IWW General Strike posters to print and forward

Hugh Electronic sez, "The I.W.W. hired Eric Drooker to design posters for a general strike which he is told, now appears imminent in Wisconsin. The Industrial Workers of the World asked him to design versions in Spanish and Arabic, for international solidarity."

English (JPG), Spanish (JPG), Arabic (JPG)

(Thanks, HughElectronic, via Submitterator!)

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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Anonymous

SEIZE THE MEANS OF PRODUCTION!
Anonymous

I’m curious how many people are currently members of the IWW. I learned about them in one of my history classes and I got the impression they had been shut down. Wikipedia (yeah, I know) says they only have 2000 members…that doesn’t seem like much of a strike. I’m pretty surprised that they still exist.
- Anonymous
  
  The idea isn’t that IWW members strike alone, the idea is that IWW members work with all workers, union and unorganized, public and private sector, to co-ordination mass actions in defense of the right to organize.
  
  BTW that 2000 are only those in good standing. Since the IWW, unlike most unions, does not have automatic dues deduction from paychecks, most of the IWW’s members are in inactive or bad standing. Wobblies must choose to actively pay delegates or pay online. This helps ensure that all associations are voluntary, ensures accountability and democracy, but can hurt long-term financial viability of the union. Counting those who have fallen out of good standing, the IWW has a membership closer to 12,000 (US and Canada) as well as hundreds to thousands in regional organizing committees in the UK, Australia, Germany, Austria, and at large members all over the world.
Anonymous

There is power, there is power
In a band of working folk
When they stand, hand in hand
There’s a power, there’s a power
That must rule in every land
One Industrial Union Grand.
Anonymous

I just mirrored the images in the Coral Distribution Network – previously known as Coral Cache. Anyone can access the images there by appending “.nyud.net” to the host name – or cache images or content from any other site as well!

So, for instance, these URLs became:

http://unixclan.no-ip.org.nyud.net/gseng.jpg
http://unixclan.no-ip.org.nyud.net/gses.jpg
http://unixclan.no-ip.org.nyud.net/gsar.jpg

http://unixclan.no-ip.org.nyud.net/gen_strike_english_hi.jpg
http://unixclan.no-ip.org.nyud.net/gen_strike_spanish_hi.jpg
http://unixclan.no-ip.org.nyud.net/gen_strike_arabic_hi.jpg

http://unixclan.no-ip.org.nyud.net/gseng-MK.psd

This will hopefully lower the load on the servers…
Tarliman

I’m proud to be a card-carrying member of the IWW. At the age of 48, and having worked in the medical and financial industries (including 8 1/2 years at Bank of America, boo hiss), I’ve become a staunch unionist. I stand in solidarity with the workers of Wisconsin. Any companies in Virginia, where I live, that provide services to Wisconsin (and especially to its government) may find me standing out front with a picket sign.
RedShirt77

A general strike would scare the piss out of the ruling class. If someone could pull one off it would change the face of the debate.
LogrusZed

Is there a mailing list or an RSS I can opt-in to that will notify my when the American Legion reverts to form and starts attacking IWW supporters? I grew up on stories about those days and have always felt short-changed that I’ve never gotten to cave in the skull of a Fascist shill of big business for a good Proletariat cause.
- Anonymous
  
  You are probably looking for the General Defense Committee.
  
  http://www.iww.org/en/projects/gdc
Anonymous

It’s really refreshing to see a unionist talking about the REAL purpose of unions – not just higher wages and better hours, but empowerment and workplace ownership for workers.

The other thing I’m thinking as the Wobblies step forward – what a bloody shame Utah Philips isn’t here to see this. You can bet he’d be right there with them.
Anonymous

On the Channel 3 10 o’clock news tonight in Madison the correspondent outside the capitol held up a handwritten sign that said: “Strike!”

No cat, just a hand scrawled sign in sharpie. I tried to find the clip online, but couldn’t.

Anybody got that on a tivo or something? I’d like to see it again…
lyd

Sooo…. from the comments here I’m getting that most people are imagining only a sort-of general strike, where all the public employees would strike but not be joined by private-sector workers.

But isn’t the point of a general strike that it is [i]general[/i]? Isn’t the idea that all the workers join together in support?
Chris Tucker

Wobblies rock!
Crashproof

That’s one sharp-looking poster.
Boba Fett Diop

General Strike!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKgsoVYrojk
musicman

+1
nerak

Is there a significance to the cat?
- jetfx
  
  The cat is a long running symbol of the IWW and refers to a wildcat strike.
  - Anonymous
    
    Actually the cat has a name: “sabo-kitty”. Specifically it refers to Sabotage (which is NOT the individualistic destruction of machinery (a false notion spread by the capitalist class to discredit the tactic), but rather the collective withdrawal of efficiency by the working class at the point of production). The symbol is a call to “strike on the job” which was used to great effect by the IWW’s Lumber Workers Industrial Union in 1917 to win the eight-hour day (which they did).
    
    The symbol apparently predates the IWW, but the familiar version that is used throughout much of the anarchist mileu these days, was designed by IWW member Ralph Chaplin: http://www.iww.org/graphics/sabocats/sabcat_red.jpg
    
    Ralph Chaplin wrote “Solidarity Forever”.
    
    Here’s another version of the cat: http://www.iww.org/graphics/sabocats/iww_cat.gif
    
    Not sure who designed that one.
    
    These posters were designed by Erik Drooker, of course.
  - Anonymous
    
    Actually, the cat is a long-time symbol of the IWW, it is the Sabo-Cat, which stands for industrial sabotage.
- noncompliant
  
  Wildcat strikes have also been called black cat strikes. Black cats are also supposed to represent anarcho-syndicalism. Black cats are a sign – to frighten “the boss”. Where’s my t shirt?
noen

Local Poll: Wisconsin Wants Compromise

“The People” do not want what the IWW thinks they ought to want. A true general strike seems unlikely to me though you never know and I think it would even work.

The poll, conducted last week and sponsored by the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute (WPRI), finds nearly two-thirds of the state’s adults (65 percent) prefer that Walker “negotiate with Democrats and public employee’s unions in order to find a compromise solution” to the “current conflict over public employee benefits and collective bargaining rights.”

People want the respective parties to compromise. Of course the republicans may prove intransigent but people do not want the chaos and possible violence that a general strike would entail. Simply the fact that the IWW is calling for one may only serve to make it more difficult. “The People” know that the Communists, and the IWW certainly are that, do not have their best interests at heart. They also know, as any fool should by now, that Marxism is a complete and utter failure as an economic or social alternative.

There is no one in Wisc. outside of a few delusional idiots in Madison who would seriously embrace the goals and likely also the methods of the IWW.
- lyd
  
  You’re playing disingenuous games with labels there.
  
  This seems helpful.
  
  Myths about the IWW and Communism
  http://www.iww.org/culture/myths/myths4.shtml
  - noen
    
    Lyd – Indeed that was helpful. So I take what I said back, the IWW are not Communists agitating for a working class dictatorship. However as a pragmatic matter I doubt the nuance will make it through to the average person. This graphic itself just screams “Let’s overthrow capitalism and have a dictatorship of the proletariat”. That is the association that most people are going to have the instant they see that poster.
    
    I’d suggest abandoning the colors red and black altogether, they are aggressive. Also get rid of the woodcut style. You want pleasant colors and a smooth modern visual style. Not one associated with the Communist era. Humor would also be a good idea so the LOL cat “I can haz general strike?” would actually get far more traction than this one.
    
    Now that I think of it, given the reality above, I think this poster is really just preaching to the choir. It makes you feel good and promotes a general feeling of unity among your fellow IWW members but it does little to advance your objectives. Which I would think would be important.
    
    You need to re-brand yourself. That’s just the harsh reality. Failure to recognize that means that you aren’t really interested in the general welfare of the workers but are instead massaging your own narcissistic fantasies.
    
    Almost everyone has heard of LOL cats so a “Obey teh kitty! General strike!” in nice calming colors followed with “Don’t Panic” would be widely accepted. It would actually work, this poster is DOA.
    - afs97209
      
      Noen and anon – Nobody under the age of 50 even knows who “the proletariat” are. The far right so has overdone beating the dead communist horse, the word “socialist” poll-tests only 3% lower than the word “Republican.”
    - Anonymous
      
      What exactly is wrong with a dictatorship of the proletariat? You keep asserting it’s wrong but never really back it up.
      
      It certainly cannot be any worse a system than what we have now. As others have said, if you point only to the current examples of self-described socialism (even those are debatable) you see countries that had never had any history of democracy, nor a large industrial sector. Socialism is only supposed to happen after a bourgeois democracy has existed and fallen.
    - lyd
      
      Interesting points. Thanks.
- Anonymous
  
  The IWW in Wisconsin isn’t isolated to Madison; it has a General Membership Branch in Milwaukee and has members at large throughout the state.
- jacobian
  
  “They also know, as any fool should by now, that Marxism is a complete and utter failure as an economic or social alternative.”
  
  The IWW is not Marxist and Marx was almost entirely concerned with analysing the political economy of capitalism and had very little to say about how an alternative should work.
  
  In 1820 one could have looked at the failure of Republican revolutions in Europe and have thought that authoritarian monarchies or quasi monarchies would be inevitable. In fact, the republican revolutions have triumphed and the republican form of government dominates. The English and French republican revolutions both devolved into revolutionary Monarchies.
  
  There have only really been two large attempts at socialism: One in China and one Russia. They have in common that neither of them were industrialised and both had very small working classes and were comprised largerly of peasants in feudalism. Marx never imagined that socialism would be attempted under these conditions and that’s why he only ever wrote about the working class taking power, not the peasants.
  
  There are now many different models for how a system without wage labour could function. Parecon, Economic Democracy, Inclusive Democracy, Labour-time vouchers and Cotrrell and Cockshott’s planning method. None of these has been seriously attempted on even small scales, because the working class doesn’t own the means of production and the ruling class is averse to experiments that would lose them their power. It’s essentially the same reason the nobility were averse to the rise of capitalism and the displacement of feudal relations.
  - noen
    
    The Jacobin said:
    “The IWW is not Marxist and Marx was almost entirely concerned with analysing the political economy of capitalism and had very little to say about how an alternative should work.”
    
    I have very little sympathy for someone who chooses a nym associated with radical extremism. That said: Marxism is a failed economic theory. It isn’t just wrong, it’s objectively wrong. So while you’re at it say hello to your other failed sibling theory: Libertarianism. You sound just like them. I can hear the family resemblance it your “Socialism can never fail, it can only be failed” rationalizing. This is the mark of the true ideologue wrapped up in a delusional model of reality that he will never let go for purely irrational emotional reasons.
    
    “There are now many different models … none has been seriously attempted … because the ruling class is adverse to losing power” (paraphrased)
    
    Yeah, that’s what a failed model looks like. If your model fails to capture the real world then it’s pretty much worthless isn’t it? Your central error is in thinking that you can make the real world conform to your desires rather than conforming your desires to what is real. That is what the far Left and far Right have in common: a belief that what I want should be what is. That is also why behind every anarchist is a tin-pot dictator just itching to get out.
    
    Economics is not a science. It is at best a research project in the humanities and at worst nothing more than a means to rationalize the greed of a few. We currently lack the proper intellectual tools to reason correctly about economics and decision theory is hopelessly confused. Until that changes we will continue to fumble around in the dark.
    - gorillawarfare
      
      Lolcats-based posters? Really? Are you even taking seriously the issues in Wisconsin? I can understand your part about toning the red-black colors down to disassociate the movement in Wisconsin from a position that might get public sympathies away from the workers, but I don’t really see why the alternative has to be the silliness to be found in modern-day protest posters.
      
      Scott Walker taking away collective bargaining rights is no laughing matter. It is a life or death situation. If he wins this fight, it could set a precedent which could lead to workers’ rights being stripped down to a level similar to the early days of the Industrial Revolution.
      
      The “harsh reality” isn’t that militant political slogans need to be adjusted to Lolcat- or humor-based rhetoric. Instead, the “harsh reality” is that political rhetoric in the United States has gotten to such a ridiculous low that silliness is what counts for mainstream-accepted politics.
      
      Social-political issues, like the ones in Wisconsin, should not be considered funny. And if the issues have to be silliness-infused in order to be grab attention and not scare people off, then the problem lies with the society, and not with the movements that tries to make it better.
      
      Uncompromising militancy, and not “realism,” is what has gotten us where we are today.
      
      If the suffragists were “realistic,” would they have changed anything? No.
      
      If the abolitionists were “realistic,” would they have changed anything? No.
      
      If the people of the civil rights movement were “realistic,” would they have changed anything? No.
      
      The same could be said about the gay rights movement, feminist movement, animal rights movement, and virtually every successful movement till today, including the one in Egypt, where militancy and outspokenness won the battle. If activists in history saw the world around them and conformed to it, we would not be where we are today.
      
      You may think that the views you made above are “realistic” or even “sober.” In fact, it actually sounds more like comformity and apathy. I find this apathetic conformity saddening; but what I find even more disheartening is your vicious narrow-mindedness towards anything you disagree with. Almost every single one of your above criticisms was accompanied by unsubstantiated attacks.
      
      For instance, you call socialism-based ideologues (gee, if socialists/etc are ideologues, what does that make non-socialists like you?) delusional. How is socialism/etc delusion? Attacks such as how socialists/etc “will never let go for purely irrational emotional reasons” is just ad hominem.
      
      If Marxism or anarchism (or whatever view of your disliking) is a failed economic theory, then what does that make of our modern-day system of economics, where the top percentage of society owns more wealth than the bottom majority percentage combined? (One estimate I read put it at the one percent of rich people owning more than the rest of the 90 percent of society combined!)
      
      People have often said that historical examples show socialism, anarchism and the like to be failed models of society. Well guess what? Capitalism is shown to be a failed model of society by DAILY EXAMPLES of things from all around the world.
      
      It’s wishful thinking to believe that this system of ours can be sustained. If anything, you, Noen, are the one who is blind to reality.
Not a Doktor

Make them french so they’re Canadian compliant.
themelonbread

Though I can’t read Arabic, I’m pretty sure it’s read right to left. Why does the Arabic post have an exclamation point on the right of the writing?
- Yamazakikun
  
  While it would amuse me greatly if the Wobblies made such a dumb mistake, that’s an alif, not an exclamation mark.
- Anonymous
  
  it’s not an exclamation point, it’s an alif with a hamza.
Major Variola (ret)

I love the cat graphic (happy caturday everyone) but wtf abusing our feline overlords’ meme for petty human dollarsquabbles? Just print
more of those paper rectangles yall worship.
- jacobian
  
  “but wtf abusing our feline overlords’ meme for petty human dollarsquabbles?”
  
  IWW calls for the abolition of wage labour.
Johnny Coelacanth

“”The People” know that the Communists, and the IWW certainly are that…” Citation or gtfo.
Anonymous

CAT POWER!
Anonymous

@noen

I thought the workers on strike had basically said they’d bend on everything except the collective bargaining rights? I don’t see how that can be compromised on.
Anonymous

“Not much “industrial” left in what they are doing. Somehow I have a hard time picturing Bill Haywood and Joe Hill as baristas….”

“Industrial” unionism means organizing all workers in the same industry into a single union instead of dividing them by craft or skill. It is by no means restricted to “heavy industry”.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_unionism

Look at the wages people make in the service industry. They need a union and they need it now.

http://www.iww.org/unions/dept600/iu640/
Anonymous

I thought this style looked familiar. I picked up a graphic novel (all graphic, no words) called ‘flood’ he made and liked it.
noen

Yeah, that’s not gonna happen. The Communists should probably just stay out of this anyway.
- travtastic
  
  I though I recognized you from somewhere. Aren’t you the guy responsible for every single comment on Yahoo’s news stories?
crashcourse

About the people commenting that people don’t know what a general strike is and that no one really wants one, a friend of mine was just in Madison for a few days. He distributed several thousand flyers calling for a general strike. The vast majority of people expressed agreement with the call, which presumably means they also know what one is. People who want to know more about what a general strike is could also start with this pamphlet the IWW put out –
http://www.iww.org/en/node/5362

And it’s not only the IWW talking about a general strike. The South Central Federation of Labor, a coalition of labor unions in southern Wisconsin, has been talking about this as well –
http://www.iww.org/en/node/5352

That’s still not enough people, but this conflict is still very new.
Anonymous

General Strike document circulating in the USA and now worldwide…
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1u_eZAy7kWlZDyLwdCQNEw6js8NOPgGF70bbOJZ8LwZY/edit?hl=en&authkey=CLuospEO&pli=1#
ChristinaWard

As Anon said, the image is of the Sabo Cat.

Here’s the blurb from Wiki that’s pretty spot on in defining it.

“Since the 1880s, the colour black has been associated with anarchism. The black cat, in an alert, fighting stance was later adopted as an anarchist symbol.

More specifically, the black catâ€”often called the “sab cat” or “sabo-tabby”[8]â€”is associated with anarcho-syndicalism, a branch of anarchism that focuses on labor organizing (see Wildcat strike).

In testimony before the court in a 1918 trial of Industrial Workers of the World leaders, Ralph Chaplin, who is generally credited with creating the IWW’s black cat symbol, stated that the black cat “was commonly used by the boys as representing the idea of sabotage. The idea being to frighten the employer by the mention of the name sabotage, or by putting a black cat somewhere around. You know if you saw a black cat go across your path you would think, if you were superstitious, you are going to have a little bad luck. The idea of sabotage is to use a little black cat on the boss.”"

As to Badger’s organizing a general strike. That’s a yes and no. What we’ve been doing is converging on the CapBldg on Saturdays. The next one on March 12, 2011 now has support from the Farm Alliance, who are organizing a statewide tractor convoy to Madison. And as Willie Nelson is scheduled to play a show in MKE that week, there is a push on to get him to come to Madison that Saturday. If anyone knows Willie, get the word out: Wisconsin Needs Willie!

We’re too responsible a people to declare a general weekday strike, but definitely will continue with the Saturday occupations. But of course, if things continue to get worse…we just might consider a general weekday strike.
mntnr

noen makes me sad.
- noncompliant
  
  It’s funny that people don’t see Wisconsin as front lines for the battle to save the US middle class: http://www.counterpunch.org/sigal03012011.html
The Life Of Bryan

Thereâ€™s obviously been a misunderstanding; if everyoneâ€™s going on strike they want posters depicting Galt.
Anonymous

I hope for the labor side’s sake that they think things through before going through with a general strike. Public opinion could turn against them really quickly.
- Thorzdad
  
  I agree completely. While I think a general strike may be warranted, based on the Governor’s my-way-or-the-highway stonewalling, I also feel that a general strike would mostly serve to evaporate the public support the unions enjoy at the moment. As soon as Joe Public encounters some inconvenience because of a strike, you can bet his mood will quickly sour.
  
  In addition, I believe a strike would play right into the hands to the right-wing media machine. I would suspect there are already tv ads ready to go, as soon as a strike is called. Expect manufactured images of trash piling-up and crime in the streets, while union picketers stand around and laugh, high-five, smoke stogies, etc.
  
  The unions have to walk a very thin tightrope, with regards to public sentiment.
transmothra

Any mirrors yet, internets?
- Anonymous
  
  Some mirrors. Use the standard resolution for most desktop jobs and the high res for for large scale printing or editing.
  
  http://unixclan.no-ip.org/gseng.jpg
  http://unixclan.no-ip.org/gses.jpg
  http://unixclan.no-ip.org/gsar.jpg
  
  http://unixclan.no-ip.org/gen_strike_english_hi.jpg
  http://unixclan.no-ip.org/gen_strike_spanish_hi.jpg
  http://unixclan.no-ip.org/gen_strike_arabic_hi.jpg
  
  and again, the color separated image is here:
  http://unixclan.no-ip.org/gseng-MK.psd
zyodei

Isn’t this the guy who did the KMFDM covers?
- jordawesome
  
  A similar style certainly, but Brute! Propaganda (aka Aidan Hughes) did the KMFDM covers. http://www.bruteprop.com
  - wigg1es
    
    Well they do say that KMFDM is a drug against war.
- Anonymous
  
  @zyodei no, you’re think of Aidan Hughes (aka Brute!). Erik Drooker did however get some of his art from that Flood book to be the album art for a faith no more album.
Anonymous

i heard drooker donated the poster to the iww is it confirmed that he was hired?
- Anonymous
  
  Ya, I believe it was a donation.
Anonymous

A note to all Boingers – please spread the word about Wisconsin, don’t just assume your friends and family are seeing it in the news – I’m finding a lot of them have no idea any of this is happening!
Anonymous

We are humans, not cats. This looks cool but is not a strike poster.
Adam C

Eric is my brother in law. I’ll have to give him a heads up on this post.
Anonymous

That should probably say “imminent”, although the thought of a general strike that is inherent in all things is nice. Describing the general strike as one that only occurs in the mind of the subject and has no effect outside it might, on the other hand, be accurate.
Anonymous

Allow me to drop the following meme into the brain pool:

*Global* general strike.
*Global* general strike.
*Global* general strike.
*Global* general strike.
*Global* general strike.
*Global* general strike.
Stay_Sane_Inside_Insanity

Very cool. I suppose this’ll be the test of whether our tired old republic has any democratic spirit left in her.
sabcat

another use of the “strike cat” graphic:

http://img203.imageshack.us/i/sabcatwi.gif/
Anonymous

Would be VERY cool if Drooker were to make these available in .svg vector format so they would be fully resizable/customizable – and make for a smaller file size as well! Not saying that they aren’t already very cool…
Anonymous

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFrMU8wmQ9k
Rob

Kitty!
osmo

Wait wait since news about wisconsin is close to zero here… (seriously I’ve looked and last time there was anything in the news about wisconsin it was a small thing a few weeks ago) is there some good news sites anyone here can refer too?

Wonderful poster btw
- Anonymous
  
  Libcom have really good coverage on the protests that have been ongoing at http://libcom.org/tags/wisconsin-labor-protests. Noen obviously knows what he or she is talking about because those articles don’t show loads of people using IWW tactics.
  
  As for the posts addressing public support, whilst it’s always nice to have, strikes win because they’re economically damaging, not because they have good PR. In England, tube drivers are the most militant workers in the country and as a result, one of the highest paid. Whilst it’s not as bad as the media makes out, they’re not the most popular come the morning they’ve shut down the tubes. In contrast, nurses would be massively supported if they struck but never have.
- Anonymous
  
  For those looking for news about the protests in Wisconsin and having difficulty finding coverage, Dane101 has been doing a good job of aggregating information. It’s a local news blog that covers events in Dane County, and especially Madison, WI.
Anonymous

Thanks for posting this Cory!

A general strike is always hard to pull off, but the right to collectively bargain is worth fighting for. Benevolent leaders don’t grant rights down from above. We have freedom only in so far as we are willing to resist the bosses and claim our own autonomy.

This letter from the CNT to the workers of Wisconsin expresses the IWW sentiment rather well.
http://madison.iww.org/content/cnt-solidarity-madison

Everyone in the working class: public sector, private sector, retired, student, unemployed, we all should be support an economic order that benefits all of us instead of the rich elite.

Over the past 40 years real wages have gone down for 90% of Americans.
http://www.stateofworkingamerica.org/pages/interactive#/?start=1970&end=2008

During this same period the US economy as a whole has tripped in size due to gains in all of our productivity from technological advance and education. The wealth produced by the working class has been stolen by the ownership class. They got away with it because during that same time period unions were in decline. The public sector is nearly the last vestige of a working class with enough organization to stand up for itself. Public sector workers must be defended. Anyone in the private sector jealous of the job security and benefits of unionized public workers should form a union of their own.

We will not cut back to pay for the crisis of the financial robber barons. The money is there! The state may be “broke” due to a Republican manufactured budget failure, but US corporations are sitting on over $2 trillion in cash and other “liquid assets”. This amount is dwarfed by the $20 trillion in wealth that the richest 1% of US households own.

The general strike is only a start. Next should come occupation of productive capital (any empty offices, factories, inter-model transportation yards, data-centers, shops, etc) and the resumption of work under workers-self-management without bosses or capitalists!

Strike! Occupy! Produce!

If the capitalists refuse to hire, and refuse to pay current employees what they deserve, and if the state only insists in deepening the recession through cutbacks in necessary services and tax-cuts for the elite parasites, than we should occupy their idle workplaces and do it all ourselves!
Anonymous

Here is another version of the English poster, separated into layers for black, red, and background for running on a press the uses plates for each color. The union bug is also removed. Union print bugs should only be included if you are actually a union printer, so I removed it for DIY printing. If you are a union printer, substitute your own bug.

http://unixclan.no-ip.org/gseng-MK.psd

BTW the IWW is a union for all workers. Anyone who is not a manager with exclusive hiring and firing power can join. This includes public and private sector workers, members of other unions wishing to “dual card”, students, the unemployed (reserve army of labor), etc. It practices democratic process including having all officers and delegates subject to a recall vote by the membership and having no dues checkoff (union dues are always paid by worker consent and are not deducted from a paycheck by an employer). The contemporary IWW is non-sectarian never supports any political party. The IWW trains all members to be organizers and seeks power in the workplace with or without a formal contract with the bosses.

You can sign up here:
http://www.iww.org/en/join

or donate to support the struggle in Madison here:
http://store.iww.org/madison-donations.html
- technogeek
  
  Absolutely classic poster design — eyecatching, reads clearly at a great distance, easy to print with any of a variety of different technologies from offset to silkscreen. (Speaking of which, if anyone does T-shirts of this design, please let me know.)
  
  Thanks for providing the separations — and for the clarification about the use of the union “bug”; that’s something I wasn’t familiar with.
  
  The unions really need to go back to their original approach of actually explaining to the public *why* they should be supported, rather than being considered just another big business in their own right. Wisconson’s fracas is a definite step in the right direction in that regard.
  
  (I have relatives who were involved in founding the painters’ union in the NYC area. I remember a number of farmworker strikes, back when I was a kid, which drew strong public support. When it really is a matter of fighting for _fair_ treatment — which Wisconson definitely is — I’m all for ‘em. When it’s purely a matter of business negotiation, I’m less convinced. My own employer never unionized, and probably never will because it treats the employees pretty decently.)
Anonymous

The comments here criticizing a strike = why the republicans win.
- Anonymous
  
  “The comments here criticizing a strike = why the republicans win.”
  
  Damn right.
  
  This kind of activism is *exactly* why we have a 40 hour work week, strong child labor laws, workplace safety regulations, benefits, etc. In short, if it were not for unions there never would have been an American middle class in the first place. And the decline of the American middle class has gone in lockstep with the decline in unionization.
  
  Fascists always go after the trade unions first. Always.
I m bot or not

Is general strike some kind of anime feline action hero? General Strike was once the greatest leader in the army, but he was gravely wounded by a roadside bomb. A scientist at an army lab transferred his mind into a stray cat……the rest is left to your imagination.

Alternatively this looks like an ad for some new awesome firework. Like black cat only more awesome.

If this is for some upcoming event, perhaps a date and a social media info like a Twitter handle would be useful.
osmo

This really does raise the question of poster design. I mean *I* know what it refers to. I know the background of the black cat as a symbol and I know what general strike is (and why its kinda cocky putting a poster like this up)… But is the info not enough? Obviously most people don’t know why the black cat re-occurs in allot of posters and so on. Most people aren’t aware what General Strike is either so perhaps it may be good to add some info about these things
- Anonymous
  
  The poster isn’t a stand alone piece of propaganda though. The local IWW are also distributing tens of thousands of leaflets with a lot more infprmation. The text of the leaflets can be found here.
  http://wobblygoblin.wordpress.com/2011/03/01/iww-general-strike-pamphlet/
- transmothra
  
  Well, there *IS* a URL in the poster. It wouldn’t exactly matter if it featured a frog, or a ‘possum, or Abe Vigoda. The message is the same: protest! Strike! Let the streets run red with ink!
Anonymous

I can has general ztrike?
Anonymous

To this card-carrying wobblies eyes, this poster/image is amazing and an inspiring call to action. Union folks have fought and died under the red and black to win just about every important labor protection we enjoy. However, Wobblies still have a sense of humor, so here’s your damned lolcat: http://imgur.com/ixzhi
Anonymous

That’s a good initiative to fight for their rights!
gwailo_joe

That cat needs a crowbar. . .
Anonymous

My late dad, who was in a union, used to tell me black cats were only bad luck if you didn’t feed them. I just assumed it was an old wives tale, but now I think it may have had different origins.
jacobian

“I have very little sympathy for someone who chooses a nym associated with radical extremism.”

You mispelled my name. My name comes from the jacobian matrix and has nothing to do with “radical extremism”.

“That said: Marxism is a failed economic theory. It isn’t just wrong, it’s objectively wrong.”

What does objectively wrong mean? Do you have special access to the minds of the gods, or would you like to retreat from that a bit and say something more sane like “empirically weak”? This statement merely posits truth statements without demonstrating any evidence. It actually makes you sound like a mad Stalinist calling me “objectively reactionary”.

If you’d like to come back to the modern age of science then we can do a bit of empirical exploration. I’ve got some news for you. Neo-classical economics is about as far from scientific as you can get and in contrast the LTV comes out with some verifiable empirical predictions.

http://reality.gn.apc.org/econ/jelle.pdf
http://www.debunkingeconomics.com/

“Yeah, that’s what a failed model looks like. If your model fails to capture the real world then it’s pretty much worthless isn’t it? Your central error is in thinking that you can make the real world conform to your desires rather than conforming your desires to what is real.”

By that *exact* logic Republicanism was a failed model in 1820. Get it? I already explained why this reasoning does not work.

Finding the way to go about implementing solutions is part of the problem for sure. Realising that there is in fact a problem is a lot of the problem about implementing a solution. The current social order is not the only possible social order any more than feudalism was. Someday it will change, and what people think will be part of changing that.
Wally Ballou

I had no idea the IWW was still around.

Took a gander at their website – their current projects involve organizing at Starbucks, Jimmy John’s Subs, and an ad agency.

Not much “industrial” left in what they are doing. Somehow I have a hard time picturing Bill Haywood and Joe Hill as baristas….
transmothra

I took the liberty of remixing it down to a slightly less tall 640*720 format: http://twitpic.com/46qxti (works well as a Facebook profile pic – lemmings unite!)