Unity is More Important than Purity!
We must form a united front on all we can now to defeat the ruling rich.
This month’s podcasts include:
SNV Special Interview: Stodden/Cholensky 2024:
SNV Special Interview: Russian Occupation, Imperialism And Repression:
SNV Special Report: Fighting Times:
SNV Special Interview: Unity Is More Important Than Purity:
Zionism: Socialist News And Views Episode # 56:
The first podcast of the month was an interview with Bill Stodden and Stephanie Cholensky, who are the Socialist Party USA candidates for President and Vice President in 2024. While I am currently putting my energies behind getting Dr. Cornel West on the ballot here, I don’t think we should dismiss any of the left-wing and socialist presidential campaigns for president. It is my belief that we should put our final votes in November behind whatever left campaign is best positioned to gather the most votes. This vote will pose the strongest challenge to the duopoly of corporate Democrats and Republicans, and help give working people confidence that challenging the powers that be in all our other institutions is not only possible, but necessary. It is very unlikely a left campaign will win a majority of the votes in the November Presidential election, but a significant minority of votes concentrated behind one candidate would be a significant symbolic victory. Ultimately, standing together to deliver the blow is more important than having exactly the right political program.
Our second podcast of the month was our Special Interview on Russian Occupation, Imperialism And Repression. In this Special, we spoke with Raphi Rechitsky, who was born in Kharkiv, Ukraine. We set down a position that Russia is imperialist, is occupying Ukraine, and doling out repression at home. The invasion of Russia into Ukraine (which also has significant involvement from the United States and N.A.T.O.) is still an issue which leads to significant debate among many people I believe to be well intentioned organizers and activists on the left. One of the most divisive issues continues to be whether anti-capitalists should support western weapons being sent to Ukraine. It would be very helpful to organize public debates on this issue. This would not be to convince the debaters, but to help the mass of newly active young people and workers hear the strongest positions on either side and come to a solid conclusion and position. But disagreement on these issues cannot limit our ability to unite and organize against our own ruling class. We must continue to do so on many fronts.
One place we can continue to organize strongly around many issues together, even with disagreements outstanding, is within the unions. Fighting Times was the title of our next Special of the month, and also the title of our main speaker, Jon Melrod’s, book in this report. Melrod outlines many stories of eventually organizing with workers who were originally dead set against his involvement in the union. He shows that winning others over to your position is directly related to standing strong and ultimately winning campaigns. Success in the struggle is how we convince people of the best position. Obviously success does not come overnight, but people looking to get active in the struggle will see who is the most consistent in organizing, and who is the most successful in delivering on the movements goals. Organizing is important. Mobilizing is important. Solidarity is important. Unity in messages, banners, and tactics is important. When we can achieve unity, we should. When we can’t, we should observe the outcome of different tactics and strategies.
The next podcast of the month is the one we take our name for this newsletter from: Unity Is More Important Than Purity. In this Special Interview, we spoke with two elders in the movement. Dr. Rose Brewer - a professor, activist, scholar and organizer who got involved in political organizing in the late 60s and early 70s at the height of the Black Liberation movement. And Ricardo Levins Morales - a community organizer and visual artist who moved from the mountains of Puerto Rico in the late 60s and first got involved in the Chicago Black Panther Defense Committee. Brewer quotes Frantz Fanon saying “Each generation must, out of relative obscurity, discover its mission, fulfill it, or betray it.” Levins Morales says we have to “be able to approach our work with enough humility to understand that however smart we think we are, we’re always missing something.” He says this means we have to listen to “the people who are having doubts about our chosen course of action.” He says he learned with his entry into the movement that “identity is what you need in order to fight and solidarity is what you need in order to win!” He says the non-profit industrial complex has turned identity today into a brand. Ultimately, he says, “This may come as a shock to those whose movement experience is more recently but…unity is more important than purity.” He says we should not put up with abuse or betrayal, “but disappointment is not the same as betrayal.” The ruling class and their police and militaries are always seeking to divide us, and we should not do that work for them.
We finish the month with our regular episode for March. Episode # 56 starts out with news and a focus on the situation in Argentina in an interview clip with Buenos Aries Provincial Legislator Guillermo Kane. Kane, a militant and Trotskyist leader with Partido Obrero/Workers Party discusses the huge repression and attempts at shock and awe by President Javier Milei. He says workers and unions continue to organize and protest there. I suggest everyone watch the full interview linked above.
In the second portion of our monthly episode, we hear a contribution from Sana Wazwaz from American Muslims for Palestine at Minnesota to Palestine: Teach-In and Panel Discussion. She places the Zionist project concretely in the camp of colonizer. Wazwaz quotes Theodor Herzl, who is known as the father of modern Zionism, calling the movement of Jews to Palestine “something colonial.” While Wazwaz shares a number of other historical examples, we are watching the colonial extermination, a genocide, carried out in real time through our computers. We must show solidarity with our Palestinian brothers, sisters and others, stand in unity and turn our eyes towards our ruling class. Israel is an outpost of US Empire. The US Empire must be thrown into the dustbin of history. As must all other imperial projects. The world was created a common treasury for all. Stand Up All!
Solidarity (Identity + Unity),
Nick Shillingford - Host - Socialist News and Views
PS check out Frontline by Cornel West (from his 2004 album Street Knowledge).