Showing posts with label occupations. Show all posts
Showing posts with label occupations. Show all posts

Tuesday 29 August 2017

Organised Anarchists.

       It should be obvious to any observer of the present economic system that rules this world, that it can't be reformed. Capitalism can't be converted into a caring compassionate, system that sees to the needs of all our people. Its basis is self gain based on the exploitation of others, others are there to be profited from, not cared for. So running to a ballot box putting down your mark, against a chosen party disciple, will not bring about the compassionate capitalism you hope for, nor will petitioning the political ballerinas that hold the reins of power because of that ballot paper. 
      The creation of that better world for all, must take place outside the rules of capitalism, and outside the legislation of the capitalist minders, the state. The change has to happen among the people, by the people, in their communities and workplaces, in spite of, and in opposition to, the structures created by this enslaving economic system. We have no rules, we create structures and strategies as we develop, our needs will determine the shape of our new society, after we have built a bonfire of all the rules and legislations that bind us as units of profit, and as subservient units of the state.

       This from: 
In the New York Times, Niki Kitsantonis writes, “It may seem paradoxical, but Greece’s anarchists are organizing like never before.”
No. Anarchists – the sensible ones, at least – are not against organization. They are against rule – against ruling and against being ruled. Merriam-Webster explains the derivation of the word: “Medieval Latin anarchia, from Greek, from anarchos having no ruler, from an- + archos ruler.”
True, as the dictionary editors note, “anarchy” and “anarchism” are sometimes used to mean something like “absence or denial of any authority or established order” or simply “absence of order.” But rational political theorists and even activists don’t advocate pure disorder; they advocate the absence of rule, which they define as the absence of government.
So what is it that these Greek anarchists are organizing for? Well, in fact, the focus of the article is on how anarchists are supplying the services that the Greek state is not providing:
Seven years of austerity policies and a more recent refugee crisis have left the government with fewer and fewer resources, offering citizens less and less. Many have lost faith. Some who never had faith in the first place are taking matters into their own hands, to the chagrin of the authorities….
Whatever the means, since 2008 scores of “self-managing social centers” have mushroomed across Greece, financed by private donations and the proceeds from regularly scheduled concerts, exhibitions and on-site bars, most of which are open to the public. There are now around 250 nationwide.
Some activists have focused on food and medicine handouts as poverty has deepened and public services have collapsed.
In recent months, anarchists and leftist groups have trained special energy on housing refugees who flooded into Greece in 2015 and who have been bottled up in the country since the European Union and Balkan nations tightened their borders. Some 3,000 of these refugees now live in 15 abandoned buildings that have been taken over by anarchists in the capital.
One part of Athens seems to have been a self-governing, but not state-governed, territory for some time. Some sources say Exarchia has existed since as early as 1870. The name presumably comes from “ex-,” out of, away from, and of course “archos,” ruler.
In Athens, the anarchists’ epicenter remains the bohemian neighborhood of Exarchia, where the killing of a teenager by a police officer in 2008 set off two weeks of rioting, helped reinvigorate the movement and produced several guerrilla groups that led to a revival of domestic terrorism in Greece.
The police and the authorities tread lightly in the area.
The police have recently raided some buildings illegally occupied by anarchists, called squats, in Athens, in the northern city of Thessaloniki and on the island of Lesbos, a gateway for hundreds of thousands of migrants over the past two years….
The anarchists say their squats are a humane alternative to the state-run camps now filled with more than 60,000 migrants and asylum seekers. Human rights groups have broadly condemned the camps as squalid and unsafe.
In Exarchia, one of the squats includes a former state secondary school that was abandoned because of structural problems. Established last spring with the help of anarchists, the squat is now home to some 250 refugees, mostly from Syria, who have set up a chicken coop on the roof. Many more refugees are on a “waiting list” for other occupied buildings.
The squats function as self-organized communities, independent from the state and nongovernmental organizations, said Lauren Lapidge, 28, a British social activist who came to Greece in 2015 at the peak of the refugee crisis and is actively involved with several occupied buildings.
“They are living organisms: Kids go to school, some were born in the squat, we’ve had weddings inside,” she said.
There’s really nothing paradoxical about anarchists setting up institutions and communities outside the state to provide needed goods and services. The Greek anarchists probably don’t see businesses as part of that non-state society, though libertarian anarchists and anarcho-capitalists do.
What is paradoxical, as I wrote five years ago, is Greek “anarchists” who object to the state reducing its size, scope, and power by cutting back on taxes and transfer payments. Anarchists who organize voluntarily to achieve common purposes are just living their philosophy.
This piece originally published at Cato@liberty
Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

Wednesday 17 May 2017

Our Struggle Must Be Multi-Pronged.

        Greece is a country that seems to have dropped out of fashion as far as that babbling brook of bullshit, our mainstream media is concerned. That doesn't mean that nothing is happening there, the people of Greece have been put through the shredder of the capitalist system by its bully-boys, the financial Mafia. You will get the odd report about the 50% youth unemployment, 25% unemployment nationally, other facts like massive rise in suicides, families sleeping rough, disintegrating health service, collapsing eduction system, and unprecedented rise in home repossessions, will slip through as not that relevant.
       However, the people of Greece are not sitting back weeping and waiting for the "good times" to return. Across the country there are bitter struggles taking place, occupations, self-help, autonomous spaces, strikes, and constant attacks on the institutions of the corporate world and the festering edifice that is the Greek state. Anarchists in Greece are many, and varied in their approach to bring about the demise of the economic system that has, plundered their land and brutally assaulted its people, and continues to do so. 
       One group in Greece that has constantly been at the forefront of the struggle to break the yoke of the cancerous system of capitalism, is "Revolutionary Struggle", they have just produced  a paper giving some extracts from letters, texts and communiques, from the last three years. Well worth a read.
Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk
 

Sunday 26 January 2014

Change, Though Messy, Is Inevitable


      Our Oxbridge cabal of millionaires are singing in tune to the chorus of that fantasy song, “Growth, Growth, Growth”. We all know it is a fantasy tune, but for some reason or other, the singing crooks and liars, seem to believe their own words. Massaging dodgy figures to fit their illusions, and muttering, “You've never had it so good” from the confines of their pampered fantasy bubble, in a vain attempt to fool the public, this millionaire cabal live in luxury and denigrate those who suffer poverty at the hands of this system of corruption and greed. 
      The truth is that the world economy is still in crisis, the financial Mafia are worried. They see developing markets shrink and sovereign debt rising, and they start to sweat at the thought that they might lose their billions of ill-gotten gains. This would mean another attack on the living conditions of the already impoverished public, and even they realise that it would be a dangerous road to walk. In country after country, people are taking to the streets and doing their damndest to bring about real change. Riots, protests, occupations are the only road left open to the general public, as their lords and master, the financial Mafia, make brutal attempt after brutal attempt to get back their gambling losses. The next round of “austerity” could be a squeeze to far. How it turns out is up to us, it is also an opportunity for real change in the way we structure our society.
     This originally from Roar Magazine, and re-posted in Popular Resistance:
     This, in turn, raises another question: how will impoverished populations respond to the growing pressures on their livelihoods? Last summer Turkey, Brazil and Indonesia already experienced widespread social unrest. Thailand and Ukraine are currently witnessing massive anti-government protests. Just last month, Argentina descended into a bout of deadly rioting as policemen briefly went on strike. The International Labor Organization recently warned that a new global recession, by feeding already high rates of poverty and unemployment, will further contribute to the fraying of the social fabric.
      As Larry Elliot of The Guardian, just put it: “all the ingredients are there for social unrest.” It looks like the world will be in for a rough ride in 2014. Better fasten your seatbelts — the next phase of the global financial crisis may be about to get started. Cities will burn and there will be blood. It won’t be pretty.
Read the full article HERE:
Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk



Saturday 26 January 2013

THE CORPORATE DREAM.


      We are in an era where the ruthless and relentless flood of corporate capitalism, aided and abetted by our fascist governments, attempts to put an end to any, all and every, type of public space. The general plan is for all our cities and towns to be corporate entities, all our services to be corporate provided. They envisage a world of corporate shopping malls, corporate leisure centres, corporate theme parks, corporate media, corporate education and corporate health care etc.. For this reason the state views squats, occupations and self organisation as resistance to their grand plan, hence their heavy handed assault and brutal eviction of these places. Some of these squats/occupations have been in existence and serving their community for decades. However, for their plan to work, it is crucial that they crush any saplings of alternative ways of living, destroy any resistance to the corporate dream. For them to succeed they have to break the will of the people, intimidate them into accepting their vision of the super corporate world. This is not a national plan, it is an international plan. The only way they can succeed is if the people stop resisting, lie back and let the corporate juggernaut roll over them. It is our choice.
      This from Act for Freedom Now: 

THE GREEK SQUATTERS AND FREEDOM FIGHTERS ARE OUR BROTHERS AND SISTERS
      The Greek squatters movement has been under continuous attack for the last days by the Hellenic terrorist state and capital. On December the 20th, one of the most emblematic Athenian squats, “Villa Amalias” got evicted after more than 27 years of self-organization and resistance.
     This eviction was followed by a failed attempt to re-squat the house on the 9th of January 2013 and the new eviction of the squatted social center; “Skaramaga”. The day came to an end with more than 100 people arrested. Finally, on 15th of January 2013, Athen’s oldest squat “Lela Karagounis” also came under a eviction attack which was successfully repelled and ended up with the subsequent re-squatting of the building.
     Last week, especially the Sunday 13th of January a number of demonstrations and rallies took place in most Greek cities. The situation is one of tension and total war against the squatters, mainly waged (as usual) by the state and capitalism with the inestimable help of the patriotic and racist extreme right party “Golden Down” and its gangs of murderous henchmen.
    Generally speaking the Occupied spaces in Greece do not just function as mere concert halls, bars and leisure centers. About any sort of activity has been organized in them; from workshops, political debates and meetings to kindergartens and primary healthcare surgeries. During entire decades they have always been by the side of the people most exploited and beaten down by state and capitalism alike such as the immigrants, working people and members of the so-called “ethnic minorities”. Their daily activity has come to be much more appreciated within the context of the present so-called “crisis”, which is wreaking havoc among the most vulnerable portions of the population… Many squatters and their supporters can be found in the front-line of all the struggles taking place in Greece at the moment be these violent or peaceful… has the smiling clown of the TV news told you anything about this ladies and gentlemen?…. we already knew the answer/ don’t worry, we know your answer already.So we see how these brave people has the determination to choose the ONLY REAL WAY, the truly realistic solution… that of totally grassroots and therefore revolutionary self-organization, with no hierarchies, bosses, parties, trade unions or parasites of any kind.All this appears to be in stark contrast with the cowardice and simplicity still observed in most struggles and demo slogans within the chunk of land known as “Spain”. To everybody’s dismal, the latter are mainly characterised by a seemingly indisputable dogmatism around the topic of “non-violent” tactics, a very unlikely reformism, continuous attempts of co-optation by right as well as left wing political parties and unions and a naïve nostalgia of “nanny” state and its consumerist, stupefying, environmentally destructive and alienating “welfare”.
   SO WHAT ABOUT YOU?… ARE YOU GOING TO KEEP DENYING REALITY AND LOOKING AWAY SO THAT YOU DO NOT HAVE TO ACCEPT WHAT IS REALLY GOING ON?
NON-VIOLENT INGENUITY AND WELFARE STATE NOSTALGIA ARE NOT GOING TO SAVE YOU
STATE AND CAPITALISM ARE THE ONLY TERRORISTS
IF YOU NEED A HOUSE SEIZE ONE AND DEFEND IT!
IF WE NEED COMMON SPACES LET US TAKE THEM AND DEFEND THEM BY ALL MEANS.

ann arky's home.

Saturday 1 December 2012

WHAT'S THE SHAPE OF A REVOLUTION?


A comment taken from Italy Calling:

No one cares
A few dissent
They're easily stifled
A few more get scared & distance themselves
Everyone else doesn't know/doesn't care

Repeat ad infinitum
The revolution will not be direct confrontation will cops. It will not be protests & square occupations.
What will the revolution look like, what will be the spark that ignites the fire?

ann arky's home.

Thursday 8 November 2012

STRANGLE THE BEAST.


      Why is the Greek government pushing for more austerity measures when the people of Greece have already seen their living standard devastated and poverty, and deprivation swamps the country? Will the bailout that it gets after inflicting even more misery and hardship on the people of Greece, go to the Greek people to help them? The answer is of course a resounding NO. The money will go back to the financial Mafia, to the bond markets and to the banksters. So to my simple logic, the only reason for the bailout is that if the Greek government doesn't get a bailout, the banksters will suffer as well as the people, with the bailout only the people suffer. It seems however that the people of Crete have decided to strangle the beast that devours their living standards.

Heraklion, Crete: as the Parliament in Athens votes in further austerity cuts, a city shows the way forward for the struggle

At the same time that in Athens the new measures were voted in parliament and the protest outside was hit by repression and rain, some remarkable events in Heraklion, Crete show how the struggle against the memorandums can be intensified. At tonight’s demo in the city, more than 10,000 people took part – including an anarchist block of approximately 800.
The even more astonishing events took place after the demo though, where a mass Popular Assembly decided the following:
  • To block off the city’s economic activity (not on a symbolic level) by blocking off tax offices and the bank of greece at 7 AM on Thursday.
  • Meanwhile, the Labor Union of Heraklion called for another 24h strike tomorrow, to facilitate workers’ participation in the blockade. The strike was called following the pressure of anarchists and leftists present at the Popular Assembly.
  • The occupation of the administrative building of the Periphery of Crete (the administrative HQ for the entire island) continues.
  • Finally, the Assembly will produce a call-out for workers and unemployed across the country to take similar action.

ann arky's home.

Tuesday 30 November 2010

A SIGNIFICANT STRIKE!!

        
       The following post is taken from Landsbury's Lido, and it goes some way to show the extent of anger and disgust that is smoldering among the ordinary people of this country. We have students protesting in most of the cities of this country, we have bank occupations happening with ever increasing regularity across the country, there are universities being occupied. The present millionaires' cabal that is intent on pursuing their ideological slash and burn policies are expecting unrest and no doubt are prepared for these events. What we have to do is raise the bar,  students and  small groups of "Citizens United" will not win this fight on their own. It is up to all of us across the social spectrum, working, unemployed, pensioners, students to get their heads together and work on a united front. Pockets of protest can be contained, mass protests of all those in this society that will be hurt by these policies, cannot be. If we hope to win this fight, and we must, then organised solidarity is the way, not on single issues, the issues are all conected, this is a fight to destroy the corporate/financial take over of all aspects of our lives. We want a society that sees to the needs of those in that society, not one that sees to the desires of a bunch of parasitical millionaire shareholders.


The Post:  
        "When I was working for the MOD my union was the Institute of Professional Civil Servants or IPCS for short. Despite the name it was a proper union, affiliated to the TUC and all that. Hardly a bolshy union though, and in my time I think we had one strike call, which was voted against.
       This union has now developed into the union called Prospect which is now overseeing the first ever walkout from the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) at their Aldermaston, Burghfield and associated sites.
        Of course the running of the AWE is now in the hands of private contractors, as is the fate of virtually all of the UKs defence work. It seems that the employees are a bit peeved at being offered a sub 2% wage increase. And not surprising since there has at the same time been increased payments to the AWE board and also to the level of dividends being paid to its controlling companies. There's more cash for the top management and also for the shareholders, but the workers who generate that wealth? Sod all. Of course this just highlights the hypocrisy of the siren voices claiming that 'wereallinthistogether'.
      The government would do well to heed this latest outbreak of industrial dispute. When strikes are called in these establishments then it doesn't bode well for industrial relations in the wider country."
     
       A moderate voice that can sense the underlying anger, frustration and disgust that will eventually explode in the faces of our millionaire overlords at the Westminster House of Hypocrisy and Corruption.