A Resolution.

Published on Dec 30, 2015

       On the Eve of 2016, we need a resolution capable of confronting the crisis we face, and making a future worth fighting for.
      "A Resolution" looks back on the crisis and confusion of 2015: climate change-driven wildfires, droughts, and storms; ISIS and their attacks in Paris, Beirut, and Ankara; bankrupt political leaders at COP21 debating how fast to kill the world; and an ever growing number of people murdered by police across American cities. As times grow darker, as despair and hopelessness grow in tandem with stupidity and horror, people everywhere are searching for vision and direction.
      "A Resolution" points to the sparks that are creating a new light in the growing darkness: the revolutionary wave that spread from Tunis to New York; the Kurdish freedom struggle and the war against ISIS in Rojava; the riots and blockades sparked by the killings of Mike Brown and Eric Garner; and the retooling and remaking of life with “civilization starter kits” and “removing the dust” from indigenous knowledges and practices. “We, the people who work every day, who think we ‘don’t have time’ - we are the only ones who can do this,” said a Woodbine co-founder. “No one’s going to do this for us—no politician, no technological innovation, no international agreement. If we want a different future, we are going to have to make it, from where we are and in every place.”
      As people worldwide are taking stock, looking backwards to 2015 and forward to 2016, "A Resolution" shows that amidst growing catastrophe, the only real future is the one we’ll make.
        Woodbine is a hub for building autonomy in the Anthropocene. Our mission is to grow collective material and organizational capacities and build revolution in the 21st century. With a workshop, library, kitchen, and meeting space, we focus on efforts to self-organize, connect, create infrastructures, and develop individual and collective efficacy.

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

Money, Oil And The End Of The World As We Know It.

 

From subMedia TV:

      This we bring you a recap of the COP21 climate clusterfuck in Paris, with Jim Hansen’s reaction to the historic non-agreement and 350.org’s condemnation of comrades who defied the protest ban. Over in Greece we look at the yearly riots that commemorate the police murder of Alex Grigoropoulos. On the music break, deceased Greek anarcho MC – Killah P with “I Won’t Cry, I Won’t Fear” Our featured interview is with three brave comrades who managed to stop the flow of dirty tar sands oil to the entire eastern seaboard of Turtle Island, with three bike locks and some egg sandwiches.

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

Capitalism's Phoney Christmas.

    So that was Christmas, a period of abundance, an avalanche of gifts, a gorging of food, a tsunami of merriment. Well that's the picture our babbling brook of bullshit would have you believe is the norm, but capitalism doesn't work like that. No doubt in this crazy unjust system there were those who gave diamonds, cars and other expensive gifts, while feasting on an array of exotic foods all washed down with buckets of “the best Champagne”.
      However, there is the other side, the brutal side of capitalism, where kids go hungry and live in a gift free zone. This Christmas saw record levels of our fellow Scots being forced to seek sustenance from foodbanks. This year, according to the Trussell Trust, the week that contained Christmas saw more than 7,000 families and individuals forced to seek help from foodbanks. December was their busiest month, with the week before Christmas being the busiest of the month.

The Trussell Trust said people had been driven to rely on charity due to financial poverty, increased winter fuel bills and the absence of free school meals during the holidays. Many families have been plunged into “financial famine” over the festive period, the charity said.
One foodbank in Glasgow said it had received referrals for nearly a dozen clients in need of help on Christmas Eve.
Last year just over 14,000 people were helped by the foodbanks throughout the entire month of December – an increase of 53% on the previous year's figure of 9,263.
The total included 5,818 people who were helped in the week running up to Christmas Day - a rise of 51% on the figure of 3,842 in 2013. This year's figures dwarfted those for both 2014 and 2013.

       For many, Christmas is not only a period of hunger, but a period of homelessness. According to Alison Watson, deputy director of Shelter Scotland, "It's completely unacceptable that in the 21st Century 100,000 children across Britain will spend Christmas homeless, with nearly 5,000 of them in Scotland. "It's even more damning that in Scotland this represents a 15 per cent increase on the same statistics last year - so the problem seems to be getting worse, not better. 

         Glasgow fares worst in Scotland, with approximately one-fifth of the total, with more than 1,000 children in the city who opened their eyes on Christmas morning to a homeless world. The total of children living in temporary accommodation in Scotland, is up 13 per cent on last year. 

        So this is part of the ugly face of capitalism, poverty and homelessness, with children having their life's potential stunted at an early age, their health and physical development permanently undermined, while others gorge on abundance, they never earned. If you see this injustice and are aware of the suffering involved, then surely you must stand up and work for the destruction of this cancer that is capitalism.

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

Democracy, Secrecy Behind Closed Doors.

      The babbling brook of bullshit, the mainstream media, would have us believe we live in a democracy. A strange democracy, where we choose our lords and masters, pay their salaries and excessive expenses, but that democracy holds the governments papers for thirty years, in secret, away from the prying eyes of the public, that is supposed to be their employer. Some of the stench from those recently released secret papers is now beginning to fill our nostrils. The underhand, back stabbing double dealing of the Thatcher years is now appearing in the public domain. 

     One such stench comes from David Willets, who in Thatcher's government claimed that the Scots were a juicy target for cuts, as well as stating that they could gain votes down south if they were seen to be plundering the Scots, also stating that the Scots had their snouts in the trough. He had to resign because he had "dissembled" in his evidence to the Standards and Privileges Committee over whether pressure was put onto an earlier investigation into Neil Hamilton's brown paper envelope saga. Despite his “dissembling” of evidence, his career would not suffer, in fact he was rewarded like so many of the products from Oxbridge sausage factory, by a cushy number in the “Lords” and is now slouching about in ermine as Baron Willets. 

     Another smell from the recently released secret papers is one Oliver Letwin, another product from the Oxbridge sausage factory, also responsible for the vomiting of rabid racist remarks while serving in Thatcher's band of rogues. He is now a senior policy adviser to King rat Cameron. While an aide to Maggie at No. 10 in 1985, it is alleged that he said that white people are not prone to disorder, and stating that a scheme to encourage black entrepreneurs would only result in them investing in discos and drugs.
       These are just two of the band rabid racist, Oxbridge arseholes, whose views were known to those who brought them into their inner circle, to decide policies that shape our lives, so we can accept that their views are acceptable to the cabal that we keep in luxury, and allow to rule over our lives. No wonder they keep their stinking dirty linen secret for 30 years. Democracy behind closed doors, and with secret papers, if it wasn't so dangerous and disgusting, it would be funny.

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

 

Requiem For A Journey Of No Return.

       In Athens on December 6th. 2008, young 15 year old Alexandros Grigoropoulos was shot dead in the street by a cop, dying in the arms of his young friend of the same age, Nikos Romanos, who is now in a Greek prison.

    This event sparked some of the largest and most widespread riots seen in Greece, 

     Nikos has never spoken publicly about that night and the death of his friend, until now. 

      His public article, "Requiem for a Journey of No Return" can be read on Contra Info.
This is a small extract from that public letter written from prison:

  ------The most ridiculous part of it all is the fact that the propaganda mechanisms of domination attempt to portray murders committed by cops as isolated incidents caused by deranged personalities, as accidents that always occur due to negligence.
     Police murders are neither isolated incidents, nor a Greek phenomenon. They are an extreme manifestation of the democratic imposition upon social margins, poor-devils, delinquents, insubordinates, migrants. Furthermore, police murders confirm that the liberatory war exists, whenever they target insurgents who arm themselves and fight domination with the flame of freedom burning in their hearts.
     These killings are a logical consequence of cops’ perceptions of their role, perceptions with which these individuals are indoctrinated to staff the repressive machines that shield the social machine’s orderly functioning.
     Police firearms do not go off with murderous intentions only in Greece; they murder 15-year-olds in Turkey because they participated in anti-government demonstrations, they murder 16-year-olds in Italy because they didn’t pull over at a police traffic stop, they murder mothers and children in Palestine, they murder dozens of African Americans in the US on purely racist motives, they murder migrants in Sweden’s suburbs, they murder youth in England’s poorest hoods; they murder repeatedly and serially in all corners of the planet to impose social peace.
      And if the examples I’ve brought are known to many, because they have been linked with small-scale and large-scale uprisings in response to statist murders, they do not cease to be a mere drop in the ocean compared to the storm of murderous crackdowns launched by security corps in defence of capitalist domination.
     If we close our eyes and ears to the ceaseless flow of dominant propaganda, we’ll be able to listen to the thousands of anonymous deaths in police stations, terrestrial and maritime border areas, concentration camps, psychiatric institutions and prisons, war zones across the Middle East, and sweatshops that exterminate contemporary slaves. Anyone can hear the cries of people who are being tortured in police cells, who commit suicide in a confinement facility out of desperation, who are sunk by coast guard cops and drowned in the cold waters of the Mediterranean Sea, who are crippling their bodies over multinationals’ production machines in third world countries, who are buried under rubble after blind aerial bombardments conducted by capitalist empires.--------

Read his full account HERE:

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

You Resist, Or You Are Complicit.

 

      Hi friends, comrades, acquaintances, good to be back, hope you all had as good a time as I enjoyed. Though I enjoyed the few days up in St Andrews, and had a wonderful time with the grand-kids, it did nothing to quell the anger and disgust in my belly at the the system under which we live, and under which my grand-children will have to grow up and scratch out a living. I can only see their lives having a bleaker future than I had, UNLESS!!

      We all have to realise we live in an environment of class war. 

 

Benefit sanctions = class war
Workfare = class war
Wage restraint = class war
Bedroom tax = class war
Zero-hours contracts = class war
Austerity = class war

      The system is a system based on class war, class war is necessary for the system to protect and further the wealth and power of the parasitic cabal that live off the backs of the ordinary people. It never has, never will, and is not intend to, spread the wealth created by the people among the people. If we the people wish to enjoy the wealth that we create, then the system under which we live will have to be destroyed. Capitalism is a cancer on humanity, and a death knell on the environment. The pace of the destruction of peoples and the environment by the capitalist system is ever increasing, and will continue to do so, until we stop its cancerous growth. It will not stop of its own accord, it will not stop because the parasites at the helm consider that they have enough. It will only stop when we say, we have had enough. Accept the legacy of a destroyed world and continuous exploitation for our grandchildren, or start now the fight to destroy this vicious plague of greed, this time-bomb on the planet. 

      There are many ways to fight, undermine, and short-circuit this system, we can all play our part, the system is dependent on our compliance to its needs, the myth of perpetual growth. 

This from Not Buying Anything: 

     Consumerism is a war on everything, and we are being compelled to be its soldiers.
      Citizen's money is transformed into consumer bullets, bulldozers and bombs, wreaking havoc far and wide. And we aren't even happier for all of that. Lazier, for sure, but happier? Not so much.
      Advertising is the most insidious propaganda ever produced. It has formed our world view, our purpose for living. “I shop, therefore I am. If some is good, more is better.” It is causing us to volunteer our lives to the pursuit of more everything, and damn the consequences.
       Overconsumption is an act of violence. It harms others, the planet, and the person doing the consuming. It is not a positive act for children or other living things, which is why its explosive powers must be defused and the lies and corrosive myths of consumerism laid bare.
The truth is that harbouring unlimited desires and living large is not in our genetic make up. For most of the human timeline we have lived simply in small nomadic groups. Excessive possessions for most of human history were nothing more than a hindrance, and they still are today.
      We have only recently been drafted into Operation Live To Consume. Citizens have been carefully trained to be consumers, consuming far past the point of need. Perhaps that is the good news.
We still have deep desires in our genetic make up to live that planet-friendly simple lifestyle that worked for us over tens of thousands of years, and still does among the few today that continue these ways.
The ultimate planet-supporting thing to do is to be a conscientious objector, refuse to fight on the consumer battlefield, and commit to a life of nonviolence.
       We can all rejoin the original mission - Operation Consume To Live. It is a mission of enough, of peace and contentment. Of sanity and solidarity.

Remember, we are governed by consent, we can withdraw that consent. 

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

A Wee Break.

      To all my followers, acquaintances, friends and comrades, thanks for your support, banter, criticism and information, here's wishing you all the very best in the coming years. Later today I'm off up the east coast for a few days and will not be back until the end of the year. So the blog may be sleeping for a wee spell. Thanks again, and see you soon, solidarity, freedom and justice.

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

A Serious Problem With Authority.

       A poem from The Anarchist, by Roland Michel Tremblay, translated by Sheila MacLeod.

 

A Serious Problem with Authority

Ever since I was born you’ve told me what I should do with myself

I’ve never been free to take the slightest little decision

And if I once stood up to tell you I wouldn’t do something

Once just walked away to do something else

That something else soon became your Plan B

I went on doing whatever you wanted me to do

And you wonder why I hate authority

Why I don’t take kindly to criticism

Why I can’t stand people telling me what to do

It’s because you’ve planted these powerful authority figures everywhere

At every level of my existence

Some sort of authority is fencing me in

Checking up on me, spying on what I do

And if I object, however feebly, an army descends on me

An army of parents, teachers, supervisors, directors, priests

Psychologists, policemen, soldiers, agents of all sorts of outfits

What counts is order, conformity’s the thing, total peace without compromise

Well, I’m telling you I’m not the one who has a problem with authority

Too many people have too much authority over everyone else in the world

Don’t be surprised when everything blows up in your face

When someone suddenly pulls a gun and fires it among you at random

You were asking for it and you’ll find it yet

Roland Michel Tremblay. 

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

 

The People's History Of Struggle.

        I would like to take this opportunity to talk to you about “Spirit of Revolt”, this is an archive of struggles by the ordinary people, no party political material or support, no trade union history or support, simply a record of the direct actions by people in their daily battles for a better life and for justice. The material we collect is from and about, activists dead and living, events major and small, mainly from the Glasgow/Clydeside area. Why do we feel passionate about, collecting and preserving this material? It is obvious that if you write a history and a large slice of that history is ignored or lost, then you are getting an inaccurate record, a false history, a jigsaw with parts missing. If history fails to record the day to day struggles of the ordinary people, which in many cases it does, then that people become a people without a history. However the ordinary people are certainly not without a history, they have a rich history of ingenuity, resilience, imagination, courage and endless struggles against injustice. It is important to have this recorded and preserved and made easily accessible to the people, it is a history of which we can all be very proud.
      We at Spirit of Revolt feel we do a very important job, all of us are volunteers, most are deeply involved in that history. Our aim is to collect and preserve this material, but not to have it gather dust on some shelves in dark corners of a back room. We wish to bring it alive, make it easily accessible to the public at large, by digitalising it and putting on our website for all to see, read, and hopefully learn from. We also hold exhibitions highlighting events from that grass-roots working class history, hoping that it will help people to see the value of their own history and learn from that history. 

From our poster collection.

       Sadly we live in a capitalist world, and though we are volunteers, we do have costs. Our biggest cost being the need to have a qualified archivist to catalogue this material to international standards, for ease of access and study. There are other cost involved, web design and hosting, computers, scanners and other miscellaneous equipment. All of this trying to raise funds, takes up our time, time that we could devote to the archive itself, improving access, and developing outreach projects.
        So now the pitch, if you think we do a good job, which you think is valuable, and you would like to see us continue, then perhaps you can be tempted to support us financially in some small way, no donation is too small. It can be a one of donation, or better still a small monthly direct debit donation of say two, or five pounds a month, or what ever you feel you can afford. We will be extremely grateful for every donation, you can rest assured it will help us to prolong and improve the archive and its accessibility.

 Unity Trust Bank plc.

 Account name: Spirit of Revolt

 Account number: 20290793

 Sort code: 60-83-01

 Contact us with any questions and enquiries.

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

 

To Challenge Injustice.

 

     Spain, Greece, America, and countries across the world, anarchists are imprisoned, simply because they can't stand by and see injustice and do nothing. To stand up to the craven injustices in this society can bring you into direct conflict with the full wait of the state apparatus. The state stands for authority, control, and the defence of wealth and power. Challenge this and you are deemed an an enemy, an irritant to the smooth running of that control machine, you have to be silenced. No country is immune from this repression, where you have a state, you have repression. Whenever this happens we have a duty to stand with, and show solidarity with, those who feel that brutal force of the state, simply for standing up to injustice. Here in the UK, we have the recent case of Peter Simpson. He has earned our support.

       Pete Simpson was remanded on the 17th December 2015. He is awaiting trial for ‘violent disorder’ after being attacked & arrested by police at an anti-cuts mayday demonstration in Cardiff, South Wales. He is on trial with another co-defendant in January 2016. Pete has spent the last several months with an electronic tag, his freedom severely restricted, and a change of bail address led to the court remanding him to prison.

       Please write to Pete at: Peter Simpson A6060CF, HMP CARDIFF, Knox Rd, Cardiff, WALES, CF24 0UG

        Stamps, envelopes, writing paper & books are also welcome. As well as any donations. Banner pictures, dedicated actions & other forms of solidarity are also invited from comrades across the world.

         We also recommend using emailaprisoner.com if you are writing from abroad.

For any queries please email bristol_abc@riseup.net

       For the latest updates visit: https://bristolabc.wordpress.com/support-pete

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

She Won't Survive The Move---

American Sermon

I am uniquely privileged to be alive
or so they say. I have asked others
who are unsure, especially the man with three
kids who’s being foreclosed next month.
One daughter says she isn’t leaving the farm,
they can pry her out with tractor
and chain. Mother needs heart surgery
but there is no insurance. A lifetime of cooking
with pork fat. My friend Sam has made
five hundred bucks in 40 years
of writing poetry. He has applied for 120
grants but so have 50,000 others. Sam keeps
strict track. The fact is he’s not very good.
Back to the girl on the farm. She’s been
keeping records of all the wildflowers
on the never-tilled land down the road,
a 40-acre clearing where they’ve bloomed
since the glaciers. She picks wild strawberries
with a young female bear who eats them. She’s being
taken from the eastern Upper Peninsula down
to Lansing where Dad has a job in a
bottling plant. She won’t survive the move.

Jim Harrison. 

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

 

 

Cuba, Re-awakening.

      What is happening in Cuba, now that American imperialism has decided not to strangle the island and its people, but to swallow them. We all know that when America softens its stance to any country the price that country pays, is to allow the army of American corporations to stomp all over the country and its people. the question is, how will the people of Cuba respond?

      Anarchism in Cuba, is shaking the dust off itself, and starting a steady re-birth. More power to its elbow. The following is an extract from an article in The Fifth Estate, some Glaswegian comrades may remember Mario, who visited Glasgow recently, and while here, among other things, popped into the Spirit of Revolt exhibition, The Rent Strikes, 100 Years On.

“We Want to Revive Anarchism in Cuba”
       The Cuban movement erased by Castro is coming back & they need our solidarity.

  Isbel, Mario & Jimmy (photo: Gabriel Uchida)

      Changes in the Cuban state’s regulation of private enterprise and in the relationship between Cuba and the U.S. over the last decade are opening up new possibilities and dangers for Cuban society.
      However, the new conditions have also inspired the rebirth of the long-repressed anarchist movement on the island. The Alfredo Lopez Libertarian Workshop (Taller Libertario Alfredo Lopez, TLAL), named for an early 20th century Cuban anarcho-syndicalist, is one of the main groups accomplishing this task.
      In the 1980s, there was a loosening of the state’s control over cultural matters. Cubans became very active in the punk movement, and street graffiti began to appear using the circle-A, understood as a symbol of freedom.
       The collapse of the Soviet Union and the so-called socialist camp at the beginning of the 1990s inspired many to think about a thorough critique of actually existing authoritarian socialism—in Cuba, as elsewhere.
        One clandestine student group active in the 1990s and early 2000s devoted themselves to studying anarchist ideas and incorporating them into their protests and challenges to the official culture. Anarchism was attractive because of its criticism of authoritarian and bureaucratic rule and its simultaneous concern for human freedom, political confrontation, self-organization, and social justice.

Please read and support.
Read the full article HERE: 

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

Homelessness.

        Homelessness is an indictment against any civilised society, in a very rich country, where most people struggle to maintain a half decent standard of living and a small army live in extreme opulence, it is a savage brutal crime, an unacceptable injustice. Sadly it  is part and parcel of the capitalist system, and over recent years we have seen the numbers of homeless grow. To sort homelessness, we need to be rid of this inhumane system of capitalist exploitation of the many by the few. Society has to get rid of this greed driven profit based system, and replace it with a society that sees to the needs of all our people, based on mutual aid, co-operation and sustainability.

      In this episode of Circled A Radio, founder of Streets Kitchen Jon Glackin talks about the hardship of the homeless and the impact Government austerity is having on poor people. Streets Kitchen is an independent organisation which gives food, sleeping bags and other essential items to the homeless.

          Listen HERE:

 

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

Striking Miners.

       And still on miners, striking Spanish miners show that quality that abounds in the working class, ingenuity.

      This video of striking Spanish coal miners during the 2012  miners strike. when they blocked roads and clashed with police inside a mine in the northern region of Asturias. Thanks arrezafe

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

The Barbarity Of The Israeli State.

      What can you add to this video commentary, I can add nothing, except anger, disgust, and a hope that it will motivate more people to rise up against this barbarity, this inhumanity, this genocide, perpetrated by the Israeli state and financed by America, while the rest of the world looks the other way.

Why Top Veteran Journalist Reporter Anchor Jon Snow is Being Pushed From Channel 4 News
Posted by David Birkett on Monday, 7 December 2015

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

From Hero To Rogue, The Working Class Journey.

 

          A poem from a previous generation, though written about the miners, it applies equally to all members of of the toiling class in this stinking exploitative system. 

The Miners.

Ye're heroes, aye, ye're heroes,

When workin' doon the mine.

They slap yer back an' praise ye,

Ye're gallant lads an' fine,

Toilin' there among the damp

Where nane o' them wid daur,

Ye're heroes, aye, ye're heroes,

When gettin' coals for war.

They humour ye, an' praise ye,

As ye keep the bunkers fu',

An' the convoys bring the foostuffs

That they ration out to you;

Or the troopships tak' yer brithers

To the battlefields afaur,

Ye're heroes, aye, ye're heroes

When gettin' coals for war.

They'll promise ye high heaven

As the furnace flames ye feed,

In a world that's mad wi' murder,

Truth is sacrificed to greed;

As factories belch their smoke-clouds

An' their profits daily soar,

Ye're heroes, aye, ye're heroes,

When gettin' coals for war.

It was yince a different story----

Das ye mind their hunnish tricks?

They battoned ye in "Twenty-one",

Ye were jailed in "Twenty-six",

Did they aid ye in the "Thirties",

As yer miseries did increase?

Ye were traitors, rogues, an' workshies

In pipin' days o' peace.

They flatter to deceive ye,

Their creed is aye the same;

Watch them when the victory's won,

The'll try the same old game

Forget their rosy promises-----

Remind them if ye daur,

An' see how they treat the heroes

Who produced the coals for war.

James Mitchell.

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

Which Side Are You On?

From Rabble:
A poster to download and print. PDF (5MB) here. 

       These are the rich. They carve up the world for their profit. The work we do, the rent we pay, the debts we owe, all go to them.

       These are the cops. They are the guard dogs of the rich, programmed to use violence to protect their masters’ wealth.

       These are the migrants. They are people who were born in places exploited by centuries of colonialism and corporate greed. Who rose up against the puppet dictators of the rich. Who escaped from tyrants and bombs. Who are harassed by cops wherever they go. Who are fighting for the freedom to move.

So, whose side are you on?

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