On this day in 2013, Turkish protesters began occupying Gezi Park to oppose its demolition, an act with led to widespread protests and strikes with approximately 3,500,000 participants, 22 deaths, and more than 8,000 injuries.
The wave of civil unrest across Turkey began after the park occupation was violently evicted by police, who used to tear gas, pepper spray, and water cannons to try and break up the protests, injuring more than one hundred people and hospitalizing a journalist.
The protest quickly grew in size - by May 31st, 10,000 gathered in Istiklal Avenue. In June, the protests became national in scope and transcended any particular demographic or political ideology. Among the wide range of concerns brought by protesters were issues of freedom of the press, expression, and assembly, as well as the alleged political Islamist government's erosion of Turkey's secularism.
Millions of Turkish football fans, normally divided by intense sports rivalry, marched in unity against the government. Protesters displayed symbols the environmentalist movement, rainbow banners, depictions of Che Guevara, different trade unions, and the PKK and its leader Abdullah Öcalan.
On June 4th, Taksim Dayanışması (Taksim Solidarity) issued a set of demands that included the preservation of Gezi Park, an end to police violence, the right to freedom of assembly, and an end to the privatization of public spaces. Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç met the group on June 5th and rejected these demands.
Erdoğan blamed the protests on "internal traitors and external collaborators", demonizing his political opposition as the former. Despite the popular mobilization, Erdoğan remained in power and no major concessions were won from the government.
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I work at a decently sized company and one of their suppliers is israeli. Should i start some sort of petition? I feel like if i do it's not gonna go anywhere anyway. I also have no experience whatsoever organizing.
You'd basically be doing workplace organizing, the early stage where it's recommended to find one issue around which to unite. This is a way to build a list of contacts and their interest levels and to begin forming an organizing committee. If management is competent they will understand it as such and begin organizing against you.
What you do about all of this is really about your own risk tolerance and what meta goals you would find acceptable. For example, I would recommend gauging interest in casual one on one conversations before distributing a petition because I would want to create a larger, more sustainable effort that culminates in having a union and actually achieving the dropping of that supplier. Basically, build your own secret list of possible supporters before making a real petition. And maybe even organize around a different issue by asking folks if there's any one thing they'd change about your workplace if they could (in your own voice / a way that is natural in the conversation).
If you do run in full steam ahead and make the petition, just get ready to have someone rat you out and get fired. That can also have a good meta goal of raising consciousness (that your company is more committed to Zionism than to your employment) if you inoculate people first by telling them what you're organizing for and what it means if you get fired.
I would recommend the basic building blocks for union organizing, though, because the meta goals you can achieve if you do get fired are better and more numerous. You'd want to proceed and get these things:
Your initial list to gauge interest.
A small organizing committee (people that meet to plan this) that plans the petition, disseminates it, and plans further action based on it.
The petition itself and presenting it to management.
The subsequent actions you will need to take to push action on the petition or to respond to retaliation.
If you decide to change the exact thing you are first organizing around, these steps would still apply. If you do the above things, then regardless of whether you succeed you will now have the members of the organizing committee to continue working with. Even if some or all of you get fired, you can turn this into a radicalizing moment and get them into doing other kinds of organizing or socialist parties. In addition, building that committee and actions is more powerful than one person doing a petition so it is more likely you will succeed.
I do strongly recommend that you organize towards a union. Organizing to drop that supplier won't be legally protected because it's not about working conditions, as a heads up. And unless your workforce is already very anti-Zionist it's probably not the easiest issue to use as your first step. I think it would probably be more sustainable to build around a workplace conditions issue simultaneously.
You should also prepare, with your organizing committee, to put out educational sessions and materials as to why it's bad to have a Zionist supplier. There's a decent chance you're going to get some Zionist or liberal that's going to act like a rat and fuck with you so you'll want to be ready for that. The last thing you want is for your coworkers to sympathize with them rather than you. Propaganda and innoculation are very important.
Anyways good on you, it's a good idea to do something like this and with a bit of strategy you'll do well.
Good Post!
I would suggest the other way as well, check what they are supplying and can they be substituted either for same price, faster time or lower price. This can be self explanatory. Same price would require petition, and only place where it will work.
Also talk to procurement person, maybe there were some delays due to shipping, thus making them unreliable.
Unless you have fairly radical union already, you gotta make business case, not decency case