MikeDunnAuthor

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to bookstadon

Today In Labor History May 1, 1923: Novelist Joseph Heller was born on this day. He published his most famous book, the anti-war satire, Catch-22, in 1961.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #Catch22 #JosephHeller #wwii #satire #novel #fiction #HistoricalFiction #antiwar @bookstadon

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to random

Today In Labor History May 1, 1886: The first nationwide General Strike for the 8-hour day occurred in Milwaukee and other U.S. cities. In Chicago, police killed four demonstrators and wounded over 200. This led to the mass meeting a Haymarket Square, where an unknown assailant threw a bomb, killing several cops. The authorities responded by rounding up all the city’s leading anarchists, and a kangaroo court which wrongfully convicted 8 of them, including Albert Parsons, husband of Lucy Parsons, who would go on to cofound the IWW, along with Mother Jones, Big Bill Haywood, Eugene Debs, and others. Worldwide protests against the convictions and executions followed. To honor the wrongfully executed anarchists, and their struggle for the 8 hour day, May first has ever since been celebrated as International Workers Day in nearly every country in the world, except the U.S.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #anarchism #Haymarket #bombing #PoliceBrutality #police #prison #execution #DeathPenalty #GeneralStrike #IWW #LucyParsons #MotherJones #8HourDay

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to random

Today In Labor History May 1, 1830: Mary Harris "Mother" Jones was born. Mother Jones was renowned for her militancy and fiery oration, as well as her many juicy quotes. She once said, “I’m no lady. I’m a hell-raiser.” She also was an internationalist, saying “My address is wherever there is a fight against oppression.” Despite the difficulties of constant travel, poor living and jail, she lived to be 100. She was also a cofounder of the anarchosyndicalist IWW.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #union #strike #IWW #mining #MotherJones #solidarity #prison

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to bookstadon

Today in Labor History April 30, 1994: Richard Scarry died. Scarry wrote and illustrated humorous children’s books with elaborate scenes of anthropomorphized animals. Some of his recurring characters were Lowly Worm, Huckle Cat, Mistress Mouse the tow truck driver, and Dingo the reckless driver. His fictional world, Busy Town, is characterized by a strong sense of community and mutual aid. Over the years, he revised his stories in an attempt to eliminate racial and gender stereotypes.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #RichardScarry #fiction #MutualAid #ChildrensBooks @bookstadon

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to random

Today in labor history April 30 1886: 50,000 workers in Chicago were on strike. 30,000 more joined in the next day. The strike halted most of Chicago’s manufacturing. On May 3rd, the Chicago cops killed four unionists. Activists organized a mass public meeting and demonstration in Haymarket Square on May 4. During the meeting, somebody threw a bomb at the cops. The explosion and subsequent gunfire killed seven cops and four civilians. Nobody ever identified the bomber. None of the killer cops was charged. However, the authorities started arresting anarchists throughout Chicago.

Ultimately, they tried and convicted eight anarchist leaders in a kangaroo court. The men were: August Spies, Albert Parsons, Adolph Fisher, George Engel, Louis Lingg, Michael Schwab, Samuel Felden and Oscar Neebe. Only two of the men were even present when the bomb was thrown. The court convicted seven of murder and sentenced them to death. Neebe was give fifteen years. Parson’s brother testified at the trial that the real bomb thrower was a Pinkerton agent provocateur. This was entirely consistent with the Pinkertons modus operandi. They used the agent provocateur, James McParland, to entrap and convict the Molly Maguires. As a result, twenty of them were hanged and the Pennsylvania mining union was crushed. McParland also tried to entrap WFM leader, Big Bill Haywood, for the murder of Idaho Governor Frank Steunenberg. Steunenberg had crushed the WFM strike in 1899, the same one in which the WFM had blown up a colliery. However, Haywood had Clarence Darrow representing him. And Darrow proved his innocence.

On November 11, 1887, they executed Spies, Parson, Fisher and Engel. They sang the Marseillaise, the revolutionary anthem, as they marched to the gallows. The authorities arrested family members who attempted to see them one last time. This included Parson’s wife, Lucy, who was also a significant anarchist organizer and orator. In 1905, she helped cofound the IWW. Moments before he died, Spies shouted, "The time will come when our silence will be more powerful than the voices you strangle today." And Engel and Fischer called out, "Hurrah for anarchism!" Parsons tried to speak, but was cut off by the trap door opening beneath him.

Workers throughout the world protested the trial, conviction and executions. Prominent people spoke out against it, includin Clarence Darrow, Oscar Wilde, George Bernard Shaw, and William Morris. The Haymarket Affair inspired thousands to join the anarchist movement, including Emma Goldman. And it is the inspiration for International Workers’ Day, which is celebrated on May 1st in nearly every country in the world except the U.S.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #anarchism #haymarket #LucyParsons #IWW #EmmaGoldman #strike #union #8HourDay #PoliceBrutality #KillerCops #prison #DeathPenalty #Pinkertons

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to bookstadon

Mike’s Victorian Trivia: A popular Victorian pseudoscience was phrenology (using cranial shape to predict mental abilities). Allan Pinkerton (creator of the Pinkerton Detective Agency, and the Secret Service), was a phrenologist. Mark Twain said a phrenologist once visited his town, leaving it “duller and drearier than ever.”

#HistoricalFiction #fiction #writing #novels #literary #MarkTwain @bookstadon

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to random

Today in Labor History April 29, 1992: People rioted in Los Angeles and protested in other major cities in response to the Rodney King verdict. Despite video footage of police brutally beating a defenseless King, the jury acquitted all the police officers involved. Over the next three days 64 people died and hundreds of buildings were destroyed. However, the LA riots in also included an anti-Asian pogrom. 2,300 Korean businesses were looted or burned and hundreds of Koreans suffered from PTSD. Those who died included 2 Asians, 28 African Americans, 19 Latinos and 15 whites. In San Francisco, African American youth chased cops down the street with bats. And protesters shattered the façade of Bank of America with a concrete bus bench. I also remember having to duck behind a car to avoid being shot by a scared shop owner near Chinatown, as young men ran out of his store with 12-packs of beer. The violent police assault on King was one of the first to go viral in the digital age. It inspired hundreds of protests and ushered in a new era of citizen journalists documenting police brutality that contributed to the growth of the Black Lives Matter movement.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #PoliceBrutality #police #RodneyKing #lapd #blm #BlackLivesMatter #Riot #AntiAsianHate #BlackMastadon

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to bookstadon

Today in labor history April 28, 1896: Na Hye-sok was born. She was a South Korean feminist, poet, writer, painter and journalist. She was the first female professional painter and the first feminist writer in Korea.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #feminism #poetry #writer #korea #NaHyesok @bookstadon

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to bookstadon

Today in labor history April 28, 1789: Fletcher Christian led a group of mutineers against the brutal Captain Bligh on the HMS Bounty. Christian began the voyage as the captain’s mate, but Bligh appointed him acting Lieutenant during the voyage. The story of the voyage and mutiny was later retold by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall’s “Mutiny on the Bounty.” After their successful mutiny, Christian, 9 other mutineers, 6 Tahitian men and 11 Tahitian women, started a colony on the South Pacific island of Pitcairn. However, the Tahitians rebelled when the mutineers tried to enslave them and killed most of them. But not until after many of the Tahitian women became pregnant. The decedents of the mutineers continue to live there today. Bligh had previously served on the Resolution, as Master, under Captain Cook, on his second and third voyages to Hawaii. And he was present when the native Hawaiians killed Cook.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #mutiny #slavery #colonialism #hawaii #indigenous #HistoricalFiction #novel @bookstadon

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to bookstadon

Today in labor history April 28, 1896: Tristan Tzara was born. He was a Romanian-French poet, journalist, playwright, literary and art critic, film director. He co-founded the anti-establishment Dada movement. During Hitler’s rise to power, he participated in the anti-fascist movement and the French Communist Party. In 1934, Tzara organized a mock trial of Salvador Dalí because of his fawning over Hitler and Franco. The surrealists Andre Breton, Paul Éluard and René Crevel helped run the trial. In the 1940s, Tzara lived in Marseilles with a large group of anti-fascist artists and writers, under the protection of American diplomat Varian Fry. These included Victor Serge, Claude Lévi-Strauss, Andre Breton and Max Ernst. Later he joined the French Resistance, writing propaganda and running their pirate radio station. After the Liberation of Paris, he wrote for L'Éternelle Revue, a communist newspaper edited by Jean-Paul Sartre. Other contributors to the newspaper included Louis Aragon, Éluard, Jacques Prévert and Pablo Picasso.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #dada #TristanTzara #nazis #antifascist #poetry #literary #communism @bookstadon

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to bookstadon

Today in Labor History April 27, 1759: Mary Wollstonecraft, was born. She was an English philosopher, historian, and early feminist who advocated for women’s rights. In her A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), she argued that women are not naturally inferior to men, but only appeared to be because they lacked education. She married the philosopher William Godwin, one of the first modern proponents of anarchism. She was also the mother of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, who wrote Frankenstein.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #MaryWollstonecraft #frankenstein #feminism #anarchism #writer #author @bookstadon

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to random

Today in Labor History April 27, 1521: On this day, Philippine Natives fought the battle of Mactan against Ferdinand Magellan. Lapulapu’s warriors ambushed him and overpowered the Spanish forces. They killed Magellan with a poison arrow. Their victory delayed Spanish colonization of the Philippines by forty-four years. For centuries, native Muslim Filipinos fought wars against their Spanish rulers. The Spanish saw these as a continuation of the Reconquista of Spain from the Moors. They brought in conscripts from Mexico and Latin America, including many Native Americans. Mortality was high on both sides. Many conscripts fled into the countryside, or joined with the Filipino forces. Yet, despite all the slaughter and repression of Native Filipinos, the colony was never profitable to Spain. During the 1800s, Filipino immigrants fought alongside Latin Americans in their wars for independence from Spain. In 1896, Filipinos fought their own war for independence from Spain.

When the U.S. initially landed in the Philippines, in 1898, they supported Filipinos in their uprising against Spain. However, by August, 1898, the U.S. had ended their collaboration with Native Filipinos and soon annexed the country. American rule was brutal. In 1899, American went to war against their colonial subjects. The war was far deadlier and more costly than their war against Spain. 4,200 American soldiers, up to 20,000 Philippine soldiers, and at least 200,000 civilians died.

The Japanese occupation during World War II was also brutal. In the most infamous example, 10,000 Filipino and 1,200 U.S. soldiers died in the brutal Bataan Death March. However, during the occupation, Filipino guerillas fought an insurgency against the Japanese. Consequently, the Philippines became the costliest theatre of war for the Japanese. Nearly 500,000 Japanese died fighting in the Philippines. But it was much worse for Filipinos, with over 1 million dying during World War II. The Battle of Leyte Gulf, toward the end of World War II, was the largest naval battle in history.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #philippines #colonialism #resistance #independence #Guerilla

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to random

Today in Labor History April 24, 1913: A IWW strike broke out at Pilchuck, WA. The men demanded the right to organize. They also demanded sanitary bunkhouses, pure and wholesome food and a fire escape to be put on the three-story bunk house at the mill. And One hundred seventy-five IWW members struck against the two electric companies of Stockton, CA. They demanded a raise of fifty cents. The strike was led by the IWW.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #union #strike #IWW

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to random

Tortuguita was executed by police firing squad. Shot 57 times with hands in the air.

https://theintercept.com/2023/04/20/atlanta-cop-city-protester-autopsy/

#tortuguita #StopCopCity #police #PoliceBrutality #ForestDefenders

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to random

Today in Labor History April 15, 1989: The Tiananmen Square protests began in China on this day. The demonstrations started in response to the death of a reformist leader, Hu Yaobang. At the height of the protests, over 1 million people occupied the square. On June 4, the Chinese government declared martial law and sent in the military to forcibly end the occupation. They killed hundreds, possibly thousands of unarmed students and workers.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #students #TiananmenSquare #china #massacre

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to Philippines

Today in Labor History April 14, 1930: Over 100 Mexican and Filipino farm workers were arrested for union activities in Imperial Valley, CA. 8 were convicted of “criminal syndicalism.”

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #ImperialValley #mexican #filipino #union #FarmWorkers #immigrant

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to anarchism

Today in Labor History April 1, 1649: Diggers occupied St. George's Hill, in Surrey, England, seizing land to hold in common and to grow food. Other Digger communities followed in Little Heath, Wellingborough, Buckinghamshire and other regions. The Diggers are sometimes seen as forerunners of modern anarchism. In 1966, members of the San Francisco Mime Troupe formed a Diggers group, handing out free food to hippies in Golden Gate Park. The original Diggers influenced the anti-roads and squatting movements in England and elsewhere. They inspired the Leon Rosselsen song, “The World Turned Upside Down,” seen in the Youtube video, above, performed by Billy Bragg.

https://youtu.be/LK2ldle1kAk

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #Diggers #BillyBragg #anarchism #MimeTroupe

MikeDunnAuthor, 1 year ago to anarchism

Today in Labor History March 24, 1834: William Morris, British author, textile designer and revolutionary socialist was born on this date. He wrote the utopian novel “News From Nowhere” and founded the Socialist League in 1874. He was influenced by both Marxism and anarchism.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #anarchism #socialism #marxism #WilliamMorris #revolutionary #author #novel @bookstadon

LutherBlissett13, 1 year ago to random

Introduction.

Hi. I'm a Luther Blissett. Anarchist. Disabled.
I like learning, writing ambient music, reading.

Mostly moved here to listen and learn.

I've self taught myself the history of eugenics in regard to disabled people, in the UK, US and Canada, and the history of post-viral illness, past and present.

I'm happy to be asked about Disability, models of it, ideas, etc. Happy to be asked to read anything you write about it, and give an opinion if that would be helpful. If I don't know, it's beyond my knowledge, I'll tell you.

I will never be able to get the difference between "its" and "it's", no matter how many times I relearn it. My punctuation "skills" are terrible, so if that is a pet peeve, I will make you grind your teeth.

I will like the heck out of your posts.