Editor’s note: The following story uses two sources who asked to remain anonymous to ensure their personal safety. The sources said they received death threats after stepping on an American flag at a past protest.
The Revolution Club at UCLA, a pro-communism club students created in 2014 to speak out against capitalism and imperialism, held an event Feb. 16 that featured keynote speakers and communists Sunsara Taylor and Carl Dix, who discussed the need for social change. The club has five to 10 members.
The Daily Bruin’s Shweta Chawla and Janae Yip spoke with the club’s co-chairs, a third-year geography student and a third-year English student, to learn more about the club’s goals and beliefs.
DB: What does the Revolution Club do, and what are its goals?
Chair 1: Our immediate goals are to lead students to stand up and fight against crimes that are generated and perpetuated by capitalism and imperialism. We read Marxist and Communist evolutionary works and theory and hold debates and discussion over present-day issues, such as oppression.
In particular, we advocate for a new synthesis of communism that Bob Avakian, chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party, has developed. This type of communism takes into account the achievements and shortcomings of past communist revolutions and socialist states. The world has changed since Marx, Lenin and Mao, and because communism is a scientific outlook, it must continue to do so.
DB: People have posted flyers around campus, criticizing the platforms of presidential candidates in the upcoming election. What are your thoughts on the ideas proposed by these candidates and the current state of politics?
C1: America is leading a global empire that enforces not democracy but capitalism and imperialism across the globe, and all the oppression and class divisions that come with that. People running for office are essentially auditioning for who will be most effective as the head of the empire. As Hugh Hewitt, a radio talk show host said, the people are voting for someone who is cunning and willing enough to kill innocent children by the hundreds and thousands.
I believe the deciders in politics are not the general American people, as they like to pretend, but the small percentage of Americans that dominate the economy and therefore the politics, the media and every other sphere of social life. Only they have the means of molding public opinion.
DB: What is your stance on today’s social and political issues?
C1: The Revolution Club goes very much up against a lot of the prominent issues in society. We don’t queue up behind what is popular, or behind what most people are thinking about or advocating for. We’re not working on making safe spaces for certain people. We’re not working on making life better for the American people. We are radical. We are beyond the left. We are fighting for a world where pockets of safe spaces in privileged areas will no longer be necessary or even desirable, because we aim to create a whole world that is a safe space.
DB: Has there been criticism and backlash toward your club?
Chair 2: There will always be criticism, but we just have to stay true to our cause. I started this club two years ago because many clubs on campus focus on fighting just one issue. The revolution discusses many issues, and proposes solution through revolution in many different cities.
DB: What is the next event the Revolution Club will be holding?
C2: We are planning a student strike against police terrorism in April, and are working with the organization Stop Mass Incarceration Network. We want to shut down campuses nationwide by getting as many students as possible to skip class and protest on the street.
Compiled by Shweta Chawla and Janae Yip, Bruin contributors.
What a bunch of pathetic little snowflakes.