In the Wake of the Charleston Massacre:
What We Need Is an Actual Revolution—and If You Are Serious About Revolution, You Need to Seriously Get into BA
June 22, 2015 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us
WHY do outrages and horrors like the Charleston Massacre—as well as the ongoing drumbeat of murders by the police and all the other horrible oppression of Black people—go on? What makes these racists—in or out of uniform—feel that they have the right and the so-called duty to kill Black people, for no reason at all besides their Blackness? And why do these outrages not only continue, but intensify? Why, after all these years, do people not only cling to openly and outrageously racist symbols of slavery like the Confederate flag—but this is supported by powerful people in the ruling class of this country?
What is the root of the problem? How long must this go on? Can this be solved by reform—by “realizing the ideals of America”—or do we need an actual revolution? And if we do need a revolution, then what kind of revolution is needed to put an end to the problem? What would this revolution do? And how could such a revolution be made?
There is nobody who has done the work on these questions as deeply, all-sidedly, and scientifically as Bob Avakian (BA), as part of his all-round body of work going into all the questions of the revolution. If any of these questions come to your mind—if you care at all about thinking through what REALLY needs to be done—then it’s critical that you get into and engage the work he’s done.
"No more generations of our youth, here and all around the world, whose life is over, whose fate has been sealed, who have been condemned to an early death or a life of misery and brutality, whom the system has destined for oppression and oblivion even before they are born. I say no more of that."
BAsics 1:13
You can begin with BAsics, the revolutionary handbook of quotations from BA. Or you can start with any of the filmed speeches of BA (BA Speaks: REVOLUTION—NOTHING LESS!; REVOLUTION AND RELIGION: The Fight for Emancipation and the Role of Religion; A Dialogue Between CORNEL WEST & BOB AVAKIAN; Revolution: Why It's Necessary, Why It's Possible, What It's All About)—all of which get very deeply into this. You can listen to the talk “Communism and Jeffersonian Democracy,” which shows how deeply embedded this oppression is in the economic relations, the political system, and the cultural mindset and psychology of America—and how neither this oppression, nor any other form of oppression, can be ended within the confines of American democracy. You can read this work as well in pamphlet form. You can listen to the radio interview Cornel West did with Bob Avakian. There is the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America, which lays out in detail how the revolution can and will solve this. There is also the Party’s statement on the whole history of the oppression of Black people and the struggle against that oppression, rooted in the framework developed by BA. Of great immediate relevance, BA has also done a tremendous amount of work on how the current polarization in the U.S.—where the fascists and racists have initiative, where people with better inclinations are passive and confused—could be reversed into one favorable for actually making revolution to do away with ALL oppression (see, for instance, “The Coming Civil War and Repolarization for Revolution,” and “Unresolved Contradictions, Driving Forces for Revolution”). There is all the work that has been done on revolutionary strategy, also in this framework—this includes the Party’s statement “On the Strategy for Revolution,” and the work “On the Possibility of Revolution,” which lays out the basic strategic conception and approach for actually winning an all-out struggle for power, at a time when there is a revolutionary crisis and a revolutionary people numbering in the millions and millions.
These works form an important part of BA’s whole body of work—his new synthesis of communism which covers, among other things, the scientific method for understanding and changing the world; internationalism; the strategic approach to revolution; and building the new society.
This theory lights the way out of the darkness. Find out about it; get into it; take it up.
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