industrial worker - issue #1769, october 2014

8/11/2019 Industrial Worker - Issue #1769, October 2014

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Industrial Worker

PO Box 180195

Chicago, IL 60618, USA

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O F F I C I A L N E W S P A P E R O F T H E I N D U S T R I A L W O R K E R S O F T H E W O R L D

Review: Wobbly PoetKeeps Tradition OfLabor Poetry Alive 8

Baltimore JimmyJohns Workers FileULP Lawsuit 5

INDUSTRIAL WORKER

New Survey Of OnlineIWW Sign-Ups: A Wake-Up Call 3

O c t o b e r 2 0 1 4 # 1 7 6 8 V o l . 1 1 1 N o . 7 $ 2 / 2 / 2

IWW UPS Workers Organize Against Police Brutality

S

haring LessonsWith Comrades InThe FAU 12

Photos: Screw Ups

The 2014 IWW General Convention: Learning From Our Mistakes, Moving ForwardBy Maria Parrotta

This year I had an opportunity to joinfellow workers from all over the IWW forthe 2014 General Convention. The jovialWobblies I knew and loved have beeninfected with the frustration, defeat andcollective burnout that could have beenthis years unofcial convention theme.As a delegate representing the mumblingvoice of the Washington, D.C. Gener alMembership Branch (GMB), it was my

duty to defend the positions we spent vewhole minutes crafting in a meeting thatbarely reached a quorum. I arrived at theconvention concerned that our union wasfalling into a rut, but I left afraid that weare just falling apart.

Our rst order of business becamea battle between members of our dys-functional and slightly intimidating hostbranch and almost everyone else. The del-egates voted to remove a Chicago branchmember from the convention due to very

serious accusations that kept other fellowworkers from participating. Supporters ofthe accused stormed out in a whirlwindof obscenities as the convention hall fellsilent except for the scattered slap of handsmeeting foreheads.

The Chicago split faction ruled that theprimary legislative body of the union didnot have the right to decide who could bepresent for their session. They proclaimedtheir authority as the chosen Complaint

Committee tasked with determining thesafety of this members actions.Theyclaimed that since they had not yet reacheda conclusion on this case, the conventionshould have continued as if no question ofsafety was ever raised, and the delegatestraveling from all over the world to servethis union were just going to have to takethe risk of sitting next to a dangerousperson, because procedure.

I am a big supporter of following theContinued on 6

By Kaia HodoAt a round 3 a.m.

on Saturday, Aug. 30, a

group of four exhaustedWobblies from Arkansasdid our best to fall asleepin a Chicago multicul-tural center, all the whilebeing sere nade d by jambands who probably didntsleep at all. By about 9a.m., we had already leftfor a union hall, wherewe would spend the restof our day meeting withother IWW members fromacross the country (Illinois, Minnesota,California, Missouri, Alabama and Ohio, tobe specic). The purpose of the conference,a two-day set of meetings of people whohad mostly only spoken over the phone

up to this point, was prisoner organizing.Just to give a brief overview, the 13th

Ame ndment to the U.S. Consti tut ion,passed in 1865, abolished slavery and

Continued on 7

UPS workers display signsopposing police brutality.

A Labor Day Weekend For The Unseen Laborers

By Screw UpsStarting on Friday, Aug. 22, IWW

workers at a United Parcel Service (UPS)sorting facility in Minneapolis began orga-nizing against their labor supporting theongoing police violence against the popu-

lation of Ferguson, Mo., in the aftermath ofthe murder of Michael Brown, an unarmed18-year-old black man. In a series of ac-tions aimed at a local company shippingquestionable shooting-range targets to lawenforcement agencies nationwide, workersstood up to the idea that they should haveto support racism, brutality, or murder inorder to make ends meet. This action wasorganized in conjunction with, and underthe banner ofScrew Ups, a rank-and-lenewsletter which has been published byIWW workers at the facility for the pastyear.

Shortly after the murder of MichaelBrown and the deployment of militarizedpolice and national guardsmen to Fergu-son, IWW workers and in-shop allies be-gan researching Law Enforcement Targets,Inc. (LET), a company based in Blaine,Minn., which produces shooting range

targets and holds hundreds of contractswith police departments, federal agencies,and military branches across the UnitedStates. The company has held at least 10contracts with federal agencies in Mis-souri, and far more with county and local

police departments and other agencies.They sell product lines like Urban StreetViolence, featuring photos of stereotypi-cal thugs, and previously were forced towithdr aw a line of tar get s cal led NoMore Hesitation, featuring pictures ofgun-wielding children, pregnant women,mothers, and elderly people, all as if tosay that you should consider everyone yousee as a threat to be gunned down. Theirproducts are shipped through the UPSsorting facility in Minneapolis every day.

After discovering what products LETshipped, and to whom, a group of UPSworkers decided they would not be si-lent about the connection between theirwork and murders, such as that of MikeBrown. Some workers removed targetsfrom trailers that would deliver them tolaw enforcement agencies, while othersstood in solidarity and decided not to

ferry these packages to their intendedtrailers. Those who were uncomfort-able or unable to directly engage inthese actions posed with a sign reading#handsupdontship in order to speakout. Actions like this took place in vari-

ous work areas across the building, andwere taken by people with a variety ofjob positions. The following Monday,several workers continued the action,setting more targets aside for the secondconsecutive shift. This small group in-cluded both workers of color and whiteworkers, both IWW members and not.It was agreed that this protest wouldbe publicized online through theScrewUps newsletter.

For just over two years, the IWWhas actively been organizing workerscommittees within the UPS hub in Min-neapolis. One of the main outgrowths ofthis campaign has been the publicationofScrew Ups, which is handed out by al-lies outside the building to workers whoare on their way to clock in. This news-letter has consistently raised issues of

Continued on 6

Photo: D.J. AlperovitzDelegates and members at the 2014 IWW General Convention.

Photo: LenzMembers of IWOC meet in Chicago.


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Page 2 Industrial Worker October 2014

AsiaTaiwanTaiwan IWW: c/o David Temple, 4 Floor, No. 3, Ln. 67,Shujing St., Beitun Dist., Taichung City 40641 Taiwan.098-937-7029. [email protected]

AustraliaNew South WalesSydney GMB: [email protected]. Laura, del.,[email protected]: [email protected]: [email protected]: nor [email protected]: P.O. Box 5842, West End, Qld 4101. [email protected]. Asger, del., [email protected] AustraliaAdelaide: [email protected], www.wobbliesSA.org. Jesse, del., 0432 130 082VictoriaMelbourne: P.O. Box 145, Moreland, VIC 3058. [email protected], www.iwwmelbourne.wordpress.com. Loki, del., [email protected]: [email protected] AustraliaPerth GMB: P.O. Box 1, Cannington WA 6987. [email protected]. Bruce, del.,[email protected] Canadian Regional Organizing Committee (CAN-ROC): c/o Toronto GMB, P.O. Box 45 Toronto P, Toronto ON,M5S 2S6. [email protected] GMB: P.O. Box 4197, T6E 4T2. [email protected], edmonton.iww.ca.British ColumbiaRed Lion Press: [email protected] GMB: 204-2274 York Ave., V6K 1C6.604-732-9613. [email protected]. www.vancouveriww.comVancouver Island GMB: Box 297 St. A, Nanaimo BC, V9R5K9. iw [email protected]. http://vanislewobs.wordpress.comManitobaWinnipeg GMB: IWW, c/o WORC, P.O. Box 1, R3C 2G1.204-299-5042, [email protected] BrunswickFredericton: [email protected],frederictoniww.wordpress.comOntarioOttawa-Outaouais GMB & GDC Local 6: 1106 WellingtonSt., P.O. Box 36042, Ottawa, K1Y 4V3. [email protected],[email protected] Panhandlers Union: Raymond Loomer, interimdelegate, [email protected]: c/o PCAP, 393 Water St. #17, K9H 3L7,705-749-9694. Sean Carleton, del., 705-775-0663,[email protected] GMB: P.O. Box 45, Toronto P, M5S 2S6. 647-741-4998. [email protected]. www.torontoiww.orgWindsor GMB: c/o WWAC, 328 Pelissier St., N9A 4K7.519-564-8036. [email protected]. http://wind-soriww.wordpress.comQubecMontreal GMB: cp 60124, Montral, QC, H2J 4E1. 514-268-3394. [email protected] Regional Administration (ERA): P.O. Box 7593Glasgow, G42 2EX. ww w.iww.org.uk

ERA Organisation ContactsCentral England Organiser: Russ Spring, [email protected] Department: [email protected]/Wales Organiser: Peter Davies [email protected] of Scotland Organiser: Dek Keenan, [email protected] Administrator: Rob Stirling, [email protected] Committee: [email protected] Regional Organiser: Northern Regional Organ-ising Committee, [email protected] Bar and Hospitality Workers IUB 640: [email protected] and Bargaining Support Department:[email protected] and Survey Department: [email protected]: Frank Syratt, [email protected] England Organiser: Nick Ballard, [email protected] Committee: [email protected] Department: [email protected]: Matt Tucker, [email protected] of Scotland Organiser: Keith Millar, [email protected]

Womens Officer: Marion Hersh, [email protected]

ERA BranchesClydeside GMB: [email protected]/Wales GMB: [email protected] GMB: [email protected] & Wear GMB: [email protected] GMB: [email protected] GMB: [email protected] GMB: [email protected] GMB: IWW Office, SYAC, 120 Wicker, SheffieldS3 8JD. [email protected] GMB: [email protected] Midlands GMB: [email protected] GMB: [email protected] GMB: [email protected] GMB: [email protected]

Floris De Rycker, Sint-Bavoplein 7, 2530 Boechout,Belgium. [email protected] Language AreaIWW German Language Area Regional OrganizingCommittee (GLAMROC): IWW, Haberweg 19, 61352 BadHomburg, Germany. [email protected]. www.wobblies.deAustria: [email protected], [email protected]: Offenes Treffen jeden 2.Montag im Monat im CafeCommune, Reichenberger Str.157, 10999 Berlin, 18 Uhr.(U-Bahnhof Kottbusser Tor). Postadresse: IWW Berlin, c/oRotes Antiquariat, Rungestr. 20, 10179 Berlin, [email protected]: [email protected]. iwwbremen.blogsport.deCologne/Koeln GMB: c/o Allerweltshaus, Koernerstr.77-79, 50823 Koeln, Germany. [email protected] - Eurest: IWW Betriebsgruppe EurestHaberweg 19 D- 61352 Bad Homburg. [email protected]: [email protected]: [email protected]. www.wobblies-kassel.deMunich: [email protected]: [email protected]. iww-rostock.netSwitzerland:[email protected]: [email protected], [email protected]: Heimssamband Verkaflks / IWW Iceland,Reykjavkurakademunni 516, Hringbraut 121,107ReykjavkLithuania: [email protected]: iw [email protected] IWW: 004793656014. [email protected]. http://www.iwwnorge.org, www.facebook.com/iwwnorge. Twitter: @IWWnorgeUnited StatesAlabamaMobile: Jimmy Broadhead, del., P.O. Box 160073, [email protected] GMB: P. O. Box 80101, 99708. Chris White, d el.,907-457-2543, [email protected]. Facebook: IWWFairbanksArizonaPhoenix GMB: P.O. Box 7126, 85011-7126. 623-336-1062. [email protected] IWW: 206-327-4158, [email protected] Corners (AZ, CO, NM, UT): 970-903-8721, [email protected]: P.O. Box 283, 72702. [email protected]

CaliforniaLos Angeles GMB: (323) 374-3499. [email protected] IWW: 916-825-0873, [email protected] Diego IWW: 619-630-5537, [email protected] Francisco Bay Area GMB: (Curbside and Buyback IU670 Recycling Shops; Stonemountain Fabrics Job Shopand IU 410 Garment and Textile Workers IndustrialOrganizing Committee; Shattuck Cinemas; EmbarcaderoCinemas) P.O. Box 11412, Berkeley, 94712. 510-845-0540. [email protected] 520 Marine Transport Workers: Steve Ongerth, del.,[email protected] Printing: 2412 Palmetto Street, Oakland94602. 510-482-4547. [email protected] Jose: [email protected], www.facebook.com/SJSV.IWWColoradoDenver GMB: c/o Hughes, 7700 E. 29th Avenue, Unit 107,80238. 303-355-2032. [email protected]: John W., del., 914-258-0941. [email protected] DC GMB: P.O. Box 1303, 20013. 202-630-9620. [email protected]. www.dciww.org, www.

facebook.com/dciww

FloridaGainesville GMB: c/o Civic Media Center, 433 S. Main St.,32601. Robbie Czopek, del., 904-315-5292, [email protected], w ww.gainesvilleiww.orgSouth Florida GMB: P.O. Box 370457, 33137. 305-894-6515. [email protected], http://iwwmiami.wordpress.com. Facebook: Miami IWWHobe Sound: P. Shultz, 8274 SE Pine Circle, 33455-6608.772-545-9591, [email protected] GMB: P.O. Box 5390, 31107. 678-964-5169,[email protected], www.atliww.orgIdahoBoise: Ritchie Eppink, del., P.O. Box 453, 83701. 208-371-9752, [email protected] GMB: P.O. Box 15384, 60615. 312-638-9155,[email protected]

IndianaIndiana GMB: [email protected]. Facebook:Indiana IWWIowaEastern Iowa IWW: 319-333-2476. [email protected] GMB: P.O. Box 1462, 66044. 816-875-6060Wichita: Richard Stephenson, del., [email protected] GMB: Mick Parsons, Secretary Treasurer,[email protected]. 502-658-0299LouisianaLouisiana IWW: John Mark Crowder, del.,126 Kelly Lane,Homer, 71040. 318-224-1472. [email protected] IWW: 207-619-0842. [email protected], www.southernmaineiww.org

MarylandBaltimore GMB: P.O. Box 33350, 21218. [email protected] Area GMB: P.O. Box 391724, Cambridge, 02139.617-863-7920, [email protected], www.IW-

WBoston.orgCape Cod/SE Massachusetts: [email protected] Mass. Public Service IU 650 Branch: IWW, P.O.Box 1581, Northampton, 01061

MichiganDetroit GMB: 4210 Trumbull Blvd., 48208. [email protected] Rapids GMB: P.O. Box 6629, 49516. [email protected] Rapids Bartertown Diner and Rocs Cakes: 6Jefferson St., 49503. [email protected], www.bartertowngr.comCentral Michigan: 5007 W. Columbia Rd., Mason 48854.517-676-9446, [email protected] IWW: P.O. Box 3232, 55803. [email protected] Country Food Alliance: 2104 Stevens Ave S, Min-neapolis, 55404. 612-568-4585. www.northcountry-foodalliance.orgPedal Power Press: P.O. Box 3232 Duluth 55803.www.pedalpowerpress.comPhoenix Mental Health, P.L.C.: FW Jeffrey Shea Jones,3137 Hennepin Ave. S., #102, Minneapolis, 55408.612-501-6807Red River GMB: [email protected], [email protected]

Twin Cities GMB: 3019 Minnehaha Ave. South, Suite 50,Minneapolis, 55406. [email protected] Kansas City IWW: P.O. Box 414304, Kansas City,64141. 816.875.6060. 816-866-3808. [email protected]. Louis IWW: P.O. Box 63142, 63163. Secretary: [email protected]. Treasurer [email protected] Workers IU 330: Dennis Georg, del., 406-490-3869, [email protected] Rivers IWW: Jim Del D uca, del., 106 Paisley Court,Apt. I, Bozeman 59715. 406-599-2463. [email protected] a GMB: P.O. Box 27811, Ralston, 68127. [email protected]. ww w.nebraskaiww.orgNevadaReno GMB: P.O. Box 12173, 89510. Paul Lenart, del.,775-513-7523, [email protected]

IU 520 Railroad Workers: Ron Kaminkow, del., P.O. Box2131, Reno, 89505. 608-358-5771. [email protected] JerseyCentral New Jersey GMB: P.O. Box 10021, New Brunswick,08906. 732-692-3491. [email protected]. Bob

Ratynski, del., 908-285-5426. www.newjerseyiww.org

Northern New Jersey: 201-800-2471. [email protected] MexicoAlbuquerque GMB: P.O. Box 4892, 87196-4892. 505-569-0168, [email protected] YorkNew York City GMB: 45-02 23rd Street, Suite #2, LongIsland City,11101. iw [email protected]. w ww.wobblycity.orgStarbucks Campaign: i [email protected],www.starbucksunion.orgHudson Valley GMB: P.O. Box 48, Huguenot 12746. 845-342-3405. [email protected]. http://hviww.blogspot.comSyracuse IWW: [email protected] NY GMB: P.O. Box 77, Altamont, 12009. 518-861-5627. [email protected] IWW: Brendan Maslauskas Dunn, del., 315-240-3149. [email protected]

North CarolinaGreensboro: 336-279-9334. [email protected] DakotaRed River GMB: [email protected], [email protected] GMB: c/o Riffe, 4071 Indianola Ave., Columbus43214. [email protected] Ohio GMB: P.O. Box 141072, Cleveland 44114.440-941-0999Ohio Valley GMB: P.O. Box 6042, Ci ncinnati 45206, 513-510-1486, [email protected] Patches Screenprinting: [email protected] IWW: 539-664-6769. [email protected] GMB: Ed Gunderson, del., 541-743-5681. [email protected], www.iwwlane.orgPortland GMB: 2249 E Burnside St., 97214, 503-231-5488. [email protected], portlandiww.orgRed and Black Cafe: 400 SE 12th Ave, Portland, 97214.503-231-3899. [email protected]. www.redandblackcafe.comPrimal Screens Screen Printing: 1127 SE 10th Ave.#160 Portland, 97214. 503-267-1372. [email protected]

PennsylvaniaLancaster IWW: P.O. Box 352, 17608. [email protected] Valley GMB: P.O. Box 1477, Allentown, 18105-1477. 484-275-0873. [email protected]. facebook.com/lehighvalleyiwwPaper Crane Press IU 450 Job Shop: 610-358-9496. [email protected], www.papercranepress.comPittsburgh GMB: P.O. Box 5912,15210. [email protected] IslandProvidence GMB: P.O. Box 23067, 02903. [email protected] IWW: Jonathan Beasley, del., 218 S 3rdSt. Apt. 7-6, Clarksville, 37040. [email protected]: Gus Breslauer, del., [email protected]: Houston IWWRio Grande Valley, South Texas IWW: Greg, del.,956-278-5235 or Marco, del., 979-436-3719. [email protected]. w ww.facebook.com/IWWRGVUtahSalt Lake City GMB: P.O. Box 1227, 84110. 801-871-9057. [email protected]

Burlington: John MacLean, del., 802-540-2561VirginiaRichmond IWW: P.O. Box 7055, 23221. [email protected], ww w.richmondiww.orgWashingtonBremerton: Gordon Glick, d el., [email protected] (Professional Roofcare Job Shop): [email protected]. www.bellinghamiww.com.Seattle GMB: 1122 E. Pike #1142, 98122-3934. 206-429-5285. [email protected]. www.seattleiww.org,www.seattle.netWisconsinMadison GMB: P.O. Box 2442, 53701-2442. www.madison.iww.orgIUB 560 - Communications and Computer Workers: P.O.Box 259279, Madison 53725. 608-620-IWW1. [email protected]. www.Madisoniub560.iww.orgLakeside Press IU 450 Job Shop: 1334 Williamson,53703. 608-255-1800. Jerry Chernow, del., [email protected]. w ww.lakesidepress.orgMadison Infoshop Job Shop:1019 Williamson St. #B,53703. 608-262-9036Just Coffee Job Shop IU 460: 1129 E. Wilson, Madison,53703. 608-204-9011, justcoffee.coopRailroad Workers IU 520: 608-358-5771. [email protected] GMB: P.O. Box 342294, 53234. 630-415-7315

Northwoods IWW: P.O. Box 452, Stevens Point, 54481

IWW directoryIndustrial WorkerThe Voice of Revolutionary

Industrial Unionism

ORGANIZATION

EDUCATION

EMANCIPATION

Ofcial newspaper of the

INDUSTRIALWORKERS

OFTHEWORLD

Post Ofce Box 180195

Chicago, IL 60618 USA

773.728.0996 [email protected]

GENERALSECRETARY-TREASURER:

Monika Vykoukal

GENERALEXECUTIVEBOARD:

Ryan G., DJ Alperovitz,Brian Latour, Michael White,

Jim Del Duca, Montigue Magruder

EDITOR& GRAPHICDESIGNER:

Diane [email protected]

PROOFREADERS:

Maria Rodriguez Gil,Joel Gosse, Nicki Meier

Jonathan D. Beasley, Jacob Brent,

Don Sawyer, Neil Parthun,Skylaar Amann, David Patrick,Chris Heffner, Billy OConnor,

Zachary Snowdon Smith

PRINTER:

Globe Direct/Boston Globe MediaMillbury, MA

Next deadline isOctober 3, 2014

U.S. IW mailing address:IW, Post Ofce Box 180195,

Chicago, IL 60618,United States

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paid Chicago, IL.

POSTMASTER: Send addresschanges to IW, Post Ofce Box180195, Chicago, IL 60618 USA

SUBSCRIPTIONSIndividual Subscriptions: $18

International Subscriptions: $30Library/Institution Subs: $30/yearUnion dues includes subscription.

Published monthly with the excep-tion of February and August.

Articles not so designated donot reect the IWWs

ofcial position.

Press Date: September 19, 2014

Letters Welcome!Send your letters to: [email protected] withLetter in the subject.

Mailing Address:Industrial Worker, P.O. Box 180195,Chicago, IL 60618, United States.

In November We RememberSend in your announcements for the

annual In November We Rememberissue of theIndustrial WorkerbyFriday, October 3, 2014. Celebrate thelives of those who have struggled forthe working class with your message ofsolidarity. Send announcements to [email protected]. Much appreciated donationsfor the following sizes should be sent to:

IWW GHQ, P.O. Box 180195,Chicago, IL 60618, United States.

$12 for 1 tall, 1 column wide$40 for 4 by 2 columns

$90 for a quarter page

The IWShould Be Encouraging OrganizingDear Editor,

I am so very disap-pointed in the June 2014IWarticle, Worker Co-operatives: Crashing InThe Same Car, by Ogier(page 4). It starts off withinformation and factsabout a worker-ownedcooperative store. The

job sounds better thanany working-class jobI have ever heard of inthe United States. Thewor kers coo per at ive lyfound ways to be able tobuild much better lives for themselves. Thesecond part changes away from facts to alist of complaints based on Ogiers guesses,one out-of-context sentence he dislikedfrom one moment with one worker, andthen goes into a classic right-wing attackon the left.

The whole point of the IWW is to buildtoward a cooperative society run by work-ers that gives us a much better life. Whilewe work toward that goal, many of our

best, most active Wobs are earning theirdaily pay in worker-owned cooperatives,

from Just Coffee to theSisters Camelot strikerswho have formed a newco-op, the North CountyFood Alliance. The NorthCounty Wobs sent $300for solidarity on the rstday of the strike of theCitizens Co-op Wobs inGainesville, Fla. I wish

the rest of us could bethat strong in our soli-darity. Why cant thepaper report on positiveslike those more often?

This article in theIW will only deny, degrade and disruptthe best efforts of the IWW and our allies.This style of a story is the opposite of theorganizing and recruiting tool theIWusedto always be. Please try to have reportsthat educate, and organize our people,not show some immature ultra-leftist whothinks he or she is a perfectionist and ev-erybody else is wrong, especially our mostsuccessful people.

Best wishes for the futureIW.

Tom KeoughBrooklyn, NY

DearIWreaders,

Ive recentlylaunched a newblog, Life-LongWobbly, whichwill explorewhat it meansto make IWW

membership asustainable partof the rest ofyour life. Topicsso far includeGetting yoursecond ve-year

card, Wildcat political strikes, a reportfrom the 2014 IWW General Conven-tion and an ongoing series called TabooMarxist of the Month.

I invite my fellow workers to check outthe blog, and to consider writing a guestsubmission. The URL is: http://lifelong-wobbly.wordpress.com.

One class one enemy,Brandon Oliver

Read & Contribute To ANew Wobbly Blog!

Graphic: stickerkitty.comPhoto: iww.org

IWW membership card.

Readers Soapbox continues onpage 11!


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October 2014 Industrial Worker Page 3

__I afrm that I am a worker, and that I am not an employer.

__I agree to abide by the IWW constitution.

__I will study its principles and acquaint myself with its purposes.Name: ________________________________

Address: ______________________________

City, State, Post Code, Country: _______________

Occupation: ____________________________

Phone: ____________ Email:_______________

Amount Enclosed: _________

The working class and the employingclass have nothing in common. There canbe no peace so long as hunger and wantare found among millions of workingpeople and the few, who make up the em-ploying class, have all the good things oflife. Between these two classes a strugglemust go on until the workers of the worldorganize as a class, take possession of themeans of production, abolish the wagesystem, and live in harmony with theearth.

We nd that the center ing of themanagement of industries into fewer andfewer hands makes the trade unions un-able to cope with the ever-growing powerof the employing class. The trade unionsfoster a state of affairs which allows oneset of workers to be pitted against anotherset of workers in the same industry,thereby helping defeat one another inwage wars. Moreover, the trade unionsaid the employing class to mislead theworkers into the belie f that the workingclass have interests in common with theiremployers.

These conditions can be changed andthe interest of the working class upheldonly by an organization formed in such

a way that all its members in any oneindustry, or all industries if necessary,cease work whenever a strike or lockout ison in any department thereof, thus mak-ing an injury to one an injury to all.

Instead of the conservative motto, Afair days wage for a fair days work, wemust inscribe on our banner the revolu-tionary watchword, Abolition of the wagesystem.

It is the historic mission of the work-ing class to do away with capitalism. Thearmy of production must be organized,not only for the everyday struggle w ithcapitalists, but also to carry on produc-tion when capitalism shall have beenoverthrown. By organizing industriallywe are forming the structure of the new

society within the shell of the old.

TO JOIN:Mail this form with a check or money order for initiationand your rst months dues to: IWW, Post Ofce Box 180195, Chicago, IL60618, USA.

Initiation is the same as one months dues. Our dues are calculated

according to your income. If your monthly income is under $2000, duesare $9 a month. If your monthly income is between $2000 and $3500,dues are $18 a month. If your monthly income is over $3500 a month, duesare $27 a month. Dues may vary outside of North America and in RegionalOrganizing Committees (Australia, British Isles, German Language Area).

Membership includes a subscription to theIndustrial Worker.

Join the IWW Today

The IWW is a union for all workers, a union dedicated to organizing on thejob, in our industries and in our communities both to win better conditionstoday and to build a world without bosses, a world in which production and

distribution are organized by workers ourselves to meet the needs of the entirepopulation, not merely a handful of exploiters.

We are the Industrial Workers of the World because we organize industrially that is to say, we organize all workers on the job into one union, rather than dividingworkers by trade, so that we can pool our strength to ght the bosses together.

Since the IWW was founded in 1905, we have recognized the need to build atruly international union movement in order to confront the global power of thebosses and in order to strengthen workers ability to stand in solidarity with our fel-low workers no matter what part of the globe they happen to live on.

We are a union open to all workers, whether or not the IWW happens to haverepresentation rights in your workplace. We organize the worker, not the job, recog-nizing that unionism is not about government certication or employer recognitionbut about workers coming together to address our common concerns. Sometimesthis means striking or signing a contract. Sometimes it means refusing to work withan unsafe machine or following the bosses orders so literally that nothing gets done.Sometimes it means agitating around particular issues or grievances in a specicworkplace, or across an industry.

Because the IWW is a democratic, member-run union, decisions about what is-sues to address and what tactics to pursue are made by the workers directly involved.

IWW Constitution Preamble

IWW Organizing

New Survey Of Online IWW Sign-Ups: A Wake-Up Call And Call To ActionBy FW db

An IWW intern recently did a studyof online IWW sign-ups, receiving 38 re-sponses, and I hope we take a moment toseriously consider what was learned, andwhat this means. Here are some highlightsof the study:

Around 70 percent who signed up

online were 18-35 years old, 20 percentwere 36-55, and 10 percent were 56-75.

92 percent of the respondents identi-ed as male, 2 percent identied as female,and 5 percent otherwise.

63 percent of respondents identiedas straight, 35 percent as queer in someway; 10 percent preferred not to say.

95 percent of respondents identiedas white, with a 2 percent response rate forBlack/African American and from Asiandescent, and 5 percent response rate forAmerican Indian, Arab, and Latino.

95 percent of respondents had spentsome time at college, 63 percent held abachelors degree, and 36 percent held amasters degree or Ph.D.

95 percent claimed uency in Eng-lish, 8 percent in Spanish, and 2 percentin French, Czech, and German.

42 percent identied as atheists, witha majority in the theist choices.

Ok, wow. Who is coming to the currentidea of the IWW?

Let me say it this way. A revolutionarymovement that is about liberation must, byits nature, be made up overwhelmingly ofthose who have a direct personal stake inrevolution. As such in the United States,this must be overwhelmingly by peopleof color, immigrants, people with littleformal education, a majority of whom arewomen, with over- representation fromqueer communities. Well, fellow workers,

we got the last part, the queer part, thoughthat too needs to be assessed by economic,racial, and educational background.

Right now, the IWW is projecting, viaall our workin-person, online, and soforththat we are a primarily white, male,

yo un g, co ll ege -educated union.This is the scaryreality our onlinesign-ups are show-ing us. And I sayscary because Ivebeen to college and

know what hap-pens when yourearound a bunch ofwhite dudes whentheyre drinking.Or in any settingfor that matter.

Ive also been around the IWW andknow the predominance of this as a real-ity, and the way that this silences people ofcolor, women, and people with low socio-economic and educational backgrounds.It also makes conicts about any of theselines of oppressionsexual assault for in-stanceworse, because the demographicrealities and previous silences make suchincidents all the more painful. I have been

told it feels very different to be a womanor a person of color when surrounded bymen or white people, including a rapist ora bigot, than when the demographics aremore reective of our revolutionary class.The point is, not only is an unrepresenta-tive membership a barrier to changingour demographics, but it can also makethe inevitable behavior of some of ourmembers worse.

I hope this survey is a serious wake-up call. Personally it makes me seriouslyquestion how I am going to move in thisunion that is attracting 92 percent menfrom online sign-ups. To be clear, this isnot an argument for quitting. I have puttoo much time and know too many god

damn good organizers to quit right now.But if we dont see people get moving, andwith the erce urgency of this is reallyimportant; lets slow down and gure thisout without quick xes or token gestures,then maybe I will start thinking about it.

Yes I t all of thesedemographics, andyes I can do some-thing about it.

How can wechange the idea andthe reality of theIWW?

First, I think weneed to get out ofthe mindset of quickfixes even as weshould be seekingstrategies and tac-tics that x things,

even though quicker would be nice.Second, if your branch or work com-

mittee has more than two people andis predominantly white or male you areprobably doing something wrong! Thismay be hard to hear, and as someone whohas done lots of work in all-white or largelymale committees it is hard to say. But itis also true. In writing this I also got thissuggestion for the union from a right-on

IWW organizer who has walked the walk:If you are organizing in food and retailwhere the majority of workers are womenof color, then your committee MUST bepredominately women of color or it willno longer be seen as an IWW-sponsoredcampaign. It will not receive the supportof the IWW or its resources. We must bemuch more selective of who we spend timedeveloping into leaders and recruiting asmembers. Can you say this about yourcampaign? About your branch? Where dowe step to make this different?

Third, I think we need to realize thatthe best advocates for these changes arealready in the IWWcommitted organiz-ers who already are or are trying to expand

the idea and reality of the IWW beyond thecurrent pale reality. Are you a good orga-nizer? Support these organizers in theirefforts by committing your rst prioritytime to helping their projects grow. Thisalso applies to branches as a whole. This

is how we start branches or campaignsor committees right, and set them up togrow into something actually importantand potentially revolutionary. If we dontdo this Im not convinced we are doingmuch more than talking a big game. Focuson the Food Chain and the IncarceratedWorkers Organizing Committee (IWOC),

in all their questions and imperfections,are both examples of this. And both focusexclusively on one of the most oppressed,revolutionary, and active sections of theworking class. It should also be pointedout that for our all radical talk, most poorpeople, regardless of race and gender, areactually far more militant than the averageIWW member, and if we cant differentiatebetween talk and action, they sure as hellcan. That is something we need to chew onwhen we talk about the IWW. And thinkabout who are future leaders should be.

Fourth, we have got to start runningevents and actions and pamphlets andcampaigns on issues that dont impactmiddle-class white men, like police bru-

tality, like patriarchy, like not havingdocuments, or having a felony conviction,or being pregnant. And we have to becareful that a bunch of middle-class whitemen who have good things to say aboutsuch things do not come to the committeemeetings or events, and sometimes evenactions, until we have a vast majority ofthose who are directly linked to the diversestruggles at hand. Yet we should makesure that this diverse new leadership isbeing mentored and funded to the best ofour abilities, because they are our future,and our future leadership. What is moreimportant?

Fifth, our website, newspaper, andsocial media should look as diverse as

the revolution we want to be a part of.When IWOC launched we were like Shit!Do we not have ANY black (or Latino,Native, or really female) people or ideason our website, anywhere!? We haveall of these types of people in this unionpresently and historically, and we useabolitionist language in the Preamble forChrists sake. Can we please work on this?And in the pamphlets we create or reprintfrom other sources? And in the graphicswe use? Now? This we have no excuse forand should change in every next thing weever do. Always.

Sixth, I think we need to critically con-sider the truly toxic impact a small amountof problem causers and gatekeepers arehaving on individual branches, commit-

tees, and organizing campaigns, that keepsthem from growing. It only takes one per-son to create these problems. And we areall capable of it. Ive done it before. Let mestrongly encourage preventative measures,early intervention, and the willingness tosay that no one is bigger than this unionand our revolutionary mission. Not you,not me.

Finally, I want to point out how, if weimprove how we treat each other, we willall benet! This applies to the religious/spiritual membersa majority of onlinesign-ups!who dont need to be lookeddown on by our atheist members. Creat-ing a welcoming and aware culture forlow-income people or women supports

people of color stepping into leadership,and vice versa. It is not anti-male to beagainst patriarchy. It is not anti-whitepeople to be against white supremacy. It isnot anti-middle class people to be againstcapitalism! Nor does an acknowledgmentof patriarchy silence the trials, includinghorric ones, that men face, including withindividual women. Freedom from oppres-sive systems betters us all; emancipationis about all of us. Yet we will not free our-selves if the least among us do not becomethe rst among us in the struggle, becauseif we do not free ourselves we are not free.

There is no time like the present tomake real steps towards become a moretruly revolutionary organization.

Thoughts? Email me: [email protected].

Graphic: X378461


4/12


Preventable MistakesBy Juan Conatz

A lot of the knowledgeand skills we pass down inthe IWW are the basics,the initial steps, the firstthings you do. We try toinstitutionalize this stuffso members learn and then

build off them. Rather thanleaving people to them-selves, making it necessaryto reinvent the wheel everytime, we promote membereducation through pro-grams like the OrganizerTrainings 101 and 102. The idea is thatonce you become familiar with what needsto be done, youll do those things automati-cally. And as you get better, you can assesshow youve done or whether the steps andskills handed down need to be altered orimproved in some way. But even those ofus who know better make mistakes.

Like FW db said in his article TowardA Union Of Organizers, (July/August2012IW, page 3), there are certain things

that are good to do regardless of whetheror not a Wobbly plans to organize at theirworkplace. Maybe organizing isnt in yourplans now, but those plans could change.Plus, sometimes situations arise andyou need to react. Just such a situationhappened to me recently, where simplemistakes and lack of preparation hurt myefforts.

At a warehouse on the south side ofMinneapolis, I was employed at a smallcompany that specialized in buying over-stock and customer return loads fromlarge online retailers. For a good part ofthe day, we would break down the palletsfrom these loads and sort through theitems. While sorting one of these loads,

a co-worker made a joke about taking aPlayStation 2 home with him in front ofthe warehouse supervisor. Such jokes werecommon, even by the supervisor, but thistime it was different.

The next day, the owner of the com-pany was in the building, and there wererumors that there were items missing fromthe load. This was actually pretty common.The packing lists rarely matched what ac-tually came off the truck. Sometimes therewere things missing, sometimes there wasextra. This was known by everyone, includ-ing the owner.

Regardless of this fact, my co-workerwho had cracked the joke was red withinthe hour. Three years working at this com-

pany and he was out the door because ofan offhand remark. Pissed off, two otherco-workers and I confronted the ware-house supervisor about this. We quicklypicked up that personal reasons betweenhim and the red co-worker were the rootof all this. All eight of us on the oor weremad and very little work was getting done.A few hours later, the owner called a meet-ing, where he tried to explain why he redthe guy and why we should understand it.

This ended with the two co-workers andI getting into a shouting match with him.

Tempers were aring and you couldcut the tension in the air with a knife. Thiswas now a hot shop. I never plannedon organizing there, but that was now ir-relevant. We had to try and get this guysjob back and to establis h some meagerconcerted activity protection for the twoothers and I who stood up. I tried to pushthat anger toward a conversation later,rather than loud complaining that wouldeventually dissipate and collapse intohopelessness. After texting the red co-worker, we agreed to talk on the phoneafter work. With another co-worker I setup a one-on-one meeting for the next day,

so we could talk about our options and so Icould get contact info for everyone.

There was a preventable mistake withthe planned one-on-one though: no rmdate and time. As we got off work andentered the New Years Eve break, no onewould get back to me. The timing was off,but my failure to do a simple thing likeagree to a specic date and time led it tonot being a priority on a busy holiday. IfI had better prepared by sticking to whatIve been taught and know how to do it,things may have turned out differently.

In the end, a few of us ended up quit-ting and nding other jobs, a Band-aidsolution that solves nothing but transfer-ring our misery to another low-wage job.

Graphic: Mike Konopacki

Its Time To Organize The RustbeltBy Martin Zehr

Every union should have a vision ofthe future, stated Jock Yablonski as heannounced his candidacy for the UnitedMine Workers of America (UMWA)presidency in 1969. What good is a unionthat reduces coal dust in the mines onlyto have miners and their families breathepollutants in the air, drink pollutants inthe water, and eat contaminated com-modities?

Rallies held on July 31 in Pittsburghfocused on new regulations by the Envi-ronmental Protection Agency (EPA) onemissions from power plants. The UMWAorganized a rally to protest these regula-tions at a hearing. The UMWA estimatesthe rule could take as much as $208 bil-lion out of coaleld communities over thenext 20 years, reported West VirginiaPublic Broadcasting.

These new regulations are certainlyan indication of the profound characterof the steps being taken against work-ing people. These measures have nosystematic approaches that establishcompensation for workers jobs and fami-lies impacted. Even during the Rustbeltshutdowns, when steel mills closed downthroughout the northeastern UnitedStates in the 1980s, at least steelwork-

ers were provided a modicum of supportfrom the Trade Readjustment Act (TRA)for retraining and income support due toimports.

Since that time and because of thetransformation of unions into companyunions, today union leaders are promot-ing corporate prots as their job programsat the expense of the health and safety ofworking people. So steelworkers rally inMunhall, Pa., with U.S. Steel and promotefracking and the Keystone XL pipeline andthen not even a month afterwards, U.S.Steel shuts down National Tube in McK-eesport. Rural communities bear the priceof contaminated spring waters caused byfracking, while Texans come in and takethe jobs. Theres not even a correlation be-tween fracking and the local economy thatdemonstrates more jobs for local people.

As mounta intop removals continuein West Virginia and the UMWA losesmembers, the impact continues to increaseexponentially. Likewise, the politicaldomination by corporations has alreadyresulted in the contamination of the waterfor 300,000 West Virginians along the ElkRiver. The plunder is not simply to pumpup corporate prots, but it is also to keepworkers having from any say in regards totheir own lives. The same Jock Yablonski

Photo: explorepahistory.comJock Yablonski talkingto miners, 1969.

quoted at the top of this articlewas murd ered in 1969 by TonyBoyle, who was then the presidentof the UMWA. Yablonski dared todemand that unions defend therights of miners and all workers toa decent life. He dared to confrontthe coal bosses and the hacks killedhim for that.

This is not a debate aboutclimate change. This is not aboutenvironmentalism or even reduc-ing greenhouse emissions. This isabout the price being paid by ordi-nary working folks for the benetof the worlds biggest corporations.This is about a government that continuesto tax the poor to support the rich. Theburden carried in working-cla ss com-munities is that we are told to accept thecontamination of our air and water so thatthe rich can get richer. The taxes we pay foragencies that are supposed to oversee pub-lic health and safety is being squanderedby the domination of government. EugeneDebs said it succinctly: The class whichhas the power to rob upon a large scale hasalso the power to control the governmentand legalize their robbery.

The fact is that coal mining currentlyemploys 120,699 in the United States

today, which is down 15 percent from 20years ago, according to the Wall StreetJournal. Much of the new employmentis centered in open-pit mines of Wyo-ming. Thats not happening because ofEPA regulations. It is time we speak upfor ourselves and stop letting so-calledleaders speak for us. If we really want toght for jobs, its time we do it together.No pain, no gain. Spittin in the bucketwont give us water to drink. Weve got togo to the well. Lets make sure that springisnt contaminated by false leaders andcorporate polluters. Lets organize wherewe are for One Big Union.

Photo: ufcwwest.org


5/12


Wobbly & North American News

By Mike PesaT h e B a l t i -

more IWW filedsix unfair laborpractice (ULP)charges with theNational LaborRelations Board(NLRB) against

Jimmy JohnsGourmet Sand-wiches , DolchinPratt LLC, onAug . 22. JimmyJ o h n s w o r k -ers, organizers,and supportersmarched on theboss to make theannouncement,temporarily stop-ping work at thePratt Street storein Baltimores bustling Inner Harbor.

We informed the owners when wewent public that we expected no retaliation

against us, declared Jimmy Johns workerand union member Brendan Camiel. Ifthey continue to ght us, well continueto respond with escalating actions. I hopeweve made it clear today that they wontget away with intimidating the workforce.

The charges accuse Jimmy Johnsfranchise owner and general managerMike Gillette of illegally retaliating againstworkers who engaged in protected unionactivity by interrogating workers abouttheir involvement in the union, recordingworkers without their consent, disciplin-ing workers for issues that have neverpreviously warranted written disciplin-ary action, and threatening to disciplinea worker if he did not remove an IWW

pin from his uniform. In the weeks sincethe Pratt Street workers announced theirmembership in the IWW, management hasbecome much more strict about enforcingrules that they had not observed in thepast. Managers have bluntly admitted tothe workers that this crackdown was adirect response to union activity.

Only a few days after the announce-ment of these new charges, the NLRBruled in favor of the IWW Jimmy JohnsWorkers Union in an older case stemmingfrom a 2011 action in Minneapolis thatdemanded paid sick days. Jimmy Johnshad red six union members in retaliationfor that action. In the recent decision, thecourt upheld an earlier ruling, declaring

that the rings were illegal and orderingJimmy Johns to reinstate the workerswith full back-pay.

This victory has further emboldenedJimmy Johns workers in Baltimore, whohave been gaining national attention sinceannouncing their membership in the IWWon Aug. 9. Since that time, the union hasengaged in a tip cup action, two nationalphone blasts, informational pickets, andthe aforementioned march. On Labor Day,Baltimore Jimmy Johns workers partici-pated in a national day of action along withIWW members and supporters across thecountry.

The workers demands are centeredaround a ve-point program that includesfair pay, consistent scheduling, paid sickdays, driver compensation and safety, anda harassment-free work environment.Since the Pratt Street store is located in abuilding owned by the Hilton hotel chain,the union is also insisting on wage paritywith Hilton workers who have equivalentjob descriptions. This would raise the aver-age Jimmy Johns workers wages by morethan $3 per hour.

The ULP charges are only one com-ponent of a multi-pronged strategy bythe Jimmy Johns Workers Union to winbet ter wag es and wor kin g con dit ion sand more power on the job. Regardlessof the outcome of this case, workers aredetermined to keep the pressure on thecompany to meet their demands. As thenext few months unfold, there may bemore surprises in store for Jimmy Johns.

By John KalwaicThe wait staff at La Lot, a Vietnam-

ese restaurant in Seattle, went on a briefstrike because management was stealing60 percent of their tips. Managementwould also often verbally abuse the un-derpaid staff, whose need for a job madethem afraid to speak out. Many of themhad no idea how the labor laws could workto their advantage. Hien, a worker at therestaurant, realized the exploitive natureof the restaurants working conditionsand began to organize her fellow workers.

Hien approached her manager andasked about the tip situation. The manag-er agreed to let employees retain a greatershare of their tips. When her schedule

was reduced to onlyone day a week, sheknew that the man-ager was retaliatingagainst her. One ofHiens co-workers,Jeff, joined her ininvestigating op-tions to redress theirgrievances, includ-ing contacting theWa sh in gton Stat eDepartment of La-bor . How eve r, the

system for ling unfair labor practices(ULPs) seemed slow and would takemuch more time then they could afford.Hien and Jeff then turned to the SeattleSolidarity Network (SeaSol) for support.On Thursday, Aug. 14, Hien and Jeffmarched on La Lot restaurant with 50supporters from SeaSol. The other work-ers at the restaurant were too scared togo on strike. Because of the action, theysuccessfully shut down service at La Lottwice. In an about-face, the owner of LaLot agreed to their demands, includingfair tips and restoring Hiens scheduleto normal.

With files from Seattle Free Pressand Libcom.

Boston Wob Battling Leukemia Needs Your HelpBy Geoff Carens

IWW member ChrisMax Perkins has been di-agnosed with chronic my-eloid leukemia. An experi-enced journeyman carpenter(and apprentice plumberand electrician), Max nowundergoes chemotherapy.

He is disabled from workingdue to symptoms and sideeffects like joint pain, nausea,lethargy and sleeplessness.He has spots on his lung andrecently underwent a brainscan. Maxs very small income meanshe urgently needs support with housingcosts. His friends in the Boston IWWGeneral Membership Branch (GMB) ap-peal to all Wobs who can contribute anyfunds to please consider supporting Maxin a difcult time.

Max is an activist of long standing inthe struggles for environmental, workersand animal rights, and anti-fascist cam-paigns. Max remembers that the police

did nothing, when neo-Nazi skinheadsmarched in Germany and England in the1980s. He helped organize counter-dem-onstrations, enduring tear gas, brokenbones and hospitalization in his zeal toshut the racists rallies down. As a mem-ber of the Hawaii Carpenters Union, Maxtook part in strikes over wage theft and theuse of scab labor, and fought corruptionin his union local. At Occupy Long Beach,Max helped organize a protest against po-lice brutality when cops attacked a veteranof the Iraq war, choking him unconsciousfor no reason. Max explains, I spent threemonths in Lincoln Park in Long Beachduring winter in a tent, facing down po-lice harassment. I had a place I rented,but I chose to be in the park. Max recalls,

I fed the homeless and helped mentallyill people. The cops bussed people out ofcounty jail, sent them to Occupy to try tomake it impossible. I know rst aid, andas a former EMT [emergency medical

technician], I know de-escalation tech-niques, he said. These are skills whichwere in high demand in the Occupy camp.A Wobbly for many years, and now an ac-tive member of the Boston IWW, Max is axture at pickets by the Wobs and by otherunions. In recent years hes marched forHarvard workers exposing racial discrimi-nation on the job, helped local Wobbliesinvade the Flagship Gap store in touristyFaneuil Hall to protest factory disasters in

Bangladesh, and helped bring the noise tomany raucous night-time pickets duringBostons Insomnia Cookies strike (whichended with offers of re-employment andcash settlements for Wobblies red forstriking).

Max has been a musician since he wasa teen, and has performed with anarcho-punk acts including Radical Apathy, PlainTruth, Threatening Gesture and Napalm.His sadly-disbanded group Radical Apa-thy toured a number of IWW branchesjust a few months ago. Scraping by on ameager disability check, Max had a placeto live in September, but still needs hous-ing for the coming months, and has littleability to earn income.

Wobs who want to support FW Max

can send a check, made out to ChrisPerkins, to Boston IWW, P.O. Box 391724,Cambridge, MA 02139. All proceeds willgo towards Maxs housing costs and liv-ing expenses.

By Greg GiorgioThe Upstate New York Regional Gen-

eral Membership Branch (GMB) of theIWW went to the National Baseball Hall ofFame and museum in Cooperstown, N.Y.,on June 16 to conduct an informationalpicket which called on Major League Base-ball (MLB) to guarantee the same rightsfor garment workers that exist in their

own players collective bargaining agree-ment. Wobblies set up a small literaturetable with several issues of theIndustrialWorker available, as well as copies of thelatest edition of the anti-sweatshop news-letter produced by the GMB, calledBlackCat Moan. This action was conductedin conjunction with a petition drive puttogether by the IWW International Soli-darity Commissions Bangladesh WorkingGroup. It calls on outgoing MLB Commis-sioner Allan Huber Bud Selig to imple-ment standards in the garment industryfrom suppliers in Bangladesh, Guatemala,Cambodia and other countries to providefor collective bargaining, overtime pay andpaid leave for garment workers.

The Upstate New York GMB has been

involved in actions at theBaseball Hall of Fame for overa decade. And while the Hallof Fame is not owned or oper-ated by the MLB, the ownersare closely tied and sell thesweatshop-produced, licensedlogo gear in their gift shop as afoundation of their income. It

is difcult to get baseball fanswho are coming to the hall todivert their attention fromtheir adulation of their favor-ite players and teams. But theidea is to engage the curiousones about the contradictionsof a league that promotes

itself to youngsters in the United Statesand Canada, yet exploits them to produceprots from sweatshops elsewhere.

Get the kids out of the factories!shouted Fellow Worker Martin Manleyafter about 40 minutes into the hour-longdemo. He said he had an epiphany whilehanding out copies of the yer and peti-tion as hundreds of young boys and girls

were streaming into the museum frombaseball junkets they attend around thearea. Hundreds of youth league teamscome to Cooperstown to tour the shopsand the Baseball Hall of Fame while theyplay in tournaments which attract themfrom all over the United States. The otherWobblies in attendance couldnt ignorethe stark irony that we can celebrate ouryouth and the baseball culture here, but inplaces like Bangladesh, some children arekilled in factory disasters to produce someof the garments the kids here are wearing!

Petitions from this action and effortsin Pittsburgh and other Wobbly areas weremailed to Commissioner Bud Seligs ofcein early July. No reply was received at thetime of this writing.

Baltimore Jimmy Johns Workers File Lawsuit

Upstate NY Wobs Picket Baseball Hall Of Fame

Strike At Seattle Restaurant Over Tip Theft

Photo: Greg GiorgioFWs Rochelle Semel & Paul Poulos.

Photo: FW Le Le Lechat

Photo: Baltimore IWWJimmy Johns workers and supporters.

Photo: libcom.orgStrike at La Lot restaurant on Aug. 14.

FW Max Perkins at a rally.


6/12


Front Page News

IWW UPS Workers Organize Against Police BrutalityContinued from 1management harassment, speed-ups,sexual harassment and sexism, racial dis-crimination on the shop oor, and more,while soliciting contributions from otherwork ers via emai l. The news letter haseducated workers about their rights onthe job and called out the exploitation of

workers by both UPS and the Teamstersunion, which is happy to collect duesfrom the half of UPS workers working insorting hubs while forcing concessionarycontracts onto the rank and le, preservingpoverty wages and sweatshop conditionsfor those of us whose labor makes UPS amulti-billion dollar company.

However, the newsletter has only beenone part of the IWW activity at the hub.IWW workers and others have frequentlyconfronted management on issues ofsafety, harassment, and more throughcollective actions. CB, an IWW organizer,noted, We all know that conditions atour work are unsafe. We all know that wework too hard for too little pay. We know

that the Teamsters either cant or wontdo anything to x these issues. And weknow that were going to have to ght tochange things.

The IWW has always refused to restrictitself to issues of wages and conditions andhas encouraged workers to ght againstexploitation and oppression both on the

shop oor and off it. Unlike other unionsand workers organizations which seethings such as police brutality as outsideissues, the IWW has a long history ofghting against the ways that workers areforced to uphold systems of oppression.The rules say you have to do what youretold at work. Doesnt matter what youreshipping, what horrible things are beingdone with them, UPS doesnt care, soyou dont care, said J.B., another IWWworke r. Luckily, breaking the rules iswhat the IWW does best.

He further added, We dont want totake the place of the Teamsters here. Whatwe want is for workers to have an organiza-tion that can ght forand winmeaning-

ful, concrete improvements in our workand in our lives. We need an organizationthat isnt afraid to stand behind work-ers when we confront management andisnt interested in some long, drawn-outbureaucracy. If they want to keep doingthat, good for them. Thats their game, butits not ours.

IWW workers at the Minneapolishub have stated that they are commit-ted to continuing to organize with their

Continued from 1rules, but the intent of the procedure isviolate d when it give s anyone cont rolover another persons safety or if it in anyway adds to the trauma of victims andsurvivors who are seeking our support.If the complaint procedure can be usedto make our convention a forum wherethose who speak out for justice or cry outfor help are voiceless and hidden whilethe accused remorselessly claims ourspace as his procedure-given right, weneed to x that process. Our constitutiondid not come from some gods ery handengraving whereas statements on stoneslabs. Our union wrote this constitution,and it belongs to each and every one of usto interpret and change. If you demandthat people adapt to your rules ratherthan adapt your rules to the people, youare doomed to dogmatic, self-righteousisolation until you are eventually reducedto peddling poorly-assembled newspapersat every political demonstration like therevolution depended on it. Just trust meon this one.

So many of these conflicts are thedirect result of a union that is unable tokeep cohesion among its members and aninternal culture that is completely cluelessabout how to conduct union business. Atany given point you could step outside

the convention hall and nd at least onedisgruntled Wobbly smoking cigarettesand soapboxing about the IWWs short-comings. You would hardly recognize thatsoap-boxer as the bored delegate doodlingthrough the endless dissection of eachword in a resolution that probably wontpass anyway. That delegate will not standup and say what they really think becauseevery word will somehow be taken as apersonal statement. The IWW culture doesnot communicate a clear border betweenunion business and personal relationships,and its starting to put a strain on both.

Fortunately, the rest of conventionwas walkout-free after the Great Schismof 9:30 a.m., but the lingering effects

of such unexpected hostility gave theproceedings on the convention floor aparticularly meek and disoriented tone.Nervous Wobs spoke with extra delicatelanguage, passively dancing around any-thing resembling confrontation. While wemade the right decision on the Chicagoquestion when a vote was put in front ofus, our self-conscious, evasive responseto conict does not inspire condence ina union. The convention did not feel likethe annual assembly of radical labor; itsounded more like the rst meeting of astudent organization where people onlyshow up for the free pizza.

Confronting difcult problems withinthe structure of a business meeting is sucha struggle for us because we can not seem

to leave our social lives outside. So manyarguments on the oor were inated withniceties and indirect, apologetic explana-tions that it was hard to understand whatanybody really meant. Nobody wants to berude or make their friends feel bad, but wecant overthrow power when were runningaround a maze of social dynamics everytime we need to make a decision. Businessmeetings are there to get things done, andthat means being decisive and direct withour ideas knowing that our fellow workersunderstand that everybody is there to dowhat is best for the union. In the end, weshould feel comfortable accepting the re-sult of our democratic process and pickingup friendships where we left them beforethe meeting.

One of the most striking impressionsI got from the convention is that, like theseams on our members unwashed pants,this union feels like its held together bya few worn threads and some haphazardstitches of dental oss. It made me uneasyto watch all the work of hosting a conven-tion fall on the exhausted shoulders ofthe few solid local Wobs. Most delegates Ispoke to were irritated by the consistentlypoor planning and lack of communication.We heard nothing about our housing ar-rangements until the very last minute,when most of us had already either made

alternate plans or were considering pitch-ing a tent in the park again. We got an in-side look into our administrative failures,and to quote one fellow worker, I knew itwas bad, but its so much worse. We alsogot an inside look into the Chicago GMB,and I completely understand that goodhelp must be very hard to nd. Still, theresonly so much a person can take, and somepeople were expected to take much morethan that. It was a relief to make it to theend of convention with both our union andour General Secretary-Treasurers (GSTs)sanity still mostly intact.

Unfortunately, when our union isbare ly holding together, we are bare lyholding on to our principles. On the night

of my arrival, amidst friendly chats withfellow workers, I was approached with acomment about how it would be a wisestrategy for the union to sexually exploitme for their organizing efforts. Since no-body ever takes the good advice of shut-ting their mouth when they say the wordsso this is going to sound really sexist...I should be carrying ear plugs as harmreduction.

Announced sexism was kept to a mini-mum at this years convention, but therewere so many blatant acts of misogyny thatI wish were all prefaced with a warning.That way I could get enough ear plugs foreverybody. One fellow worker observedthat the delegates were respectfully atten-tive during every mans report, but as soon

as a woman was giving a presentation,there were several full volume side conver-sations in the room. This is unfortunatelya common pattern.

At a point in the day when I reallythought I had seen it all, I decided to getup and speak about a resolution. As I wasexplaining my position, several fellowworkers started yelling their counterpointsover me with arms waving. Their urgentlydisruptive outburst made me think that,in my sleep-deprived fog, I was lookingat the wrong page and I was up there de-fending something we were never talkingabout. I handed over the microphone inembarrassment and sat down. After askingeveryone around me, I was convinced thatI was on the wrong page, or that the soundsystem was so bad that all of us in the backwere hearing it wrong. I tapped one of theailing fellow workers on the shoulder toask if I was on the wrong page or if theywere just heckling me. Youre on the rightamendment. No, we werent heckling you,we were telling you [your opinion is wrongbecause x, y, z...].

These everyday aggressions, somemore subtle than others, almost always gounchallenged. They form tiny cracks in ourmorale, our dedication and our solidarity.The tiny cracks build up until the wholestructure, while appearing intact, is so

weak that if you keep putting pressure onit, it will crumble faster than you expect.

Were starting to see the real effectsof our waning faith in the IWW. Accord-ing to the GSTs report, our dues incomewas $20,000 less than expected for theyear. We pay our dues directly instead ofby check-off specically as a way to showour level of involvement and satisfactionwith the union. So when the membershipis withholding $20,000 worth of dues ina single year, it is a ashing sign of disap-proval. Considering our relatively lowbudget and small membership, $20,000 isway too much money to be coincidental. Infact, if those missing dues came out of theunions pocket every year instead of just

never going in to begin with, it would beone of the biggest expenses in our budget,a close second to GST and staff wages.I am hardly surprised that our nancesreect such a lack of condence in ourunion. Its time we stop tiptoeing aroundthe elephants in the room and start facingour unions problems with honesty andconcern. Why would anyone trust us tobuild a world free from oppression andexploitation when we are either too indif-ferent or too afraid to confront these issuesin our own organization?

I see this time as a crucial turningpoint for the union: our membership isgrowing, our tensions are high, and ourreliance on friends and good intentionshas produced total stagnation. We have

outgrown our shell. The casual, undisci-plined structure that was a good t whenthe IWW was just a handful of membersis getting too hectic for an active, growingunion.

I think that now is the perfect time foran IWW revival; in fact I think the labormovement is waiting for the IWW to showup. Ive read mainstream news talk aboutwildcat strikes, minority unionism, anddirect action as the organizing tactics thatwill dene labor struggle in this low-wageeconomy. We should take the hint. TheAmerican Federation of Labor (AFL) hasbeen out of touch for so long that their hor-rible attempts at making cat memes andusing Twitter is only showing the worldthat they are obsolete. Change to Winand the Service Employees InternationalUnion (SEIU) got their modern updates,but they are gaining a reputation as fast-talking organizers who will put so muchenergy in a campaign only to abandon itwhen the money runs out. Its time for usto jump in, but we need a union that canhandle it. We need rapid communication,organized administration, solid strategies,disciplined tactics, committed membersand serious attitudes. We also need toaddress our internal problems as seriousthreats to organizing.

Many of us throw our hands up and

concede that we will always have our prob-lems and if we just stop making such a bigdeal about it, we can get to work on the realissues. If we accept hostility and injusticeas inevitable, we are no more revolutionarythan the Democrats or the Mr. Blocks ofmiddle management.

Of course there will be conict, butthe struggle is not about expecting a per-fect world. It is about ghting for a betterworld. Contentment only drives stagnationby claiming that this is the best we can do,we are not capable of anything greater, andif we are, it is not worth the hassle. I am notcontent because I carry a card that says Iam committed to forming the structure ofthe new society within the shell of the old,

and if the union how it stands now is whatthe new society looks like, the revolutionwould hardly be worth the bullets. If weever want the IWW banner to see the endof capitalism, we have to believe that thisunion is worth ghting for. We need torededicate ourselves to the One Big Unionbecause when we took a red card we vowedto build a new society, and every stamprepresents our renewed pledge. We canlet capitalism grind down our bones untilwe have no more prot to give and we areburied in the earth our bosses own, or wecan inspire each other and fully engageourselves in the only work in which protsare ours and ours alone: the struggle forthe emancipation of the working class.

So pay your damn dues.

co-workers in order to directly fightagainst management abuses and otherissues workers face. They are also work-ing with UPS workers in other hubs tohelp them form similar committees andorganizations, and are happy to talk toanyone interested in doing so. They urgeany interested UPS workers to email thecommittee at [email protected], andadd this message to fellow workers: Dontwait, organize!

The 2014 IWW General Convention: Learning From Our Mistakes, Moving Forward

Photo: Diane KrauthamerFellow workers stand against police brutality in Chicago.


7/12


Front Page News

A Labor Day Weekend For The Unseen LaborersContinued from 1involuntary servitude, except as punish-ment for a crime. It is now 2014, and mostprisons are lled with minor offendersserving double-digit sentences, work-ing and producing goods for 75 cents anhour if theyre lucky. Incarcerated peopleare forced to work in incredibly unsafe

conditions with little to no safety train-ing around heavy industrial equipment.Combined with environmental conditionsthat put certain people (people of color forthe most part) on track for incarcerationfrom an early age, we have what is calledthe prison industrial complex, one of themost brutal intersections of racism andcapitalism in the modern age.

Its not unusual for me to lean on theMarxist concept of self-criticism a little tooheavily, so that may have colored my ini-tial feelings about the conference. For therst few moments, radical change within

and against the prison industrial complexseemed like an unattainable ideal, but Ididnt carry that with me when I left. Thereis no criticism of the IWW IncarceratedWorkers Organizing Committee (IWOC)that I could make that wasnt made withinthe group, and beyond that, given concreteways to overcome those weaknesses. For

instance, we found that meetings consistedof a group that was somewhat small innumber and mostly white. Instead of try-ing to deny that that would be less thanbeneficial to us as organizers focus ingon American prisons, by the end of theweekend IWOC members in attendancehad drawn up a plan for outreach focusedon those most affected by prisons and cre-ated a structure for organizing across thenation in a way that would allow regionalgroups to organize however works best forthem while being supported by a nationalnetwork. Additionally, we explored poten-

tial core conicts that could arise, giventhe nature of the worksuch as whetherprisons are necessary at all and what kindof time frame people will come to ndprisons obsolete, if ever. The objective ofthese discussions wasnt to come up witha specic stance on any of those items, butrather to put any sort of ideological dif-

ferences on the table. Thus we will have abetter understanding of what the makeupof our group really is and this will helpkeep those conicts from building beneaththe surface.

It would be a little ridiculous to try andclaim that the group of about 15 peoplefrom across the United States could dowhat IWOC plans to do on our own, butthat wont stop me from saying that,based on what I saw, the right people areinvolved to help start a movement thatcan. Between the formerly incarceratedmembers with an in-depth knowledge of

Olas Del CaribeBelow is a morsel of South Florida his-tory and its visceral connection with theCaribbean. South Florida IWW member,Monica Kostas, gives us an illustrationcalled Olas del Caribe and tells us a bitabout what inspired her drawing.By Monica Kostas

Lately, Ive been researching theburied radical labor history of Florida,particularly South Florida. Today we lookaround us and the level of political activ-ity is less than lively. However, theresobviously a contextour conditions areinseparable from the larger socio-eco-nomic situation of the United States andthe world at large. The economic crisis of2008 has rippled beyond its foreseeablescope, leaving the general populationstumbling through a scarcity of jobs, ris-ing debt, and continuing repercussionsof the mortgage crisis. Inevitably, theclimate of South Florida is no strangerto these ill consequences symptomaticof capitalist workings. But this goes backbefo re the cris is, speakin g more spe-cically about work. The lack of politicalturbulence points to the ever renementof the boot that quells resistance throughvarious ploys: atomization of work, laborbureaucracy, exploitation of immigrants,to name a few.

Nevertheless, the crushing step of

the sole was not always the same; therewere times in Florida history when rebelworkers scared the crap out of bosses andcapitalists. Let me explain. Digging a bitbelow our feet, there isnt only the sandupon which we build but also the waters

that take us all around the Caribbean andback, the same waters that many organiz-ers and activists from the islands used asan escape route to evade repression.

It is incredible to think that Key West,today a capital of bros, beers, and springbreak, was the center of political turmoilat the turn of the 20th century.

As the southern tip of the southern-most state of the United States, the piecethat hangs off so fragilely like an extendedhand that bridges the Caribbean to theland of blank slates, or as some of us wouldsay, the land that allows un buen borrn ycuenta nueva, Florida was not only a newhorizon for people in search of work and a

more comfortable life. These shores werealso seen as uncharted territory for eeingLatino socialists and anarcho-syndicalistswho thirsted for new land to spark revolu-tions. Dreams of a better future were notonly reserved for utopians howevercapi-talists who wished to expand business inthe Caribbean but did not want to deal withbureaucratic guidelines from Spain alsobet on their future in the Sunshine State.

In the late 1800s while the cigarindustry sprouted (and boomed explo-sively) in Key West with a wave of Cubanimmigrants, strikes and labor unrest sooncaught up as well. As tycoons the worldover started to get familiar with the popu-lar Havana cigars, their hopes to open up

factories in Key West were soon halted asthey heard the news about factory workersbeing too unruly to deal with. The discordcarried out by the organized workforces ofKey West chased businessmen north tothe city of Tampa where they were forced

Graphic: Monica Kostas

prison culture next to their almost ency-clopedic knowledge of radical conceptsand the organizers with experience onthe outside, whose energy for the work isonly matched by the varied skill sets theybring to the table, I cant nd a weak link.Additionally, a 15-minute presentat ionwhich included IWOCs ve-point plat-

form elicited a standing ovation from theIWW General Convention. Shortly after,a delegate from Milwaukee reached out,asking for more details and any ways thathe can help.

So what I hope, and its a hope thatfeels justied, is that the One Big Unionwill become a bit bigger by extending itshand to incarcerated people, and thosepeople will not nd themselves attachedto a bureaucratic and capitalistic structurethat is unaware of their existence, butinstead will nd the tools for their own lib-eration, and from there, do what they will.

Wobbly Art

to build Ybor Cityas a cigar townwhere they couldset the guidelinesand play by theirown rules.

Because of theproximity of Flor-ida to Cuba, work-ers in these newfactory towns inthe United Stateswere able to followclosely the labororganizing hap-pening in Cuba.

One such event,for instance, wasthe victory of aprolonged cigarstrike in 1902 thatsparked a multitudinous parade of thou-sands of Latino workers marching fromYbor City to West Tampa where celebra-tions erupted.

Two years later, the rst labor walk-out among Havana laundry workers wasorganized in Cuba, solely by women whowere mostly Afro-Cubans. Many of thesebrave women were arrested when policesuppressed the strike.

Olas del Caribe aims to depict thisrelationship; in particular this dialogue

bet wee n the wom en lau ndr y wor ker sin Havana and the women in the cigarfactories in Tampa.Las olas that rippledfrom the island to the mainland carriedwith them the wisdom, inspiration, andmilitancy that inuenced an important

facet of radical labor history in Florida.In turn, the woman in focus cyclicallypoints back to the island for her compa-eras to look at the laundry workers asa way to incentivize their own organizingefforts. The drawing thus tries to grasp anemblematic instance of the ceaseless ex-change that weaves indivisibly the shoresof Florida to the Caribbean at large.

For more information on this sub-ject, you can check out: The ImmigrantWorld of Ybor City by Gary R. Mor-

mino, & George E. Pozzetta, SouthernDiscomfort Womens Activism in Tam-pa, Florida, 1880s-1920s by Nancy A.Hewitt and Miamis Hidden Labor His-tory by Thomas A. Castillo (published inThe Florida Historical Quarterly).

Participate In The 2014IWW Organizing Survey!

The IWW Survey & Research Committee (SRC)part of the Orga-

nizing Department Boardhas just launched our 2014 member survey

at: http://bit.ly/Yg2SwA. We hope you can take 5 to 10 minutes of your

time to complete this survey and to share it with as many of your fel-

low workers as possible. Paper copies are also available upon request.

The information you share with us is vital to moving forward with

organizing efforts around the world. This year, we are especially focused

on understanding where fellow workers are organizing, as well as past

efforts and future goals. The more comprehensive this survey is (i.e.

the more people who respond!), the better we

will be able to plan strategically and provide

necessary trainings and resources.

If you have any questions, concerns, or

feedback about the survey or are otherwise in-

terested in the work of the SRC, please contact

us at [email protected].

For the One Big Union,

The IWW Survey & Research Committee Subscribe to the Industrial Workertoday!

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8/12


Wayman, Tom. Built to Take It: SelectedPoems 1996-2013. Spokane, WA: LynxHouse Press, 2014. Paperback, 180 pages,$19.95.

By Don SawyerWhether as song lyrics or verse, poetry

has always been a part of the labor strug-

gle, amply displayed in IWW Songs toFan the Flames of Discontent (a.k.a. TheLittle Red Songbook), a constant best-seller since its introduction in 1909. In atime when literacy was marginal and thestruggle brutal, rousing labor hymns, oftenusing well-known melodies but featuringvery different lyrics, were a vital part ofthe movement. Many Wobbly greats suchas T-Bone Slim (Valentine Huhta), RalphChaplin, and Joe Hill were as well knownfor their verses as their direct action.

With the loss of labor militancy anda society more attuned to the songs ofAmerican Idol contestants and JustinBieber, the poetry of work and workerslargely disappeared. But not entirely. Both

in North America and especially Chile andother South American countries, writershave kept the tradition of labor poetryalive. (Check out the work of the 50 poetlaborers who are part of the Poetic LaborProject: http://www.labday2010.blogspot.com/2014/05).

One of North Americas outstandingwork writers is Cana dian Tom Way-man, who, according to The CanadianEncyclopedia, has a unique voice inCanadian poetry as an ardent spokesmanand advocate for the workplace. Waymanhas been at it for a long time, penning hisearliest work in the 1960s while active insouthern California and Colorado chaptersof the Students for a Democratic Society,and later spearheading the resuscitationof the Vancouver (and Canadian) IWW.With this new collection of his work, Builtto Take It: Selected Poems 1996-2013,we are treated to some of Waymans lat-estand arguably bestpoetry.

Recognizing that while we are allworkers we are also lovers, sons/daugh-ters, grievers, observers, Built to TakeIt not only provides the reader with anice sampling of poems dealing with allaspects of work (among other jobs, Way-man taught writing at several universities,and his takes on this peculiar workplaceare often hilarious), but also just gener-ally being human. Wayman is known forhis wry humor, and much of his writing issoftened by self-deprecating wit:

(from Teaching English)Can I convey anythingto help English function betterwhere it earns a paychequeor during intimate encounters?I regard it, scratch my head.It stares back at me

while it sits,headphones on, ear-

buds pumpingmusic directly into

the auditory nerve,vocabulary shrink-

ingalong with

cognitive ability consequence of too

much televisionbefore age three,

perhaps, or excessivecellphone use eyes blank

as a missing comma.

Waymans more polit-ical poetry is refreshingly radical, drawingon the IWWs anarcho-syndicalist tradi-tion, practice and principle:

(from Anthem)I, too, would sayWere built to take it.My perspective, though, is rather

alongthe lines ofthe factory adage: If you can run thatmachine,you can wreck it. Id arguesince we make it all, we can take it all.

Clearly Wayman has been therebe-sides teaching, he worked in constructionand on a truck assembly lineand hiswriting reects his understanding of therealities of the workplace, which he power-fully captures:

(from May Day 2001: Negotiating aNew Collective Agreement)

We slide a sheet of green paperacross the table. The three peoplewho face usregard the page with distasteor fear or contempt. In their eyesa small animal gopher, squirrel frantically tests the connes of a trap,claws clinging to walls, ceiling, wallonce more.

Wayman is a realist, yes, but he neverabandons the ideal, the principles of a justand fair society; its just that he knows howhard it is to create that world:

(from May Day 2001)In 1905 the Wobblies saidone class, one enemy, one union,and that a contract is only a negoti-

ated trucein an ongoing war. All of which Ibelievebut I also see one speciesblundering ahead through the ages,ever uncertain if each individualalone should take careof himself or herself,

or if a family or town,nation or oc-cupational groupshould help bearthis responsibility,or whether none of ourseparate livescan tangibly improve

apart from all the livesaround us that being the effectof sharinga location and clump ofyears with somany other souls.

One of Waymanstrademarks is his blend-

ing of prose and poetry and imaginedinteractions with historicaland cur-rentgures.

(from Exit Interview: Utah Phillips [1935-2008]; after his death, Utah responds to aquestion about new media by explaining):

The rulers of this life are happy tohave you shut yourself offpushing at buttons on a computerkeyboard thus giving the powers-that-be afree ridein the real world. You can exchangevirtual information by the houror hit send to add your name toanother online petitionor denounce anything in your blog.That sound you faintly hear in thebackgroundis the chortling of the ruling class:theyve got youexactly where they want you.

Further on, the interviewer asks Phil-lips about his legacy, and here we see Way-mans ability to weave Wobbly wisdom andphilosophy into his writing. The poem hasUtah say:

The Wobblies the Industrial Work-ers of the World knew back in 1905 that your lifedoesnt change for the betterbecause the team you root for wins,or because you buy somethingyou dont really need. Your life isimprovedwhen your working day changes when theres a real turnabout inthe power relations at your job, when

theres a real changein the impact the goods and servicesyou create each shift haveon other people and our planet.

And the late folksinger/activist adds:I like to imagine we could be ahead ofthe curve for once.

Reviews

Wobbly Poet Keeps The Tradition Of Labor Poetry AliveIn one way, we are: the I.W.W. saidin 1905 that world labor needsa world-wide union. That was think-ing globalizationlong before the capitalist conceivedof the term.But the bosses are far ahead of uswhen it comes to

putting the concept into practice. Idont doubt well get there eventually.I just wish we werent so damnedslow.

Any parting advice?If you can get out into the countrysideaway from the smog and the noiseand the money pollution,youll observe in the nighttime sky thethree shining stars of the I.W.W.:Education, Organization, Emancipa-tion.Back in the city, if you look real hardon a clear day,you can see those same three stars.

Where do you think youre going now?I believe I will permanently achievewhat for so many years on tourI demanded of my hosts who billetedme:a bedin a room with a door that closes.

Tom Wayman is the rare poet who hasthe ability to put our lives into verse in away that helps us see ourselves and oth-ers with greater compassion and clarity,and while he does tread the poets usualturflove, nature, death as he describesithe nds poetry in the everyday, andparticularly in our daily work. No humanemotion is absent from the worksite, Tomwrites in the introduction, since a placeof employment is where human beings notonly gather, but where they contribute forgood or ill to the daily re-creation of thecommunity. And the undemocratic natureof most workplaces and their dominationby unelected authorities, who control notonly our work but also the uses to whichthe wealth generated by our work are putshapes who we are: The schizophrenicexistence of daily shuttling between thestatus of an obedient, unquestioningemployee and that of a critically thinking,free citizen of a democracyessentially,between being regarded as a child and asan adultinuences our behavior toward

every relationship we have: family, inti-mate, peer, workmate, community.

This is a remarkable collection of po-ems by a poet whose work is not just com-pelling because of the sweep and powerof his language, but because of his insightinto the joys, realities and challenges ofbeing human.

Miami IWW member AB Kunin tookthis picture (on the right) during histrip to Bogot, Colom

industrial worker - issue #1769, october 2014

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