You’ll see anarchists praising Rosa Luxemburg, who if they had actually read her writings – they would see that she was very clearly one of the “authoritarian” socialists that they rail against so much.
You see them praise the Black Panthers, who were supported financially by the DPRK and aligned themselves with the Juche ideology of Kim Il Sung.
They even praise Thomas Sankara, who purged anarchists and arrested syndicalists.
If these people had succeeded, i have no doubt in my mind that anarchists would call them “tankies,” they would call their experiments “capitalism with a red flag.” And I also have no doubt in my mind that if the October Revolution, Chinese Revolution had been crushed, they would hail Lenin and Mao as proletarian heroes.
I think the Panthers and the DPRK end up getting mentioned in the same breath a lot because of the communications they shared; though nothing I’ve studied ever suggested they outright adopted Juche. If someone’s got like-- hard and fast recollection that’s stored somewhere that they did, though; I’d very much like to see it if only for completion of my own understanding.
They were at least very complimentary of Juche. This article has a few more quotes of primary sources (though it’s a bit anti-communist):
https://archive.ph/QYo19
The Juche ideal centers on relying on the creativity of the people to adapt to their situation. It’s hard to say they didn’t adopt Juche if they say they’re influenced by it, and Juche isn’t a rigid structure.
Agreed, I’d like to see it as well. Because to me, it sounds a lot like this type of smear that’s common in American politics. “You gave an award one time to this POET who also advocated for BLOWING UP THIS BUILDING so clearly you support everything he said, so you’re a terrorist!”
The specific assertion was that the BPP “aligned themselves with the Juche ideology of Kim Il Sung.” I’m asking, is that accurate? Or did they just talk and were they both generally socialist in nature?
How is it a smear? Both are groups fighting against genocidal Yankees. It makes sense for them to have solidarity with each other.
It seems to have been specifically Eldridge Cleaver, who had a kid in the DPRK. I didn’t read this whole article, but it claims:
https://apjjf.org/2015/13/12/Benjamin-Young/4303.html
There’s a paywalled pdf I found that might point to the original source, but I’ll have to play with it later.
I feel like I read an archive of a Black Panther article saying they followed Juche, but I’ll have to track it down.