The Socialist Alternative to a World of Injustice

[marmar]

The Socialist Alternative to a World of Injustice

Sunday, 07 September 2014 12:52
By Danny Katch, Socialist Worker | Op-Ed


Before you get to socialism, you first have to ask yourself a more basic question: Which side am I on?

As I was writing this article at the end of August, Israel was raining bombs on Gaza, and Black people were staring down the police in the streets of Ferguson, Mo. In these conflicts and others, some will identity with the oppressors and others with the oppressed. (And then there are those who carefully criticize both sides to justify sitting on their gentle neutral butts.)

What accounts for these different responses? Information certainly plays a role, or rather the misinformation that most of us get from the corporate-owned media. Many people who have never been at a demonstration won't realize that "protests turn violent" headlines really mean "police got violent because their authority was questioned."

However we get our news, most of us choose sides based on a sense of fairness, which in turn is connected to our overall place in society. When fast-food workers go on strike to demand $15 an hour and a union, some instinctively support them because they know what it's like to work hard for little. Others might be sympathetic to McDonald's because they also own a business, or think they might one day. .................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/26035-the-socialist-alternative-to-a-world-of-injustice

[Louisiana1976]

1. Right on! I'm a socialist and I know whose side I'm on.

[Dirty Socialist]

2. I Am A Partial Socialist

But many right wingers can't tell the difference between a progressive capitalist and a Socialist. Hence my nic.
One can be a capitalist sometimes and a socialist at other times. Even Addam Smith said Capitalism isn't always the answer.

[socialist_n_TN]

3. I don't think there's any doubt about who's side I'm on...