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    • immuredanchorite [he/him, any]@hexbear.netEnglish
      8·
      24 days ago

      Yeah, the reputation of CPUSA being full of feds is also a reflection of the extent to which the US state has repressed the organization. There are things I disagree with about the CPUSA’s politics and strategy, but state repression isn’t something that CPUSA members chose and it is unfair to most of its members. Sadly, I do think that it has still had a very real negative effect on the party and the way it has developed and who has remained. It is sad because it is a reflection of the tremendous impact the party once had.

      • Pluto [he/him, he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
        6·
        24 days ago

        Well, I think we’re getting back into the swing of things, but trust me when I say: many CPUSA members, especially older members, don’t reveal their membership specifically because of previous harassment, especially during the Cold War, but even during the 1990s and 2000s.

        I remember hearing of one district that didn’t use the Internet till, say, 2011 or something; they just met in the woods or some place that was obscure, some rural place.

        I think such things have ham-strung us, if anything, hence why some of the politics seems “conservative” compared to, say, perhaps PSL or FRSO.

        I respect Nat’l Committee and what they’ve been through and they are very talented; hell, I love their books especially and their scholarship.

        But it often seems like the right-wing conspiracy theory “that Communist Party members are literally behind the scenes guiding things rather than being open about what they do” … because, in some ways, they are. Like, local civil rights and trans rights and labor union heads are Communist Party members, they just don’t say so.

        Also, I just saw in the video that Maurice Isserman was quoted. He’s a pretty anti-communist historian and, unfortunately, I’ve seen even leftists quoting him, at least at times. Well, perhaps they were liberals, not leftists, but you get what I mean.