Fellow Workers,

We want to be honest about something: we got things off on the wrong foot. In publishing this blog, we put up a series of three articles that were understandably seen as attacks on those we disagree with. Those three articles were originally intended as stand-alone pieces and our choice to post them all together when we launched the blog was a mistake. It exacerbated existing tensions, caused people to feel attacked in ways that were sincerely not intended, and generally did a disservice to us and to the rest of the union. We are posting introductions to each of these three articles to provide context and will include introductions explaining future blog posts as well.

The purpose of this caucus is not to advocate against anyone else in the IWW, but to articulate and advocate for the positions we believe in as a caucus. We earnestly believe that following our programme will lead to a stronger and healthier IWW that better represents the diversity of our class, and we know that the Industrial Unionist Caucus and all Fellow Workers believe the same of all their programmes and efforts as well. While we obviously have our disagreements, we want to do our best moving forward to articulate those in a comradely way.

We are committed to creating healthier debate around these issues and trust that is something everyone can agree is desperately needed. There has been a lot of frustration and acrimony within the IWW this past year, and we will try to be more considerate in our postings in the future so as not to create unneeded tension around these important issues. While some members of our caucus had been discussing putting something like this forward for a few days, the importance and urgency of it became clear after the attack in Charlottesville and the overwhelming concerns for our FWs safety. As FWs from across the US, Canada, and the UK came together to check in on each other and make sure everyone who had gone to Charlottesville was accounted for, it served as a poignant reminder that our enemies are very real, and we need to stand together against attacks to our fellow workers, whether they come from the boss, the state, or the far right.

Moving forward, we hope to be able to have a stronger, healthier debate about our and others’ visions for how to build and strengthen the IWW. We thank you for taking the time to read this. If you see someone you believe to be associated with our caucus engaging other IWW members in an unnecessarily hostile manner, please email us at Revolutionary-IWW [at] protonmail.com and we will talk to them.

Solidarity,

Wobblies for a Revolutionary Union Movement