Statement from MDS Staten Island
MOVEMENT FOR A DEMOCRATIC SOCIETY STATEN ISLAND
PO Box 40921
Staten Island, NY 10304
statenisland@mds-nyc.org
www.mds-nyc.org
24 July 2007
STATEMENT FROM MOVEMENT FOR A DEMOCRATIC SOCIETY, STATEN ISLAND
In that:
We believe that a truly democratic movement can only take root and grow from the bottom up;
We favor a decentralized structural model and believe that Movement for a Democratic Society (MDS) would best function at this time as a federation of local grassroots chapters;
We envision MDS Staten Island as part of a growing network of autonomous community based chapters;
We in MDS Staten Island consider the work we do at the local chapter level and beyond to be of critical importance in an era of increasing powerlessness, repression, rising fascism, and an unchecked, criminal war;
We represent grassroots activists, organizers and community members with a shared commitment to the struggle for social justice and a vision of radical democracy in our own right, and do not seek nor require validation of that fact from any organization, student or adult;
We are comprised of a wide range of people who believe that the fight that lies before us all requires a broad coalition of people on the Left regardless of affiliations or degree of ideological difference and we actively seek to build such coalitions whenever possible;
We remain committed to the goals of intergenerational organizing and supportive of SDS but believe that a truly exemplary model of intergenerational organizing can only be achieved through mutual support, good comradeship, and recognizing our commonality of purpose and not by destructive means: disassociation, disaffiliation, collective punishment, or indiscriminate censure;
We recognize the existence of a disruptive and divisive element within MDS but consider attempts to deal with this issue by tarring all who’d identify as members of MDS with the same brush, to be inherently oppressive, counterproductive, and in opposition to the goal of good intergenerational organizing;
We characterize membership in MDS locally as contingent upon our shared affinity for community organizing, direct action, and local/regional/national activism and not by definition on any age-based factors often assigned to MDS;
We the members of MDS Staten Island, New York hereby state that we exist as a fully autonomous chapter of Movement for a Democratic Society.
ALL POWER TO THE CHAPTERS!!
Passed by consensus, 24 July 2007, Staten Island, NY.
For More Information: statenisland@mds-nyc.org