A hundred years ago, the United States sent the armed forces to put down the resistance of coal miners demanding to be treated as humans. They put the might of the federal government behind commercial interests to the detriment of workers.
These were miners who had been shorted their fair wages by the coal companies. They were evicted from company housing during winter. They were starved, threatened, beaten. They watched their children die of pneumonia for the sake of industry profits. Their fight was just. Their country should have stood behind them.
Instead, their elected officials and public law enforcement fell into line with the companies, prosecuted the workers for treason, and the capitalists launched a massive propaganda campaign to paint the coal miners as redneck Bolshevik wannabes. Misguided lawless agitators.
Nothing has changed except that it’s Amazon workers instead of miners now.
