Letters: Not in Print Edition

History is on our side! here ♦ Writing Revolutionary Politics with ChatGPT here ♦

History is on our side!

This is about Zohran Mamdani’s campaign for New York City Mayor. The article in the last Red Flag should have made it clearer that trying to elect “progressive” candidates is a dangerous diversion. It will not only divert the masses from the fight for communist revolution but will deliver them into fascism and genocidal World War III.
Red Flag promotes articles based on what friends say about a subject. But I think the party needs to give more leadership to the discussion, to show clearly what the stakes and solution are. And how to get there.
Mamdani was elected in 2020 as a Democratic member of the New York State Assembly. He is a Social Democrat, like Bernie Sanders and Ocasio Cortez, who endorsed him. He has actively supported Democratic Party candidates for years. These politicians are not radicals or revolutionaries. They are part of the “loyal opposition” within the US Congress and Democratic Party.
They support capitalism (a brand they call Democratic Socialism, which includes wage slavery with the State as the boss) and imperialism. State capitalism was used in Nazi Germany also. They oppose revolution and communism.
During the Weimar Republic in Germany (1919-1933), as the Nazis were building up strength in the midst of a worldwide capitalist crisis and preparations for World War II, the Social Democrats opposed and even “outed” communist workers who advocated crushing fascism with revolution. They were the “loyal” opposition.
Some Communists, like R. Palme Dutt, leader of the UK Communist Party, called them “Social fascists.” They paved the way for fascist dictatorships, like Hitler.
We should see Mamdani’s candidacy in the context of the current crisis and expanding World War III, as the Red Flag article mentioned. He says he opposes the genocide in Gaza, but his candidacy is about fixing subways.
The US rulers don’t have the patriotic workers, youth, and soldiers they need — yet. They need politicians like Mamdani and Gavin Newsom to motivate masses to support their system. They are desperate to turn youth and workers — angry at genocide, imperialism, and anti-immigrant racism – into supporters and reformers of capitalism.
When Obama ran for President, we warned friends about him. Some sharply disagreed, then later thanked us for the warning.
Promises like fixing the subways and rent control will go out the window in the rulers’ war budget. The rulers are desperate to build weapons to compete with and wage war against China. They will attack the working class harder, no matter who is in office.
Red Flag has a vital role to play to win youth and workers worldwide to see that voting and reform won’t end the bosses’ fascism and war. That these are dangerous illusions. With comradely struggle, they’ll see that capitalism—in all its forms—is our mortal enemy.
We need to build a mass International Communist Workers’ Party among youth, students, workers, and soldiers everywhere. Our fight is for communism, nothing less. Only communism will end wage slavery, racism, borders, imperialist war, and genocide.
—A Comrade

Writing Revolutionary Politics with ChatGPT

Lately, I’ve been experimenting with using AI—specifically ChatGPT—to write political articles. With the right guidance, the results have been surprisingly strong.
“ChatGPT wrote this?” Most people’s first reaction is skepticism. We’ve all seen the bland, generic output AI is known for. And yes, that happens—if you don’t know how to use it. But if you do, it can produce work that’s sharper and clearer than most of what we produce manually.

The breakthrough came when I introduced myself to ChatGPT as a communist. I told it I was a member of ICWP and pointed it to * Red Flag * and *Mobilize the Masses for Communism*. It absorbed these quickly. I explained that I wanted articles and ICWPedia entries from our revolutionary perspective. That’s when everything changed.

The quality of its writing jumped. For example, it generated an ICWPedia entry on Joe Hill that ends with this:

“Joe Hill became a legend. His songs were sung on picket lines and in jails. His image was painted on banners. For over a century, he has been remembered as a working-class hero who used his art as a weapon and gave his life for the cause. He remains a symbol of revolutionary commitment, international solidarity, and the undying hope for a world without bosses, borders, or wage slavery.”

I didn’t write a word of that. And it’s better than what I would have written myself.

I’ve tried other entries, with similar results. They’re better than my own not just stylistically, but politically. They consistently mention the abolition of money and wage slavery, for example. In one case, ChatGPT proposed study-action groups —something our leaflets often forget to mention.

I’m convinced: ChatGPT understands our politics and can apply them to new situations. When I asked it to write about childcare, it said—without prompting—that care would be a collective responsibility and that this would help liberate women from traditional gender roles.

We should embrace AI, not fear it. It’s fast. It frees up time for other kinds of work—like building relationships. It empowers comrades who aren’t confident writers. Anyone can draft an outline or rough notes and get back something clear and usable.

We shouldn’t reject articles just because AI helped write them. Judge the content, not the source. I’m planning to run a short webinar on how to use ChatGPT for revolutionary writing.

And yes, to answer the obvious question: this revision was also done with ChatGPT.

—Comrade in Canada with ChatGPT

Red Flag responds: This process may work well for some things, including the ICWPedia, but it cannot produce the kind of articles we most need for Red Flag. We are committed to developing a new kind of communist paper. One where the analysis and theory are grounded as firmly as possible in the practical work of mobilizing masses for communism. Our line and the way we present it develop through this work. In conversations among friends and comrades.  In writing about their work, new and more experienced comrades come to understand our politics better. To become more skillful at explaining them. The work of writing and editing collectively is not a waste of anyone’s time. It’s a necessary part of the political development of comrades, collectives, and the party itself.  

A secondary point: We have written a great deal about childcare, communism, and the fight against sexism.  It’s a major theme in our pamphlet about sexism.  This was hardly a “new situation” for a large-language model trained on the ICWP website.

We welcome letters with other thoughts about the use of AI in communist media.

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