Protesting Walmart

Unionizing Walmart workers has been impossible so far because of the company's effective retaliatory tactics and weak labor laws. But past efforts appear to not have been made in vain. During the last ten years of retaliation and poor conditions, Walmart has angered and alienated enough people who are willing, in this new era of occupy, to join a coalition of groups inside and outside of Walmart that obviates Walmart's tactics of retaliation.

From the New York Times today:

The food and commercial workers union has made Wal-Mart a target because the company has helped put many unionized supermarkets out of business and helped push down wages at many competitors. Wal-Mart...has vigorously resisted unionization drives, closing a store in Canada after workers there voted to unionize and arranging to have outside suppliers provide prepackaged meat after the butchers at a store in Texas voted to unionize in 2000.

The food workers union has been spending heavily on this push, paying more than $50,000 for hotel rooms near Wal-Mart’s headquarters last year when it sent employees and representatives to company events, according to a filing with the Labor Department.
In this week’s planned events, OUR Walmart, which stands for Organization United for Respect at Walmart, is enlisting a broad range of allies, arranging fliers and letters that community, church and civil rights groups can use to publicize the Black Friday protest. OUR Walmart has even prepared remarks that it is suggesting members of the clergy might use in prayer, “to call upon the world’s largest corporation to treats its workers with justice and fairness.”