"This is the crossroads. Where people come from many different standpoints," Joe Washington says of the Brecht Forum. "There are people here from all different kinds of social movements that come here and talk about how we can create a better world. I for one come here out of the African American Impulse." The Brecht Forum, in a downtown Manhattan loft, is a place where people of all backgrounds come to express their views and display their art.

Joe Washington and other staff members, such as Jenna Pendergast and Liz Roberts, are only some of the workers that devote their time to this organization of social awareness. They provide roundtables where market-based topics like Science & Method and The Development of Capitalism in the United States are discussed. They offer classes in Spanish and the views of Karl Marx at reasonable prices, though a person without the right amount of money is never turned away.

The Brecht Forums loft provides a huge space for the many events that take place there. "A lot of what we are is the space," Roberts explains. "This space can be used by other organizations to have meetings or social events. It's a place where people can come and talk to other like-minded individuals." Because of this advantage, The Brecht Forum serves as an open arena for different social movements, anything from Gay and Lesbian Rights Activists to the African American Social Justice Movement Workers. This is the place for different organizations to share their ideas with each other.

The New York Taxi Workers Alliance uses the space for their meetings, which are sometimes are held at 2 a.m. - that's when drivers are free. Right now the alliance is promoting a rally for a taxi driver named Hisham Amer who was viciously beaten by Taxi and Limousine Commission officers.

The Brecht Forum is driven by the need to bring about social change, especially in the American government. "Democracy has really lost its meaning and I don't think it really exists anymore," Pendergast says. "If Democracy is how we got Bush elected then there is something wrong. The whole foundation and politics of our country is really just a joke."

"It's not only about corruption - even through that is a big part of it," Washington adds. "We are talking about contradiction. Such as we live in a society that is socially produced, but yet own by a few. The world belongs to everyone on it; not just a few of the wealthy."

A part of what the Brecht Forum views as wrong with our society is our culture, and how a lot of things are fed to the public and money-driven. Even medical advances can be considered a market of conspiracy where the main objective is to influence people to buy their drugs. "Every other commercial on TV is a drug company telling you that you have something wrong with you," Pendergast explains. "You are not going to feel 100 percent healthy every day of your life, but that does not mean that you have DMPTX syndrome, where you have to take this drug for a certain period of time and then you're hooked on it and have to keep buying it. Then you go off it and crash. And there are all these side effects which are like death. It's nonsensical."

The most important thing the Brecht Forum practices is tolerance for all groups, and the importance of keeping an open mind and free spirit. This logic is expressed through the artwork on their walls and the open celebrations of poetry, music, dramatic readings and the theater. They are more than a school of Marxism - they are also a safe haven where people can express their artistic vision and views. "We don't do enough of envisioning and stepping outside of the box and imagining things that we are never told are possible," Roberts explains about the state of humanity.

Pendergast adds, "Humanity lives without really even tapping in to what is truly possible in terms of beauty and truth about what it is to be alive." She describes the ideal society as "a culture where we are not building prisons, where we abolish prisons. Where there is no police brutality. Where people have shelter and meaningful work, healthy food and clean air. The space to have joy and leisure time and where we are equal in spite of things."

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