Maybe I’m misrepresenting some stuff as a lot of this is off memory but from what I heard out of Philly, factionalist infighting was so common there used to “beef” over who had “rights” for protests, rallies etc. Complaints about people trying to “usurp” a protest etc. were common and sometimes it was bad enough to be noticed by those outside of any of the dozen of orgs. A mutual sign-on with most of the common nominal socialist formations which has become more common in the last year or so has seen less of this which is why I found the development interesting. Is it a *strong *development that indicates the US is on the cusp of revolution? Hardly. But I don’t think I know a single person that thinks we’re where we need to be. But it’s an getting past the point of thinking eating paint chips is good nutritional advice.
I also know several of the orgs do work together fairly often. the Philly DSA, FRSO, PSL, WWP, PAAPR (Though for anyone that’s in the know NAAPR org is heavily mixed with FRSO so depending on how intertwined the Philly Chapters are that could be essentially the same membership signed on twice) and Palestine Coalition I’ve heard of working together on various smaller projects to various degrees for a while now, so just being a sign on is something that I don’t know necessarily applies here.
Tangential to the idea, I do believe there is a bit of a focus on “socialist membership” numbers that is an error committed by many on the left here considering much smaller communist organizations did much more under more repressive regimes. But I think that is people trying to cope with the lack of other types mass organizations in the US, and essentially trying to create mass socialist orgs to supplant them. (I’m dubious of that strategy since it lacks the militant power and working class governance experience of labor/tenant unions, the relief and agitation value of mutual aid groups etc. But it’s an observation I’ve had for a while and feels related towards the desire for a singularly encompassing left entity to subsume them all).
Maybe I’m misrepresenting some stuff as a lot of this is off memory but from what I heard out of Philly, factionalist infighting was so common there used to “beef” over who had “rights” for protests, rallies etc. Complaints about people trying to “usurp” a protest etc. were common and sometimes it was bad enough to be noticed by those outside of any of the dozen of orgs. A mutual sign-on with most of the common nominal socialist formations which has become more common in the last year or so has seen less of this which is why I found the development interesting. Is it a *strong *development that indicates the US is on the cusp of revolution? Hardly. But I don’t think I know a single person that thinks we’re where we need to be. But it’s an getting past the point of thinking eating paint chips is good nutritional advice.
I also know several of the orgs do work together fairly often. the Philly DSA, FRSO, PSL, WWP, PAAPR (Though for anyone that’s in the know NAAPR org is heavily mixed with FRSO so depending on how intertwined the Philly Chapters are that could be essentially the same membership signed on twice) and Palestine Coalition I’ve heard of working together on various smaller projects to various degrees for a while now, so just being a sign on is something that I don’t know necessarily applies here.
Tangential to the idea, I do believe there is a bit of a focus on “socialist membership” numbers that is an error committed by many on the left here considering much smaller communist organizations did much more under more repressive regimes. But I think that is people trying to cope with the lack of other types mass organizations in the US, and essentially trying to create mass socialist orgs to supplant them. (I’m dubious of that strategy since it lacks the militant power and working class governance experience of labor/tenant unions, the relief and agitation value of mutual aid groups etc. But it’s an observation I’ve had for a while and feels related towards the desire for a singularly encompassing left entity to subsume them all).