Letters of February 17

Raise hell with radios!
I recently discovered a WBAI radio talk show in New York city called A New Day airing at 7 am when many workers commute to jobs with their cell phones. I was able to get on the air a few times already and got to mention our www.plp.org website.
Recently I got on the air about the Bronx Hunts Point Teamsters strike that was attacked by police. I said:
 Police are the corporate dictatorship’s first budget priority because they break strikes and demonstrations that threaten their bosses’ profits. I was with transit workers who shut the city down for eleven days in 1964 and we won because as the bosses said, ‘You’ve got a gun to our heads’. Workers need to understand their power when united. Teamsters feed the city, they need to organize with transit, hospital, sanitation, service and delivery workers, and the public to build a working-class party to run society.
I think some of our Party members with important struggle experience could get on these many talk shows and bring our Party to workers.
*****
Collectivity versus individualism
The February 3 issue of CHALLENGE had an excellent back page article comparing capitalist individualism/freedom with communist collectivity. But what is this individual freedom and how is it tied so closely to capitalism?
Let’s look at the question of vaccines. Do we all have the individual freedom to choose to get vaccinated? No. Not only is there not enough of a supply but also the distribution has been badly handled by a government mostly interested in protecting big business and their profits. But there could be a much greater supply. Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca are “free” to compete to enter the vaccine market with inferior 70 percent effective vaccines. But for the last two months, they could have already been producing the 95 percent effective vaccines that are already approved.
And facilities in India and South Africa could be producing generic versions of those vaccines. But capitalist production for profit won’t allow production for human needs. For the last two months, workers around the world could have been cooperating on how to get everyone vaccinated much sooner rather than later. Instead, capitalist ideology teaches us to “jump the line” or just use bribery as many rich people are doing. And to justify this individualistic, selfish behavior, we are told it’s human nature.
The CHALLENGE article gives some examples of communist collectivity from China and Russia when they were socialist societies led by communists. Some remnants of that collectivity remain today. But there are numerous examples today of working-class collectivity all around the world. Like most things, collectivity is a class issue.
Capitalists compete and exploit their workers. So they promote individualism and selfishness. Workers fight back and have to stick together just to make any little headway against capitalist exploitation. That’s working-class collectivity.
We see it today with the massive antiracist protests against police murders and with essential workers in hospitals going the extra mile caring for their patients. We see it in the massive recent strikes in India. We see it during wars, disasters, and economic crashes all caused by capitalism. Workers going out of their way to help other workers. We need to develop this working-class collectivity into communist collectivity so we can organize a revolutionary movement to get rid of capitalism once and for all. Join the Progressive Labor Party!
*****
Why call them Big Fascists
Here’s a letter about a discussion our area had about why we call the dominant capitalist wing “the Big Fascists.” I think one of the reasons is because they are the ones who will lead the workers in the U.S. into the next world war.
I wanted to add that the Big Fascists are slicker. The Small Fascists are the open KKK members, Nazis, and Proud Boys. They are very open about their racism which keeps them a little smaller in numbers and more fringe-like.
However, the Big Fascists have their culture and media to build a larger fascist movement. They can get many good people to “fight for freedom,” “fight for democracy,” or “fight for the best government there has ever been.”
Like former U.S. President John F. Kennedy’s famous quote, “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country!” It is fascist. Getting lots of workers to think that they are fighting for what is good and merciful when it is really for the power and profits of the capitalist class.
*****
Substitute teacher’s take on capitalist negligence  
I am a substitute teacher in Indianapolis who has worked a total of one month and three days this entire school year due to schools being reopened late due to coronavirus infections and then reclosed again in early November after only being opened previously for a month.
The first school I was assigned to, I regularly worked at before the pandemic. The first day back, it was dangerous. In the Kindergarten class, I had worn masks that were too big, they did not know how to socially distance, the desk partitions were cheap foam, and the children had no understanding of why keeping their masks on was important. The school bosses were not fully prepared. I made up my mind to not take any assignments with K through second grades.
The next assignment  I had was long-term teaching Spanish in another elementary school. This school was a mini superspreader, as some students and staff contracted Covid-19. Every day for a month, I was taking a chance on my life as I have preexisting asthma. The school's leadership was anti-working-class and was sloppy on Covid-19 protocols such as on social distancing with staff and students. The principal was a joke. I was damn lucky I did not contract Covid-19. Meanwhile,  two teachers in metro school districts died from Covid-19.
Shortly before my last day, the school board announced schools would shut back down due to Covid-19 levels being too high.
Covid is a virus of capitalism. Under communism, schools would not be opened during a pandemic, as alternative learning methods will be used. It’s social murder to send teachers, support staff, and students to die in these schools.
HHHHH
CHALLENGE response:  We can all agree that the bosses’ schools are unsafe. School reopening is a lose-lose dilemma for our class. Remote learning treats students’ minds as expendable while in-person learning treats students’ safety as expendable. Either way, there is no regard for health, mental, or physical. Is the choice to stop working in those schools pro-worker? It might be helpful to think about essential workers and how it represents an impossible choice for them, too. The working class has never had it easy.
There is no returning to safe schools under capitalism. Young children, especially Black and Latin, are highly vulnerable to the bosses’ attacks. The students’ minds and health, where you choose to decline assignments, are not disposable. More than learning, schools provide health services, lunch, physical therapy, counseling, and other related services. Calling to keep schools closed “until they are safe” without recognizing this reality, and without genuine planning for student needs, undermines the cause of building working-class solidarity. As communists and members of the working class, we must be a part of the struggle. One step is to ask comrades and your co-workers how they are fighting for students during this capitalist crisis.