Building a Mass Movement

[deutsey]

I posted this when it first came out, but since Cindy Sheehan has re-ignited the anti-war movement, I thought this was all the more relevant now.


http://www.blackcommentator.com/144/144_cover_movement.html

“Democracy… does not come from the government, from on high, it comes from people getting together and struggling for justice.” – Howard Zinn, Spelman College commencement address, Atlanta, 2005.

Politicians are elected and selected, but mass movements transform societies. Judges uphold, strike down, or invent brand new law, but mass movements drag the courts, laws and officeholders all in their wake. Progressive and even partially successful mass movements can alter the political calculus for decades to come, thus improving the lives of millions. Social Security, the New Deal, and employer-provided medical care didn’t come from the pen of FDR. The end of “separate but equal” didn’t come from the lips of any judge, and voting rights were not simply granted by the Voting Rights Act of 1965. All these were hard-won outcomes of protracted struggle by progressive mass movements, every one of which operated outside the law and none of which looked to elected officials or the corporate media of those days for blessings or legitimacy. It’s time to re-learn those lessons and build a new progressive mass movement in the United States.

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[grasswire]

1. about mass movements

I have just read Eric Hoffer's "The True Believer: Thoughts on Mass Movements" -- published in 1951. I HIGHLY recommend it for today's Democrats. I believe that Rove has crafted his plans from Hoffer's insights into human nature and motivation.

(Powell's has several copies.)

[deutsey]

2. That's an excellent book

Hoffer was a longshoreman who wrote it in his off hours.

[grasswire]

3. the description of.....

...the required "leader" of a mass movement is terrifyingly close to the persona of George W. Bush. I've been meaning to post some quotes -- will do so when I get a chance.

But Hoffer's premise that movements are not begun by fear but rather by hope (as misguided as the hope might be in certain instances) is something that Dem candidates should seriously study.

[grasswire]

4. kick

for democracy