Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung
August 4, 1966
[SOURCE: Long Live Mao Tse-tung Thought, a Red Guard Publication.]
The Northern Warlords [early Nationalist period, 1916-1927] who came after the period of relative peace and order and the Kuomintang that followed were all repressive of students. The present Communist Party also suppresses student movements, and what difference is there between this and Lu P’ing and Chiang Nan-hsiang? The Central Committee has ordered a suspension of classes for half a year in order to engage exclusively in the Great Cultural Revolution. But once the students arose, it again repressed them. It was not because no one advanced dissenting views, but rather because no one listened to them. There is another view which is rather interesting. To put it lightly, this is a question of orientation. Actually, the question of orientation is a central question. It is a question of line which runs counter to Marxism, and is a problem which must be resolved by Marxism. I sense danger. They themselves ordered the students to make revolution, but when everybody rose up, they wanted to suppress them. The so-called orientation and line, the so-called trust in the masses, and the so-called Marxism are all false and have been for many years already. If you run into such things, they could blow up. They clearly stand on the side of the bourgeoisie and oppose the proletariat. [You] say to oppose the new municipal committee is anti-party. The new municipal committee suppresses the student movement so why not oppose it?
I have not gone down to stay at a selected basic unit. Some people stand more and more on the side of the bourgeoisie and oppose the proletariat the longer they stay at selected basic units. To stipulate that all contacts between one class and another, one department and another and one school and another is to repress the students is madness. Some people who came from the Central Committee are disaffected with the Central Committee’s comments of June 18, saying that it should not be uttered. The big character poster put out by Nieh Yuan-tzu and six others of Peking University is the Paris Commune manifesto of the 1960s — the Peking Commune. It is a good thing to put out big-character posters; they should be announced to the people of the entire world! Nonetheless, in Hsueh-feng’s report, it is said that the party has party discipline and the state has state law, and there must be a distinction between internal and external affairs. Big-character posters should not be posted outside the gate, so that foreigners can not see them. In fact, with the exception of secret places, such as the Ministry of National Defence and the Ministry of Public Security which should be areas proscribed to foreigners, what’s so important about other places? Even under a proletarian dictatorship, the masses should be allowed to petition, demonstrate, and litigate. Moreover, freedom of speech, assembly and publication have been inscribed in the Constitution. Judging from this act of suppressing the Great Cultural Revolution of the students, I don’t believe there is genuine democracy and genuine Marxism. It is a case of standing on the side of the bourgeoisie to oppose the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. The Central Committee of the League has not only failed to support the young student movement, but has suppressed the student movement. I think this should be dealt with properly.