Branches up and down the country have been preparing for the Revolution Festival (15-17 November), which is just over three weeks away!
This event will be the culmination of our most successful recruitment period to date, and an opportunity to bring new members into the party, educate them in Marxist theory and turn them into determined class fighters.
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Building the Marxist party
With the growth of new recruits across the country, the Revolution Festival has come at the perfect time to train a new generation of revolutionaries.
In just three weeks, the Preston branch has grown from three to five comrades, gaining recognition on campus at the University of Central Lancashire.
We’ve demonstrated in practice the need for a revolutionary party in Britain through paper sales, open meetings, and political demonstrations.
Our newest members have witnessed firsthand the hollow and disappointing rhetoric coming from leaders of the Palestine movement, as well as other groups on the left. It is our ideas that have made the difference.
In this context, we’ve been encouraging them to attend the Revolution Festival. After discussing availability and travel plans, comrades agreed to join us, eager to raise their political understanding and experience the momentum and size of our party and our international.
In Sheffield, 12 new comrades have joined, highlighting the urgent need to build more branches and leadership. Beyond one-on-one discussions and reading groups, the Revolution Festival is our top priority for the district.
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Our mission is to get every comrade to attend. Last year, every comrade who attended RevFest took on a leading role in the district afterwards – and this is no coincidence. Political understanding is the foundation of inspiration, and there is no better place for new comrades to grasp what we are building and fighting for than at the Revolution Festival.
In Leeds, we are hosting a public meeting on the crisis in the Middle East and which way forward. This will be a miniature Revolution Festival talk; comrades will politically prepare by studying the Arab spring, the nature of imperialism etc. And this will act as a last minute call for all comrades to get their tickets!
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Revolution’s calling
In North London, the Wood Green, Holloway Road, and Kilburn branches have been phone banking and reaching out to our supporters asking them to join our North London delegation to the event.
Not only have we managed to get a handful of people to agree to come along and get their tickets, we also have a number who want to formally join the party who are coming along to the branches this week.
Climb for Communism!
On 7 November RCP comrades Sally Clark, Simon Duerden (Cumbria branch) and Bill Haylock (Newcastle 1 branch) will make the ascent up Skiddaw – at 3,054 feet, it’s the fourth highest mountain in England.
This will be to mark the 107th Anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution and Leon Trotsky’s 145th birthday. It also happens to be comrade Bill’s 75th birthday!
We are setting up a Go Fund Me page for the event, and appealing to supporters and comrades for small personal sponsorship contributions. There will also be a social to celebrate the ascent at 7pm on 8 November at Bar Loco in Newcastle upon Tyne.
Leafleting and postering
Comrades have also received fantastic results by combining the building for Revolution Festival with their regular activity.
At King’s College, comrades promoted the festival alongside a security staff protest on 22 October [see issue 16]. We also managed to sell two papers and meet someone who wants to join the branch discussion this week.
In Camden, we did some postering for RevFest and our upcoming open meeting, and had a pre-branch sale at University College London last week.
As we were putting up one poster a woman asked if she could take a picture of it (of course!) and was going to look further into it – proving posters do indeed get attention! No surprise then that we had lots of new faces come to our meeting on Palestine.
In Hammersmith and Fulham, the branches have been targeting the local shopping centre at rush hour. We first start by postering the area, targeting the busiest bus stops and spaces, and then we sell the paper to people on their way home.
Given the amount of foot traffic in the area, in one evening we sold twelve papers in an hour. This has been a huge boost for a comrade who recently joined, who really enjoyed getting involved in the paper sale and postering.
This fortnight with Fiona: Why I’m going to Revolution Festival
Fiona Lali
The ‘Books not Bombs’ tour is drawing to a close. I’ve spoken in Edinburgh, Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield, Birmingham, Cambridge, Oxford, and London. And yet, the drive to war gets worse each day.
Jabalia camp, in the north of Gaza is being destroyed. The images of people dying in Al Aqsa hospital, literally burning to death, are etched into my consciousness, alongside millions of others’.
Where does the horror come from? The strikes don’t just fall from the sky!
They are planned, executed and prepared by the barbaric terrorist state Israel.
The weapons are prepared, built & shipped by America, Germany, Britain, Italy. They are all responsible. https://t.co/r4rUoq8SZw
— Fiona Lali (@fiona_lali) October 14, 2024
But amongst the despair, through political organisation, it is possible to find an anchor.
For comrades in the RCP, that anchor is revolutionary Marxism – which allows us to understand why these atrocities are taking place, and why Israel is able to get away with it. Without this, I’m not sure how I would cope.
Throughout the organisation, we are meeting hundreds, if not thousands, of people who are yearning to understand and ask the same questions. I often find people don’t want to discuss small or niche questions about this or that reform, but rather the big questions.
On my tour I’ve been asked, how do you prevent dictatorship? Why do revolutionaries turn against their own people? What happened in the African revolutions? All of these questions are vital for us to understand. That’s why the upcoming Revolution Festival will be critical.
The theme of Saturday is anti-imperialism. That’s why the day opens with a talk on the crisis in the USA. It will be just two weeks after the US elections. The US remains the biggest most reactionary imperialist power on the planet.
From the belly of the beast, we must understand the processes in American society, and the perspectives for class struggle. Antonio Balmer, a leading comrade from the Revolutionary Communists of America will be introducing that session. Harris or Trump, I will be sat in the front row!
Obama doesn’t understand why black men aren’t supporting Kamala Harris. Obama should thank his own track record, which showed the shallowness of identity politics. The shallowness of ‘progressive Democrats’, and the need to overthrow the whole capitalist system instead. pic.twitter.com/9MQuEO4q8B
— Fiona Lali (@fiona_lali) October 24, 2024
There are so many other important talks looking at historical struggles against imperialism that we can learn from, like the Haitian Revolution, and Bangladesh in 1971, as well as the theory behind these processes – for example Lenin’s incredible work State and Revolution, which explains the role of the state and why it must be smashed.
I’ll be speaking on how South African apartheid was overthrown. My advice for anyone feeling overwhelmed by the state of the world is to study the history of the oppressed and working class in struggle. In these events you will read about spellbinding levels of bravery and sacrifice.
In Cambridge, a student in the discussion said they were worried people were not brave enough for the fight. But we cannot view things in a static, superficial manner. Bravery comes from struggle. Reading about the mass strikes, protests, and actions, including school children in South Africa has reminded me of the immense power of the masses.
Had a great discussion with students in Cambridge last night! Turns out they will talk to you if you’re not a war criminal @SuellaBraverman 😘 pic.twitter.com/ED0jy6seAZ
— Fiona Lali (@fiona_lali) October 17, 2024
In a small way, all of us building the RCP today can take something from this. Whether it’s giving a speech, selling a paper, or doing an interview – bravery is not innate, but comes to us through struggle!
I’ll also be speaking at the rally on Saturday evening, on the fight against imperialism and the Gen Z revolution, so if you missed the tour, you’ll see me there! Make sure you get your ticket!