70th Anniversary of Montgomery Bus Boycott And What Comes Next

On December 1st, 1955, Rosa Parks was ordered by a bus driver to give up her seat, and she was arrested after she refused. She wasn't the first, but Rosa helped kickstart the next chapter in the Civil Rights movement. I live in Montgomery, and I'm still learning about Rosa and her legacy.

I don't think most people realize that the Montgomery Bus Boycott wasn't just for a day, or a weekend. It was a long-term protest project that lasted 381 days. Black people sacrificed so much during that time in order to force a change. It worked!

Today, we're on a path to losing many of those hard-earned rights, and it will take collective action by all of us to force change again. Freedom and equality won't be gained through a single march or week-long boycott, it will again have to be another organized long-term form of protest.

What our country really needs is a prolonged national general strike, but in 1947 the Taft-Hartley Act amended the National Labor Relations Act to make political strikes, solidarity strikes, and secondary boycotts illegal. People are being squeezed so hard economically that they can't afford to lose their jobs over a general strike - which is exactly what was intended.

If we want to ever be able to support a general strike, we must first organize each community to rely mostly on local resources and establish mutual aid networks to support each other for the long term. With our K-shaped economy and the potential for an economic crash, this is something we need to by doing anyway.

Last night, I met with the cofounders of Blackout The System in a Zoom conference, and they are working on such a project. They aren't trying to re-invent the wheel, because there are local organizations across the country already doing the work. There needs to be a third space open where all of those groups can come together and get organized to work together. ✊

If you're interested in being a community leader to help make this happen, or just want to know how to personally divest from the massive corporations who are crushing us, please take a few minutes to browse through the Blackout The System website:
https://www.blackoutthesystem.com/