CHICAGO, November 20—Members and friends of Progressive Labor Party (PLP) joined hundreds of multiracial protestors downtown today to blast the racist “not guilty” verdict of the murderer Kyle Rittenhouse. The unsurprising results of the trial in Kenosha, Wisconsin are another clear reminder that a capitalist judicial system is designed to protect its racist and violent foundation. Only communism is capable of guaranteeing workers’ safety and rights. Once our class smashes racism, private property, and profit with revolution we will run a society that no longer fosters the likes of Rittenhouse and the institutions that have protected him.
For anyone familiar with the thoroughly racist and sexist nature of the legal system under capitalism, the result should come as no surprise. The capitalist bosses would love for antiracists to feel dejected and cynical. The presence of thousands of angry workers and youth marching across the country, however, proves that the fighting spirit of the working class is alive and well!
As communists in PLP we know we have to immerse ourselves in the mass movement in order to help guide spontaneous rage against the profit system’s abuses into a militant and disciplined Party fighting for mass international revolution. Attempting to reform capitalism is like trying to control a runaway train. PL’ers are on deck today and every day, with new and old friends, to win our class to the lifelong fight for communism!
Racist capitalism let Rittenhouse off the hook
The PLP arrived at the rally, armed with a bullhorn and hundreds of CHALLENGEs and leaflets, ready to call for revolution. We split up into small groups to cover different spots around the plaza, where we could hand out literature and chat with workers.
Many workers seemed especially eager to take copies of CHALLENGE and our flyer, with some asking how they could get more involved with the Party on the spot. In contrast to the dead-end strategies offered by the opportunist politicians and reform groups at the rally, our calls for workers’ power through communism clearly struck a chord.
In contrast to the bogus liberal claim that it was “white-skin privilege”that got Rittenhouse (and many others like him) off the hook, he in fact got off because of his service in upholding the racist capitalist status quo that views property as more valuable than workers’, especially Black workers’ lives. It was this racist, sexist system that filled Rittenhouse’s head with a rotten ideology and armed him with an assault rifle to travel across state lines to shoot and kill two antiracist white workers fighting for justice for Jacob Blake. While Black and Latin workers are super-exploited by racism, all workers suffer at the hands of capitalism and it is with mutliracial, international fightback that we will truly win.
It is practically certain that if any Black or Latin worker tried what Rittenhouse got away with they would never have made it out of Kenosha alive, much less faced a trial. But to push the “white privilege” line is to distort the truth of the source and beneficiary of racism and all other divisive anti-worker attacks: capitalism.
Racist ideas and violence attack Black, Latin, Asian and immigrant workers first and hardest, but they are used to lower the living standards of the entire working class, including white workers. When white workers unite with other workers in militant antiracist struggle, the bosses and their thugs don’t hesitate to unleash state terror on them too. Our multiracial working-class unity is truly our most powerful weapon against capitalism, and thus the bosses’ biggest fear.
PL’ers crank up the militancy
By the time the rally turned into a march, our collective was ready to turn up the militancy a notch. Using our bullhorn, we took turns in leading the crowds in chants like, “The kkkops, the kkkourts, the Ku Klux Klan! All are a part of the bosses’ plan!” and “What does Rittenhouse mean? We’ve got to fight back!” Other PL’ers and friends gave speeches in between chants, including a Black worker who blasted the bosses’ criminal injustice system to wide applause.
A little boldness can often go a long way. Many marchers who were at first hesitant to take a flyer or CHALLENGE were more inclined the second time around after seeing the Party’s communist politics in action. To this end, we ran out of the 500 flyers we printed up as well as close to 400 copies of CHALLENGE.
Most inspiringly, we were able to get contact information for nearly 10 young antiracists, including one who was familiar with the Party from CHALLENGE sales in a south side neighborhood! What we do really counts!
Join PLP to turn the guns around
As uplifting as the march turned out for us, we have to keep a sober assessment about the dangers surrounding the international working class. From fascists like Rittenhouse and the kkkops shooting us down in the streets, to the imperialist bosses whipping up nationalism to try to get us to fight and die in their wars of profit, we must prepare to confront capitalist state violence with revolutionary violence. Pacifism and trusting in the bosses’ courts are two deadly miscalculations for our class.
The international communist PLP represents the force that will one day turn the guns around and smash the bosses and their murderous, racist profit system for good. Join us in the struggle to ensure that the day of our collective liberation comes sooner.