They are a low energy group which claims you can implement socialism by reforming the Democrats
A Socialist Alternative councillor of Seattle city council became part of the leadership group of the CHOP/CHAZ protests and they directed the protesters to go home and vote Sleepy Joe
You're right and even if diagnosing them as Trots seems harsh it's not wrong.
I'm reading 'What Is To Be Done' for the first time & came across this passage (one of many) that highlights the problem quite plainly:
"However, the Bernsteinian and “critical” trend, to which the majority of the legal Marxists turned, deprived the socialists of this opportunity and demoralised the socialist consciousness by vulgarising Marxism, by advocating the theory of the blunting of social contradictions, by declaring the idea of the social revolution and of the dictatorship of the proletariat to be absurd, by reducing the working-class movement and the class struggle to narrow trade-unionism and to a “realistic” struggle for petty, gradual reforms. This was synonymous with bourgeois democracy’s denial of socialism’s right to independence and, consequently, of its right to existence; in practice it meant a striving to convert the nascent working-class movement into an appendage of the liberals."
trotskyites be like:
trotsky envisioned the abolishment of the NEP first and stalin stole his economic policy
and
muh opressive bureaucratic dictatorship
at the same time
SAlt are so fucking cringe. How can any org be taken seriously when it decides to pick up on online fights?
This has big vibes of PCUSA making statements about leftbook or the anarchists I've met in-person who've come up to us and asking, "are you the tankie party?"
Maybe they're doing good work irl? I presume you live in the US? What have you heard about SAlt beyond them just being trots?
This particular org (SAlt Australia) is the dominant university student socialist org. Their paper, red flag, has some good articles on current events sometimes. Where they fall apart is in their organising structure and praxis. The party funnels large sums of money from its members into preserving the positions of a select few central members who operate as an isolated self governing clique internally and externally in student politics. They do not seek to make strategic alliances with other left wing groups and do not adapt their org's objectives to the attitude of the masses.
This leads to SAlt doing self destructive things like turning up uninvited to indigenous-led rallies to sell newspapers despite organisers asking them not to. It leads them to get their white members to organise black lives matter protests, then put the onus on indigenous & black people to go through them to have a say on the day. And of course, it causes them to waste time on unproductive endeavours like organising mass events basically to troll Marxist Leninists.
They're definitely active and politically engaged, but they are a shining example of the dangers of ignoring democratic centralism and the mass line
Besides towing the state department line like Trots usually do, they don't seem to do much. Granted they had a pretty good campaign in getting Sawant into the Seattle city council, but that seems to be their biggest claim. I don't really see them doing much in my city or hear about them nationwide. I know of a few other parties other than mine that have galvanized around both the pandemic and BLM, but SAlt is kinda absent.
Discussion Community for fellow Marxist-Leninists and other Marxists.
Rules for /c/communism
Rules that visitors must follow to participate. May be used as reasons to report or ban.
This subreddit is here to facilitate discussion between marxists.
There are other communities aimed at helping along new communists. This community isn't here to convert naysayers to marxism.
If you are a member of the police, armed forces, or any other part of the repressive state apparatus of capitalist nations, you will be banned.
Do not attempt to justify your use of oppressive language.
Doing this will almost assuredly result in a ban. Accept the criticism in a principled manner, edit your post or comment accordingly, and move on, learning from your mistake.
We believe that speech, like everything else, has a class character, and that some speech can be oppressive. This is why speech that is patriarchal, white supremacist, cissupremacist, homophobic, ableist, or otherwise oppressive is banned.
TERF is not a slur.
Posts that are low-effort or otherwise irrelevant will be removed.
This is not a place to engage in meta-drama or discuss random reactionaries on lemmy or anywhere else.
This includes memes and circlejerking.
This includes most images, such as random books or memorabilia you found.
We ask that amerikan posters refrain from posting about US bourgeois politics. The rest of the world really doesn’t care that much.
Posts asking entry-level questions will be removed.
Questions like “What is Maoism?” or “Why do Stalinists believe what they do?” will be removed, as they are not the focus on this forum.
Marxists of all tendencies are welcome here.
Refrain from sectarianism, defined here as unprincipled criticism. Posts trash-talking a certain tendency or marxist figure will be removed. Circlejerking, throwing insults around, and other pettiness is unacceptable.
If criticisms must be made, make them in a principled manner, applying Marxist analysis.
The goal of this subreddit is the accretion of theory and knowledge and the promotion of quality discussion and criticism.
Check out ProleWiki for a communist wikipedia.
