Today in Labor History May 3, 1968: The first battles of the May Upheaval began in the Latin Quarter of Paris. The police arrested 500 students meeting at the University of Sorbonne to protest repression at Nanterre. Revolt broke out along the route taken by police vans, with thousands fighting against the police. Throughout the month of May and part of June, workers and students occupied schools, factories and offices. By mid-May, 10 million workers were on strike.

Today in Labor History May 3, 1937: The May Days began in Catalonia. This was a counterrevolution by the Spanish Republican government against radical workers and anarchists. Prior to this, the communists, socialists and anarchists had been allied against Franco’s nationalists. However, anarchist workers and their militias controlled most industries, which they had collectivized, while the communists controlled the central government and finances. As a result, this brought the various groups into conflict. To make matters worse, the Communist Party of Spain was taking orders from Moscow. And they wanted to separate the two struggles: revolution against the ruling class versus war against the nationalists. In contrast, the POUM and the anarchists saw the two struggles as one and the same. The anarchist faction included the Friends of Durruti Group and the CNT (a confederation of anarcho-syndicalist labor unions).

Today in Labor History May 3. 1933: James Brown was born on this day. He was the Godfather of Soul. Mr. Dynamite. The funkiest man alive. His career began in the R&B and doo wop era of the 1950s, with the Famous Flames. In the mid- to late-60s, he was influential in the creation of soul and funk. He continued to produce some of the funkiest songs ever in the 1970s. Some of his songs were social commentaries, like “I’m Black and I’m Proud.” And he performed in civil rights benefit concerts as early as the mid-60s. However, he was politically conservative. He supported Humphrey, in ’68. And later, he supported Republican causes, including the Nixon presidency. In 1972, his concert was picketed by people with signs saying, “James Brown: Nixon’s Clown.” He also supported Reagan.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4hj1iWqoYEc

Today in Labor History May 3, 1920: A young anarchist printer, Andreas Salsedo, “fell” to his death from a 14th story window of an FBI detention room in New York City. He had been arrested during the anti-commie raids launched by Attorney General Mitchell Palmer. The FBI claimed it was suicide. Activists said he was thrown.

Today in Labor History May 3, 1919: Pete Seeger was born, Patterson, New York. He started his folk singing career in the 1940s, with the Almanac singers. This group included Woodie Guthrie, Cisco Houston and Bess Lomax Hawes. They sang about industrial unionism and racial inclusiveness. In the 1950s, they reconstituted as the Weavers. However, they were blacklisted by the McCarthyites. As a result, radio stations stopped playing their records and their bookings were cancelled. Seeger was a member of the Communist Party USA, but left it in 1949. He was also an early backer of Bob Dylan until he went electric and Seeger threatened to unplug him at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. https://youtu.be/0fhL1E2cvvI

Today in Labor History May 3, 1849: A popular rebellion broke out in Dresden, with the militant Russian anarchist Mikhail Bakunin emerging as a "heroic" leader. He was imprisoned in the Konigstein fortress and condemned to death. He eventually was released. Composer Richard Wagner also participated. He fled to Switzerland to avoid arrest.

" #Liberal parties have failed & we need a real #democratic #socialist alternative that can advance the interests of #workingclass #communities, #environmentalists & other #progressive forces with a shared vision for a better world."

https://nowthenmagazine.com/articles/jason-hickel-we-need-a-real-progressive-alternative-a-democratic-ecosocialist-movement-degrowth-21st-century-revolution

Today in Labor History May 2, 1945: The Nisei 522nd Field Artillery Battalion halted a death march from Dachau to Austria. As a result, the Japanese-American fighting unit saved hundreds of lives. Yet, even while they fought fascists in Europe, many had families in concentration camps within the U.S.

Today in Labor History May 2, 1919: Soldiers of the Freikorps murdered Gustav Landauer, anarchist, pacifist, and Education Minister, in the short-lived Bavarian Workers Republic. The Freikorps were right wing veterans of World War I. Many went on to become Nazis. Landauer believed that social change could not be won solely through control of the state or economy, but required a revolution in interpersonal relations. "The community we long for and need, we will find only if we sever ourselves from individuated existence; thus we will at last find, in the innermost core or our hidden being, the most ancient and most universal community: the human race and the cosmos." Landauer’s grandson is the acclaimed film director, Mike Nichols (Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, The Graduate, Catch-22, Carnal Knowledge, Silkwood). British writer Philip Kerr wrote the novel, “Prussian Blue,” in which Hitler is one of the Freikorps militants who murdered Landauer.

#workingclass #LaborHistory #anarchism #pacifism #soviet #Revolution #gustavlandauer #fascism #nazis #hitler #film #books #novel #writer #author @bookstadon

Today in Labor History May 2, 1933: In one of his first acts after coming to power, Adolf Hitler abolished all labor unions. Storm troopers occupied union offices across Germany. Union leaders were arrested, beaten, tortured and imprisoned, or sent to concentration camps. In the coming months, thousands more communists, anarchists and labor activists were arrested and murdered. Strikes were banned and workers’ pay plummeted, as prices soared with inflation, while the unemployed were conscripted into the military.

think it's time I made an #Introduction

I'm Orthodox #Jewish tho in my small local community it can be hard to find friends bc I'm also a #Leftist #Antinationalist. I play #Violin; currently: translations of songs with themes of #Anarchy & #WorkingClass #Solidarity. influenced by #Klezmer, #Celtic & #Folk #Music. I work in a community #Ceramics studio & study #IMLS (Info Management & #LibraryScience) / #GLAM (Galleries Libraries #Archives Museums), & #Yiddish culture/history of #EasternEurope.

TOO POOR TO WORK

Capitalism has damaged us all deeply and I think most ppl have a kneejerk "feeling" that poor people need to work harder, even if we disagree with capitalism as a concept. But it has ingrained subconscious biases into us that are often hard to notice, let alone resist.

We see someone poor, working class, lumpenproletariat, homeless or housing insecure and we apply different measures than we would for any "normal" person. We think they should get by with less stuff, less security, less dignity, less privacy (dangerous for abuse victims! but getting access to help requires giving up privacy, whether you go through official institutions or mutual aid) and that they should somehow work harder or be more resilient or be a more committed activist.

If you've not been there you probably think it can't ever happen to you, you'd find ways to avoid it, you'd be more resourceful etc. I used to think that. But I ended up homeless due to domestic abuse and I've not recovered from that yet even though I'm lucky and privileged enough to have found a place to live.

And what I'm experiencing is a vicious cycle where I'm literally too poor to work. I have no spoons because worries about basic necessities eat me alive. I have no desk, let alone laptop. I am physically and mentally disabled from having been poor and abused all my adult life — they go hand in hand because abuse makes you unable to function and isolates you from any safety net you might have had, so you end up poor, which makes you a target for abuse. Wether that's state sanctioned bureaucratic abuse to suss out benefits scroungers or interpersonal abuse because you're in no position to defend yourself. Often both.

I just wish more people understood the lived realities of poor ppl under capitalism instead of seeing it merely as an abstract theoretical issue. Theory is good and all, but we need praxis and we need solidarity and we need to not let the biases that capitalists have indoctrinated us with to stand in the way of that!

Today In Labor History May 1, 1946: The three-year Pilbara strike began in Australia. In this strike, indigenous Australian pastoral workers demanded recognition of their human rights. They were also fighting for better wages and working conditions. The bosses often treated indigenous workers like slaves. Many didn’t even pay them in cash. Rather, they paid them in tobacco and food. And if indigenous workers tried to quit or leave, the police forced them back. Sometimes they massacred entire families. The strike was one of the longest in Australian history. And it was a major event in the struggle for indigenous rights.

Today in Labor History, Canadian folksinger and composer, Peace Gordon Lightfoot, died. Composed "Ode to Big Blue," about the slaughter of whales; "Protocol," about the futility of war, “Sundown,” his only #1 hit in the U.S.; and "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald," about the 1958 shipwreck on Lake Superior. The latter 2 songs he composed and continued to perform after contracting Bell’s Palsy, which left him partially paralyzed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vST6hVRj2A

Today In Labor History May 1, 1933: The first issue of the Catholic Worker was published. Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin, who were anarchist-Catholics, founded The Catholic Worker in New York City. The first run of the paper, they published 2,500 copies. By 1936, circulation was 150,000.

Today In Labor History May 1, 1886: The first nationwide General Strike for the 8-hour day occurred in Milwaukee and other U.S. cities. In Chicago, police killed four demonstrators and wounded over 200. This led to the mass meeting a Haymarket Square, where an unknown assailant threw a bomb, killing several cops. The authorities responded by rounding up all the city’s leading anarchists, and a kangaroo court which wrongfully convicted 8 of them, including Albert Parsons, husband of Lucy Parsons, who would go on to cofound the IWW, along with Mother Jones, Big Bill Haywood, Eugene Debs, and others. Worldwide protests against the convictions and executions followed. To honor the wrongfully executed anarchists, and their struggle for the 8-hour day, May first has ever since been celebrated as International Workers Day in nearly every country in the world, except the U.S.

You can read my complete bio of Lucy Parsons here: https://michaeldunnauthor.com/2024/03/24/lucy-parsons/

Today In Labor History May 1, 1884: The Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions, forerunner of the AFL, resolved that "8 hours shall constitute a legal day's work starting May 1, 1886." Ironically, this union, created as a conservative foil against the radical Knights of Labor, helped radicalize workers with its resolution. It was this fight, for the 8-hour day, that led a few years later to the Haymarket affair, the execution of innocent anarchists, and the international celebration of May 1 as International Workers Day.

Today In Labor History May 1, 1830: Mary Harris "Mother" Jones was born. Mother Jones was renowned for her militancy and fiery oration, as well as her many juicy quotes. She once said, “I’m no lady. I’m a hell-raiser.” She also was an internationalist, saying “My address is wherever there is a fight against oppression.” Despite the difficulties of constant travel, poor living and jail, she lived to be 100. She was also a cofounder of the anarchosyndicalist IWW.

Happy #InternationalWorkersDay!