Doug Monica
Template:TOCnestleft Doug Monica died in 2020, after retiring in East Palo Alto. Former Registrar at Stanford University School of Medicine.
Doug Monica was one of the youngest members of the Bay Area Revolutionary Union, possibly the youngest. After a trip to China with Liebel Bergman during the GPCR, Doug gave his impressions to RU comrades, and he spoke to various community groups. He was twenty years old.
Doug Monica and his friend Bruce Hobson were in “opposing” Marxist organizations. Hobson was was with Venceremos .
About the only thing we had in common was support for the Farah strike. “Take the slacks off the racks!” That was then. Twenty-five years later, Doug convinced me to join Liberation Road –then Freedom Road Socialist Organization. I’ve since been a member living in México. Doug was a founding member of the Mexico Solidarity Project, a binational initiative that our organization pulled together last year. More recently, other left forces have joined the Project. Doug Monica:Liberation Road
FRSO/SON
Doug Monica, Palo Alto appeared on an early '90s mailing list of activists in the Bay Area, sent to Freedom Road Socialist Organization member Mike Conan. Several of those listed were known Freedom Road Socialist Organization or Socialist Organizing Network members .
Freedom Road magazine
Freedom Road magazine Number 13, Winter 2003 gave special thanks to Doug Monica.
Activism
Monica became active around 1965 as the farm workers’ movement began to surge and the anti-war movement started to grow. He has worked in foundries, trucking, the post office, and currently is at a university. Doug still thinks Mao is cool, and is a member of the Freedom Road Socialist Organization.
- But FRSO has been my political home for almost 25 years—a place that has allowed me to grow both personally and politically, and hopefully make some contributions to the revolutionary struggle in this imperialist heartland. So I will offer a few observations about how I came to join FRSO and what it has meant.
- My political roots were in both the Chicano liberation struggle and the New Communist Movement of the 1960’s and 70’s. I was energized by the fledgling Chicano movement and the struggle against the US aggression against the Vietnamese people. During those heady days, I found great inspiration in the Cuban revolution, Mao and the Chinese revolution and the Black Panther Party.
- I began to consider myself a revolutionary when I was 15 or 16 . This pushed me to join the Revolutionary Union, which recast itself as the Revolutionary Communist Party in 1975. I was a pretty die-hard cadre, but by 1980, even I could see that the line of the RCP was a dead-end—to put it kindly.
- I became active in the Central America solidarity movement, and through that I connected up with a small group of communists—the Organization of Revolutionary Unity (ORU; almost as long of a name as there were members). Here was a circle that had a sharp critique of the RCP that helped me make sense of years with that organization. More importantly, they embraced the notion that the Left had to grow up, begin to discard the sectarian baggage so many of us carried, and build unity with other revolutionary forces.
- By the mid-80’s we were engaged in unity talks with recently formed FRSO. I had yet to understand that there was a difference between dogmatism and being principled, so I was less than excited at the prospect of merging with FRSO. I was, however, deeply impressed with FRSO’s theory and practice around national oppression and it’s view of the centrality of the struggle against white supremacy.
- I was apprehensive about joining; how could I be in the same group with people I had reviled as “Mensheviks” (one of the founding groups of FRSO was the Revolutionary Workers Headquarters which split from the RCP—and which I had opposed)? I quickly learned that the dreaded “Mensheviks” were people I would be proud to call comrades. In fact, the kind of open and challenging discussions I would encounter in FRSO helped me to get rid of a lot of the ideological baggage I had carried for years.[1]
Revolutionary Strategies to Beat the Rising Right Wing
Revolutionary Strategies to Beat the Rising Right Wing, was a nationwide conference call organized by Freedom Road Socialist Organization, Sunday October 30, 2016.
- What's the nature of this right-wing threat? What has this election cycle changed about the political terrain we're fighting on? How do we need to prepare for whats coming after the election? Hear about these crucial questions from our panel of top political strategists, including Nelini Stamp, Bill Fletcher, Jr., Linda Burnham, and Sendolo Diaminah.
Those invited, on Facebook included Doug Monica.[2]
Now What? Defying Trump and the Left's Way Forward
Now What? Defying Trump and the Left's Way Forward was a phone in webinar organized by Freedom Road Socialist Organization in the wake of the 2016 election.
- Now what? We’re all asking ourselves that question in the wake of Trump’s victory. We’ve got urgent strategizing and work to do, together. Join Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson of the Movement for Black Lives and Freedom Road, Calvin Cheung-Miaw, Jodeen Olguin-Taylor of Mijente and WFP, Joe Schwartz of the Democratic Socialists of America, and Sendolo Diaminah of Freedom Road for a discussion of what happened, and what we should be doing to build mass defiance. And above all, how do we build the Left in this, which we know is the only solution to the crises we face?
- This event will take place Tuesday November 15, 2016 at 9pm Eastern/8pm Central/6pm Pacific.
Those invited, on Facebook included Doug Monica.[3]
Political Regeneration and Hope in Mexico
Political Regeneration and Hope in Mexico, Public · Hosted by Sarah Jarmon and Isaac Ontiveros, Bruce Hobson, Doug Monica, Michelle Foy.
Saturday, July 21 (2018) at 4 PM PDT.
Islamic Cultural Center of Northern California (ICCNC).
Sponsored by Freedom Road Socialist Organization and Center for Political Education.
Javier Bravo, professor of history at the University of Guanajuato, México and representative for México’s left party, MORENA (National Regeneration Movement -- Movimiento Regeneración Nacional) will speak on the post election situation and political crisis in México.[4]