MAY DAY
Spring 2021
Image: On May 1, 1970, approx. 15,000-30,000 protesters took to the New Haven Green to protest the arrest of Black Panther leader Bobby Seale and rally for a living wage and equal rights. Source: New Haven Museum Photo Archives
We are not launching our inaugural issue on May 1 by accident. The date has had significance for millennia, starting with the Celtic festival of Beltane and culminating in the 20th century labor movement, a legacy that still reverberates today. Ironically, although it was the U.S. Labor movement that organized large-scale strikes and protests for fair working conditions on May 1, 1886, May Day is not recognized as an official holiday here—although it is in sixty-six other countries. This isn’t a coincidence, of course: our country recognizes “Labor Day” in September as an intentional distancing from socialist and labor movements. To add insult to injury, most working-class Americans don’t even get to take the day off. (And May Day has been officially proclaimed as “Loyalty Day” by all of our Presidents — including Joe Biden — since 1958.)
Many socialists and leftists of all stripes, ourselves included, choose to recognize May Day as an act of national and international solidarity, despite our government’s attempt to erase the date’s significance from history. It is within this tradition of resistance that Garnet Oak Magazine was founded. The following issue is an introduction to Connecticut’s newest voice on the left. Read more about Garnet Oak Magazine’s mission and philosophy here.
News & Articles
The Garnet Oak Manifesto: An Introduction to Connecticut’s Newest Voice on the Left
Other publications have accused politics of making us stupid. We’d like for politics to make Connecticut residents smart.
Opinion: CT Vaccine Rollout Unsurprisingly Screws the Working Class
It shouldn’t come as a shock, even during a pandemic, that the wealthy and powerful will stick it to the working class at every turn. But in this situation, sticking it to the working class means not sticking them with vaccines.
The Absurd Cost of Dying
The funeral industry has evolved to exploit the poor and working class. But does death have to be so expensive?
‘Homegrow Or No Go’, 4/20 Rally For Equitable Cannabis Legislation
Activists want to kill bills favoring corporate cannabis. Legalize Equitably, Expunge All Records.
A Full Weekend of Protests Against Police Brutality
Protesters gathered in Hartford, Stamford, and New Haven in the wake of Daunte Wright’s murder to demand justice for victims of police violence in Connecticut
Prose, Poetry, & Art
three poems
gem luxemburg
New Haven Shell
Alison Cofrancesco
New Haven Scene
Alison Cofrancesco
morning shift
poem by Sartrea
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