Letters . . . December 13, 2023

No shackling of patients
November 14 was a busy day for U.S. PLP members and friends at the American Public Health Association (APHA) meetings in Atlanta, Georgia. We joined protests against Cop City in Atlanta and Israel’s genocide of Palestinians abroad. We were also instrumental in getting a policy passed by the APHA against shackling prisoners in health care settings (like handcuffing them to the metal rails on a hospital bed).

We worked for over a year with friends and PLP members to craft this resolution, just as we have done before on successful resolutions against police brutality and for prison abolition. This strong anti-racist policy statement gives us a new tool to demand humane treatment of prisoners at our local institutions. Two of us engaged in this policy work also hit the streets as a security team at the Cop City rally, openly advocating against capitalism and for communism. These actions opened the door to deeper political conversations at a later social event. A fellow rally security member was excited to meet a communist and to learn more about the PLP.

Handing out our newsletter, APHA Challenge, at sessions where we presented or spoke from the floor was another way we got into good conversations, including one with an interested activist who remembered us from our campaign last year around global vaccination access.

While PLP has provided consistent leadership in struggles at APHA for decades, today’s multiple crises for the global working class mean that the party group in the APHA must grow as class struggle intensifies!
*****

We will remember Claude
We live in a world where it’s “normal” to commit genocide, but it’s “unreasonable” to remember the dead.
In one New York City high school, on what would’ve been his 18th birthday, students wanted to memorialize Claude.* After what happened in March, in fear of retaliation, students wanted permission before putting up a memorial again.

Claude was a son, brother, friend, thinker, creator, student—and a victim. He was doubly targeted by the capitalist violence in the street and the racist education system in the schools. Following his killing, students had fought to memorialize Claude. In response, the administration had taken down the memorial not once, but twice! And each time, we rebuilt it bigger. (See CHALLENGE 4/12 and 4/26 for the full backstory.)  

When I met with the principal this week to submit the students’ request, she eventually said yes.  I quickly informed the students of the small win. I also asked staff to join me in wearing Black in memory of Claude.
Twelve hours later, before the school day, I received an email revoking permission to post the memorial.
When I arrived at school, I saw many workers in Black. Students and I began our morning with a circle in the hallway in front of the memorial. One student led us through a speech and ten seconds of silence. We then wrote messages on the poster.

After morning check-in, I was told by the administration to take down the memorial.

I replied, “No, I’m not doing that. I won’t be the one to remove it.”

She did a double take and said, “Okay, I’ll take it down myself. I’m not scared.”

The simple act of remembering a Black working-class student is defiance in this Black-run school. The fact that a memory of a child’s killing is so threatening exposes the racist anti-student nature of schools under bloody capitalism. One purpose of capitalist education is to recreate all the inequalities that make this profit system run. Capitalism’s schools censor and repress anti-working-class ideas. Bringing attention to Claude shatters the image of this “good school.” His memorial is a reminder that this whole system is disproportionately rigged against Black, Brown, and immigrant students. Such a system doesn’t deserve to exist.

Well, the principal finally backed down for now: “I don’t want to fight…we’ll keep it.”
Taking small risks like these helps build working-class confidence for the bigger battles ahead. Our next battle is fighting anti-Muslim racism (more next time).

Throughout the day, students from all grades signed the poster. Hundreds were careful to not let it wrinkle as they passed through the hallway. For now, the memorial is up.

Our principal was trying to bury Claude’s memory like how Israel buried 14,000 of our working-class siblings.
Students and education workers here have yet to see it, but the very group of people who kill kids overseas are the same people who kill kids in the streets.  

Be it Brooklyn or Gaza, this profit system tries to bury us, but the working class remembers. We will remember Claude. We will remember the genocide. In their memory, we will fight for the kind of world they deserve.

*The pseudonym Claude is inspired by the communist fighter and writer, Claude Mckay.
*****

Canada: worker organizer solidarity with our class in Gaza
A Progressive Labor Party (PLP) member organized a solidarity event with workers in Palestine in his rural Maritime-Canadian community. The event was part of a national day of action demanding that the Canadian government support an immediate ceasefire in Israel-Palestine and call for an end to the blockade of Gaza.

More than 250 workers and their families showed up, a substantial turnout in a town of 5000. The highlight was a “complicity tour” that involved marching to various sites in town at which designated speakers critically connected the location to Canadian support for the ongoing genocide. The stops included the local university, where the speaker called out the administration’s cowardly unwillingness to condemn Israeli state violence and made the case for the BDS (Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions) movement. Then it was on to Scotiabank, whose logo blazes the same shade as the blood of Palestinian children, with the institution’s massive investments in Elbit Systems, an Israeli death merchant.

The gap between a ceasefire demand and PLP’s call to turn the guns around appears wide indeed, but by working in a reform-oriented organization Party members will continue striving to keep the revolutionary horizon in view, testing our line among an expanding coalition of community members.
*****

Response to Gaza genocide: teacher stops business as usual
As the bombs were falling on our working-class brothers and sisters in the Levant (Gaza and surrounding area), the New York City Department of Education dropped a bomb on NYC teachers. The Chancellor put out an email saying that teachers could be fired for anything they post on social media. This is a clear escalation, and an example of liberal fascism increasing,  due to the need for the ruling class to silence any criticism of Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

Not a word of criticism was broached by the Teachers’ Union thus their silence is complicity. Upon seeing the letter, my club of Progressive Labor Party (PLP) teachers began formulating a plan to respond. One teacher shared a template that some teachers were using to write a letter to the teachers union’s president. We then decided that the club would take this course of action.

In addition, I decided that I wouldn’t be teaching my usual classes and would, instead, have a class discussion on Israel/Palestine. I was able to have a sharp conversation in the classroom and had several students — including some Muslim students — thank me. This also opened up the ability to have conversations with teachers, in which  I consistently brought up the Party’s analysis thatU.S. support of Israel’s genocide is all part of inter-imperialist rivalry.

While sitting in the teacher’s center during my off period, I quickly wrote a letter and asked for input from a young Latin teacher with whom I’d had a few political conversations. She was happy to help, and shared that not only was the Israeli genocide fueled by the Leviathan Oil fields off of the coast of Gaza, but that there were plans to create a canal that would rival Egypt’s Suez Canal and be totally under the control of the U.S. and Israel.

I then sent the letter to our entire staff. Several teachers thanked me, especially one teacher with a Muslim name who said he was afraid of speaking out due to racism. Many good conversations with students and teachers and much base-building occurred by following and carrying out the plans that my club had made. Of course, as part of our plan, we decided to share our experiences with CHALLENGE to help the Party grow and learn.