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The Las Vegas IWW at May Day 2013

The Las Vegas Industrial Workers of the World will be holding our official monthly meeting on Saturday, May 4th at 4pm at the Sunrise Coffee shop on Sunset between Eastern and Pecos (see below for map). Among other things, we will be celebrating and reminiscing about the recently concluded May Day march.

Despite some initial misgivings about some outside organizations attempting to exploit the International Day of the Worker for their own misguided purposes, this years May Day turned out great and there was an impressive visible turnout by Las Vegas' IWW crew. Everyone that was there and helped to hold the ground for the true spirit of May Day deserves an enormous pat on the back.

We also will be discussing and finalizing our official bylaws, and potentially electing a treasurer, delegates, and other necessary positions for our branch to be certified as an official GMB along with other formalities such as when we will officially meet, on what days, how long meeting should last and other related issues.

This meeting is an open meeting and can be attended by the general public. Prospective members and those wishing to find out more about the IWW are welcome to attend, but will not be able to participate directly in any decisions or votes that might take place.

What is the IWW?:

The IWW is a member-run union for all workers, a union dedicated to organizing on the job, in our industries and in our communities. IWW members are organizing to win better conditions today and build a world with economic democracy tomorrow. We want our workplaces run for the benefit of workers and communities rather than for a handful of bosses and executives.

We are the Industrial Workers of the World because we organize industrially. This means we organize all workers producing the same goods or providing the same services into one union, rather than dividing workers by skill or trade, so we can pool our strength to win our demands together. Since the IWW was founded in 1905, we have made significant contributions to the labor struggles around the world and have a proud tradition of organizing across gender, ethnic and racial lines long before such organizing was popular.

For more info visit: IWW.org


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Salvador Zamor (far left) has been on a hunger strike for 21 days as of 4-30.

The  other day, while out flyering for the May Day march, I came across Salvador Zamora. While talking to him, I learned that Salvador has a long history of sacrificing himself physically for the cause of immigration reform.

In fact, he is currently conducting a hunger strike across the street from the Federal Courthouse in Las Vegas for 21 days (as of 4-30) demanding genuine immigration reform. I was personally pretty impressed by that, since I get cranky whenever I miss a single meal. I'd be hard pressed to even imagine going without food for three weeks (and counting). And he even told me that he once went 70 days without eating during a previous hunger strike

So honor what he is doing and because it is the spirit of May Day, the true worker's holiday, I will be joining him in solidarity to support and help bring attention to his cause and would like to invite others to join me.

You can find out more info either on FaceBook here: May Day Solidarity Rally event or on our Meetup group here: Las Vegas Anarchy Meetup May Day Solidarity Rally.

Unfortunately, this is very short notice due to the fact that I didn't even know he was doing this until I happened to walk past and see him. While he has received some coverage from the local Spanish language media, none of the other local media has even mentioned it at all. Personally, I'm pretty hard pressed to understand how a guy going without food for over three weeks (and counting) isn't newsworthy, regardless of the reasons.

Although it isn't actually required to participate in the rally, I will be fasting for 24 hours beginning at midnight once May Day officially starts to show my support for his own sacrifice.

There is no "official" start time, although I'll be going down there in the morning and spending the day with Salvador. You are welcome to come at whatever time is convenient for you.

There will also be an official, albeit really sanitized and docile, May Day parade hosted by local unions and politicians beginning around 4 o'clock at the federal courthouse that you may or may not want to take part in. If so, you could just show up a bit early to show Salvador some support.

I hope to see you there. You can find the location on the map below:

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