The PSL Letters – The Red Clarion
clarion.unity-struggle-unity.org

EDIT: The original article I posted kinda sucked. I’ll keep it here for posterity if people want to read it, but I’ll replace it with a link @RedWizard posted with original resignation letter and the PSL internal response. If you want to read just the resignation letter with the PSL criticisms without any preamble, it is here.

EDIT 2: Here is the leaked PSL internal response.

Comment by @chana in the general thread: (Sorry to copy your comment here but it’s the only comment I’ve seen so far on this and it’s a good way to start off the discussion, along with summer discussion questions I’ll add below)

Comment text

Notable resignation and letter from PSL Central Committee member and related fomenting split in Brooklyn over PSL being run as a bureaucratic clique (which many will already be aware of from speaking with various PSL members trying to do more than participate in protests). PSL is good at specific local levels despite the national level dysfunction, and the vast majority of its membership good comrades. But the criticisms certainly ring true to me and are reasonable to cite as existential flaws. There is a bit of clown nonsense from the top on a regular basis (like the call for a general strike, cited in the resignation letter, lmao that is baby liberal idealism stuff).

If you’re currently unorganized don’t let this stop you from joining, it is more important to be active and learn locally from any non-abusive left space than to do nothing organized.

Discussion Questions:

  • There’s a lot of PSL fans or members here so what do you think? Like overall on this news?
  • Do the complaints have merit, or not? Do some do, and some don’t? Which ones? – If so, what does this mean for the left in the US? What are the solutions and what is the path from here? – If not, why don’t you think so? And what does it mean for the left in terms of factionalism and splitting?
  • Do you still recommend the PSL as an organization to join? What about the DSA? Join the Democratic Party? FRSO?
  • AssortedBiscuits [they/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
    2·
    6 days ago

    Point taken about the character of the Russian Empire.

    How is this supposed to work when the fascist rump states control all the military bases and their armories? Are you assuming these localized socialist blocs will have all the guns? What happens when the fascist rump states form an alliance under a national organization and utilize foreign aid to overwhelm your regionalized, decentralized, disconnected socialist microstate? You really want to replay the Catalonia experiment?

    I don’t foresee a fascist “national” alliance lasting that long since fascists are prone to infighting over stupid fascist reasons. Frankly, they’re more prone to infighting than socialists. In general, I don’t think any “national” org at that point would be strong enough to manage their branches. This goes for fascist, socialist, and liberal orgs.

    I don’t foresee PSL being able to order their entire cadre to flee to a Socialist Republic of Michigan when every individual branch would rather fight for socialism within their localized region because that’s where their family and friends live. Apply this reasoning for every single leftist org and you get the LA branch of DSA, PSL, FRSO, CPUSA sticking around in LA, the NYC branch of DSA, PSL, FRSO, CPUSA sticking around in NYC, and so on. With an irrelevant national office and more common cause with branches within the same region from other leftist orgs, the next step would be those regional branches disassociating themselves from their parent orgs and merging together to form a new regional org. So instead of the LA branches of DSA, PSL, FRSO, and CPUSA and the NYC branches of DSA, PSL, FRSO, and CPUSA, you have DSLA and CPNYC. You might have a lot of “united fronts” where each branch org hasn’t phoned home to the national office in years.