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By x388133 Last summer brought another record wildfire season to the Pacific Northwest. Smoky air from fires in the region caused hellish air quality around the entire Northern Hemisphere. The causes of the forest fires and the destruction of our forest ecosystem generally are incontrovertible. Over one hundred years of fossil-fueled capitalist development and hundreds … Continue reading Confronting the Carbon Capitalists

Five Things to Watch for in the Labor Movement By Lexi Owens The effects of the Janus case may not be felt for several years. The continued rollback of union rights and the landmark Janus decision will undoubtedly pressure the labor movement’s conservatives to redouble their efforts to expand their influence, so the leftist community … Continue reading Five Things to Watch for in the Labor Movement

By X390433 After years of on-the-job harassment, poor working conditions, and low pay nearly 8,000 Marriott hotel workers have gone on strike in 8 different cities including Seattle's Westin, which is owned by Marriott. Negotiations have reportedly been tense but fruitful in various cities, and the workers have been backed by thousands of supporters. The … Continue reading In the News: Notes from around the Northwest

By Lindsay Mimir Paul Allen, one of Seattle’s foremost business leaders, philanthropists, and rapacious capitalists died on October 15. Like many of the outrageously wealthy, he was widely celebrated in the media. He was a co-founder of Microsoft, one of Time magazine’s 100 most influential people in back-to-back years (2007 and 2008), owner of the … Continue reading What should we say when a capitalist dies?

[Originally published in issue 3 of the Seattle Worker]

By Lindsay Mimir We should stop thinking about unions from the boss’ perspective. The bosses love at-will employment, where they can fire anyone for any reason. Unions force bosses to establish just cause to fire someone, a very reasonable demand that unions make to employers. If the bosses can’t even get enough evidence to establish … Continue reading Do Unions Really Protect Bad Workers from Getting Fired?

By X358109 There has recently been a lot of informal discussions in the IWW about the Organizer Training program. These discussions have touched on a number of assumptions about organizing and strategy that purport to be “at odds” with the OT. People on the left tend to rely on a number of truisms which I … Continue reading The Myth of Precarity

By Lexi Owens This essay was inspired by ongoing discussions in online and offline anarchist spaces where many self-styled anarchists have tied themselves in knots trying to justify certain hierarchies, especially those of the educated and benevolent expert who provides leadership during revolutionary projects. It is imperative that labor organizers, union members, and other revolutionaries … Continue reading There are no Justified Hierarchies

by X389552 In early April of this year, Google workers went public with a petition against an artificial intelligence project they’d learned was slated to be used in military drones. Over 4,000 workers had already signed onto the letter that begins, “We believe that Google should not be in the business of war,” and ends … Continue reading Organizing Tech: Insights into the Tech World’s Sudden Rebellion