The Violence Of The State's Minders.

       How can a person who is known to the authorities, and who under their instructions, presents himself to the local police station, end up dead during this visit and classified and buried as an unknown person.This is just another case of callous police brutality. The minders of state power know that the establishment will protect them, as they do their bosses dirty work. From America to Greece, from UK to France, police violence is well documented, but never prosecuted. However we should never forget that brutality, nor where they stand in relation to the ordinary people.

       This horrifying case of alleged defenestration is not the first in police history, and, sadly it will not be the last. 

(defenestration: While the act of defenestration connotes the forcible or peremptory removal of an adversary, and the term is sometimes used in just that sense,^[6] it also suggests breaking the windows in the process (de- also means removal). Although defenestrations can be fatal depending on the height of the window through which a person is thrown or throws oneself or due to lacerations from broken glass, the act of defenestration need not carry the intent of, or result in, death.) Wikipedia.

This from Contra Info:

      Open letter from the prisoners of Greek prisons to the jointly responsible ministers of public order and justice:
      On the 3rd of August 2016, the recently released—and former co-prisoner of ours—Pëllumb Marnikollaj goes to Patisia Police Station [Athens] to present himself before the relative authorities in fulfilment of the conditional terms of his release. Under up-until-now unexplained circumstances, he is transferred to Red Cross Hospital and, eventually, to the morgue. Shortly before being buried as of unknown identity—and despite the fact that his identity was known to the authorities—his relatives collect his corpse and allude to torture and defenestration.
       We are not the ones in charge of judging on what really happened. However, the number of reasons, which we have, not to believe the version of the Greek Police equals to the thousands of prisoners found in Greek prisons. It’s not merely the clumsiness in the way police attempted to cover the incident up; neither the fact that their explanations go against any common sense. (Come on, misters of the Greek Police. Who would believe that not only a prisoner, but even a citizen that visits a station to have his ID card issued would ever be allowed to roam around police offices, opening and closing windows undisturbed?)
     We have every reason to believe the family’s version of the needless death of our co-prisoner because every single one of us has endured the atrocities that take place inside the interrogation offices of police stations. We might not have had a first-hand defenestration experience; however, plenty of us have been under its threat as form of a not at all uncommon method of interrogation. We have, also, all been surprised by the fact that the windows of police stations are adorned with “flower boxes”.
      That we draw up this letter and make it public does not at all mean that we have the slightest hope for an investigation or that those responsible will eventually be held accountable. It’s already straightforward that we, the poor, the unemployed, the immigrants, all those who fill up your prisons are obliged to pay the price of our deeds. In contrast, those who brought us here by means of sweeps, batons and automatic guns will always enjoy the immunity that you open-handedly offer them, since double standards apply when it comes to decisions upon what is regarded as crime and what is not.
      Finally, we make it clear to all that we, as prisoners of the Greek prisons, do not intend to take sides in the game that the Greek and Albanian embassies play. We only want a reply. Even if we take the provocatively untrue version of the police seriously, Messrs. Ministers, is it the capacity of former prisoner or that of immigrant that allows a human being’s death to be dealt with such worthlessness that not even objects deserve?

PS: As an action of protest, we will be delaying our night return to our cells by one hour for three days.

Prisoners of Greek prisons

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Squat The World.

        It's amazing how the logic of the state says that it is unacceptable that people should live in an abandoned building, and it is much better that they live on the street. That's capitalism for you, living in an abandoned building is too dangerous, much safer to sleep on the streets. Of course we all know that the state cannot allow the people to resolve their problems by themselves, it must always create the illusion that only the state and the corporate world can resolve our problems. Big business and the state are supposed to be the answers to all our problems, when in fact it is obvious that they are the root cause of most, if not all, of our problems. This video from Workers Solidarity Movement, (Ireland)

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World War III.

       What do you call a war where every major power in the world is involved? I suppose it should be called World War III. The difference with this world war is that they are not fighting each other over a large expanse of the planet’s surface. Instead, they are fighting each other on one plot of land for control of the Middle East. Of course you’ll be fed the usual bullshit that all the major powers in the world are spending billions of pounds/dollars/roubles to help the Syrian people. One section are helping the Syrian people by trying to remove a nasty leader, the other section are helping the Syrian people by trying to maintain a wonderful leader of the people. 

     Meanwhile, the people of Syria are being slaughtered in their tens thousands, their towns and cities are being pulverised, and we have to believe it is all for the benefit of the people of that area. It is the only way to help them, we in the West are so altruistic. Our lords and masters only have the well-being of the people of Syria at heart. If you believe that crap, your brain has melted by watching too much TV. 

    No matter how they dress it up, we are in the midst of World War III, the power mongers have managed to localise their slaughter, and that mode of warfare will continue until one or the other can take control of the Middle East area and it vast resources, no major power will allow any other major power to control it all, hence the bloodshed. If they can’t resolve their blood fest with a clear winner, then in all probability, it could spread over a wider area, they will have no hesitation in doing so, remember 1914, then 1939, well nothing has changed, the power mongers are still empire builders.

     To end this insanity based on greed and power, we have to destroy the root, the state. The states of this world are the biggest terror organisations on the planet. They have the greatest fire-power, they do the greatest damage, and they kill the greatest number of innocent people. Until we resolve that problem, the death and destruction will continue.

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Freedom From Religion.

       Why does religion get special treatment in our society? We are always hearing that in a free society you should be free to indulge in the religion of your choice. However freedom and religion stand on opposite sides of a chasm. Religion is an authoritarian institution, and in most cases, is interwoven with the power strands of the state. In almost all the countries on this planet, religion and state stand side by side holding hands in their attempt to control the people. All religions have a heritage of brutal violence against other religions, and more venomous brutality against those who disbelieve their particular fantasy. Religion must be seen for what it is, a control system, a system that demands obedience to a set of dogmas handed down from higher authority, therefore the enemy of freedom.
 

     If we seek freedom to live our lives in free association, and voluntary co-operation, then religion and all its authoritarian bullshit has to be our enemy. It is not, as it would have you believe, an innocent bystander that hands out charity, it is part and parcel of an authoritarian system that demands obedience. By constant struggle from ordinary people we have, to a degree, put a muzzle on the brutality of religion, but it is still inherent within the beast, they still have the desire to punish disbelievers. 

     To fight for freedom means that the gloves should be off in regard to all authority, state, judiciary, religion, and the rest. Authority comes in many guises, sometimes with a smile, sometimes with a helping hand, but behind its back, it always, but always, carries a thick stick. Religion is no different, it must be grouped with all the other authoritarians.

 

A to Z of Religions

Acclaim Arrogant Absolutes.

Bellow Bygone Beliefs.

Casuist Cackling Cabal.

Deadly Divine Dogma.

Embellish Earlier Errors.

Form Fearful Fundamentalists.

Gaily Gabble Gehenna.

Hype Holy Hate.

Ignorantly Idolise Illusion.

Justify Judgmental Jargon.

Knowingly Kindle Kulturkampf.

Lambaste Liberal Learning.

Machiavellian Mind Moulding.

Narrate Nescient Nostrum.

Obligatory Obnoxious Obfuscation.

Peremptory Pestiferous Panjandrum.

Quickly Quell Querists.

Redundant Reactionary Rants.

Suppress Scholastic Scepticism.

Totally Trammel Tolerance.

Ululate Useless Utterances.

Vaticinate Vicious Vengeance.

Wailing Wearisome Waffle.

Extol Excessive Exaltation.

Y? Y? Y?

Zany Zealous Zealots.

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The Dear Green Place??

 

      After reading the previous blog, my comrade Loam at arrezafe sent me this poem. It gives a snapshot of life under the outpourings of the Tennant's chemical works. Incidentally, it mentions the street where I was born, Charles Street. However, the story I have heard of Tennant was not one of his "radicalism" but that he built is chemical empire on a stolen formula for bleach, stolen from a friend. Though I have never had this verified.

Thanks Loam for the poem.

      The following poem, recited by Hugh Aitken Dow at a St Rollox school reunion in 1875 illustrates the change brought to a once peaceful scene by the chemical works – known by many locals as ‘Dante’s Inferno’!

 “A busy, noisy, clam’rous spot
where trees, nor flowers nor fields are seen
where men by day and night are wrought
and holy calm hath rarely been.

Where fragrant zephyrs never blow
but smutty is its atmosphere.
When rains fall dense and winds are low
It’s sulphrous elements appear.

When winds blow south, a cloud by day
it may at once be seen and felt
for smarting eyes then own its sway
through muffled noises then ‘tis smelt.

There fiery pillars, gleam at night
from hooded chimneys, tow’ring high
and cast their vivid, fork’d flames bright
up to the troubled murky sky.

Thus fiery cross like, shineth clear
the cupolas of Charles Street
answering to McAndrew’s near
while Hamilton’s the call repeat.

There Vulcan’s strokes would fail to match
the Glasgow ironworks polka blows
his lurid fires would pace and din
‘fore Tennants countless furnace glows.”

http://www.roystonroadproject.org/archive/history/garngad_royston.htm

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Opulence And Deprivation, Two Sides Of The Capitalist Coin.

       It is easy to look around this capitalist lunatic asylum we live in, and find injustice and inequality, it’s everywhere. In all our cities and towns, there are areas of opulence and areas of deprivation, but it is supposed to be the same country. All our taxes, rates and other deductions from our incomes and purchases, are meant to go into the one pot and be shared out fairly among the whole. Yet in any city there will be glaring inequality.
     I was born in Garngad, one of Glasgow’s many festering slums, it was demolished and the area renamed Royston. We moved to the Springburn area still in the north of the city. In its day it was a railway town in its own right. The Hydepark Locomotive Works was a massive employer in the area, as was the “Caley”, St Rrollox Caledonian Railway Works. In its day it was said the the Hydepark works made around 80% of the world’s steam locomotives, and the “Caley” was the largest railway repair and maintenance yard in Europe. Across the road from that was Tennants Chemical Works, again claiming to be the largest in Europe, which spewed out its toxic filth over Garngad and Springburn. They all disappeared and Springburn died with them. They knocked most of Springburn down and built a dual carriageway. 

        As a boy I spent lots of time in the Springburn Public Park, a large park with football pitches, bowling greens, cricket pitch, boating pond and wildlife pond, lots of green space and winding paths. It was also home to a wonderful botanic garden where I would spend hours wandering its corridors amazed at the array of exotic trees, shrubs and plants. It was also a wonderful place to go on a cold day and get lost in that humid heat.

 

        But Springburn is in the north of the city, not the West End, so things started to just run down through lack of funding. With the heart of Springburn gone, the botanic gardens was emptied and left to rot, now all that remains is a large rusting structure, resembling the massive rib cage of some long dead dinosaur. It has a fence around it with warnings not to enter as it is dangerous. Well, this is the north of the city, the people there don’t need a botanic garden, they can visit the one in the West End. Springburn was also home a fine red sandstone Victorian building, called The Springburn Public Hall. It was the beating heart of the district, hosting all manner of events from dances to meetings, form clubrooms to boxing events. It to closed and was left until the shrubs started to cover its ledges, it was declared unsafe and was demolished. Another land mark in the north of the city that was demolished was the Garngadhill Church, its spire could be seen for miles around as it was on a high part of the city, a well know landmark. The city fathers decided that it should come down, but there was such opposition to this, not so much the church, but the spire. The council caved in and the church was demolished, the spire remains with a bit of a garden around it.
         Now back to that pot of taxes etc. that is supposed to be spent fairly among our communities. If we move to the West End of the city, There are still lots of Victorian buildings, churches are not demolished, but when they are no longer required by the funny folk who talk to their friend in the sky, they are redeveloped into a venue, a fancy restaurant, pub or a place for music, theatre, poetry etc. Despite Great Western Road at the top of Byres Road being a nightmare of traffic jams, I’ll bet there are no plans to knock down a slice of the West End to make a dual carriageway to help the flow of traffic.
         Opulence and deprivation live side by side in all of our cities and towns, they are two sides of the capitalist coin, a system of screw you, I’m all right Jack. If you are looking to see that pot of your contributions spread fairly and where they are most need, then you will have to stop running to the ballot box. You’ll have to take matters into your own hands and demolish this insanity that is ruining millions of lives on a daily basis, while a handful of parasites live on milk and honey. However, don’t expect the parasites who hold all that wealth and power, to relinquish it by reasoned persuasion alone.

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

 

Let's End The Bullshit, Now.

          I’m 82 years old, and I wonder how many of you can tell me how often I’ve heard our political ballerinas spout, “ We are going to end child poverty”, “We are going to solve the housing crisis”, “We are going to tackle inequality”? Every election, every new leadership battle, this kind of bullshit gets spread over our heads, and sadly on the basis of who says it with the best acting performance, usually gets onto the gravy train.
       Here we are in the 21st. Century, so with all those reassurances from the political careerists, where are we on those three points, child poverty, house shortage and inequality?
       Child poverty, 2014-15 there were approximately 4 million children living in poverty in the UK. That is equivalent to more than 25% of all our kids, in some areas it is much higher, where I live, in Springburn for example, it is 52%. While this is a crime, what is worse is that we have 1.7 million kids living in severe poverty. Of course we will hear the mantra get a job and lift yourself out of poverty, well, 63% of those children living in poverty are in a home where someone is working.
       Housing crisis, not enough homes being built keeps the price of houses high, and rising. More and more people can’t afford a mortgage and with the slashing of social housing, they are forced into expensive private rentals or crap private rented accommodation. The number of homeless households has risen to more than 50,000 a year. Many of these people will wait years for decent accommodation, and many will have dependent children, they will spend years shuffling around temporary accommodation. Approximately 2,000 will have no roof over their heads and will end up sleeping rough. (figures for England)
     Inequality, over the last decade the poorest tenth of our population have seen a fall in their real incomes, while the richest tenth has seen their incomes take a much larger proportional rise than any other group. The vast majority of extra income money has gone to those with above average earnings, with approximately half of this extra money going to the richest tenth of earners.

  The overall message from these various analyses is simple: income inequalities have been increasing, both recently and over longer time periods.  These inequalities have been increasing at both ends of the spectrum.  In other words, the poorest have fallen further behind the average, and the richest have moved further ahead.

       So I have lived for 82 years of being fed pure unadulterated bullshit, though I don't remember the fist five or so, but I imagine they were filled with just the same crap.

        One encouraging feature of today is that the vast majority of the public have absolutely no belief in, or respect for, our established system. They see the political parasites for what they are, a bunch of self-centred, greedy careerists, and the establishment is worried. The growing discontent, and anger is a threat to their control over our lives, and they will go to any lengths to try to reassert that control. One feature of this fear is the latest onslaught against the Corbyn wave of popularity, they can't tolerate anyone with even a faint hint of socialism any where near the levers of control. Their hysteria has gone from reds under the beds, to Trots in the toilets.

       So now would seem the right time to really get aggressive with our anger, with our disgust, now would seem the right moment to take our anger to the streets, to the work places, to the communities. The hysterical parasites are on  the back foot, they are losing control. Perhaps that one large push of organised anger, of well supported direct action, can bring this whole stinking cancerous system tumbling down. 

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

Back From Art And All That.

          Well we are back from Pittenweem Arts Festival, it was non-stop and very cold, but for my partner, Stasia, it was well worth doing. Pittenweem is a small fishing village on the east coast of Scotland, the East Neuk of Fife, (neuk, Scots word for corner) and for the last 34 years has run what is the largest arts festival in Scotland. A beautiful little place and one of the few Scottish fishing villages that still has fishing boats coming and going, and their catch going into trucks for the towns and cities.

 

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Man Lives Not By Bread Alone.

       My partner will be exhibiting at the Pittenweem Arts Festival, both of us will be up there for about the next ten days. So the blog will fall silent AGAIN, See you all soon.

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

Break The Silence.

        In this world there is no peace, there never has been. The violence of empires have ravaged millions of people, as power mongers savaged neighbours and far flung countries. In the modern world it continues, we either have “big” wars, that kill millions, or what I call “pygmy” wars, that kill hundreds of thousands. Bombs, drones and missiles rain down on Africa and the Middle East, Pakistan and Afghanistan, are peppered with drone kills. While in Europe and America the talk is of having peace since 1945. In the usual sabre rattling and tough talking about the threat from Russia and China, the West parades its military might along the borders of Russia and surrounds the coasts of China with America’s naval arsenal. It would appear that our lords and masters, armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons of mass destruction, are spoiling for a fight. 

      This from:

     A World War has begun. Break the silence, by John Pilger:

       How many people are aware that a world war has begun? At present, it is a war of propaganda, of lies and distraction, but this can change instantaneously with the first mistaken order, the first missile.
       In 2009, President Obama stood before an adoring crowd in the centre of Prague, in the heart of Europe. He pledged himself to make "the world free from nuclear weapons". People cheered and some cried. A torrent of platitudes flowed from the media. Obama was subsequently awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
       It was all fake. He was lying.
      The Obama administration has built more nuclear weapons, more nuclear warheads, more nuclear delivery systems, more nuclear factories. Nuclear warhead spending alone rose higher under Obama than under any American president. The cost over thirty years is more than $1 trillion.
        A mini nuclear bomb is planned. It is known as the B61 Model 12. There has never been anything like it. General James Cartwright, a former Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has said, "Going smaller [makes using this nuclear] weapon more thinkable." 

        The perception that somehow the Democrats in America are more liberal than the Republicans doesn't seem to stand up to scrutiny. 

          This is the country where toddlers shoot their mothers and the police wage a murderous war against black Americans. This is the country that has attacked and sought to overthrow more than 50 governments, many of them democracies, and bombed from Asia to the Middle East, causing the deaths and dispossession of millions of people.
        No country can equal this systemic record of violence. Most of America's wars (almost all of them against defenceless countries) have been launched not by Republican presidents but by liberal Democrats: Truman, Kennedy, Johnson, Carter, Clinton, Obama.

        When will we ever learn, when will we finally rid ourselves of this army of power hungry, greed drive parasites, that control all aspects of our lives. When will we bury in the dustbin of history, this group that sees all humanity as expendable in their pursuit for power, control and wealth.

         Today, the long sleep may be over. The young are stirring again. Gradually. The thousands in Britain who supported Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader are part of this awakening - as are those who rallied to support Senator Bernie Sanders.
        In Britain last week, Jeremy Corbyn's closest ally, his shadow treasurer John McDonnell, committed a Labour government to pay off the debts of piratical banks and, in effect, to continue so-called austerity.
          In the US, Bernie Sanders has promised to support Clinton if or when she's nominated. He, too, has voted for America's use of violence against countries when he thinks it's "right". He says Obama has done "a great job".
          In Australia, there is a kind of mortuary politics, in which tedious parliamentary games are played out in the media while refugees and Indigenous people are persecuted and inequality grows, along with the danger of war. The government of Malcolm Turnbull has just announced a so-called defence budget of $195 billion that is a drive to war. There was no debate. Silence.
          What has happened to the great tradition of popular direct action, unfettered to parties? Where is the courage, imagination and commitment required to begin the long journey to a better, just and peaceful world? Where are the dissidents in art, film, the theatre, literature?
           Where are those who will shatter the silence? Or do we wait until the first nuclear missile is fired?

Read the full article HERE:

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That Babbling Brook Of Bullshit.

         By now you will all know, our should know, my opinion of the “mainstream Media, or that babbling brook of bullshit as I usually address it. A variety of outlets, all spouting a monologue, all propagating the same illusion, false information, manufactured reality. A monochrome world of false and useless information. Well useless to us, but very important to the powers that be. It helps keep us reading from the same song sheet seeing the world as they would have us see it, and all to their advantage. I believe it is very important that we realise that the babbling brook of bullshit, is there deliberately, and for a very important purpose, and it is not to  inform. The development of this monochrome song sheet, is not an accident, and its formation is illuminating to our understanding of the type of society we live under.

 

This from Tarcorteca counterinfo:

         Still, in spite of all that, it proved impossible to control the narrative, and the public support for the various US and NATO wars collapsed under the pressure of inconvenient news coming even from mainstream media which clearly maintained a degree of independence. But if you fast-forward a decade, to the current wars in Libya, Syria, Yemen, Iraq, Ukraine, and others, it is clear that something has changed. There is one dominant narrative that is being pushed by literally every mainstream media source, irrespective of their ostensible ideological bent. No matter where you turn, you read or hear about Assad’s “barrel bombs”, Gaddafi’s “massacres”, or “Russian aggression.”
       These reports invariably represent a point of view that is not only completely one-sided, but also factually wrong, even on the most basic of issues. How did US and NATO manage to achieve such an amazing discipline within the supposedly free and independent Western media?

       There are essentially three parts to the answer:
state oversight of the media;
co-opting individual reporters;
disseminating propaganda through covert means.

         The first two are obvious enough and have long been practiced. Media corporations are just that–corporations, subject to variety of laws and regulations whose enforcement can be used to steer individual outlets toward adopting a desired point of view. Individual reporter’s coin of the realm is “access” to privileged information, which may be granted or withheld depending on their effectiveness as government propagandist. The third, the covert dissemination of propaganda, is new, and that factor likely explains the lack of variation from one media outlet to the next. The media are no longer merely encouraged to toe the official line–they have the stories planted for them to pick up through social media and other unofficial channels.

Read the full article HERE:

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Migrants Are People.

        Migrants may be reported in our babbling brook of bullshit, the mainstream media, but never as people. They are this band of figures that cross borders “illegally”, but behind every mention of a migrant, there is a person and in most cases a person suffering. They are individuals and families, in search of a better life, or worse fleeing death and destruction. Despite their plight, they are herded like cattle, shunted into detention centres, intimidated, humiliated and often abused. Million of pounds are spent on immigration officials, transport and detention centres, but little in trying to alleviate the individual’s problems. The normal procedure is, gather them up, lock them up, and ship them back to what ever horror they came from. We are one people, we live in one world, would should treat each other as such, migrants are people, just like you and I.

This from Act For Freedom Now:

 Let’s break isolation
       CIEs are prisons for immigrants destined to be deported from Italy. They are part of the system of control, selection and ruling of migration flows throughout Europe. A system that by either giving or denying a document decides who can stay on the European soil in order to thicken the ranks of the exploited, and who must be taken away because they are not needed. In other words, those destined to stay as clandestine, subjected to even more blackmail and exploitation.
There have been struggles both inside and outside the CIEs in the course of the years, the struggles of those who are locked up and of people in solidarity who have decided that a stance must be taken against all this: the CIEs are to be razed to the ground for the sake of everybody’s freedom.
      One of the CIES currently operating can be found in Brindisi, hidden in the countryside of Restinco.
       Many testimonies of violence and abuse have been coming from inside the centre, directly from the prisoners, in the last month. It seems that whoever protests against the humiliating conditions of detention – if the threating wasn’t enough to dissuade him/her – will be taken by force to a little yard by the guards, away from his/her companions, and beaten up by scores of them.
     Against isolation, against all prisons, in solidarity with the imprisoned immigrants:
Demo outside the CIE in
Brindisi-Restinco
Monday 8th August 6pm
(4pm meeting point at Villa Matta squat, Lecce, via San Nicola 1)

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

Support Prisoners Strike, September 9th.

        What are prisons for? Well in the developed world they are for profit for tycoons at the expense of the tax payer. Prisoners are put to work on products for large corporations, at a beggarly rate, with no protection from exploitation, no union, no holidays, no sick pay, never late, can’t slack-off or they are punished in one way or another. However in the land of the free, the good ol’ US of A, they have taken the slave labour tactics in prisons to a new level. The prison system in America is so profitable to the corporate world that they invest billions of dollars in building ever more and larger caged hell-holes.

 When did slavery end?

       Human rights organizations, as well as political and social ones, are condemning what they are calling a new form of inhumane exploitation in the United States, where they say a prison population of up to 2 million – mostly Black and Hispanic – are working for various industries for a pittance. For the tycoons who have invested in the prison industry, it has been like finding a pot of gold. They don’t have to worry about strikes or paying unemployment insurance, vacations or comp time. All of their workers are full-time, and never arrive late or are absent because of family problems; moreover, if they don’t like the pay of 25 cents an hour and refuse to work, they are locked up in isolation cells.

           Some facts about the American prison system and the extent of the racial exploitation that is rife across America.

The U.S. imprisons a larger percentage of its black population than South Africa did at the height of apartheid.

1. The United States has 5% of the world's population, but 25% of the world's prisoners.

2. The total incarcerated population in the U.S. is a staggering 2.4 million — a 500% increase over the past 30 years. 

3. One in every 108 adults was in prison or jail in 2012.

4. One in 28 American children has a parent behind bars.  

5. At the end of 2007, 1 in 31 adults was behind bars, on probation or on parole.

6. Currently, 65 million Americans have a criminal record.

7. There are more people behind bars today for a drug offense than there were in 1980 for all offenses combined.

8. The U.S. spent $80 billion on incarceration in 2010 alone. 

9. About as many people were returned to prison just for parole violations in 2000 as were admitted in 1980 for all reasons combined.

10. Parole violators accounted for more than 35% of all prison admissions in 2000. Of those, only one-third were returned for a new conviction; the rest were returned for a technical violation, such as missing a meeting with the parole officer.

11. A first-time drug offense carries a sentence of 5-10 years. In other developed countries, that sentence would be six months of jail time, if any at all. 

12. The vast majority of those arrested with a drug offense are not charged with serious offenses. For example, in 2005, 4 out of 5 drug arrests were for possession, not sales.  

13. In the 1990s, marijuana possession accounted for nearly 80% of the spike in arrests.

14. Three out of four young black men in Washington, D.C., can expect to serve time behind bars. This is despite the fact that people of all races use and sell drugs at the same rate.

15. African-Americans comprised 12% of regular drug users, but almost 40% of those arrested for drug offenses.

16. More than 96% of convictions in the federal system result from guilty pleas rather than decisions by juries.

17. Conservative estimates put innocent people who plead guilty between 2% and 5%, which translates to tens of thousands of innocent people behind bars today.

18. Eighty percent of defendants cannot afford a lawyer. Tens of thousands of people go to jail every year without ever talking to a lawyer or going to trial. 

19. A public defender will routinely have a caseload of more than 100 clients at a time.

        Marking the prison occupation of Attica Prison in New York, on September 9th. 1971, September 9th. this year is the date marked out for a nation wide prison strike across America, prison populations in other countries are also supporting this brave move by those in cages. They are asking for support from the general public, in the form of protests outside prisons and posters.

       Here is a poster (11×17) for the upcoming nationwide prisoner strike on September 9th. Download, print and put it up around your city if you feel it. There is a grayscale version here too.
For more information about the strike and the ongoing wave of prison rebellions across the country, check out these articles: Strike Against White Supremacy | Incarcerated Workers Take the Lead | Call To End Prison Slavery

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