaign off the ground. Fill out our forms if you are interested and we will reach out to you and get you involved!

Fundraising team: https://dev.dsasf.org/Fundraising-SignUp
Research team: https://dev.dsasf.org/Research-SignUp
Outreach team: https://dev.dsasf.org/Outreach-SignUp

Reading Groups

Ecosocialist Book Club: Dina Gilio-Whitaker’s As Long as Grass Grows

Join the DSA SF Ecosocialist Committee’s book club biweekly on Mondays in August! The last session is on August 30 at 6:00 p.m.. We’re reading and discussing Dina Gilio-Whitaker’s As Long as Grass Grows: The Indigenous Fight for Environmental Justice, from Colonization to Standing Rock. Open to all! Register now using the link here.
Education

Debate: How to Relate to the Democratic Party

on August 12, 2021

By Ann Robertson

The reason we have arrived at different conclusions about how to relate to the DP stems from the fact that we are operating in fundamentally different frameworks. Our side does not start with the category of the left but with the working class. We do not believe that capitalism can be reformed; it must be abolished because it is based on the exploitation of the working class by the capitalist class. Capitalism contains a fundamentally perverse logic: in order for capitalists to survive competition, they must keep wages and benefits low. We believe that only the working class can abolish capitalism because capitalism cannot survive one day unless workers are willing to go to work and take orders. When we are atomized we have no power; when we are organized, we have all the power.

I want to begin with some history. Back in 1976 Michael Harrington, one of DSA’s founders, debated Peter Camejo on the very issue that we are debating today: should we be participating in the Democratic Party by supporting Democratic Party candidates. Peter Camejo argued forcefully that we should not. Michael Harrington, of course, was on the other side and presented the classic lesser evil argument: While the Democrat Jimmy Carter had his flaws, Harrington argued, he was certainly better than the Republican Ford. Let me quote Harrington: “If Ford wins, do you think the trade union movement is going to become more militant? … Don’t you understand that defeat demoralizes people? Defeat convinces people that you can’t beat city hall. If Ford wins, it will be understood by every political person in the United States and the world as a move to the right and people will act accordingly.”

But here are how things played out after Carter won the election. He immediately executed an about-face from his campaign rhetoric and embraced the neoliberal agenda. He cut corporate taxes, cut spending on social services that the working class depends on, raised defense spending, started deregulating key industries, including finance, signed into law the Hyde amendment, which barred using Medicaid funds for abortions, and invoked Taft-Hartley on striking miners, who responded in this way : They defied the injunction, they stayed out on strike, and they said: “Taft can mine it, Hartley can haul it, and Carter can shove it.” 

Four years later, when Reagan challenged Carter for the presidency, Reagan asked this simple question of the American public: Are you better off now than you were four years ago? And the American working class answered no. Fourteen percent fewer union households voted for Carter in his race against Reagan than voted for Carter four years earlier in his race against Ford. The American working class was worse off, and Carter lost his bid for a second term. 

This trend has been continuing ever since. The position of the working class has been in a constant state of decline.

Here is how Robert Reich, life-long Democrat and Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration, has described the role of the Democratic Party:

“It was the Democrats’ embrace of neoliberalism that won it for Trump.”

 “Democrats have occupied the White House for 16 of the last 24 years, and for four of those years had control of both houses of Congress. But in that time they failed to reverse the decline in working-class wages and economic security….

“They stood by as corporations hammered trade unions, the backbone of the white working class – failing to reform labor laws to impose meaningful penalties on companies that violate them, or help workers form unions with simple up-or-down votes.”

We can entirely agree with Harrington when he argues that defeat demoralizes people?” Yes, it is demoralizing when the Republicans win and undermine the working class. And we can even grant that the Democrats are better than the Republicans. But it is even more demoralizing when the Democrats – the so-called friends of labor – win and again we are worse off afterwards. This is what we have been witnessing for decades, and this is what the lesser evil strategy has gotten us.

There is a second argument in support of running DSA candidates on the DP ballot line while criticizing the DP. I strongly disagree. This approach harms us more than it helps:

1. Our working-class power is derived first and foremost from organizing ourselves and putting up a collective fight for our interests, not from voting people into office while we remain atomized. The civil rights legislation got passed because of massive demonstrations, not by electing people to office. The huge worker upsurge in the 30s was responsible for us winning the right to organize and social security. 

2. Elections will not by themselves create working-class power, but by running as socialists we can use them to educate people about how capitalism is not in the interests of the working class, how it is destroying the planet, making it unfit for human life and all life, how the DP is corrupt, and how it is a capitalist party that is first and foremost aimed at creating conditions favorable for capitalists to make profits. But when we run on the DP ballot line as Democrats, we undermine our critiques and make ourselves look like hypocrites by denouncing Democrats while running as one. And we are implicitly sending a message to the working class that we do not have confidence they, alone, can rise up and lead a revolution.

3. Perhaps worse, running on the DP ballot line has resulted in us seriously blurring class lines, muddling basic socialist concepts, and confusing people, including ourselves. We in DSA end up calling people like Sanders and AOC socialists, which they are not because they do not support abolishing large, private corporations, and they do not support the creation of a government run by the working class. That is why they are ok running in the DP. They think socialism is something along the lines of the New Deal. But as long as large corporations are allowed to exist, you can make all the corporate reforms you want, but once the working class sits back and relaxes, the corporations will slowly erode and revoke the reforms that we won. This is what history has taught us time and again. 

4. The way to stop Trump is not by electing Democrats. That is what got us Trump in the first place, as Reich argued. The way to stop Trump is by massive street demonstrations, massive strikes, and by creating an independent, working-class party where we educate people about all that has been going on. This is how the people of Puerto Rico got rid of their corrupt governor.

5. One final point: When we organize ourselves and struggle collectively in solidarity in a democratic movement where everyone has an equal voice in deciding policy, where we are not just fighting for ourselves but for demands that are just and that are in the interest of the entire working class, where we stop acting as isolated individuals, and instead where our first principle becomes supporting one another, then we begin to create a new culture with a deep sense of community – and that is how the West Virginia striking teachers described their experience – and we begin to take the first steps towards revolutionizing our society. This is exactly what the people of Puerto Rico are doing. Once they built a sense of solidarity through massive street demonstrations, they proceeded to maintain the spirit of solidarity by creating People’s Assemblies, which are self-governing institutions along the same lines as the Soviets, which is a huge step in the direction of revolution. This is the kind of road we should be taking.

Education

What is Fascism?

on August 12, 2021

As we watched the January 6 attack on the Capitol along with everybody else, we at DSA SF had a foreboding sense of the attack’s present and future implications for the rising tide of fascism. Our chapter is no stranger to anti-fascist organizing, having participated in a local coalition of Bay Area groups to confront right-wing mobilizations after Charlottesville in 2017. The events of the Trump years kept fascism at the forefront of our concerns, but in the aftermath of January 6 we felt a renewed sense of urgency to take our studies further.

Over four weeks, members of DSA SF met to discuss and understand fascism in a reading group organized by the DSA SF Education Committee. We began with a series of questions: Was January 6th an attempted coup? Was it a terrorist act? Was it a fascist act? And what is “fascist”? All of these questions and many others pointed to the importance of collaboratively defining these terms. “Terrorism,” for example is used so widely by the US government at this point that it serves more as a label for opponents of the US imperial project rather than as a way to describe a violent act in service of specific political goals. This same vagueness of usage can be seen when it comes to “fascism.”

So, what is fascism? Is it an ideology? Is it a mass movement? Is it inherently violent? What are the differences between neoliberal capitalism and fascism? And most importantly, how has usage of the term “fascism” developed over time, in ways that reflect specific historical, political and cultural contexts?

We submit this report on our readings and discussions to encourage the study of fascism and the contemporary far-right so that we can know our enemy and defeat them. We see collective study as an important form of socialist practice. Click here for our reading list, key questions the group grappled with each week, and some conclusions that we drew from the texts. To encourage others to read these texts and educate themselves, we have created an ebook that contains this article and the classic texts that we read. We hope other groups will draft and publish their own reports to create greater coherence in our understanding of fascism across DSA and beyond.

Click here for the e-book.

News

Housing is a right, not a political calculation

on August 10, 2021


Over the past couple weeks, we’ve seen our government carelessly allow the federal moratorium on evictions to lapse, all to have the CDC reinstate it through October 3 – an extension that will be challenged in courts. Will it survive potential challenges? What happens after October 3? Who knows?

We don’t, but we certainly know who wants to know – the millions of us who are tenants and still struggling with uncertainty, income loss, and health concerns from the pandemic. While the White House congratulates itself on saving millions from homelessness, those of us who live the crisis daily are left to cope with the anxiety of not knowing whether or not we’ll be able to stay in our homes through the end of the year, and knowing that our fates will be decided by a handful of landlords and bureaucrats we’ll likely never meet.

The moratorium extension is, such as it is, is welcome, but it is not what we are fighting for. Safe and stable housing means healthy people and healthy communities – it is not something that should be up to the courts to decide, and certainly not in the unfeeling hands of the market. We must remember that this housing precarity, and the anxiety that comes with it, is a capitalist creation – it is from a system that values financial health of the few over human health of the many. Any eviction moratoriums are little more than reminders that we live in a system that would allow millions to lose their homes.

Learn more about how the market intersects with police power at DSA SF Tenant Solidarity and East Bay SHOP’s next documentary screening on Thursday, August 12 at 7:00 p.m. on Zoom. We’ll be watching “The Fall of the I-Hotel” by Curtis Choy, which takes a close look at the significance of San Francisco’s famed International Hotel protests in the 1970s. There will also be a guest speaker on our panel after the film who was one of the many folks involved in the events shown in the documentary!

Please RSVP here if you are interested, and feel free to email tenantsolidarity@dsasf.org for more information!

Upcoming Events

? Wednesday, 8/11 (6:45 p.m.): August Chapter Meeting (virtual)

? Thursday, 8/12 (7:00 p.m.): Tenant Solidarity Documentary Screening: The Fall of the I-Hotel (virtual)

? Monday, 8/16 (6:00 p.m.): Ecosocialist Book Club: Dina Gilio-Whitaker’s As Long as Grass Grows (virtual)

? Wednesday, 9/1 (6:30 p.m.): Introduction to DSA (virtual)

For more events, click here.

Chapter Accessibility

As part of its plan of work this year, the Steering Committee identified accessibility as a long-standing chapter need. For accessibility concerns and accommodation requests, or if you would like to join the Chapter Accessibility Task Force to help us implement a chapter survey and accessibility guidelines, please email steering@dsasf.org. 

Regular Chapter Meeting

Please join us for our regular chapter meeting tomorrow, August 11 from 6:45-9:45 p.m.! We’ll have news from District 5 Supervisor Dean Preston’s office, and we’ll get updates on our chapter priorities. We will also discuss chapter plans for mass action and education around international solidarity with socialist movements around the world. RSVP for the meeting here, and take a look at the agenda here.

Announcements

NEW! Read DSA SF member Julian L.R.’s op-ed in Jacobin

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors have now committed to looking into creating a public bank for the City. In this Jacobin piece, DSA SF member and Equity Economics Lab founder Julian L.R. writes about why we need a public bank at the federal level.

Julian writes about why we need a public bank that will put control of tax money back in the hands of the people – not a government that keeps giving it to Wall Street and the military-industrial complex. Read up on why a public bank will help deliver more social housing and investment in our badly underserved BIPOC communities, then join us in the fight to win socialism!

Ballot Measure Campaign: Send us your ideas for 2022!

We’d like to hear from you! As part of our chapter priorities, we passed a priorities resolution to draft two ballot measures in 2022. We’d like to hear your ideas to build a San Francisco for all, not only the rich. Fill out the survey here.

Reading Groups

Ecosocialist Book Club: Dina Gilio-Whitaker’s As Long as Grass Grows

Join the DSA SF Ecosocialist Committee’s book club biweekly on Mondays in August! The remaining two sessions are on August 16 and August 30 at 6:00 p.m. -7:15 p.m. We’re reading and discussing Dina Gilio-Whitaker’s As Long as Grass Grows: The Indigenous Fight for Environmental Justice, from Colonization to Standing Rock. Open to all! Register now using the link here.

EducationRed Talks

Why Capitalism cannot be reformed but must be abolished

on August 4, 2021

By Ann Robertson

For lack of time I will not talk about the inherent connection between capitalism and imperialism, racism, sexism, and fascism. 

I want to begin with the arguments that have been raised in support of capitalism because when it was in its early stages western philosophers were wildly enthusiastic about it. They thought that capitalism was the best of all possible systems. And their argument went like this:

We humans have a particular nature that is individualistic, competitive and selfish. Capitalism embodies exactly these principles. So, by letting us realize our true nature we will be most productive.

More specifically, because producers compete against one another, each is compelled to try to produce the best commodity at the lowest price in order to survive as a business. Consequently, capitalism is forever producing better quality commodities at a cheaper price. And although people individually are only seeking their own benefit they are led as if by an invisible hand to promote the interests of society as a whole.  

What these philosophers did not understand is that this competitive, selfish individualistic human behavior which they took for granted is not the cause of capitalism. These behavior characteristics are the effect of capitalism. We humans have a very flexible human nature. We adapt to the surrounding conditions. Put us in one framework and we will act competitively. Put us in another framework, and we will act cooperatively. But science is absolutely clear about one thing throughout this flux: we are a social species, and we have deep physical and psychological needs to belong to a community.

What these philosophers did not take into consideration, with a few exceptions, is the impact of capitalism on the working class. They were only looking at capitalism from the point of view of the capitalists. With pressure on capitalists to lower costs, however, they typically turn to their work force:

  • Make people do more work in the same amount of time.
  • Announce they will have to move the business to where they can find cheaper labor unless the workers accept a wage cut.
  • Cut benefits by making workers pay more for their health care and pensions.
  • Transform workers into part-timers so as to pay them less and avoid paying benefits altogether.
  • Make it hard for unions to get established. 
  • Replace humans by machines.

There was a recent New York Times article about the meeting of corporate heads in Davos Switzerland. And the Times reported that publicly these corporate heads would bemoan the effects of introducing artificial intelligence into the production process because workers would lose jobs. But when they talked privately they were in a race to automate their business, and they could not care less what happened to their workers.

All of this is to emphasize what Marx originally argued: workers and capitalists have irreconcilably antagonistic interests. 

Capitalists want to pay workers the minimum in order to sharpen their competitive edge and survive. 

Workers want a substantial salary to enjoy life and provide comfortably for our families.

As a result of capitalists going after workers to maximize profits by suppressing wages and benefits, there is an unrelenting tendency in capitalism for inequalities in wealth to grow. Workers can organize, mobilize and reverse this tendency, as was done in the 1930s when there was a massive working-class upsurge. But when the upsurge subsides and labor peace returns, the inequalities once again begin to grow. This has been happening since the 1970s, and we are now as bad off in terms of inequalities in wealth as we were in the Gilded Age of the late 19th and early 20th century. Here in the U.S. since 1980 the income of the top 1% has doubled while the bottom 90% of the population has lost ground.

But things are still worse. These inequalities grow at an accelerating rate: 

The more money you have, the easier it is to make even more money.

And the rich routinely use their extra wealth to lobby and shower campaign contributions on politicians in order to influence government policy, and they have been singularly successful at getting their taxes reduced and by getting their businesses deregulated. As was recently reported by The New York Times, their efforts at getting their taxes reduced have resulted in the equivalent of each middle-class family now being forced to write a check for $15,000 and giving it to the top 1% of the capitalist class.

But there is still more that is wrong with capitalism. Every specific kind of economy spawns a culture that is a reflection of itself. Feudalism had its culture and capitalism is no exception. 

On a somewhat abstract level, thanks to its hyper individualism, capitalist culture would have us all believe that we are self-made individuals and the position we end up with in society is entirely the result of our own efforts or lack thereof. Studies have proven this to be completely false, but this theory has served as the basis of the politics of hate.

On a more concrete level, the culture of capitalism encourages everyone to one degree or another but mostly the rich to place a maximum value on the acquisition of material wealth while turning one’s back on the kind of spiritual values that derive from belonging to a community or enjoying the beauty of nature. It is a culture which encourages selfishness, greed and deceit. Look at PG&E falsifying safety records while it is on probation for committing multiple felonies, Wells Fargo committing fraud in relation to over a million of its customers, ExxonMobil lying about climate change to ensure they can continue to pollute the environment and drag us ever-closer to environmental disaster, pharmaceutical companies lying about their opioids to get their customers hooked and then lying about their involvement, and finally practically the entire banking system engaging in the home mortgage fraud, pushing us into the Great Recession. These examples of deceit and greed are not the exception – they’re the rule!

Recently academics have been doing studies on the effects of wealth inequality on human behavior. Here are a few of their results:

The rich are more likely to take candy from a jar that is labeled, “Just for kids.” They are more likely to cheat at games, cut off pedestrians in crosswalks, and take bribes. They are less likely to pay attention to someone who is in a lower economic class than they are.

We in the working class, on the other hand, even though some of this culture seeps down to us, nevertheless studies show:

We are more likely to place value on our immediate communities because we depend on each other. We keep an eye on each other’s places and do a whole array of favors for each other. We are more tuned into interpersonal relations than the rich. And we donate a greater percentage of our money to worthy causes than the rich.

Research has also confirmed that once people have a sufficient amount of money to take care of basic needs and live comfortably, money over and above that does not increase happiness. But the rich, with their poverty of spirit, simply pursue the acquisition of wealth with even more frenzied intensity. It is no wonder, as Ryan pointed out at our last meeting, why Gramsci was emphasizing the importance of creating a new culture, a socialist, working-class culture, to replace this perversely sick capitalist culture, and as Darby pointed out, this socialist culture which we are bringing into existence is one where we support one another, not use one another. 

A book by two academics has been recently published with the title Why Nations Fail. They argue that the main reason nation’s fail is that there is domination “by a narrow elite that have organized society for their own benefit at the expense of the vast mass of people.” That is exactly the position we are in today, but even worse: we are dominated by a corporate class that is prepared to destroy the planet and life as we know it in order to safe-guard their short-term profits. What is happening to the environment alone is a sufficient reason to conclude that the capitalist class is unfit to rule.

We are entering into a period of capitalist crisis, both humanitarian and environmental, which means there will be many new opportunities for us to put socialism on the agenda. 

Already, an absolute majority of young people ages 18-29 prefer socialism to capitalism, and the number keeps going up. 

And the U.S. working class is beginning to stir: 

The number of workers who went on strike last year was the highest since 1986. The teachers have been winning big strikes. 

The president of the flight attendants’ union raised the idea of a general strike and air traffic controllers started calling in sick, and suddenly Trump thought it would be a good idea to end the government shutdown. 

In France, Macron, who has arrogantly referred to the working class as “those who are nothing,” thought he could keep taking from them in order to give to the rich until the working class put on their yellow vests, got out into the streets, and told him he went too far. They forced him to retreat and make concessions, and with 70 percent of the population supporting them, they give no indication of backing down. Now they are demanding much more.  

We in DSA are in a pivotal position thanks to the tens of thousands of people who have joined our ranks. We can play a leading role in a revolutionary upheaval. But we need to continue and redouble our efforts to organize the working class, and our DSA folks at Anchor Steam deserve huge credit. And we need to continue our own education in revolutionary socialist politics, not reformism where we just aim at making the US economy look more like Denmark’s. Thanks to our Education Committee, we have made a great start.

Let me conclude with a short quote from Marx and Engels: “Our concern cannot simply be to modify private property, but to abolish it, not to hush up class antagonisms but to abolish classes, not to improve the existing society but to found a new one.” 

That’s what we’re all about!

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