How Can Communism End Crime here ♦ “I’m a Virgo” here ♦ Drug Dealers: Allies of the Bosses here ♦
Marchers protest 2010 police murder of Oscar Grant in Oakland, USA
How Can Communism End Crime?
GQEBERHA (South Africa), June 11— Our collective reading of an article from India triggered a lively discussion of this question. It described women athletes who were brutally assaulted by police after being subjected to sexual abuse by Brij Bhushan Singh, a leading member of the fascist BJP.
“How do we plan to deal with the likes of Bushan Singh and other criminals in a communist society”? asked a comrade. “Under capitalism, they open prisons as money-making schemes and exploit some prisoners as unpaid workers.”
Another comrade replied, “We won’t have crime in a communist society because we won’t have money. If we don’t have money, there won’t be any reason to commit crime.”
“In a communist society most of us will be communists but not everyone 100% will be a communist,” replied another new comrade. “How will we deal with those if they commit crime and other selfish acts”? she asked.
“There are reasons why people commit crime: unemployment, poverty, capitalist ideology,” another answered. “We will need to have a continuous struggle. For instance, in the Soviet Union, they had programs where they re-educated criminals and won them towards socialism. Most ended up contributing positively after some struggle.
“We will need to have something similar and win them through education towards communism. Those who commit heinous crime we will have to eliminate permanently,” he concluded.
This idea of eliminating those who commit violent crimes is not as radical as it sounds, a comrade remarked. “Even now there are death penalties under capitalism. Even in our communities and townships when someone is found to have committed a heinous crime like raping a child, the community often resorts to killing that individual, knowing that the police are useless.”
We will not need police under communism because the police are there to protect private property and capitalists.
“In communism, the community and collectives will be responsible for their own security. We have seen even now when the community together takes a stand, they often reduce these petty criminal acts,” added a comrade. “Just imagine a whole South Africa under communism with this outlook.”
One comrade pointed out that we can’t wait until after the revolution. He said, “We have crime now and it affects us, what can we do”?
A comrade replied, “Now we are a small number but if we use the Red Flag to mobilize where we live and win over the community towards communism and ICWP, we will then collectively deal with crime and criminals.”
“Yes,” another agreed. “We must win the masses to our party. We can even recruit some of the police because we grew up with some of them, they live in our neighborhoods. With enough numbers we can deal with criminals. Some work might even be done underground. We will win people once we effectively start doing that.”
However, it is the Red Flag and talking and fighting for communism that will advance the struggle. We must use it to win the community and working-class where we live.
“I’m a Virgo”: Anti-Racist, Anti-Capitalist, But Not Communist
“Life means being critical. My country uses Big-Bang Burger manipulation of the media to prevent organizing for social justice. No system of the rich will achieve more than communism will,” concluded a Red Flag reader after watching Season 1 of “I Am a Virgo” on Amazon Prime. She liked it very much.
This series is billed as anti-capitalist. It makes some good points, though sometimes in a roundabout, chaotic way.
“Virgo” exposes how advertisers push racist stereotypes about Black men. It shows them demeaning Cootie (13 feet tall) as a commodity to sell products.
The character Jones is an unapologetic self-declared communist. She says that poverty is caused by capitalism. It’s not the fault of the poor. To change this, she says, “Many leaders must be formed…who collectively lead the masses to move.”
Other quotes we like:
“Our power is based on the fact that we the working class are the ones who create the profits.”
“Capitalism creates, encourages crime and violence. We will put a stop to crime.”
The relations between the main characters, Cootie, Scat, Jones, and Felix are supportive. This shows a little of the collectivity we need to mobilize for and build communism.
But this support is only for survival and reform. Jones advances a reformist movement of strikes and protests. We are what we do. Someone who drinks a lot becomes an alcoholic. Someone who drives a truck for a living is a truck driver.
Past communists mistakenly thought they could get to communism by fighting for reforms. Or by becoming the new ruling class of a fundamentally capitalist state that maintained wages, banks, and inequality in socialism.
People who hate racism and oppression need to see that these are caused by capitalism. The series shows some of that. But they also need to know that only communist revolution will end them.
In capitalism, as a character says, “Everything costs money and without money there is nothing, no health or food or decent housing.” In communism, production and all life will be based on comradely relations of cooperation, sharing and collectivity. Everything will be produced to meet the masses’ needs, without buying and selling and profit.
Jones says, “I want the people to democratically control the wealth we create with our labor.” That will “take force” and we’ll “need the people for this force.”
But strikes, sit-downs, walkouts, boycotts, etc. will not end racism or get us to a communist society. The boss or the fascist cop (“Hero”) will not say, “You’re right, I’ll change my ways,” the way “Virgo” seems to conclude.
The capitalist class maintains its control through violence. If workers are not ready for a fight, we won’t be prepared for their repression and for revolution.
To make a revolution and build communism, we need to build a mass ICWP and a Red Army. The masses can understand these ideas. We need to trust this, or we’ll make the same mistakes as past communist movements.
“Virgo” shows that capitalists keep their control by racist divisions of the working class along with violence. That capitalism needs unemployment. But it attacks capitalism without providing the solution. It doesn’t show the revolutionary multi-racial working-class unity needed to win the fight for communism.
If we watch and discuss “Virgo” with friends, we can show them that only communist revolution can end racist capitalism’s exploitation by ending its material basis. The wage system (production for profit) needs to divide workers through racism, sexism, and terror.
Do you agree that capitalism is an oppressive system that needs to super-exploit workers? Then join ICWP to organize for the only real solution: communist revolution.
Communist revolution will be won not only by learning about capitalism but also learning in practice about mobilizing for communism and sharing this with others.
Only communism can end racism, sexism, exploitation, addiction. Only communism can create mental wellness and provide for all. Today’s youth will be key leaders in the class struggle for communism. Join us!
Drug Dealers: Allies of Bosses, Not of Workers
The climax of “Virgo” illustrates super-exploitation by portraying small-time drug dealers who are only trying to survive under capitalism.
But drug dealers do the dirty work for the bosses. They don’t fight them. Drugs are one way that the ruling class keeps workers under control.
It’s the capitalist ruling class that puts the drugs into working-class communities in the US, Latin America, and beyond —for repression and control. They flew cocaine into the US from Colombia in the 1980’s, trying to prevent rebellion and revolution. They flooded Black neighborhoods with crack cocaine when factories were closing and unemployment, especially among Black youth, was soaring.
The US deported gang members from US jails back to Central America, spreading US gang culture. This pushed potentially revolutionary youth into drugs and gangs.
Big pharma is responsible for the current opiate crisis in the USA.
Let’s not make excuses for drug dealers (big or small) who push drugs that destroy our communities. The rulers profit from having a passive population, disconnected from reality, that can be easily attacked.
The communist masses will mobilize to eliminate harmful drugs and drug addiction. Masses will be motivated to plan, produce and fight to meet everyone’s needs. They won’t want or need to escape into drugs!
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