Bookfair.

        Anarchist Bookfairs, those wonderful gatherings that pop up in towns and cities across the planet, though not enough of them. Some come round faithfully  year after year, others pop up then fade, perhaps to rise again at some time in the future. They are important events, they bring together anarchists and like minded people in debate, exploring ideas, renewing old contacts and making new contacts and friends. They are events for swapping ideas and experiences and helping to bring the family of anarchists closer together helping us be aware of how other anarchists are involved in the struggle for freedom and justice. In my over active imagination I see a world with anarchist bookfairs in every village, town and city across the globe. We are allowed to dream, sometimes that's where we see that better world for all, anarchist try to make it a reality.

The following from Anarchist News:

 

        XIX Anarchist Book Gathering in Madrid, December 3, 4, and 5, 2021
WHERE?
Escuela Popular de Prosperidad (La Prospe) C/ Luis Cabrera 19
Metros: Prosperidad y Avenida de América

Buses: 1, 9, 29, 52, 73
Telephone: 91 562 70 19
Email: prospe [AT] nodo50 [DOT] org

      SCHEDULE OF THE PRESENTATION OF THE XIX ANARCHIST BOOK GATHERING IN MADRID
SATURDAY NOVEMBER 6
       18H PRESENTATION OF THE NEXT EDITION OF THE ANARCHIST BOOK GATHERING IN MADRID. Doubts, proposals and everything you may think of asking.
      19H DEBATE: «THE PURPOSE OF ANARCHIST EVENTS». How do we use these tools? Do we make the best of them so that they truly contribute to our struggles?
       21H DINNER FOR THE SELF-MANAGEMENT OF THE GATHERING. Tasty menu, R.S.V.P. (write to confirm info@encuentrodellibroanarquista.org)

WHERE?
LA BRECHA SOCIAL CENTER
Calle picos de Europa 11i (local) , Vallekas, Madrid, Nueva Numancia 

 

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

It'll Be Fine!

 

       There is no doubt we are in a very new type of situation, and everybody has their own way of looking at this. Some with despair, some with fear, others with hope, I tend to lean towards the hope side. Though having reached my 86th birthday, sometimes that hope wears a wee bit thin, but it is still there.

      The following is from Madrid Cuarentena City N.2

Everything Will Be Fine.

       It’s the story of a man who falls from a 50-story building. To calm down as he falls into the void he keeps saying to himself:
So far so good.
So far so good.
So far so good…
      But it’s not the fall that matters, it’ s the landing. As in the metaphor of the French film “La haine”, we live in a world that has been condemned to disaster. The continued destruction of the ecosystems to extract raw materials, the systematic degradation of the earth’s crust by monocultures and agro-industry, the expulsion or annihilation of species, the transformation of the oceans in dunghills, the irreversible damage to the ozone layer… has had an exponential advance in recent years. They’ve put us on a path which is more than evident a transformation, for the worse, of life on earth.
     At the same time, we have generated societies that are annihilators of the different, of the enemies of risk and adventure.The perpetuation of hierarchies and authorities, slaves of an economic system that puts the flow of goods above everything else. Profit as the only ideology. In which the virtual imposes itself on reality. The simulation to the experience.
     In recent weeks, campaigns were launched in places like Italy and Spain asking children to draw rainbow posters with the message “everything will be fine” or “andrá tutto bene” and then hang them on the balconies or public buildings. Unfortunately, this illusory and innocent message implies complacency with all of the above, a yearning to return to a reality that is self-destructive for people and harmful to our environment.
     And all this has been accompanied by self-incrimination, considering individuals as guilty agents responsible for the transmission of a virus, when it is clear that diseases do not become pandemics because of the actions of a few people, for that a series of infrastructure conditions (such as overcrowding in large cities, for example), environmental conditions, movement conditions, etc. are needed, and of course they are and were given.
      We assume, then, the orders to stay at home for our own good and that of others, in a paternalistic and patriarchal tone. But when we are forbidden to go on the streets alone, or with the people we share a house with, are we responding to medical or public order criteria?
      Meanwhile, let’s clap on the balconies and hang signs… but maybe it won’t go well. It’s even possible that whatever we do won’t go well. The possibilities for the recovery of the planet are infinite, it is not so much that in this resurgence from the ashes we can continue to exist as a species. But we are not going to deny ourselves the pleasure of enjoying this journey, even if it is the last one. We are going to confront, fight, experiment, imagine… pointing out and hitting those responsible for this reality and moving away with our practices from its perpetuation.
      Another world is possible, said the classic leftist slogan, another end of the world is possible, is the slogan that we have no choice but to adopt, and we do so with passion. Muchxs without hope, but with the flame in the eyes when you are so close that you can look into the abyss.

Translated by Act For Freedom Now.

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

Concrete Desert.

      Despite the system trying hard to set up a society where everything is controlled, the city offers up many possibilities of claiming free spaces, where we can function freely with our own desires, mutual aid and respect. All it requires is a little bit of organisation, imagination and ingenuity, and I'm sure we the general public have these in abundance, if we care to use them. The publication, "A Sea of Possibilities in the Concrete Desert" is along these lines and worth a read. 

The following from Act For Freedom Now:

 

Brochure from squatters and resisting spots in Madrid, Athens and Berlin
      ‘A sea of possibilities in the concrete desert: Territory, city and insurrection’ – Madrid & Berlin
       This publication is a compilation of texts that emerges from the discussions and the work we started in the wake of the event “A sea of possibilities in the concrete desert. Territory, city and insurrection” that happened in Madrid during June 2019 in Local Emboscada and Local Anarquista Motin. Is the product of a joint work of some comrades from Berlin and Madrid, that does not finish with the publication of this pages and pretends to extend the discussion that we have shared.
      What does it mean to take territory against the State and Capitalism? How can we take it through our struggles? How does it work domination in the territories that we inhabit? Does it mean our way of living in a territory a conflict with the system?

https://laemboscada.noblogs.or

Concrete-desert.cleaned

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

Rotating Hunger Strike.

 

       Spending money on prisoners conditions is not a vote winner, so our political ballerinas shy away from such activities. Therefore the conditions in almost all prisons are atrocious. Overcrowding is a major problem, leading to psychological and physical health problems, aggravated by the treatment from the cage keepers. Obviously the abolition of the prison system is the only humane direction we should be taking, but in the meantime we have to stand up for the humane treatment of those who find themselves entangled in the loaded judicial system.

This from Act For Freedom Now:

         Madrid, Spain: Rotating hungerstrike info + letter from Toni Chavero, anarchist prisoner

         Hi everywhere, we want to spread this info about the actual rotating hungerstrike in spanish prisons. The horrible situation in spanish prisons, tortures, deads, the basicly nonexistent medical attention,terrible food, bad communication inside/outside, aislation confinement for rebellious prisoners etc. etc. There are thousands of denouncements of this situation in the offices of the European Union Tribunals at least from the last 20 years. No one there cares about this nonexistent human rights in spanish prisons! So the prisoners, with the support of solidarious groups from outside, try to continue the long tradition of struggles against this fascist prisoner system in Spain. So from last September 1st a small group of prisoners started this rotative hungerstrike and Toni Chavero, anarchist comrade actually encaged in the prison of Estremera (Madr.i.p.) wrote this letter:

          [Madrid, Spain] Letter from anarchist prisoner Toni Chavero about the rotating hunger strike in spanish prisons
         Bunker of Estremera (Prison Madrid VII)
5th September, 2019
         Cheers, comrades, I am Toni Chavero. I hope that on the arrival of these letters you will find yourself with strength and courage. We need strength, determination and a firm position. I want to thank you, first of all, for joining these rotating hunger strikes. I have been on strike for five days today, but I didn’t even have to start it, the reprisals came earlier, I have been cut off from communications with three companions, for “reasons of security and good order of the establishment”. Since they lack the arguments or connections that lead to this intervention, they continue to violate our rights and freedoms through the nose, we will see what the court says. Although I know this goes on for a long time, I have set out to recover communications with my colleagues.
The dentist and the oculist don’t even call me. Reprisals or a Hippocratic oath? Or hypocrite?
          The objective of this strike is obvious and necessary: to demand the application of Articles 104.4 and 196 RP to the companions with chronic diseases, their release without the fascist requirement of having to be in terminal phase, I mean, dead, we’re not gonna stand for this. At least they won’t shut us up. That’s clear to us.
        On the other hand, we call for the repeal of the permanent prison that can be reviewed and, of course, for the disappearance of the hidden life sentences. Here I highlight the case of Antoine or Enrique del Valle, because right now I don’t remember any other name; it would be necessary to make a list of all the people subjected to similar situations.Comrade Antoine (Antonio Nieto Galindo), after 40 years, 4 months and 16 days of effective fulfillment, they want to kidnap him to France, these sociopaths, devoid of heart, unaware of the humanitarian spirit. Who are the killers here? All that remains is for them to claim article 100 of the old penal code of 1973: redemption of penalties for works, studies, cultural, artistic, creative activities, etc., etc., etc. We have no choice but to continue sending the writings about it to the incompetent, national and international bodies, you know the addresses by the compañerx out there.
After the end of the first 10 days, I think we should continue to send letters to these individuals, bodies, institutions In solidarity with the comrades who carry out the rotating hunger strikes. After the end of these first 10 days of September, begins the Peque companion (Courage, Angel!) and so, successively, continue, as I know today, ten more people. I know that they will enter, after finishing the comrade Peque, Aroca Lisón, Doblado, Hermenegildo, Tinoco, Marían Tapia… and I do not know who you are the others. Encouragement and many forces! We will reach the end of 2019 and beyond with these rotating demands, because we deserve it and because we can do it. Determination and iron positioning, I have no doubt. And thanks, inside and out.
          I want to thank the colleagues of Tokata and Grupo Pro Presxs of Madrid, for being the ones who have more contact with me, the fact of taking care of us despite the adversities. Thanks is to say little. To all the individual people, to all the Presxs Support Groups that I know you are there, to the Families, to the Solidarity Solidarity Groups all, thank you very much, much strength for the gatherings in the cave of the jailers (SGIP), the concentrations in Navalcarnero, in Albocásser. Thanks to the friends of Alcalá de Xivert (Castellón) for their “Desde dentro” (From inside), the voice of the prisoners and everything they do. Thankfulxs, compañerxs. Come on, add there the informative tables in Anarchist Book Fairs, Tatoo Cirkus, concerts, etc. You are the fucking rod! We feel you strong in here and we are grateful.
       A terrible fraternal and libertarian embrace. May the struggle for a society without cages not cease!
Rebellion and friendship! Also in memory of our compañero Xosé Tarrío and his nai Pastora.
We don’t forget you! Cheers to everyone.
Toni  

      Thanx a lot for the difusión of this letter-document of Toni Chavero. We animate to everyone to support this struggle with solidarity-actions!  You can also write to Toni directly; his address is:

Toni Chavero,
Centro Penitenciario Madrid VII, Estremera
Ctra. M-241, km 5.750,
28595 ESTREMERA (MD)
Spain

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

Attack The Root, Don't Pluck At The Petals.

       I and countless of thousands of others have repeatedly stated that the climate change protests as they stand are delusional. They are appealing to the state to legislate to turn the capitalist destructive monster into a nice friendly green capitalist destructive monster. The planet cannot and will not be saved by states in conjunction capitalists, they are the bedfellows of the destructive system that is capitalism, a system that feeds them unimaginable wealth and power. The answer is obviously outside the state/capitalist way of thinking, capitalism needs perpetual growth, perpetual growth is the destruction of the planet. It is impossible to push for perpetual growth on a planet with finite resources, something has to give. If we continue with this economic model then in the not too distant future, we lose, and the planet goes on for countless more centuries without us. We have to attack the root of the problem, not pluck at the petals. The following article from Contra Madriz puts it much better than I could.

This from Act For Freedom Now:

        Various institutions, environmental groups, trade unions and student groups gathering under the name “Fridays for Future” have announced a so-called “Week for Climate” from the 20th to the 27th of September. Basically this week consists of programmed and alienating demonstrations in which the State and other institutions (UN, G7 etc) are being asked to remedy or take action against the disaster they are causing. In their simplistic and reformist discourse they never criticize the cause of the ongoing devastation: industrial techno capitalism and its technocratic organization of the world.
       They are the ones who criticize climate change without criticizing those who produce it: they have a corpse in their mouths, those who defend the myth of progress, of sustainable development and of a ‘comfortable’ life in exchange for slavery and the commodification of every aspect of our lives, a life sold to technological domination. They are the ones who have purchased the new fashionable product, climate change, from the supermarket of rebellion.
      Fridays for Future? Today more than ever the future does not exist, we live in an eternal present and any vestige of the past has been erased. The technological prostheses that surround and colonize us make us live in a continuous state of sleepwalking, where the catastrophe is not about to come as they insist on warning us, the catastrophe is here and now, the catastrophe is the alienating life directed by the algorithms of our ‘virtual assistants’, the catastrophe is a world already devastated by industry.
      Climate change is just one more of the thousands of harmful consequences of the industrial revolution (the only revolution, that began two centuries ago, that has reached all parts of the planet and colonized and commodified all lifeforms). Climate change is inseparable from the techno industrial system: deforestation, acidification of the oceans, desertification, extinction of thousands of animal and plant species, thousands of chemical products that doom our existence, pollution of land, air and water are just some of the the harmful consequences of this system. We believe that to speak only of climate change without criticizing the techno industrial system is to fall into a reductionism and to not go to the root of the problem.
       Climate change and all the toxicity are the consequences of the technocratic project that manages and administers our lives. A project that consists of colonizing, dominating and commodifying all lifeforms. Once nature has been colonized and dominated, the next objective is human beings, a project based on the convergence of technologies known as NBIC (nanotechnologies, biotechnologies, information technologies and cognitive sciences) to which we can also add robotics and artificial intelligence, their greed has no end. If everything is commodified right down to our daily activities, their profits will not stop increasing. To turn the world and everything that inhabits it into a programmed machine where nothing escapes its control: world-machine, human-machine. This leads us to a mechanistic vision of the world, of ourselves and everything that surrounds us.
     Hundreds of research programs with multi million dollar investments are dedicated to finding new sources of energy. This need for energy for the world to function results in the devastation of territory and annihilation of millions of human and non-human animals. Industrial energy runs the world, it is necessary for the production and distribution of all those unnecessary products that we find around us, it is the economy and it is war. The system has identified and understood as a big business that only ‘renewable’ and ‘clean’ energies will allow to it operate, expand and survive. The new technocratic project is ‘renewable’ and ‘sustainable’, it is ecological. This new project also covers the entire territory, from the industrial deserts of solar panels and wind farms (also causing climate change, devastation of the territory, diseases etc) to eco-cities (non-places where everything is controlled, optimized and automated, also producing hundreds of harmful products and an alienating life). So, to defend green energy is to defend the project that is hurtling us at great speed and a huge rate of progress towards the abyss, it is to defend those who are creating a totalitarian world, it is to defend the project of those who manage and administer our robotized lives.
        This is why we are calling for a week of struggle against climate change and all harmfulness from the 20th to the 27th of September from an anarchist perspective, which goes beyond the limits imposed by social democracy. One more week, in which by means of diverse forms of direct action various groups and individuals will confront the techno industrial system. The week of September 20-27 is only a goal for liberal and statist ecologism, but for those of us who aim for the elimination of the State, capitalism, patriarchy and the techno-industrial system, it is an opportunity to escape the narrow margins of domestication and initiate an autonomous, anti-capitalist and anarchist path against techno-industrial toxicity.

Neither the State nor techno-science will save us.
The struggle is the only way.

(via Contra Madriz)

*Translation note [AWW] – the original title for the week of action translates directly as ‘Week of Struggle Against Climate Change and All Harmfulness’, which sounds fine in the original Spanish language text but does not translate well into English. We toyed with using the word ‘toxicity’ rather than harmfulness, but in the end decided to just leave it out.

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

The State And Repression, Interchangable Words.

 

        Repression will be endless until the state and capitalism are buried deep in the dustbin of humanity's disasters. Dissent and desire for justice and equality will forever be in jeopardy as long as we tolerate the state and its bastard twin, capitalism. Under the existing system you are only free from repression if you are subservient, obedient and submissive, if that is the life you seek, then stay with the present greed driven cancerous system. If you desire a life of equal opportunity, freedom, equality and justice, then you must stand up, speak out and do what you can to erode this exploitative system that breeds deprivation, poverty and endless wars, and is well on the way to making the planet uninhabitable.
       Pick your state, and you will find that those who speak out against this savage inhuman system will be feeling the heel of brutal repression, all stamped with the badge of legality. Those who do feel that brutal heel of repression demand and deserve our support and solidarity.

Published in Enough Is Enough, This from Madrid:

        The following is the statement of the compañeras arrested in Madrid on May 13 in an “anti-terrorist” operation carried out jointly by agents of the Information and Riot Squad of the UIP in two squatted spaces in the district of Tetuán, a house and the Anarchist Space The Ambush ( La Emboscada ).
        Originally published by La Rebelión de las Palabras. Translated by Abolition Media Worldwide.
        “Guilty” or “innocent”, for them our solidarity, complicity and affection.
      On the morning of May 13, an anti-riot unit, together with the group 21 of the Provincial Information Brigade of Madrid, dedicated exclusively to espionage and hunting, burst into our homes and into the anarchist space La Emboscada, three weeks after its inauguration.
        They informed us that they were bringing a warrant for the arrest and detention of two of us under the charge of terrorism.
      During the registration, which lasted approximately 6 hours, comrades from all over Madrid came to show their support.
      Meanwhile, the police seemed especially interested in taking clothes: colored and black coats, scarves of concrete colors, foulards, flower handkerchiefs, specific footwear; they were also interested in agendas, calendars, some notebooks, some notes, notes between the pages of books, computers, hard drives, memory cards, usb, mobiles, cameras and video, CDs and DVDs, construction tools and, in particular, hammers; as well as stickers, patches and T-shirts of the brand M.A.L.P; posters and propaganda in relation to the counter-summit of the G20 2017.
       During the investigation, which has been ongoing since March 2017, they have intervened in emails, ordinary mail, mobile phones, tablets, whatsapp, icloud, dropbox and communications in general. For now, we do not have more information, since the investigation continues under summary secrecy.
        We were detained 32 hours and, although there were times when the situation was confusing and did not seem favorable, any sadness or fear became insignificant when we left and saw the support and solidarity we received from our friends and friends.
       Because even if the State comes for us, the ideas and practices that they pursue are irrepressible and multiply in every gesture of solidarity. And although we do not know what we are accused of, we are very clear about what we are and why we are being persecuted: and we do not ever regret being anarchists.
        Repression has always been on the lookout for those who fight but throughout our lives it has given us strength and encouragement to know that there were anarchists all over the world and people who shared our affinity and, living this in the first person and finding so many people, it has been very beautiful and meaningful for us.
      No anarchist will be alone as long as there are comrades who continue to fight.
        A hug to Embers, arrested on May 1 in Paris and still in prison along with many others. And to all the other anarchists and prisoners in struggle, we do not forget.

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

The Lid Is Still On, But The Pot Is Boiling!!

     The people in Spain have been getting the same message from their government that we in the UK are getting, "things are getting better, the economy is on the mend.". Of course the people in Spain don't feel that, and don't believe the propaganda, nor should we. 

     Protest in Spain and Greece have been almost continuous for a number of years now, but the mainstream media, that babbling brook of bullshit, just reports words from the mouthpieces of the financial Mafia, economic gurus and the pundits who kneel before the altar of eternal growth.
This from Roar Mag:

       The latest short documentary in the Global Uprisings series explores ongoing resistance and self-organization in the midst of the crisis in Spain.

        As social conditions continue to deteriorate across Spain, people have been turning to the streets and to each other to find solutions to the crisis. This film tells the story of the massive mobilization that saw millions of people converge on Madrid on March 22, 2014; the story of the proliferation of social centers, community gardens, self-organized food banks; and the story of large-scale housing occupations by and for families that have been evicted. The film pieces together many of the creative ways that people have been coping with crisis and asks what the future may hold for Spain.

        Filmed and edited in March/April 2014, it is part of the Global Uprisings documentary series. View more at globaluprisings.org.

Pieces of Madrid from brandon jourdan on Vimeo.

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Madrid, March, 22,2014.

        Where else but in Spain would you see so many black and red flags, black flags and banners proudly displaying the large circled "A"? It does your heart good to know that this isn't history, this is here and now, this is Madrid, March, 22, 2014. Salud, in solidarity.

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

March 22, Madrid.

     While Glasgow had its fair sized, and I would say successful, anti-racism, anti-fascism march on Saturday March 22, in Madrid it was somewhat different. On that day Spain held a protest against the conditions being imposed on them by the financial Mafia. The attendance figure for that demonstration was in the region of two and half million. They came from all over the country and from surrounding countries. Spain like Greece, is suffering poverty and deprivation on a massive, criminal scale, with the usual promise of pie-in-the-sky, if they will only suffer more poverty and deprivation and for a longer spell.

   

   I am most certainly against racism and fascism, but we need to organise a pan-European fight against the system that breeds these diseases. As long as we have capitalism we will have, if not overt, then latent or covert, fascism and racism. The system needs them to scapegoat individuals and groups for its own failings. Focus on the root cause, capitalism, it can't be humanised, it can't be modified to our benefit, it can't be a fair and just system, it will always be an exploitive system that benefits the few at the expense of the many. 

      To all those who took part in that massive Madrid display of demand for real change, Saluda, in solidarity.

This from XPressed:

 

Up to two and a half million people took to the streets in Madrid yesterday to protest against the economic and anti-social policies of the government. Six blocks arrived in Madrid from all around the country; according to the Organisers of the March for Dignity (Coordinadora 22M), some 70,000 people travelled on buses (total of 900), trains, or by private means, and even on foot! (about a month ago they began their journey on foot to Madrid). Other blocks came from abroad, for instance from Berlin and Hamburg and other cities to join the protest.

Photos from Xpressed

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

How Long Before It All Explodes?

      Spain is home to almost one third of the Euro regions unemployed, with an unemployment rate of over 25% and it has been at that for six quarters in a row. That's a lot of misery, poverty and deprivation, while the financial Mafia keep screwing the people and muttering about adjustments and growth.

         “I’m glad I don’t have any children, because I don’t need to worry when I go to bed without dinner,” says Nieto, a Madrid native who last drew a salary in 2010.

This from Anarchist News:

Riots in Madrid, Barcelona, Zaragoza,

Victory in Burgos

Submitted by Anonymous on Sun, 01/19/2014 - 13:04

     On January 10, riots began in the city of Burgos, Spain, when police attacked a protest against the gentrification of the working class neighborhood Gamonal.
http://anarchistnews.org/content/revolt-burgos-spain
     Riots continued for 4 consecutive nights, and afterwards opponents of the project to construct a ritzy boulevard through Gamonal continued mobilizing to block the construction.

   People in dozens of other cities organized solidarity protests. Protests were held in Madrid on the 14th and 15th, turning into riots both nights in response to the typically heavy handed response of Madrid police. On the 16th, solidarity protests also turned into riots in Barcelona and Zaragoza. In Barcelona, masked protesters smashed over a dozen banks, luxury hotels, Starbucks, Burger Kings, and other businesses, setting fire to a number of them, and pelting police with trash, bottles, and unprecedentedly potent fireworks that set the police jumping (in a city where riot police don't flinch when quarter sticks of dynamite go off at their feet). The protest/riot went all the way to the Generalitat, the seat of the Catalan government, where people continued to throw objects at police. Police reinforcements arrived, dispersing protestors, who subsequently attacked a police station on Las Ramblas and smashed more businesses in Jardinets de Gracia, a significant distance away.

Madrid
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wXfagNGgLM
Barcelona (videos show attack on police station, don't show the heaviest damages)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mcLvurz9Mv4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1o-tSNnqQA
Burgos
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSDWJuOr9vY

   The same day, authorities in Burgos announced that the construction project was suspended.

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

Pensioners Demand Their Stolen Money Back.

     Yesterday, Thursday 21 November saw the usual Thursday night demonstration against the Bankia bank in Madrid. This is the case where the Bankia bank in its eagerness to re-capitalise got thousands of mainly elderly to invest their life's savings in special preferred shares, stating that they would be a good return and they were as safe as houses!! Well we all know what happened to houses in Spain. They bank went bust and the administration took the lot. Elderly pensioners lost their life's savings and are demanding their money back. Individual cases are taking years to go through the courts and they are being offered a fraction of their original money, if anything at all. Some however are in no position to wait years as they are mainly elderly people. This is the usual inhuman, unjust, compassionless treatment that we would expect from an exploitative system run by the financial Mafia.

    The demonstrators, armed with a colourful array of banners, placards and posters, closed the main Gran Via street with their numbers. This has been a regular protest for some time now, but sadly the government and the courts know that this is an elderly group, and if they drag their heels on this one, the numbers will thin down. The scum can wait, the pensioners can't. 

Photos from Demotix.

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

Austerity, Poverty, 21st. Century Capitalism.

      Austerity continues unabated in Spain, with the usual wage cuts/freezes, massive layoffs and the resultant poverty that ensues with such policies. Monday 4 November, saw thousands of the refuse collectors demonstrate in Madrid, it was a noisy and colourful affair, they set off fire crackers, chanted and started bonfires in the Puerto del Sol plaza. This was to mark the start, at midnight, of an indefinite strike by the refuse workers in protest against the plans to lay-off more than 1,000 staff. The refuse workers started to converge on the Puerto del Sol plaza in the late evening. Another city, another angry population, another country facing deprivation, the face of 21 century capitalism.

 Photo courtesy of Demotix.com

      This picture is repeated across the world, how do you keep silent, how do you keep calm, when millions die in poverty, while the few lavish themselves in unimaginable wealth. A wealth created by us, the ordinary people. As children die of hunger, the parasites grow fat on their blood. This system has nothing to recommend it to the ordinary people, it is a system of abuse and exploitation that favours the greedy.

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

ASSEMBLIES, THEN WHAT?

This from Info Exchange:

Occupy to Self Manage
By Michael Albert

         I have yet to see my nearest large occupation, Boston, or the precursor of all U.S. occupations, Wall Street. Instead, I have been on the road for the past six weeks in Thesselonika and Athens Greece; Istanbul and Diyarbikar Turkey; Lexington, Kentucky; London, England; Dublin, Ireland; and in Barcelona, Madrid, and Valencia Spain.

        In all these places, I talked with diverse individuals at many meetings and popular assemblies. I met people involved in occupations, as well as audiences assembled by my hosts to hear about participatory economics. Beyond addressing assigned topics, my own priority was to learn about local movements. I repeatedly asked what folks struggling for many months wished to say to other folks first embarking on similar paths.

Boredom, Disempowerment, and Consensus Obstruct Growth
       In Greece and Spain, a single message predominated. It had nothing to do with analyses of capitalism or other analytic focuses. Instead, Greek and Spanish activists reported that they had massive assemblies in widespread cities and their occupations grew, grew, grew, so that assemblies were up to 12,000, 15,000 - and then they shrunk, shrunk, shrunk, so that assemblies are now not meeting, or are meeting in the hundreds, or less. ---

Continue READING:

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MAY DAY ACROSS THE WORLD.

          Though the Glasgow May Day showing was a low key affair, the same could not be said about the rest of Europe. Across southern Europe the numbers were in the hundreds of thousands, unions in Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal and France used the traditional marches to express anger at the attack on their living standards from the financial Mafia's “deficit reduction” program throughout the Euro Zone forcing countries deeper into recession. In France the trade unions organized around 300 demonstrations across the length and breadth of the country including the capital Paris. The Interior Ministry stated that 316,000 people turned out, compared to 77,000 in 2011. In Italy demonstrators briefly clashed with police in riot gear in Turin and thousands marched in Rieti to listen speeches denouncing Prime Minister Mario Monti's reforms. Madrid saw tens of thousands march in the rain to the main square chanting and waving signs opposing the “austerity cuts”, Lisbon saw similar numbers, while in Athens around 5,000 workers, pensioners, unemployed and students marched with banners reading "Revolt now" and "Tax the rich".

SOLIDARITY.

         This sort of activity was repeated across the globe, from Asia to America, from Europe to Australia. May Day is most certainly alive and kicking. There are some excellent photos of May Day rallies across the world HERE

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WORKERS KNOW YOUR HISTORY.

         We are always hearing politicians talk of eradicating poverty with this scheme and that scheme, or appealing to the general public to support various charities. The thing about charities is that we are told of all those hungry people and are asked to contribute money to help feed them. From this we can deduce that the food is there, but the greedy bastards who have all that food will not send it to the hungry until we the general public pay them some money. They obviously don't think that charity has anything to do with them, except perhaps an opportunity to make some more money. Filling cans with money and buying food will never get rid of poverty, it is built into the system of economics that we live under. Destroy the system and there is every possibility we will eradicate poverty.

         Some interesting facts and figures from Anarchist Without Content:

In our modern world, poverty is not natural, but the result of institutions that are set up to benefit a few at the expense of the many. Relief efforts are currently failing because they do not address the root causes of poverty. These causes are not mystical or hard to identify, as the most important ones are global property law, international debt, unfair trade, top-down privatization programs, corporate tax shelters, the those problems are social and political. Furthermore, there is a history to these problems, and poverty will not be addressed until this history is reversed.

HISTORY

The colonial conquest of the New World, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia, by European powers set up the structure of our current economic system.

History books have done a good job depicting the brutality of this period. In many places, Europeans wiped out 99% of the native populations. In places where the natives did survive, many of them were captured and made to do hard labor. In Potosi, Bolivia, for instance, native Bolivians were forced to work silver mines that snaked deep into the earth. So many miners died, that a popular saying goes “enough silver was taken from the mine in Potosi to build a bridge to Madrid, Spain, and if the bones of the dead miners were pulled from the bowels of the mine, one could build a bridge all the way back.”

Continue READING:

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FINANCIAL COLONIALISM.

        The corporate fascists continue with their hatchet job on the Greek people and at the same time having imposed an financial technocrat as boss of the Greek government, they are now intent on demolishing any semblance of democracy that the Greek people ever had. As well as demanding that the politicians put in writing that they will carry on with the “austerity” measures as directed by the corporate fascists, even after new elections, they are also demanding that they put officials in place in Greece to run the Greek fiscal policies. It is modern colonialism, corporate financial colonialism. What is more there is nothing that says that they can not, and will not, do the same to Italy, Spain, Portugal, Romania, or any other country that they feel they need to, to protect their billions and their power. After all they already have installed a Goldman Sachs hit man to run Italy. We, the ordinary people have to stand with the Greek people, we have to accept that this is not a national struggle, it is international struggle and only by international solidarity of all our people do we have a hope in hell of defeating this corporate assault on all our living conditions.

EDINBURGH.

       It is encouraging to see that there have been demonstrations of solidarity with the Greek people across Europe and there has also been demonstrations of solidarity in the US. Are we slowly awakening to the reality of our situation?  Just some of the support for the Greek people from around the world, may it rapidly grow. 

MADRID.

ATLANTA

GERMANY.

CHICAGO.

CYPRUS.

SYDNEY.

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SPAIN: ANARCHISTS AND MAY 15 MOVEMENT, REFLECTIONS.

HOW DEMOCRACY WORKS IN SPAIN. 

   

     The following is a short extract from a very interesting article posted on that excellent site LibCom It is well worth reading the full article.

        A reflection article written by anarchists in Madrid on the occupation at Puerta del Sol, leading up to the neighbourhood assemblies which took place on May 28.

        This text was written in Madrid, so many of the descriptions and reflections may not match the reality of other locations, especially given the heterogeneity of the 15-M Movement. Even so, we think that it could be useful as a point of departure for reflection for all the comrades involved in the assemblies, regardless of the site. The text was written and corrected hastily so that it would be ready before the convocation of village and neighbourhood assemblies on May 28. Keep this in mind while reading it and excuse any mistakes that it may have.

-Some Anarchists from Madrid.

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CHALLENGE TO SPAIN'S POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC STATUS QUO.

         The following was lifted from IndymediaScotland. It is always good to get some information on what is really happening in protests across Europe and the rest of the world for that matter. Let's make no mistake, these are not lots of protests, this is the one global protest against an economic system that plunders the Earth and condemns millions to abject poverty and millions more to a life of stunted desires devoid of opportunities. A system that has failed the people of the world and yet is being pushed down their throats by an small bunch of thuggish parasites. It will only stop when power is wrested from their hands into the hands of the ordinary people across the globe.

     ann arky is alwys interested in hearing from people on the ground, those involved in the various aspects of this world protest, drop a wee note.

EDINBURGH.

Interview with Michael Albert, co-founder of Z Magazine , conducted by Scott Harris.

SPAIN.

The economic crisis gripping Europe and government austerity measures have triggered angry demonstrations in major cities across the continent, including Athens, Paris and London. More recently, young activists in Spain poured into the streets, and taking inspiration from the popular revolts in the Middle East and North Africa, have occupied Madrid’s Puerta del Sol Square. There, Spaniards from all walks of life have gathered in unexpectedly large numbers to protest an economic and political system they say has given them no hope for the future. Activists in the Square, who call themselves “Indignados,” or the outraged, have organized themselves into a small city run by democratic councils. Police attempts to forcibly remove the demonstrators only swelled their numbers. 

ATHENS.

Story continues HERE.
 
 

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