Contradictions.

         How would you describe this present day society? You could write a book, a very long poem, or even make a movie. There are so many contradictions in this society, it would be difficult to capture them all. The glaring opulence side by side with destitution, the avalanche of information and the absence of knowledge, and so it goes on.
        I lifted the following quote from arrezafe and think it does an excellent job in highlighting the contradictions in this society that show it to be a flawed, unacceptable idiotic and cruel human structure. 

 

 

The following is a comment on arrezafe:

       How are we fed? Through hope and progress? (so the machine keeps moving)
Como nos alimentamos? Con esperanza y progreso (para que la máquina siga moviéndose)

Let me quote something:
Voy a mencionar algo:

“We have bigger houses but smaller families; - Tenemos casas más grandes pero familias más pequeñas,
more conveniences, but less time; - más comodidades, pero menos tiempo
We have more degrees, but less sense; - más títulos academicos pero menos sentido comun
more knowledge, but less judgment; - mas conocimiento, pero menos juicio,
more experts, but more problems; - mas expertos, pero mas problemas,
more medicines, but less healthiness; - mas medicionas, pero menos salud
We’ve been all the way to the moon and back, - hemos ido y regresado de la Luna
but have trouble crossing the street to meet - pero tenemos problemas cruzando la calle para
the new neighbor - conocer al nuevo vecino,
We’ve built more computers to hold more - hemos construido mas computadoras para
information to produce more copies than ever, - almacenar informacion para producir mas copias que nunca
but have less communications; - pero tenemos menos comunicacion
We have become long on quantity, - hemos ampliado la cantidad
but short on quality. - y reducido la calidad
These times are times of fast foods; - son tiempo de comida basura
but slow digestion; - de digestion lenta
Tall man but short character; - hombres alto de baja moral
Steep profits but shallow relationships. - enormes benificios pero pequenyas relaciones
It is time when there is much in the window, - Es la epoca donde hay mucho en la ventana
but nothing in the room. - pero nada dentro de la habitacion

--authorship unknown
from Sacred Economics”
― Charles Eisenstein, Sacred Economics: Money, Gift, and Society in the Age of Transition

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

I'm Free!

       

        The following comment was left on my previous post by Loam, thanks Loam. 

      I was twice in prison during the dictatorship of General Franco and I understood that I had two alternatives: resign myself or try to get out of there as soon as possible. For the first option I did not need anyone, for the second, yes.
        I say this because we tend to forget that we live in a prison, very decorated, but a prison that resignation and individualism reinforces. If we want to get out of it we need each other, we need all our energies to be directed towards that goal. Otherwise, we will be forging our own slavery and the slavery of future generations.

          It is a point that so many people fail to see, we live in a society where we have no real say on the shape or direction of the society in which we live. All those decisions are made by the people with the wealth, power and privileges, and that shape and direction will always be to their benefit. Our purpose or "duty" as far as the power mongers are concern is to keep the wheels of production turning and then consume the crap we make, ever increasing their wealth and power. We can be surplus to their requirements and be abandon, we can be used as cannon fodder in their power struggles, but never receive the any of the blood gained fruits of that struggle. We are wandering a manufactured world of tinsel and froth, of shiny bobbles and illusions, all scattered to appease us, a form of paracetamol, while the wealthy and powerful live lavishly on our sweat, poverty and submissiveness. As Loam says, we need each other to come together with the aim of ending this imprisonment and freeing tomorrow's generations from this insidious prison.

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

Protection Gang

       I have often posted my view on the loaded judicial system that protects the wealthy and the privileged against those who would dare to point a finger at the corruption and injustice at the heart of this capitalist system. Of course it is world wide, the rich and power have set up system to protect themselves for any form of real criticism, the decisions of these judicial guardians of the wealthy, are actions that fly in the face of the flag they have the audacity to wave, that of democracy. Their democracy is a theatre of smoke and mirrors, a grand show of illusions, with suffering as its outcome.

       The following extract refers to Spain, but as I keep saying, the pattern is repeated across the globe.

The following is from arrezafe:

Thanks Loam for the translation.

Translation:

"Do you swear to tell the truth?"              "I'm sitting here saying it."

         While the international oligopolistic press sets its sights on the situation of Human Rights in countries such as Venezuela or Cuba, where there are no cases of systemic persecution of their opponents, and much less of artists who manifest critical positions in their art, in Spain there are two firm convictions against rappers who denounce with their lyrics uncomfortable truths, abuses of the system and flagrant privileges that are inadmissible in states that claim to be democratic. The case of rapper ValtónYc, currently convicted but exiled from his own country to evade a Justice without due guarantees, is one more case of political condemned who must escape from a highly degraded Spanish institutionality, with dangerous glimpses of the fascist abyss and against them. humanity. Valtónyc was assumed as a public danger for singing Rap with criticism of a corrupt monarchy, with shady businesses and a firm presumption of money laundering and relationships with financial circuits of drug trafficking, it has become a paradigmatic case of how the judicial system is at the service of the powerful. A Judicial Power always ready to cover up systemic deviations, and ready to violate essential freedoms such as free expression and rebellious or didactic artistic creation for the awareness of the masses. Precisely what the system does not support in order to continue to function with impunity for the privileged. it has become a paradigmatic case of how the judicial system is at the service of the powerful. A Judicial Power always ready to cover up systemic deviations, and ready to violate essential freedoms such as free expression and rebellious or didactic artistic creation for the awareness of the masses. Precisely what the system does not support in order to continue to function with impunity for the privileged. it has become a paradigmatic case of how the judicial system is at the service of the powerful. A Judicial Power always ready to cover up systemic deviations, and ready to violate essential freedoms such as free expression and rebellious or didactic artistic creation for the awareness of the masses. Precisely what the system does not support in order to continue to function with impunity for the privileged.

Read the full article HERE: 

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

This Land--.

     In England 92% of the land and 97% of rivers are owned by a small, extremely wealthy,  bunch of pampered privileged parasites, Scotland is much the same. I have always been puzzled by somebody owning a large slice of the planet. Who did they buy it from, who held the original deeds, was it God? or did a bunch of thieving scoundrels just steal it, then gave bits to their friends and buddies. I think the latter. Isn't it about time we reversed that situation and became the land grabbers and take it all back into common ownership for the benefit of all?

 

 

       In the U.K., folks can wander over private property without asking permission.
       This is called “the right to roam” and its legal legacy can be traced back to a grassroots movement started by Benny Rothman in the 1930s.
      Rothman was a member of rebellious group of Manchester factory workers who called themselves “ramblers”. The ramblers sought to get out of sooty Manchester on their time off in order to see the beautiful Peak District that surrounded them. The problem was that almost all of this land was in the hands of private landlords who hired game keepers to keep walkers (and possible poachers) at bay.
       This had not always been the case. Some 300 years earlier, most of the land in the UK has been part of the Commons where people could graze livestock and hunt as they could.
        Beginning in the mid-18th century, however, the Enclosure Movement worked to privatize most common land in England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. This has been described as "a revolution of the rich against the poor," and it transformed the countryside 

 

 Thanks loam for the video link:

 

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

Mr. President.

      Most people seem to accept that Trump is the worst President of the USA ever. That's quite an accolade considering the liars and butchers that have held that post before him. To me the main difference with Trump and the other  figureheads of American imperialism, is the fact that he has a big mouth and doesn't hide his racism and fascist and homophobic views, he openly revels in them.

The following extracts are from Arrezafe:

Monday, April 16, 2018: Peace protesters trying to tear down the Truman statue in Athens

       Two days ago, Greek police forces, on orders from the SYRIZA-ANEL government, brutally attacked anti-war protesters as they tried to topple the statue of US President Harry Truman. This 3.2-meter statue - "a fossil of bloody US imperialism" , as the KKE called it in a statement - has been in the center of the Greek capital since 1963.
      Recent events give us an opportunity to remember who Harry Truman really was. A representative of US imperialism, Truman was the author of the most horrendous war crime of the previous century. We refer to the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.

         "Being in possession of a bomb, we have used it ... We will continue to use it until we completely destroy the military power of Japan. Only its surrender will stop us ... We thank God that he has placed it in our hands, and not in the hands. of our enemies, and we pray that He guides us to use it in his path and for his purposes . "

        These gruesome words were spoken on August 9, 1945, by the President of the United States, Truman, during a radio address to the American people. It was three days since the terrorist Enola Gay had dropped the atomic bomb called “Little boy” on Hiroshima and another bomb was sowing death, destruction and chaos in Nagasaki.-------

And:

  ----------Numerous American officials, as well as academics, have exposed Truman's blatant lies. For example, the US Strategic Bombing Survey group, which had been assigned by President Truman himself to study air strikes in Japan, was writing in a report prepared in July 1946:
      "Based on a detailed investigation of all the facts and supported by the testimony of the surviving Japanese leaders involved, it is the opinion of the Study that certainly before December 31, 1945, and in all probability before November 1, 1945, Japan it would have surrendered even if the atomic bombs had not been dropped, even if Russia had not gone to war and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated . "
       For his part, the then Supreme Commander of all Allied Forces who later became President of the United States, General Dwight Eisenhower, said: "The Japanese were ready to surrender and there was no need to hit them with that hideous thing . " We could cite many testimonies from various officers of the United States Army (Admiral Leahy, General MacArthur, Under Secretary of War McLoy, etc.) that confirm all of the above.
       History has documented the tremendous effects of the nuclear holocaust on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Truman and his administration are responsible for more than 200,000 deaths and hundreds of thousands of radiation-related post-attack casualties.-------

And: 

      "Hero" for the Greek bourgeoisie - "Butcher" for the people.

      The war criminal Harry Truman, who sowed destruction in Japan, is the same butcher who, three years later, ordered the bombing of the heroic guerrillas of the Democratic Army of Greece (DSE) in the mountains of Grammos. It was during the Greek Civil War that the United States intervened to help the Greek bourgeois class against the Democratic Army of Greece . In February 1948, American General James Van Fleet arrived in Athens and became the commander-in-chief of the Greek bourgeois army. 

         In 1949, the Grammos Mountains in northern Greece became the field where the American air force first used Napalm B bombs. In just one battle, in Grammos, the Americans dropped 338 napalm bombs from US positions. DSE. Years later, napalm bombs were used by American assassins in numerous imperialist wars: from Korea to Vietnam and from the 1991 Gulf War to the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia.

      Quite a record for a fundamentalist Christian, one of the many who have no problem with mass killings and then asking their god of love and peace to bless their actions. Trump is at home, among a long line of liars, hypocrites and mass murders, who have sat on that throne of savage American imperialism.

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

Mutual Aid.

       A little more on self-organising and mutual aid. It's not a new invention, it has been the backbone of human development since we started to walk the earth. However we do need to refine it to suit the disaster that we seem to have created on this same earth we walked all those generations ago. 

      Communities across the planet are more and more turning to this human resource of mutual aid, experimenting, refining and developing as they grow. We can all learn from one and other, that's the basis of mutual aid, mutual co-operation.

      The following extract is from an article taken from Open Democracy: 

   Dance festival as part of the month-long program, called “Celebration of Life”: members of a Zapatista community are enacting life after 1994. Signs say “Education,” “Health,” and “Collective Work.” | Photo: Anya Briy

       As the COVID-19 pandemic has undermined healthcare systems and economies of even the most advanced nations, mutual networks and self-organizing efforts have sprung up across the world in a show of pandemic solidarity. With the police murder of George Floyd, the U.S. has seen further spread of self-organizing: from bond and mutual aid funds for protesters to citizen patrols in Minneapolis and a police-free autonomous zone in Seattle. As the first attempt to abolish police and replace it with community-based, transformative justice are underway in the U.S., we may want to look at the communities that have been experimenting with self-organization without recourse to the states that oppress or dispossess them, such as Rojava in North East Syria, Cooperation Jackson in Mississippi and Zapatistas in Chiapas. Zapatistas, in particular, have spent the last 26 years organizing their communities autonomously from the state across all spheres of life—from police and justice system to health care, economy and education. As we witness the limits of the imaginable being radically shifted, the Zapatista experience is more relevant than ever.

Read the full article HERE:

Thanks Loam for the link.

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

My Homeland.

      What better way to start your day than with pleasant music, with an emotional content that you wish to endorse. Translations are never 100% accurate, but you get the meaning.  Lifted this from Arrezafe.

They say the homeland is
a rifle and a flag.
My homeland is my brothers
who are tilling the land.

My homeland is my brothers
they are tilling the land
while here they teach us
how one kills in war.

Oh, I don't shoot, no,
oh, I don't shoot, I don't
Alas, I don't shoot my brothers.
Oh, I was throwing, yes,
oh, I was throwing, yes,
against those who drown the people in their hands.

Prepare us to fight
against the workers
bad lightning strike me
if I attack my companions.

The war they fear so much
it does not come from abroad;
they are proletarian struggles
like brave miners.

Oh, I don't shoot, no,
oh, I don't shoot, I don't
Alas, I don't shoot my brothers.
Oh, I was throwing, yes,
oh, I was throwing, yes,
against those who drown the people in their hands.

When a general dies
they carry it on a harmonic,
the one who kills himself in the mine
the coal itself buries it.

The one who kills himself in the mine
two companions carry it,
stone charcoal pain,
mourning of brave miners.

Oh, I don't shoot, no,
oh, I don't shoot, I don't
Alas, I don't shoot my brothers.
Oh, I was throwing, yes,
oh, I was throwing, yes,
against those who drown the people in their hands.

If my brother gets up
being in the barracks
I take the gun and the blanket
and I go to the mountains with him.

Officers, officers,
you have a lot of courage
we'll see if you are brave
when our day comes.

Oh, I don't shoot, no,
oh, I don't shoot, I don't
Alas, I don't shoot my brothers.
Oh, I was throwing, yes,
oh, I was throwing, yes,
against those who drown the people in their hands.

Oh, I don't shoot, no,
oh, I don't shoot, I don't
Alas, I don't shoot my brothers.
Oh, I was throwing, yes,
oh, I was throwing, yes,
against those who drown Spain in their hands.

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

Inch By Inch.

     This little video should have gone with the previous article. It is a little demonstration how the slowly, slowly, principle works, and why we should always pay attention to those little changes in the way the state tries to govern us. Vigilance, critical thought and resistance, are the safeguards of freedoms, the few that we have, also the way to advance those freedoms. Thanks Loam for the link.

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

Land Of The Free!!

      This is an extract lifted from arrezafe it's from a book written in 1992, and things have deteriorated since then, poverty has increased significantly. Also this is a translation from English to Spanish and back to English, it is not the original English copy, though full English copy can be read here: http://www.michaelparenti.org/HiddenHolocaust.html thanks Loam for the link. The richest and most developed capitalist nation on the planet, and this is the miserable life it produces for millions of its citizens. What chance have the rest of us got if we follow the same Neo-Liberal policies of the capitalist master.

From the book Dirty Truths , [1992], by Michael Parenti
Translation from English: Arrezafe
       "I have seen strong men tear the floor, begging for a job. With some of them we have to do our best to avoid suicide. Many say they just want to die," says Charlie Tarrance, director of a private social agency. . Their task is to deal with the growing queues of desperate people looking for work, housing and food. The place is Gadsden, Alabama, but it could be anywhere in the United States.
      It could be Washington DC, at a Safeway supermarket just a mile from the White House, where an old man holding a can of dog food is crying. When asked what is wrong, he replies: “I am hungry. I'm hungry."
     It could be New York City, where a woman yells at the landlord to evict her from her home along with her children, whom, to her greatest distress, the Office of Child Welfare takes away. Desperate and sobbing, she is rushed to a New York psychiatric hospital to be treated by all-knowing psychiatrists and diagnosed as "paranoid schizophrenic."
      How much misery and cruelty on earth. As American leaders move decisively toward their Final Free Market Solution, stories of hunger, grief, and despair abound. Such tragedies exist a long time ago. Social pathology is part of this society as much as crime and capitalism. For a multitude of people, life becomes increasingly difficult.
Some grim statistics
      Conservatives like to proclaim how wonderful, happy, and prosperous our nation is. The only thing that coincides with their love for the country is the remarkable indifference they show towards the people who live in it. For them, the anguished cries of the dispossessed are nothing more than annoying whimpers of discontent. Those who criticize the existing living conditions are labeled as "complainers" and that we show some concern for our fellow citizens. But the dirty truth is that there is an alarming amount of inequalities, difficulties, abuses, afflictions, diseases, violence and pathologies in this country. The figures reveal a list that reaches millions of victims. Consider the following estimates for any given year:

27,000 Americans commit suicide.
5,000 suicide attempts. Some estimates are higher.
23,000 are killed.
85,000 are wounded by firearms.
38,000 of these die, including 2,600 children.
13,000,000 are victims of crimes including assault, rape, armed robbery, theft and arson.
135,000 children carry weapons to school.
5,500,000 people are arrested for various crimes (not including traffic offenses).
125,000 die prematurely from alcohol abuse.
6,500,000 use heroin, crack, speed, PCP, cocaine, or some other hard drug on a regular basis.
37,000,000 , one in six Americans, regularly use medical drugs to control their mood. Users are mostly women, medical sponsors, pharmaceutical company providers: astronomical profits.
2,000,000 outpatients receive powerful mind control drugs, sometimes described as "chemical straitjackets."
5,000 die from psychoactive drug treatments.
200,000 are subject to treatments of electrical shock damaging to the brain and nervous system.
From 600 to 1,000 people, mostly women, are lobotomized.
25,000,000, or one in 10 Americans, seek help from psychiatric, psychotherapeutic, or medical sources to address mental and emotional problems, at a cost of more than $ 4 billion annually.
6,800,000 turn to non-medical services, such as clergy, welfare agencies, and social counselors, for help with their emotional problems. In total, some 80,000,000 have sought some form of psychological counseling in their lives.
1,300,000 suffer some form of treatment-related injury in hospitals.
2,000,000 undergo unnecessary surgical operations, 10,000 of which die as a result.
180,000 die from adverse reactions to medical treatments, more than those who die from combined plane and car accidents.
More than 14,000 people die from overdoses of legally prescribed medications.
45,000 die in car accidents. However, the number of cars and highways is increasing while funding for safer forms of public transportation is shrinking.
Of the 1,800,000 victims who suffer non-fatal injuries from car accidents, 150,000 suffer permanent disabilities.
126,000 children are born with significant defects, mainly due to insufficient prenatal care, nutritional deficiency, environmental toxicity, or drug addiction by the mother.
2,900,000 children are subjected to gross neglect or abuse, including physical torture and willful starvation.
5,000 children are killed by their parents or grandparents.
More than 30,000 children are permanently physically disabled due to abuse or neglect. Child abuse in the United States affects more children each year than leukemia, car accidents, and infectious diseases combined. Cases of abuse by unemployed parents are increasing dramatically.
1,000,000 children run away from home, mainly due to abuse, including sexual abuse, of parents and other adults. 83 percent of fugitive children sexually abused come from white families.
150,000 children are reported as missing.
50,000 of these simply disappear. Their ages range from 15 to 15. According to the New York Times, "Some of these children are dead, perhaps half of them, buried annually in this country, are unidentified children."
900,000 children, some as young as seven years old, are engaged in child labor in the United States, serving as underpaid farm workers, dishwashers, laundry, and housework for up to ten hours a day in violation of child labor laws.
From 2,000,000 to 4,000,000 women are battered. Domestic violence is the leading cause of injury and the second leading cause of death for American women.
700,000 women are raped, one every 45 seconds.

And so the list goes on read the full list HERE: 

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

Empty Shelves.

       Behind the pulp pedaled by the media about empty shelves in supermarkets, where the finger is always pointed at the greed selfish public, never a word of criticism of the supermarkets and the food industry. Well there is more to the story than the public generally know, The following article, thanks Loam for the link, is from Angry Workers Of The World:

      Everyone is complaining about empty supermarket shelves. Lots of people are now asking themselves how they get filled in the first place. But hoarding and panic buying is a relatively minor issue – with highly calibrated ‘just-in-time’ production, shelves can be bare with only take a £6-10 increase in the normal shopping spend per household. Even if people are buying much more than this, it’s not just ‘selfish individuals’ who are to blame. We have to look at the political issues around the individualisation of working class communities over the last few decades, as well as rational responses to a government recommending self-isolation for 14 days if a family member has symptoms. More importantly though, we have to look at the structural constraints of the food supply-chain. Below you can find a few thoughts about this in particular.

       AngryWorkers’ comrades have worked in food processing factories and distribution centres for several years, organising independent workers’ bulletins and trying to expand the scope of workers’ self-activity as militant shop-stewards. This experience and an analysis of the wider food industry forms the major part of our new book, ‘Class Power on Zero-Hours’. In the second part of the book we look at the composition of this ‘essential industry’ in the UK and ask what a workers’ takeover and control of this industry would mean in today’s globalised (food) production system:

https://pmpress.org.uk/product/class-power-on-zero-hours/

     Any spike in demand brings immense difficulties because of an already overstretched supply-chain in the food sector. Here is a list of reasons why the supply-chains are susceptible to breaking point during the current crisis:

1) A dependency on global food supplies
       In the early 1980s, UK farms produced around 78% of the country’s staple foods. Today the UK has to import nearly half of its food from abroad, primarily from EU countries, but also from further afield. Under capitalism we have the absurd situation that, for example, live chickens and raw seafood are exported from EU countries to lower wage regions in order to be processed there and send back as frozen goods. The price of higher profit margins is extra work and pollution.

2) An overstretched transport system
        The share of food transported by aeroplane has risen by 140% since the early 90s. By 2000 this meant that 1 out of every 7.5 ton of goods flown into the UK was food. Furthermore, a lot of the food is stored in tourist passenger machines. So with tourism on hold due to the Corona crisis and the grounding of many planes, this transport link to get food into the country is under stress. But it’s not only the closing of borders which causes problems. The main problem when trying to expand transport is a chronic shortage of truck drivers due to the bad working conditions. [1] Many continue to work not because they are being ‘heroic’, rather they don’t have much choice as self-employed workers. The average age of a truck driver in the UK is 53 with 13% over 60 and only 2% under 25. This skewed demographic might really mess things up if and when they develop symptoms.

3) A spatially concentrated agriculture
        In the UK, areas around Spalding or the greenhouse complex Thanet Earth in Kent, [2] are highly concentrated agricultural hubs. For example, Thanet Earth produces 225 million tomatoes on around 1 square mile. These structures are at full capacity and structural expansion is relatively inflexible. In addition, and partly due to the Brexit dilemma, there is a shortage of agricultural labour. Despite talking tough on ‘unskilled migration’, the UK government has had to make extra-deals with Ukraine, for example, to secure supply of labour. [3]

4) Warehouse space at capacity limit
        The panic around ‘no deal Brexit’ had already revealed that there is an absolute lack of chilled warehouse space in the UK. [4] In the UK in particular warehouse space has become a major part of the real estate bubble, with companies like Segro speculating around land use. Chilled warehouses are up to four times more expensive than usual warehouses and cannot be ramped up at short notice.

5) Concentration process in food processing
         There has been an enormous concentration process in the food processing supply-chain over the last few decades. Let’s take abattoirs as an example: they shrank from 1022 in 1985 to 380 in 2000. Then let’s take a look at flour mills: there are only three or four major flour mills left in the UK. Two industrial companies share 55% of the bread market in the UK. And a quarter of all ready-made sandwiches come from one manufacturer. This means that these companies are at full capacity at the best of times. Despite all the hype around automation, food processing is actually pretty labour intensive. In the factories where we worked the lines are overcrowded, there is no physical space for extra staff and, even in London in some workplaces – like the Tesco distribution centre in Greenford – there can be a shortage of labour.

6) Supply problems for food processing
       Not only finished food arrives in the UK from abroad. The food processing industry relies on many half-finished products. In the case of the recent CO2/ammonia shortage in 2018 we can see how concentrated the production is within Europe. The gas is used to put bubbles in drinks and to stun chickens and pigs before slaughter. It is a by-product of fertiliser production. An uncoordinated shut-down of three manufacturers in Europe caused widespread disruption in slaughterhouses and drinks manufacturers in the UK. [5]

7) A fragile logistics system
       Most supermarkets have reduced the numbers of distribution centres (DCs) drastically, many having outsourced distribution to logistics companies. As well as reducing their direct control on day-to-day logistics operations, there are fewer bigger warehouses that increase supply-chain risks. Tesco supplies 3,700 stores with only 25 DCs. These are already at full capacity, as frequent hiccups in the logistics chain demonstrate. [6] This concentration process is even more pronounced when it comes to grocery home deliveries: Ocado operates only four main distribution centres for the whole of the UK. With higher automation levels any technical fault causes major problems. [7]

8) A highly concentrated grocery retail sector
       The final distribution and sales depends on a few big companies. The share of supermarkets in total grocery sales increased from 44% in 1971 to 60% in 1980 and 80% in 1990 and reaches 90% today, basically dominated by Tesco and Walmart. There is not much slack in the chain. Furthermore, these companies have a function of ‘central command’ which has been used by governments during times of crisis before, such as during food and mouth epidemic in 2001 and national petrol truck drivers strikes in 2012. Recently the Chinese government used the data pool of the major retail platform Alibaba for social surveillance.

9) Management bullying and workers anger
       The main structural constraint is the disengagement of workers from work. Conditions in logistics and food processing are characterised by brutal management regimes and low paid workers who are forced into repetitive work and therefore don’t give a fuck. They are disengaged not only from the company goals and work process, but also from their so-called representatives. Tesco started paying workers who keep on working during the Corona crisis a 10% bonus bribe, lauded by the union USDAW. This is after years of union co-managed cuts in weekend, night shift and annual bonuses.

——

      Under a profit-oriented system the concentration process of food production and distribution means that there are hardly any margins for error. But it also means that workers have a potentially unified and concentrated power. Instead of wishing us back into a situation of artisan producers and petty shop-owners we should organise for workers’ takeover and control. You can read in our book that this will be hard work that won’t be done by (Labour) government decree.

[1] https://angryworkersworld.wordpress.com/2015/10/29/messing-with-the-drivers/

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thanet_Earth

[3] https://www.fginsight.com/news/news/michael-gove-looking-to-ukraine-for-agricultural-workers-64721

[4] https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/nov/27/no-deal-brexit-amazon-blamed-uk-lack-of-food-warehouse-space

[5] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/06/22/caused-uks-carbon-dioxide-shortage/

[6] https://www.cips.org/en-GB/supply-management/news/2018/february/kfc-warned-that-dhl-would-fail-its-supply-chain-says-union/

[7] https://www.ifsecglobal.com/fire-news/ocado-warehouse-fire-the-questions-that-need-answers/

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

If Only---.

 Paris.

       If only it was happening here in Glasgow, London, Edinburgh, Leeds, as well as Paris, Berlin, Rome, Moscow, Canberra, Washington, and all cities and towns across the globe, at the one time, then tomorrow might look a lot brighter.

Albania.

Thanks Loam for the link.

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The Brutal Chilean State.

      Some images showing the brutal repression by the Chilean state against the population protesting against poverty, injustice and corruption. These mass protests in Chile have been going on for months, just one of the many countries where the population have taken their anger to the streets. See arrezafe for more details.

         On the repression that exists in Lo Hermida, Gonzalo Llancoa a doctor and a young villager talked with left Diario and counted the plight of constant police repression faced by and neighbors of Lo Hermida, and includes dozens injured with buckshot, people who are attacked by carabinieri in their own homes, fields and plazas violence against children, adolescents and people of the sector, among others.

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