Myths.

 De-deifying Mary Barbour.

 Image courtesy of Internationalist.

          Mention the Glasgow-Clydeside rent strike and people will say Mary Barbour. It is as though nobody else played any major role in that class struggle form 1915. The rent strike didn’t even start in the district where Mary Barbour lived, Govan, it started in Linthouse and spread to Glasgow and down as far as Clydebank. There were thousands of ordinary women threw threw themselves into the struggle many took a major role in this event. Communities across this area of Scotland organised groups to stop sheriff officers entering buildings to serve eviction notices. This was a vast community event with ordinary people playing the major role. Mary Barbour was just one of them. There is never any mention of Jean Ferguson, an activist who played a major part in the Glasgow struggle. Jean’s husband was an anarchist, a shipwright at Fairfield’s Shipyard, who was fined for organising strike, which was illegal during this period, refused to pay the fine and went to prison, Jean shared his anarchist principles. There were thousands of “Jeans” who played a major part in this tremendous struggle, who after the strike went back to being housewives, factory workers, shop assistant etc..Mary Barbour owes her fame to the fact that she went on to be a Glasgow councillor, and became well known as Mary Barbour of the rent strike. When the rent restriction act was passed freezing rents, the Glasgow part of the strike called it off. However a little part of history that seems to get over looked is that Clydebank didn’t. They carried on the strike for a further 6 months, claiming that the rent increases that had been passed on to the tenants were in fact illegal. Eventually it went to court and it was stated that in Scotland a landlord can’t just increase the rent. They first must draw up a new tenancy agreement with the tenant who has to sign the agreement, the tenant failing to do so the landlord can then apply for an eviction notice. Since none of this was done, the court ruled that the increases were therefore illegal and those who had paid the increases should be refunded. This again was the ordinary people of Clydebank who came together as one force and beat the system, six months after the Glasgow strike had had been called off, and Mary Barbour was well on her way to becoming a City councillor.

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Gone?

 

           It is always sad to see the demise of an anarchist journal/magazine, there is never enough of them circulating. So thanks to Storm Warnings for their prolonged effort, you will be missed. There are still some out there, Anathema for example, and hopefully new ones are being created by the up and coming generation of anarchists that keeps the tradition of journals and magazines  with anarchist ideas and hopes alive and kicking. 

The following from Act For Freedom Now.

     The final issue of Storm warnings, anarchist bulletin for the social war, issue 59-60(December 2022) came out. It is the full English translation of Avis de Tempêtes.

Storm warnings, issue 59-60 (December 15, 2022) :

For reading

For printing (A4)

For printing (Letter)

“To conclude, if it has always been a pleasure to write and elaborate each issue of this bulletin, we must also say that after five years, the desire to put an end to it has arrived. A certain weariness in seeking to ensure this regularity, the sometimes difficult lack of feedback or intertwined debates,
the observation of a redundancy in our ways of approaching the vast questions of action, certainly also the limits of the instrument itself, are all elements that contributed to our decision to conclude this experience of Storm Warnings. Such a decision might seem paradoxical, knowing that
the interest and need we feel for such spaces of reflection and elaboration are still alive, but the instrument we have forged over the years does not lend itself to a new start or a new format. It seemed to us more appropriate to make it disappear, so that other projects could see the light of day.”

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The 30's?

   

            It should be noted, that in France, Macron is not in power by the will of the people, he received 15% of the vote, but only 28% voted, so the vast majority of the people of France don't want him in power. How far will the people of France go to change their society to the benefit of the majority? On the 23rd of March it is estimated that 2.5 million people took to the streets in France to voice their anger at what is being imposed on them by a man who does not have the support of the majority of the people. There is now evidence of some of the police and riot squads are standing down and walking with the demonstrators. If this is true it is obviously a good sign for real change, will the people of France persist in their drive and grasp that opportunity to change French society for ever and to the benefit of all their people? 

 
 

Image courtesy of The Guardian.    

         Just across that imaginary line they call a border, in the patch of land called Germany, March 27th marks Germany's massive "mega strike" all transport comes to a halt, railways, airports, buses and metro. When was there such massive anger and discontent across Europe, perhaps back in the 30's. Has the discontent return as the poverty of the 30's returns? Will it grow, will the people finally realise that the system is rigged against them and bring it crashing down. A pipe dream, perhaps, or a reality if the people so desire.  

Image courtesy of Left Voice.

 

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Murder.

 

          Life long anarchist Alfredo Cospito is being treated in the most draconian manner by the Italian state. He is being used as a warning to all those others who would dare to challenge the state's desire for total control over the population, Alfredo has been on hunger strike since 20th. October 2022, an indomitable spirit that refuses to bend his knee to the authoritarian dictates of the state. Apart from slowly killing the man the Italian state is trying to kill the ideas and visions that he portrays, a desire for freedom, justice, equality and peace. The state in this brutal inhumane fashion is trying to kill the spirit of anarchism. Alfredo's fight is our fight, if we too wish a society of freedom, justice and equality in a world of peace. We must show solidarity and raise our anger level considerably to end this barbaric, brutal state savagery.

 

The following from Act For Freedom Now.

         SO AS TO CONTINUE TO LIVE PROUDLY AN ANARCHIST IN ITALY HAS DECIDED TO DIE PROUDLY
        Using his body as a weapon to attack the judicial conspiracy to distort his person, his struggle and the very essence of anarchism in order to bury him alive under the anti-mafia law 41bis.
with Alfredo Cospito
end 41bis now!
          “There are two types of solidarity. A passive one that all too often serves only to wash away conscience for someone’s own inactivity and that does not bridge the gaps between words and deeds.
          And then the active, concrete, real solidarity that some call revolutionary, created in silence and anonymity, where only destructive actions speak even through the words that follow. Needless to say which one I prefer.
           In final analysis, the best solidarity that i could receive is to see the planning of this new anarchy, in all of its forms, continue to move forward, insensible to the strokes of repression. I will not deny it, in every action that someone salutes us as anarchist prisoners, both in Italy and the rest of the world, my heart fills with joy.
          This is my life today. The war continues, never give up, never give in.” Alfredo Cospito 2014.

FIRE TO THE PRISONS!

 

 

poster 1 pdf

poster 2 pdf

 

Previous Post Palermo, Italy: Gathering at Ucciardone prison and poster in solidarity with Alfredo Cospito from Sicily 

 

Next Post Parcel bomb against the head of the prison guards union CSIF (Zaragoza, Spain)

 

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Munroe!

 

          SubMedia, System Fail 20, takes a look at the carnage, corruption and plundering the Munroe Doctrine has heaped on South America, with a look at Greece that authoritarian EU member regime that teeters on the verge of collapse. Again, all material that the mainstream media seem not to notice or care about.

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Talking???

         In that patch of the planet that goes by the name of Greece, a member of the EU, is a prime example of the direction Western democracy is travelling, further to the right and more authoritarian. What is happening in Greece is happening in all other states, it is just a matter of degree and timing. All states want total control of the population, a subservient populace that can be used to fuel the wheels of the capitalism's exploiting mechanisms. There are two roads open to us the ordinary people, submit and be an obedient subservient digit in their system, or resist by what ever means are available to us, destroy this burden on humanity and build that better world for all, a society that sees to the needs of all our people and stops feeding millionaire/billionaire parasites. Rest assured, we are not going to win that better world for all, at talking shops, nor by waving banners, they have too much to lose and will fight a bitter brutal battle to keep what they have plundered.

The following extract from Act for Freedom Now.

Financial support of the four comrades in pre-trial detention
https://www.firefund.net/4pretrial

          The following text is the political view of the Assembly in Solidarity with the four comrades in pre-trial detention Fotis D., Jason R., Lambros V. and Panagiotis V.

        On November 14th, 2021 an unmarked police vehicle rammed into the comrades Fotis D. and Jason R. as they were in motion and then they were taken to the General Police Department of Attica. There, the uniformed garbage of the Greek Police proceeded to mandatory fingerprinting and DNA sampling, in order to link them to the attack on the Piraeus traffic police on the same night. In a process that took only half a day, they raided their homes, making sure to plant incriminating evidence, thus building a weak case against them. At the same time, the media indulged in their usual vile role, talking about homes being bomb and explosives manufacturing facilities, in an attempt to normalise the new criminal code in the public mind (which upgrades the possession and use of Molotov cocktails to a felony). It is worth noting, that the code came into force the day before their arrest. For the millionth time, the fabrication of guilty people by the media, has socially reinforced the prosecution’s argument and created the appropriate ground for the pre-trial detention of our two comrades, who have been held captive for 15 months in the Korydallos and Avlona hellholes.

       With the trial date not being set and the case file still open, the interrogator had room to implicate more people. Following a prosecution conducted by the interrogator, on Tuesday morning 20/9, state cops accompanied by a prosecutor, stormed into the house of comrades Panagiotis V. and Lambros V. The comrades were arrested and detained in GADA, where for several hours the reasons for their detention were not known and they were not given the right to communicate with their lawyers or their close ones. The next day, they were tried by the Single-Member Plenary Court in Evelpidon for violation of the weapons law and were later released.

Continue reading. 

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IWD.

          The struggle of the ordinary people for that better world for all comes in many shapes and guises. Since most, if not all these struggle, are against the prevailing system, so their history tends to be whitewashed over, modified, buried, or romanticised, to make it acceptable to the status quo. However, all these separate strands of struggle are forged in blood sweat and tears. None more so than women's part in these struggles. March 8th. International Women's Day, rightly so, draws attention to the struggle of women for equality and justice, freeing it from the balloons and pink ribbon that the existing system would have you envisage that struggle. Women's struggle is our struggle, solidarity prevails.

the following extract from Struggle La Lucha.

       

        On many holidays recognizing people’s struggles and their leaders — for example, the civil rights movement and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. — the present-day celebrations are both sweet and sour.
       The only reason for formal recognition is that protests and struggle made it so — and this is a victory. But the other, “give it the side-eye” part is that the actual history of how they originated is covered up in pink ribbons. The blood, sweat and tears that were shed have been washed away.
       International Women’s Day is like that. So much has been done to sterilize it, package it, market it, capitalism-it (my made up word) — foremost in the capitalist West, of which the U.S. is the capital. 

Continue reading     

And More,----Imagine a gender equal world. A world free of bias, stereotypes, and discrimination. A world that's diverse, equitable, and inclusive. A world where difference is valued and celebrated. Together we can forge women's equality. Collectively we can all #EmbraceEquity. Celebrate women's achievement. Raise awareness about discrimination. Take action to drive gender parity. IWD belongs to everyone, everywhere. Inclusion means all IWD action is valid.

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Resist.

   

                                                   Image courtesy of Guardian.

             Make no mistake, the state works hand-in-glove with corporate capitalism. At the moment in the UK the capitalist class is complaining of a "labour" shortage. This simply means that they have capacity to exploit a greater number of citizens than they are exploiting at the moment. So they look around and come up with the label "economically inactive" in their eyes it is unacceptable for an individual not to be in harness to the capitalists class when it needs them, of course in over production they'll dump you without a thought about you being, "economically inactive". So the state will do its bit to make sure that those individuals classed as "economically inactive", become "economically active", to the benefit of the corporate greed merchants. The technique this time round is to do to their own citizens what they inflicted on migrants, create a hostile environment for all those, for whatever reason, are "economically inactive. You are going to be treated like subservient slaves, unless you strongly resist.

       New DWP pilot scheme threatens even more sanctions – resistance needed!

        “From Monday 27th February the DWP starts a pilot to force thousands of Universal Credit claimants to compulsorily attend jobcentres 10 times over a 2-week period, which PCS believes could increase the risk of poverty and make it more difficult for people to claim benefits.”

“If the customers, who have been claimants for 13 weeks, fail to attend they could be sanctioned and risk losing their benefits, plunging often very vulnerable people deeper into poverty.”

A new DWP pilot threatening Universal Credit claimants with even more sanctions has just started in 60 jobcentres round Britain including 11 in Glasgow and area........

https://edinburghagainstpoverty.org.uk/?p=3274

         The Glasgow area jobcentres involved in the pilot are
· Barrhead
· Castlemilk
· Drumchapel
· Glasgow City Central/Renfield Street
· Govan
· Laurieston
· Newlands
· Partick
· Shettleston
· Springburn
· Partick Jobcentre

 

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It's Ours!

 

Image courtesy of Jane Finch

 

      There are many ways to alleviate the cost of living crisis, of course the state's remedy is to get you to grin and bear it until the good times arrive, but they never do arrive. The capitalists tell is it is all due to external factors and market forces, so we just have to be patient and the market will sort it all out. There is another way expropriate what is the fruits of our labour all locked in the labyrinth of the capitalist economic swamp. We create and make everything, we distribute everything, it is all ours but we fall for the capitalist mantra, that it is they who create the wealth and we have to buy the fruits of our labour back, so as to keep CEO and shareholders rich, all bullshit of course.
        An example of self help and mutual aid from that patch of land named Greece.

Image courtesy of Anarchist News.

 

 This from Act For Freedom Now.

via:https://athens.indymedia.org/post/1623804/
Athens: Expropriation of products in My Market in Patisia area

             Precision pricing is one of the most recent manifestations of class violence unleashed by the State and the bosses on those below. The already unaffordable prices of basic goods for some have been inflated through location, resulting in privilege for the haves over the have-nots. With capital striding on the backs of the social base, further impoverishing it, and the State being the institutional guardian of capitalist restructuring and repression, taking our lives into our own hands is the only solution. We will not divide our needs into basic and non-basic, we will not step back on what belongs to us, we will fight side by side until the final elimination of the State and classes.
          In the context of the ongoing mobilizations against precision pricing, revaluations and the overall devaluation of our lives, on Saturday 4/2 an intervention was held by about 25 comrades in My Market in the area of Gravas in Patisia. Various kinds of products were expropriated and after the end of the intervention they were distributed to the people who were in the street market near the supermarket.

Everything is ours because everything is stolen

NTOY in the supermarkets, refusal to pay, war on the war of the State-bosses

 

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

Torture 2.

 

                                              Image courtesy of The Parliament.

          State prisons are not what they are sometimes labelled, correction centres, rehabilitation centres, reform centres, they are in fact death centres. When incarcerated in one of the state's and sometimes private run prisons, (run for profit) something has to die. The state's hope is that it is your desire for freedom and you can be released into the community a subservient digit in their plans. However if that spirit doesn't die then you will  go through the various processes to make it happen, even if the end result is your death. Solitary confinement, sensory deprivation, broken sleep, and a multitude of other inhumane endeavours to break you desire for freedom. Some prisoners take the dangerous road of hunger strikes rather than meekly submit to the state's  demands that they abandon their desire for freedom. We owe them our unstinting solidarity and support, their struggle for freedom and justice is our struggle. 

Image courtesy of BBC.

The following article from Act For Freedom Now.

 

Financial support for the surgical expenses of an anarchist comrade.

Dear comrades
         The Solidarity Fund for imprisoned, persecuted revolutionaries (Tameio), has been trying to obtain, since being established in 2010, a regular and consistent political, moral and material support to the political prisoners and imprisoned fighters. Alongside, it has also actively aided with legal expenses and bails of persecuted comrades and it supported prison struggles. Solidarity, as a crucial political act, is extended to include comrades who need our active support.
       With respect to this, we would like to inform you about the firefund that has been created by a group of comrades from Athens for the financial support of an anarchist comrade who faces substantial medical expenses, needing to promptly have a costly surgery.

https://www.firefund.net/medical23

In solidarity,
Solidarity Fund (Tameio)
Italy - General news ,sabotage, actions and Solidarity with anarchists arrested and all those under investigation, Revolutionary Prisoners News, Solidarity Events, e.t.c.
Greece: Announcement of the hunger strike of Anarchists and Fighting Prisoners in Solidarity with Alfredo Cospito
16 February 2023

        16th of February, Hunger Strike of Anarchists and Fighting Prisoners in Solidarity with Alfredo Cospito
        The 41-bis prison regime is the completion of the prison structure into a masqueraded death sentence. The execution, in this case, does not end in one moment, like with a gunshot, the tightening of the noose, the application of electrical current or the injection of poison into the body, rather it lasts a lifetime in a state of social coma, in a state of non-world. And so, spread through time. Out of this world, the death sentence has evaded history, just like the state pursues oblivion for all the prisoners of the social war who are buried alive in the state of 41-bis. The 41-bis regime has already murdered one fighter, Diana Blefari Melazzi.
       The 41-bis regime and the law about “massacre” are the legacy of the european counter-revolution from the time of Piazza Fontana (Strage di piazza Fontana). This civil war never ended. The states, and particularly the Italian one, carry on the counter-revolution so that the flame may never flare up again. All the systems follow, step by step, the examples first introduced as special warfare, e.g. the white cells of West Germany, the F-type prisons in Turkey and the FIES prisons in Spain to the Type-C prisons in Greece or the new high security prison system A.A.; the still active Hitler-inspired law about indefinite extension of one’s sentence on “preventative” grounds, by which comrade Thomas Meyer Falk is being held for another 10 years (25 in total) in Freiburg prison in Germany, to the different methods of extorting declarations of repentance, and from Asinara to Imrali.
        Anarchist Alfredo Cospito is fighting for the flame to flare up again. Let’s reassert the fight of the comrade. It is our duty to defend in deed the battle that Alfredo Cospito is fighting. A struggle for and against time itself. This particular hunger strike does not concern only the comrades in the italian territory, but it is internationalist, and so the star of internationalist solidarity must shine on the side of Alfredo Cospito and all those who are fighting from within a special prison regime. From Greece to every point in the planet – for all those fighting for freedom.
       Because defeat is not captivity, but losing one’s faith in the possibility of wining. So, we are collectively going on a hunger strike, according to each one’s capacity, so that we may stand by the side of anarchist revolutionary Alfredo Cospito, but also, against the death regime of 41-bis. At the same time the struggle against the new prison code in Greek prisons is continuing.

Anarchist and Fighting Prisoners

Giannis Michailidis
(1 day hunger strike)

Dimitris Chatzivasileiadis
(3 day hunger strike)

Thanos Chatziaggelou
(1 day hunger strike)

Iasonas Rodopoulos
(1 day hunger strike)

Kostas Dimalexis
(3 day hunger strike)

Lambros Vougiouklakis
(1 day hunger strike)

Panagiotis Vougiouklakis
(1 day hunger strike)

Stathis Nikolouzos
(1 day hunger strike)

Stergios Kalaitzidis
(1 day hunger strike)
 

Fotis Daskalas
(1 day hunger strike)

 

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Class War.

  A little message lifted from Act For Freedom Now.

 Destroy Borders. Destroy Slavery!

Xenophobia, hierarchy, and racism
cannot be fought with fratricidal wars
sworn on bibles or patriotic flags

In breaking the silence and
indifference of the civilised we want to
widen the space for revolt, increase the
possibilities for direct attack on the
pillars of this world.

The objectives can be seen everywhere
the concentration camps,
the airline companies that deport
‘aliens’, the ‘waiting zones’, the slave
traders, the lines of communications,
etc. etc.

Only through direct solidarity
will we be able to refuel the social
tempest of class war, sabotage and
relentless attack where the divisions
into nationals and foreigners, legal
immigrants and aliens dissolves in
joyous collision against the enemy
that oppresses us all.

Vagabond hearts, enemies of all
borders, the world-wide of insurgents

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Wars.

          The following poem was taken from Direct Action summer 1999, author unknown. It refers to different war, in another time, but war is war, no matter the time or the nation, it is the innocent that suffer, and the perpetrators, though they never pull a trigger nor shed any of their blood, are the ones who gain. When will we ever learn.

Image courtesy of Institute of Policy Studies.

All In The Name Of democracy.

From the height of 60,000 feet
you can't see the bombs hit the street
can't see the terror in their eyes
as death rains down from the skies
can't hear the shrieks and groans
as we burn their flesh and mangle bones
Milosoviv and his cronies safe below
deep in shelters where our bombs can't go.
We punish the people on the ground
Leaving devastation all around
you feel the excitement and the thrill
when "our" government says "go out and kill".
But when alone, I think " how insane
the Serbian people are not to blame
it's the politicians again - as before
and they never fight the bloody wars.
One day maybe we'll get it right
when workers of all nations refuse to fight
when all races, brothers and sisters can be
joined in human solidarity.

 

                                           Image courtesy of Stimson.org

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Keelie 38.

 

          No.38 of the Glasgow Keelie is now available,and it's free, again packed with events happening and happened, views on this corrupt system and its injustices. Contacts to  get involved in this struggle for a better life for all. Now more than ever we need our views and demands to be loud and clear, on the street, in the community and workplaces. Now more than ever we need to show solidarity with all striking workers, their fight is our fight, a fight for a better world for all. The Keelie will be at demos, protests, on picket lines, on the street, in cafes and pubs pouring out a wealth of information, ideas, and direct criticism of the insane system we are shackled under, grab your free copy. Make contact through Glasgow Keelie, and read on line.

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

Leaflets?

            Visited Paisley yesterday, Saturday January 28th. To give a wee bit of support to the "Support the Strikers" Demo. Though not a vast number, it was good to see such diverse groups out to give their support to the strikers. A good array of flags and banners. After a few impassioned speeches, the demo moved on and marched through the main street in Paisley to Gilmour Street Station and ended there with a few more very impassioned speeches.
           Who are the strikers? they are not some alien group from some other place. They are your neighbours, they live up the street from you, you meet them in the pub, supermarket, on the bus and you stand next to them at the football matches. Your kids play with their kids, they are us. This is not a struggle between a group of workers and their employer, this is a struggle for a decent life for us all. For generations we have struggled and sweated to try to have a decent life for our families, and we have seen the rich get richer while we continue to get poorer. We have seen the social fabric of our society being shredded to appease the financial markets, we have seen the rich get bigger yachts, bigger mansions and more luxurious private jets. While we on the other hand struggle to heat our homes, struggle to put food on the table. So it is with enthusiasm that we greet the strikes and we must support them with determined solidarity, join them on the picket line in the streets, shouting loud and clear, Enough is Enough

Some photos from Paisley.

 

          If I have one criticism of the event it was what to me was missed opportunities. We must always realise that the aim of these demos is not to speak to the converted, but to reach out the those not yet involved, the passers-by. Where the demo gather at first, there were leaflets and papers being handed out to those passers-by. However when they marched off down the main street they seem to forget that they were walking with lots of people moving up and down the street on both sides, all potential supporters, if we can hand them a leaflet or some literature. There should have been individuals on the edge of the march pushing leaflets and papers into the hands of those casual passers-by. The same criticism can be said when the passed the open air market, people gathered there, the march should have stopped and made sure as many as possible had a leaflet of some sort, then continued their march to the station. If we don't reach that great silent majority, we are going nowhere. Leaflets and papers are our broadcasting system.

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