Choices.

(Image: Daily Record/Tom Ross)

        Stefan King, reputed to be worth a cool £54 million, owner of Glasgow's Corinthian, Delmonica's and The Social, has suggested that his staff take three months unpaid leave to save their jobs, not to save his company of course. He has also put it in such a fashion that he is doing them a favour. This is the same Stefan King who was back in 2015 reputed to be paying staff below the minimum wage, and in 2019 had questions raised by the Gambling Commission about suspected money laundering at his Corinthian gambling club.
        No doubt as the catastrophe that is Covid19, and the ticking time bomb that is the Brexit fiasco, burst upon us, we will see more of these type of offers coming from those extremely wealthy corporate beasts as they try to milk the situation for all it is worth.
        As unemployment soars and social services diminish, there is very hard times in store for us the ordinary people. What are we going to do about this sledgehammer of poverty and deprivation that is about to strike us? Shall we appeal to our lords and masters the political ballerinas, to please take our taxpayers money and give it to the corporate world so that they will employ us again? Or will we look inwards towards our communities and organise mutual aid, self help, co-operatives and take what we need for the welfare of all our people. Commandeer those workplaces that we deem to be necessary for the health and well-being of our communities. Take control of our own lives and decide how we want to live without the exploitation of the profit driven capitalist system, owned and controlled by muti-billionaires, who by the way, while you and I have seen our struggles stiffen,  have seen their wealth grow immensely during this pandemic. The choice is ours to make, accept more of the same, or take control of the change we want to see.

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

Mutual Aid.

         It is encouraging to see that across the planet people are on the street protesting against the brutality of the state apparatus, through its front line of defence, the police. Black Lives Matter, has been the spearhead, but these protests have encompassed many more grievances that have brought global anger at the entire system to the surface. Before this outburst of justified anger there was a lot of action on, and talk of, the many mutual aid projects that had mushroomed across the world since the start of the covid19 pandemic. While the protests might be getting all the attention, we should never forget that it is with the mutual aid groups in our communities that we can change the way we live our lives and help to bring down this festering unjust and brutal system.

       Mutual aid groups take many shapes and forms and we must learn from each other, what is the best way to circumvent and undermine the economic system that has us tied to its yoke. It is a new world for many, many who have never before thought of mutual aid, but now see it as the way forward. Let's discuss it, exchange ideas, and link up from community to community, and encourage more to get involved. The street is where the battles may take place, but we need the back up of those mutual aid groups to cement any progress we make. 

       The following is an interesting article on Mutual aid from Crimethinc:

 

 

Finding the Thread that Binds Us

Three Mutual Aid Networks in New York City
Current Events
        Fundamental social change involves two intertwined processes. On the one hand, it means shutting down the mechanisms that impose disparities in power and access to resources; on the other hand, it involves creating infrastructures that distribute resources and power according to a different logic, weaving a new social fabric. While the movement for police abolition that burst into the public consciousness a month ago in Minneapolis has set new precedents for resistance, the mutual aid networks that have expanded around the world since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic point the way to a new model for social relations. The following report profiles three groups that coordinate mutual aid efforts in New York City—Woodbine, Take Back the Bronx, and Milk Crate Gardens—exploring their motivations and aspirations as well as the resources and forms of care they circulate.

        This is the first installment in a series exploring mutual aid projects across the globe.
       Food distribution at Woodbine, a social center in New York City.
      With politicians such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez calling for the people to engage in mutual aid in order to survive the COVID-19 crisis, those not previously familiar with the term might never guess it was coined by an anarchist scientist who advocated against central government. As economies collapse and the institutions of state and capitalism fail to protect people’s health and livelihoods, communities have been left no choice but to rely on each other. This has led to a proliferation of spontaneous mutual aid networks in communities where none previously existed, often cohering around Facebook groups and Google documents.
      Many communities, particularly those of poor and working class people, have long understood that we cannot rely on governments to meet our needs and have been providing for each other through autonomous grassroots collectives since well before anyone heard of the coronavirus. Now, the question is how to use the momentum of mutual aid’s recent popularity to transform the status quo and make these principles the basis for a new way of living together. An important first step will be to establish a clear distinction in the public consciousness between real mutual aid projects, which are founded on the principles of autonomy, horizontality, and solidarity, and initiatives that promote mutual aid in name only—those based more on a charity model, which serve to supplement and stabilize, rather than disrupt, state and capital.

Read the full article HERE: 

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

The End Of Austerity!!

 

        As usual our political ballerinas are prancing around with their opposing views. On the one side, the opposition spouts gloom and doom, while the group with their hands on the controls, waffle on about "austerity is over", and everything is wonderful and will only get better if you leave them in control. Then through the portal into the real world and we find the truth. The use of food banks in UK has risen by 13% this year, people are still being callously sanctioned for trivial and unjust reasons, and losing their benefits for varying periods from one week to one year, pushing them into deprivation and desperation. This winter it is forecast that their will be an increase in deaths from fuel poverty. Which translates into people sitting in their home during the UK winter with no or too little heating and in some cases dying a slow death.

      What kind of society takes the only means of survival away from poor and vulnerable individuals and families, by deliberate means of "sanctions". What is the outcome for a young family when their income is stopped, in a society where money is your means of survival? This is callous vicious vindictiveness based on an ideology that the poor must be intimidate to obey and be submissive, or at worst, a cull of the poor. 

      How can we claim to be a developed rich modern country when there is an ever increasing number of our people, to survive, are having to seek food from charities?

      While the UK spent. 2016/17, £35.3 billion on defence, the world's 5th largest defence budget, the same government is quite prepared to see an increasing number of its elderly people suffer strokes, heart attacks, pneumonia and death, simply because they don't have enough money to heat their homes.

     This is the real picture of the "end of austerity" a country that has seen, during the ten years of "austerity", the richest section of our community double its wealth, while the rest of us have seen our standard of living rapidly decrease, and we continue to slide down that slippery slope to ever greater deprivation. All of these factors can be reasonably named engineered poverty.

       This is the best that capitalism can deliver, is this the way we want to live, is this the world we wish for our children? The answer is not to look to the very wealth political ballerinas to come to our rescue, they wont. Their corporate buddies need us as a large pool of submissive cheap labour, it helps their profits. The answer as always, is in our own hands, to take control of our own lives, our communities and workplaces, and shape them to the needs of all our people. Don't expect the rich and powerful to come riding on a white charger to sort out your problems, that's up to us, and only the people can and will solve the problems of the ordinary people.  

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

A Ploy To Get You Off The Street.

        The latest show from the UK's Theatre of Lies, The General Election, has come to an end, the curtain has come down, the media frenzy abates, now back to the usual world of poverty, exploitation, homelessness, food banks, lousy wages and wars. All that time and energy, all those long TV shows and heated squabbling, in a few weeks will be dead history, and capitalist juggernaut will go merrily on its way, of ruthless exploitation, and its brutal rape and plunder of our planet, but it did give our babbling brook of bullshit, the mainstream media, a lot of bubble gum and popcorn to spew out over us.

       The capitalist system with the backing of the state has the incredible ability to morph and change, but retaining its basic structure. All those radical groups, people’s assemblies, etc. who start to form a political party, and/or enter into dialogue with the existing system to extract improvements, at best, do no more than readjust bits of the system here and there, but leave the raw structure of the capitalist system intact, much to the pleasure of the ruling elite. At the moment the system is in a critical state of turmoil and unrest, more and more of the people across the world are showing their anger at the inequality and injustice of the system, and the power mongers are looking around for any method that will hopefully return them to some sort of control. If this means new political parties, calling for more democracy, being given legitimacy, and in doing so restoring the public’s faith in “representative democracy”, then so be it.
       Probably the best known of these “people’s” movements in Europe, are Syriza in Greece and Podemos in Spain. Both came together as a manifestation of the people’s anger at the establishment and its brutal policies of exploitation, corruption and austerity. Both consisted of a mixed bunch of radical left, anarchists and ordinary people, who wanted real change. Both looked like they might challenge the system. However, both formed political parties, walked through the portal of parliament, and took their seats in the marble halls of power, both became part of the system, bolstering up the capitalist elite’s desire to get the people off the streets and bring them back to the acceptance of “representative democracy”, Accepting the parliamentary road they had taken the anger, and will of the people for real change, and channelled it into lobbyists within the system to ask for a few more more crumbs and crusts from the capitalist booty. 

        To take your protests and people’s assemblies down the parliamentary road you are cementing the status quo, you may gain a few more links in your chains, allowing you to walk a little further, but you will remain shackled to the capitalist beast of exploitation, poverty, homelessness and wars.
       Your freedom lies outside parliament, on the streets, in your communities and in your work places, organising horizontally to take control of these areas, short circuiting, by-passing, circumventing and stifling, the so called “will of parliament”. Building real horizontal democracy based on the needs of all our people, sustainability, co-operation as opposed to competition, and mutual aid, only then will you see the cancer that is capitalism wither and die, only then will the people control their own lives. 

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

Direct Action.

       Exarchia is a district in Athens that has for a long time, been an area where anarchists/libertarian socialists/communists have lived gathered and claimed as their own. Recently the drug lords have moved in, while the police look the other way trying to catch litter loots. No doubt with a hope that the drug dealers will eventually destroy that libertarian ethos of the area. However, Greek anarchists have an admirable habit of confronting their enemy with forceful direct action. 

This from Act For Freedom Now:

The struggle against the State, Drug mafias and Social Cannibalism
continues…

       Against the plans of transforming Exarhia square into a field of control, consumerism and drug dealing, Anarchists and Communists we moved organized and collectively, factually opposing the activity of dealing drugs. An activity which continued in Exarhia square even today despite the declarations of the minister of public order. In a world that promotes profit and control as “values”, there is no room for delusions.
       Only our struggles, struggles against misery and subjugation, can really liberate spaces, so social self-organization and class solidarity can blossom. These struggles are the obstacle against state enforcement, capitalist brutality and drug mafias who are sub products. Today, September 9th we raided Exarhia square unannounced and with a target, located drug dealers and gave them the message they deserve.

Comrades against the mafias.

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

Electing The Lying, The Greedy, The Power Seekers.

      Well the grand five yearly Crooks and Liars competition is drawing to a close, and all the competitors have all followed the rules impeccably. They have used every variety of lie and deceit, in every variation, they have hurtled vitriol at each other, they have all promised Utopia, they have refused to answer questions, and on the odd occasion they have come out of their little bubble of unreality, and touched mere mortals in the street. During this Crooks and Liars competition, each candidate names the other as a lying, misleading and dangerous anti-democratic menace. 

 

      However, those who win this extremely expensive charade of smoke and mirrors, will, with a smiling arrogant pomposity, take their seat in the Westminster Houses of Hypocrisy and Corruption, referring to each other as "Honourable Members". They will then proceed with the usual activities of handing out little titbits to their friends and buddies. A little slice of the NHS here, a little subsidy there, a little tax relief to needy millionaire friends. Of course they will not forget themselves in this divvying up process, there are lavish expenses to be fiddled, there are foreign junkets to be enjoyed, wining and dining with the great and good,(the greedy), and attending to their lavish pensions. 

       All of this will of course, be paid for by pillaging the public purse, taking from the poor and the needy, and that's what makes this, not just a stupid lying game, but an attack on the welfare of us, the ordinary people. The Crooks and Liars competition is just another way of perpetuating this greed driven system of exploitation of the people. It's not funny, it is a deadly serious procedure to create the illusion that you, the people, are in control. To a degree you are, you can take part in this charade and hand them power, or you can ignore them and take control and organise your communities the way you want them, working in co-operation with other communities, by communities I mean of course, all that is in them, workplaces, shops and offices, etc. We don't need an cabal of Crooks and Liars divvying up our wealth to their advantage, but they do need us for their unearned lavish lifestyle. We can surely sort this out.

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

Glasgow Games Monitor.

A wee message from The Glasgow Game Monitor 2014:

Hi all,

      We've updated the Housing Monster event page on the site. It now has youtube clips of all the films, a list of non-academic (accessible) reading materials, and some photos of the event. Please circulate to anyone who might be interested in viewing the films or accessing the reading material. http://gamesmonitor2014.org/fighting-the-housing-monster-film-and-discussion-event-sat-nov-1st-kpc-11am-4pm/

     We've added people who gave their names at the end of the event to the Games Monitor 2014 list. The traffic is very light at the moment but if you don't want to be on the list, our apologies, just unsubscribe at the bottom of the page. Also this is an announcements list, so if anyone wants to contact the group please contact us personally or use the contact address: gamesmonitor2014@googlemail.com Thanks to everyone who came, we all enjoyed the event! We'll let you know if anything else is planned. Cheers, Glasgow Games Monitor 2014

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

How Stupid Can We Get?

     I once had a lot of chickens, I was a bit worried about what might happen to them, so to protect them I paid for a group of foxes to be responsible for protecting my chickens. I then went about my daily business, working, watching football and taking the kids to the park. Then one day I went to have a look at my chickens and they were all gone. The foxes were still there, strutting around looking rather pleased with themselves, and they all look a good bit fatter. Was I rather stupid?

    Well just think, we have a NHS and we are a bit worried what might happen to it. So we pay a bunch of very rich people, who have a vested interest in selling it off, to be in charge of protecting our NHS!! One day we will take a good look at our NHS and find it has all gone. The very rich people will still be there, looking rather pleased with themselves and a lot richer.

 

Thanks to Mathew Lyall for the photo.

    That place of pomp, privilege and grandeur, The Westminster Houses of Hypocrisy and Corruption, is stuffed full of very rich people, many of them millionaires, lots of whom have interests in companies that would gain immensely from the privatisation of the NHS. These are the people that we pay to protect our NHS, while we go about our normal daily business. Are we rather stupid? Isn't time we got rid of the two-faced greedy parasites, and started looking after our own affairs? Ever heard of community control, people's assemblies, etc.? Is it wise to pay greedy millionaires to protect you from greedy millionaires? Perhaps you think that they are not really interested in wealth and power, and all they think about is your welfare, now that really is stupid.

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