To put it as plainly as possible, if the proponents of the U.S. settler-colonialism theory are correct, then there is no basis whatsoever upon which to build a multinational working class communist party in this country. Indeed, such a view sees the “settler working class” as instruments of colonialism, hostile to the interests of the colonized people, rather than viewing all working and oppressed people as natural allies in the struggle against imperialism, our mutual oppressor.
A shame, a sad sad shame. For anyone that’s read settlers, or knows about the history of labor zionism, or prioritizes any kind of indigenous voice in their praxis, this is really bad. No peace for settlers! Settlers cannot lead the revolution! I hope we see an end to any respect given to this “settler colonialism is over” politic soon.
It’s just another form of the settler move to innocence, there is no point in which the relation stopped. It’s the same argument as “racism is over because civil rights!”. Settlers never stop being settlers as long as they rely on a settler colonial government structure, nearly every company you will work for is going to be using underpaid black labor and on still stolen land. The natives are still here as much as these people want to forget that. Many black people are still practically enslaved. So why do white people get to say “It’s over now I’m actually inherently revolutionary” even though their class historically has never led anything revolutionary and has been making the same argument even when settler relations were more obvious?
because liberal indoctrination trains people to see the world through the lens of individualism: “I’m white, and I don’t think of myself as privileged, so white people as a group must not be privileged”; “Sure I own a few rental properties, but I don’t think of myself as exploitative, so landlords as a group must not be exploiters.”; “My friend’s a cop, and I’ve never heard him say anything I thought was racist, so it’s wrong to say that US policing is institutionally racist!”; “I worked hard enough to own my own small business (I earned it with nothing but determination and a loan from my parents), but don’t you dare tell me that means I’m not working class! you’re basically telling all of us (me and my friends) to not even bother doing revolution (posting!)”
some people can only understand class struggle through a moral lens. they see a class contradiction, recognize a “good” group and a “bad” group, then conclude that if they’re not on the “good” side, then the taxonomy needs to change to accommodate that. it’s difficult for some people to reconcile how they can belong to groups with “bad” class characteristics and personally do good in spite of that. I don’t feel “bad” or “good” about being born white or having a settler background, but I know that any good I aim to do in this life will disempower those groups as a necessary prerequisite to empowering the vast majority of the world. I also know that the people leading those struggles must necessarily come from the other side of those class contradictions. education and expertise are invaluable assets to revolutionary struggle, but there’s a reason that successful socialist revolutions haven’t come from the most comfortable, educated elites using their superior knowledge, expertise, and influence convince everyone to give them power so they can benevolently distribute it to the grateful serfs.
A huge part of it is how liberals/conservatives criticise Marxism. The idea that classes equated to morality in Marxism and that marxists were obssessed with equality above all else was probably one of the biggest criticisms of Marxism I used to hear back when I was a liberal.
It was basically what kept me away from Marxism for a pretty long time. I used to think that Marxism was deeply rigid and moralistic so was put off by it. Now I’m beginning to understand that for a lot of people, rigid moralism is a selling point.
A lot of people have vested interest in counter-revolutionary organizations as well. For some reason, despite a lack of accomplishments, any critical look at the material cause of their issues is met with aggression. Either the orgs are actually great and it’s just those uppity black people that don’t like it (weird that white people are saying this hmm) or native people were erased so completely their criticisms don’t matter because the genociders just won.