Went to a Palestinian solidarity protest/rally with some new folks who’d become radicalised against America/the West over the last six months. They aren’t socialists (yet, I’m working on it) - but they’re good people. So, seeing the genocide and its support by our governments filled them with disgust. We talked about the Nakba, the history of Zionism, and the current apartheid etc.

Now, we come to the protest.

Overall, the atmosphere was incredible. Lots of cool signs, different kinds of people, and, of course the pigs. That’s not the problem.

The problem was the fucking speakers. I swear, at least half of them had to be feds whose entire job was to turn people away from turning up at these events.

Some of them, and I mean this literally, wanted the crowd to chant “we support October 7” and “we stand with Hamas”.

I swear, the way the people I was with turned to look at me.

Not every speaker was like this - most were genuine. They talked of labor solidarity, campus organizing, personal anecdotes. But all of that made these speakers stand out all the more.

The worst part is that when it would happen, the organisers was one of them. So this entire thing was a sham from the start.

I feel so bad. I shouldn’t have just brought people to a random protest I saw and should’ve vetted it first.

Like, seriously. I can’t fucking get over this. Who organizes a protests of people from all walks of life in support of Palestine and wants them to chant we stand with Hamas and let’s do one hundred more October 7s?.

Jesus fucking Christ.

Like, of fucking course Hamas is a natural reaction to apartheid and ethnic cleansing and genocide. And of course Oct 7 is nothing compared to the 200 days that followed since (or the 75 years that preceded it). But come the fuck on.

    • aqwxcvbnji [none/use name]
      ·
      8 months ago

      I'm afraid you're gonna stay a very lonely anti-imperialist in that way.

      Here's a quote from Some Points on The Mass Line for you:

      Start from where people are at. Since building the struggle is at the core of our agenda, we can then proceed to outline some key principles and methods of work. The first is that our starting point needs to be the felt needs and wants of the masses of people. Good intentions will not do in this case. They might bring us to the demonstration, but we are likely to be lonely there. So to build struggle, we had better have a handle on what these felt needs are and what people are likely to do in order to achieve them. We have probably all been in meetings where some particular is under discussion, and somebody jumps up and says, “The real issue is X or Y.” Maybe that person is extremely insightful or maybe they are dead wrong (more likely). It really does not matter, we need to start from where people are at.

      • zed_proclaimer [he/him]
        ·
        8 months ago

        This is a bastardized reading of Mao to justify tailist social-chauvinism. He was talking about understanding the material needs of the people here, not about Liberal optics and becoming crypto-communists hiding our views

        • aqwxcvbnji [none/use name]
          ·
          8 months ago

          This is a bastardized reading of Mao

          Here's what PFLP has to say about the authors of that text:

          On behalf of the fighters, cadre, members and Central Committee of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, we extend our comradely greetings to every member of Freedom Road Socialist Organization. As the relationship between our organization and yours grows stronger, we would like to congratulate you for your revolutionary work (...) The challenge of upholding Marxist-Leninist principles in the main imperialist country of the world is a difficult one. But FRSO has done so admirably, and the PFLP is proud to have you as partners in the worldwide M-L movement for socialist revolution.