Why we March?-A Deeper Analysis
By Leslie Willis-Leslie Willis is an organizer, educator and writer that has worked with several publications including the People’s Tribune. Leslie is based out of Chicago and works both locally and nationally.
Are you fed up with hearing that the U.S. is the richest country in the world when we are surrounded by poverty? If we are so rich, then why do we have more than 10 million children living in poverty (and 5 million of those kids live in homes with an annual income less than $13,000!). Of course, there are 735 billionaires and one-fifth of the people are making over a million dollars a year. But what about most of us that comprise 4/5th ‘s of the population? The National Center for Children in Poverty says that a family of 4 needs from $86,000 - $100,000 a year to meet their basic needs. That leaves most people in the U.S. barely able to afford what they need.
It is easy to see by looking just a little closer, where our “riches” have gone – they have gone straight up to the top. There is an abundance of housing, food, and material wealth but it’s unequally distributed. Those who need it least have the most and continue to accumulate more as most of us sink economically lower each day. A 2023 U.S. Census Bureau Survey report found that 16% of renters are likely to be evicted in the next 2 months and 4% of homeowners face repossession of their homes.
This is not only unfair, but also life threatening, and tragically it is not even necessary. There are 16 million homes and 2.6 million apartment units standing empty – right now. So, while we are surrounded by empty homes, people freeze to death because they have no shelter! Even 1,100,000 million children in our public schools are homeless. Why can’t these children live in one of the 19 million housing units that are empty?
No, poverty is not about scarcity anymore - it's about power. Yes power. Power that the class at the top of society has, but most of us lack. Even though there are millions of Americans hard at work in jobs that are low wage, part time, gig, or contingent, (and never secure) – we rarely get ahead. Our needs go unmet year after year. Of course, plenty of lip service is given to us at election time, but nothing real is delivered no matter who gets elected.
But here we go again - all the attention of the media is turning towards the 2024 presidential elections. Once again, neither party offers real solutions for the constant decline of most Americans; neither party offers real solutions to the inequality in America. Republicans and Democrats do not offer any real solution to the high cost of housing, food, gas, health care etc. No, they just continue to squabble over the best way of serving themselves, which is what will bring the most profit to the corporations and to themselves as members of the ruling class.
With most of us suffering under their rule, how do they continue to get away with it? What is their strategy that keeps them in power, which keeps all the wealth going to the top? First, this ruling class understands that their wealth depends on us submitting to their system. This means they must keep us from uniting and exercising our power as the majority. This is their number one task. So, while they understand that they are in a class war, many of us do not. Most of us were brought up to believe that if we walked the straight and narrow and worked hard, we would get a piece of the American dream. We were taught in school that in America, despite our problems, we were one family, that what was good for our ruling class was good for us. We believed that the enemies of our rulers were our enemies too, and we would march off to war when called upon to do so. As we watch billions of our hard-earned tax money being used to slaughter innocents abroad, most of us question this logic. What do we gain by siding with our oppressors (for that is what they are)?
Another key weapon our rulers use against us is to divide and conquer. Many of us are pulled into believing candidates who pretend to be on our side and point the blame at immigrants and refugees, on inner city minorities, on people without a home, on Muslims, on people who aren’t Christian enough, on Communists, on the Chinese, on this one and that one – anyone but the corporate ruling class. These people that they ask us to blame do not sit on all the wealth in our country; they do not make laws to favor themselves; they have no power to redistribute the wealth and provide us all with life’s necessities. No, these people they blame are nothing but convenient scapegoats, and the hatred they whip up keeps us from focusing on developing a winning strategy for ourselves – for our own class.
On the other hand, we sometimes get caught up in supporting candidates who promise to give us the things we are asking for, the things that we need. They promise justice and equality, the say “Yes we can!” and promise to make it possible for us to have a fair share of the wealth and services that we presently go without. We rise up in large numbers, put them into office, only to be disappointed at their complete failure to deliver on anything they have promised. Often, we watch in disgust as they cave and compromise all their “good intentions” away, settling for the status quo and their newfound elevation into the ruling circles. Some of these candidates come from humble origins, and start out honestly but end up as deceivers, traitors to their class (traitors to us).
Sometimes we are deceived into believing that if we just elect more minorities, more women, more candidates from marginalized sections of society that they will open the way for programs that we need. As a result, today most of the major cities in the country have minority mayors, women and people of color etc. The results? Nothing has improved for the dispossessed class, but the wealthy (property developers, financiers, and corporations) have continued to accumulate more and more wealth.
As 2024 moves us closer and closer to the Presidential election in November, we will be consumed by the media’s preoccupation with this event. The millionaire talking heads on TV have little to lose no matter who wins, but the networks will rake in profit by convincing us that we have a horse in this race. So, does this mean that we have no stake in these events? On the contrary, we must use the opportunity to penetrate the bullshit they dish out and declare the truth of our situation. We must prevent another election cycle where the ruling class claims victory declaring “Ain’t democracy grand!” and “The people have spoken.”
We must march from one convention to another, from the Republicans in Milwaukee to the Democrats in Chicago if we are to be heard. We must unite and lift our voices. Now is the time to demand that we, the downtrodden and the poor, for us to realize OUR program, the program we need and deserve. Housing for all! Health care for all! Food, clothing, education, recreation, culture, and a bright future to look forward to! We demand a program that we determine for ourselves. It is time for the bounty to be shared and redistributed according to need and not about how much money one has.
