The Million Worker and Student Strike to Save Our Lives

A revolutionary act of protest to enact change in the U.S. and beyond starts with bringing capitalism to its knees.

Photo by Dmytriy Kravchenko on Unsplash

When we think of our identities, we often think of gender, race, ethnicity, sexuality, etc. Under capitalism, however, our primary identity is ‘worker.’ This identity influences and dictates so much of our life, yet we rarely reflect on it; we simply accept it as inevitable and inescapable. Stagnant wages and a drastic increase in costs of living make our daily lives a struggle for survival and sanity.

The system of capitalism in which we live allows greed-filled, power-hungry people, specifically white men, to exploit and funnel money to themselves through price gouging, wage theft, and government handouts. Our elected officials no longer answer to the citizens they are meant to represent. Instead, they follow the money that funds their campaigns and fills their pockets, and the stipulations that come with it.

This setup was exposed by COVID when the world stopped briefly in the U.S., millions lost their lives worldwide in two years (and counting), and we were expected to return to work as if nothing happened. The callous inhumanity of government officials, white men, and capitalists was put plainly by the Texas Lieutenant Governor, Dan Patrick, when he proclaimed that grandparents would be willing to die for the US economy. Meanwhile, numerous companies posted record profits during COVID as they raised prices claiming “inflation,” further imposing financial burden, hardship, and pressure for people to work. If you have recently felt despair and questioned the point of life as you watch all of this unfold before your eyes, you are not alone.

There are millions of us who are tired of seeing things go from bad to worse, our work earnings afford us less and less, and watch more and more people die preventable deaths. It is all by design and we will continue to be exploited and taken out unless we do something unified and seemingly drastic.

In the middle of writing this article, 18 children and 2 adults (as of now) were murdered in a mass shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde, TX. A similar event happened while writing my last article 10…