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(Education for socialists)
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Vol. 81/No. 12 March 27, 2017
Suppression of rights inevitably targets the working class
Below are excerpts from Counter-Mobilization: A Strategy to Fight
Racist and Fascist Attacks. It contains the transcript of a 1975
discussion led by Farrell Dobbs. Dobbs was a leader of the 1930s
Teamster strikes; central organizer of the first Teamster campaign to
unionize over-the-road truck drivers; and national secretary of the
Socialist Workers Party from 1953 to 1972. Other participants excerpted
here are Jack Barnes, national secretary of the Socialist Workers Party,
and Steve Clark, at the time the national secretary of the Young
Socialist Alliance. Copyright © 1976 by Pathfinder Press. Reprinted by
permission.
FARRELL DOBBS: Starting from our initial premise — the aim of the
capitalists with regard to fascism — I’m trying to look at each tactic
from the point of view of its effect. What happens if you start out with
the premise that you’re going to organize a battle to prevent the
fascists from saying one word in public? What happens, on the other
hand, if you operate on the basis of asserting and exercising the right
to counterdemonstrate, to confront the fascists in this form without
getting bogged down in the question of the fascists’ right of free
speech? The first approach is to the advantage of the ruling class. The
second approach puts you in a more favorable position and the ruling
class in a more difficult position for carrying out its basic aim of
crippling the rights of the antifascists.
To use a slight reformulation of that phrase of Malcolm X, the essence
of the ruling class tactic toward oppositional movements like the
struggle against fascism is to make the criminal appear to be the victim
and the victim appear to be the criminal. They try that in every
struggle, without exception. You always have to keep that in mind when
you deal with the tactical nuances in the struggle.
Remember that tactics have to serve a strategic course, and the
strategic course has to be closely attuned to the programmatic aims.
It’s not advantageous to grab hold of a tactic because it seems
appealing at the moment without always seeing the tactic in relation to
the whole fundamental problem. …
STEVE CLARK: The concrete incident that led Ginny Hildebrand and I to
want this discussion occurred at San Francisco State University. A
professor invited a Nazi onto the campus to address his speech class on
March 10, 1975. No right-wing student or faculty group was involved. In
fact, the professor was known to have left-liberal leanings. The way he
conducted his class was to bring in all kinds of professional speakers —
preachers, Communists, and in this case a Nazi.
A demonstration was called with the stated aim of running this Nazi off
campus and preventing his appearance before the class. It was called by
the Spartacus Youth League, which describes itself as the youth section
of the Spartacist League. The Progressive Labor Party and the
Revolutionary Student Brigade were involved in one way or another on the
same basic line. The real organizations with influence on campus — the
Chicano student organization, the Black students organization, the
women’s organization, and some others that were approached — didn’t want
anything to do with the action.
The Young Socialist Alliance [YSA] refused to support or endorse this
demonstration because of the way it was projected. We were aware of some
of the basic ideas that Farrell laid out. We had learned the dangers of
the confrontationist approach in the antiwar movement. …
We took a different tack than that proposed by Farrell on the question
of the rights of Jensen, Shockley, the other academic racists, and, by
implication, the fascists. We incorporated a lot of the lessons Farrell
discussed. We opposed calling on the administration or the government to
ban speakers. We thought we were avoiding the trap of placing the axis
on freedom of speech, by avoiding actions like shouting the speakers
down and other things which have led to unnecessary victimization of
antiracists. But we said that the YSA does not believe racists and Nazis
have the right to speak on campus. …
JACK BARNES: The processes going on in society, including class
polarization, reflect themselves on campus. Let’s begin with that
reality, and then we can fit all our strategy and tactics on campus into
the broader strategy and tactics of the class struggle.
That’s why I think Farrell was right to begin where he did. We don’t
start with the Constitution, or the Bill of Rights, or the fascists. We
start with the preparation of our class and its vanguard for the coming
struggles. That’s the axis that everything we do revolves around. …
Tactically, you have to differentiate between Shockley and the Nazis.
There is a whole spectrum of outright fascists, right-wing professors,
right-wing students, secretly right-wing types, open racist elements,
secretly racist elements, groups that favor a stronger role for the
military, etc. You have to be aware of the qualitative differences
between some of these shades as well as the breadth of the spectrum. You
handle each type slightly differently.
At the point where we are in the evolution of class consciousness in
this country, and the state of the student movement in relation to that
overall level of class consciousness, you cannot deal with Shockley or
Jensen exactly as you would deal with fascists.
On these questions we have the job of winning the minds not only of the
masses but of the vanguard. Even many of the more capable students
cannot self-confidently explain what’s wrong with these theories. You’ve
got to take them on at that theoretical level, as well as on the level
of the implicit politics of what Jensen and Shockley are doing. It will
be greatly appreciated in the Black community if forces come forward to
rebut this racist fakery in plain language, cogently and scientifically.
On this question, one of our weapons is science.
Of course, we don’t invite these people to campus, but we also know that
they are going to be on campus. There are going to be debates and people
are going to go to them and a lot of racists are going to look to these
pseudoscientists for ammunition. The young militants will want to know
how to rebut the Jensens. They really appreciate it when you give them
ammunition, answer their questions, clarify their confusions so that
they can answer the questions of others in their milieu.
Related articles:
Debate rages over attack on political rights at Middlebury
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