Asalamu Alaikum.

I have been trying to keep my posts as short and sweet, insh’Allah as possible lately.

But this will have to be a long one, subhanAllah. Please bare with me.

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Insh’Allah I would like to use this post to make a statement for the Left about how to orient ourselves as Leftists towards religions and religious people. This approach I think, should be adopted from Liberals, to Anarchists, to Socialists, and to Progressives in general. Insh’Allah.

I think that this is an important issue for three main reasons.

1) It is not uncommon for me to hear people on the “Left” make insulting and bigoted comments about religious people. SubhanAllah.

2) As struggles around various issues become stronger, struggles in communities of color will become more intense. As communities of color begin to fight back, many atheist comrades will find themselves organizing side by side with religious people and even religious leaders, as many religious centers are also political centers. Mash’Allah!

So making bigoted comments against religious people will not fly when, for example, you’re organizing for Immigrants Rights at a Church, or for Palestinian Liberation at a Masjid (mosque).

Of course, all of these criticisms also apply to people of particular religious faiths, towards other people of other religious faiths, or of no faith (i.e. Muslims towards Jews, Atheists towards Catholics, etc.).

3) The incident at Fort Hood has blown open the issue of Islamophobia into the public sphere in a new way. The absolute absence of any organized response by the Left to the incident at Fort Hood has shown how deeply Islamophobia has penetrated and atrophied the Anti-war Movement and the International Left in general. Its been about eight years that the Anti-war Movement has existed, and it has still not broken off the chains of Islamophobia.

If the Anti-war Movement is to succeed, and if the International Left is to grow, then the Left will need to be able to respond to these sort of incidents with immediate condemnation of the wars in the Middle East of Capitalism as the catalysts for catastrophes like the event at Fort Hood.

The Left will need to be able to call protests for the expanded, free medical care for all active duty soldiers and veterans, to call for the immediate end to the wars in the Middle East which butchers millions of people in the Middle East, and destroys US soldiers physically and psychologically in the process.

So let us begin, insh’Allah…
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Alhamdulillah, the first and most important thing to say is that freedom of religion is a civil right.

Any individual should be able to choose to follow whatever religion(s) they want, or to follow none at all.

This is the first thing to keep in mind, insh’Allah.

No one should ever be pressured to lose their faith, nor should anyone ever be pressured to join any faith. Everyone should be free to practice whatever religion(s) they feel is right for them, insh’Allah.

For Socialists, it is important to defend civil rights. Socialists should not support any particular religion, or even Atheism, but should lend our support to defending freedom of religion.

In that same vein, Socialists should not support marriage as an institution, but we should defend people’s civil right to marriage, insh’Allah. Two major examples being that even though marriage as an institution is historically a product of class society, we defend the right of people of different races to intermarry (as in the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s) and the right of LGBTI couples to marry (as in the contemporary Equal Marriage Movement).
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It is important to identify exactly what Marx and Lenin said about religion.

As Gregory Rodriguez pointed out in the Los Angeles Times in October 2008, Marx is “still the most eloquent and thoughtful of the nonbeliever.” Rodriguez went on to  write, as Phil Gasper of ISR issue 63 pointed out, that “Marx came to understand religion ‘as a symptom and not the disease,’ and ‘as a source of solace’ that would not disappear ‘until the sources of people’s pain – an unfair economic system – had been eradicated.’”

Marx’s 1844 quote is often mis-quoted and mis-understood:

Religious suffering is at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.

The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions.

If as a Socialist I only communicate one thing, insh’Allah it is that all things must be put into context. In that paragraph Marx explains several things. He explains that religion is often the source of sanctuary for the oppressed. And that it can also be the rallying point for resistance. The particular line that compares religion to opium, needs to be specifically put into context as it is the most often quoted part.

Opium, in the 1840s, was a medicine. It was used to help people in pain. Opium’s modern stigmatization as a debilitating vice is not the context that Marx had intended and is a used as a misrepresentation of what he in fact meant. His intention was to say that many people use religion to help aleve their pain, and to cope with the truly oppressive and exploitative conditions that people deal with under capitalism and all class societies.

Sharon Smith, in her article in the International Socialist Review (ISR) titled Women and Islam, quotes a lot from Lenin and his stances. Most importantly and most necessary for comrades to remember is that, as Smith pointed out:

Lenin argued, “we must not only admit workers who preserve their belief in God into the Social-Democratic Party, but must deliberately set out to recruit them; we are absolutely opposed to giving the slightest offense to their religious convictions, but we recruit them in order to educate them in the spirit of our program.”

Lenin also stated:

The revolutionary proletariat will succeed in making religion a truly private affair, so far as the state is concerned. And in this political system, cleansed of medieval mildew, the proletariat will wage a broad and open struggle for the elimination of economic slavery, the true source of the religious humbugging of mankind.

Alhamdulillah, I think it is important to point out that Lenin, the person always portrayed as the enemy of religion, is saying that it is important for comrades not to offend religious people and that we ultimately hope to protect religion as a private affair, as it should be. Mash’Allah!
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It is also important to understand that the working class is a heterogeneous (diverse) body.

Some workers are dedicated to being Atheist. Some are dedicated to being religious. Most workers are probably somewhere in between. Of the workers that are religious, they may belong to any (or several) of many different religions from around the world, and any of the different branches or sects of those religions.

So even within religious communities there is much diversity.

This is important to understand because as socialists we seek to do two things:

1) recruit the most class conscious workers to our program of working class self emancipation (i.e. Marxism).

2) we want to use our socialist organization(s) to provide radical, revolutionary leadership for the working class, to help point the way forward.

In both of these instances, we are working among the masses of people that are heterogeneous in their backgrounds, identities, religious/non-religious beliefs, etc.

So in both instances we are trying to recruit from the heterogeneous working class, as well as trying to work within the heterogeneous working class.

So to have a Socialist organization that reflects the diversity of the working class (though reflects the consciousness of only the most class conscious members of that class), requires also recruiting from the religious communities.

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The next step to understand is that not all class conscious Socialists are Atheists.

I don’t really think I need to explain this, but it is very patronizing towards the religious community to assume that all socialists are Atheists. This is an unfair generalization and does not meet the facts.

See previous section.

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While what it means to be of a religion can vary, the politics of an individual are separate from an individual’s religious beliefs, regardless of whether or not they are believers.

People are shaped by their experiences and the ideas that they are exposed too, while also shaping the world around them, and the ideas in that world.

In that same way, a person’s religious ideas will not necessarily influence their political beliefs anymore than the absence of religion would influence someone’s political ideas.

What must be kept in mind is that, based on an individual’s exposure to certain ideas coupled with their life experience, an individual will become right-wing or Left-wing. If they are religious, they will justify their ideas through their religion, regardless of what those ideas are.

This explains how, for example, Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X were both religious people, and saw their religious ideas as their inspiration to fight for Left-wing goals. Dr. George Tiller, the assassinated Abortion Rights doctor, was also a Church-going Christian.

Conversely, subhanAllah, the monster, Scott Roeder, that murdered him was also a Christian that identified his right-wing politics as justified by his faith.

So someone’s faith, or even having faith, does not immediately determine their politics. An individual’s politics are justified by their religious beliefs, not the other way around.

It is also important to say that being an Atheist does not mean that the individual is inherently Left-wing either. While folks like Marx and Lenin are great examples of Left-wing Atheists, there are also important and famous examples of right-wing Atheists as well.

Two quick examples:

Sartre was an infamous Zionist.

Nietzsche was an infamous Social Darwinist, and frequenter of brothels.

Again: a person’s politics influence, inform, and shape the rest of their ideas; religious or not.

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There is a class divide between ruling class religious people/leaders, and working class religious people/leaders.

At the risk of beating a dead horse, lets use the example of the Catholic Church (P.S. I often use Catholicism for my examples because for most of my life I was Catholic).

The average religious person, just like average human being in general, is working class. But the leaders of institutions that dictate to the followers what it means to be a follower are generally members of the ruling class.

So, in the example of the Catholic church, the Pope is clearly a member of the ruling class. The influence, affluence, and general power that the Pope carries is immense. Though the Pope has no legal influence in international matters, his social weight, and the wealth of the Catholic Church, have immense  influence in local and international matters.

The interests of the Catholic Church as an Oligarchic institution, and the interests of that Oligarchy (the Bishops, the Pope, the Cardinals, etc.) are the interests of the rich. Their interests are to stay rich, to stay powerful, and to keep the masses on a leash to retain their own power.

Conversely, the average Catholic follower is a working class person with working class interests and demands. The average Catholic has to deal every day with the pressures of racism, sexism, and homophobia. The average Catholic has to deal every day with job-insecurity, with low-wages, lack of access of health care (which includes abortion and birth control), and other social services, etc.

Therefore the interests of the average Catholic are potentially revolutionary interests, which run up against the reactionary interests of the Catholic Church’s rulers.

This class divide permeates all class societies, and all religious communities within class societies.

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It is also important to add, that many of the negative aspects attributed to religions  are negative aspects of class society that have been adapted and molded by religions.

Sexism, homophobia, the entrenchment of the nuclear family, gender norms, racism, etc are all negative aspects born out of class society. In an effort to divide the masses (to pit them against each other), and institutionalize private property (and the transfer of private property), these negative characteristics of class society had to be developed to create a class society.

These things were not developed by religions, they were given their shape and form by religions. But the things themselves (racism, sexism, homophobia, etc.) are products of class stratification, and will only disappear with the overthrow of class stratification; not with the overthrow of religion.

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So where did religions come from?

Before there were organized religions, it is thought that religions developed as a way to explain what seemed otherwise unexplainable (i.e. good harvests, good hunts, famines, mild summers, scorching draughts, etc.). These primitive forms of religion, or belief in other worlds, or other-worldly creatures, existed even in proto-communist societies.

These religions did not develop into the powerful institutions that they are now until class societies began to develop.

The prediction is that with the abolition of class society, that religions will fade because it is thought that religions were created to fill the vacuum before the advent of science and industry. So through socialism and communism, it is thought that religions will fade away.

This may true. This may also not be true, and it is important to recognize that no one knows exactly what will happen to human cultures in a revolutionary society. One thing that is certain is that it is possible for someone to be simultaneously religious and revolutionary. It was also true that religions, in a different form, existed in proto-communist societies. Therefore it is not impossible for religions to continue in a revolutionary society.

Moreover, just as it is possible that marriage and genders may disappear in a revolutionary society, Socialists should not ridicule people who struggle for marriage rights, who identify with a particular gender that disagrees with the status quo (i.e. a “man” who identifies as a “woman” or a person that identifies by no gender), or who identify as religious.

Whether or not marriage exists in a revolutionary society; whether or not genders exist in a revolutionary society; whether or not religion exists in a revolutionary society: we need to stand in solidarity.

————

So what do Socialists have to offer the religious community? Why should people who are religious, but interested in socialist politics support International Socialist Revolution? Why should religious communities trust organizations that were tainted by Stalinism and Maoism as being anti-religious?

All religious communities suffer under capitalism. Capitalism creates the racism, sexism, and homophobia that plagues all of society, including religious communities. Just as capitalism fuels racism, sexism, and homophobia, it also fuels bigotry towards various religious minorities.

It was capitalist expansion that fueled the divisions in India between Hindus and Muslims. It was capitalism that fueled anti-Semitism to scapegoat Jews during the brutal beginnings of industrialization. It is capitalism that tries to pit the religious communities against Atheists (and vice-versa) also as scapegoats.

A socialist society would be a society that is created through the emancipation of the working class, by the working class as a class, for the working class. A socialist society would be one in which the walls of racism, sexism, homophobia, and intolerance towards the religious/Atheists would be torn down.

A person’s personal ideas about religion could be their own private affair, without having to deal with Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, etc. Moreover, religious faiths would be freed to expand their ideas in a new setting.

The racialization of religions would be destroyed so that people would be freed to experiment with different ideas and explore their spirituality, or to come to their own conclusion about rejecting all religions and being Atheist, without fear of any form of reprisal.

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In closing, the Left should not join in with the right-wing in bigotry. Bigotry towards religious people is one of the last acceptable forms of prejudice that is still frequently expressed with little or no regard for those communities.

Any and all ideas of religious people being inherently backwards must be met immediately in the same way that racism, sexism, and homophobia would be met: with immediate rebuke.

No faith should be treated as if it were backwards. Religious faith is precisely that: Faith. It can neither be proved nor disproved; hence it is faith. Moreover, it is not anyone’s business to attempt to prove or disprove to anyone whether any religion is “correct” or whether no religious beliefs are “correct.” The point is to embrace our comrades and to respect each other.

What matters is what a person’s political orientation is, and whether or not they trust that the working class must, as a class, be its own liberator. This is the task of Socialists today: to win the working class to Marxism (the radicalizing minority now, the great majority of the masses during periods of potential revolution).

The recent incident at Fort Hood has shown that unfortunately many people on the Left still shares bigoted ideas with the Right-wing towards the Muslim community. This position needs to be immediately corrected. Insh’Allah.

New Libertarian Manifesto

Click it, save it, read it, live it, change the world, simple as that.

Not sure what the heck they’re talking about? visit Agorism.info for more, well, info.

But have no fear, this sexy blog is not forgotten! If any of y’all are personally familiar with me, you’ll know I’ve been really busy lately. But, while I may not have been blogging, you’ll be happy to know that I’ve been busy promoting liberty. I have begun broadcasting once a week from 10pm-12am on wednesday nights. I broadcast with rick caldwell, and you can listen at Ifaq.us we’ve got about 9 shows under our belts so far (we did an annex of our 8th show because of massive content overflow). So far it has been an exceptional expierence and has grown much more quickly than I would have expected. I’ve also registered Thenewactivist.org, although I have not yet fixed it up like it needs to be. (actually, right now, it’s a picture of a hot japanese girl and a bunch of random test pages).  But yeah, thats what I’ve been up to, and most of why I’ve been gone for so long.

A small collection of English language Haiku that I created using “Text-snippets” of different books.
They are Haiku merely in their shape, their number of syllables, they are however not observations of a moment in my life or nature.
Enjoy!

Ghosts are not alike
In contact with the ocean
Cabbage patch Jesus

The lethal weapons
Ran here and there in search of
A tropical rain.

Familiar to
Marlena’s horrified face
The mountain, the blue

The top of the tree
Anarchist friends adopted
Naked universe

Honeyed tunes like
The fluorescent lights like
Church for midnight mass

Some people are just born stupid; we call them special. Others though, they get dumb on their own. They read things like Karl Marx, or Ayn Rand, or the Bible, take them a bit too seriously, and then decided that they have the answer to all of life’s problems. Even worse, they usually try to tell other people about their “intellectual” or “spiritual” discoveries as if I give a shit how John Galt would feel about Obama’s stimulus package. I met one of these types in the airport on Saturday.

The conversation started innocently enough. I was waiting at the bank to exchange my remaining Lebanese Lira into Egyptian Pounds; there was no employee at the bank, of course, because of the soccer game, and it took about 20 minutes for one to arrive. In the meantime, a pretty average looking white guy, somewhere around my parents’ age, came up and leaned against the counter next to me. Wearing faded khakis, hiking boots, a baseball cap and a Patagonia jacket, he looked to be more of an experienced traveler than most of the American idiots that pass through the Cairo airport en route to an air-conditioned bus, a 4-star hotel, the Pyramids and beyond. Well, why not strike up a conversation?

As it turned out, he was trying to get to the same hotel, the Meramees, where Ben and I stayed for our first week in Cairo before the program (coincidentally, the last time I actually truly enjoyed being in Egypt- thanks Middlebury!). The Meramees is in downtown Cairo, a neighborhood that really qualifies as a “downtown” in name only, as its crumbling Parisian buildings are now mostly empty save for budget hotels. The Meramees, though, was a rather nice place; we met some cool people, and for $10 a night each, we scored a private room, free wifi, and a hearty breakfast of hot dog buns and tea.

The Meramees was nice, but this is still Egypt, so of course they forget to send the airport pick-up guy for my new friend. He now faced the same dilemma as me: stuck in the airport of one of the biggest cities on earth without any taxis or even bank employees to exchange money. Since I live here, I thought I’d give him some advice. “Talk to the Egyptian guy holding the Canadian Hostel sign; it’s on the same block as the Meramees, and you could probably bum a ride for a small price.” Sure enough, I was right and the guy agreed to take him if he waits around for another half-hour for the next passenger.

So we continued to wait for the bank to open and kept talking. He told me his itinerary for his time in Egypt: a few days in Cairo, the Pyramids, Southern Egypt and its ancient temples, the Sahara, and the Sinai. All in all, pretty bush league tourist shit. After Egypt, he was headed to Israel, Jordan, and Syria respectively. I warned him to do Israel last, obviously, to avoid any visa issues in Syria. He asked if he’d have any problems getting into Israel after Syria, and I told him, “Of course not, you’re an American. Israel’s like our 51st state.”

And then thing got interesting. “Well,” he says, “Israel might not let me in if they know about my record, know what I’ve done.” The sense of foreboding in his voice was palpable. “I’ve been arrested… by the American government.” Well shit, son. I’m just standing there in front of this mild-mannered middle-aged traveler, and it turns out he’s been arrested by the government. The tone of his voice was just begging me to ask what he did, but I avoided the inevitable for a few painfully awkward seconds.

I racked my brain. Arrested? Well, plenty of people get arrested. It’s the only way to get street cred, bro, and apparently you have it. By the government? Hmm, I don’t know who else can arrest you. I mean, you can’t get arrested by the movie theater or the Taco Bell, so isn’t mentioning the government is a bit redundant? One of the three characteristics defining any modern nation-state is the government’s monopoly over the use of force (and thus police powers) within its sovereign territory. Duh, anyone who’s ever read Weber knows that.

He must be a sex offender. Every time I hear of someone getting arrested for an undisclosed reason, I automatically assume that it’s a sex offense. Why? Maybe it’s the endless hours I spent in high school watching Dateline NBC’s To Catch A Predator with Chris Hanson. Maybe it’s the fact that the middle school math teacher who ran the ball-handling station at my elementary school basketball camp ended up running his own ball-handling station in the basement of his bachelor pad. Who knows? More likely, it was the fact that this guy was so soft spoken and nice, and everyone knows that mild-mannered men are far more likely to commit egregious sex offenses. And then, when they get caught, everyone is shocked because he “was so nice- a churchgoer and a family man!”

The reality, however, was far less terrifying and far more intriguing: my new “friend” was an anarchist! Whew, I guess he won’t chop me up and wear my head as a hat for the long drive through the desert from Cairo to Sharm al-Sheik!

He digressed: “Yeah man, so the government’s been all over us lately out in Berkeley. We have an anarchist bookstore, the FBI raids it like every other week. It’s cause they’re afraid, man. They know that the people are a-talkin’, that we’re not gonna bow down to their police state anymore. As for me, yeah, I was arrested last-year when they knocked our tree-sit down. We had a tree sit in Berkeley, ya know, to prevent developers from being able to uproot these trees and build on the lot. We’d been sittin’ in the trees for a while, got a ton of support from the counterculture community out here. And then the Feds came in and told us to get out, and we didn’t, so we all got arrested. Now the government has all my information, and I know they’re following me. America’s a police state, most people just don’t realize it, man.”

A tree-sit, I thought, well that’s pretty fucking retarded! That’s almost as dumb as getting arrested at a country music concert for having an open container! I understand when people do tree-sits down in the Amazon, because jungles are awesome. But come on, dude, we’re talking about developing a plot of land in one of the most densely populated urban areas in the United States. They weren’t trying to bulldoze the Giant Seqouias or the Coastal Redwoods. Moreover, don’t you have a job!?!

If I had bigger balls, I probably would have spoken my mind at this point, to the effect of: “Listen here boy. Where I come from, men sit in trees for only one reason: killing. That’s right, boy. Every fall my friend JP spends one day, two days, maybe even three in a tree in the woods, hoping to God that he gets just one shot to rip an exit wound the size of a basketball into Bambi’s papa with a .357 hollow point round. After castrating and gutting the beast, he drags its carcass to his pick-up truck and drives home. If he’s lucky enough to kill a trophy buck, he’ll cut its fucking head off, hang it up in his living room, and drape a Terrible Towel or two from the antlers. Even if the buck ain’t got no impressive rack, he’s earned the right to take the carcass to a fine, family-owned and operated meat processing business where it will be turned into an array of delicious meat products: venison steaks, ground venison patties, jerky, and party sticks. After feasting on this veritable buffet of delicious meat, he’ll return to his job, where he makes daily contributions to America’s GDP.”

He would probably object to this with something about how deer have feelings too, and I’d have to continue: “Oh, you say you’re a vegetarian? Well, consider this: in the words of the beautiful and intelligent Sarah Palin, ‘If God had not intended for us to eat animals, how come He made them out of meat?’ What, you don’t believe in God or Sarah Palin? The GDP is a social construction invented by the corporation who intend to enslave us all?? I’ve had enough of this nonsense, boy, I hope you take a nature hike in Pennsylvania State Game Lands next fall wearing a deer costume. I’ve heard the foliage is especially nice on the Monday after Thanksgiving.”

Alas, I did not say this, as the only thing smaller than my testes satchel is this guy’s brain. Instead, I offered him some sarcastic condolences for his plight with the government (“Sorry maaaaan, that sucks, duuuude”), and we continued our conversation. I told him about how Egypt sucks in general, and then he asked where I was from in America. “Pittsburgh, the greatest city on Earth”, I told him proudly.

“Ohh, Pittsburgh…” he began. “Wasn’t there some big international conference in Pittsburgh recently?”

“Yeah, the G20. Obama was there,” I answered.

“Yeah, I read about that conference. The security was outrageous, the National Guard and everything. They clamped down on the protests before the meetings even began. They wouldn’t even let people within miles of the convention center. Ya know, that’s really outrageous. Thousands of people descended on Pittsburgh that weekend, anarchists from all over. They we’re planning something big, ya know, really show these world leaders that the people are serious of revolution. And then the National Guard came in and just arrested a bunch of them, preemptively. The Pennsylvania State National Guard and the Feds, working together. Same thing happened at the political conventions last year. The anarchists, they don’t want to hear our voice. And more importantly, they don’t want other people to hear our voice.”

Awkward silence. I explained how the layout of the city of Pittsburgh necessitated the tight security situation. The convention center is located near the tip of a peninsula, effectively bordered on two of its three sides by river. A bit vulnerable if something serious was to actually happen.

“Ya know, I was reading this article on Democracy Now! that laid down some history about Pittsburgh. You know Democracy Now!?

I nodded stupidly, flexing my knowledge of leftist media outlets.

“So yeah, in Democracy Now! they were talking about this one time, in history, when the government’s Army tried to come into Pittsburgh to exert its authority. And back then, the people of Pittsburgh resisted it. They demonstrated in the streets, they revolted against the agents of the government. The PA National Guard actually took up arms against the Army. Yeah, back then people had principles. I don’t know what’s happened, man. Now we have the PA National Guard working alongside the Army, suppressing revolution.”

His examples were so non-specific, his reasoning so nonsensical; I had no clue what he was talking about. I racked my brain again. Big demonstrations in Pittsburgh… Hmm, well we just won the Super Bowl. Oh yeah, and the Stanley Cup. Oh yeah and that other Super Bowl back in 2005. Shit, and like four more Super Bowls and two more Stanley Cups and five World Series titles and shit, Pittsburgh is awesome! I bet there were huge demonstrations for those. But requiring military intervention. Hmm… there was the Homestead Strike in the late 19th century, but I’m pretty sure that was put down by the PA National Guard. The Civil War? Nope, we were with the government on that one. And then I had it… the Whiskey Rebellion! 1794!

This idiot was actually citing the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794! For those of us unfamiliar with this important historical event, in 1794, George Washington decided to place a tax upon whiskey to help pay off the debts incurred in the Revolutionary War. Back then, just like today, Pittsburghers liked their booze, and they were none too pleased about this tax. Backed by the PA National Guard, they refused to pay; the government sent in a squad of tax collectors, all of whom were promptly tarred and feathered. The government responded in kind by raising an army and sending it to Western PA, where it met no resistance. The whole ordeal was a big pain in the ass for President Washington, though, and in the end he decided to repeal the tax. Pittsburgh- 1, Federal Government- 0.

In short, the premise of the anarchist’s argument was that Pittsburghers betrayed a 215 year-old historical legacy of resistance by hosting the G-20 conference and its accompanying security attaché. He wasn’t kidding either; I heard him utter “no principles,” or “legacy of betrayal” at least three times.

At this point, I decided I was done. I was clearly dealing with stupidest man in the world. He continued to talk, but all I heard was a series of words: prison state, war on drugs, Israel, tear-gas, revolution, Israeli-made tear gas canister, tree-sit, protesting, Noam Chomsky, Israel, fresh ideas, the media, corporations, the corporate media, Israel, the system, Noam Chomsky, capitalism, the FBI, Noam Chomskyyyyy…

I told him I had to find my friend, and wished him luck in his travels. I left him with some more advice. I told him, take three or four days out of your touristy activities. Check into a cheap hotel in an Egyptian neighborhood. Go to an ‘ahwa, go to a local bar. Find some patrons who speak English, even though it might be hard. Talk to them. Ask them how they feel about the police. The government. Ask them the last time they voted. Ask them how they feel about Mubarak. They’ll be open with you, you’re a Westerner, you’re immune. Read a wikipedia article and find out how often they have democratic elections in Egypt. Talk to your cab drivers. You’ll be shocked how many have college degrees. Visit the country, and check out all the women in ninja suit niqabs. And then get back to me about how bad it sucks to live in a police state. While you’re at it, you can also shove your masters degree up your ass and find a real job.

Okay, so I didn’t say that last part. He offered a weak protest to the effect of, well, police states come in all shapes and sizes, and America is still a police state. He told me, “you wait, the police state will fall, and we will see a revolution.” In Egypt, maybe, insha’allah. I walked away, into the chilly Cairo evening. Ben was still waiting for me, and the car hadn’t arrived.

If I had bigger balls, I probably would’ve told him to skip the Israel-Jordan-Syria leg of his trip, and head down south to Somalia to check out the anarchist paradise that has been created there. “They have pirates, bro. Pirates, how fucking sweet is that? Ya know, when you don’t have a police state infringing on your freedom all the time, you can exercise your God-given right to become a pirate!”

Call For Submissions

Hello friends, we are requesting writing, art, comics, & photographs, on the practical and philosophical experiences of gender, sexuality, bodies, and queerness.

Personal experiences, good, bad, great, illuminating. Big picture philosophy, rants, funny stories, observations, interviews, desires for the future.

We are creating a positive fuck yeah for diverse queer, trans, body, sexuality, and ultra new wave inclusive feminism.

In the recognition that all oppressions are interconnected, the time is now to share our stories and deconstruct the dead ends.

We have already received numerous submissions, but are extending the deadline until February 1^st, 2010. Yes, you should send something to us. The zine will be printed and distributed thru an awesome independent publisher. This is not a profit or academic oriented venture. We want to share our experiences and open minds to worlds unseen- ours and our readers.

Deadline is February 1^st, 2010.

- Rob & Siobhan, editors

pomohomomofo@gmail.com

counterclockwisepublishing.wordpress.com

Call For Submissions

Hello friends, we are requesting writing, art, comics, & photographs, on the practical and philosophical experiences of gender, sexuality, bodies, and queerness.

Personal experiences, good, bad, great, illuminating. Big picture philosophy, rants, funny stories, observations, interviews, desires for the future.

We are creating a positive fuck yeah for diverse queer, trans, body, sexuality, and ultra new wave inclusive feminism.

In the recognition that all oppressions are interconnected, the time is now to share our stories and deconstruct the dead ends.

We have already received numerous submissions, but are extending the deadline until February 1^st, 2010. Yes, you should send something to us. The zine will be printed and distributed thru an awesome independent publisher. This is not a profit or academic oriented venture. We want to share our experiences and open minds to worlds unseen- ours and our readers.

Deadline is February 1^st, 2010.

- Rob & Siobhan, editors

pomohomomofo@gmail.com

counterclockwisepublishing.wordpress.com

too nonconformist to pay rent

I volunteer with radicals and anarchists, socialists and new wave hippies. Every week I spend a full day cooking, and hanging out with them. We do good work, we feed the homeless, we utilize society’s waste and make it into something great. We give out information, we protest.

But sometimes I absolutely hate them. These fucking worthless anarchist squatting pieces of shit, doing nothing for anyone but their own high moral code, helping people only as a by product of their agenda. Dirty hippies, coming to my house where I pay bills and do work so they can eat my food, shower in my shower, and use my internet because they’re too nonconformist to pay rent and get a job like a normal productive member of society.

But I will never say these things.

Premier Gets Shut Down – Vancouver, Canada

Friday, June 14th, 2002

Gordon Campbell was set to speak at the opening of “Carr, O’Keefe, Kahlo: Places of Their Own” at the Vancouver Art Gallery on Friday, but didn’t show his face.

A crowd of about 400 people gathered there around 6pmto demonstrate againt Campbell’s Liberal government, to disrupt his speech, and to bring attention to the rise of corporate fascism in BC and the world. His choice of venue, an opening of feminist and revolutionary women artists, was an obvious insult to everyone living under his policies. Campbell has recently cut all funding to women’s centres; another attack in a long line of cuts to social programmes in BC. These cuts are killing people and are strengthening a state that is controled by the profit margins of multi-national corporations.

Police had erected a fence on the south side of the art gallery, where Campbell was to make his public speech outside. Police also had barricades at the west side entrance where a few people stood in front of the doorway, confronting and informing the guests as they entered the building. As guests arrived they had to walk through two rows of armed police guards lining the pathway to the door. As more guests arrived police showed a more aggressive pressence and shoved, grabbed, and threatened to arrest people standing around in the entranceway. Police cleared a path for guests using bikes, ironically, making it more difficult and confusing for people to enter the showing. One of the groups who had called for the demonstration, the Anti-Poverty Committee, made speeches off to the sidelines, while several people blocked the street with banners, puppets, and street theatre. Also, artists and artist groups such as the Gorilla Girls (who had also called for the demo) and the Andy Wharhol gang handed out anti-liberal literature. Many protestors decided to enter the showing and disrupt Campbell from inside.

When the time came for Campbell to make his speech the crowd moved to the south side of the building, approached the fence and began to shout and denounce Campbell. The Anti-Poverty Committee made a few speeches while the crowd continued screaming and chanting anti-Liberal and anti-capitalist sentiments. “Campbell’s Cuts Are Class War” and “Off With His Head” were popular.

People banged fists on the fence and then started to shake it. Some tried to dismantle it. The crowd grew more agitated and the police got more aggressive. One officer showed the crowd his pepper-spray, while others attempted to strike the fence shakers’ hands. Four officers entered the crowd from behind the fence and tried to arrest a person. The crowd started to spit on the police and jeer at them, eventually forcing them to leave the area drenched and humiliated. The person the police attempted to arrest got away.

A woman dressed as Frida Kahlo took the podium but her speech was too quiet to be heard by the crowd behind the fence. A member of the Anti-Poverty Committee then took the podium and started shouting to the audience and the crowd, and was tackled and arrested by police who dragged him away by the handcuffs. A second man, a bystander, was arrested inside the art gallery. Both men were held overnight and released the next day.

As the police arrested the A.P.C. member at the podium the crowd became angrier and began to kick at the fence, jump on it, and tried to tear it down. Police continued to strike at people as they attempted to pull the fence out from underneath and continued to spit on officers. At this point police fired pepper spray, hitting three people directly in the face and others indirectly. Those who were pepper-sprayed were taken to a medical station while those still at the fence screamed in outrage at the police. The crowd was stunned by the pepper-spray, but as they recuperated they realized that Campbell was not going to show up, thus did not continue attacking the fence. Pepper sprayed people returned to the fence to demonstrate their defiance and contempt of the police and the police state. One was heard ” this art is under the gun because facism is on the rise”. and “Khalo, O’Keefe and Carr were revolutionary women, fuck you pigs” Shortly after this the demonstrators dispersed, leaving with a sense of victory, and a group headed to the police station to demand the release of those arrested. Supporters camped outside of the police station and court house most of Friday night and Saturday until both people were released.

In our analysis, the militants who attacked the fence in open rebellion, and regardless of official activists plans and speeches, were the ones who contributed the most to the disruption of the event, the cancelling of Campbell’s speech, and to strengthening the social movement of the exploited in BC as a whole. The fence was a physical barrier between classes, rich and poor, that needed to be torn down. The rich cannot be allowed to mingle and sip wine while the poor are starved and beaten.

The fence was attacked by a diverse group of people, including, men and women young and old, parents, euro-canadians, native people — all people who are deeply, and adversly, affected by the cuts Campbell’s government is making, here and now, and also by the policies of capitalist globalization. We are tired of this false democracy. When the police try to move us back by telling us we are endangering Campbell, or that we’re only going to get hurt (by the police attacking us) we know that what the Liberals are doing here, and what capitalists are doing around the world hurts more. Pepper spray is agony for half an hour, state terrorism and murder last forever.

against capital and the state,

Insurrectionary Anarchists of the Coast Salish Territories (Vancouver and Victoria)

Anti-Poverty Committee Denounces Anarchists and Street Youth on May Day

by the Anarchist Mallrat Brigade

First statement -

May 1st, 2002

For Immediate Release From: Anti-Poverty Committee Re: May Day Demonstration

“On Wednesday May 1st, the Anti-Poverty Committee held a ‘May Day’ action against the training wage. The demonstration started at Victory Square in Vancouver. Organizers from different groups spoke about the need fight the training wage and the importance of May Day as a celebration of international solidarity. ‘On International Labour Day 2002, we stand with all workers and oppressed people of the world and declare our continued commitment to heighten our resistance against imperialist globalization,’ said Carlo Sayo of the Philippino-Canadian Youth Alliance. The protesters then marched to the McDonald’s restaurant on Granville, where they blocked the entranceways of the restaurant for about an hour, shutting down business. Many people from the Anti-Poverty Committee and other labour/community groups spoke out against the training wage, the history of McDonald’s union-busting, and the racist treaty referendum.

After the visit to McDonald’s, the demonstration marched towards the art gallery. In an action that was not planned or approved by the Anti-Poverty Committee, a group of individuals marched into the Pacific Centre Mall, chanting ‘6 bucks sucks, 8 is not enough.’ The police arrested one man, who was dragged away spitting blood. Some of the demonstrators marched to the police station to show support for the arrested demonstrator. The police attacked this group at Main and Hastings, a traditional site for police brutality, and arrested three more people. At the time of this press release, all four people are still in custody. The Anti-Poverty Committee demands their immediate and unconditional release.”

Second statement -

A Statement From the Anti-Poverty Committee Regarding May 1st

“We, the Anti-Poverty Committee, are writing this letter to denounce the actions commited inside the Pacific Centre Mall by individuals at our May 1st demonstration.

Neither the derailing of our march as our demonstration was finishing, nor the subsequent vandalism carried out inside the Pacific Centre Mall, were carried out in solidarity with us or the workers inside the Centre. We were not informed that any such action was planned. The actions taken put workers at risk of being physically harmed, as was seen when one person was trying to break an enormous plate glass window with a piece of wood while people stood on both sides of it.

There was nothing political about what a small group of people did in the Pacific Centre. It was immature, adventuristic, and harmful to the interests of working class people. We are a mass based organization of poor and working people fighting for the interests of the oppressed, and the actions taken in Pacific Centre Mall unambiguously worked against these interests.

We, the Anti-Poverty Committee, are engaged in a very serious battle against this bourgeois government. The fight between capitalist oppressors and oppressed people is warfare. In a serious, dedicated political movement, we cannot afford to have people running around and engaging in destructive, clown-like behavior devoid of political consciousness. This is not the Dukes of Hazard, this is not a John Wayne movie: this is a life-or-death class struggle where every move counts, where every mistake counts. Those who engaged in this action have seriously damaged the Vancouver movement against poverty and against the BC Liberals, and we will not tolerate sloppy activities that hurt this movement. Workers in the mall, young people at the demonstration, immigrants at the demonstration who cannot risk arrest due to racist immigration policies, and many other important elements of the Vancouver working class have been alienated from participating in a militant movement against BC Liberals, and the masked-up people who rampaged through the mall are clearly responsible for this.

As we have shown at previous demonstrations, and on May 1st before this irresponsible derailment took place, the Anti-Poverty Committee is a group dedicated to fighting back against the provincial government through economic disruption. We have had a number of successful actions that were disruptive and powerful. However, we have never engaged in actions that put other workers at risk against their will, nor will we in the future. We work in solidarity with workers, indigenous people, women, people of colour, and poor people. Any group of people who does not work in solidarity with oppressed people, who puts them at risk against their will, has no place in this movement whatsoever.

In future events, we will be much more vigilant towards people who show up to our demonstrations and sabotage what we are trying to build. The interests of those fighting back against the BC Liberals must never be subordinated to the narcissistic desires of an undisciplined handful of individuals seeking an adrenaline rush.”

The real story -

The Anti-Poverty Committee is a new group of activists who have held several demonstrations in Vancouver and who plan to do welfare advocacy. They call for economic disruption to stop the current Liberal government. At the request of other groups, and to kick off their campaign against the new 6-dollar training wage, they decided to hold a demonstration on May Day in Vancouver. As with all APC demos they had a police liason and media spokesperson, as well as several “marshalls” to direct the crowd. APC had also supplied demonstrators with large placards on 2X4 pieces of wood.

Demonstrators in Victoria had been arrested and pepper-sprayed only days before. Last year on May Day in Vancouver, a group of people were arrested and pepper-sprayed for wheat-pasting posters about a transit strike.

At the beginning of the demonstration in Vancouver on May Day 2002 a small group of anarchists and militant street youth from both Victoria and Vancouver gathered. Many of them wore masks, some held banners, and one waved a black flag as the contingent marched along with the other demonstrators to the McDonalds. Most of the group attended the event because it was May Day and not because it was APC’s. They chanted “Class War Now!”, “Make the rich pay!”, and “Fuck six bucks, eight is not enough!”, injecting an obviously radical spririt to the demonstration. The group was not organized and had not made any plans.

Once the demonstration arrived at McDonalds, APC marshalls directed the crowd to block the doors of the building, which they did. The general assumption was that an occupation would take place and that the business would be shut down. Many people had anticipated a violent reaction from the police. Several people from the crowd spoke through a megaphone, including members of APC who shouted their standard “Fight Back!” rhetoric. Only one of three doors were blocked. It should be noted that the majority of people blocking the doors were the anarchists, street youth, and supporters since APC was busy adressing the crowd with speeches. Members of APC asked several masked-up anarchists to speak, but they refused. Customers inside the McDonalds continued to eat. After about half-an-hour APC called the demonstration to an end and urged people to march to the Art Gallery and disperse.

At this point many people from the crowd had already dispersed, but the group of masked anarchists, street youth, and their supporters spontaneously decided to march through the Pacific Centre Mall directly across the street. Some members of the group engaged in minor vandalism against corporate property inside the mall. Within a minute of entering the mall one of the masked demonstrators was hit in the face by a large man wearing a track suit who was angry about the march. The demonstrators decided to avoid further confrontation with this man. APC claims that one of the group in the mall tried to break a plate-glass window that people were standing on each side of with a piece of wood, putting workers risk. In fact the window was part of a display for an upscale clothing store, and so the only “people” put in danger were manequins. The fact that APC cannot distinguish between real live people and manequins begs the question of how they hope to advocate for those living in poverty. Clearly, APC has lied in a public statement.

The person who had been hit in the face was arrested in the mall and dragged away spitting blood. Some of the group then marched to the police station to show solidarity and 3 more were arrested there after a bottle was thrown.

It is strange that the first statement APC published was only sent to the anarchist websites “Ainfos” and “Infoshop” and that later public statements on Vancouver Indymedia would denounce the same people that the first statement demanded the release of.

APC says that it works in solidarity with indigenous people, wimmin, people of color, workers, and poor people, but the people that entered the mall represented all of these groups. APC says that the actions of those who entered the mall worked against the interests of working class people, but the group who entered the mall were working class people, including street youth. This also begs the question of how attacks on corporate property could hurt the interests of the working class. What does “economic disruption” mean to them?

Does inviting the media and having a liason with the police not endanger working class people who attend their demonstrations?

Inspector Bob Meanley of the Vancouver Police Department was quoted in the Vancouver Sun, May 3rd, 2002, as saying “This was a rampaging gang of criminals, hooligans and thugs, nothing else. On most occasions protesters are very cooperative. But we were clearly led astray, led to believe this was a lawful protest. In this case we were lied to.” The Vancouver Sun reported that Meanley and the police would be going over tapes made by mall security and television cameras to identify violent protesters. Again we ask, doesn’t inviting the media to a demonstration endanger people?

In the May 3rd issue of The Province it was reported that APC claimed that a splinter group had ignored its request to disband the rally. Inspector Meanley told The Province that “Everything seemed to be in order” and that he had discussed the plans for a peaceful protest with the APC organizers.

APC organizer Mike Krebs was quoted in The Province as saying “APC supports actions that are militant, not actions which put workers at risk …so we do not support anything that puts workers at risk.” Krebs was reported to agree with police inspector Meanley that the group in the mall were “criminals, hooligans and thugs.” and distanced himself from protesters who came armed with potential weapons. “If they had bags of rock and paint, that kind of speaks for itself.”

The question must be asked of what APC means by “militant” and how any militant actions could be free of risk. Why does Krebs and APC denounce protesters who came with potential weapons when they had supplied the large 2X4 placards? Why does APC denounce the actions of poor and working class people who take APC’s “Fight Back” and “Class War” rhetoric literally?

We ask how many more people have to starve to death or suffer police brutality before we are given permission to “Fight Back”?

May Day has existed for more than 100 years, as a traditional workers holiday, and day of anarchist action. It belongs to no person or group, least of all APC.

No oppressed person should have to beg for survival or the right to resist this system, and they will not! When APC says it will use “vigilance” in the future against these kinds of protesters what exactly do they mean?

- Vancouver Anarchist Mallrat Brigade

“These were the actions of working class people tired of being trampled on by both the money-grubbing capitalists of the Right, and the back-stabbing hypocrites of the Left.”

- Class War Federation (U.K.)

====================================================

A critique of the APC statements regarding May 1st

Mayday is an international workers holiday with a history going back more than 100 years, it doesn’t belong to APC. Are members of the Anti-Poverty Committee unaware that since its inception May Day has been internationally known as a traditional day for anarchist and communist action? May Day cannot be symbolic; nobody can control angry workers! When you say ‘Fight back’ and ‘This is class war!’ – do you mean it? Nobody can hijack May Day.

You denounce ‘the vandalism carried out in the Pacific Centre Mall’ in two different statements. The first was presented to members of APOV at the APC general meeting and named the Anti-Poverty Coalition of Victoria as the group responsible. The second statement was essentially the same with APOV’s name removed, and released publicly on Indymedia Vancouver and infoshop. Before this a message sent only to the A-infos website demanded the release of the prisoners and that a crowd marched to the jail in solidarity. First of all, APOV was unable to attend the demo, therefore made no plans and so didn’t lie about having plans.It was a spontaneous decision by the crowd of workers, indigenous peoples, women, people of colour and poor people to enter the mall, so no one marshaled any body through the doors of the mall. The act of going through the mall had nothing to do with APC since they were telling people to go to the Art gallery. And the crowd split and some people did leave. Using APOV as a scapegoat is exactly the tactics of the cops and media. When fighting this ‘life-or-death class struggle’ and chanting ‘The people united will never be defeated’ and then avoiding discussion and therefore creating divisions, APC is hurting the movement. How can ‘a serious, dedicated, political movement’ ignore the impact of such divide and conquer tactics? What are you trying to build, and with who? Does APC prioritize Corporate property over the lives of poor people? You say you fight the provincial government through economic disruption. On May 1st where did economic disruption occur – at McDonald’s for 30 minutes, where people inside continued to consume, or ‘rampaging’ through the mall demonstrating our rage using your ‘dangerous weapons’ ( 2×4’s with wooden signs saying ‘Fight Back’) against numerous multinationals, not just one McFuck’s.

You masturbate your ‘political conciousness’, yet appear to have no awareness of Vancouver history. It was a violent fight to get what CampHell is trying to take away. Are you waiting for a minister’s roundtable to kiss ass or do you want to fight back? This is ‘warfare’. Your authoritarian complex is hurting the movement, who do you think you are to be so self-righteous to think you can control a group of poor people. You can’t control people and advocate for them at the same time. Be specific who you want to work with. We are working class, poor, indigenous, women, and people of colour who will fight by any means necessary. If somebody throws a rock at a cop at a downtown eastside demo, will they be denounced? What do you expect to happen when rallying radical speeches inspire an angry crowd? We need words AND ACTION!!!!

How can you be so arrogant, racist and sexist as to call people immature, adventuristic, undisciplined and devoid of political conciousness? Did you read what you wrote? Sometimes it’s better to wait until the ‘adrenaline rush’ is over before making public statements.

The more masks at a demo the better. There could be enough masks provided for everyone. It not only represents international and local solidarity, but can help prevent individuals being targeted by the pigs.

As far as risks go – do you really think this world is safe? The state kills people everyday. The least we can do is fight first and not wait to be vicitims. It’s really patronizing to tell poor people to be peaceful and calm. Capitalism is killing us – there’s no time for compromise, negotiations or hesitations. You seem to have the fervor for cowardly acts of threatening ‘vigilance’ towards people who show up at YOUR demonstrations (narcissism?) and ‘sabotage’ (express ourselves) what you are trying to build, but you back down from having a militant stand against the state? APC claims to be committed for the long haul. What exactly are your long-term goals – a political party? Explain yourself! Since when has collaboration with the cops been beneficial to building a movement? Do you trust the media to tell the truth when they are in the back pocket of the pig force? Why don’t you just hand people over to the cops at the beginning of YOUR demo instead of using the ‘working class’ cop/media’s precious time sorting through video surveillance? I guess it saves APC’s labour to have the state create more propaganda for you.

We urge you to state your position regarding diversity of tactics, so that there is no ambiguity. If you advocate peaceful non-violent civil disobedience rather than direct action SAY IT !

The Clown Brigade

Furia y guerra de clases en la Columbia Británica

====================================================

Class War Rages On in British Columbia

On Wednesday, August 7th, 2002, the Anti-Poverty Committee (A.P.C.) of Vancouver held a rally, march, and action for “Welfare on Demand” and against the current economic restructuring of neo-”Liberal” government of B.C; an escalation in the war on the poor that has translated to cuts to welfare rates, and a new 3-week-waiting period for new welfare applicants. This is taking place at the same time as massive government and corporate lay-offs, and in the wake of a new 6-dollar “training wage” (2 dollars less than the minimum wage in B.C.).

The excluded class (the poor, the homeless, the unemployed, welfare recipients etc.), the most oppressed sector of society, is facing the most serious and painful consequences of these increasing attacks. In response, there has been an unsurge in self-organization, militant direct actions against the State, and the developement of “base structures” – anti-poverty organizations that struggle to provide the excluded with basic needs through direct intervention, and ultimately, to dismantle this government through campaigns of economic disruption.

The Anti-Poverty Committee’s rally began at the Burrard Street Skytrain station at 1 p.m. with a few speakers, media interviews, and the handing out of legal rights cards with phone contacts in case of arrests. A speaker announced the A.P.C.’s demands, and the crowd of about a hundred people made a short march through the financial district to the regional executive welfare office. Once reaching the office the crowd attempted to push through a line of police to gain entry to the building. A banner was dropped from a balcony by two people who had gained entry prior to the march. Several people managed to gain access to the inside of the building through side-doors and attempted to push open the front entrance doors from inside. This meant that the police had people pushing on the doors from both sides at once. At one point a door was forced open and a scuffle broke out as the crowd continued to try to force their way into the office. One cop used his bike to push the crowd back, but the demonstrators held their ground. Many people put up stickers that called for an end to the 3-week-wait all over the outside of the building . Through negotiating two A.P.C. members were granted a meeting with the office. The crowd rallied outside until they returned, and then dispersed.

A large and diverse group of organizations endorsed the A.P.C.’s demands and their march, including the Hospital Employees Union of B.C., the B.C. Government Employees Union, the Canadian Union of Public Employees B.C., the “Prepare the General Strike Committee”, as well as many community groups. While this is a welcome and positive developement, there was a visible lack of rank-and-file union workers at the demonstration, in contrast to the presence they have shown at previous rallies in opposition to the B.C. Liberal government. Several factors may have contributed to this, including the mid-day timing of the demonstration as well as it’s focus on welfare rights, rather than broad opposition to the Liberals policies as a whole. Although grassroots networking efforts by radical and community groups is important, the initiative should fall to the rank-and-file union workers, to show solidarity with the most oppressed sectors of the province. The illusions held by many regarding the trade unions must be broken, and an autonomous movement of rank-and-file workers that fights in true solidarity with the excluded must be developed.

Later on Wednesday night hundreds of thousands of citizens gathered at the beach near downtown Vancouver for a fireworks display that ended with the crowd blocking off major streets downtown, the intervention of police who arrested several members of the crowd, an attempt by the crowd to charge the police line in response, and attacks on vehicles and store-front windows. There are conflicting reports of police using pepper-spray to disperse the people who confronted them. This incident points to the always-present potential for class conflict at all large gatherings of people, particularly ones with an overwhelming and agitational police force. For insurrectionaries, this incident should illuminate other-than-traditional avenues for our own intervention and agitation.

From an insurrectionary viewpoint, the increasing willingness of anti-Liberal demonstrators in B.C. to directly confront the Capitalist State, and its enforcers; the police, is a positive development that should be expanded upon.

From our observation, this increasing militancy has become possible not only because of the deepening of class contradictions under the Liberal governement, the widening gap between the rich and the poor, but also because of the conscious efforts of radicals and militants to move away from symbolic protest and towards intentional conflict and direct action.

The context of the current class war in British Columbia includes -

- An attempt by B.C. Government Employeees Union (B.C.G.E.U.) members to charge into a hotel on January 23rd, 2002, where Premier Gordon Campbell was set to speak.

- Illegal wildcat strikes in late January by the B.C. Teachers Federation (B.C.T.F.) and the B.C.G.E.U.

- A tent-city occupation by street youth and students on the front lawn of the provincial legislature building in Victoria in February which ended with it’s dismantling by riot police

- The fire-bombing of Premier Gordon Campbell’s office on the night of February 21st.

- A B.C Federation of Labour rally at the legislature in Victoria by more than 20,000 people, at which a group of about 10 anarchists intervened by attacking a security barrier and throwing rocks at the legislature building.

- An anti-poverty Snake March in Victoria on March 25th that went through a mall and several corporate stores, leaving splatters from paint-bombs and graffitti behind.

- An anti-poverty march to one of Premier Gordon Campbell’s homes in Vancouver on April 1st.

- An all-womyn anti-poverty brigade’s occupation of a “Member of the Legislative Assembly” office in Victoria on April 25th that was broken up by riot police who pepper-sprayed several demonstrators.

- A May Day demonstration in Vancouver against the 6-dollar training wage that included a half-hour blockade of a McDonalds restaurant (one of the businesses using the training wage, and a major contributor to the Liberal’s election campaign.). After the end of the demonstration a masked group charged through a downtown mall and carried out small acts of vandalism and sabotage.

- A July 14th demonstration at the opening of a gallery show at the Vancouver Art Gallery at which the Premier was scheduled to speak at, but failed to show his face in public – because of “security concerns” caused by hundreds of angry demonstrators who attempted to dismantle a security fence, spat on police officers, and were then pepper-sprayed.

In conclusion, direct action is the only hope for the excluded, the only means available for survival and dignity. Our strategies for moving this struggle forward must focus on three areas -

- Conscious attacks on the institutions of oppression

- Propaganda

- Continuing efforts to organize affinity groups and base structures with explicitly revolutionary goals.

…Until the final victory…

Insurrectionary Anarchists of the Coast Salish Territories (British Columbia, Canada)

Anarchist Action In Vancouver

an insurrectionary anarchist analysis

Catalyzed by the growing popular resistance to the Liberal government in British Columbia, and in particular the Woodwards Squat, anarchist affinity groups have been organizing and intervening in the struggle in Vancouver in a visible and direct way.

On November 4, 2002, an affinity group of 8 anarchists dressed in black bloc made a presence felt at a demonstration against the B.C Restaurant and Food Association. The demonstration had been called by the Anti-Poverty Committee of Vancouver (APC) to expose the association of business groups that played a large part in the implementation of the $6 dollar and hour training wage. The anarchists waved black flags, chanted and pushed for demonstrators to take up more space on the road, to block both directions of traffic. Police made a pathetic attempt to curb the anarchists, with one motorcycle cop approaching the group and other cops announcing over and over again on a load speaker that the anarchists and other demonstrators should “move back for their own safety”. Once the cops realized that their petty intimidation was useless they gave up their attempts. Soon after the anarchists were approached by a different breed of pig; an irate APC member approached the group aggressively and demanded that they move away from the second lane. A shouting match ensued and a physical scuffle was barely avoided. The APC member repeated “This is an APC demo. I am telling you what to do.” Like the official cops, this self-appointed “leader” quickly realized that the group would not be intimidated or pushed around.

Mounted police then formed a line next to and then in behind the black bloc. Many within the group predicted that the police were preparing to charge the crowd. A stand-off resulted, and the anarchists shouted for the police to go home. The horse police eventually left, and as the demonstration dispersed the anarchist group chanted “Kill the rich, arm the poor, this is fucking class war!” adding a militant spirit to a symbolic display of “dissent”.

On Saturday, November 9, an autonomist group formed and attended two demonstrations in Vancouver. About 9 people with black flags and a banner that read “Time for revolution. Against Capital. Against the State.” Made their way to a protest called by the Bus Riders Union to call for a “People’s Agenda” for city hall, timed to coincide with upcoming city elections. 3 masked members of the group were detained briefly by police before the beginning of the demonstration but were released once others from the crowd confronted the cops. The affinity group then quickly moved on to a demonstration downtown against growing police repression. Residents of the Downtown Eastside, who live in the poorest neighbourhood in Canada, responded positively to the masked group, and yells of “Fuck the police!” were met with cheers. Agitators from the affinity group spoke out against police violence and in favour of militant community response. A young child from the group shouted through the megaphone “Pigs are assholes!” A member of the Marijuana Party warned the crowd of “agent provocateurs”, cops who mask up and break windows to justify police violence, and an argument and shouting match erupted. The group dispersed shortly after.

On November 17, an anti-capitalist contingent took part in a large march against the war on Iraq. Red flags, black flags, and a Palestinian flag flew side by side, as the group initiated militant chants like “George Bush, we hate you, and your fucking army too!” and “Stop! Stop the USA. Class war is the only way!”. The Anarchist Action Group – Vancouver distributed pamphlets against war, as well as capitalist “peace”.

On Sunday, December 1, an anarchist social night took place in Vancouver, and many new radicals met each other and made contacts for future organizing.

The anarchist movement in Vancouver appears to be growing and becoming more cohesive, opening up new possibilities for rebellion and revolt.

- Insurgent-S

Creativity and Insurrection

By Sam G. / July 3, 2006 / Coast Salish Territories – Vancouver, Canada

As insurrectionary anarchists, we consider the struggle to demolish this world to be contingent most of all on creativity. To retaliate against daily humiliation is to create new social relations and transform the conditions under which we live. Creativity is an expression of freedom, in its infinite outlets and potential. Our limitless creative capacity makes possible the willful ending of the world as we know it.

Social revolution is one of the potential ends this world might come to, although it could not possibly be the final resolution of all social conflict. The revolution is a creative process that is international in scope, since the institutions of exploitation and social control extend to all corners of the globe. The conscious struggle to end this world is a revolutionary struggle, even in its smallest, initial phase. Wherever it takes place, revolutionary struggle affects the entire planet.

Many exploited or excluded people who do not yet consciously seek to destroy this world, are nonetheless involved in limited struggles and rebellions that can contribute to the destructive process of the revolution. As insurrectionary anarchists, we can and do intervene in these situations with our own project and in solidarity with those who rebel against the conditions and relations imposed upon them. This intervention can be described as a creative process of combining various subversive practices.

Rebellion occurs on many scales, from individual or collective acts of sabotage and insubordination to riots and insurrections. We insurrectionary anarchists are also rebels, but our rebellion is directed towards the total destruction of all political and economic institutions, all the structures through which the dominant class controls and exploits everyone else. Our revolt is part of a project we create for ourselves and that we carry through to its end, or our own, as in the case of death. We see our lives as a project to be created, and putting this project into practice requires an analysis of the local and global conditions of the class war, social struggles that are underway, and the projects designed and implemented by the exploiters. It requires communication between anarchist companions, the deepening of mutual understanding that if referred to as ‘affinity’. It involves the development of an infinite variety of specific projects that antagonize the authorities and expand our freedom.

Informal organization is the unification of the creative powers of individuals and groups. It is a concept and practice of organization founded on incessant innovation and adaptation to circumstances, as is required by a project of attack upon the power structure of global society. It is an expression of the desire for an expansive freedom that surges against all institutional limitations everywhere.

Thoughts about a protest and some bottles in Vancouver

Anonymous
Coast Salish Territory, Vancouver, Canada
April 28, 2007

On Wednesday, April 25, 2007, the Non-Partisan Association (NPA), the ruling political party of Vancouver, held a meeting. The Anti-Poverty Committee (APC) responded with a protest titled “NPA Your Time is UP!”

The APC had made a call-out for others to join them at their planned demonstration. In their call out, APC presented several demands made upon the NPA. These demands called for the NPA to invest money in low-income housing in accordance with its own Homeless Action Plan and to cancel the 2010 Olympics and the Civil City project. Civil City is a plan to crack down on visible signs of poverty such as panhandling.

In their call out, the APC said, “We the people are defending ourselves and fighting back!” However, the APC were quick to distance themselves from a person said to have taken bottles filled with paint and urine to the protest.

After the demonstration was dispersed by police officers using bicycles and horses, the Vancouver Police Department announced to the corporate media that an officer had seen a man drop a bag in a garbage can before joining the protest. Inside, were bottles filled with paint and urine, which police displayed to the media. The cops say these were intended for use against the police. They say the APC attacked officers at the protest by trying to push through the police line.

The Province newspaper quoted APC organizer David Cunningham as saying, “There were no such bottles, and if there are such bottles, those belong to the police, not to the Anti-Poverty Committee.”

Cunningham is also quoted as stating, “If anybody brought those, it was the police who brought them and are trying to stage a disinformation campaign to undermine the work of the Anti-Poverty Committee.”

On a Global BC television news broadcast of April 26, 2007, APC organizer Thomas Malenfant said, “No member of the Anti-Poverty Committee had any of that contraband at all. We can’t control who comes to our demos, but that was no one within the APC.”

If Cunningham has been quoted correctly, we must ask how he could be sure the bottles belong to the police, especially since the police say they also found a wallet with identification in the bag and are looking for the person it belongs to?

Contraband is defined as an item that cannot be possessed legally. However, bottles filled with paint or urine don’t fit this definition. What then is the purpose of Malenfant calling them such?

APC seems to be responding to police attempts to criminalize them and spread disinformation about them with disinformation of their own. This goes beyond a simple disassociation from the bottles and the individual who brought them, endangering and isolating anyone who would bring these items to a demonstration or action. Malenfant’s statement assists in criminalizing the possession of such bottles. Cunningham has stated publicly that the person who brought the bag is a cop. If the person wasn’t a cop, Cunningham has, without reasonable cause, slandered and isolated an individual who the police say they are pursuing.

However, these kinds of statements were not made by APC after the February 12, 2007, protest and action against the Olympic Countdown Clock Ceremony at which police say eggs filled with paint were thrown. The difference there was that indigenous warriors who weren’t members of APC were arrested and the police were unprepared. Police repression of demonstrations has increased since then.

The use of paint-bombs at street actions in Vancouver was not without precedent even before the clock protest. The Indigenous Resistance Organizing Committee said one was used against a cop at an Anti-Canada Day demonstration last year. Anonymous reports claimed several were thrown at the Main Street police station during street actions in 2005 and 2006 on the March 15 International Day Against Police Brutality.

After this year’s street action on March 15, three people were arrested and charged. Police referred to those who took part in the action as “criminals”, even though none have yet been convicted of any crime related to it. This is part of an overall increase in criminalization and repression that is not limited to targeting APC.

In 2002, APC publicly denounced a group of people who vandalized the inside of Pacific Centre Mall after breaking-away from an APC-organized May Day demonstration. Police arrested and charged four people after the mall incident. APC has never retracted their denouncement.

APC’s recent statements and its 2002 denouncement assist the cops and the media’s efforts to isolate and demonize simple acts of rebellion such as the throwing of paint-bombs against government or capitalist targets. They also detract from anti-capitalist and anti-colonial resistance in Vancouver and around the world.

APC cannot be allowed to wage a war for credibility within the corporate media at the expense of the resistance movement that exists outside its organization, and which it cannot control.

An Anarchist Concept of Value

Insurrectionary Anarchists of the Coast Salish Territories
Vancouver, Canada
July 1, 2003

The insurrectionary anarchist struggle puts forward certain positive values. The freedom of the individual and the equality of the oppressed class could be described as the most basic of these, along with solidarity and mutual aid, which form the connecting link between individual freedom and class equality and make revolutionary struggle possible. Anarchists also value self-organization, creativity, joy and autonomous action, but none of these positive elements can be artificially isolated from the completely negative orientation anarchists have towards the class of exploiters and their system of domination. The interrelation of elements should be obvious, as should be the positive contribution to our struggle that the various assaults on the property of the exploiters and their guards have in terms of opening up social space in which we can act more freely.

We are not scientists of revolution incapable of seeing the subjective value of struggles that do not necessarily lead to victory for our entire class. We do not accept that there is a guaranteed formula, a political program that can carry us through the struggle from beginning to end without error, without adapting to changing circumstances.

Anarchists are simply individuals who desire freedom and equality and are consequently propelled to fight alongside the exploited masses, as accomplices rather than guides.

We are in favour of immediate, destructive attacks on the structures of the capitalist State, because we see these as indispensable elements of an insurrectionary social movement. It is very easy for an individual or group to initiate actions against the many visible institutions of the class enemy. The simpler the means used the more the potential exists for the practice of sabotage to spread across a social territory, as every small act becomes a point of reference that can be put to use by anyone.

Anarchists place value in the will to rebel against oppression and the autonomous initiative of individuals who are not content to sit and wait for the revolution to come like a gift from the sky. We do not agree with those who say that sabotage is useless or detracts from our struggle. We are not priests of the Protestant work ethic who maintain that everything must be “productive”, that capitalism is part of a progressive historical evolution.

No, it is necessary to begin to destroy all the means of exploitation controlled by the enemy, and the decision to move in this direction cannot come from anyone but ourselves. We can find comrades with who we share a personal affinity in relation to revolutionary action, and we can even contribute to larger informal organizations used to coordinate the efforts of various autonomous groups, but ultimately, the will to resist must come from within each one of us.

As insurrectionary anarchists, we can’t agree with those who think that it is possible to oppose capitalism with productive projects alone, that we can merely replace our enemies institutions with our own, all without attracting the attention of their police forces, the forces of political repression.

Our idea of anarchist communism contains within it many beautiful and positive values, but we want to fight for them, and not limit ourselves to simply advocating our views. In autonomous struggle opposed to the capitalist State we see not only a positive value, but also a material necessity.

Insurrectionary Anarchists of the Coast Salish Territories
Vancouver, Canada
July 1, 2003

Revolutionary Initiative

The Exploited Individual

“We must take into account not only the objective causes of oppression, but must also examine the subjective factors which play an important role in the persistence of exploitation and are hindering the process of workers’ autonomy.”
- Jean Weir, Worker’s Autonomy

The will to resist exploitation and social exclusion is an often overlooked factor within the revolutionary movement, but without this subjective element revolutionary change can not take place. Oppression can nurture apathy and resignation as easily as it can provoke hatred and anger. The exploitation of the capitalist system creates the context and justification for mass rebellion, but the determination to resist must come from within each individual. The spirit of revolt, the indispensable revolutionary initiative of individuals must be the groundwork of a project that aims at overthrowing the dominant class and destroying the infrastructure of their economy. The struggle for real individual freedom must also necessarily become a struggle for equality of conditions and access to social life for the entire exploited class.

The Insurrectionary Process

“When a revolutionary situation arises in a country, before the spirit of revolt is sufficiently awakened in the masses to express itself in violent demonstrations in the streets or by rebellions and uprisings, it is through action that minorities succeed in awakening that feeling of independence and that spirit of audacity without which no revolution can come to a head.”
- Peter Kropotkin , The Spirit of Revolt With the individual as a catalyst, an insurrectionary process can begin to take shape, first in small affinity groups, and then in base structures; mass organizations founded on principles of self-management, direct action and permanent conflict with the class enemy. The forum for individual and collective action is the class war itself, the contradiction between exploiter and exploited that can only be resolved by the violent elimination of those in power. Organization is a tool to be used in coordinating specific tasks, a tool to be fashioned, adapted and dismantled as necessary. It should not be an end in itself. Only the struggle should be permanent. Revolutionary initiative has a variety of means at its disposal, from counter-information work and expropriation to attacks on capitalist institutions. Class warfare may develop over time in the form of escalating individual, intermediate and mass insurrectionary struggles, but all efforts should aim at achieving concrete results and gains, and symbolic methods should be dismissed as useless.

The Institutions of Oppression

“Naturally one must begin with the insurrectionary act which sweeps away the material obstacles, the armed forces of government which are opposed to any social transformation.”
- Errico Malatesta, The Insurrection

Capitalism is not merely an abstract concept or system of social relationships. It depends on its institutions of repression, its courts, police stations, and prisons. These structures will not destroy themselves. They will not crumble under the weight of an inevitable historical process. They must be physically assaulted. The subjective aspects of material resistance also come into play, as individuals realize their capacity to actively attack and destroy capitalist targets. By intervening directly in the social clash, individuals and groups gain experience that can be attained in no other way. When engaged in collective action, the bonds of solidarity are strengthened between comrades. The combative spirit gathers momentum.

The Class Enemy

“Let every dirty, lousy tramp arm himself with a revolver or knife and lay in wait on the steps of the palaces of the rich and stab or shoot the owners as they come out. Let us kill them without mercy, and let it be a war of extermination and without pity. Let us devastate the avenues where the wealthy live.”
- Lucy Parsons

Behind every institution of oppression is the class enemy. Determined to maintain their position at all costs, intoxicated by power and willing to use the most brutal forces of repression at their disposal, the exploiters wage class war relentlessly. Revolutionary organizations must act against this reality by refusing negotiation or compromise with the class enemy. The only effective strategy in revolutionary warfare is the strategy of annihilation. The application of violence to this concrete necessity of the movement itself should not cause discomfort for even a moment. The lives of the exploiters and their servants are not worth a cent.

Autonomy and Centralization

“If revolutionaries organize like those whose rule they seek to overthrow, they are defeated before the battle is engaged.”
- Andy Anderson, Hungary ‘56

Autonomy is the prerequisite of social freedom. Only the absolute autonomy of individuals and groups, the freedom to associate or disassociate with others at will, can allow the natural tendency towards solidarity and mutual aid to take root. The principle of self-determination must grow from the free individual out towards the community, and further outwards to distinct cultural groups and geographic regions. Autonomy provides the basis for meaningful interrelations between groups and territories on the basis of communism; the equality of access to the means of existence and social life. Revolution is a project that develops decentralized organizational structures on the one hand while it attacks the centralized formations of the class enemy on the other. Revolutionaries must take the initiative to constantly fight against any tendency towards centralization if they are to defend freedom. From this perspective, revolutionary initiative becomes a project based on combining the struggle for individual liberation with the social struggle to overthrow the capitalist system and the class enemy.

Insurgent-S
Vancouver, B.C., Canada
Coast Salish Territories
April 30, 2003

Social Struggle, Social War

Insurrectionary Anarchists of the Coast Salish Territories
Vancouver, Canada
October 16, 2003

The struggle that insurrectionary anarchists engage in is social, rather than political or economic. Insurrectionary anarchists attack institutions of the political State and the capitalist economy as part of a project to completely demolish all forms of exploitation and control. We attempt to make a total and up-to-date critique of society, and this means that we reject limited viewpoints that privilege one form of oppression over another or one sector of the excluded class over another.

The ranks of today’s excluded are immigrants, the indigenous, the employed and unemployed, and there is no reason why any one of these sectors should be considered the advanced guard of the struggle.

The capitalist economy depends not only on production, but also distribution and consumption of commodities. So the old Marxist analysis that says only the workers in the manufacturing sector can be revolutionary does not make sense. Agricultural workers, indigenous peasants and the unemployed can attack capitalism at the point of distribution by blocking roads, and at the point of consumption through theft and looting. Sabotage is a flexible tool that can be put to use by any excluded or exploited individual. For those employed in the capitalist marketplace there are various techniques of self-organized direct action possible at the individual, group and mass levels. Absenteeism, destruction of machinery, theft and information tampering occur regularly in all workplaces.

Politics is alien to the exploited. There is mass abstention from the electoral process. Unionization is declining, and extra-union activity on the part of union members is growing through the use of sabotage and flying squad self-organization – with varying degrees of real autonomy.

A purely economic view of the class struggle is useless. Capitalism does not just control the world of work, but also the home and the entire social territory in which the exploited live. The enemy class uses to its advantage systems of oppression such as patriarchy and racism that predate capitalism and industry, and which divide the excluded amongst themselves.

There are many social problems inherent to the class struggle that the action of anarchists can be useful in confronting. The moral value system passed down by the exploiters to the exploited. The democratic ideals of tolerance and dialogue. The religious tendency of the workers and unemployed to look for a guide to bring them vengeance. The bigotry and irrationality that cause the exploited to battle each other, leaving the class enemy unscathed. These are the subjective elements of class society that can’t be ignored by those who really want to destroy this rotten system.

Refusing the role of the vanguard, the elitist group that is supposed to educate and guide the masses, anarchists above all act for themselves, in their own interests, not claiming to represent their entire class. But for the anarchist struggle to become revolutionary it must become social, expanding through solidarity in action. Our relationship with the mass must be informal and direct. We must recognize the mass as individuals, avoiding the danger of falling into generic perspectives and ideology.

To limit ourselves to spreading counter-information and declaring our convictions to the masses would not make sense, and would be just another form of elitism. We must always re-evaluate our analysis and attempt to advance through discussion and the gathering of information, but we must also act.

Our organizational forms should be fluid and adaptable, capable of destructuring when necessary, based on simple principles that can be used by anyone; self-organization, direct action and permanent struggle. We must reject the political party and activist organizational model of the power centre that is supposed to manage and control everything. We should proceed to action immediately, not waiting for orders or signals from anywhere.

We should fight in intermediate struggles alongside the excluded, for housing, food, shelter, wages, against police repression, against social control. But always trying to push these struggle further, helping them expand into the unknown of insurrection.

In the social war for freedom the participation of anarchists can be of great importance.

A Project Of Liberation

by Insurgent-S
February, 2003

“Theory must also take into account the human element; it must accord a place to courage, to boldness, even to rashness. The Art of War has to deal with living and with moral forces, the consequence of which is that it can never attain the absolute and positive… courage and self-reliance are principles quite essential to war; consequently, theory must only set up such rules as allow ample scope for all degrees and varieties of these necessary and noblest of military virtues. In daring there may still be wisdom, and prudence as well, only they are estimated by a different standard of value.”
- Clausewitz, “On War”

In all the history of the class struggle the exploited have always resisted their oppression. Often in individual and isolated ways, and sometimes in social movements leading to mass insurrections. Throughout the history of the class war innumerable theories, organizations, and movements have developed in opposition to capitalism, and insurrectionary anarchism, being one tendency among many, should be clarified as having many real and significant differences from all the others.

In the history of the clash between classes anarchists have defined themselves as a conscious minority within the movement of the exploited, a group that moves with the current of the social struggle against capitalism and the State. Insurrectionary anarchists do not act as a minority outside the movement, attempting to organize, manage and control the mass of the exploited, to subject the oppressed to the discipline of a single organization, trade union or political party, but instead act as accomplices to all exploited people on principles of solidarity and mutual aid.

Anarchists identify their enemies as the dominant class and the institutions of oppression and they do not hesitate to attack their enemies. They do not wait for orders from on high, or for permission to act against oppression, but instead analyze the reality of the social clash which they find themselves in, combine with comrades on the basis of affinity, and then immediately set out to assault all the structures of domination. Insurrectionary anarchists see the struggle in qualitative rather than quantitative terms and understand that every small, destructive action taken against capitalism is a contribution to the overall social clash. A revolution is undoubtedly the act of a mass of exploited people rising in rebellion, but it is not through recruitment and discipline under a single organization that such an outburst comes to be. It should be obvious that it is useful for anarchists to clarify their ideas and to present them to the mass of the exploited, but it is not propaganda alone that will overturn existing conditions. Anarchists should be distinguished from other revolutionaries because they act for themselves, against their own oppression, and in solidarity with all the oppressed people of the world. They do not seek to control or direct the social war, and instead intervene in the movement of the exploited through direct action and participation is mass organizations that are based on principles of self-management of the struggle and uncompromising conflict with the class enemy. Anarchists fight to awaken a spirit of revolt across all of society, to completely destroy the economy of exploitation.

Insurrectionary anarchists have ideas and methods of action that can be of great importance to the oppressed. A clear rejection of dominant class morality and law, a willingness to engage in direct action, a commitment to permanent struggle, and a passion for freedom, all can contribute to a revolutionary movement to overturn the present order. The importance of the insurrectionary anarchist minority to the mass of the exploited is not in the anarchist’s quality of leadership or advancement in class consciousness. It is in anarchist action, in attacks on capitalist institutions, and acts of solidarity with those suffering oppression. Any exploited person can contribute to the struggle to overthrow the exploiters. Insurrectionary anarchists merely demonstrate useful tools in the social war, and by striking the enemy in simple and direct ways provide points of reference that can be put to use by all.

Passivity, resignation and doubt can easily give way to determination and defiance. A strategy of waiting can be thrown aside in favour of a strategy of attack. Small affinity groups can immediately begin to organize direct actions against specific institutions of capitalism; schools, workplaces, businesses, and all the other prisons. Anarchists can participate in base structures, mass organizations that are not vehicles for anarchist ideology, but are instead tools with which to dismantle specific repressive structures of the capitalist State. Bosses, landlords, politicians, and all the other cops can be identified and attacked. Capital can be destroyed to make room for life.

Insurgent-S
Insurrectionary Anarchists of the Coast Salish Territories
(Vancouver, Canada)

Towards An Insurgent Social Movement in Vancouver

by Insurgent-S
March 7, 2003

“It is not us that they must remember, but their struggle, because the struggle is theirs. We are simply an opportunity in that struggle. We are something extra.”
- Alfredo Bonanno

The constant question that stares all revolutionaries in the face is the question of organization, the question of strategy and the forms that struggle must take in order to contribute to the development of a social movement against the capitalist State.

For anarchists this question has been given considerable debate and practical experimentation, and a variety of tendencies have evolved often in opposition to each other.

In the context of Vancouver, and the current social clash in the city, it would seem to me that there are some insurrectionary anarchist ideas that could be of use to revolutionaries and the exploited mass in general. Not in terms of the importance of anarchist ideas in themselves or any desire for a prominent place for anarchists at the head of the movement, but simply because the practical application of these insurrectionary ideas could lead to the widening of the social clash in general, or a rupture in the capitalist economy that might open the door to greater struggles in the future.

In Vancouver, at the present time, there could be said to be two currents broad enough to be called social movements. The first would be the loose and sporadically active movement against the Liberal government’s capitalist restructuring, the cuts to social programs and the public sector. The second would be the recent movement against the impending U.S.-led war on Iraq. Both of these involve masses of people and an array of diverse social sectors mobilizing in the streets together against common enemies. And in my estimation both of these movements have reached a crucial juncture, a dire need for a progressive push forward towards greater conflict, the achievement of concrete gains, and the spreading use of insurgent direct action tactics throughout the mass.

There is an undeniable point of tension that is being reached. There is a point where the symbolic marches and rallies begin to make those involved feel more powerless and ineffectual. There is a need to move beyond spectator politics, towards popular resistance and the active involvement of those taking part in these mobilizations. Will the movement surge in the direction of violent and open class conflict or simply degenerate and disappear? And what will the revolutionaries do at the crucial moment? Will they find useful ways to intervene in the battle, or will they be left to the side by the enraged, exploited masses? Will the strategy of waiting that some hold to be the only “realistic” one actually contribute to the decline of any potential social movement? Vancouver revolutionaries are going to have to ask themselves what the next step is and how to break away from all the dead traditions of the past.

I think these are important questions. Questions that many are not willing to face up to.

There is often a certain amount of ego involved, and defensiveness, and the danger is always present that the perceived needs of an individual or an organization will come to take precedence over the movement as a whole. There is a stubborn commitment to tired and outdated methods of political organizing that have long outlived their relevance to the reality of the social struggles currently taking place. There is a point where the desire to belong to an organization outweighs the passion for resistance, for freedom. There is a dangerous trap here.

And there are a couple of illusions that I reject. One is the illusion of determinism. I do not think it is possible to predict the outcome of our struggles in advance. Certainly we should try to learn from history and attempt to avoid past mistakes, but the methods of struggle that might lead to revolution are always changing in relation to the changing structures of global capitalism, and our methods must be developed and altered through the course of our active engagement in struggle and not just abstract theoretical reflection. Our actions might lead to revolution, or they might lead to something else entirely. We have to understand the possibility of failing and accept that possibility while proceeding with the determination to overcome all the obstacles in our path. Only then can we potentially contribute to popular revolt.

We should develop strategies, but not strategies alone, and not in isolation from the real struggles taking place outside the door of our meeting places. We must also act in order to uncover the modes of action that might be useful at this precise moment, as well as those that might not be useful at all.

The other illusion I reject is the idea of the immaturity of the exploited class. This is the authoritarian idea, the concept held up as truth by the political parties, or by the professional activists. It is an idea that is very important to these types of people because it is the idea that justifies their existence and their self-designated role as social managers, but it is not an idea that exists in reality. It is the idea that the exploited are not ready for revolution. It is an idea proclaimed by people who have no real knowledge on the subject or any real way of knowing in the first place. It is a sad and desperate idea maintained by sad and desperate people who fight to maintain the decrepit institutions to which they belong. But it is not a fact.

The exploited are always resisting their exploitation. The forms this resistance takes are usually small and isolated, but there are acts of resistance nonetheless. Sabotage, theft, and absenteeism in the workplace are spreading. The workers not directly involved in these attacks on the bosses are growing more and more reluctant to turn their co-workers in, to rat them out to the bosses. They would prefer to just look the other way, and so they extend their solidarity to their co-workers by facilitating their subversive acts. You can read about these types of things in the business section of the Province newspaper. The economists consider this rise in worker discontent to be a great worrisome problem that must be solved. We should see it as only the logical outcome of growing class division, the continual exploitation, exclusion and degradation of people who are deprived of everything meaningful and necessary in life.

From the moment that the bourgeois overthrew the feudalist system and took hold of the State and the economy the potential for the liberation of the exploited class existed. Class division is the contradiction that must be solved. The exploited are not immature and always in search of leaders to save them, but are quite often in search of new ways with which to resist exploitation, to resist work, to subvert the economy. Our task, as anarchists is to demonstrate simple and easily reproducible actions and tactics. Our task is to attack easily identifiable class enemies; bosses, landlords, politicians, police. Our goal is to unify the diverse strands of struggle in a movement that will assault capitalism itself.

We are tired of waiting, and we believe most everyone else is as well.

The exploited might not believe that it is possible at the present time to destroy this hateful system, or might not clearly see the road from here to there, but they do not want to remain slaves. There will always be a few who have internalized their oppression, and that is something we must deal with and overcome, but these people are not the rule and this obstacle is not insurmountable. We must believe that we can win, and we must encourage this belief in others.

We fight intermediate struggles; struggles for housing, for shorter work hours, against prisons, against police repression. We believe in struggles that embolden people, that encourage a spirit of revolt and a sense of dignity. We believe in continual conflict and the need to always push our struggles a step further. This is why we talk about insurrection.

The reality that the revolution cannot be achieved tomorrow in one action is no reason or excuse to sit back and do nothing at all.

Anarchists should understand that revolutions are neither the action of a violent minority or the product of an inevitable historical evolution. Anarchists must conceive of revolution as a project already in course. A project that is not determined by us but which we can contribute to.

Anarchists can intervene in the social war in Vancouver in useful and immediately accessible ways. Direct action at the points of production, distribution and consumption. Counter-information and propaganda. The construction of specific organizations; affinity groups and base structures. A variety of tools are at our disposal.

Some forms of organization can be clarified.

The affinity group is a small informal organization of comrades who have discussed their ideas and perspectives regarding the social clash and have come to an understanding on how they can immediately work towards attacking elements of the capitalist State. The strength of this type of organization is in its ability to make decisions quickly and consensually, to modify itself according to the needs of a particular struggle, to dissolve itself when necessary.

Then there is the base structure, an informal mass organization that is built around simple principles and a singular objective. Autonomy from all political forces, trade unions and parties. The rejection of authoritarian decision-making processes. The rejection of negotiation or compromise with the class enemy. A precise objective of attacking and destroying a particular oppressive structure of the capitalist system.

The base structure can include anarchists but should not become an ideological vehicle or be made up of anarchists alone. It must form around a singular task so that it can maximize the involvement of all exploited people with similar objectives and a similar desire to resist oppression.

Through using these simple organizational methods and by attacking the infrastructure of the capitalist economy in simple and easily reproducible ways anarchists and revolutionaries in Vancouver can bring latent class conflict to the foreground and build the social context for an insurrectionary opening in the struggle.

Ultimately the exploited must rise up and overthrow their oppressors themselves, and we will be in the midst of this battle only because we are of the exploited class, and not because we represent a specific anarchist organization that has amassed a large membership, and subsequently political power.

The games of control and management of the struggling exploited are not for us. We want to destroy domination. We want to fight for freedom.

Insurgent-S
Insurrectionary Anarchists of the Coast Salish Territories
(Vancouver, Canada)

Activist Practice and Revolutionary Struggle

It’s out of fashion to be a revolutionary. A lot of people have grown up over the past few years and moved on to more mature projects. Direct action against the class of exploiters and their institutions is dismissed, ignored, rejected or denounced.

The class conflict between the rich and the poor, the exploiter and the exploited, is obvious to everyone, but the orientation of those who claim to specialize in class struggle has changed. It’s now unfashionable to claim a revolutionary perspective. Specialization has deepened, and various individuals and groups increasingly define themselves as social activists, and in many cases, the radical sector of the social democratic movement. Activists keep themselves busy by organizing endless meetings, educational forums that resemble the worst type of university lectures, distribution of literature that is not informative to anyone, and pointless protest marches that could be mistaken for funeral processions.

Activist practice is the natural consequence of activist theory, and it rejects revolutionary struggle and the autonomous organization of attacks on the structures of capitalism. Activist groups tend to organize under the model of the political party. They draft a rigid political program and work to recruit a membership that will adopt it. Activist organizations, both those structured with authoritarian leadership and those that make decisions democratically, demand that the individuals who make up their membership flatten their opinions and come to a lowest common denominator consensus. Activist organizations and political parties see their primary task as building their membership and mobilizing masses of people, as this directly relates to the amount of political power an organization can gain by appearing to represent the interests of the masses. Quantity overtakes quality, while organizations struggle for legitimacy in the arena of middle-class politics and corporate media presentations. The direct material struggle of the oppressed becomes a bargaining piece in negotiations with the class enemy.

Activists continue to place special importance on the role of the trade unions, despite the increasing tendency of the unions towards abandoning the struggle in favour of compromise, and the global shift in the capitalist economy from the manufacturing to the service sector, which is resulting in the decline of unionization.

Activists continue to spout off vague and abstract rhetoric in a language people increasingly do not understand or have no interest in listening to.

We need to mobilize the masses, they say.

We ask, what masses?

That alienates people.

What class of people?

Now is not the time.

Then when?

Activist practice affects the struggle of the exploited in many negative ways. Although individual, isolated acts of sabotage and absenteeism are common among workers, there is a growing distaste for all the traditional forms of political and social organization. Apathy, passivity and defeatist attitudes are also rampant, and there are still many na?e souls looking for a saviour in the form of a charismatic political leader, playing into a cycle of betrayal and disappointment. People expect nothing to change and this attitude contributes to the continuation of this system of exploitation.

The alternative to all this, in our view, is in the growing desire to resist domination and our ability to develop an insurrectionary social movement. Oppressed individuals must self-organize a project that is antagonistic and uncompromising towards the class enemy. Individuals can form small affinity groups that come together around a common perspective and then dissolve when they have outlived their function. Affinity groups can then build base structures, mass organizations with precise objectives and a hostile position towards all political forces. Acts of sabotage can also be points of reference and anti-capitalist insurgency can spread throughout society. With an insurrectionary orientation and practice we can potentially contribute to a revolution that will overthrow the economy of control and the class who benefits from it. Those who seek dignity and freedom should settle for nothing less.

Insurgent-S
Insurrectionary Anarchists of the Coast Salish Territories
Vancouver, Canada
June 29, 2003

No one in this world fits into clear stereotypes and the Activist/Anarchist is no different.  The distant cousin of the Activist/Do-Gooder, this mo will fall for any cause that passes by him (especially if the opportunity for a hot man-on-man hook up presents itself).  The key difference between the Activist/Anarchist and his do-gooding peer is actually a lack of something: showers.  His man Madonna piercing might actually be the cleanest thing on his body.  Fret not, he’ll soon be onto his next big adventure of social change — post-progressive yuppyism.

Utah Phillips

A good friend (Max) told me about this guy and I just found some stuff from him. He’s so cool so I thought maybe it’s worth posting something.

First, it’s good to know who he was. From Wikipedia:

• Bruce “Utah” Duncan Phillips (May 15, 1935 – May 23, 2008) was a labor organizer, folk singer, storyteller, poet and the “Golden Voice of the Great Southwest”. He described the struggles of labor unions and the power of direct action, self-identifying as an anarchist. He often promoted theIndustrial Workers of the World in his music, actions, and words.

Then, I found a nice interview on DemocracyNow (the best or one of the best news programs):

• The “Golden Voice of the Great Southwest”: Legendary Folk Musician, Activist Utah Phillips, 1935-2008

However, you might have a problem watching the video, mine stops before it finishes. I downloaded the whole video since their website’s player is not good at all. I can tell you how you can do it if you want.

I found these parts of the interview very attractive so I thought posting them here might be a good idea. However, I encourage you watch the whole interview.

• “It takes a long time to shut up and listen.”
• “I would encourage young people to understand, what—that was Germany before the Second World War, the rise of Hitler, the rise of Nazism. Why didn’t people do anything? You know, the big question that young Germans are asking their grandparents: “Why didn’t you do something?” Read about the Weimar, compare the rise of fascism in Germany from the 1920s to what’s happening right here right now.”
• “The long memory is the most radical idea in America. That long memory has been taken away from us.” “You haven’t gotten it in your schools. You’re not getting it on your television. You’re not getting it anywhere. You’re being leapfrogged from one crisis to the next. You know, you can’t remember what happened last week, because you’re locked into this week’s crisis.”
• “I decided that I would learn the trade. The trade is a fine, elegant, beautiful, very fruitful trade. In that trade, I can make a living and not a killing, and that was very important to me, to make a living and not a killing, to live reasonably well. I found a world of folk music.”

• “I don’t want to make money writing songs. There are people who make money writing songs; I can’t fault that. I’m an anarchist. I don’t make rules for other people. I make rules for myself.”

And when he’s talking about a guy called Ammon, he says:

• “You couldn’t tell him he hadn’t voted. He said, “Yes, I did vote. I just didn’t assign responsibility to other people to do things. I accept responsibility and saw to it that something got done.” It’s a different way of looking at voting, isn’t it? And you can do that all the time. You could have your life. And that’s the way I live my life. My body is my ballot.”

Regarding to the point about Weimar, I found these two brief and decent: “German Police: From Weimar Republic to Nazi dictatorship” and “German Police in the Nazi State”

P.S: So how did we end up to Utah phillips? I shared some videos from Pete Seeger that is another very cool folk singer and Max recommended Utah. Check these videos for sure: Which side are you on, Last Train to Nuremberg, Waist Deep in the Big Muddy and his interview with DemocracyNow

P.S2: I’m completely ignorant in all of these stuff so I would really appreciate any comments to improve this post to make something useful out of it!

There was an opening of an exhibition called

” Sign of Revolt ” in east end of London.

It showed wide spectrum of the artistic  by-product of

the Protest Campaign, such as posters, fliers, props,

appeal installations, video images etc etc.

So that, this exhibition can be seen as from the Art with

Social issue to the sample of Applied Art; ie Graphic Design

and in the same time it was the appeal of its issue like Eco to Police brutality.

One of my friend, War Boutique, exhibited an Armoured Vest of British Army standard, but with Arabic script

printed on it.——- m m m ?   ” Is it an instruction to the enemy, how to dispose this dead body ?”  ” Oh, that is

the script of the Coca Cola can ” ——! ! !  I like this man’s twisted humor.

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In fact, I got a Police bullet proof vest made by him which got [Metropolitan Peace] tag on the chest.

One opening night of my another friend’s exhibition, I was standing on front of the gallery wearing

this Police vest, walky-talky on the shoulder and huge black dildo instead of a truncheon hanged

from the belt.  Then, out of blue, a real Police car came and stopped on the front.

Two officers in the car seemed puzzled (of cause my attire looked genuine / save some details)

and watched over me 10 minutes, may be wondering ” Is he one of us ?—–If not should we arrest him

for the false impersonation ?—– No  no, it might be an art-performance to take micky out of us”

When they leave an officer rose a hand and gave me a salute, and I gave salute back.   Ha Ha Ha 

(back to the main story)

This Revolt exhibition has much more relevance to our life today than in pure art exhibition.

( More information ——- Click right column / Associates / Spacehijackers )

Incidentally,

I’ve joined Spacehijackers  ” Training Camp 09 ” (scroll down the page in their web site and /Read more )

It was the extremely funny enjoyable few days as you can see in the photos.

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” What a hell, Zenist doing in the Anarchist’s camp ” you might say. 

Yes, this is the Zen in Action.

Buddhism is not to become vegetated state of the life.  It is for focused, selfless state of the mind

and live in full with empowered action.   Don’t afraid to be a Micky.   Live as a Top Micky.

(Hesitation came from one’s self preservative ego. Micky may need to be there to stimulate the society )