CHICAGO, October 18– A resilient and resourceful collective of multiracial fighters is keeping up the fight to demand safe and supportive housing against the capitalist bosses and their politician lackeys. In spite of plunging autumn temperatures and countless other obstacles, #RiseUptown grows with working-class support. Safe housing and livable housing conditions are in diametrical opposition to the needs of capitalism. We will continue to face this nightmare until we organize a mass international communist party to smash capitalism and build a new egalitarian world built on our collective needs and development.
The #RiseUptown movement kicked off in earnest over a month ago when dozens of pro-housing fighters occupied an unused parking lot next to Weiss Hospital in the city’s Uptown neighborhood (see CHALLENGE, 9/21). The parking lot has been slated to become new luxury housing in the mostly immigrant worker and rapidly gentrifying neighborhood. #RiseUptown was able to maintain a collective space with food, shelter, medicine and community for over 11 days in the lot before being forcibly removed by the racist Chicago Police Department (CPD).
Worldwide, capitalism is a colossal failure, unable and unwilling to provide billions of workers with the basic necessities of shelter, food, and medicine. The bosses put their profits and power over working-class lives every day (see article, page 5).Members of the Progressive Labor Party (PLP) are continuing to support the #RiseUptown struggle in modest ways, connecting with local mass organizations, and holding CHALLENGE sales in Uptown. PLP is committed to the fight alongside our class to not only secure our basic needs but to overthrow the profit system entirely!
Workers’ lives matter
Though #RiseUptown is a relatively small movement, it has proved to be a real thorn in the bosses’ side, so much that the racists have been working overtime to try to snuff out the fightback. After the encampment was forced off the abandoned parking lot, the forces regrouped in a nearby park area across the street to begin planning next steps and strategy.
But even this space was deemed unacceptable by the ruthless and racist bosses. Barely had tents been put up before more demands to vacate were placed by city agencies. The reason? That stretch of park had been designated as a “migratory bird sanctuary” and the human workers would be in the way! Although it’s doubtful that anyone involved in #RiseUptown is “anti-bird” or “anti-nature,” we all agreed that it was indicative of a system with priorities completely out of whack, to once more displace homeless workers. Only under a profit system can the lives of birds be more valuable than the lives of workers.
On top of the uncertainty and fear associated with being uprooted, workers staying outdoors in the area have faced straight-up fascist violence from the bosses’ forces. Around the time of the parking lot occupation, Wayne, a worker from a different encampment who supported the protest, confronted a security guard and a physical fight went down. The fight was broken up then, but later that night Wayne was beaten to death in his tent.
Certain details of the murder remain unclear, but all of us suspect this fascist guard, with complicity, if not outright support of the CPD. We know that we’re unlikely to see anything resembling justice from the capitalist state for Wayne and so many other victims of this system, but through building the fightback to crush all fascists for good we can honor his memory and ensure his death did not happen in vain.
Capitalism can’t and won’t solve the housing crisis
Housing, just like any other good or service produced under capitalism, is fundamentally created to serve as a commodity to be sold for profit. When the bosses’ media pouts about a housing “crisis,” what they are really complaining about is an inability to sell homes and apartments. Meanwhile, countless workers around the world are forced to go without shelter entirely while buildings sit empty, all because of the bosses’ profits!
Chicago, which has long been a stronghold for the liberal finance capital Big Fascist wing of the U.S. ruling class (see glossary on page 6), is no exception to this capitalist rule. With the onset of the coronavirus pandemic and thousands of workers in the city being instantly cut off from income and other support services, the compound crises of homelessness, mental health struggles, and hunger have sharply intensified.
In 2020, over 65,000 people experienced homelessness, close to a 12 percent increase from 2019 (Chicago Tribune, 9/20). Racist inequalities, inherent under capitalism, ensured that Black and Latin workers made up the majority of those workers without consistent housing.
In many cities across the U.S. and beyond, various liberal schemes pop up to try to soften the blow, but as expected fall way short. One example is the trend of “tiny houses” which more often than not are constructed of flimsy materials and lack running water, heat or electricity (Guardian, 3/23/17).
Under communism and a worker-run society, safe and equitable housing would be guaranteed and available to all without cost, just as it was when workers held power previously in the Soviet Union and China. We as workers naturally build all housing, so it should already belong to us! But to win that reality, we have to keep fighting for revolution.
Our class can run society!
The members in #RiseUptown are continuing to work hard, day and night despite much adversity to fight against capitalist-caused displacement and homelessness. Their efforts show that working people have the initiative and courage to organize society in collective ways. PLP will continue to salute and support these grassroots efforts as we advocate for communist revolution to build the world we all need and deserve
