March 8th.

        Today, March 8th. is the day we raise our glass and say thank you to those countless women that stood up and broke their shackles, not for themselves, but for all the downtrodden and marginalised, They saw and felt the injustice, they saw that better world and boldly marched towards it, no matter the opposition.
       There are legions of them, some we remember with pride, others have slipped off the pages of history, though their deeds didn't, their effort has moved forward the realisation of a free and just world for all.
       So a big show of gratitude to the Lousie Michel's of this world, the bold and the fierce ones, the quiet and determined ones, The well known and the forgotten.

 

Claire Lacombe, actress, whose greatest role was revolution.

Extract from: History.com 

        It was a steaming July day in Paris in 1792. In the midst of a meeting of the revolutionary Legislative Assembly, a beautiful, unknown black-haired woman with the mannerisms and rich voice of a seasoned performer stood up to speak:
        “Legislators! A Frenchwoman, an actress at the moment without a part; such am I; that which should have caused me to despair fills my soul with the purest of joy. As I cannot come to the assistance of my country, which you have declared to be in danger, with monetary sacrifices, I desire to offer it the devotion of my person. Born with the courage of a Roman matron and with hatred for tyrants, I shall consider myself happy to contribute to their destruction…Perish all despots to the last man!”
       For the next three years, Claire Lacombe, a struggling provincial actress, would become a star among the most extremist elements of the French revolution. Known as “Red Rosa,” she danced atop the ruins of the Bastille, was shot in the arm during the storming of the Tuileries, and co-founded the radical, influential feminist “Republican Revolutionary Society” (also known as the Society of Revolutionary Republican Women). These “enraged” women of the maligned lower-class fought for equal rights and the destruction of all aristocrats.
        Militant and fierce, Lacombe and her “dragoons” terrified the men of the revolution. In 1794, Lacombe was thrown in jail, and women’s clubs were outlawed. When she was released 16 months later, “she mingled with the crowd outside,” Lacombe’s biographer Galina Sokolnikova wrote, “and vanished into obscurity.”

Unbinding my feet I clean out a thousand years of poison,
With heated heart arouse all women’s spirits.
Alas, this delicate kerchief here,
Is half stained with blood, and half with tears.

Visit ann arky's home at https://spiritofrevolt.info  

Liz Willis.

    Another month, another "Read of the Month" from Spirit of Revolt. For this  month, to mark International Women’s Day, Spirit of Revolt’s “Read of the Month” for March, is an article by Liz Willis, held in our John Cooper Collection, No. 3-52-1. It is a Solidarity Pamphlet No. 48. “Women in the Spanish Revolution” . Liz hailed from Stornoway, and was active in Aberdeen, Edinburgh, and London as well as active against nuclear weapons at the Faslane nuclear submarine base. She died in 2019 from pancreatic cancer aged 72, . There is a very informative article on Liz Willis HERE.

You can read her pamphlet on line, courtesy of Libcom. 

Women in the Spanish Revolution. 

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

Glasgow Women.

      International Women's Day, March 8th. Glasgow women can stand tall with a proud history of women who stood up and took their place in the struggle for that better world. 

    During the jingoism and the establishment's rampant patriotism pushing for everybody to get behind the imperialist war of 1914-1918, women in Glasgow took to the streets and faced the wrath of the media and large sections of the public in their drive for peace. This from Strugglepedia:  "--in June 1916 organised a peace conference in the city which gave birth to The Women’s Peace Crusade which became a dominant force in the anti-war movement. There is some variation on the actual date but June 10th 1916 is generally accepted as the birth of the Women’s Peace Crusade. A year later, June 1917 saw the Women’s Peace Crusade go national with the launch of the National Women’s Peace Crusade---"

     Collectively and individually, women of Glasgow have always played their part in the city's struggles, there is a catalogue of names some well known and others less known, but all played an important part in the fight for a better world for all. 

    To name  few from the past, in no particular order, and hope that their names and deeds will always be remembered and honoured by us all. 

Helen Crawfurd, Jane Hamilton Patrick, Mary Barbour, Ethel MacDonald, Helen Brown Scott Lennox, Rita Milton, Of course there are more, many more, and some we will never see in the history books, but who are just as important as all the others. What is more important is that there are as many or perhaps more women now standing up and taking on the battles of the day, let's make sure we note their actions and remember their names. We can learn from the past. A good place to look to see what Glasgow's women are up to would be the Glasgow Women's Library.  

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

ACE Edinburgh.

 

        As usual, our friends over in Edinburgh at ACE, have pulled together another couple of months of events, important, interesting, and worthy of attention. So if you can shuffle over to Edinburgh and given them your support, all worth while.

Sunday 25th August
Rising Free book reading in aid of Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre
6.30pm
SHRUB Coop (Zero Waste Hub)
22 Bread street, EH3 9AF
https://www.facebook.com/events/2441906742569751/

       Sisters Uncut Edinburgh invite you to share space with and listen to the voices behind Rising Free, a recently published anthology of creative writing from Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre.
      Following the reading and a short break, survivors in the audience will be welcome to share their own voices in an open mic. Entry is by donation with all money collected going to support Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre.
      This topic of this event can provoke a range of emotional responses. There will be provision of support available for anyone who finds the event difficult.
        This event is open to all genders
Organised by Sisters Uncut http://autonomous.org.uk/groups-activities/sisters-uncut-edinburgh/

Mon 26 August
      Protest over Amazon fires
1pm – 3pm Scottish Parliament
Organised by Extinction Rebellion
https://www.facebook.com/events/648606235635568/

Wednesday, 28 August
     Stop Lock-Change Evictions !
Demonstration organised by Scottish Refugee Council, Living Rent and others
11:00am -12:00
Court of Session , Parliament Square, EH1
https://www.facebook.com/events/344415249767683/?active_tab=about

       JOIN US outside the Court of Session on Wednesday 28th August at 11am to demonstrate against the callous Home Office policy which forces people into street homelessness, to support the case of Ali vs Serco and the Home Office, and to raise awareness of ongoing, inhumane lock-change evictions in Glasgow.
#StopLockChangeEvictions #DignityNotDestitution

Thurs 29 August: ACE Evening Opening
       ACE open 6 - 8 pm
General browsing welcome, Open to all!

Mon 2 September
       Edinburgh Coalition Against Poverty advocacy stall
10am – 11.30ish
Leith Jobcentre, Commercial Street
All welcome
(note – weather dependent, not on if its pouring!)
www.edinburghagainstpoverty.org.uk

Thursday 5 Sept: ECAP Monthly Meeting
       ACE 6 - 8 pm All welcome
Help organise ECAP activities for the month ahead
www.edinburghagainstpoverty.org.uk

 Saturday 7 September: ACE is Open!
     Come browse & check out our groups

Open 1 - 4 pm

Sunday 8 Sept: International Women's Day Group
        Edinburgh branch - all women welcome
ACE 12 - 2 pm
http://autonomous.org.uk/groups-activities/international-womens-day/

Wed 11 September
       Action for Trans Health Planning meeting at ACE
https://www.facebook.com/events/486168151880782/?event_time_id=486168168547447

Sunday 15 September
     Edinburgh IWW branch meeting
2pm – 4pm at ACE
http://autonomous.org.uk/events/iww-2019-09-15/

Friday 20 Sept: #GeneralStrikeForClimate
       Gather 11am Middle Meadow Walk, Meadows
11.30am March to the Parliament
https://www.facebook.com/events/600485737142445/permalink/616791722178513/

      Edinburgh Youth Climate Strike
We ask that all people join us for this general strike the climate crisis is no longer an issue that will effect young people it will effect us all.
So on the 20th of September we ask people of all ages and backgrounds to stand together to face this climate and ecological crisis.

Edinburgh World Justice Festival
28 September – 19 October
http://www.ewjf.org.uk/

October
Auction for Trans Health
Online via Facebook
Coming up in October
https://www.facebook.com/groups/AuctionForTransHealth/
        Edinburgh Action for Trans Health have a facebook group where they will be holding fund-raising auctions. Expect to find some quirky queer curios and funky feminist things up for grabs! Money raised here will go directly into the hands of trans people in need or on into projects to bring about the liberation of trans healthcare. The next auction is coming up in October so join the group, set notifications to get all posts so as to not miss the auction, and add your friends so they can join in on thee bidding!

Regular Events

Every Tuesday 12 – 3pm at ACE
Edinburgh Coalition Against Poverty drop-in
http://edinburghagainstpoverty.org.uk/?page_id=2193
Plus all ACE facilities open

Every Wednesday 2pm – 4pm at ACE
Common Ground
Homeless led action and advocacy
http://autonomous.org.uk/groups-activities/the-a-team/
More news on events on Autonomous Centre of Edinburgh facebook and on the ACE calendar at www.autonomous.org.uk
For info on all the groups based at ACE see http://autonomous.org.uk/groups-activities/

CONTACT acemail@gmx.co.uk

Autonomous Centre of Edinburgh, 17 West Montgomery Place, Edinburgh EH7 5HA
        ACE is open every Tuesday 12-3pm, the last Thursday each month 6pm - 8pm, and the first Saturday each month 1pm - 4pm
Plus see ACE facebook and the calendar at www.autonomous.org.uk for special events and meetings
      Tel 0131 557 6242 - best to ring during opening hours, sorry we cannot guarantee to be able to respond to voicemail.

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

International Women's Day.

To mark March 8th. International Women's Day

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

Glasgow, International Women's Day- March 8th.

Wikipedia:
        International Women's Day (IWD) is celebrated on March 8 every year.[3] It is a focal point in the movement for women's rights.
       After the Socialist Party of America organised a Women's Day on February 28, 1909 in New York, the 1910 International Socialist Woman's Conference suggested a Women's Day be held annually. After women gained suffrage in Soviet Russia in 1917, March 8 became a national holiday there. The day was then predominantly celebrated by the socialist movement and communist countries until it was adopted in 1975 by the United Nations.
      Today, International Women's Day is a public holiday in some countries and largely ignored elsewhere.[4] In some places, it is a day of protest; in others, it is a day that celebrates womanhood. 

      If you are in Glasgow on that particular day, why not swell the numbers for women's rights, which are human rights, take part in Glasgow's celebration of International Women's Day? 

    In honour of International Women's Day-- Friday, 8 March-- a Rally and Walk of Pride will be assembling at 12 Noon in the Glasgow City Centre at the Dewar's statue in Buchanan Street.
      All are welcome to come together for singing, an open mic, a display of banners and placards, and leaflets on the history of this international holiday, and the ongoing importance of speaking out and fighting back against the twin evils of capitalism and patriarchy.
     This will be followed by a Walk of Pride through George Square to the City Chambers to honour, in song and in spirit, ourselves, each other, and all lovers of liberty and equality. Please join us as we demand respect and our rights: in our homes, our neighbourhoods, and our workplaces.
     More information on this event, and the Industrial Workers of the World, is available from https://iwwscotland.wordpress.com/

   

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

Reminder, International Women's Day, Glasgow Event.

        International Women's Day is just three days away, March 8th. and Glasgow is marking this day with an event in the city centre. So come along celebrate this international event, come and meet like minded people, come along and have a chat, make new friends, meet old friends, stand up for equality, and you don't have to be a women to come and support this event. Let's make it a big happy event.

         An International Women's Day event, initiated by the Equality Officers of the Clydeside Branch of the Industrial Workers of the World, will be held on Thursday, the 8th of March.
            The rally and Walk of Pride will assemble at 4.30 pm at the La Pasionaria statue located on the north bank of the River Clyde next to Glasgow Bridge, opposite the Custom House on Clyde Street.
          This site was chosen because of the prominent role Dolores Ibarruri, called La Pasionaria ('The Passionate Flower') played in the Spanish Civil War of 1936-1939, in defense of the Spanish Republic; and because the statue of her by sculptor Arthur Dooley so beautifully represents the revolutionary woman of courage that she was-- and that many of us strive to be.
            The rally will also honour the Scottish revolutionary, Ethel MacDonald, who was a key figure in the Scottish anarchist movement and in the Spanish Civil War. In 1936 she was sent by the United Socialist Movement to Barcelona where she became world-renowned as the English-speaking reporter for an anarchist radio station. She also remained an activist, daringly organising hunger strikes among the political prisoners, smuggling in letters, and helping some escape .

          The rally will feature a banner that says Celebrate International Women's Day For a World Free from Capitalism and Patriarchy, singing, and an open mic.
         At 5.30 pm we will start our Walk of Pride, with banner and placards, to George Square where we will join up with the Scottish Irish Abortion Rights campaigners for a #Solidarity4Repeal demo at 6 pm-- thus linking it to one of the most critical issues of the day: access to abortion as a woman's right. Throughout the afternoon, we will be proudly expressing our belief that Sisterhood, and Comradeship, are Powerful!

          All are welcome to attend. Please spread the word.
More information is available from
doraziosusan92@gmail.com

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

International Women's Day Glasgow Event.

          An International Women's Day event, initiated by the Equality Officers of the Clydeside Branch of the Industrial Workers of the World, will be held on Thursday, the 8th of March.
            The rally and Walk of Pride will assemble at 4.30 pm at the La Pasionaria statue located on the north bank of the River Clyde next to Glasgow Bridge, opposite the Custom House on Clyde Street.
          This site was chosen because of the prominent role Dolores Ibarruri, called La Pasionaria ('The Passionate Flower') played in the Spanish Civil War of 1936-1939, in defense of the Spanish Republic; and because the statue of her by sculptor Arthur Dooley so beautifully represents the revolutionary woman of courage that she was-- and that many of us strive to be.
            The rally will also honour the Scottish revolutionary, Ethel MacDonald, who was a key figure in the Scottish anarchist movement and in the Spanish Civil War. In 1936 she was sent by the United Socialist Movement to Barcelona where she became world-renowned as the English-speaking reporter for an anarchist radio station. She also remained an activist, daringly organising hunger strikes among the political prisoners, smuggling in letters, and helping some escape .

          The rally will feature a banner that says Celebrate International Women's Day For a World Free from Capitalism and Patriarchy, singing, and an open mic.
         At 5.30 pm we will start our Walk of Pride, with banner and placards, to George Square where we will join up with the Scottish Irish Abortion Rights campaigners for a #Solidarity4Repeal demo at 6 pm-- thus linking it to one of the most critical issues of the day: access to abortion as a woman's right. Throughout the afternoon, we will be proudly expressing our belief that Sisterhood, and Comradeship, are Powerful!

          All are welcome to attend. Please spread the word.
More information is available from
doraziosusan92@gmail.com
 

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

A Poem For International Women's Day, 2017.

      Another poem for International Women's Day,  thanks Loam for reminding me of this one.


You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may tread me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

Maya Angelou.

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

International Women's Day, 2017.

 

          It is a strange world where approximately 50% of its population is deemed less valuable than the other 50%. What kind of species are we that thinks one half of our kind, is worth more than the other half? It is impossible to rationalise this sort of thinking, it is simple beyond reason, for us to regain our sanity this sort of thinking has to go.

         A poem for International Women's Day, first read at an International Women's Day celebration at Joy Kogawa House in 2015,

I want to write a poem for every girl and woman today
Who has been told she can't attend school although her brothers can;
Who has had acid thrown on her dreams;
Who has been shot in the head for thinking;
Who is forced into marriage as if her life weren't her own;
Who is bought, who is sold;
Who weeps or who can no longer weep
because of the men who trespass her body;
Who is beaten and fearful; who is beaten, but fearless;
Who is starved because she speaks out, speaks back, just speaks;
Whose house is bombed, whose village is razed;
Who is stoned for adultery because she is pregnant;
Who is stoned for a rape that male judges call adultery;
Whose family erases her, whose community evicts her;
Who has just enough money for a single egg;
Who carefully slices that egg for her children to eat;
Who is denied a single day off work;
Who takes on three jobs to keep her family off the street;
Who is whipped by her boss after days without sleep;
Who watches over our children in manicured playgrounds
while her own grow up motherless;
Who lies locked for months alone in a cell;
Who huddles into herself with eyes like trampled flowers;
Whose mind is trapped in the shuddering loop of annihilating night;
Who is told she is nothing when she is everything;
Who is told she is dirt, when she is the Earth.

Fiona Tinwei Lam.

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

International Women's Day.

           I wrote this for the blog away back in 2011, there have been changes, but sadly, there is still a long way to go, to have that desired equality across our society.

 

          March 8 is celebrated across the world as International Women's Day (IWD), a day when we can come together to honour women world wide. In 1910, the Second International held the first international women's conference in Copenhagen and an 'International Women's Day' was established. It was suggested by the German Socialist Clara Zetkin, although no date was specified. The first IWD was observed on March 19, 1911 in Germany.
        It is a day when we can pay homage to all those women who selflessly fought to improve the conditions of not just women, but all humankind. Women who struggled to improve working conditions, for justice, for peace, for unity of all ordinary people.
         Every country, every city, has its role of honour of such women, perhaps not publicly displayed but it will be there, in folklore, in song, in theatre and poem. Glasgow can be proud of its list of women who fought injustice where they saw it, some struggled away in obscurity, some in the limelight of publicity, all played their part in improving our lives. Today more than ever we need our women heroes, we need the unity of all men and women to combat the savage onslaught against our living standards. Today more than ever people have to stand up and join hands in solidarity with all people's across the globe.

          Here are just a few of Glasgow's women from our recent past that are worthy of being honoured today. 

 Mary Barbour,   Ethel MacDonald,    Helen Crawfurd,    Agnes Dollan,    Jenny Patrick,  Rita Milton, who would you add to this list, there are hundreds from which to choose. Where are our modern Mary Barbour's, where is today's Ethel MacDonald? Can you name them? 

          "It is not by changing ministers - such guilty men! - or issuing declarations that fascism will be conquered. The problem is more complex than that. We do not intend to add our voice to those who delude the workers that their 'leaders' will get them out of the mess. The problems need a complete transformation in the present attitude of the working class."  Marie Louise Berneri From; War Commentary, December 1940.

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

The World Needs The Full Potential Of All Its Peopele.

      March 8th. International Women's Day, a day when we honour the achievements of women across the world, a day when the other half of the world's population should rise up, join women, and once and for all, end the domination of one half of the species by the other. Women's fight for full equality can only exist because those rights are refused by men. There is no grounds for any law, natural or otherwise, that states one half of the species shouldn't have the same rights and opportunities as the other.

      We are all born as children, it is unacceptable that we should structure our society so that one half of those children will not have the right to develop to their full potential. Any institution that furthers or defends this inequality of opportunity must be destroyed, be it religious or political.

     By seeing that every human on this planet has equal rights to develop to their full potential, will release an explosion of creativity that will enhance the quality of life across the globe. We as a species, cheat ourselves and humanity, if we deny half our population the right to add their full worth to our combined effort to build that better world. There can be no better world when half its population is denied equality.

     I thought it fitting that on this day, International Women's Day to post a cutting from an old copy of The Word, held in the Spirit of Revolt Archive. We all should honour and respect those who stand up in the face of the state, in time of war, and say, "I am are a conscientious objector". However we tend to think of them as men, this case, from WWII, is the UK's first women conscientious objector.

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

The Miners' Strike And International Women's Day.

       International Women's Day, in 1910, in Copenhagen, a second International Conference of Working Women was held. At that conference Clara Zetkin (Leader of the 'Women's Office' for the Social Democratic Party in Germany) put forward the idea of an International Women's Day. She proposed that every year in every country there should be a celebration on the same day - a Women's Day - to press for their demands. The conference of over 100 women from 17 countries, representing unions, socialist parties, working women's clubs, and including the first three women elected to the Finnish parliament, greeted Zetkin's suggestion with unanimous approval and thus International Women's Day was the result. 

 

 

       It is fitting that we celebrate the start the 30th anniversary of the miners strike, as we celebrate International Women's Day, for during that year long savage and bitter strike, the courage and solidarity of women is writ large. Throughout the miners strike, March 1984 to March 1985, women were an integral part of the struggle. They took their place in lines against the police brutality, they organised fundraisers, organised and ran soup kitchens, they battled on the streets, they were the cement that helped hold the mining communities together. Without the strength and backing of the women and the communities, the strike would have been quickly crushed.

 

       International Women's Day is a day when we can pay homage to all those women who selflessly fought to improve the conditions of not just women, but all humankind. Women who struggled to improve working conditions, for justice, for peace, for unity of all ordinary people. The miners strike was not just about miners and pit closures, it was about communities and an attempt to stop the devastation of those communities, and women were an inseparable part and parcel of that struggle. That is why the women of the miners strike can take their place on that roll of honour, not only of women, but of working class heroes.

 

  

   Every country, every city, every town, has its roll of honour of such women, perhaps not publicly displayed but it will be there, in folklore, in song, in theatre and poem. Glasgow can be proud of its list of women who fought injustice where they saw it, some struggled away in obscurity, some in the limelight of publicity, all paid their part in improving our lives. Today more than ever we need our women heroes, we need the unity of all men and women to combat the savage onslaught against our living standards. Today more than ever people have to stand up and join hands in solidarity with all people's across the globe.
      Here are just a few of Glasgow's women from our recent past that are worthy of being honoured today.

Mary Barbour, Ethel MacDonald, Helen Crawfurd, Agnes Dollan, Jenny Patrick, Rita Milton, who would you add to this list, there are hundreds if not thousands, from which to choose. Where are our modern Mary Barbour's, where is today's Ethel MacDonald? Can you name them?

       "It is not by changing ministers - such guilty men! - or issuing declarations that fascism will be conquered. The problem is more complex than that. We do not intend to add our voice to those who delude the workers that their 'leaders' will get them out of the mess. The problems need a complete transformation in the present attitude of the working class." Marie Louise Berneri From; War Commentary, December 1940.

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