LETTER

Revolution, the only solution

It is the late spring of 2005. The established global capitalist powers are utilizing all of their energy to maintain the façade of control. However, in trouble spots such as Iraq, Palestine and Chechnya, civil war is waged in the open. Other countries are plagued with insurgency and wobble on the brink of war. Although these conflicts are presented under the banner of "the war on terror" and as religiously based, historically war, in its most basic form, is waged due to dissatisfaction with the inequitable division of wealth. The contemporary situation is worsened by environment conditions. What is abundantly clear is that capitalism is in a state of international crisis more serious than at any other period in its history.

In Canada, the benefits of capitalism are also in serious decline. As a first world nation, white English Canada enjoyed unprecedented levels of prosperity following the Second World War. However, in the early 1970s even white English Canada began to experience an erosion of benefits as Canadian capitalists began to choke the social safety net to steal more wealth away from the working class. Consequently, over the last thirty years, wage disparity has struck hard and growing numbers of Canadian citizens are finding themselves in financial distress due to capitalism.

Although Canadians are generally politically unsophisticated, the contemporary setting, nationally, internationally and environmentally, have created an opportunity to reintroduce Canadians to the concepts of capitalism, class-consciousness, revolution and international communism.

Capitalism is the international social system we live under in 2005. It is based on economic-money-power, consumption, profit and ruthless competition. Under capitalism, money is power. The only thing that matters to the capitalists is getting more money. They do not care about anyone or anything beyond their own interests. That is why capitalists will even destroy other capitalists to consolidate more money-power. Capitalists do not care about the environment, and they do not care about other people. Capitalists are greedy, self-interested, egotistical, arrogant, exploiters, murders of the poor, and destroyers of the environment.

Generally, capitalists are also politically sophisticated enough to keep their true intentions, feelings and ideas to themselves. Capitalists know what to do and say to disguise themselves. Capitalists are happy. They like being capitalists. It's fun. They smile at you. They feign excitement when the Queen comes to town. They attend cultural events and serve on community boards. Capitalists walk in the walkathon and buy Girl Guide cookies. Capitalists support the food bank and make ostentatious speeches about the need to eradicate poverty at home and abroad. But in reality, capitalists do not care at all. They know that they must be very careful to walk a fine line and keep the workers and the poor as stupid as possible. That is why capitalists promote football, rock concerts and other diversion such as parliamentary elections to convince the powerless that they have power. In short, capitalism is a lie; it is an imaginary world where everyone is equal, happy and content.

Class-consciousness is the intellectual and practical understanding that under capitalism the basis of society is class or power position. Under capitalism, real strength is measured by the amount of capital an entity controls. The rich have money. They like it. They have fun. The filthy rich do not need to work, but can grow their capital by exploiting those who lack capital and who must harness their labour to live under capitalism. The rich have capital; they have power. When someone becomes class-conscious they understand this simple but profound truth. Anyone can become class conscious, rich or poor.

The natural consequence of capitalism and class-consciousness is revolutionary war. Capitalists are not stupid. To maintain their power, capitalists grudgingly allow some comforts to flow down to the poor. There are parks and libraries for the poor. There is a semblance of public transit. In Canada, it is even possible to get by if one is debt-free, willing to live in a dump and willing to work a degrading job. But fewer and fewer Canadians are finding themselves in such fortune. The only resolution for the poor is to overthrow the capitalist system through armed insurrection. To believe that peaceful reform is possible is mistaken, and time will prove this fact.

Communism is a social system where responsibility and privileged are equally distributed.

Although Canada is a young and generally politically unsophisticated society, Canada has a brief history of revolutionary activity. [...] The FLQ is most well known for the events of the October Crisis, but the lesson of the early FLQ is that fire is the first tool of the revolution. Every corner has a gas station. You get matches with smokes. Bottles litter the streets.

Today, a small but growing number of Canadians are ready to enter the international conflict. They see the truth of Marx and Lenin in their daily lives. So they study Marx and Lenin and find the freedom of thought necessary for action. But in addition to the words of our leaders, a study of the personalities and activities of the early FLQ, a small group in a long line of Canada's tradition of revolutionary warriors, it is possible to begin to understand that action is the only way to improve our situation.

(paru dans the People's War Digest magazine n° 2)