Bill Resnick interviews Alexandra Holmstrom-Smith who wrote an excellent much needed article “Leftists Need Holidays Too. Let’s Imagine Anti-Oppressive Ones.’’ Alex and Bill discuss how radicals are reinterpreting traditional holidays (like Columbus Day, July 4th, or even Christmas) and also creating new holidays and celebrations (like Kwanza and unions proposing an Essential Worker Day). The interview concludes with an examination of how this reinterpretation and creation can embed the ideas and understandings fundamental to radically democratic left commitments. Those fundamental understandings include the lability of human nature and the Wobbly proverb: the bosses brains are under the workers’ hats, with those in-born capacities brutally stultified by the coercion and tedium of modern work and consumer culture. Holmstrom-Smith’s article was first published online in Truthout on Christmas Eve of 2018.
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