The Guardian on the reign in Spain

Posted on July 30, 2006 by @ndy

[AP] Today (July 29) in History : In 1900, Italian King Humbert I was assassinated by an anarchist; he was succeeded by his son, Victor Emmanuel III.

:::::::

‘Spain finally attempts to lay ghosts of the Franco era’
Giles Tremlett in Madrid
Saturday July 29, 2006
The Guardian

Two points.

One:

Anarchist and communist groups killed tens of thousands of people during the civil war, including more than 6,000 bishops, priests, monks and nuns. Franco’s regime did its best to imprison or execute those involved in leftwing repression.

Ah yes… as George Orwell remarked: “The Spanish war has probably produced a richer crop of lies than any event since the Great War of 1914-18, but I honestly doubt, in spite of all those hecatombs of nuns who have been raped and crucified before the eyes of Daily Mail reporters, whether it is the pro-Fascist newspapers that have done the most harm. It is the left-wing papers, the News Chronicle and the Daily Worker, with their far subtler methods of distortion, that have prevented the British public from grasping the real nature of the struggle.”

And if The Guardian may (arguably) be considered a left-wing paper, then the article by Giles Tremlett in Madrid stands in a long and dishonourable tradition. Only in this case “all those hecatombs of nuns who have been raped and crucified before the eyes of Daily Mail reporters” have been substituted for the ridiculous claim that un-named ‘anarchist and communist groups’ murdered “more than 6,000 bishops, priests, monks and nuns”.

I can find few sources online regarding this figure. A review by a right-wing Catholic blogger of Warren Carroll‘s book The Last Crusade (Christendom Press, 1996) cites the following figures —

Total number of Catholic priests and religious martyred during the Spanish Civil War: 6,832.

Total number of bishops killed: 13.

— and summarises the book as being

A short chronicle of how, within living memory, thousands of Catholics gloriously gave their lives for Christ against what was almost a mouth of Hell reaching up to engulf Spain.

Agradezca a Cristo por Franco!

Still, only 233 of these ‘martyrs’ were beatified by Pope John Paul II.

But how many of the 6,000 or so alleged deaths were caused by anarchists?

And to suggest that “Franco’s regime did its best to imprison or execute those involved in leftwing repression” is such a distortion of the historical record of Franco’s murderous rule as to be laughable.

Two:

When the dictatorship ended in 1975 an agreement not to rekindle the embers of the civil war was a key element of the transition to democracy.

What ‘agreement’? With whom? I can only imagine that Giles Tremlett in Madrid is referring to a broad agreement among the Spanish elite and, possibly, the Spanish middle class, to ‘not mention the war’. An alternative account of this period by Albert Meltzer tells quite a different story, namely, one concerning the steps taken by the Spanish state to ensure that, even after Franco’s death (November 20, 1975), the Spanish anarchist movement remained buried: literally and metaphorically.

Posted in Anarchism, Anti-fascism, History, Media | Leave a comment

Class War statement on the war in Lebanon : ‘HezBollocks & IsRabies’

Posted on July 27, 2006 by @ndy

“Anarchist Opinion” / What the geezers in Class War reckon :

Class War is appalled at the carnage that is occurring in the Middle East. We are also disappointed but not surprised at what is being said about it, especially by some “progressive” organisations. Lebanon is being turned into a grotesque war-games board as the real protagonists — the USA and Iran — use their proxies to slug it out. Neither the Israeli army nor Hezbollah give a flying fuck about ‘their’ civilians, except as bloody totems to hang in front of the cameras of the world’s press in order to justify their own next atrocity.

The left have adopted two approaches. First, wholesale adoption of the Islamist agenda, cheerleading Hamas or Hezbollah without qualification or criticism. This ‘idiot anti-imperialism’, the trademark of today’s SWP [Socialist Workers Party], says my enemy’s enemy is my friend and any criticism of them, no matter how mild, is ‘racism, Islamophobia, and Zionist pro-American warmongering’.

The second approach is slightly more subtle. Hezbollah is fighting back, therefore we must support Hezbollah and the slogan ‘we are all Hezbollah’ is an act of basic solidarity with those who are fighting back against imperialism — the slogan is compared with the Parisian students who, when [anarchist turned Green Euro MP] Daniel Cohn-Bendit was attacked in the bourgeois press as a German Jew, marched through Paris chanting ‘nous sommes tous les juifs d’Allemagne’ (‘we are all German Jews’).

This argument is crap — Hezbollah isn’t a nationality or a racial epithet, it is a political party / militia; if the slogan really wanted to fit then the SWP should have handed out placards proclaiming ‘We Are All Shi’ite’. Lebanon has a radical history, albeit one distorted by the chains of [Leninism], but this has been written out of the British left’s history books in their rush to embrace Islamotrottery.

A real working class alternative is desperately needed — one that recognises that there can be no peace whilst borders are drawn by reference to the Torah, and international policy is determined in Washington by consulting the Book of Revelations.

“Israelis living in Tiberius [?] fund the war, and contribute bodies to the war. It’s not true to say they are wholly ‘innocent'” — that quote is from an otherwise relatively sane leftist, and is a justification for every atrocity against civilians ever. It gives an idea just how much the left loses it when the question of Israel is raised.

The Israeli state oppresses the Palestinians, driving them into the hands of the fanatics of Hamas out of despair at the failure of the secular Palestinian left. In turn the suicide bombers provide for the Israeli state ‘proof’ of the murderous nature of the Palestinians and drives the Israeli public to support harsher and harsher measures against the ‘terrorists’.

This is a self destructive spiral and must be broken.

The Israeli state is not shaken by katyushas or by suicide bombers – it is strengthened by them.

The last real challenge to the Israeli state was the Intifada, mass popular resistance on the streets of the West Bank and Gaza, and amongst the ‘Israeli Arab’ population. This rose up from below, from the streets, and spread all across the Middle East and north Africa as the Arab working class drew inspiration from the bravery of the Palestinian youth, and employed the same tactics to confront their own ruling classes. Inside Israel proper the Intifada created real tensions within the army, as soldiers refused to be used to gun down children and sparked a massive peace movement amongst the general population.

The Oslo peace process was designed to derail the Intifada and create from the PLO a police force to keep the unruly Palestinians in line.

All the arguments of the left revolve around one state/two state. All happily accept the artificial divisions created in the twentieth century by the very imperialists that they claim to oppose, and all ignore the actual people – Palestinian, Israeli, Lebanese, Druze, Syrian, Egyptian, Jordanian, Bedouin – who live there. Re-jigging the lines on a map will create new oppressions, new grievances and new horrors, and we as revolutionaries should have no part in assisting that.

We should stand shoulder to shoulder with those struggling against the oppressors of the Israeli state and the Palestinian bantustan. We fight against our ‘own’ rulers who attempt to use this slaughter for their own ends and use measly words ‘condemning the violence’ whilst writing out the receipts for the latest arms contract.

Any state solution is a continuation of the same bullshit.

No Borders
No States
No Gods
No War But The Class War!

See also :

Electronic Intifada : “The Electronic Intifada (EI) publishes news, commentary, analysis, and reference materials about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from a Palestinian perspective. EI is the leading Palestinian portal for information about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and its depiction in the media.”
Electronic Lebanon : “Electronic Lebanon, a project from the Electronic Intifada, offers commentary, analysis, human rights and development information, and voices from on the ground. Quality submissions are welcomed, preferably from contributors with an organisational affiliation.”
‘Gay Arab talks about Lebanon’, uk.gay.com : “Remy is a member of the Montreal chapter of Helem, an Arabic acronym for “Lebanese Protection for Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals and Transgender People”. As Israel massed tanks and troops on the Lebanese border July 21 in readiness for a likely ground invasion, Remy shared with Gay.com some background on the crisis in Beirut, its impact on LGBT people, and his feelings about the upcoming observation of WorldPride in Jerusalem.”

Posted in Anarchism, State / Politics, War on Terror | 2 Comments

Scribbles in Geelong // Two Minutes in Melbourne

Posted on July 27, 2006 by @ndy

We are Geelong, the greatest zine of all,
We are Geelong, we’re always on the ball,
We play the zine as it should be played,
At home or far away,
Our banners fly on high from dawn to dark, down at Kardinia Park

So! Stand up and fight, remember our tradition
so stand up and fight, it’s always our ambition
throughout the zine we fight with all our might
Because we are the mighty blue and white
and from when the ball is bounced, to the final bell
STAND UP AND FIGHT LIKE HELL!

‘Scribbles’ : Geelong Zine Fair is on Saturday, August 12 @ Deakin University Cafe – Waterfront Campus Level 1, 1 Gheringhap Street, Geelong (along the Eastern Beach Road Entrance). Barricade will have a stall.

Their team may be shit (sorry Jamie — where are you?), but their commitment to promoting zine culture cannot be faulted! For more details, see : Scribbles blog.

tHIS sATURDAY, 4pm — 7pm, jULY 29, tWO mINUTES OF iNFAMY @ tRADES hALL bAR! (Barricade will also have a stall @ this event.)

bE tHERE OR bE sQUARE!

Posted in Anarchism, Media | Leave a comment

Poland: Solidarity for Tomek Wilkoszewski

Posted on July 26, 2006 by @ndy

Poland: Solidarity for Tomek Wilkoszewski

Many people who have been involved in the anarchist movement, anti-fascism or prisoner support will know the name Tomek Wilkoszewski. Tomek has been serving time since March 1996 when he was sentenced to 15 years in jail. Tomek was the victim of repeated aggression by [boneheads] who were terrorizing people in the town of Radomsko in Poland. When Tomek and others who had been repeatedly attacked decided to defend themselves, there was a fight one night and one of the [boneheads] got stabbed. The ambulance was so slow to get there that he bled to death. And they pinned the whole thing on Tomek.

BACKGROUND AND CURRENT APPEAL

Tomek was in his last year of a technical high school at the time – a teenager who had never been arrested before and was not prone to violence. Being he was from a poor family, he did not get proper legal representation. He did not admit stabbing anyone and the murder weapon was never sent to the laboratory for testing.

Since his arrest, Tomek got his diploma and was given a really crap prison job; he does it and is considered a “model prisoner”. Despite his good behaviour, he has been turned down for early parole twice. People from ABC have arranged a new lawyer and are collecting money to pay this expense so that Tomek has better chances when they hear his case in a few months. A little under $1,000 [US] is needed to pay for these legal fees.

In addition, we are asking for continued support for Tomek and where possible, for donations for when he is released. (We hope this will be sooner rather than later.) Our goal is to raise a minimum of 10,000 zloties – about $3,300 [US] to help Tomek when he is released.

Tomek may study when he is released or he may try to get a job. It will be a difficult task because he is an ex-con and there is high unemployment here. Whatever he decides, he’ll need some cash. He also needs to protect himself from the [boneheads] who probably want to get revenge on him. We believe that our help will make a tremendous difference for him and for his future. The fascists and the state have done a good job of destroying his life, but our solidarity can help him take it back.

If you’d like to read more about Tomek’s case, there is plenty of stuff on the net:

The English section of this page is a little out of date but has basic information. There are new appeals from ABC groups on the following sites:

CIA
Indymedia

WHAT YOU CAN DO

What can people do to help?

First, you can send this information to other people, publish it in zines or on your web site. Or post a link. If you are in a collective which is in a position to help with publicity or fundraising on some level, you can sign a list of international supporters.

It’s very important that in the case of prisoners who have been in jail for many years that people just don’t “forget” about them or think their case isn’t important anymore.

You can also send letters or zines or postcards or music to Tomek. Friends who visited him recently said that he was a little sad – so contact with the outside world would be really important. (It also impresses the prison authorities that people from other countries write.) Tomek has a computer but it’s a little old – he can see films on CD ROM (no weird formats!) or listen to music but not view DVDs. Recently he expressed an interest in exploring reggae music.

Tomek is trying to learn English all the time, so a letter (in simple English) is OK, as are postcards. Flat packages of printed matter up to 3-4 lbs. can go through as letters but anything bigger can be problematic.

The last thing is to organize a collection of funds for Tomek for when he gets out. Anarchist Solidarity and ABC Praga are collecting funds on this account:

Jakub Gawlikowski
PL05 1140 2004 0000 3702 4238 2269
BRE Bank S.A. Retail Banking, al. Mickiewicza 10, 90-050 Łódź
BIC/SWIFT: BREXPLPWMUL
SORT CODE: 11402004

We are organizing another collective fund with other ABC groups and an action with other organizations and will soon produce a page with information about fundraising efforts. We will keep people informed.

CONTACT

anarchistsolidarity[at]yahoo[dot]com

:::::::

(Polish) “Justice” : Excessively high penalties for the nonconformists and the poor who can’t afford a ‘good’ lawyer, and mild penalties for the Mafia and the thugs.

(US) “Justice” : In 1998, two prominent anti-racist skinheads, 24-year-old Lin Newborn and 20-year old Dan Shersty, were assassinated in a desert outside of Las Vegas. Ross Hack, who fled to Europe when he was identified as a suspect two [sic] years ago, has never been charged for his involvement in the murder. According to the defense attorney, Ross Hack has been on a “two-year vacation in Europe,” courtesy of his rich father.

Posted in Anti-fascism | Leave a comment

(sir) bobwatch uk

Posted on July 25, 2006 by @ndy

Kill Rock *s : starting with Geldof, and ending with Hanna

‘Geldof cancels Italian tour after only 45 fans turn up for Milan gig’
Barbara McMahon in Rome
The Guardian
July 24, 2006

Millions of people [allegedly] like to hear Bob Geldof talk about causes as diverse as debt relief and the rights of fathers but it seems not so many, at least in Italy, are as keen to hear him sing.

The Irish rock musician and political activist beat a retreat back to London at the weekend after cancelling concerts in Milan and Rome because too few fans had bought tickets.

Only 45 people turned up on Friday at Milan’s Civic Arena for a performance by the 51-year-old singer and songwriter. The venue has a capacity of 12,000.

I can tell Sir Bob why we don’t like his concerts.

His music’s shit. (Unlike, say, Le Tigre. In fact, their music is now considered so entertaining by the corporate sector, the grrls have sold it. First to Universal, then Telus, then Goldmark, and now Nivea. Obviously, “Sometimes it’s hard to be a woman / giving all your love to just one corporation…”)

As for Sir Bob’s politics…

A month ago, advertising teacher (sorry: “guru”) Simon Hammond’s book BE was featured in an article in The Australian, ‘Believe in your brand’: “In the book he explains that BE brands are those with “belief” that customers want to “belong” to and that inspire core emotional “behaviours”. Loyalty is important among these.” Better yet: “People like Robbie Williams, Bono, Sting and Geldof are the true influences because they are perfect BE brands.”

Not to be outdone, red carpet — the mob that organised The Influentials brief tour of Australasia — describe The Influentials thusly: “Whilst humanity numbers over 6 billion, the most important changes in the [worlds] of media, technology, brands, ideas, economics and politics are the work of just a few. These extraordinary individuals are The Influentials – Leaders, Rebels and Superstars.”

Uh-huh.

Well… maybe not. Having bombed in Milan, Bob bombed in Melbourne too. (Maybe it’s got something to do with cities beginning with the letter ‘M’?)

‘How to lose buyers, not influence people: Geldof gig woes’
Jesse Hogan
The Age
July 6, 2006

IT WAS promoted as a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity”, a business leadership conference in Melbourne featuring Bob Geldof, Sex Pistols founder Malcolm McLaren and Survivor creator Mark Burnett.

But the group dubbed “The Influentials”, it seems, is not so influential.

Fuck. Don’t tell me that there’s a world outside of the masturbatory phantasies of advertising “gurus”? Sad but true: The Influentials exercised little influence over the good burghers of Melbourne, the dog and pony show attracting a small audience only on its Sydney and Auckland legs:

‘Boomtown Rat happy to take copied music’
Jonathan Marshall
New Zealand Herald
July 16, 2006

[July 28. Shit. Shit shit shit shit shit shit shit. I think I accidentally deleted the last half of this entry. Damn you Geldof! | Google Cache to the rescue!]

Sir Bob Geldof was quick to condemn New Zealand’s foreign aid contribution – but he was happy to fly home with a healthy appearance fee and a CD of copied New Zealand bands’ music. Television presenter John Campbell gave Geldof a CD compilation of local songs, which the Boomtown Rats frontman and activist packed into his suitcase before he left Auckland on Friday night…

Geldof was in Auckland to speak at a motivational business leadership conference at the Aotea Centre on Friday, after which he criticised New Zealand for its level of foreign aid contributions. He told the Herald on Sunday he didn’t know how much money he would receive for speaking at the function which charged punters $1495 per ticket. He laughed at suggestions he would donate the proceeds to charity.

“Why should I?” he said.

Grovelling Gold-Digger Geldof

Geldof, lamenting the fact that he couldn’t make any big money out of the pop-music business, said: “I wanted to make money out of it, but I only ever wanted the money to enable me to do all the things I want to do” (TV Times, 25-31 October, 1986). Have you ever heard of anyone wanting to make money to do things they didn’t want to do?

For years before Band Aid, Geldof’s band, The Boomtown Rats, had been a flop. In his so-called autobiography Is That It? he wrote that they’d made an album In The Long Grass — but it was no-go. Tracks released from it as singles — “total stiffs”. “We even went and tried to hype the second single.” They got £1,000 and “went to all the stores we knew were ‘chart return’ shops and bought it ourselves, hoping to buy it into the charts” (p.267). But it didn’t work. “We gave away a free ticket to any one of our concerts with every copy…”. Still no good. “We made four superb videos… But still nothing” (p.268). He then writes that he was getting desperate. “It was coming to the end of 1984 and I could see no prospect for the release of the album In The Long Grass… I went home in a state of blank resignation and switched on the television” (p.269). He saw the BBC film on famine in Ethiopia. Almost immediately he also saw the opportunity of the charity business bringing big publicity, and a way at last to make money ‘to enable him to do the things he wants to do’.

He knew he was well on that way when he arrived at Buckingham Palace on July 24, 1986. There, dolled up in top hat and morning dress — the uniform [deemed] appropriate [to receive] medals for service to the middle class — he was able to bow and scrape to the Queen of parasites as she officially installed him as Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire.

The squalid hypocrisy of an ‘Order of the British Empire’ — the building of which was a series of atrocities substantially responsible for the immense suffering of African peoples right up to the present day — no more deterred Geldof’s drooling acceptance of it than does any of the other phony do-gooders. On the contrary, his adulation of the Royals sometimes gets near to the extreme. In Is That It? (p.411) he says: “Of all the people I have met since this [Band Aid] began, Prince Charles is without doubt the one I have been most impressed by. I find myself more in agreement with him than anbody else.”

Then the money started to roll in. One of the little things he wanted to do was to get married to Paula Yates — the hip, boring, middle class pop robot [since deceased]. So in September 1986, out in some exotic place, he spent over £75,000 on a “quiet little wedding”. Only a month later, the aforementioned book was published — with Geldof’s name spread across the top of the front cover, aptly in the largest, gold letters — amidst a welter of publicity. This was followed by a successful “tour to packed houses in major venues”, each gig ending with the Band Aid song Do They Know It’s Christmas?. A successful tour due, as he admits (p.319) entirely to publicity through Band Aid. There was then a recording contract, an album, a rubbishy single in the charts, a pop video, appearances on TV chat shows (he’d earlier been on This Is Your Life), interviews in newspapers and magazines, and he “got rows of honours, medals, awards, and even honorary degrees, from all over the world” (p.426).

In fact, the middle class, liberal to fascist, swarmed around Geldof and his Band-wagon like flies ’round shit — and the reasons why range from feelings of guilt to unscrupulous exploitation. For example, among the flies that got a good lick of the shit were US TNCs AT&T and Kodak. The purpose of their frenzied participation in these ‘Aids’ was made clear by Dan Hovicky, ‘advertising expert’ and Division Manager of AT&T. Speaking on Channel 4 (February 19, 1987) of AT&T’s involvement with Live Aid and Sport Aid, Hovicky said: “It was a great opportunity to show to all those who matter in the world, our technical skills, abilities and services. It was of exceptional use to us because it enabled us to put it all over while at the same time giving a clear impression that we cared”.

– Andy Anderson*, ‘First Know Your Enemy’ (1988), in Andy Anderson and Mark Anderson, The Enemy Is Middle Class, Openly Classist, Manchester, 1998, pp.69-70.

[*Class War reckons Andy “was a self-confessed former US and British intelligence officer”!]

Anyway, they say nobody can find a good word for Bob, but I can :

Twat.

See also : ‘Bono Bloody Bono’, Dave Bleakney, Z, February 12, 2002:

Bono, the 80’s inspired politico warbler is the latest in a long line of performers who are trotted out on behalf of the power holders. Poor Bono, he doesn’t get it. At first I thought he looked silly. But now I see him as dangerous. Okay, well, silly and dangerous. At least that’s how he looked at the World Economic Forum held recently in New York. “Bono steals spotlight at forum,” said the Globe and Mail byline of February 5. While distribution of the Earth Times may have been banned at the exclusive Waldorf-Astoria for the WEF the corporate and political elite made a home for Bono.

Admittedly, I have never been a fan. Bono has always seemed a little pompous and overblown to me. But what the heck, pop music is aural candy. The candy I can live with. What was more alarming was to see Irish pop stars Bob Geldof and Bono praising the Canadian Prime Minister in Genoa during the G-8 meetings last year. Meanwhile, on the other side of the barricades Carlo Giuliani was shot and killed by a police bullet. Police routinely attacked independent journalists, medics and protestors, as has become a routine practice in crowd control.

Posted in Media, Music, State / Politics | Leave a comment

redwatch uk. again.

Posted on July 25, 2006 by @ndy

Press Gazette, July 21, 2006 :

Yorkshire Evening Post journalist and anti-racism campaigner Pete Lazenby has said newspaper publishers have a “moral obligation” to help bring down the far right website Redwatch believed to be responsible for a number of attacks across the country.

The Guardian, July 21, 2006 :

Following a series of attacks on anti-racist campaigners, Home Office ministers will meet police chiefs next week to consider action against individuals linked to a far-right website that publishes the addresses of politicians, teachers and trade unionists.

Home Office minister Vernon ‘When I was a student I smoked marijuana‘ Coaker met with MPs and trade unionists yesterday in the wake of the latest incident, in which anti-fascist campaigner Alec McFadden, the president of the Merseyside TUC, was stabbed in the face after his details were listed on the Redwatch site…

…Angela Eagle is the MP for Wallasey, Mr McFadden’s home constituency, and her photograph appears on the front page of the Redwatch website, alongside that of the Yorkshire Evening Post journalist Peter Lazenby…

“…The site is registered by two UK and one US citizen and the police know who they are”, she said…

…Until now, there were doubts that the website could be closed down because it is hosted in the US.

But news that Redwatch‘s sister site in Poland has been shut down following cooperation between police there and in the US has given the government new hope.

UK ministers confirmed earlier this week they were in touch with the US authorities in relation to the UK site.

NB. the parasitic Redwatch Poland subsequently obtained a new host, also located in the US[?].

Posted in Anti-fascism, Media, State / Politics | 1 Comment

Splitsville UK : Trot Guide 2006 #4.5

Posted on July 25, 2006 by @ndy

The boys and girls of the Trot Guide are no longer alone as the splitsville hits UK… this time arriving at the heart of Workers Power. According to the new mob, called permanentrevolution:

On Saturday 1 July 33 members of the LFI in Britain, Australia [5], Ireland and Sweden (30% of the LFI membership) were expelled by the International Secretariat (IS) of the League. They were all members of an International Faction (IF) that had been formed in the run up to the League’s 7th Congress in July.

The formation of the IF was a culmination of a two year long struggle beginning in Workers Power Britain (WPB) and extending into the League. That struggle was around perspectives and tactics. The majority perspectives adopted at the 2003 congress, and many of the tactics deployed by the organisation on the basis of these perspectives, were wrong, especially around the use of the slogan of a Fifth International within the anti-capitalist movement.

According to another Trotskyite sect, the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty, these 33 members do indeed constitute around 1/3 of the total membership of the ‘2/3 League for a Fifth International’. Given that 5 of the expelled members were from Australia, I think Revo Australia* / Workers Power may have to be added to the endangered species list.

(*Ugh. That name.)

Choice quote from the ones left holding the bag:

…some of our ex-member[s] are now arguing that individuals and minorities should have the right to argue different lines from that of the majority – even to recruit people to minority positions. This centrist position, condemned by Leon Trotsky, betrays their individualistic outlook. A communist, speaking in public on political questions, is not exercising her or his “free spirit”. We leave that to anarchists and liberals…

The 66 or so left behind by the 33 remain defiant, “[i]n spite of the splitters and deserters”.

That’s the spirit!

The Weakly Worker comments:

When we have felt it worthwhile, we have featured some journalistic commentary on this. We have pointed to the group’s pandering to anarchistic sentiment in the so-called anti-capitalist movement; its overblown perspectives concerning the political character of the period; its mildly embarrassing bout of youth vanguardism; and its laughably pompous and profoundly misplaced belief in its own destiny as the anointed leader of the world’s proletariat, often expressed in the form of a lofty disdain for the rest of the revolutionary left.

Pandering to anarchistic sentiment is barking up the wrong tree; overblown perspectives are to be expected; vanguardism of any sort is laughable; so too, any and all claims to proletarian dictatorship.

(Anyway, what have the Romans ever done for us?)

Back to the 2/3:

The only problem for the minority faction was that outside the British Section and the four members of the Australian section their support was negligible…

It is clear from the emails that, in an online ‘referendum’, a clear majority favoured an early split before the congress, because they feared their own demoralisation as a result of having to argue with the majority at the congress. They feared that they would either “get trapped “ by having no excusable pretext for leaving or would have to walk out after a heavy defeat. Instead they have decided to hold a founding conference in London with the British minority and the two Australian delegates. The latter were brazenly encouraged to get the money for their fares paid from the League for attending its congress and then attend the split meeting instead…

In addition Workers Power (Australia) voted unanimously at its aggregate to support one of its members “ignoring Majority faction dictates at the Revo Conference 2006”: that is, to break from the League policy of continuing the work of strengthening international democratic centralism within REVOLUTION [“REVO“] and instead fight for it to completely break its links with the League. (Lisa F, ‘WPA Aggregate/Faction meeting’).

The Faction planned to cease paying League subs from July and began transferring money to a new bank account, having discussed a subscription scale for their new organisation. Some of them it seems have already cancelled their subscriptions.

The Faction has entered into communications with organisations and individuals hostile to the League in Austria and has a project of “regroupment discussion” listing an assortment of centrist and sectarian organisations, including some who split from the League over issues on which the then faction leaders totally supported the majority…

In accordance with its inner logic this process has now culminated in a classic petit-bourgeois rebellion against democratic centralism – the highest form of proletarian organisation.

(Take that, Spartacist League!)

The petit-bourgeois diletanttes at libcom.org express typically anarchistic sentiments with regards this, the ‘tragic necessity’ for a split in the League. And their mocking the importance of the correct slogan (“especially around the use of the slogan of a Fifth International within the anti-capitalist movement”) — betrays their, um, “individualistic outlook”. A result of too much over-exercising of her or his “free spirit”, I expect; and the paying of too little attention to the views of (the majority of the) 66 members of the 2/3 of 1/5 International.

See also : ‘Workers’ Power: a tale of kitsch Trotskyism’ (AWL, 1993). One Trotskyite sect having a crack at a (former?) competitor.

We Are… The League! The only League worth listening to.

Posted in Trot Guide | 3 Comments

Further case studies in ‘The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie’

Posted on July 24, 2006 by @ndy

‘Rabbit mutilator jailed’
Sydney Morning Herald
Leonie Lamont
July 3, 2006

A Sydney financier has been jailed for 16 months for “the worst case” of aggravated cruelty against animals.

[Above : Agent 00Kitten of the Bunny Rabbit Liberation Front is fiercely protective of her Oryctolagus cuniculus companion]

Brendan Francis McMahon, 37, of Tamarama, will have to spend at least 12 months in jail for his torture, mutilation, and alleged sexual offences against 17 rabbits and a guinea pig.

The magistrate, Ian Barnett, said a strong message should be sent to the community that people such as McMahon could not escape responsibility for their actions by the fact they were psychotic at the time.

“In my view this is one of the worst case scenarios of aggravated cruelty to animals,” he said.

He accepted McMahon had a lifelong cannabis addiction and, before and during the offences against the animals, had a $125 a day addiction to methamphetamine (also known as ice).

“In my view there is community outrage at this matter and someone should not be allowed to commit such offences of aggravated cruelty against animals and say ‘Well I had been using ice at the time. I have been taking cannabis most of my life.’

“My view is … this is not acceptable.”

The dead or dying animals, some skinned, were allegedly found in and around McMahon’s York Street office between July and early August last year.

McMahon ran a financial planning and mortgage brokerage, Meares-McMahon Capital, with Jason Meares, the brother of the swimsuit designer Jodhi Meares, former wife of James Packer.

Earlier :

‘Rabbit case gets stranger still’, Natasha Wallace, Sydney Morning Herald, November 25, 2005
‘Financier in court on bestiality and cruelty charges’, Les Kennedy, Sydney Morning Herald, October 13, 2005

See also :

Pet-Abuse.Com

[Above : Anonymous human comrades strike back against the animal-hating Empire of capital and state. Some people build cages; others dismantle them.]

Posted in Cats | 1 Comment

It’s all because…

Posted on July 24, 2006 by @ndy

“Baby, I’m An Anarchist!”

Through the best of times,
Through the worst of times,
Through Nixon and through Bush,
Do you remember ’36?
We went our seperate ways.
You fought for Stalin.
I fought for freedom.
You believe in authority.
I believe in myself.
I’m a molotov cocktail.
You’re Dom Perignon.
Baby, what’s that confused look in your eyes?
What I’m trying to say is that
I burn down buildings
While you sit on a shelf inside of them.
You call the cops
On the looters and piethrowers.
They call it class war,
I call it co-conspirators.

‘Cause baby, I’m an anarchist,
You’re a spineless liberal.
We marched together for the eight-hour day
And held hands in the streets of Seattle,
But when it came time to throw bricks
Through that Starbucks window,
You left me all alone.

You watched in awe at the red,
White, and blue on the fourth of july.
While those fireworks were exploding,
I was burning that fucker
And stringing my black flag high,
Eating the peanuts
That the parties have tossed you
In the back seat of your father’s new Ford.
You believe in the ballot,
Believe in reform.
You have faith in the elephant and jackass,
And to you, solidarity’s a four-letter word.
We’re all hypocrites,
But you’re a patriot.
You thought I was only joking
When I screamed “Kill Whitey!”
At the top of my lungs
At the cops in their cars
And the men in their suits.
No, I won’t take your hand
And marry the State.

‘Cause baby, I’m an anarchist,
You’re a spineless liberal.
We marched together for the eight-hour day
And held hands in the streets of Seattle,
But when it came time to throw bricks
Through that Starbucks window,
You left me all alone.

Posted in Anarchism, Music | Leave a comment

Blogging the Middle East

Posted on July 23, 2006 by @ndy

About

Filed under: Uncategorized — Anarchistian @ 12:49 pm

Who? Secular, anarchist, graduate student

Where? Rabieh / Qornet Shahwan, Lebanon

What? Analyzing the Middle East and working towards a world without borders / exploring culture, life, and other aspects of the Middle East

Interests? Anarchism, Marxism, Mikhail Bakunin, activism, international affairs, politics, Palestine, Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Iran, Middle East, photojournalism, photography

Posted in Anarchism, Media, State / Politics, War on Terror | Leave a comment