International Day of Action to End Deathtraps: Poughkeepsie

SECURITY RUNAROUND!

by Schuyler Kempton & Cameron Ohl

The media didn't pick up Watch the Gap's third action against Gap deathtraps outside the Poughkeepsie Galleria earlier today---but mall security certainly did!

The rally was organized as one of 33 events worldwide marking the International Day of Action to End Deathtraps, organized by United Students Against Sweatshops and the Gap Deathtraps campaign.

Our action, which took place outside of the mall's main entrance-way, was attended by all of three people at first, Schuyler Kempton and his mother's friends Eric and Suzanne White. Nevertheless, two security officials approached us no later than 5 minutes into the gathering. The first official asked us what the rally was about, and was informed (or perhaps reminded) of our intention to protest Gap over workers' safety in Bangladesh. He said (sincerely, we think) that he supported our cause but told us nevertheless to get off mall property with our signs and leaflets (because the mall manager didn't like it), warning that if we stayed on property we would run into people who were not as nice as he.

We were then served notices about the rules of conduct in malls owned by Pyramid Management Group, the parent company of the Galleria. At this time, with Dutchess County Legislator Joel Tyner and Schuyler's parents also in tow (rendering us six strong) we decamped to the side of the road by Route 9 to wave our signs.

On Route 9, we were pleased to be free of security harassment, swelling to ten in number with the arrival of Democratic Dutchess County Legislature hopeful Charlie Davenport, former Poughkeepsie Journal reporter Larry Hertz, my mother's friend Michael, and the HV Radical's own Cameron Ohl. Schuyler's father, by no means a self-proclaimed activist, even distributed fliers to those sitting in their cars at the nearby stop sign.

Following the rally, seven activists remained in an attempt to drop off letters of protest to the managers of the Galleria's Banana Republic and Old Navy stores. That was not so easy.

To begin with, two security cars had placed themselves on opposite sides of where we had parked to walk down to Route 9. They didn't bother us, but served well for the purposes of intimidation. Then, as we attempted to enter the mall itself, one official stopped us to ask what our next move would be. Schuyler informed them that we simply intended to speak with store managers: No signs, no soliciting. That was enough to get us off the hook.

As we went to the Old Navy store, several mall cops were around, although they were also likely there to monitor a long line of customers waiting to buy $1 flip-flops, which went on sale today (max. 5 apiece, folks).

The flip-floppers were being tended to by the store manager, so we were only able to drop of the letter without comment. The 7 agitators moved on.

At Banana Republic, there were no excess customers in the store, although there were at least two security officials outside of it. Inside, Schuyler asked for the manager, while Joel reviewed the store's cologne collection (so as to feign interest in the merchandise, he explained).

For no obvious reason except to avoid a conversation about Gap, Inc.'s labor practices, the manager claimed she was busy and couldn't speak with us. While we had previously enjoyed a lengthy, if at times tense, conversation with the manager of the Galleria's Gap store, she had no idea we would walk in, while it was clear that her counterpart at Banana Republic was expecting us. As we exited the store, a security official spoke into her walkie-talkie: "They've left Banana Republic."

If nothing else, today should show us that the fundamental reaction of corporate power to grassroots protest is fear. Not amusement or even anger. Fear.

It was fear that made the manager of the Poughkeepsie Galleria prevent us from holding our signs and handing out fliers. It was fear that made the Galleria send in security officials to track and harass us. And it was fear that made managers of stores owned by Gap, Inc. quick to show us the door.

Fear for profits? Perhaps. Fear for their jobs? Likely. But, and I do sincerely believe this, also a fear that their accepted view of the world and their internalized ideas of what is acceptable and what is unacceptable, what is right and what is wrong, might get thrown irreparably out of whack.

A fear that perhaps what is fed to all of us as natural and right on a daily basis is in fact profoundly unnatural and completely wrong.

We 10 scraggly protesters represented a threat to the established economic and ideological order. And while the only reaction from the powers that be is to act out of fear, we have the unique ability to act out of a powerful sense of solidarity. That's what brought us out to defend the rights of workers in Bangladesh today, and that is what we have to cling to when times get rough.

Photo: Daniel Kempton (a.k.a. Pop)

Iraq Vet Suicide Note: "I Was Made to Participate...In War Crimes"

Dan Somers (right) performing at his band’s CD Release Show (Phoenix New Times/Melissa Fossum)

by Rania Khalek, Dispatches from the Underclass

On June 10, 2013, 30-year-old Iraq War veteran Daniel Somers killed himself after writing a powerful letter to his family explaining his reasons for doing so.

“My mind is a wasteland filled with visions of incredible horror, unceasing depression, and crippling anxiety, even with all of the medications the doctors dare give,” reads the letter, which Somers’ family allowed Gawker to publish, Somers went on to reveal the source of his pain:

During my first deployment, I was made to participate in things, the enormity of which is hard to describe. War crimes, crimes against humanity. Though I did not participate willingly, and made what I thought was my best effort to stop these events, there are some things that a person simply can not come back from. I take some pride in that, actually, as to move on in life after being part of such a thing would be the mark of a sociopath in my mind. These things go far beyond what most are even aware of.

To force me to do these things and then participate in the ensuing coverup is more than any government has the right to demand. Then, the same government has turned around and abandoned me. They offer no help, and actively block the pursuit of gaining outside help via their corrupt agents at the DEA.

Though he offers no specifics about the abuses he witnessed and/or participated in, we do know that Somers was a part of the Tactical Human-Intelligence Team (THT) intelligence unit in Baghdad “where he ran more than 400 combat missions as a machine gunner in the turret of a Humvee, interviewed countless Iraqis ranging from concerned citizens to community leaders and and government officials, and interrogated dozens of insurgents and terrorist suspects,” the kinds of US operations that ended in torture and murder on more than one occasion. Somers went on to become a senior analyst with the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), which is featured extensively in Jeremy Scahill’s book and documentary Dirty Wars, and not in a positive light.

What’s even more heartbreaking is that Somers’ says he tried to use his position to turn things around but the U.S. war machine wouldn’t allow it.

I tried to move into a position of greater power and influence to try and right some of the wrongs. I deployed again, where I put a huge emphasis on saving lives. The fact of the matter, though, is that any new lives saved do not replace those who were murdered. It is an exercise in futility. 

Then, I pursued replacing destruction with creation. For a time this provided a distraction, but it could not last. The fact is that any kind of ordinary life is an insult to those who died at my hand. How can I possibly go around like everyone else while the widows and orphans I created continue to struggle? If they could see me sitting here in suburbia, in my comfortable home working on some music project they would be outraged, and rightfully so.

Most recently, Somers started Project Shai to raise funds for a unique documentary film about the Iraq War. “An Iraq War veteran goes back to Baghdad to share tea with and interview former insurgents – especially those with which he personally exchanged gunfire – in order to better understand what motivated both parties to join the sides that they did,” says Project Shai’s donation page. But Somers’ suicide letter suggests that the film wasn’t working out.

I thought perhaps I could make some headway with this film project, maybe even directly appealing to those I had wronged and exposing a greater truth, but that is also now being taken away from me. I fear that, just as with everything else that requires the involvement of people who can not understand by virtue of never having been there, it is going to fall apart as careers get in the way.

Somers struggled with a variety of war-related illnesses and was diagnosed with PTSD and traumatic brain injury as a result of his tours in Iraq. In his letter, he blames the military’s suicide epidemic on the U.S. government’s refusal to fully address and take care of its mentally and physically wounded veterans.

Is it any wonder then that the latest figures show 22 veterans killing themselves each day? That is more veterans than children killed at Sandy Hook, every single day. Where are the huge policy initiatives? Why isn’t the president standing with those families at the state of the union? Perhaps because we were not killed by a single lunatic, but rather by his own system of dehumanization, neglect, and indifference. 

It leaves us to where all we have to look forward to is constant pain, misery, poverty, and dishonor. I assure you that, when the numbers do finally drop, it will merely be because those who were pushed the farthest are all already dead. 

And for what? Bush’s religious lunacy? Cheney’s ever growing fortune and that of his corporate friends? Is this what we destroy lives for?

Somers letter is a reminder that among the soldiers fighting US wars are good people who have been backed into a corner, forced to compromise their morals to fulfill the almost always nefarious operations necessary for American imperialism to flourish. And afterwards they are thrown away, ostracized for being weak and denied the medical care they desperately need to survive.

Meanwhile, the people that sent Somers to war and ordered the war crimes that mentally destroyed him are living in comfort, working cushy jobs at universities and having libraries built in their honor.

“It has been crazy . . . Daniel and I are private people and in the last week things have been ripped open and now everyone knows about how bad it has been,” Somers’ wife, Angeline, told The Phoenix New Times.

“I wish I could believe that if it had gotten out sooner that he would still be here.”

The Man Who Can't Be Moved

by Karim Talbi, Agence France-Presse via Occupy.com

A man stood still in Istanbul's Taksim Square: silent, staring straight ahead, he had not moved for hours.

His peaceful action, on the square that police cleared of protesters on Saturday and where the Turkish authorities have banned gatherings, was a new form of protest.

He arrived Monday evening as night was falling and took up position in the middle of the square, just a stone's throw from Gezi Park.

Five hours on, the man was still there, hands in his pockets, a bag and some bottles of water at his feet.

He was staring at a portrait of the revered founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk that hangs from the top of the old cultural centre. Ataturk who established Turkey as a secular state.

Word spread quickly online: on Twitter, the hashtags #Duranadam and #standingman ran a steady stream of comments, together with some photos on the event.

Hundreds of people approached the square to see for themselves.

The man behind this 'happening' was choreographer Erdem Gunduz: his one-man protest was designed to get around the ban on gatherings in the square.

On Saturday, police used tear gas and water cannon to clear both the square and the park of thousands of demonstrators, depriving them of the symbolic heart of their protest.

It was a May 31 police crackdown on a peaceful protest against plans to redevelop the square that spiralled into nationwide demonstrations against Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's Islamic-rooted government.

Now police officers surround the square, preventing any further gatherings.

For this new protest to work, Gunduz's friends positioned themselves outside the square in a bid to prevent well-wishers trying to approach him.

"We want to protect him from any provocation," said one of them, Asma, a young Turkish woman, as she tried to keep the gathering onlookers back.

"He has to be alone in the middle of the square, otherwise the police will use the pretext of a gathering to clear everyone away," she explained.

Gradually, a human chain formed an immense circle around him. Some of the youths there began arguing over whether to join him or stay well clear, as Gunduz's friends wanted.

The choreographer's plan was to stay standing still there for a month, breaking every 24 hours for three hours' rest, while a friend took his place.

It was not long however before others joined in.

A group of youths took up position beside him, following his gaze towards Ataturk -- at which point the police moved in.

The Standing Man had time to leave, surrounded by a group of friends: others were not so lucky.

Officers detained around 10 youths in a police bus, as photographers recorded the event.

After they were driven from the square and the park on Saturday, members of the protest movement talked about the need to find new ways of getting their message across.

Erdem Gunduz appears to have done just that.

Vigil for Lynne Stewart at the White House

Lynne Stewart’s spouse, the 79-year-old social justice activist Ralph Poynter, will lead a continuing vigil in front of the White House starting on Monday, June 17.

Supporters of Lynne Stewart rally outside the White House on Tuesday

As the Lynne Stewart Defense Committee has explained, Stewart is not guilty of any crimes. In representing a prisoner charged with terrorism, Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, Stewart was unjustly convicted of delivering a simple press release for her client.

Poynter urges all those concerned with justice, compassion and basic human rights to join him whether they are available for an hour, for the day, or for the duration. He will be at the White House and making visits to the Federal Bureau of Prisons several blocks away, at 320 First St. NW, Washington D.C., 20534.

Lynne Stewart, age 73, is suffering from stage 4 cancer in her lungs. The cancer has metastasized rapidly to her lymph nodes and shoulder. She has lost 60 pounds and her condition is deteriorating rapidly. Stewart’s condition is well-known and medically documented.

As Poynter explains: “Lynne has passed all of the legalities of compassionate release and qualifies for release as the bill was written. The prison warden at Carswell in Fort Worth, Texas, has signed for her release, and so has the director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons, Charles R. Samuels. Probation officers charged with inspecting Lynne’s future residence approved her housing. All that is required by the statute of compassionate release has been done. Yet Lynne is still in jail! Every day that her release is postponed makes treatment of her cancer more difficult.”

The national campaign for Stewart’s Compassionate Release started more than three months ago, in early March. Thousands of petitions were sent and thousands of phone calls made urging her release. The warden at Carswell Federal Prison recommended her immediate compassionate release six weeks ago.

All those who are concerned with Lynne's health and unable to get to Washington, D.C., are urged to continue calling the White House, Attorney General, and Federal Bureau of Prisons and sending petitions. 

CALL:

White House - President Barack Obama: 1-202-456-1414

Attorney General Eric Holder: 1-202-514-2001
Bureau of Prisons Director Charles Samuels: 1-202-307-3250

WRITE TO LYNNE:
Lynne Stewart #5304-054
Federal Medical Center, Carswell
PO Box 27137
Ft. Worth, TX 76127

SIGN LYNNE'S PETITION

VISIT LYNNE'S DEFENSE CAMPAIGN WEBSITE

To learn how to best help with Lynne's campaign in your area, or to donate Frequent Flyer miles to Lynne's husband, Ralph, call (917) 853-9759

Breaking the Bi-Partisan Jail Consensus

This is the first of three articles celebrating "minor victories" for activists in the Hudson Valley

The current group of Democratic Dutchess County legislators seemed to be almost entirely on board with GOP County Executive Marc Molinaro's plans to build a new, est. 500-bed jail.

However, after 6 members of the End the New Jim Crow Action Network (ENJAN), a local group opposed to mass incarceration, spoke to the open Democratic caucus ahead of Monday's County Legislature meeting, something changed.

My best bet is that it was remarks from long-time community activist Mae Parker-Harris that changed the game. Harris combined a mother's heartfelt appeal with the clear political threat that if county Democrats didn't stand against all steps towards jail expansion, they would be voted out of office.

Up for a vote on Monday was a $1.2 million schematic design intended to research the feasibility of a new jail facility either on the site of the old Hudson River Psychiatric Center or expansion of the jail at the current site.

Activists with ENJAN urged county legislators to modify the proposal to focus on treatment options, alternative housing, and community investment or scrap it altogether. Out the the Legislator's 7 Democrats, 5 voted against the GOP design proposal, something that wold have been unthinkable without ENJAN's efforts. Without a doubt, that's a minor victory.

Unfortunately, the legislature did ultimately pass a design bill with only a vaguely-worded nod to treatment and alternative incarceration. While Conservative Party Legislator Jim Doxsey voted against the bill, not a single Republican did the same. Furthermore, both Democratic legislators representing Poughkeepsie, Barbara Jeter-Jackson and Steve White, voted with the Republicans to support the step towards jail expansion.

This illustrates, in vivid colors, Harris' argument about the political bankruptcy of Poughkeepsie Democrats. Nevertheless, the 6 opposing votes have broken the bi-partisan consensus on jail expansion and put the expansionists on the defensive. Only two as after the vote, robo-calls went out to the dissenting legislators' districts, paid for by County Republicans.

This fight is getting vicious, and I think we'd better concede that the opposing side has a monopoly on vitriol. ENJAN doesn't have the money for robo-calls (although we can phone bank) and the political machines of both the Republican and Democratic parties have master the art of attack better than community activists every could.

Much of Wednesday's ENJAN meeting in Poughkeepsie was devoted to strategizing how to best keep up the fight in light of recent developments. Crucially, the question was raised of whether ENJAN might support a compromise whereby temporary "pods" were added to the current jail facility.

The vast majority of ENJAN members strongly rejected this, reaffirming the opposition to all forms of jail expansion written up at the group's founding. A more complex question is how ENJAN should relate to the local political process as a whole. This question centers on whether ENJAN should run/endorse candidates candidates for legislature or remain strictly an outside force.

As an anti-capitalist, it seems clear to me that the issue of mass incarceration and systemic racism (which, lest we forget, is what ENJAN set out to fight) cannot be solved within the framework of our present system. This makes me cautious that any entrance into electoral politics could turn a vibrant, grassroots movement into machine no better than the Republicans and Democrats. Even if we were to get a few things accomplished, would we not become co-opted by the system somewhere along the way?

I don't want to issue a fundamentalist opposition to participating in local politics. However, we must realize that the day we compromise is the day we lose our soul.

Beating this jail requires putting pressure on our political officials and voicing our opposition at every damn legislature meeting. But it will also require winning community resistance, organizing mass demonstrations, and very likely committing civil disobedience at some point. We already have a vision for a radically different system system of criminal justice, and we must fight uncompromisingly toward these ends.

On Wednesday, Dolores Thompson, the first Black American to live in the Hyde Park neighborhood where I grew up, reminded ENJAN that we must "keep our eyes on the prize." In this fight against jail expansion, that's a slogan worth remembering. 

Tuesday: Rally Against Sweatshops

Join Hudson Valley Watch the Gap, Occupy Poughkeepsie, Poughkeepsie Day School Diversity Club, & The Real Majority Project for the...

RSVP on Facebook here

Brutal sweatshop conditions have been imposed on workers in Bangladesh by multi-national corporations seeking cheap labor. 

Since, 2005, 1,834 Bangladeshi workers have died in preventable factory fires and collapses. To put an end to these murderous conditions, international labor groups have written the Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh

Many companies have signed on, including Abercrombie & Fitch, H&M, and PVH/Tommy Hilfiger. But not Gap. 

Gap, Inc. prides itself on being a socially responsible company. But it already has blood on its hands: In 2010, a fire at one of Gap's suppliers took the lives of 29 workers after the company had unconscionably given a clean bill of health to the factory.

After a year and a half of negotiations, Gap left the bargaining table, failing to sign on to any legally-binding safety agreements. Following the factory collapse in Bangladesh this April that claimed the lives of 1,125 workers, Gap said it would sign the agreement--before reneging on their promise and backing away once again.

It's time for Gap to quit playing games and sign the legally-binding safety agreement. The lives and wellbeing of their workers depend on it.

Join us to tell Gap: Respect Workers' Safety and Dignity!

Learn more about the situation in Bangladesh and how you can get involved at www.gapdeathtraps.org

SHAMELESS: Reps. Gibson & Maloney Vote to Axe SNAP

GOP Rep. Chris Gibson (NY-District 19) and Democratic Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (NY-District 18) joined forces last month to vote against food stamps

by Ken Hall, Times Herald-Record on 5/23/13

Sean Patrick Maloney says he created an agriculture advisory committee to help him "make the Farm Bill better." The Cold Spring Democrat has local farmers and politicians telling him about the need to increase support for research, reduce unnecessary paperwork and in general make sure that the Hudson Valley gets the most out of his spot on the House Agriculture Committee.

Too bad he left out another group from his district, one that could have used his help, or at least his vote, last week. With no poor kids on the committee, no poor moms to advise Maloney about what life is like when the food runs out and there's no money to buy more, he voted to cut $20 billion from the food stamp program. Over the next 10 years, this cut in what is now called the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program will take food stamps away from 2 million people, mostly low-income working families and the elderly. In addition, more than 200,000 youngsters will no longer qualify for reduced price school lunches because their eligibility is tied to the food stamp program.

Maloney had company on this committee vote. Rep. Chris Gibson, R-Kinderhook, also approved the reduction, the largest since 1996 at a time when the national recession has driven more working families and elderly to seek such help in the Hudson Valley and elsewhere.

This was not one of those votes that got all tied up in parliamentary maneuvers. This was an uncomplicated, up-or-down decision on an amendment sponsored by Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass. It would have restored the money to the bill before it left the committee on its way to the full House.

They faced a clear choice. Help those who need it or don't, and they chose not to.

 As McGovern said after the vote, "I think we're better than this. These are not thoughtful, innovative cuts. They're just cuts. They're going to hurt people."

Over in the U.S. Senate, Kirsten Gillibrand is leading the fight to defeat a similar but much smaller reduction. She sees the choices that seem to have eluded Maloney and Gibson.

"I am deeply concerned with the drastic cuts this bill makes to SNAP that will literally take food away from hungry children while protecting corporate welfare for insurance companies based in Bermuda, Australia and Switzerland who don't need it. These are the wrong priorities ... "Families who are living in poverty - hungry children, seniors, troops and veterans who are just trying to figure out how to keep the lights on and put food on the table - they did not spend this nation into debt and we should not be trying to balance the budget on their backs. They deserve better."

Gibson and Maloney have both issued lengthy press releases about all of the good things this new Farm Bill does for local farmers. They congratulated themselves for all the special provisions in the bill that they had proposed and supported.

They didn't mention food stamps.

Contact the author at thrkenhall@gmail.com

Labor Rights Are Human Rights

by Schuyler Kempton, HVR

Mississippi was ground zero of the civil rights movement, a land once soaked with the blood of the oppressed fighting to be free. Today, the state’s 99% continue to act as pioneers. Although you likely don’t know it, a groundbreaking labor campaign is currently underway in Canton, Mississippi, spearheaded by Nissan workers demanding union representation using a new approach.

Workers rally in New York City during the fast food industry's largest strike in its history this April. 

An article in the May issue of Z Magazine by Roger Bybee describes the campaign:

“The worker discontent has taken the form of a unique organizing drive for representation by the United Auto Workers, based on the notion that labor rights are human rights. This central theme---closely related to the civil rights teachings of civil rights giant Martin Luther King---resonates deeply among Nissan workers and a fast-growing group of supporters...The Mississippi organizing drive has the potential to re-invigorate the U.S. labor movement at a time of wide-spread defeatism caused by events like the passage of anti-worker legislation in Wisconsin, Indiana, and Michigan. Much of its progress can be explained by its reliance on the moral intertwining of labor rights and human rights which deeply connected with Mississippians---especially African-Americans---and exerts a worldwide moral appeal.”

The public apathy for many labor struggles likely results from the perception that the dispute is a crude, materialistic struggle. And, indeed, at the most basic level labor struggles are simply about wages & hours. However, on a deeper level the struggle is about dignity & democracy. A worker can usually squeeze by on the wages provided by their employer. What she or he lacks is fairness--- the right to be compensated for the full value of their labor; and a voice--- or the right to democracy at the workplace. 

The piece goes on to quote Wayne Walker, a black auto worker at the plant. He touched on both the issue of democracy and fairness: “It’s not all about the money. It’s about having a collaborative effort...The price of the vehicle goes up, but your pay and benefits degrade. That’s why we need a union. Corporations want to sit on profits and do not share.” 

However, this the framing of labor rights as human rights is not confined to Mississippi.

Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated on April, 4th 1968. 45 years later, fast food workers in New York City staged the largest strike in the industry’s history.

In a piece for MSNBC.com, Ned Resnikoff wrote,

“The date of this second strike is not a coincidence: April 4 is also the anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination. When King was shot and killed in 1968, he was visiting Memphis, Tenn., to rally on behalf of striking sanitation workers. The 1968 Memphis sanitation workers strike, the last major campaign of King’s life, came at a pivotal moment for both workplace rights and racial justice. Now, New York fast food workers are consciously borrowing that strike’s rhetoric and tactics, and framing their struggle as a direct continuation of the great civil rights leader’s final battle... The fast food strike has adopted some of that language of freedom and dignity, even borrowing the iconic slogan seen on many 1968 Memphis workers’ picket signs: ‘I AM A MAN.’”

Here in the Hudson Valley, a campaign has kicked off to defend a Black Ferncliff nursing home employee facing racial discrimination. The story, as I understand it, goes like this:

After Ferncliff nursing home (located in Rhinebeck, NY) changed hands sever years ago, the management has been consistently abusive to workers, especially to people of color. Aside from other acts of discrimination against African-American employees, management has targeted Fillipino workers, taunting competent workers by suggesting that they learn English.

In this case, a white nurse was told by management to prevent a Black nurse from using the main employee restroom. At other times, she was harassed for living in what management called "ghettoville."

The white nurse who was effectively told to enforce a system of apartheid was appalled and began to complain. However, when a formal grievance was filed, by Black and white nurses alike, it was dismissed, supposedly for lacking evidence. To this day, Ferncliff predictably denies that anything amiss ever happened.

1199 SEIU, the union representing workers at Ferncliff organized a well-attended rally at Starr Park in Rhinebeck on Monday, May 20th. Attendees listened to testimony by workers and supporters, accentuated by chants of "No Justice, No Peace."

The union, and the workers, vow to continue fighting until racism is addressed at the nursing home. Although this struggle focuses specifically on addressing racial injustice, this injustice occurred at the workplace, and is tied in inextricably with class oppression. Indeed, it is a union, the basic unit of workers' struggle, that is leading the charge. So, we have it hear too: the equation of labor rights with civil rights, and with civil rights as human rights.

The moral dimension to labor struggles has its share of pitfalls to be avoided. We need to remember Malcom X’s criticism of Martin Luther King’s reformism. We shouldn’t copy the Gandhian strategy of putting pacifist soldiers on the front lines to get their heads bashed in. 

And yet, in a system as amoral and unjust as ours, it strikes me as viscerally wrong that the trumpeters of the status quo to maintain a monopoly on morality. 

While capitalism pit humans against each other, solidarity compels an individual to defend another’s humanity. While capitalism only forces workers to meet a standard dictated at the whim of the bosses, a society based upon solidarity should ask of each individual only what is within their ability and return back to them what meets their needs. While capitalism provides only the possibility for a half-baked democracy isolated from the economic sphere, a society based upon solidarity should provide for democracy in every sphere of our lives, including at work and in our communities. 

I cannot imagine a higher moral standard, and I firmly believe that the denial of our abilities to realize this on the part of corporations and state constitutes a very real denial of our human rights.