Waiting For Lefty

“Stand up and show yourself, you damn red! Be a man, let’s see what you look like! […] Yellow from the word go! Red and yellow makes a dirty color, boys. I got my eyes on four or five of them in the union here. What the hell’ll they do for you? Pull you out and run away when trouble starts. Give those birds a chance and they’ll have your sisters and wives in the whore houses, like they done in Russia. They’ll tear Christ off his bleeding cross. They’ll wreck your homes and throw your babies in the river. You think that’s bunk? Read the papers! Now listen, we can’t stay here all night. I gave you the facts in the case. You boys got hot suppers to go to and—”

Fatt takes every moment of discord as a challenge to capitalism, calling dissenters reds, or communists. His goal is to intimidate the workers out of taking action. He posts a gunman as a threat. He tries to convince the union members that anti-communist propaganda is true, and that any attempt to fight for better conditions will result in the ruination of their lives and families and the destruction of all morals. Fatt makes an error, however, when he mentions hot meals; the workers are starving and none of them are going home to dinner.

“There’s us comin’ home every night—eight, ten hours on the cab. ‘God,’ the wife says, ‘eighty cents ain’t money—don’t buy beans almost. You’re workin’ for the company,’ she says to me, ‘Joe! You ain’t workin’ for me or the family no more!’” 

Joe’s wife helps him realize that he’s bringing in so little money that he isn’t supporting them anymore. His work is supporting the company, but his family isn’t getting the benefit of his work because they’re starving.

“Don’t yell. I just put the kids to bed so they won’t know they missed a meal. If I don’t have Emmy’s shows soled tomorrow, she can’t go to school. In the meantime let her sleep.”

Edna highlights the desperation of their situation, in which she is attempting to placate her children by using sleep as a substitute for food. Her statement suggests the way poverty is a cycle, since their daughter will be denied schooling, which will impact her future prospects.