"Which Side Are You On?" When Workers Are Still as Oppressed as in the 1930s

In 1931, coal miners of Harlan County, Kentucky went on strike. The direct cause for this was a 10% wage cut when their wages were very meager to begin with, but the conditions had been building for a while at that point. Miners who did not die from explosions or collapses more often than not died from lung cancer or a related illness that was a direct result from years in the mine. It is inhumane to expect people to work like this, but on top of all that, once the workers began organizing, the mine corporation tried to shut them down. It took almost a decade of striking for workers to win a union and a contract. These are the conditions in which "Which Side Are You On?" was written. The songwriter was Florence Reece, who organized alongside her husband, Sam Reece (one of the miners fighting for a union).

The song draws a binary between union workers and scabs; either you stand with the commoners or you stand with corporations. There is no middle ground. To remain neutral is to allow the corporations to keep taking advantage of workers. "Will you be a lousy scab/Or will you be a man?" I could connect this to the modern day in a variety of ways, but I will focus on one corporation, one of the largest and most exploitative companies in the US: Amazon.

The Staten Island factory unionized in 2022, but Amazon has not yet cooperated with them. There are a handful of other unions across the country formed with help from the Teamsters, but most Amazon workers are not unionized while still being heavily exploited. Unsurprisingly, Amazon has a history of union-busting.

Amazon workers often report feeling anxious, depressed, and burnt out, being under constant pressure to work faster regardless of what that means for their well-being. The physical burden is also near impossible to bear; some people even quit because of these harsh physical conditions. Racialized women are the ones who suffer the most; reporting having more severe pain and health and safety concerns than their white and male coworkers.

Many people can't escape these conditions. If they were to quit at Amazon, they likely would not find a job that pays as well (with Amazon paying $18 an hour on average), and they would have to learn a whole new set of rules and policies. On top of that, there is no guarantee that they would find a job. This is how capitalism is set up, and Reece discusses this in her song, but in a slightly different context: "My daddy was a miner/And I'm a miner's son". This does discuss how people are forced into the same position their parents were under, but it also highlights the community and culture around miners and their families. If you look at Harlan County in the 1930s, the community was tight-knit and relied heavily on each other, and not just because of the strike. The bonds were strong, and it only furthered the need for people to protect each other.

If your workplace does not have a union yet, start building one! Build community, and while no worker is truly free, perhaps you can lose some of your chains. "Us poor folks don't have a chance/Unless we organize"