Episode 276 of RevolutionZ takes up the issue of who is, and who isn't part of the left, including splits and divisions from the 60s to now, addressing motives and demarcation lines, and finally possible alternative approaches to the whole issue that might be more unifying than what now occurs.
Episode 276 of RevolutionZ takes up the issue of who is, and who isn't part of the left, including splits and divisions from the 60s to now, addressing motives and demarcation lines, and finally possible alternative approaches to the whole issue that might be more unifying than what now occurs.
Hello, my name is Michael Albert and I'm the host of the podcast that's titled Revolution Z. This is our 276th consecutive episode and before we get into it, I would like to clarify some things about the whole series and my work on it. The first thing is 276 is actually a pretty big number and, as each episode has a focus or a topic or a guest, it's a lot of focuses, topics and guests and I'm running out, so I'd like to invite submissions. If you have an idea for a guest you think would be a good one for Revolution Z, or if you have an idea for a topic when I'm going to do something without a guest for Revolution Z that you think would be good, maybe you could send it to sysop at zmagorg, or you could go on our Patreon site and leave a comment. But not all proposals for a guest or a topic that would make good sense and be good are ones that I would be happy to try and schedule or focus on, because I guess I have some preferences of my own and I should convey them so as to prevent people from spending time proposing things that I just wouldn't do. So about a guest, the guidelines, I guess, are relatively straightforward. I would like to have on people who have something to say that would be of interest, not redundant for the audience. That is, they would be saying things might be said more than once, but they would be saying things that not all of the Revolution Z folks subscribe to or agree with, but that would be interesting for them to entertain and consider and perhaps try to build upon. And in addition to that, the person would of course have to say yes. So you don't want to be proposing people going out of your way to think up people who would be great but wouldn't do it because they're too busy or they have a very large audience and access to it and they wouldn't want to be on something that has as relatively small an audience as Revolution Z does.
Speaker 1:And also and this is perhaps idiosyncratic to me I don't want to invite people to join me in something that I host, sort of like inviting them into the living room just for me to fight with them. So I don't feel good asking somebody to be on when I know that I'm going to disagree with them substantially enough so as to be confrontational, so to speak. And it's not because that's a bad thing, because it's not so, for instance, I'm happy to be on podcasts where the host invites me on and has every intention of disagreeing with me, knows at the outset that they don't like what I'm going to have to say and that they want to contest it. I don't mind that at all, but I don't want to do it. I don't want to ask people on where I know that's what my agenda is. I just don't want to. That's me, I guess.
Speaker 1:So what about a topic? Well, there, the idea is, again, it should be a topic about which people don't already know everything that would be said and don't already agree perhaps, with everything that would be said, but it would be a topic which has the capacity or the possibility of being useful and beneficial for people to hear discussed. Okay, what about this episode? Well, I'd like to take up something, a topic based on some recent essays I've heard and situations I have heard of, videos I've watched, etc. Which, however, don't happen just every so often, but happen over and over and over and are important, and so we can call the topic left or not left, the idea of that being that there's you know, there's everybody in society. There's everybody who's left-handed, there's everybody who has red hair. There's everybody who's left-handed, there's everybody who has red hair, there's everybody who's in the Democratic Party. There's all sorts of ways of demarcating people into groups or constituencies or whatever you want to call it, and one of those ways is left and not left. And how do you do that? How do you know whether somebody is in the left or not? Well, the first issue is to clarify what left means, because what we mean by the word left, which is not a simple matter to settle on, is going to be highly germane, even definitive, in deciding who is and who isn't a part of the left.
Speaker 1:Now, the reason I'm taking this up as an issue is because, in my perception, a good many people see themselves as left or not left, depending on whether or let me change that. For a good many people who see themselves as left, not left, seems to mean disagrees with me about something political, social, economic that I consider quite important to the agenda of making the world better for people who are oppressed. Making the world better for people who are oppressed and ultimately, making it oppression-free by changing its defining features. So a good many people, I think, sometimes knowingly, sometimes sort of just implicitly, without really knowing it's what's happening, consider who they feel comfortable with, who they agree with, and that's the left, and that people who disagree with them about something they consider really important is not the left. And this may arguably be the main way. But the issue becomes well, what constitutes something about which people can disagree and about which people draw a line of demarcation between left and not left, so that if I'm in the left and I think something, and if I deem somebody else to be not in the left, they deem something else on that particular issue? So what are some examples?
Speaker 1:Well, for example, violence or not, a person can think that there are circumstances in which being on the left entails engaging in a violent way. And there are other people who might think and who assert that being on the left requires rejecting violence in all circumstances, or virtually all circumstances, if you prefer. And so the non-violent person says I am non-violent, you are violent, you are not on the left. It doesn't mean you're violent all the time, of course, but you believe there's a place for it. Therefore, you're not on the left. It doesn't mean you're violent all the time, of course, but you believe there's a place for it. Therefore, you're not on the left, or the person who believes there's a place for violence feels I believe there's a place for violence and you don't and you're not on the left by virtue of that.
Speaker 1:Or next example consider ever voting for a Democrat, consider ever voting for a Democrat like, I don't know, hillary Clinton or Genocide Joe or not. So one person thinks that to ever vote for a Democrat like Clinton or Biden, is wrong, is not an acceptable position. This is a dividing line I have, let's say, and so I think that somebody who thinks that ever voting for a Democrat isn't in the left, or vice versa, I might think that to rule out voting for a Democrat is not all inflexible about certain things, but it is dismissive of those whose lives would be greatly affected by the difference between a Democrat and a Republican, like, say, trump, and so I feel that to rule it out is not left. This stuff exists. So, for example, there are those who, on hearing that someone says, vote for a Democrat in a contested state in the next election, or say, in the Hillary Clinton election, clinton versus Trump there are those who say that, or who virtually say in every such case that the person who is advocating participating electorally in that fashion is not just disagreeing about something, but as a shill for the Democrats supports the system is not of the left. This does exist, and so does the reverse exist.
Speaker 1:Another demarcation line for some is whether or not you believe that a particular aspect of life is more fundamental than others. And if you don't, you're not in the left. And if you do, okay, you're part of the left. So, for instance, there are those who feel that, about class, they feel that if you see what's going on in society, what's possible, what's desirable in terms primarily of class, if you understand other phenomena, you don't dismiss them. But you understand other phenomena racism, sexism, ecological decline, war in terms of class struggle, class relations then you're part of the left. But if you don't, you're not. Or there are those who would say or act as though they believe, and do believe often, that race is central or that gender is central, radical feminists, say of the past years, and they draw a demarcation line. So, in other words, you don't agree with me about the centrality and priority of feminism, well then you're not part of the left. Or replace feminism with anti-capitalism and you're not part of the left, and so on, and where capitalism is understood primarily as a class system. So that's another demarcation line for some people.
Speaker 1:Or some focus on agreeing on something I think now but that I didn't think last month or maybe last year. So the idea here is I become aware of something new. Let's say I become a vegan or I become an advocate for trans rights or something else, and I see that as important. And I define those who don't agree with me about that importance as not part of the left. Or I condemn some country's policies or a war or not, and depending on which side of that line I'm on, I'm either part of the left or I'm not.
Speaker 1:I think some tactical approach is worthy or not. This is sort of like voting or not voting, but let's say it's strikes or letters to elected officials or giving talks to the rich and powerful or something else occupations. I think that the tactical approach is worthy. I think it's important. You don't, you are not of the left, or you think it's unimportant and counterproductive. I think it's important For you. I'm not part of the left.
Speaker 1:All this happens, supporting some government or not. You know I support, I don't know, the Chinese government, or in past years, the Chinese government. Or I'd say, such and such a movement is wonderful and somebody else says it's horrible. Now, I'm not saying there are no demarcation lines, but there are often demarcation lines that should not be. I support a particular reform, a higher wage for custodians on my campus, or affirmative action, or some other, and somebody else doesn't. And the person who doesn't thinks I'm wrong and gauging in some harmful thing and thinks I'm not part of the left or I think they're wrong because they're ignoring something that's really important and they're not part of the left or supporting any reform at all. This is a big one. So a particular person let's say me, not the case, but let's say me I deem that to support any reform is to implicitly, or even explicitly, ratify the system. Moreover, it's to vest everything in that particular reform and then go home. Whether you win or you lose, you go home at the end because that's what there is. And somebody else says no.
Speaker 1:There are reforms that are particularly important to people's lives, and one has to, or one should, support the battle to win them, out of solidarity with those who are trying to, or, even more, support the battle to win them, because that process yields further radicalization and further focus, perhaps on the whole system, and so on. Another one would be being in the organization I am in or not. If you're in my organization, the organization I like, you're part of the left, but if you're not, well then you're not part of the left. Or, perhaps more often, well, maybe not, I don't know being in an acceptable organization or not at all. In other words, someone might say you're not part of the left if you're not in an organization, if you're not functioning in light of a collective project and program, and somebody else might say, well, I'm not, but I am part of the left, and so on.
Speaker 1:So the point of all this is that we can define left or not left, such that each of the above do or do not demarcate a border where those on one side are on the left and those on the other side are not. And questions arise. Well, what demarcation is warranted and what isn't? Because some are warranted right, you're not part of the left. If you are racist? Or let's make it extreme, you advocate slavery, well, okay, you're not part of the left. Or you advocate the existing fundamental relations of society, okay, you're not part of the left, and so on. So there are such lines of demarcation, but which ones are worthy? How large an umbrella under which the whole left fits. Do we favor? How quick are we to push people out from under that umbrella?
Speaker 1:And why does any of this matter? Well, the reason it matters I think probably an easier question to answer is because in the left there are historically splits, that is, a particular thing called the left divides into two lesser things, each of which deems the other not left. Or a particular organization divides into two organizations or literally just falls apart because of a demarcation line that runs through it, which people start to feel demarcates left from not left, and so those on both sides don't want to share anything with those on the other side. Or there are organizations which have these kinds of differences and they're barely tolerant of one another. They sort of are I don't know how to describe it maybe like a dysfunctional family of sorts. They don't acknowledge, don't focus on, but feel the difference, the antagonisms, and barely tolerate one another. Or the differences exist, but there's mutual aid across the demarcation line, there's solidarity across the demarcation line, even though there are differences.
Speaker 1:So why does it matter? Well, because if what you're concerned about and I hope people won't take this too pejoratively, or maybe pejoratively at all If what you're concerned about is your own comfort, which is one thing we should be concerned about. But if that's primarily what you're concerned about, then to define your shared community in terms of your comfort makes sense. But if you're concerned about trying to win a new world, or even trying to win a better society, or even trying to win a particular campaign or create a particular project, then your personal comfort becomes maybe one factor, but maybe not even a factor, but it certainly doesn't become a sole factor. What instead matters is amassing people and views that are able to develop into sufficient power to win what it is you're trying to win, and that means embodying many differences. So is there a structure that does that? Well, in my own thinking, there is.
Speaker 1:It's not a group which agrees on everything. There's nothing wrong with a group that virtually agrees on everything. You know, if you're going to undertake a difficult project or task, you may need to have that, but that will not be a group which is going to usher in a new world. It'll be a group that's going to get some particular thing done and then maybe broaden out. If you're trying to have a left emerge that is powerful and capable of winning, you're going to need to embody much difference.
Speaker 1:Well, how do you do that? I've only heard two ways. One way is that you create a coalition and the coalition involves, let's say, an anti-war movement and a women's movement and an anti-racist movement and campaigns about this, that and the other thing, but the coalition, which is an agglomeration of all that or a conglomeration of all that agrees on a particular thing. So an anti-war coalition, as existed, say, when I was young in the 60s around Indochina, vietnam, would compose, would include many components which did not agree on everything and sometimes significantly disagreed on things, but which agreed on the war and would pursue the anti-war agenda and sort of ignore everything else or largely ignore everything else. So that's one approach.
Speaker 1:I think there's a better approach when what we're trying to do is build the overall community, the overall left, and that's something that I don't know why I call it a block, but I do B-L-O-C, and the idea here is it's sort of like a society a little bit more narrow. It contains things on both sides of demarcation lines. It's not that those lines don't exist, it's not that people in the block don't disagree about things which each side thinks is important and differs with the other side on, but they hold in abeyance. They don't even hold in abeyance, they acknowledge the existence of the differences. They are pledged to, committed to listening to those on the other side of the demarcation line, inside the broad left, to hearing, to respecting and to continuing to explore in hopes of at some point coming to some perhaps new agreement, perhaps one side proves to be more right in what they were thinking, etc. And in the interim, the block includes that diversity, it includes both sides of the disagreement.
Speaker 1:Uh, so, on all those things mentioned earlier, I mean we could go through them all, maybe, maybe I'll just, um, I've got an outline of them. So, violence or not, well, uh, take for example, dave Dellinger, who was, uh, for those who don't know a central figure in the sixties and seventies, um, and a little longer, in anti-war work and in other radical work of the times, and he was a pacifist, he did not believe in the use of violence. On the other hand, he worked with, say, a group like the Black Panthers who did so. They had a very strong disagreement, but they could be mutually respectful and hear each other and try and learn from each other and operate in proximity to each other, seeing each other as part of the same left. So that's possible. You could imagine the same thing for every one of those lines of demarcation that I mentioned and you could also see ways of thinking about it, that sort of narrow the demarcation.
Speaker 1:So I don't want to go through it all, but the idea here is, instead of polarizing and defining the other as opponent, you seek to stay under the one umbrella and seek to further explore the differences in order to find what proves to be ultimately most valuable, most correct. There's a domain in which this happens routinely. It's called science. So in science, you know, there's physics, there's chemistry, there's biology and so on, many others, and in the whole people disagree. But even within those components it's like an organization in the whole left. Even inside there there are differences. So physicists have very strong differences with each other, for example that's an area that I sort of know something about and they nonetheless work together. They respect each other. They don't call the other not a physicist, they don't say you're not under the same umbrella as me, they accept that the differences exist and they continue to operate and to respect one another's efforts and to try and move forward. That's sort of like a block.
Speaker 1:Okay, so what if, in this context, we take as a case study myself, who else can I talk about? So we take as a case study of a particular person and where I am, with respect to these kinds of things, or at least some of them, not going through the whole list. So, for example, I was radicalized in the 60s and coming out of that, I developed a kind of a holistic approach to various spheres of life or focuses of social interaction or such things as what we call gender relations or racial or community relations, culture, economic relations, political relations, ecological, ecological, international, and rather than trying to see which of those is most important. So I can focus on what's most important and I can call those who don't focus on it not part of my community, not part of the left. Rather than that, I took the position and took the view, both for strategic reasons and also literally, because I thought it was the case that each of these domains was important, profoundly important. That, undoing the social relations of each that impose oppressions, hierarchies of well-being, was essential. That each, in other words, gender relations, sexual relations, economic relations, political relations and so on that each could contour the rest, that each could define elements of the rest, that to overcome them you had to sort of overcome them all because each could reproduce the rest. That became a kind of a position, and it wasn't just about two of them. So it wasn't just that I was a socialist, feminist and therefore I paid attention to patriarchy and capitalism, to economic and to gender relations, and it isn't just that I was an anti-racist socialist or an anarchist feminist, it was that they all merited that kind of prioritization, that kind of approach. We thought you don't understand, let's say, race, gender, power insofar as it impacts what's most important, class Rather. And likewise you don't understand race insofar as it impacts, say, gender, and only that where gender is deemed most important, rather you understand each of them, understanding that each emanates influences that contour and can even redefine the rest, and so they all must be addressed.
Speaker 1:And another factor or element in what I came to believe coming out of the 60s, what I came to believe coming out of the 60s, and I still believe these things, is that class is one of those things that is of great importance, because it generates hierarchies which constrain and constrict life possibilities for people, depending upon what class they're in, and therefore it's part and parcel of various oppressions and must be overcome. But I came to the belief that there wasn't just owners and workers, rather there was owners and employees. And then employees weren't just one class, there were two. There were a class that was empowered and, by virtue of its greater power, was also had more status and income and so on, and I call those the coordinator class. This was all with Robin Hanell.
Speaker 1:And there's also, among employees, the working class, who are disempowered, among employees, the working class who are disempowered. And the difference being that the coordinator class has a position in the economy, in the division of labor and with respect to markets and so on, that empowers them, that gives them knowledge, gives them skills, gives them proximity to decision-making, gives them connections to others, even gives them confidence, all relevant for and even essential to making decisions. And, on the other hand, there's the working class who have their skills limited, has their knowledge limited or delimited or reduced, have their connections to others reduced, have their access to decision making levers curtailed and even have their confidence diminished and their energy because they're exhausted from what they're doing. And the coordinator class, then, between labor and capital, dominates the working class and can indeed rise to the ruling position. Okay, so I thought that was, as compared to regarding gender. I thought you know feminism is doing a good job of understanding that and will continue to do a good job. And the emergence of, or re-emergence actually of attention to sex as well will be handled well by people who are most implicated and affected by those dynamics. And similarly for race and similarly for issues of power, but for economics, it's necessary or essential to add this dimension. So, in other words, the concepts that feminists have developed and that anti-racists develop and so on, are pretty good and can get better, but they're very good, they're on the right path. But the concepts for understanding the economy in class, there's a problem there because they sort of rule out something very fundamental, at least in my mind, which was the existence of this third class.
Speaker 1:Okay, so now suppose, with those kinds of broad views leaving aside the tactical stuff, but with those kinds of broad views I had the attitude that I should draw a line and I should say that those who are on the side I'm on at the left and those who are on the other are not. Well then I'd have to say, everybody who doesn't recognize the importance and need for attention to coordinator class, working class relations isn't in the left, or I'd have to say that everybody who elevates one of those key dimensions of life above the rest isn't in the left, or I'd have to say that everybody who elevates one of those key dimensions of life above the rest isn't in the left. Well, that would be counterproductive, as I think this kind of activity is generally counterproductive. So I never came to that view. And similarly, you know, I think it's a very profoundly important thing to at times operate within the electoral system, including even voting for somebody in the Democratic Party. But I don't deem those who don't think that, by virtue of not thinking that, as not leftists or not part of the community of progressives and radicals and so on. I just don't.
Speaker 1:So I think what I'm suggesting in this podcast episode is that there is something important to consider here, which is that, instead of frequently seeking to find a line of demarcation within what others call the left, that allows me to have a more comfortable, smaller community, instead of doing that it is advisable, desirable it's better to try and figure out a way in which we can respect, listen to, try to learn from, try to affect people on both sides of the difference, without defining the difference as a demarcation line between something good and something not so good, and that should be the first priority. It doesn't mean it will always work. Oh, so we should try the block idea, the mutual listening idea. I mean it sounds trite, but the fact is the process of trying to delimit the perfect left is counterproductive. That doesn't mean that it is never the case that there is a line and on one side there's left and on the other side there's not left. Sometimes that is the case and it's important to realize. Sometimes that is the case and it's important to realize when it's the case.
Speaker 1:But rushing to see every difference that you might have that is discomforting to you, or every difference that I might have that is discomforting to me, and trust me on this, the differences that I have over, you know, prioritizing or treating in a holistic way the various dimensions of society, or seeing two classes or three classes, are indeed very discomforting.
Speaker 1:I think that something really is at stake. But it doesn't do to jump from that to a condition of no longer listening, no longer having relations, no longer being under an umbrella, except in very extreme or pretty extreme cases. Okay, so this episode, my inclination is to think as I get to the end of it, that it probably was a little bit muddled, it probably was a little bit dream of consciousness, it probably was a little bit less rich I don't know than some others. That may be what happens when topics start to dry up. May be what happens when topics start to dry up. So please again, consider the possibility of letting me know topics that you would like to see addressed which you think maybe I would be able to address pretty well, and I'll decide if I can't, and then I won't do it, or people who you think I should have on. And that said, this is Mike Albert signing off until next time for Revolution Z.