Alinsky's Rules for Radicals
Undermine the Under-Miners
Oops, not that kind of radical.
Radical leftist Saul Alinsky came up with a set of rules to be used by leftists in their battles to create a leftist utopian nightmare by any means necessary. While some leftists may have altruistic motives I think the majority are in it for the power. They don't realize that, should they succeed in fomenting a Communist revolution, they would be the first to be lined up and shot.
On Alinsky: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saul_Alinsky
I think it is important to know something of these rules so that we may recognize when they are in use. So often “grass roots” issues are not grass roots at all, but are planned and organized operations.
Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have
Never go outside the experience of your people.
Whenever possible, go outside the experience of the enemy.
Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules.
Ridicule is man's most potent weapon
A good tactic is one your people enjoy.
A tactic that drags on for too long becomes a drag.
Use different tactics and actions and use all events of the period.
The threat is more terrifying than the thing itself.
Maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition.
If you push a negative hard and deep enough, it will break through into its counter-side.
The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative.
Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, polarize it.
These ideas have been used to undermine societies throughout the world. You see them constantly in use here in the U.S. by the political class and their goons. The riots of 2020 were the very expression of these rules.
The riots were an example of a tactic that their people enjoyed, especially since many of their people were criminally inclined. What could be more fun than burning and looting? It was not outside of the experience of their people, either, but it was outside the experience of the average small business owner. (It was not actually outside of the experience of the left wing mayors, prosecutors and their police departments, they just decided to allow it.)
The threat is more terrifying than the thing itself. Indeed, and that was the point . Kowtow to us or look at what you face. It did seem as though powerful people in political office and elsewhere were in fact fearful of the consequences and acted accordingly.
The operations were well coordinated. Piles of bricks were being delivered to city streets before a riot, with the FBI apparently unable to track their origins. A description of Antifa tactical structure and tactics is found below, and I strongly recommend reading it if you are interested in what happened. It describes a military like structure, the existence of which belies the supposed grass roots nature of the disturbances. There were “lieutenants”, “captains,” and “colonels,” all with specific rolls and identifying markers. The structure seen in the operations resembled those used by the CIA in color revolutions.
https://www.americanpartisan.org/2020/06/from-a-reader-a-look-at-antifas-field-organization/
In the article it is explained that the officers of Antifa could be recognized once you knew what to look for. They had communications equipment and would wear identifying clothing and helmets of some sort, and the colors would identify them to the cognizant. People would come and go around them as they gave orders and accepted reports, and their were reconnaissance units with personnel gathering information. The point of mentioning this is to indicate to any readers that, if they can peruse large quantities of the January 6 tapes that they might be able to recognize similar activity. Look for individuals with ear pieces, for instance, and try to see if more than one of such individuals are wearing the same colored hat, helmet, or shirt, and watch the persons who repeatedly talk to them, leave, then talk to them again.
Alinsky did have insights into pressure techniques that can be repurposed for the use of those wishing to live in a free country, and can be used against the developing world wide control system. Ridicule, for instance can be used against the woke by making jokes about them. So many of the ideas of the Left are deserving of ridicule, but somehow they seem to not receive it since the media are on their side. Once it becomes fashionable to make jokes about the left their power will wane.
How about making them live up to their own book of rules? You might argue that they really don't have any, they just do whatever works to gain power, but they do have a public facade that they can be shown to not be living up to. Do they really care about ending racism? Mostly they just use it as a power grabbing tool, as evidenced by the fact that their solutions prolong and worsen racial problems. You can assume that most of their positions are there simply to help amass power, so if you look closely and think about it you can see through them, and they may be called out on it when in a public forum. Keep in mind that many people believe them and think that they are trying to make the world better, so they support the Left, so by holding them to their supposed values they can be exposed. Remember, the issue is never the issue, the issue is power.
Consider East Germany under the Communists. They had most of the people convinced that they had files on everyone in the country, but they really had them only on a select minority since they simply lacked the capability of surveilling everyone. Hence the importance of: Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have.
Ridicule is man's most potent weapon. The ideas of the Left may be ridiculed. The Left are not used to it since they expect to do the ridiculing, and expect normal people to be civilized and not act like five year olds, but if you start hearing comedians making light of their ideas and activities you may take heart. If people make jokes at the expense of leftist ideas the culture will begin to subtly and slowly change. The Left depends on promoting itself as being those with superior intellect and higher moral standards. Ridicule would attack the foundation of the edifice.
Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, polarize it. This is where a person, law, idea, company or anything else they don't like is singled out for special attention. When it seems like all you here about is one issue this may be in play. Trump is not just an example, he is a hyper-example.
For more on Alinsky, see my essay on Alinsky's ideas on creating a socialist state:
https://drp314.substack.com/p/saul-alinsky-on-how-to-create-a-socialist
Stay Brave, Stay Free
Thank you for this article David on Saul Alinsky - "Rules for Radicals". While I certainly agree with your overview, recently I came across the theory of “The Iron Law of Oligarchy”.
The "Iron Law of Oligarchy" is a political theory first developed by German sociologist Robert Michels in his 1911 book Political Parties. It asserts that rule by an elite, or oligarchy, is inevitable as an "iron law" within any political organization as part of the "tactical and technical necessities" of the organization. Michels stated that the official goal of representative democracy of eliminating elite rule was impossible, that representative democracy is a façade legitimizing the rule of a particular elite, and that elite rule, which he refers to as oligarchy, is inevitable.
Michels' theory states that all "socialist organizations", regardless of how democratic they are when started, eventually develop into oligarchies. Michels observed that since no sufficiently large and complex organization can function purely as a direct democracy, power within an organization will always get delegated to individuals within that group, elected or otherwise. As he put it in Political Parties, "It is an organization which gives dominion of the elected over the electors. Whoever says organization, says oligarchy." He went on to state that "Historical evolution mocks all the prophylactic measures that have been adopted for the prevention of oligarchy."
According to Michels, all organizations eventually come to be run by a leadership class who often function as paid administrators, executives, spokespersons or political strategists for the organization. Far from being servants of the masses, Michels argues this leadership class, rather than the organization's membership, will inevitably grow to dominate the organization's power structures. By controlling who has access to information, those in power can centralize their power successfully, often with little accountability, due to the apathy, indifference and non-participation most rank-and-file members have in relation to their organization's decision-making processes. Michels argues that democratic attempts to hold leadership positions accountable are prone to fail, since with power comes the ability to reward loyalty, the ability to control information about the organization, and the ability to control what procedures the organization follows when making decisions. All of these mechanisms can be used to strongly influence the outcome of any decisions made 'democratically' by members.
Yes, to those who are sane and well grounded, the woke have many laughable ideas that can be easily and joyfully ridiculed.