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**
THE
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twin cities
democratic socialists
of america


** Little Red Letter No. 64
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Calls to Action / Events
Join the TCDSA Health Justice Working Group on Sunday, November 15th, at 11:00am for a training and practice on the organizing conversation--an essential tool in any socialist’s metaphorical toolbelt. They are the number one way for socialists to build power together and keep moving forward. The election is over, but our organizing work continues on.
The Socialist Reading Group on November 15 will be reading Terry Eagleton's Why Marx Was Right.
100K Member Drive

As of this weekend, over TEN THOUSAND members have joined via chapter and member-specific recruitment links and our organization overall is now over 80K members nationally. Here in the Twin Cities, we have had over 75 members either join or renew since the start of the drive. Those numbers aren’t bad, but there’s still time to pitch in and help us get to our goal of growing our local chapter by 10% -- which would mean 130 new or renewing members.
Read more here. ([link removed])
Could You Use A Mental Wellness Hour About Now?
The Mental Health Working Group has Wellness Hour every four weeks (currently on Zoom) and the next one is this Saturday, Nov. 14, at 2:00 pm. All are welcome!
Upcoming Events

NOTE: All events are on Zoom unless location is given. Zoom links are found on the calendar near the date of the event if public,
otherwise in Slack.
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Mental Health WG - Wellness Hour
Sat. Nov. 14 - 2:00 pm

Health Justice WG - Organizing Training
Sun. Nov. 15 - 11:00 am
Register here ([link removed] ) (Zoom) ([link removed] )

Socialist Reading Group
Sun. Nov. 15 - 3:00 pm
(see sidebar, left)

Ops/Tech Committee Meeting
Mon. Nov. 16 - 7:00 pm

Socialist Feminists Branch Meeting
Sat. Nov. 21 - 2:00 pm

Health Justice WG Meeting
Tues. Nov. 24 - 6:30 pm

Libertarian Socialists Study Group
Fri. Nov. 27 - 6:30 pm

Mental Health WG - Teach-in
Repeat of Mindfulness 101
Sat. Nov. 28 - 2:00 pm



Check our calendar ([link removed]) for more events as they're scheduled or changed!
Fancy banner, last seen at the street action of November 4, 2020. Now MIA, thanks to illegal mass arrests.
Not gonna lie. We are a lot more excited about this than we are
about the White House.
Chapter News / Views of News


** Socialism Is the Alternative ([link removed])
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M Health Fairview closed two hospitals and laid off hundreds of essential workers in the middle of the COVID pandemic. Other health systems had similar cost-cutting layoffs despite the terrible needs. Is there an alternative to the cruelty of "the market?"


** Social Movements and the Democratic Party (Pol Ed snippet) ([link removed])
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The Great Depression birthed two patterns that the Democratic Party continues to plague us with: the lesser evilism cycle - “that ever downward spiral” - and its twin, the dynamic that makes the Democratic party “the graveyard of social movements.” The moment Biden sits in the White House, he’ll want us to go home and go along. We may well have to fill the streets to make Trump leave, but we’ll have to stay in the streets to make Biden serve the people.


** Can Mindfulness "Cure" Fascism? ([link removed])
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On October 31st, the Mental Health Working Group presented a teach-in on an interesting death-themed topic. The teach-in centered on a theory of social and evolutionary psychology called Terror Management Theory, or TMT.


** Mass arrests at November 4 demo raises tactical, organizational questions ([link removed])
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In a period of greater revolutionary struggle than we’ve seen in decades, it is time to evaluate our approach. As a beginning, it’s necessary to view tactics as open to revision and not to fetishize an approach used under different conditions. The large scale actions of the uprising were less “organized” in the conventional sense but were more responsive to the situation. They certainly didn’t accommodate the police by offering them 600+ peaceful protestors for processing.


**
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** So Why Am I So Depressed? ([link removed])
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Almost half of the US, 70 million people, will remain completely-bonkers, alternative-reality Trumpies. What does that say about our country, I ask in a despairing tone? Well, for one thing, it says that we are a “yin-yang” nation, a nation of courageous activists creating change, but one that also includes a huge population of Americans who, throughout history, have created the need for such liberation movements in the first place.
Do you have opinions? Hot takes? Cool things you've been doing with DSA? Or do you enjoy writing, editing, or creating? To get involved, pitch something here ([link removed]) , join the #newsletter channel on Slack or come to a Comms Committee meeting.
In Case You Missed It

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With so many great podcasts, articles, books and videos coming out, it's easy to miss something. Here are a few things members have found and loved recently.
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These '90's Teens Fought Minneapolis Police and KKK ([link removed])
OG History ("a Teen Vogue series where we unearth history not told through a white, cisheteropatriarchal lens") has featured Anti Racist Action, a national network founded in Minneapolis. -ES

A union wave for Twin Cities hospitality workers (Tempest) ([link removed])
Twin Cities DSA member Paul KD on the historic union wave among Twin Cities service workers and TCDSA's role in the organizing. -NR

Learning from the Tactics of Past Labor Movements (The Trouble) ([link removed])
Lessons for both today's ecosocialist and labor organizers. Minnesota gets some nice shout-outs including on the SEIU Local 26 negotiations last winter. -MS

George Floyd Uprising - Reporter Reflections ([link removed])
A video history in five episodes from Unicorn Riot - AH-R

America's money-men could save us, but they're stuck in the 1970s (NYT) ([link removed])
A rare good op ed from the NY Times. -RT

Nice White Parents, a 5-part podcast (NYT) ([link removed])
Chana Joffe-Walt of NPR explores how white parents, even well-meaning ones, can wreck the best laid plans for equity in K12 education. But Lydia Kulina on Medium says the podcast is Disjointed and Disillusioned ([link removed]) -DKR

Workers Tried to Blow the Whistle. ([link removed])
From Huffington Post via Portside, data show a spike in ignored complaints followed by a spike in COVID-19 deaths for workers. -DKR

Inside the pro-labor push in the cities service industries (and RIP City Pages) ([link removed])
In one of its last articles before shutting down, CP explores a great swing toward unionization that many of our members are involved in. -AH-R & DKR

The Black Panther Party's Struggle for Health Justice in Boston and Beyond ([link removed])
From November 2019, Journal of African-American Studies. Not new, but new to me! Lot of lessons for socialists today. -JT

How would equitable development look at the Upper Harbor Terminal site in North Minneapolis? ([link removed])
From Belt Magazine. -DKR

The residents in my district don't have the luxury of waiting for incremental change. -Omar Fateh (Jacobin) ([link removed])
TCDSA former co-chair Nic interviewed TCDSA member candidate Omar Fateh on the eve of his historic win of a seat in the Minnesota Senate. -DKR

Press Release: Migrant Justice settles federal lawsuit on ICE retaliation ([link removed])
Just days before the election, there was a major victory - for now - for migrant farmworkers targeted by ICE for their activism. -DKR

What Black history should have taught us about fragility of US democracy (Portside) ([link removed])
"Our institutions were always more vulnerable to the kinds of corruption that Trump has enacted with astonishing speed. And America’s margins have often been the best vantage point from which to survey the weaknesses." -DKR

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If you find something that should be shared, you can post it to the #linkroundup channel on Slack, or just reply to this email.
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