Letters of July 7

I am not free.
The following poem has been written by a student.
I am not free because I’m forced to work to help my family and afford my necessities in order to survive.
I am not free because I don’t have spare time to practice self-care or to have fun like other people my age do.
I am not free because I can’t treat myself with the things I want and desire because I spend most of my income on my needs.
I am not free because I feel tired and depressed from being trapped in the cycle of poverty and capitalist laws.
I am not free because I understand that unfortunately we are forced to participate in consumerism which results in the exploitation of the working class and the enlarging of the capitalists’ pockets.
I am not free because I see how others can’t break free from the claws of these capitalist rulers.
I am not free because I hear the calls for justice for the deaths of innocent victims of the racist police system. The call for equality in our city.
I am not free because under capitalism we all are trapped in a never-ending unfair cycle; we are forced to risk it all and give it all just to make the rich richer.
We are not free until we honor people’s hard work, dreams and contributions.
 We are not free until we respect every single right each person has and the fact that they are humans like all of us, not some type of producing machine.
We are not free until we make sure that everyone’s safety and future are secured, until we make justice for those who have been robbed.
We are not free until capitalism is abolished and we prioritize our people and environment.
We must fight for a better communist world with justice and equality for everyone.
We must demand the abolishment of unbeneficial racist capitalist laws.
Only then, can we all be truly free.
*****
Red on radio: Stateless, movie on racist borders
I was lucky to get on the ‘New Day’ WBAI, NY radio talk show. The topic was a movie called Stateless about a Dominican who returns to the Dominican Republic (DR) where his mother was born but loses his birth papers and is subjected to such racism and persecution that he is forced to seek refuge and help from relatives in Haiti which is part of the same island, Hispaniola. Another caller said that even though the vast majority of Hispaniola is Black, the DR’s racism towards Haitians was due to occupation and rule by colonialism which feared Haitian resistance against oppression to the point of denying any contact.
My comment was that capitalism and imperialism have always tried to eliminate even the very existence of the working class because it threatens their power. Today the words ‘worker’ or ‘capitalist’ are rarely used. Everything is spoken of as left and right or red and blue states.
 I said, “Capitalism means profit over workers' lives while communism means abolition of profit and that communist workers’ revolution is the one and only force in history ever to stop the imperialists in their tracks.”
 I said further that the DR, the U.S., and the rest of the capitalist world has a deadly fear of Haiti’s history of defeating imperialist armies and in 1804 they led the first and only slave rebellion, and established the first democratic country in the western hemisphere. Haitian immigrants with revolutionary ideas going to New Orleans in the U.S. were a big threat to the U.S. slave holding society which led to many U.S. invasions and occupations of Haiti.
*****
The rising threat of fungal diseases
The June,  2021 issue of Scientific American had a cover-story about the developing threat of fungal diseases because there are hardly any antifungal medications!  I wrote the following letter to the editor. Hopefully you find it useful.

The article Deadly Kingdom (Scientific American,  June,  2021) is a real wake-up call.  Not only are viruses and bacteria a deadly threat but now fungal diseases (which are far more difficult to treat) are an even greater threat.  However,  an even greater threat is that Big Pharma is refusing to develop new antiviral,  anti-bacterial,  and antifungal medications because they are "just not profitable enough." The Covid-19 vaccines are NOT a valid example of rapid antiviral medication development. Most of the mRNA vaccine research had already been done, the U.S. Government guaranteed that the pharmaceutical industry would not lose any money if their vaccines failed,  and the so-called "free" vaccines were fully paid for by taxpayers so Big Pharma made out like bandits. And the half-billion vaccines being "donated" to the world by the United States are also being paid for by taxpayers, giving the pharmaceutical industry another big pay-day.  This is one more example of how capitalism,  with its profit motive requirement,  cannot meet the needs of the vast majority of the world's population.
*****