MIM(Prisons) is a cell of revolutionaries serving the oppressed masses inside U.$. prisons, guided by the communist ideology of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.
Under Lock & Key is a news service written by and for prisoners with a focus on what is going on behind bars throughout the United States. Under Lock & Key is available to U.S. prisoners for free through MIM(Prisons)'s Free Political Literature to Prisoners Program, by writing:
MIM(Prisons) PO Box 40799 San Francisco, CA 94140.
This sequel to the 1982 original Tron movie which was a technical
trailblazer for its use of CGI but not a big hit, includes dazzling 3D
special effects but not much else. The plot focuses on Sam Flynn, the
grown son of Kevin Flynn who was the main character in the original
Tron. Kevin, a computer visionary, disappears when Sam is 7, because he
got stuck inside The Grid of an alternate computer universe that he
created. The grown up Sam gets himself transported into this alternate
universe and some dazzling race and fight scenes and trite plot lines
ensue.
Tron: Legacy had a lot of potential for some interesting
political content. There is the new digital race of people who came into
being inside the computer universe. These people were all but completely
wiped out by the evil dictator program Clu in his quest to eliminate all
imperfection. Clu, the not so subtle fascist dictator, is a program that
was created by Kevin Flynn, to help him build the perfect world. So we
get a good solid anti-fascist message here. But the alternative, from
Kevin, is praise for individualism and it’s inherent imperfections, now
that he’s realized his mistake with Clu.
Rather than have the masses (of program beings) rise up against the
fascist dictator, we’re just told dismissively that they were all killed
(but one). There are a few rumblings of the other programs being unhappy
with dictator Clu, but they are incapable of organizing themselves into
any resistance and the few we see either die or end up being turncoats
serving the fascists. The only signs of useful resistance come from
heroic individualist actions by programs who break with their fascist
leader but with no explanation or organization.
In the end, the big individualists themselves are the only ones who can
defeat the fascist dictator and save both the real world and the
digitized alternate universe. This leaves us with three super-heroes who
only need to kill off the dictator and all is right in the world.
Fundamentally Tron: Legacy promotes individualism and worship
of leaders while dismissing the revolutionary potential of the masses.
It suggests that the masses can only be liberated/saved by a leader who
is much smarter than them. And so, in spite of it’s lip service to
anti-fascism, MIM(Prisons) doesn’t recommend Tron: Legacy.
As our readers already know, MIM(Prisons) runs political study
groups with our comrades behind bars. And as some of you know, and have
experienced, the state generally finds our non-violent, non-law
breaking, communist study in poor taste. In October 2009, a study group
assignment for the pamphlet “What is MIM?,” which included other
participants’ responses to the previous assignment, was mailed to a
participant held in Arizona. This study group assignment was censored
because allegedly it “may be obscene or a threat to security” generally,
and “promotes racism and/or religious oppression” specifically. Yes,
this is coming from the state that is fighting the federal government in
court to be allowed to use the color of one’s skin as probable cause for
investigating immigration law violations.
Our comrade imprisoned in Arizona appealed this decision, and
MIM(Prisons) wrote to the prison administration to request an
explanation as to how this study group assignment could “promote racism
and/or religious oppression” without even mentioning races,
nationalities, or religions:
“It is truly fascinating that your mailroom staff could find the
promotion of racism and/or religious oppression in this document.
Nowhere in the letter are the following words even mentioned: religious,
religion, christian, muslim, baptist, KKK, white, mexican, latino, asian
or arab. The word”black” is written once in the context of a reference
to the Black Panther Party’s education programs. How can you even talk
about religion or race enough to speak against it if you don’t use any
of the above mentioned words?” - MIM Distributors, Legal Assistant
No attempt has ever been made by Arizona Department of Corrections (ADC)
administration to address this point. ADC General Counsel Karyn Klausner
offered her opinion: “I have reviewed the materials sent by MIM
Distributors and find the decision to exclude the publication due to
content ‘promoting racism and/or religious oppression,’ was
appropriate.” She gave no explanation of how she came to the conclusion
that it was an “appropriate” violation of Constitutionally protected
rights. In a later letter Ms. Klausner clarified that with this
statement she didn’t mean she was “upholding” the censorship in her
official capacity as General Counsel of the Office of the Director of
ADC, just that she agreed with it on a persynal level.
Instead of explaining how the study group mailing in any way promotes
racism and/or religious oppression, ADC administrators then began to
rely on their policy of violating MIM Distributors’ First Amendment
right to free speech and association to censor this study group
assignment:
“There is nothing in case law that gives rise to a publisher’s right to
appeal a decision to exclude its material on an administrative appeal
level. . . You are not entitled to a forum within the prison system.” -
ADC Director, Charles Ryan
Director Ryan clearly had not investigated the matter on the prisoner’s
end either. He claimed that our imprisoned comrade had not appealed the
decision to censor, yet s/he had, on multiple levels, and submitted
requests for the results of these appeals.
“You claim that MIM Distributors has no rights to appeal the censorship
of their mail. While we are not lawyers, and may have put too much
weight on the Procunier case, we still uphold that we have First and
Fourteenth Amendment rights according to federal law. As employees of
the state you may not deny anyone their rights to free speech and
association arbitrarily and without due process. In fact, if you read
Thornburgh v. Abbot, 490 U.S. 401, which you referred [COLLEAGUE] to,
you will see that its procedural protection was provided because the
publisher was notified of the censorship and given the right to
independent review. A number of U.S. Court of Appeals decisions have
upheld the right of the publisher in such instances (Montcalm Publ’g
Corp. v. Beck, 80 F.3d 105, 106 (4th Cir.), Trudeau v. Wyrick, 713 F.2d
1360, 1366 (8th Cir.1983), Martin v. Kelley, 803 F.2d 236, 243-44 (6th
Cir.1986) ).” - MIM Distributors, Legal Assistant
And ADC’s response?
“You assert that ‘MIM Distributors’ First Amendment right to free
speech’ is not being respected. The Arizona Department of Corrections is
obligated to respect, within the confines of legitimate penological
interests, an inmate’s constitutional rights. It does not follow
that ADC is likewise obliged to do the same for an independent
distributor such as MIM.” - General Counsel, Karyn Klausner
It is apparent that the ADC believes themselves to be exempt from the
legal straitjacket of the United $tates Constitution, which they don’t
see as having an application in the 10th Circuit. This isn’t surprising
coming from an institution whose administrators believe that one can
promote racial and/or religious repression without ever talking about
race or religion!
Amerikans like to pretend they hold no political prisoners, yet
political repression is an integral part of the U.$. injustice system at
every step. In our struggle for a world without oppression, MIM(Prisons)
works to build public opinion for national liberation struggles amongst
prisoners through our newsletter Under Lock & Key, our free
books for prisoners program, and our study groups. Within prisons, there
are two primary ways in which the state enacts political repression:
through physical torture techniques such as solitary confinement, forced
drugging, beatings, starvation and murder; and through the control of
the spread of ideas, which also includes solitary confinement as well as
the censorship of mail, and outlawing oppressed nation organizations.
In pre-fascist Amerika, we are still promised certain rights under
United $tates laws. While we recognize that U.$. law will never lead us
to communism (a world without oppression), we still need to fight for
more room to organize and educate for revolution. Fighting against the
censorship of revolutionary literature is vital to maintaining the
connection between the inside and out, which may make the difference
between being turned on to communism or not for many people. For those
already turned on, we need to fight against censorship so that we can
continue to build our revolutionary understanding.
Like a MIM Distributors Legal Assistant mentioned above, we are not
lawyers. We do what we can to protect our Constitutional rights from the
outside with the resources we have, and we rely on prisoners to fight to
maintain their rights from the inside. If there is a lawyer who wants to
get involved with this specific incident in Arizona, or with
anti-censorship work in general, get in touch!
Determining who to write to regarding a specific issue is a tactical
question. One day it may be most important to write to the Director of
Corrections, the other it may be the Office of the Inspector General. We
make tactical decisions based on our conditions at the time. In this
circumstance, participants in the campaign to
end the
Z-Unit Zoo were bringing this issue to many government bodies,
including the Director of Corrections and the Inspector General.
In this response from the office of the Division of Adult Institutions,
A. Redding advises the participant to exhaust the appeals process.
Clearly in the petition, it says that many grievances have been filed
and none have been answered. This response is a good example of how
inhumane conditions and abuse can hide behind the bureaucracy of the
state under capitalism.
The above letter is a response from a Corrections Counselor II
Specialist (CCII) of the California Department of Corrections and
Rehabilitation (CDCR) to a prisoner in California who submitted to h the
grievance for the proper handling of grievances. Even though a CCII is
in a position to influence whether grievances are handled in a legal or
illegal manner, at least within h institution, in this letter A. Redding
advises the prisoner to file a lawsuit or contact the Inspector General
on the matter.
In this response to a grievance petition from California sent to the
Department of Justice (DOJ), they minimize the widespread scale of
corruption of the grievance system in the California state prison
system. Instead they are asking for facts and dates related to single
incidents or perpetrators.
In
“Bad
Apples” in the Pig Pen we explained why a focus on targeting
individual pigs is incorrect in most cases in our struggle because the
problems we address are societal. Although societal problems manifest in
individual pigs, focusing all of our energy trying to get one or two
pigs fired from our facility doesn’t significantly impact society as a
whole.
One may argue that the DOJ just needs a place to begin their
investigation. However, the petition makes it clear that this problem is
widespread throughout the system. Realistically they could interview
prisoners at random for details and receive enough information to begin
an investigation. Their narrow and sterile approach to “justice” is just
a cover for their interests in maintaining the status quo.
Hundreds of people gathered in downtown Oakland to mourn Oscar Grant and
express outrage at the light sentence given to his murderer, Johannes
Mehserle. Mehserle shot Grant in the back while he lay face down on the
ground. For this execution-style murder, he got 2 years in prison with
credit for time served on an involuntary manslaughter charge. The judge
gave the jury incorrect instructions for how to apply the gun
enhancement, and decided to just drop it, thus lowering Mehserle’s
maximum possible sentence to 4 instead of 14 years, rather than retry
the case. According to those inside the courthouse at the time of
sentencing, the judge openly blamed Grant and his friends for the
murder.
We didn’t expect justice from the system, but the whole struggle did
bring advances in revolutionary organizing in the region. The November 5
demonstration looked like others from the movement for justice for Oscar
Grant, but missing were the non-profits trying to run the show and
divide the protesters. It was refreshing to hear consistent messages
that encouraged people to get organized, stressed the need for
nation-based organizing (while uniting Black and Brown), refused to work
with the government and denounced the
outside
agitator line.
The city-sanctioned demo ended with a live performance of “Operation
Verdict (Fuck Dat)” by local artists Unity, Sinista Z, & Ras Ceylon.
Here’s the last verse:
Revolutionaries speak with clarity and overstand an injury to
one affects us all like Oscar Grant. Cuz I am we and we are
he So you will see us in the streets Yellin “Fuck da
Police!” No justice, no peace these non-profits is weak tryin’
to water down the movement and cut off free speech gettin paid by
the beast to calm the rage of our seeds that are sick of the
oppression that they daily gotta see and live with. You
idiot ain’t no outside agitators ’cept these murderous
pigs with the gun, badge and a taser so see ya later if you
tryin to claim that leadership you ain’t nothing but a snitch and
a politician’s bitch Fuck dat! Police out here knockin brothers
down Fuck dat! Trying to move the cats to somewhere out of
town Fuck dat! You know the state wanna water this shit
down Fuck dat!
Flattbush’s newest album Otomatik Attak (Koolarrow Records) is
a prime example of form meeting content to create a superior piece of
cultural art. A metal/grind band out of Los Angeles founded by two
members originally from the Philippines, Flattbush keeps a “fuck the
system” tradition alive with themes of atheism, revolt, and
anti-capitalism. These comrades scream for liberation in English,
Tagalog, and Kapampangan, accompanied by guest vocals in Spanish. They
go the distance lyrically by focusing on U.$. fascism and imperialism in
the Philippines, calling on the people to stand up against the Gloria
Macapagal-Arroyo dictatorship in people’s war.
From “Dear Uncle Sam,”
the sadistic american imperialists they are always at war and they
always dictate so they can maintain their self interests but uncle
sam we are not afraid of your high tech warfare and atomic
bombs uncle sam fuck you uncle sam it is necessary to take
action it is necessary to oust the u.s. gloria fascist regime if
not now then when?
And from “Otomatik Attak,”
automatic attack on the people the strike of the fascist to
wipe out the solution to their attack is to counter
attack people’s war
Flattbush hopes to expand their cultural work to the Philippines in the
near future, live! To show solidarity with the peasant masses, the lead
vocalist often performs in a conical straw hat and plain jacket, similar
to a Mao suit. Supporting his powerful and compelling vocals, the
bassist, guitarist, and drummer are all phenomenal players. On stage
they are humble, not pausing for applause between songs. This album
would satisfy anyone into metal for the music, or anyone who is fighting
intensely for revolution. Get more info about Flattbush from
[url=http://www.flattbush.com.]www.flattbush.com.
When people react this way to a Black man being murdered execution style
by the pigs, the city of Oakland blamed it on “outside agitators.”
1 November 2010, The San Francisco Giants won the World Series, and in
addition to the tens of thousands of fans in the stadium, an estimated
12 million people watched the game on TV (not counting the millions
watching in sports bars, restaurants and other public venues). As in
other winning cities in years past, the city of the winning team erupted
into “joyful mayhem,” as the San Francisco Chronicle calls it,
with tens of thousands of people taking to the streets in drunken
celebration that included property destruction, traffic disruption, and
violence.
In classic bourgeois press form, pretending neutrality, the SF
Chronicle’s headline article today was titled “SF Giants Series
Celebration is Joyful Mayhem” and stated: “On Market Street, the
celebration quickly turned wild and unruly, with an estimated 7,000
revelers in the streets, some jumping on cars, rocking Muni buses,
tossing beer bottles, lighting fireworks and blocking traffic at Seventh
Street.” A much smaller article, hidden on the Chronicle
website, also mentioned “In the Mission, there have been reports of
fires, broken windows and an alleged stabbing.” Compare this with the
same newspaper’s January 8, 2009 report on the Oscar Grant protests. The
article was titled “Protests Over BART Shooting Turn Violent” and gave a
negative review of the protest which “mushroomed into several hours of
violence Wednesday night as demonstrators smashed storefronts and cars,
set several cars ablaze and blocked streets.”
We see that the same street violence is condoned when it’s in the name
of professional sports. Police wandering the streets after the World
Series were friendly, often clapping and cheering, and shutting down
streets to help out traffic while enabling the celebration. During the
Oscar Grant protest the cops showed up in riot gear and
attacked the crowd.
While we’re no fans of imperialist
elections, the World Series victory happened the night before election
day and begs the comparison: people are more passionate about baseball
than they are about the political future of their country/state/city.
This is no surprise to those of us familiar with the decadence of
Amerikan imperialism. Amerikans don’t need to worry about politics – the
government is working in their interests to secure resources at the
expense of Third World peoples to maintain wealth at home.
Sports passion includes a remarkable number of fans cheering “we did
it!” and “we won!” as if they had anything to do with the team that won
the game. In reality the SF Giants, like all professional sports teams,
are made up of players from across the country, who are paid a
ridiculous amount of money to wear a jersey for this team. Their
allegiance to the city lasts only as long as the paycheck continues. In
fact people point to statistics about the Giants’ last World Series
victory 56 years ago when they were based in New York as if that team
had something more in common with the SF Giants than the font they use
for their logo.
MIM(Prisons) would like to take all the sports passion in Amerika and
turn it against imperialist violence or world hunger. We’d even call it
progress if people get off the couch and play sports rather than get
drunk watching millionaires play. Perhaps the improved circulation would
help people think a bit more rationally about politics and the relative
importance of professional sports.
By aligning Amerikans’ immediate interests with their long-term
interests, the militarization of the U.$./Mexico border has become a
machine that will not likely slow down on its own. This machine is
propelled by the imperialist politicians, imperialist businessmen (often
the same people), and the Amerikan labor aristocracy. This collusion of
interests at a time when Amerikan hegemony is fragile spells danger for
the oppressed nations, in particular for Aztlán.
National Public Radio (NPR) released a report this week exposing
financial and political connections between the Correctional Corporation
of America (CCA) and those behind Arizona’s oppressive
SB1070
law.(1) The law, which is still under judicial review after being put on
hold, legalizes racial profiling and empowers state police to enforce
federal immigration laws in the process. The scandal, now being denied
by the bill’s sponsor Senator Russell Pearce and others, is that they
passed the law to increase their income and the profits of their
corporate backers.
Without SB1070, CCA was getting an estimated $117 million a year from
the federal government for imprisoning migrants. Meanwhile,
Wackenhut/G4S, the next largest private prison company, has a $76
million a year contract to bus migrants around the border for the U.$.
government. Of course, both of these sums are chump change compared to
the $3.6 billion budget for Border Patrol in 2010.(2) All of this is
federal money going to the oppressor nation to do its thing – oppress.
The essence of what is going on is Amerikans getting paid a lot of money
to make sure Amerikans get paid a lot of money. That’s why the border
exists and why it must be militarized. If it is not, the masses whose
labor value has been stolen and exported to the United $tates would come
here to benefit from the fruits of their labor. Without closed borders,
we can’t keep the wealth inside.
The NPR report exposes the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC),
an organization of state legislators and powerful corporations that get
together to draft and propose laws (see figure above). The companies pay
tens of thousands of dollars to attend such meetings with those who make
the law. And according to NPR, the number of legislators who sponsored
SB1070 was almost unprecedented and 30 out of the 36 received
contributions from prison companies or prison lobbyists in the 6 months
following SB1070’s passage. Meanwhile, two of Arizona Governor Jan
Brewer’s top advisers are former prison lobbyists.(1) All of this makes
CCA’s and Sen. Pearce’s denials of corporate influence look silly.
None of this is new to CCA, which was founded in Nashville, Tennessee by
former chairman of the state Republican Party, Tom Beasley and his
former roomy from the U.$. Military Academy at West Point, Doc Crants.
Initial investors included the governor’s wife, Honey Alexander, and the
Speaker of the Tennessee House of Representatives, Ned McWherter.(3)
Ever since then, their business model has relied on close political ties
just as most military, defense and security business does. Apparently,
CCA agrees with MIM(Prisons)’s
assessment
that migrants are and will continue to be the fastest growing prison
population in the United $tates. But while we are fighting this trend,
CCA is doing all they can to foster it.
When imperialism reaches the point where the arms of oppression are
major sources of profiteering, and the people are dependent on these
operations for their paychecks and standards of living (i.e. where
oppression and the oppressors’ financial interests become one in the
same), we will see the national contradictions within imperialism
heighten rapidly. This leads to increased repression both in laws and in
actions but also the opportunity for raising consciousness and
resistance among the oppressed nations. Even those Latinos who supported
imperialist politics had to think twice about the Arizona law as it
could impact their persynal safety if they visit that state. The
imperialists expose their blatantly chauvinistic goals with these
reactionary laws and the alliances that create the laws and it is our
responsibility to point out the contradictions and organize against
imperialist national oppression.
[This is a belated resolution from the MIM(Prisons) 2010 Congress.]
Overall, MIM(Prisons) stands by the
Resolutions
on Cell Structure passed at the last MIM congress in 2005. After 5
years of putting that resolution into practice there is experience to
sum up and questions that still need to be answered.
The theoretical basis for the cell structure is that the strength of a
centralized party comes into play when vying for state power, whether by
elections or otherwise. That is not in the cards for Maoists in the
imperialist countries at this time. Maoism is a minority movement in the
First World and will continue to be so for the foreseeable future. This
makes it even more important that we utilize our strengths and shore up
our weaknesses.
One of the main lessons to take from the cell structure resolutions is
that “[w]e oppose having geographic cells come into contact with each
other face-to-face. Infiltration and spying are rampant when it comes to
MIM. The whole strength of having a locality-based cell is that it is
possible to do all the things traditional to a movement. The security
advantages of culling people we know into a cell are lost the moment we
slack off on security and start accepting strangers or meeting with
strangers face-to-face.” We find it frustrating that critics of what
happened at etext.org as MIM faced repression are willing to ignore the
lessons of those setbacks.
At the last MIM congress in 2005, they spoke of a “MIM Center” that put
out the newspaper, among other tasks. Soon after, there was no
MIM
Notes newspaper, followed by the degeneration of the original MC
cell and finally the shutting down of their last institution, the
website at etext.org.
One of the challenges of small cells is developing and maintaining line.
Much work has been done, and if every new group or every revolutionary
had to start from scratch, we would never advance. That is why when
etext.org was repressed, MIM(Prisons) posted an archive of the MIM site
on our website. While we still do not have a regular newspaper for the
movement as a whole, the website is a crucial reference for us all.
Fraternal organizations do not agree on everything; they agree on
cardinal principles that are determined by the conditions of the time.
The etext.org site is not something Maoists must agree with 100%, but
there is no doubt that it is still the most comprehensive starting point
for any Maoist organization in the First World.
Democratic centralism is important for security and for political line
development. Yet until we are organizing on a countrywide basis, there
is no need for democratic centralism at that level, not to mention
internationally.
In guerilla warfare, the cell structure has been applied in a way that
was hierarchical so that action cells were separate from each other, but
each cell could be traced to the top of the organization. This relies on
a centralized organization or center. While MIM mentions such a center
being based around MIM Notes and etext.org in their 2005 resolutions, we
do not see the need for this center given the current circumstances. As
we have recognized before, certain ideological centers are bound to
exist based on the law of uneven development. Yet such centers are not
structural, but fluid, based on the type and amount of work done.
All that said, there is an inherent contradiction in the cell strategy.
Since organizing strategy and security tactics are not dividing line
questions, once the cell strategy is adopted and full decentralization
has occurred, it is possible for cells to change their line on this
question. Even the majority could do so and a new centralized party
could push remaining cells to the periphery. Since we work to build a
movement and not our individual organizations, and our work is already
on the periphery, we should not be concerned about the impacts of such a
move on our organization. It is, however, worrisome to the extent that
we see our comrades opened up to attacks through faulty security.
Part of accepting cell strategy is distinguishing between cadre work and
mass work. The self-described anarchist movement is able to mobilize
large numbers in mass work while abhorring centralized organization. We
should learn from their example, while not succumbing to liberalism in
our security practices or abandoning scientific leadership.
Getting the correct balance of cadre work and mass work will be more
challenging with a cell structure. There is no way to impose a balance
on the movement as a whole without a center, but we can pay attention to
what is going on around us and get in where we fit in. Leading cells
should not be shy to point out where the movement needs more investment
of resources.
One amendment we would make to the “Resolutions on Cell Structure” is to
cut the suggestion that a one-persyn cell “in many ways… has the least
worries security-wise!” Certainly, one-persyn cells should maintain high
standards for admitting others. However, the value of
criticism/self-criticism on the level of day-to-day work is something
that is stressed within Maoism, and we’ve benefited from in our own
practice in MIM(Prisons). We still need democratic centralism with the
cell structure to provide crucial discipline and accountability. The
criticisms we can give and get from other cells will be limited in
nature if our security is correct. And we have seen how one-persyn cells
can degrade or disappear quickly.
