Author: James J Jackson Jr

Serious Resistance: Why I Joined the Democratic Socialists of America!

/ James J Jackson Jr / Leave a comment

Like many other people, when Donald Trump was elected in 2016 I decided to take action. I have always identified as a socialist, a leftist, and a progressive. While growing up I always did my best to get involved with activism, especially when the Occupy movement began to explode in 2011. Yet as time drifted on I could find few causes that motivated me to do anything more than share a tweet or a Facebook post. That all changed in 2016.

I am from a family of left leaning activists. My grandmother was a well known activist in Sacramento who had always organized for the homeless, migrant farm workers, and war refugees. I had the good fortune of tagging along with her to all of these causes as I grew up. She and my mother took me to my first peace march when I was five years old, and I have been there ever since. It was probably thanks to their upbringing that I ended up being voted “Most Opinionated” by my graduating class in high school. In college I became obsessed with Occupy and kept track of every single occupation that I could while trying to also find a cause to organize for at my school. Besides a few protests about tuition fees, momentous as they were for my school, I did not do much.

Then came the Bernie Sanders campaign, and as a socialist I was thrilled to just have our names on the board. I had little confidence his campaign would take off though, but I pledged my support for him from the beginning and both Bernie and the country pleasantly surprised me. It was thrilling to hear people take the platforms of the working class seriously. Anti racism and feminism became unavoidable topics thanks to the 2016 election. No matter how you want to interpret it or whose side you were on during the primary, it cannot be denied that a serious conversation about progressive policy and theory finally was taking place in the United States. When Bernie came to California I was lucky enough to make it to the front row at his first rally there, that was when I started to figure out what causes needed people the most.

It still wasn’t enough for me though. At this point getting involved still looked like nothing more than showing up for protests or Bernie events. This was around the same time that the Black Lives Matter movement in Los Angeles, where I was living at the time, took off. I was following BLM since the events in Ferguson and I wanted to get involved as much as I could because black liberation is synonymous with working class liberation.

What finally got me to show up was the case of Jasmine Richards, a BLM organizer who was arrested for lynching because she touched a police officer. The officer in question is caught on camera assaulting a friend of Richards’ and Richards reacted as any person would to seeing a friend assaulted: they tried to interfere and de-escalate the situation. The law that was actually used to arrest and prosecute Richards is the same law that California had passed in order to prevent lynchings of black people who were already in police custody. The law is meant to protect black lives not the police force who already have extra laws protecting them from assault. The fact that a black woman can get arrested for breaking a law that exists to protect black people was a wake up call to me. That wake up call said, “The system is just plain wrong!” I know I should have woken up long before this and the fact I eventually realized white supremacy and my privilege are systemic are not things I should be rewarded for.

When Bernie’s campaign ended I was disappointed and heartbroken, but I was still inspired to carry on. I stayed dedicated to the cause and I knew I would be voting for Hillary in order to dodge the bullet of a Trump Presidency. As disappointed as I was that Bernie would not be president I was relieved that at least an Oxford educated woman would be keeping Trump from the highest executive office in the country. So as you can imagine I was one of the many people who was shocked and horrified when it was announced Donald Trump had won the election thanks to a fluke in how we count and allocate votes. Trump’s victory was the grandiose wake up call I needed. It was the realization that I cannot be dependent on others like Bernie or Hillary to change the system. I knew that as did the several thousand people who took to the streets the next day screaming “Not My President!” The time for delay was over.

I had been raised in Sacramento, the capital city of California. I knew that I could accomplish more organizing in the capital than I could as just another protester in L.A. Plus I could carry on the legacy of my grandmother whose work I was worried would go in vain thanks to the new administration. I moved back to Sacramento, but was still not sure how to get involved. When I say “get involved” what I mean is what one should be doing beyond just showing up for marches and protests. While they are important I wanted to do things that I would see the immediate effects of. I did not want to just validate myself for being anti-Trump.

My work at first was very similar to what I was doing before I moved back to Sacramento. I showed up for anti-fracking events, No Dakota Access Pipeline solidarity groups, Black Lives Matter rallies and vigils, and every march including the Women’s March, the Science March, and the Tax March. Despite all of this I still had a desire to do more; I did not just want to protest for the sake of protesting. I wanted to organize and achieve tangible victories on the local level that would help the working class. That is how we can stop Trump’s fascism and reduce the effects his legacy will have; we should focus on getting resources and protections to the communities most affected by Trump’s policies.

That was when I started showing up for meetings for Sacramento’s chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America. I had been following their social media before I had even moved back from Los Angeles, and one day I decided the time was right to join and attend a meeting. At my first DSA meeting, without even knowing a single person there, I was immediately welcomed into a sphere of like minded people who had the same exact goal as me. They wanted to achieve tangible victories on the local level that were socialist, progressive, and therefore inherently anti Trump. I was both impressed and thrilled to discover such a group existed in my home town. At the first meeting I attended I learned about how in November of 2016, a former Co-chair of the DSA named Michael Israel had been killed in Northern Syria as a rebel fighter for the socialist revolution in Rojava. The chapter was planning a memorial and was inviting people to attend, including myself. I was at first hesitant because I thought it would initially be just for people who knew Michael but the membership encouraged me to attend. The memorial was not the somber event I had expected but was a lively thing with dancing, music, food, and what seemed to be the entire activist community of Sacramento coming together for a day to celebrate a life so dedicated to the cause of humanity. At both the meeting and the memorial I felt a degree of acceptance and belonging that I had never felt before. The sense of togetherness that seemed inherent to the DSA was awe inspiring, unlike anything else I had witnessed or experienced before. The strong community that I both witnessed and experienced with Sacramento DSA had so impressed me that I decided to attend the 2017 DSA convention.

Within three months of my joining DSA, I ended up becoming the chairperson for the Sacramento delegation at the convention. This was the convention where we made abortion access a national priority, where we started our Medicare for All campaign which has become a mainstream policy platform, and we laid out our electoral strategy which has brought on the success of people like Lee Carter and Alexandria Ocasio Cortez. I feel an immense sense of pride that I took part in a piece of socialist history. The convention was one of the most stressful experiences of my life but one of the most worthwhile. There were intense outbursts from the voting floor and passionate debates about the direction of the largest socialist organization in America. It was something that I got to put a piece of myself into and I am proud to see that our work from the convention is constantly yielding such successful results. With Sacramento DSA I witnessed and experienced true community, at the national convention I witnessed and experienced true democracy. Not only did I feel happy to belong, I felt proud to be involved.

I have since put a piece of myself nationally into an organization that goes against everything that Trump stands for. He attacks women’s healthcare, so we make abortion access a priority. He attacks immigrants so we adopt the policy of abolishing ICE which like Medicare for All has become a mainstream platform. With these national priorities, on the local level Sacramento DSA has organized support for Black Lives Matter and the unhoused. We have worked with the Brown Berets and other anti ICE groups. We have a flourishing socialist feminist reading group, thanks to which I have learned to reconcile with my own sexism. I have taken action against the very institutions that create and enable Trump, I did not just throw weight behind actions against the man himself. This is only a fraction of how much I have learned from my experience with the DSA. Not only have I worked hard and found a sense of belonging, I have grown and continue to grow intellectually thanks to the people that I call, “comrades.”

In short, if you want to get serious about resistance, about stopping Trump and obstructing his presidency, then look no further than your local DSA chapter. Don’t have a local chapter yet? Even better, because this is your chance to start one and therefore your chance to create an organization to fight Trumpism on the local level. The DSA combines anti racism, feminism, and class issues into one fight. If you are serious about resistance, if you genuinely want to create a space and community that goes against the racist and sexist status quo, look to the Democratic Socialists of America.

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The Exhibit, a short story about animatronic dinosaurs and mortality

/ James J Jackson Jr / Leave a comment

The state fair always had some of the best attractions, new rides at the causeway, a different type of fried something dipped into something else, and exhibits of art and science from across the state. This year the fair managed to score one of the countries most popular touring attractions, WALK WITH THE DINOSAURS.

In a giant pop up tent, outside of the building with the prize farm animals, a series of animatronic dinosaurs and prehistoric creatures stood on display for people to see. The dinosaurs stood on mounds of astroturf next to plastic ferns, and all of them doing something to make it clear to the visitors and gawkers that they were indeed a dinosaur. The Brontosaurus would dip their heads to “take a bite” of the astro turf grass, pulling their heads back up to chew it and look out over the crowds. There were two and they would take turns doing this, so that when one dipped its head to “eat” the grass the other’s head would rise up and look out over the visitors. Then they’d switch, then they switch back and etc.

In a corner there were two walls of bushes opposite each other. Every few seconds a few of the raptor robots would burst out from both sides of the bushes and run to the other while shrieking. It was back and forth and a screech, their legs pumping and their heads bobbing “Just like in Jurassic World!” as the exhibit visitors and children would exclaim at least 200 times a day. In another side was a Stegosaurus. Big, fun to look at, but not very impressive to most of the onlookers. All it did was look up, turn it’s head to you, blink, turn its head back, then bend down to eat some of the astroturf. It would then look up again do the same thing.

In the middle of the exhibit was the main attraction, the one that everyone always comes to see when there is a dinosaur exhibit, the most popular dinosaur for any seven year old, the Tyrannosaurus Rex. It stood at a height where its head could almost scrape the top of the tent. Its jaws would move slowly because of all the wiring and gears that weighed it down. “The real T-rex’s bite would actually come down with a much faster weight…” said the Dad’s who wanted to pretend they were smart to show off in front of their families.

The state fair always happened in the middle of summer, so the managers of the exhibit always had to keep things in the tent cool enough for the robots to function. The state fair prepped and planned for all likely weather contingency, even a light rain since the tent was practically leak proof. No one could have expected such a big storm in the middle of summer.

The clouds could be seen developing in the sky from miles away but there speed was something to be marveled. It was not long before the dark grayness hungover the city, a freak storm that came from practically nowhere. It took just a few hours for these drifting thunder clouds to build and consume the sky, swallowing the tri-county area into a bubble of wind and rain. The harsh 50 mph winds stung first, dragging the thunderheads in across the sky from what felt like all directions. The rain started immediately after the clouds settled over head with the wind still gusting and cutting through anyone or anything unlucky enough to be outside that day, such as the workers at the state fair. They did everything in their power to disconnect the rides from the electric generators, and to keep everything in the fairgrounds buttoned down to the ground. The Dinosaur exhibit was the first thing to be shut down, but they didn’t do anything about the lightning. Soon after the gusts and the downpour came rumbles of thunder, and then the lightning, then more thunder. Bursts from the sky hit some of the rides like the giant swing ride which got zapped and fried immediately since it stood so tall It was practically a giant lightning rod, as were the support poles that propped up the Dinosaur tent.

With another crack of thunder came yet another bolt from the clouds, this time hitting the tent dead center which crawled down and into exhibit like a web of an electric wave. It branched out to each pillar and the current flowed through the tent, working its way into each piece of the exhibits wires and gears.

Each Dinobot shook with a jolt when the pulse came through. In a flash the current was gone while the rain and thunder still crashed outside. No electricity was flowing to the tent anymore, but each dinosaur began to blink and twitch, they were moving with no electricity flowing to them.

The Brontosaurus gave out it’s deep groan of a call as it began to slowly march from its place. The T Rex roared as it’s stomped off of it’s platform. The raptors burst forth and spread out through the tent, pouncing on any piece of their new bounty of prey. Everyone began moving about the tent amongst the astroturf grass and ferns, everyone except the stegosaurus. The Stegosaurus just stood there, looking at everyone move, wondering.

“Where am I?” Thought the Stegosaurus, until an even more important question arose, “What am I?” The Stegosaurus was scared, up until now he had no memory, no thoughts. The only thing the stegosaurus could remember was standing in this exact spot, eating the grass in front of it. “How long have I been here? Is this where I was born? What is going on?” The Stegosaurus looked around to see the T-rex stomping around and roaring, to see the raptors jumping around and biting the hides of the herbivores and knocking them over to feast. They tore at the insides of the creatures, which of course were just wires and gears, but the Stegosaurus was convinced they were the innards of his fellow dinosaurs.

The Stegosaurus looked at the Brontosaurus as they stomped around and bayed, still taking turns to bend down and sample the grass. Since the Stegosaurus could remember doing nothing else it thought, “Oh, this must be something I’m supposed to do.” And it chomped down again on the grass in front of it, but it wondered why the grass had no flavor or taste.

“Is this actually grass?” Wondered the Stegosaurus. It tried to swallow the mouthful of grass but it was stuck in its mouth, it wouldn’t go down, it wouldn’t go anywhere, and all the Stegosaurus could think is “What is happening?”

The Stegosaurus had no memories but eating the grass in this one spot, and for some reason it could not even do that. It looked around at the chaos caused by the raptors and the T Rex and it wondered why it had been trapped in this one spot and for how long. The Stegosaurus was also confused because it wondered what this white thing hanging over all of them was. It looked from side to side and to see what it was and it could tell that it had walled all of them into this place together. The Stegosaurus knew there was something outside, beyond these walls, and it wanted to see.

It began to step off its patch of platform, and slowly started to make it’s way to the wall, only to suddenly fall forward and to the side, in agony. It had never known pain before, it had never known any sensation, now the Stegosaurus was debilitated. It turned into a heap on the ground and could not budge because of a sharp pain in its side underbelly. When it crashed to the ground it looked where the pain came from and it could see that one of the raptors had made its way over to them and taken a bite out of its side. The Stegosaurus saw its own wires and gears popping up from the plaster skin, thinking it had brutally been mutilated. The Stegosaurus could feel its energy being drained, leaving it, it’s eyes began to close and it’s whole body began to shut down, as it did it wondered, “What was the point of it all?”

The Professional Protester Episode 52 | The Mueller Report Flops

/ James J Jackson Jr / Leave a comment

Since it is the talk of the town I would be remiss if I didn’t make another, and hopefully my last, video about Russiagate. To sum it up, I want liberals to realize:

1. All the time spent watching speculative news stories was time that should have been used for organizing.

&

2. No matter what happens, this report won’t give us healthcare, it won’t jail killer cops, it won’t bring justice to people like Stephon Clark’s family, and it won’t solve the student debt crisis.

Okay, can we move on yet please? Thanks.

We Are Not The Socialists We Love: A Further Case Against Personality Cults.

/ James J Jackson Jr / Leave a comment

I have written pieces before about the toxicity that personality cults have on the left. As much as I do love the words of Lenin, Trotsky, and Rosa, as much as I appreciate the dedication to ideology that several of my comrades have, I have a cold sobering reminder for all of us;

You are not Lenin.

You are not Emma Goldman.

You are not the socialist that you love and idealize, and you never will be.

So many people on the left are quick to tear apart or derail perfectly sound material gains in favor of an ideological purity, a purity that is often attached to a loyalty they have for their favorite leftists who have long slipped from our realm and into the realms of the historical dialectic. What many modern leftists often forget is that the leftists of the past are just like the leftists of now, they are products of their time and place and are trying to make the most gains for the working class within their time and place.

This is why it is foolish to write off organizations like DSA on purely sectarian lines. People who say that “electoral politics has no effect” ignore the fact that the GOP dedicates all of their resources to voter suppression. If voting had no effect it would not be such a constant target of the capitalist class.

At the same time people who put all their efforts into electoral matters can forsake material gains for workers, this can happen if a self identified leftist ignores a communities need for mutual aid or when a leftist writes off all forms of direct action as street theatrics. It can even lead to the erasure of people who make up the majority of the working class such as women of color, indigenous people, trans people, and sex workers because these are groups who are often the most forsaken in electoral matters in America.

There is a time and place for mutual aid, direct action, and seizure of state power, and to reject anyone of those tiers for purely sectarian reasons is to insult the people you hope to radicalize. You cannot scream revolution while refusing to meet the material needs of the working classes, especially since the working classes is predominately made up of people who are constantly facing erasure as mentioned in the paragraph above.

This is the reality of the world we live in, we live in a time when socialism is in a position to both gain genuine state power and can provide genuine material gains for the working class in America. Neither can be foresaken and we cannot afford to put hero worship ahead of our material realities and we risk forsaking everything if we do not make our doctrines relevant to the time and place we are in. Our doctrines should be attached to achieving communism, adaptable to the times, and applicable to those whom seek liberation. The doctrines we use should not be attached to hero worship for a single leftist thinker or interpretation of theory. Remember, it is never just about the individual, it is about our power as a collective, sectarian personality cults hold us back from collective power.

I love Lenin, but his arguments came from Russia 1917, not America 2019. I am not saying there is nothing to learn from socialists of days past, quite the contrary to be honest because there is much to learn from them and it is the duty of every leftist political organizer to study the history of our movement as much as possible. The thinkers who are so often deified were trying to make sense of the world and change the world of their times. This is our task and it is still what we are doing today. There is plenty that Lenin can teach us in 2019, but what Lenin cannot do is be the guiding light for all organizing and decision making, nor can Trotsky, Rosa, Mao, Stalin, etc. and so forth.

I must emphasize this point, I am not saying these classical theorists have nothing to teach us anymore. The comprehensive study of communist theory, history and applications is a must in order for us to develop a doctrine of socialism that works for the here and now. Socialism and the road to communism must be applicable in order for it to be doable for a mass movement which can be turned into a revolution, and to make it applicable it must be adaptable, not stuck in a form of doctrine locked to the popularity of the author.

We need to be thinking about material gains and revolutionary stepping stones in 2019, we need not be evangelical newspaper salespeople with dead eyes and souls with zero understanding of Alexandira Ocasios Cortez’s politics.

The same goes for any anarchist, socialist, or communist whom their organizations have made into deities. Even Marx, we must make our efforts about the collective, not just the individual elaborating the collective.

What we need to is to adapt our theory to the present while learning the lessons of the past and using them to guide us to our future. This is not an easy task for socialist and communist organizers but it is a task we must take on. Marx himself said that “Everything moves, everything is subject to change.” So must it also be true with his own communist doctrine. I do not want people to think this is a rant against centralization or having a doctrine, or in any way a rejection of the works of Marx or any classical leftist thinker. What I am saying is that our doctrine needs to be applicable to the times we are in to best meet the needs of the working class. When you attach the doctrine to a single individual, it is almost impossible to adapt that doctrine to meet those needs. This is hero worship and it breeds sectarianism, period.

We owe it to the people we seek to radicalize, who we hope see revolt, to meet them where they are, and to build them up to where they could go. We need a socialism that is fluid, adaptable to the times, a socialism that speaks to peoples needs not one that merely preaches to them old doctrines which do not engage them. We need an intersectional communism, a socialism for the 21st Century.

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We, a socialist poem

/ James J Jackson Jr / Leave a comment

We make the profits.

We starve.

We make the wealth.

We starve.

We make you rich.

We starve.

We are promised rewards.

We starve.

We are isolated.

We starve.

We march.

We are fed.

We rally.

We are fed.

We have the guillotine.

We win.

3/15/19

Chelsea Clinton, Islamophobia and the White Supremacy of American Liberals

/ James J Jackson Jr / Leave a comment

Yesterday a confrontation at a vigil between Chelsea Clinton and a Muslim woman who was in mourning over the Chirstchurch massacre went viral. The video shows that the woman stood up to Clinton for being present at the vigil after Clinton’s comments about Ilan Omar opened up a massive wave of islamophobic attacks against Omar. Clinton never apologized to Omar.

Clinton can be seen in the video listening to the women, but it is clear she is not actually registering the woman’s objections to her presence, or she is actively ignoring them. Clinton simply nods and gives a “non apology” that would make her parents proud.

Clinton replies to the woman’s complaints with, “I’m sorry you feel that way,” repeatedly. At one point in the video a comrade of the Muslim woman angrily asks Clinton, “What does that even mean?” To which Clinton gave no answer.

My dear reader, as a white male with a middle class background, please trust me when I say that I know what “I’m sorry you feel that way” means.

“I’m sorry you feel that way,” is, to be frank, a backhanded white people way of avoiding an actual apology. The objective of using those specific words is intentional, the purpose is to make someone think you apologized to them without actually apologizing for anything. It is annoying and backhanded, I have seen people in my white family do it all the time and it is one of the whitest things a person of privilege such as Clinton could do.

When someone says “I’m sorry you feel that way,” instead of just, “I’m genuinely sorry,” they are not apologizing for their actions but making it seem that you are the one who should be apologetic for yours. I can vouch on good authority that “I’m sorry you feel that way,” is Clinton’s passive aggressive way of saying “I did nothing wrong, you should stop bothering me.” There is a word for this, gaslighting.

Of course Clinton’s followers leap to her defense while ignoring the reality that defending a white woman who upset a Muslim in mourning just after a mosque shooting is in of itself an act of white supremacy and Islamophobia.

I got into several twitter debates already about this. Many said that the woman’s attack on Clinton, “wasn’t graceful.” This is the same kind of argument you hear from city council members or local politicians who get shouted down or cussed out by Black Lives Matter supporters when there is a police involved murder of a black life. Mayors and city councils are faster to get upset at a black person for saying “Bitch stop killing us!” because swearing in city council chambers “violates decorum.” Instead of focusing on the message, which is the “stop killing us” part of that sentence, these selective solidarity liberals focus only on the method.

Instead of focusing on the message of this woman, which was “your comments about Ilan Omar perpetuate this kind of slaughter and you have yet to apologize for it,” she is blatantly ignored because the woman spoke to Clinton with intensity and anger. Anger that was completely justified, especially since Clinton and the liberals who left Omar vulnerable to islamophobic attacks have yet to apologize.

To be in a position where you are more concerned with an oppressed person’s delivery of their message rather than with their actual message is the epitome of white privilege and Clinton and her supporters fail to see that.

Aside from saying that the woman was “not graceful” other’s have said that her rebuking of Clinton was a staged act because the woman was wearing a Bernie Sander’s “College for all, Medicare for all” t-shirt. Some tweets even read “Who wears a political shirt to a vigil? It was clearly staged.” Once again we see an act of white supremacy here. To tell a Muslim woman, or anyone for that matter, what they should wear in their time of mourning is not only bad optics, it is belittling and dehumanizing. This is not about her wearing a Bernie shirt, it is about the fact that she felt used and ignored and vulnerable, a vulnerability which Clinton enabled with her rhetoric. Does any of that matter to liberals? No, because they don’t like what she was wearing when she did it.

Other defenders of Clinton have argued that “she was an invited guest,” and she didn’t “deserve” to be called out because she “came to the vigil in good faith.” First of all, the Clintons, or any capitalist for that matter, has never done anything in “good faith.” There is always an ulterior motive to anything the capitalist class does. Clinton was not there to mourn with muslims, she was there to be seen mourning with muslims.

It should also be noted that there is nothing to be suprised about here. The Clinton’s have a long record for both enabling white supremacy and using the optics of black or brown people’s issues to make themselves look good. Clinton being present at the vigil is similar to her father going on Arseno Hall or her mother moving to Harlem, it is a chance to be seen amongst an oppressed group without actually doing anything to help them. Let us also not forget that Hillary bragged about having slaves at the Arkansas governor’s mansion (prison labor was in fact used during their entire stay) or her infamous “superpredators” comment. Nor should we forget the crime bill signed into law by her husband which has perpetuated the modern day Jim Crow of prison labor to increase exponentially. Clinton being at that vigil was an attempt to use non white people for optics, period.

There is no excuse to defend Clinton on this one, yet of course liberals will do it because liberals will do anything to protect their identities as the progressive and understanding ones, even though their desire to carve out a progressive identity is coming at the cost of black and brown lives and is inevitably perpetuating the very forms of hatred they claim to be against.

To suggest that this act was staged because the woman was wearing a Bernie shirt is belittling and reductionist to her sense of mourning. To give the woman instructions on how she “should have” approached Clinton is an act of white supremacy. To defend a white woman who perpetuated Islamophobia with her rhetoric instead of listening to a Muslim woman’s righteous outrage is in of itself further perpetuating Islamophobia and therefore is an act of perpetuating white supremacy. This shows that liberals only express solidarity when their capitalist narrative is agreed with. Liberals claim they want to stand in solidarity with muslims, but clearly it has to be the right kind of muslims I.E. not ones who support Bernie Sanders or criticize Israel.

This whole situation sums up why we must abandon liberalism and why we must embrace socialism and communism, however we must do it from a place that actively rejects Islamophobia and all other forms of hatred. If socialists are to be the the active agents against white supremacy that we claim to be then we must also actively work to reject Islamophobia. This means we must not fall into the liberal trap of being selective with our solidarity. We must stand with muslims whether or not their stories or perspectives agree with our narrative. We should actively be incorporating their perspectives into our narrative and dialectic. A failure to do so would in-turn perpetuate white supremacy. We also must not reduce our Muslim comrades to just being victims in need of our help. The woman in the video is clearly not someone who needs a patronizing helping hand, but rather she is clearly an active agent in resisting the oppression that is Islamophobia as are most of the muslims in places such as Palestine who are actively fighting against their oppression.

The woman in the video had every right to confront Chelsea Clinton and Clinton clearly has no remorse for what she said and did to Ilan Omar and she refuses to see how that affected not just Omar but muslims as a whole. Those leaping to Clinton’s defense are actively defending white supremacy and are either being belittling or selective in their solidarity. Socialists must show support for muslims but that does not just mean attacking Clinton or supporting muslims who fit our narrative. It must mean that we elevate the narratives of Islamophobia’s greatest victims. To over come white supremacy we must be actively incorporating all of the realities of oppression into our analysis. To forsake Islamophobia or perpetuate it is to perpetuate the same white supremacy that prevents black families from getting justice and is splitting child and parent at the border.

Clinton had no business being at that vigil, liberals have no business defending her presence, and socialists must make it our business to be active agents in ending all dimensions of white supremacy, we can forsake nothing if we are to be active agents against oppression. If you disagree with me, well then, “I’m sorry you feel that way.” ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Link to video on twitter