Showing posts with label mass organisation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mass organisation. Show all posts

Wednesday, 3 November 2010

REMEMBER, REMEMBER THE 11th OF NOVEMBER??

       
       Every day, every month, the workers have a history to tell and write. Though we could go through the month of November and find volumes of working class history worth remembering, I think this one is of special significance. It highlighted the depth of hypocrisy and corruption that the state will go to in an attempt to crush those who stand up to fight for the rights of the ordinary people. This event was not about the deaths of eight police officers, mostly killed by police bullets, it was about trying to crush an idea. An idea that workers could organise together in an attempt to better their conditions. To this day, states all over the world are still trying to put obstacles in the way of workers organisation. Some states more brutally than others but all will go as far as the feel they can get away with in an attempt to keep the workers "in their place".

      Perhaps you could let ann arky know what piece of November working class history you think is significant and why. Write it in the comments for others to read. Our history must be written or it never happened.  Read some of Glasgow's working class history HERE.         
      
      November, 11, 1887, the Haymarket anarchists, Spies, Fischer, Engel and Parsons were executed at Illinois prison. It became know as one of the greatest miscarriages of justice in American legal history. The Haymarket affair, also known as the Haymarket massacre, started in May, 4, 1886 when a mass meeting was held in Chicago at Haymarket Square in support of a strike for an eight hour working day.
       The police moved in to disperse the meeting, at that point an unknown person threw a bomb at the police lines, the unsuing confusion of the bomb and gunfire resulted in eight police officers being killed mostly from “friendly fire”. There was also an unkown number of civilians injured and killed.
       The legal proceedings that followed saw eight anarchists tried for murder, the trial also received international publicity and the verdict received international condemnation. Although the prosecution conceded that none of the accused had thrown the bomb, four men were convicted and executed and one committed suicide in prison. At the execution, Parsons’ last words are reported to have been, “let the voice of the people be heard.”
     The Haymarket affair is usually seen as significant in the origin of the workers International May Day. It was also seen as the event that brought about the caricature of the “bomb throwing anarchist”. Although none of the accused threw the bomb, to this day, that caricature is still used by many, among them the mainstream media.
     The site of the incident was designated a Chicago Landmark on March 25, 1992. The Haymarket Martyrs' Monument in nearby Forest Park was listed on the National Register of Historic Places and designated a National Historic Landmark on February 18, 1997.
 

Tuesday, 3 August 2010

ANOTHER GREED DRIVEN THEFT.


      My aren't the political Mafia fickle? One moment they say one thing, the next they say another. For a while the Scottish SNP government was saying that Scottish Water would remain in public ownership, then some economist waved some magic numbers in front of their eyes, like £3 billion and suddenly they are considering handing over one of the Scottish people's most valued assets to the millionaire club of the corporate world.
      If this goes ahead, and I think it will, it will fit perfectly into the plans of the machete millionaire twins. Their strategy of slashing cuts has as its aim the final dismantling of all public assets of any worth and handing them to their millionaire friends, thus creating a society where nothing is there for the public good but merely to make money for their already obscenely rich parasite friends.
       Water is a natural resource and is so important that is should in no way be in the hands of the corporate greed machine. In their hands it will just another product to be sold or exported to the highest bidder. Having water run in your home when you turn on the tap will be at the vagaries of the market, need will not come it to it, cash will be the deciding factor. The poor will be priced out, and that essential product will become a luxury. Can you imagine flushing the toilet just once or twice a day to save money? Skipping the kids bath time as it costs too much? Just try to think how your life would change if you had a meter on your water and the price kept going up like gas and electricity.
       The Scottish people must organise to prevent this latest plunder of their assets, we have already seen the common goods neatly stashed away out their control. This plunder will go on and on until there are no such things as public assets. Then the corporate world will really have you by the balls and they will squeeze until your eyes pop and then leave you when you are an empty husk