Ep 343 Gene Bruskin on Labor, Resistance, and Musicals

Ep 343 of RevolutionZ has Gene Bruskin, long time and many issues, labor organizer to discuss workers' responses to rising fascism, our current predicaments and our potential paths forward.

Why does America's labor movement struggle to mount a unified response to authoritarianism, one for all and all for one? How did post-WWII labor structures intentionally divide workers by union and industry, creating what Bruskin calls a system "structured to divide ourselves"?

Why do significant segments of working people support Trump despite his anti-worker policies? Bruskin challenges simplistic explanations, arguing that economic desperation combined with Democrats' unwillingness to confront billionaires and inequality created an opening for "phony populism." When Trump says "I feel your pain" while Democrats offer only rhetoric, many desperate workers took a chance on the disruptor.

We also discuss Bruskin's post-retirement work creating political musicals about working-class history and struggle. His productions about Reconstruction and the abolitionist, John Brown, act on his belief that cultural resistance is essential for movement-building. Bruskin says, "We couldn't have won the civil rights movement if people couldn't be singing 'We Shall Not Be Moved' while they were being hauled to jail."

Bruskin leaves us with a powerful metaphor from a banquet waiter who, when pressured to give a senator special treatment and dismissively asked if he didn't know who the Senator was, responds: "Do you know who I am? I'm the guy who gives out the bread and butter." This encapsulated Bruskin's point: working people must recognize their collective power. As he put it: "Do you need the boss, or does the boss need you?"

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