Elections in Canada: Boycott this bourgeois scam!

Since I noticed that an activist from the "Communist" Party of Canada has posted a text calling to vote for CPC during the next elections, I thought it could be good to give a revolutionnary reply to this revisionnist propaganda. Here is the statement from RCP(oc), a marxist-leninist-maoist organization which continues to follow the elementary principles of marxism by refusing to participate in bourgeois elections and by defending the people's right to wage armed struggle against the bourgeoisie.

THIS PARLIAMENT IS FOR THE RICH AND THE CROOKS!
Don't vote!

After less than 17 months, the electoral circus is back again. Seventeen months later, the Canadian bourgeoisie wants to see us participate massively to the January 23rd ballot. Yes, we could easily define the democracy we know by saying it offers us one day of vote, for four years of scams and lies to come after!

Over the last 17 months - but we could say the last decades - the daily life of the majority of the people, whether at work or unemployed, has hardly changed. We are still about 50% of the Canadian people who earn less than $20,000 per year. Half of the country still receives an uncertain salary, barely enough to pay for the bus fee, pay the rent, the grocery or the gas, which price only gets higher and higher.

Over the last 17 months - but we could say despite years of presence from the "leftist" parties in the Parliament - nothing has changed, and the way the power is "shared" in capitalist society won't really change. In Canada there are maybe one or two millions of leaders, politicians, lawyers, publicists, board directors, bankers, company owners, presidents, brokers - that's the bourgeoisie! - who all take profit from a parliament just made to meet their needs. After all, whether they'd be small or big, the gifts these friends are giving to each other like in the sponsorship scandal, is not something new. We have seen that many times and with most of the bourgeois parties. Those who claim to be at the left or call for Québec separation have all made their rich friends to benefit from the system when they were in power. Let's remember the NDP in BC, or the PQ in Québec with the Caisse de Dépôt investment in la Gaspésia or in Québécor's Vidéotron Company few years ago.

Enough is enough!

As the history of capitalist development shows us today and showed in the past, the bourgeois democracy has been largely unfavorable to the workers, the poor, the youth, or the immigrant people. Despite all the promises that have been made by the parties at the elections, the gap between rich and poor is far from diminishing: in fact it is exactly the opposite! On the other side, the parliamentary system has been largely in favor of the companies, the rich and the capitalists. They saw their wealth become bigger and bigger - just look at the latest business results from the Canadian banks!

The parliament that rules under the capitalist system can't be anything but the parliament of the ruling class, the parliament of the rich and of the whole bourgeoisie's party. Whether it would be separatists from the Bloc or the PQ, Liberal, Conservative or social-democrat federalists: they are all united in defending the same society. That is to say it will stay the same, unless it is to defend a little more, or a little less, the power of the rich.

Particularly in Québec, the Bloc Québécois would like to be seen as the only alternative. This 100% bourgeois party, born from the PQ and from the Tories of Brian Mulroney, wishes to take profit of the workers' disgust for the Liberal Party, in order to improve the role of the Québec bourgeoisie within the Canadian capitalist system and in the world imperialist system. Their needs have nothing to do with those of the workers!

It is also important to separate us from those parties pretending to be communist but which participate in the electoral circus (the so-called "Marxist-Leninist Party" and the "Communist" Party of Canada). These "wannabe" clowns are just playing a ridiculous walk-on part in this play, but by doing so, they bring the genuine communism into disrepute in the eyes of the masses, who are more and more rejecting bourgeois parliamentary system. Let's state clearly that those impostors have nothing to do with communism!

For us, as we work to build the organizing committees of the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP[OC]), we see future and real change elsewhere. We want to build another politics, another democracy, another power, another society and most of all, another kind of party! Not a party to defend the bourgeois society, but a party to uphold proletarian revolution and the necessity of destroying capitalism as an unfair system that exploits people. We firmly reject the bourgeois elections. We dedicate all our energy to build the party that will allow the proletariat to get organized and therefore, to concentrate its own power and rage and rebellion in order to overthrow the real enemy: the Canadian bourgeoisie as a class.

Next fall, the RCP(OC) will hold its 2nd Congress, with the goal to officially found the Revolutionary Communist Party of Canada. In order to make this event as big as possible, from now on and as far as we can from the electoral circus, we will continue to form local organizing committees. We will continue to gather workers, women, youth, immigrants all together, not to go to vote, but to learn together the best strategy for the revolutionary struggle, the one that will allow us to get rid of capitalism. By putting in action millions of proletarians across Canada, we will exercise together the only democracy that counts, the workers' democracy, the one of the majority, the one of the exploited. And that, we will exercise it 365 days each year!

Don't vote! Boycott the elections!
Let's organize against the capitalist crooks!
Revolution is the only solution!

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A PDF version and more documents are available on http://www.pcr-rcpcanada.org.

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It is also important to separate us from those parties pretending to be communist but which participate in the electoral circus (the so-called "Marxist-Leninist Party" and the "Communist" Party of Canada). These "wannabe" clowns are just playing a ridiculous walk-on part in this play, but by doing so, they bring the genuine communism into disrepute in the eyes of the masses, who are more and more rejecting bourgeois parliamentary system. Let's state clearly that those impostors have nothing to do with communism!

Ahh, how nice to see such solidarity! If you're not going to do the elections, you'd better make yourself be heard very well in another way.

How can Marxist-Leninists be revisionist when changing the fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism make a party revisionist.

And Seriously, will not voting bourgeios parties bring about socialism? On the contray low participation rates have in the past brought in fascist governments. It hardly shows a commitment to democracy even if its bourgeios and rubbish by saying boycott it.

It should be noted that the RCP in canada, has never organized a union, got workers to fight fascism, fought in any revolutions, or have brought about change in any real way. They really only take interest in Sectarianism and Line-Struggle, Class Struggle seems to be unimportant. Making enemies with the same comrades who want to work with you.

I say vote until we're organized enough to offer an alternative to Bourgeios elections, and that alternative being revolution.

Amen to that, brother! I applaud the Revolutionary Communist Party of Canada (Organizing Committees) for trying to established a genuine Communist vanguard for the proletariat in Canada under the red banner of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, and for staying steadfast in the battle against reformism, dogmatism, and revisionism that is found in the Gorbachevist CPC and the Hoxhaite CPC(ML)!

FORWARD TO MARXISM-LENINISM-MAOISM, AND FORWARD TO PROLETARIAN REVOLUTION!

We're anti-gorbachev mother Frag, we're a party that is leninist and considers Stalin a Marxist-Leninist. Oh well, you Maoist International Movement Maoists will goto the Gulag :P

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FORWARD TO MARXISM-LENINISM-MAOISM, AND FORWARD TO PROLETARIAN REVOLUTION!

CAPS LOCK DOESN'T MAKE LENINISM LOOK ANY BETTER!

If I were Canadian I would either not vote, vote NDP or CPC, or organize a general strike. As option three, general strike, is out of the option I would either vote or not vote.

why not vote comrade? who says we need change through blood? boycotting democracy is worse than a free market. Give your head a shake, ever though people plan to get a good job, make lots of cash doing something they enjoy to HELP the common struggle? Sometimes you must join the system and destroy it from the inside yes?

Either way. I don't think it makes a party any less Communist to try different ways at securing socialism. It couldn't hurt to vote for a party seperate to yours.

One is trying to get recognized as a part of Canada, getting face-time during elections, and to be showing all the other parties that the leftist movement is rising.

The other is trying to take support out of the parliament, because its capitalism-based. It gets to be recognized as an alternative to the depressing process of voting.

Both methods have obvious flaws and pros. Both are trying to figure out what the people want.

What I think they should do, is try to be elected, and preach about how the parliament and our economic system is hindering democracy. Have huge fundraisers, and then try to change the constituition, and charter. Then, if they are of course unable to, then try to seperate themselves for the system.

What I was trying to say in the above paragraph( I just made that up . It doesn't make sense, I know ) was that I think a combination between the two would be effective. They should target what the system has done to parties (main and small), and what things are preventing us specifically from sending us on the path to socialism.

Our parties need to say that things will be very different if the government's laws and economics were changed to fix democracy.


Sorry about the rambling post.

Cause the Canadian workers will totally listen to your call to ignore the elections. Cause they'll definitely agree they are meaningless...

Yeah, WCM makes a good point.

The worker's have a loyalty to their unions, business,and lobbyists. Some things that are voted on can make a difference for them. Some of them aren't prepared to not use one of their rights, losing potential benefits, a better workplace or wage.

They've put a lot of effort into trying to help themselves through the democratic process, and telling them not to is going to take convincing.

A lot of people still believe that it can make a little bit of difference, even morally, is enough to get them to vote.

They also won't agree with the slogan that elections are a bourgeois scam. The only people who will listen to that kind of message are those who already agree with you.

I think some communist parties should learn from Nike, and understand how to market themselves better. Cause their target group has a tendency to ignore them.

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CAPS LOCK DOESN'T MAKE LENINISM LOOK ANY BETTER!

Actually, it makes Leninism look much better, pitty he put Maoism after it, thats completely ruins it

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FORWARD TO MARXISM-LENINISM-MAOISM, AND FORWARD TO PROLETARIAN REVOLUTION!

No because MLM scares me just as much as hitler does.

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How can Marxist-Leninists be revisionist when changing the fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism make a Party revisionist.

Your Party changed the fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism a long time ago, when it gave up armed struggle for electoralist strategies.

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And Seriously, will not voting bourgeios parties bring about socialism?

Boycotting the elections won't bring socialism. But it's the best thing communists can do during an electoral campaign. We must never propagate amongst the masses the illusion that capitalism can be reformed by parliamentary action. This kind of illusion is a real nuisance for class struggle. As I said boycotting won't bring socialism (neither will voting!!!) but the masses' revolutionary action will! That's why our organization will keep on struggling - like in the past 5 years - to form more and more revolutionary committees, independently of bourgeois politics.

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It hardly shows a commitment to democracy even if its bourgeois and rubbish by saying boycott it.

Come on... be serious. How can someone pretend to be communist and at the same time defend the canadian capitalist democracy?

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It should be noted that the RCP in canada, has never organized a union, got workers to fight fascism, fought in any revolutions, or have brought about change in any real way.

What do you know about that?

never organized a union... Unlike trotskyists, the RCP(oc) doesn't seek to obtain the organizational leadership of a group before obtaining the ideological leadership. So when we interact with unions, instead of trying to get leadership positions, we do propaganda work amongst the members. But even there, we concluded - after study - that the unions members are not the best target for revolutionnary propaganda, since they are often part of what we call the "labor aristocracy". Instead, we focus on the poorer sections of the proletariat (for details, see www.pcr-rcpcanada.org/fr/autres/perspectives.pdf - only in French for now).

never got workers to fight fascism... You don't know shit about this. Some of our supporters are constantly harassed by neo-nazis bastards. You should ask the comrade in Ste-Therese who almost died when he received many iron bar hits on the head because of his anti-fascist activism. Just come to the next anti-racist demonstration in Montreal and tell the people with the red flags that they are not fighting enough against fascism...

never fought in any revolutions... As far as I know, there hasn't been any communist revolution recently in Canada, so I can hardly see how the RCP(oc) could have fought in a revolution... But of course, we support the struggles of our comrades around the world, that's why we organize events in solidarity of the Maoist revolutions (like a picket line in front of the Turkish embassy last summer or some public meetings in support of the Nepalese people's war). We also strongly support the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement (RIM) and we are working to make this organization known to the canadian masses.

never brought about change in any real way... We are not reformists; our goal is not to put pressure on the politicians hoping that they will make small changes to capitalism. We want a real communist revolution and the first step for this is to set up a Party. So, when RCP(oc) was founded five years ago, its goal was to rally a significant number of proletarians into a m-l-m organization, and this is where we brought "change in a real way" : our goals were achieved and a strong Party will be created next year, equipped with a good link to the masses, a large propaganda activity in many regions and most importantly, a correct ideological line. That's the change we brought: we built the country's revolutionary Party.

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I say vote until we're organized enough to offer an alternative to Bourgeios elections, and that alternative being revolution.

Your group exists since 1921 and you're still not "organized enough" for revolution. How much more time must we wait? Another century maybe? Come on, your Party is not even preparing this "alternative", it doesn't even have any strategy for revolution.

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who says we need change through blood?

Well, the whole history of mankind maybe...

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you must join the system and destroy it from the inside

I'd really like to see that; The CPC or the CPCML succeeding in getting two or three MPs elected and then - wow, by using their magical powers - they suddenly destroy capitalism, expropriate the bourgeoisie, dissolve the reactionnary army and establish the dictatorship of the proletariat.

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It couldn't hurt to vote

Of course it could! It would propagate the harmful illusion that capitalism can be reformed. Just look at France, for example. The revisionnists once formed the government and claimed to be "socialists" and "communists" and now the communist movement in France is in a really bad situation because of that. For the majority of the French people, the word "communist" doesn't have a revolutionary meaning. When you talk to French proletarians about communism, they instantly think of the PCF and this is why it is hard to form a really revolutionary movement in France, because the masses have been largely exposed to the revisionnist lies.

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They also won't agree with the slogan that elections are a bourgeois scam. The only people who will listen to that kind of message are those who already agree with you.

This is clearly false. More and more people are convinced that bourgeois elections are pointless because the parliament is never serving the workers' interests. Just look at the participation rate graphic here : www.pcr-rcpcanada.org/fr/arsenal/a4a.jpg. (the title is in French but it says: Participation in Canadian federal elections, in percent of registered citizens)

This comrade from the RCP(OC) makes a good point:

If you become part of an organization or institution that is set up on bourgeois institutions and principles, it will inevitably be on the bourgeoisie's terms and you yourself will end up getting sucked back into their system.

It's what happened with the Popular Fronts of the 1930's, it happened with Allende in Chile (who ended up getting killed because he did not dismantle the system or its reactionary armed forces), and it has happened whenever a Communist or revolutionary ends up forgetting the goal of revolution and falls into reformist ideas...

Reformism and revisionism are suicide for the class struggle, and we must never hold any illusions as to what they do to Communist parties.

Umm did someone realize the guy just made up quotations not present in the thread and said the CPC-ML and the CPC said them?

We reject reformism, we need reforms though Socialism isn't going come tomorrow, so in the meantime having a higher minimum wage will be nice.

Participating in bourgeois elections makes a change, its not the most important way to change society. Did you ever realize that the only known parties are those who participate in elections? Even when they do not gain enough votes to be elected? Showing your face in elections is a great way to make clear you exist, and carry forward your program in a time when the people are listening. Having a MP elected is also very usefull. Putting yourself on the first row where all the bourgois actions take place can, again, help you carry forward your party program. The main rule is: dont make it your primary field of battle. The real battle is still fought outside, in the factories, in the unions and in social organisations. We have to fight this war in all fronts, not only those we like to fight. Shuffle that sectarianism up your ass and get your feet moving to the voting booth.

Vote CPC!

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Did you ever realize that the only known parties are those who participate in elections?

Really? Then how did the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), the Communist Party of Peru, and the Black Panther Party all become such popular and successful vanguard parties within their respective nations?

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Showing your face in elections is a great way to make clear you exist, and carry forward your program in a time when the people are listening. Having a MP elected is also very usefull. Putting yourself on the first row where all the bourgois actions take place can, again, help you carry forward your party program.

Yep... and then you slowly drop more and more of your principles in order to be more "electable", and then the next thing you know... you're one of THEM!

It's like a lot of these Democrats here in the U.S. that continually push themselves more and more right-wing to become more "electable"... The Democrats, in order to beat the Republicans and not seem too "extreme", keep making women's rights, gay rights, and civil liberties less and less important and becoming more and more in line with the Republican Party... has it helped the masses at all? NO! If anything, it has pulled more people further rightward.

In imperialist countries where we are in non-revolutionary situations, leftist parties running for elections always results in the above scenario. Trust me, just look at how the Green Party of the US has fared...

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get your feet moving to the voting booth

I'm sorry, but that sounds just waaaay too much like a ruling class order than something that should come out of a Marxist-Leninist's mouth...

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Really? Then how did the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), the Communist Party of Peru, and the Black Panther Party all become such popular and successful vanguard parties within their respective nations?

Have you ever realized Canada is not like Nepal, Peru or the USA in that particular time? Wow, you give me 3 examples of parties that dont fir the description of contemporary Canada.

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In imperialist countries where we are in non-revolutionary situations, leftist parties running for elections always results in the above scenario. Trust me, just look at how the Green Party of the US has fared...

Like i said, thats why you have to keep in mind that the battle is fought on all fronts. Is the RCP perhaps afraid of being dismissed at elections? First of all, the democrats never started out as a marxist party. Upholding marxist principles is not easy. But if you're goint to say "We can lose our pinciples by doing that", there wont be much left to do, is there? Maybe the RCP really is afraid to be dismissed.

You're dismissal of everything as revisionist isnt based on wether they're revisionist or not, its based on following the line of the RCP. Anything other than that is revisionist. Thats your definition of revisionism. Its hard to argue something like that, cause when i do: i'm revisionist.

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did someone realize the guy just made up quotations not present in the thread and said the CPC-ML and the CPC said them?

Honestly comraderyan, I'm quite sure the quotations were accurate. Maybe you could tell me where you've seen a mistake?

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Have you ever realized Canada is not like Nepal, Peru or the USA in that particular time? Wow, you give me 3 examples of parties that dont fir the description of contemporary Canada.

These 3 examples are fully relevant. Even if each country's situation is different, I don't see how this changes the fact that a revolutionary organization can become very well known and supported, without participating to elections.

Anyway, the CPC and CPCML have been participating to elections for years and nobody knows about them.

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You're dismissal of everything as revisionist isnt based on wether they're revisionist or not, its based on following the line of the RCP. Anything other than that is revisionist. Thats your definition of revisionism.

What do you know about that? Of course, I consider that you are a revisionist, but it doesn't mean that I consider everybody as revisionist if they don't support marxism-leninism-maoism. I get along quite well with marxist-leninists supporting armed struggle.