MikeDunnAuthor<p>Today in Labor History March 2, 1997: Earth First! Activist, feminist and IWW labor organizer Judi Bari died. Bari, and her comrade, Darryl Cherney, survived a terrorist bomb attack in Oakland, CA in 1990, when they were organizing Redwood Summer, a 3-month campaign of nonviolent direct actions, during the summer of 1990, to end the clear-cutting of northern California redwood forests. The police and FBI immediately blamed her for the bombing, claiming that she was the terrorist and that the bomb was intended for logging companies. They arrested her and handcuffed her to her hospital bed, as she lay there with a shattered pelvis. Bari and Cherney were eventually exonerated and won a settlement for the FBI’s role in violating their civil liberties. The bomber was never caught. In addition to their organizing and activism, Bari and Cherney were also musical composers and performers. Their song, “Will the Fetus Be Aborted,” (to the tune of “Will the Circle Be Unbroken,”) was performed by Jello Biafra and Mojo Nixon on their Prairie Home Invasion album.</p><p>Bari was instrumental in organizing Local 1 of the IWW, an effort to unite timber workers and environmentalists around the same goal of ending the clear-cutting of the forests. Some of the actions during Redwood Summer included preparing breakfast at base camp and getting it to the timber workers at 5 am, before they began work, in an effort to talk with them and organize them. Redwood Summer, as a whole, was well-organized. Veteran Direct-Action activists hosted numerous organizing events in the months that preceded the actions, to train activists in their legal rights, direct action tactics, security, jail solidarity, etc. However, there was little to no training in labor organizing or class solidarity. Consequently, at least for the actions in which I participated, the conversations with timber workers tended to be privileged activists talking down to the workers, telling them how they should be thinking and acting, and the timber workers yelling at them and threatening them. One environmentalist was clobbered with an axe handle. Others were attacked with rocks. And on at least one occasion, assailants fired guns at base camp. Overall, the actions did not stop the clear cutting of the forests, but they did slow things down for a while, and they did reduce Louisiana Pacific’s profits.</p><p><a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/LaborHistory" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>LaborHistory</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/workingclass" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>workingclass</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/IWW" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>IWW</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/earthfirst" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>earthfirst</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/judibari" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>judibari</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/fbi" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>fbi</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/terrorism" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>terrorism</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/bombing" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>bombing</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/police" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>police</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/ecology" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>ecology</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/redwoodsummer" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>redwoodsummer</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/folkmusic" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>folkmusic</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/solidarity" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>solidarity</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/classconsciousness" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>classconsciousness</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/jail" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>jail</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/directaction" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>directaction</span></a></p>
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#RedwoodSummer
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It's Going Down<p>We spoke with Steve Ongerth about the radical history of <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/RedwoodSummer" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>RedwoodSummer</span></a>, and how <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/IWW" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>IWW</span></a> and <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/EarthFirst" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>EarthFirst</span></a> organizer Judi Bari worked to bring together timber workers and radical environmentalists fighting to save old-growth forests. </p><p><a href="https://itsgoingdown.org/steve-ongerth-on-the-bombing-of-judi-bari-and-redwood-summer/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" translate="no"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">itsgoingdown.org/steve-ongerth</span><span class="invisible">-on-the-bombing-of-judi-bari-and-redwood-summer/</span></a></p>
MikeDunnAuthor<p>Will the 2020s make the 60s look like the 50s?</p><p>So far, no. But there is time. And the student protests in support of Palestine, and the union support of them, particularly at the University of California, is a positive sign.</p><p>What are the lessons we can learn from the past?</p><p>Organizers of Redwood Summer, in the 1990s, had the hubris to make a similar claim, that the actions they were organizing were so radical, would be so effective, that they'd make the radical 60s look like the mundane 50s. To be sure, the 90s were a radical time. We were organizing mass civil disobedience, direct actions and sabotage to end US support of death squads in Central America, to end the death penalty in the U.S., to end nuclear testing, to support immigrants at the southern border, to support LGBTQ rights, and to halt the U.S. war in Iraq. Food Not Bombs were getting arrested for serving free food to the unhoused, while publicizing the U.S. war machine. Homes Not Jails was liberating federally-owned buildings and converting them into squats for the unhoused to live in. And left-wing pirate radio stations were popping up in cities to report on and publicize these efforts. But in the end, the 90s did not make the 60s look like the 50s.</p><p>I participated in Redwood Summer (and many of these other movements). It was fun and exciting. But Redwood Summer, in particular, was supposed to be a collaborative effort between radical environmental and labor activists, as well as indigenous rights activists and others. There was a bit of this. A very little bit of it. Worse, there was too much class bigotry and arrogance by the predominantly white, middle class environmental activists, and this alienated the working class timber workers we hoped to unite with over saving the ancient redwood forests from being clear cut by Pacific Lumber. </p><p>So, one major lesson is that effective coalitions require real solidarity, which requires listening to others, and authentically nonhierarchical structures, in contrast to the hidden power structures that often evolve in movements, even within so-called anarchist organizations. (A great read on this topic is: "The Tyranny of Structurelessness," by Jo Freeman).</p><p>Perhaps the most powerful tool we have is the General Strike. Of course, this tool has been virtually obliterated by the Taft Hartley law, which bans them. Consequently, none of the mainstream unions will ever consider this tactic out of fear that their leadership will be imprisoned, and their war chests will be seized. But that doesn't mean we can't still have a General Strike. Just means it will have to be organized in other ways, outside of mainstream union channels, like word of mouth, social media, wheat pasting posters, stickers, etc. But it also requires good old-fashioned relational organizing: going "door-to-door," talking with colleagues at work, at school, neighbors, family, friends, educating them about the power of this tool. Actually listening to their fears and concerns. Providing support and mutual aid whenever possible. Empowering them. And it will require employed workers, not just students and professional activists. Why? Because if we really want to hurt the bosses, we need to halt profit-making, which is most effectively done by halting production. And while blocking roads and bridges can slow down business as usual for a few hours, getting millions of workers to refuse to work can halt a lot more business for a lot longer. It can literally bring capitalism to its knees. Compel leaders and decision-makers to buckle to our demands. It can even become revolutionary and lead to major social change. But we don't currently have millions of workers who are already radicalized to the point that they will participate in a General Strike, let alone believe that revolutionary social change is possible. So, there's a lot of organizing that still needs to be done. That's a lot of us going out and listening to our colleagues, neighbors, peers, doing the underappreciated, not so glorious, time consuming work of building a movement.</p><p><a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/workingclass" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>workingclass</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/LaborHistory" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>LaborHistory</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/IWW" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>IWW</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/earthfirst" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>earthfirst</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/RedwoodSummer" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>RedwoodSummer</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/environmentalism" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>environmentalism</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/protest" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>protest</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/sabotage" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>sabotage</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/directaction" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>directaction</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/iraq" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>iraq</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/antiwar" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>antiwar</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/Organizing" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>Organizing</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/lgbtq" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>lgbtq</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/immigration" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>immigration</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/generalstrike" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>generalstrike</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/MutualAid" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>MutualAid</span></a></p>
MikeDunnAuthor<p>Today in Labor History June 11, 2002: Earth First! and IWW activists Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney won $4.4 million in a false-arrest lawsuit against Oakland police and the FBI. They had been arrested for blowing up their own car while they were in it. The jury unanimously found that six of the seven FBI and OPD defendants had deliberately framed Bari and Cherney in an effort to crush Earth First! and chill participation in Redwood Summer.</p><p><a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/workingclass" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>workingclass</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/LaborHistory" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>LaborHistory</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/earthfirst" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>earthfirst</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/IWW" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>IWW</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/police" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>police</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/fbi" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>fbi</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/JudiBari" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>JudiBari</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/bombing" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>bombing</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/RedwoodSummer" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>RedwoodSummer</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/oakland" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>oakland</span></a></p>
MikeDunnAuthor<p>Today in Labor History March 2, 1997: Earth First! Activist, feminist and IWW labor organizer Judi Bari died. Bari, and her comrade, Darryl Cherney, survived a terrorist bomb attack in Oakland, CA in 1990, when they were organizing Redwood Summer, a 3-month campaign of nonviolent direct actions, during the summer of 1990, to end the clear-cutting of northern California redwood forests. The police and FBI immediately blamed her for the bombing, claiming that she was the terrorist and that the bomb was intended for logging companies. They arrested her and handcuffed her to her hospital bed, as she lay there with a shattered pelvis. Bari and Cherney were eventually exonerated and won a settlement for the FBI’s role in violating their civil liberties. The bomber was never caught. In addition to their organizing and activism, Bari and Cherney were also musical composers and performers. Their song, “Will the Fetus Be Aborted,” (to the tune of “Will the Circle Be Unbroken,”) was performed by Jello Biafra and Mojo Nixon on their Prairie Home Invasion album.</p><p>Bari was instrumental in organizing Local 1 of the IWW, an effort to unite timber workers and environmentalists around the same goal of ending the clear-cutting of the forests. Some of the actions during Redwood Summer included preparing breakfast at base camp and getting it to the timber workers at 5 am, before they began work, in an effort to talk with them and organize them. Redwood Summer, as a whole, was well-organized. Veteran Direct-Action activists hosted numerous organizing events in the months that preceded the actions, to train activists in their legal rights, direct action tactics, security, jail solidarity, etc. However, there was little to no training in labor organizing or class solidarity. Consequently, at least for the actions in which I participated, the conversations with timber workers tended toward privileged activists talking down to the workers, telling them how they should be thinking and acting, and the timber workers yelling at them and threatening them. One environmentalist was clobbered with an axe handle. Others were attacked with rocks. And on at least one occasion, assailants fired guns at base camp. Overall, the actions did not stop the clear cutting of the forests, but they did slow things down for a while, and they did reduce Louisiana Pacific’s profits.</p><p><a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/laborhistory" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>laborhistory</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/WorkingClass" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>WorkingClass</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/IWW" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>IWW</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/earthfirst" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>earthfirst</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/judibari" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>judibari</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/fbi" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>fbi</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/terrorism" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>terrorism</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/bombing" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>bombing</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/police" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>police</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/ecology" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>ecology</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/redwoodsummer" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>redwoodsummer</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/folkmusic" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>folkmusic</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/solidarity" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>solidarity</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/classconsciousness" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>classconsciousness</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/jail" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>jail</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/directaction" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>directaction</span></a></p>
MikeDunnAuthor<p>Today in Labor History June 11, 2002: Earth First! and IWW activists Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney won $4.4 million in a false-arrest lawsuit against Oakland police and the FBI. They had been arrested for blowing up their own car while they were in it. The jury unanimously found that six of the seven FBI and OPD defendants had deliberately framed Bari and Cherney in an effort to crush Earth First! and crush participation in Redwood Summer.</p><p><a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/WorkingClass" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>WorkingClass</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/LaborHistory" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>LaborHistory</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/IWW" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>IWW</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/EarthFirst" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>EarthFirst</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/JudiBari" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>JudiBari</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/fbi" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>fbi</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/police" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>police</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/bombing" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>bombing</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/film" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>film</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/RedwoodSummer" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>RedwoodSummer</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/ecology" class="mention hashtag" rel="tag">#<span>ecology</span></a></p>
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