Strikes are not only done for social and economic impact but also to show those in power what we want and what we are demanding. They’re not only to teach them a lesson, but they also teach us, the people, a huge lesson.
By striking in whatever form it might be whether it is not going to work, not attending classes, not purchasing anything, causing disruption, friction, and stopping business as usual, we begin to understand what collective power can do. And it also makes clear that corporations and government are dependent on the people, not the other way around, which is what they are constantly trying to propagandize. The fact is that they need us, we do not need them.
Another lesson is that understand the scope of our reliance on these corporations and entities. For instance, in preparation for a week-long strike, often people stockpile everything they need all at once before the strike week begins. But they are still getting our money this way, just all at once and quicker.
We should absolutely prepare for strikes. But we can begin to think about different ways that we don’t need to get from these corporations and entities at all.
It makes us question what it means to have our own sustainable food sources, and what true accessible public transportation might be. It makes us think about ways that the system has made us reliant on it for medication, life-saving supplies, and services. We can begin to think about what we can do to make those universal and fully accessible. The very systems we are striking against, that we are trying to hold accountable to us, that actually need us, we can fundamentally change and even dismantle them.
Keep in mind that the point of a strike isn’t just to delay the spending of your money, or to accumulate more work by not going into the office, or to miss learning because you are not going to class. Striking is also the perfect opportunity to understand what divestment could look like. So a strike is a two-pronged approach: hit them in their pockets and for us to practice what the world could look like without them. Pockets, practice.
So yes, let us strike so we put pressure on Empire to meet our demands. But also let us remember that another purpose of this is to decolonize ourselves so that we remember that we do not even need these institutions in the first place.
Divest, decolonize, dismantle.
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