Interview with David McNally—Part 1 by Tempest, February 11 https://www.tempestmag.org/2024/02/perspectives-for-socialists-in-2024/ Part 2, March 4 https://www.tempestmag.org/2024/03/perspectives-for-socialists-in-2024-2/ both parts, all in one at Links, March 12 https://links.org.au/perspectives-socialists-2024-interview-david-mcnally . . . Right now the electoral advances of the Right need to be countered in every way possible. But if we want to stop the attack on reproductive rights in the United States, for example, we should not focus on getting Democrats elected. Instead we need to rebuild a mass based reproductive choice movement. That’s what we’ve seen elsewhere, and it’ll be the case in the United States, just as it was in the 1970s, in terms of winning on reproductive rights.
Mass social movements create a different kind of politics. They teach people that politics doesn’t have to be submitting to the Clintons of the world. We’re never going to win over working-class people if that’s what we project to them as the alternative—that a bunch of technocratic elites like Biden and company, who have been lifelong political hacks in a Democratic Party machinery, represent your future. We’re not getting anywhere and we’re ultimately losing politically in those terms. The real question for us is creating a mass counterbalance and political life that prefigures a different kind of politics, a different kind of organizing, and a different kind of struggle. That will inevitably produce electoral spinoffs. For instance, think of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party or the Peace and Freedom Party associated with the Black Panther Party in California. There will be electoral spinoffs, but right now the one overwhelming priority is creating a Left force in politics to counter the Right. Ultimately, we need mass Left movements to do that. We’ve got to get back to street, community, and workplace mobilization as the key. There’s an opening right now around justice for Palestine. I hope we don’t squander it. # #. # -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#29533): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/29533 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/105017482/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. #4 Do not exceed five posts a day. -=-=- Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/8674936/21656/1316126222/xyzzy [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
