Responses to a Measured Sequel: DSA BloNo

[Full disclosure: I am a member of the Democratic Socialists of America. However, I’m currently in exile from the local chapter. So, it’s complicated. The following is my own personal statement and not the statement of DSA BloNo. Please make a note of it.]

[Additional Note: In order to adhere to the BloNo DSA’s 8th Community Agreement,¹ I will refer to some individuals using pseudonyms. Any such names will have an asterisk next to them.]

Responses:
Argument 1: Mediocrity
Argument 2: They’re Just Volunteers
Argument 3: Who is Anti-DSA?

---

There were several responses to renewed criticism of the Bloomington-Normal chapter of the Democratic-Socialists of America (DSA BloNo).

The biggest critique came from DSA BloNo’s own Afro-Soc caucus who made a public statement condemning the alleged widespread abuse of power and anti-democratic strategies of DSA BloNo’s leadership. This Afro-Soc statement was passed by a majority vote of the caucus. See their full statement.

To be clear, this wasn’t just a public statement; the caucus filed an official grievance with National DSA against the DSA BloNo Executive Committee and calls on Exec members to be deposed if they don’t meet the caucus’ demands.

These demands include (but, are not limited too):

1. That the elections reform resolution as adopted by the members in August be IMMEDIATELY implemented.
2. Chapter business must be immediately conducted as it relates to the Disciplinary reform resolution that was improperly blocked by the Executive Committee in September. The resolution must be published and voted on by the members who have a strong desire to remove the executive conflict of interest that has caused our membership extreme harm. This corruption of the process has enabled the EC to continue its abuse of power and to silence and punish dissent. The membership introduced a resolution to resolve this conflict of interest and to help restore a balance of power and a culture of accountability for our leadership, but the EC has refused to allow the members to vote on this important reform!²

This was followed by my own Measured Sequel (which I’m sure you have already read). Then, the ISU chapter of the Young Democratic Socialist of America released their own statement supporting the Afro-Soc grievance.

Even famous critic of DSA Blono, former-Alderperson Jenn Carrillo, came back from their self-imposed exile from local politics to reiterate their previous critique of the chapter.

In the wake of all this recent controversy, all four of the Harrassment Grievance Officers (HGOs) have resigned from their positions, with some resigning from the organization entirely.³

---

There are some people who think this whole DSA BloNo critique is just Leftists battling over who is the purest Leftist. That’s not the conversation I’ve been trying to have.

I will look at just three of the different narratives going around. (Not all of these criticisms were directed at me or at my articles.)

Argument 1: Mediocrity

The first response is to former-Alderperson Jenn Carrillo, whose critique goes a little something like this:

I would argue that DSA’s presence has been a net negative. Have they done some good things? Sure. Overall though, they have created an arena of “empowerment” for privileged mediocre white folks to basically sit around jerking each other off about anti-racism and socialist feminism so they can feel like they are doing something, while (a) continuing to enable and encourage white supremacist and misogynistic behavior from their leaders and members and (b) actually sucking precious organizing resources away from places that really need em. They are not accountable to any base of working class people, which has allowed them to Frankenstein some perversion of organizing wherein the work is done mostly for their own fulfillment and actualization. They have created an echo chamber wherein white women can learn from one another how to sharpen their use and abuse of white tears (at the expense of people of color). They exemplify white supremacy culture so perfectly in their complete avoidance, defensiveness and inability to receive any critique without calling it abuse. So, yeah… they’ve brought people in and taught them things… are they the right things? Largely no.

Jenn Carrillo

At this point, sure.⁴ It’s probably all correct. Philosopher’s are supposed to know nothing, right? It was Socrates that first set us down a destiny of nihilism.

The only thing I’ll add is regarding the “mediocre white folks” part. DSA BloNo leadership struggles to hold even the bare minimum of business meetings required by the bylaws (the minimum is 6 meetings a year). For some reason, it is literally the most arduous, exhausting event to do. It probably has nothing to do with the fact that membership can only overrule exec at business meetings. Or the fact that Exec does get overruled regularly at these meetings. The executive committee very strategically schedules business meetings throughout the year to prevent business they don’t want to deal with.

The excuses vary.

Secretary Anakin Fox has frequently argued it’s absurd to think any organizing or business occurs at business meetings.⁵ Others say business meetings are a turn-off to members suggesting the org loses member engagement. Then, there are those that so ridiculously straw person your argument it’s hard to take them seriously. This is just one of the conversations I’ve had:

Zach: We should have have more frequent business meetings to increase democratic decision making.

Gem*: Jesus Christ, Zach! I don’t think you’re going to be happy until we tell you, “fine, let’s have all unending business meetings every month and that’s all we will ever do, just to appease YOU, regardless of what other members may want out of meetings.” I guess your resolution for next month should be to have 12 business meetings, no community meetings, and meetings to last indefinitely, and then you’ll get your vote.

(To be clear, that was not the resolution I submitted for new business that month).

This year alone they won’t even meet the minimum 6 meetings a year, because the September meeting did not meet quorum (allegedly) so no business could be done which means… the business meeting…. didn’t occur. Exec disagrees and considers it one of the 6 required meetings (not only violating the bylaws, but also the principle of non-contradiction).

Compare this to DSA BloNo’s own Afro-Soc Caucus which meets WEEKLY! Guess which organization gets more work done? Mediocre indeed.

Argument 2: They’re Just Volunteers

The 2nd response is regarding the volunteer status of the Executive Committee members. A typical argument about this will be: “All of these positions are volunteer. No one on Exec signed-up for a full-time job. They are clearly doing the best they can with what they got and working out a structure that gets things done. Therefore, demanding anything of Exec is wrong.”

A couple things:

1. Find me a DSA BloNo member getting paid to participate. If you are one, leave a comment. (Spoiler alert: everyone in DSA is a volunteer, and we’ve been waiting years for those damn Soros’ checks.)⁶
2. Executive members volunteered to take on the obligations that come with their position. No one put a gun to their head.⁷
3. If an Exec member is overwhelmed, take a step back and ask for help. It’s literally Community Agreement #3: Share the air; move up and move back.

In any volunteer organization, the capacity to get things accomplished is an ongoing concern. People–including exec members of DSA BloNo–have full-time jobs, lives, obligations, hopes, dreams, desires, and passions completely independent of DSA (and they have a right to these). Leftists often have a problem where they care about other people too much that they fail to take care of themselves. The two biggest problems associated with overcapacity is burnout & bad decision-making.

Yet, following the calamity that was the June election, a hyperfocus on security & secrecy within the chapter grew to tremendous proportions.⁸

Secretary Fox’s first official secretarial order was to state they don’t feel comfortable letting any new members who had recently joined until after the new member went through the new gate-keeping or on-boarding process. An on-boarding process isn’t inherently bad. For a long time, new members would be added to the email list and might receive a link to join the slack channel; but not much was done after that to engage the member unless they took the initiative themselves or were specifically brought in by another member. Fox’s original idea for the on-boarding process was to have a one-on-one with the new member welcoming them to the chapter and learning what their interests were. From there, the new member could be directed to the part of the organization best suited for them. It was also a perfect time to explain how the organization functions, learn basic parliamentary procedure, and agree to the Community Agreements. This makes perfect sense especially for a growing organization.

However, more than a month after the election, BloNo DSA still had a double digit backlog in letting new members into the space. People would complain in BloNo Leftist Facebook groups: they weren’t being allowed in. People would ask about it in Slack, and the Secretary said they’d fix it…

Yet, nothing was done.

At a community meeting in July, I asked Secretary Fox when the next membership/welcoming committee was, the committee tasked with welcoming new members into the chapter. The Secretary is usually in charge of keeping track of membership for various purposes, so the question was within their purview. They told me it was Wednesday. I then asked where it was. They told me it was at a coffee shop. Finally, I asked the time. With each question, Secretary Fox’s eyes grew wider & wider, and their face became paler & paler to the point I feared they might be ill or even become a ghost.

“Why do you want to know?” Secretary Fox asked suspiciously.

I responded politely, “Am I not supposed to know?”

The Secretary said, “It’s not that; it’s just that it’s a closed committee.”

“A closed committee, you say?” The only closed committees I was aware of were Exec and Treasury, which requires members be elected per the bylaws. “How exactly does one get on this ‘closed committee’?” I queried.

“Well, only Cecelia [the co-chair] can appoint people to this committee.” And, in what seemed like a puff of smoke, the Secretary was suddenly on the other side of the room. I later told Mr. Garcia about this exchange, and he immediately asked Chairperson Long who said, “Anakin was incorrect; it’s an open committee.”

Assured by the chair the committee was open, both myself and Robert Garcia attended said Membership/Welcoming Committee meeting. We knew there was a backlog in onboarding members and sincerely wanted to help get it fixed as quickly as possible.

If there is a capacity issue among Exec members, then the obvious thing is to delegate the responsibility to others. Step back; share the air.

However, upon arrival, both Mr. Garcia and myself were singled out for being “uninvited guests.” One of the new Harassment Grievance Officers (HGOs), Brilliant Person*, was leading the meeting. Officer Person* mentioned how because they didn’t know we were coming, we had to–again–reaffirm the Community Agreements. Officer Person* also stated she felt that Mr. Garcia’s language in slack or other places was not aligned with the community agreements.

Mr. Garcia was understandably upset, and Officer Person* was in violation of Community Agreement #3 which includes “sharing the air.” This means one is supposed to continually reflect on “Why am I speaking?” and “Is this the appropriate time for this topic?” It sounded like Officer Person* was discussing a grievance which is certainly not appropriate at a Welcoming Committee meeting. In the end, both myself and Mr. Garcia agreed–again–to the Community Agreements.

After doing the roll call, Officer Person* asked if anyone present didn’t want to proceed with the meeting because of “unannounced attendees.” Chairperson Long was the first to speak in favor of not proceeding, ostensibly because Secretary Fox was not present,⁹ and she didn’t know if the Secretary would be comfortable sharing their grand master plans with two “uninvited guests.”(Nevermind, the other six people who were also volunteering their time to be there.)

Mr. Garcia chose to leave the meeting, so as not to be a distraction. Chairperson Long ran after him, chasing him down the street. According to Mr. Garcia, he was at his car attempting to get in and leave, but was prevented by the chairperson. Long kept going back and forth between: lobbing false allegations that he had threatened white women or made them uncomfortable; and claiming there were no specifics, that people simply didn’t agree with his position on this issue or that issue.¹⁰ He was literally in tears as she berated him saying white women in the organization were scared of him, a man of color. (This right here is falsifying evidence against my argument that Carrillo’s racial critique is shallow identitarianism).

She was harassing Mr. Garcia for a whole hour, while the rest of us continued the meeting as scheduled.¹¹ Before she returned, we had figured out a plan to create training videos educating committee members on how to onboard new members. I was going to make a rough draft of a script for everyone’s perusal. However, despite literally chasing people away, Chairperson Long thought it wasn’t right to begin even a rough draft because some members of the committee weren’t present. She said we needed more committee member feedback before I could proceed.

The issue was never discussed again. It was the least Welcoming Committee meeting I’ve ever been too (and, I’ve been to jail before).

Five months have passed since that meeting. Last week, the Public Relations Officer finally started letting backlogged members into slack,¹² admitting there hadn’t been a Welcoming Committee meeting for along time (I assume since the July meeting), so they hadn’t been able to onboard anyone.

If this is the best that can be done, then this isn’t a functioning organization anymore because things are most assuredly not being done. Other volunteers volunteered their time to help out the organization, to take some of the work off of Exec’s backs (3/5ths of which were new to the positions), and they were chased down the street with allegations of making women of a Caucasian persuasion uncomfortable. For five months, no one thought it made sense to speak up and say, “Hey, we’re behind on letting new members in. Can we get some help?”

(I also feel like this also falsifies arguments made that DSA BloNo’s decreased activity was caused by the allegedly toxic behavior of members like myself. I’ve been exiled for three months by now and have virtually no input in what the Executive Committee chooses to do or not do. But, it’s still my fault? You sure?)

Argument 3: Who is Anti-DSA?

As a final point, there’s a persistent–and, in my opinion, pernicious–narrative that Mr. Garcia is completely anti-DSA. He has such a deep-seated (BIGOTED!) hatred for this organization that he is hellbent on seeing the organization crushed into tiny pieces, ground into a paste, filtered through a septic tank, and force-fed to DSA members Human Centipede-style (again, I’m paraphrasing). Let me put to rest this narrative once & for all.¹³ The number one thing DSA BloNo has consistently done right since the pandemic is provide financial aid to members struggling. With few questions asked, the treasury committee will dish out hundreds of dollars to help members with rent, food, health care, or any calamity that may befall a person, regardless of whether they currently like that person or not. This includes myself and people who I am currently in strong disagreement with.

Like most things in the known universe, the mutual aid fund is finite.

Guess who consistently donates to that fund keeping it full (and by donate, I mean drops a grand in there): ROBERTO FUCKING GARCIA.

He donates knowing full well some of that money might go towards people he is currently in strong disagreement with. Because he knows there is a bigger picture, people are human, and everyone deserves a certain bare minimum of solidarity.¹⁴

Not only does Mr. Garcia’s hatred for DSA lead him to donate thousands of dollars in mutual aid, but he is also a national DSA trainer, an AfroSoc HGO, a member of DSA National’s Immigrants’ Rights Working Group, and a member of DSA AfroSoc National. Who could have imagined such intense disdain would lead to this deep of an infiltration? The only logical conclusion is that Mr. Garcia is a neo-liberal agent provocateur trained by the CIA to crush DSA with the weight of his mighty mustache (he probably has Trump on speed-dial and was trained in the clandestine arts by the re-animated corpses of J. Edgard Hoover & George Bush Sr, and the dark, cold-hearted machine formerly known as Dick Cheney).

It feels to me like there are so many people behaving in a way indistinguishable from the moderate of a Caucasian persuasion Martin Luther King warned us of:

First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and that when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress. I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that the present tension in the South is a necessary phase of the transition from an obnoxious negative peace, in which the Negro passively accepted his unjust plight, to a substantive and positive peace, in which all men will respect the dignity and worth of human personality. Actually, we who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.

“Letter from a Birmingham Jail”

I mention this important quote from MLK Jr., because I have made many similar critiques to DSA Blono as Mr. Garcia (and, to a lesser extent, Carrillo). Yet–to the best of my knowledge–I have not been considered an insurrectionist; no one has accused me of hating DSA or plotting its demise. Why is Garcia, a man of color, being accused of these things, while I, a man of Caucasian persuasion, am not? (This is more evidence in favor of Carrillo’s racial critique.)

Pointing out a problem, critiquing dogma, is a necessary act for anyone who believes in even an ideal form of revolution. At the most basic philosophical level, revolutionary thought is the recognition–nay, the insistence–that all institutions are mortal, they have a beginning and they will have an end. This includes the small political institution that is a chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America political entity. We cannot say we proudly support our amazing men & women in Blue (and, by Blue, I am referring to the workers of the United States Postal System (USPS),¹⁵ not the police¹⁶) and shoot every messenger that is delivering you a letter that factually challenges your belief system. Is this not a preference for “a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice?” I was exiled for three years because I supposedly spread misinformation about DSA BloNo Exec members (I was never given a single example of what misinformation was being spread).

That’s not the socialism I believe in; it’s not the democracy I believe in. It’s not the revolution I believe in. There is a pattern of behavior that is actually anti-DSA, that does not uphold the values of democracy & socialism, that doesn’t even meet the minimum standards of the bylaws. Again, I ask, “Who’s Anti-DSA?”

This article was originally published on Strangecornersofthought.com.

1. 8. If someone makes you angry, address the behavior; do not shame or blame others.

   

2. So far, only the first demand was met.
3. I don’t blame them.
4. My articles on DSA could easily be titled “How I Went From Loving DSA BloNo to Hating It in 160 Days or Less.”
5. I’m paraphrasing Secretary Fox’s comment.
6. We actually pay for the privilege of being an official volunteer. I’ve been paying for this bullshit.
7. To the best of my knowledge.
8. That’s not to say security & secrecy weren’t already an issue in the chapter. But, after the election, it went on steroids.
9. Secretary Fox was unavailable because of a personal issue that had come up for them that day.
10. I feel like lobbing false allegations against a person should be a violation of the Community Agreements.
11. This is on top of the two hours she spent the previous month trying to coerce Mr. Garcia in to dropping his election-related grievance against her.
12. This is not the Public Relations Officer’s job, and I think it’s unfair they have to do that and their other duties.
13. For those that listen, of course.
14. Even if they are currently behaving in a way I might describe nicely as extremely shitty.
15. Let’s extend that to all postal workers. Whether you wear blue or brown, solidarity forever!
16. Obviously.