Hi. Not everyone getting this will know the characters, period and struggles discussed herein. David sketches them well and as historical context for
understanding our current dilemma and hopefully, a spark for struggle, or at least appreciation. I've previously written of David's own long, righteous history. He wrote this last night and sent it at 4am EST. What a guy! It occurs to me that if enough people are interested I could ask him to send me a copy of the film, show it publicly in LA, give the few bucks to an appropriate cause and pass it on to other areas. Write me if Interested. Ed Months and months ago I recorded Rosa Luxemburg on my VCR. It joined the stack of "good films I must sit down and watch . . . some day". Today was the day. The New York Local of the Socialist Party had its monthly meeting (our next meeting is Saturday, February 12, 3 p.m., at the Muste Institute, 339 Lafayette St., in Manhattan - you are invited) and after a small but good gathering, with a provocative discussion of new ways of thinking about Marx, we broke and reassembled in Brooklyn for a "video evening". I had agreed to supply my copy of Rosa Luxemburg. The film was made in 1986 in Germany by Margarethe von Trotta - it was a commercial release, got good reviews, and I'm sure is available on tape (if not DVD). Luxemburg is a legendary figure in socialist circles, born in 1872, murdered during the unsuccessful Sparacist rebellion in Germany in 1919, she was a leading Marxist theoretician. She was jailed during the first world war for her anti-war agitation (a collection of her extraordinary "letters from prison" is available for $2 from the A.J. Muste Memorial Institute - for info check the Muste website, http://www.ajmuste.org). Each of us brings to any film our personal history, gender, language, age, politics. No two people ever see a film in the same way. These brief notes are a tribute to "Red Rosa" as well as a look at lessons "for our time" gained from the film. (Those seeking an expert on Rosa Luxemburg should write to Prof. William Pelz, who had set up an international conference on Luxemburg and can answer questions of history much better than I - write him at: [EMAIL PROTECTED]). Great names from Marxist history take life on the screen, not only Rosa, but Karl Liebknecht, Karl Kautsky, Clara Zetkin, August Bebel - key figures in the German Social Democratic movement at that time. That movement is shown as it was - a major force in European politics, headed by men and women who had hoped to secure social revolution through the electoral process. They are filmed at a grand party in 1900 as the new century came in, and with it, great hopes for fundamental change. The horror of the Great War lay fourteen years in the future, the Russian Revolution seventeen years. The film jumps back and forth, from Rosa's time in prison, to her youth; from the debates about how to move Germany forward to the news from Russia. But to younger radicals what should stand out was the pervasive anti-militarism both of Rosa Luxemburg, and of the political movement of which she was a part. The hatred of war as an institution dominated the film, every bit as much as the struggle against European capitalism. For a left which has since tended to relegate militarism to a secondary issue, it is important to see the film to realize the extent to which radicals at that time - those, like Luxemburg, who were truly revolutionaries - saw the institution of war as a basic enemy. For the European left the thought of a woman playing such a key role in her debates with fellow Social-Democrats was remarkable. Margarethe von Trotta deserves credit for not over-emphasizing this - for giving us Rosa Luxemburg primarily as a radical leader. Luxemburg, in otherwords, is not used to advance an agenda, but as a key historic figure in her own right. The tragedy of that period was the "Great War". Rosa was among those who argued to the very moment the war began (and after it started!) that socialists must oppose it, call for strikes, mass action, even revolution - for anything that would save the workers of Europe from tearing each other apart. Nearly a century has passed, and that moment still reaches out, the absolute failure of European Social Democracy to stop the war which would, all too soon, lead to Hitler. It is easy to blame the social democrats for their failure. I wish it were that simple. The fact is that nationalism was as much the root cause as capitalism. The German left was no more prepared then to risk being seen as disloyal to Germany than liberals are today in the face of the US Occupation of Iraq. I listened to Ralph Nader tonight, who was interviewed on the Tim Russert Show, and the best he could do in the face of the US invasion of Iraq was to call for a "responsible" ! plan for withdrawal in six months, after internationally supervised elections. It was then, and is now, a kind of treason to state that our loyalty is to values higher than our own state, to condemn utterly and without reservation the militaray adventures of our ruling class. I remember in talking with both A. J. Muste and Norman Thomas that, whatever their disagreements (Muste was more radical than Thomas), both men looked back to the failure of the Second International as a decisive, tragic turning point, the results of which would haunt the 20th Century. Finally, I thought of the problem we face, in the here and now. We do not have a coherent movement. We do not have, as the French and German socialists did then, representation in parliaments. We do not have an organized opposition party. Some of you getting this know as well as I do all the byways of the last fifty years, all the ego trips (as well as honest efforts) would-be revolutionists have pursued, trying to substitute tiny groups, cults, "mini-mass parties", for any real base. We have seen Trotskyist and Maoist and Stalinist efforts to build revolutionary vanguards, in the process chewing up lives and time and leaving very little behind. How painful it is then to look back at Rosa Luxemburg, a genuine leader with a mass following, part of a movement with trade union support, and realize that she failed, that all of social-democracy failed the test. (Yes, there were sections of the International, including the US Socialist Party, Lenin's wing of Russian Social Democracy, the Italians, etc., which opposed the war even after it began - and that should be remembered. But more important, to remember that just as Lenin's Revolution ended in an historic blind alley, so too did the largely peaceful, electorally oriented socialist forces in Western Europe). We have so very far to go before we will even reach the point at which Rosa Luxemburg saw her hopes consumed in the fire of that war. I have no idea how to build that "mass movement", much less how to guarantee that "this time it won't fail". But I do know we don't have that movement! I hope a film such as Rosa Luxemburg can give us a trace more humility than we sometimes have, as well as helping to rescue a courageous woman from the relative dust bin of history. To take a line from one of Kenneth Patchen's poems, we have no choice but "to pause and begin again". The forces Rosa Luxemburg confronted are still in charge. And we are still in the resistance - where else can we be? Politics becomes in some ways an existential matter. We not only do not know if we can win, but history suggests the odds are against us. If we still choose to gamble on the struggle, it is because the struggle defines us. As Gandhi would note, the ends are never in our hands, only the means. And for us, the struggle is a necessary path, the "means" at least to defining who we are as this new century begins. David McReynolds 1.9.04 (obviously can be sent on without permission) *** Religious communities must stop blessing war and violence... ICUJP Announcements Saturday January 8, 2005 Interfaith Communities United for Justice and Peace Education, Action & Witness: Love and Justice Bring Us Together *Events in January and February:* to Honor Dr. Martin Luther King, Defend Civil Rights and Stand for Peace ---------------------------------------- Wednesday January 12, 2005 Press Conference: Religious Leaders, Holocaust and Japanese Internment Survivors To Demand Justice for Detained and Persecuted Muslims 10:30 am in front of the gate of: FCI Terminal Island 1299 Seaside Avenue, Reservation Point Terminal Island directions <http://maps.yahoo.com/maps_result?ed=iGYZxOp_0Tqkz_nmN8ol.JRViqLY9fKJPe_9yqL0.Yh9kPJ9z.OTLeY_fa8xpg--&csz=Terminal+Island+CA&country=us&cat=&trf=0> Supporting organizations include Nikkei for Civil Rights & Redress, the Progressive Jewish Alliance, Progressive Christians Uniting, Interfaith Communities United for Justice and Peace, CAIR, Progressive Muslim Union, Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Our community is burdened with a continuous difficulty encountered by people 'traveling while Muslim' and the detention of people (mostly religious leaders) without charges or worse: rolling secret charges. They face financial and public ruination leading to people accept deportation (the case of Mohamed Ghoneim) rather than remain in the U.S. fighting an endless expensive battle. Join us as we focus on these issues from the perspective of religious communities and leaders reaching out to Muslim religious leaders - who appear to be the special target of INS activities. download a poster <../pdf/posters/11x17_12_repugnant.pdf> see icujp.org calendar <http://icujp.org/calendar.shtml#jan12press> for more information ---------------------------------------- Thursday January 13, 2004 Affirm Our Moral Values co-sponsored by ICUJP and the American Friends Service Committee 7:00 pm American Friends Service Committee 980 N. Fair Oaks Avenue Pasadena directions <http://maps.yahoo.com/maps_result?ed=Gv2Swep_0TpNNwhJyXDSHKfCz4EB.QvXa9S7Gbjltw--&csz=Pasadena+CA&country=us&cat=> In this past election, we saw "morality" redefined to be little more than opposition to abortion and gay marriage. But, what about war's cost to civilians and society? What about taxes being cut for the wealthy while poor and working poor people were forced out of social programs that support basic needs? What about the pollution of our environment? What about spreading fear against GLBT and immigrants? What about the death penalty? These are moral values and we cannot allow morality to be defined to not include them. ---------------------------------------- Friday, January 14, 2005 honoring the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Shabbat Service at 7:00 pm Temple Kol Tikvah 20400 Ventura Blvd. Woodland Hills directions <http://maps.yahoo.com/maps_result?ed=oG_Dn.p_0Tr9U1P6G1r_R1Beug53SeGWzIGR&csz=Woodland+Hills+CA&country=us&cat=&trf=0> Featured Speaker Rev. James Lawson Clergy & Laity United for Economic Justice (CLUE) Southern Christain Leadership Conference ------------------------------------------------------------------------ also Join ICUJP at the Kingdom Day Parade Monday January 17 11:00 am at Crenshaw and MLK Blvd. directions <http://maps.yahoo.com/maps_result?ed=pekCL.p_0TpGTwkY9CuRlXrWL5gTs5O6FbVlLj2edzCR.q_fSkgldqlQ_zSp&csz=Los+Angeles+CA&country=us&new=1&name=&qty=> ------------------------------------------------------------------------ DOWNLOAD A SIGN -- [signs are 11 in x 17 in] If your printer cannot make 11 x 17 prints, we recommend that you go to a copy store with online access, bring up the icujp.org calendar page, and print the signs <http://icujp.org/calendar.shtml#jan17> <http://icujp.org/pdf/01.17.05_kingSign_war.pdf> <http://icujp.org/pdf/01.17.05_kingSign_brothers.pdf> <http://icujp.org/pdf/01.17.05_kingSign_blessing.pdf> <http://icujp.org/pdf/01.17.05_kingSign_enemy.pdf> ---------------------------------------- Tuesday January 18, 2005 Vigil to Protest the Death Penalty Donald Beardslee is scheduled to be executed at San Quentin on January 19 at 12:01 am Rally At 7:00 pm Westwood Federal Building 11000 Wilshire Boulevard Los Angeles (Corner of Veteran) directions <http://maps.yahoo.com/maps_result?ed=XwVwjOp_0TpMB.ZSHcLbqF.Z9TIJlfltnjNFrzGPuzvI&csz=Los+Angeles+CA&country=us&new=1&name=&qty=> March at 8:30 pm to St. Albans Church 580 Hilgard Ave. Los Angeles directions <http://maps.yahoo.com/maps_result?ed=ZMKmQup_0ToVsAyks6PWTsHpKJ6tw7z0&csz=LOS_ANGELES+CA+90024&country=us&cat=&trf=0> This is a clear case for abolition of the death penalty. The jury didn't know of Donald Beardslee's severe brain damage at birth (and subsequent injuries) that impaired his judgment. They were told that he was a danger to society when in fact he has been incarcerated for 20 years where he's been a model prisoner. Further, the California Legislature has recently started a Blue Ribbon Commission to study the Death Penalty -- shouldn't we hold off on executions while the fairness and justice of capital punishment are being studied. Please write to Governor Schwarzenegger asking him to grant Executive Clemency. Flyers, sample letters and other information: California People of Faith Working Against the Death Penalty <http://detention.la-archdiocese.org/Erics%20Stuff/Donald%20Beardslee/Info%20and%20Action%20Page.htm> More information: Stephen Rohde <miailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> or Eric DeBode at 213/637-7402 A vigil will continue at the Church concluding at such time as the sentence has (or has not) been carried out. ---------------------------------------- Monday OR Tuesday January 24 OR 25 , 2005 (final White House information not yet available) ICUJP invites you to State of the Union Address of G.W. Bush: A Community Viewing, Panel and Discussion 6:00 pm All Saints Church 132 N. Euclid Pasadena directions <http://www.mapquest.com/maps/map.adp?country=US&addtohistory=&address=132+N.+Euclid&city=Pasadena&state=CA&zipcode=&homesubmit=Get+Map> ---------------------------------------- Monday February 7, 2005 ICUJP Monday Night Forum co-sponsored by Progressive Jewish Alliance and Progressive Muslim Union And Then They Came For Me: Civil Liberties... History, Now and Tomorrow 6:00 pm to 8:30 pm SGI-LA Friendship Center 5899 Venice Blvd. at Fairfax Los Angeles directions <http://maps.yahoo.com/maps_result?ed=aDcCiup_0TqAU3xbrYP.JB4oXsDtN2DBg18-&csz=Los+Angeles+CA&country=us&new=1&name=&qty= > Moderator Stephen Rohde Key note address Rev. James Lawson music by Ani Zonneveld and Fidel S�nchez We will be looking at historical perspectives regarding the current immigration roundups and the oppressive racist abuse of the Muslim community; it's mirror reflection of the internment of Japanese Americans; the struggle for justice of African Americans and its echoes of Nazi Germany. People are being picked up on minor violations; there's a lot of harassment (a knock on the door at 4:30 in the morning). The Muslim community is fearful. They feel isolated, and afraid of being deported. They feel targeted by the department of Homeland Security; they are being excluded from entering the US. It resembles the internment of Japanese Americans in the US during WWII and of course the persecution of Jews in Nazi Germany. ---------------------------------------- SAVE THE DATE: Wednesday February 9, 2005 Ash Wednesday Protest Action with Pax Christi and ICUJP Downtown Los Angeles Federal Building 300 N. Los Angeles St Los Angeles Morning/early afternoon- (exact time TBD) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ We invite you to join us every Friday morning at 7:00 am at Immanuel Presbyterian Church, 3330 Wilshire Blvd. at Berendo when we meet for reflection, education and planning. For study guides and further information please see the ICUJP website at http://www.icujp.org <http://icujp.org/home.shtml> or phone (626) 683-9004. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Interfaith Communities United for Justice and Peace (ICUJP) P.O. Box 483 Pasadena, CA 91102-0483 USA tel.: (626) 683-9004 ? fax: (626) 683-9485 http://icujp.org <http://icujp.org/home.shtml>email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>* *(coordinator) [EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (web and email) [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Take a look at donorschoose.org, an excellent charitable web site for anyone who cares about public education! http://us.click.yahoo.com/O.5XsA/8WnJAA/E2hLAA/7gSolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- LAAMN: Los Angeles Alternative Media Network --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Unsubscribe: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Digest: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Help: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Post: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Archive1: <http://www.egroups.com/messages/laamn> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Archive2: <http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/laamn/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
