May Day, Glasgow Buchanan Street, 2013.
Today, May 1st., May Day, has been celebrated across the planet, and rightly so. It is probably the most important day in the calendar of the ordinary people. In some cities it was a massive display of workers solidarity, in others it was a more quiet affair, but there would be few cities that didn't have some sort of show. Though it should be held on May 1st. and is in lots of cities and towns, in others, Glasgow for example, it will be on the first weekend after May 1st.. That said, Glasgow had a small but colourful stall in Buchanan Street, put on by the Clydeside IWW and the Glasgow Anarchist Federation. The stalls attracted considerable interest from passers-by, and a lot of literature was handed out. There was of course, lots of old faces reappeared, just to be there and show solidarity, even if it was just for a few minutes and a few words with old comrades.
May Day, Glasgow Buchanan Street, 2013.
As I write these words, it's still morning in London -- and already
LabourStart's front page is full of coverage of May Day 2013, the international workers' holiday.
In
Istanbul, police have used tear gas to try to block trade unionists from gathering in the city's central Taksim square, scene of an infamous massacre in 1977.
In
Greece, a general strike by workers protesting against the highest unemployment levels in Europe has shut down much of the country's transport system.
Your local newspaper or television station may be reporting all these stories -- but I doubt it. That's why we created LabourStart 15 years ago -- precisely for moments like this when we need to know what is happening in the labour movement all over the world.
Please make sure to
visit LabourStart today and spread the word to your friends, family, co-workers and fellow union members.
Thank you -- and happy May Day!
Eric Lee
Wednesday May 1st.
MayDay, Labour Day, Workers Day, call it what you will, but it is all about the ordinary people coming together to celebrate their struggles and their victories. A day to remember all those
working class heroes, who struggled and fought for the betterment of all, fought for a society that sees to the needs of all our people. Organise your own celebration, make for the streets, make new friends, meet up with old friends. Make it an opportunity to re-new that vision of a fair and just society that is buried in all out hearts, show the strength of solidarity that will get us there. May Day, a time to re-new that
Spirit of Revolt.
Now more than ever we have to show solidarity, we have to come together to defend our standard of living. May Day this year is an ideal opportunity to show that solidarity with all the ordinary people of this country and across the world, to lay down a marker, as the pampered parasite political class make a ruthless and savage grasp to capitalise everything in sight to save their gambling spiv bankster friends and bond merchants, from carrying their own gambling debts. We are expected to quietly pay off the gamblers losses and stand by while they privatise everything they can lay their sweaty palms on, that can make them money. It is their world -- or it is our world, you can decide.
May Day is a day to realise our strength and see that road to the better world we all desire.
The 1st of May has been celebrated across the world as International Workers Day since the execution of four anarchist migrant workers in Chicago in 1886 in the fight for the eight-hour working day. Since the late 19th century Mayday has been a focal point for workers of all countries to stand united against the [...]
