The Majority Report with Sam Seder - 3666 - Can The Left Build Real Power Before It's Too Late? w/ Yotam Marom

Starting point is 00:00:00 The majority report with Sam Cedar. The destiny of America is always safer in the hands of the people than in the conference rooms of any elite. Sam Cedar. They are unanimous in their hate for me, and I welcome their hatred. We must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The majority report. with Sam Cedar. It is Monday.

Starting point is 00:00:43 June 15th, 2006. My name is Sam Cedar. This is the five-time award-winning majority report. We are broadcasting live steps from the industrially ravaged Gowanus Canal in the heartland of America, downtown Brooklyn, USA. On the program today, Yotam Maram, organizer, facilitator, writer whose new book for louder days, reaching beyond

Starting point is 00:01:12 a politics of powerlessness. Also on the program today, Trump finally capitulates U.S. and Iran strike a deal for a potential long-term end to the war and a reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. Meanwhile, Israel refuses to end its assault. occupation of Lebanon jeopardizing that said deal. G7 summit begins as our allies plan for a world with a completely rogue and unreliable U.S. Kirstarmer says Britain will ban under 16-year-olds from using social media. Mitch McConnell admitted to the hospital.

Starting point is 00:02:00 Sure, it's just a check-up. U.S. to lose its measles elimination status as a Utah outbreak. It's about to hit one years old. Trump now insists that the SAVE Act must be attached to the FISA renewal. DOJ okays the Paramount Warner Brothers merger. State AG still to have their say as well as European regulators. Trump's White House cage match a dud, but for a few Power Mount Plus members, and of course, they're owners. People like Trump, for instance, who own a part of the UFC.

Starting point is 00:02:47 Trump picks another one of his personal defense attorneys to the DOJ heading the Southern District of New York. And lastly, the Knicks. All this and more on today's majority. Report. It is New York. New York, New York. Anyway, casual Monday.

Starting point is 00:03:26 Some people have not stopped drinking. Nothing about that was casual. I made the sunglasses choice at the last minute. To have Mike Breen on the call, Patrick Ewing have this weight lifted off of him. You get Spike Lee to see it in real time before he passes. Clyde gets to see it all. Larry

Starting point is 00:03:48 David's gets to see it all. People will say that the spurs collapsed, but the Knicks came back down double-digit leads. They came back with all playoffs against the calves. Across the board, they were clutch. Jalen Brunson on another level mentally. Towns finished with the highest plus-minus in a single postseason in NBA history. O. G. Ananoby, relentless, bridges, efficient, workman-like, heart, energetic, passionate with

Starting point is 00:04:21 rebounding. Shout out to Jose Alvarado. Shout out to Mitchell Robinson. Shout out to Landry Shammit. Shout out to the whole bench. Everyone contributed. Fox and Castle were like four of 25. The Knicks are champions. So, yeah, that's all. So that's the UFC?

Starting point is 00:04:39 Is that the UFC you're talking? talking about. Well, there we go. Hey, thanks to joining us today, folks, and we'll see you tomorrow. People are asking if you're okay. So, Emma wanted to start with the Knicks.

Starting point is 00:05:02 We didn't pull a clip for the start of the Knicks, but now we've got that, there we go. My friend texted me that it sounds like you're making a case to a judge. And you know what? I won the case. I won the case. I'm off scoffrey, baby.

Starting point is 00:05:21 I'm going to what crime I'm being charged with. Loving my team and my city and the people in my life. Persecuted Knicks fan on the cross. No more. I am reborn. Were you all right? I'm done. Okay.

Starting point is 00:05:41 Or you get used to it once you get closer to 18 of them. Yeah, exactly. It starts to expect it. Yeah, it's true. It's true. No, this is fun. I remember back in the 1950s. The Jojo White era?

Starting point is 00:06:02 Yeah. Read Jojo. Bob Coosie, greatest ball handler all time. All right. Okay, let's get to some of the other news. The parade will be on Thursday. All right, let's go into this. So Donald Trump has announced,

Starting point is 00:06:27 and J.D. Vance has claimed that the United States has digitally signed an agreement with the Iranians. The Iranians, however, I mean, this is the only way that I even, are entertaining the belief that this is somewhat real that the Iranians have announced that they'll be assigning on Friday in Switzerland on this agreement still. I mean, we had an agreement once,

Starting point is 00:07:03 so it's hard to know what this is going to mean. But for the time being, it is good news. Here is Pete Hegsteth, just yesterday claiming that none of this was even necessary because we already controlled the strait of hormones. By the way, I think your viewers need to remember, Project Freedom never stopped, and we've run 125 million barrels of oil through the straits, and Iran couldn't do anything about it. How many ships from Iran have transit our blockade?

Starting point is 00:07:34 Zero, zero. We have controlled the straits this entire time. You're going to negotiate with them to immediately and gradually. it. So, okay. We've controlled it the entire time. We had nothing to negotiate with them except for we've negotiated it and now opened it up because, of course, the Iranians also had control of the straight of Hormuz. That's why Trump trothed out like that open the effing straight and threats to essentially annihilate Iran because we had controlled it the whole time. I totally bought into it. Jeremy Scahill over at Dropside had been reporting over the past couple of days that the Iranian negotiating team was meeting with a team of psychiatrists and psychologists, I should say, to give them a sense of how to approach Donald Trump.

Starting point is 00:08:30 And according to Scahill, the Iranians, without any sort of irony or, um, You know, contrary to their S posting on different sites, we're not relaying that this was their strategy as a way of owning Donald Trump, but rather that they believe that they're dealing with someone who has diminished mental capacities. And this was just the best way to get to a deal. And it seems to have worked. perhaps we could we could do something like that domestically too but that remains to be seen here is Donald Trump

Starting point is 00:09:12 yesterday at 430 announcing on truth social the deal with the Islamic Republic of Iran is now complete congratulations to all I hereby fully authorized the toll free opening of the straight of hormones

Starting point is 00:09:29 and simultaneously herewith authorized the immediate removal of the United States naval blockade ships of the world start your engines let the oil flow president donald j trump he's very happy about this they should give him a little outfit like the way that the nobel peace prize was given to him to make him think that he actually won the Nobel Peace Prize they should give him like a little toll booth outfit you are you get to control the straight of war moves that's right a ceremonial uh like toll gate that he can lift for himself

Starting point is 00:10:05 I also authorized the open of the straight yesterday, but nobody seems to be talking about that. And, you know, it's the, the objective truth of this. And while I hesitate to say it, and it's not like Donald Trump is watching this show and is going to be embarrassed. But this was a total failure in every imaginable way possible. of course with starting with the killing of thousands of Iranian civilians. God knows the implications of some of the early bombings, particularly the ones that blew up the petroleum facilities outside of Tehran. It was incredibly costly for the United States.

Starting point is 00:10:57 For those who are terribly concerned about our weapons arsenal, it was incredibly costly for our weapons arsenal, which we can be sure that we're going to be paying to rebuild in the coming years. And it has probably will have to see what the actual deal says, but we'll end up providing for Iran access to their billions of funds. I've seen reports up to $25 billion. it's their money, but from the perspective of supposedly the agenda of those who wanted to wage this war, it is a complete, utter beyond failure, even if it is legitimate for Iran to have access to

Starting point is 00:11:49 their money from the perspective of those who thought this was a good idea, total failure. and even from the perspective of keeping Iran from their nukes, here is Jonathan Carl reminding everybody, which we all knew from the very beginning. This is number two. We agree never to have or make a nuclear weapon. But there is nothing new about that. In fact, in the very first paragraph of the nuclear agreement

Starting point is 00:12:18 that was negotiated by President Obama more than a decade ago, Iran makes that promise. That was an agreement, of course, that President Trump tore up in his first term. All right, John, our thanks to you tonight. Now to the history. There you go. I mean, and I will say this, you know, kudos to ABC for adding the bare minimum context to all of this, which is the supposed goal of this war was to get us back to where we were in terms of Iran's nukes 10 years ago.

Starting point is 00:12:52 and we were only in this place where there was a fear that they were restarting a nuclear weapons program because Donald Trump had tore up the deal. I mean, so all of this, the inflation, the coming potential food crises around the world, the ongoing inflation that may come from the sort of like secondary products that come out of the Strait of Hormuz or products that are that use the products that come out of the Strait of Hormuz, all of this, a complete and utter waste of time. The only thing it did maybe was to get the Epstein files off the front page. And again, now they're in the front row at the UFC events.

Starting point is 00:13:44 Exactly. And, and again, you know, let's be clear. Who knows? I mean, I'm, you know, hesitant to even report that. stuff because there's no um i i you know because israel saying they're not they're publicly posturing saying we're totally independent of the united states the problem is that iran has held firm and strengthened its position as it relates to lebanon where it wants a cessation of israel's bombing of lebanon but additionally they can hold the line in negotiations to ask for a withdrawal of ground troops from southern lebanon which would be just another strengthening of iran's position and more that they would gain strategically

Starting point is 00:14:22 versus the U.S. and Israel than they would have prior to the war. And let's not forget, we also killed thousands of Iranians for nothing, including over 100 girls at that girl's school, kids at that girl's school, in Iran. And the environmental impact of the war,

Starting point is 00:14:44 we're emissuating our own population for this, but also the level of destabilization, and blood that has been spilled for this because of Trump's own ego. I mean, it's just astonishing. But let's hope that the deal holds and we're done with this, but time will tell. In a moment, we're going to be talking to Yotam Maram. He is an organizer, a facilitator, a writer of a new book entitled For Louder Days, Reaching Beyond a Politics of Powerlessness.

Starting point is 00:15:20 First, a couple words from our sponsors today. This episode is brought to you, of the majority report, brought to you by Wild grain. What is wild grain? It is fantastic. Wild grain is the first bake from frozen subscription box for artisanal breads, seasonal pastries, and fresh pastas. I don't care what box of food you have ever got.

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Starting point is 00:18:17 That's $30 off your first box. free croissants for life when you visit wildgrain.com slash majority or you can use the promo code majority at checkout. We started using rocket money. My sister first started using rocket money a while back and she's like, this is amazing. I can't believe how many subscriptions I have. And I went through the exact same thing. But I will say I have so many subscriptions over the course of so many years that I didn't pick up that was like charging me. The really sneaky ones are like half-year ones where you can, you know, you look back in your credit card

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Starting point is 00:19:20 And then once we've got me Rocket Money, I realize I've been paying for like probably 10 or 12 subsets that I've never read. Rocket money can track subscriptions and it has the ability to cancel unwanted ones within the app, literally with a few taps, you can save over, it's saved over users over $880 million in canceled subscriptions. The app will also consolidate a check. checking savings, loans, investments into a single dashboard to give you a clear view of your financial picture. It is fantastic. I will say like a lot of the models of these subscriptions

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Starting point is 00:20:31 RocketMoney.com slash majority. Quick break when we come back, Yotam Maram, organizer, facilitator, and author of For Louder Days Reaching Beyond a Politics of Powerlessness. We are back. Sam Cedar, Emma Vigland on The Majority Report. It's a pleasure to welcome to the program. Yotam Morome. He is an organizer, facilitator, author of For Louder Days,

Starting point is 00:21:11 reaching beyond a politics of powerlessness. We should also say one of the founders of a wildfire project, and I think this audience familiar with Joshua Con Russell, who we've had on the program for years and years, was a facilitator with wildfire. Tell us just, let's just start with what is wildfire, the wildfire project, just so that folks can get a notion of your background and from where you are writing this from. Sure. Well, first of all, thanks for having me. I'm a huge fan. Wildfire, okay, I mean, wildfire is in a bunch of transitions, but, but, but it, it, it, it's role basically was to facilitate and train movement organizations that were coming up.

Starting point is 00:21:57 I mean, it started at the sort of tail end of Occupy Wall Street, basically identifying that, okay, this was a huge moment. There's a lot of momentum happening, but our movements don't have a lot of infrastructure, don't have a lot of institutions. We need to train the organizations that were coming up in that time. Like Occupy Homes in Minnesota was like, you know, an organization that was supporting people to basically resist their foreclosures

Starting point is 00:22:25 by using direct actions. So we, you know, a bunch of organizations like that, and we were doing political education and group dynamic work and stuff like that. That's most of my work as a facilitator now is supporting movement groups through their strategizing and their sort of group stuff. Well, let's move in. I want to move into the book because I just want to give people an understanding because I don't sure, I mean, I'm not sure how widely people understand that there is an infrastructure for the infrastructure. And in many, in many, I mean, the book is about how to, in many ways, enhance the infrastructure and not necessarily the capital I infrastructure, but infrastructures that exist.

Starting point is 00:23:12 And it's also a, I think it's fair to call it like a part memoir. A lot of the, the lessons are filtered, or almost all of them are filtered through your personal experience and that of others in developing the infrastructure of the movement. And the premise of the book is what happens to a movement when members of that movement accept their powerlessness. Let's just start, though, before we get into that broad thing, let's start with Occupy Wall Street. for much of what's been going on today

Starting point is 00:23:54 Occupy Wall Street was sort of the the beginning of that. I mean, I remember pre-occupy Wall Street and I know you were involved in like the, you know, marching against the Iraq War and that movement was frustrating because it did not seem like it made a difference. how many millions of people were brought out there.

Starting point is 00:24:21 George W. Bush was like, I'm not, we're not running a focus group here, which is literally what he said. But talk about Occupy Wall Street. And you had a sort of almost a dry run of Occupy Wall Street in the weeks or I guess the months before. Just talk about that. And then let's get into what was both effective and problematic about Occupy Wall Street. Sure. Okay. Yeah, it is a fascinating time to be talking about Occupy Wall Street again. Like when I was writing the book, I was like, does anybody give a shit about Occupy Wall Street? And then, but yeah, there is this way that what we're seeing now is really only possible because of some of the stuff that happened there. So yeah, I was involved in, you know, student movement stuff leading up to Occupy Wall Street. And then part of a crew of people that had a street occupation called Bloombergville outside of City Hall to try to stop the budget cuts that Bloomberg was ramming through summer of 2000.

Starting point is 00:25:18 2011, like really brutal schools, hospitals, clinics, firefighters. I mean, just like kind of everything across the map. And it was, you know, a failure. Similar to how you're describing the anti-war movement, which of course was important. And it was what radicalized me and brought lots of people into the movement and did a lot of things, but it didn't stop the war. And, you know, I sort of came up in a movement that felt generally like

Starting point is 00:25:43 we were always going to be the underdogs. And we were never really going to win. and we were never really going to have power. And we can talk more about what that does to you when you feel that way and what it does to movements that feel that way. That's like what the book is about. But Occupy was this, because I was around in the lead-up to it, I ended up playing, you know, like a leadership role.

Starting point is 00:26:04 Don't tell anybody because we didn't have leaders, but, you know, a role there. And it was my first experience feeling powerful, first experience, like feeling that a movement could be popular. And, yeah, I mean, we can talk. talk about that also failed in all sorts of ways, but it also succeeded in a bunch of ways. I think the big successes of Occupy, you know, brought many thousands of people into the movement, trained lots of leaders, set up a bunch of organizations that exist today, like I think laid ground for kind of a decade of movement moments since then that all also learned from our

Starting point is 00:26:38 experiences in some ways doing things better than us. And I think, you know, the big thing is, this is what movements are often really good for is they change the common sense. sense. They might not win clear, tangible gains right away, but they change the public's common sense about something. And what Occupy Wall Street did was change the common sense about class. I mean, the frame of the 99% versus the 1% is like a pretty big contribution to American society's like conversation about politics. And you don't get like Bernie Sanders run without that shift. And I don't think you get a Zoran win without that kind of shift. Well, can you go ahead, Sam, then.

Starting point is 00:27:19 Well, I just want to say, like, in many ways, the chickens have come home to roost. I mean, and, you know, a 16-year arc in that respect. But the, and it's hard to sort of say, you know, with that knowledge and what you've just said in terms of, like, you know, what it did as almost like a training program, really in a networking event. I mean, it, it has taken a long time. It's initiated and also the messaging was huge. I mean, for five or six years, seven years, that 99% sort of, I guess, construct was employed by Sanders and Warren in particular, but others. But what was the, but there was also an absence of any other way to measure it because there wasn't necessarily an agenda. associated with it.

Starting point is 00:28:16 At the time, I felt like that's okay because, you know, it is getting a message out. But talk about the sort of like how the either lack of leadership or the allergy to leadership that created a sense that there was no leaders. I mean, it's confusing in that sort of like a little nexus. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I mean, I think all the things that made Occupy Wall Street, this magic. thing were also kind of its self-destruct mechanism. And the book is very much about this thing I call the politics of powerlessness,

Starting point is 00:28:53 which is this ambivalence about power, this kind of conflicted relationship that we have with power and leadership and identity and all this kind of stuff in our movements where, you know, for pretty good reason, we're suspicious of leaders. Like the leader usually is like the president that's dropping bombs on like a bunch of babies and these billionaires and the boss and all that stuff that we like kind of hate. And then we have this complicated dance that we do inside of our movements where we really don't want to replicate that. We often come to our movements to kind of escape a lot of the way the dominant society functions.

Starting point is 00:29:31 And then we do kind of dumb shit as a result. And so, you know, like we pretend. So at Occupy, we did it in a pretty extreme way where we said out loud. that there were no leaders and pretended that there were no leaders. And again, in some ways, that was a stroke of genius and magic. Because part of what movement moments are incredible about is they welcome people in and they let them just use their own agency and their own creativity to flourish. So, like, that's how you get this thing like Zuccotti Park,

Starting point is 00:30:01 which is just like a random park. And then suddenly there's thousands of people in this place. And then this person is a doctor, so he starts a medical clinic. And she's a librarian, so she starts a library. and there's food being distributed in their yoga class and this and that. People are just like doing, just doing, because nobody's in their way, and they're feeling, they feel inspired and moved and sort of transforming. But, yeah, when you pretend that there are no leaders,

Starting point is 00:30:25 then when obviously leaders do start to find their place and get connected with each other and start making decisions, there isn't any structure to hold them accountable, there isn't any way to intentionally train some leaders to sort of, level up. There isn't, there isn't, there isn't a way for us to grow. It's hard to make decisions. You can't really have a strategy if you don't have any, a way of sort of exercising leadership and direction. If you can't have a, if you don't have a strategy, then you're not going to win. Like if you don't, if you don't know how to say what winning is going to be, then you're

Starting point is 00:31:01 not going to get there. And that's another one of those things that's like, yeah, it was incredible to say we're not, we're not speaking in the same language that the, mainstream media wants us to speak about with, you know, the 10 demands that they're going to then make fun of. We're speaking beyond that. We're saying like we want a whole system transformation. And that's really entrancing. But like the trance goes away after a little while. And we never managed to convert that into something that was like durable enough to win something and get concessions from the opponent and like wield power. Right. Well, you said leader, you said leadership or direction and I had just written down leadership versus direction because that's I think something

Starting point is 00:31:43 interesting to look at with Occupy with Obama took a lot of the energy out of Occupy. He took a lot of energy out of the activists left more broadly that also you know it was a part of him winning but um not something he wanted to really be beholden to when he was governing and I think when you bring up Zoran Mamdani in this current moment of I would also say class conscious consciousness. The importance of winning political power is really, I guess, essential to underscore here, because that creates such a snowball momentum that now we're seeing Daryalisa's campaign, Claire Valdez's campaign, Democratic socialism as an electoral force in the state of New York is a real thing. And so that's where it's like, you know, sometimes I think there's this impulse with activists that are, you know, skeptical of things like hierarchy or that we've been so politically

Starting point is 00:32:44 disenfranchised on the left for so long that there's this inclination to abandon electoralism, as they say, altogether. But you see how once a win happens, how much more, how much easier it is for other electoral wins to happen,

Starting point is 00:33:01 but even if electoralism isn't your thing, that's the oxygen that it creates for activism to flourish as well. Mm-hmm. No, I think that's really right. I mean, I really think that the thing that I'm describing, that you're describing, this sort of like aversion to power and hierarchy and direction and all that stuff, like I think it comes from a feeling that we're not going to win anyway, which was certainly the feeling that I came up in the movement with.

Starting point is 00:33:28 I basically was in the movement as like, this is, I'm moved by this and it's the right thing to do. But I didn't think, like, it was like Bush too, and it was like surveillance state and flags everywhere. Like, it really felt like, oh, this is like 1984. We're never going to win. Like, this is what we have to do, but we're not going to be powerful. And if you don't think you're going to be powerful, if you don't think you're going to win, then there's a lot of stuff that's easier to not do, like the really hard work of crafting

Starting point is 00:33:56 a strategy because crafting a strategy really means making hard choices and saying no to most of your options so that you can say a really strong yes to something that you really have leverage about. It's easier not to tell the truth inside our, our groups because our groups are kind of, they're special to us and we don't want to hurt each other. But if you don't tell the truth, then you can't have a good strategy and also like all the sort of like identity relationships. And, you know, that these, like we, we end up having sort of like small-minded, internally focused groups. These are all, I think, reactions to a feeling

Starting point is 00:34:28 that we're not going to win. But as soon as you feel like you are going to win or you could win, there's potential to win. And that's what I think what you're describing right now. We have this feeling of like, oh, we could, like we could win. We could win things. Maybe not the whole thing all at once or whatever, but we can, we can win things. Then suddenly, like, you know, you get that same feeling that you get in the beginning of a movement moment, which is, like, I want to grab everything I could possibly grab to throw at this thing. Like, you know, a movement that doesn't think it's going to win, it doesn't really work that hard to recruit everyday people into it because that's hard and

Starting point is 00:35:01 complicated. And, like, it's more uncomfortable to stay, like, kind of in our in-group. But a movement that thinks it might win, it grabs any. anybody and everybody. It wants everybody to be a part of it. It knocks on every door. And that is a winning movement. So like you're saying, the sort of winning generates the kind of political orientation to power and losing generates the orientation to powerlessness. I want to talk just a little bit more about that powerlessness before we go through some of the examples you give of how you get out of how you correct the implications of that feeling. of powerlessness.

Starting point is 00:35:41 But talk just a little bit more specifically about that powerlessness, essentially, if you can't win the greater fight, you end up looking for smaller fights that are more often than not within the context of the movement itself. And just talk about that path that too often happens. Yeah. I think the thing is people really actually hate feeling powerless. And so if we don't believe we can win, because our opponent is enormous and vicious and violent, because climate change, because of like, just like if we're really, you know, sort of fear and despair, then we want to exercise our power on the things we have control over, and that tends to be our spaces. So then suddenly we turn away from, like, our opponent, we turn away from the public that we're supposed to be organized and we turn in towards each other.

Starting point is 00:36:38 other and often against each other. And, you know, so then how can, so we, you know, if, if we're too far away from the enemy to really, like, do them any real damage, they don't even really know we exist. They don't really give a shit about us. That's how we often feel in our, in our movements and down moments. Then we find enemies in the room instead. We find enemies in each other. Sometimes enemies in ourselves, like, you know, the way we sort of, yeah. So that can look like attacking our leaders. It can look like internal conflicts about identity. It can look like sort of litmus tests for, you know, in a lot of spaces, spaces that want to grow, movements that are healthy.

Starting point is 00:37:19 Like we were saying before, like they want to recruit people. What they do is, and I have like a story about this in the book that's actually about my like pickup softball league. You know, spaces that don't feel threatened, they welcome you. They have a sense that you're joining, like, your joining is what's going to lead to transformation, not the other way around. Movements that are in a small-minded, scared posture. What they do is they expect you to be perfect before you can join. And that's like, you know, most people, nobody's, nobody's perfect. So then our movements end up being pretty small and on the margins, and they feel that way.

Starting point is 00:38:04 they feel marginal. And so, yeah, anyway, I guess what I'm saying is when we feel, when we feel powerless, we actually hate that feeling. And so we look for feelings of power, but inside of our movements where we actually are big enough to do things. Well, and also I would imagine that the structure, the lack of hierarchy sometimes and the lack of structure can also mean that it acts more like group therapy or, you know, like a validation of one's own like emotional response to injustice which is valid in and of itself

Starting point is 00:38:41 but it is like you're on an elliptical as opposed to hiking a mountain yeah i think that's i think that's right i mean i think all these things they come from somewhere pretty understandable like we want to feel a sense of belonging inside movements it makes sense that we want that um and it movements that are only focused on themselves and each other and how it feels to be in the space, they're, first of all, clearly they don't win because they're not really paying attention to what's outside themselves, but they also don't feel that great ultimately. Like groups that don't have momentum and they're not looking outside together, they don't end up actually offering real belonging in the long run.

Starting point is 00:39:18 People don't, don't, most people don't want that. They don't want small and self-referential. Tell us the story of, and then that's just like tracking, the book, that premise, you then give us examples of how you deal with the problem associated with that feeling of powerlessness. You start with the idea of being able to be truthful in the context of an organization in terms of just like how you're going to maintain and develop a strategy. Use the example of a, or one of them, of a tenant. organization in Queens and in Chinatown, exactly.

Starting point is 00:40:08 And it tells us about that, because a lot of that energy ends up years later showing up in the context of DSA and in the Mamdani Kim. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I mean, so again, sort of connected to what we're just talking about belonging. if our groups are primarily for us to feel good and safe, they're a place for us to be because we don't really think we're going to win anyway, then we end up being pretty conflict avoidant because we think that the way to kind of maintain this little family

Starting point is 00:40:41 is to avoid hard things. And that is kind of a death sentence to strategy because strategy really requires like getting to the bottom of something, being really honest about our opponent, about ourselves, not what we wish we were and how good we wish we were and what we wish we could be, but really what we are, what, like, usually very small piece of leverage we have against our opponent

Starting point is 00:41:03 and what is true about this moment. And it usually requires being in conflict with each other and being able to make one choice over a bunch of other options. And so, you know, organizations that are kind of riddled with a feeling of powerlessness don't have the incentive to have that hard conflict with each other because they don't think they're going to win anyway. But organizations that are really interested in power that are like, No, we have to do this either because they're clear about what it means for them to survive

Starting point is 00:41:32 or because they think there's really potential. Then they start to move towards conflict and they start telling the truth to each other. And they start telling the truth about strategy and they can make hard choices about it. But they also start telling the truth about other stuff, about their internal dynamics, about how they deal with identity, about how they deal with belonging, all that other stuff. And they become healthier organizations that can actually win stuff. So the story in the book is about this organization called CAV, which organizes Chinese and Bengali tenants in New York, Chinatown, and in Queens, and they're expanding.

Starting point is 00:42:00 And, you know, the scene, you know, the book is very much made, like you said, of stories. My story is being in the movement, stories of being a facilitator and being alongside these, like, kind of, you know, incredible organizations. And this story is, you know, we're having a retreat years ago, I don't know, five, seven years ago, strategy retreat where something's not clicking in their strategies, just not panning out. They don't think they're going to win the campaigns that they're in the middle of. and we're adjusting.

Starting point is 00:42:28 And basically they make a decision, a hard decision through some conflict and some acknowledgement of loss. They make a hard decision to prioritize in one place over a bunch of other places. And it's hard for them to do it because they have to basically say, okay, we're going to give up this campaign. We're in the middle of that. It means we're going to give up these tenants that we're organized. We're going to have to go over there and tell them, like,

Starting point is 00:42:49 we're not going to win this campaign and we're actually going to move our resources elsewhere. Like, just hard stuff. And there's a moment in this retreat. where a person, where there's sort of there's doubt of should we do this or not. And one of the people says, no, we absolutely have to cut this and we have to make this choice. And the person who's saying it is a person who is likely to lose her organizing job because of it, this kind of brave moment of like, no, we have to make the hard choice for the sake of the strategy. And they make that decision.

Starting point is 00:43:18 And, you know, in some ways that I chart out in the strategy, like it's sort of like clicks over time and adds up to, you know, in a pretty direct way, adds up to their sister organization, Cav, voice, being one of the very first endorsers of Zoran Mamdani, like really before that took off. And they became like a pretty central part of organizing Zoran's Bengali base and Chinese base alongside a bunch of organizations like Drum and DSA. Tell us what's the fear in that. I mean, because it's another way of saying, like, you know,

Starting point is 00:43:50 a person's got to know or an organization's got to know their limitations. And once they can sort of like confront their own limitations, they're able to deploy their resources in a way that provides the biggest opportunity to win. And that win creates a momentum and you can start to expand, etc., etc. What's the fears, though, when you start to get down and make it like a more, you know, there's humans and there's groups and there's people like who, you don't want to let down. You don't want that group to feel abandoned.

Starting point is 00:44:28 And also the fear of like the implications of abandoning that, you know, that fight. Absolutely. I mean, I think, yeah, I think often it's fear of loss. Like if we're going to, if we're going to make a choice, then we're going to have. This is true just in life, right? It's like if you're going to make choices in your life and then you're going to give up on a bunch of other versions of your life, you know. And in our movements, we like to, you know, because. Because everything feels so dire, like we're in it to, like, God, we're facing like real, like, potential

Starting point is 00:44:58 like extinction of our species. It's like a pretty serious thing. It's hard to say no to any of these big things we got to do. And it's also hard to say no to each other. Again, because so much of our life in these organizations is also about our own fulfillment and our own connection to each other. So often people, the way people make a strategy is like, okay, well, this person wants to do this and this person wants to do this and this person wants to do this.

Starting point is 00:45:20 So the strategy will be this plus this. plus this, but that's not a strategy. That's just a list of shit. Like a lot of our organizations, really, they just have like lists of stuff that we want to do or things we believe in or values or visions or mission statements. I've written a bunch of these things myself, like just over the years, like fluff,

Starting point is 00:45:37 like stuff that doesn't have a choice baked into it. Because the choice is hard, because if we choose one of those three things, then like maybe two of these people are going to leave. And maybe the group will collapse, and that's where I find meaning. And maybe these people who, you know, in this at these projects and queens like they're going to be upset and also they need us and like

Starting point is 00:45:55 how how could we you know and but but there's this when you have an orientation to power then you you start to say okay like but that we have to do we have to narrow because that's the only way we can actually win and that's more important than us sort of appeasing each other feeling good or you know but yeah there's a lot of risks there's also risks you know with funders disappointing our funders, disappointing our partners, all these sort of pressures to stay on the surface, to kind of bullshit each other, you know? I can't help but think, I mean, I, you know, throughout the book, like, I'm reminded and it, it doesn't, it was not, I didn't learn of this phrase in the context of social movements,

Starting point is 00:46:41 but rather sort of like the democratic establishment, the iron law of institutions where people will um would rather be in you know come in second but maintain their uh authority within a group than to you know come in first and maybe at the expense of their own sort of rank and this cuts that sort of idea it's a little bit different in the context of this but but it's a similar impetus people may be more generous in terms of like rather it's not just about my rank per se, but it's about my feeling like we're helping these people and these people don't feel like they're alone, even though we can't win in this fight if we, you know, spread our resources too thin. But let's talk about rank and power and leadership. There's an

Starting point is 00:47:34 allergy just tied, I think, on some level to the ideological underpinnings of a lot of these social movements, which is more participatory. making things more democratic, which if you follow down that path becomes like there is no leader. We just, we vote on every single thing. But that is, it's very hard to get stuff done in that way. But talk about that, those pitfalls. Yeah. Well, I mean, I think the thing is that, you know, so the concept that I talk about in the book is rank,

Starting point is 00:48:12 but it really just means like power, who has power in the group to make a thing happen. And, you know, the thing that we often don't like to admit in our movements is that everybody has rank. Everybody ranks. Every group has some kind of rank system, whether they admit it or not. It makes sense in our movements that we want to be more participatory and we want to be more democratic. We want to sort of embody the values of the world we want more. It makes sense, especially because we come from a really hierarchical society that's like hurt a lot of us and isn't the society that we want to recreate. So it makes sense.

Starting point is 00:48:44 but often what ends up happening then is we want to blur the lines we don't want to talk about who's in charge in part because it's like we don't want to we don't it's a it's part of that conflict avoidance that we have in our groups on a bunch of levels so one of the things we like to avoid conflict about is power i mean it's like power is just so fundamental to our lives it's so it's so like tied up with our value our own sense of our self-worth and and obviously like the ability of the project to do anything. So what often happens is we pretend we don't have leaders or we acknowledge that we have leaders, but like, that's not really how we run things.

Starting point is 00:49:25 Like, yeah, there's an org chart, there's an ED, but like really we're all kind of like in it together. And again, it makes sense why we do that. But once we start doing that, things get, it's way worse. It's way worse to be in an environment where people are not honest about the power dynamics than one in which people are honest about them. When you start being honest, I mean, a lot of my work as a facilitator is with groups,

Starting point is 00:49:47 basically supporting them to tell the truth about what's actually happening in their organizations. Sometimes that's about strategy, and sometimes it's about leadership and power. And as soon as they start telling the truth about it, they have so many more tools. Often what's actually happening is the power dynamics are good. They just are being buried.

Starting point is 00:50:05 And as soon as they start talking about them, they're like, oh, this is actually like fairly healthy. But now that we're talking about it, I can give you feedback and you can give me feedback, and we can actually make adjustments. We can build structures around it. We can make choices about our leadership structure. We can support lower ranking people to increase their rank. We can, you know, all that kind of stuff that when you're pretending that there isn't, that there aren't power dynamics in your group, you can't do that. You can't have those conversations about anything. You can't really make any choices about any of it. Let's talk about identity, because that also gets into, and one of the sort of the, sort of, over the past 16 years.

Starting point is 00:50:42 I mean, if we're going to peg it to Occupy, has been the, I mean, there's been real sort of like emancipatory movements that have had success, like marriage equality. And we had the largest protests in the history of the country in 2020 for BLM. But there's also been sort of a backlash or a competing, there's always been sort of a competing, I think, sort of like a sense within similarly aligned ideological spaces to the extent that they are, and there is quite a bit overlap.

Starting point is 00:51:21 There's certainly, you know, some identity politics that we call that are sort of co-opted and used for other purposes. But where does identity play within the context of movements, which they're fundamental. premises, we can't do this as individuals. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean, I think, again, it kind of breaks down in whether our groups and our movements have an orientation towards power or powerlessness. And organizations and movements that have an orientation towards power, they see identity as like a contribution to our movements in the sense that they can help us understand how systems function and who they fuck over and who they exploit and how we can support people from marginalized identities to

Starting point is 00:52:13 like take leadership in the in in the unraveling of the system and all that kind of stuff movements that are feel that feel powerless that don't really think they're going to win that are afraid of the enemy uh they tend to use identity as a way to bludgeon each other um and so you know i've been i have been bludgeoned and also been a bludgeoner um like when a movement is in contraction it tend like we're talking about before like you don't want to feel powerless so you use you look for where you can exercise power in the space identity is often like a channel through which we do that and you know it cuts every which way in the story that I tell in the book like one of the sort of main arcs of that chapter is about me as a leader in an organization you know tokenizing a woman of color who I

Starting point is 00:53:02 worked with very closely and her eventually sort of pushing back and breaking our relationship and it taking me years to understand why and learn that. And, you know, I did, I did hurt her and I hurt the project. And like, that's real stuff that a focus on identity can like help us fix. We should be better in our movements and our movements should be liberatory for all people, including people who are especially targeted by the system or maybe most. And, like, I, I've also been in movements where because of this feeling of powerlessness, I was, I got the message that because I'm a white dude, I should actually minimize myself.

Starting point is 00:53:48 That the biggest contribution I could make to our groups is to kind of disappear because in some way I was like a conduit for the enemy. And that is a losing movement because, like, yeah, a multiracial working class movement is going to include everybody, including white dudes. And like you said in the very beginning, like, we're not going to do this alone. That's actually mass movements are, they're complicated, and they're going to need to include everybody. And so if we're walking around in our movements, making people feel like they shouldn't be here,

Starting point is 00:54:19 then we're going to lose. Is it the difficulty in that, and specifically in terms of when it comes to white dudes, the the challenge is how like how much does um uh white dudes for lack of bad term um uh position in society implicate how much power they should have within a group it in so far as that like you know you're that's the the tough part right it's not just like just in and of itself it is fine to say like everybody you know we should all be equal here that is the idea but we're not doing this in a vacuum uh the implications of of you know when we all leave uh our meeting room we're all going to have a very different experience and you know statistically speaking we can make some presumptions as

Starting point is 00:55:11 to what those experiences are going to be we'll walk out the door yeah you know and i'm thinking in the context of i mean this is more sort of electoral but there's a broader you know sort of sense of like we've got to accept a certain amount of bro culture or whatever it is. But it ends up, I mean, it has to be constantly monitor, doesn't on some level. Yeah, I think so. I mean, I think, look, I also think different groups can have different cultures and different movement moments have different sort of like appeals. That's also okay.

Starting point is 00:55:47 But yeah, I mean, I think that's kind of where I started with identity. on a good day with the right orientation, like identity politics are a huge contribution. They can really show us. Identity doesn't determine how we behave, but it is a pretty good lens through which to see things alongside a bunch of other lenses. And yeah, often, like, as a white dude,

Starting point is 00:56:15 I have definitely perpetuated, like, a lot of the sort of, white supremacist patriarchal values that the system put in me. Like, it wanted me to do that. It trained me to do that. It takes a lot of work to untrain yourself. We make a lot of mistakes and all that. And I needed, like, people to challenge me and give me feedback and hold me accountable. And that's what groups are good for.

Starting point is 00:56:37 That's why we should all be part of groups, because that's where you get feedback. That's how you transform. That's the vehicle for which you can make change in the world. It's also the way where you can find connection with other people and, like, dignity and belonging and all that kind of stuff that people really yearn for. And yeah, so like a lot of my work as a facilitator, even though I have this, you know, I clearly have this like position about what it means to what I, how how identity politics can, like, turn us in against each other or towards each other. But really a lot of my work as a facilitator supporting groups to like talk honestly about their identity or whatever. So like I really agree with what you're saying.

Starting point is 00:57:15 Yeah, we actually, this is the thing we need to be intentional about for sure. Well, it's so important to emphasize this because there's this impulse, I think, right now, where it's like, stay away from what is called the culture war stuff or stay away with so-called identity politics, which, you know, like, I think any real movement includes an acknowledgment of difference, and a multiracial coalition that acknowledges that difference is much more durable than one that says, hey, you can maybe be a part of our group, but don't bring up like your trans crap. I don't want to hear that or like your your issues with systemic racism. It's just a very different orientation.

Starting point is 00:57:59 And I mean, I would include white women in this as well who also are privileged in in spaces like this. It's also an acknowledgement of who gets to participate in activism or who has the ability often to participate. in activism because maybe they have fewer financial burdens or had an easier upbringing, that that acknowledgement of difference also allows for the movement to be stronger because it makes it so that those same hierarchies aren't replicated. I think that's right. Let's talk about belonging because I think this is also, it's fascinating because these movements are, we have a big problem, I think, in our society writ large,

Starting point is 00:58:45 with the idea of we no longer have the sort of institutions in some ways of where people can join. We have, you know, famously, I think sort of we've lost the third spaces in many respects. The Internet and technology has sort of atomized us. And so these movements both provide belonging, but that can't be the ends of it. That is a means, right? You talk about that sort of dilemma or paradox? Yeah, absolutely.

Starting point is 00:59:20 So, I mean, where you're starting is absolutely right. I mean, also the right has gone to war against our, like, civil society. So, like, people are just generally part of fewer institutions and neighborhood associations and whatever. And also people are less religious and people, you know, there's like a lot of, a lot of, and the internet, whatever, everything you said. And so people are looking for connection and belonging. And some people find it in our movements. And that makes sense. It makes sense to look for that and want that.

Starting point is 00:59:49 I want that. Like really a lot of my belonging is in the movement. I mean, this whole book is like a love letter to the movement because it's like my, in a way, my home, you know. And that makes sense. But again, movements that don't have an orientation, movements and groups that don't have an orientation towards power, they then start to use that drive for belonging. It stops there.

Starting point is 01:00:12 and we start to feel like the most important thing is our feeling and sense of belonging and safety and connection inside our spaces. A movement that's healthy that's interested in power, it understands that people do need to feel connected and belonging, and our spaces do need to feel healthy. But real actual belonging and dignity and connection, and not to mention survival in our society, is going to happen because we can build mass movements

Starting point is 01:00:39 that actually win shit from our opponent. and change the system. And so that the belonging that we want in our movements is important, but part of a bigger thing, that we're only really going to feel that feeling. We're only going to really get the fruits of that in a society that is transformed, not in our little spaces. And so, you know, movements that feel that way and think that way,

Starting point is 01:01:06 they welcome you because they want to be big. And that's complicated in hard work. some movements that don't believe they can win don't do that. So much of the book, it feels like it also and could apply to almost just like a relationship. Like there's a, so much of we're talking about like this truthfulness

Starting point is 01:01:34 and this awareness of like what my limitations might be in the context of this relationship and boundaries for, you know, to use a more hip term, I guess. But and you tie it up at the end about love with the parenthetical at the risk of seeming ridiculous. And this is like where, you know, for me personally, a lot of the, like the, and I've grown in the context over the years to sort of like appreciate all of these dynamics, I think sort of just in my interpersonal relationships. But talk about how a love, how you can, you know, talk about love in the context of the social movement and also it not be sound ridiculous. And maybe like, let's just start with why it might sound ridiculous to people.

Starting point is 01:02:26 Well, I mean, it sounds so it's a borrowing from a check quote where he's like at the risk of seeming ridiculous. So you're like, even like the most baller revolutionary in history has to like caveat anything he wants to say about love. because it feels squishy and kind of soft, you know, and like we want to be, you know, we want to win things. We want to feel powerful where, you know, we're hard-nosed. We talk strategy, political parties and whatever. And, you know, so it makes sense to, I felt very like, I didn't, when I started writing that chapter, I didn't really know I was writing a chapter about love. I thought I was writing a chapter about the way the movement split after October 7th

Starting point is 01:03:04 and what we can learn from that. And I think there's like some juicy stuff. in there. But it ended up, but through the writing of it, I ended up realizing like, oh, yeah, that's actually, what I'm talking about is, I mean, there's a couple of things to say about love. One is, I think that when you love something, you take responsibility for it. And we often in our society think about love as this like kind of, you know, Hollywood Disney-esque, like, bullshit where there's like this like arrow from Cupid and then you like swoon for each other. And then the story ends. But really, like, most of our relationships, actually, that's only the beginning.

Starting point is 01:03:37 beginning of it. And like having long-term relationships often means making a choice to struggle with somebody forever or for however long. Or with a sports team, for example. Or with the sports team or with your movement, you know? Yes, big week for us to be struggling with our, yeah. And so, like when we, when we decide to love something or someone, then we tell it the truth. We tell the truth about ourselves. We tell it the truth about itself. I mean, that's the sort of like really opening premise of the book. And then I think where it ends up, kind of where you're, where you're landing, Sam, is like, often in our movements and in our lives in general, we make the choice to turn away from each other because it's simpler and it feels easier. And what I'm encouraging us

Starting point is 01:04:28 to do is to always turn towards each other. And like really it connects back to the same kind of like refrain of almost every chapter is like, look, you want this to be different? We really just have to learn how to tell the truth. You want better strategy? We have to learn how to tell the truth. You want healthier dynamics around rank and leadership and power? We have to tell the truth. You want to talk seriously about identity? We have to tell the truth. Like all this kind of stuff. And so the turning towards each other rather than away from each other is like an act of love. And it's complicated and it's scary. And we think we might be better up if we don't do it. But really, if we don't do it, we stay on the surface.

Starting point is 01:05:03 instead of going deeper. Why, I mean, and why is it, why is it, in your opinion that the right, despite having none of these attributes? Like, just like honestly, like, it just sort of, I just, you know, my experience with like the, the, the people on the right who fight these fights are so far off the scale of dysfunction. and yet they are successful in a lot of their agenda. It's the difference in agendas, isn't it? Yeah, I mean, I think part of it is like we have really completely different projects and their project doesn't rely on like us being collectively strong, right? It relies on on violence being exercised on, you know, a handful of billionaires,

Starting point is 01:05:54 you know, making choices and stuff like that. And, you know, we live in a society that's, yeah, like, it's hard for all of us to kind of recognize our agency that really if we took our agency away from the system, it would collapse. But there are lots of reasons why we don't do that. And so their project is just easier than ours. But I also think, listen, I mean, they're much more strategic than us. Like they make 40-year plans that are coming to fruition, you know, that we see the results of them now of them basically, like running the courts. That's like part of the 40-year arc.

Starting point is 01:06:23 They made choices about where to prioritize. And they got rich people to put money in those choices. choices. And that's one thing. And I think, you know, I don't think that people long-term feel the kind of belonging that we're, I think, hoping for and describing in right-wing movements, but they do have often shorter, simpler entryways for people than our movements do. And what do you mean by that, explain that concept? Yeah, like, like evangelical churches often, are, you know, these are enormous institutions, right? And part of the reason that they're enormous is that people there really want you to join.

Starting point is 01:07:08 They don't expect you to be perfect before you join. They trust the power of their institution to transform you once you stay. And so that's part of the promise. On some level, the, like, the entry is like, the more effed up you are, the better because we fix you. That's our job. So they give you a big parking lot and they give you child care and they give you bingo night

Starting point is 01:07:30 and they give you like the reading club and they give you the sermon and they give you all these things they offer you all these different ways to connect and feel part of a thing to feel that belonging and the belonging leads to purpose and as opposed to what often we do in our movements

Starting point is 01:07:46 not always but often what we do in our movements is the opposite. It's like you have to prove that you are down and then you can join and also you're always on thin ice You can always get called out and we can always turn on each other and the group can always implode. But movements that are interested in power, you know, like the canvases that are leading to these Democratic Socialist victories, they're like, we're going to knock on every fucking door and we're going to get everybody to knock on every door with us. And we're going to give you a pin to show, to make you feel awesome about how you were there. And then we're going to, you know, all these things that make it feel that make you feel connected and feel inspired and invigorated and want to be a part of a thing.

Starting point is 01:08:22 And over time, people, you know, if we do our work right, over time, people, people, you know, people develop more politically and they get, they, they join like long-term institutions like DSA or these other community organizations or or workplace, you know, unions, neighborhood organizations, you know. Who is this book for? Like, I mean, because I'm in, because obviously if I'm running an organization or I'm in the leadership of an organization, if I haven't worked with you or folks in your orbit, I, I obviously I want to read this.

Starting point is 01:08:57 I mean, it's also, I mean, I imagine, too, for folks who are looking to organize across the country, whatever it is, the people in your building because of tenant issues or, you know, there's a lamp post down the street that is a problem and the kids can't play at night. It's out. All of this be incredibly helpful.

Starting point is 01:09:17 What about somebody who's like, I don't want to lead anything? Like I want to, I want to be a partisan, something, but I'm going to lead it. Do I, how would this information help me? Yeah. It's a great question. I mean, look, you said earlier that a lot of this is really just about relationships. And I think that's true. I mean, I've gotten, like, I do think that there are some, like, really pretty specific, useful lessons for people in movements and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and and

Starting point is 01:09:47 things long term. But I also think that like, um, yeah, there's stuff in here because it's all about stories and it's all just I mean some of the stories are are are like, like I said like from my pickup softball leading from my relationship with my with my with my wife and my kids like they're there are like characters in the story and it's really all about us sort of like growing and transforming and I think it's relevant to anybody, certainly anybody who's near movements who cares about the world who wants things to be better. I mean, I got some feedback from, I'm getting a lot of feedback from people who are

Starting point is 01:10:22 starting to read the book now. And like they're saying, first of all, it reads, they're saying it reads like a novel, which I didn't say. I will, I will confirm. I appreciate that. And I'm like, that's a fucking great compliment. And that people are feeling moved, like emotionally moved by it. And I also know some people who are like not, you know, in the dead center of movements who are reading the book. And what they were like is like what one of them totally was like, yeah, this rank shit. Like that's totally happening in my workplace, not movement. You know, these are just like dynamics that groups have, you know. And the groups that I care about the most are the ones that are, you know, driving movements to transform society.

Starting point is 01:11:00 But I think like, yeah, I think there's something. Well, cults are like the inverse of this or religious fundamentalism. this is the theme is the need of for belonging and like kind of creating a community around that need for belonging and and I just think under capitalism in particular we're so atomized we're so told that the way for us to kind of express our individuality or our need for purpose is through consumption or purchases or even some more liberal forms of protest are about boycotting, which has its place, but the power of a group with a sense of belonging that's moving to a broader purpose that it's not insular, like a cult would be, which is to bring everybody in and isolate. A group with a purpose that is about bringing change

Starting point is 01:11:59 and pushing it outward, and having an external goal as opposed to an internal one is what makes, that's what makes political movements powerful. Yeah, totally. Yeah. Let me ask you just lastly. Like, electoral politics, obviously, it's not, what is the relationship from, like, the movement?

Starting point is 01:12:24 Are they just two separate tracks? Or is there a, like, what should the dynamic? What should we be looking for? in our elected leaders, and maybe on some level, this is just about applying that sort of truth meter, like what they can and cannot do, and so that we have a sense of what expectations should be, or what?

Starting point is 01:12:49 I like that idea. I hadn't thought of that. The sort of demanding the truth from them. In this sort of like division of labor, you know? I think, look, I think the sort of like electoral, I do think that these are like parts of a movement together, the sort of like street protests and the organizing at the doors and the canvas to the electives and the elected officials and all that stuff, I think these are like part of an ecosystem together. I think, you know, healthy movements understand that different organizations and parts of the ecosystem have different roles to play.

Starting point is 01:13:23 And yeah, I'm like super psyched about like what's happening in New York and Zoran and like this sort of like DSA wave and I'm a DSA member and like a, you know, I'm like a fan boy and whatever. and I think, and also, like, most of my role is not there. Most of my role is in sort of movement organizations that are after sort of either material gains and concessions from, like, opponents or these kind of big movement moments that are meant to sort of change the weather. But those things are all, all have, like, a symbiotic relationship. And I think, I think, you know, people who do electoral politics in a way that I subscribe to understand that connection, too.

Starting point is 01:14:02 They understand, like, yeah, you don't do it. get. You don't get a Zoran without movements laying the ground for that. And you also don't definitely don't win this agenda without movements in the streets fighting the opponents to that agenda, these billionaires. Like the electoral machine on its own, especially not at this young stage of the left having some amount of power, it does not win agendas on its own. Like, I think he's amazing. I think this administration is amazing. And like, there's no way we, we, we could win the agenda that he's describing just from inside city hall. Like, that's going to take movements of people fighting the billionaires who are dead set

Starting point is 01:14:43 on not giving us that agenda. And they're going to use politics, and they're going to use money in politics, but they'll also use, like, guns and tanks if they have to. Like, at the end of the day, that's like what history shows us. And so we actually need movements of people as what get us these electoral wins in a long arc. the electoral wins then sort of like are able to actually wield some of the power and take take and wield some of the power in a way that movements often can't do and then movements are what you know paved the way for winning and and you know in a in a relationship with that with with with an electoral movement

Starting point is 01:15:20 that is looking forward looking looking constantly feeling like I think these this electoral um drive on the left will be successful if we see ourselves as ascendant and in process and in conflict, we're always campaigning for more, as opposed to we won some things and let's like circle around it and collect our gains, which are going to be really meager right now. We're actually at the very beginning of a big fight, you know. All right, let me put my own parenthetical at the risk of being a little navel-gazy. From the perspective of like, you know, if politicians from a movement, perspective are sort of assets, you know, at different times. And from a politician's perspective,

Starting point is 01:16:06 it's important to have a movement behind you so that you can legislatively or executively deliver on this. Where to like people like us in, you know, a closet that is sometimes air-conditioned, talking to microphones, like, where is the value that we can add within the context of of this of this ecosystem. You want me to tell me, you want me to tell you how great you are? I'll take that. Oh, please.

Starting point is 01:16:38 No, but honestly, like, you know, I mean, the ideas that we're, we're always trying to improve. And I imagine, like, just even, there are lessons that I think we try and do here. Like, what are the limitations of what we can do? That's very important for us to understand before we can do anything that's decent.

Starting point is 01:16:54 But what, like, what role should this, and I don't mean just this show, but this space that we weirdly operate in because there hasn't really been there's been analogs, but there hasn't been a situation where the means of communication

Starting point is 01:17:14 have been so democratized despite the fact that like, you know, Twitter is now owned by a billionaire and every other TV. But like, we have no bosses here. Right. Brian does. But I don't. I have the best boss in the world.

Starting point is 01:17:32 I technically have a boss, but soon it will be me. We don't have the constraints that, you know, we have the ability to reach a decent amount of people without the constraints that historically have been levied upon us. Outside of like, how do we both deliver a message and retain an audience just based upon what the audience was? here. Yeah. Well, it's an awesome question. I mean, I think it's above my pay grade, but, but, uh, because you're the experts in your,

Starting point is 01:18:07 in your line. And I think, again, like, these are part of a big ecosystem together and like this, this show, this sort of what you're describing as like a, you know, a sector, really, like, of sort of media in the hands of people. I think it's part of the movement. I think, you know, I think, you know, I think, you know, similarly. to how movements are often, what they're good for is changing the common sense. I mean, I think that is a big part of the job of sort of, I don't know, if you consider

Starting point is 01:18:36 yourself independent media, if that's like the, you know, a fair terminology or whatever. I think there's something else that's coming up for me just because you're asking, I haven't really thought about it, but sort of in the context of the book, like the, you know, like I say over and over again in the book and in every story, like ultimately it comes down to being able and willing to tell the truth. And I think that's a big role for our media is. to tell the truth, to tell us the truth, to force us to tell the truth to each other, and to go a level deeper. It's like once we start telling the truth about stuff, we can make good choices

Starting point is 01:19:12 about all sorts of things. And in the book, those things are, in our movements, those things are strategy and belonging and whatever else. But there's a lot of things we have to learn how to tell the truth about. So I think that's a big job you have. Good time. Marom. The book is for louder days reaching beyond a politics of powerlessness. We will put a link to that. Real pleasure. Thanks so much for coming on. Appreciate the work you've been doing and thanks so much for joining us. Thank you. Thanks for having me. Appreciate it. Thank you. Folks, and also let me just remind you that you can go to canvass.com, socialist, n.yc. uh, DSA in New York

Starting point is 01:19:59 city is, um, mobilizing, trying to get, uh, canvassers out for, uh, the DSA slate.

Starting point is 01:20:09 You've got, uh, Claire Valdez. Uh, you've got Darya Chivalier. You got Abreqa, uh, running for state Senate,

Starting point is 01:20:17 uh, other, uh, state assemblies, but we have two Congresspeople, at least, uh, that you can go out in canvas for.

Starting point is 01:20:23 And we will put a link to that canvas for. I yeah two s is on canvas dot socialist dot nyc uh hold on that's the that's the link yeah canvas dot socialist dot nyc okay um you're writing that down no i'm just uh they gave me a different oh give me the one that you have well i have dsa dot nyc slash geot tv okay that's another one too we'll put both up there. How's that? Yes,

Starting point is 01:20:58 yes. For New York, I guess specifically, DSA.NYC slash GOTV for Get Out the Vote. So check that out as well. Also, before we go, we have a message from our sponsor.

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Starting point is 01:23:49 I'm telling you. It's changed his disposition. We'll put that in the podcast and YouTube descriptions. Also, just a reminder, it's your support that makes this show possible. You can become a member at JoinThe Majority Report.com. When you do, you're not only get the free show free of commercials, but you also get the fun half. You can IM.

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Starting point is 01:24:34 Matt. Where is Matt? No idea. Matt's in somewhere in Europe. I'm not sure if we should give out his assassination. Oh, yeah. Let's not do that. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:24:46 He's, but so the show, what is we have any idea of? On Friday, the Jackman show, it looks like it was Matt free, but David talks with Rio Grande Valley, Valley organizer and policy research, Etienne Rose, about what's actually being built in Brownsville, Texas, and then a socialist response to Elon Musk's new status as the world's first trillionaire. Here's a clue to where Matt is. He's like everywhere. All right, quick, quick.

Starting point is 01:25:25 break and we'll head into the fun half.

The Majority Report with Sam Seder - 3666 - Can The Left Build Real Power Before It's Too Late? w/ Yotam Marom

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