Fuck Your $2.90, Fare Strike Now!
Added 2024-09-20 10:00:11 +0000 UTCJamie and Sam discuss the mass shooting committed by the NYPD in the New York City subway this past Sunday. In pursuit of an alleged fare jumper, the cops wound up shooting the suspect, two random people, and one of their own. The city of New York spent $150 million in extra overtime last year in order to apprehend $104,000 worth of fare jumpers. The answer is clear: defund and abolish the NYPD. Also: fare strike!
The PG crew also gives updates on a pro-Palestine action in Richmond, VA, as well as some good news from the Sol Fund 3 trial in Atlanta.
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Comments
I don’t think this episode was advocating for an “either/or” sort of a choice between militant street action and mass organizing. Maybe just advocating for the later to keep turning up the heat? I think there might be a way to fold the two into each other, sorta like what you mentioned about a possible general strike. Personally I’m reminded of how League of Revolutionary Black Workers/DRUM often had to physically confront both the cops and UAW. Re: production being the bourgeoisie’s soft underbelly, imma have to disagree there. The labor movement has to contend with more than a century of labor law, govt agencies, and the like. Even the unions themselves are bound to a logic of self preservation that can run counter to more revolutionary aspirations. Don’t get me wrong, these are important places to struggle within, but you might find yourself stuck in a swamp of rules that will either co-opt you or force you break them
Cowabungular Manslaughter
2024-09-28 01:21:36 +0000 UTCI did fare evasion today in solitary
Shane
2024-09-27 00:59:41 +0000 UTCRead a lot of that crimethinc article, I maintain my assertion that the police are a red herring. "The workers struggles of a generation ago have become struggles against the police." Incorrect, the contours of the class war/ class exploitation are fundamentally identical. "What bosses once were to workers, police are to the precarious and unemployed." Idiotic. The boss-worker social relationship is the same exploitation it has always been. And the relationship between police and the lumpen remains the same, tho the police have enhanced powers of repression via modern technology. The crimethinc article says that "the polulation has been renderred expendable by globalization and automation." Incorrect. Automation expands a workers productivity, but the worker is still essential to the production process and as a consumer. Labor remains the source of value. Globalization just means that proletarians in other parts of the world are also producing value. Exploitation is international, so what? All the more reason for international worker solidarity/ organizing. The idea that police-lumpen struggle has essentially supplanted the class struggle is completely corrosive to useful proletarian politics. Doesn't seem likely that the lumpen will displace the proletarian as the central revolutionary subject since the lumpen is almost entirely divorced from the production process. The proletariat is the key, as ever.
Sai
2024-09-22 19:01:15 +0000 UTCI mean maybe it's useful to "practice" confrontation with police... Slightly dubious 🤷♂️ I mean don't get me wrong I hate the cops but I question the strategic value of direct confrontation sometimes. Well mass worker organizing and the threat of revolution achieved the new deal and the civil rights victories in the last century, a "work stoppage" among American soldiers helped end the Vietnam war... And you're right I think there is an upswing of class consciousness at least among the workers of the US.
Sai
2024-09-22 18:30:52 +0000 UTCAs for the other points about focusing instead on the classic “seize the means” approach, I mean sure absolutely. I would argue that organized labor activity is actually on the upswing lately and seems to be gathering momentum so focusing on building towards a general strike as UAW president Shawn Fain has suggested would be awesome if it actually works. It would inevitably result in police repression and violence. Obviously the proletariat has to be ready to respond to that. If the most radicalized sections of the working class have been regularly honing their skills and refining their tactics in confrontations with the police, doesn’t it follow that the working class would be better equipped and prepared for such a mass confrontation like what we saw in 2020? Also, I would like to know when was the last time a worker’s struggle or strike has actually led to any kind of meaningful mass movement in the United States in the last century? I say this as a union member myself.
Justin Rodin
2024-09-22 15:36:00 +0000 UTCI think it would help you understand this viewpoint among other ultras like myself and the makers of this podcast if you read the article “The Thin Blue Line Is A Burning Fuse” on Crimethinc https://crimethinc.com/2014/11/25/feature-the-thin-blue-line-is-a-burning-fuse
Justin Rodin
2024-09-22 15:30:46 +0000 UTCAt least fighting the cops on a picket line would be a productive battle in the class war. The transit system itself is a critical part of the capitalist production infrastructure, surely it would be good to organize it for militant prolerarian struggle. What is your relationship with transit workers?
Sai
2024-09-20 20:40:02 +0000 UTCHow do you envision direct confrontation with the police leading to a transformation of society to a better mode of production? They're a red herring. The enforcers of capital, the literal spear point of the capitalist state domestically. Direct confrontation with them will inevitably fail, they have more resources. The left movement should focus on building power from within production itself. This "activism" I hear y'all speak of so often smacks of adventurism or hooliganism. If the class war were a boxing match between us and the bourgeoisie, direct confrontation with police is like thinking you'll beat your opponent by meeting his fist with your face over and over. The means of production are there for the taking. The bourgeoisie's relatively unprotected belly. If we take the production process, the cops would become our bruisers. What use is "propaganda of the deed" if the overall effect is just strengthening the bourgeois state and allowing them to refine their techniques of oppression? Idk I don't follow your theory of change. I don't understand it.
Sai
2024-09-20 20:35:06 +0000 UTC
