Labor needs to back causes that the middle class and the Have Nots’ need to better their lives, like minimum wage of $15 an hour, free healthcare and college, right to form a union and a healthy world to live in. Unions also need to stand up with the students who want safe schools to go to.
Let’s not make the same mistake labor made during the Vietnam war. Labor sided with the war and against the protesters, who were also mostly young people, and some unions members even participated in beating these protestors. This was a shameful day for labor. This time we need to get it right.
These young people are our new leaders and will soon be able to vote. So far, these young people look like fighters, which is what unions need—voters and new blood, who know how to fight for their rights and what is fair.
Labor missed its chance when Occupy Wall Street was protesting. Now we have March for Our Lives. Let’s not let this chance slip by. This is ready made for labor’s support. Unions are about people and their lives. These protestors want to make everyone’s lives better, beginning with gun regulations, especially for military grade assault weapons.
As our government is pushing us toward more wars, dragging on the wars we are already involved in. The people need to just say, “enough with the wars” and start voting with their feet and the voting booth.
Again, we can start with new voters, who can get us a higher living wage, establishing a universal basic income, a free education and healthcare and make climate change a priority. This would also be a good time to end the war on drugs and use that money to treat addiction like the health problems that it is and takes the profit out illicit drugs. Then addiction would be like a tree with no water, it will just die.
At this time our young are facing poverty, inequality, inequity, poor healthcare, more unending wars and a failing higher educational system, if the students aren’t killed while obtaining their lower education.
It is up to the children because we sure as hell haven’t done anything to bring about change. This is a tipping point, and labor can take its place in support the children, helping to expedite the change this country needs to see, while bringing back the middle class.
Yes, they are coming for us. Workers need to have one another’s backs because no one else will. Neither the broader labor movement nor the Democratic party are prepared to meet the urgency of this moment. So it’s going to fall upon the rest of us to mount a real resistance against Trump’s authoritarian takeover. We’re going to have to get our hands dirty. I don’t care if you have a good, well-paying union job and you are in the middle class now—if you see a worker being dragged out of his workplace regardless of how skilled the job and potentially taken to another country, you should be ready to be there for that worker. When I.C.E. shows up, gather around and shame them into leaving. It has worked in other places. America is sleep walking into authoritarianism, and if there’s anyone out there who is a member of a labor union that is safe—at this point— and doesn’t think this applies to them. Understand that they just haven’t gotten to you yet. They’re coming for all of us. There are ...
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