Taking out BA’s New Year’s Message on MLK Day
February 3, 2014 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us
From readers:
January 28, 2014: Over the weekend of January 18-19, and on MLK Day (January 20), we had a very successful push to get out BA’s New Year’s message, and Revolution newspaper. A central part of all this was playing BA’s message over a new, extremely portable but loud sound system. Many people heard BA’s voice in this way, including a few who stood and listened to the whole message. Among immigrants, we read the message in Spanish. We let BA speak for himself, with little more than an intro that this was an important message from the leader of the revolution to YOU!
Over the three days, we sold around 100 papers and raised a little over $20. We had been struggling for a synergy with selling the paper and raising money for BAE. This is something we're summing up and digging into more.
On Saturday, as we walked through the neighborhood with a large poster/display of BA Speaks: REVOLUTION—NOTHING LESS! we went down a street where the residents had joined us in an impromptu march last summer against the acquittal of George Zimmerman. We stopped in front of a house where two women who were relaxing in chairs wanted to hear BA's New Year's statement. They listened intently. One of them was shaking her head a lot, especially at the passages where BA denounces the oppression of women, and she followed the end of the reading with “Amen.” This also provoked questions like, “Why is the system like that?” “Why did Zimmerman get away with murdering Trayvon Martin?” “What can we do?” They bought a paper and one of them took copies of BA's statement to distribute at her church.
On the next block, a nine-year-old girl responded to one of our crew: “You don't think it's in God's hands? You mean it's in our hands?” Asking if she could help post the statement, she led the comrade to her house, to her grandmother and aunt, who got a paper. One of them saw the centerfold with its bold statement, “Abortion on Demand and Without Apology!” and commented that she wished that she had had a chance to choose, back in the day. And then with her permission, the little girl ran off, sticking up posters and asking people to donate, saying, “This is for the revolution.” She demonstrated how people can contribute by picking up a can and putting it in the garbage bag.
We got into some discussion and debate with a middle-aged man who insisted that, while it was good that we are doing what we're doing, that he was already “in the revolution”—by helping inner-city youth to stay in school. To his claim that education is the key to break youth out of the bad situation they are in, we replied, “That's just not true.” This provoked him to think. Meanwhile another middle-aged man, also saying that it's good that we are out there, “but...,”and then he cited the repression the government brings down, and insisted that there is nothing he could do. We told him that there are many things that he can do, very importantly donating money to BA Everywhere. He pulled $10 out of his pocket and put it in the donation can.
In an immigrant neighborhood, where lots of Central Americans have experience with various movements, a group of guys around a truck were among the first people we approached. When we told them we had a message from the leader of the revolution, one guy raised a number of questions related to his different experience of what revolution was. Instead of us having a discussion with them on all these questions, we began to read BA’s message in Spanish, and this changed the terms of things dramatically. People started throwing money into the bucket and took papers. They gave us a way to get back with them, so that they could be part of this movement for revolution, and a copy of “On the Strategy for Revolution” got out to them to address some of what they were raising. We got a sense of the difference it makes when people engage with BA and how it transforms the dynamics, including how their questions were reframed. We continued on up the street and wherever we ran into small groupings, we would read the message in Spanish, getting it out to many more people, and getting out papers along the way.
At the jail, where we have been a regular presence, we played the audio of BA in English, and would periodically switch to agitating in Spanish. It was harder given the flow to switch back and forth between languages with the message. But the voice of BA was continuous, and prompted a Black ex-prisoner to come up to us and listen intently to the whole thing. He said he thought he had heard BA speak before, and asked if he had been on the Coast to Coast radio show. When we mentioned the Cornel West interview with BA on the Smiley and West show, he thought maybe that was where he heard him. He said, “Revolution means solution.” The situation frustrates him, and he feels like he might explode; that we need to wake people up. We put to him the challenge BA puts out that “What is missing is YOU,” and he took up the task of collecting cans to raise money for the campaign. He was with some other guys, and immediately got a can to put in the bag. He is homeless, but knows where he can hook up with us to follow up.
A middle-aged Black woman came over after telling one revolutionary that she agreed we need revolution. As she listened to the statement where BA lays out the situation, she was smiling, nodding her head in agreement, and at points commenting on how true it is what he just said. As BA got into revolution, and that it is communist revolution that we need, her expression got markedly more intense. She asked, “Where is he?” to which we replied, “He needs to be everywhere.” This provoked a broad smile, and led to some discussion of protecting revolutionary leadership. She went to her car to get $2 for the paper, and expressed enthusiasm for coming to our meetings. One point about how there will be unity and struggle with people in building this movement, is that when BA says, “It’s not in God’s hands, it’s in our hands,” she agreed, saying, “God put it in our hands.” We made clear that BA is an atheist, and pointed to the Cornel West interview, and how the two of them discuss their differences over religion and yet work closely together. She responded, “Because they both stand for liberating people.”
In our city there are two Martin Luther King Day parades, one of which attracts a more politically aware crowd. We took out the New Year’s message as our framework. We had a “BA Speaks: Revolution-Nothing Less!” banner and also used the Three Strikes poster. We got out 46 papers, and raised about $10 for BA Everywhere. A youth, who is new to the team, summed up that we had a broad and very favorable response. Many people, upon hearing the agitation, pulled out their money for the paper even before someone approached them. The atmosphere was very different than our experience after Obama’s first election, when people thought this marked the end of the oppression of Black people. There was a real sense expressed by many that things were intolerable and needed to change. The message of reform or revolution resonated broadly among the crowd, well beyond those that actually ended up with a paper. Several people said they had run into the revolution before and appreciated the perseverance of BA and the Party in the face of others giving up or selling out. One person had gotten our paper at a local restaurant, and said he liked it for its honesty.
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