BRIEFS

MDC DSA CALENDAR OF EVENTS

NATIONAL DSA CALENDAR OF EVENTS

Thursday, January 21

6:30pm | Right to Housing Committee Meeting (ONLINE)
ONE DC
ONE DC’s Right to Housing committee supports long-time DC residents to fight against displacement and for safe and affordable housing. At ONE DC, we believe in the universal right to housing. RSVP here.

INFO ACCESS

Publications Schedule: The Pubs Working Group has scheduled January’s remaining Update for Friday, January 22. The February issue of the Washington Socialist will be sent Friday, January 29 and the article deadline is Saturday, January 23.

The Publications Working Group (#publications on Slack) is one of the longest-standing WGs in MDC DSA and is responsible for much of the chapter’s outward-facing communications — in particular for the chapter’s Friday Updates and for monthly issues (online since 2012) of the Washington Socialist newsletter, which publishes longer articles on socialist thought and action at all levels from the personal to the global.

Members who indicate interest and skills in any of those comms specialties on our member survey have been or will be contacted to join this integral part of MDC DSA’s public face and representation. Achieving a socialist society means forging a wide consensus that socialism and socialist reforms have earned fair consideration by the public. That is our particular job, and our passion, in the Pubs WG.  

To contact us directly, email [email protected]

And speaking of Slack — Are you an MDC DSA member who wonders how to get on our chapter Slack? Just email [email protected] and identify yourself as a member. Put “request for #Slack” in the subject line. Use the email address by which national DSA knows you. If you are a new member, forward the email receipt that national DSA sent you acknowledging your status. Please be patient; our admin committee is loaded with chores and shorthanded to boot. Our Slack platform, with numerous channels for all our caucuses, branches, campaigns and working groups, is a great place to get connected with the kind of socialist work YOU want to do in DSA.

GOOD READS

Shared by our comrade Nate H, Chair of the Queer Caucus: Tensions have been high, particularly on Instagram and Twitter, in the Queer community about the role of public shaming during a global pandemic. Why the Public Shaming of GaysOverCovid Sparked a “Gay Civil War” explores the privilege and affluence of attendees who recently travelled to Mexico for a circuit party that endangered local workers and the public.

Good Listen: Chris Hedges in colloquy with Dr. Cornel West … ’nuff said.

Of interest from the Prospect — Bob Kuttner reminds us of Napoleon’s advice: “Never interfere with your enemy when he is making a mistake.” Hence Kuttner’s advice: Lefties: Stay Away From This Weekend’s Disruptions

Described as “the Republicans’ biggest nightmare” as Dems take tacit Senate control: Bernie as chair of the Budget Committee. Here are some prospects, via the NYT’s economics writers.

Who wonders whether a permanent social media ban on Donald Trump is a good idea? Edward Snowden warns against it.

Tech workers organize around non-core worker issues. Result: “a common pattern in organizing in the tech industry: campaigns are formulated around ethical and social issues, which have limited success and are unable to escalate beyond petitions and public statements.”

Written by a DSA member out in Colorado, this piece explores the nature of modern conspiracy, capitalism, and mental illness. Drawing from his past as an evangelical and in sober-living communities, the author explores how material circumstances churn into the sort of nightmare fuel that breeds alienation and isolation. Essential reading for understanding QAnon and the sort of thought loops that have pulled so much of the country into the arms of the fascist right.

Recommended by our local comrade Ben D, in this piece from Collective Power Network’s The Organizer — Materialism Not Metaphor — Sacramento DSA’s Annabel V. argues that our movement must win more concretely than “sparking consciousness,” and that metaphorical language and goals distract organizers from the work of material gains.

From Organizing Upgrade, Bargaining for the Common Good is building community interests into union bargaining and broadens the context of, well, class struggle.

“Tech giants were right to ban the president. We still need to break them up,” opines Michelle Goldberg in the NYT. She thinks they should be broken up, echoing Elizabeth Warren. Now that Trump and the fascist Right are getting the back of the hand from Big Tech, right-wing columnist Frank Miele argues in RealClearPolitics that the social media giants should be nationalized.

How did the Capitol coup come about? A conflux of right-wing fear campaigns, coupled with well-oiled establishment propaganda campaigns. This report in Documented lays out the old-school, corporate-backed Republican electoral machines that drummed up support for the “protest.”

What online radicalizing processes take place to form groups like the Proud Boys, Three Percenters or others who swarmed the Capitol January 6? The NYT’s Ben Smith harks back to his days at BuzzFeed, where virality was being refined as business practice and aspirational lifestyle, and to individual stories that found their way to video that shambolic Wednesday, years later. And don’t pass up the watermelon link.

And how do you explain an opportunistic young senator at the center of the Capitol violence — a product of elite schools? Here’s a try, tipped to the Oldest Editor by a Pittsburgh comrade of like vintage: The Roots of Josh Hawley’s Rage  

More than 250 Black cops have sued the Capitol Police since 2001, citing numerous instances of racism. ProPublica details examples of various allegations and illustrates how January 6’s Capitol insurrection came as no surprise to many Black Capitol police officers who have warned for years about the department’s racial discrimination issues.

And MDC DSA comrade Chip Gibbons pens a piece in Jacobin on the case against using the Capitol riot to introduce new domestic terrorism legislation expanding state surveillance powers, warning against the potential backlash that might threaten the left.

Ages have come and gone, kingdoms and powers and dynasties have risen and fallen, old glories and ancient wisdoms have been turned into dust, heroes and sages have been forgotten and many a mighty and fearsome god has been hurled into the lightless chasms of oblivion.

But ye, Plebs, Populace, People, Rabble, Mob, Proletariat, live and abide forever.
- Arturo Giovannitti