Oh! No! Occupy Announces General Strike!

by | Mar 26, 2012 | Labor Relations Ink

Well, don’t cancel your plans for May 1 yet because America might not grind to a halt that day afterall.  Occupy Wall Street, the official front organization of the Occupy Movement, had announced last week that it was calling for a “crippling” general strike on May 1.  And while the working title of the strike “The Day Without the 99%” has a post-apocalyptic feel to it, the street buzz is few people with a job to strike from will actually be participating. “It won’t happen,” said Stuart Appelbaum, president of the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union. “They (Occupy) are not working with the unions in a serious way yet; nor are the unions working with them in a serious way.  And it is the wrong strategy.” “I think the concept is a great one but the reality is very tough,” said Arthur Cheliotes, the President of Local 1180, and Communications Workers of America, telegraphing labor’s general aversion to illegal strikes.  (The United States hasn’t seen a wide scale general strike since 1946 as they were soon outlawed by Taft-Hartley, but then how would a bunch of Poli Sci majors know that!) “We’re public sector workers—we take a day off for a general strike and we’re fined two days’ pay,” said Cheliotes. “I don’t think my members are inclined to engage in that process.” “We do expect people to not work,” said organizer Max Berger. “Just in terms of participation by labor organizations and mass people not working, we’re realistic about where we’re at and what’s possible.”  Which leaves all the rest of us once again asking, and so the point again is? “Frankly there’s not enough union people in this country anyway, so even if you made every union person strike, you still couldn’t have everyone not working,” said Jeff Smith, an Occupy organizer.  “It’s about getting enough people to opt out of what their normal equation is.  Even if you just stay home and watch TV, in some ways you’ll have participated in this.” Oh.  So there you have it.  Stay home, watch TV and overturn the capitalist structure. The official poster of  “The Day Without the 99%” lists these possible alternatives to your normal May Day – no work, no chores, no banking, no shopping, and no school – so plan accordingly.

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