Freedom Road Socialist Organization

Our Texas comrades recommended this article from the Left Labor Reporter as an update on the Occupy movement in Austin. Have local updates? Send 'em our way! Reprinted with the author's permission.

Five hundred union members marched through downtown Austin Sunday chanting, “What do we want? Union jobs” and “They got bailed out, we got sold out” during the Occupy Austin Labor Solidarity March. Ironworkers, sheet metal workers, electricians, telecom workers, and transit workers marched alongside teachers, state and local government workers, and EMS technicians.

Postal workers carried signs reading, “Save Our Postal Service, Save Saturday Deliveries” in reference to the United States Postal Service’s proposal to cut mail delivery services and lay off thousands of postal workers. Teamsters carried signs reading “Stop the War on Workers.”

Phil Bunker, vice-president of Teamsters Local 657 explained to me how the war on workers is affecting local Teamsters who work for Yellow Freight, a regional trucking company. Recently, the company threatened to file bankruptcy unless the union agreed to re-open and re-negotiate the contract. When the union reluctantly agreed, the company reduced wages by 15 percent, stopped making contributions to the workers’ pension fund, and reduced their health care benefit. “The members are very demoralized now,” Bunker said.

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It may be a bit of a cliché, but it bears saying: a single spark has in fact lit a prairie fire. An enormous one.

The last year has witnessed what appears to be the beginning of a new historical period. From the ferment in the Arab world; to the upsurge in Wisconsin; to the outpourings in Greece, Chile, Spain and other countries; and now to the Occupy movement that has spread across the US and beyond, we have clearly left the period that started with the fall of the Soviet Bloc. The last twenty-plus years was characterized by the supposed triumph of capitalism and the crisis of socialism, what the Right called “the end of history”. We have now entered a new worldwide era of popular upsurge. One of the indicators of how pregnant the moment is with possibility is the fact that the Occupy movement spread across the country even while it was still quite modestly sized for a New York City protest. It was only after it started to become a nationwide movement that we started to see many thousands of people hitting the streets of NYC.

This new period was actually in development a decade ago with the brief rise of the global justice movement. However, the 9/11 attacks short-circuited that motion and threw the world into war and repression for ten long years. One result of this decade-long sidetrack is that the contradictions developing within capitalism that the global justice movement sprang up to combat, grew even deeper and more profound, culminating in the current grave economic crisis. This is why the worldwide motion we’ve seen over the last year has been so sudden and broad.

In retrospect, it’s not surprising that it took three years from the beginning of the current crisis for large-scale protest to kick off. The Great Depression began with the stock market crash of 1929, but it wasn’t until 1932 that massive political struggle began to flare up. When a crisis begins, people’s first response is in fact to lower their expectations in the face of the new conditions. It takes time for the new situation to be absorbed as the new normality and for the contradiction between reality and people’s expectations to open wide. We have now reached that point.

Here are some great suggestions for ways to directly engage with your local Occupy movement from a comrade who has been participating with Occupy Las Vegas, which is currently a permitted encampment protest with about 20 tents and 40-100 participants at any given time. He's been a part of the group, participating in general assembly meetings and sleeping in a tent, but still going to work during the day.

Here are his ideas for socialist participation:

1. Make LEFT signs: We used dumpstered cardboard and cheap paint to make about 50 signs for the last march with slogans like "class war/ end capitalism before it ends las vegas", "Occupy Wall St not Palestine", "We can't afford billionaires", "They took our houses, let's take their power", etc. Our signs were the only ones that were explicitly anti-capitalist and they were well received. Many people took them and used them in the march. This is a quick and easy way to shift messaging to the left.

2. Stock the people's libraries: A common feature of the camps are library booths or tents. We printed off some classics — The Communist Manifesto, The Mass Strike by Rosa Luxemberg, etc.; some resources on anti-oppression strategies, some random radical stuff like the Zapatista declarations and Left Turn articles. The local news reported on the alarming presence of the Communist Manifesto at the camp!
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Introduction

As the world careens towards an uncertain future, this much is certain: if a genuine revolutionary alternative to capitalism is not realized, we may witness the emergence and dominance of a global regime of horrendous barbarism, the end-of-days festival heralding the death of Mother Earth.

We are already witness to portents of the ecological barbarism which an unrestrained capitalism inevitably produces: in unprecedented series of droughts, floods, wildfires, hurricanes, tornadoes -- all the inevitable result of an atmosphere choking on a geometrically-increasing carbon burden, of a systemic pollution and toxicification of lakes, rivers, aquifers, waterways, and oceans destroying both the food and water supply necessary for the sustenance of all life, the erosion and pestilential chemical destruction of arable lands, or their conversion (a la China) into gated and militarized playgrounds for a hedonistic bourgeoisie; the apocalyptic species loss, greater than anything witnesses by our Earth Mother in 65 million years (most of the planet’s fisheries have been depleted by over-fishing or destroyed by pollution), the polar icecaps and other massive frozen water supplies are melting at a rate even the most highly-advanced computer systems have failed to predict.

This unprecedented and interconnected series of environmental events constitute what is referred to as the global ecological crisis, or what we might call the death throes of Mother Earth. The ecological crisis is itself intertwined with the global economic crisis, whose Marxist terms “stagnation due to the declining rate of profit” fails completely to capture the horror of a system that causes 24,000 children to die each day due to hunger or completely avoidable illness.

The following is an excerpt from an article on Ask a Socialist

I made a living working for non-profits for nearly 20 years doing community organizing and blah blah blah, so you could well accuse me of biting the hand that has fed me. But you could also say the same of a union member exposing the damages done by their company.

In this case, it’s a whole sector that needs examination, especially by those who choose to work in it. “Non-profits.” Makes it sound like, hooray, they are outside of the capitalist system doing good for the little people. So we progressives and radicals, particularly those of us who are not from the working class, flock to jobs that purport to do God’s work or Marx’s work or Alinsky’s work or whomever – at least it’s not Mammon’s work. (And while organizing jobs may not make you rich, they pay better than working at a nursing home or McDonald’s, jobs working class people are more likely to be stuck with.) Other countries don’t call it the non-profit sector, they call it the non-governmental sector, which may be more clear: this sector is not some third way, outside of the capitalist system.

There have always been “voluntary” organizations, groups of people banding together for common projects. Like providing services. Like political change. Like revolution. Organizations that didn’t need anyone’s permission for anything. Non-profits are a form of voluntary organization, but they are defined by their federal tax status, exempt since their work does not financially benefit private individuals. To get the exemption, the tax code also puts in place numerous rules that an organization must follow, including allowing government scrutiny. “While the idea of exempting charitable organizations from paying taxes is old, it was in 1954, the year of the McCarthy hearings which aimed to root out and destroy communist sympathizers and progressives through defamation and scare tactics (after successful anti-capitalist organizing by the above throughout the 30s and 40’s) that the tax code was revised to say that no political activities (except an “insubstantial amount” of non-partisan education on issues) were allowed by organizations seeking tax exemption. The main upshot over time has been the growth of social service not social change organizations. There’s a political history, as with all laws, in 501(c)3 of the Internal Revenue Code.”

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October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month. As a communist who has been working as a domestic violence hotline counselor for two years, I believe it is incredibly challenging but also imperative that we bring domestic violence into the public sphere. We need to do this to create communities in which we all have power over our own lives and feel safe and supported in our homes.

During the process of training to be a hotline counselor, I learned the importance of active listening and creative thinking. I believe, in accordance with my politics, that my purpose as a counselor is to push for the self-determination of the caller. In my role within the non-governmental organization (NGO) I work with, I am there to listen and encourage the person experiencing violence to think through her¹ solutions. My instinct may be to tell her to leave the relationship, but her experiences may tell her something else. Her kids, her finances, or her own emotional vulnerability may depend on the relationship surviving. It is not my life and not up to me to judge.

As an active listener, I sharpened the skill of choosing words and phrases carefully. Women tend to be better at that because they are often trained, through oppression and socialized gender roles, to be tactful and perceptive of social cues. Men have a harder time being considerate of others' feelings because they are socialized to speak their mind, and society tends to encourage that behavior. But I believe that everyone, comrade or counselor, should be careful with their words. Words can damage and abuse, or words can affirm and liberate.

If you haven't been living under a rock for the past month you've probably heard about the wave of protests across the United States set off by Occupy Wall Street on September 17. By now you've probably seen them in your own city: Occupy Together lists events in more than one thousand cities in North America and elsewhere around the world. Some have spoken of a new movement like the anti-apartheid and anti-globalization movements of the '80s and '90s; others look back to 1968 or beyond for comparisons.

For socialists and leftists of all stripes these "occupations" have been both exciting and challenging, raising new questions every day. Can this movement grow and sustain itself until it can challenge the political status quo in the US? What are the politics of the occupations and their likely political trajectory? As socialists, as members and leaders in mass organizations, as community members and victims and resisters of the Wall Street parasites and their system -- how do we take part in the movement and in this rare historical moment?

Here are a few things that we've been reading to help sharpen our thinking around some of these questions.

• Theory, tactics and practice: In So Real It Hurts: Notes on Occupy Wall Street, Manissa Maharawal writes about her experiences at the Occupy Wall Street general assembly. McKenzie Wark writes about challenges and opportunities for OWS in How To Occupy An Abstraction and Earl McCabe writes about tactics and goals at the blog Permanent Crisis. A piece by "SKS" discusses the politico-military dimension of Occupy Wall Street's "leaderless resistance".
• Occupy/unoccupy: Many people have written about the contradictions of a movement calling for "occupations" on land which was stolen from its inhabitants -- and is still being occupied by the descendants and beneficiaries of that theft. Michelle Merrill writes about it in Occupied Lands, and "Tequila Sovereign" writes more about the history of Manhattan and the Lenape who were its original inhabitants in her post Manna-hatta. Another challenge to the perceived whiteness of Occupy Wall Street comes from Occupy The Hood, as Julianne Escobedo Shepherd reports at AlterNet.
• International solidarity: As Occupy Wall Street was inspired by the wave of revolutions in the Middle East and North Africa and movements against austerity in Europe, so in turn it has inspired solidarity actions across the globe. The Maoist website Utopia reports on a gathering in Zhengzhou, China, where protestors called for "Determined Support for the American People's Great 'Wall Street Revolution!'" (Summary in English here, original full report in Chinese here.) Participants in the movement of the indignados in Spain have linked their struggle to that in the US and called for a global day of action on October 15.
• Politics and prospects: Many arguments about this movement center on the "demandlessness" of the occupiers. Should they have a list of specific demands? What should they be? This leads to even bigger questions: where is the movement going? What should it strive for and what can it achieve? Vijay Prashad offers some analysis of the movement and its place in the politics and society of the US in Zombie Capitalism and the Post-Obama Left. Matt Sledge writes about occupiers resisting co-optation in a piece for the Huffington Post. At Fire on the Mountain, Jimmy Higgins admits he was wrong about Occupy Wall Street and looks to the bigger picture.
• Stray thoughts: Sarah Jaffe discusses the class implications of the call for protestors to 'know your history.' Time collects 50 of the best photos from Occupy Wall Street. Sady Doyle tells stories from her life that challenge the idea of the 99% versus the 1%. And at The Nation, Richard Kim says We Are All Human Microphones Now.

We want to hear your thoughts too. Send us an email at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it -- or better yet, find us in the streets.

I was wrong.

And just how wrong I was still remains to be seen.

When the Occupy Wall Street! action was announced and even after it started, I thought it had FAIL written all over it. The core was a few score young, mainly white, activists from the radical youth milieu with plenty of demonstration experience but limited ties in the people's movements and communities of NYC. The messaging was vague, the tactical implications of the call to Occupy! even vaguer. This, I thought, was bound to be a nothingburger.


Now just three weeks later, it is clear that Occupy Wall Street! has slapped the defibrillator paddles to a constellation of social movements which have been on the critical list since at least the run-up to the 2008 election and is drawing thousands new to activism into motion. The spirit, determination and self-organization which characterized the Wisconsin uprising of last winter have gone nation-wide. And this time the struggle is not a desperate battle to turn back an ambush.

Because it has roared into existence so quickly, has spread so spontaneously and is still evolving so rapidly--new slogans and memes supersede the old almost daily--almost everybody I’ve talked to who identifies with OWS! feels that all of us 99%ers are playing catch-up ball, trying to relate to our own upsurge.

Here are three brief points roughed out during hours at Liberty Square (or Zucotti Park or whatever we are calling it today) and then refined at yesterday’s mass march. I offer them for orientation purposes as we attempt to figure out what’s going on--and where to go next.

We are excited by the potential the Occupy Wall Street/Occupy Together protests embody; stay tuned to see more reports from the ground. As a first dispatch, here's a piece our New York/New Jersey comrades are circulating at Occupy Wall Street (OWS) providing some context on the local struggles against police brutality reaching beyond the protest arrests.

These two pieces are worth checking out for background (h/t to Portside):

• We are the 99 Percent Tumblr
• Protests Against Wall Street Spread Across US -- An AP story via CommonDreams.

Have a local report to share? We want to hear it! Please send it our way: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Fred Shuttlesworth, the pillar of the southern civil rights movement, died October 5, 2011 at age 89. Some of you have had the very wonderful experience of working with him as I have. While the mainstream press has widely noted his passing, most of the accounts don’t tell the full story. We have an obligation to do that.

He led the Birmingham Movement and was viewed by observers of the struggle in Alabama as the one who made the victories possible. His hard work made household names of Drs King and Abernathy. He and his family were the victims of repeated bombings and near-fatal mob violence. Martin King said often that Fred inevitably was going to be the movement's martyr. Although nationally he didn't have the name recognition of others that were familiar to the public, that was not true in Alabama. The great mass of people who were challenging Jim Crow certainly knew him and so did the defenders of Southern Apartheid-- Bull Connor and his police-Klan axis.