FIGHT FOR COMMUNISM!
International Communist Workers Party
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FIGHT FOR COMMUNISM! |
International Communist Workers Party | |
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Comrade In Spain Inspired by Conference in South Africa
We expected about 40 workers to attend the International Communist Workers’ Party Conference in South Africa. However, I was surprised to see that along with enthusiasm and intense effort the comrades brought more than 100 workers--members of ICWP.
I feel strengthened, inspired and more eager to continue the work of spreading communist ideas. We are sharing this experience and also intensifying the work of spreading Red Flag.
The need of the working class was made clear in this meeting. We talked about how to build a mass party, how to resolve our internal contradictions in order to resolve the external contradictions, and about what a communist system will be like. That’s how we will be able to explain in the best way to the rest of the workers at work, school, or in college that the only way to end the super-exploitation of the whole working class is by fighting to build communism.
We are the vanguard and we are on the correct road. Let’s continue working to win more workers to our communist line and shorten the life of capitalism. LONG LIVE ICWP! LONG LIVE COMMUNISM!
--A Motivated Comrade
Communism and the “Gun Question”
In the light of recent terrorist attacks around the world and killings by the use of firearms in the US in particular, the question of weapon ownership has become an important topic. In the US, many “left-leaning” people want guns banned or tightly controlled and many “right wingers” argue that this attacks the Second Amendment right to bear arms.
The question for us: what would we do about guns under communism? Since there will be no private property, there will be no gun ownership as we think of it in the US today. People will not own houses, cars, televisions, etc. All goods will be held collectively and distributed according to need.
This doesn’t mean that workers won’t have access to guns. There may be guns distributed for recreational purposes (sharpshooting) and possibly hunting. The decision to whom and when these guns are distributed would be made collectively under the leadership of the Party.
More importantly, millions of soldiers will be members of the Red Army, where they will get intensive training. Because the revolution will most likely be under external attack from other countries and internally from capitalists, fascists, etc., it is important that most of the adult working class has access to weapons when needed. This is another part of mobilizing the masses – the ability to defend Communism, under the leadership of the Party.
We may even have to mobilize and arm huge numbers of workers when, say, the danger of terrorist attack is high. These armed comrades will combine with a mobilized population. This kind of mobilization will suffocate the efforts of the tiny band of terrorists.
The Party would provide not only the training in using the weapons, but the continued ideological training/struggle to win everyone to understand the basis of the new social relations. This will be the greatest protection against, and prevention of, terrorist attacks. Because the ideology of Communism is best for 99.9% of the world’s population, it will be much harder for anti-working class groups, racists, etc. to win people to their ideologies.
There is NO WAY to be free of “terrorists” under capitalism. Imperialism creates more and more of them every day. The only way to be free of this threat and to solve the “gun question” is to build a Communist world, where the international working class will fight for a future free of terrorism and every other “horror of capitalism”.
--Comrades in Seattle
Building ICWP in South Africa
I joined ICWP last year. First I had doubts about abolishing money (capital). Then I attended ICWP classes where I learned Dialectics. At that time, I was unemployed and my house is a bit far from other comrades. Sincerely I was not stable, and that caused a negative impact in terms of working collectively with other comrades, and that is a contradiction.
I started to mobilize alone and that leads to individualism. If you don’t work collectively with our class it’s easy to be tempted by the capitalists. You’ll start to make ways to benefit, even taking credit for other comrades’ work. I became self-centered, and another problem was alcohol. If you are a communist, you must socialize with your soldiers, not with anti-communists. Here in South Africa we had meetings on the week-ends, so it became harder for me to attend meetings, because my Party comrades don’t mix alcohol with revolution.
Being a communist, you must focus on mobilizing the masses for communist revolution. But you can’t do that without collective work. Because of alcohol, I lost my cell phone which was very instrumental for my mobilization. Also it became harder for me to reach the other comrades. In all, I was not disciplined and we don‘t need that in our Party (ICWP).
But after meeting other comrades from El Salvador, USA, and Spain, my mentality changed. My attitude improved. I started to realize my mistakes. I had a long chat with my comrades, before the conference, and after the conference. Discipline comes with dedication. Self-introspection is very important when you are a communist. What I learned from my comrades is collectiveness, discipline, and sharing. You must need something; don’t want it because your friends have it. That is competition, which is a capitalist tool to destroy us.
The conference was a great success, although the struggle continues and more work must be done. Five Comrades and our 83 year old legend, who recently joined our party—all these comrades are very old comrades. We must learn from them. They are an inspiration to our struggle. Comrade R from the United States said to me, “These comrades are old. They won’t live forever. One day they will be gone and we have to continue with the work. But with-out discipline we won’t achieve our goals.”
Those words transform me into a Red Lion. Positive criticism, then self-criticism, self introspection is a way to guide yourself so that you’ll stick with ICWP’s principles. After all, we are humans, under capitalist rule. We’ll make mistakes but we must learn from them. Roar lions of ICWP, Roar.
--A Comrade
p.s. I’m including a poem.
The sun sets from the east
And rises to the west
The sun has no borders; it lights the whole world.
Roar lions of ICWP.
The working class’ needs are not heard.
The sun sets from the east
And rises to the west
The Communist Fist will Smash the Capitalist Beast
Comrade T in South Africa was a key member in helping establish the presence of ICWP. His dedication, discipline, deep relationship with the masses and understand-ing of communism created deep roots for ICWP to grow. A few months ago some personal issues and external circumstances made the comrade inactive. However, he remained a loyal supporter of the party, offered a room in his house to visiting comrades and attended the ICWP conference in South Africa. He was asked to write a letter on what he thought about the conference. Here is his response.
Ok comrade I will but first I had to be free in my heart because I was still angry at many things. My heart didn’t allow me to write anything until am free. At least now I feel better and I will be back at mobilizing. My brother was always begging me to be active again. So I have decided to be active as I was before. I will be attending meetings in my brother’s area because he said they need my presence to help understand communist materials.
I also miss you guys and I plan to be very active. Also, what I love in my brother’s area is I know a lot more people than in my area and it’s a fresh start for me personally. But I am a person that really be-lieves in honesty even though we live in an awkward system.
First let me say I am happy that all the comrades who visited us here in South Africa got back home safely because it’s not easy to travel about 35 hours via air. I know the experience. It’s really exhausting and not always safe and it’s life-threatening. But nevertheless nothing will stop ICWP comrades in pursuing our mission to free the working class from this brutal capitalism.
I haven’t been active in the last few months, but seeing my fellow comrades I last saw in El Salvador last year I was reborn again. And seeing them made me become active again and even more than before. I miss them. I wish I could see them more frequently because they are the reason for my existence in the party, besides the fact that I joined the party to destroy the system. I know it’s only ICWP that can end and destroy capitalism. I feel like and always felt like I was born to be an ICWP comrade. It’s been in my heart before I was even introduced and became an ICWP comrade by my fellow South African comrade and a California comrade.
The conference which was held in South Africa a couple of weeks back showed a great potential for mobilizing masses for communism because people (masses), the working class never knew that there is actually a party that is working so hard to destroy this capitalism system. It’s all been in our hearts and a wishful feeling that capitalism must be destroyed. So it was truly a blessing and great news for masses in the conference to know that in fact there is a party called ICWP which is directly fighting for communism to free masses from inequalities, injustices, poverty, wars and racism, and many more tools that promote capitalism. Masses will be free masses together with ICWP shall destroy capitalism once and for all.
Thank you comrades for your patience and trust in me. I am truly happy to be active again. I will exceed expectations. Communism is my life. I speak it all the time. Even when people chat about life I always change the topic to capitalism vs. communism and always try to make people see the only solution to global problems is communism.
--Comrade T
What it Means to Join the Party
The article on the Russian revolution was confused and contradictory on a very important point: what it means to be a member of the ICWP. For example, at one point it says we follow “democratic centralism” and explains what that means. A few sentences later, it says we follow instead “communist centralism” – without explaining what this is.
However, rather than criticize the article in detail, I’m going to say what I think the situation is. I hope to start a discussion about this.
First, our party is a mass party, open to any-one who agrees with Mobilize the Masses for Communism and who is willing to work to make this vision come true. You don’t have to be very experienced, though we have many members who are. You don’t have to be very knowledgeable (have read lots of Marx and Lenin), though again, we have members who are. You don’t have to have lots of spare time to devote – most of us don’t.
If you can read the paper, attend meetings of your collective, take part in events and (very important) spread our ideas and recruit among your friends, family and co-workers, that’s great.
Our operating principle is centralism; how-ever you describe it. What this means is that we collectively decide what to do, then rely on you (and other members) to do what you agreed to do. Reliability is vital because otherwise we can’t get anything done, and the party degenerates into a talking shop. Lenin believed that this principle was non-negotiable. He was willing to split the Russian Social Democratic Party over it, and did so, founding the Bolsheviks.
What you will do for the party is negotiated with your collective. Some may do more than others, because of their situation and/or commitment. We’ll help you over time to improve both, but if meanwhile you can only do the basics described above, you’re already making a big difference.
When we have millions of members like you, we can create the communist world we want.
--A comrade
