January 9, 2006: "Monday Bloody Monday"
The World Can't Wait called for "Bloody Monday" actions around the country on January 9 to "oppose Alito's rubber-stamp approval to the Supreme Court." The following report is about how revolutionary communists took this up in the southeast ghetto section of Washington, D.C.
It’s the first day of the hearings to confirm Alito as Supreme Court Justice and while two sides square off in front of the Supreme Court, a few miles away across the bridge in Southeast D.C. --an area that is virtually all Black -- you got a glimpse of the potential for massive numbers of Black people, especially the youth, to fight for that better future.
Several people go to a transit center in SE to sell the Revolution newspaper and talk to people about the battle. We post up hand-written signs -- Abortion is Not Murder! Fetuses Are Not Babies! Women Are Not Incubators! Drive Out the Bush Regime! Join the Emancipators of Humanity! Women Hold up Half the Sky!
An organizer at a bus stop: "Without the right to abortion, women are slaves! This traditional morality that Alito and the Bush program stands for means death for women. If women can’t decide fundamental questions about their own lives, like when to have children, they are reduced to slaves!"
Someone shouts back: "She shouldn’t have opened her legs!"
In response to this another woman says: "I used to think that way -- until I needed an abortion. If I ain’t got say-so about this then I don’t really got much say about a lot of things. It would be a terrible thing if they can stop abortions."
Then some youth gather, from different schools and different neighborhoods. They greet each other joyfully with hugs. They laugh loud, talk shit, clown around, being seen. Ten cop cars are on the scene. The system has a future for these youth: prison and punishment. And the Bush regime has added its own "Christian Fascist" twist, which includes a strong element of genocide.
But these youth have the potential to fight for a different future, and to play a crucial role in changing the whole direction of society – right now.
One of the organizers selling the Revolution shouts out to the youth about the upcoming demonstrations against the Bush regime in D.C on January 31 and February 4. "Bush has to step down!"
One of the youth, Danny, turns around. "Yeah! He need to! Yeah!" He takes a stack of leaflets and with no discussion steps into the crosswalk, agitating. At first the other youth ridicule Danny, and ask is he getting paid for this. But Danny stands in a crowd of 30 or 40, debating and struggling with them to take up the flyers and posters.
"Bush let the people die in that flood in New Orleans. You saw it! All them people calling for help! You heard ‘em! Bush killed them people down there! Bush got to go!"
He runs out into the intersection, and puts posters and flyers on the windshields of the puzzled motorists stopped at the traffic light. Soon two or three other youth join him. He tapes the posters up on the walls. Soon several other youth go into the streets, handing out leaflets, and putting them on the windshields of the cars stopped at the light.
The cops pull up and try to disperse the crowd of 35 kids on the corner. A chant goes up: "Fuck Bush!" Everyone is laughing and chanting: "Fuck Bush!" Then it becomes a rhythmical chant "Fuck Bush!... Fuck Bush!" Another part of the crowd starts up "Fuck the police!" and this chant gets taken up enthusiastically for a few beats until it returns to "Fuck Bush!...Fuck Bush!" The cops are off guard and irrelevant. The cars are honking. The youth have turned it into a march and it’s really powerful. They appear to be twice their number and they all head off together and take the intersection, stopping both lines of cars, and the chant turns into "Bush Step Down! Bush Step Down!"
They hold the signs over their heads and look at themselves in amazement. "Bush Step Down!"
They march into the transit center station chanting with their posters held high. People getting off work at first look startled -- and then, electrified. They take posters and flyers and exit the station holding "Bush Step Down" posters over their heads and with wide smiles across their faces.
The atmosphere was now electrified with politics. And with the masses beginning to take matters into their own hands. The actions of the youth had helped push the discussions that had been going on all afternoon about abortion, communism, religion, the liberation of women, the Bush regime and a dozen other things to a whole new level of engagement. And in the flurry of the posters going up and the spirited discussion, you could see and hear an inkling of a different future.