A Message to the Bernie Sanders Supporters: An Invitation—and a Challenge

July 13, 2016 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

You were RIGHT to reject Hillary Clinton, and find her despicable.
You aspired to something different. But now Bernie wants to lead you back into the fold, back into what you once swore you’d never go along with.


A word. Now is NOT the time to give up on this—your aspirations with “broken hearts,” to “hold your nose” while voting for Hillary. Precisely the opposite. Now is the time to really follow through on your convictions. Now is the time get really radical and scientific: to dig into the cause of the problems and horrors that drove you to Bernie... and into the solution as well. Ask yourself:

What is the nature of this system that gives rise to the howling inequalities, not only within this country but to an almost unimaginably greater degree worldwide? Is it just control by the “greedy corporations”—or is there something deeper in the very framework and “rules” of how things work?
What is the history of this country, interwoven since its founding with the slavery and continuing oppression of Black people? And how does that play out today?
Is America a source for good in the world, or is it in fact the principal source of the world’s horror—of imperialist wars, unprecedented violence and torture, and oppressive domination of entire nations?
Why do immigrants come here? Who and what drives them on their deadly journeys?
Why are women so pervasively degraded and abused in this society—and in this world?
Could you really solve the rapidly developing ecological catastrophe within the framework of this economic and political system?

Let’s also ask this: What will it take to get beyond all this? Does the road out lie in rallying big crowds of disaffected people within this system’s workings and choices, and ultimately funneling people back into what they started out rejecting? Does it lie with a “third party”—again, within this system? Is it a social movement that may rattle some chains of this system, only to be suppressed or swallowed up in its entrails?
Or is what humanity requires a REAL revolution that shatters those chains?
What, for that matter, is GENUINE socialism? Is it a basket of Scandinavian-style social reforms (based on a position high in the imperialist food chain)? Or is it a path toward truly uprooting all forms of oppression and exploitation, and getting to a world fit for all seven billion on our planet? A hard path, yes, one with challenges and sacrifices—but one that is actually capable of birthing a whole new world.

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There are answers to all of these questions. But this requires science—a method for understanding the world as it actually is and how it can change—and it requires leadership based on this science. Without this, even the most heroic struggles remain confined and contained within the system that is the source of these horrors, and the nightmare continues.
That is what makes Bob Avakian (BA) so important. BA has developed the scientific understanding and approach to make the kind of revolution that can emancipate humanity. He has learned deeply from previous revolutions, as well as from many different spheres. He has forged a strategy for how a revolution could be prepared for and won, as well as a concrete vision for the new society that is on the road to real liberation. At the same time, he has kept his connection to and acted as a true champion of the oppressed, from those who catch the hardest hell in this country’s ghettoes and barrios, to the majority of the seven billion around the world. He has never given up, and today he leads a party which is actively preparing for a real revolution, one aimed not at reforming but overthrowing this system.
That is real leadership—leadership that demands to be engaged and examined. At the same time, there are real outrages that must be fought right now and that people ARE fighting right now. Let’s join together in both dimensions: fighting to STOP the madness and, as we do, digging into what it will take to fundamentally and finally get beyond this insanity. And let’s do this now—at both conventions.
Leave Bernie behind. Get ready for, and get into, the REAL revolution.
Get Radical, Get Scientific, Get Into BA!
Fight the Power, and Transform the People, For Revolution!