Work?

  

         We have created a society, a structure that demands we sell ourselves to someone or something in order to gain sustenance to survive. Work becomes the term used for normality, the desired state to find comfort. In order to have a decent life we look for our slave master, we accept our slavery, or we could find ourselves homeless, destitute. In most cases this work enriches others rather than ourselves and our family. The more we look for and accept work as a means of survival the stronger the power of our slave masters. Until we realise this, we hand a heritage of slavery to our children and our grandchildren. Work is dressed up as good and honourable, the right thing to do, when in fact all it does is strengthen the links on our chains, binds us to an unjust, unequal and insane structure that will, in the end, if allowed to continue, destroy us all and our planet.

 

The following from Act for Freedom Now:

      Let’s destroy work, let’s destroy the economy!

         Let’s destroy work, let’s destroy the economy! We are not concerned with the political problems of those who see unemployment as a danger to democracy and order. We do not feel any nostalgia for lost professionalism. We don’t want better wages or the continuation of subsidies. Nor are we for the abolition of work, the discovery of alternative ways of life, or the reduction to the minimum in order to live happily. We want the destruction of a system that makes us beg for the minimum necessary so as not to starve to death.
        We want the destruction of work and this society, of what we do during the day and its continuation that extends until night, a perpetual circle that never seems to end. We refuse to remain prisoners in this prison without bars or walls, but whose objective is exactly the same: resignation to what they tell us to accept, to the bosses’ orders and to the police that protect them and protect what we need to destroy.
        We want the destruction of the rule that makes us continue like this, prisoners of a job that takes all: our time, our energy, our creativity. The destruction of work is above all the destruction of survival, a step into the unknown. Destroying work means attacking, attacking that on which work is based and that which it produces. The attack does not affect profit indirectly, as a strike does, but hits the structure directly, either the means of production or the end product. And the object to be destroyed, although it is property, is also work, because it is something that results from work.

 

 

 

We do not want to be destroyed by capitalism, so capitalism will have to be destroyed by us.

 

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

A Just Struggle.

          Anyone with a rational and objective mind who takes a look at the system that we presently live under, will admit that it fails dramatically to produce fairness, justice or equality to any acceptable degree. Our society is riven with injustice, inequality and by any measure lacks fairness. The divide between those with power and wealth and the ordinary individual, is an unbridgeable chasm. Opulence, pomp, privilege, power and wealth sit cheek-by-jowl with homelessness, hunger, poverty and deprivation, creating a vision that makes a mockery of "democracy" and human decency.
         However we are naive in the extreme if we believe that those who exploit and oppress us will, through dialogue and peaceful protest, willing give up their power and privileged position and abandon their obscene wealth in an attempt to make society a fairer and more just society. They will use whatever means available to them, to protect their wealth, power and privileges, be it by passing laws, backed up by force, or blood on the streets.
       We have to accept that those who hold that wealth, and power which endows them with privileges are our oppressors, who work hard at maintaining the unbridgeable chasm. As oppressors we have to treat them as such, we can't ask them to please give up your wealth, power and privileges so that we have a fair society, it won't work. Perhaps we should think hard about the words of Frederick Douglass, escaped slave, abolitionist, writer, and orator.

        “Those who profess to favor freedom and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing the ground; they want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. This struggle may be a moral one, and it may be a physical one, or it may be both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. Find out just what any people will submit to and you have found out the exact amount of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them, and these will continue until they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of whom they oppress.” -Frederick Douglass

         Only a revolution will replace this greed driven economic system that degrades the human spirit and breeds inequality and injustice. However, you can't buy a revolution, you can't make a revolution, you have to be the revolution, and a revolution will not come with a bunch of roses in its hand.

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

The Long Struggle.

Photo courtesy of Telesur

        The people of Haiti have been in struggle since and before they proclaimed the island as a republic. A slave population that took control of their own lives and freed themselves from French imperialism. Well not quite, France forced the people of Haiti to pay reparations to the slave owners for the loss of their slaves, or face military destruction. Those payments went on until 1947 continually dragging the economy of the island down and enforcing poverty on the people.

        Now the continuing struggle of the people has taken a new twist as the police fight the military on the streets of Port-au-Prince. Only the people can determine how this stage of their battle will resolve itself. These are a people dragged from their homes and families in Africa, sold into slavery on the other side of the world, battled and struggled to be free, and still their struggle goes on. Imperialism doesn't loosen its grip freely or quickly, it will do its damnedest to squeeze the last drop of blood from its conquests. 

        Which ever way this stage of their struggle goes, the people of Haiti deserve our fullest and continuous solidarity and support.

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

The Release Of Some Bile.

        This little piece is just the release of some bile that has been bothering me for some time now.

       Europe, one of the supposed centres of the civilised world, an extremely wealthy enclave. The usual story put about of how the Europeans came so wealthy is that here was the heart of the industrial world, a continent of hard working intelligent people who introduced the world to a multitude of inventive industrial processes.
        Of course this mythical history of Europe, is built on a series of massive lies. The wealth of Europeans, was 100% built on savage brutality. We Europeans sailed forth and landed on a continent we called America, plunder it is lands and brutally killed its people, genocide was the foundation of the wealth that flowed from there to Europe, bolstered by the savage growth of slavery. It is estimated the the indigenous population varied between 5 million and 15 million, but by the end of the "Indian Wars" it had dropped to a little over a quarter of a million. We arrogantly rampaged through Arab Africa treating the indigenous population as lower animals slaughtering where we felt necessary, to allow us to plunder their resources. Sub-Sahara didn’t escape the European blood lust, we moved into a land where people had live for countless centuries and called it ours. Any resistance to this mindset was met with savage slaughter and genocide. In that vast and ancient country of India, once again we moved in, called it ours and subjected its people the some of the most horrifying slaughter imaginable, countless millions dying as our iron grip milked the country for the benefit of the wealthy Europeans, in this case mainly British. China wasn’t over looked in the European arrogant attitude of superiority, Asia and China received the same treatment as we intended to call the part of the world ours, and plunder with impunity. As usual local resistance would be met with the customary European savagery.
        The wealth of the Europeans is soaked in blood, for centuries we have prospered on the suffering and death of countless millions, and most of the conflicts across the planet today, are actions of that arrogant bunch of Europeans, (of course that includes those who settled in America), as they try to hold onto what they see as their right to plunder and control the world’s resources. Nothing has changed in the arrogant attitude of the established wealth of the Europeans, and nothing will change until we recognise that no group has the right to dominate any other group. Nothing will change until we get rid of this unjust system of arrogant wealth and power accumulation, and replace it with a system of social justice, a system built on sustainability and the needs of all our people.
Burrp. 

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

Rain Of Terror.

I couldn't help myself from lifting this from arrezafe.

Rain of Terror
By Abiodun Oyewole
Excerpts from a poem by Abiodun Oyewole, of The Last Poets.

America is a terrorist killing the natives of the land
Killing and stealing has always been America’s master plan
To control the earth and everything on it
To divide and conquer is all they wanted.
America is a terrorist killing the buffalo that roam the plains
Killing and slaughtering animals was turned into a game
Giving blankets contaminated with small pox
The natives were killed, the beginning germ warfare
The beginning of white fear.
No respect for the land, the trees, or the air we breathe
And Christianity was an excuse to bring others to their knees.
America is a terrorist with a slave system in place
To take away the humanity of a darker race
Put people in chains, then beat them with whips
Made them give up their names
Those who survived the slave ship.
America is a terrorist with a Howdy Doody grin
Using the Bible to keep others in check
While America commits all the sins
Thou shalt not kill, that’s not part of the American dream
For to kill is a thrill they love to show on your TV screen
Romance the gun just for fun.
Drop a bomb just for charm.
This is the American Way.
And all of this talk about equality, justice and peace
Spewing out of the mouths of these governmental beasts.
But every time Blacks tried to find a way to do for self
The American terrorist wasn’t having it
And fear was all Black folks felt.
America is a terrorist feeding off racism and greed
Not caring or sharing, but enjoying watching people bleed.
For over 400 years Blacks have lived in fear of the vicious cruelty of the racists.
They tried to march for justice and civil rights to be treated fair
Attacked by dogs and fire hoses, beaten by police, forced to live a life in total despair.
They bombed the church in Birmingham while the children were in Sunday school
Took the lives of four little girls, yes this terrorist was just that cruel.
American terrorism is like a virus that’s home grown and spreads across the planet too.
Selling guns and chemical weapons, gift-wrapped in red, white, and blue.
Soldier boys selling guns for hard drugs in exchange
It should be obvious by now that this country is deranged.
America is a terrorist and no one wants to admit
And pointing the finger at others is the ironic part of it.
Drop a bomb in Philadelphia to wipe out an organization called MOVE.
Killed unarmed women and children because the police had something to prove.
And all the Black Panthers who were trying to help their community
Wiped out by the FBI for trying to create Black unity.
Put drugs in the hood, set folks up for no good.
Kept unemployment high, education is laced with lies.
Turn the people against each other.
Made money more sacred than your mother.
Cause an avalanche of grief by trigger happy police.
Locked the Black man up in jail, made him think he was born to fail.
And no place are you safe if you have a darker face.
Henry Dumas, Amadou Diallo, Yusef Hawkins, Michael Griffith, Anthony Báez, Eleanor Bumpers, Emmett Till, James Byrd, just to name a few
Died at the hands of American terrorists.

Terrorism here ain’t nothing new.

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

Slavery And The Prison Struggle.

       A fact that is little broadcast by our babbling brook of bullshit, the mainstream media, is that it was the “abolition” of slavery, (we all know that it didn't really get abolished, just transformed), that gave a tremendous boost to the industrial revolution. As the slave owners were obliged to release their slaves, they were richly compensated by tax payers money for their loss. As they found themselves with buckets full of cash, they looked around to see how they could make it grow. So the the new industrial era got under way. This little map gives you some idea of the money that flowed into the pockets of the genteel folks of Edinburgh, who had their hands well dipped in slave ownership. This avalanche of tax payers money to slave owners, was repeated across the UK and elsewhere. 

 

      In support of the ongoing US prison strike, 325 has an interesting article that explains how today’s US prison system is more or less a continuation of the slave system that built empires. During the European imperialists expansion, slavery and indentured servitude were the backbone, the fertiliser, of capitalist growth and imperialist expansion. Little has changed, capitalism still thrives on slave labour, allied to cheap labour.

 

From 325:

 Prisons in the USA – The dark side of slavery in American society

        In order to be in the position to understand the importance and necessity of the us prisoners’ struggle, we first need to analyze the role of slavery in the foundation and evolution of the american state and its historical and integral ,until today, link with the capital.
      Slavery in its many forms was actually the foundation on which the omnipotence of american overlordship was gradually built. The root of this phenomenon can be traced back in the era when the christian empires of europe started a race to conquest unknown lands, founding colonialism regimes, in the era of brutal genocides of the indigenous populations and the slave trade of the non-white african population. Since then and until today, the social and political circumstances have rapidly changed, mainly because of a heavy blood tax that has been paid from beneath, towards the direction of the total shaking off of slavery as an institution. However, it continues up until today, more or less covered.
      Today’s prisoners’ class and racial composition, the spreading of private prisons, the institutionalization of enforced labor as a form of criminal sanction, the exploitation of prisoners by big companies highlight the fundamental connection between state-capitalism-slavery and prison.

Slavery in the first colonial systems

      During the first years of the “new world’s” colonization and until the early 18th century, most of the settlers were not free but were under a status of an idiotype slavery, known as “indentured servitude”, which aimed in equipping the colonies with cheap workforce. The “indentured servant” signed a contract according to which she/he was mortgaging her/his freedom and provide her/his work to a master for a period between 5 to 7 years and, in exchange, the latter covered her/his transportation expenses to the colony. In practice, it was happening by the signature of the contract between the “indentured servant” and the ship owner and the subsequent transferring of the contract to the new master, as soon as the ship arrived to the “new world”. The institution was initially introduced in 1619 through Virginia Company. It has been calculated that 80% of the refugees in the american colonies before american revolution were under this status, while only 40% managed to survive. “Interventured servants” consisted of three categories : -----------

Continue reading:

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

Workers Know Your History, Nat Turners Rebellion.

     August, 21, 1831, workers in Southampton County Virginia rose up, they were a specific kind of worker, they were owned and fed by their "masters", they were slaves. Though we say slavery was abolished, slavery still goes on all over the world. In some cases it is the slavery of old, owned and fed by their owners, this is slavery in its most barbaric form. However the vast majority belong to that new regime of slavery, where the slave is handed a pittance and sent out to find shelter and feed themselves. That form of slavery goes under the name of wage slavery. Today the slaves are still rebelling against their conditions and it will continue until we finally overthrow the individual and corporate slave owners. 

From Wikipedia:

      Nat Turner's Rebellion (also known as the Southampton Insurrection) was a slave rebellion that took place in Southampton County, Virginia, during August 1831.^[1] Led by Nat Turner, rebel slaves killed anywhere from 55 to 65 people, the highest number of fatalities caused by any slave uprising in the Southern United States. The rebellion was put down within a few days, but Turner survived in hiding for more than two months afterwards. The rebellion was effectively suppressed at Belmont Plantation on the morning of August 23, 1831.^[2]

      There was widespread fear in the aftermath of the rebellion, and European-American militias organized in retaliation against the slaves. The state executed 56 slaves accused of being part of the rebellion. In the frenzy, many non-participant enslaved people were punished. At least 100 African Americans, and possibly up to 200, were murdered by militias and mobs in the area. Across the South, state legislatures passed new laws prohibiting education of slaves and free black people,^[3] restricting rights of assembly and other civil rights for free black people, and requiring white ministers to be present at all worship services.

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

What Is Freedom?

   To all the the world, seasons greetings from Percy Bysshe Shelley:

XXXVIII
'Rise like Lions after slumber
In unvanquishable number,
Shake your chains to earth like dew
Which in sleep had fallen on you-
Ye are many-they are few.

XXXIX.
'What is Freedom?-ye can tell
That which slavery is, too well-
For its very name has grown
To an echo of your own.

XL.
''Tis to work and have such pay
As just keeps life from day to day
In your limbs, as in a cell
For the tyrants' use to dwell,

XLI.
'So that ye for them are made
Loom, and plough, and sword, and spade,
With or without your own will bent
To their defence and nourishment.

XLII.
''Tis to see your children weak
With their mothers pine and peak,
When the winter winds are bleak,-
They are dying whilst I speak.

XLIII.
''Tis to hunger for such diet
As the rich man in his riot
Casts to the fat dogs that lie
Surfeiting beneath his eye;

XLIV.
''Tis to let the Ghost of Gold
Take from Toil a thousandfold
More than e'er its substance could
In the tyrannies of old.

XLV.
'Paper coin-that forgery
Of the title-deeds, which ye
Hold to something of the worth
Of the inheritance of Earth.

XLVI.
''Tis to be a slave in soul
And to hold no strong control
Over your own wills, but be
All that others make of ye.

XLVII.
'And at length when ye complain
With a murmur weak and vain
'Tis to see the Tyrant's crew
Ride over your wives and you-
Blood is on the grass like dew.

XLVIII.
'Then it is to feel revenge
Fiercely thirsting to exchange
Blood for blood-and wrong for wrong-
Do not thus when ye are strong.

Excerpt from The Mask of Anarchy.

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

Britain's White Slaves.

       Here "Circled A Radio" discusses a little know history, the British white slaves, and the start of racism.

Enjoy it HERE:

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

Can There Be Democratic Slavery?

      Currently this government is doing a great job in helping their millionaire corporate friends to cut their labour costs, all part of the drive for a low wage economy. The new legislation that will come into force on April 2014, will take workfare, (unpaid forced labour) to a new level of exploitation. Job centres will be able to hand out tougher community service orders than the courts. What will your crime have been? Why the heinous act of being unable to find work. They say that slavery was abolished, but what do you call being forced to work without pay, for a rich multi-national company such as G4S? The simple truth is that those who call this society a democracy are liars or fools, or perhaps both.

       This from Boycott Workfare:

       Currently EOS, Maximus, Learn Direct, Reed in Partnership, ESG, G4S (tax dodging supremos) and Interserve (they rely on prayer & financial support from Christians) are all inviting bids from voluntary sector ‘partners’ to provide Community Work Placements in a ‘real working environment’ for up to 30 weeks, for up to 30 hours per week. In other words, forced unpaid labour for people who have not found ‘sustained employment’ while on the Work Programme.

     The criteria for being sent on a Community Work Placement are ‘lack of motivation‘ (for example a reluctance to be exploited in no pay, low pay jobs) and/or ‘lack of work experience‘. Claimants will have to do these placements alongside ‘supported job search’: the exhausting and pointless process of endlessly looking for non-existent employment opportunities. As blogger Johnny Void says: “This new scheme represents 780 hours unpaid work, over two and a half times higher than the maximum community service penalty that can be handed out by the courts.  And this is just for the crime of being unable to find a job.” Read the rest of this entry »

Read the full article HERE:

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

Death Of An 8 Year Old Bride!!

      Today, people are living in slavery in countries all around the world. Slavery is hidden away in factories, on farms, and behind closed doors, in homes and other places in the cities and towns of the world’s richest and poorest nations. But with the power of a worldwide movement, social networks, and technologies, we can expose these hidden crimes – so that ours is the last generation that needs to fight the trade in human lives.

An appeal from walkfree.org:

      The story is all over the news – days ago, Rawan, an 8-year-old Yemeni girl was sold by her parents, forced to marry a man five times her age and on her “wedding night”, her fragile young body sustained fatal injuries. 

      Right now, the collective horror of the world is focused on the devastating death of an 8-year-old girl. We’ve seen thousands of emails, Facebook posts and tweets from our community calling for action. We know that ending Forced Child Marriage everywhere poses big obstacles and yet, this may be one of few fleeting moments when millions of at-risk girls are counting on the support of a global movement of activists. We’re not going to let them down.

     Forced Child Marriage is a form of modern slavery, and in Yemen there is no law that makes it illegal. It’s common for girls as young as 8 to be forced to marry to settle debts. In fact, 50% of girls in Yemen are married before they reach the age of 18.

    The Yemeni Government has the power to bring an end to Forced Child Marriage forever; the first step is to ban the marriage of anyone under the age of 18, protecting children from a life of domestic and sexual slavery. The Yemeni government needs to know that the eyes of the world are watching and expect their swift response. Will you help?  

      Ask the Yemeni Government to end Forced Child Marriage by making marriage under 18 illegal.

     Rawan’s story has struck a chord with people everywhere.  As well as depriving girls of their right to a childhood, Forced Child Marriage leaves victims vulnerable to sexual, emotional and physical abuse at the hands of their so-called husbands and extended families.

    Now is the time to act. The Walk Free community is over 3.7 million strong and growing rapidly. Our collective voice is powerful – we can urge the government of Yemen to pass crucial legislation protecting children and young girls from the brutalities of forced marriage.

      Forced Marriage is modern slavery and can be stopped. Call on the government of Yemen to ban Forced Child Marriage.

      The idea of being sold into a life of domestic and sexual slavery seems unbelievable, and it’s sad that only extreme cases like Rawan’s gain attention. How amazing would it be if these cases never made the media – not because they were unreported, but because Forced Child Marriage no longer existed?

     Thank you in advance for your support. If you have a moment, please forward this email to 3 of your friends so we can become one step closer to building a world free of this form of modern slavery. 

In solidarity,

Debra, Nick, Mich, Kate, Ryan, Jess, Amy and the Walk Free Team

P.S. On Twitter? Follow us  

1. http://www.hrw.org/news/2013/09/10/yemen-end-child-marriage

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

FUTURE SLAVERY.

    Part of the bailout deal forced onto the people of Greece by the Troika, is that Greece privatises its public assets. These are assets that bring money into the public purse of Greece and could be spent on social services. One of the companies, soon to be privatised, in which the Greek state is the principle shareholder is ELPE (Hellenic Petroleum), while anther big money spinner that is set to be privatised on instructions from the troika is OPAP the state owned gambling monopoly. Two enterprises from which, it is virtually impossible not to make pots of money, to be handed over to the friends of the troika, the corporate world. While the troika are stating that Greece is bankrupt, they are forcing it to sell off that from which it could earn income.

      Of course it is all going to plan, the blatant and barefaced plundering of all that is public and transferring it to the private corporate world, the impoverishing of the people to replenish the gambling losses of the financial Mafia. What is more it is not just Greece that is being plundered in this fashion, it is world wide. Take a look closer to home, we here in the UK have already lost a host of rich assets to the corporate greed merchants, coal, gas, electricity, telephone, railway, now instead of being money earners for the public purse are part of the rip-off machine that grinds us ever nearer deprivation. However it doesn't end there, bit by bit education is being privatised, the National Health Service is halfway down the road to privatisation, social housing has all but disappeared, and there is much more to come. The corporate world will attempt to make money from anything, we are already seeing the development of a lucrative prison system. Which will of course mean that policies will turn to making sure that it has a steady and ever increasing flow of people to keep it profitable, it's called growth. The corporate world are not investing in large prisons as a short stopgap to help us out, their eyes are on future profits. Capitalism, no matter its shape or form, that is the direction it keeps moving.

      Do we really want to live in the faceless world of corporatism, a world over which you have no control what-so-ever? A world where you have no say in the shape and direction of your community, a world where everything is available to the rich and nothing available to the poor? Look carefully at what is happening, that is the road we are sleepwalking down, if we don't wake up soon, it will be too late and we will leave a heritage of slavery to the corporate world for our kids and grand-kids.

ann arky's home.

THE CORPORATE WORLD FOSTERS CHILD SLAVERY.

        An appeal from AVAAZ regarding child slave labour in India. Slavery is abhorrent in any form, but child slavery must rank at the bottom of the barrel. No child should be denied an education, no child should have its potential destroy, no child should be denied its childhood.

  
Dear friends,

India is stalling the toughest child labour law in its history... because politicians say it’s not a ‘priority’! But the majority of MPs support it and all they need is a massive public push to bring it to a vote. Let´s raise our voices for India´s children. Sign now:

     The Indian Parliament is closing without passing the toughest child labour law in its history. Worse, the bill is supported by the majority of MPs, but it was ignored for weeks, because they felt it was not a ‘priority’!

     India is the world’s child labour capital -- kids as young as five are sold to traffickers and forced to work as modern-day slaves, abused and beaten. The historic new bill would ban outright any child labour under 14 and provide stipends for poor families to keep their children in school. But MPs have let it fall off their agenda, and Indian child rights groups say they badly need our help, now, to ramp up the public pressure.

     If the Avaaz community comes together, we can create a wave of attention to the bill, and push MPs to vote. Sign this urgent petition and forward it widely -- when we reach 1 million we’ll deliver our message to the Parliament with former child workers:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/india_child_labour_g1/?bwqhjab&v=20550

    A staggering 215 million children work in mines, quarries, and factories around the world. All nations have signed an agreement to put the eradication of child labour at the heart of their national education plans. But, India is home to the largest child labour force in the world. If the new law passes, it would ban all child labour for under 14-year-olds and all harmful work for under 18s. The law even has provisions to ensure it doesn’t hurt the poorest families -- enshrining the right to free education and proposing stipends to compensate any losses.

     Critics say the real problem isn’t the law, it’s bad enforcement. And it’s true that in the last three years in India less than 10% of the 450,000 reports of child labour were prosecuted under the existing, weak, law. But the new law packs some serious punch. The police will no longer have to wait for a court order to act. All forms of commercial child labour under 14 will be criminalised, and instead of meaningless fines or short prison sentences, the criminals will face tough penalties.

    While the majority of MPs say they'll support the bill, there's no political urgency to bring it to a vote. But each day they delay, more children are forced into a life of sweatshop misery. It’s up to us to push them over the edge. Sign the petition to India's MPs now, and share widely:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/india_child_labour_g1/?bwqhjab&v=20550

     The Avaaz community has campaigned to protect the children and the most vulnerable, time and time again. Just weeks ago, 1.2 million of us got together to help pass the most comprehensive education plan in Pakistan. How we treat our children is a reflection on our moral compass -- and it´s time to take firm steps against their abuse. Let’s join together to speak out for the future of India’s suffering children.

With hope and determination,

Jamie, Alice, Alex, Alaphia, Lisa, Jeremy, Ricken, Dalia, Rewan, Michelle and the whole Avaaz team

MORE INFORMATION:

India proposes ban on child labor (Washington Post)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/india-proposes-ban-on-child-labor/2012/08/29/ef9d802a-f1f2-11e1-a612-3cfc842a6d89_story.html

Getting ready for the new law against child labour (The Hindu)
http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/article3878212.ece

Over 60 million child laborers in India (India Tribune)
http://www.indiatribune.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2884:over-60-million-child-laborers-in-india

35 child workers rescued from Delhi factories (Business Line)
http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/industry-and-economy/economy/35-child-workers-rescued-from-delhi-factories/article1694550.ece

End Child Labour and Educational Disadvantage - report and film
http://educationenvoy.org/

Support the Avaaz Community!
We're entirely funded by donations and receive no money from governments or corporations. Our dedicated team ensures even the smallest contributions go a long way.

ann arky's home.

WE LINGER IN THE BORDERLANDS.

A quote from The Anarchist International:

          "We once made watches to buy time for ourselves. Some of us still do. But time is our enemy and we cannot toil for it any longer. The old world is gone and the Anarchist International persists, lingering outside of time on the borderlands between slavery and freedom."

Read the full article HERE:

        Hopefully, soon there will be no borderlands, as slavery disappears from our consciousness and freedom is the only reality.

A SLAVE BY ANY OTHER NAME.

      Did the West really abolish slavery, or did it merely re-label and re-package the concept? Are those who have to sell their labour power really just selling their skills or are they selling themselves? Can you separate the skills from the person, therefore, as an employee are you free?

Carole Pateman points out the implications of the employment contract in her book The Sexual Contract:

       Capacities or labour power cannot be used without the worker using his will, his understanding and experience, to put them into effect. The use of labour power requires the presence of its “owner,” and it remains as mere potential until he acts in the manner necessary to put it into use, or agrees or is compelled so to act; that is, the worker must labour. To contract for the use of labour power is a waste of resources unless it can be used in the way in which the new owner requires. The fiction “labour power” cannot be used; what is required is that the worker labours as demanded. The employment contract must, therefore, create a relationship of command and obedience between employer and worker.... In short, the contract in which the worker allegedly sells his labour power is a contract in which, since he cannot be separated from his capacities, he sells command over the use of his body and himself. To obtain the right to the use of another is to be a (civil) master. [1]

[1]Carole Pateman, The Sexual Contract (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 150-151.

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21st. CENTURY SLAVERY, UK STYLE.

      

        Every day it becomes more obvious the the ConDem millionaires coalition is nothing more than the unadulterated self interest of the millionaires club, a straight up front attempt to safeguard their unearned wealth by slashing the welfare state and allowing their other millionaire friends to offer the services at a price and a profit to them. Privatisation brought in under the guise of necessary “austerity cuts”. They know it is class war, isn't it about time we reacted accordingly? This cabal of millionaires are now not afraid to show their true colours, to hell with the pretence of “liberalism”, it is now in with the hatchet and carve everything up for privatisation. At the same time placing the blame on the last bunch of corrupt fraudsters, with their mantra, it was all their fault, while they gleefully go about attacking the living conditions of the working class.

         They will spout their favourite phrase, “deregulation” which will remove any form of community control and carve up even the most basic services to the poor and vulnerable, to allow their millionaire mates to step in and make a killing at our expense. What is on the cards for the working class is a society controlled by Group 4, Capita, etc. with the only guarantee being crap wages, no job security, longer working life, if you manage to get a job, and shit pensions. All this along with high unemployment decimated health service and shredded education system. There will of course always be the few charities struggling to do their best to help out in this Victorian society of deprivation.

          Another little trick they have up their sleeve is, if you have been unemployed for any length of time on job-seekers allowance, (in the midst of high unemployment) you will be “obliged” to do 30 hours manual labour a week, for free. It could be council work picking up litter or some other job that the council has to pay somebody to do. So I don't see the council employing people when they can force them to work for nothing. For those people with a little dignity and a belief that slavery went out some time ago, who decide not to demean themselves or take somebody else's paid job away, they will be hit with their benefit being stopped for three months, all £65 of it.

        This is the millionaires co-joined twins' “Big Society”, everything privatised, slavery for thousands and crap wages and conditions for the “lucky”. All this while the millionaires who dreamed up the plan laughing all the way to the bank, chuckling, “suckers”.

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LOCAL WHITE SLAVES.

    

     When people in this country talk of and condemn slavery they are invariably talking about that abomination where we “civilised” whites, ripped poor unfortunate Africans from their homes and shipped them half way across the world, brutalised them and forced them to work as machines that were possessions of the plantation owners. We are alas, rather reluctant to admit that some our upper crust individuals in Scotland made quite a fortune from this slave labour.

     However what is completely glossed over is the white slavery that went on here in our own Bonnie Scotland. The Scots landed gentry and industrial bosses were not too bother about enslaving their own white Scots brothers. In a move to protect the Scottish landlords the pre-Union Scottish parliament, enslaved colliers, saltiers, lead miners and fisher folk. Another form of free labour was the practice that was encouraged by the authorities as a way of reducing vagrancy, masters were encouraged to seize able bodied beggars and retain them as slaves.

     There was also the the business of families to avoid starvation selling themselves as indentured servants. During the slavery period there were as many as 100,000 Scots worked in the American plantations as indentured labour, they weren't slaves, but that was in name only, to all intents and purposes they were slaves. The UK parliament outlawed the practice when it abolished slavery. 

     If we look at our history and count those of our ancestors who worked for the “landed gentry” for no wages, then we can assume that there were millions over the years who in this country could be classified as slaves.

     Now of course we are all wage slaves, shackling ourselves to mortgages, credit cards and other debt in an attempt to gain some sort of living standard, the system hasn't really changed, it is just that some of the slaves have more goodies to reward them for their labour.

 

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