How Does the Left 'Get Organized'?

Responding To Left Criticism

Photo by Alex Haney on Unsplash

I recently made a note on Substack that gained a bit of traction concerning the left’s fixation on Trump.

Before people strawman my points I want to be clear.

Getting organized does not mean ignoring Trump or the harm caused by his administration it means the opposite. How can you organize an effective opposition to Trump without understanding what his administration is doing? That’s a trick question, you cannot.

I want to clarify that point quickly before proceeding. I also want to expand upon what I meant in the post before addressing the consistent, borderline bad-faith criticism I have received from others on the so-called left.

Deconstructing the Post

Deconstructing the meaning of my post is necessary since short-form internet posts can easily be misconstrued. My post is about the very real phenomenon of mainstream media, liberals, and, by default, leftists focusing their efforts on Trump. You can easily see this trend by looking within left-affiliated circles.

If Trump breathes the wrong way, someone somewhere will talk about it. Many people are making money from the genuine fears others have about a second Trump presidency. Do not be mistaken, Trump and what he represents are harmful, especially to marginalized communities, but consuming content about Trump or complaining about him on social media does not stop him.

What will stop Trump? Well, in the past what stopped other fascists was a world war. In the case of Europe, what largely stopped the Nazi war machine was the Soviet Union. The labor movement and left-wing political movements generally were always a thorn in the side of fascism from a historical perspective.

Nevertheless, to truly answer the question, ‘What will stop Trump?’ We have to reflect on our current conditions and the past.

The United States has low union membership, there is no ‘worker’ or ‘labor’ party, and the left is fragmented with little to no true political power. If America truly goes down a fascist path there is no left opposition to slow it down and no socialist or left project to stop it.

This is the problem the left faces, it is fragmented and weak. The left has been co-opted by liberals for years while its needs and wants have been ignored. With that being said, the concentrated efforts of the left should not be complaining about Trump online or consuming related content. The efforts should be on building an independent left movement capable of opposing Trump and fascism effectively.

My problem with the left is that it has no skin in the game. Many can go online to air their grievances, but at they involved? Are they a part of left organizations? Do they go to protest? Do they lead initiatives?

Going online to complain about Donald Trump is low effort and does not threaten Trump’s presidency by any real means.

Bad Faith Takes

There were a few comments on my note from others who claim to be a part of the left who took issue with my basic premise of ‘get organized’. To be good faith, maybe these folks do not know where to begin and are overwhelmed with the great amount of information on the topic. I refuse to see this confusion as a lack of knowledge as we live in the internet age, it is super easy to look into left organizations and gain some type of political information.

However, access to information does not make a person knowledgeable about that information. That is an argument that makes sense as many people have many opinions they can post at any time on social media, but it does not guarantee these opinions are well-informed.

The premise of ‘get organized’ is seen as vague and therefore unhelpful because it does not provide a clear path forward in their mind. Well, that is the point, putting yourself out there to get involved in organizations is not straightforward at all. The organizations that are available to you will depend on various factors such as where you live. Your journey towards left organizing will depend on who you are organizing with. This will lead you to gain a different understanding of politics in your area.

Numerous socialists talk about class struggle, they understand what they do as a struggle. The problem with American leftists is that they forget political organizing is also a struggle. Struggle entails hardship, struggle means putting yourself on the line for what you believe, and struggle means sacrifice. Left movements of the past did not win what they did by not struggling.

People in labor movements died fighting for better working conditions, people died fighting for civil rights, and leftists of the past were put in concentration camps.

Chronically online leftists do not have skin in the game, this is probably why platitudes such as ‘get organized’ are daunting and seen as unhelpful. People want the answers laid out in front of them when the reality is that there are no clear answers. There is no bulletproof strategy for stopping Trump and the MAGA movement, but this is not an excuse to roll over toward cynicism and doomerism. This means we have to do the difficult work of building a strategy instead of relying on dead-end methods like voting in a better Democrat.

Telling others to ‘get organized’ is a call towards struggle. This means doing the hard work of educating yourself on political theory and then attempting to apply theory in practice. In my opinion, a leftist struggling in a left political organization attempting to do real work that aims to challenge our oppressive society is a bigger threat to Trump than a leftist complaining about him online.

Does this mean we on the left should just get off social media altogether? No, not at all. Social media is an opportunity for us to propagate our messages, potentially educate others, and even recruit supporters for our causes. The problem is fixating on online activities at the expense of offline activities.

An Instagram post, YouTube video, or Substack article will not fundamentally change the state of affairs in the US or get us closer to our goals in of themselves. Offline political struggle via political organizing should be our primary concern if we want to combat Trump, online activities are secondary to this.

Nevertheless, I received other criticism which I think is extremely helpful for my next segment of points.

What is to be done?

Another person’s criticism within the comment section of my note centered on the failures of organizing from their experience. I think this is a great point that I want to elaborate on.

Left organizations have their problems from ineffective campaigns to sexual abuse scandals. While I just argued that being involved with an organization is better than not and is way better than just complaining online… it is also true that there are ineffective and sometimes even harmful organizations or chapters of certain organizations out there.

It is also a possibility that you will join an organization see problems within it and probably leave. That happens often from my experience with many socialist-oriented organizations. This is where the missing piece comes in, education.

Remember when I said, “Access to information does not make a person knowledgeable about that information”? Understanding your political position as a leftist does not mean you’re knowledgeable about left political theory and history. It does not mean other leftists are necessarily knowledgeable about left political theory and history.

These considerations are probably why certain organizations and movements fail or are not as effective because their theoretical understanding is not coherent or cohesive. One of the problems within the left is a lack of education concerning theory.

When an organization or movement fails to accomplish what it aims to accomplish folks rarely stop to reflect on the basis of those failures. Humans are habitual and we move in patterns, the issues that hindered the left movements in the past are largely the same. People selling out, people not having cohesive strategies, people being too dogmatic about their approach, people collaborating with bad actors, people being delayed in taking action, etc.

Being in an organization does not mean you and your colleagues will not run into similar problems. However, a strong historical and theoretical understanding of left politics will help you and others better navigate these issues or avoid other issues.

That being said, education needs to be applied. It is not helpful to read someone like Marx and not apply anything you’ve learned to your circumstances. The pitfall that I have experienced, and many others do, is getting so caught up in the theoretical implications of left political thought rather than putting it into practice. It is easier to argue about socialism or anarchism in Discord servers than it is to organize a protest, organize a reading group, or set up a mutual aid network.

On the flip side, some folks are so caught up on boots on the ground struggle that they do not feel the need to read theory or even scoff at the idea. Then those same people are surprised they hit their head against the wall repeatedly in their organizing efforts. But I think this is the minority of cases, I think most leftists have an issue with getting involved in the first place which is why I emphasize getting involved in political organizing first.

It is much more helpful for the aims of the left for leftists to be imperfectly involved rather than perfectly distracted.

Action Steps

After reading all of this your main takeaway should be two things if you aren’t already. If you are a leftist (NOT a liberal) then you should:

1. Get involved with left political organizations.

2. Read left political theory and history.

While I just simply said the two things leftists need to do, these two things are not easy.

How can you get involved with left political organizations?

First, I would use a search engine (Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, etc.) and look up local left organizations in your area.

What is a left organization? Any organization that upholds left ideologies such as socialism, anarchism, social democracy, and other deviations. This does NOT include liberal organizations. When I speak of ‘left,’ I am speaking about any political ideology to the left of liberalism.

Second, research the organization. Learn its values and mission and check whether it hosts events or meetings. The more information you can gather, the better you can decide whether this organization represents your interests. 

Keep in mind there is no such thing as a perfect organization. There are obvious red flags and exceptions such as sexual assault allegations within particular chapters of an organization making you not want to join that organization or chapter. At the same time, not going to a particular organization for petty reasons (i.e. the organization does not represent a particular ideology you hold) to delay getting politically involved serves your ego more than it does your community.

Third, try to attend a meeting or event. Typically, organizations and their chapters have websites and social media. If you don’t see clearly outlined instructions on how to join a meeting or event, reach out. Then you go to a meeting or that event.

Maybe come up with a short list of questions or concerns you had from gathering information. See what group members are saying, see if the group has any needs, see if any future events/meetings are coming up, and see if you can help in any capacity.

Fourth, if the organization seems like a good fit then get involved in events, go to more meetings, and see if you can provide anything. Maybe the organization needs to create flyers for an upcoming event and you have graphic design skills, so it makes sense to help them make the flyer.

Realize you are not married to a group and it is okay to disagree with group/organization decisions and actions. It is also okay to disagree on a theoretical and strategic level with fellow members of the organization. Going through this struggle within an organization will help in your political development and will put you above those who do not engage in this struggle.

How do you read political theory and history?

This section is less straightforward and a bit tricky. There are many things a leftist could read that comes from a variety of sources.

My orientation is more socialist and Marxist, so what I recommend as reading material will be biased from that perspective. I will suggest some readings that will help leftists generally as well as some resources leftists can use to read more.

From my perspective, I would read The Communist Manifesto by Marx and Engels, Principles of Communism by Friedrich Engels, What Is To Be Done? by Vladimir Lenin, Fascism and Social Revolution by R. Palme Dutt, and Blackshirts and Reds by Michael Parenti to start with.

Many of these writings can be found in the Marxist Internet Archive.

For leftists with more anarchist leaning then The Anarchist Library is a good source.

I want to acknowledge that reading books alone does not make one knowledgeable. The best way to gain knowledge from my perspective on these topics is to join a reading group. Organizations and reading groups for leftist political theory exist on college campuses, in community centers, and online.

I cannot, in good conscience, recommend any reading group in particular where you have to take the time to look into things yourself.

Reading groups are powerful and can help you build up your theoretical understanding. What helps me is taking and sharing notes with colleagues on agreed-upon readings and then taking time to talk about it with them.