For workers to raise their own status, to break free from the fetters of employers, there is no other way besides striving and struggling, because employers in general do not hold any humanitarianism; how could they care about the life and death of workers? Take wages for example: a few years ago, each worker got two jiao of silver dollars a day; now it is only three jiao a day, an increase of less than one-half. The rise in the cost of living, how could it be only one-half? Employers are unwilling to follow the saying "a rising tide lifts all boats" and resolutely increase workers' wages, causing them to endure hunger and starvation, gradually reaching a state where they cannot possibly live, yet still unable to gain a bit of pity from the employers. Therefore, besides striving and struggling against the employers, workers have no second way. Alas, the pitiful workers, your own problems must be solved by yourselves. If you want to improve your lives, you can only rise up and solve it yourselves! To hope that employers will show a benevolent heart and improve the methods of treatment is a charitable act that we are ashamed to endure, and it is also an impossibility. To hope that others will advocate on our behalf to achieve the goal of labor liberation is also without effect. I dare to assert one sentence: if workers do not want to improve their own lives, then so be it; if they want to improve their own lives, there is only "bracing for a tough fight, fighting to the death," rising up and struggling for themselves!

But if workers want to struggle with employers, they should first have a strong and solid organization, then they will not be defeated. Without a strong and solid organization as backing, to rashly declare war on employers is to be invariably defeated. The laborers in various places in China have also repeatedly launched strike movements, and the result has mostly been failure. This is due to the lack of a strong and solid organization. Therefore, the most crucial step in the current Chinese labor movement is to quickly organize a strong and solid labor organization. How is a strong and solid labor organization to be organized? This is a long story, but to put it succinctly: first, every laborer must have a thorough awakening. What is the degree of awakening of China's laborers? To speak of it is very pessimistic and disappointing. This is because the majority of workers are recruited from the countryside and have not received a school education, so they have no knowledge at all, and their minds are filled with many base and vulgar concepts. When others shout at the top of their lungs "Labor Liberation," they do not even know what "Labor Liberation" is. They are not sure if they themselves can be considered laborers, and some even fear that the gentlemen who loudly sing "Labor Liberation" are radicals. If we believe their words, we will be seduced by the radicals, and we fear we will be implicated in the future. These words are not my own fabrication; if you all go and carefully examine the psychology of the workers, you will believe that this situation indeed exists. Since the minds of the laborers are so simple, and their knowledge so shallow, for us to hope that they have a thorough awakening, is this not "climbing a tree to catch a fish"? Since the workers do not have a thorough awakening, for us to hope that they organize a strong and solid, genuine labor organization, is this not daydreaming?

But although the laborers do not now have a thorough awakening, we still hope to find a way to enable them to have a day of thorough awakening. We cannot, just because the laborers do not now have a thorough awakening, give up on the labor problem. Laborers are the pillars of society; if the labor problem is not solved, how can society be peaceful and tranquil? But how exactly do we enable the laborers to have a thorough awakening? This problem must be solved through the problem of worker education, because the reason why workers do not have a thorough awakening is precisely because they have not received an education and do not have abundant knowledge. Now, if we enable them all to have the opportunity to be educated, and thereby obtain abundant knowledge, it will naturally not be difficult for them to have a thorough awakening. Now, in all places, there are free schools for workers being established. I have also visited a few, among which those that are true to their name and can indeed enhance the workers' knowledge, supply the workers' knowledge, supply the workers' needs, and plan for the improvement of the workers' livelihood are certainly not few. But those that are not true to their name, merely hanging up a sign of "Free School for Workers" to win praise from others, and are of no benefit to the workers, are also many. I hope that the gentlemen who are enthusiastic about labor education, in places where free schools for workers have not been established, will quickly gather comrades to open free schools for workers to attract workers to come and study; in places where free schools for workers have already been established, they should redouble their efforts to improve and expand them, so that workers do not feel left out in a corner. If this is truly done, it will not be difficult for the workers' level of knowledge to rise day by day. Then the workers will naturally be able to use theory to judge new things. What is the tyranny of the employers? What are the rights that workers should have? There will be no worry that they will not have a thorough awakening! Therefore, I believe that the problem of worker education is the prerequisite for all labor problems. Once the workers have a thorough awakening, they will naturally, due to their interests, unite together to organize a genuine labor organization, and they will feel that if they do not do so, there will ultimately be no hope of improving their own lives. Thus, the labor organization they form will become all the more consolidated. Whether the words above are correct or not, I very much hope for everyone's criticism.

(This article was published in the Hunan Dagongbao in December 1920)

A Labor Record Compiled by the Anyuan Workers Themselves (Excerpt)