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There was an article published in the Opinions and Editorials section of The Lawrentian recently about the pro-Russian sentiments that are allegedly pervading Students of a Democratic Society (SDS). Although I am not a member of this organization, rather I am a member of Lawrence University Young Democratic Socialists of America (YDSA), I do feel the need to push back on some points as I feel they paint a picture of SDS and the left broadly that may not entirely reflect reality.
I would first like to clarify my stance on the Russian invasion of Ukraine. I am in full support of Ukraine, and I genuinely hope that they push out the Russian military and their hired PMCs out of Ukrainian land. I do not think that this is some inter-imperialist war. The U.S is not involved at all as far as our military aid goes. Furthermore, this concept of Russia invading out of fear of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) expansion is nonsensical and shows complete ignorance of history in that region. Russia started their power play after the Euromaidan protests. Euromaidan was sparked after former President of Ukraine Viktor Yanukovych pulled out of a European Union trade association agreement, an agreement that he promised to pass if he was elected in his 2012 campaign. Yanukovych pulled out of the trade deal a week before it was finalized after Russia had employed severe economic coercion against Ukraine in the months prior. After Yanukovych pulled out of the deal, decentralized and chaotic protests erupted overnight. Everyone was mad that Yanukovych had caved into Russian coercion, which in the 1994 Budapest Memorandum stated that Russia could not engage in this behavior. They were also extremely mad that he had walked back on the promise that got him elected by the people in the first place. These protests quickly evolved into Yanukovych using lethal force against protestors. The police were particularly cruel against student protestors. This quickly snowballed into galvanizing the entirety of Ukraine against Yanukovych. Yanukovych then banned protesting, hired Ukrainian crime syndicates to beat protestors and had snipers positioned on top of buildings to take out protestors. Eventually, Yanukovych realized how bad the situation was and fled the country. After a brief interim government, elections start again where a new president in elected. Shortly after, Russia invades Crimea and starts on the track that will eventually lead to their full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Some people who like to keep defending Russia after this point to Euromaidan being a so called “color-revolution” and claim that the United States and its allies were supporting the protestors. However, this is not true at all. Victoria Nuland, a U.S diplomat in Ukraine at the time, urged protests to take a deal with Yanukovych to stop the protests. Western forces were constantly trying to keep Yanukovych in power and tried to push the protestors into negotiations with Yanukovych, but they refused to negotiate. This argument not only ignores reality, but also strips away the autonomy and agency of the Ukrainian people, something that is echoed in the NATO expansion line of thought. Prior to the war, most Ukrainians did not want to join NATO at all. To join NATO, a vote must not only pass in the government, but the people of the country must also have a majority popular vote to join. Ukraine was not going to join NATO. The interest in joining NATO hardly ever passed even 30% in the general population until Russia invaded Crimea. Even then the majority did not want to join until eventually a full-scale invasion took place. It was not NATO expansion nor U.S involvement that pushed Russia to invade — Russia saw that Ukraine was not willing to bend the knee to their economic coercion, especially after they had successfully scared one of their presidents into trying to submit.
I support Ukraine entirely, and if I may add so do many leftists and Marxists. The author of the article made it seem like all leftists and Marxists defend Russia, but this just is not true. The Combat Organization of Anarcho-Communists (BOAK) is an anarchist communist organization operating in Russia that is extremely far-left and communist but is bombing railroad tracks and has firebombed recruitment stations and other military installations. They are considered the biggest rebel group active in Russia right now, standing in solidarity with Ukraine and pushing back against the authoritarian nature of Putin. There are also various communist, anarchist and left-leaning brigades and partisans within Ukraine that are all fighting Russian imperialism. Acting like defense of Russia is something endemic to the left is dishonest.
Most of the people defending Russia that would be considered left are Stalinists and authoritarian socialists. I personally do not consider these people leftists. Their ideologies are antithetical to socialist ideals, and they have severely bastardized the words of Marx. Many forget that Marx talked about the dictatorship of the proletariat in the context of responding to Louis Auguste Blanqui and his followers who wanted a small group of elite revolutionaries to control and lead the revolution. The Marxian concept of the workers controlling the government is in direct opposition to the Leninist and Blanquist approach of the vanguard party. Rosa Luxemburg, one of Lenin’s contemporaries, called him out for being elitist and Blanquist. Marx rejected Blanquism, and he would have rejected Leninism for the same exact reasons. Please do not call these people Marxists. It’s bad enough that they call themselves Marxists.
I will now address the leftist thinkers he referred to. Glenn Greenwald is not a leftist and never was. He is transphobic and loves a lot of conservative pundits like Matt Gaetz and Tucker Carlson. Jeffery Sachs worked with anti-communists after the fall of the Soviet bloc and contributed to the disastrous policy of shock therapy economics. Noam Chomsky is an example of someone who I am disappointed in that is left leaning. However, Chomsky is not and never was perfect; he is a linguist and has written some great work on rhetoric and semantics. I think Chomsky should stay in the realm of linguistics where his specialty lies. His takes on foreign policy is really hit or miss. If you want an example of a leftist who does support Ukraine, Slavoj Žižek, a Slovenian philosopher, is a Marxist and is in full support of Ukraine. He is even in support of NATO expansion. The left is not a monolith. Now that we have cleared that up, let us talk about the claims made in the article.
The main point of the article is exposing SDS’s affiliation with the publication Fight Back!, a newspaper that has espoused rhetoric defending Russia and excusing their flagrant human rights abuses in Ukraine. The article states that this publication belongs to SDS. However, this is not the case; this publication is printed and distributed by the Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO). FRSO is an organization I am willing to criticize, and I have before. Their defense of the likes of Xi Jinping, Kim Jong-Un and a one Joseph V. Stalin among other factors such as their defense of so-called “actually existing socialism” makes it easy to do so. SDS’s relationship with this organization has been known for some time and can be traced back to 2006 when SDS was formed and took on the namesake of its predecessor from the 60s and 70s. According to accounts of their first official convention in 2006, members of the FRSO have been present within the organization since its inception. However, there were also various other flavors of leftism present such as anarchists and socialists. SDS does not follow any specific ideological line. As a result, it draws from a lot of different tendencies. FRSO’s involvement has been criticized from within SDS before, even as early as 2008, only two years after their formation.
In an interview published in September of 2008, New York SDS organizer Rachel Haut spoke on the issue of FRSO dominating their sphere and bringing in undemocratic ideals. Haut specifically spoke on Maoism being disseminated by the organization into SDS. This conversation about Maoism and the FRSO came up after talking about the differing ideological trends present within SDS. Haut felt it did not matter that there were people with different ideas within the organization if they were in favor of democracy. However, she did feel that having any conversation about ideological differences within the organization while authoritarians were present made these authoritarian tendencies legitimized within the organization.
“I believe that Maoism is in opposition to a democratic society, and thus their position or reason for being in SDS is opportunist,” Haut said. “I think it is inappropriate to have conversations about ideological differences when we still have Maoists in the organization. Why should we be having these conversations with them, including them in the discussion, if their ideology is in direct opposition to building a democratic society?”
Haut and other SDS members have accused FRSO of trying to co-opt their organization, a claim which FRSO had pushed back on, specifically in a public statement made in response to the interview. There is evidence that some in the FRSO treat SDS as a subsidiary organization. In a video by Jason Unruhe addressing rape and sexual assault cover-ups within the FRSO, he refers to SDS and Fight Back! as satellite organizations. This, paired with the fact that many in SDS during the early years felt that they were trying to infiltrate or, as Haut put it, “push an agenda within the organization” makes it seem like their relationship could be seen as more than just cooperative, but SDS still does consider itself to be separate. They do separate work and there are elements within SDS that still push back against FRSO like Haut.
With this said, we can see that most of the pro-Russian sentiment is coming from the FRSO and their publication. SDS is not formally affiliated with Fight Back! While SDS does have a history of doing work with the FRSO, it does not mean that SDS is a puppet organization. Some may treat it like that, and some within SDS may feel like certain organizations are trying to turn it into one, but they do seem to be their own separate entities. Furthermore, I have spoken with and have done work with SDS. I have talked with members about my concerns surrounding some of their rhetoric around the Russian invasion and they are very receptive and willing to have a nuanced conversation about the situation. Not every SDS member has the same view on the war, and I am sure the vast majority have good intentions in mind. SDS does excellent work and there are those within the organization that do not agree with the authoritarian line. As stated before, SDS does not adopt or adhere to any specific ideology. I guarantee members of SDS are well-intentioned and great people to have a conversation with. If you have concerns, it never hurts to reach out. I am sure someone in the organization would be willing to talk and hash out any disagreements.
I agree with the author in some ways. Still, their framing of the left was dishonest to an extent which is why I wanted to clear the record in the first few paragraphs. I also think that their framing of FRSO’s publication as SDS’s publication was not entirely accurate and deserved correcting. I do agree that tolerating the likes of Stalinists and democratic centralists can be detrimental to the integrity of a democratic and or leftist organizations. I do have some concerns about the FRSO link. Authoritarianism does undermine the mission of a democratic organization, but if you look and talk with members, you will not find those elements in the Appleton SDS.