MAY DAY, WHERE DID THAT COME FROM?

         Glasgow's “Official” May Day march was a well attended and colourful affair, if a rather short journey from George Square to the Concert Hall at the top of Buchanan Street. As the party faithful filed into the hall to listen to their “leaders” spout their usual party line, the Anarchists and Wobblies reformed and set off on a colourful parade through the city centre to the pedestrian precinct in Argyle Street. The parade was lead by a wonderful contraption made from two bikes joined side-by-side with a sound system in the middle and festooned with lots of red and black balloons. Lots of literature was handed out on route and at the stall set up in Argyle Street where there was free vegan cakes on offer.

         It is sad that so few celebrate this marking of all that is wonderful in working class hopes and dreams. I suppose even fewer know where it all started.

This from UFCW Voice for Working America:

       The fight for the eight-hour workday began in earnest in the United States, over a century ago, when the American Federation of Labor adopted an historic resolution asserting that "eight hours shall constitute a legal day's labor from and after May 1st, 1886." Up until that time, working people were routinely required to work 10 to 16 hours a day, 6 days a week! In the months prior to May 1st, 1886, American workers in the hundreds of thousands were drawn into the struggle for the shorter day. Skilled and unskilled, black and white, men and women, native-born and immigrant - all became involved.

       In Chicago alone 400,000 were out on strike for the shorter workday. A newspaper of that city reported that "…no smoke curled up from the tall chimneys of the factories and mills, and things had assumed a Sabbath-like appearance." On May 3, 1886, peaceful public demonstrations by the strikers precipitated violent police retaliation, resulting in the death of at least one striker, and serious injury to many more.

The next day in Haymarket Square a public meeting was held to protest the brutal assaults on the demonstrating strikers. The crowd was orderly, and Chicago mayor Carter Harrison advised the police captain to send home the large contingent of police reservists who were waiting at the stationhouse in case they were needed for crowd control.

         By ten o'clock that rainy evening the meeting was winding down and only about 200 of the demonstrators remained in the Square. Suddenly, a police column of 180 men, led by the police captain, moved in and ordered the people to disperse immediately. At that moment, the peaceful assembly became violent - a bomb was thrown into the police ranks, killing one policeman outright, fatally wounding six more, and seriously injuring about seventy. The police opened fire into the crowd; the number of wounded and killed has never been ascertained.

         A reign of terror swept over Chicago. The press and the pulpit called for revenge, insisting the bomb was the work of socialists and anarchists. Meeting halls, union offices, printing works, and private homes were raided, and known socialists and anarchists were rounded up. Even many individuals who had no connections at all to the socialists or anarchists were arrested and tortured. "Make the raids first and look up the law afterwards," was the public statement of Julius Grinnell, the state's attorney.

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DON'T PAY??

        The extreme hardship being inflicted on the Greek people by the financial Mafia has pushed the people to organise with new tactics and strategies in an attempt to hold on to some dignity. The savageness of the "austerity cuts" has radicalised thousands of Greeks and forced them to think outside the system of exploitation. One of the fastest growing organisations is the "Don't Pay" movement, which is gaining momentum as the living standards of the Greek people descend ever deeper into deprivation.

      The following article translated from the Greek, though not the best English, does convey the principles behind the movement.

ABOUT US          The ‘DEN PLIRONO’ movement is born from the current social needs and constitutes a political movement of disobedience and resistance. It is flesh from the flesh of all exploited social layers and fights for two years, vindicating the social character of public goods. Fundamental political place and axis of action of our movement constitutes freeing of charge and access to all people, in all social goods that are essential for his decent existence.
           We fightingly claim free of charge education, health, streets, public spaces, Means of Public Transport, Water, Electricity, all natural goods (eg beaches, forests, air), and each good of social character for each person, Greek or immigrant.
The unprecedented crisis of the last years tosses radically the capitalistic system. Rulers in their effort to fortify their political, economical and ideological regime and to subjugate people, they form new, disguised juntas.
          The economic fortification of (global and national) financial system requires direct transport of wealth from the households to the banks. Such a ‘grab’ is attempted with the curtailment of wage and pensions, the dissolution of public health and education, the selling out of public property and with the continuous anti-social taxes.
         The question that enters henceforth in the population is the following: How long for will we bend our heads obeying to a bunch bullies exploiters who want to steal our life? When at last will we rise up and take back our lives?
          The first signs of collective workers’ class struggle has already initiated. The ‘DEN PLIRONO’ movement committees, the neighborhood assemblies, the strikes in the factories (eg Steelworks) and in Means of Mass Media (ERT, ALTER, etc.) they are certainly some of the luminous examples of disobedience and resistance.
          We call all exploited individuals, to choose the way of collective fight by actively participating in the open committees of the ‘DEN PLIRONO’ movement. We invite you all to unite our voices and our punches in order to take back our stolen lives.

WE DO NOT PAY THEIR CRISIS
WE ORGANISE COLLECTIVELY THE REFUSAL OF PAYMENTS TO ALL NEIGHBORHOODS
WE FIGHT AGAINST ALL THOSE WHO STEAL OUR LIVES UNTIL THE FINAL VICTORY
www.kinimadenplirono.gr
www.oxidiodia.gr

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MAY DAY GLASGOW.

  

         It's time to recapture our history, our culture, the spirit of working class solidarity. May Day is a symbol  of the history, a celebration of all those working class heroes that the establishment wants you to forget. Come to Argyle Street, bring what you want to find, but most of all, bring your desires and hopes.

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MORE ON MAY DAY.

           To see any event that goes any way to capture the spirit of May Day you have to leave the UK. Try Spain, France, Greece, Italy, for starters. Why, in this country, has the establishment managed to turn a major event in working class history into a mishmash of a handful of individuals? Where is the mass event? I can remember "official" May Day in Glasgow being a massive family affair on the Glasgow Green, and a real good show would be put on by anarchist and other activists on the actual day, May 1st. Now the "official" May Day event is a slow march of the dead a short distance to a hall to listen to a bunch of power seekers stroke their ego, while their adoring followers try to sell the party paper and get people to sign something. I don't know what that has to do with the spirit of May Day. Only in the UK could this transformation take place.

        We live in a country where society has been totally and utterly fragmented and the idea of a mass movement has been removed from our consciousness. Working class history is buried, air brushed out of existence, our culture and heritage is the stuff of phony TV sitcoms, the established media is allowed to shape “our culture” and what they peddle is an illusion. After a rather quiet May Day on May 1^st. by a small group of anarchists, wobblies and communists, tomorrow is Glasgow's “official” May Day event, I sincerely hope that the people of Glasgow prove me wrong, in which case I will gladly eat my words.

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WHEN IS A BOYCOTT NOT A BOYCOT?

        Over the years there have been pickets and attempted boycotts of multi-nationals because of some aspect of their business, recently it was Holland & Barrett because of their embracing the workfare scheme. What were we trying to do? Get Holland & Barrett to be a more compassionate capitalist, or trying to shut it down? Do we want a more compassionate capitalism, or can we shut it down? Were we capable of imposing a boycott and to what effect? When is a boycott not a boycott, and when is it a valid tactic?

This from Profane Existence:

          It really pisses me off when I hear some punk kid or anarchist claim they are boycotting Nike (or whichever other giant corporation). Not because I think they should be supporting Nike, but simply because it shows a lack of any understanding of what a boycott is. And if we desire to be effective, we need to have a clear understanding of what different tactics and strategies actually are.

          Boycotting is a non-violent consumer tactic which is based on withdrawing support (usually financial) as a way to force ones enemy/oppressor into a compromised position in which they must negotiate with you or meet your terms in order to regain your support. So simply not participating is not the same as actively boycotting. Thus going Vegan is not a boycott of the meat and dairy industry for example.

          There are many problems with the idea of some patched up crusty claiming to be engaging in boycott tactics against major corporations. The first of which is that in order to take part in a boycott, you must first have support to withdraw, meaning you need to be a client or customer of the target company who financially contributes to them. Even further, you need to be open to reinvesting that financial support one the target has complied with your demands. This differs greatly from the DIY punk ethos of making our own shit rather than giving them our money, which is actually more about creating an alternative economy, or perhaps an alternative to economy.

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SACRED PRIVATE PROPERT.

       The Occupy Movement hasn't gain much ground here in the UK but has moved forward with much greater momentum in the US. For this reason, in the US there is a much wider discussion about private property, creating conflict within the Occupy Movement. This is no bad thing and it is a discussion that I would love to see take centre stage in any protest movement here or anywhere else.

The following is an extract from an interesting article on American Leftist:

Occupy and Inviolability of Private Property

         A couple of months ago, I discussed one of the most difficult challenges facing Occupy, the willingness of middle class progressives to rationalize the abuses of the police because they place a greater priority upon the preservation of social order by law enforcement. Such progressives want to square the political circle by seeking a transformation of American society without conflict. They are most perfectly represented by Chris Hedges, a man who seems to find the verbal abuse of the police at protests more disturbing than police assaults and finds himself incapable of deciding whether protesters should throw tear gas canisters back at the cops who fired them.

But what is it that these progressives believe requires the protection of the police, even at the cost of the violent suppression of Occupy protesters? Upon reflection, the answer is obvious: private property and the hierarchical social relations inscribed by it. Of course, Occupy participants are not all anarchists or communists, far from it, but they have adopted direct action tactics that have frightened progressives with the ghost of expropriation. Initially, occupiers set up encampments in public spaces as a means of highlighting enormous income inequality and corruption. They sought to prefigure an alternative, much more egalitarian, social order that stood in marked contrast to the existing one. If we were living back in the 1960s or 1970s, the government would have responded with a program of increased public assistance, a program that would have drained away support for Occupy by providing housing, jobs, student aid and medical care, but that would have threatened to reverse the neoliberal process of the marketization of all aspects of our lives, and, hence, was never seriously considered.

Instead, with the federal government guiding them behind the scenes, cities, starting with Oakland in October of last year, cleared out the encampments with force. There was an initial broad based criticism of these police attacks, but, as it became apparent that Occupy had evolved into a loose coalition of anti-authoritarians, people of color, the homeless and other marginalized people, such criticism dissipated. Meanwhile, particularly on the West Coast, occupiers organized more confrontational actions in response, such as the November 2nd general strike in Oakland, the December 12th port shutdown, the January 20th Occupy Wall Street West protests and the attempted seizure of the Kaiser Auditorium on January 28th. The failure of Occupy to extract any meaningful political response to the distress of millions of impoverished Americans and the interrelated corruption of the financial and political systems was pushing its participants towards more and more radical approaches. Within occupations, this resulted in increasingly acrimonious personal conflicts, as most publicly displayed in Oakland, while the progressives that should have been allies became hostile.

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ONE WORLD, OUR WORLD.

        Western democracy in action, the system is creaking under the strain of the desire for freedom and justice, how long before it completely collapses. We should always remember, we are governed by consent, we can always withdraw that consent, hundreds thousands have already done so.

When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty.  Thomas Jefferson.

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AH, ANOTHER ELECTION.

           It's election day, the day when we, the common herd, are promised the earth. The day when the Crooks and Liars hang about to see just how popular they are, will they get back on the gravy train or will they have to ask their cronies for pay back, for all the favours the handed out while they were in the trough with both hands. Will it be a new shining smile that will take their place in the hallowed halls of power. One thing for sure, whoever gets “voted” in will do their own standard of living a power of good.

         It never fails to amaze me that failed promises after failed promises from tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum, and lots of people still run and cast their wee X in the belief that this crop of Crooks and Liars will somehow be different from the last lot of Crooks and Liars. They say that one of the signs of insanity is to keep doing the same thing time after time, but hoping for a different result, perhaps that is the answer. Or could it be that the Crooks and Liars, with the help of the media have woven a very clever illusion.

        In my long, long experience in watching these Crooks and Liars competitions they call elections, I have to admit that this one is about the quietest I have witnessed. I think I have had one party political leaflet through the door but no callers preaching their particular brand of lies, now that's hardly enthusiastic. Perhaps the reason for this could be that this particular gang of Crooks and Liars are aware of what the public at large think of them, and so are keeping a rather low profile.

       Low profile or not, low turnout or not, there will be a gang of Crooks and Liars taking their seats in those marble halls and divvying up the proceeds, each making sure that their future is secured in the system and seeing to the welfare of their cronies. That's how this system works, it's a privileged club and you and I are not members, we merely fund it.

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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.

THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE AND THE BATON.

       This video shows how “austerity cuts” are pushed through in Greece, the resentment and anger of the people at the savage slashing of their living standards, is met with unbridled brutality. While the unelected leader of the Greek government forces through the dictate of the financial Mafia, the state's muscle men are on the streets doing their damnedest to instil subservience through fear. It is not that the Greek state is any more brutal than any other European state, it is just that the Greek people are being hit harder by the “deficit reduction” plan, and are therefore showing more anger, so have to be beaten down harder by the Greek state, who are doing no more than any other state will do, should they feel the need. As the number of people in the UK being pushed into poverty rises, unemployment soars and social services are slashed, we can expect to see the anger spill onto the streets, it is then we will see the UK state unleash its well trained, well kitted out riot police to do its duty, and brutally subdue the will of the people. Nothing must stand in the way of the plunder of public assets, nothing must hinder the transfer of wealth from the public to the private bank accounts of the financial Mafia.

 

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MAY DAY ISTANBUL.

         As I stated in my last post, May Day was celebrated across the globe, and in most cities it was massive. Each city marked it in different ways, like I said Glasgow was a rather low key affair, not so in Istanbul in Turkey. Anger took a more volatile route.

During the day there was also some excellent advice handed out.

A free world with no money.

Your days of wealth are over.

Photos from Contra Info.

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MAY DAY ACROSS THE WORLD.

          Though the Glasgow May Day showing was a low key affair, the same could not be said about the rest of Europe. Across southern Europe the numbers were in the hundreds of thousands, unions in Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal and France used the traditional marches to express anger at the attack on their living standards from the financial Mafia's “deficit reduction” program throughout the Euro Zone forcing countries deeper into recession. In France the trade unions organized around 300 demonstrations across the length and breadth of the country including the capital Paris. The Interior Ministry stated that 316,000 people turned out, compared to 77,000 in 2011. In Italy demonstrators briefly clashed with police in riot gear in Turin and thousands marched in Rieti to listen speeches denouncing Prime Minister Mario Monti's reforms. Madrid saw tens of thousands march in the rain to the main square chanting and waving signs opposing the “austerity cuts”, Lisbon saw similar numbers, while in Athens around 5,000 workers, pensioners, unemployed and students marched with banners reading "Revolt now" and "Tax the rich".

SOLIDARITY.

         This sort of activity was repeated across the globe, from Asia to America, from Europe to Australia. May Day is most certainly alive and kicking. There are some excellent photos of May Day rallies across the world HERE

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GLASGOW MAY DAY.

    This year May Day in Glasgow was a quiet affair, no bands playing, no dancing in the street, no marching through the city centre. In Buchanan Street there was the usual anarchist stall with its band of bright, young, friendly individuals eager to engage the public and hand out their literature. There was a small contingent from the Communist Party, complete with flag and papers, then there was the Wobblies, (IWW), with their stall, eagerly pushing their wares. On the whole it looked like the local Glasgow folks, though eager to take the literature on offer, had forgotten their working class heritage.

       Of course there will always be those who say why bother with May Day, it's just another holiday, sorry, your wrong. This is not a day to celebrate some royal event, or some imperialist battle fought a hundred years or so ago, or some day to remember the butchers of Empire. This is a day to remember all those who have struggled to improve the lot of the ordinary people, a day to celebrate working class victories won through bitter struggle, and in some cases paid for by imprisonment and even death. There are innumerable reasons for turning out on May Day, it is a day of hope, of solidarity among the working class across the globe. What are my personal reasons for turning up, this extract from NOLA ANARCHA puts it better than I personally could.

Why March on May Day in the name of Anti-Capitalism?
Because Capitalism is the Dominant Moment of the existing system of Global Domination. Because Global Capital strives for institutional domination, ideological domination, domination of the social imaginary, and domination of the practice of everyday life. Because Global Capital utilizes the hollow rhetoric of "limited government," even as it employs monstrous coercive force to impose economic oligarchy on humanity, and as it strives toward a totalitarian order of technological surveillance and control. Because Global Capital poses itself as the putative end of history, as even Stalinoid STATE capitalism mutates finally into state CAPITALISM. Because Global Capital mumbles pious platitudes about "free markets," even as it generates neo-feudalism on an immense scale and creates more literal slaves than those who toiled under classic slave economies. Because Global Capital creates massive planetary climate disruption and biodioversity loss that have culminated in the Sixth Great Mass Extinction of Life on Earth. In short, because Global Capitalism is the Universal Culture of Death: the culture of genocide, of ecocide, and of the degradation and destruction of the human spirit. It is because of all this, and out of love for Humanity and the Earth, and a passion to defend both Humanity and the Earth, that on May 1 some of us abandon the Everyday March of the Undead and join instead a March for Life and Liberation.

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AUSTERITY AND REPRESSION, PARTNERS!!

         As the austerity plans of the financial Mafia bite ever deeper, so the repression comes on harder. The state will always see the population as something that has to be controlled and in the “good times” it is relatively easy as people would rather get on with their lives than than take to the streets to change things. However as living conditions begin to deteriorate and more and more people are beginning to hurt, so the control becomes more difficult, complaint turns to anger, anger turns to protest and if the controllers can't get the lid on it, protest turns to insurrection. We should have no illusions about the extent the state will go to keep the established order in place. No matter how much democracy they preach, if the people look like they are gaining in their desire to change things, then the kid gloves come off and the full force of the state's armoury comes into play. In this country we don't need to go too far back in our history to see the extent of force the state will use. 1911 the dockers strike, troops on the streets, and two protesters shot by the military in Liverpool, 1919, 40 hour strike, Glasgow, machine guns on the roofs around George Square, soldiers with fixed bayonets on the streets and at the docks, tanks stationed in warehouses in the East End of the city. In this so called democracy, the will of the people is the last thing the establishment will tolerate.

        Today in Europe, Greece is at the forefront of the financial Mafia's plunder of public assets and as the anger of the people takes to the streets so the Greek police are given a free hand to brutally intimidate, repress and attempt to break the spirit of the Greek people. Our mainstream media seldom covers what is happening on the streets in Europe, we seldom see a mention of the police brutality in Greece, but it is there in force on a daily basis. The population of Greece is less than 11 million, approximately a sixth of the UK, yet in that country on average one person a week dies in Greek prisons or in a Greek police cell. The cold bloody shooting by a police officer of 15 year old Alexis Grigoropoulos to the weekly deaths in custody, is testimony to the brutality of the Greek state apparatus, we should never swallow the media crap that our police are somehow different, given the order the brutality level will rise.

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FOR SURE, THE TIMES THEY ARE A CHANGIN'.

Sometimes a voice from the past can tell us the future, The Times They are a Chagin'.

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OLYMPIC FERVOUR.

        According to the mainstream media, we are all excited about the Olympics. Well I know the corporate sponsors are very excited, but you and me?Apart from it being an opportunity to pour massive amounts of public money into corporate bank accounts, at a time when our millionaire cabal of politicians are telling us we can't afford anything, it is also a wonderful opportunity for the powers that be to try to crank up public fear and flood the country with armed police. It appears that the security bill for the Olympics will be one billion pounds, a phrase that springs to mind would be, “austerity budget my arse”. Some of this billion pounds will be spent on putting surface-to-air missiles on the roofs of private residents' apartments in East London. The proposed site for this lunacy has over 700 residents living there, and they are none to pleased about this addition to their facilities. Can you imagine the scene if one of those adrenalin pumped uniformed watchful eyed individuals actually fired one of those missiles over an Olympic packed city like London? After an unbelievable explosion it would rain white hot shards of metal shrapnel down on the innocent citizens of wide area of London. Of course our millionaire government of the people, for the people, are quite prepared to do such a thing, well that's what governments do.

Photograph:The Daily Mail on "modern British policing" and preparation for the Olympics

         During the Olympics we can expect our cities to look a bit like a war zone, there will be armed police everywhere, but after the “Games” don't expect them all to disappear again. Over the years we have seen the police being militarised and this is another opportunity to go further down that road. We already have armed police strutting around airports, so why not shopping malls, outside banks, at football matches and of course those blood protesters need to be watched. Eventually we can expect our “community” policeman to look something like the photo.

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WORKERS KNOW YOUR HISTORY.

         We are always hearing politicians talk of eradicating poverty with this scheme and that scheme, or appealing to the general public to support various charities. The thing about charities is that we are told of all those hungry people and are asked to contribute money to help feed them. From this we can deduce that the food is there, but the greedy bastards who have all that food will not send it to the hungry until we the general public pay them some money. They obviously don't think that charity has anything to do with them, except perhaps an opportunity to make some more money. Filling cans with money and buying food will never get rid of poverty, it is built into the system of economics that we live under. Destroy the system and there is every possibility we will eradicate poverty.

         Some interesting facts and figures from Anarchist Without Content:

In our modern world, poverty is not natural, but the result of institutions that are set up to benefit a few at the expense of the many. Relief efforts are currently failing because they do not address the root causes of poverty. These causes are not mystical or hard to identify, as the most important ones are global property law, international debt, unfair trade, top-down privatization programs, corporate tax shelters, the those problems are social and political. Furthermore, there is a history to these problems, and poverty will not be addressed until this history is reversed.

HISTORY

The colonial conquest of the New World, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia, by European powers set up the structure of our current economic system.

History books have done a good job depicting the brutality of this period. In many places, Europeans wiped out 99% of the native populations. In places where the natives did survive, many of them were captured and made to do hard labor. In Potosi, Bolivia, for instance, native Bolivians were forced to work silver mines that snaked deep into the earth. So many miners died, that a popular saying goes “enough silver was taken from the mine in Potosi to build a bridge to Madrid, Spain, and if the bones of the dead miners were pulled from the bowels of the mine, one could build a bridge all the way back.”

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MAY DAY - MAY DAY - MAY DAY.

MAY DAY --WHAT'S IT ALL ABOUT?

        May Day, Labour Day, Workers Day, our day, a day when we the ordinary people of the world can celebrate the heroes from our ranks. Paying homage to the men and women who dedicated their lives to the cause of working class emancipation. People who sought nothing for themselves, many dying for their beliefs, individuals that sometimes stood like a colossus astride the political scene, others that worked tirelessly in the shadows, all for the greater good of all peoples, not more for themselves. Their statues, their plaques are no where to be seen, the establishment has them airbrushed out of history. Instead, the powers that be litter our public squares and parks with grandiose statues of arrogant warmongers, empire builders, kings of industry, rich merchants, all who made a fortune on the back of slave and/or cheap labour or the bloodshed of ordinary people. The establishment wants us to forget our heroes, no statues, no plaques, we mustn’t be allowed to think that fighting for the betterment of ordinary people is a worth while cause, much better to try to convince us that it is more honourable to be a self-centred arrogant pursuer of power and wealth at the expense of others. We mustn’t let this happen, we have to keep alive the names and deeds of that legion of men and women who dedicated their lives to our future well being and that of our kids.

       MAY 1st. Must always be a festive day, a day of celebration and pride, a day when we can all come together and wave our banners, party, and remember those names and deeds. A day to revive that spirit of co-operation in struggle and hopefully push our cause to a higher plain. Always on May 1st. not some conveniently arranged employer/union date, the nearest Monday, so as not to upset their production. It is our day, always claim it as a day of family fun, festivities and remembrance, a day of hope for the future of all the ordinary peoples of the world. Glasgow, like most cities, is fortunate in having its own legion of working class fighters, a legion that stretches back through the industrial age and beyond. To pick a few at random, names like George Barrett, Tom Anderson, John MacLean, Helen Crawfurd, Guy Aldred, Ethel MacDonald, Jenny Patrick, William McDougal --- and the names go on and on and on, events such as, The Cotton Spinners strike, the rent strikes, the first world war peace movement, the 1919, 40 hour week strike, etc, etc, etc. All names and events to be justly proud of but difficult to find recorded, all the more need to celebrate MAY DAY and keep alive that part of our history, our culture.

         Take to the streets this MAY DAY, bring the family, bring colour, bring music, bring the spirit of the working class, have fun, remember why we are there, be proud and strengthen your resolve to do more to push the cause of co-operation in struggle with all our people. Keep alive the names and deeds of our past, not those of a corrupt, brutal, exploitative system. Keep alive the dream of a society of free association, voluntary co-operation, and mutual aid, a system of seeing to needs and not to the greed of the few. This year with the financial Mafia on a high with their grand plan of “deficit reduction” shredding the living standards of all our people, it is more important than ever that we make a show of our power. We can stop the system simple by coming onto the streets and having fun, not the dedicated activists, but all of us, the family, the street, the housing scheme, community, we can make a better world, but only if we all really want to, for the benefit of our kids and grandkids.

Published on 16 Apr 2012 by buddhagem

On May 1, 2012 we will have a "Day without the 99%" We are urging all to not go to work or school, don't bank or shop, don't engage in the capitalist system that robs and steals from us; take to the streets and help us create a better world now! For more information:

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MATEWAN, ARMED STRUGGLE.

            Not many films are ever made that cover a strike from the strikers point of view, one such film was Matewan by John Sales. I think Matewan is one of the most powerful films made, it covers a miners strike in West Virginia when all the miners walked out, this action turned West Virginian into a battlefield with the miners fighting it out with armed strike breakers, who were paid and armed by the mining companies. After a harsh and brutal struggle the miners eventually laid down their arms probably from the excess fire power of the enemy, but also an appeal to patriotism played a part. This short clip shows one of the many powerful scenes and should be essential viewing.

         Times have changed but the struggle hasn't, it is still those who have to work to survive, and those who exploit them to enrich themselves and/or their shareholders. To them workers are just tools, expendable items that are bought at the cheapest possible price, and cast aside as profit margins dictate. As long as we have that duality, there will always be conflict and struggle.

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EUROPE, THE WORLD'S LARGEST SWEATSHOP.

        Though the following article sees the Greek situation spreading to all the Southern European states, I on the other hand, see it coming to practically all the European states. It would suit the corporate fascist in conjunction with the financial Mafia to turn Europe into one very large sweatshop. This would put them in a much stronger position when trading with all the other power blocks on the planet. Cheap labour and low corporation taxes, is the perfect recipe for for corporate greed. To expect our respective national governments to somehow protect us from this "grand-plan" is rather naive as they are the managers of the "grand-plan" on behalf of the financial Mafia, they are the servants of the corporate fascists. 

This from Teacher Dude's Grill and BBQ.

     It's not a great photograph but its sole virtue is that its tells a story, and so illustrates so much of what is happening in Greece today and for that reason I posted it.
      In it are all the elements of a new emerging economy that has been foisted upon Greece in the name of financial salvation. In the foreground is the child beggar, no more than 11, I'd venture, his Fagin like "handler" (How Dickens serves us in times of need) just off frame at the entrance of the Ble patisserie.
      Ble, which serves high end baked goods at the kind of prices that even New Yorkers/Parisians might baulk at is, itself a perfect example of how the economy is going. Inside the employees haven't been paid for months and yet remain working, as they know giving up a job there means certain unemployment, a fact the supervisor hovering in the background is no doubt aware of.
       300 Euro per month wages, total absence of labour protection laws and rampant poverty are the fate that awaits other southern European economies adopting the kind of austerity measures that Greece has implemented in the last three years.

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