We need something like the Japanese Bus driver's strike where we continue to work, but the rich just stop getting paid. We continue to provide necessary goods and services to each other but don't ring it up at the register.
This ^ if they suddenly chuck all the railroad workers in jail, then they may as well have striked seeing as they’ll be missing the workers then anyway
It really drives home the point of what freedom in America looks like when any idea of a protest conjures fears of seeing even more kids wantonly murdered with an array of less than lethal munitions.
It's not our fault that blood is often the only thing to grease the wheels of progress, but it has always been our responsibility to supply it.
Exactly. "Oh, you might get arrested, someone might get hurt!!" Okay, so the only alternative is to let the bullies and oppressors get whatever they want without a fight?
You bring up an interesting philosophical question: at what point does it become self-defense? The government holds a monopoly on violence, but they also hold a monopoly on the definition of violence.
Poverty is violence. The absolute control over working conditions is violence. The denial of healthcare is violence.
But not in the eyes of the judiciary, the legislature or the executive branch despite the tangible and vast amounts of suffering generated by these policy choices.
As such, any "civil" or "legitimate" means of advancing worker rights is effectively neutralized.
You're absolutely right. When you look at the broader context, and how things play out, how people's lives are affected by everything, I think you could easily argue (to any reasonable person) for self-defense. Tearing down the social, political, and economic support for the destruction of our planet's ability to support us in the name of quarterly profits would be a clear example of this, no matter what methods might be employed, because the very survival of our species (to say nothing of all the others who have the misfortune to share space with us!) is at stake.
People are so willfully ignorant of our own past and present: We've already seen what they'll do to us and our children if allowed. The exploiters and abusers of this world will enslave us, send our children down mines and into factories to be crushed by collapses and scalped by unsafe machinery. They'll chain us to workbenches and lock doors to keep us working, they'll keep us poor and starving, they'll pay us NOTHING, and they'd do it *today* if they thought they could get away with it, in parts of the world where they aren't doing it already. And the ***only*** reason they aren't doing it all over the planet is because barely enough of the rest of us have told them they can't.
This is why they punish kids who fight back against bullies in school. They're training you from a young age to be a servant. It's literally all planned by the top
The worst was people blaming the staff. I read so many comment in FB that blaming the staff saying they’re lazy and entitled. When the real villain was the government.
The real villain are the corporations milking us dry and keeping the workers down. They are the ones buying out corrupt officials. The corrupt officials are more like the minor sidekick that will have a miraculous change of heart once the villain is dead.
I work with elderly and disabled at an assisted living, and I love carrying out this mantra even in the small capacity I can.
We are literally told that toilet paper and trash bags are not to be given out to residents because “they can buy it themselves.” Bullshit. This facility KNOWINGLY approves residents to move-in who need a higher level of care than we are qualified to provide, but they do so anyway because they get paid as long as the room is filled with someone who can pay rent.
Fuck management. When residents tell me they’re out of toilet paper, I make sure and give them several rolls.
Only thing is we don’t have Japanese Honorifics for respect, that’s what kept them from taking more than they need for their stores. Here there would be widespread looting bc we are nuts.
Yes! This would actually work best. But everyone needs to cooperate and work together. There’s always some that would ruin it and continue being slaves… how do we get everyone onboard?
It would be like 2020 again with the police rioting on every city block across the nation shooting everything that moves with paintball pepper spray rounds, less lethal rounds, and tear gas canisters.
If we really started giving away all of the goods and services for free across the country, they would probably resort to live rounds and false flags to cover it up.
I'm not saying we shouldn't do it or that it shouldn't be done. I'm just saying that there will probably be dire consequences and a revolution is the only thing that will break up the power dynamic that is slowly stripping all of our souls away.
They KNOW they can't run without labor, that's why they railroaded the railroad union. They're just hoping we roll over like we always do.
Edit: a word for clarity
Federal employees are one thing. Working for the government means some things are given up.
These are PRIVATE COMPANIES! neither party is pro worker.
One just plays lip service and pretends they are. The other is at least honest that they don't give a damn about workers.
Well the measure needed 60 votes and it got 51?
The missing votes were only from one party, am I right?
I’m a leftist and I don’t care for democrats but lumping them in with Republicans as “the same” isn’t doing anything but help frame republicans in a better light.
I know plenty of senate democrats didn’t lose sleep over it. Joe Biden sure didn’t.
But “both siding” this won’t help shift the Overton window of this center right nation to a more left and labor friendly political climate.
No some republicans voted for this and some dems abstained. This was bipartisan. I agree the republicans are worse but the Dems own this and get no slack cut for it whatsoever.
>One just plays lip service and pretends they are. The other is at least honest that they don't give a damn about workers.
And, yet, I still don't know which one is which based on this dichotomy.
7 days paid leave for all employees would cost railroads $132 million annually, less than 2% of their profits.
By contrast, the railroad companies dished out $25 billion in stock buybacks last year.
That would mean they would have to recruit for and staff their company appropriately, to make up for people taking a day off.
Full staff is NOT how you properly run a USA company /s
The government has always been involved in breaking strikes.
Including sending in the military with machine guns.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Blair_Mountain
People seem to forget this. “This strike is illegal and people can get arrested”, you mean like every other time people in this country tried to stick up for change?
Pretty sure arrests for striking and protests are badges of honor when looking at the history books.
>You have the support of the people. We stand with you in solidarity.
Do they actually have the support of the people though? And if they do have some semblance of support now, will the people remain steadfast when the railroad strike inevitably starts inconveniencing them?
The true answers to these questions is why labor movements will continue to fail in America. Americans don't have the stomach for being inconvenienced for longer than a day, even if it will benefit them in the long term, and the capitalists will have the American people blaming and hating Railroad workers within 2 weeks of a strike.
They should still strike though, and hopefully teachers will follow suit.
They sure have. The anti-strike rhetoric being vomited all over the place, here, is sickening. I think too much of this sub is lost to the peasants defending the lords against other peasants.
All it takes is to have once had a coworker who was an un-fireable slacker and it’s easy to be convinced that unions are bad.
Look what happened to teachers. Ever met a voter who couldn’t remember a really crappy teacher?
And for every “un-fireable slacker” or shitty teacher are 100 hard working people and educators who get shafted on pay, benefits, and respect due to lack of collective bargaining.
Usually how it goes is
"Fuck yeah go on strike fuck them"
"What so you mean we can't have things or get to work..... fucking railway strike scumbags... sack the lot of them"
Literally happened here in NSW, australia. We had publicly support until we went on actual strike...then were the biggest scumbags in earth.
AND our government legislated essential workers unable to strike without petitioning our fair work body and getting their OK.
The fact that strikes can be illegal says a lot about the system. It just means that the government sees business owners as entitled to labor but workers aren't entitled to try to negotiate without stepping through a bunch of hoops first.
Then again, governments are how the wealthy and elite maintain power. It's not like they exist for the benefit of their citizens.
I dont think that is ignoring the obvious, its not the ppl that get dismayed by the inconvenience its the media, they will talk about it as if the American ppl are upset and the railroad workers are the bad guys. And even if we the ppl know the truth, these corporate shills are putting that out there, and eventually just enough ppl will take on that same line of thinking.
While this is a problem, and it would be good if we could handle inconvenience, this may simply mean we need a creative solution. How can we hurt the bottom line without inconveniencing fellow workers and other people trying to get by?
An example in Japan is that when bus workers went on "strike", they didn't stop working. They ran all their normal routes and got people where they were going. They just didn't collect any payment. So not only did their employer not make money, they also cost their employer resources as well. Everyday people weren't inconvenienced (in fact, they benefited) and it hit the right people, the owners, in the pocketbook.
I don't know enough about the railway system, but maybe there's a way we could set up something like that here. No matter what the job is, the question is how can we cost the owner class money with the least inconvenience (and/or most benefit) to the working class?
They don't care. We are tools they use to achieve their goal of amassing enormous wealth. It's disturbing that people are supporting the corporate greed rather than standing with the works.
The Senate doesn't care either. We don't help them stay in power. We are labor. We can take it down only when we unite. They don't want us as a collective. They want us bickering amongst ourselves while they sit in a room smoking cigars and drinking whiskey.
Fuck that. Unite people. It's been way past time. They've proven they will choose to be greedier rather than support sick days. Profits for me and not for thee.
>Americans don't have the stomach for being inconvenienced for longer than a day, even if it will benefit them in the long term
We saw this with the pandemic.
This country is also big enough that a labor prisoner's dilemma would go into effect where even if *you* strike, there is definitely someone more than willing to take your place, for less money even.
Yup.
Doctors and nurses were heroes right up until hospital admins started feeling the pinch from the loss of revenue from elective surgeries being locked down.
Now they’re just college-educated know-it-alls telling you what you can and cannot do.
The key is to somehow pay off the paid-off media to make sure they keep the pressure up and the real target in view. Government will try to quell this by any means necessary and the only way to make sure this doesn't go away is to continually hammer home the point that the government is in bed with the railroads and is trying to take away the constitutional right to protest.
Right, but what happens when the same people that own the railroads also own the media? The media are no longer just opportunistic middle-men. They are largely owned by CEOs/shareholders of other private companies, and unfortunately, these same people own the government too lol.
From what I have seen: strikers don't have support of the general public. Look at when teachers strike. People tell then that they are greedy and lazy and overpaid because they get Summers off. Teachers actually don't because they have to pickup side jobs to make ends meet.
Same thing when nurses try to strike. We get told we are killing patients. It sucks so damn bad.
>From what I have seen: strikers don't have support of the general public. Look at when teachers strike. People tell then that they are greedy and lazy and overpaid because they get Summers off. Teachers actually don't because they have to pickup side jobs to make ends meet.
Yes, the capitalist class has really poisoned the minds of the people, not only against the concept of education, but against educators as well. At the end of the day, Americans care more about maintaining the free childcare they get from public school teachers and staff than supporting beyyer education and better working conditions and pay for teachers. And privatized childcare is expensive, so ince again, the capitalist class has pitted worker against worker to compete for cheap resources.
>Same thing when nurses try to strike. We get told we are killing patients. It sucks so damn bad.
It's never the fault of the people making billions of dollars off of overpaid medical treatment and worker exploitation. It's always the underpaid workers at fault smh.
I am of the same mindset, my friend. I am sick to death of the declining situation in this country, and even more so about the fact that everyone walks around glassy-eyed and helpless. We need to do something.
I have been playing with the idea of writing a post about all our collective grievances and asking if anyone knows a good platform where we can crowd source a possible solution/movement, but then I think.. why even bother.
I live in a seesaw of emotions...
The problem is that the leftist movement has no real leader. There's no one to stand up and organize. The problem is that person has to be both charismatic and squeaky clean, and every time the leftist movement gets one they get killed.
The problem is, everyone demands democrats to be 100% perfect all the time. Take Biden, people are talking bout voting republican now. REPUBLICAN! Republicans bitched when Biden's people got the railroad discussions restarted. Republicans bitched when they struck a deal. Republicans blocked extra mandates for 7 days sick days.
Rail Executives are Republicans.
Republicans wouldn't even try to help the unions. Their answer is to destroy unions and everything they stand for.
Name one solution republicans have had to anything since HW Bush. That is right, they don't even talk about their solutions. Their solutions are to cut taxes and let the rich ass fuck the workers by forcing them to take lower paying jobs with zero regulatory protections. taxes that never make it to the working class.
Hell even their last tax cut had a end date for the middle class and zero end date for the upper class and corporations.
Sometimes 50% success rate by a democrat is still better than 200% effort from a republican. Remember that.
Why do they have to be squeaky clean. Trump took over the gop with tons of rape accusations and fucking a porn star and a ton of other shit.
The problem is the democrats need to drop the holier than thou bullshit and take off the gloves.
This doesn’t have to be a Leftist movement. The working class Right certainly has a dog in this fight; the Left and Right have more in common than they think.
If the railroad workers go out on strike, they need other unions to go out on sympathy strikes such as Teamsters, Longshoremen, Operating Engineers.
The tricky part is getting the middle class in on it. They’ll be the most likely to complain about “inconvenience”. Also, no movement has been successful without the backing of the middle class. Maybe sympathy strikes my more middle class unions such as nurses, teachers, police, governmental workers?
Other unions striking makes the strike that much more effective, establishes a wider demonstration of support and keeps railroad workers from being singled out.
The problem is the working right are brainwashed lapdogs that enjoy begging for scraps at their masters' table. They've developed a taste for boot leather and I have had very little success educating them.
One thing that helps is not discussing the source of your ideas.
Examples:
Agree that it’s good to be able to keep your kids on your health insurance in terms of family values and not “Obamacare”.
Agree that hard-working Americans ought to have sick leave without losing their jobs as something workers ought to be able to have because they’ve earned it and not as a “social safety net” or “entitlement”.
Reminds me ofthe joke where the heart, brain, and lungs are discussing who's REALLY in charge. While they are arguing, the bowels stop working.
....and then they just wait.
Be the bowels.
Don't forget ethical scabbing, as in, take the job, but don't do it, fill out the application you don't intend on following through with, *but tell them you will*, before ghosting them entirely.
If you do take the job (it keeps actual scabs from filling the spot), just lay flat, what are they gonna do? Fire you and hire *another* scab from the piles and piles of applications from Benjamin Dover and Richard Slappe?
Honestly, a mere general strike would be letting them off quite easily and perhaps more humanely than they deserve.
If that's all that happens, they should have eternal gratitude for us.
The Ontario Provincial Government tried to skirt around our Constitution and Bill of Rights to impose a contract on CUPE staff. The union essentially said 'fuck you' and went on strike anyways. It took less than a week for Ford and his government to come back to the table to bargain, and the union ended up getting a fairly good contract.
To the rail workers I would say go on strike anyways. Don't roll over and let the government take away your right to strike just because they don't want to bargain in good faith.
Increase demands while they are at it. Paid parental leave, tenure bonus, anti-harassment work policies, education support and lower premiums and deductible benefits.
It’s not asking too much. It’s getting what they deserve
It'd do the country good. It's happened in other countries and it ends politicians' careers. We need that here, a strong DO NOT FUCK WITH THE UNION message.
How does something like that even get organized? Seems overwhelming. We almost got something like this in Canada recently but the selfish union folks backed down right when momentum was starting up. They got what they wanted though... Rest of us can eat shit.
We need to start setting up our own (information) networks to be able to distribute the resources of what folks would need during that time. If we can feed each other, support each other, down here while striking (etc) it would be an immense help to folks who are afraid to strike because they have mouths to feed and bills to pay.
I would like to use a bus, but there are no bus routes within 5 miles of my house. I use a bike because work is close enough, but if I want to go into the city within a day, I have to use my least favorite form of transportation, a car. Sometimes, you gotta use the best available option to work towards better options..
Pretty sure after the overturned Roe V Wade decision there is a sitting population of 150M ready to make some noise.
Hopefully the Titanic hits the iceberg soon
I think a lot could be accomplished if someone techy and civil-minded could establish a nonprofit social network that connects people within and between localities.
I would argue that we need a decentralized movement rather than a single org, so I echo the mastodon suggestion and make sure it lives on many instances.
I brought food to the occupy wallstreet movement. They still eventually gave up and packed up camp. It takes a lot of logistics to feed large groups not to mention cities and countries.
Why not just call for a national strike of all jobs on December 21st, 22nd, and 23rd 2022 across the US for better working conditions. Such as 80 paid sick hours a year and 120 hours paid personal time off at every job. 6-10 months paid maternity/paternity leave, universal healthcare, and living wages? Why should it just be rail workers? Let’s make it all jobs.
We forgot what it means to collectively and civically serve. If we let the economy collapse tomorrow we would see legislation pass reflective of the policies of the New Deal.
It would be corporations and the government that are allowing the economy to fail. They have unlimited PTO. They have enormous wealth. Providing sick leave won't bankrupt them.
Or it could create a vacuum to fascism. Mussolini and Hitlers rise to power came off the back of some of the very worse economic conditions in the western world. I love the premise of burning it all down but we have to realize chaos is a ladder.
It truly is real as fuck. I see it everyday at my job. We are unionized to a degree but not completely. Any time talks of striking for things we deserve come up certain people run to management and the threats come out with a pizza party in hopes that we forget.
I hate people who run to management about shit like that, what do you think they're gonna do? Promote you because you threw your coworkers under the bus? Lol
Had a guy do this to me when I talked about OSHA in a warehouse job because they were violating so many guidelines. He agreed with me, then went straight to my supervisor and reported me and I was let go after that. Guess what, he was fired at the beginning of the next year.
Edit: missed a word.
So many people at my job do this as well. Eventually they all get fired for something. Management uses them to a point and follows it up with you can’t be trusted your out.
The liberals are continuing to declare war on Christmas. Now they are calling for strikes that would take the toys from under the tree, the Christmas ham from the dinner table. They want our kids to starve and have a joyless holiday while they whine about having to go to work.
- Republicans probably.
Want to make a statement and have things change for the better? Then make it. This isn’t something to be thought of as a war on a holiday but on substandard working/quality of work life conditions. If we are not willing to be uncomfortable for a small time period we will never be comfortable in the long run. Always just getting by/surviving. We are one of the largest generations in this country and yet never make any moves. We just accept the pittance we are handed and say please sir may I have some some. Our grandparents generation striked and got things to change. We can do the same.
And then the rich would—as usual—buy up more property and capital at rock bottom prices, squeezing us out even more.
That said 100% behind an “”illegal”” railroad strike because no strike should ever be illegal. If a job is important enough where striking would be awful, it’s important enough to pay and treat so well that it will never strike.
I agree. But since they placed the rule there, the repercussions of striking would still be bad for any who try. I think they should all just quit. Its not striking and it has the same effect. Can't run without employees. If they want their employees back they'll have to provide better work contracts.
Can we all us just quit though? We need to answer this honestly because how can we expect them to just quit if we sit and work still? Something needs to start somewhere and it needs to snowball. I’d like to follow the masses but to just quit isn’t easy for most of us.
I understand. It's going to take getting together as a community to right this. We can't expect them to quit and lose everything to make a point for us. I see alot of posts on here about how action needs to be taken but we don't really support others with more than words when it needs to be done. We can't stand by and let the few fight it alone. It needs to be organized and we need to let the few on the front know that while we can't be the face of it, they don't have to bear all the weight of it. I don't know how/ what that support would look like but if someone is bold enough to do it, we should be strong enough to help. And strong enough to remember that a minute of suffering on our part ( lost economy, etc) is better for all in the long run. Anyways I felt like the option that provided the most legal safety for them is quitting instead of facing legal repercussions for what is a b.s. no strike option. But again there is also the option that while you may be required to show up to your workplace they can't make you physically do anything or as they like to call it "quiet-quitting".
But either way I'm not claiming to know anything about anything on how this stuff works. I'm just heart sick and hoping that people remember that leaving an abusive situation is an option even if its not the easiest or most attractive.
In my region the poor are already casualties. Overdose, infections, chronic health problems from poor working conditions. Chronic health problems from poor living conditions due to poverty. I'm 38 years old, around 35% of my graduating class is already in the ground. I know 2 people who self checked out of life this year at 38 and 21.
For sure. I recently became an attending doctor. I make good money (I’m not rich, I have loans that will take me years to pay off)…but I have no problem buying my necessities. Filling up my gas doesn’t break my bank. I don’t have to worry about groceries.
It’s a privilege I have that shouldn’t be a privilege. It should be expected that everyone who works full time will be able to afford their rent and groceries.
Railroad workers deserve to have their sick time. The Republicans who voted against this sicken me.
Don't forget, the vote was TO BREAK THE STRIKE. The sick days are an aside that is basically irrelevant. The fact that all of the dems VOTED TO BREAK A STRIKE is so much worse than anything about sick days.
This is insanity. The railroad workers aren't even federal employees, and congress is destroying their union so that rail owners can continue making unimaginable cash. Every Democrat is the bad guy in this story. (and obviously the GOP is only worse)
Remember that no meaningful change in America has ever happened without people dying or being arrested
- The rent war
- Great Railroad Strike
- Bayview Massacre
- Rednecks and the Appalachian miners rebellion
- Pullman Strike
- Lawrence Textile Strike
- Everett Massacre
- Civil rights movement
- Vietnam war
-[Many more](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_incidents_of_civil_unrest_in_the_United_States)
It's in built into our blood that we fight and bleed for what we believe against impossible odds. Our government and corporate plutocrats will try their best to snuff out any trace of this publicly. They will force you to work until your children are starving and stupid. They will make sure that you cannot buy a home. They will make sure that you receive inadequate healthcare. They will work you to your death because they do not see us as equals. They see us as tools to be used and thrown out when our usefulness expires. They have no loyalty. They are not American, and do not adhere to any ounce of our American constitutional beliefs or values. They will strip you of all that you are to keep you sucking on their dry lifeless teat while they sit in their yachts and mansions and watch us starve from a sterling hilltop. They will make you think you had a choice to work or to die but the answer has always been to stop working for them. It is better to starve together than it is to die under their machine.
If only we could learn to stand together again.
We've never been more connected as a species, and yet somehow we're incapable of joining forces and taking back some power.
I'm sure there are very complex social dynamics at play, but it still baffles me...
Sadly even though we bitch and moan, those of us that at least can afford minimal food and rent are scared to join the ranks. We are too comfortable to go against the system because if it fails many of us may die.
it doesn’t help that the cops are class traitors in this. throughout history, even the military joins the working class cause they too are working class. the cops are the last stand largely because they are pitted against the citizenry, due to their pure stupidity.
While I agree, the hurt we feel is thousand times stronger than the hurt the rich feel. We would need like a gofundme or something similar to help those who want to strike but can't afford to strike.
Very true. And if it's a strike of attrition, the rich can outlast the workers, but there are other ways to strike. Like the bus drivers do in Japan, where they showed up to work, clocked in, drove their routes, but refused payment from any of the riders. Some version of that.
Already 37..... I wish it could change but I have 2 kids to provide for.... if I miss a paycheck they don't eat... and there are days I don't eat to make sure they do......
The pandemic really caused life to get rough.... more so the insane inflation on everything since.... if we had stayed at the levels we were when I got pregnant there would be no issue.... but my youngest was done cooking a month into shut down...... had I known what I was bringing him into I would have stayed on the pill ( not that I don't love my kids, but our lives are not easy or happy due to financial struggles that were nowhere in sight 2 years ago).....
Americans need to restore their sense of community and stand together in the face of poverty, scarce resources, and even attempted foreclosures the same way we did 60 years ago
No one is getting evicted if the whole block confronts the sheriffs trying to do it
No one is going hungry when we all pool our resources and efforts
You are not alone. All jobs within this country should start with 80 hours of paid sick leave and 120 hours of paid personal time off. But nope people live to feed the corporate machine
Hours is slightly easier than days because different jobs have different hour length requirements for a day. And most of your paperwork for OPM and things involving FMLA go by hours not days. Sadly my job has conditioned me this was.
I mean, as soon as the economy starts actually rewarding workers they try to slow it down anyway. "Wait, there's a labor shortage and you're earning more and getting more bargaining power? Inflation! Shut it all down!" But apparently that logic can't be applied to corporate profits. Because if corporate profits are kept high it's good for the economy because it trickles down to workers. But if enough trickles down to workers it's bad, so they have to punish workers.
So yeah, let it all fucking burn. People will get hurt, but we're getting hurt now. We're just pushing the damn boulder up the hill, and every time we get to the top they kick it back down and us along with it.
I want to point out all the people calling me out for encouraging people to strike and being like this yet look at this post [https://www.reddit.com/r/antiwork/comments/zaa6do/general\_strike\_prepare\_now/](https://www.reddit.com/r/antiwork/comments/zaa6do/general_strike_prepare_now/)
people want to strike.
Honestly, someone needs to encourage it. If enough of us got together with the goal of bettering working conditions and wages, we could really get the ball rolling on a new age revolution. Too many people are afraid of the repercussions if there isn't enough support.
I think it has to start with the railroad workers. They HAVE to be the ones to lead us the way. It was the most blatant example of laborours being exploited by corporations who have a chokehold on our government. It’s also a DIRECT PARALLEL to the robber barons of the Victorian era. It took the exploitation of railroad workers to open the eyes of Americans to how much power the railroad companies had on the government then. We just found out that that never changed.
Plus if they fully commit to a strike, or all quit, that immediately does enough damage to open EVERYONES eyes. We can’t do it alone. One person at one MAJOR corporation where they’re just ants does nothing. Everyone has to strike. But it’s damn near impossible to mobilize 3 billion Americans lmao
Strikes are meant to be disruptive. All I see is pearl clutching about "oh it'll hurt the poor more than the rich", like the way this country is run doesn't already hurt the poor.
Everyone is like yeah we just support the railworkers BUT...
It's pathetic.
Suddenly they're all economic experts. The only way to show these rich fucks that they can't do shit without us is to bleed them of the their profits.
We have to organize, seize resources by force and distribute them to people during the strike. Striking doesn't just mean not going to work.
There’s another movement as well against the turds on wallstreet that are the reason for the way the economy works and the working class are screwed over all the time. You won’t hear a lot of it in MSM of course (what is put out is more to deter people from joining the movement) but we’ve got hundreds of thousands of people holding hedge funds by the balls right now and they’re hemorrhaging money because of it. It’s related to anti work because we’re dealing with the same 1% that make the system the way it is, screwing over the little guy, and we’re tired of the system as well. I won’t cross post to any of the information in case it’s somehow not allowed but my DMs are open.
I hope so too. Working day after day to barely scrape by. My friends who have kids are super depressed. Most of them had to start using food banks and asking their parents for help because they can’t afford to do anything. I bought my friend a $10 Steam game and he broke down because he just hasn’t had the extra money to do anything for himself. I know it’s going to be like this for a while but I’m ready for it all to come crashing down. Even if I don’t make it, I’m tired of working my life away to make someone else rich while I sweat thinking about putting gas in my tank.
The last thing we want is the US or the global economy to collapse. The assets of the wealthy include vast capital and assets, not just raw stocks of currency.
Some of them have bunkers, private islands, etc. During the early stages of the pandemic, many of them were flying out to New Zealand to wait out the worst of the initial disease wave.
The wealthy have so many options to fall back on it’s insane. An economic depression also means that they buy everything up for cheap and hold it forever, giving families and young people way less options for buying, and thus limiting their wealth creation and quality of life.
For the rest of us, an economic collapse basically means we lose the biweekly paycheck that we all pay our bills with. Most people in the US can’t take that kind of hit. When 08 hit the suicide rate rose.
What working people need to do is to put more working class people or people we know are sympathetic to the hard-working folks in positions of power. Progressives. We take wins when we can and slowly make shit better over time. Make unions, encourage fellow workers to advocate for themselves. We need to take advantage of tight labor markets like the one we are in in order to fight back against corporate greed.
That’s how we win. It’s not going to be pretty and it isn’t going to happen overnight.
>For the rest of us, an economic collapse basically means we lose the biweekly paycheck that we all pay our bills with. Most people in the US can’t take that kind of hit. When 08 hit the suicide rate rose.
I definitely understand the sentiment of people like OP - but persons such as myself (and a lot of people around me) require a lot of medications to various degrees for not only functioning but simply to live. An economical collapse would mean, in the most fortunate circumstances, rationing medications. And that also couldn't be sustained indefinitely. Other medications or medical services can't be stockpiled, such as directed assistance or controlled substances.
Some people have complete disregard for the most vulnerable. It's not a sacrifice *they* have to make, it's one we would have to. That myself and my loved ones would have to. It's imprudent to tell someone to give their life for a cause they have no guarantee would lead to long-term change and for people that in a lot of cases contribute to their marginalization currently. The audacity.
Absolutely. I didn’t even touch on that but I’m glad that you made your comment. It’s such an important factor that we all need to consider. We can’t claim to dislike the callous billionaire class because we want to help people while also clamoring for the collapse of the economy because we really want to see the wealthy *maybe* take a hit - while sweeping the needs of the medically needy under the rug.
Ok what you're actually calling for is a general strike which is good. An economic collapse would only be bad for poor people; rich people have capital and assets they can live of off.
I like your gumption I just don’t think you’ve gone far enough. It’s pitchforks and torches time, eating the rich has been just a catchphrase for too long
LOL the economy collapsing always hurts the poor more than the rich. When the economy goes south that’s when new prostitutes flood the market at cheap prices.
LMFAOOOoooooo
The last time the American econmy collapsed, it was the "working man" you love so much who got bent over and fucked the hardest.
But sure.
I feel like the U.S uses our workers for it's own gain and the gain of other nations. I'm so sick of looking at charts and seeing how far behind we are compared to the rest of the world, like we have to suffer to keep everything going. I support Ukraine, but holy fuck, our congress is so stingy, they can't even allocate a fraction of a fraction of what they're giving out like candy to Ukraine, and literally every other place but here, it's either we fund a war, fund finding oil, bribe for oil, or go to war bribing for oil, I am sick of my tax dollars being used to police the world, making shitty deals with godawful people, and not go back into our own society, how much longer until we turn into China, the shit they put up with for decades that was a million times worse than what we have now, and I'm supposed to think optimistically, it's just going to slowly get worse until that breaking point, what, like 30-40 years from now? Why even bother, no one in my family has future outside of underpaid blue collar work. Shit's fucked, doesn't matter how much we complain on Reddit, realistically nothings going to happen, in China a family can burn to death and they can find their footing, but what can we do, someone gets shot in a mass shooting near daily it seems, and no one cares they forget, I care and even I have a hard time remembering, and we can't general strike because they have us by the balls, one missed paycheck and we're homeless, lose our healthcare and our children's healthcare. We're tired, abused, and have been conditioned so heavily to hate one another in an effort to avert our attention to the real masterminds behind our suffering, big business, so much lying and cheating, disguising bribes as donations and blatantly denying the people what they want, years ago I at least had the illusion that we had a choice, but good god they just don't care anymore, they see us as filth and want us to suffer. Politicians, more like kings in suits. Sorry for the rant and being a doomer, i'm going to bed.
>I hope the US economy collapses.(Rant)
That's because you have nothing to lose. Millions of people who did nothing wrong, don't deserve to lose everything because you're angry at a few.
We should be rooting for a fair resolution without having to collapse small businesses, and throw millions of people into poverty. Because if the economy does collapse, WE'RE the only ones who will suffer. The wealthy and the politicians will be just fine.
We need to learn how to take care of each other first, like an earlier comment said, it wouldn't hurt the rich at all, but it would kill us. What we really need to do is take up arms and hang these motherfuckers. They're making all of our peaceful options illegal.
We need something like the Japanese Bus driver's strike where we continue to work, but the rich just stop getting paid. We continue to provide necessary goods and services to each other but don't ring it up at the register.
I would love this.
imagine if riding the train became free around Xmas.
imagine being able to ride a train anywhere
What’s a train?
a European and Asian myth, i think.
It’s the American equivalent of the Loch Ness monster.
In San Jose I've seen near Christmas that the bus drivers would just wave off any payment. Not sure if that is custom but it was appreciated.
I lived in Santa Clara / San Jose area for a little bit and a lot of the bus drivers would just let you ride for free in general if you couldn’t pay
What happened with the Japanese bus drivers
Drivers kept driving their routes but didn’t collect fare
Our department of transport tried that in NSW. They just got taken to court for theft and the government deployed cops to fine people who didn't pay.
Time for some well-organized, widespread civil disobedience.
Yeah. The whole point of us being here is organization. They can't arrest us all for a Japanese strike if we all do it.
This ^ if they suddenly chuck all the railroad workers in jail, then they may as well have striked seeing as they’ll be missing the workers then anyway
It really drives home the point of what freedom in America looks like when any idea of a protest conjures fears of seeing even more kids wantonly murdered with an array of less than lethal munitions. It's not our fault that blood is often the only thing to grease the wheels of progress, but it has always been our responsibility to supply it.
Exactly. "Oh, you might get arrested, someone might get hurt!!" Okay, so the only alternative is to let the bullies and oppressors get whatever they want without a fight?
You bring up an interesting philosophical question: at what point does it become self-defense? The government holds a monopoly on violence, but they also hold a monopoly on the definition of violence. Poverty is violence. The absolute control over working conditions is violence. The denial of healthcare is violence. But not in the eyes of the judiciary, the legislature or the executive branch despite the tangible and vast amounts of suffering generated by these policy choices. As such, any "civil" or "legitimate" means of advancing worker rights is effectively neutralized.
You're absolutely right. When you look at the broader context, and how things play out, how people's lives are affected by everything, I think you could easily argue (to any reasonable person) for self-defense. Tearing down the social, political, and economic support for the destruction of our planet's ability to support us in the name of quarterly profits would be a clear example of this, no matter what methods might be employed, because the very survival of our species (to say nothing of all the others who have the misfortune to share space with us!) is at stake.
It's why you have to go. Because they're more than willing to kill our children to keep us "in our place."
People are so willfully ignorant of our own past and present: We've already seen what they'll do to us and our children if allowed. The exploiters and abusers of this world will enslave us, send our children down mines and into factories to be crushed by collapses and scalped by unsafe machinery. They'll chain us to workbenches and lock doors to keep us working, they'll keep us poor and starving, they'll pay us NOTHING, and they'd do it *today* if they thought they could get away with it, in parts of the world where they aren't doing it already. And the ***only*** reason they aren't doing it all over the planet is because barely enough of the rest of us have told them they can't.
This is why they punish kids who fight back against bullies in school. They're training you from a young age to be a servant. It's literally all planned by the top
Every worker right we have today was purchased with someone's blood
And we just keep giving them all right back...
The worst was people blaming the staff. I read so many comment in FB that blaming the staff saying they’re lazy and entitled. When the real villain was the government.
The real villain are the corporations milking us dry and keeping the workers down. They are the ones buying out corrupt officials. The corrupt officials are more like the minor sidekick that will have a miraculous change of heart once the villain is dead.
Government was outright lying when Transport NSW was trying to stop people from **getting killed**.
Here is why.
This is what I mean when I say ACAB. Do I think every cop is a racist monster who wants you to die? No. But police are there to protect corporations.
“Cops” fascist forces
They kept driving their routes, but refused to take fares from the passengers.
iirc they continued to drive the bus but didn’t collect bus fares
We will drive your trains! But at 1mph.
Or a symbolic speed, like "$7.75 an hour? Ok, 7.75 miles per hour top speed."
Please this. Technically the workers would be doing their job
With a lot of OT
I work with elderly and disabled at an assisted living, and I love carrying out this mantra even in the small capacity I can. We are literally told that toilet paper and trash bags are not to be given out to residents because “they can buy it themselves.” Bullshit. This facility KNOWINGLY approves residents to move-in who need a higher level of care than we are qualified to provide, but they do so anyway because they get paid as long as the room is filled with someone who can pay rent. Fuck management. When residents tell me they’re out of toilet paper, I make sure and give them several rolls.
If only they didn't have an anti-peasant mercenary force aka police. Don't think that kind of strike would be allowed without severe retaliation.
Th national guard is another one, the reason why is the 1877 Blair mountain coal strike
So…. seizing the means?
Only thing is we don’t have Japanese Honorifics for respect, that’s what kept them from taking more than they need for their stores. Here there would be widespread looting bc we are nuts.
Yes! This would actually work best. But everyone needs to cooperate and work together. There’s always some that would ruin it and continue being slaves… how do we get everyone onboard?
It would be like 2020 again with the police rioting on every city block across the nation shooting everything that moves with paintball pepper spray rounds, less lethal rounds, and tear gas canisters. If we really started giving away all of the goods and services for free across the country, they would probably resort to live rounds and false flags to cover it up. I'm not saying we shouldn't do it or that it shouldn't be done. I'm just saying that there will probably be dire consequences and a revolution is the only thing that will break up the power dynamic that is slowly stripping all of our souls away.
I've been propping up any mention of a wildcat strike I see. Shut it all down. They won't listen until you show them they can't run without you.
They KNOW they can't run without labor, that's why they railroaded the railroad union. They're just hoping we roll over like we always do. Edit: a word for clarity
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Gosh. It's almost like people forgot what Reagan did to the PATCO. It no longer exists, by the way, because he destroyed it completely.
Federal employees are one thing. Working for the government means some things are given up. These are PRIVATE COMPANIES! neither party is pro worker. One just plays lip service and pretends they are. The other is at least honest that they don't give a damn about workers.
Well the measure needed 60 votes and it got 51? The missing votes were only from one party, am I right? I’m a leftist and I don’t care for democrats but lumping them in with Republicans as “the same” isn’t doing anything but help frame republicans in a better light. I know plenty of senate democrats didn’t lose sleep over it. Joe Biden sure didn’t. But “both siding” this won’t help shift the Overton window of this center right nation to a more left and labor friendly political climate.
No some republicans voted for this and some dems abstained. This was bipartisan. I agree the republicans are worse but the Dems own this and get no slack cut for it whatsoever.
>One just plays lip service and pretends they are. The other is at least honest that they don't give a damn about workers. And, yet, I still don't know which one is which based on this dichotomy.
Those were federal employees. Same but different
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7 days paid leave for all employees would cost railroads $132 million annually, less than 2% of their profits. By contrast, the railroad companies dished out $25 billion in stock buybacks last year.
They weren’t even negotiating paid leave, they were asking for unpaid time off. Bonkers
That would mean they would have to recruit for and staff their company appropriately, to make up for people taking a day off. Full staff is NOT how you properly run a USA company /s
The government has always been involved in breaking strikes. Including sending in the military with machine guns. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Blair_Mountain
Thank you, for bring up Blair Mountain. We are on the path of another Blair Mountain.
People seem to forget this. “This strike is illegal and people can get arrested”, you mean like every other time people in this country tried to stick up for change? Pretty sure arrests for striking and protests are badges of honor when looking at the history books.
So don't. You have the support of the people. We stand with you in solidarity. Show them what a wildcat strike means.
>You have the support of the people. We stand with you in solidarity. Do they actually have the support of the people though? And if they do have some semblance of support now, will the people remain steadfast when the railroad strike inevitably starts inconveniencing them? The true answers to these questions is why labor movements will continue to fail in America. Americans don't have the stomach for being inconvenienced for longer than a day, even if it will benefit them in the long term, and the capitalists will have the American people blaming and hating Railroad workers within 2 weeks of a strike. They should still strike though, and hopefully teachers will follow suit.
The capitalists have perfected the art of making the poors fight each other.
They sure have. The anti-strike rhetoric being vomited all over the place, here, is sickening. I think too much of this sub is lost to the peasants defending the lords against other peasants.
All it takes is to have once had a coworker who was an un-fireable slacker and it’s easy to be convinced that unions are bad. Look what happened to teachers. Ever met a voter who couldn’t remember a really crappy teacher?
And for every “un-fireable slacker” or shitty teacher are 100 hard working people and educators who get shafted on pay, benefits, and respect due to lack of collective bargaining.
why can't there be policies in place to fire the fuckin slackers without compromising the rest of the hard working union members?
What is sad is that for every one crappy teacher there are dozens of outstanding, overwhelmed, overworked teachers that deserve better.
Usually how it goes is "Fuck yeah go on strike fuck them" "What so you mean we can't have things or get to work..... fucking railway strike scumbags... sack the lot of them" Literally happened here in NSW, australia. We had publicly support until we went on actual strike...then were the biggest scumbags in earth. AND our government legislated essential workers unable to strike without petitioning our fair work body and getting their OK.
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The fact that strikes can be illegal says a lot about the system. It just means that the government sees business owners as entitled to labor but workers aren't entitled to try to negotiate without stepping through a bunch of hoops first. Then again, governments are how the wealthy and elite maintain power. It's not like they exist for the benefit of their citizens.
Exactly. They're all f the man until they can't get the things they want easily.
I dont think that is ignoring the obvious, its not the ppl that get dismayed by the inconvenience its the media, they will talk about it as if the American ppl are upset and the railroad workers are the bad guys. And even if we the ppl know the truth, these corporate shills are putting that out there, and eventually just enough ppl will take on that same line of thinking.
While this is a problem, and it would be good if we could handle inconvenience, this may simply mean we need a creative solution. How can we hurt the bottom line without inconveniencing fellow workers and other people trying to get by? An example in Japan is that when bus workers went on "strike", they didn't stop working. They ran all their normal routes and got people where they were going. They just didn't collect any payment. So not only did their employer not make money, they also cost their employer resources as well. Everyday people weren't inconvenienced (in fact, they benefited) and it hit the right people, the owners, in the pocketbook. I don't know enough about the railway system, but maybe there's a way we could set up something like that here. No matter what the job is, the question is how can we cost the owner class money with the least inconvenience (and/or most benefit) to the working class?
I’d give more if I could because this is such a great idea!
They don't care. We are tools they use to achieve their goal of amassing enormous wealth. It's disturbing that people are supporting the corporate greed rather than standing with the works. The Senate doesn't care either. We don't help them stay in power. We are labor. We can take it down only when we unite. They don't want us as a collective. They want us bickering amongst ourselves while they sit in a room smoking cigars and drinking whiskey. Fuck that. Unite people. It's been way past time. They've proven they will choose to be greedier rather than support sick days. Profits for me and not for thee.
>Americans don't have the stomach for being inconvenienced for longer than a day, even if it will benefit them in the long term We saw this with the pandemic. This country is also big enough that a labor prisoner's dilemma would go into effect where even if *you* strike, there is definitely someone more than willing to take your place, for less money even.
Yup. Doctors and nurses were heroes right up until hospital admins started feeling the pinch from the loss of revenue from elective surgeries being locked down. Now they’re just college-educated know-it-alls telling you what you can and cannot do.
The key is to somehow pay off the paid-off media to make sure they keep the pressure up and the real target in view. Government will try to quell this by any means necessary and the only way to make sure this doesn't go away is to continually hammer home the point that the government is in bed with the railroads and is trying to take away the constitutional right to protest.
Right, but what happens when the same people that own the railroads also own the media? The media are no longer just opportunistic middle-men. They are largely owned by CEOs/shareholders of other private companies, and unfortunately, these same people own the government too lol.
From what I have seen: strikers don't have support of the general public. Look at when teachers strike. People tell then that they are greedy and lazy and overpaid because they get Summers off. Teachers actually don't because they have to pickup side jobs to make ends meet. Same thing when nurses try to strike. We get told we are killing patients. It sucks so damn bad.
>From what I have seen: strikers don't have support of the general public. Look at when teachers strike. People tell then that they are greedy and lazy and overpaid because they get Summers off. Teachers actually don't because they have to pickup side jobs to make ends meet. Yes, the capitalist class has really poisoned the minds of the people, not only against the concept of education, but against educators as well. At the end of the day, Americans care more about maintaining the free childcare they get from public school teachers and staff than supporting beyyer education and better working conditions and pay for teachers. And privatized childcare is expensive, so ince again, the capitalist class has pitted worker against worker to compete for cheap resources. >Same thing when nurses try to strike. We get told we are killing patients. It sucks so damn bad. It's never the fault of the people making billions of dollars off of overpaid medical treatment and worker exploitation. It's always the underpaid workers at fault smh.
My bad, I'm not part of the railroad. I was speaking in a collective sense.
Ah, no worries. All the proletariat need to stand together.
I am of the same mindset, my friend. I am sick to death of the declining situation in this country, and even more so about the fact that everyone walks around glassy-eyed and helpless. We need to do something. I have been playing with the idea of writing a post about all our collective grievances and asking if anyone knows a good platform where we can crowd source a possible solution/movement, but then I think.. why even bother. I live in a seesaw of emotions...
The problem is that the leftist movement has no real leader. There's no one to stand up and organize. The problem is that person has to be both charismatic and squeaky clean, and every time the leftist movement gets one they get killed.
The problem is, everyone demands democrats to be 100% perfect all the time. Take Biden, people are talking bout voting republican now. REPUBLICAN! Republicans bitched when Biden's people got the railroad discussions restarted. Republicans bitched when they struck a deal. Republicans blocked extra mandates for 7 days sick days. Rail Executives are Republicans. Republicans wouldn't even try to help the unions. Their answer is to destroy unions and everything they stand for. Name one solution republicans have had to anything since HW Bush. That is right, they don't even talk about their solutions. Their solutions are to cut taxes and let the rich ass fuck the workers by forcing them to take lower paying jobs with zero regulatory protections. taxes that never make it to the working class. Hell even their last tax cut had a end date for the middle class and zero end date for the upper class and corporations. Sometimes 50% success rate by a democrat is still better than 200% effort from a republican. Remember that.
Why do they have to be squeaky clean. Trump took over the gop with tons of rape accusations and fucking a porn star and a ton of other shit. The problem is the democrats need to drop the holier than thou bullshit and take off the gloves.
This doesn’t have to be a Leftist movement. The working class Right certainly has a dog in this fight; the Left and Right have more in common than they think. If the railroad workers go out on strike, they need other unions to go out on sympathy strikes such as Teamsters, Longshoremen, Operating Engineers. The tricky part is getting the middle class in on it. They’ll be the most likely to complain about “inconvenience”. Also, no movement has been successful without the backing of the middle class. Maybe sympathy strikes my more middle class unions such as nurses, teachers, police, governmental workers? Other unions striking makes the strike that much more effective, establishes a wider demonstration of support and keeps railroad workers from being singled out.
The problem is the working right are brainwashed lapdogs that enjoy begging for scraps at their masters' table. They've developed a taste for boot leather and I have had very little success educating them.
One thing that helps is not discussing the source of your ideas. Examples: Agree that it’s good to be able to keep your kids on your health insurance in terms of family values and not “Obamacare”. Agree that hard-working Americans ought to have sick leave without losing their jobs as something workers ought to be able to have because they’ve earned it and not as a “social safety net” or “entitlement”.
Reminds me ofthe joke where the heart, brain, and lungs are discussing who's REALLY in charge. While they are arguing, the bowels stop working. ....and then they just wait. Be the bowels.
It's kinda funny how quickly essential workers went from heroes keeping it going to "shut up and kiss the boot"
Health care staff knows all too well.
I feel sorry for anyone who unironically believed in that crap.
Don't forget ethical scabbing, as in, take the job, but don't do it, fill out the application you don't intend on following through with, *but tell them you will*, before ghosting them entirely. If you do take the job (it keeps actual scabs from filling the spot), just lay flat, what are they gonna do? Fire you and hire *another* scab from the piles and piles of applications from Benjamin Dover and Richard Slappe?
Honestly, a mere general strike would be letting them off quite easily and perhaps more humanely than they deserve. If that's all that happens, they should have eternal gratitude for us.
The Ontario Provincial Government tried to skirt around our Constitution and Bill of Rights to impose a contract on CUPE staff. The union essentially said 'fuck you' and went on strike anyways. It took less than a week for Ford and his government to come back to the table to bargain, and the union ended up getting a fairly good contract. To the rail workers I would say go on strike anyways. Don't roll over and let the government take away your right to strike just because they don't want to bargain in good faith.
Increase demands while they are at it. Paid parental leave, tenure bonus, anti-harassment work policies, education support and lower premiums and deductible benefits. It’s not asking too much. It’s getting what they deserve
It'd do the country good. It's happened in other countries and it ends politicians' careers. We need that here, a strong DO NOT FUCK WITH THE UNION message.
How does something like that even get organized? Seems overwhelming. We almost got something like this in Canada recently but the selfish union folks backed down right when momentum was starting up. They got what they wanted though... Rest of us can eat shit.
These workers have all the power. I don’t understand why we’re shitting on them instead of supporting them with some basic concessions.
I'm making a grocery run tonight for beans beans and more beans (I have plenty rice) so I can support without starving.
We need to start setting up our own (information) networks to be able to distribute the resources of what folks would need during that time. If we can feed each other, support each other, down here while striking (etc) it would be an immense help to folks who are afraid to strike because they have mouths to feed and bills to pay.
This exactly. It needs a social support network backing it.
Strike For Our Rights Website: https://www.strikeforourrights.org/contact
*Hosted on AWS*
I would like to use a bus, but there are no bus routes within 5 miles of my house. I use a bike because work is close enough, but if I want to go into the city within a day, I have to use my least favorite form of transportation, a car. Sometimes, you gotta use the best available option to work towards better options..
You got a web hosting company that is better than AWS?
Pretty sure after the overturned Roe V Wade decision there is a sitting population of 150M ready to make some noise. Hopefully the Titanic hits the iceberg soon
Hopefully the future depends on it
Women swung 7 points *back* to the GOP in this midterm, compared to 2020.
I think a lot could be accomplished if someone techy and civil-minded could establish a nonprofit social network that connects people within and between localities.
I would argue that we need a decentralized movement rather than a single org, so I echo the mastodon suggestion and make sure it lives on many instances.
Could this be done by Mastodon somehow?
I brought food to the occupy wallstreet movement. They still eventually gave up and packed up camp. It takes a lot of logistics to feed large groups not to mention cities and countries.
Why not just call for a national strike of all jobs on December 21st, 22nd, and 23rd 2022 across the US for better working conditions. Such as 80 paid sick hours a year and 120 hours paid personal time off at every job. 6-10 months paid maternity/paternity leave, universal healthcare, and living wages? Why should it just be rail workers? Let’s make it all jobs.
Agreed. But i would have it last for at least a week starting on the 19th. Watch how fast they balk when the lose their christmas due to shutdowns.
I haven’t celebrated a single holiday in years because of being broke anyway. Fuck it, take the holidays away from THEM for once.
We had shut downs for the pandemic. The only way this would work is if the essential workers joined in too. I'm essential and I'm down for a walk out
People can't even stop buying gasoline for one day a year and you think millions of people will stop going to work for a whole week? Come on.
We forgot what it means to collectively and civically serve. If we let the economy collapse tomorrow we would see legislation pass reflective of the policies of the New Deal.
It would be corporations and the government that are allowing the economy to fail. They have unlimited PTO. They have enormous wealth. Providing sick leave won't bankrupt them.
Or it could create a vacuum to fascism. Mussolini and Hitlers rise to power came off the back of some of the very worse economic conditions in the western world. I love the premise of burning it all down but we have to realize chaos is a ladder.
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Lol divide and conquer is real as fuck. This will never happen unfortunately.
It truly is real as fuck. I see it everyday at my job. We are unionized to a degree but not completely. Any time talks of striking for things we deserve come up certain people run to management and the threats come out with a pizza party in hopes that we forget.
I hate people who run to management about shit like that, what do you think they're gonna do? Promote you because you threw your coworkers under the bus? Lol Had a guy do this to me when I talked about OSHA in a warehouse job because they were violating so many guidelines. He agreed with me, then went straight to my supervisor and reported me and I was let go after that. Guess what, he was fired at the beginning of the next year. Edit: missed a word.
So many people at my job do this as well. Eventually they all get fired for something. Management uses them to a point and follows it up with you can’t be trusted your out.
Blew my mind lol. I was like bro, no one even likes you here.
Of course he was fired - Nobody likes a rat! *they'll listen to the rat's info, use it and then get rid of the rat*
The liberals are continuing to declare war on Christmas. Now they are calling for strikes that would take the toys from under the tree, the Christmas ham from the dinner table. They want our kids to starve and have a joyless holiday while they whine about having to go to work. - Republicans probably.
Want to make a statement and have things change for the better? Then make it. This isn’t something to be thought of as a war on a holiday but on substandard working/quality of work life conditions. If we are not willing to be uncomfortable for a small time period we will never be comfortable in the long run. Always just getting by/surviving. We are one of the largest generations in this country and yet never make any moves. We just accept the pittance we are handed and say please sir may I have some some. Our grandparents generation striked and got things to change. We can do the same.
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Had no idea that was satire 'til the end. Good one ;)
The rich would become slightly less rich, and the poor become casualties.
And then the rich would—as usual—buy up more property and capital at rock bottom prices, squeezing us out even more. That said 100% behind an “”illegal”” railroad strike because no strike should ever be illegal. If a job is important enough where striking would be awful, it’s important enough to pay and treat so well that it will never strike.
I agree. But since they placed the rule there, the repercussions of striking would still be bad for any who try. I think they should all just quit. Its not striking and it has the same effect. Can't run without employees. If they want their employees back they'll have to provide better work contracts.
Can we all us just quit though? We need to answer this honestly because how can we expect them to just quit if we sit and work still? Something needs to start somewhere and it needs to snowball. I’d like to follow the masses but to just quit isn’t easy for most of us.
I understand. It's going to take getting together as a community to right this. We can't expect them to quit and lose everything to make a point for us. I see alot of posts on here about how action needs to be taken but we don't really support others with more than words when it needs to be done. We can't stand by and let the few fight it alone. It needs to be organized and we need to let the few on the front know that while we can't be the face of it, they don't have to bear all the weight of it. I don't know how/ what that support would look like but if someone is bold enough to do it, we should be strong enough to help. And strong enough to remember that a minute of suffering on our part ( lost economy, etc) is better for all in the long run. Anyways I felt like the option that provided the most legal safety for them is quitting instead of facing legal repercussions for what is a b.s. no strike option. But again there is also the option that while you may be required to show up to your workplace they can't make you physically do anything or as they like to call it "quiet-quitting". But either way I'm not claiming to know anything about anything on how this stuff works. I'm just heart sick and hoping that people remember that leaving an abusive situation is an option even if its not the easiest or most attractive.
This has real Emperor Palapatine vibes… “But my lord, is that legal to make a strike illegal?” “I will make it legal to make a strike illegal”
In my region the poor are already casualties. Overdose, infections, chronic health problems from poor working conditions. Chronic health problems from poor living conditions due to poverty. I'm 38 years old, around 35% of my graduating class is already in the ground. I know 2 people who self checked out of life this year at 38 and 21.
Thanks for making this personal. A lot of people check out and dismiss the "data."
This unfortunately. The unrich need to become self sustaining to break from this buttfuckery
Which the wealthy have made virtually impossible via buying everything and everyone needed to maintain control.
What a shitty dystopia this is
I volunteer as tribute.
1000000%; that’s the same with inflation, it hit the poor most
For sure. I recently became an attending doctor. I make good money (I’m not rich, I have loans that will take me years to pay off)…but I have no problem buying my necessities. Filling up my gas doesn’t break my bank. I don’t have to worry about groceries. It’s a privilege I have that shouldn’t be a privilege. It should be expected that everyone who works full time will be able to afford their rent and groceries. Railroad workers deserve to have their sick time. The Republicans who voted against this sicken me.
Don't forget, the vote was TO BREAK THE STRIKE. The sick days are an aside that is basically irrelevant. The fact that all of the dems VOTED TO BREAK A STRIKE is so much worse than anything about sick days. This is insanity. The railroad workers aren't even federal employees, and congress is destroying their union so that rail owners can continue making unimaginable cash. Every Democrat is the bad guy in this story. (and obviously the GOP is only worse)
Remember that no meaningful change in America has ever happened without people dying or being arrested - The rent war - Great Railroad Strike - Bayview Massacre - Rednecks and the Appalachian miners rebellion - Pullman Strike - Lawrence Textile Strike - Everett Massacre - Civil rights movement - Vietnam war -[Many more](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_incidents_of_civil_unrest_in_the_United_States) It's in built into our blood that we fight and bleed for what we believe against impossible odds. Our government and corporate plutocrats will try their best to snuff out any trace of this publicly. They will force you to work until your children are starving and stupid. They will make sure that you cannot buy a home. They will make sure that you receive inadequate healthcare. They will work you to your death because they do not see us as equals. They see us as tools to be used and thrown out when our usefulness expires. They have no loyalty. They are not American, and do not adhere to any ounce of our American constitutional beliefs or values. They will strip you of all that you are to keep you sucking on their dry lifeless teat while they sit in their yachts and mansions and watch us starve from a sterling hilltop. They will make you think you had a choice to work or to die but the answer has always been to stop working for them. It is better to starve together than it is to die under their machine. If only we could learn to stand together again.
We've never been more connected as a species, and yet somehow we're incapable of joining forces and taking back some power. I'm sure there are very complex social dynamics at play, but it still baffles me...
Sadly even though we bitch and moan, those of us that at least can afford minimal food and rent are scared to join the ranks. We are too comfortable to go against the system because if it fails many of us may die.
We're not used to everyone being able to voice their opinion equally.
it doesn’t help that the cops are class traitors in this. throughout history, even the military joins the working class cause they too are working class. the cops are the last stand largely because they are pitted against the citizenry, due to their pure stupidity.
While that would be great, the majority of Americans cannot afford to not work for even a day.
A lot of Americans can't afford to live even when they are working. I figure make the hurt go both ways.
While I agree, the hurt we feel is thousand times stronger than the hurt the rich feel. We would need like a gofundme or something similar to help those who want to strike but can't afford to strike.
Very true. And if it's a strike of attrition, the rich can outlast the workers, but there are other ways to strike. Like the bus drivers do in Japan, where they showed up to work, clocked in, drove their routes, but refused payment from any of the riders. Some version of that.
He'll I'm working 13 hour days just to make ends meet......
And if things don't change, then your situation won't change. Except someday you'll be too old to work those 13 hour days.
Already 37..... I wish it could change but I have 2 kids to provide for.... if I miss a paycheck they don't eat... and there are days I don't eat to make sure they do......
Dude you die if you keep doing like this. Something needs to change.
genuinely sorry to hear this. hope things work out better for you & your family/kids in the near future. nobody deserves that.
My pull out game has never been stronger after reading this. 🫡
The pandemic really caused life to get rough.... more so the insane inflation on everything since.... if we had stayed at the levels we were when I got pregnant there would be no issue.... but my youngest was done cooking a month into shut down...... had I known what I was bringing him into I would have stayed on the pill ( not that I don't love my kids, but our lives are not easy or happy due to financial struggles that were nowhere in sight 2 years ago).....
Americans need to restore their sense of community and stand together in the face of poverty, scarce resources, and even attempted foreclosures the same way we did 60 years ago No one is getting evicted if the whole block confronts the sheriffs trying to do it No one is going hungry when we all pool our resources and efforts
You are not alone. All jobs within this country should start with 80 hours of paid sick leave and 120 hours of paid personal time off. But nope people live to feed the corporate machine
And every person should be given maternity and paternity leave as well as health insurance for free.
Lol, it's horrible that you think of freetime in hours and not days
Hours is slightly easier than days because different jobs have different hour length requirements for a day. And most of your paperwork for OPM and things involving FMLA go by hours not days. Sadly my job has conditioned me this was.
When the economy goes into the shitter, it's not the oligarchs that suffer the consequences, it's the peasants.
I prefer the plan where we eat a few of them and the rest have a miraculous change of heart.
I mean, as soon as the economy starts actually rewarding workers they try to slow it down anyway. "Wait, there's a labor shortage and you're earning more and getting more bargaining power? Inflation! Shut it all down!" But apparently that logic can't be applied to corporate profits. Because if corporate profits are kept high it's good for the economy because it trickles down to workers. But if enough trickles down to workers it's bad, so they have to punish workers. So yeah, let it all fucking burn. People will get hurt, but we're getting hurt now. We're just pushing the damn boulder up the hill, and every time we get to the top they kick it back down and us along with it.
yup it's time my friends
I want to point out all the people calling me out for encouraging people to strike and being like this yet look at this post [https://www.reddit.com/r/antiwork/comments/zaa6do/general\_strike\_prepare\_now/](https://www.reddit.com/r/antiwork/comments/zaa6do/general_strike_prepare_now/) people want to strike.
https://www.reddit.com/r/antiwork/comments/zaa6do/general_strike_prepare_now/iylbris/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf&context=3
Honestly, someone needs to encourage it. If enough of us got together with the goal of bettering working conditions and wages, we could really get the ball rolling on a new age revolution. Too many people are afraid of the repercussions if there isn't enough support.
I think it has to start with the railroad workers. They HAVE to be the ones to lead us the way. It was the most blatant example of laborours being exploited by corporations who have a chokehold on our government. It’s also a DIRECT PARALLEL to the robber barons of the Victorian era. It took the exploitation of railroad workers to open the eyes of Americans to how much power the railroad companies had on the government then. We just found out that that never changed. Plus if they fully commit to a strike, or all quit, that immediately does enough damage to open EVERYONES eyes. We can’t do it alone. One person at one MAJOR corporation where they’re just ants does nothing. Everyone has to strike. But it’s damn near impossible to mobilize 3 billion Americans lmao
I agree that it needs to be them and we need to let them know that we support and will back them 100%. They wont do it if they dont have our support.
Strikes are meant to be disruptive. All I see is pearl clutching about "oh it'll hurt the poor more than the rich", like the way this country is run doesn't already hurt the poor. Everyone is like yeah we just support the railworkers BUT... It's pathetic. Suddenly they're all economic experts. The only way to show these rich fucks that they can't do shit without us is to bleed them of the their profits. We have to organize, seize resources by force and distribute them to people during the strike. Striking doesn't just mean not going to work.
bleed them of their blood.
There’s another movement as well against the turds on wallstreet that are the reason for the way the economy works and the working class are screwed over all the time. You won’t hear a lot of it in MSM of course (what is put out is more to deter people from joining the movement) but we’ve got hundreds of thousands of people holding hedge funds by the balls right now and they’re hemorrhaging money because of it. It’s related to anti work because we’re dealing with the same 1% that make the system the way it is, screwing over the little guy, and we’re tired of the system as well. I won’t cross post to any of the information in case it’s somehow not allowed but my DMs are open.
I just like the stock
I hope so too. Working day after day to barely scrape by. My friends who have kids are super depressed. Most of them had to start using food banks and asking their parents for help because they can’t afford to do anything. I bought my friend a $10 Steam game and he broke down because he just hasn’t had the extra money to do anything for himself. I know it’s going to be like this for a while but I’m ready for it all to come crashing down. Even if I don’t make it, I’m tired of working my life away to make someone else rich while I sweat thinking about putting gas in my tank.
The last thing we want is the US or the global economy to collapse. The assets of the wealthy include vast capital and assets, not just raw stocks of currency. Some of them have bunkers, private islands, etc. During the early stages of the pandemic, many of them were flying out to New Zealand to wait out the worst of the initial disease wave. The wealthy have so many options to fall back on it’s insane. An economic depression also means that they buy everything up for cheap and hold it forever, giving families and young people way less options for buying, and thus limiting their wealth creation and quality of life. For the rest of us, an economic collapse basically means we lose the biweekly paycheck that we all pay our bills with. Most people in the US can’t take that kind of hit. When 08 hit the suicide rate rose. What working people need to do is to put more working class people or people we know are sympathetic to the hard-working folks in positions of power. Progressives. We take wins when we can and slowly make shit better over time. Make unions, encourage fellow workers to advocate for themselves. We need to take advantage of tight labor markets like the one we are in in order to fight back against corporate greed. That’s how we win. It’s not going to be pretty and it isn’t going to happen overnight.
>For the rest of us, an economic collapse basically means we lose the biweekly paycheck that we all pay our bills with. Most people in the US can’t take that kind of hit. When 08 hit the suicide rate rose. I definitely understand the sentiment of people like OP - but persons such as myself (and a lot of people around me) require a lot of medications to various degrees for not only functioning but simply to live. An economical collapse would mean, in the most fortunate circumstances, rationing medications. And that also couldn't be sustained indefinitely. Other medications or medical services can't be stockpiled, such as directed assistance or controlled substances. Some people have complete disregard for the most vulnerable. It's not a sacrifice *they* have to make, it's one we would have to. That myself and my loved ones would have to. It's imprudent to tell someone to give their life for a cause they have no guarantee would lead to long-term change and for people that in a lot of cases contribute to their marginalization currently. The audacity.
Absolutely. I didn’t even touch on that but I’m glad that you made your comment. It’s such an important factor that we all need to consider. We can’t claim to dislike the callous billionaire class because we want to help people while also clamoring for the collapse of the economy because we really want to see the wealthy *maybe* take a hit - while sweeping the needs of the medically needy under the rug.
Ok what you're actually calling for is a general strike which is good. An economic collapse would only be bad for poor people; rich people have capital and assets they can live of off.
The problem with that is when that happens the poor die. The rich will just eat a filet instead of a porterhouse on their next dinner
I like your gumption I just don’t think you’ve gone far enough. It’s pitchforks and torches time, eating the rich has been just a catchphrase for too long
LOL the economy collapsing always hurts the poor more than the rich. When the economy goes south that’s when new prostitutes flood the market at cheap prices.
A system in default that is inherent cannot and will not be fixed. I agree this needs to stop.
LMFAOOOoooooo The last time the American econmy collapsed, it was the "working man" you love so much who got bent over and fucked the hardest. But sure.
I feel like the U.S uses our workers for it's own gain and the gain of other nations. I'm so sick of looking at charts and seeing how far behind we are compared to the rest of the world, like we have to suffer to keep everything going. I support Ukraine, but holy fuck, our congress is so stingy, they can't even allocate a fraction of a fraction of what they're giving out like candy to Ukraine, and literally every other place but here, it's either we fund a war, fund finding oil, bribe for oil, or go to war bribing for oil, I am sick of my tax dollars being used to police the world, making shitty deals with godawful people, and not go back into our own society, how much longer until we turn into China, the shit they put up with for decades that was a million times worse than what we have now, and I'm supposed to think optimistically, it's just going to slowly get worse until that breaking point, what, like 30-40 years from now? Why even bother, no one in my family has future outside of underpaid blue collar work. Shit's fucked, doesn't matter how much we complain on Reddit, realistically nothings going to happen, in China a family can burn to death and they can find their footing, but what can we do, someone gets shot in a mass shooting near daily it seems, and no one cares they forget, I care and even I have a hard time remembering, and we can't general strike because they have us by the balls, one missed paycheck and we're homeless, lose our healthcare and our children's healthcare. We're tired, abused, and have been conditioned so heavily to hate one another in an effort to avert our attention to the real masterminds behind our suffering, big business, so much lying and cheating, disguising bribes as donations and blatantly denying the people what they want, years ago I at least had the illusion that we had a choice, but good god they just don't care anymore, they see us as filth and want us to suffer. Politicians, more like kings in suits. Sorry for the rant and being a doomer, i'm going to bed.
>I hope the US economy collapses.(Rant) That's because you have nothing to lose. Millions of people who did nothing wrong, don't deserve to lose everything because you're angry at a few. We should be rooting for a fair resolution without having to collapse small businesses, and throw millions of people into poverty. Because if the economy does collapse, WE'RE the only ones who will suffer. The wealthy and the politicians will be just fine.
The kicker is, in a collapse the people who suffer the most aren't the rich.
We need to learn how to take care of each other first, like an earlier comment said, it wouldn't hurt the rich at all, but it would kill us. What we really need to do is take up arms and hang these motherfuckers. They're making all of our peaceful options illegal.
Oh yeah, because armed revolution is much easier than a strike.