I think he brings up many great points that we already float around on here (don't be sectarian, ultra, or anti-AES) but there's one point he emphasizes that there needs to be "a theory" for us to follow.
When I try to think of what our Communist vision of the future in America, and our actual ideas of a program, I come up short. There are for sure many things we call for in terms of reform now with m4a, electoral reform etc. Yet in terms of what our objectives are in the long-term we're all very vague. Of course it's hard to map out what exactly the future brings, but we should also try to create at least an outline of what we will do.
For example, there's the idea of ending the periphery-core relationship in agriculture (America dumps GMO corn etc. made in unsustainable industrial agriculture into the US at extremely low prices into a country, where the farmers now have to produce and sell cash crops instead of food to maybe stay out of debt.) We won't simply be able to snap our fingers to end said relationship, there needs to be a plan of how to end the dumping of commodity crops into the third world without also generating a food crisis in the countries that are currently leashed into it. Stuff like this isn't necessarily fun and epic, but we have to really think about and create plans for these problems if we're to ever succeed.
Yeah, Prashad is a great Marxist communicator. WIll definitely check this out.
without also generating a food crisis in the countries
and ensure that our own domestic farmers and agricultural workers don't lose their jobs in the process.
This video basically forced me to look more deeply into China's post-Mao accomplishments and change my mind on them.
Communists have historically suggested five year plans when in power and substantive reforms that challenge the liberal status quo when out of power.
But those are communist parties, not scattered internet communists. "We" don't exist without a party or an org that is de facto a party. You exist and I exist and we can communicate and commiserate, but unless you're on board with some organized collective action with a platform there's no "we" that can take concerted action or haggle about what should be done. "We" are just anonymous-ish individuals.
Communists are a fringe minority in much of the West. There aren't enough of us to form effective units even in large cities. Therefore, what we need more than anything else is growth. We need to keep striking the iron that's been growing is already: anti-liberal reformism with a class-conscious message, ideally being more explicit in the necessity of socialism.
If we don't grow the ranks, when things come to a head we will simply be annihilated/sidelined.
This was a great talk, it was very inspiring. I watched it a while ago and it helped convinced me that communism, the idea and the struggle, didn't permanently die in 1991, that it's possible to have a communism for the 21st century, one that doesn't wholly reject past efforts, but doesn't nostalgize it either.
