Old Tactics & New

During the years of 1905-1908, IWW’s Big Bill Haywood wanted to organize the forgotten unskilled workers (think fast food workers of today), those without votes – without unions. Haywood once said at a meeting, “I do not care a snap of my fingers whether or not skilled workers join the IWW movement at this time.” He shouted at the meeting, “We are going down into the gutters to get at the mass of workers and bring them up to a decent plane of living (think minimum wage $15 to $16 per hour). It is these ‘have nothings’ who will be the shock troops of labor who will establish the first beach head in the resistance of the entrenched industry so that later labor organizations can win what is rightfully theirs for the masses. Eugene Debs, labor leader, said the industrial workers are organized not conciliate, but to fight the 1% oligarchy class. The oligarchies own the tools they do not use. The workers use the tools they do not own. So you can see there is power with the wage slaves. They just have to take it. The wage slaves, 99%, do have support like Anonymous, again a tactic from the past, which was a proven success. The old IWW wobblies made a point of not inquiring into the background and past of new acquaintance. It was a cult of anonymity most wobblies signed their names their names as aliases like Denver Dan, Red, Wob, Rambler or just Card No. 34528. It sounds like today’s Anonymous is using the tactics of yesterday’s leaders. What we have to do is to better communicate by cell phones, text messages, e-mails and social media and any new form of communication invention on the horizon. In the old days, people had to rely on printed pamphlets, newspapers and songs, which were very easy for the anti-worker people to find and destroy the workers' efforts, but not so easy today. With new tactics and old tactics, the workers of the world have a chance to put up a good fight against the oligarchies. Remember as wage slaves, we sell our lives one day or one hour at a time and for this we need healthcare, pensions for our retirement, living wage, safety on the job, respect and for this we can keep making the money people rich. We need to start closing the gap between the 99% and 1%—power to the wage slaves.