I know this has been shared many times before but never by me and I did want to share it for that one person who may not know it yet (or didn't know who wrote it)
#activism #marwanmakhoul #poem #poetry #war #antiwar #antifascism #antifa
I know this has been shared many times before but never by me and I did want to share it for that one person who may not know it yet (or didn't know who wrote it)
#activism #marwanmakhoul #poem #poetry #war #antiwar #antifascism #antifa
In honor of Black History Month, a short biography of Ben Fletcher (April 13, 1890 – 1949), Wobbly and revolutionary. Fletcher joined the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) in 1912 and became secretary of the IWW District Council in 1913. He also co-founded the interracial Local 8 in 1913. Also in 1913, he led a successful strike of over 10,000 dockers. At that time, roughly one-third of the dockers on the Philadelphia waterfront were black. Another 33% were Irish. And about 33% were Polish and Lithuanian. Prior to the IWW organizing drive, the employers routinely pitted black workers against white, and Polish against Irish. The IWW was one of the only unions of the era that organized workers into the same locals, regardless of race or ethnicity. And its main leader in Philadelphia was an African American, Ben Fletcher.
By 1916, thanks in large part to Fletcher’s organizing skill, all but two of Philadelphia’s docks were controlled by the IWW. And the IWW maintained control of the Philly waterfront for about a decade. After the 1913 strike, Fletcher travelled up and down the east coast organizing dockers. However, he was nearly lynched in Norfolk, Virginia in 1917. At that time, roughly 10% of the IWW’s 1 million members were African American. Most had been rejected from other unions because of their skin color. In 1918, the state arrested him for treason, sentencing him to ten years, for the crime of organizing workers during wartime. He served three years. Fletcher supposedly said to Big Bill Haywood after the trial that the judge had been using “very ungrammatical language. . . His sentences are much too long.”
#workingclass #LaborHistory #IWW #benfletcher #union #strike #philadelphia #longshore #docker #waterfront #worldwarone #prison #antiwar #freespeech #racism #blackhistorymonth #BlackMastodon
Today in Labor History February 4, 1900: Jacques Prévert was born (1900-1977). Prevert was a poet, surrealist and libertarian socialist who glorified the spirit of rebellion & revolt.
Excerpt from “Song in the Blood”
There are great puddles of blood on the world
Where’s it going all this spilled blood
Murder’s blood. . . war’s blood. . .
Misery’s blood. . .
And the blood of men tortured in prisons. . .
The blood of children calmly tortured by their papa
And their mama. . .
And the blood of men whose heads bleed in
Padded cells
And the roofer’s blood
When the roofer slips and falls from the roof
The Minister of War:
I continue.
A destroyed hospital: ten, a hundred -
and I am modest -
can be rebuilt
And, the project adopted unanimously,
night has fallen,
the hospital was blown up with a few scraps of the neighborhood around.
Day breaks over the city
where the laughter dwindles, dissipates and disappears.
Everything becomes serious again.
Life, like the stock market, resumes its course
and general mobilization continues as normal.
#workingclass #LaborHistory #prévert #Ferlinghetti #antiwar #socialism #poetry #Poet #surrealism #rebellion #books #revolt @bookstadon
Today in Labor History February 4, 1900: Jacques Prévert was born (1900-1977). Prevert was a poet, surrealist and libertarian socialist who glorified the spirit of rebellion & revolt.
Excerpt from “Song in the Blood”
There are great puddles of blood on the world
Where’s it going all this spilled blood
Murder’s blood. . . war’s blood. . .
Misery’s blood. . .
And the blood of men tortured in prisons. . .
The blood of children calmly tortured by their papa
And their mama. . .
And the blood of men whose heads bleed in
Padded cells
And the roofer’s blood
When the roofer slips and falls from the roof
The Minister of War:
I continue.
A destroyed hospital: ten, a hundred -
and I am modest -
can be rebuilt
And, the project adopted unanimously,
night has fallen,
the hospital was blown up with a few scraps of the neighborhood around.
Day breaks over the city
where the laughter dwindles, dissipates and disappears.
Everything becomes serious again.
Life, like the stock market, resumes its course
and general mobilization continues as normal.
#workingclass #LaborHistory #prévert #Ferlinghetti #antiwar #socialism #poetry #Poet #surrealism #rebellion #books #revolt @bookstadon
In honor of Black History Month, a short biography of Ben Fletcher (April 13, 1890 – 1949), Wobbly and revolutionary. Fletcher joined the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) in 1912 and became secretary of the IWW District Council in 1913. He also co-founded the interracial Local 8 in 1913. Also in 1913, he led a successful strike of over 10,000 dockers. At that time, roughly one-third of the dockers on the Philadelphia waterfront were black. Another 33% were Irish. And about 33% were Polish and Lithuanian. Prior to the IWW organizing drive, the employers routinely pitted black workers against white, and Polish against Irish. The IWW was one of the only unions of the era that organized workers into the same locals, regardless of race or ethnicity. And its main leader in Philadelphia was an African American, Ben Fletcher.
By 1916, thanks in large part to Fletcher’s organizing skill, all but two of Philadelphia’s docks were controlled by the IWW. And the IWW maintained control of the Philly waterfront for about a decade. After the 1913 strike, Fletcher travelled up and down the east coast organizing dockers. However, he was nearly lynched in Norfolk, Virginia in 1917. At that time, roughly 10% of the IWW’s 1 million members were African American. Most had been rejected from other unions because of their skin color. In 1918, the state arrested him for treason, sentencing him to ten years, for the crime of organizing workers during wartime. He served three years. Fletcher supposedly said to Big Bill Haywood after the trial that the judge had been using “very ungrammatical language. . . His sentences are much too long.”
#workingclass #LaborHistory #IWW #benfletcher #union #strike #philadelphia #longshore #docker #waterfront #worldwarone #prison #antiwar #freespeech #racism #blackhistorymonth #BlackMastodon
