#redfored

[selfmaderibcageman]

big fan of how Fucking Evil the Dark River flag looks

[mariacallous]

In 1981, President Reagan’s decision to fire striking air traffic controllers seemed to mark the death knell for labor actions in the United States. Union membership has plummeted by over 60% since 1970, and worker participation in strikes has seen an even more dramatic 90% drop. For decades, strikes have seemed to be like vinyl records—relics of the past. Perhaps they evoke a sense of nostalgia for a bygone era, romanticized and somewhat symbolic for those who remember them fondly, but they have been perceived as ineffective tools in the modern landscape.

Yet, like the vinyl record, recent years have seen a surprising resurgence in teacher strikes. From Wisconsin in 2011 to the nationwide “RedForEd” movement in 2018, educators have taken to the picket lines with renewed vigor, seeming to garner public support and win significant concessions. This unexpected revival prompted my colleagues Matthew Kraft (Brown University), Matthew Steinberg (Accelerate), and me to investigate the prevalence, causes, and impacts of teacher strikes in the 21st century.

[random-thought-depository]

"Trump is a scab, Dems need unions, Dems are not faithful to unions, unions make the Dems better, workers want unions, the public loves unions, and union membership is falling.

It's falling! This one is on the union leadership. Unions are sitting on gigantic warchests that they are resolutely not spending organizing the workers who are clamoring to join unions:

Unions have historic high cash reserves and are doing historically low organizing. This part is the unions' fault:

Or rather, it's the union bosses' fault. Union leadership in America, broadly speaking, sucks. Bosses love shitty unions, and the biggest unions obliged bosses for decades, with leaders who established suicidal practices like "two-tier contracts." That's a union where all the workers have to pay dues, but only the senior workers get protection from the union those dues fund:

If you sat down and said, "Let's design a union contract that will ensure that every worker hired from this day forward hates unions," this is the contract you'd come up with.

Those shitty union bosses? They're on the way out. In 2023, the UAW held its first honest elections for generations, and radicals, led by Shawn Fain, swept the board. How did workers win their union back? They unionized more workers! Specifically, the UAW organized the brutally exploited Harvard grad students, and the Harvard kids memorized the union by-laws, and every time the corrupt old guard tried to steal the leadership election, one or another of them popped to their feet, reciting chapter-and-verse from the union's own rules and keeping the vote going:

Fain led the UAW to an historic strike: the UAW took on all three of the Big Three automakers, and cleaned their clocks. UAW workers walked away with three new contracts, all set to expire in 2028. Fain then called upon every union to bargain for contracts that run out in 2028, because if every union contract expires in 2028, we've got the makings of a general strike.

That means that when the next presidential election rolls around, it's going to be in the middle of the most militant moment in a century of US labor history. That is an opportunity.

Labor movements fight fascists. They always have. Trump and the GOP are not on the side of workers, notwithstanding all that bullshit about supporting workers by fighting immigration. Sure, when the number of workers goes up, wages can go down – if you're not in a union. Conservatives have never supported unions. They hate solidarity. Conservatives want workers to believe that they can get paid more if labor is scarcer, and there's some truth to that, but solidarity endures in good times and bad, and scarcity ends any time bosses figure out how to offshore, outsource, or automate your job. Scarcity is brittle.

...

Organizing a 2028 general strike under Trump won't be easy. Workers won't be able to secure support from the courts or the NLRB, whose brilliant Biden-era leadership team is surely doomed:

But the NLRB only exists today because workers established unions when doing so was radioactively illegal and union organizers were beaten, jailed and murdered with impunity. The tactics those organizers used are not lost to the mists of time – they are a tradition that lives on to this day.

The standard-bearer for this older, militant, community-based union organizing was the great Jane McAlevey (rest in power). McAlevey ran organizing and strike drives as mass-movements; she wouldn't call for either without being sure of massive majorities, 70%-95%:

McAlevey understood union organizing as a source of worker power, but also as a source of community power. When she helped organize the LA #RedForEd Teachers' strike, the teachers didn't just demand better working conditions for themselves, but also green space for their students, and protection from ICE raids for their students' parents. They did this under Trump, and built a turnout organization that flipped key seats and delivered a House majority to the Democrats in 2020.

In her work, McAlevey excoriated the kind of shittyass Dem power-brokers who just lost an election to a convicted felon and rapist, condemning their technocratic conceit that the path to electoral victory was in winning over precisely 50.1% of the vote in each tactically significant precinct. McAlevey said that's how you get the nightmarish Manchin-Synematic Universe where Dems can't deliver and workers don't vote for Dems. To transform America, we need the kinds of majorities that McAlevey and her fellow organizers won in those strike votes – majorities that produced durable, anti-fascist power that turned into electoral victories, too."

[faecorpspublishing]

I Will Wear Red

I will wear redfor my sisters whose health is at riskfor my sisters who have been rapedfor my sisters who have been batteredfor my sisters who are already strugglingto feed hungry childrenfor my sisters who need to finishmiddle schoolhigh schoolcollegegrad schoolfor my sisters who are just not prepared I will wear crimsonfor their lifebloodthat will […]I Will Wear Red

[planemadgetit]

The Jeff! Great simulation available in dcs. The best modern high fidelity REDFOR aircraft

[blue-pikmin-gaming]

i went into a "candiepopped bud" ons... becam redfor a bit it was ffun butiwent into blu one again becaus. i missded swimbing.

[fuckyeahmarxismleninism]

The Chicago Teachers Union released the following statement today regarding the passing of President Emerita Karen GJ Lewis:

Our union is in deep mourning today at the passing of our sister, our leader and our friend, President Emerita Karen GJ Lewis. We are sending heartfelt condolences to her husband, John Lewis, and her surviving family and friends. She will be dearly missed.

Karen taught us how to fight, and she taught us how to love. She was a direct descendant of the legendary Jackie Vaughn, the first Black, female president of our local. Both were fierce advocates for educators and children, but where Jackie was stately elegance, Karen was a brawler with sharp wit and an Ivy League education. She spoke three languages, loved her opera and her show tunes, and dazzled you with her smile, yet could stare down the most powerful enemies of public education and defend our institution with a force rarely seen in organized labor.

She bowed to no one, and gave strength to tens of thousands of Chicago Teachers Union educators who followed her lead, and who live by her principles to this day.

Karen had three questions that guided her leadership: ‘Does it unite us, does it build our power and does it make us stronger?’ Before her, there was no sea of red — a sea that now stretches across our nation. She was the voice of the teacher, the paraprofessional, the clinician, the counselor, the librarian and every rank-and-file educator who worked tirelessly to provide care and nurture for students; the single parent who fought tremendous odds to raise a family; and the laborer whose rights commanded honor and respect. She was a rose that grew out of South Side Chicago concrete — filled with love for her Kenwood Broncos alumni — to not only reach great heights, but to elevate everyone she led to those same heights.

But Karen did not just lead our movement. Karen was our movement. In 2013, she said that in order to change public education in Chicago, we had to change Chicago, and change the political landscape of our city. Chicago has changed because of her. We have more fighters for justice and equity because of Karen, and because she was a champion — the people’s champion.

Our hearts are heavy today, but it brings us joy to know that Karen has joined Jackie Vaughn, Marion Stamps, Addie Wyatt and Willie Barrow as the vanguard of Black women who have forged a heroic path of labor, justice and civil rights in our city. Karen now sits among them, still guiding our every move, and still guiding our vision for the schools our students and their families deserve.

[elises-pieces-plush]

Red for Ed face masks are up in my shop! They are adult-sized masks, 100% cotton, one-sided print with adjustable straps.

**5% of each "Red for Ed" mask sale will be donated to the National Education Association**

link is in the source

[mostlysignssomeportents]

This day in history

On OCTOBER 23 at 7PM, I'll be in DECATUR, GEORGIA, presenting my novel THE BEZZLE at EAGLE EYE BOOKS.

#20yrsago Sony bullies Retropod off the net https://web.archive.org/web/20041018040446/http://www.retropod.com/

#15yrsago This Side of Jordan – Violent jazz age novel by Charles M Schulz’s son Monte https://memex.craphound.com/2009/10/16/this-side-of-jordan-violent-jazz-age-novel-by-charles-m-schulzs-son-monte/

#10yrsago FBI chief demands an end to cellphone security https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/17/us/politics/fbi-director-in-policy-speech-calls-dark-devices-hindrance-to-crime-solving.html

#10yrsago Please, Disney: put back John’s grandad’s Haunted Mansion tombstone https://thedisneyblog.com/2014/10/16/petition-to-return-a-lost-tombstone-to-the-haunted-mansion/

#10yrsago How Microsoft hacked trademark law to let it secretly seize whole businesses https://www.wired.com/2014/10/microsoft-pinkerton/

#10yrsago If you think you’ve anonymized a data set, you’re probably wrong https://web.archive.org/web/20141014172827/http://research.neustar.biz/2014/09/15/riding-with-the-stars-passenger-privacy-in-the-nyc-taxicab-dataset/

#10yrsago The lost cyber-crayolas of the mid-1990s https://memex.craphound.com/2014/10/16/the-lost-cyber-crayolas-of-the-mid-1990s/

#5yrsago “The People’s Money”: A crisp, simple, thorough explanation of how government spending is paid for https://neweconomicperspectives.org/2019/10/the-peoples-money-part-1.html

#5yrsago What it’s like to have Apple rip off your successful Mac app https://memex.craphound.com/2019/10/16/what-its-like-to-have-apple-rip-off-your-successful-mac-app/

#5yrsago Blizzard suspends college gamers from competitive play after they display “Free Hong Kong” poster https://www.vice.com/en/article/three-college-hearthstone-protesters-banned-for-six-months/

#5yrsago Terrified of bad press after its China capitulation, Blizzard cancels NYC Overwatch event https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-10-15/blizzard-cancels-overwatch-event-as-it-tries-to-contain-backlash

#5yrsago A San Diego Republican operator ran a massive, multimillion-dollar Facebook scam that targeted boomers https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/craigsilverman/facebook-subscription-trap-free-trial-scam-ads-inc

#5yrsago Britain’s unbelievably stupid, dangerous porn “age verification” scheme is totally dead https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/10/uk-government-abandons-planned-porn-age-verification-scheme/

#5yrsago Not only is Google’s auto-delete good for privacy, it’s also good news for competition https://memex.craphound.com/2019/10/16/not-only-is-googles-auto-delete-good-for-privacy-its-also-good-news-for-competition/

#5yrsago Edward Snowden on the global war on encryption: “This is our new battleground” https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/oct/15/encryption-lose-privacy-us-uk-australia-facebook

#5yrsago In Kansas’s poor, sick places, hospitals and debt collectors send the ailing to debtor’s prison https://features.propublica.org/medical-debt/when-medical-debt-collectors-decide-who-gets-arrested-coffeyville-kansas

#5yrsago Want a ride in a Lyft? Just sign away your right to sue if they kill, maim, rape or cheat you https://memex.craphound.com/2019/10/16/want-a-ride-in-a-lyft-just-sign-away-your-right-to-sue-if-they-kill-maim-rape-or-cheat-you/

#5yrsago #RedForEd rebooted: Chicago’s teachers are back on strike https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/union-strike-chicago-teachers/

#1yrago One of America's most corporate-crime-friendly bankruptcy judges forced to recuse himself https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/16/texas-two-step/#david-jones

Tor Books as just published two new, free LITTLE BROTHER stories: VIGILANT, about creepy surveillance in distance education; and SPILL, about oil pipelines and indigenous landback.

[icantalk710]

Wearing some #RedForEd while I work on this, the day before Labor Day weekend (good morning to all the unions whose leaders don’t sell out their rank and file) in solidarity with the teachers, students, and parents saying #WeWontDieForDOE as De Blasio insists on pushing in-person teaching when… *points at pandemic*

Dude’s more than happy to pass a budget overfunding the brutalizing NYPD and defunding education/parks/other useful things, then is all *shocked Pikachu* when there’s pushback on this because said defunding limits how well schools can even prep? 🤦🏽‍♂️ Sign/share @morecaucusuft’s petition to demand in-person school #OnlyWhenItsSafe: https://www.change.org/p/nyc-mayor-bill-de-blasio-and-schools-chancellor-richard-carranza-say-no-to-mayor-bill-de-blasio-s-plan-to-reopen-school-buildings-in-september 🔥🙏🏽✊🏼🔥 (at Bronx, NY) https://www.instagram.com/p/CEuDlLOg8zU/?igshid=1to3rqkuvsezs

[nothntoseehere]

So I didn't have a fancy sign or a witty shirt and I didn't get to go to the statehouse today, but I still wore my red for ed today. Indiana ranks 50th for teacher raises since 2002. It is expected that charter schools will be given a funding increase of 20% while public schools will be given an increase of 2%. Indiana ranks 37th in teacher's salaries. Oh and teachers are now required to complete an unpaid "externship" in order to renew our licenses. Teaching is hard enough without worrying about how you are going to make ends meet or how you are going to be spending even more time on professional development. Think about your favorite teachers and students. Don't they deserve better than this?

[kathleenshea]

I love when celebrities support teachers! #redfored #ctu #solidarity https://www.instagram.com/p/B4G5erDBEjlaxAgrLtu4Slg-kwgH0GRI1niz1U0/?igshid=16lmahei61jk9

[bvar]

New Jersey schools are back in session, and every Wednesday we wear red to support local teachers... especially one we especially love. ❤️ #RedForEd #whitepicketfence #njea (at New Milford, New Jersey) https://www.instagram.com/p/B2kYUzPHz3c/?igshid=18tzgonkl4x9b

[canonizedandotherwise]

In praise and thanksgiving for a successful resolution to the LA Teacher’s Strike.

[wildlilaccdc]

On May 8th, Wild Lilac will join in spirit many thousands of educators, students, parents and community members around the state on a day of action dedicated to fully funding Oregon's public schools. Our public schools are over-burdened and under-funded; the rights of children and youth to high-quality education are not being honored. We know that we can do better, that we must do more. We lend our voices to the call to create schools where all children and youth have every opportunity to thrive. Fully funding our public schools means smaller class sizes, the restoration of music and arts programs, more school librarians, nurses, counselors and educational support personnel, and so much more. Please join us as we advocate for the schools -- and future -- our children, teachers, and communities deserve.

Wild Lilac Child Development Community