The leftwing deadbeat: a look at leftists’ poor track record in workplace organizing campaigns

To be clear, the authors MK Lees and Marianne Garneau are not writing from an anti-leftist perspective here, but I think it's a common thing people trying to be active in their union or workplace organizing run into when they try to start doing something.

> There is often a temptation when starting out organizing to focus on people you think may be politically left – to reach out to these people first, or even to invite them onto your organizing committee. >   > “He’s in DSA”  > > “She posts guillotine memes”“They wore one of those IWW ‘General Strike’ t-shirts to work one day!”  > > These people are already ideologically pro-union therefore they should be predisposed to engage in a class struggle, right?  > > Not so fast. In almost every campaign either of us have ever been involved in, and in dozens of stories from fellow organizers, the overwhelming trend is for otherwise proud leftists to show themselves as flakes at best, or actively undermining organizing at worst. Here are just a few examples.

Sections:

* **Flakes, turncoats and rogues** * **Refusing to talk to coworkers** * **Militancy where you’d least expect it** * **Why is it this way?**