I’ve heard from various people that the SRA has a lot of problems, most prominently the lack of leadership from the national organisers, who defer virtually all branch affairs to local organisers, who are often absentees who deprive their membership of the opportunity to organise themselves. Are there any members here who’ve experienced these problems first hand, and if so, what are your thoughts on the organisation as it currently stands?
I personally think any armed group in the imperial core that doesn’t have a solid foundation in anti-imperialism (like any ML org), is by definition reactionary and incredibly dangerous. There was a thread a few weeks ago on one of the SRA subs, that showed the community defends vaush, fedanarchists like robert evans, sides with Ukraine in this conflict, etc…
There’s not many things scarier to me than armed vaushites calling themselves socialists invading leftist spaces IRL. These people will fight and die to defend US empire at all costs, and would gladly kill russians or chinese people if given the chance.
Commies need a Communist Rifle Association where people are strictly communists/MLs. Anything short of that, a distraction and largely unproductive. A “CRA” could train on guerrilla tactics, mountaineering/hiking fitness, wilderness, reading, first aid, as well as mutual aid and agitprop.
We need an international hard-left gun rights org.
IMO until US communists can find the language and the guts to address the existential problems facing them Im afraid stuff like this can only lead to disaster. The problem is much deeper than the terminology we use to describe ourselves, its our class character.
I’m a rather new member so I don’t know much about the SRA’s national leadership, but I’m very impressed with the leadership of my chapter. It’s a very active and cohesive unit of leftists that believe in mutual aid and forming strong local communities.
That sounds reassuring. What kind of activities does your branch carry out in your community?
We work with our local Food Not Bombs chapter to retrieve, sort, and hand out food to those in need as well as support local abortion clinics by being escorts for patients. Those are the 2 big things. We also provide (LGBT+, minority)-safe resources for firearm instruction. I’ve also seen members ask for help from other members in our members-only chat and immediately receive assistance whether it be help moving furniture or money to help pay bills.
They definitely took my money for awhile, but I stopped that eventually.
Ultimately the problems I had were a lot of folks who were not legally allowed to own guns trying to get guns (like, beat their wives, had prior gun violence raps, one of them shot a guy for telling them they were going to need gas money)… Not a whole lot of activity, and at least 2 officially sanctioned orgies as the only meetups I could find for a year.
But that’s gonna be different for each group so, find a good chapter and it’s probably pretty great.
I can just tell you what my friend who was in the SRA experienced (she left because she was caught in so much drama from anarchists that it became impossible for her to remain productively).
most prominently the lack of leadership from the national organisers, who defer virtually all branch affairs to local organisers
Absolutely right. So apparently it’s gonna depend on what your chapter looks like. They really, really don’t care about local leadership and will tell you to figure it out yourselves.
The problems she went through was that anarchists thought it was their club (they started it) and she was not the only ML there when she joined, but she was one of the most vocal. So she always pushed back on typical anticommunist talking points other members brought up.
The anarchists didn’t like that, and tried to have her kicked out at various times, without success. They also brought committees against her (I forgot the name, it’s an MWC) to investigate her behaviour.
Her behaviour was that yes, sometimes she can be stubborn, but she was defending Marxism-leninism and not letting the chapter fall into vulgar anticommunism. Which is allowed in the Socialist Rifle Association. They’re a big tent left unity group so MLs are okay.
Pushing back on China propaganda, Stalin, USSR, etc. And for this they said she was a genocide denier, she had no place in the SRA, etc.
They purposely misunderstood her stance or misunderstood her words to claim she was picking fights with other. Thing is she was galvanising other MLs to speak up too. So maybe that’s why the anarchists didn’t like her.
The way chapters work is they have moderators who are supposed to mediate issues between members. A few of them really didn’t care at all about their role, like they showed up to mediate but then spent the time on their phone or whatever. That’s why one time it led to a misunderstanding they wanted to kick my friend out for. Just didn’t care to do their job which doesn’t reflect very well on the organisation.
And this whole time the organisers were setting up committees to deal with complains and also just telling people to stay civil and stop picking debates. That’s not leadership if you ask me.
Like I said it used to be the anarchists in her chapter and maybe they thought they had their personal clique? And didn’t like when MLs started joining too cause they couldn’t steer MLs like they could demsocs. So they try to get them kicked out.
Also afterwards rumors/allegations/proof of abuse and other super uncomfortable stuff came out (she never entirely specified) and yeah, that’s kinda where the chapter fell apart.
Problem with SRA is anyone can join if they say they’re nominally left. I don’t necessarily mind that, though when you get a guy who sounds like a fed and nobody worries about it, I guess it is something to mind. But the problem is, the SRA is big tent unless you are ML in the wrong chapter. Cause they’ll say shit about ussr, china, etc and if you push back they’ll create trouble over it. To me big tent means either you shut up and stop creating trouble that has nothing to do with a socialist rifle association, or you accept that people will push back when you’re wrong.
Over this whole ordeal which lasted for 2 years I think, two members got kicked out (or one left and the other was kicked out) because in the end they were just harassing her over this and just creating trouble all the time just because she was a vocal ML in the SRA. In the end she left, or said she would, because it was just becoming crazy for her. Honestly, I don’t think they were very happy years of her life.
Really sounds like it depends on the local chapter. I joined up and never met anyone from mine. I guess I could have put more energy into it, but well, you know. I have to say, though, that criticism is all well and good, but I think overall the SRA has been a positive thing. It seems to have gotten a bunch of left/left-leaning people into arming themselves, and maybe even introduced some firearm enthusiasts to left politics. I’m also broadly supportive of anything that gets people together in meat space for community organizing (not applicable for my local chapter).
Yes, it really is dependent on your local chapter. Also, for anyone who is interested in joining, do not base your opinion of the SRA on the conversations in the members only forum lol. The forum sucks. The only time I ever posted there was when I first joined and I was trying to get in touch with my local chapter. After that you should be invited to join your chapter’s private chat whether it be on discord, matrix, slack, etc.