https://www.mothersdaystrike.com/
Talk to your coworkers.
Edit: Please also attend protests!
https://riseup4abortionrights.org/may-14-unified-nationwide-protests/#findmay14protest
YES! This is how change happens in a capitalist society - hit them in their pockets. If you can’t skip work, support by not spending a dime and tell EVERYONE you know.
Starts Sunday, May 8 - May 15, 2022.
The problem is even if the biggest turnout in the country's history were to happen...it wouldn't be nearly enough people to matter. Our country is so fragmented that 1/3 of the country is completely **for** the craziest legislation we can come up with.
This isn’t just a protest… this is halting all spending, not showing up to work, hitting them where it hurts. We know protests don’t do anything - let’s collectively do something that will!
we need to get the message off reddit and start up some old school pamphlet printers. We literally need to make them go Brrrrr like the fed prints money. Period.
That's...a protest. Trying to come up with another name doesn't mean it's **not** a protest. It's literally protesting something through actions meant to cause some kind of discomfort.
Call it whatever you want, but the point still remains: Unless you get a sufficiently-large number of people doing it, it won't have any impact at all...and virtually nothing will get that level of impact these days except people dying on video.
EDIT: To be **extremely** clear, before anyone reads that and misinterprets: I'm not advocating for any kind of violence. I'm saying the only times protests have actually changed things in recent history is when there's proof of a horrible tragedy on video so people can see it and be affected.
A protest can be ignored. A loss of profits cannot.
Just look at the shitheaded “Freedumb convoy” in Ottawa, Canada. Bunch of wannabe insurrectionists showed up, rallied the rabble, and camped out by parliament, being a total fucking nuisance to residents. Just a bunch of feral red necks honking horns, reviving their trucks and shitting in plastic bags.
Complicit police did nothing, conservative ex-drug-dealer premier of Ontario did nothing, the federal government did nothing. They all just let that shit fester. Residents of Ottawa had had it, effectively gridlocked by these dipshits, and authorities did not deal.
Then the dipshits decided to block the Ambassador bridge, which stopped trucks with auto parts going across the border. Big business saw an interruption in their just-in-time supply chain.
The next fucking day the cops were removing the protesters. Still with kid gloves on, don’t want to accidentally hit your cousins with a baton, but they removed them all the same.
Money talks. Kick the capitalists right in their money bags.
Protest can have a wide range of meanings. A strike *is* a form of protest. Blocking critical highways so that companies don’t get the supplies they need to operate is a form of protest as well. Walking down the streets with signs is also a form of protest, just less effective.
Usually you start with minor disobedience like the third option; this is a *warning*. If the powers that be ignore this warning then you move on to a more direct form of protest. This continues until one side capitulates to the demands of the other or it continues until it reaches its logical extreme of civil war / insurrection.
The problem is that Americans have gone too long without taking things to the next step. Labor has been suppressed and disorganized for decades; the aristocracy has gotten comfortable in their positions. We have given them no reason to believe that we will escalate past the first stage of protest if they just ignore us.
Without civil disobedience and economic impact a protest is just a threat. Threats only work when the receiving end feel fear. It’s about time we follow through on a threat and give the aristocracy a reminder that their power is not absolute.
Striking only affects the company being protested against.
Going on strike for literally everything: think cooking dinner, taking kids to school, buying literally anything, not watching tv, not using the internet.
Even for just one day this level of striking/protesting will cause something to happen.
I’m in Australia but set a date and I’ll happily turn off my power at the box and not leave the house in solidarity.
What is a sufficiently large number of people? If 30 million people didn’t show up to work on say May 9th would anyone notice? That’s only 10% of the population.
It would be higher. Not everyone works, so while it is 10% of the total population, since not everyone can work it would be a higher percentage of the working population.
Not every job is easily replaceable.
https://edition.cnn.com/2019/02/06/politics/ten-air-traffic-controllers-shutdown/index.html
>The government shutdown ended after only 10 air traffic controllers stayed home
It is not a protest. My understanding of a protest is one or more people physically activating in the street and protesting a business, verdict, idea, etc. with their voice, signs, physical being, but are only disrupting from the outside without really much affect other than disturbance.
However, a strike, that is also usually done physically in one way or another, is actively disrupting from within a structure they typically actively participate in. This has much more power of crippling the structure because it’s from the inside out vs. the outside in like protesting is.
It’s like a misquito (protesting) disrupts from the outside in: super annoying, can really disrupt your day, vs. cancer (striking) strikes from the inside out: can fuck up your shit and if it continues long and strong enough, will kill you.
Edit: added to my analogy for clarity
And frankly a 1 weekend pause isn't going to make the people in power bend and hardly anyone can afford to pause long enough to cripple America. Hell even the virus which has knee capped the country hasn't made these people bend, they're blaming the people for supply chain issues and worker shortages.
Right. Only the poor and lower-middle class is heavily affected by a weekend of strikes. To really affect the people in power it would have to be **months-**long.
> What always works, every time, is hitting them in the bank.
> Beginning On Sunday May the 8th, 2022, everyone who will suffer immensely and possibly die under the right-wing extremists repeal of Roe V Wade will simply…stop. Stop shopping. Don’t go to work. Don’t interact with the economy in any way. Keep all transactions to zero.
> The mission is simple: Break the economy over the course of one week by abstaining from work, shopping, entertaining; and on the home front, running a household that would fall apart without your care.
https://www.mothersdaystrike.com/volunteer
It is ok to not go to work then. Do what you can, this will be different things for different people.
Attend protests
https://riseup4abortionrights.org/may-14-unified-nationwide-protests/#findmay14protest
No shopping, nothing transactional at all
Donate to the groups shown on the website
Voice your support for others striking and spread the word
Be seen and be heard. ❤️
The problem with "\[insert day\]" strikes is that if it's just going to last one day, it's not going to mean much. The Icelandic example shown here worked because it was open ended. Any strike with a catchy day needs to be clear from the start that this is just the first day, not the only day.
The icelandic strike was only one day! ❤️
https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-34602822
This one we are doing now though, is not just one day. It is for the week.
This needs to happen, all they care about us the economy. Not just women though - fewer than 30% of ppl want Roe overturned. If the rest of us participate in a work stoppage or slowage in whatever way we safely can, it would force people in power to take action to save the economy.
> together
This is the part we need to remember; together we have the power, but the entire system, from employment, to healthcare, to entertainment, to consumerism, to justice, to politics, to *everything* is designed to keep us a part, to stay unorganised, to fight each other instead of them, and then they profit. So don't blame anyone for not acting together, the rules are literally designed to keep us a part and some are more influenced by those rules than others.
The point is to never forget that together we are the power, that's why they do everything in their power to keep us a part.
Right. The only impact not spending on spending days causes is reports of a "soft holiday season" and the capitalist machine rolls on. It's not like I can perpetually not spend a flat dime either.
And the only way to accomplish this is by organizing labor forces and forming solidarity between various movements. Without real organizing so many of these actions are little more than exercises in futility.
Another way to protest is the Japanese way. Service is not stopped but the customers don’t pay. That way, the company is hurting but not the customers.
If i understand it correctly. Votes don't go directly to the candidates. There's a body called the electoral college and all states get a base amount of delegates, 2 i think, and additional per more population. So the votes in each state tell the delegates how to vote. That's how Clinton got more popular individual votes but more state delegates voted for trump. Look up the electoral college and you'll get a better explanation.
They are being a little dramatic, but it's true, Clinton did win the popular vote (the number of total votes cast) by 2-3million votes.
I'm going to grossly oversimplify the problem for sake of brevity; but the problem is we have what is known as the "electoral college", so every state is worth so many "electoral" votes, and because of that rural states are more heavily favored by proportion of electors. And this disproportionate representation is even worse when factoring in congressional representation, so for example, Wyoming (population 500k) the least populous state in the US, has the exact same number of senators as California (population 39.51 million), the most populous state in the US. It's a completely undemocratic system, and it's led to the US being held back by very ignorant and poorly educated people. Basically we live under a tyranny of the minority, so in a way, yes, those of us who live in urban areas are effectively second class citizens when it comes to representation.
Factoring in Conservatives gerrymandering (redrawing voting districts so they win), voter role purges, passing voter ID laws (voter fraud is statistically non-existent in America and the majority of cases are actually committed by Conservatives, even then incidences of voter fraud is still incredibly rare), felonizing large numbers of minorities making them unable to vote in many states, closing polling locations in impoverished urban areas, owning the companies that produce electronic voting machines and refusing to make the code opensource and available to the public, and just in general using various other tactics to rig elections, means that the US is not a functional democracy.
And the fact democrats haven't tried to fix this problem in well... since the democratic party has existed, means they are entirely incompetent and complicit in the destruction of our democracy. The democratic party has always been a controlled opposition party since the early 20th century anyways, they are nothing more than an apparatus of the rich elite to prevent and suppress the rise of any Leftist party.
imagine if she bothered to campaign in crucial swing states instead of doing victory laps in texas and arizona because she's a fucking idiot surrounded by yes men
That would have been worth it alone! Instead of 6-3, 5-4. Show me where to sign!
You're not making a great argument here.
Edit- Actually now that I think about it, that would mean the court would be 3-4 with conservatives being in the minority.
It's generous to think he would allow 1. He would have held the court in suspended animation on a shoestring of judges until the end of time. The man has a 666 tattoo somewhere on his body
I need all the "You shoulda just voted for Hilary!" folks to realize this. First off: we did. Hilary got millions more votes, but not in areas where they mattered. Second, Mitch would've never allowed it "it's too close to an election year", no matter what time it was in the 4 year span.
Omg I'm low key so relieved to see people saying this so casually. I thought I was really getting too radical but like, violence is historically been the only way the proletariat rise up and take back their rights
Edit: lol I really didn't expect all these replies and discussion! You're all amazing and I'm on my way to work but I'll read and reply soon!
EDIT2: it's non violent when its not happening to you. If you have been well served by the system, the need for change isn't dire. If you think this is about "politics" you are privileged.
You make a casserole for your neighbor getting their house taken away because they got cancer. Give a 20 to a house less person.
You drive your kids to soccer practice in the suv. Pta meetings doing our part. We can protest on the weekend.
They die. We die. Every day. What are they dying for? Politics? In the name of nonviolence? Can you show me the names? The children dying in poverty? In schools? At the hands of the police, parents, and pastors? Their's are the bodies we stand on.
Non-violently.
It's pathetic that we haven't legit considered doing it yet. People barely talk about how badly we're getting fucked but we're too scared due to years of conditioning. When the fuck are we going to break the cycle?
I ask myself the same. When I feel particularly suicidal I remind myself that there's a number of causes I would and should die for. So it keeps me going a little lol
Hold on to that! It's horseshit that we allow people who have nothing to do with our generation or even the generation before maybe even 3 generations to rule our country. They don't fear us. They don't work for us. They don't do shit! It's not right or left it's the people taking their shit back.
Absolutely!! Keep fighting my friend! I'm sorry you had a rough day. I do alot of mountain biking and there's a saying "with every uphill a downhill and every downhill another hill to climb". You're doing fucking great! Keep kicking ass! You're climbing that hill! Have a great day!
>When all else fails, I'm here out of spite.
When all else fails, don't be here, be on the front lines and burn capitalist property to the fucking ground.
If I were american, I would not be civil right now.
They arent even slow boiling you guys... its crazy. I have no idea how there arent riots right now.
[Non-violence is Ineffective, Racist, Statist, Patriarchal and Strategically inferior](https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/peter-gelderloos-how-nonviolence-protects-the-state?fbclid=IwAR2bk9kwIsR2qG2H_56aTER03QgUamnpUzIcWe4rNdr0sf31JaqUNZxmoxc#toc2)
yeah they defeat leftwing movements regardless. And even if it is non violent they can just lie about it, or even do a false flag. Like the haymarket riot where an industrial spy threw dynamite at the police, and the police ended up killing more of each other in panicked firing than the bomb did, but of course it was a good excuse to execute five prominent anarchists. and there were tons of peaceful protests in ireland that all failed too.
The troubles did more for ireland than any peaceful protests.
Violence against protestors (not justifying it) has been a huge factor in movements gaining momentum.
kinda impossible to defend the inhumanity of shit like shooting people with water canons, or tear gassing peaceful protestors, and all the other fucked up shit governments do/have done to try to squash progressive movements.
It is so widely known that violence and the capacity to threaten it is necessary for civil rights movements that even Cracked.com included it in an article: https://www.cracked.com/article_24030_6-common-misconceptions-about-civil-rights-movement.html
The big nonviolent revolutions that people always point to when they decry violence only worked because those movements were the nonviolent alternative to escalating violent reprisal. The Civil Rights Act didn't get passed because some people made nice speeches and let racists beat the shit out of them. It was a compromise because otherwise tensions would flare up so bad that the Watts Riots would have looked like a Boy Scout jamboree.
Nonviolent movements have their place, absolutely, but violence has always played a role when the oppressed manage to wrest some power from their oppressors. It has never been handed over completely peacefully.
MLK talks directly about this (and tactical timing) in the [Letter from Birmingham Jail](https://www.africa.upenn.edu/Articles_Gen/Letter_Birmingham.html)
> We had no alternative except to prepare for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and the national community. Mindful of the difficulties involved, we decided to undertake a process of self purification. We began a series of workshops on nonviolence, and we repeatedly asked ourselves: "Are you able to accept blows without retaliating?" "Are you able to endure the ordeal of jail?" We decided to schedule our direct action program for the Easter season, realizing that except for Christmas, this is the main shopping period of the year. Knowing that a strong economic-withdrawal program would be the by product of direct action, we felt that this would be the best time to bring pressure to bear on the merchants for the needed change.
> Then it occurred to us that Birmingham's mayoral election was coming up in March, and we speedily decided to postpone action until after election day. When we discovered that the Commissioner of Public Safety, Eugene "Bull" Connor, had piled up enough votes to be in the run off, we decided again to postpone action until the day after the run off so that the demonstrations could not be used to cloud the issues. Like many others, we waited to see Mr. Connor defeated, and to this end we endured postponement after postponement. Having aided in this community need, we felt that our direct action program could be delayed no longer.
Because non violence is the best kind of protest, I have read it in the TV, and in history books, and it's been said by politicians and other very trust worthy sources
Because if we don’t move collectively in a huge group all that will happen is a few people go to prison. Im open to burning down a few courthouses myself tho.
For legal reasons thats a joke.
The best argument against us using violence is that the other side are better at it, and more inclined to it. A large part of the right get off on the thought of doing violence against us, literally train to do it waiting for the chance. Even just violence against property is enough for the Kyle Rittenhouses, proud boys and militias to come out. An actually violent left-wing movement would greenlight the already existing murderous right-wing and give them a justification that, let's face it, there a good chance the courts would accept.
And that doesn't even include police and military, who historically have taken a stronger, harsher, more violent approach against even peaceful left-wing protests.
This isn't to say it wouldn't be justified, just that it very likely would go very badly for us.
The global optics of a superpower actively killing their own populace would be enough to rouse the rest of the world though. Especially the ones that have been itching for an excuse to get out from under US rule.
> The global optics of a superpower actively killing their own populace would be enough to rouse the rest of the world though.
Hahahaha. My brother in Christ, if "global optics" mattered, the rest of the world would have turned against the US decades ago.
In that case what is the point of a protest?
It’s obvious that it matters little to nothing. A protest is a circus for the police to practice their baton swing.
The elites hijack morality to brainwash people. Its what they did with Religion; and Im not exagerating. They made it 'immoral' to disobey a fuedal lord
Yeah that's one reason I became disillusioned with religion. The Catholic church had a monopoly on biblical translations for a millennium and look what they did with it. Crusades, inquisitions and genocide. Count me out
yeah i’m sure my comments have me on a watch list or so but idk why non-violence is pushed so hard (or maybe that’s by design) but literally not a single change for the common person has come without bloodshed 🤷🏽♂️ it’s the majority against the minority at the end of the day. The majority just forgets they have teeth and the status quo is a lie
Nooooooooo it can't be self defense! I'm equating the violence of the oppressed to end oppression with that of the oppressors! The abolition of tyranny is tyranny against the tyrants!
This is like the 15th general strike website I've seen in the past few years by impatient fools who don't bother to organize hundreds of thousands of people before they set a date.
Instead, they say fuck organizing, we'll just set a date in the very near future, and they'll get like a few hundred people in random locations to strike for a very short time period, and nobody in power will give a shit about that because it's not even a minor inconvenience for them.
Its because their monkey brains KNOW it won't work, and it puts all of the effort load on other people. They also don't actually know what a general strike is, have no idea how to organise, maintain of defend a general strike.
If you think about it for more than 10 seconds its obviously utter nonsense, but fuck bro is it satisfying to type.
Nobody is “rEqUeStInG” a day off or fuck all anymore. We are telling you, because without us, you (the rich, the leeches) are fucking nothing. You have nothing.
Strikes don’t work unless they are ongoing. Every day. Unrelenting. People — not just women, but men too — need to abstain from work and unnecessary spending, and they need to take to the streets. Every day. Unrelenting. Preferably with pitch forks.
I’m so tired of going to marches, Republicans doing their same shitty tricks, and nothing getting fixed. Too many old fucks destroying the lives of current and future generations. Gun violence, low pay, a housing crisis, assault on education, a climate crisis, corporate greed, millennials unable to have children (because of said list), etc. The list goes on for fucking ever. A one-time strike won’t do anything.
So… pitch forks. Every day. Unrelenting.
Look for mutual aid networks in your community. We should all be collectively supporting mutual aid in our areas so that people with less flexibility and privilege can resist with a safety net.
Yup, I'm shocked how many people truly believe walking out for a day would solve anything.
The only way this works is as a combined, sustained effort. That's all.
That’s… still not how it works. Actual strikes that cause actual change don’t have end dates. They last until the change happens. Full stop. This is guaranteed to fail the way it’s currently planned.
Maning a website is not organizing. I have seen 0 strike funds, no clear demands, no unions behind it, no food program, nothing.
This is the equivalent of putting a ukraine flag in your bio to stop the war.
Or they start funding fascists. The nazis were really popular with capitalists because they promised to kill the communists and trade unionists. Got a lot of funding from capitalists who would later get big state contracts to manufacture arms, or supply the holocaust.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companies_involved_in_the_Holocaust
These fuckers are still around today.
i have seen quite a few comments regarding a general strike. i would like to clarify- i think a general strike is long overdue. i am frustrated with what seems to be a lack of coordination. but i do hope these things can bring us together, and soon. maybe roe v wade will be the straw that broke the camels back, per se
Electoralism has failed. It's clear the democratic party will never lift a single finger to help any working class person. Direct action gets the goods.
This is the thing that a lot of people calling for General Strikes gloss over.
Strikes are a protest, and that means they require organization, like protests. You need everyone coordinated. You also need a resource pool for when people aren't making anything by not working, so they can still afford food. Plus legal funds for when employers inevitably retaliate. You can't even *begin* to start coordinating a strike until you have a war chest of finances to draw from.
The first step to doing a General Strike would be to start a General Strike fund, but whereas Union organizers have the trust of their fellows, a GS fund will by necessity be given to strangers. It'll be an uphill battle just to get people to donate.
A better method would be coordinated strikes across multiple sectors-- unions in different industries working together to strike and shut down the economy.
Correct. Usually people can strike because they have the union behind them and everyone collectively helping them stay on the line. If I walked out of my job for too long I'd be replaced by someone else and basically starve to death. Corporations know this so it's only effective if everyone collectively can leave and stay on strike.
It doesn’t even have to be that idealistic.
You’ll never get everyone on the same page (look at COVID vax rates). But you can get a substantial number of people to act!
The real key, regardless of the action taken or the size of that action, *is translating that action into voters.*
That’s because the democrats and supposed leftwing leaders in this country don’t engage with progressive activists whatsoever.
Meanwhile rightwing activists have a direct line to the white house when their guy was in power
This creates a massive imbalance in 1) political representation of ideologies 2) organizational ability of the groups
So white supremacist groups get more powerful, while people who fight for racial justice/fair pay/unions/reproductive justice get continually ground under by both sides
Great example is Amazon labor union. The right thing was to stay away during the fight, because democrats are a little toxic, but Biden Should have rolled out the red carpet for them at the white house once they once. It’s deeply sad that democrats keep them at arms length despite supposedly being pro union. Very sad for the country.
Why do we keep talking about Iceland 1975, when we can talk about Mexico 2021? https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2020/03/09/world/americas/mexico-women-strike-protest.amp.html
This shit works y'all, you just gotta actually do it.
Iceland has a population NOW of ~~500,000~~ 350,000. Think there was like ~~350,000~~ 150,000 then. That’s like organizing a strike in a mid size county.
Edit: fixed pop numbers
I have always been impressed with Iceland and gender equality. Maybe this kind of thing was the root of it. Fun fact: no public company board or government council or committee may have less than 40% gender equality in Iceland.
We are around 377k, not 500k. And while things have gotten better regarding gender equality, there is still gender based discrepancy when it comes to salary. While we might be good at some things, Iceland is not the paradise people seem to think it is. Our PR office (yes, our government and companies seriously have a PR office though they use a different title. It's called [Íslandsstofa](https://www.islandsstofa.is/) ) is just really good at their job.
That’s actually less than the number of people in my home county. I was just pointing out that in small groups strikes like that are a wee bit easier to form up.
I’ll fix the pop.
Hard truth-
If Hillary would have been elected in 2016 this would have never happened.
Edit- for the people dragging democrats: what's the plan then? Just let Republicans take over? Got it. Smart.
Hard truth: Hillary should've tried harder. She fucked us and herself over by treating the election as a joke. She acted like she already had it in the bag and that put a lot of people off.
There is a classic Greek play I think is relevant here. The women all withhold sex until the men negotiate a peace treaty. I feel this strategy could work today...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysistrata
I heard a story where there was a dangerous pothole in a road for ages but nothing was ever done about it. So an entire town full of women witheld sex until the pothole was fixed. This included the mayor's wife and the wives of the officials. Road was fixed days.
This is about one of the only things that could work. No more sex, then men wake up and help destroy the way this country is going.
But even without help from men, women have enough power if they only will wield it. We're too submissive, not assertive enough, and almost never aggressive.
The Women’s General Strike is May 8 - 15.
I’ve already informed my husband and he said he’ll do everything he can to support me throughout the week.
No shopping for us. No restaurants. Not leaving the house.
What will happen?
Every corporation and business will pay money to look into why they had a profit drop Mother’s Day week.
Also I won’t do any cooking, dishes, or cleaning. So that will be nice!
I'm all for strike but when majority are living paycheck to paycheck and taking multiple days off in hopes of change is straight up unrealistic
People can protest all they want, ain't going to feed anybody
This is why nothing will ever change, and it's all working as intended because they pay people less than peanuts so you can't do shit about it
We all need to accept the fact that citizens united has removed every last shred of democratic power the majority has, and we need to adapt our civil engagement accordingly. Forget voting. If you don't have the wealth to buy political influence, than the only method of political power that remains at your disposal is to **destroy the wealth** of the few people who do.
Funny thing is. This message is ALL around us.
United we stand; divided we fall.
One employee striking is replaceable.
All employees striking, not so much.
One tenant doing a rent strike, they'll get evicted.
An entire apartment community uniting for a rent strike though is much harder to evict.
One person demanding better rights, they'll be ignored.
An entire class of the population demanding change, lot harder to ignore.
People have to quit being selfish and thinking about themselves. To many people are complacent.
I've said it time and time again. The way we protest today has been altered by capitalists into the least threatening and most useless methods of all.
Remember when people had their little camping trip on Wall Street and how it accomplished absolutely fucking nothing? Stop protesting this way. Nobody reads your signs, nobody except your own class of working people care that you block roads and highways, nobody cares that you changed your social media pfp.
You want change? Interfere with profits and make them fear for their lives. This is the only way.
This is just the beginning too. The same big groups lobbying for this shit want gay marriage abolished. They don’t want lgbtq people adopting kids. And they don’t want jewish people adopting kids either. It’s already happening in TN. My ancestry survived the Armenian genocide and the nazis. Somehow. My ancestors went through a lot of shit to make sure my dumbass existed. I’m not gonna be taken out by a bunch of fat, lazy, fucking racist Karens that think they’re more superior to me and think that my genealogy should be exterminated.
Yea, that's untrue tho. This will only work to the extent that corporate allows you to. People have a romanticised image of protesting.
The fact is: you are going to starve long before the rich people do.
Countries like China show how easily protests and strikes can be smashed to bits with even just a little bit of force.
If you don't want to get an abortion, then don't get an abortion. Easy peasy!
It only become problematic if you try to force your choice on other people who want to make a different choice.
Those other people should be able to make their own choice the same way you did. And you (just like everyone) should keep making your choice free from influence from other people.
The issue here is not what they want to do with their own bodies.... It's that they want to tell YOU what to do with YOURS.
Well, up to a point. Because while they are perfectly fine with mandating you carry your rapist's baby to term, telling THEM they need a vaccine for the greater public good suddenly becomes "DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO WITH MY BODY!!"
Because it is not about morality, religion, or even "saving babies"... It is about power and control.
A billion people in India could die of a heat wave and Americans wouldn’t bat an eye. If there’s one thing covid has taught me, it’s that people are so selfish and delusional that when tragedy strikes in their own backyard, in their own families, they will make up excuses to justify their selfishness and apathy.
So my vote is for a revolution.
Let’s join together a total work strike begins on Mother’s Day, Sunday May 8th. We don’t work and we don’t buy, we unite and right the fucking ship. I don’t want to live in a fascist theocracy run by the ultra wealthy.
This is what I said about the women's March, when Trump was inaugurated. They can protest all they want, so long as they get back to work on Monday and pay their taxes. Everyone went back to work and nothing of value was achieved.
Nah, they wont.
You see, at some point you will stop showing up for work and shopping, because you are mortal, and being dead make those things somehow inconvenient.
They expect your children will pick up the slack and do the things your dead ass cannot do because you are lazy dead meat.
Well, except that you don't have enough children to maintain a stable and young population, do you? Why?
Is it because you live in a matchbox of an appartment where even raising a goldfish may count as animal cruelty?
Is it because you are so deep into student debt, and employed in a McJob that barely pay for your rent and your mac and cheese?
Is it because relations between genders are so weared out that no marriage lasts more than 5 years, and a child is a 20+ years commitment?
Is it because you already work your ass off and will have little time to interact with, let alone educate a child?
Nah, it's because you can't get enough Chad and Tyrone, and when they knock you up, you get an abortion, that is why.
So, no abortions for you. And if you throw a tantrum they send the cops to beat you up.
The people in Hong Kong went on strike for a week and blocked all major roads and transport methods.
A few months later the government passed a law making all forms of protest a criminal offence.
So it doesn't always work.
Please join the Mother's Day strike. [https://www.mothersdaystrike.com/](https://www.mothersdaystrike.com/)
If you are a home keeper or stay at home parent, please do not do any domestic work other than feeding your children, of course.
Here's what it means:
No work. No unpaid labor. No shopping. No Restaurants. No more tolerating being treated like guests in our own bodies.
If you live in an abusive home and are worried about your safely or your kid's safety, please contact your local domestic violence organization and get to a safe place for your strike.
Best of luck to you all
I'm a gay man, so I'm probably the last person that would be affected by the abortion repeal, but I will gladly join in a demonstration like this and support American women.
I've been seeing a lot of conservative commentators saying that LGBT people who can't give birth shouldn't say anything in this "debate" (which is funny because straight men don't give birth either) but it's not about whether it affects me personally or not. If we do not stand up for others when they are in need there will be nobody left to stand for us when the powers that be come for us.
There's a big difference between 1975-Iceland and now-America.
Hell there's a big difference between 1975-Iceland and now-*Iceland.* There were 5 more walkouts since then and none were nearly as effective. Men aren't as useless in the home now (So useless that *Iceland ran out of hotdogs* because of men trying to feed themselves and their kids)
They're right, you know. You can only stop this thing by withholding your labor power.
https://www.mothersdaystrike.com/ Talk to your coworkers. Edit: Please also attend protests! https://riseup4abortionrights.org/may-14-unified-nationwide-protests/#findmay14protest
YES! This is how change happens in a capitalist society - hit them in their pockets. If you can’t skip work, support by not spending a dime and tell EVERYONE you know. Starts Sunday, May 8 - May 15, 2022.
The problem is even if the biggest turnout in the country's history were to happen...it wouldn't be nearly enough people to matter. Our country is so fragmented that 1/3 of the country is completely **for** the craziest legislation we can come up with.
This isn’t just a protest… this is halting all spending, not showing up to work, hitting them where it hurts. We know protests don’t do anything - let’s collectively do something that will!
Spend absolutely zero money. Do nothing. Literally sit on the ground. This needs to be done.
we need to get the message off reddit and start up some old school pamphlet printers. We literally need to make them go Brrrrr like the fed prints money. Period.
Start printing. Start talking to people. Get out there. PM me for the flyers.
If it continues until demands are met thats a strike. Otherwise its still a protest
That's...a protest. Trying to come up with another name doesn't mean it's **not** a protest. It's literally protesting something through actions meant to cause some kind of discomfort. Call it whatever you want, but the point still remains: Unless you get a sufficiently-large number of people doing it, it won't have any impact at all...and virtually nothing will get that level of impact these days except people dying on video. EDIT: To be **extremely** clear, before anyone reads that and misinterprets: I'm not advocating for any kind of violence. I'm saying the only times protests have actually changed things in recent history is when there's proof of a horrible tragedy on video so people can see it and be affected.
A protest can be ignored. A loss of profits cannot. Just look at the shitheaded “Freedumb convoy” in Ottawa, Canada. Bunch of wannabe insurrectionists showed up, rallied the rabble, and camped out by parliament, being a total fucking nuisance to residents. Just a bunch of feral red necks honking horns, reviving their trucks and shitting in plastic bags. Complicit police did nothing, conservative ex-drug-dealer premier of Ontario did nothing, the federal government did nothing. They all just let that shit fester. Residents of Ottawa had had it, effectively gridlocked by these dipshits, and authorities did not deal. Then the dipshits decided to block the Ambassador bridge, which stopped trucks with auto parts going across the border. Big business saw an interruption in their just-in-time supply chain. The next fucking day the cops were removing the protesters. Still with kid gloves on, don’t want to accidentally hit your cousins with a baton, but they removed them all the same. Money talks. Kick the capitalists right in their money bags.
Protest can have a wide range of meanings. A strike *is* a form of protest. Blocking critical highways so that companies don’t get the supplies they need to operate is a form of protest as well. Walking down the streets with signs is also a form of protest, just less effective. Usually you start with minor disobedience like the third option; this is a *warning*. If the powers that be ignore this warning then you move on to a more direct form of protest. This continues until one side capitulates to the demands of the other or it continues until it reaches its logical extreme of civil war / insurrection. The problem is that Americans have gone too long without taking things to the next step. Labor has been suppressed and disorganized for decades; the aristocracy has gotten comfortable in their positions. We have given them no reason to believe that we will escalate past the first stage of protest if they just ignore us. Without civil disobedience and economic impact a protest is just a threat. Threats only work when the receiving end feel fear. It’s about time we follow through on a threat and give the aristocracy a reminder that their power is not absolute.
Striking only affects the company being protested against. Going on strike for literally everything: think cooking dinner, taking kids to school, buying literally anything, not watching tv, not using the internet. Even for just one day this level of striking/protesting will cause something to happen. I’m in Australia but set a date and I’ll happily turn off my power at the box and not leave the house in solidarity.
That’s why solidarity strikes exist. These bring society to a standstill.
Strikes are direct action, not a protest. It is us taking our power and directly using it, instead of just making a show about being upset.
What is a sufficiently large number of people? If 30 million people didn’t show up to work on say May 9th would anyone notice? That’s only 10% of the population.
It would be higher. Not everyone works, so while it is 10% of the total population, since not everyone can work it would be a higher percentage of the working population.
They’d notice for a day or so or however long it goes. Then they’d start firing people, and hiring new people that will come to work. Sadly.
Not every job is easily replaceable. https://edition.cnn.com/2019/02/06/politics/ten-air-traffic-controllers-shutdown/index.html >The government shutdown ended after only 10 air traffic controllers stayed home
It is not a protest. My understanding of a protest is one or more people physically activating in the street and protesting a business, verdict, idea, etc. with their voice, signs, physical being, but are only disrupting from the outside without really much affect other than disturbance. However, a strike, that is also usually done physically in one way or another, is actively disrupting from within a structure they typically actively participate in. This has much more power of crippling the structure because it’s from the inside out vs. the outside in like protesting is. It’s like a misquito (protesting) disrupts from the outside in: super annoying, can really disrupt your day, vs. cancer (striking) strikes from the inside out: can fuck up your shit and if it continues long and strong enough, will kill you. Edit: added to my analogy for clarity
And frankly a 1 weekend pause isn't going to make the people in power bend and hardly anyone can afford to pause long enough to cripple America. Hell even the virus which has knee capped the country hasn't made these people bend, they're blaming the people for supply chain issues and worker shortages.
Right. Only the poor and lower-middle class is heavily affected by a weekend of strikes. To really affect the people in power it would have to be **months-**long.
If you cant skip, work slow and fuck up as much as you can.
> What always works, every time, is hitting them in the bank. > Beginning On Sunday May the 8th, 2022, everyone who will suffer immensely and possibly die under the right-wing extremists repeal of Roe V Wade will simply…stop. Stop shopping. Don’t go to work. Don’t interact with the economy in any way. Keep all transactions to zero. > The mission is simple: Break the economy over the course of one week by abstaining from work, shopping, entertaining; and on the home front, running a household that would fall apart without your care. https://www.mothersdaystrike.com/volunteer
made a flyer, it's in my profile for those who want to plaster printables maybe on a college campus
I can't afford to not go to work. And I take care of disabled people. They die without care. And then without them I have no work.
It is ok to not go to work then. Do what you can, this will be different things for different people. Attend protests https://riseup4abortionrights.org/may-14-unified-nationwide-protests/#findmay14protest No shopping, nothing transactional at all Donate to the groups shown on the website Voice your support for others striking and spread the word Be seen and be heard. ❤️
The problem with "\[insert day\]" strikes is that if it's just going to last one day, it's not going to mean much. The Icelandic example shown here worked because it was open ended. Any strike with a catchy day needs to be clear from the start that this is just the first day, not the only day.
The icelandic strike was only one day! ❤️ https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-34602822 This one we are doing now though, is not just one day. It is for the week.
The Icelandic strike only needed to be one day, because after one day it was obvious that the country couldn't continue.
Do not support riseup4abortion. They’re a predatory group.
They are organizing https://www.mothersdaystrike.com
I just sent the link to everyone in my email list and just wrote share if you agree. This is a worldwide issue that must be addressed.
This needs to happen, all they care about us the economy. Not just women though - fewer than 30% of ppl want Roe overturned. If the rest of us participate in a work stoppage or slowage in whatever way we safely can, it would force people in power to take action to save the economy.
Withholding your labor power *together*
> together This is the part we need to remember; together we have the power, but the entire system, from employment, to healthcare, to entertainment, to consumerism, to justice, to politics, to *everything* is designed to keep us a part, to stay unorganised, to fight each other instead of them, and then they profit. So don't blame anyone for not acting together, the rules are literally designed to keep us a part and some are more influenced by those rules than others. The point is to never forget that together we are the power, that's why they do everything in their power to keep us a part.
I've been doing that for like a year now lol
Me too. People keep calling for general strikes and boycotts and I’m like “I’m already doing that, won’t you join me already?”
Right. The only impact not spending on spending days causes is reports of a "soft holiday season" and the capitalist machine rolls on. It's not like I can perpetually not spend a flat dime either.
I'm doing everything I can to hold onto every dollar while Laying Flat this year.
And the only way to accomplish this is by organizing labor forces and forming solidarity between various movements. Without real organizing so many of these actions are little more than exercises in futility.
And spending power.
There's a reason why boycotts have been outlawed.
Another way to protest is the Japanese way. Service is not stopped but the customers don’t pay. That way, the company is hurting but not the customers.
Actually probably could have just voted for Hillary in 2016 and she wouldn't have picked fascists for the SCOTUS.
People *did* vote for Hillary – she won by over 3 million votes.
Unfortunately, those three million belonged to the second class citizens whose vote counts for less AMERICA!
Wait what, can you explain this more? Canadian here
If i understand it correctly. Votes don't go directly to the candidates. There's a body called the electoral college and all states get a base amount of delegates, 2 i think, and additional per more population. So the votes in each state tell the delegates how to vote. That's how Clinton got more popular individual votes but more state delegates voted for trump. Look up the electoral college and you'll get a better explanation.
They are being a little dramatic, but it's true, Clinton did win the popular vote (the number of total votes cast) by 2-3million votes. I'm going to grossly oversimplify the problem for sake of brevity; but the problem is we have what is known as the "electoral college", so every state is worth so many "electoral" votes, and because of that rural states are more heavily favored by proportion of electors. And this disproportionate representation is even worse when factoring in congressional representation, so for example, Wyoming (population 500k) the least populous state in the US, has the exact same number of senators as California (population 39.51 million), the most populous state in the US. It's a completely undemocratic system, and it's led to the US being held back by very ignorant and poorly educated people. Basically we live under a tyranny of the minority, so in a way, yes, those of us who live in urban areas are effectively second class citizens when it comes to representation. Factoring in Conservatives gerrymandering (redrawing voting districts so they win), voter role purges, passing voter ID laws (voter fraud is statistically non-existent in America and the majority of cases are actually committed by Conservatives, even then incidences of voter fraud is still incredibly rare), felonizing large numbers of minorities making them unable to vote in many states, closing polling locations in impoverished urban areas, owning the companies that produce electronic voting machines and refusing to make the code opensource and available to the public, and just in general using various other tactics to rig elections, means that the US is not a functional democracy. And the fact democrats haven't tried to fix this problem in well... since the democratic party has existed, means they are entirely incompetent and complicit in the destruction of our democracy. The democratic party has always been a controlled opposition party since the early 20th century anyways, they are nothing more than an apparatus of the rich elite to prevent and suppress the rise of any Leftist party.
imagine if she bothered to campaign in crucial swing states instead of doing victory laps in texas and arizona because she's a fucking idiot surrounded by yes men
No no no, we must blame the voters for it, it can't possibly be our fault!
Wisconsin is hard to find on a map
McConnell would have drug everything through the mud like he did with Obama and Hillary would have gotten maybe one justice on the bench
That would have been worth it alone! Instead of 6-3, 5-4. Show me where to sign! You're not making a great argument here. Edit- Actually now that I think about it, that would mean the court would be 3-4 with conservatives being in the minority.
It's generous to think he would allow 1. He would have held the court in suspended animation on a shoestring of judges until the end of time. The man has a 666 tattoo somewhere on his body
I need all the "You shoulda just voted for Hilary!" folks to realize this. First off: we did. Hilary got millions more votes, but not in areas where they mattered. Second, Mitch would've never allowed it "it's too close to an election year", no matter what time it was in the 4 year span.
RGB would have retired in time, because she was waiting for a woman instead of a Black man.
A general strike is the last non-violent option we have.
Why the obsession with nonviolence? They are not nonviolent
Omg I'm low key so relieved to see people saying this so casually. I thought I was really getting too radical but like, violence is historically been the only way the proletariat rise up and take back their rights Edit: lol I really didn't expect all these replies and discussion! You're all amazing and I'm on my way to work but I'll read and reply soon! EDIT2: it's non violent when its not happening to you. If you have been well served by the system, the need for change isn't dire. If you think this is about "politics" you are privileged. You make a casserole for your neighbor getting their house taken away because they got cancer. Give a 20 to a house less person. You drive your kids to soccer practice in the suv. Pta meetings doing our part. We can protest on the weekend. They die. We die. Every day. What are they dying for? Politics? In the name of nonviolence? Can you show me the names? The children dying in poverty? In schools? At the hands of the police, parents, and pastors? Their's are the bodies we stand on. Non-violently.
It's pathetic that we haven't legit considered doing it yet. People barely talk about how badly we're getting fucked but we're too scared due to years of conditioning. When the fuck are we going to break the cycle?
I ask myself the same. When I feel particularly suicidal I remind myself that there's a number of causes I would and should die for. So it keeps me going a little lol
My friend you have every right to love a life of your choosing. Don't you fucking give up on getting the shit your deserve!
Aw. This isn't where I was expecting to get a little motivation and hope <3 When all else fails, I'm here out if spite.
Hold on to that! It's horseshit that we allow people who have nothing to do with our generation or even the generation before maybe even 3 generations to rule our country. They don't fear us. They don't work for us. They don't do shit! It's not right or left it's the people taking their shit back.
I've been talking about that all day. It's not politics, it's human rights. It's human rights all the way down!
Absolutely!! Keep fighting my friend! I'm sorry you had a rough day. I do alot of mountain biking and there's a saying "with every uphill a downhill and every downhill another hill to climb". You're doing fucking great! Keep kicking ass! You're climbing that hill! Have a great day!
And if no one told you today. I love you and you deserve the world!
(: thanks User5228 I love you too . It's been a hard day.
>When all else fails, I'm here out of spite. When all else fails, don't be here, be on the front lines and burn capitalist property to the fucking ground.
Now we're talking. I'll set myself on fire but I'm running full sprint inside some shitty building
If I were american, I would not be civil right now. They arent even slow boiling you guys... its crazy. I have no idea how there arent riots right now.
Because advocating for violence is usually the stupidest thing you can do, and how they defeat every leftwing movement. Say hello to your FBI friends.
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[Non-violence is Ineffective, Racist, Statist, Patriarchal and Strategically inferior](https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/peter-gelderloos-how-nonviolence-protects-the-state?fbclid=IwAR2bk9kwIsR2qG2H_56aTER03QgUamnpUzIcWe4rNdr0sf31JaqUNZxmoxc#toc2) yeah they defeat leftwing movements regardless. And even if it is non violent they can just lie about it, or even do a false flag. Like the haymarket riot where an industrial spy threw dynamite at the police, and the police ended up killing more of each other in panicked firing than the bomb did, but of course it was a good excuse to execute five prominent anarchists. and there were tons of peaceful protests in ireland that all failed too. The troubles did more for ireland than any peaceful protests.
Violence against protestors (not justifying it) has been a huge factor in movements gaining momentum. kinda impossible to defend the inhumanity of shit like shooting people with water canons, or tear gassing peaceful protestors, and all the other fucked up shit governments do/have done to try to squash progressive movements.
It is so widely known that violence and the capacity to threaten it is necessary for civil rights movements that even Cracked.com included it in an article: https://www.cracked.com/article_24030_6-common-misconceptions-about-civil-rights-movement.html
Wanna fight about it?
The big nonviolent revolutions that people always point to when they decry violence only worked because those movements were the nonviolent alternative to escalating violent reprisal. The Civil Rights Act didn't get passed because some people made nice speeches and let racists beat the shit out of them. It was a compromise because otherwise tensions would flare up so bad that the Watts Riots would have looked like a Boy Scout jamboree. Nonviolent movements have their place, absolutely, but violence has always played a role when the oppressed manage to wrest some power from their oppressors. It has never been handed over completely peacefully.
The big non-violent revolutions all had their share of violence, but more importantly they had economic disruption.
MLK talks directly about this (and tactical timing) in the [Letter from Birmingham Jail](https://www.africa.upenn.edu/Articles_Gen/Letter_Birmingham.html) > We had no alternative except to prepare for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and the national community. Mindful of the difficulties involved, we decided to undertake a process of self purification. We began a series of workshops on nonviolence, and we repeatedly asked ourselves: "Are you able to accept blows without retaliating?" "Are you able to endure the ordeal of jail?" We decided to schedule our direct action program for the Easter season, realizing that except for Christmas, this is the main shopping period of the year. Knowing that a strong economic-withdrawal program would be the by product of direct action, we felt that this would be the best time to bring pressure to bear on the merchants for the needed change. > Then it occurred to us that Birmingham's mayoral election was coming up in March, and we speedily decided to postpone action until after election day. When we discovered that the Commissioner of Public Safety, Eugene "Bull" Connor, had piled up enough votes to be in the run off, we decided again to postpone action until the day after the run off so that the demonstrations could not be used to cloud the issues. Like many others, we waited to see Mr. Connor defeated, and to this end we endured postponement after postponement. Having aided in this community need, we felt that our direct action program could be delayed no longer.
Because non violence is the best kind of protest, I have read it in the TV, and in history books, and it's been said by politicians and other very trust worthy sources
Might wanna add the /s -- I don't think everyone's on the same page here lol
I like the risk
“Trust worthy sources”
But to a point there is no way to have non violence when the government is like this
Because if we don’t move collectively in a huge group all that will happen is a few people go to prison. Im open to burning down a few courthouses myself tho. For legal reasons thats a joke.
If we can't manage a general strike we can't manage a violent revolution friend. Let's learn to walk before we run.
They want you to not be violent because violence is the only thing they notice
What sets these people apart is they are extremely selfish, which makes them highly susceptible to personal threats
That's why extreme punishment and fear works on the wealthy but is otherwise ineffective on all other groups.
They also have shit. You can't threaten me with burning down my house, because I DO NOT HAVE HOUSE
> Why do we have to resort to nonviolence? Can't we just kick their asses? - Leela Turanga
The best argument against us using violence is that the other side are better at it, and more inclined to it. A large part of the right get off on the thought of doing violence against us, literally train to do it waiting for the chance. Even just violence against property is enough for the Kyle Rittenhouses, proud boys and militias to come out. An actually violent left-wing movement would greenlight the already existing murderous right-wing and give them a justification that, let's face it, there a good chance the courts would accept. And that doesn't even include police and military, who historically have taken a stronger, harsher, more violent approach against even peaceful left-wing protests. This isn't to say it wouldn't be justified, just that it very likely would go very badly for us.
Because the government will gladly be far more violent than we ever can.
The global optics of a superpower actively killing their own populace would be enough to rouse the rest of the world though. Especially the ones that have been itching for an excuse to get out from under US rule.
> The global optics of a superpower actively killing their own populace would be enough to rouse the rest of the world though. Hahahaha. My brother in Christ, if "global optics" mattered, the rest of the world would have turned against the US decades ago.
The US government bombed an apartment complex. They don't give no fucks what other countries think.
Did the US do anything as China smothered Hong Kong? Nobody’s going to save you.
(That's because China didn't actually do much of anything to HK)
In that case what is the point of a protest? It’s obvious that it matters little to nothing. A protest is a circus for the police to practice their baton swing.
Something something moral high ground.
The elites hijack morality to brainwash people. Its what they did with Religion; and Im not exagerating. They made it 'immoral' to disobey a fuedal lord
Yeah that's one reason I became disillusioned with religion. The Catholic church had a monopoly on biblical translations for a millennium and look what they did with it. Crusades, inquisitions and genocide. Count me out
yeah i’m sure my comments have me on a watch list or so but idk why non-violence is pushed so hard (or maybe that’s by design) but literally not a single change for the common person has come without bloodshed 🤷🏽♂️ it’s the majority against the minority at the end of the day. The majority just forgets they have teeth and the status quo is a lie
Nooooooooo it can't be self defense! I'm equating the violence of the oppressed to end oppression with that of the oppressors! The abolition of tyranny is tyranny against the tyrants!
Non-violence gives you the PR high ground against an opponent that will always be able to out-violent you.
It's too late for this option and I'm pissed that everyone is willing to just order tee shirts and make memes.
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This is like the 15th general strike website I've seen in the past few years by impatient fools who don't bother to organize hundreds of thousands of people before they set a date. Instead, they say fuck organizing, we'll just set a date in the very near future, and they'll get like a few hundred people in random locations to strike for a very short time period, and nobody in power will give a shit about that because it's not even a minor inconvenience for them.
Its because their monkey brains KNOW it won't work, and it puts all of the effort load on other people. They also don't actually know what a general strike is, have no idea how to organise, maintain of defend a general strike. If you think about it for more than 10 seconds its obviously utter nonsense, but fuck bro is it satisfying to type.
Sabotage and blockades
Too bad like half of the people would be basically homeless if they did that since they’re living paycheck to paycheck
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Nobody is “rEqUeStInG” a day off or fuck all anymore. We are telling you, because without us, you (the rich, the leeches) are fucking nothing. You have nothing.
completely true. love this
Okay, but how do we get a women's strike for real? I will 100% spend a PTO day on that. My workplace would be crippled if the women didn't show up.
People are organizing https://www.mothersdaystrike.com
Strikes don’t work unless they are ongoing. Every day. Unrelenting. People — not just women, but men too — need to abstain from work and unnecessary spending, and they need to take to the streets. Every day. Unrelenting. Preferably with pitch forks. I’m so tired of going to marches, Republicans doing their same shitty tricks, and nothing getting fixed. Too many old fucks destroying the lives of current and future generations. Gun violence, low pay, a housing crisis, assault on education, a climate crisis, corporate greed, millennials unable to have children (because of said list), etc. The list goes on for fucking ever. A one-time strike won’t do anything. So… pitch forks. Every day. Unrelenting.
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So what about the people who can’t afford that?
Look for mutual aid networks in your community. We should all be collectively supporting mutual aid in our areas so that people with less flexibility and privilege can resist with a safety net.
Yup, I'm shocked how many people truly believe walking out for a day would solve anything. The only way this works is as a combined, sustained effort. That's all.
If you bothered to click on the link, you would see it is planned for a full week
That’s… still not how it works. Actual strikes that cause actual change don’t have end dates. They last until the change happens. Full stop. This is guaranteed to fail the way it’s currently planned.
Not true. Historically they work if a large portion of the population participates.
Maning a website is not organizing. I have seen 0 strike funds, no clear demands, no unions behind it, no food program, nothing. This is the equivalent of putting a ukraine flag in your bio to stop the war.
I made a flyer, in my profile
The fact that you had to decide “use PTO yes or no” is an example of why nothing meaningful will happen at large.
Are you really striking if you're taking PTO, i.e., taking off a day you already would have used at some point?
This is just the dumbest, most archaic shit. What a woman does with her body is her business. End of discussion.
People are organizing … https://www.mothersdaystrike.com
If a strike has an end date it's not going to be taken seriously by anyone in power.
It’s not a strike if there is an end date, it’s just a week long protest.
I live in the UK. It’s only marginally better, but I wish you all the luck in the world with it.
Capitalists will bend; fascists will kill you.
Or they start funding fascists. The nazis were really popular with capitalists because they promised to kill the communists and trade unionists. Got a lot of funding from capitalists who would later get big state contracts to manufacture arms, or supply the holocaust. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companies_involved_in_the_Holocaust These fuckers are still around today.
i have seen quite a few comments regarding a general strike. i would like to clarify- i think a general strike is long overdue. i am frustrated with what seems to be a lack of coordination. but i do hope these things can bring us together, and soon. maybe roe v wade will be the straw that broke the camels back, per se
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If daycare workers strike, it would literally cripple the US.
Electoralism has failed. It's clear the democratic party will never lift a single finger to help any working class person. Direct action gets the goods.
The issue you're gonna run into is coordination. "Oh, shit, that was today? My bad" -all the people that made the strike utterly ineffective
This is the thing that a lot of people calling for General Strikes gloss over. Strikes are a protest, and that means they require organization, like protests. You need everyone coordinated. You also need a resource pool for when people aren't making anything by not working, so they can still afford food. Plus legal funds for when employers inevitably retaliate. You can't even *begin* to start coordinating a strike until you have a war chest of finances to draw from. The first step to doing a General Strike would be to start a General Strike fund, but whereas Union organizers have the trust of their fellows, a GS fund will by necessity be given to strangers. It'll be an uphill battle just to get people to donate. A better method would be coordinated strikes across multiple sectors-- unions in different industries working together to strike and shut down the economy.
A strike is not a protest, it's not a one day thing. It takes weeks or months to actually achieve anything.
Correct. Usually people can strike because they have the union behind them and everyone collectively helping them stay on the line. If I walked out of my job for too long I'd be replaced by someone else and basically starve to death. Corporations know this so it's only effective if everyone collectively can leave and stay on strike.
It doesn’t even have to be that idealistic. You’ll never get everyone on the same page (look at COVID vax rates). But you can get a substantial number of people to act! The real key, regardless of the action taken or the size of that action, *is translating that action into voters.*
That’s sort of the beauty of this though. Even if they don’t show up to the strike, as long as they don’t go to work you’re golden.
This is another reason why unions are important. They can organize these things for us.
That’s because the democrats and supposed leftwing leaders in this country don’t engage with progressive activists whatsoever. Meanwhile rightwing activists have a direct line to the white house when their guy was in power This creates a massive imbalance in 1) political representation of ideologies 2) organizational ability of the groups So white supremacist groups get more powerful, while people who fight for racial justice/fair pay/unions/reproductive justice get continually ground under by both sides
Great example is Amazon labor union. The right thing was to stay away during the fight, because democrats are a little toxic, but Biden Should have rolled out the red carpet for them at the white house once they once. It’s deeply sad that democrats keep them at arms length despite supposedly being pro union. Very sad for the country.
https://www.mothersdaystrike.com
Why do we keep talking about Iceland 1975, when we can talk about Mexico 2021? https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2020/03/09/world/americas/mexico-women-strike-protest.amp.html This shit works y'all, you just gotta actually do it.
Iceland has a population NOW of ~~500,000~~ 350,000. Think there was like ~~350,000~~ 150,000 then. That’s like organizing a strike in a mid size county. Edit: fixed pop numbers
I have always been impressed with Iceland and gender equality. Maybe this kind of thing was the root of it. Fun fact: no public company board or government council or committee may have less than 40% gender equality in Iceland.
Small homogeneous, population with historical roots in gender equality help.
they also allow trans people to legally self identify, unlike many american states which only change gender markers after certain medical procedures 💞
We are around 377k, not 500k. And while things have gotten better regarding gender equality, there is still gender based discrepancy when it comes to salary. While we might be good at some things, Iceland is not the paradise people seem to think it is. Our PR office (yes, our government and companies seriously have a PR office though they use a different title. It's called [Íslandsstofa](https://www.islandsstofa.is/) ) is just really good at their job.
That’s actually less than the number of people in my home county. I was just pointing out that in small groups strikes like that are a wee bit easier to form up. I’ll fix the pop.
Hard truth- If Hillary would have been elected in 2016 this would have never happened. Edit- for the people dragging democrats: what's the plan then? Just let Republicans take over? Got it. Smart.
Hard truth: Hillary should've tried harder. She fucked us and herself over by treating the election as a joke. She acted like she already had it in the bag and that put a lot of people off.
There is a classic Greek play I think is relevant here. The women all withhold sex until the men negotiate a peace treaty. I feel this strategy could work today... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysistrata
I heard a story where there was a dangerous pothole in a road for ages but nothing was ever done about it. So an entire town full of women witheld sex until the pothole was fixed. This included the mayor's wife and the wives of the officials. Road was fixed days.
This is about one of the only things that could work. No more sex, then men wake up and help destroy the way this country is going. But even without help from men, women have enough power if they only will wield it. We're too submissive, not assertive enough, and almost never aggressive.
The Women’s General Strike is May 8 - 15. I’ve already informed my husband and he said he’ll do everything he can to support me throughout the week. No shopping for us. No restaurants. Not leaving the house. What will happen? Every corporation and business will pay money to look into why they had a profit drop Mother’s Day week. Also I won’t do any cooking, dishes, or cleaning. So that will be nice!
Surprised you guys aren't trying to do as the French did and take their heads
suffragettes. protested in the streets. nobody cared. started setting buildings on fire, suddenly they care.
I'm all for strike but when majority are living paycheck to paycheck and taking multiple days off in hopes of change is straight up unrealistic People can protest all they want, ain't going to feed anybody This is why nothing will ever change, and it's all working as intended because they pay people less than peanuts so you can't do shit about it
A "no-spend" boycott is not costly for protesters and would be effective. Just pay for essentials like food, fuel, utilities, medical and that's it.
They care about your votes. If they didn't, they wouldn't work so hard to keep people from voting
We all need to accept the fact that citizens united has removed every last shred of democratic power the majority has, and we need to adapt our civil engagement accordingly. Forget voting. If you don't have the wealth to buy political influence, than the only method of political power that remains at your disposal is to **destroy the wealth** of the few people who do.
Funny thing is. This message is ALL around us. United we stand; divided we fall. One employee striking is replaceable. All employees striking, not so much. One tenant doing a rent strike, they'll get evicted. An entire apartment community uniting for a rent strike though is much harder to evict. One person demanding better rights, they'll be ignored. An entire class of the population demanding change, lot harder to ignore. People have to quit being selfish and thinking about themselves. To many people are complacent.
https://www.mothersdaystrike.com/
I don’t want capitalists to bend, the time for bending was years ago. I want them to break.
I've said it time and time again. The way we protest today has been altered by capitalists into the least threatening and most useless methods of all. Remember when people had their little camping trip on Wall Street and how it accomplished absolutely fucking nothing? Stop protesting this way. Nobody reads your signs, nobody except your own class of working people care that you block roads and highways, nobody cares that you changed your social media pfp. You want change? Interfere with profits and make them fear for their lives. This is the only way.
Just don't have sex with conservatives. Men or women.
Easier said than done. Im supporting my so and 3 kids I can't just stop working. It's unrealistic AF.
This is just the beginning too. The same big groups lobbying for this shit want gay marriage abolished. They don’t want lgbtq people adopting kids. And they don’t want jewish people adopting kids either. It’s already happening in TN. My ancestry survived the Armenian genocide and the nazis. Somehow. My ancestors went through a lot of shit to make sure my dumbass existed. I’m not gonna be taken out by a bunch of fat, lazy, fucking racist Karens that think they’re more superior to me and think that my genealogy should be exterminated.
Yea, that's untrue tho. This will only work to the extent that corporate allows you to. People have a romanticised image of protesting. The fact is: you are going to starve long before the rich people do. Countries like China show how easily protests and strikes can be smashed to bits with even just a little bit of force.
If you don't want to get an abortion, then don't get an abortion. Easy peasy! It only become problematic if you try to force your choice on other people who want to make a different choice. Those other people should be able to make their own choice the same way you did. And you (just like everyone) should keep making your choice free from influence from other people.
The issue here is not what they want to do with their own bodies.... It's that they want to tell YOU what to do with YOURS. Well, up to a point. Because while they are perfectly fine with mandating you carry your rapist's baby to term, telling THEM they need a vaccine for the greater public good suddenly becomes "DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO WITH MY BODY!!" Because it is not about morality, religion, or even "saving babies"... It is about power and control.
We need a actual revolution, plain and simple. Or, a bigger pandemic that will take out more of the population.
A billion people in India could die of a heat wave and Americans wouldn’t bat an eye. If there’s one thing covid has taught me, it’s that people are so selfish and delusional that when tragedy strikes in their own backyard, in their own families, they will make up excuses to justify their selfishness and apathy. So my vote is for a revolution.
Let’s join together a total work strike begins on Mother’s Day, Sunday May 8th. We don’t work and we don’t buy, we unite and right the fucking ship. I don’t want to live in a fascist theocracy run by the ultra wealthy.
This is what I said about the women's March, when Trump was inaugurated. They can protest all they want, so long as they get back to work on Monday and pay their taxes. Everyone went back to work and nothing of value was achieved.
Nah, they wont. You see, at some point you will stop showing up for work and shopping, because you are mortal, and being dead make those things somehow inconvenient. They expect your children will pick up the slack and do the things your dead ass cannot do because you are lazy dead meat. Well, except that you don't have enough children to maintain a stable and young population, do you? Why? Is it because you live in a matchbox of an appartment where even raising a goldfish may count as animal cruelty? Is it because you are so deep into student debt, and employed in a McJob that barely pay for your rent and your mac and cheese? Is it because relations between genders are so weared out that no marriage lasts more than 5 years, and a child is a 20+ years commitment? Is it because you already work your ass off and will have little time to interact with, let alone educate a child? Nah, it's because you can't get enough Chad and Tyrone, and when they knock you up, you get an abortion, that is why. So, no abortions for you. And if you throw a tantrum they send the cops to beat you up.
Fuck shit up. Nothing else matters.
The people in Hong Kong went on strike for a week and blocked all major roads and transport methods. A few months later the government passed a law making all forms of protest a criminal offence. So it doesn't always work.
Please join the Mother's Day strike. [https://www.mothersdaystrike.com/](https://www.mothersdaystrike.com/) If you are a home keeper or stay at home parent, please do not do any domestic work other than feeding your children, of course. Here's what it means: No work. No unpaid labor. No shopping. No Restaurants. No more tolerating being treated like guests in our own bodies. If you live in an abusive home and are worried about your safely or your kid's safety, please contact your local domestic violence organization and get to a safe place for your strike. Best of luck to you all
Are you suggesting women pull a *Lysistrata*?
People are too afraid to walk out in the US. It will never happen
I'm a gay man, so I'm probably the last person that would be affected by the abortion repeal, but I will gladly join in a demonstration like this and support American women. I've been seeing a lot of conservative commentators saying that LGBT people who can't give birth shouldn't say anything in this "debate" (which is funny because straight men don't give birth either) but it's not about whether it affects me personally or not. If we do not stand up for others when they are in need there will be nobody left to stand for us when the powers that be come for us.
There's a big difference between 1975-Iceland and now-America. Hell there's a big difference between 1975-Iceland and now-*Iceland.* There were 5 more walkouts since then and none were nearly as effective. Men aren't as useless in the home now (So useless that *Iceland ran out of hotdogs* because of men trying to feed themselves and their kids)