Industrial Workers: Key to Mobilizing for Communism

The following comments are part of a speech prepared by a young industrial worker for the Los Angeles Summer Project kick-off picnic:

Starting in Kindergarten, schools train us to be industrial workers. Show up every day! Be on time! Do what you’re told! Don’t ask questions! Don’t learn too much!
Nearly all jobs under capitalism are like this, even the ones people go to college to get. We are trained to be wage slaves, motivated to work only by money. Everything in capitalism revolves around money. And we wage slaves get barely enough to survive ... if that.
We need communism to get rid of money. Work will be motivated by our commitment to each other and our desire to make use of our abilities. Instead of buying and selling or even trading, we will share what we produce to meet everyone’s needs.
In capitalism almost all of us are wage slaves, but there are differences too. I have worked at many jobs, like delivering pizzas, as a security guard, and in a mall. You can’t really organize much on jobs like these. We are pitted against each other. We compete for hours or for the respect of the boss (so she or he will give you more hours). More hours means more money to pay bills.
I have also had industrial jobs. Now I am working in a place that repairs and ships aerospace-related devices. We’re all the same, not in competition with each other. We all get up early to get to work on time. We all eat lunch together. We all go home at the same time and go to sleep early so we can get up the next day.
There is a reliance on everybody. These are the kind of social relations that we need for communism.
Working in industry, you learn valid skills that will be useful for building communism. It’s not like being a security guard or working a cash register.
It’s also a lot clearer how we are exploited. I am paid $13/hour but the company bills customers $75/hour for my work! More hours means more exploitation.
But industrial workers aren’t going to come up with a plan for communism just by being exploited. We have to bring them the idea of mobilizing the masses for communism.
Workers in the Party have a great opportunity to do this, long term, on the inside. We can build relationships on and off the job. We can have many conversations. But the Party also has a great opportunity to make communist ideas into mass ideas, from the outside, in ways we can’t do without getting fired right away.
During the first ICWP Los Angeles Summer Project, I was one of the students who helped distribute Red Flag outside garment factories and MTA transit divisions. Now there are at least six hundred transit workers who have been reading Red Flag for five years. Even more garment workers read the paper. Some of these industrial workers have joined the Party. Others help distribute the paper.
So I am asking everyone to take part in the ICWP Summer Projects this year in Los Angeles and Seattle. And I hope that more young leaders will think seriously about going into industry, maybe before or after doing military work.

Comrade in South Africa Writes:

Red Flag is ICWP’s Most Powerful Weapon

I was in the public transport the other day going to town to get my passport. As I was sitting there with the latest issue of the Red Flag in my hand, a university student sitting next to me noticed that I was carrying the paper. But he had never seen it before, so he asked me what type of paper this was.
I explained to him that this was not a new paper but a revolutionary tool against capitalism. I explained to him this was the most important weapon in our arsenal to destroy capitalism. So he wanted to know more about communism because I told him that the S.A.C.P was not a communist party but a socialist party because communists can’t sleep in the same bed with capitalists.
But we were on a taxi so we decided to exchange numbers. I gave him the copy of the Red Flag. He told me to call him so we could meet again because he lives close to my house.
We had a meeting on Sunday, but unfortunately some of my comrades could not attend. But there was this new comrade met during the week just like two other comrades. So we decided since all of them were not familiar with the philosophy of dialectics, we would talk about dialectics. I was surprised how fast they understand the concept.
One comrade wanted to find out how we are going to destroy capitalism. The answer came not from me but from another comrade who told him that in order for us to destroy capitalism we must mobilize the masses for communism. That is the only way we can end the disease we call capitalism. We also talked about nationalism so we decided that, when we meet again we will talk about two things: nationalism and idealism.

********

Red Soldier Writes:

“Pacific Pathways” Means War in Asia

Now, there is no way of knowing for sure when World War III is going to happen, but we only have to open our eyes to see the signs of what is to come.
All indications suggest that the next World War will be fought in Asia. The participants have begun making their preparations in the shadows. And although a multitude of media outlets have started making their speculations, the bosses have yet to reveal, to the masses, the destruction they are preparing to bring.
Currently in the U.S. Armed Forces we have a “training exercise” called Pacific Pathways going on. On the outside, this is a routine training exercise which consists of troops going to different countries in Asia, like Thailand and the Philippines and training with the local militaries while also helping to provide humanitarian aid.
The training mostly revolved around setting up field sites in the different countries and trying to become familiar with the terrain all while strengthening relations with those countries’ Armed Forces.
To the untrained eye, this might not seem like anything out of the ordinary for the Armed forces to be doing but when we begin to dissect this training exercise and look at it from a communist point of view, we begin to see what’s going on behind the curtains.
To begin with, why the sole focus on Asia? Next, what is the significance of us as troops learning the terrain and what is the importance of strengthening our relationships with those foreign militaries?
With these simple questions the onion already begins to unravel. It we consider that the expectations of where the next big war is going to happen is Asia, then we immediately answer the question of why the focus on Asia.
With that said, the answer to the next two questions become quite apparent. If we are accepting that Asia is going to be the next playing field, then why not know the turf as well as possible? Make it so that the troops feel as if they have home-court advantage. And finally, have as much support as possible.
By investing now into the foreign militaries, the bosses are hoping for a big return on the day the main characters face each other.
This is just one example of one of the many things the US is doing in the military in order to prepare itself.
As a soldier with communist insight, I feel like I might have a little more access to this information than most. Because even when talking to fellow soldiers, I get the sense that they are not fully aware of what we are heading towards.
That’s a scary thing, because if even we inside the military do not fully grasp what is going on, then the masses must be even more clueless. Meaning they themselves are not preparing for the mass destruction that is coming for them.
Luckily, through Red Flag, we have the opportunity to let the masses know what is going on, so they themselves can begin to mobilize themselves and reject being victims of capitalism by turning the guns around.

Chile:

Need to Mobilize for Communist Education

June 13—Ninety percent of the teachers in Chile have been striking for three weeks. For over a month there have been massive marches of hundreds of thousands of teachers, students and workers in Santiago and throughout the country against education reform, heavy work loads, low wages, pension cuts, and the privatization of education.
Teachers are fighting against government reforms including standardized tests and evaluations. Two students were killed during one demonstration by the son of a business owner when they tried to put a banner on a wall of his business. This fascist act caused even more anger and actions among the students.
The Chilean working class has a long history of mass workers’ struggles At one time Chile had the largest Communist Party in Latin America, which was reformist and participated in the elections. Today the Chilean Communist Party is part of the government which is repressing the mass demonstrations.
Today, Chilean workers need to and can build a mass ICWP. The continuing struggle against the bosses’ education system shows that our class needs to destroy capitalism, not reform its educational system, which is designed to serve the capitalists’ profit needs and push their ideology. We need communist education. To achieve it, workers, students and teachers need to mobilize for communist revolution. Communist education will combine communist theory and work to prepare everyone to meet the needs of our class in a communist system.