Anarchic update news all over the world - 16.03.2018

Today's Topics:

   
1.  [Kurdistan] Urgent international call for Afrin By ANA
      (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
2.  France, Alternative Libertaire AL #280 - Papyart
      (libertarian serigraph): " It has become vital that transport be
      free " (fr, it, pt) [machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
  
 3.  [Spain] On anarchism and relations of power. The hidden
      feminist. By ANA (pt) [machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
4.  [Greece] Solidarity is our weapon -- In Greece, Turkey and
      Macedonia, the enemy is in the banks and ministries. By ANA (gr,
      pt) [machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
5.  anarkismo.net: The dangers of focusing all our attention on
      Donald Trump by Jerome Roos - ROAR (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
6.  Britain, Class War: If you're part of a group with similar
      politics to CW this maybe of interest... (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
7.  Rojava, If Afrin falls ---- ... it will have been too late!
      (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
8.  Greece, APO, Dirty Horse: CELEBRATION IN THE PANBALIAN
      SOLIDARITY DECLARATION IN LIBERTATIA (gr) 
     [machine translation]
      (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)


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Message: 1






We reproduced the urgent call from the Information Center of Afrin Resistance to the 
international community to take action on an imminent Turkish attack on the center of 
Afrin. ---- Stop the ethnic cleansing of Turkey in the Kurdish city of AFRIN! ---- March 
10, 2018 ---- Since 20 January 2018, the Turkish occupying army has continued its 
ceaseless bombing of civilians in Afrin. ---- The Kurdish people in Afrin are undergoing 
ethnic cleansing and genocide on the part of the Turkish army with the support of jihadist 
groups like Al-Qaeda, Al-Nusra and the remains of ISIS. ---- The international community 
still remains silent and looks away from the massacres of civilians. ---- Despite the 
adoption of a UN Security Council resolution on the ceasefire throughout Syria, attacks by 
the Turkish army intensified. The ceasefire is only on paper and there are no forces 
overseeing compliance with the UN resolution. The resolution offered a glimmer of hope to 
prevent further massacres of civilians. But Western governments are silent, which is 
making the EU, the US, Russia and the United Nations the accomplices of a genocide against 
Afrin's children. Since the UN resolution, 50 civilians have been killed, including many 
women and children, and in total since the Turkish state's first day of attack in Afrin, 
more than 280 civilians have been killed and 747 others injured.

Chemical and prohibited weapons against civilians in Afrin.

Turkey has been using chemical weapons against civilians. He attacked several villages 
with forbidden weapons. Thousands of civilians have been forced to flee their villages and 
seek refuge in the center of Afrin due to continuous air strikes and bombings.

Water and electricity completely cut in Afrin.

Now that the Afrin town center siege has begun, the Turkish army is especially aiming at 
infrastructure to force the evacuation of local residents. Water purifiers, bakeries, 
electricity and telephone lines are also being affected by Turkish attacks. From 
harassment to the plant of the Meydankê Dam in Afrin there is no longer any water and 
electricity supply.

The Kurds in Afrin now face the prospect of becoming victims of an ethnic cleansing 
campaign under which they will completely eliminate Afrin. The reality is that this 
enclave was historically one of the main areas of Kurdish majority, but the day after the 
invasion Erdogan stated that Turkey's intention was "to return Afrin to its rightful 
owners." It is clear that Turkish President Erdogan has started a campaign against all Kurds.

Turkey continues its attacks despite the UN Security Council Resolution urging a 30-day 
ceasefire on Syria. But the United Nations and international powers remain silent and 
inactive despite this commitment.

The results are clear:

Turkey is killing Kurds while the UN is silent.

Yesterday was ISIS in Kobane, today is the Turkish state in Afrin.

As Turkey assassinates, Europe, NATO, Russia and the UN only look.

The Turkish campaign means ethnic cleansing and genocide in Afrin.

icafrinresist.wordpress.com

Translation> Sol de Abril

Related Items:

https://noticiasanarquistas.noblogs.org/post/2018/03/11/europa-se-afrin-cai-sera-demasiado-tarde/

https://noticiasanarquistas.noblogs.org/post/2018/03/09/franca-turquia-afrin-%E2%80%A2-o-militarismo-mata/

https://noticiasanarquistas.noblogs.org/post/2018/02/22/italia-marcha-nacional-defendafrin/

anarchist-ana news agency

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Message: 2





Papyart is a serigraph and militant Libertarian lyonnais who stood out in the 1970s for 
the protection of the district of Croix-Rousse which was to be transformed into a business 
district. Among other things, he advocates for free access to public transport. The latest 
anti-fraud campaign of the Lyons Public Transport (TCL) shows users as criminals and 
solidarity as a crime (150 euros of fines for the donation of a transport ticket still 
valid). In response, Papyart is preparing an exhibition of the posters of the struggle for 
free transport in Lyon. ---- Libertarian alternative: Can you explain to us how and when 
began your commitment for free transport in Lyon ? ---- Papyart: My commitment actually 
began with the struggle for " cycle paths in Lyon " in the years 1975-1976. Indeed, at 
that time, the bikes were very unhealthy seen because according to the authorities, they 
hindered the traffic. Cyclists were accepted only for the Tour de France ! Recreational 
cycling, like MTB did not exist and even at the Tête d'Or Park, it was forbidden to ride a 
bike ! The privileged means of transport was the car, the mayor, Louis Pradel, and his 
team swore by the fast lanes, the hoppers and his best achievement was undoubtedly to lead 
the highway in front of Perrache station.

When I was 17, I went to Copenhagen, Denmark to visit the large squatter area of 
Christiana and there I discovered the thousands of bikes in the city center. It was a 
shock and, as soon as I got back, I participated in the production of silkscreen posters 
to demand bike paths. In different eco-libertarian groups, it was the era of the 
anti-nuclear maneuvers and the militants were less dogmatic. There was a silkscreen shop 
in the historic Horace Cardon building on rue Mercière. The first poster calling for a 
demo in June was on the premises of the Militia Action and Resistance Group (GARM). 75, 
was printed and signed by Friends of the Earth !

What actions have been taken ?

At the same time, the popular committee of the Croix-Rousse made a large-format wall 
newspaper, screen printed and stuck on the walls of the neighborhood. A fight was waged to 
demand a metro station at Croix-Paquet, which the TCL wanted to zap for profitability and 
speed, it was the time of the new metro. On this occasion, the population mobilized much 
especially the old ones who had known " the string to two cents "A super convenient tram 
that passed Rue Terme to go up the slopes to the plateau and that the mayor, Pradel, had 
deleted early in his term. Subsequently, the idea of free transport appeared in many 
claims, even in the program of a political group in vogue at the time, the PSU. The 
libertarians on rue Pierre-Blanc started making posters and then stickers, I printed some 
in a company where I worked, others did in offset, agitation began ! In 1988, the 
libertarian communist organization (OCL) of Lyon calls for a boycott of the ticket 
following the passage to 7 francs, the fines rain down ! In 1993, it was the " precarious 
unemployed committee Which takes over to demand free transport, TCL agencies are invaded. 
At the beginning of 2000, unions took up the idea of free, that's the time when some 
cities put it up.

In your opinion, why is free transport desirable ? Can public transit really be free ?

Yes, it is better to talk about the free use of public transport because there is always 
someone who pays the operating costs ; we see it with the participation of employers who 
cover 50% of the cost of the subscription of their employees. Other sources of funding are 
possible. Social college researchers battalions have been laying out entire shelves on 
this topic since time ! In the interest of public health, today with pollution, it has 
become vital that transport be free. In the field of management, TCL ticketing must cost 
them a fortune in machines and controls, they might save money !

What are your reactions to the latest anti-fraud campaign conducted by the TCL ?

I thought it was an up-to-date campaign, threatening and aggressive, and stupidly 
moralistic. Resume the visuals of the movie Usual Suspect, it's funny for hypsters 
moviegoers, unlike the " threat of custody " it always terrorizes the poorest, those who 
have nothing, no social worker to give them tickets, no bikes to get around, no boss who 
takes charge of the subscription. That's why I decided to react by doing this exhibition 
on past struggles, to show that the revolutionaries also make good communication, but human !

Tell us about your exhibition. How is the struggle for free education still relevant ?

It will be a poster exhibition of the XX th century on the theme of the struggle for " 
free transport ". They come from different sources. A majority was printed in Lyon, 
notament screen printing stickers with the famous slogan " Your ticket can still be used, 
give it to someone who goes " published for the 1 st time in 1978 and then taken by 
multiple groups decades following !

This is partly the message that was targeted in the last advertising campaign with the 
threat of a fine ! Social networks have reacted massively, some have diverted with talent 
posters. My exhibition could be an opportunity to discuss the graphic responses to 
consider when we are in front of these moralizing pubs, which come regularly dirty our 
mornings.

Interviewed by Julien I. (AL Lyon)

The exhibition Papyart "Free Transportation" will take place in March at 37 rue de 
Burdeau, in the 1 st district of Lyon. Exhibition opening Thursday 1 st March to 19 hours.

http://www.alternativelibertaire.org/?Papyart-serigraphe-libertaire-Il-est-devenu-vital-que-les-transports-soient

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Message: 3





It is not necessary to be specially formed to be an anarchist, in my opinion. The concept 
of Social Justice is a thread that sews each person with reality, until it makes you feel 
really uncomfortable. To get rid of the internalized concepts and face the experience from 
the perspective of the struggle, this has been my learning. Organic life, assemblies, the 
opportunity to have a voice and a body, and being a change agent forces a twist on you in 
an indescribable way. And little by little the rest, the theory, is learning. ---- Writing 
can be a personal learning exercise, too. Write about what it means to be a woman. It 
could fill pages of letters and allusions, lives in quotation marks, references in the 
struggle, but in the end they are no longer acts of others. It is absurd to deny the 
influence of other thoughts on one's own life, but perhaps it is by my personal moment, by 
the ever closer perception of the passage of time in myself, but by this time, having to 
look around to see what happens in me as a person, as a woman, as a worker, and as a 
mother annoyed at the impositions of what I am supposed to be.

I do not have any modesty anymore. No more than they require me. I still can not maintain 
a healthy relationship, without having shaved because I veto my own nature. While I make 
an appointment with the beautician of the moment, I dedicate myself to sharing angry 
images that represent my struggle against the aesthetic impositions of the system. It 
comforts me to think that many like me do the same. Claiming our space between wrinkles 
and gray hair as we struggle against every sign that makes us feel erased before 
ourselves. Capitalism and illusion of eternal youth. It's not easy to touch a cracked skin 
for years.

However, I claim my right to my sexual self. I refuse to feel wanted, I refuse to desire 
myself. I do not fit into the measurements of the mannequins of the underwear stores, I do 
not fit nowhere. I walk in the limbo of those who can still look at each other in the 
mirror by closing one eye. But I want, and I want to be wanted. The woman as an erotic 
self-demand, that's me. Fucking without complications and pursuing one's own satisfaction 
is also one of life's learning exercises. Not to feel submissive, to know how to impose a 
no, and to take on the weight of feigned orgasms that we carry on our backs, women who, 
like me, have learned from childhood that virtue was a gift submitted to your masculinity.

Free love, relational anarchy, sexual freedom, open relationships ... Metaphors of people 
seeking new models embedded in old clothes.

Safe environments no longer exist. Not even within anarcho-syndicalism. Contrary to what 
one might think, respect and feminist learning is not acquired by infused science when 
they give you the membership card. And you discover that once again your voice and your 
struggle dissipate in your genitals. Companion is just a word, not a reality. I remain in 
my effort not to quote, but if I want to create here a space for reflection for all those 
people who have ever claimed the feminist struggle as inherent within the anarchist and 
not as a separate process. Your struggle for better working conditions does not make you a 
feminist. Reading or sharing in networks a handled summary of Durruti speaking of her 
responsibilities at home does not make you a feminist. Plan a fraternal snack at the union 
site and contribute a lunchbox with whatever you have prepared your partner at home, 
that's what you say. Attending assemblies while your partner does the home care work 
alone, that's what you say.

The statutes are but words. Being a feminist organization by definition is no more than 
that. A debate is urgently needed to reflect on what it really means for an anarchist 
organization or to include the word feminist in its description.

Feminists are not mothers. We fight between education theories, some with flavor at more 
rancid times of fixing the woman to the baby. If we wish to incorporate ourselves into the 
world of work, we are criticized for being slaves to the system and an additional cog in 
the production scheme. Staying at home and playing the role of absolute mother, drawing 
Montessori toys with your own hands and weaving the early stimulation blankets begins to 
be an option for many women. It is certain, however, that this second alternative needs a 
capitalist partner as maintainer of the home. And that, in my view, annuls many facets of 
the woman-person, making her a mother-woman. But who am I? A mother educated by a 
pediatrician.

And soon we are this mass of women that we reconcile our personal and labor progression 
with a suffocating maternity for what it demands. And we, precisely, are the ones who have 
been expelled from the Confederate Eden. We, the ones who teach our children equality, 
those we play as judges and parties, have no place in late assemblies, week-long meetings 
at times of imperative child-repose, which we carry with three rucksacks to attend 
demonstrations. We are alone.

There are few unions that listen to the demands of a collective that we do not really want 
to be anywhere else. That union organizations continue to be eminently masculine spaces 
does not make anyone feel and reflect on what we are doing wrong so that we, who we know 
to concilia because we have no remedy, occupy our space in the fight. And if we do not 
fight, who does it for us? We are alone. Appealing to sorority in these cases is nothing 
more than evidence of the isolation of our existence.

It's March 8th. It calls for a feminist strike, a labor and care strike. I wonder if the 
convening organizations will take care of sending someone to my house to do all this 
invisible work each day or whether it is directly assumed that I will feed my son with a 
nasogastric tube, or leave him the snack in a feeder for cats with a yellow note on it: 
"See you tomorrow. Your mommy who loves you. " I also wonder if all the couriers that are 
coming to me with information on how to join the strike are being received by people who, 
at least for one day, should wear my high-heeled shoes and let me exercise my right to 
shout through the streets that I am still a person.

It's March 8, anyway. And I'm a woman. And wherever I am, I am anarcho-syndicalist. My 
incongruities between what I feel and how I live unite with other women who also speak in 
a low voice about the hope of what we would like to do when we grow up. Women who fight, 
comrades, we are not old. We are not mothers, we are not workers, we are no one. And we 
have one day a year to claim dignity, to remember that in any environment, but especially 
in the anarchist, we are on the same level as you. We are not Emma Goldman, we do not want 
to be Emman, nor Susan Brown, nor many others. We do not need models of reference because 
we are growing and we realize the emptiness around us. We, comrades, are there. We 
invisible feminists.

Cristina Cobo Hervás

Source: http://nosotras.cnt.es/opinion/anarquismo-las-relaciones-poder-la-feminista-escondida/

Translation> Sol de Abril

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Message: 4





The question of the name of the neighboring country became relevant again due to the 
increase in defense of the European Union and NATO, two supranational instruments of 
economic and military power, and also the desire of the Greek capital of expansion in the 
country of Macedonia. In other words,  the name contest was begun once again to serve the 
economic, military, and political interests of the ruling elites.  For this reason, 
nationalism and polarization have settled on both sides of the border. As poverty, 
control, exploitation and exclusion intensify, the Greek state attempts to establish 
social "peace" between the exploiter and the exploited in the imaginary community of the 
nation through the narrative that "our" enemy is a national threat and not the class struggle.

Our enemy is the state, the capital and its fascist reserves.

Solidarity with the  Scholio Free Social Center ,  the Libertatia occupation   and the 
self-organized theater  Empros .

Our allies are the occupations, the self-organized projects and those that fight against 
the authoritarian world.

Our struggle is against the exploitation and repression of humans by humans, for a world 
with equality, solidarity, justice and freedom. Our struggle is internationalist, against 
the motherland and borders, against nationalism and xenophobia.

It is our class, political and internationalist duty to make a barrier against local and 
international nationalism, as well as against the new wave of nationalistic illusion 
generously created by the media, the church and the political parties about the so-called 
"Macedonian problem."

Against the geopolitical antagonisms of the state, which have turned the world into a war 
zone, we will encourage solidarity among people and make it clear that we will not become 
a piece of meat for their weapons.

Instead of the Balkans with divided and bloody nation-states,  we will work across a 
Balkan peninsula without the scars of borders and without religious and nationalist 
divisions. We will work to make the Balkans a free movement space for both local and 
immigrant people, the Balkans as a large commune, the Balkans of those without power.

International struggles against nationalism, war and fascism, for the subversion of the 
state and capitalist barbarism.

For social revolution, anarchy and communism.

INTERNATIONAL MANIFESTATION OF BÁLCÁS

Saturday, March 10, at 12 noon. In Kamara, Thessaloniki.

Anarchist Group of Athens,  Vogliamo tutto e per tutti

vogliamotutto.espivblogs.net

Translation> César Antonio Cázarez Vázquez

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Message: 5





Trump's erratic presidency is a manifestation, not the cause, of democratic decay. The 
unfolding political crisis will outlast him. So must the resistance. ---- It's been a year 
since Donald Trump was inaugurated as the 45th President of the United States of America - 
and we're already exhausted. Exhausted by the endless stream of sexist and racist bigotry 
pouring out of his hideous face and Twitter feed. Exhausted by the rapid succession of 
24-hour scandals, one outrage sweeping another from the headlines before the immensity of 
the previous one has even begun to properly sink in. ---- Exhausted by the immature 
personal grudges and individual fallings-out that are constantly played out in public 
amidst the gratuitous threats of nuclear annihilation. Exhausted by the gas-lighting 
narcissism, the power-hungry egotism and the self-aggrandizing vanity of a 
multi-billionaire businessman who has never known anything but public adulation for his 
inherited wealth. Exhausted, frankly, by the very realization - recurring on a daily basis 
- that this man-child's maniacal delusions have actually been confirmed, insofar as he 
himself is concerned, by his election to the most powerful office in the world.

Nevertheless, amidst the storm of chaos that Donald Trump has unleashed upon the world, it 
becomes ever more necessary to take some distance from the headlines and reflect upon the 
broader meaning of the past year in American and global politics. For me personally, three 
observations stand out.

1) THE LIMITS OF TRUMP'S "DECLARATIVE POLITICS"

When Trump was first elected, many warned of his authoritarian ambitions and the threat of 
incipient fascism in America. In left-liberal circles, in particular, comparisons to 
Hitler and Mussolini were rife. There was always some merit to these concerns, as white 
supremacists clearly felt emboldened by Trump's "America first" rhetoric, and the brazen 
response of various alt-right and neo-Nazi groups has had far-reaching, even lethal 
consequences. But if his first year in office has confirmed anything, it is that Trump - 
while certainly a vile and dangerous racist who revels in hate speech against historically 
oppressed groups - was always far more interested in promoting himself than in a 
disciplined ideological commitment to a cause external to his own self-advancement.

In fact, what stands out is Trump's almost utter incapacity to move beyond what I call a 
narrow declarative politics - a superficial form of national-populism that panders to 
prevalent xenophobic and anti-establishment sentiment but relies almost entirely on 
discursive interventions, while making little systematic attempt to transform electoral 
promises or everyday bluster into tangible policy outcomes or new power configurations. In 
saying this, I certainly do not mean to downplay the material consequences of Trump's 
reactionary rhetoric or the disastrous policies he did manage to push through over the 
past year. But the fact that the president celebrated the first anniversary of his tenure 
amidst a government shutdown, even as his party controls both houses, is indicative of the 
isolated and relatively powerless position in which he finds himself.

On the election trail, Trump repeatedly promised to "drain the swamp" and rid Washington 
of "special interests." His erstwhile chief strategist, the now-estranged Steve Bannon, 
even vowed to "deconstruct the administrative state." Instead of presenting a rupture with 
the status quo, however, Trump has actually presided over its radicalization. Behind the 
scenes, the real power center in his administration continues to lie with Wall Street and 
Big Oil - just as it did under previous Republican and Democratic presidents. Far from 
descending into national-socialism, the United States remains governed by the same 
belligerent billionaire class that thrived under Reagan, Clinton, the Bushes and Obama 
-always  pursuing further tax cuts and financial deregulation.

This is not to say that nothing has changed. As I argued after the elections, Trump's 
victory speaks to a profound legitimation crisis of the neoliberal establishment, and to a 
broader incapacity of the United States to reproduce its hegemonic role in the liberal 
world order it created in the wake of World War II. Domestically, the elite consensus that 
cemented the politics of both major parties over the past four decades - especially around 
the issue of trade liberalization - is under severe attack from within, and 
internationally US power is clearly on the wane. Trump represents a desperate attempt to 
reverse the latter process by shattering the former consensus: countering America's 
decline by reasserting control over its national borders and replacing the liberal 
internationalism of the Clintons and Obamas with a new white nationalism.

Clearly, the consequences of this reversal have been most keenly felt by migrants, who 
rightly fear being deported by the new administration. Yet, without defending Trump, it is 
important to point out that US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers actually 
deported fewer people in 2017 than they did under Obama in 2016. So far, the domestic 
political implications of Trump's "populist" earthquake have therefore been more limited 
than is generally acknowledged. It is mostly Trump's declarations - his impulsive tweets 
and offensive statements - that defy the established liberal order; when it comes to the 
material constitution of US politics, the center still holds.

2) THE COMPLICITY OF THE LIBERAL #RESISTANCE

This brings me to the second and closely related observation: the extent to which the 
shallow "resistance" of the liberal establishment has actually played into the hands of 
the far right. Just as Trump's defiance operates mostly at the discursive level, so the 
Democratic Party leadership has done little to move beyond superficial declarations of 
indignation. When it comes to actual policy measures, leading Democrats have repeatedly 
enabled the Republicans to pursue their reactionary agenda - most recently voting along 
with their GOP counterparts to further extend the president's vast surveillance authority. 
As Glenn Greenwald astutely pointed out in The Intercept, "the same Democrats who denounce 
Trump as a lawless treasonous authoritarian just voted to give him vast warrantless spying 
powers." So much for the #resistance.

Moreover, by focusing almost all of their attention on Trump as a person, wilfully 
overlooking their own responsibility for shaping the systemic political and economic 
conditions that brought him to power, centrist Democrats have entirely missed the bigger 
story: the fact that no one really trusts them anymore to solve the country's most 
pressing problems. As I noted right after the elections, Trump did not win because he was 
popular - Hillary lost because she was extremely unpopular. What has been most astonishing 
over the past year has been the Democrats' outright refusal to recognize this most basic 
fact. Instead of looking inwards for answers and assuming part of the blame for Trump's 
rise to power, the best they could come up with was to reinvent a set of Cold War scare 
stories about Russian interference in US political life.

Interestingly, the liberal opposition has thereby chosen to operate its #resistance 
strategy almost entirely on the terrain of right-wing politics, using the president's 
"national treason" and "mental incompetence "- rather than his overt sexism, racism and 
classism - as the primary prongs in their attempt to push him from office. By drawing the 
battle lines this way, the Democratic establishment is already shaping the terms of debate 
for the post-Trump era: instead of laying the groundwork for a wider assault on 
patriarchy, white supremacy and the concentrated power of the billionaire class, the 
liberal elite aims to present Trump as a mere aberration within a broader legal and 
political framework of otherwise fair, sound and functional political institutions.

The liberal media, for its part, has been happy to play along with this game. Once 
identified by Steve Bannon as the authentic "opposition party," major centrist 
broadcasters and newspapers like CNN and the New York Times are certainly trying their 
best to discredit the president - but their obsessive preoccupation with his personal life 
and his outrageous public statements belies a similar short attention span as Trump's. The 
media's constantly renewed sense of indignation is simply being absorbed into the giant 
spectacle that Trump himself continues to feed; the media simply responds, always on the 
back foot, to the latest Twitter outrage. Almost every other day a new scandal hits the 
headlines - in the past two weeks alone we have gone from "a bigger nuclear button" to 
allegations of advanced dementia, from "shithole countries" to hush money for porn stars - 
but none of these stories seem to stick for longer than 48 hours before the media 
collectively piles in on the next big distraction.

The result is that Trump and his liberal opposition end up holding each other up in 
perfect suspension - both effectively paralyzed by the inflexible and increasingly 
ossified institutions of representative democracy, and both exceedingly frustrated by 
their relative impotence and failure to advance in their stated objectives. It is always 
Groundhog Day at the White House. Stuck in a political deadlock of sorts, it is precisely 
the relative powerlessness of the president and his liberal opposition that perpetuates 
the overwhelming sense of crisis. The same mutual "impotence" will also make for a 
particularly dangerous situation in the years ahead- for despite the institutional 
stalemate in which he finds himself, Trump still has that "bigger nuclear button" on his desk.

3) THE ENDURING NATURE OF THE POLITICAL CRISIS

This finally brings me to the third observation, which is that Trump is not the cause but 
a consequence of the broader democratic crisis in which American politics-and, indeed, 
politics around the world-currently finds itself. Surely his presidency will accelerate 
and intensify the contradictions at work here, but the roots of the present calamity run 
much deeper and will outlast the sitting president by years, if not decades. Trump, in 
short, is not just a dysfunctional aberration within an otherwise functional political 
order, nor does he alone constitute an existential threat to the survival of American 
democracy. Rather, he is a morbid symptom of a system entering into an advanced state of 
decay.

It follows that the opposition to the president and his reactionary brand of far-right 
national populism cannot limit itself to the same level of declarative politics at which 
Trump himself operates. The shallow #resistance rhetoric of the centrist Democratic 
establishment will prove wholly incapable of redressing the broader systemic crisis. Even 
if Trump is unseated from office, either through impeachment or in the 2020 elections, the 
same popular discontents that brought him to power will continue to fester and eat away at 
the perceived legitimacy of the old political elites and representative institutions. To 
respond convincingly to these dynamics of democratic decay will require a degree of 
social, political and economic transformation that no mainstream politician in the country 
is willing to publicly countenance at this point.

The left, for its part, if it ever gains power, will encounter many of the same challenges 
and limitations that Trump and his white-nationalist minions are currently running in to: 
from a hostile media and entrenched party bureaucracy to inflated popular expectations and 
the rigor mortis of existing institutions. Moving from a politics of opposition to a real 
movement that can withstand the counter-attacks of capital, the far right and the 
neoliberal establishment to abolish the present state of things will require a level of 
political organization and strategic thinking on a scale far beyond anything currently 
found on the left-even among the well-intentioned camp of Bernie Sanders supporters.

There are therefore important lessons to be drawn from the experience of the past year. 
The declarative politics of left-populism, with its emphasis on discourse and its grand 
promises of a reinvigorated social-democratic politics, will likely falter in the absence 
of a broader campaign to rebuild popular power from below. Socialism, even in its innocent 
Nordic garden variety, cannot simply be declared into existence after wresting the 
decaying institutions of liberal democracy from Trump's tiny hands. To chart an 
emancipatory way out of the current standoff between the authoritarian neoliberal 
establishment and an authoritarian nationalist president will require a much more 
extensive commitment towards mobilizing popular mass movements, countering political 
fragmentation and instituting new forms of radical democracy from below.

I contend that the crisis we are living through is of a general and structural nature. The 
social, political and economic institutions that underpinned the postwar world order, 
enabling the triumph of global capitalism and the consolidation of liberal democracy, are 
now in a process of decomposition. It would be very dangerous to reduce these 
world-historical developments to the inanities of a single person, no matter how vile or 
threatening they may be. Trump's erratic presidency is a manifestation, not the cause, of 
the wider democratic decay that has accompanied the neoliberal turn of the past four 
decades. The unfolding political crisis will outlast him. So must the resistance.
Related Link: https://roarmag.org/essays/dangers-focusing-attention-donald-trump/

https://www.anarkismo.net/article/30878

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Message: 6





We seem to have found a way to get a few more groups without them actually being in CW - 
RESPECTING THEIR AUTONOMY and working as and when with them...........heres a group from 
Brum working with us.........
Thanks for the support! We're definitely happy to work with Class War in any way, and 
hopefully we can provide some assistance wherever possible . We're very much looking 
forward to the Class War paper coming back, and will happily distribute a few hundred 
copies around Birmingham etc once it's available and we can buy some. We'll be in touch 
when we have some activism ideas, and hope you guys feel free to do the same. It's about 
time those rich bastards had the smiles wiped off their faces .
Class War

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Message: 7





We call on Monday, 12.3.2018 to start with this militant campaign wherever we can hit the 
rulers: Radical, creative and courageous, involve you and organize local actions as a 
prelude to a resistance that will show the powerful of this world that Afrin is not alone. 
Like the people of Rojava, we also say: "Together we will fight, together we will lose, or 
together we will win". ---- Long live the international solidarity! ---- If Afrin falls 
... It will be too late ---- By ANA on March 11, 2018 ---- 
europe-se-afrin-will-be-too-late-1 ---- [We make a call on Monday 12.3.2018 to start with 
this militant campaign anywhere, that we can strike at the rulers. Let us take a radical, 
creative and courageous part. Let us organize local actions as a prelude to a resistance 
that will show the powerful in this world that Afrin is not alone. As they say in Rojava, 
we also say: "We will fight together, we will lose together or we will conquer together."]

For more than 6 weeks we have seen the attack and occupation of Afrin, the western canton 
of Rojava, by the Turkish state alongside Islamist groups linked to al-Qaeda and ISIS. In 
this extermination campaign, the invaders are not afraid to use deliberate bombardments 
against the civilian population and even chemical weapons. Islamic mercenaries and fascist 
Turkish soldiers leave a trail of devastation, plunder, rape and murder, and practice 
ethnic cleansing in the territory of the Kurds. To date, more than 300 civilians and many 
militants have given their lives, dozens of villages have been destroyed and hundreds of 
thousands have been forced to flee their homes.

Despite the determined resistance of the people of Afrin and the YPG / YPJ / SDF defense 
units, the Turkish army manages to gain more ground every day. While the Turkish offensive 
was stagnant in the border area of the canton during the first month, in recent days 
important cities like Raco and Shera were conquered by the invaders. Its destination is 
the city of Afrin, the place where until now they found refuge the civilians that fled of 
the villages and the small towns that were conquered.

This is possible thanks to the massive use of modern NATO technology, such as fighter 
jets, artillery, tanks and drones. The Islamic-Fascist war against Afrin is not only 
Erdogan's attempt to destroy the Kurdish liberation movement. While Russia opens the door 
to the Turkish air forces the Syrian regime of Assad indeed remains inactive. NATO 
actively supports this war with information on intelligence, military technology, weapons 
and ammunition from Western factories. The hypocritical messages of the palaces of power 
can not hide the fact that this war is nothing more than the calculation of the rulers 
with the revolution of Rojava. It is the calculation against the attempt to confront the 
capitalist system with a self-determined alternative of radical democracy, liberation of 
women, true gender equality and social ecology.

The radical left across the world should be aware of the historic importance of these 
days. The attack on Afrin is an attempt to destroy the most promising revolutionary 
project of our generation. The Rojava revolution is not only the only significant 
emancipatory prospect in the Middle East, it is also one of the last rays of hope left to 
make another world possible.

Like no other revolution of the last decades, Rojava inspired us and shows us how radical 
and beautiful the struggle for the liberation of society can be. The heroic resistance of 
the YPG and YPJ in Kobane and the self-organization of the population under the initiative 
of women liberators enchant thousands of leftists, anarchists, socialists and feminists. 
Throughout the world this revolution is discussed, admired and motive of solidarity; 
hundreds of people made their way to Rojava and participated in the resistance against 
ISIS and in building a new society. Despite all the contradictions, Rojava's movement, 
with its determination, its connection with people and the concrete implementation of our 
utopias, became the most important focus of the global struggle against capitalism, 
patriarchy and racism.

Today, this design lies between the sword and the wall. The war in Afrin is a struggle 
between existence or non-existence for revolution in Rojava. If Afrin falls, Minbij will 
fall, too. With a victory for the Turkish state west of the Euphrates, US imperialism will 
also reshape its regional strategy and consider turning Syria north to Islamic militias 
affiliated with Turkey under the label of FSA, a new ally of ISIS, and al-Qaeda / 
Al-Nusra. This would be not only the beginning of ethnic cleansing and the bloody end of 
Rojava's revolution, but also the beginning of a new phase in the development of Turkish 
fascism as the source of world Islam: Erdogan's dreams about the new Ottoman Empire with 
him like Sultan to the head, would no longer have any counterpart. The internal 
dictatorship would consolidate for decades, the colonial expansion would extend to the 
outside. The Middle East would be driven deeper into the chaos of war and annihilation 
without a force that could develop an emancipatory alternative.

The fact that events in the Middle East have a direct impact on political and social 
processes also in Europe and other parts of the world has been demonstrated not only by 
ISIS attacks in recent years. Also the rise of racism, sexism and anti-Semitism in 
European societies, the new militarism and the increasing calls for the authoritarian 
state with the return of the radical right, are directly related. We must be aware that 
the conditions under which we, the radical left, are struggling in the centers of power, 
are also affected to a great extent by the international balance of power. As well as the 
political conditions in the metropolis of capitalism, they influence the conditions under 
which our friends fight in Afrin.

The people of Rojava stand still, YPG / YPJ / SDF oppose these developments. And so far 
this resistance has been successful just because people have decided to give it all away. 
However, Afrin will not be able to defend himself against the brutal superiority of 
attacks by the Turkish army and its Islamist collaborators without international support. 
But despite weeks of protests around the world, the states of North America to Russia, 
across Europe, cling to their cruel decision to end this revolution, and seem to have 
sealed the fate of the people in Rojava. The resistance in Afrin will only succeed if we 
are ready to give everything, even if it is the most valuable.

We will not continue to passively contemplate this injustice. We will not leave the people 
alone in Rojava and our comrades in the struggle, because the war against Afrin is a war 
against us. The Turkish attack on Afrin is NATO's political, economic and military push at 
the heart of our revolutionary struggles, our dreams and our hopes. Let us return this war 
where it was approved, endorsed, legitimized and produced. We will raise the costs for 
those who benefit from this war. We will hold those who support the murder of civilians 
accountable, legitimize it as a supposed "war on terror". And we will make the deaf 
European public listen, we will remind our societies that we are all responsible for what 
governments are doing on our behalf.

In this sense, we call on the emancipating forces around the world to break the silence, 
and give voice to the people of Rojava so that no one else can ignore it. If not we, who 
else can claim responsibilities to our societies? The situation in Afrin is an existential 
threat to all our revolutionary perspectives. When, if not now, is it time to risk 
everything? If Afrin falls, it will be too late. Only if we give everything, we can win 
everything.

The actions of solidarity with the resistance in Afrin were correct and accurate. We 
salute all the comrades who have been organizing, manifesting themselves and carrying out 
direct actions for weeks. These were important moments, but they are not enough. In the 
present situation, the murderous silence and support of Turkish fascism by the 
international community obliges us to other means. We must exercise the right to 
self-defense of our hopes.

Direct action can not only be a concrete intervention in the war and propaganda machine of 
the Turkish state and its supporters, it has much more potential to draw attention to the 
extraordinary urgency of the situation. Burning Turkish embassies and consulates, 
sabotaging armaments companies and massive militant actions against the symbols of 
capitalism and imperialist rule, will break the silence and make the atrocities of Turkish 
fascism impossible to ignore. The system in Europe feeds on us to make us dependent and 
stun us, to pacify conflicts and contradictions. Let the illusion of social peace be 
consumed by the flames. Let us demonstrate to the rulers that we will resist the attacks 
with the people of Rojava and will defend all that the revolution means in Rojava, which 
is also our revolution.

We make a call on Monday 12.3.2018 to start with this militant campaign anywhere, that we 
can strike at the rulers. Let us take a radical, creative and courageous part. Let us 
organize local actions as a prelude to a resistance that will show the powerful in this 
world that Afrin is not alone. As they say in Rojava, we also say: "We will fight 
together, we will lose together or we will conquer together."

Afrin will not fall!

Biji Berxwedana Afrin

Long live international solidarity!

fight4afrin.noblogs.org

Translation> Sol de Abril

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Message: 8





In the context of its progressive disintegration, the authoritarian patriarchal capitalist 
system attacks * intensifies repression, promotes sexist violence and social cannibalism 
with the aim of fragmenting the body of the oppressed * disseminates intolerance, 
nationalism and fascism with the aim of subjugating the " internal enemy "by striking the 
threat of external dangers and bringing forward the imaginary community of national 
interests dominated and dominated by the true community of internationalist sentiments. of 
the ranks of exploited, women and men. ---- The shake-up of the "Macedonian issue" and the 
intensification of state competition in the Balkans in the context of the US strategy to 
stabilize their sovereignty in the region can only trigger tensions, such as those 
recently expressed in the organization of nationalist rallies in Thessaloniki and Athens, 
rallies which were accompanied by attacks by fascists on self-organized struggle 
structures (Front, ESC School) culminating in the arson of occupation of Libertatia in 
Thessaloniki. Attacks that have continued, such as that of the Golden Dawn members at 
Favela in Piraeus and the failed attempt to arrest the occupation of 37 Lace Karagianni in 
Athens.

In this nationalist delirium, the most advanced parts of Greek society oppose: anarchists 
and anarchists, anti-fascists and anti-fascists, youths who organized and participated in 
the internationalist anti-fascist rallies of January 21 in Thessaloniki and February 4 in 
Athens. It is no coincidence that the arson of occupation of Libertatia took place at the 
time when the comrades of occupation took part in the anti-fascist concentration in Kamara.

Nationalism and fascism are the most brutal expression of state totalitarianism. For women 
in the stratums, the nationalist narrative holds the worst: behind the sanctity of the 
woman's role as a modest and dedicated mother lies the sad reality of transforming her 
into a life-giving body destined to serve the interests of the state and capitalist 
mechanisms, all the more so at a time when the clouds of war in the Balkans seem to be 
thickening. The degradation of the woman, related to the fascist rhetoric of separation 
into "higher" and "inferior" beings based on characteristics such as gender and race, is 
the ideological alibi for providing cheap labor power in times of crisis. Capitalism is a 
powerful economic system, which benefits from these segregations. At this point, we could 
not fail to mention migrant and refugee women, the most trapped part of the socially 
excluded, who become the main recipient of the intolerant rhetoric and capitalist 
exploitation. Women who have been forced to leave their countries because of war or 
economic deprivation are treated as unwanted populations in which everything is permitted: 
their encroachment on miserable living conditions, rape as a daily reality, forced 
prostitution by the international slave traders' circuits trafficking, turning them into 
north for the bosses as a cheap workforce in the destination countries. we could not fail 
to mention immigrant women and women refugees, the most depraved part of the socially 
excluded, who become the main recipient of intolerant rhetoric and capitalist 
exploitation. Women who have been forced to leave their countries because of war or 
economic deprivation are treated as unwanted populations in which everything is permitted: 
their encroachment on miserable living conditions, rape as a daily reality, forced 
prostitution by the international slave traders' circuits trafficking, turning them into 
north for the bosses as a cheap workforce in the destination countries. we could not fail 
to mention immigrant women and women refugees, the most depraved part of the socially 
excluded, who become the main recipient of intolerant rhetoric and capitalist 
exploitation. Women who have been forced to leave their countries because of war or 
economic deprivation are treated as unwanted populations in which everything is permitted: 
their encroachment on miserable living conditions, rape as a daily reality, forced 
prostitution by the international slave traders' circuits trafficking, turning them into 
north for the bosses as a cheap workforce in the destination countries.

Nationalist and fascist totalitarianism consists, among other things, in the denial of any 
other identity beyond the national one. In this context, being a woman and struggling to 
overturn the existing state of affairs is a double "crime": the "crime" of a violation of 
"female nature" that destines the woman for the role of the mother who feeds the forces of 
the nation and the "crime" of questioning "national unity" through the emergence of the 
competitive interests of sovereign and predominant, exploiters and exploiters. From this 
point of view, it is not accidental the "special treatment" reserved by the oppressive 
powers of the struggling women, with the examples of the torture of the arrested 
anti-fascist mopeds in Ag.

Against this grim reality that the powers in the Balkans and the Eastern Mediterranean and 
across the globe reserve for us, we put forward the organized and structured presence on 
the road in order to oppose class and internationalist solidarity among the peoples, the 
organized class counter-attack exploiting women and men to overthrow the world of 
patriarchy, state and capitalism, to create a society of equality, solidarity and justice 
without exploiting transnational wars and disorienting competition.

INTERNATIONAL FIGHTING
AGAINST PATRIARCH, THE STATE AND CAPITAL
AGAINST NATIONALITY, PHASE AND WAR
FOR THE SOCIAL EXCHANGE OF ANARCHY AND
FREEDOM COMMEMORATION

ALL AND ALL IN THE PAMBLANIAN SOLIDARITY DECLARATION ON
LIBERTATIA DOWNLOAD TO BE
DECISED 10 MARCH IN THESSALONIKI Pre-concentration ahead of Libertatia at 11am
Concentration in Kamara at 12 noon

Group Against Patriarchate
Anarchist Political Organization-Federation of Collectivities

https://ipposd.wordpress.com/2018/03/13

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