Are They Insane, Or Just Stupid? Whatever, They Are Dangerous.

       Looking around the world at all those autocratic entities that divide humanity, called states, you find several common features. One in particular that always seems to receive special protection is religion. Religion has its thumb in all manner of the states affairs, yet it  has been over the centuries the most divisive of institutions ever devised by the human mind. It has a history steeped in blood and persecution, as each holier than thou group maims, kills and tortures some other holier than thou group. Religion has spawned wars century after century, all based on some fairy tale of a super being somewhere in the universe that selects one particular group as special, all others as somehow inferior and to be converted or eliminated. One sect of this insane grouping believe that those who disagree with them should burn in hell for all eternity, hell being another fanciful place with some enormous fire, that doesn't seem to have any known location. The adherents to these various fairy tales, despite their abhorrent history, demand protection from ridicule, criticism and demand a place at the table in the corridors of power, what is more, they usually get that place.

     As long as religion survives we can never be truly free, religion is all about submission to some fanciful code of conduct supposedly handed down from the invisible being in the sky, and only a few are privy to its dictates, which we are meant to swallow without question. Religion is the enemy of the free thinking mind, the enemy liberty, an anathema to truth and justice. 

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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Israel's Future???

        Israel, a state born on the promise of an invisible man in the sky, who is said to have promised this particular tribe a large part of the Middle East. As far as I am aware, there were no witnesses to this promise, and I doubt if an invisible man in the sky would have the where-with-all to write the promise down and sign it. So some "man" had to do the writing, again, as far as I am aware, their were no witness at the invisible man's dictation. What a load of crap to use as the foundation of a state, but those who believe this nonsense are prepared to maim, kill, and steal land from others to fulfill this childish fiction story.

      That ludicrous fictional promise has spawned the largest concentration camp on the planet, the enslavement and creeping genocide of a group of people who happen to have lived on the plot of land for countless centuries, the Palestinians.

       It is hard to imagine any state built on such ludicrous foundations could possible come into existence, let alone last, but it suited the imperialist powers of the time, and today Israel survives as it is doing the job of the Western imperialists policeman in the Middle East. But for how mach longer?

An interesting article on Israel's possible future,

  By Gilad Atzmon, The End of Israel

          September 14, 2019 "Information Clearing House" - The lesson to be drawn from the current Israeli political stalemate is that Israel is imploding, breaking into the elements it has never managed to integrate into one. The schism is no longer the more quotidian dichotomy of Ashkenazi vs. Arab Jews (aka Sephardim); this divide is ideological, religious, spiritual, political, ethnic and cultural. Nor does it break down to Left and Right, Jewish Israelis are politically with the right even when they pretend to be ‘Left.’ Although some of the most astute critical voices of Israeli politics and Jewish fundamentalism are Israelis (such as Gideon Levi, Shlomo Sand, Israel Shamir and others), there is no political Israeli Left. Israeli politics break down into a lot of extreme right voters and many ordinary hawks. The Arab Joint List Party is practically the only Left party in the Israeli Knesset. This should not be surprising any more. Jewish Left, as I have been arguing for many years, is an oxymoron; Jewishness is a form of tribal identification and Left is universal. The ‘tribal’ and the ‘universal’ are like oil and water, they do not mix very well.
       What is peculiar about the Israeli political divide is that the Israelis are more united than ever in their nationalist beliefs and in the primacy of their Jewish symptoms. Why is it, if the Israelis are so unified, that no one can form a government in their so-called ‘Jewish State’?
        Avigdor Lieberman, formerly an enthusiastic Netanyahu ally and himself a radical Jewish nationalist, delved into the Israeli political deadlock yesterday. He maintained that the elections had already been decided: “The ultra-Orthodox and Messianic bloc reaches 62-61 seats.” The leader of the rabid nationalist Yisrael Beiteinu said, “If there is no voting rate of at least 70% in Gush Dan and Sharon, the Halacha government will be established.”
        Basically, Lieberman said that unless secular Israelis in Tel Aviv go to the polls, they should expect to live in a Halacha State under an ultra right wing Netanyahu government. Lieberman appears to hold the key to Israel’s political stability. Although he and Netanyahu are ideological twins regarding Israeli security and nationalist matters, the two are bitter rivals who fight aggressively against each other. Netanyahu has known for a few years that, absent a strong ultra right wing government, he can expect to spend some time behind bars, an adventure that has become common for Israel’s prime political figures. Netanyahu’s natural partners are the ultra right parties and the orthodox parties. Ideologically, Lieberman should also feel comfortable within such a political coalition but Lieberman has made a crucial political decision, essential for his political survival. A while back he grasped that his political home base, Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union, many of them barely Jewish and subjected to constant rabbinical terror, regard the Jewish Orthodox parties as their ultimate foes. Many of these Russian and Ukrainian Jews hold ultra right wing political positions but also see the Rabbis as an imminent threat to their survival.
         Theoretically, Lieberman could broker a huge unity coalition with Netanyahu at the top, joined by Blue and White (Kachol Lavan) and its three right wing field marshals, Lieberman’s own party and probably the Labour party. Such a coalition would hold around 80 Knesset seats, more than enough to sustain a strong government but this coalition would refuse to guarantee Netanyahu’s immunity.
       Netanyahu gambles instead on a weak ultra right wing religious government, a government that may not hold for very long but would buy more time for its PM to stay out of jail.
        This conflict at the heart of Israeli politics is a window into the Jewish state and its fears. Israel is rapidly becoming an Orthodox Jewish state. Israel’s Orthodox Jews are the fastest growing group in the country. They are also the country’s poorest population, 45 percent live below the poverty line in segregated communities. Ordinarily, one would expect the poor to support the left, but Israeli Torah Jews are rabid nationalists and openly lend their support to Benjamin Netanyahu and his party.
        Prof. Dan Ben-David of Tel Aviv University warned recently that Israel could cease to exist in a couple of generations. He pointed to the astonishingly high birth rate among ultra Orthodox Jews and predicted that, based on current trends, they will comprise 49% of Israel’s population by 2065. The ultra Orthodox parties are destined to dominate the Knesset within a generation or less. Ben David predicts that their dependence on Israel’s welfare system will lead to a rapid decline is Israel’s economy. This is economically damaging enough and is made worse by the refusal of most rabbinical schools to incorporate standard Western subjects such as mathematics, science and English into their core curriculum. Consequently, Israel is educating a growing percentage of its population in a fashion that fails to equip them to contribute to the needs of a hi-tech society that is immersed in a conflict for survival.
        The picture that comes across is peculiar. As Israel becomes increasingly Jewish and fundamentalist in its nationalist and religious ethos, it has also become more divided on everything else. The Russian immigrants find it impossible to live alongside the ultra Orthodox and vice versa. The secular enclave in Tel Aviv is committed to seeing their metropolis as an extension of NY. The Israeli Left has morphed into an LGBT hasbara unit. It has practically removed itself from the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Jewish settlers adhere to the concept of a ‘Two Jewish States Solution.’ They want to see the West Bank become a Jewish land. Orthodox Jews are barely concerned with any of these political issues. They well know that the future of the Jewish state belongs to them. All they need to do is sustain a productive secular Jewish minority to serve as their milk cow. On top of all of that we face Bibi’s survival wars that threaten to escalate any minute into a world conflict.
         In light of all of this, the Palestinians are in relatively good shape.. They simply need to survive. Israel seems to be Israel’s fiercest enemy.
         Gilad Atzmon is a saxophonist, writer, and political activist. He was born in Israel, but now lives in London. https://gilad.online/writings/2019/9/12/the-end-of-israel

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Trust And False Narratives.

        Where is the truth, how do we find it in the smoke and mirrors of the state propaganda mouthpiece, the mainstream media? How many of us live the false narrative of the state, seeing "our people" as special, better, different, while those "others" over there are in some way inferior, to be treated with suspicion and to be feared. The appalling treatment of migrants is one living proof of the result of this poisonous narrative. Wars are built on false narratives, otherwise would the bus driver want to go overseas to kill the shop assistant, or the gardener want to kill the plumber from over there? States can't exist without a false narrative, how else would they keep their wealth, power and privileges, while the rest of us struggle from week to week? How else would they get their citizens to send their sons and daughters across the sea to kill some other parents' sons and daughters? Our system is built on false narratives. One way to see through the false narratives is to abolish borders, see all humanity as our brothers and sisters, see our differences and admire at the variety, live with a system of mutual aid, sustainability, co-operation and seeing to all our people's needs, free from the profit motive. Put an end to wealth accumulation, privileges, and power over another. A difficult job, but do you see an alternative?

              An interesting extract from from Tony Kevin, (retired Australian diplomat.) 

Truth, Trust and False Narratives

          Let me now turn to some theory about political reality and perception, and how national communities are persuaded to accept false narratives. Let me acknowledge my debt to the fearless and brilliant Australian independent online journalist, Caitlin Johnstone.
          Behavioural scientists have worked in the field of what used to be called propaganda since WW1. England has always excelled in this field. Modern wars are won or lost not just on the battlefield, but in people’s minds. Propaganda, or as we now call it information warfare, is as much about influencing people’s beliefs within your own national communityas it is about trying to demoralise and subvert the enemy population.
       The IT revolution of the past few years has exponentially magnified the effectiveness of information warfare. Already in the 1940s, George Orwell understood how easily governments are able to control and shape public perceptions of reality and to suppress dissent. His brilliant books 1984 and Animal Farm are still instruction manuals in principles of information warfare. Their plots tell of the creation by the state of false narratives, with which to control their gullible populations.
         The disillusioned Orwell wrote from his experience of real politics. As a volunteer fighter in the Spanish Civil War, he saw how both Spanish sides used false news and propaganda narratives to demonise the enemy. He also saw how the Nazi and Stalinist systems in Germany and Russia used propaganda to support show trials and purges, the concentration camps and the Gulag, anti-Semitism and the Holocaust, German master race and Stalinist class enemy ideologies; and hows dissident thought was suppressed in these controlled societies. Orwell tried to warn his readers: all this could happen here too, in our familiar old England. But because the good guys won the war against fascism, his warnings were ignored.
          We are now in Britain, U.S. and Australia actually living in an information warfare world that has disturbing echoes of the world that Orwell wrote about. The essence of information control is the effective state management of two elements, trust and fear, to generate and uphold a particular view of truth. Truth, trust and fear: these are the three key elements, now as 100 years ago in WWI Britain.

Read the full article HERE:

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American Privileges.

 

       Another fine article from Australian Caitlin Johnstone, summing up some American home truths, not a lot I could add to this piece except to say that we citizens of its puppet regimes are equally guilty as our governments bend their knee to all those American privileges. We are complicity in so much as our acceptance our governments unquestioning and safeguarding those American privileges. Our governments are very unlikely to change their stance on these privileges, but perhaps we could change our support for such a corrupt and damaging structure.

American Privilege
By Caitlin Johnstone

         September 14, 2019 "Information Clearing House" -

        American liberals and progressives talk a bit about white privilege, male privilege, straight privilege etc, but one thing I never hear them talk about is American privilege: the ability their nationality gives them to have a relationship with this world that the rest of us do not have.
         American privilege is reassuring yourself that there are problems enough at home without worrying about the trillions your government’s war machine is spending terrorizing the world and encircling the planet with military bases.
     American privilege is reluctantly allowing the potential Commanders-in-Chief have an eight-minute conversation about foreign policy in your presidential primary debates, when your country’s military policy functionally dictates the affairs of rest of the world.
        American privilege is arguing against the legality of assault weapons on the basis that they are “weapons of war”, implying that they’re fine as long as they’re used to kill some foreigner’s kids.
         American privilege is being able to masturbate your outrage addiction over a racist joke while ignoring the way your military murders black and brown people by the tens of thousands every year.
          American privilege is being able to lose your mind over someone using the wrong pronouns while paying no attention to the fact that your government pours your tax money and resources into governments and groups who hang gay people in the town square.
         American privilege is believing your propaganda is the truth, and everyone else’s understanding of the world is fake news.

There are 800 U.S. military bases in 80 countries. https://t.co/yUrf7T5U1B pic.twitter.com/AAqqJ25ZFd

— CounterPunch (@NatCounterPunch) March 5, 2016

          American privilege is assuming your prudish Puritanical brand of sexuality is healthy and normal so it’s no big deal that you insist that all English-speaking social media adheres to your creepy nipple-hating norms.
         American privilege is telling foreigners to butt out of your politics when your politics are literally killing them.
          American privilege is having a shit fit over election meddling in one social media post, while cheerleading regime change in the next.
        American privilege is starting a war on a lie without being charged with a war crime.
          American privilege is committing war crimes with impunity while jailing the whistleblowers and journalists who reveal them and still getting to call yourselves the good guys.
           American privilege is being able to spend all day arguing online about domestic policy while the rest of the world, completely incapable of influencing your government’s behavior, prays you don’t get us all killed.
         American privilege is only having a robust antiwar movement when your own citizens are at risk of being drafted, then completely forgetting about peace for decades while an increasingly robotic military force gives you even more peace of mind.
         American privilege is being able to relax about war because your soldiers are being replaced with drones and proxy militias in US-driven conflicts, even though those kill people just as dead as manually operated killing machines.
        American privilege is being hush-hush about the egregious imperialist stances of progressive candidates like Bernie Sanders because they have some decent domestic policies.
      American privilege is black bloc protests against public appearances by figures like Milo Yiannopoulos and the Proud Boys while murderous war pigs like Bill Kristol, Henry Kissinger, John Bolton, David Frum and arms industry executives go from appearance to appearance completely unbothered.
         American privilege is benefiting from cheap goods and oil and a strong dollar and never wondering how many innocent foreigners lost their lives and homes in the wars your government starts to make that so.
       American privilege is living in a nation whose government can murder an entire family one day with explosives dropped from the sky, and yet you never hearing about it because that isn’t considered a newsworthy occurrence.
        American privilege is being one of the worst-travelled populations in the world while having military bases in countries that most Americans wouldn’t recognize the name of, let alone have been to.
        American privilege is having your insane culture normalized around the world via Hollywood and other media so that nobody stops and wonders why we’re letting this bat shit crazy nation rule our planet, and so no one makes you feel bad about your American privilege.
       American privilege is living in a nation that uses its military and economic might to terrorize, murder, imprison, starve and impoverish anyone who doesn’t go along with its interests, and feeling no urgent need to bring a stop to this.
        American privilege is being fine with being the world leader, but not being too bothered about what exactly that means.

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I'll Walk With The Poets.

        I've read the news from different avenues, I've poked my nose in some papers, I've intervened in the internet, and my thought for the days is quite simple, walk with the poets.

 

WALK WITH THE POETS.

My head has had enough of you,
you doomsday sooth-sayers, and
rationalists, that trap us in the world that is.
Go weave your tales of “can't be done”
to the dead, and those of no imagination.
I want to walk with the utopian,
the dreamer and the poet,
laugh with the child and sing with the wind.
Run with the deer, not with “the market trend”
Enough of, “this is the way it has to be”,
a world of poverty, wars and inequality.
Now, I'll create the world I want to see,
A world of sharing, peace and liberty.
I want the children to plan tomorrow,
the adult help them get there,
trees and flowers our treasured possessions,
with birds and animals their keepers.
Who wants a world that chains us to mortgages,
binds us to a labouring day, just to eat bread?
Who wants to spend their life, feeding fat-cats
while their own children go hungry?
No, this is not the world that has to be,
in our foolishness and misplaced trust,
this is a world that has slithered over us,
poisoning our mind, putrefying our spirit.
Let's call on the poet, let's welcome the dreamer,
let's take council with the utopian,
They'll help us create a better world for all.

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

Thousands March To Defend Exarcheia.

        Happening now, thousands take to the streets in Athens in protest at the riot police and military style violent attacks on the district of Exarcheia. Since mid August the district of Exarcheia has been under continuous police attacks and evictions, with hundreds of migrants evicted and arrested. Exarchia is a district in Athens where there are numerous squats in empty property and used as social spaces, educational and health centres, and for housing migrants. It is run on the principles of mutual aid, co-operation, self-help and respect for the individual, free from the burdening shackles of the state.  The Greek authoritarian state has decided that it will not tolerate people living outside their dictates, rules and regulations, it seeks total control. Besides it sees the district as of value to the developers, so wishes to clear the residents out and see it become another tourist centre pandering to the rich with expensive apartments, high fashion outlets and a source of tax revenue to fund their neo-liberal capitalist expansion.

        The people of Exarcheia need our support and solidarity, and their fight to be put fully in the spotlight of public knowledge, share and spread. First they came for Exarcheia---.

Links:

https://itsgoingdown.org/greek-anarchist-movement-responds-to-assault-on-exarchia/

 http://voidnetwork.gr/category/voidnetwork-news/

 https://twitter.com/th1an1/status/1172831586355752960

 

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

Glasgow's Workers City.

        A wee reminder, just a couple of days to go before the, not to be missed, Spirit of Revolt's FREE event, Show and Tell, Workers City, at the Mitchell Library. Workers City was a series of events that took place in Glasgow 1989-1991, organised by writers, artists, poets, activists and a melody of other Glaswegian stalwarts. It was a counter to the events being organised by Glasgow City Council during Glasgow's European City of Culture year. Some of those present for this open discussion were involved in organising the Workers City event, and it should prove to be both informative and entertaining.

        On display at the event, for your perusal before the open discussion starts will be a selection of material from he Spirit of Revolt Archive, relating to those events during Workers City. Come along look, listen, contribute, enjoy and learn a little bit more about the grassroots history of your city.

Details:
Free event.
Spirit of Revolt,
Workers City,
12noon-2:00pm.
Blythswood Room
Mitchell Library,
Glasgow.

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

A Radio-Berlin, Alternative Media.

 

          I often spout on and on about the lack of our papers and leaflets, etc. on the streets, of course paper on the street should not be to the exclusion of all other methods of communicating with the public at large. As anarchists we should always be useing our imagination and all other means available for spreading our ideas. One method that seems too be gaining ground is the podcast/radio and one at the forefront of this avenue is A Radio-Berlin. They draw on info and interviews from all around the planet, and are always worth a visit.

This from A Radio-Berlin:

            As Anarchist Radio Berlin we had the opportunity of talking to some comrades from the Anarchist Federation in Great Britain. We already published the first half of this interview as part of our international radio project „Bad News“ in August 2019, focussing on the never-ending topic of Brexit and the possible repercussions on the population. Now you can listen to the complete version of this interview concerning also the back-stop question in Ireland, the anarchist approach to Brexit as such, antifascism and what our comrades learned from the recent Congress of the International of Anarchist Federations, IFA, in Slovenias capital Ljubljana, where this interview was recorded.

          You'll find the audio (to listen online or download in different sizes) here:
http://aradio.blogsport.de/2019/09/13/a-radio-in-english-brexit-and-anarchism/

Length: 22 min

             You can find other English and Spanish language audios here:
http://aradio.blogsport.de/englishcastellano/.

         Among our last audios you can find:
         * An interview about the Balkan Anarchist Bookfair 2018 in Novi Sad, Serbia:
http://aradio.blogsport.de/2019/05/21/a-radio-in-english-the-balkan-anarchist-bookfair-2018-in-novi-sad-serbia/
        * An interview on the International Week of Solidarity with Anarchist Prisoners 2018:
http://aradio.blogsport.de/2018/10/05/a-radio-in-english-the-international-week-of-solidarity-with-anarchist-prisoners-2018/
          * An anarchist perspective on the last Chaos Communication Congress 2017 in Germany (December 2017):
http://aradio.blogsport.de/2018/02/18/a-radio-in-english-the-chaos-communication-congress-2017-in-germany-an-anarchist-perspective/
         * An intro audio to the hungerstrike of Mapuche Political Prisoners in the Iglesias Case in Chile:
http://aradio.blogsport.de/2017/09/26/a-radio-in-english-chile-the-hungerstrike-of-mapuche-political-prisoners-in-the-iglesias-case/
            * An interview on Charlottesville, the murder of Heather Heyer and antifascist perspectives:
http://aradio.blogsport.de/2017/08/31/a-radio-in-english-reportback-from-charlottesville-unite-the-right-and-the-murder-of-heather-heyer/

Enjoy! And please feel free to share!

A-RadioBerlin

        ps.: We are on Twitter! Please feel welcome to follow us at @aradio_berlin! ps2.: Please note: We are always looking for people willing to lend us a hand with transcriptions and translations from Spanish or German into English as well as people able to do voice recordings - in order to amplify our international radio work. You can contact us at aradio-berlin/at/riseup(dot)net!

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

The Great Anarchist Festival 2020.

 

      The Anarchist Festival Collective is again asking anarchists across the country to get involved and organise an event or events all over the country at the same period. I got quite excited about the idea when it was first announced for 2018 event, but sadly nothing much happened in Glasgow to support the idea. This year it is in May and takes in May Day, a wonderful opportunity for groups across the country to organise something. Can you think of a better way to get our ideas out to more of the public than a festival that happens in every city, town, and village across the country at the same time? This year, as I said it falls around May Day, the Glasgow May Days Group will be putting on its now annual May Picnic on The Green, this will be flanked by other events, film, talks, history walks, and who knows what else we can come up with. So to all those anarchist groups, large and small, let's try and get this into a bustling fun and educational event that happens right across the country all at the same time, it is up to us.

Anarchist Festival announces its 2020 dates

 From Anarchist News:

 

via Freedom News
Anarchist Festival, a decentralised event happening across Britain and Ireland since 2018, has announced its 2020 dates. Here is what the Afest collective has to say.
         This is a call out to take part in what will be the third Anarchist Festival, happening across Britain and Ireland. The idea is simple: groups or individuals put on their own anarchist events and actions, concentrating on the dates of Friday 1st to Monday 4th May 2020, and the programme is collated and promoted by us on our website and social media( 1 and 2).
        So far the model has been a success, with a good range of well-attended events at multiple venues having occurred. The decentralised model means location shouldn’t be a barrier to putting something on.
        The ideal vision for the festival would be to see events, large and small, all across Britain and Ireland. The more events that take place, the more momentum the festival has, and in turn the more people might get involved and come into contact with anarchist ideas. The whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts.
         In recent years we have seen anarchist bookfairs pop up in cities and towns across the UK and it would be particularly good if those groups might organise something as part of the festival.
         But in practice anyone could put something on, whoever they are and wherever they are. This is a good opportunity to get anarchist thinking and practice happening in the local community, and outside of the usual anarchist circles. Ideas might include: reading an anarchist text in a local book group, organising a discussion in a local pub or meeting space, engaging the local community in a little ‘anarchism in action’, be it a solidarity action collecting for a food bank, a bit of guerrilla gardening, closing a street off for a party – whatever you think is best. There’s an archive of events from the last two years on the Anarchist Festival website, but don’t let what has gone before limit the possibilities. The potential here is endless, and the definition of what counts as anarchism can be at its broadest and most inclusive.
        A little history: the idea to do this came after feeling the absence of the London Anarchist Bookfair in 2018 and 2019. We couldn’t readily replicate the incredible organisational work that goes into putting the bookfair on, but those who wanted to could at least put on our own small events, and keep the spirit of a communal yearly anarchist event going.
        It is cheering to see that there is an attempt to get an anarchist bookfair in London up and running again in October 2020, but with the previous success of our decentralised festival we feel it’s worth keeping this initiative going too. By having our event in May it leaves a space of about half a year between the two events, allowing plenty of time for planning and organising.
        This year Afest will also fall on the weekend of May Day / International Workers Day. In the past this has been a bank holiday, but the government has shifted the holiday to Friday 8th May so as to commemorate the 75th anniversary of VE Day, all of which seems like a fitting moment to go some way to reclaiming May Day’s anarchist roots.
        Do have a look at the website for more info, not least about what to do to submit an event for the programme. www.anarchistfestival.wordpress.com
Really hope you can get involved!

Anarchist Festival

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

Attica Forty-Eight Years On.

       Prisons are inhumane institutions where people are caged and conditions often lead to pent up anger and frustration which invariably leads to violence. They are state tools of repression whose purpose is to turn the individual into a submissive units of society, a place to neutralise dissent.
       I'm a couple of days late in marking the anniversary of this rebellion. September 9th. 1971, prisoners suffering appalling conditions and in an institution that was grossly over crowded, took control of Attica prison in New York. After several days of negotiations, the authorities stormed the prison, the result was described as the worst one day slaughter in America since the America Civil War. Riot at Attica prison. The retaking of the prison was short, and extremely brutal and vicious, and as usual, covered in media lies. This incident should be another reminder that the state will use whatever violence it wishes to keep control of the population, then stamp it with its own badge of legitimacy, under the self appointed law that it alone holds the monopoly on violence to be used at will.

       Statement from the Revolutionary Abolitionist Movement (RAM) on the anniversary of the Attica Rebellion and national prison strikes in 2016 and 2018.

        Forty-eight years ago today, prisoners at Attica Correctional Facility in Attica, New York made history by beginning a days-long riot against their captors, demanding better living conditions and respect of their basic humanity. The rebellion occurred just two weeks after the murder of Soledad Brother George Jackson at San Quentin prison, while he made a bid for his freedom. This uprising forms a critical part of revolutionary history and serves as a constant source of inspiration as we continue to fight against the same horrific institutions that have kept people in bondage for centuries.
       The spirit of Attica lives on in anti-prison struggles of today, including the nationwide prison strikes that occurred in both 2016 and 2018. These strikes began on August 21st, a day on which both George Jackson’s escape attempt and the Nat Turner slave rebellion of 1831 are commemorated; and ended on September 9th, the final day of the Attica uprising. Prisoners all over the U.S. participated through such actions as hunger-striking, refusing to buy items at commissary, and refusing to report for work. Folks on the outside expressed solidarity with those behind the walls via actions like noise demos, motorcades, statements, letter writing campaigns, fundraising and banner drops.
         Nearly half a century after the Attica uprising, prisoner demands of today very closely mirror those of the 1970s. In other words, nothing has changed. Prisoners are still regularly subjected to solitary confinement and beatings; lack access not just to “healthful” food full of nutrients, but often, even sanitary food that isn’t covered in mold; and have what few “privileges” are allowed, such as visitation, regularly revoked without any explanation. Last winter saw mass mobilization around Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, New York as word got out that prisoners there had gone without consistent light and without consistent heat for weeks— during one of the coldest winters in recent history, with record-breaking lows and ferocious winds rattling the region.
       These details only fuel the fire sparked by the very act of putting someone in a cage. Whatever such a person is fed, whatever “privileges” such a person is allowed, locking someone in a cage is an inherently violent attack by the State against our friends, neighbors, and communities. This social, political, and economic situation is the continuation of slavery in the US and abolition of prisons and all the institutions making this situation tenable is an immediate goal. Such attacks cannot be tolerated! In the spirit of Attica! Solidarity with revolutionary comrades behind the walls!

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Those Sub-Human Beings, Migrants!!

         Most countries propaganda wing paint their particular plot on the planet as a wonderful place to live. However their state mentality of borders, those imaginary lines drawn on the planet's surface by power-mongers, means that they create a new class of beings. They are called migrants, and somehow this group are deemed to have no human rights, to be suspect of all manner of crimes, to be undesirables and therefore can be herded like cattle and enclosed in over crowded concentration camps, in appalling conditions, men, women, children, aged and infirm, it matters not, they are migrants and the state so deems them to be "different".
        Ask people what Australia is like, and in most cases you will get a glowing report of a vast land with lots of undeveloped areas, and a great place to live. Beaches, cities and of course the outback. Few will mention concentration camps, but like all other states, concentration camps are part and parcel of the Australian state's make up.

        From Amnesty International:

        From the the BBC: 

       From The Post Magazine:

        
          The following is a book review from Revolutionary Feminism In Action, The Freedom Socialist Party:

      A hush falls over the thousands-strong crowd at 2019 Melbourne’s Walk for Justice for Refugees. Behrouz Boochani is giving the keynote speech by phone link from Manus Island in Papua New Guinea, where he’s been illegally imprisoned for six years. An award-winning Kurdish journalist who refuses to be muzzled, Boochani is now a household name in Australia. He draws large audiences wherever he speaks and his writing is widely published.
        Faced with imprisonment in Iran for his journalism and advocacy of Kurdish rights, he fled for his life in 2012. Having made it to Indonesia, he boarded a boat to Australia where he hoped to start a new life. Although Boochani meets all the criteria for refugee status, according to the UN Convention on Refugees, Australia has locked him up indefinitely, with more than a thousand others, on Pacific island hell-holes.
        No Friend But The Mountains: Writing from Manus Prison is Boochani’s first book. He wrote it in defiance of the Australian government, which goes to great lengths to silence refugee voices — and fails. The impact of this powerful exposé is unstoppable. Boochani was awarded the Victorian Premier’s Literary Award. His book is now a best seller in Australia and gaining international attention.
        How this work was written is extraordinary — it was crafted as thousands of individual text messages! Boochani did not dare commit his ideas to paper lest they be seized in one of the regular prison searches. No Friend is an intense collaboration between the author and his translator, Omid Tofighian. The depth of their partnership is revealed in the translator’s introduction and afterword. Boochani wrote in Farsi, the language of his oppressors. Tofighian then translated the Farsi into English, the language of Boochani’s jailers and torturers.
       Refugee reality. In the opening four chapters, Boochani narrates every detail of the dangerous journey from Indonesia. Each passenger, desperate for a new life, is acutely aware of boats that have sunk and he captures the fear on their faces. The journey is a mixture of anxiety, sheer terror, discomfort, hunger and exposure to the elements and rough seas.
        After a brief detention on Christmas Island, Boochani and hundreds of others are exiled to Manus. And then begin the days, weeks, months and years waiting without news regarding their status which fuels periodic rumors throughout the prison. The despair, boredom, humiliation, hunger, thirst, pain, toothache, heat, humidity, filthy conditions, insomnia, and psychological pressure — all combine as tools of torture. But there’s also the larger-than-life personalities, the hope, resilience, the sharing of cultures, friendships and solidarity.
        Boochani describes the jail’s pecking order. At the bottom are the incarcerated refugees; the Papuans who work in the center are only slightly higher than the prisoners. He calls them Papus. They wear different colored uniforms and must follow orders from Australian officials without question. The Papus are paid a mere fraction of what the Australians get. At any opportunity, says Boochani, they will display some kindness and empathy. He explains, “The reason I don’t really see the Papu as a real officer and consider him as just a kind of extra person is because Papus are basically stripped of any kind of autonomy of power in the prison. They are only there because the system is obliged to accept them as part of its agreement.”
       The book’s characters are composites of Boochani’s fellow prisoners: Mani with the bowed leg, the irascible Iranian, the father of the months-old child, the young Rohingya boy, the comedian, the insomniac, the hero, the man with the thick moustache, and many others. Just a handful of refugees are named — those who have tragically died in custody. Their stories are woven throughout the text. Twelve have died, seven of them in Manus prison.
       Reinforcing resistance. This unique book is a beautiful work of art combining narrative and poetry. Woven throughout the lyrical text is Boochani’s sharp political analysis. He characterizes Manus as a “kyriarchal system,” that is, one built on multiple types of discrimination (e.g. sexism, racism, ethno and caste superiority, colonialism etc.) based on domination, submission and oppression. He calls it Australia’s border industrial complex. The government pays corporate profiteers millions to run its offshore prisons.In essence, Boochani spotlights Australia’s punishing imperialist role in the Pacific.
        The book reaches its climax during the two nights of prison riots in February 2014:
       Violence expressed through the chanting of pithy slogans/ Violence, rechannelled in questions by prisoners gnashing their teeth in rage and indignation/

What is my crime?/
Why must I be in prison?/
And other questions more like demands/

         The power was cut, the prison stormed, hundreds beaten, and Boochani’s best friend, Reza Berati, was murdered. No prison authorities involved have been called to account.
       The voice of global refugees. Those marooned indefinitely in Manus are refugees escaping homeland persecution, resistance fighters through sheer survival. They are Rhohingya fleeing Myanmar government atrocities, Tamils persecuted in Sri Lanka, and peoples from all parts of the ravaged Middle East, many of them Kurds. Boochani reflects on the home he fled: “These were the days when war was part of our everyday lives and ran like blood through our identity … A war that devastated our families and sizzled and incinerated all of our vivid, green and bounteous homeland.”
        His magnificent book symbolizes the broader Kurdish struggle and makes a stand for refugees in every hemisphere, up against the cruelties of collapsing capitalism.

Send feedback to FSnews@mindspring.com.

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Resistance To State brutality Is The Only Answer.

           Yea, here I go again, Exarcheia, well it is savage, brutal and against all humanity, and I am well aware that this sort of thing is happening all over our planet every day of the week. Perhaps shining a light on this particular one incident, will help to bring home just how brutal any state can be, and their total lack of human consideration. Dialogue and voting for change is pointless, as should be obvious by now. How many ballot boxes have been filled and counted, how many change of governments have we seen throughout history? However, the brutality still persists, the drive for total control increases, and another ballot box is not going to change that. Resistance and solidarity across borders is the only answer.

           A report from resistance in Exarcheia, and a call for solidarity. The brutality of the state goes on, the state is not concerned with human needs, but only with gaining control. Migrants will be treated as non-persons, with no rights, not as human beings in distress, and will be herded into concentration camps. Those who stand up to defend and support migrants will be labelled criminals. The media will dress this savage attack on a way of life based on mutual aid and solidarity, as clearing the area of criminals and terrorists. The repression will not stop until the resistance wins or the state wins and hands the area over to the developers. The outcome is in the hands of the people.

        This entry was posted on Monday, September 9th, 2019 at 2:48 pm, and is filed under Automony. 

 This from 325:

 Greece: We stand against state repression

          The state and capitalism continue to target the freedom of the social base and appropriate its labour and resources. In recent years we have experienced some of the most violent attacks on this freedom through the mass impoverishment of the already oppressed and exploited. At the same time, a widespread social resistance and solidarity movement has formed. People have created a variety of self-organized spaces such as housing infrastructures, social medical centers, community kitchens, open parks and public spaces. In spite of setbacks, the movement has created a solid social ground and accumulated considerable knowledge and experience. Through squats, political groups, base unions, squares and neighbourhood assemblies we have formed communities of struggle with strong social bonds. Communities oriented towards society, with a critical eye all the same. At times, the movement has had to use violence as a means of defending and expanding free spaces against state repression, capitalist interests and fascist attacks. It is a movement that grows in diversity and vibrancy, despite the ongoing criminalisation of solidarity and mobility.
         In the context of this socio-class conflict, on Monday 26/8, the state, armed with police forces, seized Exarchia and evicted four squats. Two of these squats were migrant homes—Transito and Spirou Trikoupi 17, from where the police abducted 144 migrants, uprooting them from their places of residence for a second time and isolating them in what the state calls detention centers. Evictions were also carried out in an ongoing housing and political squat in Assimaki Fotila street, and the Gare squat, where three arrests were made. Police also invaded the homes of comrades from Gare. In the next days, police kicked out homeless persons from Strefi hill, beat up a homosexual couple, attacked the steki of anarchist immigrants and the squatted social space of K’ BOΞ. The movement gave multiform answers with gatherings, actions and demonstrations. In addition to the squats and the movement, this repressive operation targets migrants. These are some of the most oppressed people in society, since their very existence is considered illegal. In a state of ‘illegality’ there is no access to health and education, and working conditions are like slavery. Many choose self-organisation and solidarity structures in order to survive and resist. Together with locals and internationals they build communities and claim visibility, posing a direct threat to political and economic power. The solidarity we are—all of us together—building is antithetical to the humanitarian aid of NGOs that can be seen to manipulate migrants and make money off their problems. Real solidarity is at odds with state ‘humanitarianism’, which covers up deaths at the borders and deflects from the violent conditions in concentration camps. Prisoners do not receive adequate medical care and therefore suffer from potentially fatal diseases. These concentration camps lack basic hygiene, people live with bed bugs and miserable food and are frequently beaten, all to force them to flee Greek and European territory. Transferring migrants from the squats where they have chosen to live undermines their dignity and self-determination. The excuse that these camps are safer and healthier is a shameful lie of the state, an absolute reversal of reality.
           Throughout these years, the solidarity movement has responded to a variety of needs and desires. The most important achievement of the movement is that people of different backgrounds have organized into squats and formed collective bodies to create projects that reflect the world of equality and freedom we desire. Squats are free spaces where social relations can be developed free from state control and economic exclusion. These spaces transgress national, gender and other systemic discrimination and answer basic needs such as housing, breaking out of rent coercion and wage exploitation. In times of mass forced migration, they offer shelter and hope to thousands of people by making inclusive and active spaces. Squats in collaboration with other grassroots forces defend neighbourhoods and public spaces from corporate and political power. The political agenda of New Democracy is a continuation of Syriza’s policy. It aims to transform the whole territory into readily exploitable land for local and foreign capital. The result is further exploitation and destruction of the environment and the aggressive gentrification of urban space that transforms neighbourhoods inside the city into areas of touristic consumption, displacing residents and carrying out an informal “social cleansing”. The militarisation of public space, the imprisonment of those who rise up, the subjugation of workers, students, the unemployed, migrants, women and LGBTQI+ people is essential for implementing such a plan. Some of New Democracy’s first moves were to integrate the correctional system and the immigration ministry under police jurisdiction. At the same time, they hired 1,500 new people to the police force, expanding the state’s army of repression. They further criminalised the means of struggle and abolished university asylum in preparation for the new social and class struggles. The struggles that Syriza assimilated and disintegrated paved the way for an even more aggressive totalitarian state that we saw with the rise of New Democracy.
          We call all people of the struggle–the rebels, squatters, collectives and individuals–here and abroad, to join in strengthening our efforts towards a common front against police and state repression. Our primary aim is to defend the squats and our social achievements against the state and capital.
             Don’t let the struggle be absorbed by any force of the regime! Let’s expand the already existing self-organised structures and create new ones, let’s escalate our class and social struggles. It is time to crush the oppressive forces, to debunk systemic media propaganda, and to bring out the truth of the struggle of the oppressed.

SOLIDARITY TO SQUATS AND ALL SPACES OF STRUGGLE
LOCALS-MIGRANTS WE STRUGGLE TOGETHER

Other report on Exarcheia evictions: 

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Donald Rooum.

         Some of you may already know this, others may not, so for that reason I believe it is worth posting, in tribute to one of us. A life dedicated to justice and peace. 

This from Anarchist News: 

 

      I HAVE just learned with sadness that Donald Rooum, above, whose work appeared periodically in print editions of the Freethinker over many decades, died in London on August 31.
       I was alerted to the fact that Rooum had died by another longtime Freethinker contributor, Professor John Radford, author of  Don’t You Believe It!: Sixty things everybody knows that actually AIN’T SO!, a book that Rooum illustrated.
Rooum’s career and colourful life was affectionately documented in a blog called Spitalsfield Life in 2012. The author wrote:

      In spite of the fearsome reputation acquired by Anarchists, Donald possesses a quiet nature, almost unassuming, and he has not been on a demonstration since 1963 when he was framed by the police for having a brick in his pocket. A brick which the police inadvertently – and famously – forgot to plant. It amounted to a national scandal at the time. Since then, Donald prefers to stay at home and seek his political influence indirectly by working on his long-running cartoon series, leaving it to younger Anarchists to take to the street.

      Rooum, who in 1963 was working as a cartoonist for Peace News, was arrested by a violent and racist London policeman, detective sergeant Harold Challoner. On July 11 of that year, Rooum was demonstrating outside Claridge’s Hotel against a visit to the UK of Queen Frederika of Greece. Challoner told Rooum:

You’re fucking nicked, my beauty. Boo the Queen, would you?.

       After hitting Rooum on the head, the copper went through Rooum’s possessions, claimed to find a half-brick and said:

   There you are, me old darling. Carrying an offensive weapon. You can get two years for that.

       Rooum, a member of the National Council for Civil Liberties who had read about forensic science, handed his clothes to his solicitor for testing. No brick dust or appropriate wear and tear were found and Rooum was acquitted, although other people Challenor arrested at the demonstration were still convicted on his evidence.
        By the time Challenor appeared at the Old Bailey in 1964, charged with conspiracy to pervert the course of justice, he was deemed to be unfit to plead and was sent to Netherne mental hospital with a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia. Three other detectives involved in the arrest of protesters – David Oakley, Frank Battes and Keith Goldsmith – were sentenced to three years in prison.
Rooum told Spitalsfield Life:

        When I was sixteen, I thought a free society would be easy to get. Now I don’t think things are going to be easy, but the civil rights movement has been good. There have been improvements. There’s no longer any law against homosexuality and no longer any corporal punishment in schools. There was an awful attitude that people who weren’t white were inferior. When I first came to London in 1944, I phoned up a boarding house and they asked me to come round in person, because there was a no coloureds policy.

       To me, Anarchism is an ethical stance, a point of view which regards coercion of any kind as wrong.

      Rooum edited the London-based anarchist paper, Freedom, for many years. He became lecturer in typography at the London College of Printing, took an Open University Degree in Life Sciences and was elected a member of the Institute of Biology at eighty.
Spitalsfield Life said:

      His endeavours have spanned the political, the literary, the artistic and the scientific, yet it is in the levity of cartoons that he has found his ideal medium.

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