Facebook Instagram Twitter YouTube

Stop Acting Like This is Normal: A Call for Submissions on the Pandemic

Left Voice is calling for submissions about the struggles of the working class and oppressed during the COVID-19 pandemic. Please send us your stories, your struggles, your reflections, and your class rage to [email protected]

Left Voice

December 14, 2020
Facebook Twitter Share
Image: Angus Mordant/Bloomberg

The pandemic rages on — and it’s only getting worse.  

Again, after a harrowing and deadly spring, there are about a quarter of a million new cases of COVID-19 reported each day; about 3,000 die each day of the disease; and the numbers are only going up. Hospitals are once more at, or nearing, full capacity. And once more, the people who need masks and other personal protective equipment (PPE) most — the frontline workers in the hospitals, in the grocery stores, etc. — are facing shortages. 

Vaccines are in the wings, and already being rolled out across the globe. And yet in the U.S., no vaccine has yet been approved for use against Covid-19, and it will take months to distribute across the chaotic infrastructure of the American political and healthcare “systems.” We already know that the rollout will be wildly unequal, benefiting the rich and well-connected first and foremost. And even when the vaccine is distributed, it faces doubts — for example, because of the attempts by the Trump administration to use the vaccine as an election prop — and because of the memory of horrific abuses of medicine perpetrated on people of color — like at Tuskegee.  

The capitalist economy is still convulsing. The coronavirus shutdowns of the spring are returning. Millions upon millions have been fired and furloughed. And the working class and oppressed — the “essential workers” being praised by the bosses and their politicians — are already feeling the first blows of an eviction crisis that has only started to arrive, as 19 million people can’t pay their rent. The politicians have again and again delayed the full force of that crisis with eviction moratoriums, but those are set to expire at the end of 2020, and certainly can’t be renewed forever. And yet corporations are posting massive profits. The stock market is booming.  

Meanwhile, the Democrats and Republicans squabble over the next aid package. The latest offer — without a penny for direct stimulus to average people, and only a few crumbs for the unemployed, but plenty of money for the super rich — was shot down. Joe Biden’s priorities now, at the height of the pandemic, are more masks, vaccines, and — reopening the schools. He echoes Trump and the Wall Street Journal, pushing to make sure that kids have someplace to go so their parents can be forced back to work.  

But the struggle of workers and the oppressed is far from dead. We have seen healthcare workers go on strike for better pay and safe work conditions. We see workers at Amazon fighting for unionization, and the revolt against police violence continues — in Hackensack, in Philadelphia, in Ohio

At Left Voice, we know it’s crucial to amplify and connect the voices of that struggle.  

Teachers: share the stories of the chaotic opening and closing of your school, and of the struggles to stay safe and win power against the bosses and the state!

Healthcare workers: share the stories of the dangers you face, and your organizing to fight back!

Service workers: share the stories of your fight to make ends meet in a pandemic and economic crisis, and the ways you’ve found to mobilize!

Renters: tell us about your fight in the pandemic to maintain secure housing, and what struggles you have had to wage against landlords and courts to evict you!

Activists and organizers: share your stories about your efforts in helping workers and the oppress fight back!

Facebook Twitter Share

Left Voice

Militant journalism, revolutionary politics.

United States

What “The Daily” Gets Right and Wrong about Oregon’s Move to Recriminalize Drugs

A doctor at an overdose-prevention center responds to The Daily, a podcast produced by the New York Times, on the recriminalization of drugs in Oregon. What are the true causes of the addiction crisis, and how can we solve it?

Mike Pappas

March 22, 2024
Former president Donald Trump standing at a podium in front of American flags.

To Stop Trump, We Need Much More Democracy, Not Less

Democrats have been trying to kick Trump off the ballot as an "insurrectionist." Liberals say we have to restrict democracy in order to save it. As socialists, we think they have it backwards: to beat the Far Right, we need a mass movement fighting for radical democracy.

Nathaniel Flakin

March 18, 2024

New Jersey Democrats Attack the Public’s Right to Government Records

The New Jersey state assembly, led by the Democratic Party, just tried to fast-track a bill that would have gutted the Open Public Records Act. This is a reminder that their party is an obstacle, not an ally, in the fight to preserve democracy.

Samuel Karlin

March 15, 2024
President Biden giving his State of the Union speech at a podium in March, 2024.

Biden’s State of the Union: Hyper-Nationalism and Eroding Legitimacy

President Biden’s hyper-nationalistic State of the Union speech focused on selling himself as a defender of democracy at home and abroad. But it’s not enough to solve his — and the whole U.S. regime’s — crisis of legitimacy.

Tatiana Cozzarelli

March 14, 2024

MOST RECENT

A square in Argentina is full of protesters holding red banners

48 Years After the Military Coup, Tens of Thousands in Argentina Take to the Streets Against Denialism and the Far Right

Tens of thousands of people took to the streets across Argentina on March 24 to demand justice for the victims of the state and the military dictatorship of 1976. This year, the annual march had renewed significance, defying the far-right government’s denialism and attacks against the working class and poor.

Madeleine Freeman

March 25, 2024

The Convulsive Interregnum of the International Situation

The capitalist world is in a "permacrisis" — a prolonged period of instability which may lead to catastrophic events. The ongoing struggles for hegemony could lead to open military conflicts.

Claudia Cinatti

March 22, 2024

Berlin’s Mayor Loves Antisemites

Kai Wegner denounces the “antisemitism” of left-wing Jews — while he embraces the most high-profile antisemitic conspiracy theorist in the world.

Nathaniel Flakin

March 22, 2024

Lord Balfour Was an Imperialist Warmonger 

We should give our full solidarity to the Palestine Action comrade who defaced a portrait of Arthur Balfour at Cambridge University. But the problem for everyone who opposes the genocide against Gaza is how to massify and politically equip the movement.

Daniel Nath

March 21, 2024