He is just triangulating and moving right to gain greater proximity to DNC establishment types, people he is now having call shots on his campaign. This is not someone hiding their power level, these are not even remotely clever answers from someone being savvy. It is a consistent rightward rebranding per the bourgeois liberal electoralist charade.
Also, we have high standards? This is genocide and it is very fucking unpopular. If there is a pipeline here, it is to capture outrage and mollify it into status quo liberalism. DSA is not organized and it has no education program. It’s all just fucking around and pinning hopes on one guy not being more self-interested than principled and competent, and the electoralist “wing”, such as it is, is allergic to both of those things.
Folks really showing their liberalism with their unwavering belief in the secret principled leftism of the guy pulling the rug out from under them in the exact same way 5 other identical guys have done every couple years.
Nobody on hexbear should be surprised that a “left” organization with zero principled discipline doesn’t produce principled campaigns with discipline. Instead, it produces an endless litany of self-interested climbers doing milquetoast liberal reformism at best, as moneyed interests dominate their campaigns.
I mean, I advocated for wait and see because I knew from the get go they weren’t going to listen to all the people dogpiling them. I see what WildWeezing420 meant though when they said their big issue is older members still falling for the same trick. Most people I know that seemed hype for him in my age bracket (early 20s) weren’t paying enough attention to Bernie and AOC to get why it happened and no one reads theory (especially lenin!) so I kinda ignored it. Seeing people justify the need to say he’d collaborate with Nazis as some 4D chess has rattled me. Some of the people I’ve seen pulling this bullshit have been organizing longer than I’ve used two digits for my age.
I just keep telling people that without discipline you’re just leaving “candidates” to face up against the (strong) forces of liberalism with no counterweight. This means opportunists will happily take your free labor for unserious (or worse) campaigns and even well-meaning people will be prone to crumpling against media forces alone, and that’s before the cops start routinely harassing you or protecting the fashy vigilantes that keep showing up to your house.
When I say this it gets decent upbears but the electoralists never engage. I think the concept of discipline must actually threaten them on some personal level, like they don’t want to think about how much of their own time they are potentially wasting.
It’s because that discipline would then also be applied to them as well. Militancy is only fun when you’re already done the work and have leverage. Risking your job to form a union isn’t. It’s not glamorous sitting there talking to your coworkers about how collective bargaining gives you leverage.
I dunno I kind of enjoy that stuff. And unfortunately a good number of people do at least romanticize it and use labor work as caché, seeking out positions not for the cause but because of how they’d like to think of themselves in it. I’m thinking of truly incompetent labor organizers I know, folks that don’t do a very good job nor improve and it’s because ultimately they are still self-interested, even when that self-interest comes in the form of making a show of self-sacrifice. I hope that makes sense!
I doubt DSA has the gonads but if they actually pulled rank on him now less than 3 weeks til the election I bet it would change his behavior going forward.
If I was in NYC DSA would be focused on building my caucus and trying to dominate education and an onboarding process so that incoming members all had positive relationships with my caucus as well as biases towards us. Having at least one project into which to plug people would also be useful, but it should follow from embedding in community and having direct conversations with locals in targeted areas to determine what they care about most, what is hurting them most.
One of DSA’s flaws is that it continues electoral thought towards putting the cart before the horse, e.g. revolution through resolution. A good resolution is secondary to building good org members. It would follow naturally from the organizing work that has to happen first. Finally creating discipline requires having enough trust and support for the idea in advance, otherwise even if you manage to pass the resolution, which is difficult if the org itself is too electoral or incoherent, you will have a hard time actually enforcing it.
But once at an organized stage like that, discipline would look like needing to follow key org lines or get sanctioned/removed on top of unendorsed, requiring that all campaign resources come from grassroots sourcing, primarily org work, requiring that candidates come from the org itself and after a period of onboarding, education, and various pledges and interviews, and a requirement that electoral work rotates such that members do not regularly get their paycheck from the mere existence of campaigns. Some amount of this may run counter to election law, but would be worked around in the same way bourgeois parties do, relying on one main carrot/stick to enforce the “soft” rules, e.g. being very strict about support snd endorsement and volunteer labor such that running foul is actually damaging to the candidate.
needing to follow key org lines or get sanctioned/removed on top of unendorsed, requiring that all campaign resources come from grassroots sourcing, primarily org work, requiring that candidates come from the org itself and after a period of onboarding, education, and various pledges and interviews, and a requirement that electoral work rotates such that members do not regularly get their paycheck from the mere existence of campaigns.
My general understanding is that except for the last thing about rotating that’s what they’ve got going on.
The question is whether the membership is really brave/united enough to pull the plug when they can practically taste the sweet victory of an election in less than 3 weeks.
They should have some sort of mechanism to act that quickly or at least make a credible threat as I heard somewhere that mamdani has to attend weekly (general membership?) meetings
I’ve only seen a couple examples of left organizations with good discipline in my life and none that were involved with electoralism. They were created with the idea of a very strongly democratic practice where the expectation is that everyone gets their fair voice but once the vote is cast, you follow the group even if you personally wanted something else. Requires A++ meeting skills to have everyone feel they had the chance to participate.
And, it will always happen that the leadership who are often more dedicated revolutionaries, must adhere to decisions that don’t meet their ideal. It has to be actually democratic so sometimes you lose. But by doing that they set the example and expectation and everyone gets bolder and moves on collectively.
I don’t know how that could be integrated into an elected position like mayor, really. He can’t be micromanaged by hundreds or thousands of people. And the fact of the matter is, there is no way he will be able to perform his duties to their satisfaction for years on end. Because he’s subject to many outside competing forces.
Maybe DSA should only put people up for election if they sign a contract stating they will leave elected politics, lobbying and all associated industries for at least 10 years after. Like a super harsh non compete. Oh wait those are not valid in most places anymore.
My general understanding is that except for the last thing about rotating that’s what they’ve got going on.
They have none of it. Zilch. They have, essentially, a committee of people focused on elections that say a lot of nice vaguely leftist words and implement zero accountability. The people on those committees regularly get paid positions on these campaigns and it is no surprise that they are very defensive of the concept that an “elected” is failing. It is a collaborative relationship mediated by cash and proximity to electoral power.
Regarding the specifics:
NYCDSA leads the charge against electoral accountabikity. They push back against it, not for it, and have never unendorsed a candidate they ran.
The Mamdani campaign is not financially or organizationally dependent on the DSA. This is why he is shmoozing with ghouls. In classic DSA electoralist fashion, it is a one-way street in terms of direct benefit and control: Mamdani receives some resources but does not need them exclusively, nor is he in any way afraid of losing the free volunteers and fundraising. What are they gonna do, unendorse? Kick him out? lmao
Mamdani was not a regular member when he ran for state legislature. He didn’t do jack shit and had no internal vetting outside of one of these committees saying, “yeah okay”.
The extent of interviews and holding to lines is just one of those rubber stamp committees. It is not serious and it has no actual standards. They are like union endorsement decisions, it is just 4-5 liberals calling someone that loves cops a “real progressive” that is “fighting for the working class”. Their filter just keeps out those who step too far outside of liberal hegemony or don’t have a list of how many doors they need to knock (it doesn’t meed to be a plausible list).
The question is whether the membership is really brave/united enough to pull the plug when they can practically taste the sweet victory of an election in less than 3 weeks.
NYCDSA membership, by and large, reflects the practices above. Pull the plug? They are more likely to approve the resolution saying not to criticize Mamdani now or once in office. Their electoral approach adopts the form and function or bourgeois electoral systems, they are protective of the climber system and investing in cheerleading and donating and volunteering regardless of what a candidate or “elected” says or does. It is an anti-participatory process that is more like an NGO than a political organization that believes in anything.
They actively avoid having policy positions on which to have discipline. These are the folks that opposed the anti-Zionist resolutions for years and years and are only now transforming once it is somewhat popular among liberals.
They should have some sort of mechanism to act that quickly or at least make a credible threat as I heard somewhere that mamdani has to attend weekly (general membership?) meetings
This requires a substantial change in membership, leadership, and associated political orientation. Any theoretical mechanusm doesn’t matter if nobody enforces it or cares about it or worse, if they actively oppose it. This is why my answer focused on the need to do actual organizing and education into a proper political program and not just whatever is stated on a resolutions. NYCDSA, like any chapter, can always have a big membership vote on anything at least once per month, and can give these committees “emergency” powers to reject candidates, etc. But that means nothing if there is no will to use it. Kind of like how CA Dems never override their governor’s veto.
I’ve only seen a couple examples of left organizations with good discipline in my life and none that were involved with electoralism.
SA has pretty good discipline and was successful at electoralism. Unfortunately they are Trots with a lot of shit takes and bad ideas, but theor level of organization and discipline puts DSA to shame.
Most communist orgs have pretty good discipline. Their members avoid criticizing their own org publicly, for example. Any time I criticize PSL here, I assume none will publicly agree, and some will defend against the criticism. Part of this is naturally defending one’s own group and ideas they agree with and part of this is internalized discipline. I assume that some part of my criticism may register internally locally, but not publicly.
I don’t know how that could be integrated into an elected position like mayor, really. He can’t be micromanaged by hundreds or thousands of people.
Why would this be the only way? Committees and the fear of being recalled means no need for mass micromanagement. It begins with openly withdrawing support for “electeds” by having a policy line and sticking to it. Once that fails in its own way, they can commit to and build more structure, etc etc.
It’s all just fucking around and pinning hopes on one guy not being more self-interested than principled and competent, and the electoralist “wing”, such as it is, is allergic to both of those things.
That is a good point. False hope, like gambling, often emerges from not having a strong embedding in something real that is paying off. Indulging the fantasy instead of confronting the reality.
The reason that Americans resort to so much adventurism is the same reason why so many pin hopes on bourgeois politicians that owe them nothing: no other political outlet for hope. They are not organized, they are not active.
He is just triangulating and moving right to gain greater proximity to DNC establishment types, people he is now having call shots on his campaign. This is not someone hiding their power level, these are not even remotely clever answers from someone being savvy. It is a consistent rightward rebranding per the bourgeois liberal electoralist charade.
Also, we have high standards? This is genocide and it is very fucking unpopular. If there is a pipeline here, it is to capture outrage and mollify it into status quo liberalism. DSA is not organized and it has no education program. It’s all just fucking around and pinning hopes on one guy not being more self-interested than principled and competent, and the electoralist “wing”, such as it is, is allergic to both of those things.
Don’t you know? Not wanting someone to say they’d collaborate with Nazis, sometimes knowingly, is purity testing.
They’re National Socialists and we need left unity!
/iwanttoenditalldealingwiththesepeople
Folks really showing their liberalism with their unwavering belief in the secret principled leftism of the guy pulling the rug out from under them in the exact same way 5 other identical guys have done every couple years.
Nobody on hexbear should be surprised that a “left” organization with zero principled discipline doesn’t produce principled campaigns with discipline. Instead, it produces an endless litany of self-interested climbers doing milquetoast liberal reformism at best, as moneyed interests dominate their campaigns.
I mean, I advocated for wait and see because I knew from the get go they weren’t going to listen to all the people dogpiling them. I see what WildWeezing420 meant though when they said their big issue is older members still falling for the same trick. Most people I know that seemed hype for him in my age bracket (early 20s) weren’t paying enough attention to Bernie and AOC to get why it happened and no one reads theory (especially lenin!) so I kinda ignored it. Seeing people justify the need to say he’d collaborate with Nazis as some 4D chess has rattled me. Some of the people I’ve seen pulling this bullshit have been organizing longer than I’ve used two digits for my age.
I just keep telling people that without discipline you’re just leaving “candidates” to face up against the (strong) forces of liberalism with no counterweight. This means opportunists will happily take your free labor for unserious (or worse) campaigns and even well-meaning people will be prone to crumpling against media forces alone, and that’s before the cops start routinely harassing you or protecting the fashy vigilantes that keep showing up to your house.
When I say this it gets decent upbears but the electoralists never engage. I think the concept of discipline must actually threaten them on some personal level, like they don’t want to think about how much of their own time they are potentially wasting.
It’s because that discipline would then also be applied to them as well. Militancy is only fun when you’re already done the work and have leverage. Risking your job to form a union isn’t. It’s not glamorous sitting there talking to your coworkers about how collective bargaining gives you leverage.
I dunno I kind of enjoy that stuff. And unfortunately a good number of people do at least romanticize it and use labor work as caché, seeking out positions not for the cause but because of how they’d like to think of themselves in it. I’m thinking of truly incompetent labor organizers I know, folks that don’t do a very good job nor improve and it’s because ultimately they are still self-interested, even when that self-interest comes in the form of making a show of self-sacrifice. I hope that makes sense!
If you were in NYC DSA what would your proposal be to create discipline?
I’d vote to censure Mamdani over this statement and force him to publicly denounce it or get booted from the org.
I doubt DSA has the gonads but if they actually pulled rank on him now less than 3 weeks til the election I bet it would change his behavior going forward.
Judging by how the discussion has gone on the National forums, they’re not gonna have those gonads. Oh well, time to join
If I was in NYC DSA would be focused on building my caucus and trying to dominate education and an onboarding process so that incoming members all had positive relationships with my caucus as well as biases towards us. Having at least one project into which to plug people would also be useful, but it should follow from embedding in community and having direct conversations with locals in targeted areas to determine what they care about most, what is hurting them most.
One of DSA’s flaws is that it continues electoral thought towards putting the cart before the horse, e.g. revolution through resolution. A good resolution is secondary to building good org members. It would follow naturally from the organizing work that has to happen first. Finally creating discipline requires having enough trust and support for the idea in advance, otherwise even if you manage to pass the resolution, which is difficult if the org itself is too electoral or incoherent, you will have a hard time actually enforcing it.
But once at an organized stage like that, discipline would look like needing to follow key org lines or get sanctioned/removed on top of unendorsed, requiring that all campaign resources come from grassroots sourcing, primarily org work, requiring that candidates come from the org itself and after a period of onboarding, education, and various pledges and interviews, and a requirement that electoral work rotates such that members do not regularly get their paycheck from the mere existence of campaigns. Some amount of this may run counter to election law, but would be worked around in the same way bourgeois parties do, relying on one main carrot/stick to enforce the “soft” rules, e.g. being very strict about support snd endorsement and volunteer labor such that running foul is actually damaging to the candidate.
My general understanding is that except for the last thing about rotating that’s what they’ve got going on.
The question is whether the membership is really brave/united enough to pull the plug when they can practically taste the sweet victory of an election in less than 3 weeks.
They should have some sort of mechanism to act that quickly or at least make a credible threat as I heard somewhere that mamdani has to attend weekly (general membership?) meetings
I’ve only seen a couple examples of left organizations with good discipline in my life and none that were involved with electoralism. They were created with the idea of a very strongly democratic practice where the expectation is that everyone gets their fair voice but once the vote is cast, you follow the group even if you personally wanted something else. Requires A++ meeting skills to have everyone feel they had the chance to participate.
And, it will always happen that the leadership who are often more dedicated revolutionaries, must adhere to decisions that don’t meet their ideal. It has to be actually democratic so sometimes you lose. But by doing that they set the example and expectation and everyone gets bolder and moves on collectively.
I don’t know how that could be integrated into an elected position like mayor, really. He can’t be micromanaged by hundreds or thousands of people. And the fact of the matter is, there is no way he will be able to perform his duties to their satisfaction for years on end. Because he’s subject to many outside competing forces.
Maybe DSA should only put people up for election if they sign a contract stating they will leave elected politics, lobbying and all associated industries for at least 10 years after. Like a super harsh non compete. Oh wait those are not valid in most places anymore.
They have none of it. Zilch. They have, essentially, a committee of people focused on elections that say a lot of nice vaguely leftist words and implement zero accountability. The people on those committees regularly get paid positions on these campaigns and it is no surprise that they are very defensive of the concept that an “elected” is failing. It is a collaborative relationship mediated by cash and proximity to electoral power.
Regarding the specifics:
NYCDSA leads the charge against electoral accountabikity. They push back against it, not for it, and have never unendorsed a candidate they ran.
The Mamdani campaign is not financially or organizationally dependent on the DSA. This is why he is shmoozing with ghouls. In classic DSA electoralist fashion, it is a one-way street in terms of direct benefit and control: Mamdani receives some resources but does not need them exclusively, nor is he in any way afraid of losing the free volunteers and fundraising. What are they gonna do, unendorse? Kick him out? lmao
Mamdani was not a regular member when he ran for state legislature. He didn’t do jack shit and had no internal vetting outside of one of these committees saying, “yeah okay”.
NYCDSA membership, by and large, reflects the practices above. Pull the plug? They are more likely to approve the resolution saying not to criticize Mamdani now or once in office. Their electoral approach adopts the form and function or bourgeois electoral systems, they are protective of the climber system and investing in cheerleading and donating and volunteering regardless of what a candidate or “elected” says or does. It is an anti-participatory process that is more like an NGO than a political organization that believes in anything.
They actively avoid having policy positions on which to have discipline. These are the folks that opposed the anti-Zionist resolutions for years and years and are only now transforming once it is somewhat popular among liberals.
This requires a substantial change in membership, leadership, and associated political orientation. Any theoretical mechanusm doesn’t matter if nobody enforces it or cares about it or worse, if they actively oppose it. This is why my answer focused on the need to do actual organizing and education into a proper political program and not just whatever is stated on a resolutions. NYCDSA, like any chapter, can always have a big membership vote on anything at least once per month, and can give these committees “emergency” powers to reject candidates, etc. But that means nothing if there is no will to use it. Kind of like how CA Dems never override their governor’s veto.
SA has pretty good discipline and was successful at electoralism. Unfortunately they are Trots with a lot of shit takes and bad ideas, but theor level of organization and discipline puts DSA to shame.
Most communist orgs have pretty good discipline. Their members avoid criticizing their own org publicly, for example. Any time I criticize PSL here, I assume none will publicly agree, and some will defend against the criticism. Part of this is naturally defending one’s own group and ideas they agree with and part of this is internalized discipline. I assume that some part of my criticism may register internally locally, but not publicly.
Why would this be the only way? Committees and the fear of being recalled means no need for mass micromanagement. It begins with openly withdrawing support for “electeds” by having a policy line and sticking to it. Once that fails in its own way, they can commit to and build more structure, etc etc.
Also sorry for the wall of text. Not trying to debate, just want to explain my thinking clearly.
Also this was funny timing:
https://hexbear.net/comment/6591284
That is a good point. False hope, like gambling, often emerges from not having a strong embedding in something real that is paying off. Indulging the fantasy instead of confronting the reality.
The reason that Americans resort to so much adventurism is the same reason why so many pin hopes on bourgeois politicians that owe them nothing: no other political outlet for hope. They are not organized, they are not active.
The slot machines will eventually reward you with electoral Sankara if you just sit there long enough.