Worker-Exploitation

Scott Noble of Metanoia Films has released part I of an important video history of class struggle in the US. Combining historic photos and video with reflections drawn from a range of historians, the film covers uprisings and revolts most of us never heard of in our history classes. As Deep Green Resistance emphasizes, a successful resistance movement must learn from the history of what has and hasn’t worked for others. Plutocracy is an excellent introduction to the mass movements of the working class in American history. ...

One of the ironies of contemporary politics is the identification of poor whites with the Republican party, even more opposed to working class interests than the Democrat party. Taken to the extreme by the Tea Party, this cooptation takes energy which might challenge the capitalist class structure and redirects it against other poor and working class people who have different skin color. Dave Strano has worked for years against this counter-productive racism, in Kansas and Missouri as part of the John Brown Gun Club distributing anti-racist literature at gun shows, and more recently in Colorado as Redneck Revolt. In an excellent interview, Strano points out how the left, even the radical community, often practices classism subtle and overt, leaving a large segment of potential allies as easy recruits for racist elements of the conservative movement. He describes organizing within this culture to restore traditional values of opposition to exploitation: ...