Without Struggle, There Can Be No Progress

Frederick Douglass Used these words to remove the blinders of “liberals” and abolitionists alike from the notion that a government unrepresentative of the oppressed could possibly liberate by legislation or some other easy way out.

Just like Douglass, and so many  others throughout history, I intend to write in this space with a single end in mind: We are not alone and it is Us that need to formulate our destiny. We cannot gain human liberation through the voices not our own, through the interests not our own, through the actions not our own.

It may seem to you that my personal journeys seem unrelated to this theme. The purpose of a new liberatory future is the wholeness of our world and, therefore, the wholeness of each one of us. Seeking to find my way is not unrelated to us finding our way.

Make no mistake, the “our” referred here  are the voices, the interests, the actions of people seeking to benefit from the wealth that we all create but that is aggregated into the hands and coffers of the so very few who largely benefit from the  work of others and not their own; the voices, interests, and actions of women, whose oppression is the root of all oppression that has resulted from the development of class society; the voices, interests, and actions of the the vast majority of different colors, ethniciites, and oppressed nations whose social oppression is perpetrated in the interests of a capitalist class created over the course of history to serve as a repository for the theft of material wealth and the maintenance of beliefs that we live in this “best of possible worlds”.

My voice is one among many. My interests are many and reflect the interests and questions that I believe every human being (including the oppressors among us) should undertake to understand. The actions I take will always be to root us out from the notion that any of us–no matter how different or abled, no matter how ill-educated we are at any one point–deserves nothing less than all that is possible for every person, every element of sentience, every view of life.