Introduction

When I was eighteen years old, I decided to volunteer full-time for a year with an organization called the Coalition of Concerned Medical Professionals, before going to college. The group purported to be an organization providing free health care to migrant and seasonal farm workers. Although they did do this, they were also a front group recruiting people into the Provisional Communist Party, which is a political cult. I was recruited and spent fourteen and a half years in the cult, working 24/7 with various front groups from 1979-1994. During that time I missed my sister's wedding. I missed spending time with three of my grandparents who died while I was to busy. I missed my mother's graduation when she earned her PhD in Education. I missed countless family events, and greatly hurt my family. For these things I am sorry. I will never get to redo those years. I was fortunate enough to reconnect with my family and they forgave me. We are now close again. I went to college and earned an electrical engineering and then a law degree. I am married to a wonderful man and have my own law practice. My husband and I have a ministry to developmentally handicapped adults and I do pro bono work in the same area. We are devoted Christians and I have been truly blessed. I have spent a lot of time figuring out my years in the political cult and trying to understand my actions. This blog is about sharing those thoughts with those who may be interested. They are my own thoughts and my own conclusions.

The front groups I worked with included the Coalition of Concerned Medical Professionals (CCMP) and the Eastern Farm Workers Association (EFWA). Both are a part of the National Labor Federation (natlfed), which was built by the Provisional Communist Party. Other groups in natlfed include the Eastern Service Workers Association (ESWA), Western Service Workers Association (WSWA), Western Farm Workers Association (WFWA), Northwest Seasonal Workers Association (NSWA), Western Massachusetts Labor Action (WMLA), Midwest Workers Association (MWA), and Mid-Ohio Workers Association (MOWA). I was operations manager of EFWA in Upstate NY from 1981-1993. Most of the full-time organizers I worked with during the time I was part of the Provisional Party were good and intelligent people. We worked hard building small independent community organizing drives which provided some material benefits, such as food and clothing, to those who needed it. Sometimes we took actions around specific issues which effected low income people in the community. These organizations are still active and continue to do what they have been doing this for 40 years on about the same scale. Although that was our objective practice we believed that we were building a revolution which would change things and we thought we had the only answers to all the problems of the world. We didn't. Even today, after years of doing the same thing and more or less staying the same size, natlfed continues to assert that they have a long term viable solution to change the conditions of low income people in the United States. I vehemently disagree and I also think the manner in which they provide material relief is very inefficient when compared to other organizations. After leaving natlfed I have participated in non-profit organizations which use the resources donated to them in a more efficient manner with more results.

The full time volunteers at natlfed, who have been doing this for a long time believe that they are fighting a revolution which will build a voice for low income workers and overthrow the US government. They have voluntarily put themselves under a discipline, which looked at objectively, is nothing more than mental and emotional abuse. They submit to it because they have come to believe that the “organization” (the Provisional Party and the community groups it built) is the only hope for poor people in the country to have a decent life. They think that by canvassing, building workers benefits councils (WBCs), building workers committees and unions out of the WBCs, and building a support base for this in the community, they will win a revolution in the US. They believe that by submitting to the Party discipline they will become the organizers and revolutionaries who can make the revolution happen and save the world. The sad reality is that for the 40 years the organizers have been doing this, the only results are the small community organizations you see. There is no reason to think that in the next 40 years anything different will happen. The national leadership of the organization, who give the orders, have no experience in making change other than building these small community organizations, and no credentials which would lead anyone to objectively believe they have the knowledge, capability, experience, and/or insight to build anything else. The ones that said they had the experience were lying. I hope to do future posts detailing the research to support this. Although they have a plan which sounds good, and a vision of a better world, they have no goal posts or method of evaluating the program objectively. Simply having a plan and a vision does not mean that you are going to change the world or get to that vision. There is no evaluation process or accountability in the group. To have a viable plan to meet a goal you have to be able to measure progress, evaluate that progress, and be able to objectively evaluate your practice. They believe that if they keep doing it, the right conditions and situation will arise which will sweep them to power as they've built the base. I highly doubt this.

My most serious criticism of natlfed is that they deceptively and manipulatively recruit their full time volunteers using techniques of mind control. They believe that communist revolution must be made to solve problems and that since everyone grew up in the bourgeois world they've been brain washed and must therefore undergo a process called TV-TV to understand that revolution is needed. TVTV stands for tab volunteer, viable volunteer, tab cadre, viable cadre. A tab volunteer is someone who comes through the door for their own reasons and volunteers on their own schedule. Natlfed front groups through classes on their methodology and why other groups won't change things, finding out more about the person, and telling the person why change is needed for them to meet personal goals, tries to get them to make a schedule and work with a front group towards a change. They concentrate on the failings of other groups rather than what they have accomplished and are accomplishing. Once someone is a viable vol, they start learning more about historical efforts for change in the US and natlfed's philosophy. They get experience with taking more responsibility in the front group. During that time, if the person is deemed to have potential as a full-time organizer, information is gathered on them and centralized. Conversations with them are planned and reported back on. Many times the conversations are very aggressive telling the potential recruit they’re doing nothing of import with their life and therefore should be doing more with a natlfed group. Eventually someone tells them that they are smarter than the average Joe and probably realize that the group they are working with alone won't change everything and that a revolution is needed. They're told that that is what the group along with others in the country are doing. They then learn about communism and what it takes to make a revolution, and are asked to increase their commitment and go full-time. After a year probationary period as a party member they become a viable cadre and a full party member. All of this is kept secret. No one is told the next level until natlfed thinks they will agree. They are told that since communists are not allowed to hold leadership positions in trade unions, the Provisional Party must be kept secret. This ensures that the philosophies and programs of the Party are never open to criticism by anyone who has the knowledge to provide constructive criticism.

During the recruitment process people are encouraged to spend more and more time with the organization and less with their family and friends. For instance, they are told that their family is also affected by conditions, and if they really love their family it is more important to canvass than go to a family event. Full-time organizers work 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year and often sleep less than 7 hours a night. You can google it and find out what the effects of sleep deprivation and 24/7 work without a break are. The full-timers don't get time to think about themselves and their lives or reflect on either the results of their hard work or where their lives are going. They do not decide themselves whether they can take a vacation. This is decided for them as vacations have to be approved from the leaders of the party as revolutionaries do not take vacations. I do hear that they go home for short family visits to manage family relations now. They do not decide the strategic direction of the organizing drive - this is directed from above. They are told the only value they have is the effect they have on the world, and if they want to have a positive effect then they will do what the natlfed leadership tells them. The natlfed leadership tells them they are the only ones in the country with the experience, etc. to make change.

Just like other cults, natlfed organizers are caught inside of a philosophy. If you are unfamiliar with destructive cults and their characteristics, think about destructive and abusive relationships where people are isolated from their families and friends, constantly have their self-esteem tromped on, are told no one will love them if they leave the relationship, etc.. An analogy – If you looked at a family relationship 1) where one spouse could dictate what the other spouse had to do and the other spouse had to follow orders; 2) where the one spouse could dictate in what location the other spouse lived; 3) where one spouse could dictate the work that the other spouse has to do; 4) where one spouse could dictate what the other spouse says to friends and relations in response to questions about the relationship; 4) where one spouse wrote scripts for the other spouse to memorize or read for most contacts with other people; 5) where one spouse insisted that the work they had for the other spouse was much more important than them seeing their friends, going to concerts, or other activities – would you label that an abusive relationship? I would. Well, that is what ordinate full-timers do to their subordinate full time organizers in the Provisional Party. The only reason the subordinates submit is because they think they’re learning to be revolutionaries and to change the world. Yet there is not objective evidence that this is the case. So how do they convince the subordinates of this? The answer is mind control techniques, and social influence. I hope to do my best to explain this in subsequent posts. For now, I’ll refer you to a good site – freedomofmind.com. Steve Hassan has been studying this for years. There are also other books you can find on social psychology and influence.

Other techniques used for the national leadership to keep control is undermining the local organizations. Whenever one of the local organization begins to really build and take actions which would lead to some success they are undermined. For example, people may be moved to other organizations or organizers turned against each other. A junior organizer may be told that his/her superiors aren’t doing their job and he/she must work from below to change this. At the same time the senior organizer is told that the junior organizer may be a police agent. This keeps control in the national leadership’s court.

I have a problem with this type of recruitment and abuse. I do not believe it is right. A person is valuable because of the person they are, not because of what they do. Each one of us is unique and should be valued. There is plenty of information on-line on natlfed, and the provisional communist party. I’d advise anyone thinking about volunteering with or donating to natlfed front groups to research this. If you are truly looking for the best way to use your talents and resources to help people (I'll refrain from my speech on each person being a unique person and not just part of the mass) I would advise checking out many different organizations and comparing what you can accomplish. I think the full-time volunteers natlfed front groups are good people. But, you can be nice, intelligent, good people, and still be part of a destructive cult.