Whenever I think of the McDonald's employee who snitched on Luigi Mangione I can't help but wonder how many people did identify him during the week or so he was on the run. Those who, going about their day, saw this dude wearing a beanie and a mask and thought "hey, wouldn't it be funny if he was that shooter guy". Then they caught a better look at his face and realize "damn he does kinda look like him".
I imagine them thinking about those $50.000. Perhaps they even felt tempted for a moment. Perhaps they thought about their own debt to the healthcare industry. Perhaps they thought about clearing their own or a loved ones loans.
Yet they did not. They decided that, wether this guy did or didn't shoot that CEO, what happened the other day in New York matters. It matters so, so much, either in the short or the long run. That it could be the first step towards something big. Maybe that something, just maybe, is change.
And then they kept their mouth shut and continued with their afternoon as if nothing ever happened.
To those people, I wish you nothing but the best. You did what you had to do. And that says a lot about you.
In short, I refuse to believe class consciousness is dead. But guess I'm a romantic like that.
One Piece 1159 Spoilers: Figerland is an Inhuman Bastard and just showed us what happens to women in a dystopian society where wealth and power are unevenly divided and the law bends for the rulers but not the masses!
Like, the Fuck, Odachii?
You won’t even let us see the face of the woman who gave birth to Shanks?
But given the current political climate, I think this is apt! To people like Garling, women and, by extension, children are nothing but property.
If he treated the mother of his children like this, no wonder he would’ve tried to win Shakky in a competition like she was a brood mare.
Look here, ladies, and even the men of this world.
One Piece is your periodic reminder that in a dystopian world you as an individual are seen as nothing but “bodies” to be used for the pleasure of powerful men, bodies to be exploited for labour, and then for people with wombs to become “host bodies” for incubating babies. Even if you think you are protected because you gave birth to your overlord’s children, you are still a slave, a replaceable biological device, just like what Garling did to Shanks’ mom! He never saw her as his life mate or loving mother of their children but as a sex slave who gave birth to “his children”, like the womb she is! She was simply a medium to an end!
Every woman, man, and child who is not born to the top 1% is a potential slave to the power-hungry men’s greed.
We already saw what happened to Fisher Tiger, Ginny, the Boa Sisters, Caimie, Jinbei, and Jean Bart: it doesn’t matter how strong or influential you are; you are an object to be bought, raped, used and killed after you have satisfied their boredom. And it never ends; there is always a new target. There is always a new shiny human they want to rape. Hence, they came for Shakky because she was a free woman, living life on her terms and choosing to love on her terms. The very idea of a woman choosing to live and love on her own terms makes the celestial dragons want to enslave her. Because how dare you? How dare you rise above your station as men’s property?
I think we cannot distil it any more than this; exerting one’s will over another is about control. Power is power.
And given how right-wing media has fuelled red-pill content, this arc came at the right time!
Shanks kill Garling, okay? You must avenge your faceless mother’s death.
Some thoughts on the conclusion of Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, class, humanism and personal experience.
Before I say anything else, I want to say that my thoughts and feelings on this topic are not any more "right" or justified than anyone else's and that I deeply appreciate however each person has experienced this story.
Heavy spoiler warning for everything I am going to say, and a warning for heavy themes relating to both the game and the real world.
The game begins with us getting to know the people of Lumiere, a civilization of orphans trying to farm and survive for a little while longer in the bombed ruins of their home town.
We see death and devastation, but we also see solidarity and hope shining through.
Our main characters are farmer, a farmer-researcher, another researcher, and an orphaned child working as a courier. Our main characters are facing despair, disadvantaged by their situation, coping with physical disability as well as emotional turmoil. We also see the support and the healing a collective can offer.
While we, the players, are not people of Lumiere, we can empathize with their plight.
We, too, must live with uncertainty and fear, often under forces uncontrollable to us that shape our daily lives, be that illness, war, oppression or poverty.
We toil and oppose the despair everyday, not just for our own gain but for the well-being of our families and communities, our friends, environment and the future. For those who come after.
When we get deeper into the world, we meet two more benign peoples facing devastation and genocide. We also learn they have their own beautiful cultures, their unique beliefs and a will to survive. We are united in the struggle for survival and grow an ever larger understanding of the collective we are fighting for.
Even our most common opponent, the Nevrons, don't appear as an oppressor as much as a people enslaved to fight a war that does not serve their own interest.
On occassion, we meet a Nevron who's broken these chains and pursued another meaning, and none of these Nevrons exhibit unprompted aggression, instead seeking connection and fullfillment.
Later on, we are joined by a single father and his son, Noco, who in the process of the story is lost, not even as an active participant but as a bystander, collateral damage. Renoir, who fails to even take proper notice of the loss he has caused, sees no significance in the life of a child to whom personhood does not in his view apply.
To us, the players, Noco was as real as all the people in the story, though. We saw him with his family, we saw his hopes and dreams, in many ways Noco was more of a person to us than the blurred out images children in the news as their lifeless bodies are carried out from the ruins of their bombed out homes.
At no point in the story is there a clear distinction between who is "really real" in a way we could tell. Both the people of the canvas and the Dessendres are shown to have their motivations and this is carried out all the way to the end where Verso clearly has the ability to defy the "creators" of his world. It might even be interpreted from the text of the story that the "writers" responsible for Verso's death and Alicia's disability are in fact the writers of the game, making the life of the Dessendres in par with the peoples of the canvas even within the context of the story.
... and then some time later we find out about the Dessendre family, their loss and struggles and that they are high class mansion owners. The complex feelings of this dysfunctional family of four are the determining factor that drives the destructive, genocidal events in a world scale.
To the Dessendres, though, this is not a question of genocide or planetary destruction. The peoples of the Canvas world are not real people like them, with real feelings and real motivations.
They are but a cog in a machine that has stopped serving the interests of the Dessendres, an item that can be discarded.
This would not be anywhere near so disheartening if this was not the exact reasoning that has allowed so much war, oppression and genocide in our world. Who is human enough, worthy of whole personhood, is twisted and molded depending on the needs of the powerful.
The people of the canvas are spontaneous, living in the moment, people farming the land and living in huts and having crass, at times brutal, simple lives. They dance and they have sex, they love, they play, they lose, they imagine and hope. No people in the canvas own mansions, though. They do not go to the university. They are not eloquent in their speech and highly trained in their art. They do not have the luxury to remain home to grieve or to recover. Once they become disabled, orphaned, widowed, once death looms right ahead, they adapt and drag themselves right back to work because they must, for their families and communities. For the vast majority of people of our world too, this is the reality of life, and for this, our lives are considered worth less and our humanity minimized.
I'm sorry to say this, but at this point in the game I became so much less invested with the whole story.
Suddenly I am asked to empathize with a couple of mansion owners and conclude that there are two equally bad and bittersweet options: either four people's lives must be inconvenienced so that a world with it's civilizations can survive and rebuild OR that it is an acceptable trade-off to destroy a world to make four really wealthy people feel better and deal with their maladaptive coping strategies.
As much as I have enjoyed Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 and as much as I love the characters, the story and the heart put into all of it, the ending can not stop bothering me, and NOT because it was bittersweet or dark, but because it felt a little too much like how the people in power in my world must see my life and the life of my family, my friends, my community, and millions of people and communities just like mine around the world:
I've had to flee persecution and endure hunger and systemic violence. I've lost friends and family members to illness and despair. I've fed my child queuing in the bread line, I've begged for medicine from the church, I've done things you would not like to even imagine to keep a roof above my family's head. Insurance denied and disability benefits withheld, I go to work and face physical violence on a constant basis. It is my daily wish for my family and friends to stay fed and sheltered and that we would not face war or persecution. I have more in common with the peoples of the canvas than I will ever have in common with the Dessendre family, and this applies to a lot of people, maybe you too.
There is no brilliant way to end this ramble. It is overly personal, it is biased, and maybe it is taking a role-playing game intended for refreshment way too seriously.
In the event that this resonated with you, though, or you have something to share in the spirit of a friendly exchange, please feel free to do so.
It is my most sincere intent to keep this positive.
Let us play, create and share. Let us cry together. Let us hope and believe in a better future.
No matter how Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 ends, that is not how we end.
Let's go forward together, for us, and for all those who come after.
Please take care of yourself and others and know you are precious.
„All world-views are valid”. No, not at all. Marxism is a science; your bourgeois conservatism/liberalism is based on idealism and prejudice, and its only use is maintaining the power of the ruling class.
Wesprzyj strajkujących w fabryce kominów Jeremias! Już 3 czerwca odejdziemy od naszych stanowisk pracy w walce o podwyżki 800 zł, wydłużenie płatnej przerwy do 30 minut, sprawiedliwy system premiowania i korzystniejszy tryb rozliczania nadgodzin.
Dlaczego strajk?
Fabryka w Gnieźnie to część międzynarodowego koncernu. Jesteśmy spółką zależną wobec Jeremias Abgastechnik GMBH. produkujemy tu m.in. części niezbędne do funkcjonowania niemieckiej fabryki. Spółka-matka w ciągu niespełna 10 lat zwiększyła swoje przychody ponad trzykrotnie, z 64 do 210 mln euro w latach 2015-2023. W 2024 roku pięcioosobowy zarząd naszej firmy, wśród którego zasiada trzech niemieckich członków międzynarodowej grupy Jeremias, wypłacił sobie 1.87 miliona złotych wynagrodzeń. Firma w Gnieźnie korzysta także z finansowej pomocy państwa w zatrudnieniu, otrzymując niemal milion zł rocznie za pracę więźniów w swoich halach fabrycznych zakładu karnego w Gębarzewie.
Wszyscy naszą ciężką pracą wypracowujemy grupie kapitałowej wielomilionowe zyski. Pora, aby w końcu większa część tych zysków trafiała do naszych kieszeni. Mamy takie same żołądki co nasi koledzy w niemieckiej fabryce. Chcemy być lepiej traktowani.
Liczymy, że zarząd Jeremias sp. z o.o. zdecyduje się na polepszenie warunków, zamiast zaryzykować destabilizację spółki. W ciągu ośmiu miesięcy negocjacji z zarządem w ramach sporu zbiorowego oraz po zwolnieniach dwóch związkowych liderów, czujemy że zarząd nie pozostawia nam wyboru. Otrzymaliśmy silny głos wsparcia od pani Minister Rodziny Pracy i Polityki Społecznej, która ogłosiła że według ministerstwa nasz spór zbiorowy jest w pełni legalny i mamy prawo do referendum. Dlatego 15 maja zorganizowaliśmy referendum strajkowe: 72,3 procent załogi oddało głos za podjęciem strajku o godne warunki życia, przy frekwencji sięgającej aż 67 procent. W dodatku zwolniony przewodniczący naszego związku w Jeremias Mariusz Piotrowski otrzymał właśnie sądowy nakaz przywrócenia do pracy. Inspektor PIP oskarżył dyrektor HR Jeremias o nielegalne zwolnienia naszych związkowców. 3. czerwca zaczynamy strajk. Jeśli chcesz pomóc nam wygrać tą walkę, zasil nasz fundusz strajkowy dowolną kwotą!
Dlaczego zrzutka?
Według prawa w Polsce za dni strajku pracownicy nie dostają wynagrodzeń – o ile w toku negocjacji prezes ich nie przyzna. Niskie wypłaty większości z nas nie pozwalają na utrzymanie się w trakcie strajku. Nasz bojowy związek jest wciąż niewielki. Jego fundusze opierają się na niskich składkach płaconych przez pracowników również często zarabiających w okolicach minimalnej krajowej. Dlatego jeśli tylko masz możliwość, bardzo prosimy o wsparcie naszej walki poprzez wpłacenie dowolnej kwoty na zrzutkę.
Z góry dziękujemy i pozdrawiamy z zaciśniętą pięścią,
Inicjatywa Pracownicza w Jeremias
***ENGLISH*** SUPPORT OUR STRIKE IN JEREMIAS CHIMNEY FACTORY!
Support the strikers at the Jeremias chimney factory! On June 3rd, we will stop our work. We fight for a 800 PLN pay raise (circa 180 euro), extension of the paid break to 30 minutes, a fair bonus system, and a one-month overtime calculation method (instead of 12 months).
Why the strike? The factory in Gniezno is part of an international corporation. We are a subsidiary of Jeremias Abgastechnik GMBH. We produce, among other things, parts necessary for the functioning of the German factory. The parent company has more than tripled its revenues in less than 10 years, from 64 to 210 million euro in the years 2015-2023. In 2024, the five-person management board of our company, which includes three German members of the international Jeremias group, paid themselves as much as 1.87 million złotys in salaries. The company in Gniezno also benefits from financial assistance from the state in employment, receiving almost a million złoty annually for the work of prisoners in its factory halls of the penitentiary in Gębarzewo. We all, with our hard work, generate multi-million profits for the capital group. It's time for a larger part of these profits to finally go into our pockets. We have the same stomachs as our colleagues in the German factory. We want to be treated better.
We hope that the management of Jeremias sp. z o.o. will decide to improve the conditions instead of risking the destabilization of the company. During the eight months of negotiations with the management as part of the collective dispute and after the dismissal of two union leaders, we feel that the management is not leaving us any choice. We received a strong voice of support from the Minister of Family, Labor and Social Policy, who announced that according to the ministry, our collective dispute is fully legal and we have the right to a referendum. Therefore, on May 15th, we organized a strike referendum: 72.3 percent of the crew voted in favor of a strike for decent living conditions, with a turnout of as much as 67 percent. In addition, the dismissed chairman of our union at Jeremias, Mariusz Piotrowski, has just received a court order to be reinstated to work. On June 3rd, we are starting the strike. If you want to help us win this fight, contribute any amount to our strike fund!
Why the fundraiser?
According to our Law, in Poland workers do not receive wages for the days of strike (unless the management agrees to provide them during final negotiations). Low paychecks do not allow us to support ourselves and our families during the strike. Our union is still small and its funds are based on contributions paid by workers who very often also earn the minimal wage.
Therefore if you have the opportunity, we ask you to enable us to continue our struggle by contributing any amount to the fundraiser.
I always find it hilarious when people say “young people just don’t want to work anymore.” Since when has anyone ever wanted to work? People work because they need money to survive. That has literally always been the case. People work because it’s an obligation under capitalism: if you don’t work, you starve.
Nobody has ever genuinely loved labor the way boomers pretend they did. Please go tell that to the 80-year-old men who spent their entire youth without basic labor rights, destroying their bodies in miserable jobs, ending up with chronic pain, unresolved trauma, and fifty thousand health problems because they were exploited half to death by the system. They didn’t enjoy working either. They hated it.
The difference is that older generations were socially conditioned to romanticize suffering and exploitation as “dignity,” while younger people are increasingly willing to say “actually this is fucking miserable.”
