Youth and Imperialism

It is clear that the young people of Australia have much to be mad about. The continual decimation of public education and TAFE, the fact that 'public' transport resides in private hands, private hands that charge ridiculous fees and the never ending steep incline of university fees to name a few.

But what can be done? Disillusionment with the two establishment bourgeois parties is through the roof. Young people know that these parties are nothing but puppets of interests that couldn't be further from their own. Unfortunately, however, these parties have succeeded in establishing a monopoly over the word and concept of 'politics'. The majority of young people have no interest in politics, as they see the talking shop of parliament as the be all and end all of politics. That there is no way out of their predicament, that it simply needs to be put up with. The small minority who do decide to tackle the issue either join the Greens, where they tend to find themselves railroaded in the same direction as the Libs and Labor, or alternatively join a Trotskyist party, where ineffectual sloganeering and rampant 'left blocism' lead to a quick burnout.

A bright start has been made in Melbourne by a campaign calling itself 'FightBack!', it is nominally led by the Trotskyist 'Socialist Party of Australia', which is attracting young people by offering simple explanations on aforementioned issues. For now, the SP isn't putting it's branding on 'FightBack' material and it will be interesting to see where that goes.

But such a campaign can only go so far, without the understanding and application of the mass line and mass work. The lack of linkage of issues to US imperialism is also a real barrier to understanding and providing solutions to these problems. Solutions to problems such as these that pit young students and workers in direct contradiction with imperialism and capitalism can only be found when a genuine people's front guided by young Marxist-Leninists applying the mass line and diligently engaging in mass work gets up running. Only then, when the realisation that the primary contradiction that affects the lives of young people is that between them and imperialism is reached, can solutions be found.

60 years since the defeat of the outlawing of the Communist Party.

It is now sixty years since the victory of the people against the most vicious attack on civil rights ever made by an Australian government. Menzies and his Liberal government proposed a referendum that would have banned membership of the Communist Party, made it a criminal offence. At first it appeared as if this referendum would get up easily, but fortunately, wide sectors of the community realised that this issue was about more than simply sticking it to the reds. This was an attack on everybody, this bill would have given Menzies (a man who had expressed sympathy for Hitler as late as 1938, some food for thought) the power to essentially outlaw any association or grouping he saw as subversive. Wide sections of the community mobilized into the broadest united front possibly ever seen in Australia, and in the end the bill was narrowly defeated. In the face of current attacks on fundamental democratic rights in Australia, through bodies such as the ABCC and with issues facing us such as the ever increasing imperialist domination of our 'democracy', there are many lessons to be learnt from the work of communists within this united front, and how it relates to our experience today. All Australian  Marxist-Leninists should take this opportunity to reflect upon the experiences of 1951, and think about what lessons can be gained from this. One of the ideas that flows out of this is that we need to establish the broadest unity we possibly can, beginning amongst ourselves. We nee to work closer on the issues that unite us, and focus on these, not the questions and issues that divide us.