LOL No 647 Earl Of Erne or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

Posted on July 14, 2010 by @ndy

A few weeks ago, British QUANGO the Parades Commission gave the go-ahead to a “Cultural Demonstration” by the Blue Man Group followers of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh the Orange Order (LOL No 647 Earl Of Erne) in Ardoyne, Belfast.

And the rest, as they say, is over 400 years of History.

And ah, screaming headlines.

And er, riot pr0n.

Anyway, the media is doing its bit to bring about a peaceful resolution to the centuries-old conflicts in Northern Ireland/The Six Counties. (Paola Totaro, Fairfax corporation’s Europe correspondent, summarises the political situation as follows: “The great majority of the British Army, seemingly ever-patient and self-controlled, stood for years as Irish kids baited and yelled, shoved and provoked. A handful of soldiers used well-placed butts while guns were fired only in response to the vandalism.”) Thus ‘The Mirror describes it as “wanton violence for the sake of it”. The Irish News calls it “shameful”. For the News Letter, the blame lies with dissident republicans “who have nothing to offer this community”.’

Otherwise, The Guardian‘s reportage on the mere fact that police intend to publish photos of persons of interest (Northern Ireland police chief to publish images of Ulster rioters, Henry McDonald, July 13, 2010) singularly fails to match the enthusiasm with which The Age undertook the task in 2006. On the other hand, the devastation the G20 protests brought to Melbourne that year easily overshadow the 82 police injured in 48 hours in rioting in Belfast and Co Armagh (Belfast police, Catholic rioters clash over parade, Shawn Pogatchnik, The Washington Post (The Associated Press), July 12, 2010).

See also : Ardoyne Sit Down Protest Attacked by PSNI | A personal account of the annual Orange Order parades from Belfast to Bangor (2009) | The Orange Order & sectarianism in Ireland.

Posted in Broken Windows, History, State / Politics, War on Terror | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Flubba Bubba Wubba Jubba Noongar NOT RACIST. And That’s Official!

Posted on July 14, 2010 by @ndy

LOL.

Blackface is sweet.

Nine sisters twelve cousins and I’m fucking the lot.

Mister Barker was holding up a mirror to multicultural society.

Aussie Aussie Aussie / Oi Oi Oi.

Mister Ward who?

Et cetera et cetera et cetera…

‘Racist’ video acquittal sparks outrage
Giordano Stolley and Amanda Banks
The West Australian
July 13, 2010

A Perth filmmaker whose music video Flubba [Bubba] Wubba Jubba Noongar was slammed by Aboriginal leaders for being racist was acquitted in Perth Magistrate’s Court yesterday.

Simon Charles Barker pleaded not guilty to a charge of aggravated conduct likely to cause racial harassment.

Aboriginal Legal Service WA chief executive Dennis Eggington said Mr Barker’s acquittal was a clear example of why Australia needed a Bill of [R]ights.

Mr Barker claimed during his trial last week that he had made the video in a bid to lampoon the stereotypical attitudes of white West Australians towards Aboriginals…

See also : OMGWTF! YouTube producer on racist charge! (December 10, 2009).

Posted in !nataS, Media, Music, Poetry, State / Politics | Tagged , | 4 Comments

Melbourne Black #3

Posted on July 14, 2010 by @ndy


online | print

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Gone Fishin’

Posted on July 1, 2010 by @ndy

It’s not just the name of a Flipper album.

As part of an elaborate plot involving the shipment of massive amounts of KGB gold hidden among mountains of bagels — a mad dash across the globe made at the behest of an Athenian dog whose er, tentacles (if she had them) would extend deep into the heart of the famous anarchist quarter of Wellington — I’m taking a break from blogging for a few days, or maybe even a week or two.

In the meantime:

Anarcho-blogging roundup
Phil Dickens

I’m currently away from home (and thus my own PC) in London.
I will be home tomorrow, and normal blogging service will resume therafter. Whilst I’m on this – extremely brief – blogging hiatus, though, here’s a quick roundup of other worthwhile anarchist and left-libertarian reads.
The Liverpool Solidarity Federation congratulates German anarcho-syndicalists FAU-B on their court victory. Brighton SolFed have an emergency budget special edition of their newsletter out. 

Their local No Borders comrades offers some comment on recent forcible deportations both here and here. They also ask “Just Who Is Responsible For UK’s Worsening Treatment Of Migrants?“
Adam Form has excellent reviews of both The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists and Simon Pirani’s The Russian Revolution in Retreat, 1920-24. The latter offering historical context on the Russian revolution which ties in nicely with my Property is Theft post on Communism and the State.

Seán from The Soul of Man Under Capitalism lifts The Veils of Illusion from Tory cuts and dissects the budget. Julia at 10 Minutes Hate has a similar assesment of the budget as well as a warning to children not to bully the weird kids. 
Slackbastard @ndy has coverage of Kiwis arrested in Toronto, as well as the continuing misadventures of Australia’s fascists here, here and here.

To round everything off, whilst contemplating the ConDem government’s policy of “dis a disabled,” Bendy Girl is suffering Oxycontin withdrawal.
There are more than a few good reads in there, which should tide things over until I return to Liverpool. If you still end up lacking anything to fill that time, I’d suggest that you’re not really using the internet properly.

Otherwise:

Intensive surveillance of ‘violent radicalisation’ extended to embrace suspected “radicals” from across the political spectrum.
Tony Bunyan
Spectrezine
June 30, 2010

Chronicle of a Riot Foretold
George Ciccariello-Maher
Counterpunch
June 29, 2010

“As the trial of former transit cop Johannes Mehserle for the murder of Oscar Grant rushes at breakneck speed toward its conclusion, spurred by the insistence of Judge Robert Perry and political imperative, ominous clouds of injustice begin to crowd the political horizon in anticipation of a verdict, which could come as soon as this week. But while it is this injustice that we should most fear, too many are focusing their fear and the fear of others on the possibility of a repeat of last year’s street rebellions should Mehserle be acquitted or convicted of a lesser charge…”

The first war on terror
Laura Miller
Salon.com
June 20, 2010

Miller reviews “A new history of bomb-throwing anarchists and conniving intelligence agents in the 1800s”; it is “chillingly familiar”. Three months earlier, so did Stuart Christie (The World That Never Was: A True Story of Dreamers, Schemers, Anarchists and Secret Agents, The Guardian, March 27, 2010). I think The Slow Burning Fuse: The lost history of the British Anarchists by John Quail is neat, while the Kate Sharpley Library continues to find bodies buried beneath the mounds of bourgeois history. The International Campaign Against Anarchist Terrorism, 1880-1930s (Richard Bach Jensen) provides some historical context for the antics of the anarcholocos…

Bonus Lovin’

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Picket in Preston

Posted on July 1, 2010 by @ndy

Word on the street is that there’s a 24-hour picket at the former Nylex factory in Preston (32/46 Chifley Drive), now home to a company (?) manufacturing textiles for the automotive industry (Toyota). The TCFUA has coverage at the factory, the workers have not had a pay increase in 3/4 years, and numbers are apparently needed in order to help stop trucks going in. Management is not being helpful, and cameras are being used to film the picket.

Or so I’m told.

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This Comp Kills Fascists Vol. 2 Available Now!

Posted on June 30, 2010 by @ndy

The second installment in the Scott Hull (PIG DESTROYER, AGORAPHOBIC NOSEBLEED) curated series of compilations, ‘This Comp Kills Fascists Vol. 2’ collects the very best from today’s sprawling underground grindcore, hardcore and punk scenes. ‘This Comp Kills Fascists Vol. 2’ features new and exclusive material from legends like DESPISE YOU, LACK OF INTEREST, CROM, and APARTMENT 213 as well as material from NOISEEAR, OWEN HEART, EXTORTION, and more that must be heard to be believed. ‘This Comp Kills Fascists Vol. 2’ is an indispensable look at the worldwide underground, and fast becoming the crucial compilation series of this generations grind scene.

Note that the most recent fascist entry into the local metal scene was conducted by way of Gareth Sansom’s ‘White Noise Productions’ [www.myspace.com/whitenoiseaustralia]. Despite the *nudge nudge / wink wink* name, normally, budding entrepreneurs of this kind have the noûs not to parade their views too openly, but Sansom made the mistake of promoting local neo-Nazi network ‘Blood & Honour’ on his MySpace page.

D’oh!

The fact that the Victorian organiser of ‘Blood & Honour’, Justin O’Brien, is the man behind the counter at Hold Fast Body Art in Burwood, or that he’s promised to violently put an end to my blogging activities, does not appear to have resulted in any significant downturn in trade, however, so maybe Sansom should have simply stuck to his guns… or is there really no Lebensraum for fascists in heavy metal these days?

See also : This Comp Kills Fascists Vol. 2 on Facebook | Metalheads Against Racism | This Comp Kills Fascists | “What Will The Nazis Think?” (I don’t care!) (April 28, 2010) | N – – – – r lovers and faggots // Bullets in your head! (December 29, 2009).

Click Here to View The Video Titled: THIS COMP. KILLS FASCIST 2

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Over 9000 arrests @ G20 in Toronto

Posted on June 29, 2010 by @ndy
    The great majority of the protesters, seemingly ever-patient and self-controlled, stood for hours as police baited and yelled, shoved and provoked. A handful of protesters used well-placed elbows while banners were raised only in response to the brutality.
    ~ G20 police strike at Toronto’s heart, Paola Totaro, The Age, June 28, 2010

    A journalist on assignment for The Guardian newspaper was arrested and beaten by police officers at the site of a peaceful demonstration on The Esplanade near the G20 security fence in downtown Toronto at approximately 11:00 p.m. 26 June 2010. Having been punched in the stomach and elbowed in the back by officers, it is believed that Jesse Rosenfeld, a 26-year-old writer from Toronto, was then taken to the temporary detention facility on Eastern Avenue in Toronto.
    ~ TVOntario journalist Steve Paikin witnesses beating and arrest of Guardian reporter at G20 protest, Chris Davenport, The ACTivist Magazine, June 27, 2010

Pretty much, yeah: same old story. Media demonisation; monitoring, infiltration and intimidation of activist groups; establishment of security perimeters; introduction of new / suspension of established laws; peremptory arrests; deliberate targeting of organisers and independent media; use of excessive force… blah blah blah. Now that the protests are officially over, the same events produce the same analyses. Otherwise, ruling elites agreed with one another that governments should increase taxes and reduce expenditure, cutting deficits in half by 2013. See : Sticking the Public with the Bill for the Bankers’ Crisis, Naomi Klein (The Globe and Mail), June 28, 2010 | UK budget 2010: New era of austerity in Europe?, Ben Quinn, The Christian Science Monitor, June 22, 2010 | wsws.org on World Economy.

ground zero

one

Toronto is burning! Or is it? Black bloc tactics play into the state’s hands
Links

It was a perfect storm. A massive police presence who were primed for “dangerous anarchists” after a week of peaceful protests. No more than one hundred, probably fewer, young men who think violent confrontations with the police will create a radicalisation and expose the violence of the state. A new generation of young people who are becoming activists believing they live in a democratic society and are shocked by the degree of police violence arrayed to stop them.

But it is the police that let the handful of people using Black Bloc tactics run wild and then used the burning police cars and violent images as a media campaign to convince the people of Toronto that the cost and the excessive police presence was necessary. They knew what would happen and they knew how it would happen. It is the police that bear the responsibility for what happened last night. They were responsible for keeping the peace and they failed to do it.

two

Toronto G20: The brutal face of capitalist reaction
Fightback Canada (International Marxist Tendency)

“The police and the black bloc are, in fact, two sides of the same coin.”

three

Toronto police violently suppress G20 protests, arrest over 600
wsws.org

“A police car was vandalized and set alight. A reporter noted that the gas cap for the car had been removed prior to the “Black Bloc’s” arrival. Shortly thereafter, at the corner of Bay and King—the centre of Canada’s financial district another police car was set ablaze.”

wsws.org : Divisions in G-20 open on summit eve, Nick Beams, June 24, 2010 | Massive police build-up for Toronto G20 summit, Paul Franklin, June 26, 2010 | G20 summit: Leaders try to paper over differences, Nick Beams, June 28, 2010.

A mostly-reasonable account of wtf is the black bloc:

York University political science professor David McNally talks to the CBC’s Carole MacNeil about Black Bloc tactics and anarchists
CBC

McNally refers to an incident in Montebello in Quebec in August 2007, in which three police infiltrators taking part in a black bloc were uncovered; the police were attempting to provoke others into violence, thus justifying — or, at least, providing a better pretext than might otherwise be the case — a police crackdown on the protests as a whole. See : Québec Police. Not Big. Not Clever. (August 25, 2007). Otherwise, see : The Black Bloc Papers: An Anthology of Primary Texts From The North American Anarchist Black Bloc 1998-2005, Edited and compiled by David Van Deusen & Xavier Massot of The Green Mountain Anarchist Collective and The Subversion of Politics: European Autonomous Social Movements and the Decolonization of Everyday Life, George Katsiaficas, 1997/2006.

See also : Appeal for broad political support for the G20 arrestees (Movement Defence Committee) | 40 Kiwis arrested in Toronto! (June 28, 2010) | Photo of the now / Toronto : G20 // G8 Summit Protest Reporting (June 27, 2010) | “Anarchy in Vancouver” (May 20, 2010).

∞

Anarchy! Linchpin | Anti-Capitalist Convergence (CLAC 2010) | l’Union Communiste Libertaire (French) … Miaow! Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist) | Revolutionary Communist Party (Canada) … Reds! Communist Party of Canada / Young Communist League of Canada – Ligue de la jeunesse communiste du Canada (YCL-LJC) | Socialist Voice … Trot! International Socialists | Socialist Action / Ligue pour l’Action socialist … Also! “Upping the Anti is a radical journal of theory and action which provides a space to reflect on the state of political organizing in Canada.”

Posted in Anarchism, Broken Windows, Media, State / Politics, That's Capitalism!, Trot Guide, War on Terror | Tagged , , , , | 3 Comments

40 Kiwis arrested in Toronto!

Posted on June 28, 2010 by @ndy

From the Department of Fat @ndy: “What’s a Riot?” & “Who Remembered to Bring the Marshmallows?” comes news of the arrest in Toronto of over 9000 40 75 500 suspected Kiwis following a riot, called to celebrate the arrival of 20 war criminals robber barons heads of state. The 20 are understood to have arrived in Toronto earlier in the week in order to attend the latest in a series of secretive meetings in luxury hotels. The gang group calls themselves the ‘G8’ (or alternatively ‘G20’), and are known to be extremely powerful and violent concerned about global poverty and environmental degradation.

According to The Australian, some of the anarchist group’s leaders were among 75 arrested yesterday (that is, Caturday), and police knew the identities of other troublemakers from photographs taken after the melee (in which a police vehicle was badly damaged). But a yellow dog, widely believed to be il Capo di tutti capi and known by various pseudonyms, some of the more common being ‘Loukanikos’ and ‘Kanellos’, has once again escaped police custody.

The Kiwis and their canine leader are understood to have been criss-crossing the globe in pursuit of the 20, and in recent years their tour has taken in Melbourne, Athens, Los Angeles, Paris, London, Pittsburgh and now Toronto. “What we saw yesterday … is a bunch of thugs that pretend to have a difference of opinion with policies and instead choose violence in order to express those so-called differences of opinion,” Dimitri Soudas, spokesman for Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, told a news conference.

A Marxist concurs:

The anarchist crazies involved in the ultra-violence were in no serious sense part of Caturday’s demo. Just like their black bloc mates in Europe they simply exploited the demo for their own purposes.

Right throughout the lead-up to Caturday they made clear their hostility to and contempt for other protestors. On Caturday they did all they could to disrupt the demonstration and were hostile, abusive, threatening and ultra-sectarian towards people on the demo.

Canada, fortunately, has not previously been blighted by the sort of black bloc anarchist activities which have had such a disastrous impact on demonstrations in Europe. These people are simply provocateurs that open up protests to police repression. In Europe their ranks have been riddled by police agents and fascists.

What gave them a certain critical mass at the G8/G20 was the presence of considerable numbers of anarchists from overseas. A Marxist from New Zealand said he recognised at least 40 Kiwi anarchists. He knew at least 20 of them by name. There were also a considerable number of black bloc anarchists from Europe. We know of people from Sweden, Germany and England. These people are like football hooligans who travel the world looking for violence.

On top of that there were also a considerable number of anarchists from outside Ontario.

Because of the behaviour of these provocateurs the media and the law and order brigade are having a field day.

The left should offer no comfort to these crazies. We should do whatever we can to isolate them. They are wreckers. If they grow in Canada it will simply make it harder to build future protests and movements.

See also : Rebel Dog | In Dog We Trust | Anti-Capitalist Convergence of Montreal (CLAC 2010) : Warning Shot! An anticapitalist reader on the G8/G20 | G20 and G8 Summit Protest Reporting.

Posted in !nataS, Anarchism, Broken Windows, Media, State / Politics, That's Capitalism!, War on Terror | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

Alizee Sery pays tribute to Uluru

Posted on June 27, 2010 by @ndy

Alizee Sery’s tribute to Uluru is the latest in several centuries worth of tributes to indigenous peoples and cultures — not that them’s grateful. In any event, her salutation has certainly gone some way to ‘deepening and broadening the visitor experience of Uluru’, a development which Peter Garrett, the Minister for Uranium Mining, Woodchipping & The Yartz, is certain to welcome.

“What we need to remember is that traditionally, the Aboriginal people were living naked. So stripping down was a return to what it was like. After such a hard climb, when you reach the top, the view and the magic of the place gives you an amazing feeling of peace and freedom. You want to sing, dance and strip.” ~ Alizee Sery (Indigenous group wants Uluru stripper deported, ABC, June 27, 2010)

See also : Garrett to allow Uluru climbs, Lindsay Murdoch, The Sydney Morning Herald, January 9, 2010: “…under a new 10-year management plan announced by Mr Garrett yesterday, the 348-metre rock will remain open to climbers until its popularity dwindles or new visitor experiences are developed. The Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, and the Northern Territory Chief Minister, Paul Henderson, were among the people who said the rock should be kept open to climbers. Mr Garrett told reporters in Sydney that the key issue for the rock was to deepen and broaden the visitor experience.”

Posted in !nataS, Sex & Sexuality | Tagged , | 7 Comments

Photo of the now

Posted on June 27, 2010 by @ndy

G20 capitalism is attacked in the streets of Toronto, No-One Is Illegal MONTREAL, June 27, 2010.

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