I simply would rather not potentially contribute to regime change rhetoric as a westerner.
That’s an important core of it to me. The people of Venezuela will struggle with it and do their best from the position that they’re in. Our task is to support them, not to romanticize power struggle and get caught up in rhetoric that suggests dramatic, sacrificial conflict is the only way for them to make it through this. Whether the evidence leans more in the direction of “Venezuelan leadership is compromised” or “Venezuela is held hostage”, is less important than whether international communists are supporting Venezuela in its liberation, such as in its commune projects and in its general sovereignty. The 1st one is obsession over “correctness of worldview” which has its value, especially for the people who actually live there, but ultimately can be a big nothing if it only amounts to one feeling like they are more correct than others. The 2nd means that regardless of what is happening with the 1st, they are getting help from international comrades.
Even in basic rhetoric, international comrades can support them insofar as emphasizing their sovereignty, the need for the empire to leave them alone, as opposed to positioning it specifically as “the people and government vs. the empire” or “the people vs. the government and empire.”
As it is, it may well be that it is simply more complicated than “compromised or hostage” and that trying to reduce it to a binary is itself a mistake. Binaries are convenient but don’t tell us the precise class dynamics of a town, a province, a region. They don’t tell us where things are doing really well and where they are lagging far behind. They feed into good vs. evil narratives and forget how complicated it is to transition a society from one mode of production and power to another, much less try to do this under the shadow of a brutal, global empire. The “compromised” narrative would imply the issue is mainly the response to the empire itself, rather than the strangling material conditions attached to being under its shadow. And though it’s possible more militant, more scientific, more seasoned (I don’t know, I’m just coming up with markers for competence) leadership would navigate this better, we can’t assume that’s necessarily the issue just because the outcomes aren’t ideal. The revolution is the whole organized struggle in the context of material constraints, not only the most prominent names and their willpower.
That’s an important core of it to me. The people of Venezuela will struggle with it and do their best from the position that they’re in. Our task is to support them, not to romanticize power struggle and get caught up in rhetoric that suggests dramatic, sacrificial conflict is the only way for them to make it through this. Whether the evidence leans more in the direction of “Venezuelan leadership is compromised” or “Venezuela is held hostage”, is less important than whether international communists are supporting Venezuela in its liberation, such as in its commune projects and in its general sovereignty. The 1st one is obsession over “correctness of worldview” which has its value, especially for the people who actually live there, but ultimately can be a big nothing if it only amounts to one feeling like they are more correct than others. The 2nd means that regardless of what is happening with the 1st, they are getting help from international comrades.
Even in basic rhetoric, international comrades can support them insofar as emphasizing their sovereignty, the need for the empire to leave them alone, as opposed to positioning it specifically as “the people and government vs. the empire” or “the people vs. the government and empire.”
As it is, it may well be that it is simply more complicated than “compromised or hostage” and that trying to reduce it to a binary is itself a mistake. Binaries are convenient but don’t tell us the precise class dynamics of a town, a province, a region. They don’t tell us where things are doing really well and where they are lagging far behind. They feed into good vs. evil narratives and forget how complicated it is to transition a society from one mode of production and power to another, much less try to do this under the shadow of a brutal, global empire. The “compromised” narrative would imply the issue is mainly the response to the empire itself, rather than the strangling material conditions attached to being under its shadow. And though it’s possible more militant, more scientific, more seasoned (I don’t know, I’m just coming up with markers for competence) leadership would navigate this better, we can’t assume that’s necessarily the issue just because the outcomes aren’t ideal. The revolution is the whole organized struggle in the context of material constraints, not only the most prominent names and their willpower.