The proletariat in the U.S. is multinational

MIM’s view is that in the imperialist citadels such as the U.S., the majority of workers are labor aristocrats. Along with this, they say "the national and class questions have merged in the U.S." I.E. to the degree they see a proletariat in the U.S., it's all oppressed nationalities (which they apparently don't seem to see as divided into classes), and white workers are all part of the enemy and have a material interest in defending imperialism.

This kind of superficial and crass method of analysis confuses many honest people.

It's the case that tens of millions of oppressed people and immigrants are locked into caste-like conditions within the lower rungs of the proletariat in the U.S. If you live in the inner cities like New York or L.A., it seems they’re all you see filling up the sweatshops, low wage services, and factories.

But there are also tens of millions of white proletarians whose conditions of life/work are far from idyllic, from the Pacific Northwest to the rural South.

Rosa (rl) wrote (from rural Georgia, so I assume her description includes some or many white workers):
"Unionization here is next to non-existent, yet there are plenty of productive workers in everything from bob's candy company (just closed throwing nearly 600 people out of work), to ice cream cone plants, the cotton mill, chicken processing plants and so on. Then there are people working in the service industry, many also receive welfare benefits."

In a painfully moving RW article (10/7/2001) "Alabama Mine Explosion: Thirteen dead at Blue Creek #5", Mike Ely unearths the situation for rural proletarians:

"Every one of those 300 miners in No.5 knew they were in danger. They knew something was wrong with the ventilation. And so did the company... It says something about working class life, about capitalism, that the miners returned anyway, day after day, to be lowered into that shaft to dig the coal.... Many of the workers had traveled far to find work here at Brookwood. Groups of them had moved from the southern tip of West Virginia... where the huge complex of U.S. Steel mines shut down in 1986. Many came because they were in the their '50s, and needed to work several more years in the mines to get their pensions. They would lose those pensions if they took other kinds of jobs. These workers were trapped, forced to work--despite the danger."

Such is the multinational proletariat in the U.S. (though not yet class conscious) all of whom have a material interest, and basis, to see the need to overthrow capitalism-imperialism. Even the relatively privileged sections (e.g. coal miners) are fucked over big time (why some go postal!)

Whatever crumbs/privileges these workers receive (e.g. better wages, being white or living in the imperialist U.S.), they pay for it with their misery as members of the exploited class, and some pay with their very lives. The proletariat in the U.S. are not mere abstractions! (see Rafael's two posts in this thread).

Our DP says:
"The bourgeoisie works overtime to keep the masses of proletarians from seeing their common interests and their mission as a class. They create desperate conditions in communities and force the masses to compete against each other for jobs and survival. They spew out racist ideas that lie about people's cultures. They try to conceal what proletarians of all nationalities have in common and the real strengths that exist in their differences.

"This does not mean that the proletariat cannot fulfill its revolutionary mission. What it means--what it powerfully demonstrates--is that the proletariat needs its politically advanced and organized detachment, its vanguard party, to enable it to recognize and to carry out this revolutionary mission."

...and part of the international proletariat

From the same RW article by Mike Ely:
"Across the world, working people face these terrible conditions and disasters--when they enter the earth to enrich the owners. The same week...20 workers, including nine women, were crushed in a massive cave-in in eastern India....Last month...a methane explosion killed at least 14 miners in western Romania...."

From an L.A. Times article, January 2002:
"China leads the world in coal production--and in lives lost in the mines. About 5,400 coal miners perished in explosions and other accidents during the first 11 months of last year....Some estimates put the annual death toll at 10,000...

"'Of course I plan to go back down'" the 33-year-old father of two said. Since he lost his job a few years ago at a large state mine, where he had worked since he was 17, Li has toiled at several private operations and narrowly skirted death in two explosions...."'My family needs the money, I don't know how to do anything else.'"

This is just one industry but the words of this 33-year-old miner could have been spoken in English, Chinese, Hindi, Romanian and many other languages. The international proletariat is no mere abstraction either — its existence, objective interest and revolutionary potential.

Unity in the struggle,
dolly veale, RCP, SF