Gregory Koger -- an Inspiration and Role Model Who Must Be Defended!

Below I am reposting an article by Gregory Koger originally published at the newly redesigned revcom.us website for Revolution Newspaper.  Gregory is a former prisoner who I had the great privilege of getting to know through the movement for Revolution.  Currently, the state is moving to lock him up once again -- on completely illegitimate and unjust grounds.  As he explains below, he is being made an example by a system that is deeply afraid of those who are locked on the bottom of society -- and those locked literally in the bowels and dungeons of this criminal system -- connecting up with the real revolution, connecting with the leadership of Bob Avakian, and becoming emancipators of humanity.  Take the time to read his statement and the excerpts of letters from other prisoners who have been inspired by him and are standing with him.  Then, add your name to the statement demanding "Not One More Day" in jail for him and share this with everyone you know.

What This System Does to the People of the World Is Criminal—Dedicating Your Life to Emancipating Humanity Is Not

A statement by Gregory Koger

November 18, 2012 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

Three years ago I was arrested for attempting to document a political statement opposing censorship by Sunsara Taylor at the "Ethical" Humanist Society of Chicago (EHSC). What began as a brief but principled statement opposing the censorship of her long-scheduled talk and an invitation for those who wanted to hear her talk to join us at the home of a now-former member of the EHSC was rapidly transformed by powers in the ruling class into a three-year-long political and legal battle against a political prosecution and 300-day jail sentence for non-violent misdemeanors.

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"Let's Be Real Here: As Bad As Bush Was,..."

 

New audio clip from a recent talk by Bob Avakian. Highly relevant going into the elections.

"Let's Be Real Here: As Bad As Bush Was, In Many Ways Obama Is Worse..."

Listen to it, play it for others, and spread it.

STOP EVERYTHING -- START READING! NEW INTERVIEW WITH BOB AVAKIAN

Revolution #267, May 1, 2012

WHAT HUMANITY NEEDS Revolution, and the New Synthesis of Communism

An Interview with Bob Avakian

Fierce, Joyous, Inspiring...A Movement to End Pornography and Patriarchy is Launched!



On Saturday, March 10th a new energy, a new defiance, and a new commitment to fight for the full liberation of women, were felt on the streets of New York City.   Beginning at noon in front of St. Patrick's Cathedral, proceeding on a tour of many sites which concentrate the oppression of women, and concluding in front of a strip club and porn store near Times Square; people of all ages, many nationalities, and all genders condemned the enslavement and degradation of women.

In Times Square

As people gathered in front of St. Patrick's Cathedral, beneath its towering spires and enormous brass doors designed to make humans feel small and humble, their faces were filled with both exuberance, but also hesitation. It is not typical to confront churches. In fact, it’s not typical these days to directly confront woman-haters of any kind. It is all too typical for people to complain in hushed voices or to send money and sign petitions to politicians in the hopes that maybe someone else will do something. So, it is understandable that this felt new to many people.

As people picked up signs and decked themselves out in stickers, I was reminded of something told to me by a self-defense instructor years ago. She made a point of taking the time to insist that all her female students learn to yell forcefully. She did this because women are so deeply socialized to be polite, demure, docile, quiet and agreeable that they have to learn to trust their anger when they are under attack.

"I Demand my Reproductive Rights!!
 I'm a Human Being!!"

I shared this story with the crowd and added, “Today, women around the world are under attack and we ought to be angry about that. We ought to be loud about that. We ought not to be the ones telling our stories in whispers and through tears while woman haters scream 'slut' at the tops of their lungs. Today, we are going to get in touch with our anger. We are going to yell at the tops of our lungs. If it feels funny at first, that's okay, keep at it. After a while it will stop feeling funny and will start to feel really fucking good. And then, it will be contagious. That is the point of today. We are taking it upon ourselves to defeat the war on women. We are changing ourselves in the process. And we are launching a new movement that wakes up and draws in others wave after wave until we win.”  Read more...

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The fury of women can and must be fully unleashed as a mighty force for proletarian revolution

Revolutionary Communism and the Liberation of Women -- WE NEED TOTAL REVOLUTION!    

#9

You cannot break all the chains, except one. You cannot say you want to be free of exploitation and oppression, except you want to keep the oppression of women by men. You can't say you want to liberate humanity yet keep one half of the people enslaved to the other half. The oppression of women is completely bound up with the division of society into masters and slaves, exploiters and exploited, and the ending of all such conditions is impossible without the complete liberation of women. All this is why women have a tremendous role to play not only in making revolution but in making sure there is all-the-way revolution. The fury of women can and must be fully unleashed as a mighty force for proletarian revolution.

Bob Avakian 

Chairman of the

Revolutionary Communist Party, USA

BAsics 3:22

"Look at all these beautiful children who are female in the world..."

Revolutionary Communism and the Liberation of Women -- WE NEED TOTAL REVOLUTION!    

#5

"Look at all these beautiful children who are female in the world. And in addition to all the other outrages which I have referred to, in terms of children throughout the slums and shantytowns of the Third World, in addition to all the horrors that will be heaped on them—the actual living in garbage and human waste in the hundreds of millions as their fate, laid out before them, yes, even before they are born—there is, on top of this, for those children who are born female, the horror of everything that this will bring simply because they are female in a world of male domination. And this is true not only in the Third World. In "modern" countries like the U.S. as well, the statistics barely capture it: the millions who will be raped; the millions more who will be routinely demeaned, deceived, degraded, and all too often brutalized by those who are supposed to be their most intimate lovers; the way in which so many women will be shamed, hounded and harassed if they seek to exercise reproductive rights through abortion, or even birth control; the many who will be forced into prostitution and pornography; and all those who—if they do not have that particular fate, and even if they achieve some success in this "new world" where supposedly there are no barriers for women—will be surrounded on every side, and insulted at every moment, by a society and a culture which degrades women, on the streets, in the schools and workplaces, in the home, on a daily basis and in countless ways."

Bob Avakian 

Chairman of the

Revolutionary Communist Party, USA

BAsics 1:10

Out of Denial and Into the Streets – International Women's Day 2012

Women the world-over are facing a growing assault on their lives, their rights, and even their recognition as full human beings.


In the U.S., Catholic Bishops have turned women's basic right to birth control into a national controversy. At least twenty percent of U.S. female soldiers are sexually assaulted by fellow soldiers. Every moment we are bombarded by images of women's bodies, half naked and half starved. And strip clubs, which serve up the subordination of women to men in the living flesh, have become so mainstream that annually men spend an estimated $16 billion dollars on them (as compared to the $4 billion they spend on baseball).


In the Congo, tens of thousands of women have been so brutally raped they can no longer hold their bladders or bowels. From Moldova to Thailand and beyond, millions of girls and women are sold as sex slaves. Throughout the world, fueled by the massive dislocations caused by imperialist development as well as imperialist wars, Islamic fundamentalism is rising with its “honor” killings, forced veiling, and hatred of women. And from China to Honduras to Silicon Valley, the near-slave labor – and sometimes outright slave-labor – of women and girls has disproportionately fueled the growth in cheap manufacturing.


These are not “just a bunch of different bad things happening to women."  These are but a few of the many fronts in an all-out war on women. While the forms this takes may appear different – or even unrelated – a common rope is tightening around nearly every dimension of the public, social, political, and intimate lives of women.

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Two radical ruptures

Revolutionary Communism and the Liberation of Women -- WE NEED TOTAL REVOLUTION!    

#4

"The Communist Revolution is the most radical rupture with traditional property relations; no wonder that its development involves the most radical rupture with traditional ideas."

 

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto



 

the burkha...the thong - what they have in common

Revolutionary Communism and the Liberation of Women -- WE NEED TOTAL REVOLUTION!    

#3

"While they may appear very different, the burkha enforced by fanatical Islamic fundamentalism, on the one hand, and the "thong," widely advertised and promoted as "sexy underwear" for women, in "modern" capitalist society, on the other hand, are both hideous symbols and embodiments of the degradation of women. The fundamental thing they have in common is that they are both manifestations of a world marked by horrendous forms of oppression, both "traditional" and "modern"—a world dominated overall by capitalist imperialism—a world that needs to be turned upside down and radically transformed."

from A Declaration: For Women's Liberation and the Emancipation of All Humanity 

by Revolution Newspaper

"the equivalent of those 'Postcards of the Hanging.'..."

Revolutionary Communism and the Liberation of Women -- WE NEED TOTAL REVOLUTION!    

#2

"I began the "Revolution” talk with “They're Selling Postcards of the Hanging,” reviewing the ugly history of the lynching of Black people in America and the way in which celebration of this became a cultural phenomenon in the U.S., with the selling of picture postcards of these lynchings a major expression of this—often including smiling and leering crowds of white people surrounding the murdered and mutilated body of a Black man.  In a recent exchange, a comrade emphasized this profoundly important and compelling point: Today, the way in which pornography depicts women—the displaying of women in a degraded state for the titillation of viewers—including the grotesque brutality and violence against women which is involved in much of this, is the equivalent of those “Postcards of the Hanging.” It is a means through which all women are demeaned and degraded."

 --- Bob Avakian, Unresolved Contradictions, Driving Forces for Revolution

"The fabric of women's oppression..."

Revolutionary Communism and the Liberation of Women -- WE NEED TOTAL REVOLUTION!    

#1

"The fabric of women's oppression is carved deeply into the calloused hands of women in the sweatshops of China and Honduras. It is draped over the faces of young women in Saudi Arabia and Indonesia. It is stripped off the bodies of girls of Moldova and Bangkok who are put up for sale in brothels worldwide, and it is worn like a prize by pre-teens in the U.S. and Europe who are taught to dress and move like sex objects long before they understand what sex even is. This fabric ropes back into history, it winds its way around the globe, braided into all the dominant religions and “moral codes” and woven into every aspect of human societies. It is a heavy veil that cases the darkness of humanity's first oppressive divisions over the lives, the dreams, and the prospects of every corner of humanity in the 21^st century.

To live like this on this planet in the 21^st century cannot be justified and should not be accepted. None of this can be tolerated or excused away with counsel of patience.
WE DECLARE: NO MORE!"

from A Declaration: For Women's Liberation and the Emancipation of All Humanity 

by Revolution Newspaper

"Let's get down to basics: We need a revolution..."

BAsics, 3:1 

Let's get down to basics: We need a revolution. Anything else, in the final analysis, is bullshit.

Now, that doesn't mean we don't unite with people in all sorts of struggles short of revolution. We definitely need to do that. But the proffering of any other solution to these monumental and monstrous problems and outrages is ridiculous, frankly. And we need to be taking the offensive and mobilizing increasing numbers of masses to cut through this shit and bring to the fore what really is the solution to this, and to answer the questions and, yes, the accusations that come forth in response to this, while deepening our scientific basis for being able to do this. And the point is: not only do we need to be doing this, but we need to be bringing forward, unleashing and leading, and enabling increasing numbers of the masses to do this. They need to be inspired, not just with a general idea of revolution, but with a deepening understanding, a scientific grounding, as to why and how revolution really is the answer to all of this.

Making Revolution and Emancipating Humanity - Part 2:
 "Everything We're Doing Is About Revolution,"
Revolution #114, December 30, 2007

Interview on Michael Slate show: "End Pornography & Patriarchy: the Enslavement and Degradation of Women"

On KPFK on Jan 13, 2012 -

As the anniversary of Roe v. Wade approaches, I was on the Michael Slate show to talk about the call to   End Pornography and Patriarchy: the Enslavement and Degradation of Women.  The film I mention about the trafficking in women is "The Whistleblower."
Here's the interview including calls from listeners: Listen Here

Indiegogo.com/BAsicsEvent - A Success!!

To all my blog followers:

Here's the wonderful update on the determined effort to fund the upcoming film "Occasioned by BAsics: A Celebration of Revolution & the Vision of a New World."

By the time of the deadline at midnite PST on Dec. 12, $25,002 was raised!

Here's the final message from Indiegogo.com/BAsics event:

WE MADE IT!!  Thank you to the hundreds who contributed in large amounts and small, thank you to everyone who helped call people, attended house parties, participated in bake sales and more!  All of us together accomplished a very important thing in raising and contributing the funds so this film can be produced and released.  The community that came together to fund this film can grow further as the film is released... and every single donation that came in will help reach a greater community and audience from here forward.  We will keep everyone posted on developments with the film.  Thank you!

"Break On Through! To The Occupy! Hella Occupy Oakland!"

Interview with a revolutionary

(Revolution #249, November 6, 2011)


The following report and interview is with someone who was part of Occupy Oakland nearly from the beginning and who was arrested in the police attack and destruction of the camp. Occupy Oakland has now come back, to the same place as before.

Q: Can you tell us why people came together initially for Occupy Oakland?

Hella Occupy Oakland started off converging onto Downtown Oakland's Frank Ogawa Plaza, all united around the slogan "WE ARE THE 99%!" Many people spoke of the deeply felt anger towards this system in many different ways, from the greed of corporations to the ongoing wars for empire. Others expressed a sense of hope coming from the Occupy Wall Street Movement that is spreading throughout this country and the world, because it is based on mass resistance and mobilization to the crimes of this system on many levels, including mass nonviolent civil disobedience, challenging people to act in accordance with transforming the world, however they may see that or relate to that. Nonetheless the call was clear; we the 99% are indeed, as Annie Day said in her article "Report from Occupy Wall Street: 'We Only Want the World'" (Revolution #247, October 9, 2011), "fed the fuck up," may I add, "hella fed the fuck up!" In the mix the first day were two communists who supported the newspaper Revolution. I was one of them and I had my backpack ready with clothes, hair and toothbrushes, and a sleeping bag ready to hella occupy this mutha fucka! While I listened to people speak and express their sentiments on unity, inspiration, and concerns, a HUGE FUCKING BANNER saying "WELCOME TO THE OSCAR GRANT PLAZA ON OHLONE LAND"

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Outright Piggery from the Camp of Counter-Revolution

from Revolution #249, November 6, 2011
Revolution is a serious and complex matter. It involves many different people coming together to unite on a common program of struggle, identifying and working toward the aims and means of fighting to make a radical change in the whole way humans interact with each other. Communists are fighting for a revolution which will bring an end to the power held by the capitalist-imperialists over the lives of billions, and bring into being a very different—and better—society for all of humanity. Those who hold power promote counter-revolution, working in every way they can to oppose and derail movements for revolution. This is the counter-revolution,

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BA EVERYWHERE... IMAGINE THE DIFFERENCE IT COULD MAKE!

Announcing: A Mass Campaign to Raise Big Money to Get BA’s Vision and Works Into Every Corner of Society

Revolution #250, November 13, 2011


“I hope he gets number one Amazon.com. We need to get this kind of word, this kind of conversation out—it needs to be disseminated, it needs to be in the mainstream more. We got to stop thinking that this kind of stuff just belongs at the very, very fringe of society...”

—journalist and writer

“I wish I had a copy of BAsics in high school so that I could counter the bullshit being taught to me. I didn’t have that opportunity, but there are millions of students today who need to hear the voice of Bob Avakian so they can join the fight. BAsics presents an essential challenge to all that is oppressive and intolerant. It paints not only a picture of a new world, but it leaves room for innovation and growth, as a communist future will have, as Bob Avakian says, ‘a solid core with a lot of elasticity.’”

—student from the Midwest

“I want to urge everybody out there to get their hands on this book and to help get it into the hands of others, not just prisoners, but into the hands of youth who are in danger of becoming prisoners themselves.... Help them unlock their potential and give them a sense of purpose that doesn’t involve killing each other. Give them an alternative to the criminal lifestyle that doesn’t involve conforming to this horrid system. That is what they need, that is what they ache for. They want to rebel, they just have to be introduced to the correct way to do so. Put them on the path to becoming communists...”

—a prisoner from California

These are things people have written us after reading BAsics, a book of quotations and short essays from Bob Avakian. They feel the need for more people to know about Bob Avakian—his vision and works. And so do we. 

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Time to Intensify Outpouring of Resistance -- by Carl Dix

from Revolution #248, October 23, 2011


Interview with Carl Dix about October 22, 2011

Time to Intensify Outpouring of Resistance

The following is from an interview done on October 11 with Carl Dix:

Revolution: Going into NDP, what is it about the situation today you would like to highlight in terms of both the ongoing and accelerating police murder and brutality as well as the need for people to manifest resistance against that?

Carl Dix: This is the 16th annual National Day of Protest to Stop Police Brutality, Repression and the Criminalization of a Generation. We formed this group [October 22nd Coalition] because there was an epidemic of police brutality and police murder that needed to be resisted on a nationwide level. And that brutality, that repression, that criminalization, has not only continued, it has intensified. I mean, look at the 2.3+ million people incarcerated in the U.S. And this has been really targeted at especially Black and Latino people. The police brutalizing and even murdering people has also intensified. In Chicago, as of last month, the police had shot 47 people, including people in situations where there was no claim by the police that the people had done anything wrong. But none of the police have been charged with crimes or disciplined in any way for shooting, maiming and even in cases of killing innocent people. Then you have things like the death penalty. The Troy Davis legal lynching very graphically brings that to the fore. Here you have a man who was railroaded into prison based on evidence that was concocted by police. And the Troy Davis case is really a concentration of how the criminal injustice system treats Black and Latino people, in terms of people being thrown into prison on the flimsiest of evidence or no evidence at all, given long sentences, or even given the death penalty.

So all of these things are going on. They’re intensifying. But then the other part of the situation that’s very important and that’s very heartening is the way in which there have been significant acts of resistance. A very important one has been the hunger strike of the prisoners in California. People who are locked down in special housing units that amount to torture chambers, kept in solitary confinement, sometimes for decades, denied human contact. These conditions meet the definition of torture, as far as international law is concerned. These prisoners organized a hunger strike beginning July 1 that involved 6,000 people. The California authorities made a show of negotiating with people and the hunger strike was suspended on July 21. But then when the prisoners saw that the authorities weren’t making any real changes, the hunger strike was started again on September 26 and has involved up to 12,000 prisoners. That’s a very important example of resistance. As well as the response to the Troy Davis lynching. We weren’t able to build the kind of resistance that could have stopped his execution, but there were large numbers of people all around the country and around the world who signed statements, marched in protest, and then marched in outrage after the murder of Troy Davis by the state. And you saw both large numbers of the oppressed who were saying, they’re trying to kill us. But then you also saw people from diverse backgrounds, people from the middle class, white people, who were seeing this, shocked, but also outraged that it was happening, and joining in the resistance. And this is very, very important.

Revolution: I know you’ve been part of an effort around putting a stop to Stop and Frisk, a call has been put out, and there are some efforts leading into NDP to build resistance, to actually stop Stop and Frisk. 

Dix: The call to stop Stop and Frisk was issued by Cornel West and me and it came out of a strategy session back in July which discussed how to take the fight against mass incarceration to a new level.

And what we determined coming out of that strategy session, was that there was a lot of work being done to expose this—Michelle Alexander’s book, The New Jim Crow, is a very important work in that vein. And different groups have come together to spread some of that exposure and to work in various ways, either through the courts or through lobbying in the political arena to try to deal with the horrors of mass incarceration.

But we thought that a missing ingredient here is determined mass resistance. And in particular we felt the situation was analogous to the late ’50s and early ’60s in the struggle against Jim Crow segregation and lynch mob terror where a lot of people were being weighed down by these foul and very overt forms of oppression aimed at Black people. But then other large sections of people were not so aware that this was going on. And some of those who were aware bought into the explanations and justifications for it. And what was required to create a situation where things could be changed was a beginning small number of people stepping out and engaging in dramatic resistance. With the Freedom Riders, the students who started the sit-in movements at the lunch counters and other places like that, and there weren’t a lot of them to start with. But they took very determined action, they stood up in the face of repression and delivered a message to the whole country and the world, that we’re not going to take this anymore. And that determined action was a spark that spread throughout the country and launched a powerful movement against the oppression of Black people.

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Atheist Alliance America & Texas Freethought Convention – Shout Outs!

This past weekend has been the joint convention of the Texas Freethought Convention and the Atheist Alliance America in Houston, Texas. Somewhere around 700 people attended this conference – a very impressive and positive development in any place at this time of dangerous Christian fascism within the U.S. and rising fundamentalism throughout the world. But come on now: Everyone knows it is even more impressive, and positive, if this many people turn out for atheism and secularism in Texas! Rick Perry, get the fuck out of the way!

Over several years of traveling and speaking nation-wide, I have always been struck that progressive people, radical people, revolutionary people, and atheist people in Texas really have to be bold and courageous. Certainly, one of the very best parts of attending the convention was getting to know and learn from the impressive number of atheists and freethinkers who came from all over Texas. This included many who came on their own, who had never been to a gathering of atheists before, and who might not even be open with their families and friends about being atheists.

So, before anything further: a heartfelt shout out to all the atheists and reality-based people who took this step for the first time!

Also a shout out to those who spent many hours of many weeks of many months organizing this conference. Special appreciation to Staise Gonzalez (President of Houston Atheists), Paul Mitchell (President of Texas Freethought Convention), and Nick Lee (President of Atheist Alliance America). Also, Angelo who moderated all three panels I was on and to the volunteers who got my powerpoint running (sorry, I didn't get your name but THANK YOU). Obviously, to everyone else who made this thing come together – I know there were a LOT of you. Thanks.

As at any conference, I wasn't able to catch every panel or plenary. Nor do I feel that the most interesting post from me would be an attempt at a round-up of the whole weekend.

Instead, over the course of several installments: a few highlights... some reflections mainly on questions that came up in the panels I was part of... as well as in my conversations with participants... and an invitation to continue the dialogue.

Tomorrow: "Diversity (and Black people specifically) in the Movement"

Challenging People to Think: Activism for Atheism

[Originally published in On The Issues Magazine - fall issue on activism]

by Sunsara Taylor

People generally think of activism as something you do. But activism aimed at changing how people think is equally important. There is, after all, a profound connection between what people think, as well as how people think, and what they are willing – or not willing – to do.


In particular, the belief in god and the specific content of the world's major religions constitute huge shackles on people's minds and, as a result, on their behavior. Every major religion is highly oppressive, especially toward women. Religion has led people to take actions that are harmful to humanity; religious faith interferes with rational thought, and, religion frequently stands in the way of people's willingness to throw themselves into the struggle for liberation in the actually existing material world.

This, then, is the story of how, in the course of my revolutionary struggles – I am a communist revolutionary -- I came to activism on behalf of atheism.

Seeing Holes in the Cloth

I didn't come from an atheist background. Actually, I grew up a deeply believing Christian. As a little girl, I even read my Bible at night to my stuffed animals (so concerned was I for their eternal souls).
Religion interferes with rational thought

My Christian convictions initially dampened my own activism. I can remember the feeling of profound disorientation that arose when I first defended an abortion clinic in North Dakota back in 1995. I had longed to stand up in support of abortion doctors since the assassination of Dr. David Gunn in Pensacola in 1993. But at my first clinic event, I was confronted by Father Frank Pavone, head of Priests for Life, on the other side of the barricades. I didn't know of all the ways he had whipped up an environment that led to doctors being killed; all I saw was his white collar, a symbol, which, to me, conveyed absolute moral authority. His presence on the other side and his direct challenge to me -- including through the use of the scripture -- shook me deeply.

Afterward, I struggled for months to sort this out. This process eventually led me to cast off belief in Christianity and in god altogether. I found no material evidence for the existence of god, although most people are indoctrinated with and surrounded by religious belief. Believers say that they accept the idea of god on faith, but there is tremendous historical evidence that every myth about god is man-made.

I became more outspoken about atheism as I saw how believing in things that one doesn't understand is not harmless: it interferes with rational thought, keeps people ignorant and causes real suffering.

For example, while organizing resistance to the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan during the Bush years, I frequently encountered Christian fundamentalists who were convinced that George W. Bush had been chosen as president by god. The fact that Bush had lied about the existence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq was irrelevant to these fundamentalists because, they insisted, he was acting on higher truths than those of mere men.

People's religious beliefs also keep them from taking effective political action, even in the face of screaming outrages. In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, I made several trips to New Orleans. Residents of the Ninth Ward shared stories with me of being trapped in the floodwaters, discovering deceased loved ones upon return and wondering what had become of their still-missing neighbors. However, more than a few of these residents disregarded my suggestions of resistance against the government's criminal response because, they insisted, the real cause of the hurricane was their own sinfulness.

Of course, there are many people whose religious beliefs motivate them to struggle against injustice. I have worked with and learned from many of them over the years. I certainly don't think belief in god should be a dividing line in the fight for a better world.

At the same time, the content of the major world religions -- Christianity no less than any other -- is horrifically oppressive. The Bible was written by human beings who lived in patriarchal, slave-owning, agrarian societies before the development of science. Consequently, the Bible is saturated with the ignorance and prejudices of their times. For example, the Bible insists that women obey their husbands as the lord (Ephesians 5:22); that homosexuals be executed (Leviticus 20:13); that disobedient children be stoned to death (Matthew 15:4), and that slaves obey their masters (Ephesians 6:5). Upholding these Bible myths is upholding enslavement and oppression, and is very harmful to real people in the world today.

Beyond the harmful content, taking things on faith stands in the way of seeking to understand the real world causes for why things happen and the real world possibilities for radical change.

Exposing People to A Different Way

My activism for atheism involves explaining what atheism is -- many people around the country have never been exposed to atheist thinking at all. I engage in panels and debates at university campuses, in community forums or on the radio. In 2009, I appeared on a Black talk radio station in Atlanta. Some callers debated me fiercely over scripture, others felt they had the space to announce their own atheism for the first time, but almost everyone thanked the host for bringing them a perspective they'd never heard on Black radio before. At times, my advocacy on atheism taken me right into the thick of religious zealots. In 2006, I attended a stadium rally of tens of thousands of Christian youth who were preached to by Navy SEALs, Franklin Graham and George W. Bush himself (via a letter). I went with a group of revolutionaries to learn more, to write about it and to directly challenge the youth to get out. Much to my surprise, in the middle of the event, my face was projected onto the huge JumboTron screen that showed a television debate I'd done with the group's leader, Ron Luce. Suddenly, my anonymity disappeared and I felt the "battle cry" crowd look at me as the personification of the devil. Still, just in the last month -- all these years later -- I received a copy of a letter from someone who met us at that rally, had since broken with fundamentalism and now wanted to do something better in life.

In championing atheism, I am not merely giving people new information (as important as that is). I am challenging people to think with a different method. I prod them not to follow someone just because of the person's claimed religious authority and not to accept things on faith. Instead, I want people to evaluate things based on evidence, to ask questions (including about what I am saying), to seek answers in the material world and to put their energies to transforming this world. "Oppressed people who are unable or unwilling to confront reality as it actually is, are condemned to remain enslaved and oppressed," wrote Bob Avakian, author of Away With All Gods! Unchaining the Mind and Radically Changing the World. I seek not merely to "balance" my commitment to "unchaining the mind" with my commitment to "radically changing the world," but to working for the best possible dynamism and mutual reinforcement between those two interrelated missions.

I came to the fight for atheism as part of my larger commitment to the liberation of humanity through communist revolution. My approach of engaging people around atheism differs from that of other activists who are building political resistance but insist that any debate over religion just "gets in the way." It also differs from those who are single-minded about atheism and look down on those with religious faith as if they are stupid or have no insights.

Fighting the attacks on women driven by Christian fundamentalism

Taking up the fight for atheism has especially strengthened my ability to fight for the liberation of women. When I stand in defense of abortion clinics, whether in Mississippi or Colorado or elsewhere, I see pro-choice people, particularly young women, go through the same kind of disorientation that I felt when I first heard "my" bible used against me. I am able to help them see that they are up against human authorities -- both the patriarchal humans who wrote the Bible and the patriarchal humans who are wielding it to terrorize doctors and shame women -- not up against the "word of god." Not everyone casts off her belief in religion, but a seed is planted, and the young women feel a weight lifted to have this question addressed head on.

On the flip side, I struggle for the atheist community to put more energy into fighting the attacks on women driven by Christian fundamentalism. After giving a talk on this subject at an international atheist conference, women thanked me and shared their stories of abortion. One young woman burst into tears as she explained that even though she grew up pro-choice and been active in the atheist movements, she'd never heard anyone say that abortion was okay. She had begun to feel like there must be something wrong with her for never having felt remorse about her abortion.

People who are atheists can do more to open people's minds. For one thing, they can come "out" about it. Many people have never met an atheist and are denied the opportunity to consider it for themselves.

Atheists can challenge people to confront the passages in the Bible or other religious texts that command injustices. Ask, "Would the world be better, or worse, if those commandments were followed?" It is not an insult to challenge people to cast off beliefs that are not founded in reality; it is an insult to think that anyone is incapable of coming to understand the material world without the lens of religion.