Today's Topics:
1. Canada, Collectif Emma Goldman - Racism and discrimination:
the myth of Canadian exceptionalism (fr, it, pt)[machine
translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
2. Belarus, pramen: Call for International Week of Solidarity
With Anarchist Prisoners 2020 // 23 - 30 August
(a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
3. cnt.es: Women Defend Rojava Madrid condemns Turkey's brutal
attack on Helîncê (ca) (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
4. US, Expanding the Struggle: Notes on the Future of the
#BlackLivesMatter Movement - by Black Rose NYC
(a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
5. Britain, anarchist communist ACG: Crops Not Shops: For
Health and Food Security, Against Capitalism and Climate Change
(a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
6. icl-cit: Solidarity with School Teachers in Greece (ca)
(a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
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Message: 1
Text written by Brintha Koneshachandra, doctoral candidate in history, University of Montreal. The article appeared on the storyengaged.ca
website. Link to the original, here . ---- In the United States, brutality and police killings affecting the African-American community
sparked a protest movement from east to west of the country. This protest movement, which also denounces systemic racism and the status quo
more widely, is rapidly gaining momentum. From Paris to Montreal, as in many other countries, protests like what is observed in the United
States are heard. Each claims the names of their own victims: in Montreal, the names of Regis Korchinski-Paquet, Nicholas Gibbs, Pierre
Coriolan, Alain Magloire, René Gallant, Anthony Griffin, Preslie Leslie, Osmond Fletcher , Kirt Haywood, Marcellus François and Trevor Kelly
echo.
On June 1, 2020, the Prime Ministers of Canada responded. In Quebec, François Legault said during his daily press conference that systemic
racism did not exist in the province: "I think that discrimination exists in Quebec, but there is no systemic discrimination. There is no
system of discrimination[1]. Ontario Premier Doug Ford noted that Canada does not have a history of systemic racism rooted in its
construction as it would have been in the United States.[2]
By positioning themselves on the inexistence of systemic racism in Quebec, Ontario, or the rest of Canada, are not the people who run the
provinces and the country continuing to invisibilize the communities concerned and discriminate against them? that affect them, but also to
maintain the idea of Canadian exceptionalism? It is a dangerous path that was taken for the umpteenth time in June 2020.
From stories to history: the construction of two countries
Olivier le Jeune, who died in 1654, was the first slave bought in the region of what is now Quebec. In Canada, the slavery of panis and
afrodescendants between 1689 and 1834, under the British and French colonial regime, was a common practice. Between 1750 and 1834, from
Detroit to the Gaspé, approximately 4,185 slaves were identified, the majority of whom were Aboriginal. Historian Marcel Trudel believes
that this number could be 5,000 to 6,000 slaves[3]. At the end of the 18th century, the sale of slaves on markets in Quebec was customary.
The slave was part of a social order accepted in New France. Under the British regime, around 2000 slaves tried to escape to the free states
of the northern United States by taking a Southbound Underground Railroad[4]. Contrary to popular belief, the first Underground Railroad
between the United States and Canada was actually used to free the slaves detained on Canadian territory, and not vice versa. Although
anecdotal for some, this information mainly helps to deconstruct this myth of Canadian exceptionalism and to account for the racial
construction of the Canadian nation, which was formed on genocide, exploitation and oppression of indigenous and black communities.
On both sides of the border, the practice of slavery was a very real social reality. In the United States, the 13th amendment subsequently
led the country to practice multiple forms of discrimination[5]: Jim Crow laws in the South, supporting the principle of "separate but
equal", and various forms of exclusions and racial segregation in northern cities through redlining processes, for example[6]. In this
context of total institutional segregation, African-American communities have built a parallel black society including schools, hospitals,
universities, churches, associations and businesses. This was found in the southern states, but also in northern cities, such as Chicago or
Detroit, where we find the African-American districts of Paradise Valley and Black Bottom. It would therefore seem that a microsociety
developed in parallel with a dominant white society, which was oppressive and discriminatory for African-American communities in the
post-abolition era. In Canada, demographically speaking, the African-Canadian community was much smaller than the African-American community
at the turn of the 20th century. Historian Dorothy Williams points out:
"In the United States, widespread discrimination has created two parallel societies. Black Americans lived in a completely segregated
society, from top to bottom, and had their own universities, businesses, lawyers, newspapers, hospitals, traders, black workers. But in
Canada, where opportunities were supposed to be equal, the vast majority of blacks, whatever their skills, were only accepted at one level
of society - the bottom.[7]"
According to Dorothy Williams, in the United States, the segregation processes have led to the construction of a parallel African-American
society. While in Canada, and in Quebec, this persistent myth of equality and a raceless Canada did not allow the development of a parallel
society, nor the acceptance of African-Canadian communities within the dominant society white, if only at one level of society - the bottom.
On both sides of the border, societies are built around processes of racial discrimination and exclusion with different mechanisms, but the
results of which come together: the exclusion of black identity and the consideration of it as inhuman. In Nova Scotia, for example, within
the city of Halifax with the black district of Africville, governments have implemented a system of legal segregation. Among other things,
we can think of segregated schools, which are an eloquent example. As for Montreal and elsewhere in Canada, "Emily Robertson raised in an
oral history interview in 2017 that racial discrimination in Canada was often a subtle matter, you know, a subtle matter ... If you go to a
restaurant, you are the last person they come to serve[8]".
Demonstration in Montreal on June 7, 2020 (Credit: Brintha Koneshachandra)
There is therefore a circularity of physical movements, ideas, practices and modes of resistance between the two borders. Like the
transnational protest movements today, the circularization of ideas for the liberation of black people arrives in Montreal through the
pan-African movements, civil rights or Black Power. Oppressed in a dominant white Canadian society, the Montreal black community identified,
and identifies, with the struggles and ideas put forward by African-American activists and intellectuals. At the turn of the 20th century,
Marcus Garvey went to Quebec's metropolis - he was arrested there by the police - and opened the second branch of the Universal Negro
Improvement Association there.in 1919, where the parents of Malcom X will meet elsewhere[9]. The civil rights and Black Power movement
popularized by Stokely Carmichael also influenced the ideologies of various associations in Montreal, including the Negro Citizienship
Association in the 1950s. Following the Sir George Williams affair, testimony gathered for the Montreal Gazette emphasized:
"For 400 years, we've been exploited. We've been beaten. We've been shot. Not only in raceland USA We've been discriminated against here.
We've been exploited here. We've been degraded here. We've got to get things straight here, too. 1968 is the time to put an end to the
discrimination, the exploitation, the degradation[10]. "
Points of convergence and difference can be identified in the mechanisms of racial discrimination, segregation, oppression and exploitation
within the two territories. The building of nations was formed on the making of a white supremacist identity and the racial domination of
indigenous and Afro-descendant populations. Canada and the United States are therefore based on a system based on racial exploitation, from
yesterday to today. The report on race relations in Ontario (1992) by Stephen Lewis, but also the recent publication by Robyn Maynard
NoirEs, under surveillance. Slavery, repression and state violence in Canada(2018), participates in the deconstruction of this myth of the
multicultural ideal and Canadian exceptionalism which still persists until today. Canada is also anchored in a global history of
colonization and slavery that has built black identity by perpetually questioning the humanity of these communities.
Building the myth of Canadian exceptionalism
If similarities are visible and easily identifiable in the construction of the two nations, how is it that the myth of Canadian
exceptionalism is so persistent? Indeed, at the heart of the national formation of the Canadian territory is the myth of a raceless Canada
with astonishing innocence existing in parallel with a raceland United States of America . The state builds and deconstructs different
narratives through its institutions, which has extremely dangerous consequences for the consolidation of collective memory. From yesterday
to today, the country sees itself associated with a saving role, a welcoming land and let us recall here the myth of the Underground
Railroaddeconstructed previously. This concept of Canadian exceptionalism is still widely publicized today, Canadian identity also being
associated today with the international, in most western countries, with that of a multicultural country, a welcoming land. The myth of
innocence and Canadian exceptionalism is established and endures through invisibility and the construction of public discourse.
The change that distinguishes Canadian identity from that of its neighbors manifests itself first of all in semantics. The transformation
took place by the transition from the use of the term race to that of origin or ethnic group. Constance Backhouse's work on the legal
history of racism in Canada reveals that one of the strategies adopted by the country is notably to abandon racial categories to designate
population groups. At the turn of the 20th century, the federal government still used racial categories determined by color: white, red,
black, yellow. It was from 1951 that Canada officially abandoned the use of American racial categories, where the race of individuals was
designated by the color associated with them. From the middle of the 20th century, there was an abandonment of the use of the term race in
favor of that of origin or else ethnicity- term still used today. The 1951 census report conceded that the use of the terms origin or
ethnicity made it possible to collect information that was cultural, biological and geographic. References to elements of culture, geography
and biology to define categories of human groups demonstrate that in reality this passage from race to origin and / or ethnicity was only a
semantic change, without being noun: they simply demonstrate the transmutability and impermanence of the concept of race[11], as Ted Rutland
points out:
"Modern and scientific conceptions of race appeared precisely when the system of formal slavery died out, transferring the concept of black
identity from a legal (subject) register to a series of biological, cultural and politicians who reaffirmed and supported the conceptions of
the slavery era of black inferiority and inhumanity[12]".
If historically and semantically speaking, Canada wishes to distinguish itself from its American neighbor, the construction of the myth of
Canadian exceptionalism is also formed by the invisibility and rewriting of the experience and experiences of black Canadian communities, a
particularly tangible process in archival institutions. The African-Canadian experience related to slavery or other multifaceted process of
discrimination is often downplayed or overlooked. One form of invisibility involves the absence of racial data collection in Canada. For a
historian, this means having to multiply sources more than normal as the community is invisible, as pointed out by Rinaldo Walcott[13].Negro
Community Association-, the historian Steven High discusses the silence of the sources on the presence of the black communities within the
archives of the city of Montreal. The data gathered within the archives have made the black presence invisible and seems to present the
district as a predominantly French-speaking place, even though Little Burgundy was the cradle of Montreal's black population and culture. In
reviewing some 1,000 photographs of the expropriation of apartments in the neighborhood, the historian points out that only a few of these
photographs evoke the presence of the black community in this Montreal neighborhood. Most of the residents represented were white French
speakers, as he says: "The expropriation photographs[...]thus record racial exclusion[14]".
In addition to invisibility and silence in municipal archives, for example[16], this myth of Canadian exceptionalism is based on and is also
constituted by the erasure of the experiences and experiences of black communities, the minimization of these experiences. , in particular
by constantly bringing them back to a comparison with the American giant, and by building public discourse. This discourse of Canadian
difference is also manifested through education. In her thesis, Catherine Larochelle demonstrated that imperialist, racist, orientalist, but
also gendered discourses and ideologies circulated in the Quebec school system in the 19th and 20th centuries. Institutions such as schools,
and by extension education itself, have continuously participated in building and maintaining systemic racism: presenting the Other (when
presented), producing a discourse, stereotypes and rhetoric around it. These discourses participate in the formation of a white and
supremacist Canadian identity[17]. In terms of public speeches, words like those made by Prime Minister François Legault participate in the
reproduction of the ideal of the Canadian exception, even if the country is built on operating systems , oppression and genocide of
populations: indigenous peoples and black communities.
The dangers of silence
Denying the existence of systemic racism in Canadian society is extremely dangerous, in addition to saying a great deal about the mechanism
by which society is constructed and the dominant national identity. The silence, denial and invisibility of the experiences and experiences
of oppressed communities marginalize their lives by keeping them on the outskirts of society. In this case, this denial puts forward a
story, that of a white colonial supremacy. By denying the experiences, experiences and history of oppressed communities, public discourse
and institutions only further marginalize and exclude these communities from the building of the Canadian nation. Canadian exceptionalism,
which invisibilizes and discredits the experiences and experiences of the communities, is violence for the communities concerned. These
ideals and the rejection of historical reality impact both societal, collective memory and the construction of Canadian identity. Let's name
systemic racism. Let us name the faults of Canadian society, its national construction on economic and racial exploitation, let us name its
functioning which is anchored in systemic racism. Name, instead of ignoring it. To name instead of to deny.
Systemic racism does not only manifest itself in the form of apartheid in South Africa, or under Jim Crow laws in the southern states of the
United States. It is a global process. It can be legal, but it can also appear in more subtle ways. The individual racism of our societies
emanates from systemic racism, both of which feed off, which contributes to their maintenance. It is time to stop denying and pursuing the
ideal of Canada's multicultural myth and its exceptionalism. Canadian exceptionalism does not exist. It is time to confront the examination
of the faults of Canadian society, in order to be able to heal this plague, wide open, for centuries.
To dig into the subject of systemic racism would also be to realize that it perversely occupies all strata of our societies: the nation
being part of a larger, global process, and of a system operating on mechanisms of economic exploitation. and racial. To question systemic
racism is to reject the status quo.
[1]Valérie Boisclair, "Discrimination exists in Quebec, but it is not systemic, according to Legault", Radio Canada , June 1, 2020:
https://ici.radio-canada.ca/nouvelle/1708260/racisme- francois-legault-quebec-discrimination-manifestation-livre-vert
[2]"Doug Ford's comments on racism ignore history of black trauma in Canada, writers says", CBC News , June 3, 2020: https://www.cbc.ca
/news/canada/toronto/doug-ford-racism-kathleen-newman-bremang-canada-1.5596346
[3]Marcel Trudel. Myths and realities in the history of Quebec (T1). Montreal: Hurtubise editions, 2010, p. 183-184.
[4]Dorothy Williams. Blacks in Montreal, 1628-1986: An Urban Democracy. Montreal: Éditions Yvon Blais, 1989.
[5]The text of the 13th amendment emphasizes: "Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for a crime of
which the guilty party has been duly convicted, will not exist in the United States or in any of the places subject to their jurisdiction.
Section 2. The Congress will have the power to give effect to this article by appropriate legislation ".
[6]Defined by sociologist John McKnight in the 1960s, the redlining process refers to the discriminatory practices which consisted in
refusing and limiting loans to populations located in a certain geographic area. This process took place in the 1930s in many cities in the
northern United States. These practices particularly affected the African-American communities, which were refused loans or rentals in
certain white areas, since their presence could harm the coast of the district. The Home Owners' Loan Corporationhas created residential
security cards for around 239 cities, indicating the level of risk of investments for different neighborhoods. These cards have long been
used by private and public companies, which have consistently refused loans to black communities.
[7]Williams, Op. Cit ., P.44.
[8]Steven High, "Little Burgundy: The Interwoven Histories of Race, Residence and Work in Twentieth-Century Montreal", Urban History Review
, 46: 1, 2017, p. 25.
[9]Erik S. McDuffie, "The Diasporic Journeys of Louise Little: Grassroot Garveyism, the Midwest and Community Feminism", Women, Gender and
Families of Color , 4: 2, 2016.
[10]"Montreal Mourned and Cried with Black and White together ", The Montreal Gazette , April 8, 1968, in Sean Mills. The Empire Within:
Postcolonial Thought and Political Activism in Sixties Montreal , Montreal: McGill-Queen University Press, 2010.
[11]Nell Irvin Painter. The History of White People . New York: WW Norton & Company, 2010.
[12]Ted Rutland. Displacing Blackness: Planning, Power and Race in Twentieth Century Halifax . Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2018,
p. 22.
[13]Rinaldo Walcott. Black Like Who? Writing Black Canada . Toronto: Insomniac Press, 1997.
[14]Steven High, "Little Burgundy: The Interwoven Histories of Race, Residence and Work in Twentieth-Century Montreal", Urban History Review
, 46: 1, 2017, p. 37.
[15]Henry Yu, "A Provocation: Anti-Asian Exclusion and the Making and Unmaking of White Supremacy in Canada", in Dominion of Race:
Rethinking Canada's International History, Vancouver: UBC Press, 2017.
[16]In the case of Montreal, the historian is not obliged to turn to the archives of the Negro Community Center to view and trace the
history of the African-Canadian populations, since municipal archives invisibilize and ignore the presence, experiences and history of
African-Canadian populations.
[17]Catherine Larochelle. The learning of Others: the rhetorical construction and the pedagogical uses of otherness in the Quebec school,
1830-1915 . Doctoral thesis, University of Montreal.
Bibliography
Austin, David. Fear of a Black Nation: Race, Sex and Security in Sixties Montreal . Toronto: Between the Lines, 2013.
Backhouse, Constance.Color-Coded: A Legal History of Racism in Canada, 1900 - 1950 . Toronto: Toronto, University Press, 1999.
Bertley, Leo. The Universal Negro Improvement Association of Montreal, 1917-1979 . Master's thesis, Concordia University, 1980.
Cooper, Afua. The Burning of Angelique: The Untold Story of Canadian Slavery and the Burning of Old Montreal . New York: Harper Collins, 2011.
High, Steven. "Little Burgundy: The Interwoven Histories of Race, Residence and Work in Twentieth-Century Montreal", Urban History Review ,
46: 1, 2017.
Madokoro, Laura, Francine MacKenzie, David Meren. Dominion of Race: Rethinking Canada's International History . Vancouver: UBC Press, 2017.
Maynard, Robyn. Policing Black Lives: State Violence in Canada from Slavery to the Present . Black Point: Fernwood Publishing, 2017.
Mills, Sean. The Empire Within: Postcolonial Thought and Political Activism in Sixties Montreal. Montreal: McGill-Queen University Press, 2010.
Painter, Nell Irvin. The History of White People . New York: WW Norton & Company, 2010.
Rutland, Ted. Displacing Blackness: Planning, Power and Race in Twentieth Century Halifax . Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2018.
Trudel, Marcel. Myths and realities in the history of Quebec (T1). Montreal: Hurtubise editions, 2010.
Walcott, Rinaldo.Black Like Who? Writing Black Canada . Toronto: Insomniac Press, 1997.
Williams, Dorothy. Blacks in Montreal, 1628-1986: An Urban Democracy . Montreal: Éditions Yvon Blais, 1989.
Listed 17 hours ago by Collectif Emma Goldman
http://ucl-saguenay.blogspot.com/2020/07/racisme-et-discrimination-le-mythe-de.html
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Message: 2
A new decade has started on this planet. With the rise of right-wing movements and the slow decline of social democracy, we are looking into
coming years of intense struggle with the state and capitalism. There are already many anarchists sitting in prisons for taking on this
fight-forgotten or ignored by liberals and human rights NGOs for "violent" actions. ---- Quite often anarchists do get solidarity from parts
of the society from which they are come. After all who can support one better than their own fellow humans trapped in the same misery of
exploitation. However, we believe that responsibility for those facing repression in different parts of the world should not be only on the
shoulders of local communities, but of international anarchist movements. Through our collective actions we can not only more widely diffuse
the resources that are available, but also keep the fires burning in the chests of those imprisoned through autonomous revolutionary love
and direct actions!
This is a call for you to act in solidarity with imprisoned anarchists all around the world. From the 23rd of August 2020-the day of
execution of Sacco and Vanzetti, you can do everything, limited only by your imagination. Put some of that vast imagination into action to
make people feel your energy and show our collective strength in revolutionary struggle!
325
ABC Brighton
ABC Warsaw
ABC Dresden
ABC Belarus
NYC Anarchist Black Cross
Cempaka Collective
Anarchist Union of Afghanistan and Iran
anarchistnews.org
https://pramen.io/en/2020/07/call-for-international-week-of-solidarity-with-anarchist-prisoners-2020-23-30-august/
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Message: 3
Kurdistan - Democratic confederalism ---- Women Defend Rojava condemns from Madrid the brutal murder of Zehra Berkel, mother Emîna Weys and
comrade Bedîea Mele Xelîl by Turkey. ---- Activists of Women Defend Rojava in Madrid have issued a statement condemning the brutal
aggression by the Turkish state against the population of Helîncê (Helence) in which three women lost their lives. ---- The full text of the
declaration is as follows: ---- "On the night of June 23, in the village of Helence, on the outskirts of Kobane (West Kurdistan, Syria),
drones from the Turkish army launched missiles at a civilian home where several women had gathered. Zehra Berkel, a member of the Kongra
Star Coordination of the Euphrates Region, mother Emîna Weys and our comrade Bedîea Mele Xelîl died as a result of that attack.
These three women fought side by side with thousands of other Kurdish, Arab, Assyrian, Circassian, Yazidi comrades from Northeast Syria, in
order to live in a democratic, free, egalitarian and patriarchal society.
At the same time, in Besre, in the Deir-ez-zor region of eastern Syria, a brutal attack has been carried out on the Women's House (Mala
Jin), where women mediate in family conflicts, from gender violence and support colleagues in vulnerable situations.
The war crimes of the Turkish fascist state against the advancement of women's freedom have intensified.
The revolution started in 2012, based on radical democracy, social ecology and the liberation of women, has continued to advance despite the
pressure and attacks from the various hegemonic forces that intervene in the region and the immense pain of seeing more die. of 12,000 of
his companions in the fight against the Islamic State over 5 years. Women in northeastern Syria are waging unrivaled resistance against the
occupying forces of the Turkish state and its jihadist allies.
All the allies of the Turkish state are also responsible for these attacks. The International Coalition and the Russian State are
responsible for the massacre of our comrades. We hold them accountable and make it clear that these savage attacks by the Turkish state must
cease and that international states and institutions must not be complicit in the femicide and genocide of the Kurdish people.
Military attacks against civil society are war crimes. Targeting the women who organize their society and who have a role in politics is a
crime against the future of women.
For this reason, we call on women and women's organizations around the world to take a clear stand against these attacks and to show
solidarity with the resistance of the women of Rojava. Furthermore, we call on the Kurdish people and all their allies to ceaselessly
intensify resistance and take action against fascism and treason.
The Turkish fascist state is a murderer of women. The goal of Turkish fascism and the butcher Erdogan is the slaughter of women who organize
to create an egalitarian society.
Once again we condemn these barbaric attacks. We promise our comrades Zehra, Bedîea and Mother Emîne that we will resist wherever the
fascist and misogynistic mentality manifests itself. This attack reinforces our commitment to seek freedom, and each fall in the fight
illuminates our path and our organization. We will guarantee the freedom of women and all peoples with Zehra, Bedîea and Mother Emîne as our
vanguard. "
https://www.cnt.es/noticias/women-defend-rojava-madrid-condena-el-brutal-ataque-de-turquia-contra-helince/
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Message: 4
An unprecedentedly broad, decentralized, confrontational, and leaderless movement has arisen in response to the police murders of Michael
Brown, Eric Garner and too many others. With the back-to-back non-indictments of Officers Darren Wilson and Daniel Pantaleo, we have
witnessed a powerful rage against the impunity of the police and their disrespect for Black life that has sparked a surge of activity not
seen in recent times in NYC or across the US. What began as an isolated outburst in Ferguson has surpassed initial concerns about the
longevity of the protests by quickly becoming one of the most profound American social upheavals in recent decades. ---- Many have said,
"People are mad today, but will they still be mad next week?" Massive mobilizations over the past few weeks-taking over streets, bridges,
tunnel entrances, places of business, train and ferry stations, sometimes with planning, other times with no prior planning at all-have
allowed us to answer that question with a resounding YES.
But if we don't expand the struggle, there will come a week when the answer is ‘no,' and we risk a return to normal. Or if we are seduced
into believing that the police can be reformed into submission with superficial policy initiatives like body cameras or civilian review
boards, we may believe that we have fixed the problem only to witness more Michael Browns, more Eric Garners. At the end of the day, the
police are the physical extension of the state and capital. So how can we continue the momentum while targeting the underlying systems of
oppression behind the white supremacist state violence that has outraged millions?
The Movement
Since Michael Brown's murder, an anti-authoritarian leaderless movement has emerged energized with the confrontational #ShutItDown
mentality. In Ferguson, demonstrators have staged confrontational sit-ins in front of police stations, taken over streets and malls, and
burned police cars. Protesters in New York City marched and successfully shut down five of the city's bridges, two of its tunnels, two of
its highways, the ferry terminal, Grand Central, and other transit hubs.
As opposed to the traditional image of the hierarchical, monolithic social movement directed from above by a handful of charismatic
visionaries, we are witnessing a rapid proliferation of knowledge and experiences that is allowing protesters to apply methods of disruption
to their local circumstances without looking upward for direction. As the conflict unfolds, more and more people are seeing beyond the false
good cop/bad cop binary and thinking of the entire police force as the enemy.
The current decentralized movement of working-class African-American men and women and their many diverse supporters is in direct conflict
with white supremacy. They proclaim #BlackLivesMatter, because combating the ingrained state violence that supports white supremacy and
erases and destroys Black bodies is the ultimate goal. If you think this is just about a few cases, about just one individual cop versus one
individual victim, you're wrong.
Containment
The NYPD has allowed these marches and die-ins to happen. DeBlasio and Bratton, in conjunction with dozens of cities across the country,
have devised a policy of containment and surveillance in response to the recent wave of protests.
Containment has allowed protesters to congest the traffic in the city. Bratton's strategy is to allow the fire of the protesters to burn
itself out by not providing it any extra tinder to burn by cracking down. The strategy is informed by the intelligence gathered by NYPD
detectives observing the conflict on the ground in Ferguson.
Instead of busting heads right away, helicopters buzz overhead and tag protesters that step out of line; fire trucks and ambulances drive
through marches scattering and dividing protesters drawing power away from marches and actions. The NYPD is trying to make us tired,
uncomfortable, and, above all, trying to make us stop.
However, the NYPD containment strategy is not hands off. The cops arrested 328 people during the first three days after the Eric Garner
decision. They used pepper spray, sonic cannons, and good old fashion clubs when they felt they could. Beneath the NYPD's veneer of civility
and respect towards protesters lurks the full power of state violence. Cops are still cops.
Expanding the Struggle
Shutting down business as usual through marches and die-ins is an important first step toward magnifying popular outrage at police terrorism
and crystallizing resistance into a movement, but, especially considering De Blasio's containment focus, we must raise the stakes by
enhancing the depth and scope of our actions.
What if students followed up walkouts with strikes and occupations until the killer cops were prosecuted? What if all of the thousands of
people who flooded the city turned to their co-workers and organized die-ins at work? What would happen if the growing mobilizations for a
$15 minimum wage or decent work conditions at Walmart pushed beyond the narrow agendas of the union bureaucrats to affirm that
#BlackLivesMatter at work as well as in our communities? Or if environmentalists could affirm that their movement is no less racialized than
any other, and spend more time addressing the fact that communities of color breathe air that is 40% more polluted, and less time on
photo-ops with Leonardo DiCaprio?
To uproot white supremacy from a society whose racism is historically ingrained, we have no choice but to expand the struggle into all areas
of our lives and recognize how it thrives on capitalist exploitation, heteropatriarchal violence, and state control. And so, while we affirm
the importance of intermediate demands that defund, restrict, and push back against police abuses in developing this popular movement, and
stand in solidarity with those who promote them, we must remember: as an institution designed to protect the rich and enforce a de facto
system of racialized terrorism in working class communities of color, the police cannot be reformed! The only solution is a popular
revolution of strikes, occupations, and mass resistance to abolish the class society that spawned the police into existence in the first place.
https://brrnnyc.tumblr.com/post/105024009466/expanding-the-struggle-notes-on-the-future-of-the
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Message: 5
The pandemic has caused many people to question how food is grown and who controls its production and distribution. Capitalist agricultural
practices are a major cause of climate change and food insecurity around the world, including the UK. Good quality food, like housing, is a
basic necessity and should be available to all. Given that the current food industry is about profits rather than needs, many people have
begun to take control over both food production and consumption. Already pre-lockdown there were a number of alternative food projects
including community gardens, organic city farms and community kitchens, but with the inadequacies of the supermarket system and the hardship
endured by many people, the concept of DIY food has taken off even more. This article showcases Crops NOT Shops and is based on information
from the blog, Alternative Estuary: https://alternativeestuary.home.blog/2020/06/23/crops-not-shops-dig-for-victory-hope-for-the-future/.
Crops NOT Shops is a guerrilla gardening project that is made up of a fast growing community of people stepping away from the unsatisfactory
and unreliable retail food supply supermarket cash removal machines to taking control of their own living spaces, food and diet, by
investing in growing and managing their own food supply. They recognise that: "a huge foundation of system change lies in what we eat, where
we get it, how to ensure it is in permanent supply, and, costs as little financially as possible".
Mission Statement and Introduction: https://youtu.be/03ZyOHMw3eQ
"The project has been running just a couple of months but has already unified 800 active community members and is growing by the day. They
have just started their 14th community site since January 2020, there is a vibrant seed, seedling, knowledge and work team sharing group
that are also establishing contacts with other similar and related groups such as "Food Communities" , "Foraging UK" and "Grow Cheshunt".
Their principles are:
Shared Food
Ethical growing
Chemical and cruelty free
Shared Knowledge
Community Support Network
The more free food available in the community also means less cash clogging up checkout registers in your supermarkets. In line with the
obvious we can take from this being that food, power, fuel, shelter are the core components to life that tie us to work , school, education,
taxation slavery has not gone unnoticed by the powers that be".
The Covid 19 pandemic motivated many people to get involved because clearly the government and supermarkets were not coping. Not only were
shelves empty but with many people losing jobs and income the high prices of supermarkets made it difficult for people to feed themselves.
"We hit Brexit in January, traffic through the ports slowed and failed to complete their journeys, port delays, Dover and Calais were on
full stop from January 16th doe to port blockages even and still we are experiencing delays into mid-May. Perishables were not making their
delivery window, and, permit transport papers were not stamped. Highways England were tasked with managing the back log of traffic through
the ports on this side of the channel. Yet the British press reported the reason for shelves running bare was due to pandemic hoarding and
greed, seriously?, How many times did you see that same photo of the overweight guy with two trolleys of toilet roll at Costco be used in
the papers up and down the country? The Government cannot be trusted manage retail food supply for the people. Here is a little more
reading to check out:
https://www.resilience.org/stories/2020-04-20/anarchist-farm-a-revolutionary-feast/."
Growing food and finding ways to share this food among those who need it is a key form of mutual aid. It is a way of building united,
resilient communities, the foundation for solidarity in other struggles.
Want to set up your own sister group driving the change in your area?
Here is the group page link for crops NOT shops: https://www.facebook.com/groups/824963631333587/
For more information on food, health and capitalism, see the new ACG pamphlet:
anarchistcommunism.org/2020/07/02/crops-not-shops
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Message: 6
The Greek government passed a new education bill in the wake of the COVID-19 lockdown that will worsen the already bad situation at schools
in Greece for both teachers and student. The ICL expresses its solidarity with teachers in Greece who are fighting the new laws. The
education workers of ESE, the ICL's section in Greece, have issued the following statement on the new law. ---- ESE Information on Reform of
Public Education ---- While schools were closed and public meetings and gatherings were completely banned, the Greek education minister
commented ironically on the objections expressed by the teachers' unions that no such bill should normally be brought to negotiation during
the lockdown that it was even better this way, as all the educators had enough time to read through the proposed bill and could discuss it
on teleconferences instead of calling general assemblies.
That public deliberation phase is now over. The bill is thus finalized and has been voted into law exactly as it had been originally
proposed. Among other things, the bill introduces the evaluation of the teachers' performance. Moreover, during the same period, an
amendment to the same law was summarily passed - whereby no time for public negotiation was allocated - that allows the installation of
cameras in classrooms on the pretext of providing the students that have to stay at home due to health reasons equal opportunities to attend
their classes.
At this point, it is worth taking a look at the reality of a public school teacher in Greece: Actually, most of us do not only teach but
carry out a series of administrative tasks such as keeping count of the pupils' absences, listing them and keeping statistic data,
documenting relevant info in the school computer system or notifying the parents on a variety of occasions, as there are no extra
secretaries in schools. When the children take a break, we have to oversee their behavior in the schoolyard and even treat wounds, as there
hardly any school nurses or other auxiliary staff.
Regarding employment conditions, today more than 30.000 instructors - i.e., approximately a quarter of the total number of active educators
- are so-called supplementary staff. Substitute teachers are a cheap alternative to their permanent peers and are deprived of most of the
latter's benefits. For example, pregnant colleagues cannot claim for a school year of maternity leave like the permanent staff, their days
of regular leave are deducted from their salary, etc. They moreover work for a maximum of 10 months a year.They have to resign over the
summer and live on unemployment benefit (approx. 380 euros a month).
Despite the fact that they might be covering the so-called ‘steady and continuous needs' of the educational sector, they can be endlessly
hired under that temporary status, without ever gaining a permanent contract. This creates a situation where people have to work longer
(sometimes over 40 years) in order to be able to receive a full pension! Characteristically, 2019 has been the year where the first person
that had exclusively worked as supplementary staff throughout his professional life retired. Furthermore, those colleagues never know in
advance whether they will be hired at all during the next term. Even if they are hired, they never know in which part of the country they
will get posted. And they also have to be willing to operate as ‘multitasking tools' (teachers, secretaries, psychologists, social workers
and nurses).
Even though the average age of Greek teachers has become older in the last decade, no new permanent staff is hired to replace those that
retire at 67, which is the retirement age foreseen at the moment (but which is expected to rise in the near future). Instead, schools remain
understaffed and at best vacancies get supplemented by part-time temporary staff for a few months in a year.
All of the above takes place in a starkly underfunded school environment where the number of teachers steadily decreases, whereas that of
pupils steadily increases, where classrooms get cold in the winter and hot in the summer, where even basic items like photocopy paper and
stationary have to come out of the teachers' and the parents' pockets. Even cleaning in most schools gets done by cleaners who work
precariously and are severely underpaid.
Within that kind of landscape, the new education bill will bear the following effects:
- Increase the numbers of students in each classroom.
- Increase the numbers of examinations that the pupils will have to take in the last three grades of secondary school. The current minister
additionally declared that these tests will also have an impact on the pupils' capacity to continue their studies in universities and colleges.
- Create elite schools for the ‘top' students.
- Drive older teenagers and young adults out of the daily, public vocational schools.
- Put teachers under the steady pressure of evaluation from their superiors who are habitually executives selected according to their
ideological-political adherence to the ruling party.
As a result, the pedagogical aspect of educational work will deteriorate, as it will be impossible to pay attention to every child's
individual needs and difficulties in large classrooms. The lessons will turn into an assembly line of exams practicing through endless
simulations, which leaves us with zero time and space for discovery learning.
Low income and socially disadvantaged children - such as from single-parent working-class families, migrant and refugee children, Roma,
orphans and all those facing hardship - will find it very difficult to complete secondary school. Predictably, many of them will leave school.
Teachers will be terminated and face unemployment.
The class divide will become more pronounced even within public schools.
Therefore, we maintain that this bill is unacceptable in its entirety and demand the minister and the government to withdraw it at once!
Especially, the provision regarding the installation of cameras in the classrooms contradicts any pedagogical principle and established
labor rights.
https://www.icl-cit.org/solidarity-with-school-teachers-in-greece/
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