Haven’t seen either one of you in ages….

That’s precisely how “Iskra” was, or so I’ve read. Indeed, the Trotskyist papers DO miss the point, as they don’t allow for any proof that there are differences within the Trotskyist organizations. As someone once said, there should be no secrets from the working class!

1) Obviously the type of jobs matter to how one views their relationship to the university. Most of my peers aren´t professors. They work clerical and administration jobs. Hence, they don´t feel the emotional attachment other workers might feel to the school.

2) You guys sound (even if unintentional) that lack of participation from others is so new discovery. Think of how many people go to Church just on Sundays? They never go to anything Church related again. Unless an organization has exact demands on membership (think Church of Latter Day Saints where our peers dedicate two years of their life to missionary work), the 80-20 is inevitable. Whether I think the current DSA model is viable in the long run is subject for another piece.

3) Erik Straub of SDS once pointed out the idea of a party organ should be to promote debate within the organization, not just be its mouth piece to the out side. That was his interpretation of Lenin in a way. He felt that Trots really missed the point on that. I think, however, what´s worthy of praise is putting yourself out there to sell a paper. You are going to get nagged and cat called. I remember dealing with YDSers who really had too thin skins to be American socialists. If you can´t deal with some negative feedback, you aren´t ready to build socialism in the USA.

In the end, the best way to find out if someone is a flake is to call them to do something. I always say: never underestimate a good phone bank and rap to mobilize folks. I don´t say that about carefully worded email blasts.

((the following is a slight detour from David’s article))

I’ll give the example of the Democratic Left (a bit anachronistic, I know) last year. While tabling we had more people sign up for our mailing list than any other student organization short of the College Democrats and we passed out fliers about democratic socialism and engaged with people directly. (Perry and I might have been especially charismatic that day.) Granted they were almost all freshmen and had a lot on their plate, but out of the almost 60 people on our mailing list only around a dozen or so, not counting friends of all political orientations we brought in to pad the crowded, materialized. Everyone else just wanted to be involved in protest actions and not in day to day deliberation and political debate. That should be expected, but it’s unfortunate, because for the moment the latter is more important than the former. Most people aren’t politicized and committed enough to join a nascent movement, but they won’t be politicized by “action-ism” alone. Granted this applies more to organizing on campus rather than workers into trade unions, but I can levy some criticisms along these lines towards publications (largely written by radicals) like “Labor Notes”. It’s like reading the phone-book, but without all the sexual innuendo-littered names, and I don’t see how it politicizes.

Anyway, I agree that technology does not replace old-school organizing. I think technology actually leads to a great sense of alienation in many ways. Facebook, as you point out, leads to a lot of narcissism and voyeurism. People also feel as if they are “doing something” just by joining dozens of online groups, yet they don’t understand the need to lift a finger in real life. There’s something wrong with this picture. How do we solve the problem, though? There are no easy answers-the world is gray, as you said.

I tend to think that a certain percentage of people will always be hangers-on more than cadre; the 80-20 rule is very true in organizations, unfortunately. A certain portion of people will join a Facebook group but be flakey in real life (I’ve had this happen many times when people have randomly messaged me online about YDS and then never end up doing anything). I guess the key is to recognize this fact and move on.

P.S. That’s awesome Will got a date that way! It wasn’t with Lily, was it? Anyway, I definitely need to bring more DLs to rallies, etc…..

And it’s Trotsky-IST, Comrade David, not Trotsky-ITE! Show some respect for the “Old Man” (as Ernest Mandel always called him)!