THE MASKING OF DEPRIVATION.

        While the media was spewing out images of everybody having a great time over the last week or so, we should remember that nothing has changed, austerity is still the plan. With fireworks, tinsel and an array of nicely wrapped boxes, it is easy to forget the misery inflicted the poor on a daily basis by this austerity and it is still there. Christmas has done nothing for the people of Greece who are still being rapidly pushed down the slope to the pit of deprivation. The media would have you think otherwise, with glowing reports of how the financial Mafia have agreed the terms for the next slice of bailout. Which in fact will never go anywhere near the ordinary people of Greece, it is merely to help out the Greek banksters. Just remember, Greece's today is our tomorrow, unless, of course, we change the system.

This from LibCom:

      As more loans have been released to the Greek state a combination of recent surveys and reports show the true effects of years of austerity. There has been across the board reductions in conditions and living standards for large parts of the Greek population.
       The political and financial worlds have been feeling pretty pleased with themselves recently. The next instalment of loans to the Greek state have been released and the country's credit rating has even improved. The Prime Minister and his government tell us that this means Greece is on the road to recovery. The government and it's international lenders have saved Greece, just in time for Christmas.
In contrast to the official optimism(or delusion) a recent round of reports and surveys shows that the situation is in fact getting worse. Unemployment, corruption, suicide and homeless rates continue to rise as living standards and wages fall.
      The latest unemployment rate is around 26% and is expected to rise further still. 26% of the Greek working population comes to over one million people without work. In addition to this it's also possible that up to 500,000 more are unemployed but not included in official statistics. As the economy is expected to contract further in 2013 we should expect this rate to keep rising.

Read the full article HERE:

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THE CORPORATE VIEW OF HAPPINESS???

       Well the greed, gluttony, over consumption, festival of massive waste is all but over, for the time being. However this is capitalism and over consumption is the name of the game. Even although the illusion that this is happiness is soon dulled by the weight of debt left behind, it seems to repeat itself again and again. This system creates a world of obscene contrasts. Where we have this multitude gorging on all things material, we have millions dying of starvation, where we have millions titillating phony material desires created by advertising propaganda, on the other side of the coin we have millions desperately seeking material things simply for their survival. Surely even an idiot can see that there is something wrong with the system.

This from The Situation:

Thoughts on Christmas, and the Battle Between Materialism and Anti Materialism within Consumption Culture.
       The circus has once again come to town, hundreds upon hundreds upon thousands upon millions of feet are marching up and down streets all over the country (indeed all of the world) on a multitude of separate quests- chasing something, a dream, an image, an impossible reality sold to each and every one of us on our t.v’s, on billboards and in magazines. Like the children of Hamelin running blissfully towards their unhappy [1]ending all of us march glazed eyed and dozy footed through rows of lights and tinsel, eyes shining towards that unattainable moment, that glorious realization that can never quite be reached; because each time we get close to reaching material satisfaction, the advertiser, the store owner, the profiteer, our peers, and even ourselves snatch it away and raise the bar a little higher.
     Yet doggedly we keep on, believing somewhere somehow perhaps that in material we will find salvation, that among the cess pit of new toys, lingerie, and Christmas fucking pudding we might find something that will bring daylight streaming into the underside of the hill[2]- but we won’t. Shopping, the quest for material enlightenment is like masturbation without the orgasm[3]. Yet, when Christmas is done and put away and we go back to working overtime at our nine to fives to pay back the money we owe to loan sharks and credit card companies; we will if nothing else have once again achieved one giant cum stain of waste, broken toys, and half eaten food in the landfill of post consumer commodities.

Read the full article HERE:

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RED AND BLACK.

       There is nothing like a bit of emotion to get you all fired up. I've seen this show three times and if it comes round my way again, I'll probably go and see it once more. Enjoy.

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ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF HISTORY.

        New year, new year resolutions, great hopes, a time when we aim for our dreams. What is the dream of the ordinary people of this world, and what is the dream of the corporate power of this world? Will your dream be on the right side of history, will you make history and help that dream become a reality.

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WELCOME TO MY WORLD.

    For all those anarchists with an imagination and a vision of their utopian better world, you know, the one that we are all working so hard to achieve. Could you put it into words, what is the anarchist world you're struggling so hard to create, what would it look like? I have no doubt we will all come up with a different picture, but I have no doubt there will be some basics that will be universal, a deep respect for the other, co-operation and mutual aid, will be the basic building blocks.

A wee challenge from Combustion Books:

Introducing the Anarchist Imagination

     Everyone knows the world is a mess. There’s starvation and ecocide, racism and sexism. The rich get richer and the poor get dead, all while species go extinct and carbon warms up the air. It’s not surprising that so much of our fiction is as bleak as our future threatens to be.

      But we can imagine other worlds. We can imagine better ways to organize ourselves, better ways to treat one another, better ways to treat the earth. And specifically, we can imagine worlds without the authoritarianism of the state and capitalism. The question, then, is: what would those worlds look like?

     Combustion Books, a worker-run publisher of genre fiction, is looking to publish a new line of books: The Anarchist Imagination. We are looking for novella-length (15,000-40,000 words) anarchist utopias.

       Our intention is not, of course, to put down blueprints that must be followed line by line. We offer no prescription for future society. Instead, the utopia is a form we can use to explore our revolutionary desires, to showcase ideas we might put into practice, to give us glimpses of what we fight for.

     The utopia is a peculiar form of fiction to write, to be sure, and we’re looking for stories that balance the exposition of society with compelling narrative and character. The stories can be set in our own world–past, present, or future–or in fantasy. The politics can be anything anti-state, the economics anything that isn’t capitalism. As this series goes on, we hope to showcase just how wide this terrain can be.

Submissions can be sent to submissions@combustionbooks.org.
You can also view our regular submission guidelines.

ann arky's home.

WHOSE RIGHT DIRECTION?

       David Cameron in his new year speech has said that Britain “is heading in the right direction”, and he really means it. As far as our millionaire parasite Prime Minister and his millionaire corporate cronies are concerned, we are “moving in the right direction”. Two years of shrinking incomes due to wage freezes/cuts and wage increases of less than inflation, have taken the country nearer to that corporate dream of a low wage sweatshop economy. It is all falling into place, low wages, part-time workers desperate to hold onto their carp job, temporary contracts that can be cancelled at a moments notice and a massive erosion of workers rights and entitlements. A few more years of this and our corporate masters will be able to compete with any sweatshop in the East. Their other success story is of course the cuts in social spending. To the corporate greed merchants, social spending is tax money, if we can get rid of all that mamby-pamby social spending nonsense, it would mean a reduction in taxes and therefore, an increase in their profits. In their philosophy of greed and exploitation, if people want services of any kind, social or otherwise, they can purchase them from the corporate world. Of course if you can't afford that, well, tough, that's not their problem.

     Yes Mr Cameron, you can hold your head up high among your millionaire corporate cronies, you have been successful in taking the people of this country well down the path of transformation from workers to serfs. However, if I were you, I would not get too confident and complacent, I do expect the people of this country will start to stand up and do to you, what you have done to them, and kick the shit out of you, and those millionaire corporate cronies. We will not quietly crawl into serfdom, we have been there before. 

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY PANAGIOTI.

        In Glasgow in February 2012 I arranged an Earth First talk/discussion/meeting with two America Earth Firsters, Panagioti and his partner Carla. The evening was a great success. They have been life long campaigners in trying to get us all to treat our precious planet with more respect. As usual I am a bit late with the birthday wishes, it was Panagioti's birthday on the 28th December, happy birthday comrade. It appears it will be a double whammy for him and Carla as the birthday will be followed by the birth of their first child. Congratulations.

This from Earth First Magazine:

        If industrial civilization were to collapse any time soon–and its looking like it could happen any day now–it’d be in no small part due to the rather outrageous and tireless misadventures of a little known biocentric biped called Panagioti. 
    Though he has no formal education past 10th grade — “diploma-free and proud” as he’d say — you’d be hard pressed to find a smarter and more politically influential animal amongst the more radical environmental milieu, especially in the South. He’s also a real sweetheart, a soon-to-be-father, my best friend and all around nice guy and superhero.

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FROM THE HEART.

    Perhaps instead of theorising we should start to follow our emotions and when we discuss, we should speak from the heart, not from the book. The following short piece might sound soppy to some, but would it be bad if lots more spoke and felt like this?

From united99:

      I typed this just now in an argument with others who feel workers make what they deserve. There are typos, there are things that are not worded right, but it is from the heart...Right now I am in a state in the USA which is sooo anti-workers that it makes my heart weep! I feel that this is the sortof place where this sortof speech needs to be given. The workers who are making 7.00 working at factories which make millions are incredibly dangerous, this men need to know that they are worth more than minimum wage. Workers who are forced to be without their families on holidays and for the vast majority of the day and night deserve to know that they are worth more than money, they are priceless. Workers have lost their pride, their heart, their motive, their souls so to say. It would be easy to give a speech and wage a war in an area which already has a strong labor movement, but in a right to work state, which is really a right to fire state, these men need their muscle back. I will die for my fellow workers, I will gladly spend time in prison for my fellow worker, I will be poverty stricken if it means that I am doing it on my terms and not those of some shitty business, some call center, some factory, some fast food place, some warehouse. Tonight I decided that my years of travel and activism, that it would all mean nothing if I did not finally put MORE action to my words, and those actions and words are following in the footsteps of Eugene V Debs or Bill Haywood. Tonight I begin my steps toward real freedom.

ann arky's home.

FIGHTING FOR OURSELVES.

     For those interested, the Solidarity Federation's new book, "Fighting for Ourselves" gets a detailed review in The Commune.

"---- Yet it is not quite. Despite a few caveats about SolFed not being the be all and end all, this is a SolFed-centric vision. This is maybe most evident in the passage about the SolFed Local:

“At the heart of the anarcho-syndicalist union is the Local, which aims to be at the centre of community and workplace struggle in the surrounding area. But the role of the Local goes beyond that. It provides the physical space where a diverse range of groups, such as oppressed, cultural, and education groups can organise. The Local acts as the social, political, and economic centre for working class struggle in a given area. It is the physical embodiment of our beliefs and methods, the means by which workers become anarcho-syndicalist not just on the basis of ideas but activity.”

     Such bodies will need to exist. But if there is a particular reason why they should be part of – or mainly facilitated by – SolFed, it is not described within these pages. Thinking of Liverpool radical politics right now, I would love to be in such a group with the SolFed comrades, but I’d want AFed comrades there too, as well as the many unaligned comrades who make up the overwhelming majority of radical class struggle activists.----"

Read the full review HERE: 

      You can buy hard copies of Fighting for ourselves for £6 (including p&p) from Freedom Press (UK – £5 in the shop), and for $10+p&p from Thoughtcrime Ink Books (North America). It can also be viewed or downloaded for free from the ‘Selfed’ website.

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REMEMBER THOSE OTHERS WANT TO FORGET.

     Even in those least democratic areas of the developed world, people will celebrate, to welcome in the new year, passing greetings between friends and neighbours. However, in these areas there are those who cannot celebrate with friends and families. They are prisoner of the state. Locked in their cramped conditions, suffering isolation, loneliness and repression, we should not forget them. 

This from Contra Info:

      “Persons locked up behind bars stop living, they just survive in prison. Every one of them makes their own mold into which they’re supposed to fit, finding refuge in standardized behaviours and reactions (…) one becomes simply a number, another accusatory brief scattered on an iron bed, in a narrow prison cell. A number less, who cares. In any event, the punitive system thinks that inmates haven’t ever been born but just sprung up from somewhere, and they can just as easily be uprooted.” [excerpts from a comrade’s letter on prisons]
      Monday, December 31st, 2012 by 23.30pm Solidarity gathering outside Koridallos women’s prisons
      From Santiago to Montreal, and from Thessaloniki to Chania: 10, 100, 1000 solidarity gatherings outside prisons, juvenile detentions centres, immigration concentration camps
When all others celebrate, we remember those that others want to forget
—anarchists

ann arky's home.

A HARD AND POVERTY NEW YEAR TO YOU!!!!

        Well it is that time of year when we start to think of what the next year will bring. You can rest assured that as far as the ordinary people are concerned, it will not be a year of prosperity, though it most likely will be for the corporate world. For them, profits up, taxes down, for you and and I, continued wage freezes/cuts, as pay increases stay below inflation, more part-time jobs, less job security. We will also face increased prices in food and energy, poverty and deprivation will be on the increase, more "austerity" cuts, more attacks on the most vulnerable in our society. This is the plan for many years to come, when will we as the general public, say, enough is enough? This article from The Guardian points the path that our millionaire parasites have in store for us, the ordinary people of this country. The one line I might disagree with is "---with workers maintaining a 'grin and bear it' attitude", I sincerely hope not. I would expect to see greater organisation and resistance from the workers. Why should we "grin and bear it" to the benefit of the corporate parasites when we don't have to. There are alternatives.

Workers face 'hard year of slog' in 2013

      New year will bring longer hours, continued squeeze on pay, fewer new posts and more job insecurity, warns economist. Workers can expect longer hours, a continued squeeze on pay and fewer jobs being created in 2013, in a "hard year of slog", a new report has warned.

    Job insecurity will remain high, with workers maintaining a "grin and bear it" attitude, said John Philpott, director of The Jobs Economist. Unemployment is forecast to increase by 120,000 to 2.63 million in 2013 because growth in the workforce will exceed the number of jobs being created, Philpott said.

Read the full article HERE:

ann arky's home.

THE CORPORATE WORLD FOSTERS CHILD SLAVERY.

        An appeal from AVAAZ regarding child slave labour in India. Slavery is abhorrent in any form, but child slavery must rank at the bottom of the barrel. No child should be denied an education, no child should have its potential destroy, no child should be denied its childhood.

  
Dear friends,

India is stalling the toughest child labour law in its history... because politicians say it’s not a ‘priority’! But the majority of MPs support it and all they need is a massive public push to bring it to a vote. Let´s raise our voices for India´s children. Sign now:

     The Indian Parliament is closing without passing the toughest child labour law in its history. Worse, the bill is supported by the majority of MPs, but it was ignored for weeks, because they felt it was not a ‘priority’!

     India is the world’s child labour capital -- kids as young as five are sold to traffickers and forced to work as modern-day slaves, abused and beaten. The historic new bill would ban outright any child labour under 14 and provide stipends for poor families to keep their children in school. But MPs have let it fall off their agenda, and Indian child rights groups say they badly need our help, now, to ramp up the public pressure.

     If the Avaaz community comes together, we can create a wave of attention to the bill, and push MPs to vote. Sign this urgent petition and forward it widely -- when we reach 1 million we’ll deliver our message to the Parliament with former child workers:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/india_child_labour_g1/?bwqhjab&v=20550

    A staggering 215 million children work in mines, quarries, and factories around the world. All nations have signed an agreement to put the eradication of child labour at the heart of their national education plans. But, India is home to the largest child labour force in the world. If the new law passes, it would ban all child labour for under 14-year-olds and all harmful work for under 18s. The law even has provisions to ensure it doesn’t hurt the poorest families -- enshrining the right to free education and proposing stipends to compensate any losses.

     Critics say the real problem isn’t the law, it’s bad enforcement. And it’s true that in the last three years in India less than 10% of the 450,000 reports of child labour were prosecuted under the existing, weak, law. But the new law packs some serious punch. The police will no longer have to wait for a court order to act. All forms of commercial child labour under 14 will be criminalised, and instead of meaningless fines or short prison sentences, the criminals will face tough penalties.

    While the majority of MPs say they'll support the bill, there's no political urgency to bring it to a vote. But each day they delay, more children are forced into a life of sweatshop misery. It’s up to us to push them over the edge. Sign the petition to India's MPs now, and share widely:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/india_child_labour_g1/?bwqhjab&v=20550

     The Avaaz community has campaigned to protect the children and the most vulnerable, time and time again. Just weeks ago, 1.2 million of us got together to help pass the most comprehensive education plan in Pakistan. How we treat our children is a reflection on our moral compass -- and it´s time to take firm steps against their abuse. Let’s join together to speak out for the future of India’s suffering children.

With hope and determination,

Jamie, Alice, Alex, Alaphia, Lisa, Jeremy, Ricken, Dalia, Rewan, Michelle and the whole Avaaz team

MORE INFORMATION:

India proposes ban on child labor (Washington Post)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/india-proposes-ban-on-child-labor/2012/08/29/ef9d802a-f1f2-11e1-a612-3cfc842a6d89_story.html

Getting ready for the new law against child labour (The Hindu)
http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/article3878212.ece

Over 60 million child laborers in India (India Tribune)
http://www.indiatribune.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2884:over-60-million-child-laborers-in-india

35 child workers rescued from Delhi factories (Business Line)
http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/industry-and-economy/economy/35-child-workers-rescued-from-delhi-factories/article1694550.ece

End Child Labour and Educational Disadvantage - report and film
http://educationenvoy.org/

Support the Avaaz Community!
We're entirely funded by donations and receive no money from governments or corporations. Our dedicated team ensures even the smallest contributions go a long way.

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A CORPORATE WORLD CONTROLLED FROM THE BOARDROOM.

       The financial Mafia's grand plan is world wide, it is in fact a world wide epidemic. It is not something that is limited to Europe, no country is immune from this destructive infection. The only real antidote to this vile infection is social justice through anarchism. 

     America, that land of freedom, democracy and opportunity!! Well just like the rest of the corporate dominated world, ordinary Americans are getting poorer and the rich Americans are getting richer. Forbes has just released the latest figures on the richest Americans, and it states that the wealthiest 400 Americans posses 13% of the total wealth of all of America. This year alone their wealth increased by 7%, making the average wealth between this 400 work out at $4.2 billion each. This puts people like the most recent Presidential contender, Mitt Romney, in the poor league, as he has to get by on a personal fortune of a mere $250 million.

       Compare this to the ordinary American, this year millions of workers have been forced into poverty, saw the pensions disappear, along with their health care. Their wages are now in lower than what they were 40 years ago, if you take into consideration the rate of inflation over that period, the average wage is 22% lower now than the average in 1972. Unemployment is high, house foreclosures almost common place, homelessness rampant, jobs almost impossible to find.

       The onslaught against the ordinary people is world wide, no country is immune from the financial Mafia's plans to drive down wages, Greece, at the moment, may be at the sharp end, but others are perilously close, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Ireland, to mention a few in Europe. There is nothing in the rule book that says that the American people can't follow the Greek people into total misery and deprivation. By the slashing social spending the corporate world will achieve two things, one, it will reduce the tax they are asked to pay, so increasing profits, and two, it will open up greater opportunities for the corporate bodies to privately supply, at a profit to themselves, those services that have been trashed by national governments. No social services, only privately provide services at a cost, and if you can't pay, then you have to go without.

       Everything must turn a profit for the corporate body, no public assets, no public spaces, no social services, just big business. A bleak, harsh and desperate world for the ordinary people, a world where if you fall on hard times, it will be up to charities to help you out, or friends and relatives, who might themselves be facing the same poverty and deprivation. This is the great austerity plan, the pinnacle of capitalism, the corporate planet controlled from the boardrooms of fat-cats, with one aim in mind, increase profit, to fatten your shareholders. We either face this world and live with it, or face it and destroy the present greed driven system and replace it with a better world driven by co-operation and mutual aid, based on sustainability with the aim of seeing to the needs of all our people.The only real

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A LETTER FROM THE PAST.

From the Anarchist Library, an anonymous letter from a worker 1883:

Capital and the Capitalists

What is capital? The harvest of the rich by the sweat of the people.

       Yes, we workers created capital. By our work we increase it every day. And far from profiting from what we have created, we become slaves to it and by making the capitalists richer to our own detriment, we become insufferable. Many workers look to suicide to end this order of things. I think there is a better way.

      What, the capitalist wallows in pleasure and the worker cannot live off the product of his labor. While the former is dancing and feasting, the latter is starving.

        O worker, my brother, you are suffering and the capitalist is laughing at your pains. You die and he insults your corpse. Faced with these blatant facts, you find nothing better than to end your life without caring that on the day of action your brothers in slavery will be missing your support.

        No, you have not thought of that and that is your excuse, but from now on chase these thoughts from your head and feel something different.

        Yes, there is a better way than dying. You have to live in order to prepare the great era of the future. You have to live to see your efforts crowned with success. You have to live to be present at the resurrection of the worker and the death of the capitalist.

        To get there what do we need: Audacity — we have it. Finances — we’ll find it. Sacrifices — we are all ready to give what is dearest to us for the triumph of our ideals.

        Therefore, let’s get to work. Let’s group together — there is strength in union. No half-measures. Think of those who are suffering, whose children demand vengeance. Encourage the weak. Finally, let’s get ready because the hour approaches when we will have to call upon different arguments than those of our corrupt representatives.

        And on that day, no mercy to the masters, like they have shown none to us. Let our battle cry be:

Down with capital.
Crush the capitalists.
Death to traitors and scoundrels.
Long live the Revolution!

— Letter from a worker exploited by capital.

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AUSTERITY TO SERFDOM!!

      So 2012's candle is starting to flicker, soon to be extinguished. What does a look at the year tell us? It saw the world's ordinary people assaulted and ravished by the power of capital, aided and abetted by their administrators, the state governments. It also saw some of the fiercest fight backs against the full might of the state's repressive power. From London to Washington, from Athens to Moscow, from Madrid to Delhi, the ordinary people of this planet organised and protested against the battering ram of the financial Mafia's austerity plan. Sometimes it was bloody, with South African miners being gunned down by the state's bully boys the police. Tear gas and and baton charges were almost daily events in Athens. Death and injury were seen among protesters time and time again.

       This was not just an aggressive attack on the living standards of the people, it was a case of what little freedom we had being eroded. The state's clandestine agencies stepped up surveillance on dissenting voices, with more covert operations being mounted against legitimate protest groups, they introduced new legislation criminalising acts of protest, many civil liberties were torn up and binned.

       What was also visible over the last year was the disintegrating support for the usual mainline parties. The usual flunky parties in the pocket of the corporate world saw the people turn away in droves, with a mixture of disgust and hatred. That support in some cases turned to apathy, but mostly moved to the more radical wings of the political spectrum, the radical right as well as the radical left.

       Just as the financial Mafia's drive for more austerity will not fade away in the coming year, it is more likely to intensify, so the resistance will grow and the struggle become more bitter, more fierce. However it also means that there will be another front being fought, that for the hearts and minds of the people, against that rising tide of extreme right wing groupings. In every country where austerity has been biting, and the people resisting, the extreme right has gained ground. No doubt financed by many of those powerful people and institutions that financed and backed the usual mainstream puppets that are now discredited.

      What little gains the ordinary people have made by decades of bitter struggle, resistance, and perseverance have been wiped away, what crumbs came our way have been greedily stolen back. To stand still we will have to re-double our efforts, as the financial Mafia's plan is to push us further back, to something resembling the poverty of the Victorian era.

      2012 also saw a continuation of the US corporate funded government acting as guardian of the the world's corporate profit seekers. Bombing the shit out of people across the globe, all in the name of peace and democracy of course. Any country that wouldn't let the dollar and Western capital control their assets, became the axis of evil, and felt the full fury of Western “shock and awe” democracy. We all know the list, and it is still growing with more on the agenda.

       2013 will prove to be a critical year, as the rate of the financial Mafia's drive for “austerity” increases, so will our descent into serfdom. Unless we can counter that with increased resistance, an abandoning of the tradition politics, and a massive move towards politics from below, with increased resistance, direct action, occupation and a desire not to fix the system so that we can reclaim some of the crumbs we lost, but dismantle it and replace it with a sustainable system of seeing to the needs of all our people. A system of co-operation, mutual aid and free from the profit motive.

ann arky's home.

EARN MORE PAY LESS TAX - ONLY IF YOUR BIG!!

        Recent figures show that the corporate world are continuing their greed driven trend of shuffling profits to “tax havens” (fiddling bases). While lifting those profits from the people of UK, they refuse to pay the UK citizens there fair dues through the medium of tax. As company profits continue to rise, their tax returns continue to fall. This is a situation that can only be found in large corporate businesses, it just doesn't happen in smaller concerns or with employees income. It is all the result of our millionaire cabal residing in the Westminster Houses of Hypocrisy and Corruption creating a corporate friendly environment for their millionaire corporate buddies at the expense of you and I.

       A recent Reuters analysis of official figures shows that large companies in the UK now pay less tax than they did 12 years ago. The corporation tax figures for the year 2011/12 show that large companies paid just £21 billion, this a 21% decrease since 2000.01. The Office of National Statistics states that during the same period the gross operating surplus for all companies in the UK rose by 65% to £329 billion. They also verify that tax receipts from small companies and personal income tax rose over the same period.

      As the UK GDP grew over the period 2000/12 by 55% and company surplus earnings grew by 65% and their tax payments fell by 21%, it is obvious that they “are at it” as one might say. All that discrepancy in what they should pay and what they actually pay is hived off to shareholders bonuses, to fat cats bank accounts. In the meantime, you and I, who pay our full whack of taxes are being hit by cuts in our standard of living, cuts in education, health and all essential social services. The poor and vulnerable are being penalised with cuts in benefits, and the mantra from our millionaire Oxbridge Honourable Gentlemen is, “We can't afford it”. Which translates into, “We have to give our banker millionaire friends all your money.” 

 "We can't afford to pay any more tax, it would be bad for business."

        So as you count your pennies to try and manage to eat and feed your family, those tax dodging, sorry, tax avoidance, fat cats are glancing through the latest yacht catalogue, or perhaps considering another villa in Bermuda. That is the system that we carry on our backs, we work, we pay our taxes, we scrimp and scrap, they avoid paying tax, and live in the lap of luxury. It's called capitalism, like it?

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ANARCHISM - NATURALLY GOOD.

        By anarchist spirit I mean that deeply human sentiment, which aims at the good of all, freedom and justice for all, solidarity and love among the people; which is not an exclusive characteristic only of self-declared anarchists, but inspires all people who have a generous heart and an open mind.

 Errico Malatesta.

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THE PRICE OF CAPITALIST ADJUSTMENT, DEPRIVATION.

      Every economist comes up with their own personal idea of the "problem" with Greece and the Greek people and all of their answers usually are around some capitalist economic formula that is hinged to the "people" paying more to put things "right" by taking a greater hit to their already impoverished living standard, or by the state borrowing more and creating "growth". The former solution will be an even greater disaster for the Greek people, the latter, beneficial for the corporate world, but more of the same for the Greek people. All capitalist "adjustments" require deprivation, malnutrition, homelessness and mass unemployment to be heaped on the ordinary people. The Greek people's solution, like all those ordinary people across the globe who are at present suffering "austerity", does not lie in any form of capitalist economics, capitalist economic solutions are the problem, the only answer for the ordinary people, lies outside capitalism. 

      An interesting article by Nikos Libero, on the Greek situation taken from The Commune:

 

      Greece is living through its biggest crisis since the downfall of the military junta in the summer of 1974 – a consequence of the world economic crisis and the historical decadence of the Greek bourgeois elite. The same internal tendencies – with more or less the same characteristics as in the USA in 2008, at the beginning of the world economic crisis – are manifested in Greece today in an explosive form.

All the social conquests of the working class since 1974 have been lost in the last three years. Since the end of the second world war, there has never been, in a period of peace, such a dramatic decline in the standard of living of the majority of the population of any country in Europe, or such a violent redistribution of wealth in such a limited time.

         The crisis has given rise to an assault not only on the working class, but also on the middle class, which is being destroyed today. And here it should be noted that in 2009 the petty bourgeoisie is two or three times larger, as part of a proportion of the total population, than in the so-called developed capitalist countries.

       In November 2012, unemployment reached 30% – and 80% of the unemployed received no benefits. Since 2009, the real income of ordinary people has been reduced by 40%. And the downfall will continue in the next year.

      The minimum daily wage for people below the age of 25 is 22 euros, and for those above 25, 26 euros. Three million people, in a population of less than 11 million, are living below the poverty line. There are 40,000 homeless. The suicide rate is rising dramatically especially among the destroyed middle class. In tens of thousands of homes, the electricity has been cut off. Crime is rife.

Read the full article HERE:

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IT'S THE THOUGHT THAT COUNTS!!

       It is possibly not the most stylistic or easy flowing Christmas poem ever written, but it is a nice thought.

I'm Dreaming of a Red and Black Christmas

'Twas the night before Christmas, And all through the land,

Factory workers were slaving to meet high demand,

For video games, DVDs, and cheaply built toys,

To be given the next morning to spoiled American girls and boys.

The workers had had it, They were at their wits end,

Worked day and night with no time off, The bosses would not bend.

Then over the loudspeaker on one factory floor,

Boomed a fat boss's voice, "WORK FASTER! PRODUCE MORE!”

“Our profits are way up, but not quite enough,

Our shareholders aren't happy – you've got to make more stuff!”

That was the last straw. The workers would take no more abuse,

So they stopped working and jammed up the machines 'till they were of no more good use.

And with a collective burst of rage, the workers cried,

“That's enough! We've had it with this shit!” They marched up to the boss's office and demanded, “If you don't give us some time off, we're all going to quit!”

“Quit?!”, laughed the boss, “Go ahead, not a problem!”

I'll have your replacements here by 4 AM tomorrow!”

“Plenty of poor schmucks need a job so badly,

I can pay them peanuts, and they'll take this shitty job – GLADLY!”

“In fact,” smirked the boss, “I'll save you AND me the trouble...

“YOU'RE ALL FIRED! Now get your asses out of here, ON THE DOUBLE!”

Well, what happened next can't really be told,

Because no worker who was there that day will tell,

Of the action taken that was so bold. All we know for sure is that after that day,

A whole new meaning was given to the phrase “Christmas sleigh”...

On that cold snowy Christmas Eve night the news spread like wildfire,

And suddenly, the workers' situation didn't seem so dire. Throughout the land in every factory around,

Workers rose up with this new boldness they had found.

They eliminated their bosses and formed democratic workers councils instead,

And from that day ever after, it was called “Red and Black Christmas”,

because hierarchy in the workplace... ...was finally dead.

by adamgkrause

ann arky's home.