Letters of August 1

PLP Women Lead, Party Grows in South Asia

To add to recent discussions on cultural obstacles to overcoming sexism and recruiting women to PLP in areas where women are severely oppressed, it’s encouraging to learn about how working-class women were recruited in one South Asian country.

It happened during a so-called natural disaster, made worse by capitalist greed. Thousands of people became homeless, including some members of the Party.  For almost two years they lived in tents during the freezing winters that followed. Reconstruction money that poured into the area from the government, overseas organizations and individual donors, was being diverted into the pockets of national and local officials. It was also gobbled up by NGO’s with expensive operating costs.  

Little was going to the victims until the Party organized a fight demanding funds to rebuild homes. It was a strenuous struggle, lasting several months, carried out in difficult living conditions. But eventually the community’s militant actions resulted in a distribution of building materials and financial aid for reconstruction.  

During the months of demonstrations and confrontation with the authorities, the Party built ties within the community and recruited new members. In one family females and males joined. This was not an easy task in a society where unrelated men and women cannot mix freely, although less rigidly imposed for bourgeois, educated women. The reason for the success in recruiting women can be found in the anti-sexist politics of the leaders and their commitment to making women equal partners in the struggle.

A female comrade, helped the women — housewives and low-paid workers who’d lived lives conforming to custom — to overcome their fears of stepping outside traditional female roles and become activists.

Most important was educating male members about the role sexism plays under capitalism in maintaining ruling class domination of both men and women and the importance of the full inclusion of women in building a communist society. 

One of the women recruited in the struggle went on to organize other working-class women in a fight against the local utilities company when a rise in the cost of electricity added hardship to their lives.

Out of these struggles two Party clubs were formed, run by women, surreptitiously attended by men. Today there are more clubs where men and women both take part. 

What happened in this region underscores how culture is a capitalist concept that serves to reinforce the class system with women at the bottom of the heap. Their unpaid labor in the home and super exploitation in the lowest-paying jobs outside maintain the profits of the ruling class. When the stereotypes are challenged by communist ideas of equality, women break away from customary behavior and play an essential role in building an egalitarian society.

There are other examples from this part of the world; after the Russian revolution, thousands of women in the Muslim states gathered in the streets to throw off their burkas, the symbol of their repression. In nearby Afghanistan, women were a significant force during the growth of a Marxist movement and government in the 70’s and 80’s.

Worldwide, sexism hinders the growth of a powerful working-class movement. PLP recognizes that the fight against sexism is inseparable from the fight against capitalism and makes it primary along with racism in building the Party. 

Anti-sexist fighter

‘One Day Longer, One day Stronger!’ — Rally vs. Hospital Layoffs

At the June 28 rally at Downstate Hospital to stop layoffs, CHALLENGE interviewed a rally speaker. 

Q. There were hundreds of workers and community rallying. Is this enough to stop the layoffs?

A. Possibly not this time, but we have made an impact.  We showed there is a working class-force to be considered and that new leaders are stepping forward.  Each of the 500 participants has hundreds of friends that will become involved.  An impromptu chant was picked up loudly and enthusiastically that showed hope for the future, that we will last and grow, “One Day Longer, One Day Stronger.”  This is an important beginning.

Q. What lessons have you learned from this?

A. An important lesson is that ordinary determined workers with a vision can organize against the layoffs and Downstate’s closing; We needed to do something besides writing letters to the governor.  We needed to show solidarity between all the unions and job categories and to express our anger over this racist attack.  Many different workers organized for this: nursing assistants, community people, unit clerks, doctors, housekeepers, students, clerical staff, computer programmers, clinical assistants, nurses and absolutely no sellout politicians. 

Imagine the result if any one of the unions and their parent organizations (like CSEA [Civil Service Eployees Association] with its 200,000) had thrown themselves wholeheartedly behind us.  We could have had not 500 but 50,000. Then we could encircle the hospital and grow until layoffs are stopped and the governor finds the money our community needs.  

Q. Governor Cuomo says there is no money; how do you respond?

A. Many speakers exposed this lie.  Cuomo has plenty of money for his banker and investor friends. When he talks of budget deficit this only applies to workers’ salaries.  Cuomo has intentionally cut Medicaid to Brooklyn hospitals and he reimburses double the amount to Manhattan Hospitals. Cuomo has done nothing to stop Federal aid cuts, aid that now goes to make war, to build drones and missiles.  

Cuomo has supplied millions and billions to private contractors and bankers, (see NY Times exposé “Committee to Save NY”).  These bankers and investors like Stephen Berger and Stanley Brezenoff and JP Morgan’s Jamie Dimon write state health policy to benefit their class and remove our jobs and vital services.  Two years ago the State attached a private hospital, Victory Memorial, (bankrupted through the usual corruption) to Downstate.  Budget problems for Downstate then accelerated, partly because a 10-year $100-million lease for Victory was signed with bank fees plus interest that will probably mean over $200 million for a nearly empty structure.

Q. There were 400 CHALLENGEs distributed at the rally, Were there any other media reports on the event?

A. No other media, even though a press advisory was sent to all the press.  This lack of media coverage of fight-back seems to be part of their plan to keep us workers in the dark about events important to us.  That is why so few in the community know that this vital hospital which serves 75,000 ER visits a year may close. Having CHALLENGE report on our actions helps our struggle.

CHALLENGE: The working class thanks you for your efforts showing workers will take action against injustice and that around the world workers are understanding that a system that can’t provide health care must be destroyed, and we can rebuild a world that serves all workers: a communist world.

Red Hospital Worker 

Profiling: Capitalist Tool

At the Harlem anti-racist march (CHALLENGE, 7/4) I was asked for an inteview at 110th street. The following is a general description of the discussion between the interviewer (I) and myself, a CHALLENGE seller (CS):

I: Your sign says, “If You See That Capitalist Kills, Say Something!” What is its meaning and why are you marching?

CS: I’m here to support our children who are being terrorized, dehumanized and murdered because the capitalist bosses know that their racist profit system has no future for our youth and are trying to force them into being cannon fodder for their imperialist wars. These bosses still fear the national anti-racist rebellions of the 1960s in dozens of cities and neighborhoods like Harlem. In Los Angeles alone there was one billion dollars of property damages and ended only after two army divisions were recalled from Vietnam.

I: Were you ever racially profiled?

CS: Yes, as a youth (white) in the 1950s I demonstrated for Civil Rights legislation like anti-lynch and anti-poll tax laws (on black voters) and was threatened with arrest many times for being in cars with black people or even staying with them at hotels which hosted Civil Rights conventions.

I: So you’ve been against racism for a long time?

CS: Yes, I recall with disgust my Catholic priest describing to our class that the Jewish boys from the synagogue across the street were part of a religion that murdered “our lord” which led to violence. I remember a boss who threatened my factory job because I was disgracing the white “race” by letting black and Latino people outwork me. I remember a landlord threatening to rent to black people if we refused a rent increase. The capitalist bosses use racism, sexism and religion all over the world to divide workers and to steal trillions in profits from the wage differentials. I was called a “dirty communist” and threatened with lifetime blacklisting [job ban] for trying to organize a union in a sweatshop with unsafe conditions. I didn’t even know what a communist was then but I quickly learned that any worker who threatened bosses’ profits was profiled as a communist, so I guess I was a communist.

I: Are you a communist now?

CS: Yes, and this CHALLLENGE newspaper fights to destroy capitalism and racism and describes how our Progressive Labor Party is organizing a revolutionary movement for a communist system that abolishes wages, money and profits and works collectively to build a worker-run society.

A Comrade

Letters of July 18

‘We must stand up and take back our streets!’

There’s a fine line between justice and murder. Legally justice is the proper administration of the law; the fair and equitable treatment of all individuals under the law. The dictionary definition for murder is the crime of killing another person deliberately, not in self-defense or with any other extenuating circumstance recognized by law.

Time and time again we’ve watched police nationwide violate our rights and gun down our youth. NY cops hide behind their badges as excuses to kill innocent young men and women with no more penalty than a police desk job or termination after drawn-out legal procedures.

The most recent act of deadly force occurred when [a black] NYPD Det. Atkins gunned down a good friend of mine, Shantel Davis. As someone who knew them both, I know this is a gross lack of judgment by the NYPD for allowing a bigot such as Atkins to remain on the force long enough to kill an unarmed individual. I’ve had several encounters with Atkins before stop-and-frisk was an “issue.” I was interrogated, searched and taunted with no more probable cause then my skin color and gender.

Atkins is not alone! Even though he’s solely responsible for murdering Shantel Davis, he’s just one of the many NYPD’s ticking time bombs. We workers pay the salary of the same officers who turn around to harass, illegally jail and gun down our children and grandchildren.

Don’t wait until they kill your child. Stand up before the NYPD murders someone else’s child. It’s a vicious cycle in our community where our recurring encounters with police have become so normal that people ignore the injustices and dismiss it as routine.

Why is this so widely accepted in the urban communities? Why does your zip code and skin color determine how much police interaction you will have, whether engaged in illegal activities or not? We rely on politicians and TV personalities to broadcast our feelings of disrespect and hopefulness but when will we, as a whole, stand up for ourselves, our rights and our children’s future?

We’ve asked for equality long enough and still face some of the same barriers we’ve been fooled into believing we’ve broken down. They kill our unarmed youth and then flood the media with rap sheets and allegations as if to justify their actions. They never flood the media with allegations and infractions of the officers whom they stand by so firmly.

We can no longer rely on department “investigations” and Internal Affairs to produce the truth. We must get the answers ourselves. We must educate our friends and family on what police are and aren’t allowed to do to us and lift the veil which has been placed over society’s face and led us to believe these police actions are justified. I’ve been pulled over and harassed while I watch countless people walk past as if nothing was happening. We need to stand up as a community and take back our streets!

There’s no reason why, in 2012, we should still be facing a racism issue in a country that calls itself the “Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave.” This is definitely the land of the brave because when you’re a young black male growing up in these inner city neighborhoods you’re brave for even walking these streets, already knowing that the police will target you, crime or no crime. My friend was gunned down with no explanation no apologies and no remorse.

Racism no longer confines itself to Caucasians hating African-Americans. This disease has buried itself deep within our community and has caused a sick self-hatred like no other. I don’t know exactly Atkins’ nationality but I know his skin color was as dark as mine. They’ve drilled it into our heads that we’re a threat to society and we in turn gun down and fear our own brothers and sisters.

We’ve came a long way when it comes to white people and racism. You even see Caucasians more actively involved in the movement than we ourselves. Now the tables have turned and we’re now forced to deal with racism amongst our own brothers and sisters in our community.

It starts with us. We, as the younger generation who deal with the struggles everyday, must become more active in the fight for equality. If we do not unify and stand together as one, there’s no way we can defeat the demons we face on a daily basis.

STOP relying on other people and authority figures to do the work. We blame the system and speak of hopefulness but we are the ones that have the voice and ability to change the system. This is a subject I can speak about all day, but I end this chapter with a question: What will you do to change the wrongs around you?

Anti-racist Youth

May Day: Salvador PL’ers Expose FMNL Traitors

On May Day in El Salvador there were two marches: one led by the pseudo-leftists, the FMLN (Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front), and another led by angry students and unions such as teachers and health care workers who currently fight to get out from under the FMNL’s influence, but still retain some socialist nostalgia.

PLP participated in the march to honor the memory of the workers killed by the bosses in Chicago in 1886. But we also marched with the rest of the working class struggling against — and to get rid of — capitalist exploitation. 

PLP organized 116 comrades into four collectives to coordinate agitation, distributing DESAFIO and 5,000 fliers which condemned the capitalist massacres and wars forced on us. The so-called leftist unions only asked for reforms. The FMLN marched as if this were a religious procession, but simultaneously acted as cops.

One FMLN member — a former major of Soyapango, Carlos Ruiz, called “the little devil” —  took our literature and then insulted our comrade. This only mirrors the FMLN’s service to the capitalists’ interests.

College students used loudspeakers to condemn this element. Our literature, including 100 CHALLENGES, was well received by the workers, indicating the great potential we have and the fact that we have much more to do.

The workers in El Salvador, as in the rest of the world, have no other alternative than to organize ourselves in the PLP to fight for a communist world, one that hoists only one red flag — we are one international working class.

For this we need real communist discipline as well as to break with capitalist illusions, with the individualism and selfishness which the bosses’ propaganda has used to fragment us for decades.  

We must break the chains that imprison us — wars, fascism, borders, sexism, racism, nationalism — to fight all the evils of this murderous system in every corner of the world. We have the potential to organize the international working class, to teach our children to turn their guns against the bosses, not against their working-class sisters and brothers. Join the PLP. 

Comrade from El Salvador

Obama’s Minimum Wage Fakery: Starvation, Inc.

The U.S. federal government defines the “federal poverty level” (FPL) as the “minimum amount of gross income that a family needs for food, clothing, transportation, shelter and other necessities.”  FPL is currently set by the Census Bureau — which is part of the Department of Commerce, part of Obama’s cabinet — at $23,050 per year for a family of four (about $11 per hour). The administration is required to update it annually according to rising inflation, but it is based only on an estimate from the food budget for minimal nutrition without taking into account how other necessities have risen in cost. 

Contrast this with something called “self-sufficiency wages,” which is based on the amount needed to provide the necessities without any government aid, whether that aid is in the form of tax credits, welfare payments, food stamps, Medicaid, public housing, child care, or any other subsidy. You might think those would be about the same figure, but you would be wrong.

A professor in the University of Washington School of Social Work, Diana Pearce, has calculated self-sufficiency wages based on most of the 50 states in the U.S. She has come up with figures for families of various sizes and in various states and counties. For example, in Tucson, a family of four needs $49,563 per year ($23.83 per hour). The federal minimum wage is $7.65 per hour, which doesn’t even meet their own $11-per-hour level needed to barely rise out of their definition of poverty. Therefore it takes more than twice the FPL wage to live. You are not defined by the feds as impoverished unless you make less than half that amount.

In other words, Congress and the Obama administration (and all administrations) don’t give a bloody damn if you starve to death or live on the street or have to leave your young kids home alone while you work. More than half the families in the U.S. live on less than $49,563 per year, the self-sufficiency wage. That is, more than half of the workers in the U.S. are actually impoverished, while the super rich grow ever richer with the help of Obama and the Congress. Can anyone doubt that we need to overthrow this system and replace it with one run by the working class?

Saguaro Rojo

Meeting CHALLENGE Seller ‘Is highlight of my week’

Having the privilege of being one of the CHALLENGE sellers at the recent Unitarian convention, I encountered mostly friendly responses.  There was one article about the main topic this year:  Immigration Reform, which seemed a good idea others might emulate — making sure an article pertinent to any convention’s topic, be it a union, the MLA (Modern Language Association) or any national health association, is in the paper during the convention.

While selling this year, several times I indicated it was a communist paper and usually got “interesting” as a response, but nothing as outstanding as one in particular: a young woman delegate listened as I pointed out a few articles, ending with, “and this is a Communist newspaper.”

She stared at me very intently, “So you are a communist and a Unitarian?” I said yes, and added that many of the principles were the same.  

 Her face became so serious that I had no idea what she was thinking, and I became a little apprehensive.  After a long moment she said, “This is the highlight of my week, meeting you.”  She took my information gladly, however was reluctant to give me hers.  She did say that she would be in touch.  I think she will.

A Unitarian Communist

Letters of June 20

PLP Helps Fight Sexism

A group of students in a school where PLP has a base decided to protest bullying in general, and bullying of homosexuals in particular. A student who has a CHALLENGE network of ten papers was part of the leadership of this protest. The students wore black tape over their mouths to symbolize the silence that exists around the discrimination that homosexual teens get.

The PL teacher saw this protest as an opportunity to engage his students in a struggle on sexism within his classroom. He discussed the social identities that exist under capitalism.  The PL teacher made sure to stress that we shouldn’t unite based on these identities, but unite based upon our identity as the working class.  He further discussed how capitalism uses racism and sexism to divide and conquer the working class.  He pointed out that sex is biological anatomy and gender is what society demands the individual conform to based upon that biology. 

Sexism is discrimination and oppression based upon the roles that capitalism demands human beings adhere to due to their sexual anatomy.  Since communism means the abolition of “race” and redefining gender roles after the revolution, many students came closer to understanding the need to abolish a system that brutalizes people based upon gender roles and their skin color.

A conversation on bullying also led to students discussing the fact that the U.S. acted like a bully to the whole world. This conversation on U.S. imperialism also touched on racism towards Muslims and dovetailed with the racist mass murderer who’s on trial in Norway.  Pointing out the intersections of systemic oppression in the classroom helped to clarify how capitalism affects us all. Many of those students who participated the most in the class discussion were already CHALLENGE readers, but those who aren’t yet will start getting the paper.

By clearly illustrating PLP’s line on sexism and fighting for a communist analysis of bullying, racism, sexism, and capitalism, opportunities to build the Party and organize for May Day were seized. Communists must help students as they fight back against all forms of oppression while clearly illustrating the interconnection of that struggle to capitalism as a whole.  

Communist Teacher

PLP School Unites Workers Across the Caribbean

During a communist school in the Caribbean, workers worldwide spoke about how to write for CHALLENGE in a collective manner. We discussed drug trafficking as one of the many evils capitalism generates, and how only workers united for communism in PLP can end it once and for all. We realized we have more similarities than differences and understood the need to build an international party. There is no difference in the way that capitalists use workers, regardless if you live in Pakistan, China, Japan or South America. 

Imagine that you are a single mother with three children; you receive government assistance. It isn’t enough to pay for rent, education, dress your kids, or buy food. An “opportunity” presents itself: transporting drugs. What do you do? Accept and take the risk of imprisonment or death? Or do you accept that your family will suffer for the rest of their lives? This is only a natural scene under  capitalism. The only options the working class is offered is oppression or more oppression. Drug trafficking has many levels, but the effects it has on the working class are devastating.

Drug Tracking in El Salvador manifests itself in many individual forms or by using distribution through neighborhood gangs. El Salvador is just a corridor where drugs pass through without control. Two years ago, two tons of cocaine from Colombia were discovered that were on their way to the United States. Drug lords use men, women and children as drug traffickers.  

In the Dominican Republic, drugs are a tool to keep the youth and working class away from class consciousness. Drugs are kept and distributed by capitalists through the corruption of governments. We must fight in this struggle. We cannot abandon our youth. For example, in the Dominican Republic during the 1970s, the youth fought for a better education system and for the lives of workers. They went out on the streets under communist flags. However, now the drug lords have put the youth to sleep with drugs and “easy money.” The reality is that they end up dead.  

In New Jersey, the government and the police depend a lot on the drug market in the poor neighborhoods. In Newark, unemployment and poverty for black and Latino youth is highest. Since the 1950s, factories have left Newark for cheaper and more controllable labor elsewhere. The youth have no future. That’s why they’ve fallen prey to drugs and crime.

Poor workers became involved in heroin and other drugs that began with the Vietnam War. Also, the capitalist music industry spreads drug use through their artists’ lyrics and they also help drug trafficking.

I’m a teacher and many of my students sell drugs to help their families survive. This is only an example on how capitalists use drugs to maintain inequalities and horror. That’s why the only solution for us is to fight for a system for the workers — communism. 

A comrade

Honored to Be Part of Brooklyn’s May Day

May Day 2012 painted the world red. The streets of Brooklyn were paved with workers sick and tired of this racist capitalist society. The day began with a rally to send a message to workers that we shall not quiver in fear of the police, to show that bosses may cut our benefits and paychecks but they can never cut worker’s spirits. Then a two-mile march of red glory down streets of Brooklyn as we try to rally up the dormant hearts of the exploited workers, followed with chants and CHALLENGEs. Workers young and old never yielded as they continued marching strong.

Afterwards, we celebrated this joyous occasion with dinner and a program. Comrades worked hard cooking delicious food, doing music presentations, and giving their thoughts about communism. It was awesome and an honor to be part of this year’s May Day.

Young Red

Letters of June 6

‘The Effect of Communism Was Spreading Like Wildfire’

My experience at May Day was unbelievable. I’m a middle school student who was recently introduced to PLP. From the moment  I saw red flags, the noise of chants accompanied by hundreds of people was incredible. I was amazed by people marching, shouting, holding banners along with PLP. I realized why all these people were screaming at the top of their lungs: the effect of communism was spreading like wildfire. May Day was created to admire and appreciate the effort of workers that make up the world we live in. This rebellion is a thing that all workers should join to create a new world and society. I’m proud that I was in that rebellion that represented so much more.

A Middle School Student

Israel-Palestine: Jobless, Depressed, Then Joins PLP

I was personally touched by the article “Pakistan: Workers Fighting Hell of Capitalist Crisis” in the April 11th edition of CHALLENGE. I was especially touched by the story of the young Pakistani worker with a Master’s Degree who committed suicide after being unemployed for over a year after graduating. The same thing almost happened here, in Israel-Palestine, to my fiancée.

I am engaged to a young woman (now 27 years old) who finished her Bachelor’s Degree in Biology in 2009. She had a year of job experience in a lab and a lot of motivation to work in the field. But there were no jobs for her, neither in her profession nor in other, even unprofessional, lines of work. Jobless, she had to live off her parent’s savings, which were intended for funding her Master’s Degree.

After a year of unemployment, her self esteem was devastated; she saw herself as a burden to me (then her boyfriend) and to her family. Her mental health deteriorated and she started having obsessive thoughts about her appearance. We tried to look for professional help, but private help was too expensive for us, and the overworked, understaffed, underfunded public system didn’t lift a finger to help her.

Eventually, in April 2010, she tried to commit suicide and almost succeeded; she had to be hospitalized in an intensive-care unit (which, luckily, is funded by the state healthcare insurance here in Israel) for a weekend. This tragic event has finally moved the public system to give a little bit of help — namely, anti-depressants — and moved the National Insurance (Israel’s Social Security) to finally give her disability benefits of 2,200 ILS (around $600) a month. This was not enough to live on, but it did allow her to survive  longer on her savings.

Now, in 2012, she is still unemployed, living off the disability benefits and some help from me and her mother. While the medication helps her a little bit, she is still quite depressed and dissatisfied with herself, as the capitalist system was unable to allow her to make use of her talents for the benefit of others.

I must say that she joined PL in May 2010 and is now fighting alongside the other comrades in our club for a communist future. But as long as capitalism survives, she is condemned to poverty and a feeling of uselessness. Today, in May Day 2012, we are fighting for a real future for her and the rest of our generation — a communist future!

Red Grad Student from Israel/Palestine

Veteran PL’er Proclaims, ‘Hail to the Youth!’

I have been in the Party for many years. Lately I have not been able to attend many Party functions. On April 28 I was able to attend the May Day event in Chicago. I was impressed. The youth of our Party ran the event. They did an excellent job. The Party and the working class have nothing to fear with them running the struggle for workers’ revolution. They were very punctual.

Long live PLP. Long live our Party youth.

Red Senior

‘Pathway’ Program Needs Better Class Analysis

In the article “CUNY Profs Slam Racist, Sexist Pathway to Ignorance” in CHALLENGE (3/28), it’s nice to hear about the Professional Staff Congress’s stand against CUNY Pathways. However, this one seems to be a struggle by university professors to keep control over their curriculum and to maintain a certain intellectual prestige in what they teach. Let’s not forget that this prestige was the very thing that Chancellor Goldstein spoke about preserving when he, along with the Board of Trustees, got rid of open admissions a few years ago, effectively beginning the racist purge of CUNY. This “prestige” is what’s keeping a lot of poor, black, Latino, South Asian, and immigrant students out of 4-year colleges at CUNY and is making it harder for students to transfer credits from other schools and community colleges. 

I’ve also noticed that a lot of my own professors, who are actually very conservative, have opposed CUNY Pathways, and the reason they’ve done so is precisely to maintain this racist “prestige.” Of course, not all the professors who stand against CUNY Pathways feel this way, but the article fails to see the entire class character of the institution of CUNY. Students need to graduate faster, learn better, and be better prepared. So, there is a contradiction in CUNY Pathways which needs to be better analyzed because it does let students easily transfer credits from community colleges. 

A bourgeois education is a lose-lose situation for workers, especially for those among us who are black and Latino. Dismissing CUNY Pathways by just pointing out “the subtle racism of lower standards” fails to see the issue in its racist entirety.

CUNY Red

Agent Orange Genocide Hits 3 Million 40 Years Later

Should there be any doubt about CHALLENGE’s defining the U.S. war against Vietnam as genocidal, one need only read a report published in the Nation of Change website written by documentary-producer Jon Mitchell. The genocide was revealed in an interview with Vietnam veteran Larry Carlson (now 67) by The Japan Times and the Ryukyu Asian TV station. Carlson is one of three vets awarded disability payments by the Veterans Administration for exposure to Agent Orange, resulting from handling the storage of the toxic herbicide on Okinawa.

From December 1956 to April 1967 the U.S. military sprayed huge amounts of Agent Orange over the jungles and crops of Vietnam and Laos in its herbicidal warfare campaign to destroy those areas. The Vietnam Red Cross estimates that 40 years later 3,000,000 Vietnamese are still suffering from exposure to the dioxins contained in the herbicide.

The range of death-dealing sickness it caused includes a variety of cancers, skin diseases and diabetes, among others. It is also fetotoxic: children died in the womb and 150,000 are now suffering from these illnesses while others have been born with crippling defects, both mental and physical. The ground in southern Vietnam where Agent Orange has been stored is still highly toxic. The soil near Danang Air Base has recorded dioxin levels 30,000 times that which is considered normal.

Veteran Carlson said he and other GIs and Okinawan stevedores were exposed to Agent Orange when unloading thousands of barrels in 1965 and ’66 for shipment to Vietnam. It is still present in the soil there. So far 130 of these vets have lodged claims for disability payments but “experts say the number of those exposed could be in the thousands.” Carlson himself says he is “the tip of the iceberg.” His disability payments cover a daily dose of 20 different pills required to control the poisons in his body.

Such a weapon of mass destruction affecting millions is an integral part of U.S. imperialism’s inevitable war-making to dominate the world’s resources, energy and otherwise, and of its global drive to exploit the labor of millions of workers. Only a communist revolution by those millions can rid the planet of these most vicious killers the world has ever known.

Long-time comrade

PLP College Work Growing

Nine months ago, I joined the NYC PLP college club after a two-year hiatus from political work. Since the club’s formation in September 2011, we have held CHALLENGE sales at the campuses where each of us attend school. As a result, I sell CHALLENGE at The City College of New York (CCNY). 

I was nervous about selling on campus because I had never mentioned my political life to any of my friends. I was worried they’d shun me if they knew I was a communist. I ended up telling them and, to my surprise, they were okay with it (although they didn’t fully agree with PL’s politics).

The campus sales have overall been positive. We’ve gone from selling 100 papers a sale to selling 250. Those numbers come from selling on a Friday, a relatively lax day at CCNY. This boost in numbers also come from the extra help we’ve received. Through our sales, we’ve been able to get contacts. One CCNY student who we have kept in constant contact has been selling CHALLENGES with us. He has also come around to our events and is very friendly to our politics. Other students have shown their support by giving donations or taking extra papers for their friends.

I am a part of two campus clubs. The first was the Sci-Fi, Games and Animation (SGA). It’s an uphill struggle getting my SGA friends to read CHALLENGE, but I’ve been able to distribute a few papers and I even have some political discussions. Another group I’ve joined is Leaders Against Systemic Injustice (LASI). Not much is going on because I joined towards the ending of the semester. We are preparing for a forum in the Fall semester. I look forward to being busy in the Fall, as I am part of two clubs, school work, and building the PLP.

Red Student

Letters of May 9

PLP Strikes Back Against Sexism 

“STRIKE!” shouted a male comrade of PLP.  “Against Sexism!” replied the crowd of women, men, young, not-so-young, comrades, and others meeting the Party for the first time at a cultural event organized by PL’ers and friends. The poetry, songs, and stories of struggle clearly centered our Party’s fight against the special oppression of women as a key element of anti-sexist action.  Sexism, like racism, uses artificial social identities and roles to divide the working class. PLP specifically targeted the attacks capitalism unleashes on women and celebrated their heroic struggles.

The Culture Committee struggled and planned collectively in a multi-generational setting to create this event. In a process that focused on each PL’er on the committee struggling against their own individualism and emphasizing the collective, the communist essence of the struggle against sexism was clarified. Once this happened, culture became a weapon as each part of the program emphasized utilizing friends of PL participating in songs and developing the leadership of female comrades.

Reading the poetry of Tillie Olsen and a letter from Anna Louise Strong alongside a letter from a veteran comrade discussing her growth as a revolutionary communist illustrated the consistent role women have played in the international communist movement. A poem about the day-to-day struggle of being a woman subjugated by the daily insults meted out by capitalism particularly resonated with one young female HS student who deals with sexist degradation on a regular basis.

The role of culture as a weapon against capitalist ideological structures is being developed by PLP. As we continue to advance our understanding of communism and our practice at creating communist culture, we will create more events to help bring more people around our Party.  People who wouldnít ordinarily come to political rallies or discussion groups came to the cultural event and saw our ideas in practice. The whole event ended with an invitation to join the Party and for everyone present to march on May Day.  

Cultural Commitee

Hunger Games Going On Now

 The Hunger Games is a battle to the death, consisting of 24 teenagers fighting each other for survival (see past three issues of CHALLENGE). A N.Y. Daily News reviewer thought the Hunger Games portrayed a future capitalist dictatorship that forces children to kill each other. I think that future is happening now.The greatest form of violence today is capitalist genocide against billions of workers from hunger and poverty.

The gladiatorial Hunger Games are used as a metaphor for the life-and-death games that poor people must play every day under capitalism in order to survive. The mass appeal of Hunger Games is no media fad but is a reflection of workers’ long hatred of the capitalist 1 percent’s monopoly of desperately needed resources that the 99 percent created but have no access to. The Hunger Games are also symbolic of the daily struggle of millions of high school teenagers for survival in the capitalists’ world of racism, unemployment and wars.

While a few reviews of Hunger Games can make some of the above points, none will mention communism, a system that outlaws hunger, poverty, racism, sexism, unemployment and profit wars. As the Hunger Games trilogy unfolds, pushed by the bosses’ media, we will see communist revolutionaries vilified as fascists who want to destroy individualism. But PL’ers struggling for collectivism within the working class can point out that fascism is a form of capitalism and that only PLP’s revolutionary communist party can end the bosses’ fascist tyranny of the working class.

A Comrade

Diego Rivera’s Art Is A Weapon for Workers

Diego Rivera’s Murals for MOMA is an exhibit of Diego Rivera’s works produced for New York City’s  Museum of Modern Art in 1931-32. It is a great opportunity to see how a mass communist movement can inspire great art. The exhibit includes eight murals by Rivera that honor the working class, depict the righteous anger of the exploited, working class heroism and offers a limited exposé of capitalism.  Additionally the exhibit contains two series of small color sketches by Rivera. One series depicts construction workers building New York’s skyscrapers. They are beautiful and like several of the murals in the exhibit portray an inspirational view of the working class.

The most impressive, and moving, part of the exhibit is a series of sketches by Rivera made when he visited the Soviet Union for the 10th anniversary of the Russian Revolution. The small pictures portray a single day’s events starting at the home of a Russian family and moving into the streets and onto a massive communist march. 

While the murals on display are beautiful and outshine in both content and form most of what passes for art these days, the exhibit is limited in a couple of areas. One is that the exhibit cannot possibly include Rivera’s greatest works painted on the walls of Mexico’s National Palace in Mexico City. 

Secondly, while the strengths and weaknesses of Rivera’s politics can be seen through his work, from the moving Russian series to an almost Christ-like portrayal of Zapata, the exhibit only skims the background on what Rivera thought. There is no mention of the political debates Rivera engaged in with Picasso over the nature of art, or his self-criticism of his bourgeois tendencies when he asked to rejoin the Communist Party.

The exhibit provides some limited information on Rockefeller asking Rivera to paint a major mural for Rockefeller Center and then later ordering it destroyed because Rivera refused to take out a painting of Lenin. But this part of the exhibit disingenuously presents Rivera as opportunistically soliciting the patronage of MoMA and the commission to do the mural, while portraying Rockefeller as being “reasonable” in trying to work with him.

In fact the exact opposite was true.Rockefeller was actively seeking to both co-opt and undermine the socialist realist art inspired by the mass communist movement of the times. Rivera was sought out in the hopes of buying off a major figure of the movement at the same time that Rockefeller, through MoMA, was trying to build up abstract painters to take class content out of art. The destruction of the Rockefeller Center murals was a political setback for the bosses, driven by Rivera’s refusal to play ball.

Even with its weaknesses, the exhibit is worth seeing. While the limited background material presented didn’t stop exhibit visitors from debating and discussing the political nature of the art, a little research on Rivera and his politics beforehand will make the visit all the more interesting and satisfying.

Red Art Buff

Garment Fire, Murder in the Mines: Same Enemy, Same Fight

I attended the commemoration of the Triangle Shirtwaist fire disaster on March 23rd, as I have for a number of years. One hundred forty-six workers, mainly young Jewish and Italian immigrant women, were killed 101 years ago in a fire caused by their bosses’ greed. After the fire, hundreds of thousands of outraged workers marched or lined the streets of their funeral procession. 

Fire safety, child labor and workplace safety laws were enacted in response to this anger. Union contracts were signed at many garment factories. The Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union and the International Ladies Garment Workers Union grew in its aftermath. Although the factory bosses were brought to trial, they were found not guilty of all charges. In fact, they netted a substantial profit from their fire insurance claim. 

The annual commemoration has a pro-immigrant, anti-sweatshop feel to it. This year, however, there was an ironic twist to the event. The Amalgamated Bank, begun by the garment union as a “workers’ bank,” which is a major sponsor of this event, now has a major shareholder named Wilbur Ross. This murderous thug was the owner of the Sago Mine in West Virginia where long-standing serious safety violations caused the deaths of twelve coal miners in 2006. While Ross profited from conditions in his coal mine, he was never criminally charged for the deaths  the safety violations caused.

The union movement claims that reform of capitalism are the best aims workers should have. The continued deaths caused by sweatshop conditions in the U.S. and around the world prove their claims are a lie. Similarly, many working-class people put their money and trust in the Amalgamated Bank. Occupy Wall Street called on people to move their bank deposits out of the big commercial banks and into “good” banks like the Amalgamated. Unions likewise deposit their vast sums into the “labor bank.” The relationship of Amalgamated and Wilbur Ross is a stark example of the bankruptcy of the ideas that the unions honestly fight in workers’ interests and that some capitalists can be good. 

Building the revolutionary Progressive Labor Party is the way to avenge these and many other deaths caused by capitalism!

Red Retiree