“Occupy Your Workplace” Not Just a Slogan for Workers in Chicago
This post is a part of the “What Democracy Looks Like” column, in which I covers left-wing movements, activism and the occasional labor battle.
Photo by Rory Fanning.
Before the term “Occupy your work place” was a part of the activist lexicon, the strategy was put into place by factory workers in Chicago three years ago, and they were now at it again and this time with support from the Occupy movement.
In December 2008, then workers of Republic Windows and Doors, around 200 member of United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE) Local 1110 staged a six-day sit-in strike to combat the company’s shutting down of business. Citing that the company had only given them a three days notice of closure, instead of the mandated 60 day notice, along with the company’s plans to ignore the employee’s severance pay, including reimbursing them for vacation pay and health insurance coverage. In the end, the workers reached a settlement of $1.75 million. The labor battle was shown in the documentary “Worker’s Republic.” It was also prominently featured in Michael Moore’s 2009 film, “Capitalism: A Love Story.”
The settlement was not the only victory at the time for the worker. The following month, the company that took over the plant, California-based Serious Materials decided to hire back the same work force however only a small part of the work-force was retained.
Which brings us to today. According to reports by the Chicago Tribune, the employees received the following statement on Thursday, February 23, 2012:
Ongoing economic challenges in construction and building products, collapse in demand for window products, difficulty in obtaining favorable lease terms, high leasing and utility costs and taxes, and a range of other factors unrelated to labor costs, have compelled Serious to cease production at the Chicago facility.
Upon hearing the news, the workers received instructions from their union to sit in following the end their shift on Thursday. Thus began the 2012 version of the occupation, which has the Twitter hash-tag, #SeriousOccupation. The employees decided to once again stage a sit-in protest inside their Goose Island factory. Among the demands listed by the workers were a chance to save their jobs, and to be given time to either find another buyer for the plant, or to be given the chance to buy it and run the business by themselves as a co-op.
Police reportedly arrived quickly at the scene of the protest and blocked the entrance, refusing permission for anyone to either enter or leave the factory. The cops went as far as refusing permission for the delivery of a pizza, that was until a chorus of “Let the workers eat” persuaded the police to permit the food to go in.
Photo by Rory Fanning
Late Thursday evening, around 100 demonstrators mostly from Occupy Chicago rallied outside the factory to express solidarity with the close to 50 workers fighting for their jobs. Also represented among those showing support outside included members of unions including National Nurses United, Chicago Teachers Union, Unite Here, American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) among others. This video put out by Occupy Chicago Press Committee included footage from outside the factory, and shows the activists outside chanting, “The workers united will never be defeated,” and “What’s disgusting? Union busting!”
UE union organizer Leah Fried was in the fore-front of the occupation, just as in 2008. Fried took question from reporters outside, and went on to state the worker’s demands to keep their jobs.
When asked how long the workers were prepared to occupy the place Fried responded with, “As long as it takes. We did one before and we’ll do it again.”
Well it took much less than it did three years ago, but the employees came out victorious once again. According to the Occupied Chicago Tribune the workers reached an agreement with Serious Materials at around 1 a.m. Friday, February 24. UE’s Mark Meinster released the following statement around an hour later:
A deal has now been struck to try and save the jobs. Serious Energy has agreed to keep the plant operational and people on the job for another 90 days while the union workers and the company work together to find a way to keep the plant open with new ownership because the plant will no longer be part of Serious Energy’s business plan. After 9 hours the occupation has ended with a hopeful workforce.
The UE Local 1110 members demonstrated once more that it is not only possible for workers to fight back at the means of production, but to also come out successful in the end. Almost as exciting as the victory, was the amount of members of different unions that showed up to express solidarity, and gave meaning to the phrase, “An injury to one is an injury to all.”
The “Serious Occupation” was not the only exciting event this week, as we saw the occupation of Brian Piccolo Elementary School six days prior.
As Caitlin Sheehan reported in Socialist Worker–parents, students and teachers occupied the aforementioned Brian Piccolo Elementary School as way to protest the proposal to turn-around the school. The process of “turning around” a school essentially means that the entire faculty and staff of that school will be let go, and will then have to re-apply for their jobs in order to obtain them again. However, most of the time, the jobs go to a whole new staff.
After close to 10 hours of negotiations the occupiers got the chance to meet with the Board of Education in order to state their argument against the turn-around. I highly recommend Sheehan’s article for more detailed information on the occupation.
Unfortunately, Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s proposal to turn-around 10 public school–including Piccolo–and to close seven others passed unanimously by the board on Wednesday, February 22. However if the initial occupation of Piccolo taught us anything is that the parents, teachers and students will not take that defeat lying down, and will continue to challenge Emanuel’s attempts to destroy Chicago public education.
What we have seen in Chicago in the past week is that the people are no longer going to take the assault on the 99 percent in order to further benefit the lives of the One percent.
Newest Occupy Chicago Committee Protests Anti-Choice Bigots
This post is a part of the “What Democracy Looks Like” weekly column, which covers left-wing movements and activism. Formerly known as “The Active Left.”
On Saturday, January 28, the newly formed Occupy Chicago Gender Equity Committee held its first direct action in Oak Brook, Illinois.
The committee describes itself as follows, taken from the groups Facebook page:
The Occupy Chicago Gender Equity Committee demands full and open access to social services for all people. We recognize that issues of gender equality are inseparable from the long-running history of oppression of the working class and racial minorities. The fight for a truly democratic society cannot be achieved without the struggle for gender equity. We stand with all our brothers and sisters engaged in the fight for equality and ask all of you to join us in this: the fight for dignity, equality, and democracy.
After meeting up in downtown Chicago early Saturday morning, around 20 or so demonstrators made up of occupiers and members of other organizations, headed out to Oak Brook and braved the brutal cold to protest the annual Speak Out Illinois conference. SOIL is a right-wing, anti-choice event made up of over 30 pro-life organizations, politicians and activists.
Photo credit Brit Schulte
The protesters stood in front of the hotel were the conference was hosted. Some of the signs present read “Trust Women,” “Bigots Go Home,” “Keep Your Rosaries Off My Ovaries,” and “Don’t Soil Yourself,” to name a few. After an hour or so of chanting, the occupiers decided to hold a rally and speak-out. Speakers talked about the need for women to be able to have safe and legal abortions and how laws that ban abortion not only fail to decrease the amount of them, they also put the lives of women in danger. Ryne P. of Join the Impact Chicago–an LGBTQ group–stressed the importance of solidarity. Other groups represented were DuPage County NOW, Coalition Against Corporate Higher Education and the International Socialist Organization.
As soon as the speak-out concluded, the activists decided to march around the outside of the hotel, partly to be seen by the anti-choicers inside and partly to stay warm. While marching, the demonstrators chanted “Same Struggle, Same Fight. All Unite for Women’s Rights,” Two, Four, Six, Eight. Abortion Rights in Every State,” and a few others.
Some of highlights of the rally and the march were captured in a video made by Corrie W. of the Gender Equity Committee.
One speaker, and member of the ISO, brought to light the fact that 2012 will continue to be struggle because 2011 brought a myriad of anti-choice attacks from several politicians. Some examples are attempts to defund Planned Parenthood, an Ohio stunt to test the heart-beat of a fetus–which would have put in order some serious restrictions to abortions, a failed Mississippi law that attempted to deem a fertilized egg a legal person and a Georgia Republican’s plot to criminalize miscarriages. Last year also brought laughable remarks from anti-choice right-wingers such as when Arizona Sen. Jon Kyl said the “Not intended to be factual” statement that over 90 percent of Planned Parenthood’s business came from providing abortions and Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann’s insane statement that women were frequently getting abortions after shopping solely because of a Planned Parenthood near by a shopping mall.
The right-wing attacks prompted a re-birth to the women’s rights movement which saw mass city-wide demonstrations via the Walk For Choice campaigns around the country. Of course 2011 also brought the popular Slut Walk, which fought back against rape culture world wide.
Along with the draconian attempts to restrict abortion and the weird laws that would redefine rape, the right-wing attacks also put in danger basic female and male health services by demanding the aforementioned cuts to Planned Parenthood and other health providers.
Hopefully this year brings not only strong attempts to defend a woman’s right to choose, but also develops into an offensive feminist movement in the struggle for free abortion on demand and for the end of rape culture.
Rahm Makes Protesting Illegal in Chicago
This post is a part of the “What Democracy Looks Like” weekly column, which covers left-wing movements and activism. Formerly known as “The Active Left.”
Protesting is now illegal in Chicago, Ill. Well maybe not illegal, but pretty damn close it.
In a 45-4 decision–with one abstention–the Chicago City Counsel voted on Wednesday, Jan. 18 for a Parade Ordinance crafted by Mayor Rahm Emanuel to stiffen protest laws for the NATO/G8 summit to be held in Chicago in May. The law has occasionally been referred to as the “Sit Down, Shut Up Law.”
Photo by Brit Schulte
Occupy Chicago among other groups, showed up to City Hall Wednesday morning to protest the vote. The activists chanted “We vote no” to let the Mayor and all the Aldermen present in the vote know that the people were against this ordinance.
After being told that there was not enough room in the office for the demonstrators, the protesters very loudly chanted, “Let us in.” So loud in fact, that the chants could reportedly be clearly heard from other floors in the building. Soon after that, security had no choice but to allow a handful of people to go in.
Protesters outside of the office were informed about the result of the vote and chanted the Wisconsin-inspired, “Shame!” After attempting a mic-check, the representatives of Occupy Chicago were escorted out of the office.
Once the vote took place, Occupy Chicago held an impromptu General Assembly inside of City Hall in order to assess the vote, debrief people recently showing up and to talk about next steps going forward.
Events were also held the prior day including a press conference by Occupy Chicago, Coalition Against Nato/G8 (CANG8) and others at City Hall–which I recommend for everyone to watch–as well as a mock funeral for the Bill of Rights held at Occupy Chicago Head Quarters. The latter was also held in order to protest the recently passed National Defense Authorization Act.
Soon after the Parade Ordinance was passed on Wednesday afternoon, so-called “progressive” Aldermen Joe Moore and Joe Moreno respectively released explanations for voting for the ordinances.
Moore’s statement praised Emanuel for his proposal and he even went on to say, “Unfortunately, the debate over the Mayor’s proposals too often has been marked by overheated rhetoric and over-the-top hyperbole.” Moore had previously butted heads with Occupy Chicago when voted for Emanuel’s ridiculously anti-99 percent budget in late 2011, which lead to him being mic-checked the same day as Emanuel. I wrote a post about it back in November.
Moreno posted a column in the Huffington Post defending his vote. In it, Moreno basically stated that the over 2,000 people that contacted him asking to vote no on Wednesday did not know what they were talking about. Moreno also managed to defend the summit itself and stated how good it was for Chicago to be hosting in it. Soon after the column went up, Pink Scare later released this great post about Moreno.
For anyone that is not familiar with the ordinance, Andy Thayer posted on Huffington Post some of the key parts of it:
* Virtually every street protest in the downtown would be designated a “large parade” requiring $1 million liability insurance and for organizers to “agree to reimburse the city for any damage to the public way or to city property arising out of or caused by the parade”;
* Large parade or not, organizers would be required to provide the city with “a description of any recording equipment, sound amplification equipment, banners, signs, or other attention-getting devices to be used in connection with the parade” at least a week in advance of the march;
* Every contingent in the march and the order in which they would appear would have to be registered at least a week in advance with the City; and,
* Demonstration organizers would be required to have one marshal for every 100 participants.
* Under a wholly new section of the municipal code (10-8-334), even gatherings on sidewalks, with no presence in the streets, would now be subject to demands that they get permits, giving the City extraordinary latitude to dictate what union and other pickets occur or get shut down by police action.
What makes the law even worse is the fact that even Emanuel himself confessed that the new protest law would be a permanent one that would come in effect 10 days after being voted on.
Now a lot of people expected Chicago to turn into a police state for the week of the NATO/G8 summit once it was announced, however what they didn’t see coming was the fact that Emanuel would go into “Emperor Rahmilus mode” and turn Chicago into a city were a picket line would never be legal again.
It’s somewhat obvious that Emanuel had to expect for the NATO/G8 summit to attract massive protests, however after months of struggle with various labor groups and unions, as well as the emergence of Occupy Chicago, he must have felt the need to implement such an outright violation of civil liberties to feel truly prepared for the conference.
No one really knows for sure how far Emanuel will go in enforcing these laws, however what is known is that Occupy Chicago–among others–will still be on the streets come May and beyond.
To truly understand what the outrage is with this conference being held in the United States, one has to have a good idea of what NATO and the G8 are. In short, NATO is the personification of imperialism while the G8 represent the One Percent’s economy. For more information on these two entities visit the website of the afore-mentioned CANG8.
UPDATE 1-20-12: Here’s video footage of Wednesday’s event at City Hall released by Occupy Chicago.
Occupy Chicago “Mic-Checks” Rahm Emanuel
This post is a part of the “What Democracy Looks Like” weekly column, which covers left-wing movements and activism. Formerly known as “The Active Left.”
Fresh off a weekend visit to Iowa, Chicago mayor, Rahm Emanuel was back in town Monday, November 21.
However, what Emanuel didn’t realize was that Occupy Chicago was still pretty bitter about the passing of his racist, job-killing, anti-poor budget proposal that had less than a week earlier.
Journalist and activist Shaun Harkin explained how Emanuel’s budget will bring job cuts, tax cuts for the rich and union-busting privatization attempts in his article, “Chicago’s Warrior for the 1 Percent.” Some of the most disturbing effects of the budget include that six out of the city’s 12 mental health institutes are to be closed, all seven of the city’s health clinics will be privatized, the severe cuts to the Chicago Public Libraries and the over one hundred lay-offs that will occur by next year.
Mayor One Percent (Emanuel) decided to hold a press conference to display the new Loop Light Show that the city was bringing out for the holidays, which turned out to be the perfect opportunity for Occupy Chicago to air their grievances–about not just his budget, but also the arrest of over 300 occupiers back in October–to his face.
Screenshot Taken From Youtube
The Occupy Chicago Civil Liberties Committee had planned for a 4pm march to City Hall to deliver a petition to Emanuel in order to drop the charges of every occupier that had been arrested. However, after the movement learned about the planned conference set by Emanuel, an audible was called. After getting around 50 activists together at Occupy Chicago Head Quarters (Corner of Jackson and LaSalle), the demonstrators began to march at 4pm to the Emanuel conference. Although the march was very energetic and contained many of the familiar Occupy Chicago chants, the protesters showed up right on time silently marching, while raising their fists in the air.
Emanuel was booed as soon as he was introduced, and soon after he began speaking, the demonstrators mic-checked him. The activists voiced their displeasure with the passing of Emanuel’s budget through the people’s mic, along with demanding the dropping of all charges for all arrestees. Emanuel nervously reacted to the mic check and cut his presentation short. It appeared as though Occupy Chicago had chased the mayor back to City Hall.
“It is unconscionable for you to stand before us as the mayor who put 328 of us in jail for exercising our First Amendment rights,” Occupy Chicago said over the people’s mic. “it is further unconscionable that you propose to cut mental health facilities, and close over a hundred public schools.”
They closed out the mic check of Emanuel by chanting the popular, “One: We are the people. Two: We are United. Three: The occuptation is not leaving.”
After realizing that Emanuel had left, the protesters marched to City Hall as planned and held a rally outside of Emanuel’s office on the fifth floor. The occupation made themselves heard with chants such as “Hey Rahm Emanuel, take your cuts and go to hell,” and “Hey Rahm, hey-hey, How many job did you cut today?”
While outside his office protected by over a dozen police officers, Occupy called out Emanuel and told to come and accept the a petition signed by thousands. The petition demanded for all charges of the arrestees to be dropped. However, Emanuel declined to come out and instead sent out a representative to grab the petition.
What seemed like a victorious day for the occupiers did not stop there.
The Occupy Chicago neighborhood branching out group, Occupy Rogers Park decided to add Ald. Joe Moore to the list of the mic-checked. Around 30 or so occupiers attended the evening’s Chicago Democratic Meeting of the 49th Ward. With key Democratic figures present such as Congresswoman Jan Shakowski, the group felt it wa the perfect opportunity to let that community know how Moore had turned his back on them by voting for Emanuel’s budget last Wednesday, November 16.
Moore was obviously not the only alderman that voted for the budget as it passed unanimously. However, Moore is considered to be one of the more progressive, liberal voices in Chicago, and had reportedly pledged to oppose the mayor’s budget. Since Moore turned on his word, Occupy Chicago and Occupy Rogers Park decided to let the Democrats knows that, “The occupation is not your ally!”
The two mic checks by Occupy Chicago were significant because they are believed to be the first two performed to Democratic politicians.
The movement’s hope is that politicians all throughout the nation get the message that if they will be held accountable by the people if they are to continuously attack the working-class and the 99 percent.
Full disclousure: I may have participated as an activist in both of these events. Links to both mic-checks are present in the article, and both are must see.
The #OCCUPY Movement Continues
This post is a part of the “What Democracy Looks Like” weekly column, which covers left-wing movements and activism. Formerly known as “The Active Left.”
Last week I wrote an article titled, “Protesting America’s Corporate Oligarchy,” which was about the Occupy Wall Street campaign that started Saturday, Sept. 17, 2011. Well the Occupy Together movement that has now spread into over 200 cities worldwide, is now well into its third week.
Let’s just say that similarly to last week, this one started off with a figurative bang. On Saturday, Oct. 1, Over 700 protesters were arrested at the Brooklyn Bridge for blocking traffic, although there are speculations that the police entrapped the demonstrators. By the way one of the activists was a 13-year-old girl, because I’m sure she posed a severe threat to the peace. Continue reading
About the Author
Recent Comments