In my opinion, the people like Maupin, Jackson Hinkle, and especially the Infrared YouTube channel (people like Haz) have not engaged in the debate in good faith AT ALL.
But moreover, I do believe that patriotism, certainly “American patriotism”, has no place in the ML movement. I believe in the working-class, but I wouldn’t want to muddy the waters with cheap appeals to what would essentially be working-class conservatism and chauvinism. I won’t say much more than the fact that my comrades and I have been talking about this extensively and all agree: decolonization comes first and foremost. Landback is a must and many people, of all races and ethnicities, have been hurt by colonialism and neo-colonialism as well as imperialism both within and outside the United States, the original indigenous inhabitants being a prime example.
I hope I haven’t said anything to offend anyone, but I support Landback and decolonialism. I even originally became an ML in part due to Berta Caceres’s murder in Central America. In the CPUSA, Browder was very controversial and was fought against as he became more and more unpopular (until he was finally ousted, in huge part because of his “Americanism”). SO even then: the issue of “American patriotism” was suspect. I think that we live in a much more radical and interesting time where decolonization must take center stage now more than ever before.
That Haz would say that “indigenous peoples” or Native Americans have no place in the ML movement is folly; we should be doing more to not only comfort them but make us more available to them as a movement, not decry them or anything.
Anyways, enough Twitter drama. I took a break from most social media and I feel much better now. But I think Maupin/Haz (Infrared)/Jackson Hinkle have belittled and side-stepped the issues at stake, from what I’ve seen of their content.
It does the wider communist movement a disservice when people claiming to be CPUSA members (who obviously aren’t or can’t be traced back to in the databases) and people who certainly are CPUSA members (albeit, from what we can tell, a minority so far in the organization) try to appeal to right-wingers and sometimes even believe in their nonsense. Well, I can’t say much more about the organization other than what’s on display on Twitter, but I do think that one should be open about all this.
Welp, that’s all I have for now.
Haz’s mistake was to go after Luna like he does after breadtubers.
Well, that was just the latest in a string of terribly bad decisions, the first of which was opening their youtube account.
If there is a place for nationalism in the left, then surely there must be a place for nationalism in USA communists? I’m reminded of Vizzion’s statement, who said it was difficult to be patriotic in Germany because of the nazis, but that if you are not patriotic, if you do not love your compatriots and want to improve their lives, then why are you a revolutionary? Just because it’s fun, just because it’s edgy?
With that said I absolutely abhor Haz’s online persona, which is exactly the same as the anarcho-cringe breadtubers I rant about. Their weird brand of “american communism” is off the mark by several degrees, which prompted luna to call them agents provocateurs. There is no way to reconcile the symbols of imperial America with revolutionary theory and praxis.
Haz was actually the first person I heard talk about sublimating capitalism with communism, and I think it’s a very apt word for everything we do. Yet they do not want to sublimate the symbols of imperial america with symbols of revolutionary america. There is this pervasive feeling that we have to reach out to the right at the cost of our revolutionary theory that I see a lot. Yes, we have to integrate workers no matter their political stance. We will be able to reeducate them in time. But no, we should not have to compromise marxism-leninism to achieve that.
That was not a mistake, he exposed Luna Oi for her pandering to American leftists for money. Which you can read here.
This tweet shows how she does not represent the the political line of the Communist Party of Vietnam and how her views run counter to the party.
Her hypocrisy shines through here, the dress is actually of Chinese origin and is also worn in Korea, yet it is bad when a Chinese woman wears it yet ok when a white American woman wears it. This is complete hypocrisy.
This shows how she claims to be a Marxist and to be espousing dialectical materialism, yet she seems to be blending in radlib views which run counter to Marxism and simply have nothing to do with it.
Here is why she is wrong about flag burning, and yet she claims that the Vietnamese hate America even though Pew polls show that the vast majority of Vietnamese people have a favourable opinion of the United States.
The hypocrisy of Luna Oi here (that hasn’t already been explained in Infrared’s article above) is that Vietnam have their own natives that were exploited and moved off their land by Vietnamese settlers yet she never talks about that at all and completely ignores her own country’s problems with their indigenous people such as the Champa, Khmer and the natives of the mountains in the north and west.
This is how the baizuo who Luna is pandering to actually view native peoples. She also literally will block anyone who criticises her in any way and is unable to listen to those who disagree with her and downright censors anyone who exposes her.
No authentic Vietnamese Marxist-Leninist would have any of these views or would be pandering to Western leftists for money.
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The reason you do not want to throw away old symbols and introduce new ones, at least not abruptly, is because these American symbols have too much power. You can’t spontaneously or voluntarily produce something that has as much reverence. A bald eagle is not just a bird in people’s minds, it is a powerful, tremendous raptor with a 6 foot wingspan, and being a part of that makes people feel powerful. When people see the American flag, they think of Iwo Jima, the soldiers raising it triumphantly over fascism. If you abandon these things, you are donating them to counterrevolutionaries, free of charge.
When reactionaries and counterrevolutionaries fight against the revolution, I don’t want them to feel powerful. I don’t want them to think they are fighting tyranny. I want them to feel like traitors. I want them to be forced to adopt counterfeit symbols that have hollow meaning, instead of picking something up that has history.
On the point of symbols, each person can have their own personal opinion and feelings about them, like the flag for example.
However, the only thing that will determine what will happen moving forward is the American people as they seize a (future) revolutionary moment. We can have symbols and flags for the parties, for your socialist groups, but only the people of a socialist country will decide what works for them.
In that sense, we cannot preemptively design what the flag will look like. We cannot preemptively tell working class people they should burn the flag, or get used to a new one. Only once American socialism has gained power will symbols be defined and used. Until then, anything else is playing pretend.
It is for that reason that there is no point in centering what we do to the current imperial flag. Why talk to people about symbols if there’s no broad political or class consciousness yet about what the symbols are even supposed to represent? What’s the point of declaring to the world that you hate the flag because it represents imperialism without first having everyone listening be convinced of anti-imperialism? An analogy: Why scold people for liking a luxury brand or buying a product (a personal act) if they aren’t already against monopolies and capitalist materialism (a class analysis)?
At this stage, with no communist power, our priorities need to be class consciousness and analysis of power structures, not symbols of class and state or personal feelings (yet)