DIY History | Transcribe | Campus Culture | Ain't I A Woman? newspapers, June 1970-July 1971

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Ain't I A Woman? newspapers, June 1970-July 1971

1970-08-21 "Ain't I a Woman?" Page 6

NOT EVERYBODY LOVES AM

[photo] DOLORES CARRILLO

   We Mexican Americans are always turned down and told they’re not hiring, and the people in the plant say they are hiring. We go and put in our applications and they don’t hire us. The unemployment office sends us to Oscar Mayer’s and we never get called. They don’t care whether you’ve got a green slip or not, they don’t call you.
   I’ve got people who know how to do that kind of work. They’ve worked in Chicago, and they’ve got their little union books, they belong to the union, but they still don’t call them. These people need jobs. They don’t have no jobs now. They go all over Davenport and nobody gives them a job. So when the unemployment office sent me to Oscar Mayer, they gave me a green slip and they said “Delores, this is a sure thing,” and like a big fool I came over here believing him, and they still didn’t call me. I know how to do that work.
   But they’ve got to give you a finger test, they’ve got to give you a written test. Why? They don’t need that to get into that plant. You don’t have to write nothing. Let me tell you something, if I give you that finger test, you won’t pass it. Because of the fact that when you take a finger test in front of lots of people, there’s about 20 people in the room when you take that test, the man looking you straight in the face, you aren’t going to pass it. And whether you passed it or not, he can tell you you didn’t. I know I passed it. He told me I did. And am I in Oscar Mayer’s? I’m outside looking in. Well, I just finally got tired of it and I said “I’m going to do something about it.”

Ramona Castenada came here three years ago with 10 years experience working in meat packing in Chicago. She went down and showed them her union book and applied for a job and she wasn’t hired. Another boy came from Chicago with four years experience and he applied for work there. Two days later they hired a white boy just out of high school. What the heck did he know about cutting meat? The union man said, “Well, you’ve got to prove it, and give me their names. “So I did. Then he said he knew the personnel manager wasn’t prejudiced. I said, “If you don’t call that prejudice I don’t know what you call it.” He said he didn’t know.
   They have this MA5 program. This old lady was the first name on the list. They hired 18 blacks, maybe 20 whites. Eight Mexican-Americans signed up and not a darn one was hired. I told him about it and he said he didn’t know nothing about it. He knows.

   But I’m out here every day, every day wondering, am I really going to get some place? When I stop to think, maybe I will.

   There are 3,000 Mexican-American people liv[missing letters]
scattered throughout the inner-city. Most work [missing words]
order of things. Women like Dolores Carrillo li[missing words]
ternatives. It takes real work to live on ADC—[missing words]
People like Dolores (black, brown and white) are [missing words]
ployment offices, knocking on personnel manager’s [missing words]
less tests—working, working, working just to get [missing words]
with the vitality and awareness of Dolores and [missing words]
to pack meat. What kind of society so wastes [missing words] 
A society that says there can’t be worked for ever[missing words] 
Rate of profit.

   And always people are told they just don’t [missing words] 

   What doesn’t Dolores understand? That when [missing words]
alike) says “we may interview 1600 people and one [missing words]
ashamed. They think they’ve answered the question [missing words]
describes the meaningless testing— the finger test [missing words]
interview—they say “we can’t do anything about [missing words]
that people who can’t speak English still have [missing words]
communication. That everywhere she goes there [missing words]
natural superiority and natural assumption of [missing words]
ship and understanding and a desire to “help” [missing words]
the brown hands to open the windows, to run the [missing words]
at a meeting with uniform officials of the Amalgam[missing words]
men (AFL-CIO) in Davenport.

   When we put some white faces on the picket [missing words]
picketing began, suddenly the union men wanted [missing words]
resentatives reproduced on this page speaks for [missing words]
on these pages, too. A group of some 30 people [missing words]
enport. They want support in their picketing [missing words]
in leafletting downtown and in their boycott of [missing words]
Dolores in Davenport or Women’s Liberation in Iowa [missing words].

   The inevitable economic squeeze that is hit[missing words]
people hardest as Amerika tries to subdue the [missing words]
ing an unintended effect. One WL member put it [missing words]
“The Third World is Getting Bigger All the Time. [missing words]
world of people who don’t fit into the economic [missing words]
the people who have always been the source of [missing words]
of experiments like Cuba where people are working [missing words]
where housing and necessities are free, where [missing words]
doesn’t spend most of her productive labor just [missing words]
no one earns much more than anyone else, where [missing words]
eliminated, where there’s a real chance for free [missing words] 
profit gained off the labor of others is not the [missing words]

The way I started is because I had a dream one night [missing words]
laying on the street, laying on the sidewalk, laying [missing words]
a big factory would come by and pick up one of these [missing words]
the rest just laid there, never got picked up and go [missing words]
for a job, or never got noticed at all. So after I [missing words]
help these people, and I’m going to help myself.” [missing words]
would name these people out here every day “the [missing words] 

[photo] BROWN IS BEAUTIFUL

6   Vol. 1, No. 4   AIN’T I

Saving...

NOT EVERYBODY LOVES AM [photo] DOLORES CARRILLO We Mexican Americans are always turned down and told they’re not hiring, and the people in the plant say they are hiring. We go and put in our applications and they don’t hire us. The unemployment office sends us to Oscar Mayer’s and we never get called. They don’t care whether you’ve got a green slip or not, they don’t call you. I’ve got people who know how to do that kind of work. They’ve worked in Chicago, and they’ve got their little union books, they belong to the union, but they still don’t call them. These people need jobs. They don’t have no jobs now. They go all over Davenport and nobody gives them a job. So when the unemployment office sent me to Oscar Mayer, they gave me a green slip and they said “Delores, this is a sure thing,” and like a big fool I came over here believing him, and they still didn’t call me. I know how to do that work. But they’ve got to give you a finger test, they’ve got to give you a written test. Why? They don’t need that to get into that plant. You don’t have to write nothing. Let me tell you something, if I give you that finger test, you won’t pass it. Because of the fact that when you take a finger test in front of lots of people, there’s about 20 people in the room when you take that test, the man looking you straight in the face, you aren’t going to pass it. And whether you passed it or not, he can tell you you didn’t. I know I passed it. He told me I did. And am I in Oscar Mayer’s? I’m outside looking in. Well, I just finally got tired of it and I said “I’m going to do something about it.” Ramona Castenada came here three years ago with 10 years experience working in meat packing in Chicago. She went down and showed them her union book and applied for a job and she wasn’t hired. Another boy came from Chicago with four years experience and he applied for work there. Two days later they hired a white boy just out of high school. What the heck did he know about cutting meat? The union man said, “Well, you’ve got to prove it, and give me their names. “So I did. Then he said he knew the personnel manager wasn’t prejudiced. I said, “If you don’t call that prejudice I don’t know what you call it.” He said he didn’t know. They have this MA5 program. This old lady was the first name on the list. They hired 18 blacks, maybe 20 whites. Eight Mexican-Americans signed up and not a darn one was hired. I told him about it and he said he didn’t know nothing about it. He knows. But I’m out here every day, every day wondering, am I really going to get some place? When I stop to think, maybe I will. There are 3,000 Mexican-American people liv[missing letters] scattered throughout the inner-city. Most work [missing words] order of things. Women like Dolores Carrillo li[missing words] ternatives. It takes real work to live on ADC—[missing words] People like Dolores (black, brown and white) are [missing words] ployment offices, knocking on personnel manager’s [missing words] less tests—working, working, working just to get [missing words] with the vitality and awareness of Dolores and [missing words] to pack meat. What kind of society so wastes [missing words] A society that says there can’t be worked for ever[missing words] Rate of profit. And always people are told they just don’t [missing words] What doesn’t Dolores understand? That when [missing words] alike) says “we may interview 1600 people and one [missing words] ashamed. They think they’ve answered the question [missing words] describes the meaningless testing— the finger test [missing words] interview—they say “we can’t do anything about [missing words] that people who can’t speak English still have [missing words] communication. That everywhere she goes there [missing words] natural superiority and natural assumption of [missing words] ship and understanding and a desire to “help” [missing words] the brown hands to open the windows, to run the [missing words] at a meeting with uniform officials of the Amalgam[missing words] men (AFL-CIO) in Davenport. When we put some white faces on the picket [missing words] picketing began, suddenly the union men wanted [missing words] resentatives reproduced on this page speaks for [missing words] on these pages, too. A group of some 30 people [missing words] enport. They want support in their picketing [missing words] in leafletting downtown and in their boycott of [missing words] Dolores in Davenport or Women’s Liberation in Iowa [missing words]. The inevitable economic squeeze that is hit[missing words] people hardest as Amerika tries to subdue the [missing words] ing an unintended effect. One WL member put it [missing words] “The Third World is Getting Bigger All the Time. [missing words] world of people who don’t fit into the economic [missing words] the people who have always been the source of [missing words] of experiments like Cuba where people are working [missing words] where housing and necessities are free, where [missing words] doesn’t spend most of her productive labor just [missing words] no one earns much more than anyone else, where [missing words] eliminated, where there’s a real chance for free [missing words] profit gained off the labor of others is not the [missing words] The way I started is because I had a dream one night [missing words] laying on the street, laying on the sidewalk, laying [missing words] a big factory would come by and pick up one of these [missing words] the rest just laid there, never got picked up and go [missing words] for a job, or never got noticed at all. So after I [missing words] help these people, and I’m going to help myself.” [missing words] would name these people out here every day “the [missing words] [photo] BROWN IS BEAUTIFUL 6 Vol. 1, No. 4 AIN’T I