The Flint Sit-Down Strike in Comics

The Flint Sit-Down Strike in Comics

The storied Sit-Down Strike in Flint, Michigan has a special significance for today. Led in large part by left-wingers—Communist, Socialist, and Trotskyist alike—it was, more important, the most dramatic part of a movement that swept across the nation. Not so unlike Occupy (or the Wisconsin Uprising), it took everyone by surprise, stunning the participants themselves with their own collective power. Through largely nonviolent action, it changed the landscape for democracy; unlike Occupy, it could halt production and profits.

-Paul Buhle

Story and art by Ethan Heitner (www.freedomfunnies.com), an editor of the political comix magazine World War 3 Illustrated and author of a regular comics column at Mondoweiss. The story of the strike is based on Striking Flint: Genora (Johnson) Dollinger Remembers the 1936-37 General Motors Sit-Down Strike by Susan Rosenthal.

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