IRSCNA: May Day 2009 Statement -- Stormont Watch

[ Show ]

Support VoyForums

[ Shrink ]

VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

[ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, 2, 3, [4], 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: Fri, May 01 2009, 2:36:16 PDT
Author: Danielle Ni Dhighe
Subject: IRSCNA: May Day 2009 Statement

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

1 May 2009
Irish Republican Socialist Committees of North America

May Day 2009 Statement

The Irish Republican Socialist Committees of North America send
solidarity greetings to our fellow workers and comrades in the class
struggle around the world on the working class holiday of May Day,
also known as International Workers' Day. We salute and share in your
fight against oppression, exploitation, and imperialism.

As the North American section of the Irish Republican Socialist
Movement, we extend our greetings to our comrades and fellow members
of the IRSM in the Irish Republican Socialist Party, Irish National
Liberation Army, Republican Socialist Youth Movement, Republican
Socialist Martyrs Flute Bands and Teach na F�ilte, along with all
republican socialist prisoners of war. We reiterate that we remain
committed to the struggle for national and working class liberation
in Ireland, and working class liberation worldwide.

As this May Day dawns, the capitalist world is in the midst of its
deepest crisis in decades. Millions of workers have lost their jobs,
while millions more live in fear of losing theirs. Capitalists have
used this crisis as an excuse to roll back wages and benefits, while
governments have used it as an excuse to make deep cuts to social
services. As attacks mount on our class, the working class, we must
defend ourselves by any means necessary.

Many people still suffer under the delusion that capitalism works and
will recover from this latest crisis without any long term effects,
but we believe that this crisis only reveals just how close to
collapse the structure of global capitalism is. While it may indeed
find a way to recover from this crisis, another one is inevitably on
its way. Capitalism as an economic system is periodically plunged
into crisis by its own internal contradictions, and it's always the
working class that bears the brunt of each crisis. The only
resolution for our class is to rid ourselves of the problem,
capitalism, and build the only solution, socialism.

There are signs of growing resistance to exploitation. Workers for
Ford Visteon in Ireland and Britain have defiantly occupied their
workplaces after they lost their jobs and the bosses refused to pay
wages due or honor their contracts. We stand in solidarity with those
men and women in their struggle. As this crisis deepens, all workers
need to increase their resistance. While the voices of politicians
tell us that we need to make concessions for our own good, we can
plainly see that isn't an option as we lose our jobs, our wages and
benefits are cut, and we're more ruthlessly exploited by our employers.

We need to organize bigger and better unions, ones that will fight
for the working class instead of trying to collaborate with the
bosses to manage class conflict in favor of capitalism. The
Industrial Workers of the World and the Independent Workers Union of
Ireland are two already existing unions that are pro-worker. Workers
in the United States, the heartland of global capitalism, are the
least unionized workers in the western world and have found
themselves without a structure for resisting the capitalist attacks
on our class.

But even in the United States, there are glimmers of hope. A recent
national telephone survey found that 20% of adults think socialism is
better than capitalism, and 27% are undecided about whether socialism
or capitalism is better. For adults under the age of 30, 37% think
socialism is better and 30% are undecided.

Up to this point the only noteworthy instances of mass working class
resistance in the United States have emerged amongst layers of the
hyper-exploited immigrant working class. We urge all American workers
to back their struggle and demands, and not to be divided by the
bosses and the promises of the bosses' hired politicians. The IRSCNA
will continue to actively support the working class immigrant and
amnesty movements. Indeed, any other position for Irish-Americans and
supporters of Irish republicanism would be absurd.

The recent march of 120,000 workers in Dublin in opposition to the
Irish government's budget cuts is another example of growing class
consciousness internationally.

The next step is to move beyond protesting to organizing, educating,
and agitating for fundamental changes to how our class-based society
is organized. The solution lies in the hands of the working class and
our ability to lead a revolution to create a sustainable socialist
economy that can meet the needs of both our class and the planet we
share.

Although Barack Obama was elected as President of the United States,
let us be honest with you, he has the best interests of the
capitalist system in mind, not our interests as a class exploited by
that system. The United States remains a bastion of imperialism and
exploitation, and a few fancy words from Obama won't change that, nor
does he wish to change it. Placing our hope in the Obamas of the
world will not bear any fruit. We are the only ones with the power to
change things. Reformist politicians only want to lead us away from
real change.

In Ireland, conditions are growing for a republican socialist
alternative to fill the void in revolutionary politics. It is obvious
that neither the Good Friday Agreement nor any other imperialist
brokered settlement can resolve the fundamental contradictions at the
heart of Irish society. Only a socialist Ireland with full
self-determination can do that, and a socialist Ireland can only
thrive if capitalism is defeated on a wider scale.

On behalf of the Irish Republican Socialist Movement, we also extend
solidarity greetings to the following organizations: All-African
People's Revolutionary Party, All Pakistan Trade Union Federation,
Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia, Communist Party of Cuba,
Communist Party of Nepal, Communist Party of the Philippines,
Communist Party of Spain (Reconstituted), Debs Tendency of the
Socialist Party USA, Freedom Socialist Party, Northeastern Federation
of Anarchist Communists, Organization of Iranian People's Fedaii
Guerrillas, Party for Socialism and Liberation, Party of World
Revolution, Peace and Freedom Party, Popular Front for the Liberation
of Palestine, Radical Women, Scottish Republican Socialist Movement,
Seattle Anti-Imperialist Committee, Uni�n del Barrio, United Socialist
Party of Venezuela, Worker-Communist Party of Iran, Worker-Communist
Party of Iraq, Working Women Organization and all others who are
struggling to liberate the working class from the shackles of
capitalism and imperialism.

As the great Irish revolutionary James Connolly said, "The great only
appear great because we are on our knees, let us arise!"

###

Irish Republican Socialist Committees of North America
PO Box 901479
Kansas City MO 64190-1479
USA
irscna@irsm.org
http://www.irscna.org/
http://www.irsm.org/irsm.html

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]