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-----Original Message----- >From: Louis Proyect via Marxism <marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu> >Sent: Mar 16, 2015 6:06 PM >To: barryfin...@earthlink.net >Subject: [Marxism] Giving a Voice to Immigrant Workers in New York > >******************** POSTING RULES & NOTES ******************** >#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. >#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. >#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. >***************************************************************** > >NY Times, Mar. 16 2015 >Giving a Voice to Immigrant Workers in New York >By LIZ ROBBINS > >It was 8 p.m. last Wednesday inside a Manhattan office building, and >Modesta Toribio would not let the men in the room rest. She was >directing a presentation about immigration reform for a dozen >carwasheros, workers from Latin America who toil in the city’s carwash >industry. > >As the free pizza settled in their stomachs and their eyes began to >glaze over while she detailed the federal government’s reform plans, Ms. >Toribio ordered the men, sweetly, to stand in a circle. “Move, if you >believe in change!” she commanded. > >And then: “Better to die standing than to live on your knees!” She was >borrowing the slogan often attributed to Emiliano Zapata, even if her >exhortations were more practical than political; she did not want the >men to fall asleep. > >Ms. Toribio, a senior organizer for the Make the Road Action Fund in >Brooklyn, sounded like the elementary schoolteacher she once was in the >Dominican Republic. Now a working mother of two, Ms. Toribio, 36, has >brought her family’s tradition of activism with her to New York City. In >her organizing for workers who are predominantly men, she has challenged >stereotypes within a Latin American culture that celebrates machismo. > >“She’s got the stature of a man, in a symbolic sense,” said Santos >Lopez, 29, from Guatemala, as he stood with her on a picket line across >from the Vegas Car Wash in Park Slope, Brooklyn, last Thursday. “I feel >a lot of respect for her because not just any woman would do what she’s >doing.” > >Ms. Toribio may stand only 4 feet 10 inches tall — she is dwarfed by the >familiar inflatable rat outside union protests — but she possesses >outsize energy and magnetism. As part of a campaign joining Make the >Road, New York Communities for Change and the Retail, Wholesale and >Department Store Union, Ms. Toribio has helped win contracts for eight >of what are now the 10 unionized carwashes in the city, achieving higher >wages, back pay and better conditions for workers. > >“At first we didn’t believe her,” said Patricio Santiago, 42, a Queens >carwash worker. “But she kept coming back, day after day, until finally >we agreed to speak to her and we overcame the fear.” > >The workers on strike in Brooklyn made less than minimum wage (wages for >novice car washers can start at just $4 an hour, less than the cost of a >wash), and have been living on the $100 per week stipend their union >provides to support them during the frozen months. > >Ms. Toribio has not lost a fight yet. > >Growing up in Navarrete, a town north of Santo Domingo, Ms. Toribio was >a precocious, independent child, she said. She recalled, even at 10, >being unafraid to set an example for neighborhood youths by buying ice >cream from Haitian vendors despite the rumors that they were there to >kidnap Dominican children. > >At 21, after completing college, she was already organizing neighborhood >and church groups to demand functioning utilities from the government. >“If you want to get something, you have to make a group,” she said. > >Her father, Andrès Moran, was a construction worker who built houses >even for those who could not afford a roof. When he died in 2000, his >funeral was akin to that of a president, Ms. Toribio said. Her mother, >Concepción Santos, was an unofficial money lender, defying the >stereotype of women in a subordinate role. > >“I raised my family teaching them that you have to help those who have >the least,” Ms. Santos, 69, said in the Toribio family’s living room. >She was a teenager in November 1960 when three famous women, the Mirabal >sisters, were murdered as a result of their activism against the >Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo. > >Ms. Toribio has lived that lesson. But in New York, it still comes with >a personal cost. She rarely sleeps. She rises early to make lunches for >her children, Oswaldo, 8, and Fatima, 4; she is not always home for >dinner. When she gets home from meetings, she prepares others’ >applications for the city’s new municipal identity cards. She is >tethered to her cellphone, answering even at 2 a.m. to help workers >fearing deportation or illness. > >“Put it this way,” said her husband, Roque Toribio, 35, a teddy bear of >a man, “sometimes I get mad at her because she doesn’t want to stop. Her >thing is, do whatever she can for others, no matter what it takes. She >could be sick and she’s answering phones, going places, taking people to >wherever they need to go.” > >He loved her since they were young in Navarrete, but was then too shy to >tell her. He came to New York at 14, but it was not until 2006 that they >saw each other again. They were married two years later. > >“She is very good at what she does and I do feel proud of her,” Mr. >Toribio said. “I want to help her in whatever way I can.” > >He sometimes drives her to late-night meetings where she is often the >only woman in a cramped room of a dozen men, sharing her own >experiences. As a cashier working at a Brooklyn thrift shop soon after >coming to New York, she learned that her co-workers were making only $3 >an hour. Many were afraid to speak up because they were undocumented, >but Ms. Toribio, who had legal status, organized a protest. In >retaliation, her boss cut her hours, but eventually raised salaries. > >She soon joined Make the Road New York as a volunteer, and then became a >staff organizer in 2009. She now makes about $43,000 per year, she said, >just slightly more than her husband earns as a concierge at a Park >Avenue office. > >“She can read a person, she can read a group of people, she can read a >carwash,” said Deborah Axt, Make the Road’s co-executive director. “Her >instinct, her connection with people is real.” > >She said the women in the office have co-opted the Spanish nickname that >Latino carwash owners used to call them to embarrass the workers. “They >would say, ‘Why do you want to be part of that campaign of ‘shouting >women?’ ” Ms. Axt said. > >Ms. Toribio just laughed. > >She is already thinking about her next campaign: Chinese restaurant >deliverymen who are paid only in tips. “I have to continue organizing,” >she said. > >Louisa Reynolds contributed reporting. > >_________________________________________________________ >Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm >Set your options at: >http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/barryfinger%40earthlink.net _________________________________________________________ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
