Left Coast Media
Left Coast Media
Wherein We Find Solidarity In Criticism
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Wouldn't it be funny if I changed my handle to just five rs and end. Oh God, I would hate you so much.
Speaker 2Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, whoa, Whoa, whoa.
Speaker 1All right. Welcome to another episode of the Left Coast podcast. Today is a little bit different. We have a interview with myself, a communal sauce and Twitter's good girl talking about some issues that are sort of affecting the way that we are running our local chapters and uh, that we think need to be readdressed and the upcoming, uh, national convention. Uh, and then after the interview there's going to be a sort of quick rundown with myself and Aaron on some other things that we think might have been missed in the interview that we can maybe put out there, uh, before we actually get into next week with all of the chaos that the convention entails. All right, I'll see you on the other side of the interview. Okay. So, um,
Speaker 3uh, we're keeping this pretty, fairly narrowly focused to sort of, um, the, the challenges and issues that you've seen facing DSA recently. Um, particularly around, uh, funding challenges. I think it was a, I can't, I can't remember the specifics. Yeah.
Speaker 4Hi. We, we don't need to keep it to that. I guess I, and again, I mean I'm, I'm here all night books but I don't necessarily need to like, I guess spend all my time talking about that. Like I think I made my points pretty clear and okay. Are those, for those that don't know, my points were that there were very few funding encouragements made by national in enough time for us to really do enough good with it for the criticisms we got later about not doing it soon enough. And on top of that, the like the tiered convention pricing where, you know, here's, here's the poor people that pay this amount and here's the regular people that pay this amount and here's, you know, the corporate sponsors or whatever, the fact that pay, you know, the rest of the amount that, that, that really bugged me and I, I did, I, I did not communicate I guess the first time in the best way possible. But I think I did the second time and that was what really I think helped me talk about it and get, I think a little bit more of my point across. Like I was just mad the first time and just firing off things that I think people didn't listen to. And, uh, the second time I spent a little more time on it and I came up with the thing and I wrote up what I thought was right. So I that, that that's where I'm at.
Speaker 5Yeah. The, the first one. I mean, one of the things that came out of that was, um,
Speaker 6I mean
Speaker 5I'm on an Osi on an organizing committee and this was the first that I'd heard about there being funds available. Um, like that we could sign up people ourselves and keep
Speaker 6and then
Speaker 5pass that on to national.
Speaker 4Yeah. Like I, I, I'm, I'm the general secretary of Central Indiana Dsa. I knew that we could sign people up and I knew that we could use our, like basically pass around a basket at meetings. Like that's how we raised funds. Uh, except for a national where we posted a bunch of links on social media the day after I posted my grievances. Um, and we got a lot there, which was fortunate for us. But most of our fundraising comes from just passing around a basket. Like we're damn church. It's, it's, it's a little bit, it's a little bit, I guess, uh, I don't even know the word I'm trying to go for here. Like untrustworthy and we're all shady. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's, it's, yeah, it's, so we paid for, I think since I have joined 17 memberships out of our, out of our general fund, which is from a basket that we pass around. So it's, it's, it's us getting people joined and getting nothing back from it. And I've heard now, because nobody told us this before and even our chair didn't know this and didn't communicate it to us when he found out. We didn't know that we were maybe entitled to some money back from what we spent to sign people up. Even like, even like whether we spent it or they spent it, they, we, we didn't get anything back. And that's a problem I feel.
Speaker 5Yeah, this constant refrain of we didn't know, like I know that the gross has been hard with the huge amount of members and the national is, you know, scrabbling. But
Speaker 7the,
Speaker 5the sheer amount of just silence and, and lack of response to concerns like makes things even worse because then we're just relying on, well, so and so told me.
Speaker 4Yeah, it's, well people on Twitter told me where like where do we go from there? Like where, where, what, what, what, which, which thing are we supposed to actually align ourselves with?
Speaker 5So that kind of segways into something that I was wondering about. Um, you know, Larry website is one of the people running for national political committee. Um, do you think that's, I mean, kind of, no matter who ends up on NPC, somebody is going to have a Twitter presence. Do you think that's going to change the way that the interacts with which room with social media? Because currently the main interaction is just,
Speaker 7okay.
Speaker 4Well, I honestly, I don't, I don't think it will change. Even if say layer website gets NPC fine. We in our local chapter operate mostly on like actual like person to person interaction. And honestly, most of us aren't on Twitter, but really what most of the people who routinely show up for meetings are for us are the union people. They're, they're, they're the people that we actually deal with on a daily basis. They're the people that were out there working for, they're the people that we have communicated with who recognize that we're working for them and they see some benefit in our cause. It's not that we're some Twitter organization that says, you know, democrats are bad. It's that we're actually doing things with union members and out there supporting them. And we, we get support locally because we are doing that for them. And then they realize that they actually have an ally. Anna's,
Speaker 3so it's, it's the in person and on the ground organization that actually has, um, that that's actually going to be carrying us forward. Uh, it's, it's, it's nice to get the word out on Twitter or other social media, but you know, without, without a real world presence and without that kind of a person to person interaction, you, you basically don't have an organization that is going to survive for any length of time.
Speaker 4That's, yeah, that's exactly right. Like they, we, we can pontificate all day on Twitter about, you know, this journalist set a dumb thing, but what are we actually doing besides that? Like I, the only reason that I think I'm, I'm still onboard with DSA is that our local chapter is so good. Like our local chapter is out there doing shit. Our, we're, we're, we're helping them, we're helping unions weren't showing up and like trying to block picket lines where we're actually like trying to do things that matter and we are showing up for protest, for showing up from mayday. We're showing up for, you know, pride events, things like that. It, it, it, it doesn't matter what you say on Twitter, it matters what you do. And I think a lot of people want to, you know, yell at Dsa, people for just being online Twitter presences, which I mean, I got, I got yelled at for that and I'm like, have you seen any of the pictures of me at like events doing shit like this? We do things, we're not just Twitter presences. This is not just online. We, this is my platform that I have, I think the best option and talking to people, but
Speaker 7okay,
Speaker 4I do things that are not Twitter that I, I don't understand. I guess a lot of times why people think it's one or the other. So that's a good opportunity for me to ask. What's the, what's the kind of the big things that your chapter, uh, is working on right now? Beyond fundraising? Yeah. Uh, so our fundraising a lot of right now goes to one of the things that we're doing that we're really, really excited about. We're working with the local food, not bombs, um, which is an anarchist organization that we really, really enjoy. Uh, they operate out of a, uh, just a general social club nearby that offers them the ability to use the kitchen and the bar and everything like that. And they prep all the food there and then they take it to a park and they just let it, there's, there's no means testing. They just say, hey, here's the food habit if you want. And it's every Sunday. And people know that it's there and nobody says, oh, you look too white. Or you look to, uh, you know, not poor. Like anybody who shows up can just have the food. That's the entire point of it. Here's, here's the food we made it for. You have it. And our organization, our local DSA, uh, has partnered with them and it's been really, really good. And we need honestly a little bit more support. Like I've been trying to get our local like Panera bread and things like that to partner and give us like their donations. But there they change. Sorry, backstory here. I used to work for Panera bread when I was in high school and they used to um, just allow anybody to come in and as long as they just sign their name on a sheet, we would give them a bag full of uh, bagels and bread and cakes and things like, oh, like whatever we have left at the end of the night. And now they don't do that. Now they make you go through like this huge registry process where you have to like pray, like provide the five oh one five, oh five, oh one c three, whatever that thing is. Yeah, the nonprofit status and then, uh, the Ein and all that. Like they make you give all that information before you can even be considered, which is just, I mean, that's so much, so much food goes to waste and that is so stupid. Like we can just show up and be like, Hey, we have poor people and homeless people who want the food. Can we have it? Nope. Because if they don't give it to a charity, they cannot write it off on their taxes or something like that, I'm guessing. Yup. Yup. So, uh, that's, that's one of the big things we're doing. Um, we've got a couple of initiatives that we're, they're not fully into fruition yet because it's the summer, but we want to work with local schools. Um, one of the things is paying off student, uh, like lunch debt, uh, basically in like trying to make sure that nobody ever gets shamed again for not being able to pay like the 35 cents that's left on their account. Like, that's so stupid. That is so stupid. Let your students eat if you have a like, uh, okay. We have a huge problem, not who attain low light, like national and local, um, scholastic standards here. And nobody seems to connect the fact that we also have one of the highest, like highest, highest are hundreds of people who cannot afford to eat and people who cannot afford to graduate because there's is they just cannot connect the two things like that. That's so sorry.
Speaker 3Well, it's that then particular is actually a problem that we have been discussing a lot in our local chapter as well. Um, you know, trying to figure out a way that we can start up like community gardens or trying to sort of, um, you know, make it so that we are promoting local self sufficiency in terms of food or housing and, and these other, and it's, it's a really, it's a really challenging situation because you know, that there is, is a lot of money behind, you know, there's this big agriculture that is basically subsidizing the corporations but not helping out, you know, regular people. Uh, there's, there are a lot of these other issues like you said, with um, uh, you know, tax status, uh, in terms of trying to get food to people when it would otherwise go to waste. But, you know, all these kinds of issues. Part of, part of what we see as, as kind of a challenge for us is that we are, we are really small and, and, um, you know, brand new local chapter. We're basically the only socialist organization, like within a 50 mile radius. And it feels a little bit like, uh, were kind of floundering a little bit. We're getting help from other local chapters in the area, you know, more established DSA chapters and in the bay area proper. But it, there's basically nothing coming from uh, like the, the DSA national that has really any meaningful value in terms of like actual organizing on the ground.
Speaker 5I would actually disagree with that because I went to the leadership training and that was very helpful. Beyond that. Yes. Yeah.
Speaker 4In terms of like financial support, we give them my, like my big thing is we give them a lot of our money, a lot of our money and very few of us in terms of chapters get it back. We, we don't get support and we don't get a lot of, I think the, at least one to one outreach that we really need. It's hard to describe DSA sometimes to other people because God our own, like we've done it. Like we've done some outreach and we've had people say, it sounds like an an an MLM scheme. It sounds like it just, it becomes very hard to get behind when all of our money goes to one thing. Nothing comes back to the ostensibly Socialists Organization and then we are also expected to go and pay more money to have our voices heard.
Speaker 5Well, I have to keep face that this is mostly growing pains that none of this is is done intentionally, but I mean when you criticize national, sometimes there will be an instinctive kind of push back of how dare you. I mean, yeah, you, you kind of encountered that and I know that you've said that some of it was because of just venue and, and tone and such, but I think that had that criticism been anywhere, it would have resulted in some backlash. It was just Twitter was absolutely right.
Speaker 4Do it since, and Dave had basically the same experience no matter, it didn't matter how, I guess coherently or nicely they put it, it all came down to a bunch of people who have decided DSA is their God and their disciples are their friends and it became kind of like, uh, it, it became I guess an identity politics thing, which normally I'm on board with that man. Don't do, don't do it like that. Don't, don't make it something that, you know, people can't access because they have problems. Like I'm sitting here with a fucking DSA flag behind my back, like hanging on her window. Like I still believe in this. Don't, don't make me afraid to question what we're doing it. And I think a lot of people are encouraged or discouraged because of that.
Speaker 5There's a, there's a concern that I've, I've developed recently about just some of the stuff that's coming out of convention that's leading towards more centralization and standardization of chapters, thus is the current kind of loose federation big tent. Uh, and I think that is also tied in with what you described of
Speaker 6that
Speaker 5not being much room for disagreement.
Speaker 6MMM.
Speaker 3Yeah. And to piggyback, actually, my next question is, uh, a pretty, uh, along these lines was the sort of a way that I kind of, uh, thought of what the DSA, I guess like should be, if it had the, the institutions that, you know, we're actually in place and functioning because, you know, in all fairness right now, what it feels like is that it has more members and more chapters than it has sort of like institutional capacity to actually deal with. So I, you know, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna say that it's like any kind of malice I think is just a, uh, uh, you know, uh, a group of people who previously didn't need the kind of, uh, sort of like professional knowledge, uh, professional organizing knowledge that they do now and are scrambling to sort of build that up. But, but the way that I, I think about it is, you know, the, the national is basically a, um, a way to sort of like lubricate the mutual aid between chapters and, and not to have any kind of real, um, uh, top down policy setting or, or any like explicit, um, you know, national electoral goals in the short term because quite frankly, we're not big enough for that. And that would just basically take resources away from the local chapters building up power where they are, you know. So I kind of wanted to get your, your reaction on that. Cause you know, I'm, I'm coming from a very, you know, a libertarian socialist, Eco anarchist, you know, perspective and, and so I, I would prefer to see things much more decentralized. So
Speaker 4I, I think you're absolutely right. I, I would like to see less, I mean, the fact that we first of all can't depend on national but then also need national is a problem. But we only need them in as much as we should be able to find direction a little bit on a local level. They need to be able to be there and to actually, you know, give guidance to us as local chapters and a yeller, yeller, you know, coastal people. Um, I'm not gonna lie like, and we kind of resent y'all like, Yep. You, you guys have this huge group that we can't even come close to and yet Indiana, like we were one of the oldest chapters in the nation, like we, and we kind of invented socialism like in, in, in as much as like America is concerned, not like globally, but like we had, you know, Eugene debs,
Speaker 3Oh yeah, absolutely. A American socialism springs from the heartland and the apple ashes. It's, it's not really, it's not really a, uh, a European import. It's, it's very much homegrown and it came and it's coming from the place is exactly like you're talking about like where you are.
Speaker 4Yeah. So I mean, coming from Indiana it sometimes feels a little shitty. I guess. It, it, it you, you get either these slates yes. From, you know, the coast and they're all from the coast. And then one of them added, I guess some people from Illinois and things like that. And that's great. But the person from Illinois, from Chicago, that's not necessarily a small town. They're not there. They're not Hartley and they're not the, there is no like fucking yell Adera [inaudible] nobody from is in any of the slates and that that is a problem like nobody from the south. And so it, I guess back to the original question, it becomes, do we want, do we want the national to guide us, lead us step in something like that? No, I don't. I, I think the national should be there to serve us when it comes to having a and overall solidarity. I don't think the national needs to be there to legislate us and I, I definitely don't think that we need to start using the democratic slate to get anything done. It just that, that, that just, it's bad faith to me.
Speaker 5I feel like national can have a part in this type of area said in facilitating information exchange between chapters and um, you know, putting on the, the training, the leadership training that they are, have started doing that. I was incredibly lucky to be able to attend. Like stuff like that I think is valuable and setting up, setting up structures that um, chapters can make you soft if necessary. Uh, like national grievance stuff or like, um, having pre, I know one of the things that national does is for national campaigns they like come out with like prewritten materials that you can use for if you're going to engage in it in a campaign. Like stuff like that. I am, I'm all behind national giving us resources like that. But when it becomes, when national becomes more important than the chapters
Speaker 8is, is
Speaker 3yeah. That that's when it starts, you know, um, reifying the same kind of liberal power structures that were running away from the Democratic party because of, yeah.
Speaker 5And all go into the trots.
Speaker 3You're going to the trots.
Speaker 4Yeah. It just, it, it, there's, there's a lot of things that I see that again, I, I've, I've talked about this a lot of times and I think, um, at Jude computer said it best when she said that learning theory should not be a barrier to being a leftist. But yeah, I definitely agree with that. Like I like I honestly like full disclosure, I was, I was kind of terrified to come on your podcast. Like I don't feel like I'm an authority on anything. I feel very undereducated on a lot of this, but I know what I've experienced and I know how I came to leftism and I, it's, I, I've not, I haven't read the fucking communist manifesto. I wish I had, I, I've got it. Like I own it. Well, actually I don't own it. I found it in a tire replacement place on a chair.
Speaker 3That's even better.
Speaker 4My,
Speaker 5I've mentioned this on previous podcasts, like my level of theory is if it can be presented in a meme or an a tweet, then I can get it. But if I have to read a thing,
Speaker 4yeah,
Speaker 5that's, that's not going to happen.
Speaker 4Um, like, and I come to what I do out of, out of feeling like what's right there. There's theory, there's reading and there's experience and I don't think either either. I don't think any of those, Trump's one another, I think people who come to leftism from any stripe should be able to access it. I don't think they should be, you know, oh you haven't read the Communist manifesto will clearly you should be, you know, going back to school or whatever like that, that, that, that is an incredibly like Neil Lib thing to say like you, you can't, you can't be a leftist if you haven't had access to all of this education. Like I, I, I don't have it. I, I've been to school twice and dropped out both times. Like I, I, I'm not a good student.
Speaker 2Okay.
Speaker 3Right. Well, and you know, I've, I've said this before and I'm probably going to say quite a few more times before we're all said and done with, you know, capitalism, but the, you know, what, what you're doing the, the praxis, the actually like the actual on the ground, like taking, taking ideas about,
Speaker 2mmm.
Speaker 3You know, what's, what's right and what's just, and, and putting it into, into like actual action on the ground.
Speaker 2MMM.
Speaker 3That isn't that, that's not frankly that complicated. It really isn't. I mean, there's, there's like a very minimal basic amount of, of theory that you need to get and you can get most of that in like a half hour conversation with anybody, half competent in, in sort of like general leftist ideas. And, and then the rest of it is really just, okay. So, so the principle is we do, we involve the, uh, as many people as we can and helping each other out in a way that isn't mediated by private property or, you know, in, in our case for, for a, um, a, um, a less authoritarian kind of socialism that isn't also mediated by, you know, authoritarian bodies like the state. Uh, you know, you start from that and then you go, okay, so how do we actually do that? And, and like your theory could be the most amazing, best theory ever. It's, it's not even close to being a substitute for actually like getting out and doing it. And so, so yeah, there's, there's, you know, there's, there's a real need for, for, for theory to, to kind of, um, you know, for argumentation, for something to do and to give me something to do, frankly. Cause, cause I'm just, we do much of a nerd to be only praxis, but, but yeah, it's, it's not, it's not actually that necessary. I mean, yeah, I mean like you, uh, so, so the, the Socialists who, who, you know, were the sort of core of the socialist movement back in the, you know, post reconstruction, Pre World War II era. Um, most of those people weren't coming from a place where they were, you know, deep into the, the socialists readings. They were coming from a place of actually like, you know, doing shit on the ground and getting shit done. That's where they came from. It was very practical people.
Speaker 9Okay.
Speaker 4So we're trying to make it better and this is the best way forward. That's, yeah. That's where they were coming from.
Speaker 5And I, I do want to reiterate because I, we've kind of been saying it without saying it, that I think DSA is great, but it could be better. And that's where our critique comes from. It's not from like a we hate it, we want to leave or we want to split. It's from like, what drew me to Dsa was certain things and I don't want to see those get lessened.
Speaker 3Yeah. And it, and in many ways, DSA is really like the only socialist game in town right now. But, but there's, there's been so many people who have joined so quickly to DSA and you know, like we were saying, one of the critiques is that Dsa can't keep up. That might actually be a kind of a longterm benefit for us because, uh, we have been forced as local chapters to do things for ourselves and reach out to other chapters without being mediated by national. Yeah.
Speaker 5And we can do all sorts of shit while their back is turned.
Speaker 3Exactly. So, so we can, we can basically, like, we can basically like accidentally be, yeah. We can basically accidentally be an archivist entries. I mean, and, and so, you know, it's, it's not that, um, yeah, like you said, it's, we're, we're coming from a place where this, we see this as, you know, our, our best way forward right now and what we want is for it to succeed. Like, like we're not saying DSA is bad. We're saying that DSA could be better and needs to be better for,
Speaker 4yeah. And that's everything. I felt like something got lost in the way I said it badly. And the way I said it well was that I want this to succeed like this. I would not have spent the last six months. I wish I'd known about it sooner. I would not have spent the last six months putting so much time and effort and you know, anxiety I guess over it. I don't have a lot of money, so I can't say I put a lot of money it, but a lot of sweat equity or whatever. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Labor. It's, I put a lot into this and I don't, I think I was, I think I felt personally hurt that when I said it could be better. People were like, no, it's fine. And that really hurt. I that that's, that's I think where I got a little bit screwed up about it. Like I had to take some time off. I told everybody in the chapter, give me a week, let me take a week. I'll be back. I'll, I'll do better. I'll be fine. Just give me a week. And I did. And I am, I'm, I'm back and I'm, I'm feeling a lot better and I definitely, I mean, God, I want this, I want this, I want this to succeed. So I hope that when it comes to the convention, we can actually do something that makes it better. I don't want it to stay the same and that's okay. I guess a little bit why I'm concerned about some of the slates. I just, it seems like it seems like platitudes instead of actual change and, and I, I would, I would prefer to have not sleeps, but individuals, I mean like somebody from the coasts, both coasts, so to then somebody from the south, somebody from Midwest, maybe from the plains. It just get, get people in there who are from everywhere. Don't get your friends. It's not, it's not feasible to have that many people on your side. If the only people who are electing you are the people that you spent, you know, six months getting all buddy buddy with that, that it doesn't work for me.
Speaker 5It's one of the reasons why I went, I'm a convention. I don't think I will be voting a slate because I want to,
Speaker 2okay.
Speaker 5Like judge each candidate on their merit
Speaker 2or on what
Speaker 5they say they're going to do. But when it comes to the slates, like their manifestos or whatever, really don't say very much. It's all, um, it's all what I think it was fair week on Twitter, just kind of referred to as just big flashy reveals, but no actual content. Like we're already sold on this stuff. We're going to vote for somebody, give us, let us know what we're voting for.
Speaker 4Yeah, I know there's some questions about Keto of Utica. I did not know anything about it before I signed on, but I do think that Keto Vivica presented, I think the best individual platform that I, that I, that I have seen. I so personally, yeah, I'm coming up for them.
Speaker 3Well, and, and you know, for, for myself, uh, I'm, I'm really weary of, you know, voting for people first. That sort of, um, kind of violates my sensibilities a little bit. Uh, the, the way that I sort of think of it is that what we should be doing is, you know, in our local chapters and in sort of like our regional caucuses and then finally up at the national level, we should be sort of, um, voting on a policy slates and, and a platform ideals that, you know, are, are appropriate to that sort of like level of organization. And then, you know, once we, once we have those sort of figured out, like then we look around and look at our comrades and ask, okay, so with was to do this. Yeah. With this set of policies, who wants to do with this and who's capable of doing it. And then we pick the people. I, I, for me, if fields to backwards to go, I'm going to vote for you in the hopes that later on and we'll get policy from you. It's like, well, we should start with the policy because that's really what matters. It's, you know, you can, you can find the right policy first and then just, you know, Eh, put a body in there that's willing to do something about it.
Speaker 4That's, I think that's why I,
Speaker 9okay.
Speaker 4I mean, I really don't want to shit all over Larry Larry website. I think he's done so much for the organization. I really appreciate what he's done, but at the same time, all I know is that he's gotten people in, I don't know anything else about him or what he thinks should be done. And it's hard to align myself with somebody who I don't know anything about. I don't, I don't, I don't know what, I don't know what he wants. I don't know what he's trying to do. I don't know. I mean, I don't know if y'all feel the same way, but like I don't, I don't know. Like it's, it's weird and it's bad because I definitely like for a long time thought, oh, leary website follows me on Twitter. That's so cool. Uh, and then all of a sudden I was like, wait a minute. This sucks. Like, he doesn't do anything. Aside from like we've been membership, he's like, he's like a Pokemon master but it doesn't train his actual poker ones. I don't know. It's weird. It um, for voting it's this feeling that we shouldn't be picking personalities but it kind of feels like it may come down to that come down to who has name recognition. That's what it feels like. Yeah. Well I mean technically Larry has no name recognition but I really, I really have anything against him. I think he's doing a lot of good. I just want to know more specifically about how he plans to make it better. Like we were talking about like how, how is it going to get better instead of are we going to just get new membership?
Speaker 5So I'm gonna maybe put you on the spot a little bit here. Um, if you had a, if you had your magic wand and you could change just one thing about the essay, like before convention, if you could implement, implement one thing to improve, improve the organization as it is now, what do you think would be, would be the one thing that you did
Speaker 4better? Communication top down. I worked in marketing. I'm currently an employee depending on wants to hire me. Um, I worked in marketing. It's not hard to isolate the people that you need to be talking to and those people can disseminate the information below them. So national needs to get with. Like I, I'm a, I'm a delegate and I don't know what the schedule is. I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't think it's been announced, but it should have been, I mean, it's only a couple of weeks away and it should have, it should have already been locked down, announced and given people time to, you know, say, here's what I'm going to, here's why I'm voting, here's what I'm doing it. That has not happened. It's not okay that they have done it this way. We need top, here's the, you know, I guess mid level tier people, like I guess that we'll distribute it to the rest of the chapter. But I mean, I mean, anybody who is on the DSA mailing list should have access to this information. It's not hard. It's not hard. Like, I could write them a fucking, I could write them a program that would do it.
Speaker 5Yeah. I don't think you'll find any disagreement here that, uh, communication has been, isn't it? Yeah. Is Not one of Dsas strong
Speaker 4right now. And yeah, I again, I know it's a growing pain. I know a lot of it is, we didn't know that we were going to grow this quickly, but at the same time we do know how much we've grown. There is a scale there that can be worked with. You can forecast it necessarily, but it probably should have in forecasting. I mean, given what happened, it should have been at least anticipated. And after it became a reality, we really should have grown with it and we didn't, we leave. We blamed it on growth instead of actually like leaning into the growth. That's what I think is a big problem.
Speaker 5Well, I want to thank you so much for staying up so late in your time zone and talking to us. Um, in the show notes, we're going to link to your Twitter and your podcast and also the, um, the Google doc that you, that you posted about DSA criticisms. Is there anything else that you would like us to, to make sure is included in the show notes?
Speaker 4Um, I not really, I mean, I, I would say maybe don't listen to our podcasts. Like, I mean, normally me and Scott just get drunk and talk about things. So
Speaker 5that's the basis of many good podcasts. Yeah.
Speaker 1Okay. Well thank you very much. Yeah, thanks for, thanks for joining us and sharing today.
Speaker 2Okay.
Speaker 10That was a good conversation. Um, a lot of, uh, a lot of kind of inside baseball. Um, but
Speaker 1yeah, I mean it's, it really is quite, um, sort of DSA specific. This is, um, perhaps maybe touching on things that would come up and, and other organizations and you know, even sort of like broadly in the, the left socialist meal, you, but you know, this is, this comes out of something, you know, some pretty specific events and concerns that we have with the specific organization. So, yeah.
Speaker 10You know, anytime there's a large growth of, um, members in any organization, uh, these issues are going to arise. And, um, it's particularly the new blood, not just to DSA, but to the left I think is frankly a positive. Um, a lot of kind of new perspectives, new skills, uh, are being brought to the table. And I'm really hopeful.
Speaker 1Yeah. And, um, you know, you still, you still see some, some issues on Twitter. Uh, just recently we had a big blow up with a Bhaskar Sunkara kind of shitting on mls, um, which, you know, that, that's always fun because I mean, left unity as a phantasm anyway, like that's never gonna happen, but, you know, it's, uh, it's not helped when you have someone as you know, prominent and sort of,
Speaker 2yeah.
Speaker 1Uh, you know, as, as prominent to figure as he is a really taking time out of his day to basically crap on an entire sector of, uh, the, the left and DSA. I mean, I, I have, I have my own issues with Marxism. Leninism um, I don't think we really need to go into that right now. I don't think it is, I think it is less important. Um, yeah, I kind of want to get your, I kind of want to get your response to that in light of the, the conversation that we had about the, um, uh, the sort of like centralization of DSA and, you know, local chapters not feeling included and we're all chapters having maybe less of a say about, I know what happens, uh, with the, the sort of like national platform.
Speaker 10Okay. Yeah. Um, I agree that it's, well, it's, it's not so pertinent because as far as the tasks ahead of us, um, you're, you're sort of like overriding ideology for your ideal post revolution. Society is not going to come to bear anytime soon in that sounds a little, um, two pragmatist, uh, even for my own taste. But, uh, these are people we can work with, um, because our tasks are basically rebuilding a left and starting to, um, you know, put out policy and mutual aid and stuff that's going to improve the conditions of people's lives. So Marxist Leninist are just as capable of working on those things as any of us. Um, I was a little, I get a little torn in these situations because, you know, Bosch gars been on the left for years and I see people that maybe haven't arguing over things like terms and I guess like we, a lot of us, myself included, have sort of a naivety about things, which means we don't have the baggage at the same time. I wonder if, um, you know, like there's particularly awful people on the left that I think there's a reason people have such a bad taste in their mouth, um, for certain sectors and um, you know, maybe instead of shitting on a whole, um, you know, sector of the left explain like why and how we can sort of change that. Um, as far as, uh, the DSA issue, I, I think it's sort of the same thing. Um, there's a lot of sort of organizational issues, the growing pains, but the initial task ahead remains the same, which is to radicalize as many people as possible, bring them in if not to DSA. Then just to general sort of socialist, uh, mindset, uh, for the coming years, it's going to be a battle that's not, you know, like I'm sneaky. Pete said it's not a four year thing, it's a 10, 20, 30 year thing. And so just bringing people into the sort of, as opposed to liberal view of policy and of, you know, political economy is way more important than I think. Any other sort of, um, you know, categorical distinctions. Um, as far as organization goes though, I really, really think our power is going to be most important to be built in these rural areas. Uh, the, the planes, the Midwest, the south, um, you know, Berkeley's got Berkeley's Ben sort of like you said, uh, the, the sort of, um, holding place for the radical left for decades. And, uh, but it did come out of the south, the Midwest, you know, um, uh, the rust belt. And so that's where people are suffering very badly. And that's where we, I really would like to see the radicalization happening. Does that make sense?
Speaker 1Yeah, yeah. No, I totally agree with you. Um, you know, I'm like, I'm, I'm not really one to, to defend the tank brigade. Um, you know, I think that, I think it was a pretty shitty thing that Bhaskar did. Uh, but I kind of get why he did it. Um, you know, that, because the biggest issue that I see with, um, you know, certain tendencies like Marxism Leninism is that they have a kind of, um, sort of like reverence and desire to, to reify centralized power in a way that I think is ultimately counterproductive. Um, you know, you can, you can claim that, uh, you know, Marxism Leninism has the most cohesive, um, ideology for, uh, fighting and defeating capitalism. But frankly, like, I just, I don't buy it, uh, because I, you know, it's, um, you know, especially, especially in the heart of the empire, I, you know, it's, it's really not, you're never going to build a, you're never going to build a centralized socialist institution that, that is credibly capable of, uh, you know, forming a threat to the power of the state under capitalism in are imperialists capitalism as it stands. That's, that's not going to happen. Uh, the only, the only credible threat to the state's power is essentially the, um, there's a massive people working people, the, the laboring class essentially withdrawing their, their support from that. And the only way that that's ever going to happen is in a situation where you have, uh, essentially, you know, essentially a situation of dual power where local communities are able to support themselves and stand in solidarity and mutual aid with other like minded communities. And that's never going to happen in a dis, in a centralized institution. That is, that is by necessity going to have to be incredibly decentralized, incredibly horizontalized.
Speaker 10Yeah, absolutely. And um, I really enjoy, you know, your, your, in the previous conversation, your distrust of, of personalities as far as something to, uh, you know, uh, rally behind, I think that is gonna give us a little more on sort of armor against sabotage and you know, whatever the liberals and the right is going to throw at us. The ideas are central and then they can be worked out and you don't have to worry about your dear leader, you know, saying something dumb and then anyways,
Speaker 1yeah. Well, I mean, yeah cause cause leaders are always going to emerge. You're like, when in any movement you're always going to have a certain group or you know, of individuals who just naturally emerge as people that other people want to follow. Um, but you know, it because of that tendency it, it is really incumbent upon us as you know, uh, as a group of people to, you know, really intentionally privileged the idea over the person. So that, so that even if even if the person does turn out to be, you know, a piece of crap or you know, if, if they are somehow compromised or whatever, um, we ha we aren't pinning our movement to them. That we are intentionally and specifically pinning our movement on the idea that a better world is possible. And the um, you know, the, what we pin our hopes to are the ideas of how we get there. Having, having the, that the ideas and the policies and the actions privileged over the people really means that it is, it is easier for other people to come in and join the cause where they are. And, and to be a part of the movements in the context that they are in.
Speaker 10Uh, okay. So how do we, how do we structure DSA, which we've all decided to join because I think we all are smart enough to recognize, um, there's this big burst of energy on the, in a lot of people are, I think when, when I see DSA and particularly Lee, the convention coming up, I think all of the neuroses and pathologies and problems with the left are gonna still be there. And it's going to be a lot of infighting and there's going to be a lot of, um, sort of those. Um,
Speaker 1that's that. I don't think that's a bad thing, personally. I really don't. Um, I think that, I think that when it becomes a bad thing is, is when you have, uh, essentially factional splits along personality lines, which happened in any large organization is it's something that you can only mitigate, you can never get rid of. Or if, uh, you essentially have a group of people sort of solidify power within the organization and say, everybody who doesn't believe what they do is gone. Ah, yes, that is, that is the other side. So, uh, you know, for, for me, I think that having these arguments and, and having them out in the open is ultimately a good thing for us. I think it, I think it's a healthy for us to have these arguments. So long as we remember that we're not arguing with reactionaries, we're arguing with other people who want to build a better world, just the same as we do. That is incredibly important.
Speaker 10Yeah. A very, very well said. And just, just putting that, that thought in the front, that, uh, this is something that hasn't happened in, in decades. This is, it's tiny. It really is. But this is the largest socialist organization that's existed in the states in a really long time. Fourth largest in the history of the states. And, uh, imagine, you know, um, under Clinton or even under Obama, it's something like this emerging, you know, uh, uh, people just, there's, we're in a sort of a shift interregnum or whatever and we have to, I really, really, really don't want to see people walk away from it because, um, they didn't like how things were done organizationally or whatever. Um, or because the same sort of, um, factional splits happen. I really want to see a collective agreement that we're going to make this thing work. I'm going to bring all of our talents and skills to the table and, and really solidify our direction for the next year. Um, you know, in regards to the convention. And I, and I do have a lot of faith because man, everyone I meet that goes to DSA meetings or that is generally, you know, um, Ben a part of the left since the election when I really started, you know, leaving my house, um, frankly has been amazing. I mean I really, really, I really have faith. And as far as the specifics go, you know, um, I think people are willing to listen to each other. I really do. And I would hope that that's what happens.
Speaker 1So yeah, there, there is a lot of, um, I think there's a lot of positive energy. Uh, and, and I think that there are a lot of people, you know, even with different tendencies who are willing to come together and, and work to build something positive and something better. And that's, and that's really why, that's really why I am as critical of DSA as I am. Yes. I'm, I'm critical of it because I see it's important and, and I see the potential of a, you know, this, this coming a year, two years cycle as, as being incredibly, incredibly important for our future. Just, I mean, like just flat out for our future. Yes. And I want that to be as good as it can be. And, and I want the DSA to be as strong as it can be because right now that's where everybody is. That's where the energy is. That, that's where the, the attention is. So that has to be as representative of the, um, of the people who have been for decades, centuries oppressed and marginalized in this country and around the world to have a place where they can, you know, uh, express their power. Uh, and, and so when I, when I say that I see things that are happening wrong in DSA, it's not because I hate DSA is because I want Dsa to succeed. And that's really like for me, that is, that is why it's important to speak out because I mean, not like I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna speak out against like, you know, to, to critique the specifics or what's going on in like, I don't know, fucking oath keepers. Like I don't give a shit about them. Right, right. Let them let them fail. I don't, I hate them. Yeah. I'm not going to, I'm not going to go out and say like, they're their, um, they have all of these structural organizational issues. Like, no, that's not worth it. It's not worth our time. What is worth our time are the organizations that are doing good already and, um, have places where they could be doing better. [inaudible]. Like these are the, these are the places and these are the people that are worth our time. And right now, DSA is still worth our time. It really is.
Speaker 10Uh, yeah, strongly agree. And, um, the explosive growth, I mean it's been since what the fall, so I see a small office that was built for a certain size suddenly, you know, buried. And I would hope that maybe, uh, as part of that sort of, um, critiquing in order to, you know, improve and focus something that we really love and have faith in, we can bring, like I said, the skills that we have and even the sort of ideology, we have a decentralized a little bit. If there's organizational problems or simple administrative problems, you know, this is the era of the Internet. And, uh, maybe we spread the responsibility among people. You know, I know a lot of people that would want to do more and maybe they have a particular skill that they have from their job. Um, simple stuff as streamlining the communications or, um, things like that. And I hope that having a lot of delegates from around the country meet in real life can, can sort of tackle these problems one by one. Um, I know the issues of electoral politics are important, but frankly I'm just strengthening the ability for DSA members to work together, um, and to sort of enhance what people are doing in their own regions I think is the central should be the central focus.
Speaker 1Yeah. Building power in DSA. Um, air building the power of DSA really does mean building the power of communities locally. Uh, because, because it is really because of, because of our politics and the only way that we ever have power is by numbers and the only way that we're ever going to have numbers in this, in this late stage of capitalism where, um, you know, austerity is the word of the day and everybody's jobs are incredibly precarious and nobody gets paid what they're worth. And it really does mean that you know, your material conditions have to be met and satisfied to a it to at, at some degree where you can actually go out and do other things and work on something better.
Speaker 10Yes. And, and I, I really, uh, Doug, what the kind of conclusion y'all came to, um, in that, in this time with explosive growth and perhaps a lack of, um, sort of a party line. And I hope that doesn't emerge at all, but, um, right now there's definitely not one that we can really scrambled to build, um, you know, parallel sort of, uh, focuses and um, things that are specific to the regions. Um, just, just the story about the food not bombs, um, that, uh, Twitter's good girl, uh, told was really, really, really inspiring to me. And that's the direction I think I would like to see us move in. And I would like to see, um, the DSA sort of infrastructure facilitate through templates and, you know, a potential resources, coaching, mentoring, um, you know, sort of a, just here's what works in North Dakota. Maybe it'll work in south Florida. Uh, here's what worked in, in Georgia. And, uh, I don't know if it'll work in Portland, but let's try it and sort of come up with sort of a, a really polished way too.
Speaker 11Okay.
Speaker 10Address people's needs and make them more open to left wing ideas.
Speaker 1Absolutely. Agreed. Anything else you want to leave us with?
Speaker 10Uh, just, um, you know, uh, I'm excited for the convention. I won't personally be there, but, uh, I have a lot of faith in sauce and all of our other comrades and,
Speaker 11okay.
Speaker 1I'm really excited. Yeah.
Speaker 11Cool.
Speaker 1All right, well if you want to be a part of the conversation, uh, hit us up on Twitter, you can find the show and myself at left-pad, uh, on Twitter or my dms are open. So go ahead and, uh, you know, give us critiques and feedback. Uh, you can find, uh, Aaron at R, R, R, r,N , which I hate saying you need a better Twitter handle. Um, you can find communal sauce at communal sauce. Uh, you can also get us on a email and if you want to, um, uh, if you want to get in contact with us that way, our email address is left coast podcast@gmail.com. Uh, we also, if you want to get a, if you are on reddit and you want to be a part of the conversation there, our sub reddit is reddit.com/r/left coast. And if you want to find our show notes and our RSS feed, you can go to soundcloud.com/left coast podcast signing off. This is Tiberius and this is Aaron. Go in peace and be in solidarity comrades.
Speaker 12Ah,
Speaker 13when the unions inspiration through their workers blood children, there can be no power. Greater. Yup. Horse on earth is weaker than the female stripe. The one young man.
Speaker 12Yay.
Speaker 13It is we who plowed the prayer. He's built the cities where they trade the mines and built the workshops and bliss. Miles of railroad laid. How we stand out casting, starving middot wonders we have made Methuen makes us strong.
Speaker 12Okay.
Speaker 13They have taken on all the millions that they never Doyle to Erin, but without our brain and muscle, not a single wheel can turn. We can break their body power, gain our freedom. When we learned that the union makes us in our hands is placed a power greater than their hoarded gold, greater than the might've Adams magnify it up holes and boom, we can bring to birth a new world from the ashes of the old makes us strong.