Words of Encouragement.

The order came from above: "Inspire, please." The courteous approach concealed a certain desperation. For those not in the know, let me explain that we who write for the progressive, radical movement have our specialties. Some write depressing stuff. Others write humorous pieces. Still others concentrate on trashing their fellow leftwingers. It seems that there was an opening this month for someone to inspire, and I got the short straw.

Not an easy job, considering that the U.S. government (I was about to say "we," in Dan Rather style, but decided that my interests and those of the White House do not coincide) had just finished dropping thousands of cluster bombs on Yugoslavia. And yet my editor says: "Inspire, please."

OK, let me have a go at it. I've just returned from London, where I was invited to speak to a gathering of socialists who assemble every year around the topic of "Marxism." I confess that what enticed me was their promise to do a performance of Marx in Soho--my one-person play, in which Marx appears in the present, saying, with a laugh (yes, Marx really said this to someone who annoyed him): "I'm not a Marxist!"

Well, to get away from promoting my play, I expected to find a few hundred aging, solemn leftists who---against the general consensus across the political spectrum that Marxism is dead--insist on the importance of the old Moor and the validity of the socialist ideal.

I had the numbers wrong. Not hundreds, but 6,000 were there, mostly from the United Kingdom, though many came from other European countries, and some came from the United States. I also had the ages wrong. They were almost all young people, from early twenties to early thirties. And I had the temperament wrong. They were lively, exuberant, fun-loving people.

Maybe you won't agree, but I found this inspiring. Or, to use less extravagant language--encouraging. Six thousand people assembled in one place who believe in socialism. Six thousand people denouncing the United States and Britain for bombing Yugoslavia. Six thousand people taking the British Labour Party to task for Blairing forth its belief in the wonders of the market and the miracle of bombing.

Now comes the difficult part. The gathering was sponsored by the Socialist Workers Party or, as some on the left would caustically call them, "the Trots." And about half of the 6,000 seemed to be trying to sell the party newspaper, Socialist Worker, to the other half. (Actually, I'm told the SWP in England is not connected to the SWP here, but to the International Socialist Organization.)

I have always been careless about security matters and have never checked the credentials of people or organizations who invite me to speak. Nor have I run their literature through a scanner. I suppose I have been so hungry for listeners that, unlike Groucho Marx, I will talk to any group that will have me.

I recall a moment during the Vietnam War when a self-appointed political commissar of the anti-war movement phoned me: "Howard, I see you endorsed the antiwar rally called by the SWP [yes, that same inescapable bunch]. You really should have run that by me."

Well, I was always repelled by this scrutinizing of people who, whatever they were doing at other times, seemed to be devoting themselves at the moment to a worthy cause. As sectarians often say, let's not be sectarian.

The London conference began with a spirited rally at the Friends Meeting House (those Quakers don't scrutinize either, the softies!). Tariq Ali, the veteran English radical, subjected the New Labour honchos to a scathing critique. The next days were filled with dozens and dozens of gatherings, with these young, eager people rushing from one to another, whether the subjects were topical (East Timor, global warming, Kosovo, blues and rock, the arms trade) or theoretical ("is there progress in history?"), or esoteric political economy ("the labor theory of value"). the evenings were filled with music, disco, plays. And movies: Full Metal Jacket (Vietnam at its rawest), Gallipoli (one of the most powerful of anti-war films), When We Were Kings (the story of Mohammed Ali's 1974 heavyweight championship fight against George Foreman in Zaire). And activism was everywhere, with leaflets advertising the latest rallies and demonstrations.

I'd like to believe that this meeting foreshadows a coming multiracial generation of radicals. Take the young woman who was born in Vietnam and was transported to the United States at the age of two by her parents. Her father had been in the Saigon army and was a supporter of the United States. But over the years, his daughter, now an enthusiastic socialist, has led him to rethink his views.

The conference received no coverage in the mainstream English press: not in The London Times, The Guardian, The Independent--which should instruct us all not to judge the degree of dissidence in society by what we see in the media. Imagine how many gatherings and actions are taking place all the time that we don't know about because they are not covered by radio, television, or newspapers.

But when you look closely, when you listen to alternative radio, when you read outside-the-mainstream periodicals like The Progressive, Z, The Nation, In These Times, when you check out the stories in The Nuclear Resister or the newsletters put out by Jonah House in Baltimore, when you keep your eyes open for unorthodox sources of information, you can begin to realize how many people in this country and all over the world do not accept the political and economic system that now dominates.

So, yes, I am encouraged. I

Howard Zinn, author of "A People's History of the United States," is a columnist for The Progressive. His play, "Marx in Soho," is published by South End Press.