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poetry

Si, Se Puede (It Can Be Done)

Philip Kolin
Marking the anniversary of his death (April 23, 1993), Cesar Chavez continues to inspire support for immigrant farm workers’ rights around the country.

This Week in People’s History, June 6 . . .

Portside
Civil rights activist James Meredith wincing in pain just after he was wounded by a sniper Bullets don't stop March Against Fear. Strikers' play fills Madison Square Garden. Court rules for lunch-counter sit-in. Cesar Chavez gets started. CIA lawbreaking whitewashed. Environmental racism costs Shell Oil. Paul Robeson defies witch-hunters.

labor

Paying Symbolic Tribute to César Chávez Isn’t Enough

Armando Ibarra The Progressive
Chávez and the UFW exposed a paradox that still affects most farmworkers. No matter how hard they work, most will never achieve the so-called American Dream as they are bound to a system of agricultural production that thrives on labor exploitation.

labor

Cesar Chavez, Dolores Huerta and the Legacy

Duane Campbell Talking Union
“When we are really honest with ourselves, we must admit that our lives are all that really belong to us. So it is how we use our lives that determines what kind of people we are. ..I am convinced that the truest act of courage..is to sacrifice ourselves for others in a totally nonviolent struggle for justice.” Cesar Chavez (1927-1993)

Tidbits - April 2, 2015 - Mexican Farmworkers Strike; Death Penalty; Water Privatization; Elizabeth Warren; Cesar Chavez; and more

Portside
Reader Comments - Mexican Farmworkers Strike; Innocent Man on Death Row - Prosecutor Apologizes; Stealing Africa's Seeds; Fighting Water Privatization - Ireland and Mexico; Run Elizabeth, Run; Jews Who Speak Out Against Israeli Policies; Cesar Chavez, the UFW - Lessons for Today; Feminist Heroes for Children; Cuba Eradicates Syphilis; Billie Holiday and Ethel Rosenberg; Resources for Passover; To Better Understand Greece and Syriza; Announcements

labor

Cesar Chavez, the UFW, and Why Unions are Needed

Duane E. Campbell Talking Union
The movement led by Cesar Chavez , Dolores Huerta and others created a union and reduced the oppression of farm workers for a time. Then the corporations and the Right Wing forces adapted their strategies of oppression. The assault on the UFW and the current reconquest of power in the fields are examples of strategic racism, that is a system of racial oppression created and enforced because it benefits the over class -- in this case corporate agriculture.

What Cesar Chavez Movie Missed

David Bacon In These Times
The new film, Cesar Chavez: History is Made One Step at a Time, doesn't capture the diversity of the farmworkers' movement. "When I was a farmworker, before the strike, we lived in different worlds - the Latino world, the Filipino world, the African-American world and the Caucasian world," Eliseo Medina as interviewed by David Bacon for In These Times.
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