MAY FIRST IS MAY DAY
The real Labor Day

From Wikipedia:

May Day

The holiday is most often associated with the commemoration of the social and economic achievements of the labor movement. The May 1st date is used because in 1884 the Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions demanded an eight-hour workday in the United States, to come in effect as of May 1, 1886. This resulted in the general strike and the U.S. Haymarket Riot of 1886, but eventually also in the official sanction of the eight-hour workday.

May Day is designated International Workers Day. It is indeed a thoroughly international holiday; and the United States is one of the few countries in the world where pressure from local working classes has not led to an official holiday. In the 20th century, the holiday received the official endorsement of the Soviet Union; celebrations in communist countries during the Cold War era often consisted of large military parades and shows of common people in support of the government.

There is some suggestion that Labor Day in the United States was created specifically to avoid commemoration of May Day. The adoption of May Day by communists and socialists as their primary holiday cements official resistance to Labor Day and similar non-May Day celebrations, which they view as being controlled by the ruling class. (See Loyalty Day.)

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Yes, everywhere else in the world, May 1st is the day for thinking about issues affecting workers, but in America, it's "Loyalty Day." Figures.

From WorkingForChange:

Bring back May Day!

It took another entire generation of struggle, but by 1912, federal workers were granted the eight-hour day; and in 1917, while America was desperate for the cooperation of unions in the war effort, the Eight Hour Act became law. And there, one would think, the matter was settled.

Okay, quick: Do you actually work only eight hours in a day? Only 40 hours in a week? Five days?

Not very many of us, any longer.

And

Ultimately, though, the eight-hour day was never about money. It was about having time for the rest of our lives. I can't begin to count the number of people I've talked with over the years who, when laid up or laid off or otherwise taken out of their daily grind, blurt out some statement along the lines of "I can't believe how much my job interferes with my life!" That's both because a lot of us don't like our work, and, even more importantly, but increasingly, that's all we have time for. No time for family, for friends, for relationships, for travel, for study, for hobbies, for our community, for the stuff that makes life fun. And worthwhile.

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It strikes me that this last statement is self-evident, but I am continually confounded by the fact that so many Americans just don't get it. We don't work simply to survive: we work so that we may have enjoyable, meaningful lives. The best statement I've ever heard about this comes from my favorite education film, Dead Poets Society:

Keating: We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman, "O me! O life!... of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the faithless--of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life? Answer. That you are here - that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse." That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. What will your verse be?

How can you contribute your verse if your existence is nothing but an endless cycle of work and rest? We all must work, as Karl Marx observed long ago, but work cannot be our only reason to live. We cannot be human beings if our purpose is to be nothing but cogs in gigantic corporate machines. I think that, more than anything else, this concept has become the most important of issues to me: how are we going to live our lives?

Here's what I had to say about May Day a couple of years ago.

¡Vive la revolución!

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