NEW YORK CITY, January 20—At our campus’s main entrance, dozens of multiracial, multigender, students, faculty and staff held a militant rally supporting undocumented immigrant students. Much organizing and struggle led to this rally and there is much more to come. The antiracist marchers chanted “Racism means… We got to fight back!” at a line of confused and intimidated campus police. Tensions rose.
As we approached the campus entrance, a young woman Muslim student declared, “Okay I’m skipping class and staying. This is way more important and my professor should be out here anyway.”
Near the scared line of campus police, we hesitated. We didn’t realize it, but the cops were afraid the militant rally would shut down the main campus entrance. But we backed off, and several cops breathed audible sighs of relief.
That moment symbolized the strengths, weaknesses, and potential power of our growing movement of students, workers and faculty. The potential to shut down the racist and sexist business as usual on our campus, but also to build a revolutionary movement to shut down capitalism itself, with communist revolution.
Moments before, this crowd had shouted down the college president in a mass meeting, challenging him on why he wouldn’t support the many immigrant students by declaring our campus a “sanctuary campus.” But the undocumented immigrant students, who led the meeting and rally, have shown that the working class here isn’t taking racism and sexism lying down.
Members and friends of the Progressive Labor Party (PLP) have been in the thick of these struggles, helping to organize, selling CHALLENGE newspaper, and building communist leadership. Our growing base among students, workers and faculty has impacted the campus with the politics of militant antiracism and multiracial unity.
Black Workers Lead
This recent upsurge in communist organizing began when some Black, campus maintenance workers invited some PL’ers to their mass, union meeting. The separate unions of the faculty and campus workers were negotiating new contracts. The maintenance, building, and clerical workers represented are mainly Black, immigrant, and women workers. They are low-paid, work extremely difficult hours, and endure racist and sexist white male supervisors, who often refer to the Black workers as “slaves.” The majority are purposely scheduled less than a forty-hour workweek, denying them full-time benefits. Many have worked for years and routinely work above and beyond their job descriptions to provide the best possible learning environment for the mainly Black and immigrant students.
At the workers’ mass union meeting, two union organizers tried to pacify the workers, after five years without a contract. Some workers heckled the misleaders, others walked out in disgust. A PL’er stood up and denounced the union misleaders for making backroom deals instead of fighting the racist city bosses. He denounced his own union misleaders for selling out the adjunct faculty and staff, and called for class solidarity across both unions. When the PL’er called on the workers to “fight like Ferguson” and build antiracist working class unity, the union hacks called the campus cops.
Despite being thrown out of the meeting and banned from future meetings, some Black maintenance workers, led by a former Marine, approached the comrade and exchanged contact information. This marked the beginning of several new friendships.
Organize With Friends—Discuss Communism
More recently, we approached some student clubs, including the Muslim Student Alliance (MSA), to screen the antiracist film PROFILED. The clubs agreed, but it was still a struggle to get the film shown. We spent lots of time with our friends, navigating the campus bureaucracy, assembling a panel, etc. It was quite a learning experience, but we succeeded!
Meanwhile, PL’ers organized many CHALLENGE discussion and study groups. Many staff and students read CHALLENGE and lively discussions are everywhere. Students come from our classes and from campus clubs. Former students who had traveled with PLP to the antiracist rebellion in Ferguson also attend.
PROFILED Sharpens Antiracist Politics
The culmination of our semester was the screening of PROFILED to over 100 mostly Black, Latin, Muslim, and immigrant students, workers and faculty. At a panel discussion, students spoke movingly about their personal experiences being profiled by racist cops, and about racism on campus. A Black, Muslim student panelist was moved to tears describing his dual struggles with anti-Black and anti-Muslim racism.
A Black woman student asked if the film’s director, a white woman, was trying to “speak for Black people.” The response was that the Black women featured in the film, who became inspiring antiracist fighters, spoke for themselves. A Latin woman student wondered if workers were divided by skin color in order to control us, then the solution must involve all skin colors uniting in multiracial unity. A vibrant debate ensued. Finally, a Latin immigrant student suggested that capitalism itself was the problem. He left us with the question, how do we build a revolution to overthrow it?
The sponsoring student clubs gathered over 80 contacts of interested students. An antiracist faculty worker, whose class came to the screening, informed the audience that a “sanctuary committee” was forming on campus. The sanctuary movement to protect undocumented immigrant students is growing on many U.S. campuses. The screening of PROFILED provided a boost for this committee. One Black student asked the film organizers “if they’d ever heard of PLP.” His high school teacher was in PLP, and the forum reminded him of his teachers’ discussions about multiracial unity and communist revolution. He was put in touch with the PLP group on campus.
Small Steps Toward Revolution
There is a lot of positive fightback. Student clubs, a sanctuary committee, campus workers and faculty are all stepping up. Our Party, the Progressive Labor Party, continues building communist leadership and uniting all these struggles to fight for a better world: communism! Join us!