The protests changed me in a lot of ways. One way was, I was by no means a class reductionist before. But the protests really woke me up to the real struggles of oppressed communities in the US and importantly, the revolutionary potential in those communities. I remember listening to Rev Left in my car and had to pull over for a minute to absorb it when Breht said something to the effect of "what did white socialists in America ever give us?! Bernie Sanders!? Fuck that! The real revolutionary potential is with oppressed communities."

  • PermaculturalMarxist [they/them]
    ·
    4 years ago

    Some major things for me were:

    -The weird left-com/ Third Worldist feelings I had were done away with. I intuitively came to understood the need for a vanguard party, even though I didn't know what that even meant. I began reading ML theory around this time.

    -It was the first time I saw opportunism and wreckers really start fucking shit up "within the walls" of leftist orgs and movements. "Leftists" going after bail fund organisers for being "tankies." Org leaders tailing reformists and quickly pivoting the momentum to a Biden campaign, etc. This lead to me reading more about opportunism, left sectarianism, and put me more onto ML theory.

    Basically, the protests turned me into a tankie.

          • PermaculturalMarxist [they/them]
            ·
            4 years ago

            That's fine, we all got something different from the protests, which is why we're sharing on this thread. I'm sure some people saw it as a triumph of spontaneous organising, like what people said about Occupy, or as further proof that revolution in the US is impossible because the uprisings lead to nothing. I just don't see it that way, I saw it as proof that the people in the US want a revolution and just don't know how to get there. I also don't believe the third world can "go it alone" and the people in the imperial core have a responsibility to struggle and do their part in furthering the revolutionary cause.

      • Gkalaitza [he/him]
        ·
        4 years ago

        We have seen nothing successfull on a large scale of numbers and time communism anarchism wise in the US in general. Still the most successfull and threatening to teh status quo organization in the modern american left were the Black Panthers with a membership of barely 10k at their peak. So i guess moving towards that organizational stucture and theory is moving to the right direction for the OP

          • grisbajskulor [he/him]
            ·
            4 years ago

            What did the protests actually do though? All I've seen is corporate anti-racist lib training

              • grisbajskulor [he/him]
                ·
                4 years ago

                It got a whole lot of people out on the street. I think that's definitely something to admire, and a huge source of potential. If even 10% of the people who were on the streets were part of a revolutionary organization, or even fucking DSA, we'd be in a very different place.

          • Gkalaitza [he/him]
            ·
            4 years ago

            First of all we can hardly judge any "lasting change" for the socialist/communist left project in the US from the protest at this point in time .

            Also the success of the BPP and the reason they were persecuted harder than any modern socialist org was a direct result of their structure ,ideology and practice. Idk how you can look at their history and actions and pretend it aint so ,especially when they themselves were constantly highlighting how their actions come from their theory. Them being able to stay ideologicaly consistent and coherent and present a united revolutionary front that acted and reacted efficiently against the entirety of the empires state violence and interference focusing on them wasnt a coincidence that could have happened whatever their structure or ideology. Them being able to successfully implement the maoist mass line on a large scale on the heart of the empire wasnt a coincident and i surely dont believe that it could or would have been replicated by a demsoc or anarchist bbp doing mutual aid. Them even being able to amass almost 10k commited and well red revolutionary members iwthout completely collapsing by infiltration or being coopted has something to do with their structure . Their organized disciplined militancy and internationalism wasnt a coincidence either

            Of course they lost, its insane that they got that far in the first place as an openly black revolutionary anti-state party in the heart of the empire. If you are 70% sure that any organizational structure and tendency could have replicated that and produced a BPP under those circumstances that seriously challenges state power systematicaly and successfully implements revolutionary power building and connection to the masses go ahead .I dont see it, at all.

              • Gkalaitza [he/him]
                ·
                4 years ago

                Well decentralization always exists, alongside centralization, especially in Revolutionarty organizations trying to gain power and protect themselces from the state. In almost any ML revolution the party was considerably more "decentralized" when under persecution or attack from the state especially compared to the heavily centralized post revolution image. By no means horizontal or anarchist but there is always a balance in each condition