This is part of the series “Journals of a
lumpen-proletariat.” The idea
is to relate real working class experiences for the benefit of Marxists and
Maoists who are studying the theories, but may not be familiar with the actual
people these theories were intended to improve the lives of. Most of my 20s I
spent as a member of the lumpen-proletariat class. I worked full or part-time
jobs that paid only minimum wage. I tried to sell drugs to help stretch my
money and to get drugs cheap or free. One year I landed a job working at the
Stokely-Van Camp’s pork and bean factory in Lawrence, KS. It was one of the few
times when I actually earned enough money to live comfortable. For that one
half a year I was a member of the actual proletariat. (Real names are not used
here and some details may be fuzzy as I am writing this from memory, mostly.)
I also joined the Teamsters Union while I was at the plant and
it gave me an opportunity to experience actual class struggle through union
activities. By December of 1979, the Union and its members were tired of
their contract coming up for approval right before Christmas. There was an
issue of pay, but every union member agreed that the main reason talks broke down
between the union and the company was a union demand for changing the
negotiation date.
“No one
wants to go on strike before Christmas,” a tall elderly man said at a union
meeting I attended. “The company knows we can’t afford to go on strike before
then and they use it as leverage to keep us from pushing our demands on them.”
There
was real anger among the union members of the plant. The local newspaper,the Lawrence Journal
World said the
strike was divisive to the town. At one point a woman in the union complained
that company official’s referred to us as monkeys. For people as myself it was
a real eye opener to see these corporate rulers exposed as the creeps they are.
One
thing that is probably not the usual for such a strike was the Marxist workers
in the factory who came there because Lawrence is college town and the new
communist movement was moving into the University of Kansas, as it did
universities across the country. The Progressive Labor Party and the
Revolutionary Communist Party occasionally made their appearance at KU. Also the
Socialist Workers Party showed up a few times a month. There were local groups
that dealt with a lot of foreign policy issues such as the North American Club,
which I belong to. It was an umbrella group for Latin American issues. Many of
those in the group were pro-Castro. There were also the Friends of the Iranian
People, of which I was also a member. The last group was aligned with the
Iranian Student Association, which was made up mostly of Maoist Iranians.
Most of
these groups took part in the various university activities related to the
Stokely Strike. Movies were shown and panel discussions were held. Some people
involved in the strike attended these activities and one was a labor organizer
called Sam.
Sam was
involved with the new communist groups and activities. He was a tall blond man
who wore a red earring. I heard him arguing against the draft and US actions
against the USSR for its involvement in Afghanistan.
“I don’t
have anything against the Afghanistan people and their government,” I once
heard him say.
The
strike was a good opportunity for the both of us to get involved in class
struggle right here in the USA. Sam used the opportunity to take a leadership
role in the strike. One day I was discussing politics with Sam and he realized
I had a lot of political experience.
As we
talked, we both realized we were getting a unique experience that some Marxists
never get. And later I would realize I might never get such a chance again.
Some of
the tactics being used my certain union members and leaders involved vandalism.
A thin red haired girl name Betty said she needed the money too bad and crossed
the picket line. Her and some other scabs were parking their cars at a cab
company and using cabs to get to work. Some union people found out and slashed
their tires at the cab parking lot. Betty went as far as walking down railroad
tracks, though a wooded area, to go to the plant in the back way so no one
would see here. It didn’t help. When she returned to her car, her tires were
slashed.
This one
foreman was an old nasty redneck who tried to run the picketers over when he
crossed in to work each day. He drove a big red pickup truck. It was brand new.
One night some union people put grease and oil all over the inside of his
pickup cab, making it impossible for him to drive to work the next morning. I
thought that was funny at the time, especially since he was such a right-wing
ass hole—Hell!—I still think it was funny. There were some people who didn’t
approve of such tactics. Both Sam and I had no problem with them.
“Should
we really use tactics like that?” asked a 20 something union man.
“If
someone broke in and raped you mom, would you fight them?” he asked. “We are
fighting to save our jobs. It is the same things.”
As the
strike ground on, the union decided to spread the strike to two other plants.
The plan would really hit the company in their bankrolls. Sam invited me to go
with him to another plant in another state to help spreading the strike. Since
I was taking a class at KU at the time I couldn’t go.
Stokely
had been relying on union busting layers to try and break the union. When we
spread the strike they flipped out. Sam told me their representatives were
clearly pissed. They finally made an offer for a very tiny raise and they moved
the negotiation date. The raise was a tiny fraction of what we asked for.
I had
learned a lot from the experience. As the strike drug on, I went to a dog food
company and told the guy I needed the money and would quit at the other place
if he would hire me at his plant. I was wearing down and living on the strike
benefits of $40 a week. It was getting hard for me to get buy all this time.
“I can’t
do that,” the balding old bastard told me. “If you’re lying then I would be
helping another company to break a strike and I can’t have that. What if we had
a strike here? We all have to work together to prevent strikes.”
So there
it was. The guy had taught me that businesses know how to stick together and
crush working people, while we had a hard time convincing some workers that
sticking together was the only way to defend our rights as workers.
Right
before the end of the strike I got a call from someone at Stokely’s asking me
to come back to work. I told them I would not go back until the strike was
over. They were polite, but when the strike ended, they didn’t hire me back.
I had a
friend named Boz who worked with me at Stokely. I had known him before the
strike. He lived as a lumpen-proletariat, just as I had. He was biker and
a vet and was a fanatic about bicker wear and customs as some bikers are. He
was short and dressed kind of plain and was proud of his long-black scraggly
hair.
Boz was
on the grave yard shift cleaning tanks. He liked working on the grave yard
shift so he could sit in bars all night and go to work about the time the bars
began to close. He had it timed just right.
No one
ever complained about his drinking until after the strike. He had been a solid
union member and spent time on the picket line. So they fired him for drinking
right after he went back to work.
Sam also
got fired after another employee started a fight with him.
Another
union member I knew was Barb, a young woman about my age who had long dark
hair. She was the one who got me on at Stokely’s. We dated briefly but stayed
friends. One day Boz and I were at her home visiting. Another friend of hers, a
young man, came over and he said;
“I heard
that Stokely has been firing all the people who were hard core supporters of
the union.”
“You’re
in a room full of them,” Boz said.
Today
the plant is closed down. I moved to Wichita shortly after that. But I haven’t
forgotten the days of that strike. It was a great learning experience.
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