Where I work among the homeless on the street, I see the infinite degradation experienced by those discarded by capitalist society and barely surviving on its margins. There were always those who live on the edge. Karl Marx was describing the lack of transparency in social relations: what appears to be a free decision to sell your labor is nothing of the kind. Yet people stay away from thinking about how all labor, even paid labor, is forced labor.
On March 24, around 200 activists protested against a surprise eviction of the tent encampment in Echo Park. There is antagonism between houseless people and the families and businesses close to them. For poor communities to scapegoat even poorer people is the way that the 1% keep us fighting for space and resources while they throw us bones.
The battle against the COVID-19 pandemic is a battle over how society will change, mirroring the battle over how to confront and adapt to the climate and extinction crisis. Strikes are erupting across the world.
The spread of the coronavirus cannot be viewed in isolation from the corruption of China’s state-capitalism and the danger the virus poses especially to the poor, homeless and refugees.
Readers’ Views Part 2 takes up: the needed return to Marx’s Humanism, and Voices from behind prison bars.
Readers’ Views takes up: women’s liberation, youth in the battle, Blacks vs. racism, border cop thugs, Middle East struggles, and voices from behind bars.
An in-person report of the recent devastating earthquakes in Mexico and how social conditions including capitalism, government corruption, etc., negatively affect rescue efforts; how everyday people’s self-organization makes a significant difference.
A forum on “Responding to Mental Health Crises without Police” heard from a number of local groups attempting to organize our communities to deal with mental health crises.
Readers’ Views on: environmental and social crises; Martin Luther King Day; healthcare crisis, Donald Trump and the election; brutal “justice”; and who reads News & Letters.
A look at the situation in the Middle East in light of Donald Trump’s election that takes up Syria, Yemen and the arming by the U.S. of varying forces–some of whom are fighting each other.
Readers’ Views on: Racism and Revolt Put U.S. on Trial; Life and Death Under the Class Divide; Environmental Struggles; War and Atrocities; and Women’s Lives at Stake.
Mohammed Al-Waleedi was killed by Houthi militants on the street in Taiz, Yemen, on June 26. This coldblooded senseless murder was met with a wide public outcry.
Several hundred people of all races marched from the Union Rescue Mission in Skid Row, where a homeless Black man with mental problems known as Africa, was killed by six Los Angeles police officers.
In Chicago, thousands march for a living wage, while in Los Angeles, protesters of all races marched downtown on the anniversary of Martin Luther King’s 1968 assassination. They included low-wage workers campaigning to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour, uniting with the movement against police killing of unarmed Black and Brown youth.
From the July-August 2014 issue of News & Letters
New York—When new Mayor Bill de Blasio was campaigning, his pledge was to end the “two cities” here, one of the rich and one of the rest of us. And a major component of that was to address the housing problem. Some may contend that [=>]
Readers’ Views from the Nov.-Dec. 2013 N&L: SYRIA AND WORLD POLITICS; WARS PAST AND PRESENT; PHILOSOPHY AND MASSES; PRISONERS READ & SPEAK
Readers’ Views from Nov.-Dec. 2013 N&L: U.S. RACISM AND BLACK AND LATINO STRUGGLES; LABOR UNDER ATTACK; CTA vs. THE HOMELESS; DISABILITY AND HUMANITY; ABORTION IS A HUMAN NEED; EGYPT’S CONTRADICTIONS; DETROIT CRISIS; NUCLEAR PERIL; WHY A NEWSPAPER LIKE N&L?
Los Angeles–At a March 5 gathering sponsored by the Southern California Immigration Coalition (SCIC), over 60 people gathered to address immigrant workers’ concerns, such as stopping the attacks on and the abuse of vendors, the need for “Legalization now,” abolishing Arizona SB 1070, and ending police harassment and brutality.
An LAPD officer shot and killed Carlos [=>]
