While mainstream radio and television media organizations sent all of their reporters and cameras to West Los Angeles, Santa Monica, and Mission Viejo today to cover three well-attended rallies in support of striking and locked out UFCW supermarket workers, a fourth demonstration in the harbor community of San Pedro was easily as crowded and a great deal more boisterous.

Several hundred members of the community, along with members of various unions including Teamsters and--as usual in harbor-area labor rallies--a sizeable contingent of ILWU longshoremen and marine clerks, joined UFCW picketers at the Vons supermarket on 13th and Gaffey in San Pedro for an extremely vocal rally that effectively shut down the store for several hours and brought an impressive police response.

Fired-up demonstrators roared "Scabs go home!" at the replacement workers and (mostly non-existent) shoppers holed up in the store. Participants formed a human chain in front of all three entrances to the market--although in truth this was hardly necessary given the size of the crowd and the pro-striker sentiment that prevails in San Pedro--and were in due course hauled away by riot-helmeted LAPD officers, to the cheers of the crowd.

These photographs were taken with a built-in cell phone camera. Apologies for the less-than-stellar quality.

Why should I not shop at Ralph's? Becasue some workers have a beef about paying for health insurance? Shit, I pay for my health insurance plus I pay for the deadbeats in CA (Medicare, MediCal etc)

Where were the unions when I got laid off? Did they protest my employer and urge people to shop elsewhere? No they did not.

You did not care about my job and I don't care about Ralph's employees either. Grow up and go back to work.

:-)

Brent

Brent, you are the union! Why not organize your co-workers so you don't have to deal with crap from your bosses anymore? Don't wait on someone from a union to come in- do it yourself.

www.iww.org