BY VANESSA KNAPTON
SAN DIEGO - The Young Socialists recruited a new member and met several other young people interested in joining the YS while participating in the protests at the Republican convention here August 12-15.

In the week leading up to the convention YS member Jason Phelps worked with other Socialist Workers campaign supporters to put up tables of Pathfinder literature on campuses. One table at the University of California (UC) -San Diego especially attracted a lot of attention. Campaigners sold 23 issues of the Militant that day, and explained who the Young Socialists were and why they were coming to San Diego.

One of the most important parts of the week was the success of the Young Socialist class series. These classes were an important way of running with our recruitment campaign and drawing these young people to us. The classes were held every evening and were part of seeing that the hundreds of youth who had come to San Diego to demonstrate wanted to talk about politics, were attracted to defenders of the Cuban Revolution, and wanted to discuss how best to start fighting back against both the Republicans and the Democrats.

The tables and meetings to have political discussions are powerful tools to meet the type of people that would be interested in joining the YS. Justin Beck, a University of California - Irvin student said, "I heard about the meeting at a table...Laura Garza [the Socialist Workers Party's vice- presidential candidate] gave a cool talk, awesome. The real politics is here. This is my kind of thing."

The first class, on the Communist Manifesto, attracted two young students who heard about it at a campus table. We discussed imperialism's drive towards war and how the revolutionary character of the working class will come through as it starts fighting back, and how the demonstrations we were participating in are a glimpse of the larger battles coming down the road. Cindy, a women's studies major at UC - San Diego, attended the class and joined us at 5:30 a.m. the following morning to be part of defense of an abortion clinic against a right-wing attack.

Brandi, an activist against police brutality from Pittsburgh, joined in all the events and talked to many youth about the work of the coalition that she is in. Brandi said that La Marcha, a march for affirmative action through the state of California, was the most thrilling part of the week. She is one of four Native Americans enrolled at Carnegie Mellon University. She had heard about La Marcha in Pittsburgh from a national poets group that had toured there.

Sandra Morales, a 15-year-old high school student, was at the campaign office the morning after Garza's talk, resting after protesting against anti-abortion thugs. When asked what she'd been doing the last few days she said, "Marching! I met you [the YS] at the march for affirmative action. Then I marched for abortion rights, and then for gay and lesbian rights. Then I went to a Young Socialists class and to hear Laura. My friend and I want to join the Young Socialists." Sandra is now a member of the YS.

On Saturday the YS class was on Che Guevara and the Cuban Revolution. Two YS members and one of the Marchistas, all of whom had been on the Cuban Youth Exchange, reported on their trip. The Marchista, Ramon Muñoz, described the Cuban military base on the border next to the U.S.-held Guantánamo naval base. Muñoz was surprised and impressed that women made up many of the Cuban troops and were also officers. Monica, one of the three other Marchistas at the class, expressed earlier her appreciation that the Young Socialists had shown real solidarity for La Marcha by being on parts of the march every other day. One young Black worker joined the discussion and stayed for the social; another participant bought the Episodes of the Cuban Revolutionary War by Che Guevara after the class.

We also held classes on The Politics of Chicano Liberation and on "Buchananism, what it is and how to fight it." The final class we held was on "Cuba today and the role of Cuba in the world." Jesse, a young striker from Nassco shipyard, came to the class. He told the class about the struggle he and his 4,000 co- workers were involved in against the shipyard company - a fight to demand a contract. We spoke about the Central Organization of Cuban Workers congress last April and about the upcoming trade union conference and youth festival in Cuba 1997.

The Young Socialists in Los Angeles now have many people that we met to follow up on and advance our national recruitment drive. We held a Socialist Educational Weekend August 21-22 where 10 young people came, two of whom we had met in San Diego. It looks like three people will join the YS shortly here in LA and another person in San Diego.  
 
 
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