What does a Maoist do in the US to struggle against capitalism and imperialism?

Can a US Maoist afford to struggle against revisionists?

Today I received a message from the Maoist List, an e-mail service, http://www.groups.yahoo.com/group/MAOIST_REVOLUTION. Many Maoists throughout the world still talk about the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement (RIM). But sadly, there really isn’t such a group.

From the Maoist_List;

'A World to Win' was the journal associated with the Committee of the
Revolutionary Internationalist Movement (RIM). The last issue of 'A
World to Win' was published in 2006. RIM disintegrated several years
ago The 'A World to Win News Service' is put out by the Revolutionary
Communist Party, USA and embodies its political views."

Some parties in some countries still talk about reconstructing the RIM and about struggling from revisionism.

The Party of Ecuador Committee of Reconstruction (Partido Comunista Del Ecuador Comité De Reconstrucción), is among many groups, world wide, who want to revive the RIM.

“He has already begun the debate titled "Reconstitute or settle the MRI (Revolutionary International Movement or RIM in English), struggle between Marxism and revisionism" that prepared our party a week ago. This is precisely one of the goals set by our organization: the unleashing of the two-line struggle in the MCI (Communist Movement International) around the hot spots of the communist movement and international perspectives.”

But many of us don’t live in hot spots. Can we really struggle between Marxism and revisionism in the US? In this country I live no where near any Marxists, revisionist or other wise. When I see how much the system has built itself into the culture of both this country, state and town, it is hard to even imagine finding a way to be heard among the rightwing jackals who have high-jacked our schools, news media and political parties. When I go to work in the middle schools here in Wichita, I find the military is everywhere. They have “leadership” classes. They put on assemblies for the whole school which glamorize the military and its imperialist wars. All the schools require students to stand to the pledge of allegiance each morning. They can opt out of the military cadet classes, and they don’t legally have to say the pledge. But most students below the high school level just don’t know they can do that. They are not exposed at all to other points of view other than US militarism. Teachers are allowed, even encouraged, to put up “In God We Trust” signs that have been donated to the school system from outside right-wing groups. The news media is closed off from all but the centrist middle left. Many issues, such as the War on Afghanistan, are just not up for discussion in the local media. We can write a letter to the editor, but that really doesn’t go that far.

Our local government is completely out of reach of ANY kind of leftist, liberal, revisionists or Marxist. Corporate interests have locked in control of the entire political system and the Media.

So what do small groups of people, who live in such a right-wing police state, do? A police state is pretty much what this place is. There isn’t much freedom of any kind in this town, especially for those who want to go against the established beliefs of this system. We all learned from the Occupy Movement that the police are more than happy to beat the hell out of unarmed protesters and arrest people for exercising their freedom of speech. Our politicians mostly just laughed the brutality off and much of the news media did all they could to confuse people as to what was going on.

It would be great to see what it is like in India or the Philippines, where they have enough Maoists for guerilla armies. It would be interesting to see what it is like to be a Maoist living in Ecuador. But we don’t live in those places, so organizing any kind of left is hard to do. I can guarantee that 99 percent of the people living here have never heard of the RIM. Most don’t know what a communist really is and most probably don’t think there are any active today.

So here in the US our biggest battle is to find a way to crash through the isolationist bubble that this society has created around anyone outside of their two-party right-wing ideology. They have found many clever ways to block us out and we must find ways to get around their blockades. It is obvious that we can’t work with in the system today. We can get minor changes, but nothing significant, such as closing down the US imperialist military establishment.

Our work is cut out for us, here in the states. Any suggestions on how we can move ahead in such a repressive atmosphere are welcome. -សតិវ អតុ