<blockquote>January 29, Washington, D.C. (WPS) “We must go into the streets in the spirit of the Cultural Revolution!... Let’s show Teng a sight he’ll never forget!” In minutes the street outside a Washington church was transformed into a sea of flaming red banners and portraits of Mao Tsetung, the symbol of revolution to millions. Draped with a hangman’s noose, a huge placard was hoisted up demanding “A Fitting Welcome For Teng!” Hundreds of Red Books shot into the air. The chants quickly swelled to a mighty roar. “MAO TSETUNG DID NOT FAIL, REVOLUTION WILL PREVAIL!” Five hundred people, led by the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA, were pouring into the streets to give Teng Hsiao-ping the promised greeting he so richly deserved.

As the march assembled, Teng was sitting down to dinner at the White House to celebrate his treachery to the people of China and the international working class with the U.S. imperialists. He was there to sip champagne with the likes of Jimmy Carter, Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger while lining China up to be cannon fodder for the U.S. war machine. He was serving China up on a silver platter to the top U.S. bankers and industrialists–the very jackals who are bleeding the life out of us here and itching to sink their teeth into China. And he was raising a toast to the end of “30 years of unpleasantness”–the very period of history when the Chinese people, led by Mao, were throwing off the yoke of these foreign exploiters.

But this rat–royally introduced as “His Excellency, Mr. Teng Hsiao-ping”–must have nearly choked on the splendid banquet that was set before him. Outside, hundreds of revolutionary fighters swore to ruin his pompous spectacle and raise high the red flag of his hated enemy, Mao Tsetung. The spectre of revolution was rising up like a vision of the future right in the heartland of U.S. imperialism, right at the front gate of Teng’s superpower sugar-daddies.

Cops were swarming in the streets, sent by the bourgeoisie to smash the revolutionary message represented by the demonstration. Hundreds of riot police backed up by squad cars fanned out around the demonstrators. Menacing people with their clubs, they tried to intimidate the march with a blatant show of the armed might of the capitalist state. But already people passing in cars were grabbing leaflets, clenched fists were going up, horns honking. Agitators addressed the people on every street corner in open defiance of the pigs.

In the face of the threatening cops, people were pouring into the street, fresh with the memory of people’s testimony at a powerful rally that had given vivid expression to the bright future that revolutionary China had represented for all mankind. Faces were filled with hatred for the towering setback brought by Teng, who is trampling on Mao’s legacy and dragging China back to capitalism.

The portraits of Mao were held still higher by the marchers. So were pictures of the Four–revolutionaries who heroically fought to defend Mao’s line and working class rule in China. Banners were held more firmly with their slogans: Down with the Reactionary Treachery of Teng Hsiao-ping and Co.–Firmly Uphold the Revolutionary Banner of Mao Tsetung! Down with NATO and its Newest Member, China! Down with U.S. and Soviet War Preparations!

The marchers began to move out, fired with a sense of history in the making. The eyes of the world were focused on Washington–history demanded that a stand be taken.

Immediately the cops moved in, shoving people up onto the sidewalk, yelling that the permit to march in the street had expired. Red Books were raised in defiance, hearts steeled with determination. The revolutionaries who went down in China had not fought in vain! The march pushed forward, growing in intensity. The spirit of the Cultural Revolution was coming alive in the streets of Washington!

The march swept down Columbia Avenue, led by a militant contingent of the Revolutionary Communist Youth Brigade whose blazing red jackets symbolized the revolutionary batallions of the Red Guards who had knocked Teng and his fellow rats from their high positions during the Cultural Revolution. People came out of their houses in the largely Black community where in 1968 a powerful rebellion exploded against national oppression. Many came up to say they remembered the support that Mao had given them when he said: “The Afro-American struggle is not only a struggle waged by the exploited and oppressed Black people for freedom and emancipation, it is also a new clarion call to all the exploited and oppressed people of the United States to fight against the barbarous rule of the monopoly capitalist class.”

This was the most militant demonstration they had seen since the ’60s. But it was different, too–people, many of them workers, were being led by a revolutionary Party and consciously raising the banner of revolution, waving it right up in the face of the bourgeoisie. As one worker who was on the march said, ”You know I worked all my life, I never knew I could fight back. I knew there was police killing people in the streets, that I was working my ass off and didn’t have nothing. But now I know what we’re fighting for, that we can fight, that we’re going to make revolution. Through the Revolutionary Communist Party I learned it’s this whole damn system that’s gotta go–like little roaches we’re gonna wipe ’em out!”

The street was alive with people inspired by the fact that the banner of revolution was still around and being held high in the streets. Two women ran out shouting ”Good luck, good luck!” Another stood holding a bag of groceries, her lips moving to the chant of “Down with Hua, Down with Teng, We uphold Mao Tsetung!” A man ran over and grabbed a large portrait of Mao and proudly held it as he waited for his bus. Hearing the chants of “Mao, Mao, Mao Tsetung, Revolution’s gonna come!”, a dozen youths came out of a pool hall yelling, changing the chant to “Revolution’s coming now!” against a vicious assault spearheaded by motorcycles and mounted police and unleashed the righteous fury of the international proletariat at Teng’s betrayal of the cause of communism.

As the police regrouped, they began taking vengence on the demonstration, furious that it had accomplished its political objective of exposing their masters’ reactionary little dinner party. They clubbed many people and arrested 78, including Bob Avakian, Chairman of the Central Committee of the RCP.

Suddenly the marchers could see the White House. The police were growing desperate. In a last ditch attempt to stop the week-long political offensive launched against Teng by the RCP, they announced that another parade permit to march in front of the White House had been revoked. Refusing to back down, the marchers pulled out hundreds of American flags and set them on fire. A man who had joined the march with his three year old son demanded a flag of his own to burn, waving it in flames in a blazing display of his hatred of U.S. imperialism.

As the cops began their attack, the marchers suddenly broke into a run toward the White House. A thundering cry reverberated down Pennsylvania Avenue, “DEATH, DEATH, TO TENG HSIAO-PING!” As the police moved on the crowd clubbing and beating, hundreds stood their ground.

Many prisoners who were badly hurt were denied medical treatment and others were singled out and beaten in jail. But the revolutionary spirit of the demonstration continued to rock the walls of the jail cells and revolutionary songs and chants rang out in the courtrooms of the enemy.

While the march was a source of inspiration to revolutionary minded people around the world, it was a nightmare for the bourgeoisie. The intensity of the police attack and the severity of the charges–felony assault thrown at the 78 arrested–only underscored the desperation of the bourgeoisie that they were not able to stop this powerful statement from being made. It was definitely a “fitting welcome” for the ratfaced traitor Teng Hsiao-ping. And during the rest of his visit, the same message would be delivered again and again.</blockquote>

Hah hah! Legendary!

A fitting welcome indeed for that reactionary scumbag. (I think Mao was wrong though. Deng was actually the #1 capitalist roader all along. And that picture with the cowboy hat...is there any better symbol for who and what Deng represented than this pathetic, humiliating minstrel show he put on for the U.S. imperialists?! Just think if Mao had been alive to see THAT!)

Thanks for posting this, Mike. Great writing.

I understand that the RCP had its weaknesses, but c'mon, any group that does something this kick-ass deserves some serious props.

I wish there was a group around here with this kind of bold, fighting spirit. Things like this shouldn't be done on a whim obviously, but there are times I think when the hour demands this kind of statement, and Deng's visit was one of them.

Very inspiring. But also a little saddening too because I read things like this and think, "Man, if only the RCP had done some things differently. If only they'd nurtured a real democratic spirit within the organization, if only they'd have shown respect and even love for their people dealing with personal difficulties (addiction, sexual identity issues, family issues, etc.), if only the leadership had shown some more humility along the way, maybe things would have turned out differently and maybe we would already have the kind of revolutionary organization we need.

I don't know. I sometimes think the anarchists have a point with respect to democratic centralism. History has shown that organizations that adhere to it tend to become less and less democratic over time.

On the other hand, it's hard to imagine being able to make revolution without the kind of discipline and singularity of purpose that democratic centralism brings to the table. So I guess my question is, can we create mechanisms that would preserve the democracy in democratic centralism and create real accountability, or this kind of set-up inevitably doomed to become the province of a few leading intellectuals duking it out for control behind the scenes, leaving cadre to simply obey whatever directives come out this backstage political knife-fighting?

Thanks for posting this. Just a quick thought- How much is anti-revisionism tied to Maoism?. I'm thinking of folks like Robert Williams and Herbert Marcuse who could be considered anti-revisionists but not necessarily Maoists.

&gt; Herbert Marcuse who could be considered anti-revisionists

No way! Marcuse was with the Frankfurt School, which was definitely revisionist by any standards.

@Patrick, I would disagree- Marcuse was a critic of Soviet Marxism(in fact the title of the book he authored that was condemned by various Communist Parties of the period) He also upheld the Panthers, SDS (both in Germany and the US). One thing he was not an adherent of Mao.

&gt; Marcuse was a critic of Soviet Marxism

He was more than that. Eduard Bernstein and Karl Kautsky were also critics of Soviet Marxism. But they were revisionists of the first order.

The Frankfurt School became prominent among the New Left in the 1960s at a time when class contradictions in the USA seemed to have relaxed to such an extent that it was all just a matter of supporting black civil rights and helping the white middle-class get over its sense of alienation. Marcuse gave all of this a theoretical form by rejecting the role of the working class, as it fits into Marxist analysis. The problem was not that he argued that for the duration of the post-WWII economic boom the US working class was essentially bought off and couldn't be expected to do much until capitalist decline began to hit home. That much would have been a valid Marxist view. But Marcuse gave a new theoretical foundation with the idea that the working class no longer occupied the place in history which Marxism gave it. That is clearly revisionist.

Kazembe writes:

<blockquote>"How much is anti-revisionism tied to Maoism?. I’m thinking of folks like Robert Williams and Herbert Marcuse who could be considered anti-revisionists but not necessarily Maoists."</blockquote>

I have a very specific definition of "revisionist" for historical reasons (meaning people who arise within the communist movement who advocate a capitalist road for humanity). But in general I shy away from using jargon and terminology that is given such a specific meaning by a relatively small group of people.

And for that reason the meaning of "anti-revisionist" can vary depending on which groups are arising within the communist movement to advocate capitalist politics. And the term "anti-revisionist" on the EROL archives refers to a very particular struggle (emerging over the 1960s as the parties associated with the Soviet Union clashed sharply with new and much more radical communist forces grouped around Mao).

That particular anti-revisionist movement in the 1960s was tied to Maoism (and its initial emergence on a world scale) -- but who can miss that since then there have also been <em>revisionist</em> currents that arose <em>within</em> Maoism, and new anti-revisionist currents that have arisen to combat them.

Patrick's response illustrates how others (emerging from other parts of radical and socialist thinking) have rather different views on all this. (Patrick's view seems to posit an original Marxism, and situate revisionism on a particular denial of assumed certain tenets like the role of the working class and so on.) That emerges from a rather different view of Marxism than mine, and therefore from a different sense of what would be considered revisionist.

And again, rather than argue over semantics, it seems more valuable (to me) to engage over substance.

Robert Williams was a revolutionary nationalist -- whose politics brought him to Cuba and then to China. Certainly given his strong advocacy of armed struggle and revolution, and his specific allignment with Mao, I suspect that he can be considered "anti-revisionist" (in his orientation to the Soviet Union and the CPUSA, and their politics). I heard him speak shortly after his return, I got the impression he was self-identified (at that point) as a communist and a Maoist -- though, still, I suspect (from reading his writings and book) that his politics were closer to what I would call revolutionary nationalist.

In any case, my point is that it seems more helpful to describe people's politics in a nuanced way -- and not try to debate whether they fit into that bag or another.

Marcuse was (as Patrick points) part of the Frankfurt School... and he was politically rather far from the currents generally called "anti-revisionist" in those 60s days. Not that he was pro-Soviet -- but that his politics and philosophy were while favorably and respectfully engaged with Marxism, were generally considered outside the framework of organized communism.

In other words, because I never really considered Marcuse (or the rest of the Frankfurt School) communist, I also really can't consider him "a revisionist" in any significant way. He is (in my view) part of important, other, radical and pro-socialist currents that operate in their own distinctive framework -- and that should be studied, learned from and if necessary critiqued on the basis of their specific views.

I think one of the main points worth making is that people can (from such a position) still make important contributions to thought and radical action -- and I certainly have always thought that there was much one can gain by engaging with Marcuse's work, even though I have never agreed with his overall framework or many specific verdicts.

Patrick writes:

<blockquote>"But Marcuse gave a new theoretical foundation with the idea that the working class no longer occupied the place in history which Marxism gave it. That is clearly revisionist."</blockquote>

Well, it is clearly not part of orthodox forms of Marxism. And I have personally not agreed with his view. But I also think that the ultimate historical verdict on that debate will emerge from history itself -- and people will (in the future) be in a better position to decide who was right.

&gt; In other words, because I never really considered Marcuse (or the rest of the Frankfurt School) communist, I also really can’t consider him “a revisionist” in any significant way.

Would you apply the term to Bernstein or Kautsky at all? They were never considered "communists" either, but were leading intellectuals of the German Social Democratic Party at a time when said party was very much identified with "Marxism." I can certainly see the argument that the label "revisionist" has been worn out so far that it may no longer be productive. But if it is to be used at all then I'm inclined to say that the trends which won out among the German Social Democrats in the early 20th century are an important defining moment for the term.

The communist movement before WW1 was called the Social Democratic movement (as you know). So yes, Kautsky and Bernstein emerged in the communist movement of their day (though neither they nor other socialists generally used the specific word communist then.)

I don't think the politics of a a century ago are particularly important "defining moment" for our politics or our terms. I think this is the defining moment for our politics, and the past is the background we use to inform ourselves as we think and act.

&gt; our politics or our terms

Those would be two very different things. Terminology actually is based upon past experience. Whether or not a given terminology is helpful for politics today is a different issue. I can see how the very term "revisionist" could be considered as exhausted today, though I still allow for some usage of it.

Any serious consideration of revisionism as an issue must place it side-by-side with dogmatism as the parallel issue. People formulate world views, whether Christianity or Marxism or something else, because paradigms are needed to frame issues in a world where judgments often have to be reached on the basis of limited information. A purely empirical study of each question that arises is not always possible, so we learn to rely on our world view paradigm to give us a shortcut.

A good such paradigm will be capable of absorbing adjustments which sometimes must be made as the level of new empirical data contradicting old assumptions becomes overwhelming. But it will also be capable of referring once more to guiding central ideas which have always informed the paradigm from the onset and reaffirming such ideas with the new data. Failing this in one direction leads to dogmatism, and in the other to revisionism. The history of Marxism as a working body of thought is certainly loaded with multiple failures in both directions.

Historically, REVISIONISM HAS ALWAYS MEANT REVISING MARXISM generally, and
especially, particularly REVISING THE MARXIST THEORY OF THE STATE (because it is Marxism's key teaching)

Lenin said, "Marxism is all-powerful because it is true." Lenin recognized correctly that with the triumph of the ideas of Marxism within the world left, the only way to attack Marxism would, from then on, be from within, from supposed "Marxists" who claim to "support" Marxism while gutting it of its essence ... revisionism = attacking Marxism (now Marxism-Leninism) from within thru negating/revising its most important points.

And the most fundamental of all points for Marxism(-Leninism) is the question of state power. Marxism recognizes the fact that every class society (that is, every society since the end, some 10,000 years ago, of primitive communalism) has been, and can only be, a dictatorship of one class over the others, a dictatorship exercised thru armed force unrestrained by any laws. In particular, it was as a result of observing close-at-hand the defeat/crushing of the Paris Commune that Marx and Engels realized that it must be so for socialism too. From then on, they emphasized no point more than this one. This is why Lenin said, "Only he is a Marxist who extends the recognition of the class struggle to the Dictatorship of the Proletariat."

So, in the world today where no country is pre-capitalist, the question of state power asks (and answers): what class holds state power in capitalist societies (the capitalist class); how do they maintain it (thru their (armed) dictatorship (unrestrained by any laws); what class must and will overthrow them (the working class leading its non-capitalist class allies); how can/must that overthrow be accomplished (thru violent revolution); what class must dominate in the new society (the proletariat); and what form must that domination take (as socialism, the dictatorship of the proletariat with democracy for the vast majority and absolute dictatorship against the bourgeoisie (external, and internal (past-remnants and newly-arising)).

The following is a list of the world's greatest revisionists for the first 60 or so years of the 20th century:
the first important Revisionists:
Kautsky &amp; Bernstein (German Social-Democrats) and the 2nd International (after Engels' death, when it went pro-Imperialist),
the most important Modern Revisionists:
Browder (CPUSA; he even dissolved the Party, it supposedly wasn't needed because the U.S. liberal Bourgeoisie was so progressive.)
Tito (Yugoslavia; the first "Communist" Party with State Power to betray Socialism and the working class),
Krushchev (CPSU(B) - USSR: "Party of the Whole People", "State of the Whole People", "Peaceful Road to Socialism"; no "communist" has done anywhere's near the damage he did - we lost the USSR and some 100 CPs.)

[N.B. Revisionism is NOT, by a long shot, the only form of anti-Marxism or opportunism. But that's a separate post.]

KASAMA PROJECT, YOU CAN'T HAVE IT BOTH WAYS: EITHER MARXISM OR REVISIONISM
I must add that the following criticism is specifically addressed to the KasamaProject leadership and NOT necessarily to anybody else who posts or reads this site:

KasamaProject's leadership publicly states that they are communist; they propose uniting communists thru an Iskra-newspaper type project, etc. But in this thread (and all over the place throughout the entire site), instead of explaining and defending Marxism-Leninism, they in fact revise the guts out of it, constantly calling for re-evaluation (but of what? this can only be of (THE fundamentals) of M-L-ism); and they actively post stuff that, in fact, reflect a hodge-podge of theories that are at variance with Marxism and can’t lead either the Marxists to unity or the masses to victory.

[Marxism is no more invalid or out-of-date than is Newtonian Physics; the essential principles of both still hold true; while at the same time, in response to the ever-changing objective (material) and subjective (consciousness) conditions, each science has been further qualitatively advanced (for example, by Einstein and Lenin, respectively.]

Out of decent respect for the science of communism and its creators (Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin), please EITHER stop revising the living guts out of Marxism(-Leninism) (including re-evaluating / revising the Marxist meaning of the word Revisionism); OR stop claiming to be communists and openly proclaim that Lenin was/is wrong when he said/says that "Marxism is all-powerful because it is true".