Fuck the Capitalist Class and their lackeys. And the Stalinists and their apologists that drowned the Revolution in blood. You really do see the Soviet type societies in quite a different way than I do or Justin, say. I saw at the time 1) both an essential counter-weight to the ability of the US Empire to totally obliterate Vietnam (w/o the fSU and the PRC support of the NLF, the US would have killed even more than the 2.8 million that were killed from '62-'75, Cuba, etc. And 2), failed models of socialism, overly bureaucratized with little concern given for building working class power.
And 3) if you ever read any of the critical literature your Manichean picture of all virtue on One side and Pure Evil on the other, might be made more complex.
And 4) Your demogogic question doesn't reflect well on you. To engage in some counter-demogogy, how do you feel if I ask you if you will be a thug not for the mining company but for the future Stalin's? Michael Pugliese http://www2.centenary.edu/home/jhendric/left_culture/ Modern American Left Culture
http://www.kdvs.org/kdviations/spring97/folk.htm Two works that explore these links came out last year. The first is "When We Were Good, The Folk Revival" (Harvard University Press, 1996) by Robert Cantwell, an adjunct professor of American Studies at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. The second is a 10 CD box set "Songs For Political Action, Folk Music, Topical Songs And The Left, 1926-1953" (Bear Family Records, P.O. Box 1154, D-27727, Hamburgen, Ger many). The Bear Family set will require you to dig into your pocket to the tune of about $225.00, but is well worth it. http://www.bear-family.de/index_english.htm
LBO-Talk April 2001: Re: The left: still dying (was Re: ... ... John Lacny. See the book by Robbie Lieberson published by Univ. of Illinois Press on folk songs and the left. "My Song is My Weapon": People's Songs, American ... www.nuance.dhs.org/lbo-talk/0104/0760.html http://www.geocities.com/Nashville/3448/whichsid.html WHICH SIDE ARE YOU ON? (FLORENCE REECE) (1930s) (Tune: "Lay The Lily Low"/"Jack Munro")
In 1931, coal miners in Harlan County were on strike. Armed company deputies roamed the countryside, terrorizing the mining communities, looking for union leaders to beat, jail, or kill. But coal miners, brought up lean and hard in the Kentucky mountain country, knew how to fight back, and heads were bashed and bullets fired on both sides in Bloody Harlan. It was this kind of class war -- the mine owners and their hired deputies on one side, and the independent, free-wheeling Kentucky coal-miners on the other -- that provided the climate for Florence Reece's "Which Side Are You On?" In it she captured the spirit of her times with blunt eloquence.
Mrs. Reece wrote from personal experience. Her husband, Sam, was one of the union leaders, and Sheriff J. H. Blair and his men came to her house in search of him when she was alone with her seven children. They ransacked the whole house and then kept watch outside, ready to shoot Sam down if he returned.
One day during this tense period Mrs. Reece tore a sheet from a wall calendar and wrote the words to "Which Side Are You On?" The simple form of the song made it easy to adapt for use in other strikes, and many different versions have circulated.
Edith Fowke and Joe Glazer, Songs of Work and Protest, New York, NY, 1973, p. 55. Come all you good workers, Good news to you I'll tell Of how the good old union Has come in here to dwell. CHORUS: Which side are you on? Which side are you on? Which side are you on? Which side are you on? My dady was a miner, And I'm a miner's son, And I'll stick with the union 'Til every battle's won. They say in Harlan County There are no neutrals there. You'll either be a union man Or a thug for J. H. Blair.
Oh workers can you stand it? Oh tell me how you can? Will you be a lousy scab Or will you be a man?
Don't scab for the bosses, Don't listen to their lies. Us poor folks haven't got a chance Unless we organize