They say music makes the worlds go round, it certainly can be inspiring, and it certainly can bring people together, a weapon to energise a group, a community, a city or perhaps raise an idea to popular acceptance, like Love Music-Hate Racism.
New album form Love Music-Hate Racism, worth a wee listen, It is available as digital download or LP, from £10.
Surprise, surprise, the world's largest workers strike doesn't get much media coverage. The Indian farmers' strike where somewhere in the region of 200,000 took strike action against the implementation of new government legislation opening up India's agriculture to the free market. This strike has been ongoing since November 26th 2020, and farmers are still camped outside the capital Delhi demanding a complete withdrawal of this legislation. All rounds of talks with the government have so far failed to reach any agreement.
So far they managed to get the court to implement a stay of the legislation "until further notice" and the court has set up a committee to attempt a deal between the farmers and the government. Meanwhile the government has ruled out any roll back of this legislation, while the farmers have repeatedly stated that they will settle for nothing less than the complete withdrawal of this free market legislation. The court has also agree to hear a multitude of petitions against this legislation.
Agriculture should be for sustainability and self sufficiency, not about mass markets for export to enhance corporate coffers. The "free market" in agriculture has nothing to do with sustainability and self sufficiency, it's all about large corporations dominating the production of food for profit.
The determination of the farmers is borne out by the period over which the strike has persisted and the hardship the strikers have endured. At least four farmers involved in the strike camp outside Delhi have committed suicide, many others have died from various illnesses and from the bitter cold winter conditions. This legislation would be the death knell for thousands of Indian farmers.
This strike should be receiving world wide solidarity and support, of course a world wide strike would be one answer. The free market is an enemy of the ordinary people and puts more of the world's resources in the hands of the ever greedy and powerful corporations. They already control vast swaths of our resources and wield tremendous power over our lives, for the benefit of all humanity, we have to reverse this march of the corporate world.
My rant form 10 January 2016.
This winter may have been mild, but it is Scotland, and it is winter, cold and damp, not the sort of conditions anyone should find themselves homeless. While our parasitical politicians tell how well everything is doing, spouting, everything is on the up and up, some facts contradict that propaganda. The number of homeless people is rising, rising homelessness can never equate with an improving society. Glasgow City Mission, a charity that helps provide temporary shelter for homeless people, claims to have had a 60%+ increase in the number of rough-sleepers seeking a bed for the night. The charity claimed that, December 2015, saw 711 individuals came to them seeking a bed, compared with 437 December 2014. The quietest night this December saw 14 individuals seek a bed for the night, last December that figure was 4. While the busiest December night this year the figure was 31, compared with last December when there were 21.
Not a very flattering picture of Glasgow, Scotland's largest city, and an indictment of the system we live under. Glasgow has an abundance of glossy, glitzy, shopping malls, lots of fancy expensive restaurants, car parks littered with luxury cars, yet hunger and homelessness stalks its streets. Under the neon lights a doorway can be a shelter from the cold and damp, a dark lane, a bed for the night. There is an invisible army of enforced hungry, lurking in the shadows of abundance. It is totally unacceptable that hunger's vicious claws tear at an individual a hands throw away from a warehouse of food. It is totally unacceptable that someone should lay their head on cold wet stone for a bed, when the city abounds in empty accommodation.
This cruel injustice is the law of capitalism, no matter your needs, you will have to do without, if you can't pay. You can't be provided for if there is no profit in it for somebody. In this insane system, you can die from hypothermia and/or hunger, while shelter lies empty, and food rots next door. Why do we tolerate this?The figures may be different today but the injustice and inhumane callous cruelty persists, ah, that's capitalism for you. With the present pandemic creating a whirlwind of unemployment and austerity, we can expect the usual result from capitalism, more child poverty, and more homelessness to help to "balance the books".
The Homeless
Tenebrous spectres, they exist, out there,
on the crumbling edge of chaos.
A father, a son, a brother,
a daughter, a sister, a mother.
Fragments of some shattered family structure;
waste products
from a society being driven to destruction
by a hurricane of greed,
living a life that wears out life,
dying,
the devious death of exhaustion from existence.
http://radicalglasgowblog.blogspot.co.uk/.../wealth-and...
Living Rent have been battling to stop this site in Marhill which was once the site of council houses to stop its sale to private housing. We need our land to build council houses, not sold to rip-off landlords. We need reasonable rent council houses if not for our selves, for our young folk who have little enough to look forward to without just working to pay the rent. Wages going down rent going up! Time to stop the give away! It would be zero cost to the council to postpone the sale and listen to us.
Townhall Meeting For Maryhill
Invited speakers:
Bob Doris MSP, Cllr John Letford, Patrick Harvie MSP and candidate Keiran O'Neill are all confirmed as coming. Now is the time to make the community's view heard. Are you coming?
The Council spoke to just 69 people over 13 years to come up with their sell off plans for bought housing. Now is the time to show the community's real view and decide the site's future. Try to be there. 6:30pm, Tues 12th, meeting link at www.livingrent.org/collinastreet
Sign the petition:
https://www.livingrent.org/halt_the_sale_of_collina_street?fbclid=IwAR2Jc-fNLYznYA3a_J8AbenhXsvOIUIjLMsf1e4vS5-UCQeRJmQZ_Xz1wAQ
The UK holds many accolades, not many of them for worthy causes.
The UK has the largest Immigration Detention estate in Europe. UK policy results in asylum seekers facing detention at any time, even if they have committed no crime whatsoever. Detention has no time limit and is not automatically subject to Judicial Review. Many endure months and some endure years of indefinite detention.
There are no safeguards in place to prevent the detention of vulnerable persons, including those who have faced imprisonment, torture and /or sexual violence in the countries from which they have fled. This harmful and expensive practice is unnecessary and deprives people of their freedom, their dignity and is damaging to their mental health.
Detention Action Frequently Asked Questions about Detention and reports including Detained Lives. They also have a freephone number 0800 587 2096 for advice.
Some detainees are being held for too long and in insect-ridden rooms at Europe’s largest immigration centre in west London, inspectors say. Conditions at Harmondsworth Immigration Removal Centre were “desolate”, with bare rooms, broken equipment, bed bugs and cockroaches, the report by Chief Inspector of Prisons Peter Clarke said. Some detainees were held for over a year, with one man held for five years.
The outbreak has led to renewed calls for all detainees to be immediately released. “The outbreak of COVID-19 at #BrookHouse detention centre was completely predictable - and utterly preventable. Nobody should be detained for immigration purposes during a global pandemic,” tweeted Freedom From Torture. Celia Clark, the director of Bail for Immigration Detainees (BID), similarly argued: “The government should now recognise that the use of detention and deportation in the current climate helps to spread coronavirus and puts lives at risk.
Harmondsworth IRC currently has a capacity of 676, which makes it the largest detention centre in Europe. It holds only men and the security in several of the wings is comparable to a Category B (high security) prison. Harmondsworth is run by private security company Mitie, under contract to the UK Border Agency.
The last inspection by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Prisons was released in March 2018. The report found that there were considerable and persistent failings in the safety and respect afforded to detainees.
The following article is from crimethinc:
Meanwhile, as the Republicans Fracture, a New Political Center Emerges—Further to the Right
As a consequence of Donald Trump’s supporters occupying the Capitol building in Washington, DC after a rally promoting his baseless claims of election fraud, the Republican Party is fracturing, setting the stage for the consolidation of a new bipartisan political center—albeit much further to the right than before. Yet this also paves the way for massive sections of Trump’s base to break away from representative democracy altogether, embracing an explicitly fascist alternative. The events of January 6 offer them martyrs and a revanchist narrative that will serve them for years to come, providing an internal mythos for recruitment and a justification whenever they need to use force.
The events of January 6 will discredit Trump supporters in the eyes of centrists and force some Republicans to shift their allegiances to the center, but they will also push the envelope regarding what is acceptable. This may help the far right recruit locally countrywide and could normalize similar actions in the future.
But this is not the only danger ahead. In the name of a war against extremism, centrists are going to demand to expand the same machinery of state repression that the next Trump will inevitably use against us. This is essentially what happened in Weimar Germany, setting the stage for the rise of the Third Reich. Likewise, Trump’s chief weapon throughout 2020 has been the Department of Homeland Security, created under Bush in response to the September 11 attacks, and he has also benefitted from further centralization under Obama. Centrist appeals to fight “chaos” will serve to draw many of our former allies out of the streets, while justifying new crackdowns that will target us as well as the far right.
The state clampdown after this will suppress freedoms across the board, targeting all forms of dissent. In Turkey, when Erdoğan put down a right-wing military coup, that paved the way for him to repress every form of protest. State repression of the right will follow the playbook they use against our movements—incorporating reformist elements while isolating and destroying “extreme” elements. If the only pressure on the government is from the far right, the state will make concessions to them.
We are already seeing our former allies withdrawal from the streets in the events of January 6. Liberals urged people not to go to DC, counting on the authorities to deal with Trump supporters. This was a miscalculation. Security forces are not particularly inclined to stand up to the part of the population they sympathize with most—and even when they choose to do so, their hands are effectively tied by the deeply engrained institutional habits of treating conservative white people much more respectfully than they treat people of color, poor people, and anti-capitalists.
IndustriALL Global Union’s Korean affiliate the KMWU believes that POSCO workplaces will only become safer when union representatives are able to participate fully in safety structures. Instead, POSCO recently dismissed three union activists for exposing union busting, and failed to reinstate them after the National Labor Relations Commission ruled that the dismissal was unfair.
The KMWU argues that large-scale industrial disasters happen at POSCO due to management decisions to not upgrade aging facilities and equipment, to downsize subcontracted workers, and to outsource risks instead of eliminating them.
POSCO blocks the KMWU from accessing accident sites and refuses to allow union safety experts to participate in accident investigation. The company fails to disclose the true cause of an accident after an investigation is concluded, leaving workers to face the same risks that killed their colleagues.
South Korea has the highest occupational fatality rate among OECD countries and every year 2,400 workers die in industrial fatalities. In 2018, trade unions and civil society launched a campaign for a Corporate Manslaughter Bill after a young worker in his twenties was found dead in a power plant after the company violated standard operating procedures.
The signatures of 100,000 citizens placed this bill before the Korean National Assembly. The intent of the bill is to impose heavy penalties on employers who cause the death of workers, and to ensure that they adopt comprehensive preventative measures.
The KMWU believes that if the bill becomes law, POSCO CEO Jeong-Woo Choi should the first person to be held accountable.
Accidents in November and December at POSCO’s Gwangyang steelworks in Korea resulted in the deaths of five workers. On 24 November, an explosion near a blast furnace lead to the deaths of three workers. In further incidents on 9 and 23 December, another two POSCO workers lost their lives.
The lastest is the 18th accident in the past three years at the company’s Pohang and Gwangyang plants. POSCO workers have been killed by asphyxiation, explosions, fires, physical crush injuries, fatal falls, and overwork. The accidents have continued despite the plants being subject to an inspection conducted by the labour ministry.
The Glasgow Keelie jumps into 2021 with its latest issue, No.14, and as usual it carries a punch and variety of subject matter. This pocket rocket of criticism and information is a must read, read it and spread the word, it's your paper Glasgwegians. However it might be a local paper but the info is of interest to all who wish to see through the smoke and mirrors of this society.
These are tough times. Disgusted by imposed social behaviour and the models it reproduces, against every form of authority and exploitation, we aim at the destruction of this rotten system, whether it’s in “crisis” or is “prospering”.
As the State and system continue to assert their proven role against anarchists, anti-authoritarians, fighting people, self-managed spaces and various parts of society, we consider multiform action an integral part of the revolutionary process. From the distribution of leaflets in the squares, the occupation of spaces, self-organization in workplaces and neighbourhoods, to militant protests, night-time raids and re-appropriations.
The words of our brothers and sisters in captivity give us the strength to continue. Nothing is forgotten, nothing is left behind, the social war will continue as long as the enemy persists.
The multiform actions of the many groups and individual comrades in Greece and around the world have always raised our spirits and strengthened us. In the struggle there are also losses but the journey continues. With its losses and its joys, its hardships and also its pleasant surprises.
Solidarity and respect to all those around the world fighting in every way, inside and outside the walls, against this rotten system.
NOTHING IS FINISHED, EVERYTHING CONTINUES.
Comrades from the anarchist project Act for freedom now!January 2021
One from away back, forgot it was there.
Twelve Myths About Direct Action
Direct action—that is, any kind of action that bypasses established political channels to accomplish objectives directly—has a long and rich heritage in North America, extending back to the Boston Tea Party and beyond. Despite this, there are many misunderstandings about it, in part due to the ways it has been misrepresented in the corporate media.
Inspired by a quote from anarchist writer Voltairine de Cleyre, “Direct action is always the clamorer, the initiator, through which the great sum of indifferentists become aware that oppression is getting intolerable.” In other words, throw a spanner in the works.
I believe it is true to say that the American establishment is the most brutal, savage institution on the planet. It has invaded more countries than any other country on the planet, and it runs its own country with the same ruthless brutality. In doing so it has incarcerated a greater percentage of its population than any other country, and it runs that prison system with the same brutal inhumanity and savagery, and runs the prisons as one massive slave labour camp for the profit of its corporate moguls.
The American criminal justice system holds almost 2.3 million people in 1,833 state prisons, 110 federal prisons, 1,772 juvenile correctional facilities, 3,134 local jails, 218 immigration detention facilities, and 80 Indian Country jails as well as in military prisons, civil commitment centers, state psychiatric hospitals, and prisons in the U.S. territories.
Yet it sits at the head of the table of those nations that go by the name of the most developed and peaceful nations. The greatest illusion ever perpetrated on the human race.
40 Years A Prisoner.
Eight-year-old me couldn't imagine not seeing my dad's smiling face on Christmas morning, or drawing my mom a cartoon-filled card covered in thank yous for Mother's Day, or the thousands of other memories small kids get to share with their parents. These types of memories make up the foundation of our traditions and are the things that we pass down to our kids. Mike Africa Jr., who was born in prison, was robbed of the chance of creating those in-person memories with his parents. The Philadelphia police department forced him to figure out life on his own.
Africa Jr.'s journey is brilliantly related in the new HBO documentary film, "40 Years a Prisoner," directed by Tommy Oliver and available now on HBO Max. Featuring an all-star ensemble of producers including The Roots, Common and John Legend, "40 Years A Prisoner" is a compelling film about the horrors of America's criminal justice system. The story begins in 1978 when Philadelphia police raided MOVE, a back to nature organization based on love, among other peaceful principles. Africa's parents, two MOVE members, were arrested during that raid on trumped up charges and convicted before he was born. In the film, Oliver documents Africa Jr.'s life pursuit of freeing his parents, along with other MOVE members, and a decades-long battle with the Philadelphia police department. I recently got a chance to talk with Africa Jr. and Oliver about the film on an episode of "Salon Talks."
"40 Years a Prisoner" is streaming on HBO Max.
For better or worse, board games tend to be a popular form of entertainment in radical spaces, and yet there are precious few games that explicitly deal with anarchist ideas. For those exhausted by games glorifying nationalistic conquest, monopoly capitalism, and settler colonialism, Bloc by Bloc: The Insurrection Game may offer a breath of refreshing (if tear-gas-scented) air. According to the introduction in the manual, Bloc by Bloc is “a semi-cooperative game simulating protest movements, riots and popular uprisings in urban areas of the world during the first decades of the 21st century.” The name refers to the black bloc, a tactic used to anonymize and thereby protect participants in these uprisings, and in the game refers to the literal wooden blocks that represent such participants.
Released by Out of Order Games in 2018, the latest edition of Bloc by Bloc features randomized map generation, area control strategy, and hidden agendas, where each player is a faction of revolutionaries fighting against the police in an attempt to liberate their city. Each of the various factions (workers, neighbors, prisoners, and students) has a special ability giving them an advantage in their struggle against the state. For example, the students can more easily and freely move about the city, whereas the neighbors are better at building barricades to slow down the movement of the police.
Bloc by Bloc is a game for 2 to 4 players and it typically takes 2 to 3 hours to play. Players new to strategy board games might find the learning curve a little steep, but the instruction manual is clearly worded and includes reference cards that remind players of their available actions. Experienced board gamers will probably find many of the mechanics familiar. Board game comparison site boardvsgame.com gives it a complexity rating of 2.7 out of 5; compare this to the 2.3 / 5 of the classic competitive mainstay Settlers of Catan or the 2.4 / 5 of the popular cooperative game Pandemic.
While it can be played in fully cooperative mode, the game’s unique semi-cooperative mode is the recommended way to play, and in this Final Straw Radio interview, the game’s designer TL explains why. In contrast to fully cooperative games, where all players are on the same team and playing against the game’s “cardboard AI,” the players in Bloc by Bloc might all be on the same team — but they also might not. In fully co-op games, there is a tendency for everyone to follow the lead of the most experienced player, at its worst becoming a de-facto game of solitaire with less experienced players acting as mere extensions of the most experienced. This dynamic (while perhaps a rational strategy, the players want to win after all), isn’t necessarily encouraging of the critical thinking and anti-hierarchical mindset that anarchists seek to cultivate. But by introducing uncertainty about other players’ agendas, Bloc by Bloc instead forces each player to autonomously evaluate any particular move on its own strategic merit.
It was fun but the gameplay is horrible . It wouldn’t be too hard to tweak it to Make it playable. The fix would to have way less dice rolling , which there is more of in this game than risk, which is the reason risk doesn’t hold up. Also the game is way too long. I appreciate the effort though, it’s hard work creating a game
