this post was submitted on 18 Jul 2023
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Work Reform
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A place to discuss positive changes that can make work more equitable, and to vent about current practices. We are NOT against work; we just want the fruits of our labor to be recognized better.
Our Philosophies:
- All workers must be paid a living wage for their labor.
- Income inequality is the main cause of lower living standards.
- Workers must join together and fight back for what is rightfully theirs.
- We must not be divided and conquered. Workers gain the most when they focus on unifying issues.
Our Goals
- Higher wages for underpaid workers.
- Better worker representation, including but not limited to unions.
- Better and fewer working hours.
- Stimulating a massive wave of worker organizing in the United States and beyond.
- Organizing and supporting political causes and campaigns that put workers first.
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They're not the only ones who forgot. It's crazy how many people I know who shun the idea of any form of action beyond general protest in the face of corruption. I always ask them how they think change is going to happen when we have protest after protest and nothing to show for them, but they never have an answer. Things are going to get a lot worse before people realize we need to fight for our rights, and being angry on the internet - or even in person with a sign - is no longer enough to make a change.
When violence is used to maintain the status quo, announcing up front that you're unwilling to use violence in response tells those in power that they need not listen to you.
Perhaps the whitewashed, watered down MLK would beg to differ. He's been reduced to like three quotes for people to slap on their Facebook profiles; for companies to paste on their messaging in February; to be trotted out once a year like Weekend are Bernie's so people can feel the warm fuzzies inside and ignore actual, real-world racism and violence that is happening right now.
It's like anytime someone mentions anything above a megaphone and a cardboard sign there's always one of you that comes out of the woodwork and is like "MLK... Checkmate 😎". As another commenter said, MLK was not the civil rights movement of his time. The reason he is the poster child for that movement in that era is specifically because his personal convictions about non-violent protest are safe for the system as it is. Slavery can still exist, albeit in a different form. (Not chattel slavery) Racism can still exist, albeit in different forms. People who are victims of these systems are dismissed out-of-pocket because that's the goal: the system never wanted to change, and by making MLK the summation of "the civil rights movement" in the eye of the public, they infused passivity into the discourse. They tell you to make your signs, and get your megaphones, and write your blog posts because that's what is safe for the system to continue on as it has always been.
I 100% agree with your position, but I just want to correct a long-standing whitewashing that still tricks folks on the left; his nonviolence theory was a political strategy, not a moral position