To Build New Leaders, Discuss Red Flag here ♦ Health Care Workers Angry, Ready for Communism here ♦
Lancaster, PA (USA) November 21: Nurses Strike for Increased Staffing
To Build New Communist Leadership: Discuss Red Flag!
SEATTLE (USA), November 22—Since the US presidential election, many of us in and around ICWP have talked with friends about voting. These discussions sometimes get heated, as many of our friends are convinced that getting Trump out of the White House will prevent fascism and that life will go back to “normal.” Nonetheless, these discussions have opened opportunities to advance communist ideas and build party leadership.
A social worker said, “Voting is a lot of time and energy wasted. A lot of us know deep down that the emperor has no clothes. The Black Lives Matter movement really got young people engaged. I wouldn’t say I am a communist, but I would say I am anti-capitalist.”
My multi-racial family members were energized when one of them had a letter about voting printed in Red Flag. He was willing to trade his vote for a conversation about mobilizing for communism. During the pandemic, my family has become a Red Flag network. Here are parts of some of our discussions.
A young woman said, “I know under communism that none of these issues [racism, sexism, etc.] would exist, but since it may be a while until we get there, I want to try to help those who can be seriously impacted by some of the laws passed.”
Her uncle answered, “This presidential sh-t is really just a show. These conversations are needed all over the country.”
From a teacher: “I also agree that while we do need to struggle to change our current system, we also need to figure out how to operate within it as well, until change comes.”
From another young relative who has become more involved: “No matter who is in office, capitalism will still exist so long as the current system is alive. As a ‘young’ person who has not been thoroughly educated on communism throughout my life and has lived to know this current system (democracy) it’s hard to get a grasp on what a world under communism would be like, or how it would even be possible.
“So much of society has been brainwashed into thinking communism is one thing,” they continued, “when clearly it is not. For me this is where the fight has to start, erasing the stigma attached to communism. There needs to be more of a focus on the positives of communism rather than the negatives of our current social systems.”
And what better way to start the fight than to develop more Red Flag networks of readers and distributors, who, like my family and friends, debate the articles in the paper?
Inspired by this collective conversation, I contacted other friends.
A healthcare worker said, “Many people I know felt they had to vote because they see Trump as a threat. The blatant racism and anti-communism they push just pissed everyone off. I want an end to the system, but do I think it’s possible, not sure. I will continue to read Red Flag… I will always talk to my friends with a class analysis … keep up your work.”
When the people around us read Red Flag and we struggle with them about mobilizing the masses for communism, we win others to ICWP and we build new communist leadership. Friends who read Red Flag and share it with others can discuss the conversations they have and write about them for the paper. These discussions will generate new ideas for articles for the paper.
In this way we will strengthen our ties to our friends, improve our work, build new leadership and hasten the end of the deadly capitalist system.
Health Care Workers: Exhausted, Angry and Ready for Communism
USA, November 22— “I went back to work part time,” said a recently retired New Jersey healthcare worker, “because my department is so understaffed. People are on medical leave and the hospital refuses to hire anybody else. I felt I had to help, and I can use the little extra money to help with food for my daughter’s family.” Their work hours had been cut.
“The problem is all these hospitals are businesses. Even the non-profit hospitals are run like a capitalist business. What a joke!”
A healthcare comrade in Texas agreed. Texas has a rule that once the percentage of COVID patients goes above 15%, the hospital has to shut down elective surgery and other non-essential operations.
“Somehow, the percentage always stays just below 15%,” he said.
Everyone working there knows the hospital is shipping COVID patients outside the region to keep the count low. The hospital makes the most money from elective surgeries.
Even here, the hospital refuses to hire enough staff. The administrators recently negotiated contracts that have workers on call almost all the time. On-call status often requires essential personnel to stay at the hospital. The surgeons don’t want to wait 20 minutes or so for the necessary personnel to arrive from home. It’s all about making as much money as possible from elective surgery.
The capitalist media admit that there aren’t enough beds to take care of the surge of COVID patients, let alone for other urgent care. But as these healthcare workers were quick to point out, it’s not about beds. It’s capitalist healthcare.
The capitalist healthcare model can’t properly prepare for pandemics. And it is woefully inadequate when it comes to all public health.
Like any business, healthcare is based on getting by with the least number of workers. The bosses brag about this as “capitalist efficiency.”
Communist healthcare relies not only on science, but also on mobilizing masses.
“Mask-wearing is a good example,” said the Texas comrade. Even if the bosses want people to wear masks, hundreds of years of pushing individualism makes it harder for them to mobilize the population to do so. On the other hand, the public health strategy of wearing masks fits right in with communist collectivity.
The role of mobilizing masses becomes even clearer when we start talking about vaccines.
- David Paltiel, from the Yale School of Public Health, was very clear. “Vaccines don’t save lives,” he said, “Vaccination programs save lives.”
He and his colleagues published a study in the journal Health Affairs simulating the coming rollout of coronavirus vaccines. They found that when it comes to infections, hospitalizations, and deaths, mobilizing internationally to get the vaccines to the masses matters just as much as the efficacy of any particular vaccine.
The pandemic has made it clear: communist revolution is a life and death issue for tens of millions of people worldwide.
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