Quote:
Originally Posted by Saya
I don't get Bum Rush The Vote as a radical action though. That is an action that suggests if the right people were in power things would be better, rather than challenging that anyone should be in power at all. Couldn't the money raised for that be better spent on community building?
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Well, a big part of the political campaign itself is community building.
The money George has raised does not come from Occupy. Occupy has been bankrupt for like 6 months, and occupiers largely have no money to donate.
The money he's raised has come from individual constituents and some of the wealthier occupiers, and once again he won't accept anything over $2012 no matter who gives it to him, and he uses that money to feed people and start things like
the freedom school. A political campaign as direct action can be extremely useful, for highlighting just how broken the political system is, as well as getting less radical elements of the proletariat to interact with folks who are already radicalized.
In Anarchist Catalonia, you had Anarchists elected to public office, and many of them used the system's resources against itself. In fact, you had
CNT-FAI collaboration with the government which, while controversial, was probably the best move considering the circumstances.
Like Malcolm X said, voting is one of the bullets in your gun. The problem is not using that bullet, but seeing that single bullet as your only shot when you have 5-15 others.
Besides, the point of Bum Rush the Vote is not to get the right people into office, it's a way to put power back into the hands of the proletariat by building an open-source way to bypass traditional political campaign structure.
The only danger is if people start seeing it as a totalitarian solution, as the ONLY means bringing about the world they want, and at this point I don't think that's a realistic danger for OWS.