A Look at Life Under a Capitalist Democracy: A Passage and A Breakdown

"'Democracy with its motto of equality of all citizens before the law and Liberalism with its right of man over his own person both were wrecked on the realities of capitalist economy,' [Rudolf] Rocker correctly observed.  Those who are compelled to rent themselves to owners of capital in order to survive are deprived of one of the most fundamental rights: the right to productive, creative and fulfilling work under one's own control, in solidarity with others.  And under the ideological constraints on capitalist democracy, the prime necessity is to satisfy the needs of those in a position to make investment decisions; if their demands are not satisfied, there will be no production, no work, no social services, no means for survival.  All necessarily subordinate themselves and their interests to the overriding need to serve the interests of the owners and managers of society, who, furthermore, with their control over resources are easily able to shape the ideological system (the media, schools, universities, and so on) in the interests, to determine the basic conditions within which the political process will function, its parameters and basic agenda, and to call upon the resources of state violence, when need be, to suppress any challenge to entrenched power.  The point was formulated succinctly in the early days of the liberal democratic revolution by John Jay, the President of the Continental Congress and the first Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court: 'The people who own the country ought to govern it.'  And, of course, they do, whatever political faction may be in power.  Matters could hardly be otherwise when economic power is narrowly concentrated and the basic decisions over the nature and character of life, the investment decisions, are in principle removed from democratic control." (From Chomsky on Anarchism, 2005)


In other words:

"Democracy believes in the equality of all citizens.  Liberalism (the intellectual idea) believes human beings were entitled the right to their own person (i.e., they could not be slaves).  Both of these ideals do not hold true under capitalism."  If a person is forced to (or else starve/lose their home) work for a minimum wage (sell their labor/time) they are deprived of the right to live (or to work in) a productive and creative job that makes them happy, and makes the people they collaborate with happy as well.  Under capitalist democracy (this is what we experience in 2019), the main motive is to make sure that the bosses and owners are happy.  If the bosses and owners are not happy, there is no work, no support for people who need it, essentially no survival.  With this being the case, everyone who is not a boss must submit to the whims of the rich and powerful, and since the rich and powerful have so much wealth they can shape what the media, schools, and universities teach and don't teach.  (Where are the classes in labor organizing?  In making sure that the thing you do for a living is well-paid, meaningful, and not subject to dumb rules?)  Because the rich literally own the media, they get to determine what is talked about and not talked about in political discourse.  And remember, because the rich control so much wealth they also control the police, prison, court systems, and armies and will use them to make sure they are not threatened by people who do not have money.  John Jay, an influential person in the foundation of this country, said, "The people who own the country should rule it."  And, of course, this is true, no matter if a Democrat or Republican is in office.  When wealth and power are held in the hands of the few the basic decisions of how society should function is removed from democratic control.  When wealth and power are held in the hands of the few, some lives matter more than others.  When wealth and power are held in the hands of the few, most of the people struggle to survive.  When wealth and power are held in the hands of the few, it's okay, no, it's important that we begin to ask if and how another world could become possible.

To Serve or Not to Serve

I thought about not serving him.  I thought about asking him politely to leave.  I thought about calling in the comrades to disrupt his entire afternoon.  Instead, I provided excellent service – refilling his diet coke twice and bringing out his fish sandwich with a smile. 

               Former interim President of Michigan State University (MSU), John Engler, came into the restaurant where I worked in the fall of 2018.  I was having a slow-paced and fine Saturday afternoon when the giant man strolled in and took a table in my section.  My stomach dropped and I began to see red.  I texted my dad because I knew he could talk me down.

               I worked at the kind of establishment that serves the rich – a haven for those with enough wealth to segregate themselves from the general public.  I used to tell myself I was researching the lives of the rich or I was a radical spy gathering intel, but the truth is the paychecks were large and they fed me great food.

               I served Engler and his two guests, but behind the bar I was writing down a statement, “As a hospitality professional I am obligated to give you excellent service.  As an MSU student I am obligated to tell you I do not support your treatment of survivors or your continued presence in the MSU community.”  I went into the service area and practiced it under my breath.  If I had had the courage to go say those words I would’ve been chewed out, possibly fired, or at worst, endangered my teaching certification if Engler wanted to retaliate.

               “Everyone is someone…if he was a Nazi, then you could tell your boss you can’t serve him on principle.”  My dad’s words calmed me down as I expected, or possibly hoped– they reminded me that Engler is not a Nazi and therefore is worthy of human dignity.  Regardless, I would be false if I didn’t admit that I wasn’t ready to risk my teaching certification.

               I faced riot cops and Nazis at the MSU Pavilion earlier that year when Richard Spencer tried to speak.  I had posted #FireEngler on Twitter and even hung a few posters on campus, but when I faced Engler in my bar that Saturday I chose not to resist.

               Perhaps I should have - he certainly has done enough to warrant his afternoon lunches to be disrupted.  His slandering of survivors has finally brought about his firing – the chickens have come home to roost.

               Everyone is someone, but not everyone deserves a quiet meal in public.  Nonetheless, I caved under the risk of confronting the interim president of my university as he ate lunch.  I served John Engler better than he served the MSU community.

               So what is the threshold for confronting evil?  To what extent are we willing to risk our positions and our careers in order to challenge injustice?  What social and institutional norms enforce complacency, if not corroboration, in an unjust world?  How do we preserve our integrity when working in these alienating environments?

               This past year at MSU taught me first hand that the rich and powerful serve themselves and those that can benefit them in the pyramid scheme of American politics.  In order to make this world a more just, peaceful, and equitable place we will need to confront those in power vigilantly and strategically; but more importantly we must be prepared to take the risks required of us when acting in solidarity.

Fred Hampton and the Illegitimacy of the State

Forty-nine years ago, the Chicago Police Department (CPD), in cooperation with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), raided the home of twenty-one-year-old Black Panther Party leader, Fred Hampton, just before dawn.  Also killed in that raid was organizer, Mark Clark. 

I was eighteen years old when I began independently researching the murder of Fred Hampton.  This was ten years ago when I learned how the FBI planted an operative close to Hampton, a coward by the name of William O’Neal, who, on the night of the raid, drugged Fred Hampton so that he wouldn’t wake up when the police busted down door.  As a result Fred Hampton was shot in his bed next to his pregnant fiance, Deborah Johnson.

The photo evidence is a Google search away.  The documentary goes into more depth regarding the depravity and planning of the government agents that murdered Fred Hampton in his sleep.  I hate seeing the body of Fred Hampton laying across the bottom of his bedroom threshold, but I really hate the smug face of the cops that took Fred Hampton’s body out of his house, and every single person involved with the repression, harassment, and murder of Civil Rights and revolutionary Black organizers. 

At eighteen I understood the potential of State violence and their willingness to use it without remorse, and in the next ten years, I haven’t found a damn piece of evidence to counter this perspective.  It was Martin Luther King Jr. that called the United States government “the greatest purveyor of violence” in the world in 1967, and it still holds true today in the seventeenth year of the invasion of Afghanistan.  The State (by that I mean the Federal, State and municipal governments, bureaucracy, court systems, police, and military) is not a peaceful entity, but rather a self-serving leviathan of invested individuals dedicated to maintaining this current (unequal, violent, and polluting) organization of the world. 

How dedicated to maintaining control to the wealth and power in the USA?  Enough to target and kill a twenty-one year old in his bed because the head of the FBI declared the Black Panther Party “the greatest threat to the internal security of the country.”  The function of the State (and really any institution) is to maintain its existence, legitimacy, and control over wealth and power in an area.  The United States is pretty efficient at maintaining control and legitimacy, so much so that we can drop two atomic bombs in 1945 and then use the hypothetical existence of atomic bombs to invade another country (Iraq in 2003). 

Coming from a peace and justice perspective, it doesn’t take long to notice a trend: the pattern of violence, corruption, debauchery, and hate that has driven foreign and domestic policy since the founding of this nation.  On the flip side, it is equally apparent how much USAmericans and especially those at the top of the capitalist pyramid scheme, have to lose: material comforts, financial stability, excess, new items for consumption and dopamine spikes, and the rest of the manufactured and imported goods that are threatened by the necessary solutions to global climate change.

But this isn’t about climate change, this is about realizing the potential for depravity and violence that the boys in blue possess.  This is about my inability to forgive the police for the murder of Fred Hampton, and for harassing, targeting, imprisoning, and repressing so many other Civil Rights leaders during the sixties, including Martin Luther King Jr. 

Once you have this kind of knowledge on the nature law enforcement in the USA, there is no way in hell they can ever legitimize themselves again.  Not that they’re trying very hard.  The shooting of Emantic Bradford Jr. in the Alabama mall on Thanksgiving is being exposed, and it looks like the cops shot the twenty-one year old in the back as he directed shoppers to safety holding a firearm he was legally allowed to carry in public. 

Cops can plan out and execute a charismatic and promising twenty-one-year-old leader of a revolutionary Black organization while he sleeps, or they can gun down a twenty-one-year old in the back while he directs panicked people to safety.  For both instances, the boys in blue were threatened by someone with a gun because as I mentioned above, the function of the State is to maintain control by any means necessary.  And an institution with those kind of operating instructions, and with that amount of firepower, and with that much invested in the unequal distribution of wealth and power, well that institution is illegitimate and must be abolished. 

Radical Idealism: Jesus and the Radical Tradition

This piece was originally published on Counterpunch.org.

Another world is possible, if not already on its way – for better or worse.  There are humanizing and sustainable alternatives to the way we organize society, and there is a diverse tradition of individuals and movements that do the work to build a better future.  I would characterize this tradition as radical idealism: a stance dedicated to dignity, peace, and the constant struggle against injustice.

As a young person in US public education as well as the Protestant church, I did not consider the possibility of another world: it’s not the purpose of those (or any) institution to suggest alternatives exist.  But I was a critical child, and discovered the tradition of radical idealism through the punk rock scene.  Everything was permitted: from NOFX to Chumbawamba, Noam Chomsky to Emma Goldman, Edward Abbey to Rachel Carson, Leonard Peltier to John (Fire) Lame Deer, Howard Zinn to James Boggs, and from Fred Hampton to Subcomandante Marcos[1].  My education began where the school and church curriculum would not go.

The tradition of radical thinking, writing, organizing, and fighting for a better world – the foundation of radical idealism – is a fringe tradition. I recognized this early on, and made a connection to things I read in the Bible, namely the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth.

Jesus was a threat to the power structures during His time and was exiled immediately after birth.  He taught his followers a lifestyle incompatible with greed, individualism, authoritarianism, militarism, and nationalism.  He healed, preached, and educated without a place to lay His head because He knew what awaited Him if He was captured by the authorities.  His Sermon on the Mount wasn’t meant to comfort the listener in turbulent times, but rather establish an ideal: an impossible standard to guide and provide hope for humanity. Like so many radical idealists before and after Him, Jesus was executed by the State.

The contradiction is stark.  If Jesus Christ was radical, what happened to the religion named after Him? Why does the nation that identifies with that religion seem to be the most oppressive and dangerous nation in history?  French professor, Jacques Ellul, in addressing why Christianity gave birth to a culture “completely opposite to what we read in the Bible,” offered an entire book on the “the subversion of Christianity[2].”  Although, in His typical fashion, Jesus explained the disconnect on an individual level when he quoted the Old Testament:

“Though seeing, they do not see; though hearing, they do not hear or understand.”  In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah: “You will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.  For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes.  Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.” (Matthew 13: 13-15).

Jesus spoke plainly, radically, and idealistically[3].  He challenged His followers to hear His words and not participate in the ways of predatory economics, authoritarian politics, and rampant individualism.  Unfortunately, Christianity allowed the social forces of greed (capitalism) and country (nationalism) to institutionalize the Man and His teachings in order to obtain a seat at the table of power.  When a person’s eyes, ears, and hearts are closed to the love and dignity of all humans, dehumanizing solutions develop in the darkness.

This darkness is palpable in 2018.  The United States of Amnesia, consumed by 24-hour news media and miles of Twitter feeds, has given way to an information age with little substance.  The most powerful office in the country is held by a White Nationalist, and it appears that many Christians in the U.S. support him.  The Democrats can only hope to be a moderating force against overt white supremacy, exploitation, and war as they shift quickly to the center-right of the political spectrum.  The socialists, if not consumed by the Democrats, can barely get a platform in the political arena.  All the while the anarchists battle the fascists, distribute for Food Not Bombs, and provide disaster relief.  The ideology of capitalism and war research is embedded in academic institutions, and will not allow the university a chance to combat a corrupt and oppressive society.  All the while, Noam Chomsky can’t stop reminding us that we face two existential threats: climate change and nuclear annihilation (i.e., the slow burn or the fast track).

Radical idealism is not delusional, but allows the individual a way to conceptualize light in dark times.  It does this by positioning us in the collective struggle for dignity, peace, and justice.  Radical idealists have left a trail of breadcrumbs and books for us to draw strength from including the teachings of Jesus contained in the Gospels.  It is up to us to build a new society in the shell of the old, an ideal society grounded in love, dignity, and lessons learned from the light of radical idealism.

Notes.

[1] Listed are leftist political musicians, USAmerican anarchists, environmentalists, Indigenous resistant fighters, working-class intellectuals, and revolutionary organizers.

[2] The contradiction inherent in radical idealism is the accompanying pessimism resulting from the fact that past attempts at redistributing wealth and power in society have resulted in totalitarian states either through seizing control internally as was the case with the Soviet Union, or waging war against the revolution as was the case in Spain in 1936. Therefore, any lesson from other movements that were corrupted by greed and the pursuit of power are valuable. (Ellul, Jacques. The Subversion of Christianity. Grand Rapids, William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1986.)

[3] This particular reading of this Bible passage was offered to me by Joel Spring quoting Wilhelm Reich quoting Jesus of Nazareth in the phenomenal book, A Primer of Libertarian Education. (Spring, Joel. A Primer of Libertarian Education. Montreal/New York/London, Black Rose Books, 1998.)

Critical Hope

"For Marx, Freire, and the twentieth-century existentalist psychologists, it is in the realm of consciousness that the contradiction between freedom and determinism is overcome.  While consciousness and life activity are determined by material conditions, a person who has no consciousness of self, who has nothing but life activity, is completely propelled by social forces.  But the person who is aware of these forces and conscious of their nature is able to break with the trajectory of history and participate in the radical change of self and society."

- From "A Primer of Libertarian Education" by Joel Spring

For critical hope - the hope for another world, the hope for an end to a culture of violent individualism and fear - there is a necessity to pay attention, to stay woke, and to strategically go to the places on the outside of the mainstream narrative and do the lord’s work, that humanizing kind of work where we lose our lives in order to find them. “‘The unexamined life is not worth living’ and ‘the examined life is painful’” (Socrates and Malcolm X told through educator and writer, Jeff Duncan-Andrade).  I remind myself often that the old-timers despaired probably as much or more as I do now at the state of the world when the US invaded Afghanistan and Iraq.  I was only becoming aware of the world then, but I remember the rage of my older activist friends.  At the same time, I think the current day is a pretty unique and frightful reality.  Twitter doesn’t help - with more information comes more vexation.  Bombs, Trump, white supremacists, troops on the border, huge lottery jackpots, too many flavors of beer, memes, Marvel movies, climate change, ad infinitum…

What is required is a simultaneous rejection of despair and cheap optimism, a courageous and love-filled facing of the social forces that drive our material existence, and an affinity for the solidarity work that takes us outside our comfort zone to the marginalized places all over the globe in order to do the necessary work to struggle for equity, justice, peace and dignity.

Early Notes on National Capitalism

Trump is a nationalist.  He’s urging his folks to use that word.  His nationalism is a response to a notion of ‘globalism,’ or ‘globalization.’  Back in the early 2000s globalization was the enemy of the radical Left.  Globalization and the neoliberal, state-sponsored capitalism that was engulfing the globe in multinational corporate expansion.  Globalization was what every mass protest from Seattle to Miami was rallying against.  The anti-globalization movement didn’t want US companies moving production overseas to exploit the global poor.  The anti-globalization movement didn’t want predatory banks and international lenders doing the same to poor countries as the predatory lenders were doing to poor homeowners in the US before the bubble burst.  The anti-globalization movement of yesteryear wanted international solidarity, environmental regulations to stave off mining, foresting, drilling, and other Earth-destroying activities, and the end to multi-national predatory capitalism and finance.  

Now Trump is a nationalist because ‘globalism’ is bad.  Somehow the moderate and radical Right have co-opted the global economic justice movement of the Left and turned it into the momentum behind national capitalism. 

I don’t use that term lightly.  I also recognize the contradictions when the president of the US espousing an ideology of nationalism since the US (including its multinational affiliates) is the economic and political empire of the day.  How can the US power structures believe in nationalism when it’s the exploitation of the entire planet that has provided this country with so much wealth throughout the last 500 years?

The anti-globalization movement hoped for another world, a world where wealth and power were distributed equally across the globe and across local communities in order to combat the ever-increasing centralization of wealth and power in the hands of the few.  The anti-globalization movement valued the diversity of local communities and sought to empower their unique solutions to problems facing us as humans.  The anti-globalization movement recognized the contradiction that multi-national corporations had access to move capital and production centers across borders, but poor people of the world were not allowed the same freedom of movement.  But Trump and the radical Right have now co-opted the discontent with the world we live in and are offering a terrifying, authoritarian solution in the form of national capitalism.

We can identify some of the tenants of Trump’s national capitalism in a few broad strokes: 1) the vilification and inhuman treatment of migrants, 2) the deregulation of environmental policies, 3) the consistent reliance on the war manufacturing sector of the US economy, 4) the continued structuring of wealth and power in the hands of a few, and 5) the sinister motto of “profit above all else.”

Trump was a capitalist.  Now he’s a proud national capitalist.  Let’s do ourselves a favor and not call the American fascists "nazis" (national socialists), but the more apt term "national capitalists."  Once we recognize this threat facing humanity we can begin to talk about constructive and creative ways to empower democracy, ensure the dignity of all people, and redistribute wealth and power in the world.  Or at the very least resist fascism in the USA.

Bring on the End

The end of a matter is better than its beginning, and patience is better than pride (Ecclesiastes 7:8).

Years ago, I rallied around this Old Testament verse after watching HBO’s detective drama True Detectives.  After eight, hour-long episodes, I was relieved that the dark Louisiana drama was over.  It made it better.  It made it ephemeral.

Originally, corporations, limited-liability companies, were not immortal institutions able to accumulate huge amounts of wealth and power.  Municipalities or local governments would task a group of people to build a bridge or work on a specific task, and after the job was done, the corporation would be dissolved.  And in a sick twist of political maneuvering, corporations jumped on the 14^th Amendment, the Amendment passed to protect the rights of freed enslaved persons, and now, arguably, Amazon, Apple, Google, Facebook, and the like have more protections, allowances, and power under the law than the people of the United States, and in certain arenas, the United States government.

Returning to the Old Testament, comes the often overlooked portion of Leviticus that redistributes the wealth and property of Israel because private property is a delusion when everything under the sun belongs to God.  The biblical law of Jubilee requires all lands to be returned, persons (sold into servitude) to be released, and all debts to be forgiven.  The unbridled accumulation of wealth and power through generations is a terrible idea, but essentially the founding idea of this nation. 

The end of something is better than the beginning.  It allows us time to reset.  To redistribute wealth and power.  To reflect on the decisions made individually and collectively in our lives and societies. 

Yes, I’m talking about the end of capitalism.  Of the American Empire.

This requires responsibility and patience – responsibility for ourselves and our neighbors, and patience with the messy and slow-moving pace of peace, justice and equity work.  But that’s the work that needs to be done.  It’s pride and greed that drives Trump to slap his name on every hideous thing his family’s estate has built.  It’s pride and greed that drives the American war hawks and profiteers into every corner of the globe.  It’s pride and greed that created 24-hour news media with it’s endless jabbering and political catering.  It's pride and greed that motivates the Democrats and Republicans to not take any serious measure to combat the slow apocalypse of climate change.  It’s pride and greed and institutions with no end in sight. 

I’m looking to the end of capitalism for the sake of the planet.