Class War.

           The state/corporate war on the ordinary city dwellers goes on unabated, it takes on the polite and harmless sounding label of gentrification, Gentrification is the process of changing the cities form living spaces to money making machines of tourism and expensive entertainment. The serfs that will work these new money making centres will be banished to live in the periphery of the city in soulless poor quality schemes. City centres become perfect cathedrals to the class system that dominates the economics of capitalism. Know your place and money is your key to entry, but we know there are ways to fight back. Our imagination solidarity and desire for freedom are our weapons.

The following from Act For Freedom Now:
       Berlin. There are currently seven so-called KbOs areas, considered “high-crime rate locations” in Berlin: Kottbusser Tor, Hermannplatz, RAW, Görli and Wrangelkiez, Alexanderplatz, Rigaer Straße, Hermannstraße. 

 

 

Originally published by Indymedia DE.
        Here, the police have the power to establish their own security measures by stopping, identifying and searching people they consider suspicious of crime, even if there is no reason to do so. These measures end up taking the form of racial profiling and other types of discrimination. Controlled and criminalized are mainly Black people, People of Color, Rom*nja and Sinti*zze, groups of young people, drug users, homeless people and sex workers.While the criteria for establishing them are determined based on the discretion of the police, free transit is hindered and prohibited and people are criminalized and deported.
        The streets do not become safer as a result. They are perceived as more insecure and become completely impassable for some groups. Thus legitimizing the monopoly of violence in public spaces by capitalism and the mechanisms of the State. And contributing to the invisibilization of those who do not fit into a capitalist, racist and patriarchal system.Gentrification and social control are going hand by hand by displacing of population from the center to the periphery of our city, creating “safe” neighborhoods from precarious social groups. Leaving a showcase city for tourists and yuppies that have little or nothing to do with those who today we try to build networks of mutual support, solidarity and resistance in every neighborhood of this city.
       That is why on September 12th, during the Entsichern congress, we want to make these spaces ours with a bike demonstration that will go through these areas.
       September 12, 05:00pm (17:00), Alexanderplatz, Neptunbrunnen, Berlin.

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

"Gentrification And Ghettoisation"

       It is a world wide phenomena, changing cities. Cities used to be where ordinary people lived, worked and had their leisure activities, those days have gone. To day cities are being turned in to, "business centres" or "pleasuredromes" for the wealthy, centres for tourists to come and spend their wealth. Expensive luxury apartments, glossy, glitzy restaurants, expensive coffee bars and "high fashion shops. In some areas, the ordinary people of the district are being pushed out to make way for what can only be called university towns, one or more universities surrounded by student accommodation. All this is to make money for the chosen few, the small group of parasites that control our lives by duplicitous financial manipulation. We accept that we should be excluded form our cities and herded on the periphery, or we decide that the cities belong to the people and not the financial Mafia. If we believe we should live in our cities we will have to fight to take them back, they are not going to gifted to us by the invading corporate juggernaut.

     The following article is from Athens, but could be from any city in the developed world. The ordinary people are being herded out to the periphery to be housed in  cheap, shoddy schemes, lacking in amenities. A systematic policy of "gentrification and ghettoisation". Out of sight of the prancing privileged as they enjoy their existence in the consumer illusion of happiness made of bubble and fizz.

This translated version from 325: 
Original source: https://athens.indymedia.org/post/1597841/

         Tourism grows like flowers in the spring, security cameras appear like leaves to protect the peaceful citizens. Everything must be clear, beautiful and in developmental path. The appearance of the city should fit into the list of Aegean Airlines. Tourists do not need a lot, some chain stores and hipster coffeeshops, a good guide to explaining which places to avoid, and something that fits into the “authentic Greek experience”. We look forward to the next group of tourists who will take a selfie around the Acropolis.At the same time, our neighborhood degrades slowly. People who can not respond to the increase of rent price are either forced to find another home to stay or are forced to comply with the new rules. At the same time, investors are exacerbating the situation as they buy old houses, which are being demolished and, in their place, they are building luxurious housing estates. Apartments renovated for short-term rent (AIRBNB) as well as public spaces and parks are privatized reducing free and open spaces. The game is as old as the same city is listening to the name of private property . The rule is also simple: whoever does not own, will pay, whoever does not pay will be expelled. People who are not part of the capitalist machine, little illegal sellers and homeless people, illegal graffiti and political posters, life in general, and things that can not be sold will disappear. We know very well that nothing will be given to us because we do not belong to the owners’ side. We know that we do not even fit into this suffocating capitalist context, nor do we want to keep up with the logic of bosses and investors. That is why we are fighting against their expansionist and developmental plans.On Tuesday 9/04, we visited a boutique (as they call it) of luxury apartments, which is in its final stage of implementation, on Kolokotroni street between Koukaki and Petralona. Kolokotroni Street is a street with several old or abandoned houses, and it seems that the crows of the construction company from Glyfada have put it in the goal. During our visit, we put a banner that read: “RICH PEOPLE GET BACK TO YOUR SUBURBS, HOUSING IS NOR A LIFESTYLE NEITHER A PRODUCT, IT’S A NEED (A)”, we throw paint on the freshly painted walls and advertisements of the company, write slogans and open holes or even completely tear apart interior walls. Nevertheless, investors insist on forcing us to a second visit and today they have put cameras thinking that we will stop.

OUTSIDE THE INVESTORS FROM OUR NEIGHBORHOOD AGAINST AIRBNB AND LUXURY APARTMENTS NO ATTACK TOWARDS OUR LIFE WILL STAY WITHOUT ANSWER IF WE DON’T GET ORGANIZED IN ALL NEIGHBOURHOODS, OUR CITIES WILL BECOME MODERN PRISONS

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

RAW CAPITALISM - PEASANTS BEWARE.

    

        Capitalism doesn't change it's spots, it is a system of exploitation of the many for the advantage of the few. At the end of WW2 and the existence of the Soviet Union creating a threat of Communism across Europe, and other places in the world, capitalism modified slightly. In the West it made concessions to the working class and the middle class, grants to higher education, a health service, social housing, a welfare system, to help the poorest etc.. With the collapse of the Soviet Empire and Thatcher's subsequent destruction of the trade unions, the threat of communism had gone. The need to appease the workers no longer existed. Capitalism could get back to its true form, it was time for raw capitalism with the gloves off. What we are living through is the system of capitalism mounting an all out attack on the working class and the middle class. For the majority real austerity will be the order of the day, with education an expensive luxury for the rich, a health service that will cater for those with the most money, charity your only hope of social services. Bankers, CEO and their sidekicks will live in ever increasing luxury. Our billionaire landed gentry and nobility are back in full control, peasants beware.

         Our children will be denied a decent education, without which it will be impossible to understand the complexity of the geopolitical system that is draining their lives, let alone organise to change its structure. Society will be fragmented with petty crime on the increase, communities will become ghettos. A rather frightening picture but the only out come from an unchallenged system driven by one overriding desire for profit, a system where human beings are no more than expendable resources. The gap between the ordinary people and the billionaire ruling class will be unimaginable. The answer for the majority of people on this planet does not lie in capitalism and time is of the essence.

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