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A thread on imperialism, an excerpt from my article from the Summer 2020 issue of @plbmagazine:
1. Most people who call themselves leftists would agree that reactionary calls for white power are qualitatively different from revolutionary calls for Black power.
1. Most people who call themselves leftists would agree that reactionary calls for white power are qualitatively different from revolutionary calls for Black power.
2. They would also agree that when people of oppressed nations in the United States express reactionary chauvinism, they do so as a response to white supremacy, and therefore combating white supremacy should be the main ideological issue at hand.
3. Unfortunately, many self-described “leftists” lose sight of this when it comes to the international arena. Ultra-leftists and anarchists often refuse to stand in solidarity with the people of countries targeted by U.S. imperialism,
4. because, failing to recognize U.S. imperialism as the primary contradiction at hand and the domestic issues of its victim countries as secondary contradictions, they hold the position of both sides being “equally bad” and objectively side with imperialists.
5. During the CN Civil War, an anti-Japanese united front between the CPC and the KMT was formed, with the understanding that the contradiction between the JP imperialists and the CN people had become primary, and the contradiction between the CPC and the KMT had become secondary
6. Mao stressed the fact that the fall of China to Japan would have compounded the existing oppressions faced by the Chinese people, and would have made the Chinese people’s liberation far more difficult.
7. Had the Chinese people taken the position of the KMT and the Japanese being “equally bad,” China would have been completely subjugated by the foreign boot, which is typically more difficult to fight off than the domestic boot.
8. Communists must learn from this example and honestly analyze the contradictions of today’s world.
9. Sympathizing with, making excuses for, and objectively enabling U.S. imperialism on the international stage is similar to making excuses and objectively enabling white supremacy within the United States.
10. We cannot overcome national divisions and form political solidarity within our class, the working class, without understanding and combating white supremacy, and we cannot expect international solidarity if we do not understand and actively oppose U.S. imperialism.
11. Furthermore, it is nothing but chauvinism to expect anything less than perfection from other countries while turning a blind eye to the imperialist activities of the country we are in.
12. To give an example: even if everything the mainstream media says about China were true (this is not the case, but let’s say what-if), we must ask ourselves: who is threatening whom?
13. Is it China or the U.S. that has the other surrounded by military bases in client states? Is it China or the U.S. that actively overthrows democratically elected governments abroad? Is it China or the U.S. that actively props up military dictatorships throughout the world?
14. Can we honestly say the two are “just as bad” as one another? Even if we have criticisms of CN, should we not support the defense of their sovereignty from US aggression, especially since we are in the US and have the power to exert pressure on those who run things here?
15. We live in the age of capitalist imperialism, and the United States, though not the only imperialist country, is the leading imperialist power. This makes the struggle against Yankee imperialism the primary contradiction in today’s world.
16. Many who consider themselves “leftists” in the west fail to see this, and are instead against an abstract form of imperialism which deems all countries equally bad.
17. To draw the parallel once again between what the United States does internally with what it does externally, if we are able to recognize the false equivalence the U.S. legal system makes between the weak and the powerful when it claims there is “equality before the law,”
18. then we must also see that those who claim the U.S. and Assad are “just as bad as one another” are really siding with U.S. imperialism.
