Three hundred gathered for this May Day march and celebration. They embraced each other with hugs, smiles, and exchanges of “Happy May Day!”
Future leaders of the international working class, newer workers and students being introduced to the Progressive Labor Party got the opportunity to meet many courageous communist workers as we all strengthened our ties as working people.
For communists, May Day is both a historical reminder of the relentless brutality of capitalist oppression, and a source of revolutionary optimism showing workers glimpses of what is necessary to destroy that same system of vicious inequality.
May Day marks a new year of fightback
“One World, One Class, One Party” was our theme of this new year. This message was embodied in every aspect that shaped this militant demonstration. Families with children, older workers, couples, classmates, co-workers, individuals of different genders and races marched alongside each other and embraced the energy of each other and the workers who witnessed along the streets.
Dancing and chanting in the streets
We went through a mainly working-class Caribbean, Latin, and Black neighborhood. All along the march, participants and observers were electrified by the chants being led by PLP with their conviction and enthusiasm.
Combined with some infectious beats, the lines of these political chants were a tool of mass popular education to clarify for those within reach what we mean when we say “Fight For Communism!”
Passersby stopped along the sidewalks, came out of stores, looked out the windows of their apartments, turned in our direction from within buses and cars, and listened to the youth on the sound truck encourage workers everywhere to overthrow capitalism through communist revolution!
Many workers danced on the sidewalks as they watched us pass by. Many working-class people put their fists up with us when we called for “Workers’ Power (Este Puno Si Se Ve, Los Obreros Al Poder)!”
Many nodded with their fists in the air, moving to the beat of the music, when we chanted, “Fight Back!” against all the crimes bosses inflict on us as their wage slaves. Others were compelled by our energy to join us. Two thousand workers received CHALLENGE, our revolutionary communist newspaper. We also distributed almost 500 copies of a special edition of Le Défi, our newspaper in French and Haitian Creole.
At a moment mass culture encourages individuals to take digital videos and photos of distinctive significance in their lives. A critical mass of workers that encountered our demonstration took out their phones and captured and shared our call to join PLP and struggle to emancipate all workers from capitalist exploitation.
Bosses’ terrified of workers’ potential
Imperialist bosses everywhere are terrified of losing their domination over workers as they steal the surplus value (profit) that we produce. They will do everything in their power to hide or distort the historical significance of May Day for our future—the need to liberate the force of all production, the international multiracial working class, from capitalist domination.
All of the militant demonstrations being waged by PLP around the world this May Day, such as the one in New York, demonstrate that bosses can only do so much to stop workers from organizing against them as violent oppressors.
No matter where you are, join us not only on May Day but also in PLP in developing the courage and confidence of all workers in uniting and fighting for a communist future!
When a young Black teacher and a Latin high school student who are friends of Progressive Labor Party emcee our May Day dinner, you know it will be an inspiring event! These two young women led 60 comrades, families and friends through an interactive, enlightening program complete with good food, music, poetry, games, banner painting, and speeches. At the end of the night, every person in the room wanted to find out about how to get more involved.
The theme of the night “Smash Capitalism with Multi-Racial Unity” shined through all aspects of the event. The main speech took lessons from Kent, Ohio and South Africa about organizing multi-racial unity. Then after analyzing the world situation, the whole room sounded off about what they are doing to change this.
Communist trivia, table talk, and poetry
We followed this with a trivia game based on the latest issue of CHALLENGE. The entire room fell silent—except for the sound of shuffling pages, as competitive communists and friends furiously read articles looking for the answers. The “winner” was happy to take home a year subscription to the paper as her prize.
We moved table talk, engaging participants in a discussion around what it will take to destroy capitalism.
And what May Day dinner would be complete without a Langston Hughes poem? Two high school students from the base of PLP gave a stirring rendition of “Open Letter to the South” (see poem excerpt on page 6). This reinforced the message of the night that freedom for the working class starts with multi-racial unity.
We closed the night with 60 fists in the air singing “The Internationale”.
March in dark times
This event then encouraged many to march on May 1st with PLP. Although small, we were able to participate in two different May Day marches across Los Angeles.
Our banner, created by the participants of the May Day dinner, led the way both politically and aesthetically. One thousand workers on the street went home with a copy of CHALLENGE and thousands more chanted and cheered in celebration of the working class.
The marches were considerably smaller than last year, which is telling, given the raids and terror campaign against immigrant workers. Having said that, for the young Black teacher who marched with us for the first time and rocked our “Fight Back” chant, May Day was empowering. For us, it brought a swell of energy which was really inspiring for our small group.
The digging into mass organizations and on-the-job work in Los Angeles is paying off. This May Day dinner and march would not have been possible without our friends’ organization and leadership. We strive to convert these efforts into recruitment and consolidation.
Fifty comrades and friends of Progressive Labor Party rallied and marched through the streets of Bronzeville to celebrate May Day 2018. PLP has been having regular CHALLENGE sales in the neighborhood for years— lately every week—with an enthusiastic response from the community. It is a historically Black area that has been the home to workers and communists since the 1920s.
We rallied with red flags and signs against racist deportations and mass incarceration.There were specific messages about killer kkkop Jason Van Dyke, who murdered teenager Laquan McDonald by shooting him 16 times. We shouted anti-racist, pro-international working class chants, and distributed over 400 CHALLENGEs during our two-hour rally and march.
A young man who had been arrested while attending a court hearing for Van Dyke’s pre-trial motions gave an impassioned speech on the bullhorn. He pointed out that he lost his freedom and his job for calling for justice, while Van Dyke is still free and working.This racist, capitalist system will always protect kkkops and punish workers to maintain itself. This is why we chanted, “The cops, the courts, the Ku Klux Klan: all are part of the bosses’ plan!”
One world, one international working class, one party
After the march we had a dinner and dynamic program, with just over 90 people and families attending. The main speech was given by a young comrade who focused on the inspirational international fight back that is happening around the world and in the US. He linked the struggle of striking nurses in Zimbabwe to striking teachers in West Virginia and other states, and striking health care workers in Illinois. He explained how holding state power (controlling the military, the police, the press, the schools, and the workers through dead-end reform groups) is the way capitalists are able to continue to exploit our class. He pointed out that true freedom can only be won when the international working class, led by a mass PLP, captures state power.
The comrade linked the policies enforced by Clinton, Bush, Obama and Trump: imperialist war, deportations, mass incarceration. His speech was inspiring and made it clear that “we have to be in it to win it!” He talked about our Party organizing 30 workers in only three days in Indiana to protest an ICE raid where eight construction workers were arrested at work (see page 3). After the speech, we had table-talks about whether reform movements can create lasting change and if non-violent revolution is possible. The discussions that followed were inspiring, and were followed up by a call for all in attendance to continue these conversations and actions by joining the Party and study groups.
Ey ta, ta ta!
The program highlighted the importance of a fighting and politicized international working class. We read aloud letters from comrades from around the world: Iran, Iraq, Ecuador, Pakistan, China, and Afghanistan (see some on page 6).We chanted (both during the rally and at the dinner) a slogan from the anti-apartheid struggles in South Africa, “Ey Ta, Ta Ta!,” which mimics the sound of an AK-47 fired by workers to shut down the fascist system during revolution.
We also heard from the mother of a KeMonte Cobbs, a young Black teen murdered by the police in Gary, Indiana last year. There’s been no reason as to why her son was gunned down by killer kkkop Justin Hedrick.She has bravely called out the lies and conflicting stories in the police reports and is fighting for justice for her family.
Through their mass organization, comrades have stood with the family, highlighting that true justice can never be won from appealing to killer kkkops and their murderous system. Her story and strength showed both the personal effects of this racist system, as well as the strength and ability the working class has to challenge the system.
We ended the evening with fists up, singing the International; another inspiring May Day celebration with friends and comrades. Onward to another year of communist organizing!
AFGHANISTAN
Greetings from communist youth of Afghanistan to all PLP everywhere! We take this opportunity to send our greetings and love to all our communist friends in these historical days of May. Our success is our unity. Long life to our all communist friends, long life to our all revolutionary youth of Afghanistan and all over the world!
*****
NORTHERN INDIA
Comrades! Red Salute to you, one and all, on 132nd International Workers’ Day from northern part of India. The world today feels more affirmatively than ever the need of an international working class organization to convert the bubbles of opportunities into a sustained stream of communist revolution to change the world for once and all. Today, amidst the rising atrocities against ethnic and religious minorities, women, we join hands across the globe to reaffirm the solidarity shown by the Chicago comrades on the first May Day.
Tomorrow is ours. Long live revolution!
*****
IRAN
Workers of the world UNITE under the triumphant flag of the PLP! One class, one party, one struggle, one world to win. The workers of Iran send our strongest message of solidarity to the workers in the USA and everywhere, for the May Day anniversary. Special salute to the members and supporters of PLP everywhere!
*****
PAKISTAN
The working class of Pakistan is struggling against exploitation, poverty and low class consciousness. We are striving amid the vigorous terrorism spread by the bosses to keep the working class passive against their atrocities.
The bosses are using the fundamentalism (religious fascism) and nationalism to divide the working class. We in the PLP are struggling to bring unity among the poor workers and peasants. We are organizing the poor masses against the bosses under the red flag of PLP. Workers are being deprived of every right; they are being terrorized at the work places and at the streets. May Day gives us an opportunity to bring working class people closer to our line by organizing rallies and demonstrations.
One day we will win. Long live Communism and the PLP.
*****
SOUTH INDIA
On the occasion of May Day 2018, we revolutionaries from India extend the warmest and most sincere greetings to PLP and all working people of the U.S. who are keeping high the banner of May Day.
This day is a symbol of the revolutionary potential of working people, people who make human society with their sweat and intellect, but fruits of whose labors are taken away by exploiting classes.
Recently, India has seen a rising tide of strike struggles and mass protest actions by workers in auto and other manufacturing industries, airlines, railways and road transport, banking and insurance, hospitals and numerous other sectors.
Workers in modern service sectors have started forming unions to resist capitalist super-exploitation. Peasants and tribal peoples are resisting the corporate land grab.
There is widespread discontent and anger against the fascist nature of the present bourgeois rule. The ruling classes of India are able to rule because they succeed in dividing and persecuting working people on the basis of caste, gender, religion, nation and region like racism in the U.S., so as to keep the working class and people divided and terrorized into submission.
We are facing the growing menace of religious fascism, even graver than the earlier times. Communalism (religious nationalism), ethnic nationalism, Casteism in virulent forms are transforming both the physical and mental geography of India. They turned the country in to a slaughter house for the wealth and power of the ruling class and ruling parties.
It is a special form of class struggle against all divisive fascist tendencies to build class unity and class consciousness to proceed to overcome the exploitation, oppression, discrimination, cruelty, stupidity, and greed that still rule our world.
May Day is a symbol of not just national but international unity of the working class. We along with working people of the world solemnly salute the memory of workers of Chicago and U.S. who were killed by police and fought for an eight-hour workday. It is essential for the working people of the world to keep its spirit alive and hold high the flag.
May the first of May mark the world working class to cherish and stand for a new Spring, a new season in which we working people of the world hold together internationally to fight for a classless society.J
*****
HAITI
Comrades, comrades, comrades:
In the name of our struggle against the exploitation of the working class, in the name of our struggle for a better world, a world without classes, without racism and sexism, we greet you and wish you a successful May Day, the day of the international working class.
Unfortunately, the struggle is becoming more difficult; workers are becoming more and more alienated in spite of the degradation of their material conditions of existence and the revolting crimes of worldwide imperialism committed against the lives of millions of our sisters and brothers. In Haiti, the PLP is fighting alongside the workers, urban and rural, and students, in for a living wage, against the corruption and militarism of the imperialists and their lackeys, to guarantee that workers, who create all value, have the power to determine our own destiny. It is only our class that can give ourselves all the necessities for a decent life.
It is for this reason that we must today recall what our class has accomplished in the fight for liberty. We must always fight back against the campaigns of the bourgeoisie in all countries that wants to turn this day, a day rich in the lessons of history of the struggles to build revolution, into a day of festivities. May Day is not a festival, but rather a day for reflection and evaluation and consolidation of our willingness to fight together.
Comrades, May Day is the day the working class, the day of those like us, fight for a communist world, an egalitarian and just world.
Vive May Day!
Vive the Progressive Labor Party!
Vive communist revolution!
From the friends and comrades of PLP in Haiti, always ready!
*****
ISRAEL-PALESTINE
Times are tough for the working class in Israel-Palestine. The horrors of capitalism threaten to destroy us. Fascism is on the march. The Israeli Defense Force (IDF) murders Palestinians on the Gaza border in unprecedented numbers (see page 2). The IDF murdered dozens of unarmed Palestinian demonstrators in Gaza and wounded over a thousand. The snipers on the Gaza border filmed themselves laughing and celebrating the carnage.
But we do not lose hope. We hold on to the dream of revolution and liberation. We are well aware that revolution might take generations to make, but we know that this dark night shall have its end, in a red dawn.
The system is in crisis and the Israeli government is discarding liberalism. Prime Minister Netanyahu and Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked move to discipline the High Court of Justice. This court is of course racist, authorizing torture and assassinations of Palestinian militants. It, however, did try to maintain a liberal facade, which is no longer seems viable for the Israeli rulers.
The “Im Tirtzu” movement—openly fascist group and connected to the Prime Minister’s Office—scapegoat liberal groups as “traitors”. As Zionism feels the ground crumbling under its feet, it cannot rule through liberalism. Israel is showing its true nature: fascist and genocidal.
But, workers are fighting back. The government tried to deport 38,000 Black migrant workers to their almost-certain death. A mass multiracial movement smashed this attempt, and the mass deportation-or-prison plan is cancelled for now. Their lives remain in limbo. Class struggle at work places continues. The working class still marches, and we are proud to be part of that march.
Long live the Progressive Labor Party and communism!
- Information
Arrested while working: racist police terror everywhere
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- 05 May 2018 92 hits
INDIANA, April 28—Members of the Progressive Labor Party in Indiana have been connecting with community members through collective fight back against deportations, arrests, and racist police murders.
On Tuesday, April 24, eight workers were arrested by ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) while doing construction work on an apartment complex in Highland, Indiana. This vicious attack subjects workers and their families to the psychological terror that the police continue to inflict on working class communities.
Mothers Against Police Violence
After finding out about the police terror these workers experienced, members of Progressive Labor Party immediately met, got in contact with friends and coworkers, and together organized a response.
The day after the arrests, PL’ers held an event with an anti-racist campus organization and a local Black Lives Matter chapter. The event, titled “Mothers Against Police Violence”, prioritized the voices of two mothers who have also experienced racist police terror, when their sons were murdered by kkkops.
One mother noted that a third to a half of violent encounters with law enforcement involved people with disabilities. She shared stories about her son, who had autism spectrum disorder, and was murdered by kkkops in their own home while she was asleep.
Making connections
Discussions at the event connected kkkop murders with the eight workers arrested just the day before as well as the deportations that occur at the Gary International Airport, every Friday.
All point to a common enemy: a racist police state permitted only by kkkapitalism. Attendees of this event were invited to rally at the apartment complex along with other community members who organize against racist deportations out of Gary International Airport. They were called on to oppose the killer kkkops that killed fifteen-year-old KeMonte Cobbs in Gary and fifteen-year-old Stephon Watts in Calumet City.
Through collective action, the PL’ers and friends successfully united 30 community members, with militant chants denouncing racism and police terror in all forms. While one protester urged the community to vote out our oppressors, a PL’er stressed the importance of direct action, stating that we will only change this racist system when we come together as one: the international working class. Racist police terror is everywhere, and it only gets worse under capitalism.
The struggle to unite these struggles continues, and our Party will continue fighting to link them to our growing movement for communist revolution. Only communism can abolish the police state and provide true justice for our class. Join us!
