Syria.

     With the pandemic taking up all the media's attention, the horror that is Syria is no longer news. However, the suffering of the Syrian people goes on and is deepening, thanks to America's vicious "no bullets war" of inhumane sanctions. Nine years of a devastating war has reduced Syria to a battle torn remnant of a country, Now the brutal savagery of a modern war has more or less subsided, Syria is unable to rebuild its infra structure  due to the inhumane raft of sanctions inflicted by the US.

    Sanctions against a country are a war crime, as what they do is kill the civilian population, and it is intentional, as the enforcer of these sanctions is well aware of their result. The people of Syria having come through, what was nothing short of a world war, involving most of the world's major powers fought on their soil, are now seeing their civilian population slowly dying from hunger. They are unable to rebuild their schools, hospitals, homes and workplaces, all due to that one deliberate action of the US, sanctions. 

     Economic sanctions are a vicious tool of the powerful capitalist countries to try to enforce their will on other nations, and in most cases for control of resources. They are a war against a civilian population, in the full knowledge that young, old and infirm, as well as the health, will slowly suffer and large numbers will, in all probability, not make it. 

    Just another example of the ruthlessness of the economic capitalist system that controls our lives and devastates the planet, for no other reason than to enrich a pampered, privileged bunch of parasites, what do we, the ordinary people, gain from the suffering of the Syrian people? How much longer will we tolerate this vicious injustice, how much longer will we struggle for a half decent life while watching our fellow humans suffer, all for a pot of gold for the greedy billionaire class. Our silence makes us complicit in the suffering and death of every Syrian child.

    The following extract is from an article in Mideast Discourse by Steven Sahiounie

        The US sanctions have been unsuccessful in their goal of ‘regime change’ in Damascus, but have been hugely successful in making the Syrian people suffer, even though they have survived 9 years of terrorist attacks, occupations, deaths, injuries, and destruction they continue to suffer from economic-warfare.
       A school teacher in Latakia, said, “We thought if we resisted the terrorists, and defeated them, we would rebuild the lost homes, schools, hospitals and farms and start a new post-war-life. Now, the war is over, and we can’t rebuild anything and our life is even worse now that we are in peace-time. Where is our victory over terrorism? Why is America punishing us for defeating the terrorists?”
     The latest US sanctions are designed to prevent any reconstruction of infrastructure damaged in the war, which includes homes, shops, businesses, factories, and infrastructures such as schools and hospitals.
     US sanctions have exemptions for ‘humanitarian aid’, which include food, supplies, and bank transfers for humanitarian purposes. However, those exemptions are in theory only and have never been applied, as the paperwork and time to secure a waiver from the US government makes the exemption useless.
     The Trump administration, US Congress, and many Syrian-American groups have praised the new extreme sanctions against Syria. While the people living today in Syria suffer under the sanctions, those Syrians living inside the US and Europe are prospering and unaffected by the sanctions.
     Azhdar Kurtov, of the Russian Institute for Strategic Studies, explained in an interview with RT, “Syria has become an unpleasant ‘splinter’ in American politics in the Middle East. Moreover, this is not only a local defeat; it is evidence of the collapse of, above all, the global ambitions of the United States. 

Read the full article HERE:

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Churchill.

      So Churchill's statue is to be protected in case someone takes umbrage, and defaces it in some way, well what would you expect the white racist, imperialists of our establishment to do? Churchill was a true follower of their faith, arrogant, racists and little regard for humanity. His arrogance was backed up by his ineptitude, probably the best display of these qualities was his Gallipoli disaster, a pointless, sacrifice of thousands of troops lives based on his total ignorance of the situation. His catalogue of brutal and inhumane treatment of those who dared to stand in the way of the British Empire's exploitation of native people's is difficult to surpass.

    The recent flap over Winston Churchill — with Labour politician John McDonnell calling Britain’s most revered prime minister a “villain” and prompting a rebuke from the latter’s grandson — will astonish many Indians. That’s not because the label itself is a misnomer, but because McDonnell was exercised by the death of one Welsh miner in 1910. In fact, Churchill has the blood of millions on his hands whom the British prefer to forget.  

From Jacobin, the Real Winston Churchill:

    ----In addition to being motivated by a profoundly antisemitic “good Jew-bad Jew” dichotomy, the colonial underpinnings of Churchill’s support for Zionism were later made clear when he addressed the Palestine Royal Commission on the subject of Palestinian self-determination. Resorting to bestiary for his imagery, he compared self-rule to the dog running its own manger, a right he did not acknowledge. “I do not admit,” he went on, “that a great wrong has been done to the Red Indians of America, or the black people of Australia . . . by the fact that a stronger race, a higher grade race . . . has come in and taken its place.”
       As an imperial tactician, Churchill recommended fighting the insurgency in British Mandate Iraq by gassing them. Indeed, he had already pioneered such deadly weapons in Russia, against the Bolsheviks. It is important to recognize that, as with his support for aerial combat, he tended to justify this as a humane, high-tech alternative to more brutal methods. “I am strongly in favor of using poisoned gas against uncivilized tribes,” he wrote, before explaining: “The moral effect should be so good that the loss of life should be reduced to a minimum.”------

      So why wouldn't our white racist imperialist, lords and masters wish to protect one of their heroes, he is truly one of them. 

 

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Choices.

  A new slogan suitable for our capitalist parasites ideology.

Photo courtesy of Erik R. Rishoff /flickr.

    

    By now it should be clear to everybody that crunch time is fast approaching and capitalism doesn't work for the benefit of the ordinary people. Everywhere you turn companies are laying off employees, the list is staggering.

   All the figures point to a massive increase in poverty, homelessness and deprivation, no blue horizon for the ordinary people of this country.

    Figures announced this morning state that the UK economy shrank by 20.4% in April, the largest monthly contraction on record, and it is all just beginning. In the coming months job loses will be on a scale not seen since the twenties and before. Here is a short list of what is known at the moment:

The Telegraph states that 250,00 business will be laying off employees.

Frankie and Benny's is closing 120 restaurants,

Roll Royce laying off 3,000,

UK car industry laying off 2,000

British Gas laying off 5,000

J Mathey laying off 2,500,

Airlines expected to lay off 70,000

BP world wide, laying off 10,000

Mulberry laying off 25% of workforce, 

Bentley cars laying of 25% of its workforce,

Airbus stated it will make job cuts. 

This list is by no means complete and comprehensive, and this as the cheery part of the picture. 

    And so the dark clouds continue to gather, and we haven't even sorted out Brexit and the mayhem that it will cause. Another factor, and I suppose we can blame the Thacher gang for this, most experts agree that UK will be hit hardest of the rich nations as 75% of its economy is in the service industry, and that will be devastated.

      Meanwhile the Chancellor of the Exchequer has been pouring billions of money he doesn't have into the coffers of the corporate world, to "save jobs" which translates into saving the corporate world from losing too much of their loot, and keeping them "afloat", you have to keep the shareholders happy. Money that the money lenders will shortly be knocking on the Chancellor's door to sort out a repayment method. Which will include cutting government spending, which means cutting social spending, much tighter and deeper austerity, a cap or cut to public sector wages, and of course selling off public assets to raise cash to pay for that bailout of the corporate parasites, for example, parts of NHS etc.

     So what should we the ordinary people do? Just grin and bear it, start thinking of charity shops, food banks and hand-outs, tighten our belts and get on with it? Remember, bringing your kids up under such conditions will stunt their potential, blight their general physical and mental health, scar them for life, and in all probability, also scar their children. 

     A lot of people during this pandemic learnt about mutual aid and found it worked and was enjoyable. We need to expand that feeling of community and and continue and expand mutual aid in our lives. Refuse to fall back into the consumer mode that the corporate world desire, buying crap and that endless supply of stuff that is out dated  forcing you to buy another. Start to organise to take control of our workplaces, and distribution centres, to produce what we want and need and distributing them in a fair and just manner.  Our lords and masters are already organising to get you back on the treadmill of ever increasing consumption and growth, all to the detriment of the planet and the the benefit of that pampered, privileged bunch of wealthy parasites. You follow them to your detriment or you resist and follow the path that will benefit us all in an equal and fair manner. The choice is simple, more and bleaker austerity, poverty and deprivation, or a chance to build that better world for all.

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Up Yours!

      Bristol, is a city with a large content of two  fingers "up yours" attitude to the establishment. I always read with interest and sometimes with a smile on my face, at some of what comes out of that fair city. Long may that spirit flourish and grow. Hopefully it could become infectious and be the next pandemic.

      This latest rendering from that part of our island may not be to everybody's liking, but it does continue that spirit of "up yours", which can be so endearing.

The following from 325

 

PDF: Engaged Combatant (Cover)

PDF: Engaged Combatant (Contents)

This is a collection of poetic ramblings by an anarcho-nihilist hooligan in Bristol, UK.

     Forging some kind of weapon by merger metaphors and poetry from lived experiences, an alternative from quick-fix solutions in the fast lane of instant gratification, stolen and twisted out of meaning, into some spiritual sloganeering which hopefully challenges a life of just material band-aid.

    The author feels like they are tidying up the loose ends in their mind!

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A Dream.

      Just Imagine a little corner in Glasgow city centre where traditionally all shades of the left gather with stalls on a weekly basis, leaflets, pamphlets, badges T-shirts, etc and lots of banter. There is one simple rule, only left stalls allowed, a dream of some over fertile imagination. Well perhaps in Glasgow it is a dream, however some cities can do this, where did we go wrong Glasgow?

    I'm sure where I lifted this video from won't complain, it's from,

https://www.facebook.com/puestostirsodemolina/ 

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Who Shapes?

       Today, across the world, we are certainly in the process of seismic changes, we could let them unfold without any input from us to shape those changes and accept the world that forms. Or we could be the driving force to shape those changes to the benefit of all. You can rest assured that the rich and powerful are already doing their best to shape those changes to the benefit of their parasitical class. We should be grateful for those millions across the world that have taken to the streets with a concerted effort to grasp control of those changes and drive them in the direction of the better world for all.
       Anti-police brutality needs to be looked at from the point of view of why the police are there in the first place, who needs them most and why. The police are not an entity that exists in a vacuum, they are part and parcel of a system. A system that shaped them the way that they seen best to fit their purpose, a system that needs that reserve of violence for its existence. We don’t have a racist brutal police force, we have a racist brutal system, of which the police are an integral and necessary part. We should never lose sight of the fact that we will never be rid of police brutality as long as we tolerate this brutal capitalist system.
     Perhaps we should all carry with us, to shape our actions, a few lines from Adrian Mitchell’s book, Heart At The Left.

My brain socialist
My heart anarchist
My eyes pacifist
My blood revolutionary.

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Dystopian Adventure.

      Right at the very start of this pandemic I stated that it couldn't have come at a better time for the "establishment". No matter who why and where it started, it was a blessing to the big corporations, the world economy was sliding down to recession, the bond market (where the states go to borrow money) had been dying for at least the previous 4 years, the big crash was coming, and the corporate world and the financial Mafia would be looking for a big bailout of public funds.
      After 12 years of severe "austerity", (transferring public funds to the private sector), there might have been a bit of resistance from the public. Low and behold, they are getting billions perhaps trillions of money, that will eventually have to be paid back from public funds, being thrown into their coffers. What's more, because of fear the public are sitting back and in lots of case supporting this plundering public funds.There's no money for social services, but big business needs it, it gets it.
     To exacerbate that fear, and take advantage of it, the various states are introducing draconian measures on our civil liberties without any pretense of parliamentary scrutiny. It is legislation by dictate, from a small group of pampered privileged parasites who are firmly on the side of and in the pocket of, big business, the economy is sacred.
     Emergency is a wonderful excuse to bypass any form of democratic dialogue or scrutiny, and it would be naive to imagine that all those measures of gathering personal data, limiting numbers of who you can meet, and dictated instructions with threats, will all some how dissolve when the pandemic is over. Sorry, I doubt the emergency will never disappear, there will be another, and another, to make sure that the fear never really goes away, fear is a wonderful weapon to create a submissive population. We are witnessing a monumental structural change in the we we will be forced to live. That is unless we get as organised as they are, and start to create our ideas of the new normal.
     The following might be a rather long article, but I consider that it would be negligent not to make it as easy as possible to read the full article, it is from Acorn Winter Oak:

       Once terrorism, which (one will agree) had been somewhat overly abused, had used up most of its potential, so well deployed for the first fifteen years of the new century, the moment had come to move on to the next phase, as I announced in 2011 in my text From Terrorism to Despotism.
     Moreover, the counterinsurgency approach adopted immediately and everywhere in what is improperly called the “war on the virus” confirms the intentions underlying “humanitarian” operations in this war, which is being fought not against the virus, but against the rules, rights, guarantees, institutions, and peoples of the old world. I am speaking here of the world and institutions that have been established ever since the French Revolution and are now disappearing before our very eyes in the span of a few months, just as quickly in fact as the Soviet Union disappeared. The epidemic will end, but not the measures, possibilities, and consequences it has unleashed, which we are now only beginning to experience. These are the birth pangs of a new world.
      We are witnessing the decomposition and end of a world and a civilization, that of bourgeois democracy with its parliaments, its rights and powers and counter-powers. These are now completely useless, since laws and coercive measures are dictated by the executive branch without being immediately ratified by parliaments, where judicial power, and thus the power of free opinion, loses all semblance of independence and hence its function as counterbalance.
     Peoples are thus brusquely and traumatically conditioned (as Machiavelli established: “injuries should be inflicted all at once, that they be less savored.”). The citizen having long ago disappeared in favor of the consumer, the latter now finds himself reduced to the role of simple patient, over whom one has the power of life and death, upon whom one can administer any kind of treatment or withhold it, depending on age (productive or unproductive) or any other criterion, arbitrarily decided and without the right of appeal, at the discretion of the caregiver or of others. Once imprisoned at home or in the hospital, what can he do about coercion, abuse, arbitrariness?
     The Constitutional Charter has been suspended, in Italy for example, without raising the slightest objection, not even from the supposed “guarantor” of its institutions, President Mattarella. Having become mere monads, anonymous and isolated, subjects no longer have any “equality” to claim or rights to assert. Law itself will no longer be normative, but is already becoming discretionary, like life and death. We have seen that, on the pretext of the coronavirus, 13 or 14 prisoners can be killed with impunity and at the drop of a hat in Italy without so much as their names being given, or their crimes, or the circumstances, and no one seems to care. They are doing an even better job than the Germans at Stammheim Prison. They should admire us, at least for our crimes!
     The only thing people talk about any more is money. And a state like Italy is reduced to begging the necessary capital for the transition from democratic to despotic forms at the hands of the sinister and illegitimate Eurogroup 16. The same Eurogroup that in 2015 ferociously wanted to expropriate the entire public patrimony of Greece, including the Parthenon, and transfer it to a fund situated in Luxembourg under German control. Even Der Spiegel described the Eurogroup diktats as “a catalog of atrocities” for the humiliation of Greece, and Ambrose Evans-Pritchard wrote in The Telegraph that, if you wanted to assign a date to the end of the European project, this was it. So behold, the deed is done. All that remains is the Euro, and even that is highly provisional.

    Neo-liberalism has had nothing to do with antiquated class struggles, it does not even remember them, thinks it has expunged them from the dictionary itself. It believes itself to be all-powerful, which does not mean that it is not afraid of them, since it knows very well what it is preparing to inflict on the people. It is obvious that people will soon be hungry, obvious that there will be mobs of unemployed, obvious that people working under the table (4 million in Italy) will have no support at all. And those whose work is tenuous, who have nothing to lose, will start to engage in struggle and sabotage. This explains why the strategy in response to the pandemic has above all been a strategy of preventive counterinsurgency. We will see some nice examples of that in America. The FEMA camps will soon be full.
      There are thus at least two powerful reasons to impose the new despotism in the West: one is to contend with the domestic subversion it provokes and expects; the other is to prepare for foreign war with a designated enemy, which is the oldest form of despotism in history. Nothing new has been learned on that score since The Book of Lord Shang (Fourth century B.C.)—a book all strategists of the Occident should hasten to read with the greatest attention. If they have decided to attack Chinese despotism, they should begin by proving they are better on its own terrain, that is to say more effective, less costly, and better performing. In short, a superior form of despotism. But that remains to be proven.
     Thanks to the virus, the fragility of our world appears in the full light of day. The game now being played is infinitely more dangerous than the virus and will cause far more deaths. Yet contemporaries seem not to be afraid of anything but the virus …
     It would seem that the present age has been given the task of contradicting what Hegel said apropos the history of philosophy: “World history is the progress of the consciousness of freedom.” But freedom itself exists only insofar is it is in conflict with its opposite—he adds. Where is it today? While in France and Italy people denounce those who do not obey?
     If a mere microbe sufficed to plunge our world into obedience to the most repugnant of all despotisms, this can only mean that our world was already so ready for this despotism that a mere microbe sufficed.
    Historians will call the time that is now beginning the age of Occidental Despotism.

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Out Again.

       Managed out on the bike yesterday, June 7th. just a wee spin round the Lowmoss area, wee runs are all I do nowadays, circumstances dictate. Gone are the days when I could get up in the morning and decide is it Loch Ard, Arrochar, Callander, Lake of Menteith, Loch Venachar, Strathyre, or Dunoon, then set off with a smile on my face. Now I usually start with a wee cruise around the Cadder Cemetery before heading out onto the road. At that point I lose my camera assistant Stasia, hence the view of so many tombstones. It was a pleasant enough day but I picked the wrong thin cycling shirt, so the temperature was just that wee bit lower that I find comfortable. Of course there is something that most cyclists will be aware of, some of the road surfaces are downright dangerous. There is a bit of the road on the Lowmoss to Lenzie road, though not the only road, that is really a killer lying in wait. The road isn't that wide and you have to go wide from the edge to avoid craters rather than potholes, and with cars doing their usual 50mph minimum it can sometimes be a wee bit nerve racking, especially to an old crater like yours truly.

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Death Sentence.

     How many prison riots are we going to see repressed with savage brutality before we all stand up and say, enough is enough. Prison conditions across the planet are all in various degrees of overcrowding, unhygienic, coupled to lack of proper health care, all administered with vindictive and arbitrator rules that are intended to humiliate and intimidate. Prisoners have been rioting from Italy to America, from the UK to Australia and rightly so, as their conditions are now life threatening with the threat of covid19. The unacceptable conditions in prisons are a breeding ground for the virus and next to nothing is being done  to remedy this unacceptable and inhumane situation. A prison sentence is now becoming a death sentence, and this must be stopped. Our full solidarity and support must get behind the prisoners and their demand for justice.
      We have to end this system that depends on brutality for survival, an end to prisons and the system that creates and needs them.

      This short report from prisoners rioting in Australia who are being brutally crushed by the state's violent minders.

  The following from Anarchists Worldwide.

      So-Called Australia, 08.06.2020: Riot cops and IAT (Immediate Action Team) have brutally crushed a prisoner revolt that had spread to 3 separate yards at the notorious Long Bay Prison located about 14km south of Warang / Sydney. During the revolt, prisoners used prison-issue towels to spell out BLM (Black Lives Matter) in one of the yards so it could be seen by media helicopters.
     Update 1 – There is an ongoing Black Lives Matter uprising at Long Bay Prison, NSW. There is massive resistance.
     The Immediate Action Team (IAT) who killed David Dungay Jnr on 29/12/15 and the Riot Squad are deploying massive amounts of tear gas and other chemical weapons into the yards to break the resistance ~ so nobody can breathe.
      Children and elderly people in the surrounding suburb of Malabar are also struggling to breathe.
      Update 2: The IAT and Riot Squad have used attack dogs, indiscriminate use of riot batons and held a gun capable of firing baton rounds to the head of people who had already surrendered and were restrained.
      One person is in hospital with severe dog bite injuries.
     The uprising spread over three yards at Long Bay in scenes reminiscent of the Attica Uprising.
    The indiscriminate use of tear gas in Long Bay is being inflicted on the people most at risk of contracting and dying from Covid 19.
      Some people in neighboring suburbs have fled as tear gas has contaminated large parts of Matraville and Malabar.

 (via Abolitionist and Transformative Justice Centre / Facebook)

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BLM & The Green.

 

       Glasgow's mass BLM protest held on Glasgow Green Sunday 7th June, was a well attended and peaceful affair, and what's more and unusual for Glasgow, the weather was kind. I wasn't there but a report from a friend who managed to attend, said that their estimate put the attendance at between 2,000 and 3,000. My friend also said that on the whole most people kept a reasonable distance apart, as did the police, patrolling in twos around the crowd.

        Let's hope that this coming together of all shades of humanity to protest the injustice and brutality inherent in this economic system we live under, stays together as a cohesive body. Let's hope that they continue their presence on the street and in their communities, not just against the police brutality but recognizing that the police are just a strand of this system and one the establishment hold sacred. The system sees the police as a necessary force to allow the powers that be continue their looting of the public purse and the exploitation of the people. It should be our aim not to change the police, but to change this entire system of privilege based on wealth and power.  

      As with all Glasgow protests, there is a plethora of hand made placards, snappy slogans, short to the point statements, which I always find fascinating, opinions scribbled on cardboard, cheap, easily and quickly made.

      Here are some of the placards from Sunday's protest, thanks to my young friend.

 

  

Anarchy & Covid19.

What Might an Anarchist Society Look Like?

     1 The world’s resources would be held in common and shared with all the diverse life on Earth.
    2 People would manage their own lives, work and communities, and everyone would have a say in decision making through decentralised forms of organisation.
   3 Relationships in all areas of life would be based on mutual respect and equality regardless of gender, skin colour, sexual orientation, disability, age, culture etc.
    4 Work wouldn’t be boring and repetitive, but instead would be a means of voluntary self expression and fulfillment; unpopular or difficult jobs would be shared.
    5 Education would be integrated into daily life to produce free individuals who think for ourselves.
     6 Goods and services would be produced ecologically for human needs based on the principle “from each according to ability, to each according to need”

      Anarchist, by word and deed, strive for that better world for all, anarchism has the books, the leaflets, the history, the road map, and there has been the experience in several places in the world where these became practice. However the world changes and anarchism like that world must also change. We have to convince people that our philosophy would work in drastic situations, pandemic is the most resent event that anarchist must show that it could cope with, and better than, the present centralised autocratic state/capitalism system. That requires honest debate, co-operation and open mindedness.

     The group Anarchist Writers has produced an interesting article that perhaps will open and encourage that debate among anarchists and the general public.

Anarchy and Covid-19

Fri, 06/05/2020 - 20:22 — Anarcho

       A standard reproach against anarchism is that it would not be able to withstand crises as well as hierarchies. This is often the underlying assumption of Marxist diatribes against Anarchism – although these usually invoke euphemisms to avoid admitting that what is really being suggested is that they and their party should be in power. Hence the assertions on the need for a centralised “workers’ State” to organise defence against the counter-revolution (i.e., anyone who disagrees with them), plan the economy, and so on – skilfully avoiding discussing the grim inefficiencies and tyrannies of the Bolshevik regime or the various counter-examples which show the opposite (most obviously, the response of the CNT-FAI to Franco’s coup).

      The coronavirus crisis – like any crisis – sees people “rally to the flag” and be more willing to view those in power in a good light. This happened in the UK with the serial lying, incompetent, self-serving, waffling, racist, sexist, homophobic lazy waste of space known as “Boris” but better called Johnson (and not only because that is his surname). It even happened with Trump – although his bump in the polls was both smaller in size and shorter in duration. Still, Trump does serve a purpose – making even Johnson and his response to the crisis seem better by default.

     Which raises a question – what would an anarchist society, an anarchy, do in the face of a coronavirus crisis?

This is no idle question for addressing a serious issue and the concerns it generates in the general public (i.e., people we want to become anarchists) should be something anarchists do. We must apply our ideas to real events if we take our ideas seriously and seek to see them applied – rather than an excuse to sound ultra-radical.

Now, there may be a tendency for some anarchists – as with “crime” (i.e., anti-social behaviour) – to simply say that a free society would not have any. This, as with crime, is not very convincing and, for example, Kropotkin did not suggest that. He argued, like other anarchist thinkers, that anti-social behaviour would, indeed, be vastly reduced in a decent society, but it would never disappear completely. Therefore any which remained would be dealt with via free arbitration between the parties in conflict, as well as community solidarity and self-defence conducted as humanely as an illness would be.

     The same can be said for Covid-19. Yes, a free society would be one based on workers’ control, so it is unlikely that it would be lacking in safe and hygienic working conditions. It would not have the same pressures from bosses to cut corners to maximise profits (and in non-mutualist anarchies there would be no market pressures to do likewise). It would not experience the hollowing out of society and its various institutions (not least health-care) that neo-liberalism has produced nor would it have people with low-paid, insecure jobs who have to drag themselves into work because they have bills to pay but, by so doing, spread the virus. It would not have obscenities like billionaires having a net worth far in excess of the costs of paying their workers decent sick pay for months.

Continue reading HERE: 

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Hope.

        As the mass protests and outrage at the public murder of George Floyd by the police, started to spread across the world, that little glimmer of hope that I always had, that one day all the single issue politics would disappear and become one mass worldwide protest movement against this savage, brutal and exploitative system and end it once and for all, that little hope grew brighter. Here at last the ordinary people of all the shades of humanity were coming together, this illusion of race was evaporating before our eyes. Perhaps now we would all see that the only real division in the human race is class. Though the hope is still there, I never underestimate the subterfuge, devious and brutal nature of the other class, the "establishment", the millionaires and billionaires the corporate bodies and their minders, the state. That is what we should be watching for, there underhand, hijacking and false propaganda to divide and undermine that unity.

The following is from FSP, (revolutionary feminism.)

The Barricades Are Burning.

       On Saturday, May 31, the world witnessed an historic event – the fires of mass rebellion broke out a few hundred yards from the White House.

Donald Trump, the political head of the most powerful imperialist state that economically and militarily lords over the whole Earth, was escorted to the secure bunker inside the White House fearing that the angry masses of Black, Latinx and poor white Americans would attempt to settle accounts with their president.

     Thousands of Black working-class youth have led massive protests composed of workers and the unemployed of all races due to the Covid-19 pandemic since the American dream has become a nightmare of growing poverty, the loss of housing, the lack of jobs, the super-exploitation of part-time employment, and the absence of adequate healthcare. Brave young people – both citizens and immigrants – faced off against brutal, murderous men in uniform to avenge the death of George Floyd by shouting, “No more police killings!”

      In a May 30 statement, the National Comrades of Color Caucus of the Freedom Socialist Party and Radical Women wrote that, “The police have always been in the service of capitalism and white supremacy since its origins as the slave patrols of the South. Ever since, the corrosive power of white supremacy has been used to delude working-class whites into thinking that their interests lie with rich whites instead of their own class brothers and sisters of color.”

       Now the monumental crisis that the capitalists have created in the world economy that delivers its most violent and terrible blows to the lives of most the humble and dispossessed has drawn a clear line between the rich and poor, the exploiters and exploited, the oppressors and oppressed. 

The class interests of workers in the U.S. are beginning to overcome the racial barriers that the U.S. bourgeoisie has maintained to divide poor whites from poor Blacks since the founding of the nation.

      The moving expressions of solidarity around the world clearly illustrate that the working class is a single class and international. Let no wall stand in the way of grief over the death of George Floyd, a Black man; nor impede solidarity with the oppressed and exploited in the United States. The same state that drains the livelihood of workers in other countries beats and strangles its own people.

        It is time for working people around the world, united in suffering and pain, to stand up against capitalism that destroys and kills and end all oppression by building a socialist world.

Workers of the world, let us unite!

Committee for Revolutionary International Regroupment (CRIR)

Partido Socialismo y Libertad – Argentina
Partido Obrero Socialista – México
Freedom Socialist Party – United States and Australia

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Migrants & Solidarity.

      Migrant centres, camps or call them what you will, prisons would probably be a more accurate name, go hand in hand with violence, intimidation, humiliation and denial of human rights. This is easily verified by a little research into reports from those detained. Since these degrading institutions are ordered, created and organised by the state, what this highlights is another strand of the states vindictive, callous, psychopathic,  violent, racist structure. As another display of the state's callous brutality, in most cases it hands these institutions over to private corporations to run them at a profit, making money from human degradation and misery, operated by the low life that calls this "a job". It is an inhumane society that treats those fleeing war, famine, deprivation and death in such a threatening and vicious manner. A society that doesn't have compassion for all human life is a flawed and failed society. Police brutality on the outside, state violence on the inside, two sides of the same coin, are the pillars of a this society, built on plunder, privilege, exploitation, intimidation and control.

The following from Anarchists Worldwide:

        Recently it became publicly known that systematic violence is perpetrated against refugees in the federal asylum camp in Basel (Switzerland). Obviously this violence is neither an isolated case nor is it limited to the asylum camps in Switzerland.

       This violence is systematic and the system has names. Those responsible are internationally represented and operate in many different places. Let’s name them and show them that their actions bear consequences.

The spread of the coronavirus has highlighted the violence of the European migration regime – both at the EU external border as well as in local asylum camps and prisons.

        This call wants to continue the intensified struggles against it.

What are federal asylum camps?

     Since the spring of 2019, asylum seekers in Switzerland are being administered in so-called federal asylum centres. The accelerated asylum procedures related to the erection of these new structures do not result in fairer procedures for most of the persons affected, but in faster deportation. The federal asylum camps are often geographically isolated. The type of construction, the location, as well as the rules imposed are reminding of prisons and other institutions that deprive people of their freedom. They are contributing to the racist constructs of the nation state and borders.

Whether the Swiss federal asylum centres, the German anchor centres, the CIE (Centro di Identificazione ed Espulsione/ Centro de Internamiento de Extranjeros) or the French CPA (Centre de Premier Accueil): they are all part of the European migration regime, which categorises, isolates and deports people by force and coercion.

      For the maintenance of these camp structures, various sectors must be covered. The include, for example, construction, administration, delivery of food, transportation, servicing, surveillance and security services.

All these tasks are entrusted to companies that profit financially from the precarious situation of people in search of asylum.

What is happening is Basel?

      Reports from witnesses show that in the federal asylum camp in Basel people from the Maghreb are deliberately harassed, abused, beaten and in some cases seriously injured by employees of the Security AG. The disciplinary measures referred to by Securitas as “self-defence” often end in hospital for those persons affected.

        Securitas is mandated and gets covered by the camp operator ORS and the SEM (State Secretariat for Migration): Those persons affected by the mistreatment are being blamed for any incidents. The injuries inflicted by Securitas employees are racist portrayed in the official reports as self-inflicted injuries by “aggressive North Africans”.

     The federal asylum camp in Basel is located directly next to the (deportation-) prison “Bässlergut”. Both in the prison and in the camp, there was and still is resistance from detainees. Actions and attacks against these institutions also take place outside the walls.

Further info:

        Documentation brochure of the Securitas violence in Basel (in German): https://3rgg.ch/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/3RGG_Immer-ein-Grund-uns-zu-schlagen_2020-1.pdf

   Information and past actions concerning the Bässlergut (in German): https://barrikade.info/tag/74

On the security business

       In Switzerland, Securitas AG is mainly responsible for “security and order services” in the federal asylum camps. Protectas is also deployed in the camps. Protectas is the Swiss version of the internationally active Securitas Group (logo with the three red dots), which has nothing to do with Securitas AG in Switzerland (eye logo).

There are many other companies that offer these services and thus carry out the direct oppression and control of people through psychological and physical violence.

On the “Organization for Regie and Special Projects (ORS)”

       In Switzerland, ORS has a near monopoly in the management of asylum camps. It operates internationally in Italy, Germany, Austria and Spain (under development) and has an EU office in Belgium.

ORS Service GmbH
Muthgasse 36
AT-1190 Wien
+43 (0)1 8906666-808
info@orsservice.at www.orsservice.at
www.orsintegration.at

ORS Deutschland GmbH
Albert-Schweitzer-Str. 16
D-78052 Villingen-Schwenningen
+49 (0)7721 697 18 40
info@orsdeutschland.de

ORS Deutschland GmbH
Güterhallenstrasse 4
D-79106 Freiburg
Tel. +49 (0)761 769 931 20
info@orsdeutschland.de

ORS S.r.l.
Piazza Annibaliano 18
I-00198 Roma
Italia
info@ors-italia.com www.ors-italia.com

ORS Group
14b Rue de la Science
1040 Bruxelles
Belgium
info@ors-group.eu www.ors-group.eu

Further addresses (in Switzerland) of responsible companies can be found in the call at https://barrikade.info/article/3517

++++ This is a call! ++++

For solidarity beyond national borders. Let’s fight together against the Fortress Europe and all its pillars!

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

Solidarity.

      This must be the time of a universal stand in solidarity between people across the world, a new era of universal solidarity. The public murder by the police of George Floyd, opened the flood gates to rage and out pouring of solidarity, our solidarity must encompass all those in struggle against this punitive, exploitative violent system. In our rage and fury at this brutal system we must not forget the others still suffering at the hands of the various "legal" systems of repression across the globe.

      This is a call for solidarity from Italy for comrades being dragged through the Italian state's judicial mesh.
From Act For Freedom Now:

 

 

      The second degree of the «Scripta Manent» trial will begin in Turin on July 1st, 2020. We ask comrades and people in solidarity for economic support, all the more important because in these months of lockdown the benefit initiatives have been reduced to a minimum if not completely interrupted.

The bank references to send money are:

Iban: IT56M0567617295IB0000592586
Accountholder: Omar Nioi
Bank: Banco di Sardegna
Bic/Swift code: SARDIT3S100

For any information contact the e-mail: cassamanent[at]anche.no

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