Section 44

26/07/2023

Support your nurses (and share this post)!

On June 27, nurses in Austin at Ascension Seton Medical Center and in Wichita at Ascension St. Francis and Ascension Via Christi St. Joseph went on strike for one day.  The strike was historic…

15/02/2023

You Don't Want Your Nurse to Be Overworked!

On January 26, 2023, nurses across the country held rallies to protest understaffing at a number of major hospitals. The issue, says the National Nurses Union/National Nurses Organizing Committee …

15/03/2021

A must, must-read analysis - with relevance far beyond Texas - of a freeze and intersecting crises from Tempest Magazine

Reprint from Tempest Magazine By Snehal Shingavi The events of February 13 to 19, 2021 devastated Texas, as winter storm Uri swept through the state bringing historically low temperatures and expos…

10/03/2021

The 60s and 70s were decades marked by radical ideas and ambitious organizing that the Texas GOP still hasn't recovered from today - more about the radical origins of Roe vs. Wade below.

The year began with some relief for abortion rights in Texas, when the U.S. Supreme Court eliminated any legal basis for Gov. Greg Abbott’s opportunistic ban on abortion during the first months of …

09/03/2021

With Ronald Jones on his new film, "Again, Together: the Cumulative Impacts of Environmental Racism in Houston."

On January 21, Ronald Llewellyn Jones premiered his documentary, “Again, Together: the Cumulative Impacts of Environmental Racism in Houston,” on Zoom to an audience of activists.  The do…

04/03/2021

Inside a Neighborhood’s Fight Against Environmental Racism in HTX | Interview with Four Fifth-Ward Activists - Impact Fifth Ward

In January, the Department of State Health Services declared another cancer cluster in Houston’s Fifth Ward, with skyrocketing rates of leukemia and other illnesses in the area. &nbs…

01/03/2021

Shout out to our readers at The Teamster Rebel who republished. Local 104 members are now looking at a contract to vote on - stay tuned for more on this.

“To them, money is more important than human lives,” says Local 104 Business Agent Russell Medigovich. Teamsters are organizing at Albertsons across the Southwest to get essential workers the conditions they deserve.

26/02/2021

Solidarity with Teamsters Local Union 745 and Teamsters Local 104

At Albertsons’ locations in Texas, Arizona and New Mexico, union drivers represented by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters have been waging labor actions for basic protections.  E…

23/02/2021

This could turn the region upside-down - shout out to the tremendous organizing effort in Bessemer, AL led by BAmazonUnion and Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU)

By now, it’s obvious to just about everyone that something serious is taking place in Bessemer, Alabama. In the heart of the Deep South, a majority-Black and women workforce of about 6000…

23/02/2021

Outstanding analysis - reprint from Rampant Magazine

Reprinted from Rampant Magazine. Written by Snehal Shingavi Two images capture the crisis in Texas perfectly. First, nurses at St. David’s South Austin Medical Center came to work on Thursday …

12/02/2021

The attacks on homelessness have been heating up in Austin in the midst of the pandemic and a breakdown in services more generally.  Part of this debate has between state and municipal po…

02/12/2020

Monica Muñoz Martinez, The Injustice Never Leaves You: Anti-Mexican Violence in Texas. Harvard University Press, 2018. 387 pp. Mucho antes de que existiera el campo de concentración que se ubica ho…

18/11/2020

Emma Tenayuca and Homer Brooks wrote “The Mexican Question in the Southwest” in 1938 as an attempt to theorize the experience of Mexican Americans for the Communist Party USA. Tenayuca a…

16/11/2020

The Democrats try again. Everyone has the story by now: Trump cleared in Texas by almost six points, Biden found new strength in the suburbs outside Austin and Houston, particularly in Fort Bend, W…

24/09/2020

The presidential race is actually quite tight in Texas, and this is very important. Biden is solidly in the margin of error, sometimes trailing Trump, sometimes ahead. The Texas Democratic Party is…

19/09/2020

In an interview for Section 44, Snehal Shingavi spoke with Ken Zarifis, the President of Education Austin (a merged union local of both NEA and AFT), and Luke Amphlett, the Consultation Chair and Executive Committee member of the San Antonio Alliance of Teachers and Support Personnel. Ken is a long-time activist in Texas and has been leading the charge against school re-openings. Luke Amphlett just successfully pushed back attempts by the San Antonio school board to put him on administrative leave for speaking out against in-person schooling while the risks of the pandemic were still extant. And while the national debate about school re-openings rages on, teachers in Texas have found ways to fight back locally.
https://section44.org/2020/09/19/resisting-the-re-opening-an-interview-with-two-texas-teachers/

In an interview for Section 44, Snehal Shingavi spoke with Ken Zarifis, the President of Education Austin (a merged union local of both NEW and AFT), and Luke Amphlett, the Consultation Chair and E…

17/09/2020

Is the BLM Summer going to continue through the election cycle? This is the question one way or another on the minds of millions. A new Pew Research Center survey seems to point to declining suppor…

24/04/2020

So cool.

With live productions no longer safe during the pandemic, workers both in and behind the scenes of the entertainment industry are struggling. In Houston, theater unions have reported massive layoff…

20/04/2020

As part of a continuing series of interviews with frontline workers in Texas, Section 44 spoke with two anonymous Kroger workers and members of the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) union, working in different stores across Dallas. This interview explores how the crisis has transformed the production process and the sharpened social relations escalating on the shop floor and beyond. We invite those with labor stories during the pandemic to contact us at [email protected].

As part of a continuing series of interviews with frontline workers in Texas, Seth Uzman spoke with two anonymous Kroger workers and members of the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) union, …

18/04/2020

On February 20, 2020, GE announced the intent to close this shop with the employees that keep our national electric grid running. Local IUE-CWA members are demanding GE use this facility and its highly-skilled workers to manufacture ventilators, and are calling for increased safety measures to protect them at this time. The plant has won the company’s coveted “Center of Excellence” designation and has a clean room which would help facilitate ventilator production. Snehal Shingavi spoke to Walter Bradford, President, and Danielle Jones, shop steward, of IUE-CWA Local 86788 in Dallas, TX.

On February 20, 2020, GE announced the intent to close this shop with the employees that keep our national electric grid running. Local IUE-CWA members are demanding GE use this facility and its hi…

18/04/2020

Our much-anticipated arrival on Twitter.

The latest Tweets from Section 44 | A Journal of Texas Marxism (). We are revolutionary socialists in Texas, seeking to build on the legacies of the best of radical Texan activism and struggle. https://t.co/wAnOExT8yL

18/04/2020

We encourage readers to share and contribute towards the following local fundraiser for the family of a fallen worker at the El Paso Psychiatric Center. To donate and share, please follow the link here [https://www.gofundme.com/f/m3j5tx-medical-supplies?utm_source=customer&utm_medium=copy_link-tip&utm_campaign=p_cp+share-sheet]. You can read more about the Crisis at the El Paso Psychiatric Center here [https://section44.org/2020/04/17/paying-a-tribute-to-nati-luevanoss-family-eppc-family/].

“Today April 14, 2020 we recieved the news of losing one of our fellow companions due to sudden illness. He was very passionate about helping others, great sense of humor and always made the best of every situation. On behalf of el paso psychiatric employees, we are coming together to raise as much money possible for his family in this difficult time of the loss of their loved one. Please help Nati's family by donating, spreading the word and sharing with as many people as you can. Thank you to everyone that participates. ANYTHING HELPS.” - EPPC Family

To donate, please visit https://www.gofundme.com/f/m3j5tx-medical-supplies?utm_source=customer&utm_medium=copy_link-tip&utm_campaign=p_cp+share-sheet.

17/04/2020

On April 14, 2020, an employee at the El Paso Psychiatric Center (EPPC) died from COVID-19. That came on the heels of several other patients and employees at the center testing positive for the virus. State-wide, more than 108 employees at state-supported living centers and state hospitals have tested positive. The El Paso Psychiatric Center, in particular, is being seen as one of the primary sources of the outbreak of the virus into the larger El Paso Community. Snehal Shingavi spoke to a recently resigned social worker (here called Employee X to protect their identity) at EPPC and Aviv Rau, an organizer with the Texas State Employees Union local 6186 about the situation in the center.

On April 14, 2020, an employee at the El Paso Psychiatric Center (EPPC) died from COVID-19.  That came on the heels of several other patients and employees at the center testing positive for t…

15/04/2020

Many thanks to our clutch comrades at rs21!

Sue Ferguson discusses socialist-feminism, capitalist childhoods and social struggles today. While conducted weeks previously, this interview goes online amidst a pandemic, exposing and aggravating a crisis of social reproduction.

13/04/2020

Register here! https://actionnetwork.org/events/txlaborhistory/?fbclid=IwAR0E6crmV1_TO1fYx3HrVVfTi49QKt-GS8apAaHS61Xrkj_PwFuFBZkAoqE

This is a 4-week reading and discussion group designed for organizers and union members to establish an understanding of the history of labor struggles in Texas. In our current social and political…

10/04/2020

Devoted to securing rent relief.

08/04/2020

The Trump administration and employers didn’t prioritize saving lives over saving money. Nurses did.

06/04/2020

As the first strikes and wider fightbacks flare amidst a cratering economy and an exploding pandemic, Houston-based socialist and author, David McNally spoke with Snehal Shingavi of Section 44 about what’s behind the crisis — and ahead for the Left.

As the first strikes and wider fightbacks flare amidst a cratering economy and an exploding pandemic, Houston-based socialist and author, David McNally spoke with Snehal Shingavi of Section 44 abou…

30/03/2020

This week’s installment is the title.

Ralph Bivins, Houston 2020: America’s Boom Town – An Extreme Close Up. Fifth Estate Media, 2018. 160 pp. Review by Sans C. Naomi Klein thinks the coronavirus pandemic is another example o…

25/03/2020

In light of today’s pandemic and as many Texas cities go under lockdown, Section 44 reprints a petition authored by domestic workers in Laredo, TX on October 19th, 1903 in the Laredo Daily Times. The border town fell under army-enforced quarantine during that year’s yellow fever epidemic, inducing many local elites to flee, taking their wealth with them. In these extraordinary conditions, women workers for whom English was not their first language intervened and confronted local authorities, making and winning demands for social provision. We hope their bravery and leadership find their way into our present.

In light of today’s pandemic and as many Texas cities go under lockdown, Section 44 reprints a petition authored by domestic workers in Laredo, TX on October 19th, 1903 in the Laredo Daily Ti…