And now they all vote for Republicans
I once took a roadtrip to Matewan (where much of the war itself was centered, Blair Mountain is nearby, but it’s just one battle in a larger war), and there’s a little gift shop across the street from the Mine Wars Museum.
I distinctly remember looking at a rack of bumper stickers, and on the left side were stickers about the Mine Wars: Miners Union logos, “Rah rah, we’d do it again if we had to” kinds of slogans. Stuff like that. In the right side of the rack were all Trump stickers.
Matewan is a fascinating place with a lot of history, in a very beautiful part of the US. I would encourage everyone to go, if you have the chance. The people there are all incredibly kind, and very excited to tell you about the history of their home. But it is nothing of not a land of contradictions, and that rack of bumper stickers was really emblematic of that.
Hard to argue with that
I grew up maybe 30 min from Marmet and never even heard of this until I went to college in NC.
There are plenty more and current events are pushing for another one.
“Damn that sounds pretty significant, I learned about similar events in school but definitely never this. I wonder if it’s as big as the post implies or if it’s being exag-”
The Battle of Blair Mountain was the largest labor uprising in United States history and is the largest armed uprising since the American Civil War.
“… Huh.”
Well I see why they left this one out.
Yeah, it would give folks ideas
Or we organize our own industrial worker cooperatives and try to avoid a shooting war.
Organize workers into a co-op, negotiate staffing agreements with the capitalists, and use the staffing margin to fund a business plan for the co-op to operate.
And then of course, drop the staffing contracts when they’re no longer needed. Too bad so sad, find your own workers now.
Guess what the ownership class does when they notice these things happening. Hint: it involves so many bullets.
They have my ip. shrug
This isn’t a fair description of events.
You forget how the US military and WV National gaurd also got involved, not in a neutral way to end the conflict between these two groups. Oh no, they fought with the private big buisness forces. Tax dollars at work
Wow that would make a great movie. Funny Tom Hanks didn’t choose that one.
The history of the American labor movement and the socialist wave front that propelled FDR to the presidency for four terms are never discussed in American schools because capitalists control what our children are taught. Howard Zinn should be required 9th grade reading.
The Business Plot, a series of corporations conspired to overthrow FDR, was also hidden from history books.
Corporate leaders and oligarchs don’t want the People to ever be so strong that they can topple businesses with monopoly charges and jail time for shareholders.
Always good to be reminded that executives and billionaires don’t really care about anybody else, and they were willing to nuke the entire world not that long ago rather than let working people have a chance at a decent life.
This thing. It’s totally in the history books that you didn’t read.
“history books:”
Which ones? My high school US history textbook talked about the Coal Wars with a mention of Blair Mountain. Which isn’t necessarily representative, but then “history books:” is an unfalsifiable claim.
My high school history book had a small paragraph about the trail of tears. I don’t believe any American history book for high schoolers fully explain it. So OP isn’t wrong.
It’s not unfalsifiable (James Loewen does an excellent job of thoroughly reviewing information across dozens of the most commonly sold American history textbooks), it’s just a pain in the ass to do it.
Sorry, I should’ve clarified that I meant “unfalsifiable” not in the sense that it’s impossible to evaluate statistically but in the sense that it’s weasel wording, where regardless of the evidence, you can always retreat and declare what you said isn’t false because you never made a specific enough claim compared to what you’re implying.
“Doctors believe vaccines cause autism.” is true in the sense that there are doctors who exist who believe that, even if the overwhelming consensus of the medical community is that the claim is fraudulent nonsense.
(Yes, I recognize the irony in retreating to a clarification of what I said; it wasn’t intentional.)
Make the prospect of death equal in appeal to the current standard of life and suddenly people act like they have nothing to lose? How odd…
What? I watched Justified… is that not enough?
So, are you saying that the US should rise up? How would you suggest we do that?
There’s a number of ways we can build counter power, and not only does it materially help our situation, it also reduces the feeling of helplessness and despair dramatically, and you’ll likely meet some friends along the way.
Here’s a handy guide on how to get involved in that sort of stuff.
Part 1: The big picture
The protests are good ways of meeting like-minded people in your community to form connections, as well as spreading awareness of local mutual aid groups so more can join or form ICE resistance groups who can join an encrypted chat to coordinate, alert neighbors, and talk strategy. It also is a good place for unions or union members to encourage others to unionize their workplaces, which can also ultimately work toward a national general strike, which is our most tangible and powerful collective action.
The country would be brought to its knees if suddenly deprived of profit and labor, allowing us to directly demand real changes (such as ending the war in Iran, ceasing support for the genocide of Palestine, and Abolishing ICE).
The General Strike was extremely effective in Chile in 2019, and had they not fallen for the trick of liberal reform, they would’ve had a successful revolution on their hands with virtually no bloodshed.
There are some concrete steps all of us can take toward enacting that hard-core general strike to make it more viable and bearable for us all. (the titles below expand if you click them).
Part 2: Learn First Aid
Violence is being used against those who resist and it will only continue. It extremely important to have the skills to be able to keep yourself and others alive if they get hurt.
Tacticool Girlfriend provides a great introduction to building a personal first aid kit, called an IFAK, which can deal with things like bullet wounds and other serious bleeding wounds. I also want to emphasize her recommendation of only buying medical gear from reputable sources (not Amazon!), such as North American Rescue to avoid fakes that could cost you your life.
But you’ll need to learn how to use that equipment, too. The best resource for that is to take a local Stop The Bleed class, which are pretty widely available in most places. They may cost a small fee, but can also sometimes be free. Alternatively, if you cannot access a local class, this video by PrepMedic will give you a solid understanding of how to use Tourniquets and Gauze for wound packing.
Injuries are less harmful if they are tended to early. Learning first aid can help conserve resources when healthcare becomes unaffordable. Having several medics in case of harm by police is an extremely powerful morale booster during a protest that may become a police riot. When you become comfortable with the basics of first aid, riot medicine is the next suggested step.
Part 3: Establish or join local Mutual Aid networks
If you haven’t already, get to know your neighbors. Mutual aid is a willingness to support and grow your community. This can include informal networks through friends, tenant/renter organizations, solidarity groups, and industrial unions.
These are groups using direct action to solve each other’s problems. Building strong communities makes it difficult for fascism to take root. The actions of the government are going to hit every community hard, and the ones who build trust in each other and work together are most likely to survive. We’ve been building a list of resources in [email protected] to help you on your way. Also check out this handy guide to find existing groups in your area.
This isn’t only for your own community protection. Your ability to organize today will change the political landscape tomorrow. When revolution occurs, the social organizations that show the greatest resilience through the regime are the ones typically calling the shots when the dust settles. When it comes to elections, get out the vote drives are useless if most of the voters are fascists. At some point, you have to do grassroots political education if you don’t want fascist candidates winning elections. Mutual aid networks are excellent forums not only for teaching each other good political ideas, but demonstrating them in practice.
There’s also some projects you can do that help build community (and can be fun in themselves!), for more info, go here, and scroll down to the “Fun Projects to Build Community) section”
Part 4: Join a Union to help prepare for a General Strike
If you aren’t in a union (or even if you are, it’s worth dual-carding), consider joining the IWW to unionize your workplace (bonus: you’ll get higher wages, better benefits, and more time off if you succeed!) to make a general strike possible.
Once you are in a union you and your coworkers will need to pressure your leadership to prepare for a general strike, as well as pressure them to organize with other unions to enact a general strike. This is especially true if you are in a more traditional union that isn’t the IWW. Your local shop may need to organize directly with other unions if your union leaders are too cowardly to do so.
Most unions have a strike fund that can supplement your income during a general strike to make it more financially bearable (you should also save as much money as you can reasonably do, so it can also be used to keep yourself afloat during a strike). A General Strike is officially planned by the UAW for May 1st 2028, but it was planned before Trump was elected, and by then will be too late, so prepare now for one that may start sooner.
You can contact the IWW with the link below:
And for our international friends, you should join one as well, as fascism is gaining momentum globally. If your country isn’t listed below, just contact the IWW directly in the link above, and they’ll help you set up a new local branch.
Part 5: Adopt Security Culture and Digital Camouflage
Sometimes benign seeming efforts can turn into unexpected personal data collecting traps. Like an obscure website for exchanging contact info with other students turning into a global ad-tech surveillance network (Facebook), or innocent seeming online personality tests being use to harvest character profiles. Even Etsy, Reddit, Tinder, and Duolingo are feeding information to US Government Agencies like ICE.
Security culture is commonly used to describe the general awareness of such potential traps and how it can affect groups or entire communities. This goes beyond mere individual privacy efforts, as without joint efforts these often fail to work.
Especially in activist circles, security culture is paramount. For opsec reasons not everyone in the group might be aware of what clandestine efforts others are involved in, but with a general security culture many potential data leaks can be avoided.
Movements are made by the volume of their participants, and the easier and less dangerous it is to participate, the more people will get involved. As more people get involved, individual involvement becomes even less dangerous, creating a virtuous cycle.
We’ll start it off with some General Advice:
- Mentally wall off personal uniquely identifying info from your online presence, actively build a habit of opsec so that withholding information is your default mental state
- Be careful about who you meet online
- Use different, unrelated usernames, passwords & emails for every account. And try not to connect to those accounts with your real IP address (use Tor or a VPN)
- Be mindful that anything done online leaves a trail
- agents provocateurs may seek to find patsies willing to perform an ill-advised illegal activity in order to legitimize police repression. If someone is trying to pressure you, especially if you don’t have a long and proven history with them, be extremely wary.
For a full guide on what encrypted communications platforms to use, and how to stay off the radar, read the Digital Camouflage section within the Monthly Meta post here (you’ll need to scroll down. I’d add it here, but it won’t fit in this comment).
I’d also highly recommend Full Spectrum Resistance to anyone who wants further info on how to resist (audiobook version here).
These are great and so is building cooperatives. OP was not implying these things, but I’m glad you’re giving ideas that are solid.
By organizing into cooperatives.
We don’t want to give people ideas.
