The Re-Imagining May Day / International Workers' Day community forum the evening of May 1st went well but was not as big as the organizers had hoped. It was at the Friends Meeting House on the Duke Campus, which is a nice space, but would have been very cramped if lots of people had turned out. Nicole Rowan of the Durham People's Alliance spoke on May Day history and passed out an article by Rosa Luxembourg. Next there were speakers from the Forest Foundation (speaking on fair trade), the NC Coalition to Defend Health Care, myself (on local labor struggles), El Pueblo (on immigration), and I can't remember the name of the group represented on pay day lending. It was probably the Center for Responsible Lending of the Self Help Credit Union. It was very informative, and lots of questions were asked, mainly about immigration and healthcare I think. NC House bill 1358 on healthcare was praised I think. El Pueblo supports a compromise on immigration that is more progressive, but still fines undocumented immigrants to not offend public opinion. It shows how broken our system is that, while free trade destroys Latin American economies, legal immigration can require years of waiting, and a wait of I think up to 15 years for reuniting families. No wonder immigration, encouraged by American employers, occurs illegally. North Carolina has attacked predatory lending, but it hasn't been ended here yet. A $50 dollar loan from these companies ends up costing the average debtor hundreds of dollars.
I went over the 5 minute speaking time because I didn't plan my remarks in detail and left out some more distant campaigns out. No one asked any questions about labor, and I expect that that indicates a problem with communication on these issues. On the other hand, the audience did seem to know about some local campaigns.
There were 16 of us in all, including the vice chair of the Durham Republican Party (!), one or two activists with the International Socialist Organization, Lori Khamala of the National Farm Worker Ministry, and others. There was some balance, but I was also disappointed that the audience was mostly white. There was more diversity by age (still younger than at the Durham impeachment meeting though) and sex. I think part of the problem is that we started detailed publicity late and we didn't know the Independent wouldn't have an issue out the week before. I didn't do as much online publicity for this, apart from emails. Having gotten upper front page publicity that Sunday and in the A section Monday in the Herald-Sun, I expected a crowd. Nicole expected more Durham People's Alliance members to turn out. Maybe it has something to do with all the stuff organized for for May Day 2006, but I still think our publicity and approach could be improved.
It was a start, and the DPA plans to do something next year too. Next year hopefully we can organize something bigger, even multiple events, and I would encourage again organizing in Chapel Hill. The immigration events probably added weight to the occasion, so it will be in people's minds for next year.
I'm thinking of things to organize for July 2006, since July 4th relates to civil rights, democracy, and revolution. The DPA might be interested in this idea. I'm not sure exactly how to approach this. Doing something like the May Day forum would be practical and could draw in other groups and more people, while organizing something specifically socialist would be my ideal, but maybe draw fewer people (because it is abstract and because there might not be strong local organizations to sponsor it, definitely not Alliance, unfortunately). July 23rd is the anniversary of the Downing Street Minutes and should be marked by the Grass Roots Impeachment Movement and there will probably be a town meeting on impeachment somewhere in the Triangle for July. I'm sure the Orange County and Durham Bill of Rights Defense Committees will have actions for July 4th. Close before July 4th will be the Southeast Social Forum at NCCU in late June.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment