A Freebie from Freemont

On my recent CCTV appearance, which I shall have up on the blog and Youtube in the upcoming days, I was unable to go toe to toe with Todd Feinburg (a local conservative talk show host for WRKO) with the idea that conservatives are copping out just as much as liberals when they call Obama a socialist.  I could not get my point out because I co-host the show with a fellow vulgarian, Roger Nicolson, who unfortunately remains uninterested in the same type of political arguments that I am. As such, I am in the process of starting my own show on Somerville Community Access Television (SCAT) where I believe it will be easier for me to get my ideas out into the world. I will keep all of you posted on when the new show will air. At the moment, I am in negotiations with the access television team about the content and nature of the program.

Until then, let me make it clear on my blog that I believe the reactionary use of the word socialist on behalf of the right is as equally unproductive as the use of the word racist by those on the left. And for any of you reactionary assholes on either side of this fucking argument, here is why:

1.)   Both words today are commonly used as generalizations: there is no clear way to define a racist just as there is no clear way to define a socialist. Am I a socialist just because I favor the creation of a third political party in America that incorporates the socialist concept of equalizing the political voice of those in the lower classes of society with those of the upper? Am I a racist just because I feel that the word nigger can be used effectively in satire and that using the word is actually a good way of opening up the discussion about race? I have a feeling I know how both sides would respond to both of these questions.

2.)   Both words today can be used as a smear tactic: in this day in age of government bailouts and the United States’ increasing deficit, the word socialist has been used as a smear tactic against the liberals of the world in the same way that racist is used as a smear upon those of the right. I see no difference between the fear-mongering tactic of trying to label someone as a socialist (which creates fear and confusion among those who wish to avoid such a categorization) and the same method of disparaging someone as a racist. Either way, one is working to use fear as a way of preventing an honest political discussion.

3.)   Both words today are used as blasphemy through a larger historical context of the United States America: the significance of categorizing someone as a racist or socialist is based upon a deep and long history. Let’s just acknowledge here the fact that a group of individuals who have since been categorized as close-minded, nativists known as the Klu Klux Klan formed in the southern United States years ago to strike fear in the hearts of white, Anglo Americans by making them suspicious of a dangerous minority group—a group they saw as threatening the power structure of the country. This same phenomenon has occurred throughout history and surfaced in the1920’s and 50’s during the Great Red Scare, where a minority group of harmless Americans (deemed as ‘Socialists’) were made to appear as a threat to wellbeing of the United States of America. It would seem to me that liberals today are more interested in using the word racist as part of a ‘reverse witch-hunt’ to dismantle the integrity of the right rather than they are in seeking to challenge the racist and classist mechanisms that still exist within the systemic power structure of the United States. While they are doing this, the right is committing the same fallacy by recreating a modern-day Red Scare, in which anyone favoring government regulation over a laissez-faire free market is seen as a socialist.

What I am simply saying is that words can frame an ideal, but ultimately it is action that changes the status quo. And weakness lies in the time wasted in an argument over semantics when mass movement is needed. As a radical, you only lose if there is an unwillingness to move forward. Clearly, both liberals and conservatives seem quite content with this current standstill.

As for me—I’m always in motion, Friends of Freemont. I’m about to get my own fucking TV show.

Power to the mother fucking people of the Free Movement,

Freemont Barrington    

In my last blog I mentioned in its conclusion that it is my belief that both the right (embodied in the vigor of the tea party movement) and the left (encouraged by the outdated concepts of the NAACP) are similarly missing the point with their separate political agendas. The result is that we as a nation (right and left) will continue to be lost inside of this back-and-forth bullshit and will never realize the truth that would allow us to rise up against our true oppressors within the system. This notion can be seen very clearly for me after the events that took place in relation to the NAACP’s reaction to possible Tea Party racism and Mark Williams’s departure from the group after making statements that were perceived by both the left and the right to be offensive.

If you are unfamiliar with the story, Mark’s response to the NAACP request for the Tea Party to rid itself of its extreme racist elements was the following piece of satire, which is a theoretical letter from a NAACP member to Abraham Lincoln:

Dear Mr. Lincoln

We Coloreds have taken a vote and decided that we don’t cotton to that whole emancipation thing. Freedom means having to work for real, think for ourselves, and take consequences along with the rewards. That is just far too much to ask of us Colored People and we demand that it stop!

In fact we held a big meeting and took a vote in Kansas City this week. We voted to condemn a political revival of that old abolitionist spirit called the ‘tea party movement’.

The tea party position to “end the bailouts” for example is just silly. Bailouts are just big money welfare and isn’t that what we want all Coloreds to strive for? What kind of racist would want to end big money welfare? What they need to do is start handing the bail outs directly to us coloreds! Of course, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is the only responsible party that should be granted the right to disperse the funds.

And the ridiculous idea of “reduce[ing] the size and intrusiveness of government.” What kind of massa would ever not want to control my life? As Coloreds we must have somebody care for us otherwise we would be on our own, have to think for ourselves and make decisions!

The racist tea parties also demand that the government “stop the out of control spending.” Again, they directly target coloreds. That means we Coloreds would have to compete for jobs like everybody else and that is just not right.

Perhaps the most racist point of all in the tea parties is their demand that government “stop raising our taxes.” That is outrageous! How will we coloreds ever get a wide screen TV in every room if non-coloreds get to keep what they earn? Totally racist! The tea party expects coloreds to be productive members of society?

Mr. Lincoln, you were the greatest racist ever. We had a great gig. Three squares, room and board, all our decisions made by the massa in the house. Please repeal the 13th and 14th Amendments and let us get back to where we belong.

Sincerely

Precious Ben Jealous, Tom’s Nephew

NAACP Head Colored Person

Let me first say that I defend Mark Williams’s claim that the above posting was satire. It was extremely bad satire (I do much better), but it was satire nonetheless. I would even go as far to say that this might be the most creative piece of literature that I have seen come out of the Tea Party movement. No matter what you believe about his intention, at least this website posting made you think. And this may be the first time I have had to use any small part of my brain when reading something made by a Tea Party patriot. Normally, the ambiguous cookie-cutter talking points that are spewed forth from the Tea Party work to fog up any glimpse you might get of a coherent political agenda (Sarah Palin’s Energy / Budget Tax Cuts / Lift Americans Spirit comes to mind). But this piece at least put some meat on the bones of an otherwise mindless group of complete fucking morons. Don’t get me wrong—I think the Mark Williams’s and Andrew Breitbart’s of the world are opportunistic douche bags—but at least they have a plan of action.

As you can imagine, the liberal (and conservative) backlash to Williams’s above website posting was predictably quick. And the result was that his faction of the Tea Party (known as the Tea Party Express) was disbanded from the Tea Party Federation. But I am here (and will remain here) to say that all of this uproar is simply reactionary bullshit on the behalf of both the liberals and the conservatives. We must be a country that gets past the notion that symbolic racial victories lead to progress when the reality is that systemic change is what we actually need to strive for. We must try to forge ahead when it comes to the concept of race (as hard as that may be) and recognize that it is the steep imbalance between the classes of this country that is the real reason why a unified revolution of the people must occur.

Now, I don’t expect any of the Tea Party followers to embrace many of the concepts that I have put forth. And, if they do, it would only be lost in translation and stuffed inside the bloated bullshit of one of their mindless talking points. But, once upon a time, it used to be the organizations like the NAACP, founded on the noble ideals of social equality, that understood the importance in my argument. Today, they only rely upon outdated political tactics to maintain the power that they hold rather than fighting for the real causes of their forgotten revolution. And it is within this thick atmosphere, saturated by the smell of stale bullshit, that our true sense of purpose has been lost in the mindless and reactionary malaise of got-ya politics.

So, you can yell socialist and you can yell racist, but I will only yell revolution until I’m cut up into small pieces and fed to the hungry dogs that wait for me out back.

FreeB.