Workers' Voices
Below are quotes from Cesar Chavez and farm workers. With each quote, the reader gains more understanding of the goals behind the UFW and that which each member of the Union struggles for.[[1]] Upon reading the passages provided by the farm workers, I hope the reader realizes their need for support.
In his own words...
"Our struggle is not easy. Those who oppose our cause are rich and powerful and they have many allies in high places. We are poor. Our allies are few. But we have something the rich do not own. We have our bodies and spirits and the justice of our cause as our weapons." C.C.
"Do not romanticize the poor...We are all people, human beings subject to the same temptations and faults as all others. Our poverty damages our dignity." C.C.
"It's ironic that those who till the soil, cultivate and harvest the fruits, vegetables, and other foods that fill your tables with abundance have nothing left for themselves." C.C.
"We shall strike. We shall organize boycotts. We shall demonstrate and have political campaigns. We shall pursue the revolution we have proposed. We are sons and daughters of the farm workers' revolution, a revolution of the poor seeking bread and justice." C.C.
"Society is made up of groups, and as long as the smaller groups do not have the same rights and the same protection as others--I don't care whether you call it capitalism or communism--it is not going to work. Somehow, the guys in power have to be reached by counterpower, or through a change in their hearts and minds, or change will not come." C.C.
"There is a great fear of our Union--a fear that I do not fully understand, but that I know is present...What is it that causes some men to act so hastily and so cruelly? It cannot be that we are so powerful. Is it so much to ask that the poorest people of the land have a measure of justice?" C.C.
Workers' Voices
- CastleRock--A report of a poisoning incident that occurred on October 20, 2005, at the CastleRock Cold Storage Facility in Richgrove, CA. It is a first-hand account as told to the UFW by the victims, all of whom were farm workers.
To read more quotes by Cesar Chavez, visit Education of the Heart at the UFW's Official Site.
