Acceptance.

       Where are we now in this new world wide control system, where have the little freedoms we had gone, where are our choices? We seem to have accepted the state's open prison approach to this pandemic without much of a public discussion. We willingly abandon our right to be involved in formulating the solutions of our problems, to our political ballerinas, with their economic value structure and their sole interpretation of the "science". Now we walk in a world of weariness, fear, confusion and mistrust, pinning our hopes on the big capitalist pharmaceutical companies to come up with the magic bullet, a vaccine. Could it have been different if we the public were involved in helping formulate the solutions, would the economy have outweighed the health and welfare of the people? Too late now, we are where we are, not so, we could still take control of the situation, taking the politics and economy out of the equation, and concentrating on the health and welfare of the people, allowing the experts in the fields of pandemics, public health and medicines to guide us, all free from the weight of saving the economy.
        The following an extract from an interesting article originally in El Critic 

 

Barcelona.

 Translated by Autonomies: 

 

         The social malaise spreads moment by moment. The endless sequence of confinement – de-confinement – re-confinement – is the rope that slowly asphyxiates us. It is the rope that a State, incapable and seized by panic, holds to, to try to impose its new normal. Now we know that the announced new normal is nothing more than the continuation of this nightmare. When it all started, it seemed that we were in a science fiction movie, and that we were masked protagonists. The contained emotion of the first month was made up of fear and relief; the fear of dying and the relief of not having to work. The balconies strove to open up to the sky. Now there are no songs. The slogan “Everything will be fine” sounds even more stupid, and we have learned that we are only the useful fools of a moment in the history of capitalism. The plot can be summed up in a few words: unbridled capitalism – what is usually known as neoliberalism – produces a virus that capitalism itself reuses to control us. In the silence of the night subjected to a curfew, the cry of “Enough!” is heard. We are tired, fed up with so much uncertainty, fed up with so many falsehoods and, above all, fed up with so much arbitrariness.

Read the full article HERE 

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk 

The Relentless March Of The Financial Mafia.

 

       It is relentless, it is gaining in pace, it will continue as such, unless we stand up and resist. I'm talking about the march of privatisation, gentrification and corporatism, the commandeering of public spaces, a process that can by any rational thought, be called the culling of the poor. Excluding them to the margins of this new society, built for profit only. The ordinary will be dumped in poverty camps on the periphery, there to be called upon when needed to serve the new society built to the god Mammon. Obviously autonomous spaces are a threat to this financial Mafia dream, so must be rooted out, by rigged laws or brute force. Argument and dialogue will have no more than a delaying effect, they have the wealth, and the power of the state behind them, they know their goal. Do we the ordinary people, know ours?

This from Autonomies

         Anarchist social centres constitute fragile points of passage for anti-capitalist archipelagos of resistance.  There fragility is born of the (ever increasing) restrictions of private property and State opposition.  Yet they are often the only link to rebellious pasts and radical presents: they are the vehicles of radical thought and practices, the precious islands of different futures struggling against and creating beyond the violence of the present.
      The Centro de Cultura Libertária of Cacilhas-Almada, Portugal is the oldest anarchist cultural centre in Iberia; a centre whose space is now threatened by rampant real-estate speculation.  From the CCL, we share their urgent call for solidarity.

The CCL needs your support!
       The Centro de Cultura Libertária, an anarchist association with 44 years of activity in Cacilhas-Almada, Portugal, is again threatened. The continued pressure of the real estate business, the change in the rental law and the gentrification that forces the departure of residents from the central spaces of cities, the destruction of non-profit spaces or the closure of neighborhood stores, now also touches the CCL.
What is happening?
       This is not the first time that the CCL’s permanence in its historic headquarters has been called into question.
Between 2009 and 2011 the Centro de Cultura Libertária resisted an eviction procedure initiated by the landlord. Only the solidarity of many collectives and individuals here and beyond allowed us to face the costs of the judicial process, which led to two trials and one appeal. In the end, we reached a rent increase agreement that allowed us to continue in the space without changes in the duration of the contract.
      However, in 2014, as a result of the changes in the rent law in favor of property owners’ interests, the CCL contract duration was set at five years. At the end of 2018, we have reached the point where, as has happened to thousands of tenants, the continuation of the rent of our space will be at the mercy of the owner’s will and the conditions that he wants to impose on us.
Why support the CCL?
      The CCL is an anarchist cultural centre founded in 1974 by old libertarian militants who resisted the dictatorship, occupying since then the space rented at number 121 Rua Candido dos Reis, in Cacilhas-Almada. The Center has a unique library and archive in Portugal, with documents produced over the last hundred years, as well as a bookshop promoting libertarian culture. It has been a fundamental space for anarchism in Portugal, welcoming successive generations of libertarians. During its existence, the Center hosted numerous activities, such as debates, meetings, reading circles, video sessions, workshops, dinners and various learning workshops, and served as home to many libertarian groups and collectives. Different publications came out of the space, such as the Voz Anarquista in the 1970s, Antithesis in the 1980s, the Anarchist Information Bulletin in the 1990s, and Húmus magazine in the first decade of this century.
As an anarchist association, the functioning of the CCL’s internal organisation is horizontal and is based on the assembly of its members, where decisions are made and the tasks inherent to the life of the association are distributed. Participation in the CCL is always voluntary, unpaid and non-profit. The only sources of funding are membership fees, the bookstore, dinners and solidarity donations.
What future for the CCL?
       We do not want the Centro de Cultura Libertária to end! We want it to continue to exist as an active libertarian association for many years!
       But at the moment the future of the CCL is open: it can remain in the same space, paying a much higher rent, or move to a new space, where we would try to have better conditions for our activities, but where expenses will also be higher.
       In both cases, and given the conditions imposed by the current housing market bubble, we know that we will need financial means that we do not have. For this reason, we will start a fundraising campaign, which will include crowdfunding, concerts, dinners and other initiatives.
      We count on your solidarity support so that together we can guarantee a future for the CCL.
Center for Libertarian Culture
October 2018
C.C.L. bank account details for donations
Holder: CENTRO DE CULTURA LIBERTÁRIA
IBAN: PT50003501790000215493029
(Bank: Caixa Geral de Depósitos)
Contacts
E-mail: ateneu2000@gmail.com
Mail: Apartado 40 / 2800-801 Almada – Portugal
http://culturalibertaria.blogspot.com
www.facebook.com/CulturaLibertariaCentro
The website for the crowdfunding effort can be found here. 

        For the Centre’s blog, click here.
       Original Portuguese language statement from CCL, HERE

Visit ann arky's home at radicalglasgow.me.uk
 

The Death Of A Failed System.

        I recently posted about 2008 being a missed opportunity, and the fact that the disintegrating system will of course throw up other opportunities, and we should be organising for that next, system convulsion. However there is a line of thought that maintains that to wait for that opportunity is foolish, or worse, it is being complicit in prolonging the death-rattle of an already dangerous disintegrating civilisation. We are in the midst of the last convulsions of a crumbling system, its demise will not be a peaceful affair, it will be violently brutal, and savage as it devours itself and humanity, in a vain attempt to survive. For the survival of the planet and humanity, sanity demands the we bring about its death as quickly as possible. However, I believe, sadly, this can only happen when, what I often refer to as, “that great apolitical apathetic horde” open their eyes to the reality of their situation and see the full blown disaster of which they are an integral part. It is all there, the struggling midst poverty and deprivation, brutal wars for power and wealth, the arrogant flaunting of wealth by the few, midst the misery of the many, the vulgar spectacle of opulence trampling the poor, the many dressed in misery and humiliation, justice and compassion battered and blooded. This failed economic system has turned our planet into a theatre where the darkest and most brutal of dystopian plays is being enacted, we are the willing players, who can carry the story to it cataclysmic end, or we can change the script, to one of hope and sustainable survival, but time is running out. 

Tomorrow is cancelled

        It’s useless to wait-for a breakthrough, for the revolution, the nuclear apocalypse or a social movement. To go on waiting is madness. The catastrophe is not coming, it is here. We are already situated within the collapse of a civilization. It is within this reality that we must choose sides.
       The Invisible Committee, The Coming Insurrection

       The Invisible Committee, is one group who advocate the second line of thought, they have already produce two insightful essays, The Coming Insurrection, and, To Our Friends, their third Maintenant(Now) is being translated, one chapter at a time, into English, by Autonomies.

Tomorrow is cancelled         All the reasons for carrying out a revolution are present. None is missing. The sinking of politics, the arrogance of the powerful, the reign of the false, the vulgarity of the wealthy, the cataclysms of industry, rampant poverty, naked exploitation, ecological apocalypse – we are spared nothing, not even that of being informed. “Climate: 2016 breaks the record of heat”, tells us Le Monde on its first page, as almost every year nowadays. All the reasons are united, but it is not reasons that make revolutions, it is bodies. And the bodies are all in front of screens.

Continue reading HERE:

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk