I failed in my wage claim, but this was entirely due to personal issues with route, mindset, and technical problems. Therefore, I wrote a summary of this wage dispute for reference and as a negative example for the forum members. After seeing jqr’s successful wage claim case, I also looked at mine; this event was truly educational for me, and I hope it can help everyone.
Background of the wage dispute: I worked as a trial worker at a pastry shop for five hours. The owner refused to pay me wages, claiming that the trial was just pre-job training. I tried to persuade him emotionally via WeChat—threatening to come to the store if he didn’t pay—without success. Then, my friends and I decided to go together to demand wages. I and a female friend took the lead, angrily confronting the staff at the store, while two other friends pretended to be passersby to help, and another friend, who liked vlogging, pretended to record life to pressure the staff.
Before heading to demand wages, I had just finished watching jqr’s factory diary episode on wage disputes, which inspired me with his motivating speech. After researching labor laws and arbitration cases related to wages for pre-job training, I set out full of determination, thinking: I must get my wages!
However, this attempt deviated from the true mass line and ultimately led to failure.
After arriving at the mall and meeting with my friends, we went straight to the pastry shop. Initially, we did the right thing: I and my female friend stood at the cashier—where it was easiest to block the business—and loudly told the staff, “Call out your manager.” We explained our purpose of demanding wages. But the manager was a flashy, bourgeois man who cunningly hid in the kitchen, unwilling to come out when he saw trouble, while two cashiers delayed us at the front. At this moment, the female cashier suddenly became overly loyal to the boss, defending that she was just a trainee with no wages. My first mistake was losing patience and angrily calling her a “slave.” She was immediately offended, retaliating fiercely, insulting my friends as “sick,” and a heated argument ensued over whether she was a “slave.” During this, she also insulted my friends. We argued back and forth, creating chaos. My three friends, disguised as passersby, saw us fighting and couldn’t directly intervene, so they pretended to be onlookers, explaining the situation to customers and staff, trying to stir public sentiment. Although the crowd agreed that “wages should not be owed,” I, as the claimant, failed to seize the opportunity to explain to the crowd that I was working hard for the store owner who still refused to pay, and to expose the capitalist’s evil face, which could have aroused their righteous indignation. Instead, many people just saw a quarrel and left bored. This was my second mistake: as the crowd grew, I didn’t take the chance to rally and explain, causing the crowd to disperse, leaving me and my friends isolated to confront the city management, auxiliary police, property staff, and the store manager. I think the store manager, hiding behind the scene, was satisfied to see me and the female staff arguing, as it excluded the crowd from the wage dispute and also pushed the key figure—who could contact the boss—out of the picture.
Later, the female staff burst into tears and took out her phone to call the police. At this moment, I made my third mistake: I didn’t act first to call the police when she was about to report “disturbance.” If I, as the unpaid worker, had called the police, the police would likely have aimed to mediate the labor dispute, possibly helping to settle the wages. But if the staff called the police citing insults or disturbance, the police would aim to suppress. The police, being lazy and unprofessional, only want to finish their work quickly and go back to leisure, so when the store staff reports insults or disturbance, they won’t care about my unpaid wages. This was a technical mistake: I misunderstood police procedures and failed to call first, putting myself at a disadvantage.
Soon after, the city management arrived. Since the police didn’t take this matter seriously, only city management came, not auxiliary police. They started mediating, saying that even if I was owed wages, it shouldn’t affect normal business. The mall property staff also arrived—about four or five people—aiming to restore order and help the pastry shop. They told me not to block the cashier or disrupt normal operations, and took turns persuading me and my friends to go to the property office to negotiate with the manager. But I thought going to the office would leave me isolated (based on a previous experience of wage dispute a year and a half ago), and I knew that the boss, not the manager, paid the wages, so negotiating with the manager was pointless. So my friends and I resisted the pressure and refused to go. This was correct because these service businesses fear losing customers and normal operations, which is their real interest. During their persuasion, they called the police again, and soon the auxiliary police arrived.
During this period, I continued my deviation from the mass line—failing to seize the last opportunity to rally the crowd, instead wasting time arguing with city management, property staff, and auxiliary police. My friend and I got into a wheel battle with over ten people, debating whether pre-job training should have wages, whether our wage claim was reasonable, etc., but we failed to focus on the crowd. We didn’t try to mobilize the masses or explain the principles of Marxism, unlike jqr. Debating was useless; the store manager just smugly said, “No wages, no solution,” and we, as individuals, were too weak. Even with our disguised friends, our strength was limited. No matter how many people there seemed to be, could they withstand the continuous suppression machinery? Without mobilizing the masses and propagating the struggle principles and Marxist theory, limiting the conflict to a few arguments, we would inevitably suffer a defeat.
Later, the cunning auxiliary police began to demand I leave, citing disruption of business. But they had no law enforcement authority—they couldn’t force citizens to leave. The standard for judging disruption is high; just standing in front of the cashier doesn’t qualify. The police were just bluffing. Unfortunately, due to my lack of knowledge of Nazi laws and experience with Nazi violence agencies, I believed their words and accepted a compromise: I was moved to the side of the store, a place blocked by a cement pillar, which wouldn’t hinder business or attract too much attention. This marked the end of my opportunity to rally the crowd, and the situation irreversibly headed toward failure.
Seeing that my friends and I had been taken away from the most prominent place, the property staff, staff, store manager, city management, and auxiliary police all heaved a sigh of relief, thinking the matter was nearly over. The auxiliary police and city management even pretended to say a few words about going to labor arbitration, implying we should leave and go bother the labor bureau instead. After a while, seeing that my friends and I couldn’t stir up any trouble, they left, and everyone else dispersed—including the property staff—leaving only my friend and me standing there, unsure of what to do. (The three disguised friends had also been driven away; the Nazi police saw they actively helped me and realized we were together.) From a momentum perspective, it was difficult to launch another attack. Moreover, I was about to take the train back to school and had no more time for wage disputes.
Later, I returned home and summarized this wage dispute experience.
In terms of ideological issues, I initially thought wage disputes were troublesome and didn’t want to fight. It wasn’t until a friend came to care about me that I realized I was about to return to school without having fought for my wages. So, with personal motives—avoiding being seen as unwilling to fight and considering the struggle troublesome—I went to demand wages. But my understanding of wage disputes was not high enough to promote Marxism; I only saw it as a task to complete, rushing to get the wages to “finish the task.” Therefore, I focused on demanding wages, but the more I focused on personal gain, the less I promoted Marxism and united the masses, which meant I couldn’t pose a strong threat to the bourgeoisie. The more I wanted the wages, the more I neglected to promote Marxism and unite the workers, leading to failure and emboldening the bourgeoisie’s arrogance (the auxiliary police once said, “This is your store again,” and mentioned a man who failed to claim wages a few days earlier, finally getting wages through complicated arbitration). My failure in this wage claim would make the bourgeoisie think workers are easier to bully, allowing them to delay wages even more.
Regarding the route problem, it was my deviation from the mass line. My process of wage claim was the opposite of jqr’s—completely a negative example. I failed to mobilize the masses. The wage dispute itself was not important; the wages were only around a hundred yuan. Promoting Marxism to the masses was the most important thing. The more I thought about wages and personal interests, the more I became isolated. I wasted time arguing with staff, managers, city management, auxiliary police, and property staff, trying to use Nazi legal cases and labor laws to argue with unreasonable people. That was impossible. Even if I argued legally, the other side could still cheat: “You’re right, but I still won’t pay wages.”
On technical issues, I lacked clear understanding of legal provisions, Nazi police and auxiliary police powers, and lacked experience. It was also a Friday, with few customers.
About a year and a half ago, I worked at a coffee shop, was sexually harassed by the manager, and owed wages. With friends’ help, I sent the manager to detention, then went to demand wages again. I made the same mistakes: first, ideological fear of struggle, and second, I couldn’t speak when I arrived with friends. Instead, my friends angrily accused the manager of crimes and wage arrears. When the female owner arrived, I also got into a shouting match with her. As the injured party, I didn’t accuse the store of oppression. Despite many customers, few paid attention to our wage fight. Later, the male owner called the police and arranged a Nazi mediator to take me to a mediation room. I didn’t know I could refuse mediation, so I agreed. The police, being lazy, took me to a fake address, and my friends were tricked into a different location. I was left alone in a mediation room colluding with the owner, only thinking about wages, not standing from the working class perspective to denounce the boss’s shamelessness. The mediator favored the boss and forced me to sign an agreement, causing the dispute to fail. I only received part of my wages, but was suppressed by bourgeois collusion with Nazi officials, which emboldened their arrogance.
Another friend of mine had a similar experience at the coffee shop but chose to rally the crowd and expose the injustice, attracting the public and helping him fight. Despite police and auxiliary police arriving, he insisted on the mass line, refused mediation, and ultimately won.
Now, looking back at these two failed wage disputes, I feel angry. Thinking about my mistakes causing these failures, and the bourgeoisie’s justified arrogance and wage arrears, makes me sick. That’s why I write this summary as a negative example. During wage disputes, don’t just think about personal interests; think about the overall interests of the working class. Only by mobilizing the masses can we win and make the proletariat powerful, crushing the bourgeoisie’s arrogance.