EASY TO BLAME

It's easy for the different generations to blame each other for the current state of the world and why nothing is being done to change it .
The young blame the old, the old blame the young, and the system remains intact .
Meanwhile , everyone still seems to be thinking of working within the framework the system has put in place , the same system that has gotten us into this mess in the first place .
Read this :

“BOOMERS”—“X,Y,Z”:
THE PROBLEM IS NOT “GENERATIONS,”
IT’S THE SYSTEM

by Bob Avakian

April 27, 2020 | revcom.us

It is very common these days to hear things posed in terms of generations, and for generations to be pitted against each other. There are the “boomers” and later “lettered” generations (“X, Y, Z”). There is, on the part of some among these later generations, the dismissive taunt “OK Boomer,” accompanied by an indictment blaming the “boomers” for creating the messed-up world that the younger people are inheriting, including the accelerating climate crisis. And there is the tendency among some “boomers” to be dismayed, or even disgusted, by the phenomenon that younger people seem to be cynically self-absorbed, knowing (or caring) little about important history and world events, and failing to act in meaningful ways to oppose the terrible actions of those in power. So it is important to examine how “generations” relate to the very real problems and dangers people are confronting today.

Generations are real societal groupings, and particular generations do have common experiences that differ from other generations. But, first of all, generations are not “homogenous”—they are made up of different classes, nationalities (or “races”), genders, and so on. And, even more fundamentally, everything that is experienced by people, of all different generations, is shaped by the system that people live within—most of all, by the economic system (the mode of production) and its basic relations and dynamics, as well as the corresponding social relations (for example, racial and gender relations) and the political system and the dominant culture and ideas that reflect and enforce these economic and social relations.

With regard to the “boomers,” first of all, there is the important reality that is often not recognized (or not even known about by many) these days, and is covered over and distorted by the dominant powers and institutions:

During the 1960s, a whole generation (or a large and defining part of that generation) broke with American chauvinism...and, at the cost of real sacrifice, dared to stand up against the atrocities committed, here and throughout the world, by the rulers of this country, and fight for a better world.¹

And:

By 1968 and for several years after, there were large numbers of people in this country, including millions of youth from the middle class as well as masses of poor and oppressed people, who were motivated by a thoroughly justified hatred of this system and aspirations for a radically different and better world—and this reached deeply into the system’s own armed forces—even if the understanding of most was marked by revolutionary sentiment which, while righteous, was lacking in any deep and consistent scientific basis.²

Along with the understanding of the need for—and a real belief in the possibility of—bringing a radically different and better world into being, and the refusal to listen to tired-out arguments about why things have to be the way they are, there was at that time a marked break with the notion of the “self” as the most important thing in the world, a rejection of putting personal concerns and ambitions above what was going on in the larger society and world. To provide a sharp illustration of this, if anyone in those days spoke in terms like “my career”—a phrase so commonplace now—they were generally met with expressions of disgust (and forget about any notion of “my brand!”).

Of course, while this was definitely true of a “large and defining part of that generation,” it was not true of individuals like Donald Trump (or George W. Bush), who were never part of—and in fact were, and have remained, violently opposed to—everything that was positive about and had overwhelming initiative among that generation as it “came of age” politically and ideologically through the 1960s. And people like Joe Biden were also never part of the powerfully positive radical upsurge of that time.

Since that time, however, as I have also noted:

Unfortunately, all too many (though not all!) of that generation have become disoriented and have allowed themselves to become, as the French say, “récupéré”—that is, they have come back under the wing of the ruling class, in particular its “liberal” representatives in the Democratic Party, and have far too much accepted things on the terms of a system they once, very rightly, recognized as viciously criminal.³

As for why so many have become “récupéré”—and, in the years since the 1960s, the things they were rising up against, as well as additional outrages and in fact existential threats to humanity itself, have continued or even become more extreme—this is not because people have just “gotten older,” tired out, and more conservative, in some abstract sense. It is fundamentally because there was no revolution and the same system that people were rising up against has remained in power. In a number of works, I have spoken to why there was no revolution at that time, and I have examined major changes, largely of a negative kind, that have taken place over the decades since—including the heightening parasitism of this country (the fact that its wealth rests ultimately on a vast international network of sweatshop super-exploitation, especially in the Third World of Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and Asia, even as that wealth is very unevenly distributed within this country itself).⁴ Accompanying this parasitism is the fact that individualism (the nearly single-minded pursuit of personal goals and ambitions, objectively and often aggressively in competition with everyone else) has been promoted to an extreme degree in this country especially.⁵ All of this has affected (and, it might be said, infected) people of all generations.

In short, the reason the world is in the terrible state it is—including the reason why the climate crisis continues to get worse in an accelerating way—is because the world is still dominated by this system of capitalism-imperialism and this continues to exert a powerful influence in conditioning how people think and specifically how they see what they should be doing in relation to the way things are. The problem is not “generations.” The “boomer generation” is not the cause of the world’s problems because of the fact that far too many of that generation have become “récupéré” (even while many continue to abhor some of this system’s more egregious crimes). Nor is the fact that many of those now presiding over this system are of the “boomer generation” the reason the system is so terrible—it is the nature of the system itself, regardless of who occupies its leading positions. So, too, succeeding generations (generations “X, “Y,” or “Z,” or whatever) are not the cause of all this through the failure of so many to break with American chauvinism or their obsessive focus on the self (even as many also grumble about the state of the world and blame the “boomers” for the ways things are). The solution will not be found by blaming one generation or another for its—real, or imagined—shortcomings and failures. The answer is to cast off blinders, of all kinds, and come to the necessary recognition of what is the fundamental problem—this system—and the fact that no attempt at reforms or electing “better leaders,” within the confines of this system, can deal with the profound ways in which the masses of humanity are subjected to terrible suffering on a daily basis, humanity as a whole is facing very real and growing crises and the very future of humanity is seriously imperiled.

Only an actual revolution, aimed at nothing less than overthrowing this system and bringing a radically different and far better system into being, represents the possibility of dealing with all this in a way that is in accordance with the fundamental interests of the masses of humanity and ultimately humanity as a whole. And, to have a real chance of making this a reality, it is necessary to have a consistently scientific approach to understanding and changing the world—which looks beyond secondary phenomena such as generations to the fundamental cause of the problems and to the basis for the solution: an actual revolution and the new society and world for which such a revolution opens the way.⁶

---

1. THE TRUMP/PENCE REGIME MUST GO! In the Name of Humanity We REFUSE To Accept a Fascist America, A Better World IS Possible. Video of this speech by Bob Avakian is available at revcom.us.  [back]

2. Why We Need An Actual Revolution And How We Can Really Make Revolution. The text and video of this speech by Bob Avakian are available at revcom.us.

In addition to what is said in “Why We Need...How We Can...” (and in THE TRUMP/PENCE REGIME MUST GO!), the following sheds further light on significant changes taking place during the 1960s, major components and characteristics of the radical upsurge of that time, and important contrasts with more recent times:

First, it’s important to speak to the contrast between today and the 1960s period in this country and in the world overall. At that time, back in the 1960s, masses of people all over the world, including in this country, were filled with hope and determination about the prospect of bringing into being a radically different and better world. Throughout the Third World, there were liberation struggles aimed at throwing off the yoke of colonial oppression that had been imposed on them for decades, generations and even centuries. And in the imperialist countries themselves—including, in particular, the U.S.—the generation that came of age in the 1960s had both the understanding of the need and a real belief in the possibility of bringing a radically different and better world into being, and was not interested in hearing all the arguments about why things had to be the way they are.

This was true among the educated youth, many of whom were among the first in their families to go to college, when things were being opened up by the ruling class because of its needs internationally, punctuated for example by the whole Sputnik episode when the Soviet Union sent a satellite into orbit and, all of a sudden, the U.S. was confronted with the so-called “space race” as part of the overall contention with the Soviet Union, which was itself at that point firmly on the road to restoring capitalism and striving to become a major world imperialist power but was, as such, posing a real challenge to the domination in the world by U.S. imperialism. So there were millions of new educated white youth who in turn were inspired by educated youth who had come from among the basic masses, in particular Black people, and had come to the fore of the civil rights struggle in the 1950s, particularly the late 1950s, and who, in the mid to late 1960s, became much more radicalized and went from civil rights to Black Liberation with a definite revolutionary orientation and impulse, however broadly defined and however differently understood among different people.

And this spread among the basic masses of people, the bitterly oppressed people in this country—Black people, but also Chicanos and others within the confines of the U.S. who’d been long oppressed—so that you had among these basic poor and oppressed people, as well as millions among the middle class educated youth, a desire for a radically different and better world, and a genuinely and strongly held revolutionary sentiment that this whole world needed to be turned upside down, and “We’re not gonna listen to anybody telling us about how ‘this is the best of all possible worlds,’ and we’re not gonna listen to the hypocrisy of the people who have presided over all these horrors all this time.” That was exemplified by the slogan, especially among the educated youth, “Don’t trust anybody over 30,” which, while a little mechanical, nevertheless had a real point: We don’t want to listen to these tired-out old “leaders.”....

So this was a sentiment that wasn’t simply a matter of age. It was more like: These people cannot be allowed to run the world and ruin the world in the way they are. This sentiment was held by millions and millions of poor and oppressed people, but also broadly among the middle class youth. And, as I pointed out in Why We Need An Actual Revolution And How We Can Really Make Revolution, by the end of the 1960s this had spread broadly and deeply throughout society, even into the armed forces of the very system, the capitalist-imperialist system, in this country itself. I remember, for example, that there was a poll taken by the military which, among other things, asked the question: whom did the soldiers, rank-and-file soldiers, of the U.S. army look to for political leadership—and, particularly among the Black soldiers, the president of the United States was way down on the list. The plurality, the highest “vote-getter,” if you will, was Eldridge Cleaver, a leader of the Black Panther Party. So when you have things like this, you have a real problem for the system. Even with Eldridge’s weaknesses and limitations, which were very real, this reflected something very, very positive.

As one manifestation of all this, among Black people—who we’re always told are just sort of inherently religious—there was a massive turning away from religion, especially among the youth. Why? Because people were filled with hope, they didn’t believe that there was no hope for a better world. They were full of hope for a better world right in this world. And so, among Black people, there was, on the part of the youth in particular, a major turning away from religion and from all the old conventions that went along with religion that were conservatizing influences holding down the people. Remember, there was Malcolm X, who would give speeches where (even though he was still religious, had taken up Islam) he said to people, “I don’t care” (I’m paraphrasing, but this is the essence of what he said) “I don’t care if you’re a Methodist or a Baptist or AME, or whatever you are, when you come out here into the world you need to leave that religion in the closet, because for all the good it’s done you, you need to put it aside.” Even though Malcolm X was still religious, he wasn’t saying, “Don’t be a Christian, be a Muslim”—he was saying, “We don’t need that stuff out here in the public sphere.” And he also said to the older generations: “These youth today, they don’t wanna hear anything about the odds, they don’t wanna hear you old Uncle Toms telling them about how the odds are against them.” This was a sentiment broadly taken up particularly by the youth, but also some older people. And this was not only among Black people. Malcolm X was a great inspiration and radicalizing influence, a very positive radicalizing influence and inspiration among educated youth, including many in the white middle class.

So this question of religion was manifested very differently. People were turning away from it. If you remember the movie Panther (not the recent movie Black Panther, but the older movie Panther, about the Black Panther Party), there is this scene where one of the youth is talking to his mother, sort of on the periphery of a Black Panther Party rally. The mother says something about religion, and the youth responds along these lines: “Well, the Black Panther Party says we just need to leave that religion alone, it’s not doing us any good, that’s not what we need.” (I’m paraphrasing again, but that’s the essence of it.) And the mother replies: “You believe that?” Well, a lot of Black youth at that time very much believed it.

[From HOPE FOR HUMANITY ON A SCIENTIFIC BASIS, Breaking with Individualism, Parasitism and American Chauvinism. The text of this work by Bob Avakian is also available at revcom.us.]  [back]

3. THE TRUMP/PENCE REGIME MUST GO!  [back]

4. In a number of works—including Why We Need An Actual Revolution And How We Can Really Make Revolution; Breakthroughs: The Historic Breakthrough by Marx and the Further Breakthrough with the New Communism, A Basic Summary; HOPE FOR HUMANITY ON A SCIENTIFIC BASIS, Breaking with Individualism, Parasitism and American Chauvinism; and Bob Avakian Responds To Mark Rudd On The Lessons Of The 1960s And The Need For An Actual Revolution (all of which are available at revcom.us)—Bob Avakian speaks further to “why there was no revolution” at the height of the 1960s upsurges and “major changes, largely of a negative kind, that have taken place over the decades since.” Among these observations are the following (from Bob Avakian Responds To Mark Rudd):

An actual revolution requires two essential factors: a revolutionary situation, and a revolutionary people in their millions. And these two factors are closely interconnected. 

A revolutionary situation involves not just a crisis in society in some general sense but a situation where the system and its ruling powers are in a profound and acute crisis and millions and millions of people refuse to be ruled in the old way—and are willing and determined to put everything on the line to bring down this system and bring into being a new society and government. Key components and signs of a revolutionary crisis are that the violence used to enforce this system is seen by large parts of society for what it is—murderous and illegitimate—and that the conflicts among the ruling forces become really deep and sharp, and masses of people respond to this not by falling in behind one side or the other of the oppressive rulers, but by taking advantage of this situation to build up the forces for revolution.*

[* Bob Avakian has also characterized a revolutionary situation this way:

What is a Revolutionary Situation? A deep crisis and sharpening conflicts in society and in the government and ruling circles, where they cannot find a way to resolve these conflicts—in society and among their own ranks—which do not make things worse for them and call forth more resistance and further undermine people's belief in their "right to rule" and in the "legitimacy" of their use of force to maintain their rule; programs of "reforming" the system are shown to be bankrupt, totally unable to deal with what more and more people recognize as profound dysfunction and intolerable injustice of the whole setup; those, in society as well as among the ruling class, who are trying to enforce the existing system are on the political defensive, even if lashing out; millions of people are actively seeking radical change, determined to fight for it, willing to put everything on the line to win it, and searching for a force to lead them in doing so; and a solid core of thousands is united around a leadership, an organized vanguard force with the vision and method, strategy and plan—and deepening ties among masses of people—to actually lead the fight to defeat and dismantle the violent repressive force of the existing system and its power structure, and to bring into being a new revolutionary system that can provide the means for people to radically transform society toward the goal of abolishing oppression and exploitation.]

This section of Bob Avakian Responds To Mark Rudd continues:     

At the high point of the radical upsurge of the 1960s/early 1970s, there were definite elements of the necessary factors for revolution: there was a very real and deepening political crisis for the ruling class, and there were masses of revolutionary-minded people. This is an undeniable truth…

But the situation had not yet developed (and, as things unfolded, it did not develop) into an all-out revolutionary crisis; and the revolutionary forces at that time were not clear on and not united around a strategic approach that could have cohered the widespread revolutionary sentiment into an organized force capable of waging a real revolutionary fight to defeat and dismantle the violent forces of repression of the ruling capitalist-imperialist system. As I have summed up:

the real failure of that time was that there was not yet a revolutionary vanguard with that scientific foundation and method, and the orientation, strategy, and program that could give organized expression to the mass revolutionary sentiment and lead a real attempt at actually making revolution. [Here Bob Avakian is quoting Why We Need An Actual Revolution And How We Can Really Make Revolution.]

The radical upsurge of the 1960s in this country was in turn part of a broader wave of struggle and transformation that was taking place throughout the world, and was driven and inspired to a large degree by the struggles, throughout the Third World of Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and Asia, to throw off the yoke of colonial oppression—and beyond that the existence of a revolutionary socialist state in China and the mass revolutionary movement of the Cultural Revolution in that country, involving hundreds of millions in the struggle to defeat attempts to restore capitalism in China and, in opposition to that, to continue and deepen the socialist revolution there and support revolutionary struggles throughout the world. But, as I have analyzed, including in recent works such as Breakthroughs and Hope For Humanity On A Scientific Basis, that upsurge ran into certain limitations as well as powerful opposing forces, and it ebbed, not just in one or another country but as a worldwide phenomenon. And since that time there have been profound changes in the world, many of them negative: Capitalism has been restored in China; in the Soviet Union, where capitalism had already been restored in the 1950s but the ruling class there continued for some time to present itself as a bastion of socialism, this deception was finally abandoned as the Soviet Union itself imploded, leading to the open emergence of capitalism throughout the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe; and the forces leading liberation struggles in the Third World have either been defeated or transformed into bourgeois ruling forces acting in concert with and essentially as appendages of international capital and the imperialist system. Within this country itself, in the context of this changing international situation, and through a combination of repression and the building up of middle class strata among the oppressed, along with the heightening parasitism of this system, feeding off the super-exploitation of billions of people, particularly in the Third World, over several decades there has been an increasingly deadening political atmosphere and culture and an orientation on the part of most of the forces seeking social change to restrict themselves to the limits of the existing oppressive and exploitative system and its BEB (Bourgeois Electoral Bullshit), as we have very rightly characterized it. And all this has been accompanied by a relentless ideological assault, by the ruling forces of this system and their media mouthpieces and intellectual accomplices—an assault on communism, and indeed on every positive aspect of the radical 1960s upsurge—an assault to which Mark Rudd is making his own modest contribution.

A particularly significant aspect of this setback following the 1960s upsurge is the following (from Hope For Humanity On A Scientific Basis):

Among the basic masses of people, including Black people (not the more middle class strata being developed through conscious ruling class policy, but the masses of oppressed people), there was a tremendous amount of demoralization and sense of defeat, and the introduction (including through deliberate ruling class policy and action) of massive amounts of drugs further intensified the desperate conditions of the basic masses and further reinforced the sense of demoralization. A lot of people were dying or being reduced to broken wretches on the basis of turning to drugs out of despair—the lack of hope, or the death, in immediate terms, of the hope that inspired so many people, on a real basis, through the course of the 1960s upsurge, which had now ebbed and been transformed. And this situation was made even more desperate and demoralizing with the growth of gangs in the ghettos and barrios of this country (as well as internationally), with youth drawn to the gangs in conditions of increasing deprivation and desperation and what was for most the illusion of getting rich, with the orientation of “get rich or die trying,” fueled by the growth of the drug trade and the influence of the putrid culture promoted throughout society that fostered and extolled the exploitation and degradation of others as the means for making it big, whether on Wall Street and on the world stage, or on the streets in the neighborhoods of the inner city.

At the same time as he has analyzed the major changes, including the very real setbacks and reversals, that occurred since the 1960s upsurge, Bob Avakian has emphasized this:

the emancipation of humanity from all this is profoundly and ever more urgently necessary, and the possibility of a radically different and far better future demands and requires a real revolution and the advance of humanity beyond this system, with the achievement of communism throughout the world. That this will be difficult to achieve and will require monumental, arduous and self-sacrificing struggle on the part of millions, and ultimately billions, of people, is something that no serious person—and certainly no one basing themself on the scientific method and approach of the new communism—would deny. But a scientific analysis leads to the definite conclusion that this is as necessary as it is difficult—and that it is possible (not certain, and certainly not inevitable—but possible). And all those who refuse to accept the world as it is under the domination of the capitalist-imperialist system, all the unnecessary suffering this imposes on the masses of humanity and the very real existential threat it poses to humanity itself, should dedicate themselves to contributing to this revolution. [Bob Avakian Responds To Mark Rudd]  [back]

5. Hope For Humanity On A Scientific Basis contains these important observations about individualism and its role and affect, particularly in this country, today:

As I have pointed out, in Ruminations and Wranglings* (and in other works), the contradiction that people exist as individuals, but they also exist in a larger social context and are largely shaped by that social context, is a complicated contradiction that is important to handle correctly. And this contradiction is acutely expressed today in the fact that while people do exist as individuals, the terrible suffering of the masses of humanity and the urgent challenges facing humanity as a whole as a result of the escalating destruction of the environment by this system of capitalism-imperialism as well as the possibility of nuclear conflagration that continues to loom as an existential threat over humanity—all this cannot be seriously addressed, let alone actually solved, by each person pursuing their particular individual interests, and in fact people acting in this way constitutes a major obstacle to bringing about the necessary solution. Individualism is a significant factor and “unifying element” in much of the negative trends that play a major role in keeping people from recognizing the reality and depth of the horrors continually brought about by this system—and recognizing the urgent need to act, together with others, to abolish and uproot all this, at its very source. This highlights and heightens the fact that individualism, which is encouraged and expressed in extreme forms in this particular society at this time, is a profound problem that must be confronted and transformed.

Virulent Individualism and Oblivious Individualism

These are two broad categories of individualism, which have some different particular characteristics but also have in common the basic focus on and preoccupation with the self. Virulent individualism is an extremely poisonous variation of this. It’s basically the view that “I’m out to get everything I can for myself and fuck everybody else. And if I have to trample on everybody else to get what I want, that’s just the way it is and I’m gonna do it the best I can, so I can get everything I want—I want it all and I want it now.”

Oblivious individualism is individualism that may not have those particular aggressive characteristics and may not even have a consciously hostile attitude toward other people in general, but involves going along pursuing one’s particular interests, aspirations, or “dreams,” without paying attention to the larger things that are going on in the world and the effect of this on masses of people throughout the world and indeed on the future of humanity.

So there are these different kinds, or two broad types, of individualism (with many gradations, obviously). But what is the unifying element in them? Self. The self. As I pointed out in the Dialogue with Cornel West** in 2014, the “selfie” is a perfect iconic representation of this whole outlook and this whole culture. It’s not that every “selfie” is in and of itself bad, of course. But there is a whole culture around it, even to the point where people go to a beautiful place in nature and what are they preoccupied with? Taking a “selfie” of themself instead of taking in (and yes, taking photographs of) the vast beauty that’s stretched out before them. The important thing, with this outlook, is: “Here I am, look at me.” It’s the “look at me, look at me, look at me” ethos that is so predominant in both these forms of individualism, even in the one that’s not consciously virulent but is nevertheless strikingly oblivious.

Oblivious individualism may seem more benign (or, in simple terms, less “nasty”) but it is nonetheless marked by being inexcusably ignorant of, or consciously choosing to ignore, what is happening in the larger world, beyond the self (and the narrow circle around oneself), and the consequences of this for the masses of people in the world, and ultimately for all of humanity—or paying attention to this only as it affects oneself in immediate and narrow terms.

[* RUMINATIONS AND WRANGLINGS On the Importance of Marxist Materialism, Communism as a Science, Meaningful Revolutionary Work, and a Life with Meaning. The text of this talk by Bob Avakian is available at revcom.us.]

[** This Dialogue between Bob Avakian and Cornel West took place in November 2014 at Riverside Church in New York City, on the theme of REVOLUTION AND RELIGION: The Fight for Emancipation and the Role of Religion. The film of Bob Avakian’s talk at that Dialogue is available in BA’s Collected Works at revcom.us.]

[back]

6. In Why We Need An Actual Revolution And How We Can Really Make Revolution, Bob Avakian speaks substantially to those questions; and the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America, authored by Bob Avakian, provides a sweeping vision and a concrete blueprint for a radically different, socialist society, aiming for the final goal of a communist world. The Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America, as well as the text and video of Why We Need An Actual Revolution And How We Can Really Make Revolution, are available at revcom.us.  [back]

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Now Available:

Hope For Humanity
On A Scientific Basis

Breaking with Individualism,
Parasitism and
American Chauvinism

Bob Avakian
Author of
The New Communism

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Read excerpts here, including
Individualism, BEB and the Illusion of “Painless Progress”
With a Note Added by the Author, Fall 2019

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BOB AVAKIAN RESPONDS TO MARK RUDD
ON THE LESSONS OF THE 1960s
AND THE NEED FOR AN ACTUAL REVOLUTION

Infantile Expressions of Outrage, or Accommodation to This Monstrous System, Are Not the Only Alternatives

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LOWLIFE RATS

This is the time when those inclined to go running to the authorities about just about anything are just fucking thriving , and really believe they're heroes for reporting kids playing basketball or walking too closely together.
Fuck those loser rats .

THE MOST VULNERABLE

This is what happens to the most vulnerable in the richest country in the world. People who have had no healthcare for decades, and who have been left to die if the system has no use for them. This is amerikkka.......

Detroit: A “Perfect Storm” of Coronavirus and Years of Savage Inequality

April 20, 2020 | revcom.us

Editors' note: This letter from a reader on how the coronavirus pandemic crisis is unfolding in Detroit is an acute expression of what Bob Avakian has described: “In the context of this current crisis, the exploitative and oppressive relations built into this system are asserting themselves in a pronounced way, within this country and internationally, just as they have in previous crises.”

The state of Michigan is now third in the country behind New York and New Jersey in coronavirus cases, with more than 30,000 cases and more than 2,200 deaths as of April 18. The epicenter of the virus in Michigan is Detroit, with more than 7,400 cases and more than 580 deaths. Detroit’s population is smaller but its death rate from COVID-19 is higher than New York City’s. This has everything to do with the fact that Detroit is 83 percent Black, and the Black people there have faced decades of genocidal oppression and criminal neglect under this system of capitalism-imperialism. This now puts Detroit in a “perfect storm” of “pre-existing conditions” from these years of oppression, an anti-science fascist regime’s criminal mishandling of the spread of the virus, and the nature of the virus itself.

Thousands Lack Water in a Pandemic

Nothing concentrates the genocidal oppression of Black people in Detroit and how it intersects with the coronavirus pandemic more than the water shutoffs of recent years. Along with social distancing, the most important way to prevent virus infection is frequent handwashing. But since 2014, more than 140,000 homes in Detroit have had their water service disconnected for inability to pay water bills. This is a crime against humanity. The UN called it a violation of human rights, and there was a worldwide outcry when the news got out in June 2014. Canadians drove truckloads of water to Detroit, and there were mass protests.

But the water shutoffs continued. More than 23,000 homes had their water shut off in 2019, and 37 percent hadn’t had service restored as of mid-January 2020. When the virus hit, the city promised to restore water to residents, but as of March 31, thousands still had no water service in a pandemic. (Vox News, April 10, 2020)

On Democracy Now! (April 13), a video was shown, made by a woman watching water being shut off for her neighbor who has two children, one of them an infant. The woman said that despite a so-called moratorium, shutoffs are ongoing. In a pandemic! Reverend Roslyn Bouier of the Connection Food Pantry in Brightmoor, one of the neighborhoods hardest hit by the virus and by water shutoffs, explained why shutoffs in a pandemic are so deadly. She said in ordinary times, even with water shutoffs, people will go to work and school and have access to water to drink and wash. But stuck at home with no water, there is no sanitation at all. She said:

“...When your water is shut off and we are given the directive to shelter in—which, I need to say here and stop for a moment and say, we should stop using that word ‘shelter,’ because we’re not using that word correctly. ‘Shelter’ is defined as having a place of safety and comfort and protection. And when you don’t have water on, that’s not shelter. It’s not shelter when children have to take their waste outside and throw it in the garbage. It’s not shelter when you don’t have water in your home and the sanitation is not available, because the city had declared that laundromats were nonessential providers, so laundromats were closed up, as well.”

Comorbidities: Pre-existing Conditions of Capitalism and White Supremacy

There are other conditions that make Black people in Detroit and elsewhere particularly vulnerable to COVID-19 in terms of their health. These are called “comorbidities,” diseases and conditions like asthma, hypertension, and diabetes that may make people more susceptible to contracting coronavirus and/or to dying from it by weakening their lungs, immune systems, and/or other vital organs or systems.

Take asthma for an example. Detroit has one of the highest rates of asthma in the U.S. The percentage of people with asthma in Detroit is twice that of the rest of Michigan. Poverty is one important factor in asthma, and 38 percent of people in Detroit live in poverty. One of the major triggers for respiratory problems like asthma is air pollution. The neighborhoods of poor and minority populations in this country are often close to and downwind of heavy industrial areas, power plants, incinerators, chemical plants—and this is true of Detroit. The nation’s biggest trash-burning facility was located in Detroit for decades, in a low-income, primarily Black neighborhood. After years of protests, it only closed in March of 2019, after years of protest.

Health Care Dangers for Both Patients and Workers

One of the reasons Black people are dying disproportionately from COVID-19 is their lack of access to health care. In Detroit, where health care services have declined for years, the health care system is totally inadequate to deal with the outbreak of the coronavirus. In the past decade, two major hospitals closed—Herman Keifer, Detroit’s main public hospital, and St. John Riverview, the last hospital on Detroit’s East Side. And some neighborhood clinics like the Northeast Health Center have also closed.

Black people are also disproportionately affected as workers in hospitals and especially in nursing homes. According to BuzzFeed.com (April 10, 2020), “Bureau of Labor statistics data shows black people work a disproportionate number of jobs as health care and personal care assistants, for example. Such jobs lead to exposure with potentially sick people, which is even more risky for people who aren’t wearing hospital-grade protective gear.” As of April 12, more than 2,700 health care workers in the Detroit area were sick with confirmed or suspected coronavirus infections, and four had died.

The lack of personal protective gear (PPE) for health care workers, a problem across the country, is so acute in Detroit that one nurse described driving around for hours picking up home-made masks for her and her co-workers. A severe staffing crisis has led to nurses and doctors watching patients die because they had too many patients to care for adequately. It got so bad at one hospital, Sinai-Grace, that emergency room nurses staged a sit-in in their break room, refusing to work until they were given support.

On April 6, the Detroit Free Press quoted Jamie Brown, a critical care nurse at Borgess Hospital and the president of the Michigan Nurses Association, who said that nurses have “a tipping point [where] the best thing any RN can do for their patients, their families, and their coworkers is to speak out ... rather than remain silent.” Hospital staff who speak out are threatened by administrators, and at least one nurse at Sinai-Grace has been fired for voicing protest.

Deadly Shortage of Testing

Compounding the pre-existing conditions of poverty and racism is a shortage of coronavirus testing. Since the first coronavirus case in Michigan was diagnosed on March 10, the virus has spread quickly, but the state was unable to adequately track the rapid spread because of a lack of testing kits. Without being able to identify who was sick, public health officials had no idea where the virus was spreading. It took eight days before the state was even able to identify 100 cases. By then, the coronavirus had already taken root and was quickly spreading throughout Detroit and other nearby communities.

People are dying and seeing family members die because they can’t get tested and treated in time. Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer publicly criticized Donald Trump and the federal government for failing to provide medical equipment, including testing kits, to Michigan and Detroit. With the number of deaths skyrocketing, Trump retaliated by telling vendors not to send medical equipment to Michigan!

Bodies Piling Up

According to CNN on April 14, photos shared among emergency room staff at Sinai-Grace show bodies being stored in vacant hospital rooms and piled on top of each other inside refrigerated holding units brought into the hospital’s parking lot. Sources told CNN that at least one room, which is typically used for studies on sleeping habits, was used to store bodies because the morgue was full!

One ER worker said: “All I know is we ran out of beds to keep our patients on so we couldn’t spare any for the bodies.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has reported that Sinai-Grace has one of the highest COVID-19 mortality rates among hospitals in the U.S. According to DeadlineDetroit.com (4/9/20), patients have been “dying in the hallways” as they await care.

Morally Devastating

Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, a public health expert and a former director of the Detroit Health Department, said: “Just morally, we have to say that it’s just—it’s devastating. This is a disease that has shown itself to have a predilection for the most vulnerable, like all diseases do, but this one in particular, because it’s so vast.... What we have to understand is that the dynamics of any outbreak—the dynamics of really any infectious disease—it’s not enough just to focus on the pathogen. We also have to understand the dynamics of the host and the environment that leave people susceptible and vulnerable to a disease like this, and we’re watching that play out in real time in Detroit.” (U.S. News and World Report, April 8, 2020)

Detroit is the origin of so much music and culture, from Motown to techno, which have touched people around the world. Anthony Bourdain, the food critic and travel writer, once said that he “love[s] Detroit” but that he “feel[s] anger seeing the extent to which it has been allowed to crumble.” What’s happening now to Detroit in this pandemic is an outrage that should infuriate people all over the world

NEVER FORGET

Despite the distractions, never forget about u.s. imperialism and the harm it infilcts upon people here and all over the globe. The racist beast must die.

REVOLTING BARBARITY, SHAMELESS HYPOCRISY

For Those Who Cling to the Myth
Of “This Great American Democracy”:
Some Simple Questions

by Bob Avakian

April 21, 2020 | revcom.us

Can anyone honestly deny the plain truth of the following words boldly spoken by abolitionist and former slave Frederick Douglass in a July 4th speech in 1852?

For revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival.

This statement echoes down through time, expressing a profound truth today.

If you doubt, or recoil at, this statement, then think about this: After slavery was formally ended through the Civil War, not only were Black people virtually enslaved once again during the long years of “Jim Crow” segregation, but the constant terror they were subjected to was repeatedly punctuated by thousands of lynchings—and lynchings were the cause for public celebrations, where huge crowds of white people, adults and children, gathered to watch and cheer the lynching and claim parts of the mutilated body of the lynched Black person—and postcards were made from photographs of these lynchings and were sold throughout the country.

This was not a one-time orgy of perverse violence—it happened over and over again, generation after generation. Nor is it some kind of “aberration” from the “especially good” nature of this country. And it is not just “ancient history”—atrocities of this kind are not something that is being left behind as this country carries forward its journey toward “a more perfect union.” Despite the rising of Black people through the Civil Rights and Black Liberation struggles after World War 2, which reached a high point in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and has continued in various forms and on various levels since then (and despite the fact that, breaking with the despicable history of this country, large numbers of white youth in particular have actively supported these struggles), the fact is that, in the time since 1960 the police have killed more Black people than all those lynched during the days of “Jim Crow” segregation and Ku Klux Klan terror, and Black people as a whole live with the ever-present threat of being brutalized or murdered by police.

And all this, in turn, is a concentrated expression of everything this country has been about, from the beginning and down to today. This is the reality of how the rulers of this country, while proclaiming themselves “the leaders of the free world,” have amassed their wealth and power—through grotesque brutality, plunder and destruction in every part of the world—something which is extensively laid out in the American Crime series at revcom.us, and which leaves no doubt as to the huge scope of these crimes and the fact that they are “built into” the very nature and structure of the system in this country. To repeat the words of Frederick Douglass:

For revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival.

One final question: Is it not time, at long last, to face up to all this and act with determination to put an end to all this, with the recognition that for this to become a reality a radically different system and a radically different kind of country is needed?*

---

* The Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America, authored by Bob Avakian, provides a sweeping vision and a concrete blueprint for “a radically different system and a radically different kind of country.” This Constitution is available at revcom.us.  [back]

REASONABLE ?

Of course fuckface trump calls his supporters "reasonable", despite the confederate flags seen regularly at his rallies. 

I stand by my earlier writing about people getting ridiculously hysterical, but at the same time I realize this is happening . I'm just not going to go around wearing a gasmask , gloves, and a hazmat suit, ready to call the cops whenever I see someone not following the rules .  

Here are some of fuckface's "reasonable people".....

EVEN THOUGH

Even though I think the average peron has been a little hysterical over the coronavirus, I still think fuckface trump is a total fucking moron, and his followers are dangerously stupid as well. 

From RefuseFascism.org:

A Hellish Week of Fascist Insanity April 13—16, 2020

by Coco Das

April 20, 2020 | revcom.us

Revcom.us Editors’ Update: As we go to press, mobilizations to “reopen America” continue to spread. Most are directly funded and organized by fascist forces like the Christian fascists, Koch Brothers, and people close to the Trump regime, and others are being linked and drawn into the fascist movement around this question. Some have had a broader draw than fascist thugs and open white supremacists, including people anxious about their economic situations and lacking scientific understanding of the pandemic. These protests are enthusiastically promoted by fascist media like Fox News, and openly encouraged by Trump himself, in an attempt to force through “from below” the rapid reopening of the economy that Trump desires—along with serving as mobilizations against Democratic governors, health professionals and scientists who oppose premature easing of restrictions related to controlling the pandemic.

Monday, April 13

The White House Coronavirus Taskforce Press Briefing reached a pinnacle of fascist lies and insults, including the following:

• A video of Trump’s “success” in handling the crisis, which began with the statement “THE MEDIA MINIMIZED THE RISK FROM THE START” followed by a clip from the Fox Fascist New Network’s Hannity Show—a brief compilation of three highly edited, decontextualized news reports that appeared to downplay the threat of the virus. This was presented as proof that the media as a whole was to blame. Then the timeline of the regime’s response began at March 2, more than 6 weeks after Trump was first briefed on the virus. Then came the collage of governors from both parties praising and thanking Trump and Pence.
• A now routine attack on a female reporter’s question (Paula Reid, CBS) about the missing month of February: “You’re so disgraceful. It’s so disgraceful the way you ... look, look, you know you’re a fake. Your whole network, the way you cover it, is fake.”
• While insisting he had the authority over governors to decide when to reopen state authorities—in blatant violation of the US Constitution—Trump went so far as to declare absolutely no limit on his authority: Trump said, “When somebody’s the president of the United States, the authority is total.”
• In the face of a fascist concerted campaign to #FireFauci, with one retweet from Trump himself, Dr. Fauci was compelled to give a conciliatory speech praising Trump’s disastrous handling of the COVID crisis. No doubt this was done in an attempt to keep his position in order to better advocate for a reality-based public health response to global pandemic.

NOTE TO MEDIA AND #RESISTANCE:

Here’s what did NOT happen at the April 13 press briefing:

• Trump did NOT “have a meltdown.” These are the very consistently offensive communications of a full-on, crazy-like-a-fox fascist.
• Trump was NOT “a toddler having a tantrum.” A toddler can be put in a time-out corner, yet Trump is the leader of the most powerful country in the world, and we have not yet driven him out.
• Trump was NOT being “ignorant of what he can or cannot legally do.” He was telling you what he can get away with. Look at the last three+ years of his record on what he supposedly can’t do and what has stopped him. (Not much.)

Tuesday, April 14

The Trump/Pence regime froze funding to the World Health Organization, a move that can bankrupt the organization during a pandemic when international coordination is critical. This move:

• says “fuck you” to the people of the world with its disgusting “America First” chauvinism. The W.H.O. provides critical research and resources to the entire world, but most critically it provides technical assistance to poor countries that do not have the healthcare infrastructure to handle a pandemic like this. In addition to COVID-19, W.H.O. also provides resources to treat diseases such as malaria, AIDS, polio, and Ebola.
• throws xenophobic red meat to the fascists who call this the “Chinese virus,” scapegoats Asians, and wants a check on the rising superpower of China, which threatens U.S. dominance over the world.
• again shows that this regime will tear up norms and change the rules. Money for the W.H.O. has already been allocated by Congress, but Trump has a history of bypassing congressional approval to divert allocated funds to other programs: See one example here.

Wednesday, April 15

Chanting “Lock her up,” thousands of pro-Trump protesters, organized by the Michigan Conservative Coalition, blocked the streets with their cars (while many also defied the social distancing order and gathered at the steps of the state capitol) to force their governor to re-open the state and drop stay-at-home protocols necessary for flattening the curve.

• Also seen: Confederate flags.
• With a death toll of more than 30,000 in this country, contrast the Michigan protesters—the worst filled with passionate intensity—with the best who do not want a fascist America but have lacked the conviction to act in a way commensurate with the danger we face. Fascists have not only responded heinously to this COVID crisis, but are now using the crisis to make leaps in consolidating their fascist—openly terroristic—form of rule. We must be willing to step outside of normal channels to resist and stop this.
• Millions of us should be banging our pots and pans and flooding the streets with cars demanding explicitly and urgently: “The Trump/Pence Regime Must Go NOW!”—acting together with courage and conviction to drive out this murderous regime.

Also on Wednesday, Trump threatened to implement a NEVER-USED constitutional power to suspend both houses of Congress in order to force confirmations of his nominations for federal positions. Congress has been on an extended recess because of the pandemic, but Trump called this a “dereliction of duty.”

Thursday, April 16

The E.P.A. will weaken controls on the release of mercury and other toxic metals from oil and coal-powered plants.

These four days alone prove that the Trump/Pence regime is a CATASTROPHIC danger to humanity and the planet and must go now!

When is enough enough? The hour is late. Join us in a nationwide body bag delivery to Trump properties this weekend.

Read, sign, and share this Statement of Conscience and Call to Act. This statement concentrates hard but essential truths of what we are facing with this regime and points to a way for us to come together, with courage and conviction, to do what humanity desperately needs from us—to drive this fascist regime from power. Reading, signing and spreading the statement is a first essential step in making this a reality.

Bang your pots and pans and demand Trump/Pence #OutNow! Raise a stinking hell, because right now the fascist Trump/Pence regime is winning, humanity is losing, and this cannot stand

FUCK THIS AND FUCK THE HYSTERICAL FUCKING GOVERNMENT

An $880 fine for hanging out with your own kids in an empty parking lot ???
Who was being threatened and who feels safer because of this incredibly stupid fucking bullshit? 
Fuck oakville, the pigs, and their pathetic fucking shitpants mayor.

Coronavirus: Oakville, Ont., family hit with $880 ticket after going rollerblading

BY ALBERT DELITALA GLOBAL NEWS

Posted April 12, 2020 4:35 pm

Updated April 12, 2020 4:40 pm

Video will begin after these messages...

 WATCH ABOVE: An Oakville family is facing a big fine after recently going rollerblading. They say they went to an empty parking lot nearby and despite living under the same roof, they're accused of violating physical distancing rules. Albert Delitala reports.

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An Oakville, Ont., family is speaking out after a rollerblading outing turned into a costly ticket for allegedly violating COVID-19 physical distancing rules.

On Friday, Todd Nelson took his sons Liam, Brandon and Dustin to the parking lot of Glen Abbey Community Centre to go rollerblading, he said — but after about 45 minutes, a bylaw officer pulled up and told them they had to go.

“I kind of looked around. There was nobody near us. The whole parking lot was completely empty.”

TWEET THIS

“I just said, ‘Who are we hurting?’ He said, ‘Oh, you’re not going to be like that, are you?’ And I said, ‘I’m just asking a question,’ Nelson said. “And that was it. He said, ‘Give me your ID’, and next thing you know we got a ticket.”

The ticket added up to $880 after surcharges. The alleged offence: violating the emergency order issued by the Ontario government that closed outdoor recreation areas to curb the spread of COVID-19.

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 The ticket for $880 ($750 plus surcharges) issued to the Nelson family by an Oakville, Ont. by-law officer. Courtesy: Todd Nelson

“Dad had just asked a question,” son Liam said. “He wasn’t really — he wasn’t doing anything wrong.”

His brother, Brandon, said the situation left him feeling “bad,” insisting, “we were just exercising.”

READ MORE: Ontario reports 401 new coronavirus cases, including 21 deaths as total cases top 7,000

On Sunday, the entrance of the Glen Abbey Community Centre parking lot remained without any tape or pylons to indicate not to enter.

[ Sign up for our Health IQ newsletter for the latest coronavirus updates ]

The Town of Oakville has warned in recent days it is serious about enforcing the emergency order.

Mayor Rob Burton said in a statement posted online last week: “I urge everyone, and I urge parents to tell their children, stop getting together with friends in parks. They are closed for a reason — to keep people safe.”

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When asked about the case involving the Nelson family, the town said it could not get into specifics but said in a statement, “We are in a pandemic and the province and the town have both put in place orders and bylaws to protect the public and to help curb the spread of COVID-19.”

READ MORE: Coronavirus: Latest developments in the Greater Toronto Area on April 12

Nelson told Global News he believes the law was poorly executed in the case of his family.

“In terms of, you know, the spirit of social distancing, it was just our immediate family,” he said.

“We weren’t with anyone. We weren’t touching anything.”

TWEET THIS

He said he is still trying to make sense of where his family can and can’t go, adding the town could make better use of signs and barricades.

He said he plans to appeal the fine.

“I think there was an opportunity for education, maybe, instead of a ticket.”