Let the Games Begin!

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Socialist Action newspaper’s coverage of revolutionary land were remarkable in their detail and analysis, often Following the Zapatista rebellion in Mexico, he visited tas had temporarily occupied, to learn first hand of their mind that highlights Gerry’s desire to directly connect with the people whose struggles he embraced. I visited San Cristóbal to try to meet with the Zapatistas and to observe their negotiations with the Mexican government, fore I left for Mexico, Gerry asked me to bring him back a dictionary of the language of the indigenous people. At the time, such an effort was the last thing on my mind.

But by coincidence, during a press conference following the negotiations, a fellow walking through the aisles was hawking just such a dictionary, and I thought that I would bring it back to San Francisco to surprise Gerry with my and he quickly opened it. In a moment, with perhaps a tiny hint of disdain, Gerry said, “This dictionary is Tzotzil. I need to begin with the major indigenous root language, politics. At that time, IP was the official periodical of the rope that challenged Stalinist rule, allowed him to author Nahuatl. It won’t do me much good.” Vintage Gerry! I am sure that comrades who knew him have thousands of lutionary developments in these countries—especially the nal relations. Reactionary U.S. legislation prevented the party’s formal affiliation, as it does with Socialist Action ments coincided with Socialist Action’s. For the first time in decades the possibility of building Trotskyist parties in Eastern Europe and the disintegrating USSR had real and tions. Socialist Action has received condolences from printed by FI sections. His journalistic assignments took many comrades outside our movement, comrades who forts to send Trotskyist delegations to Eastern Europe and might have differences with us on important political tion, which overthrew the fascist Salazar dictatorship. He the USSR as well as our contributions to the building of a Trotskyist party in Poland, including the translation into ing our ideas and who benefited from the material that lutionary wave swept from power the U.S.-backed and installed Shah of Iran and opened the door wider than ever to a socialist transformation. In both cases and in all full time for Socialist Action as the International Editor riched in myriad ways. He lives on in our deeds and other instances where Gerry’s knowledge, reporting, and dedication to the revolutionary cause and program that he Wing IV, he insisted that we underwrite his proposal that he lutionary developments, Gerry collaborated with the FI groups in those countries, which were active in the mass the messages that have come in from Gerry’s friends and associates around the world. A memorial meeting will the FI’s new publication, International Viewpoint (IV). edge of Eastern Europe and the recent events in the USSR take place in the S.F. Bay Area on May 28, and in New He remained in Paris on this assignment for more than contributed greatly to the depth of coverage in our press.

Socialist Action may 2012 11 and MICHAEL SCHREIBER “The Hunger Games”, directed by Gary Ross; written by Ross, Susan Collins and Billy Ray, from the novel by Susan Collins, starring Jennifer Lawrence, Donald Sutherland, Stanley Tucci, and Elizabeth Banks. D of “The Hunger Games,” from Su- irector Gary Ross’s film adaptation san Collins’ eponymous novel, has a lot going for it. For one thing, it features a heroine, Katniss Everdeen, played by Jennifer Lawrence, who wowed critics in her breakout role in the indie film “Winter’s Bone.” She is in virtually every scene, so she carries the movie. Katniss is an independent thinker, a provider, a survivor, and a loner who doesn’t care if she’s liked.

“The Hunger Games” forces one to think about the future, of a government that not only spies on its citizens, but deprives them of decent living conditions and starves them to death as punishment for fomenting rebellion. But pure repression is not always effective in staving off revolt. Accordingly, the film dissects the methodology of regimes (perhaps our own?) that recognize the value of mindless entertainment and games as a means to tranquilize the population. In the film’s fictional land of Panem, the head of government confides to one of his underlings that the rulers’ aim is to give people hope—but not too much hope.

The citizens of the 12 Districts that make up Panem are depicted as dirt poor and living in ramshackle homes. In worn, handmade clothes they look like subjects in a Dorothea Lange collection. They are constantly watched by hidden cameras. In an exposition ... Gerry Foley (continued from page 8: “Gerry Foley A life dedicated to socialist revolution”)

Fourth International (FI), the world revolutionary socialist organization with which the SWP maintained fratertoday.

Gerry remained on the SWP staff for some 17 years, writing for all its publications, with his articles often rehim to Portugal, where he covered the 1974-75 revolualso traveled as a reporter to Iran, when in 1979 a revolanguage skills took him to far-off places to cover revomobilizations.

Gerry left the SWP in 1980 to take a staff position on flashback, we see Peeta Mellark (Josh Hutcherson), who works in his mom’s bakery, throwing burned buns to scraggly pigs in a pen. He sees a starving Katniss, whose father was killed in a mine explosion, lying in the dirt and does nothing.

Cinematographer Tom Stern uses a palette of grays and blues in scenes that take place in District 12 villages.

The bright green forest under a blue sky provides relief; here, the only place where one feels free, Katniss displays her hunting skills with bow and arrow, egged on by her friend, gregarious Gale Hawthorne, played by Liam Hemsworth. Together they witness a monstrous space vehicle hovering into view, shaking trees and making the earth tremble as it transports the TV reality show “Hunger Games’” organizers to the District. The games, Cliff Conner Communist League (LCR).

and other Eastern European languages, and his keen interest in the mass movements in the USSR and Eastern Euscores of articles that provided great insight into the revocritical struggle of the USSR’s oppressed nationalities.

immediate potential. He supported Socialist Action’s efPolish of some important works by Trotsky.

of our newspaper. Typical of Gerry, however, before leavvisit Hungary for three weeks so he could “learn the language” and more effectively follow events in that country.

Socialist Action’s Political Committee, where his knowlwhich began almost three quarters of a century earlier as punishment for a failed citizens’ rebellion against the totalitarian Capitol, became so popular they turned them into a reality show that people were required to watch as contestants fought to the death.

In front of a crowd of citizens, guarded by white clad, heavily armored (as in “Star Wars”) “Peacekeepers,” Katniss’s sister, Primrose, along with Peeta, are selected by a lottery to be District 12 tributes. In a stunning move, Katniss volunteers in her sister’s place.

Like today’s military recruitment films, Tributes are shown a propaganda film narrated in stentorian tones by President Snow (a white-maned and bearded Donald Sutherland), to make them feel good about their sacrifice, which is alleged to help their country “keep the peace.”

a decade. His departure from the SWP, which expelled Gerry retroactively, stemmed from his opposition to the bureaucratic and cultlike practices of SWP National folding events. Secretary Jack Barnes, who, along with a compliant new “leadership team,” engineered the SWP’s rejection of its Trotskyist heritage. This was accompanied by the expulsion of hundreds of its most dedicated comrades, including many of the SWP’s founding members from 1938. Many of these comrades soon after formed Socialist Action.

Relocated in Paris, Gerry was a staff writer, translator, and often a speaker for IV at conferences and conventions of FI sections.

He authored hundreds of articles covering critical events in world politics and joined the French section of the FI, the Revolutionary Beginning in the late 1980s, Gerry’s mastery of Slavic centricities.

Gerry’s assessment of the importance of these developIn the early 1990s, Gerry returned to the U.S. to work Back in the U.S, Gerry was immediately co-opted to Katniss and Peeta are treated like royalty aboard a richly appointed hi-speed train that whisks them to Panem’s Capitol.

They are ensconced in luxurious quarters; groomed, trained, and fattened up. Lavishly dressed, they must toady to wealthy people in order to convince them to become sponsors. A scene depicts Katniss’s independence and unwillingness to play by the rules: She is brought before a jury headed by a mesmerizing Seneca Crane (Wes Bentley). The jury is too busy gossiping as Tributes demonstrate their skills. But Katniss gets their attention in a startling William Tell move on Crane.

President Snow gives the Tributes an avuncular pep talk, then sends them off in individual capsules, uploaded to a dense forest. Once there, the countdown begins, then the slaughter. We are not spared the sight of hacked bodies and blood. White-clad monitors track and manipulate them on computers built into a Lucite table in a blindingly white war room. They can add deadly obstacles or send supplies and medication to their favorites. As in the CBS TV reality show, “Survivor,” the Tributes betray each other and form secret alliances—but virtually all of them lose their lives in the end.

Is this merely science fiction? We note that on May 1, New York City cops employed a flying-saucer-type contraption to hover above the May Day Occupy-labor demonstration and spy on the protesters. In this day of FBI entrapments, indefinite detention, round-ups of immigrants and Muslims, and the militarization of police forces, how long will it take for governments to devise a means of punishing citizens in a way not far removed from a reality show called “The Hunger Games”? n developments in Eastern Europe, Latin America, and Irefrom first-hand sources or direct participation in the unGerry eagerly took on assignments around the world.

San Cristóbal, Ocosingo, and other cities that the Zapatisimpact and to meet with their representatives.

An incident related to the Zapatista rebellion comes to which temporarily ended their first uprising in 1994. Beability to make good on his essentially eccentric request.

I gleefully handed Gerry the dictionary upon my return, similar anecdotes highlighting Gerry’s magnificent ecGerry Foley touched the lives of revolutionaries around the world, including comrades from other socialist currents that do not share our politics, program, and tradiquestions but who respected Gerry’s diligence in presentonly his skills and experience could provide.

Gerry was one of a kind. To know him was to be enchampioned for a lifetime. n See www.socialistaction.blogspot.com to read some of York on June 10. See the website for times and locations.