Fight the Man!: 8 Defining Strikes in New York City History
In the end, this is the thing about strikes. Who is speaking for the people? Striking workers are obviously thinking about their own benefits but, in an ideal world, they are also considering the workers who will come after them, and, in the case of teachers, the lives that they can affect if they are able to do their jobs well. And sometimes the management is, in its own weird way, thinking of the people too. After all, the Ocean-Hill Brownsville school district was trying to implement a radically new curriculum in a failing educational system. What they were forced to return to obviously didn’t work. As knee-jerk as the reaction is to side with those unfairly fired, could it have been a case of the ends justifying the means? We’ll never know. All we do know is that students of Brownsville have remained, since the strike ended, at the bottom of the NYC public school system.
The strike in Chicago is due to end this weekend and school is scheduled to resume. There are no impending strikes on NYC’s horizon. This isn’t Europe, no matter how many sockless, loafered men wander the streets of downtown Manhattan these days. But it’s never a bad thing to question the man—especially when the man is a little man who doesn’t want anyone to ever drink anything that isn’t breast milk ever again.
Follow Kristin Iversen on twitter @kmiversen