FIGHT FOR COMMUNISM!
International Communist Workers Party
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FIGHT FOR COMMUNISM!International Communist Workers Party |
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LOS ANGELES—"Look at these garment workers, walking and eating, as they head to the factories," said a comrade while, together with other comrades, they distributed Red Flag to these men and women workers. City-wide you can see these images, men and women garment workers eating while sitting on the sidewalks, on the steps of the buildings or inside their cars.
"Put the paper in my purse," say many women workers, because they have both their hands full, in one a plate of food, and in the other a cup of coffee. Others, carrying their coffee and a piece of bread, ask that we put the paper under their arm. All are walking hurriedly toward the centers of exploitation.
Apart from this, many workers have to bring their own bottled water to the factory. This happens in many parts of the world. In their thirst to make maximum profits, the bosses do not provide adequate drinking water, but they enjoy clean water bought from the profits they make off our backs. What kind of system treats those who create everything of value like this? Capitalism.
This appears to be a normal situation, but its not. It's capitalist exploitation, the buying and selling of labor power to produce profits, and not to meet the needs of the working class. The bosses and their government do not care about the health or well-being of the workers.
The bosses buy the workers' labor power for 8 hours or more, at the cheapest price. According to the worker's ability, he or she is assigned a machine or other productive activity. What happens before or after these hours does not interest the boss in the smallest way. At the same time we workers have to sell our labor power to be able to survive. If we do not find someone to buy our labor power, we don't have food to eat or a place to live. That is how the capitalist system functions. A system like this should not exist. It has to be destroyed by a revolution.
In a communist system, the priority will be the workers. Selling and buying our labor power will not exist and therefore there won't be money or bosses. We workers will no longer be slaves; we will decide the way we will work and our needs. In the centers of work, study, medical care and recreation, there will be dining areas with amenities for the well-being of the same workers.
In Los Angeles County, over 70,000 men and women garment workers are working. They create an enormous amount of clothes and big profits for the bosses.
About 1000 copies of each edition of Red Flag are distributed among these workers. The majority of these workers come from Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. Potentially they are an enormous force to help liberate the working class. These workers and their families can become communist organizers and massify these ideas and our International Communist Workers' Party, helping to distribute Red Flag, the newspaper of the international working class.
The men and women garment workers in Los Angeles, Bangladesh, Mexico, China, Honduras, El Salvador, and many other parts of the world must take our future in our hands, fighting for a communist world.
The problem of capitalism is not only that we the workers are forced to eat while walking or to take water to work, but that worldwide it destroys our lives and families with its poverty, exploitation and wars. Therefore it's worth it to fight for a new communist world, in which we will not be seen as a pair of strong arms, but as human beings.
Why has Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff authorized the use of the military during the World Cup? What are they afraid of? Who are these soldiers really protecting?
In the run-up to the World Cup, thousands of Brazilian workers have been working day and night for miserable wages, under dangerous, sometimes life-threatening conditions, to build the "quality stadiums" demanded by the International Federation of Football Association. (FIFA).
Hundreds of thousands of workers of all sectors of industry, especially in the twelve cities where games will be played, have joined massive protests against the upcoming event. One of the largest, in Sao Paulo, Brazil's largest city, had 10,000 people demanding "quality health care, education and housing."
Workers are enraged by the tremendous amount of money poured into the renovation and construction of stadiums and the infrastructure required to access these venues. The racist bosses also grabbed the land to build on, forcibly evicting over 250,000 families, mostly black workers living in horrific favelas like South Africa's shanty towns.
The biggest lie the bosses try to sell to the masses in the host country, with their campaign "Goal Brazil," is that it will improve the country's economy and therefore everyone's life. The truth is that workers pay directly for these events and only certain groups see the benefits. Big corporations like Coca Cola, Anheuser-Busch, Volkswagen and other transnationals use the World Cup as an opportunity to advertise on TV to hundreds of millions worldwide.
Sports and Imperialism
The Chinese capitalists put their weight behind Brazil's bids for the 2014 World Cup and the 2016 Summer Olympics. Such mega-events require heavy construction of improved infrastructure such as roads, trains, and communications. These projects are also fulfilling the need to move industrial goods and natural resources from every corner of Brazil to port cities like Rio de Janeiro, Salvador, Santos, Belem, and Sao Joao de Barra. The Chinese bosses have made huge investments in these ports, which will help them compete with German imperialist investors who have been there longer and are Brazil's biggest investors.
Over $12 billion have already been spent on infrastructure, and as much as 15 billion more will be needed. This will be the most expensive World Cup ever. Despite former President Lula da Silva's 2007 promise that no public funds would be used, some 85% has come so far from public funds and tax exemptions. This is the capitalist way.
Under communism, in contrast, all resources will go to improve the lives of billions of workers by allocating them where most needed, without misuse or abuse. We'll all work to provide food, health care, education, housing, transportation and other essentials, as needed, with no money involved.
Bosses Fear the Masses
On May 27th, after 200 strikers in Rio de Janeiro surrounded a bus transporting the Brazilian team to their base camp, President Rousseff authorized the use of 70,000 troops to reinforce the 100,000 police already assigned to the World Cup.
Brazilian bosses fear that the increasing anger could spin out of control, possibly even forcing them to cancel the event, costing them billions of dollars in profit. They fear that these demonstrations can grow in size, as millions of workers took to the streets during the June 2013 Confederations Cup, and that they could become more radical or even revolutionary. That's why they are mobilizing the military now.
The bosses don't want to take any chances when masses of angry workers rebel. They see poor working-class people as their real enemy and are willing to use military force to keep them in line. They know that the working class is capable of destroying them and their corrupt system.
The working class doesn't need any bosses to exploit and repress us. Workers are capable of creating a better future for ourselves and our families.
Soldiers, Students, Workers: Unite
for Communism!
Military service is compulsory for all Brazilian men, who must serve for 9-12 months. But most soldiers now in the armed forces volunteer to serve much longer. Most come from working-class backgrounds and join the army as a way to improve their lives.
We call on the men and women in the Brazilian military to disobey orders to repress the workers. For the capitalists, the armies of the world are used to repress the working class or as cannon fodder in their wars for profits and empire. Instead, soldiers should join the millions of workers protesting in the streets. They should mobilize for communism.
Soldiers, workers and students have the same need to get rid of this racist system by fighting for communism. The Brazilian masses in motion are showing their great revolutionary potential. Soldiers, students and workers have more in common with each other than with the blood-sucking bosses who try to divide us with lies and pit us against each other for their own benefit. Red Flag readers in Brazil should join ICWP and concentrate their revolutionary aspirations on mobilizing the masses of workers, soldiers and students for communism.
Only in a communist society will the well-being of all workers and their families be the priority.