Edited by Carolyn Bennett
Joseph Kishore’s thoughts posted today at World Socialist
Web Site (wsws.org) seem spot on to me. This is an excerpt from that article.
Buttressing status quo
Figures like [Jesse] Jackson (net worth $10 million) and [Al]
Sharpton (net worth $5 million) speak for a highly privileged social layer. A
substantial group of black executives and politicians has emerged as a
principle constituency for the Democratic Party — even as conditions for the
vast majority of African Americans have worsened.
Their attempts to present racism as the ‘core’ of American
society are false and reactionary. Racial inequalities exist and racism is
promoted by sections of the ruling class. However, this is one particular
expression of the fundamental division in society: class. Indeed, the most
horrific levels of poverty and unemployment for black workers are to be found
in cities overseen by black mayors, politicians, police chiefs and businessmen.
The crisis of capitalism cuts across the racial and identity
politics that have been promoted for decades as a basis of ideological and
social support for capitalist rule in the United States. Since the ghetto
uprisings of the late 1960s in particular, the ruling class has sought to
divide the working class while cultivating a small layer of African Americans
and other minorities to police the cities and provide a new base of support for
the status quo.
What lies under?
Unemployment and poverty, repression-driven
inequality, paranoia-driven violence
Racial prejudice may have played a role in the killing of
[Trayvon] Martin, who was African-American. The initial public reaction,
however, did not focus on race, but rather on the gross injustice involved. As
Martin’s mother, Sabrina Fulton, put it, ‘It’s not about black and white; it’s
about right and wrong.’
The background to the killing of Martin is the promotion of
law-and-order vigilantism and the passage of reactionary legislation like
Florida’s ‘Stand Your Ground’ law. Police and prosecutors have cited this law
in justifying their refusal to take action against [George] Zimmerman.
At the same time, the
deepest economic crisis since the Great Depression contributes to immense
tensions building up in American society, which find expression in different
forms, including violent actions by disturbed individuals such as Zimmerman.
The year 2011 saw the eruption of major social struggles on
a world scale that raised the fundamental issue of social inequality. Mass
working class demonstrations and strikes in Egypt and other countries initially
eclipsed religious and sectarian differences and focused on the basic questions
of unemployment, poverty and political repression.
Sources and notes
“The killing of Trayvon Martin and racial politics in
America,” April 5, 2012, http://www.wsws.org/articles/2012/apr2012/pers-a05.shtml
“Interview with Joseph Kishore of the Socialist Equality
Party (Posted On Tuesday, March 6, 2012 By Matt J. Stannard. Under Context2012),
http://politicalcontext.org/blog/2012/03/interview-with-joseph-kishore-of-the-socialist-equality-party/
WSWS.org is the voice of the Socialist Equality Party (SEP),
a pro-Fourth International Marxist group with affiliates in several countries.
The predecessor of the Socialist Equality Party was the Workers League. The
Workers League initiated the process of transformation into the SEP in 1995.
The founding congress of the SEP was held in 2008. In the United States headquartered
in Detroit, Michigan, the SEP National Chairman is David North and its National
Secretary is Joseph Kishore.
IMAGES
JACKSON/Sharpton
image: http://www.sodahead.com/
Race
bludgeon image: http://www.lloydmarcus.com/
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