Socialist magazine fires staff for forming a union

Vice reports:

Nathan J. Robinson, editor-in-chief of the socialist magazine Current Affairs, has fired most of its staff for trying to start a worker co-op, workers wrote in a letter posted on Twitter on Wednesday morning. 

“We, the former full and part-time staff, write to you with deep sadness and disappointment about the recent events that have occurred at Current Affairs,” a letter signed by five fired staffers said.

“On August 8th, editor-in-chief Nathan J. Robinson (author of Why You Should Be a Socialist) unilaterally fired most of the workforce to avoid an organizational restructuring that would limit his personal power. Yes, we were fired by the editor-in-chief of a socialist magazine for trying to start a worker co-op.”  

They should not be surprised. Off memory I can’t think of a single communist or socialist country that has free and independent trade unions. In almost every case they have puppet unions that actually represent the state, not workers.

So the editor-in-chief of the socialist magazine is merely following decades of tradition by crushing an independent union.