A month ago, we watched as the fascist blunt object we call a president climbed the rarely used front steps of the White House and posed for a photo-op after leaving an extravagant hospital suite in Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. In a campaign video, Trump declared himself “immune” from COVID while on powerful steroids less than five days after being diagnosed. He urged the American people to not let COVID “dominate” our lives, as we opened schools and businesses despite rising cases.

But we know that the only thing dominating us is the rotting, putrid imperative of Trump’s reactionary alternative!

Trump’s “triumphant” return was flanked by the US reaching 200,000 in COVID-19 deaths and the end of economic relief talks in Congress (unless, of course, they bail out airlines). While tens of thousands of us have died alone in hospitals, Trump has kept his staff and cronies close. Super-spreader events and symbolic displays of strength have all been in the name of suppressing a responsible approach to a deadly pandemic and forcing the continued consolidation of ultra-conservative hegemony within the court system. No amount of death and tragedy will halt the advancement of fascism without our organized resistance. And as schools are pressured to be more profitable, teachers are being asked to sacrifice themselves in the name of that profit.

This is why, when Haitian garment workers organized with Batay Ouvriye lifted the casket of their comrade Sandra René and brought her funeral procession to the front doors of the insurance company that killed her, we saw the seed of our true alternative – the alternative that comes only from the independent organization of the people dominated and exploited by capitalism and imperialism. Instead of pleaing with their representatives or counting on the next election, these workers understood the task before them didn’t include choosing the best politician to call on for help. They were able to call on their organization and on the international solidarity of people like us whose lives are made possible by their work.

This is why, when Haitian garment workers observed May Day in 2020, they were able to modify their plans to accommodate concerns about COVID without losing their solidarity and focus. This organization was established over 30 years ago: the sooner we start to build this consciousness and solidarity among ourselves, the sooner we can expect to rely on each other along a political line to make significant changes in our communities to weaken imperialism. We have watched Batay Ouvriye bear fruit despite the harsh exploitation that Haiti has faced under imperialist domination. And more than just watched: our solidarity with their organization has helped align us with the worker’s struggles. Our solidarity gives us the chance to contribute to a truly progressive movement that is grounded in the interests of the people. Batay Ouvriye is an example of the highest form of solidarity that we aim for: organizing in our interests in solidarity with people dominated and exploited by capitalism all over the world.

Teachers need to organize with their own interests in mind in order to define their own goals outside of a union or school. We are being dominated in the name of capitalism and imperialism, and we must organize and resist. Batay Ouvriye can show us how we can organize: these workers have organized in their own interests, without relying on unions, non-profits, or NGO’s. They fight for better wages, for humane working conditions, and to unify themselves along an anti-imperialist, anti-capitalist class line. They connect with workers directly, defining their group for themselves and in the workers’ best interests.

Batay Ouvriye does not organize around people or around leaders but instead around truly democratic relationships that rely on every individual’s solidarity. Teachers are being exploited for their labor, paid meager wages, and are expected to cure social ills while being immune to COVID-19. Batay Ouvriye is an example of a worker-led movement based on political and class unity, much like the movement that teachers need today. We need to organize and resist! We need to follow the example of the workers who are facing this impossible decision: risking their lives for exploitation wages or starving with no way to pay rent but staying home safely. We, too, are facing similar impossible decisions from a different perspective but under the same mechanism of capitalist imperialism.

This is far from being an abstract connection, or one solely based on “charity.” We can see the need for the kind of organizing Batay Ouvriye struggles toward in our own lives. Beyond the absurdity of Trump’s antics – like his “morale-boosting” drive around hospital grounds – it’s clear that this moment calls for our own forms of organization independent from all capitalist and imperialist interests, including liberals ones. We’ve seen true revolutionaries perish alongside laborers forced to risk their lives for groceries and mail. We’ve seen medical professionals crumbling under the pressure of a bloated and ill-prepared medical industry. We’ve seen the richest capitalists explode their wealth while the rest of us lost our jobs and scrambled to cope with closures and lockdowns. And now, all over America, teachers are facing impossible decisions as they are called to return to school and teach students without proper protection from COVID-19.

Even though absolutely no one should be risking their lives right now, as we can see from the examples of other comparable countries, teachers are not only asked to enter the classroom during a pandemic, they’re also tasked with teaching half in-person and half-virtual hybrid classes, with ensuring the safety of their students, and with maintaining test scores so no federal funding is lost. Teachers are being asked to navigate virtual technology with little to no training, cope with hybrid classroom demands, and enforce social distancing rules with no real ability to do so. On top of this, many teachers are underpaid with little to no benefits and no way to protect themselves from COVID. School policy is driven by profit motives and nothing else.  These ridiculous expectations are only overshadowed by the worst outcome, an outcome that is already happening all around us: teachers are dying from COVID-19.

These preventable deaths are all occurring in the name of capitalism and profit-over-people mentality. Colleges are reopening for in-person classes despite knowing full well that these decisions will lead to reckless behavior and viral transmission. Tuition money is more important to capitalists than human lives, health, and wellbeing. Multiple teachers are dying from being exposed to COVID in the classroom, yet schools are not closing. Educational alternatives are not being explored on a meaningful level. Aid bills are not being passed (and Trump is actively quashing them). Unions are not protecting teachers and keeping them home, but instead are barring teachers from being able to strike and bargain with their collective power. Capitalist interests have declawed these unions, leaving teachers at the mercy of capitalist institutions whose interests diverge from our own. Make no mistake: neither teachers nor students are the bottom line for Florida’s public schools. Profit outweighs any protective instinct that policymakers and administrators may have, forcing teachers to reconcile with the demands of their new position without resources, support, adequate care, or protective equipment. As class sizes grow and social support programs are cut, teachers are increasingly being used to meet multiple societal needs by acting as educators, social workers, therapists….all while they themselves are dominated or exploited. People will keep dying as long as our society prioritizes capital over the quality of its education and the life of its educators.

But what if we weren’t denying our current realities? What if we saw each of these deaths, all of these dangerous and horrific circumstances for what they are? What if we recognized them in truth, seeing their connections? These deaths were preventable. These circumstances are preventable. But not under imperialism. Not under capitalism, which demands that we sacrifice everyone— our educators, our public servants, our “mandatory workers,” our families, our friends and families and selves who are disabled, who are elderly, who are poor, who are incarcerated— simply so that the markets stay open. So that people continue to profit with as little interruption as possible. And while they are comfortable—  quarantined in their mansions, with their private staff, with access to doctors and anti-viral and other cocktails— people are dying because of their greed, and because of this abhorrent system that dictates every facet of our lives. If we as a collective absorbed the true meaning of these deaths, every single one of these funerals could have been an opportunity for organizing in solidarity with each other, demonstrating class unity to demand that no more deaths happen, that no more teachers— or any workers— face this impossible choice.

This is just one example that proves the need for us to join in solidarity to this struggle and adapt it to our own positions. We’re here to learn from workers who are resisting imperialism and setting the examples for our future. From the most recent Batay Ouvriye mobilizations, the textile union in Carrefour grew stronger, gaining 90% support for collective bargaining. Workers have been able to establish a union presence in Alain Villard’s newest free trade zone, and successfully pressured Villard to pay his OFATMA bill so that they can receive medical care. Not all of the worker’s demands were met, but this struggle has been years in the making and will continue. It is through organization that BO can remain resilient and push forward with their political goals, despite resistance from global imperialist interest. We must fortify ourselves to stand in the face of this same enemy, in solidarity with the international working class and from our own foundation of principled combativity. There can be no more acceptance of concessions from our capitalist class enemies that push our domination off onto global exploited communities, because we understand that those exploited workers do more to advance our interests than capitalists ever will.

There is no work that is exempt from the brutality of capitalism. Teachers are important members of our communities, but under capitalism they have no choice but to feed their students into this same failed arrangement. We are all forced to play our roles in the continuation of this system. It will only stop when we collectively build the power and political consciousness to resist it. It’s time to join the rest of the world and fight back!