David Bacon's opinion piece in today's SF Chronicle looks at the hotel fight as a civil rights struggle, both for the "overly aggressive," "noncompliant" African American workers whom the industry seems intent on phasing out, and the suposedly "pliant," "subordinate," and "subservient" immigrants from Mexico, Central America, the Carribean, and East and Southeast Asia with whom employers have sought to replace them. Bacon explicitly links the struggle of the locked out workers to freedom rides old and new and sees the birth of a "new civil rights movement."

This makes the union part of a new civil-rights movement,

geared to a changed world of globalization, in which millions of immigrants

fleeing war and poverty have become an important part of the U.S. workforce,

especially in service industries. They now encounter discrimination like that

faced for years by longtime residents, especially African Americans. Instead of

competing for jobs, workers could identify with each other in an effort to

protect the rights of all. The key is prohibiting discrimination against

immigrants because of their legal status, while enforcing affirmative action to

gain more jobs for underrepresented communities.