SEATTLE (USA), Jan. 21—Sometimes, the oddest questions reveal important truths.
“Primary or secondary?” asked a young man as a comrade offered him a Red Flag at the Martin Luther King Jr. (MLK) rally. After some thought, our comrade realized he was talking about primary (first-hand) or secondary sources.
“Primary!” answered the comrade. “This paper features the voices of workers around the world in the struggle for communism. That’s the only way we’ll put an end to racism, sexism and xenophobia [fear of foreigners].”
The young man thought for a few seconds. “Good! I’ll take two.”
Our comrade changed his approach as he continued to distribute the paper and collect donations: “Would you like a copy of Red Flag? Hear the voices of workers in communist revolutionary struggle around the world.” We distributed every paper we brought, over 325.
MLK day is a national holiday in the U.S. Many cities have marches and rallies. In Seattle, the ICWP attends every year. This year, the Women’s March partnered with the MLK rally and march.
Another marcher was immediately attracted to the front-page article from El Salvador. Her parents had emigrated from there in the ‘90s. She was glad to read about how workers there were talking about communism.
Many marchers liked discussing the other front page article, “Wall of Women.” It too featured a conversation with a potential new ICWP member who had been active in the demonstrations.
A woman who came to Seattle from Nigeria had a long conversation with a comrade about communism, socialism and capitalism.
She made a special trip to the Party’s table. She took copies of ICWP pamphlets on the communist fight against sexism, how communism will end racism, communist education and our manifesto Mobilize the Masses for Communism. She immediately started to read them.
Boeing Workers Discuss Reactions to Communist Literature
The next day a comrade at Boeing talked to a friend who regularly participates in the MLK march, sometimes as a speaker. This time he couldn’t make it. He wanted to know how people greeted our communist message.
Hearing about the Nigerian woman we met, he responded, “That’s great! But you can’t really talk with people here [US native-born] and expect that kind of reaction.”
“I don’t know about that,” answered our comrade. A group of U.S. high school students took a bunch of papers. One said, “Thank you, comrade” and all his friends did the same.
“That shows respect,” said our impressed Boeing friend. “We should understand that!”
Self-critically, we haven’t discussed the response with enough workers and students. Our paper Red Flag is unique in this regard. You don’t find reports just anywhere on international communist struggle that features party members and friends.
Sometimes we don’t have party members or friends involved in a particular struggle. We are forced to write a communist analysis “from afar.” But there is nothing stopping us from struggling about the communist potential with those we see on a regular basis at school or work. We can (and do) report on those discussions.
A comrade noted that some people commented specifically on how they liked the international look of the paper. “Now it’s on to preparing for the potluck,” she reminded us, referring to our next ICWP event. A good response to our communist paper requires following up with all our new and old friends.
Front page of this issue
