Radical media, politics and culture.

In the Streets

April 26, 2004 - 8:07am -- hydrarchist
Analysis & Polemic
In the Streets

hydrarchist writes:

London Demo Cancelled
Comments by Some Members of the Mayday Collective

Following a meeting held in mid-January the London Mayday
Collective decided not to proceed with plans for an anti-capitalist
event this year. This will be the first time in 5 years that there has
not been an event of its kind in London and we hope what follows
will help to explain the reasoning behind the decision and perhaps
begin some discussion into the prospects for planning future Mayday
events, keeping in mind what has gone before. What follows is a personal
reflection from a couple of participants in this year’s collective
rather than a statement issued by the group as a whole.

April 26, 2004 - 8:03am -- hydrarchist
Announcements
In the Streets

hydrarchist writes:

Mayday Dublin 2004
For An Alternative Europe

Irish
people have generally seen the European Union as a
good thing, for reasons that include investment in
infrastructure and farm subsidies.

But
increasingly the EU is an excuse for privatisation,
for shifting the burden of taxation onto you and
for Ireland's increasing involvement in military
adventures.

We are
struggling with others across Europe for a
different type of Europe, one that puts people
before profit and does away with top-down decision
making. Join these protests in the struggle for an
alternative Europe.

April 20, 2004 - 2:39pm -- nolympics
News
In the Streets

"POW"

Jo Wildings, April 17th

Fallujah — Sergeant Tratner of the First Armoured Division is irritated. “Git back or you’ll git killed,” are his opening words.

Lee says we’re press and he looks with disdain at the car. “In this piece of shit?”

Makes us less of a target for kidnappers, Lee tells him. Suddenly he decides he recognises Lee from the TV. Based in Germany, he watches the BBC. He sees Lee on TV all the time. “Cool. Hey, can I have your autograph?”

Lee makes a scribble, unsure who he’s meant to be but happy to have a ticket through the checkpoint which all the cars before us have been turned back from, and Sergeant Tratner carries on. “You guys be careful in Falluja. We’re killing loads of those folks.” Detecting a lack of admiration on our part, he adds,
“Well, they’re killing us too. I like Falluja. I killed a bunch of them mother fuckers.”

April 17, 2004 - 4:02pm -- nolympics
News
In the Streets

ainfos
writes

I.
Dear Friends,

Below, I continue my inquiry of the preceding days into media representations of the protests against expropriation of Palestinian lands, their destruction, the uprooting of olive trees by the hundreds (probably thousands), the enclosing of Palestinians into ghettos, and the rest. My inquiry has been prompted by what the average Israeli that one meets believes regarding what is happening in the OTs, and why Israelis are so ill informed. While some Israelis do not want to know, this is by no means true of all. Unfortunately, most think that they do know, even though those of us who do take the trouble and the time to learn the history of the conflict, to be part of the protests, to meet Palestinians and talk to them, to share their pain, to live with them through some of their tribulations, and to look around at what is happening to Israel as a result of what is occurring in the OTs, immediately recognize that the Israeli public is being fed a steady diet of misinformation. The media is as complicit in distributing misinformation as is the government in distributing propaganda.

Part 2 of this intro, discusses the quotations from newspapers above. Part 3 scans newspaper depictions about yesterday's protest at Biddu.

April 8, 2004 - 4:00pm -- nolympics
News
In the Streets

'Thank You Paul Bremer"

David Martinez


Seven weeks away and Baghdad has changed dramatically. Our old hotel, scene of alternative journalism and Iranian pilgrims, no longer allows Westerners out of safety concerns, both for us and for them. The Iranians stopped visiting after the bombings of the Shia mosques in early March, plus the border was closed or curtailed on the Iraqi side.  And the Mount Lebanon Hotel bombing, which blew out windows all over the neighborhood, sent the foreign journos scurrying back to walled compounds or guarded apartments. And I can hardly blame them. I am writing from inside one myself.

I am warned not to walk the streets alone, even during the day. There is now a significant anti-foreigner sentiment in the city that did not exist as strongly before. In any Shia neighborhood, pictures of Mukhtadar Al Sadr hang on every doorway, where before they did not. Overnight, the son of the Shia martyr is the new hero of the resistance.

April 5, 2004 - 1:33pm -- jim
Analysis & Polemic
In the Streets

Tacitus writes:

"In this fine article, probably familiar to some, HST looks at the ferment of declassed drop-outs that 'Mr. Mulford' (lawmaker) considered to be the ones causing all the trouble in Berkeley, Cal. at the time of the Free Speech movement... It seemed useful, and I couldn't find it anywhere online.

"The Nonstudent Left"

Hunter S. Thompson

BERKELEY, September 27, 1965 — At the height of the “Berkeley insurrection” press reports were loaded with mentions of outsiders, nonstudents and professional troublemakers. Terms like “Cal’s shadow college” and “Berkeley’s hidden community” became part of the journalistic lexicon. These people, it was said, were whipping the campus into a frenzy, goading the students to revolt, harassing the administration, and all the while working for their own fiendish ends. You could almost see them loping along the midnight streets with bags of seditious leaflets, strike orders, red banners of protest and cablegrams from Moscow, Peking or Havana. As in Mississippi and South Vietnam, outside agitators were said to be stirring up the locals, who wanted only to be left alone.

March 31, 2004 - 3:23pm -- nolympics
In the Streets

An anonymous coward writes http://www.baltimoresun.com/features/lifestyle/bal -to.shield20mar20,0,236004.story?coll=bal-pe-today

Catching up with a human shield

By Linell Smith

20 March 2004


March 19, 2003: The human shields waited nervously for the bombs. The media had predicted that the American air attack would begin about 4 in the morning, and Faith Fippinger was awake - just like everyone else in Baghdad, she figured.


The 62-year-old retired school teacher was living in a one-story stucco house, just like hundreds of others in the community surrounding the Daura Refinery in the south end of Baghdad. She shared the house with several activists who had traveled from Turkey, Australia, England and Germany hoping to help preserve the peace.


When Faith looked out the front window, she could see the homes of Iraqis who worked at the refinery. Children came to visit after school, showing
off their dolls and bicycles. They also showed her the shelters they would use if bombs fell while they were in class.


No country in the world has the right to do that to a child, she remembers thinking. Perhaps her presence - and the presence of the other human shields - would spare this neighborhood.

March 31, 2004 - 9:06am -- jim
Events
In the Streets

Call Congress Now to Close the SOA (202) 224-3121


Call Congress Now to tell them new research reveals that the SOA/WHISC still trains known human rights abusers. Tell them to Sponsor HR1258 to Close the SOA.

Details below.

March 29, 2004 - 2:58pm -- jim
News
In the Streets

"Haiti's Army Turns Back the Clock"

Charles Arthur, Red Pepper

It didn't take long for the new order in Haiti to reveal itself. The day after President Aristide 'left' for exile, 34 union members at the Ouanaminthe garment assembly factory run by the Dominican Grupo M company, were fired. The next morning, when the 600-strong workforce decided to strike, a group of armed men launched a violent attack. Some unionists were handcuffed, many others were beaten up, and the workers were forced back inside the factory.

March 27, 2004 - 6:05pm -- jim
Analysis & Polemic
In the Streets

DN writes:

"Marching to Nowhere?
Some Thoughts on the San Francisco M20 Demonstration


On March 20th, 2003, as bombs fell on Iraq, I joined with the thousands who took to the streets of Portland, Oregon, to express our rage against the war and to disrupt business as usual. That day, intersections were occupied, some freeways were temporarily blocked, and a couple of ugly businesses got trashed. A mass rally also took place. Surprisingly, we did not stop the war, but our fightback made a difference — we demonstrated to each other that it was possible to go beyond resignation and passivity. The question was how to be more focused and effective from then on. For some of us, San Francisco's actions of the same day hinted at solutions; the shutdown of that city's financial district was an inspiration.


One year on, I decided to travel to the Bay Area to check out the anti-war/anti-occupation demonstration there. What follows is not an attempt at a comprehensive report-back; I will merely describe my own experience, and draw a few general lessons from what I saw. I hope that this exercise will be useful to those already active around the occupation, and perhaps also those who wish to be.

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