Who else does the IWW organise?

sounds par for the course.

it is.

Please take the religion discussion to another thread. And can someone please move the comments on that discussion from this thread to that new one? This thread is useful and interesting, or at least could be. I doubt that one will be or could be. In any case I for one have no interest in that discussion, I expect many others on here feel the same.

As for who can join, the IWW constitution allows anyone to join the organization including the self employed. The only exclusions are for those who have the power to hire and fire and those who are officials of trade or unions and political parties. There are provisions for exceptions being made at the branch level for union/party officials. There is talk about amending the constitution to make it so there is no grounds for interpreting the constitution in a way that allows government officials like the MSPs to be members.

Probably. I wouldn't know, I've never gone to any of their services. I just run the office. I dunno, I think it is a good thing for older folks to have some kind of sympathetic community to feel apart of and a place to talk about issues and support struggles. I can't imagine much moralizing goes on. Just speakers talking about issues and current events, some debate and discussion, and a lunch. What's wrong with that?

Well, Dev that's nice, but what about my housing co-op's office worker who lives in another co-op and has worked in co-operative housing for the last twenty years. He clearly has "a community of interest" with the members, and yet we have unfairly sacked him. Now he's not a member of any union, so basically he has got to pay a lawter to fight his case in a industrial tribunal, he could have of course called apon his fellow workers to support him but he also got the sack (but he is in a union, so will at least get a free lawyer)and the very part time groundsman couldn't afford to risk upsetting the cabal that runs (well runs the co-op into the ground whilst ripping it off)the co-op. Still i'm sure it's a great comfort that life is so black and white for you.

Well... I know that alot of older members of the church I work at joined the congregation during the red-baiting McCarthy era, since it offered some semblence of a sanctuary for people to talk about radical politics and associate with each other. Plus, in the US, there are other benefits to being a church when it comes to tax status, etc.

But yeah, like Nate said, best left to another thread...

Revol asked

No Revol, I'm not. By inclination I'm actually kind of an asshole about my atheism to such a degree that I have a hard time being respectful with folks who are. My mom was in an abusive relationship for a really long time and she used to say that she didn't want to leave because she thought god didn't want her to get another divorce. So religion sets my teeth on edge to a rather irrational degree (as does anti-feminism, BTW, which is why I don't engage with you on your thoughts on radical feminism - this is not an attack on you so much as an admission of a difficulty I have in having certain discussions in a civil manner).

On the other hand, at an intellectual level I don't really care about other people's religious beliefs, I think people can believe all kinds of dumb things and still do great stuff, just like people can believe all kinds of great things and still do dumb or fucked up stuff, much of the left as a case in point. I think it's wicked important that we be able to meet people wherever their at, whatever their beliefs and idioms, in order to struggle together. That participation in struggle changes people and it provides the start for a relationship wherein intellectual disagreement can happen productively. Like I said, religion's not one that's easy for me to have productive disagree on, I tend to mentally just go "fool!" in my head when people talk about believing in god. That's a ton more work for me to talk about than other stuff, for contingent and irrational reasons like I said.

All that aside, WP's a friend of mine and even if he wasn't and even if was a devout catholic instead of a unitarian the resort to name calling on this thread is very frustrating and is going to derail this thread if it continues. It makes me wonder if y'all have much experience and success talking to people who don't already agree with you on everything and getting them to start to come closer to your opinions.

This is another comment to be moved to that other thread, where we can name call and shit talk to our hearts' content.

There are a few other provisions that could have implications on this matter, including the Constitutional provision on the right to deny membership to those whose employment is incompatible with the aims of the union, and also a long-standing resolution against direct *or indirect* alliances with political parties or anti-political sects.

I haven't actually read the thread because it looks really inane, but here in the Ottawa-Outaouais branch there is a panhandler's (uk = beggar) union that is doing some really interesting and useful work.

When I lived in Glasgow I tried to organise with the staff of a student union I worked at. I have a lot to learn about organising.

I was citing from a document

sorry if i came off flip, i have a bug up my nose about UUs. i have gone to UU services, and ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh gawwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwd

nothing, nothing at all. i just wish they wouldn't call it a religion. it just seems cowardly, as if they want the vibe of religion without any of the mental labor, as if "i feel it, therefore it's true" is a valid argument.

you might want to read this. believe it or not devrim, a hell of a lot of students have to work nowadays. long gone are the times when the state provided education for free.

Well Devrim I don't support the members of parliament being in the branch though I still see nothing wrong from a principled position with the staffers themselves.I've also already said this twice on these boards, granted with the recent shit storm maybe you missed it.

....also I think you are trying to steer this away from priests and back to politicisans.

It's an impossible position to defend. The final decision was referred to head office in Philidelphia. It needs sorted out, the recent debacle clearly illustrates that (what if Sheridan had joined... Sheesh. It doesn't bear thinking about.). On a practical basis however there's no real point or gain for the IWW in pissing off Carolyn Leckie or Rosie Kane (the two MSPs who're members) and it would potentially alienate those members of the IWW who are also in the SSP - now that would be a seriously bad move as there are a lot of militant workers in the SSP who we'd be hoping to recruit from. It would also piss off the job branch. That is the only consideration. It needs sorted out tho.

This type of organising is also taking place in Ireland and across Latin America. You see no benefits in organising the reserve army of labour? Their poverty stricken existence is capital's first line of defence against workplace militancy - 'Look, you'll end up on the streets!' Beggars, vagrants and down-and-outs make good scabs, hence organising them is important, and wins concrete material gains for the class. It's also a process of political education for those involved, it ties into other housing struggles of the class and is good propaganda for other organising efforts. Of course it could be done in a completely voluntarist way - let's find the poorest people and help them - but I don't think that is the case here, and it certainly isn't the case amongst many homeless/landless movements the world over. The right of every person to a decent home is a very good transitional demand, and one that can be won in the here and now.

On your other comments, the IWW is not simply a labour union, it is a political organisation akin to a worldwide social movement organisation with a broad base united around certain key demands for the purpose of building workplace power however we see fit. Under that definition wobbly preacher may have no real labour power himself but to debar him from membership when he could be doing all sorts of good work trying to build workplace power for the class thr9ough the IWW is fucking mental, and you obviously know that. You're not so daft as to be completely 'structural' in your thought like that.

A broad base of less than 2000 people, of a worldwide social movement with 90% of it's membership concentrated in the U.S. and Canada. A base so broad it includes members of Parliament, and anyway they see fit as long as they don't upset the members of Parliament and the SSP!

Exactly comrade. That's why I'm a 'leftist' and you're a left communist. I think being involved in pragmatic reasoned and strategic reformism is the most important thing I think I can be doing, and that involves sacrificing or bending certain principles up to a point all the time to achieve desired results, whereas you reject that. It's a question of means and ends, and your position to my mind is more often an abstract philosophical one that brooks no compromise with reformism, I'm more into going to people where they are now with a minimum programme and an organisational approach and trying to work towards a more maximum programme.

Boring! It's both.

Revol tbh I don't think we are actually that far away from each other. If I were in the Edinburough branch I probably would be pushing for other organising targets, having said that if I were to be outvoted I would still work on the campaign, and as it stands I think the Brittish ROC is doing the right thing. The wrong thing would be refuse to support these workers because they are 'fucking trots' even though they signed red cards, that is simply irresponsible and puts factionalism ahead of defending the members of your labour organisation. I think these folks should be supported for the same reason I would strike in defence of a fellow worker who happens to be a trot, because we are both workers.

In the end all of the problems with this in my mind are strategic problems, not problems of principle, in fact this instance illustrates precisely why no matter how much you think you have in common with your bosses you can still get screwed by them.

I also disagree with Dundee United that pissing off SSP members should be a concern at all. If they are militant workers and they see their staffers getting screwed then they will side with us anyways, otherwise they are scarcely worth our time. Our obligation is to the workers we have organised- full stop. Every other concern aside from basic principles are irrelevant. We only cheapen the cause of these folks by trying to play politics and win allies from political sects out of this.

Having said that I think the campaign to win these people their jobs back is admirable and well executed. This is very good experience for the entire BIROC and I think their odds of at least a partial victory are pretty good. I just hope they don't stop here and they apply these experiences to other industries.

For the record the IWW's student membership is fairly small, probably no more than 5%, and not particularly influential. As far as I know there are no student on the GEB or serving as officers for the international. In my local group I think there's one student. The LA group that I worked with last year there were 0. When I lived in Chicago I think there maybe two or three students who were active in the local GMB and, again, none of them were serving as officers or were particularly influential in either the local or with the couriers union.

I fail to understand why an organization having multiple tendencies and currents within it is problematic. Yes, the IWW is supposed to be a union and in a lot of places and for a sizeable minority of the US membership (somewhere between 20 and 30%) it is a union at the workplace. Elsewhere the IWW does step-in to help members who get abused by their bosses by helping them file paperwork with various state agencies and, more importantly, engaging in solidarity actions such as pickets over unpaid wages or unfair firings.

What is probably more important is that the organization is growing and more and more acting like a union and focusing its energies on organizing. Today there at least seven branches in the US that are seriously engaged in workplace organizing (i.e. either represent workers through a formal contract or have some form of shopfloor control someplace either through open or clandestine organization). Five years ago there were maybe two.

As for the parliamentary workers from what I can tell of the situation it does look like some people who shouldn't have been admitted into the organization have been. After the conflict this should be sorted out. Trying to sort it out in the middle of the conflict seems really messed-up and not the best way to support the workers involved which I think should be the priority. I know an investigation has been called for I am sure that things will get sorted out.

And now I'll let everyone get back to the hate-fest...

I don't hate you Wobbly Preacher, even if you are a preacher. You need union protection from the more religious congregants anyhow

I think the IWW is a union at every member's workplace. I take my membership from job to job with me. At almost every job I've been at, there were either Wobblies there before, or there sure as hell were after!

The union is doing some great work in NYC with immigrant workers in the foodstuffs industry. Ditto for the work of the couriers union in Chi-town. And we do seem to have a growing membership amongst short-haul truckers in the Los Angeles area, and the Bay Area is always a hub of activity. For those contract fans, we've got a few of those too.

In just the USA, I would put our figures at around 1,500 - maybe a bit more. It's a little tricky to figure out based on what dues Headquarters has on record as being paid-up for any given month...and a lot of members pay month-to-month (we don't do dues check-off either) to a delegate, who must then mail the report in or turn it in to the local branch. So I think a more accurate count would be looking at membership for who paid in the last six months, which would probably put us closer to 2,500 in the States. In our *total history*, we've probably had over 1,500,000 members.

The IWWs influence and experience also varies a lot by branch and industry. In chicago about 10% of the bike messenger industry are members, with maybe anohter 10% having been involved at one point or another.

And of course we're far from perfect. I think the North American wobs on these boards probably agree with each other way more than most member do and I know I at least tend to talk about the best parts of the union without spending near as much time talking about the problems. I can see how that might seem like a distorted picture, but I assure you - no one's trying to mislead anybody here. It's more like how when we're out in front of others my wife praises me for being a good cook and doing the dishes all the time, and doesn't talk shit about how I'm messy and antisocial. One tries to encourage the best elements in order to develop them further.

And fuck, what else is there on the US left to be part of? If I lived on the east coast I'd probably look into joining NEFAC, and I'd still be a wobbly. Where I live the IWW is by far the only game in town as far as I'm concerned.

Not really, since population density, number of local groups (as opposed to isolated members dotted up and down the country) and location of groups are easily as important in terms of effectiveness as what proportion of the population you organise. It's not a simple numbers game.

It really pisses me off when people try to reduce politics to "Oh yeah, but how many members have you got?"

what the man said. Currently the IWW in the UK has more members than all three @ feds put together, but dozens of the members live on their own in wee villages and that. That makes things really difficult.

indeedio - in london we've got loads of members, but some live in essex, kent, surrey, hampshire, etc, it's bloody hard to get the all in one room.

I will comment on this after the resolution of the dispute.

Yeah of course, but the relative size of the IWW in the US is only tangentially relevant to organising efforts in other countries. Moreover as the recent New York organising campaign has been showing, growth can be very rapid in certain industries (even in as much as it can also be very fragile).

I think for example the IWW in the UK ought to be thinking of building a network of militant workers. The recent rank and file conference that all those general secs fucked up a few months back could have been organised by the IWW. We're in a position now to be doing shit like that (we have the size).

do you?

I reckon I could count the number of active wobblies in the UK on my fingers and toes, tbh.

That's not to say that people with Red Cards aren't active politically, but that they aren't involed with the wobs. The Manchester branch for instance, hasn't met since I've lived here.

the IWW has very strong syndicalist tendencies but it's not a syndicalist union.

i wouldn't say it that strongly. it looks pretty minute an unimportant but everything's got to start somewhere. a decade ago the IWW had a handful of members and did virtually nothing. now we have more members and do more. it is, as is everything in life, a work in progress.