VIDEO
In February 1949, members of the Karen ethnic minority launched an armed insurrection against Myanmar’s central government.
Over 60 years later, the conflict continues, with more than a dozen ethnic rebel groups waging war against the army in their fight for self-rule.
VIDEO
Africa Rising goes right inside the extraordinary story of how a large rural area of Ethiopia is taking itself out of poverty. With a cast of thousands, the film reveals a new dawn of Africans solving Africa’s needs themselves.
For the real scandal of Ethiopia is that, like much of the rest of Africa, it is a potentially rich country with enormous resources. But what has not been recognised, until now, is that the solution to its dilemma lies in the hands of its own people.
This controversial, colourful and frequently uplifting documentary highlights the failure of Western policies towards Africa, asking whether it is time to reconsider the role of Western aid workers on the continent.
Al Jazeera has had a string of enlightening and very well made/informed documentaries of late. I’ve decided, in my now rare tumblr appearances, to post these two for two purposes: (i) general interest, and (ii) to inform politicized communities (to which many of us belong) of the real work going on in different places in the world to construct, from the bottom up, a better life by the people and for the people, as well as the problems and challenges associated with these efforts and struggles.
If the Tea Party did not exist, we would have to invent it. Hey, waidaminute, that’s what fucking happened. Fret all you like about a bunch of pasty Midwestern slobs in American-flag underpants overpaying for Goldline coins between ads for the strongest erectile dysfunction herbal remedy this side of true Scandinavian fish oil, these Chinamen are not the issue, man. The difference between tea party yahoos and progressive worriers is the difference between beagles and terriers, and if they just stopped for a moment to sniff each other’s asshole, they’d realize that cosmetics aside, they’re all just dogs. Poor, abused, unadoptable dogs awaiting the grimly pleasant vet tech and the numbing, pre-euthenasiac sting of the needle. The Tea Party held America hostage during “the debt debate”? No, you fool, you idiot; fucking rich people did it. The Tea Party is just some shit they cooked up to keep you busy, to keep you fuming at each other while they steal your tooth fairy money and grandma’s dentures. Every policy that you abhor and mistakenly ascribe to the ersatz conservative revanchism of the so-called tea-party movement is a willful policy of oligarchic centralism with the end goal of extracting every last red cent from every last human being on the earth. You are both the miner and the mine. Strap the gaslight to your forehead, bub, and stick your head right back in where the sun don’t shine.
Yea verily, I have returned unto you to put it straight to yinz: there is no tea party; there are no Democrats; there is no America. There is only global capital. There is no keeping American competitive for the future against the Chinese children of the math-science learning gap to win tomorrow today with the power of innovation. There is a single transnational elite whose allegiance is to itself. They would’ve fucked you on Saturday; they’ll fuck you next Wednesday instead. There was no debt crisis. THERE IS NO DEBT CEILING. You are like prisoners in a concentration camp, tearing each other apart over crusts of bread. The guards check their rifles. The kommandant shtups his mistress. The carrion birds circle against the concrete sky.
You must destroy the rich.
NB. FUCKING THIS.
LEWISBURG, PENNSYLVANIA - Leonard Peltier, Lakota, imprisoned for the past 35 years, has released a letter from solitary confinement, through his attorney. The letter is posted in its entirety on the website AIM WEST.
Peltier was convicted of killing two FBI agents who showed up on June 25, 1975 at a private residence in Oglala, South Dakota.
In the letter, Peltier writes about his placement in the hole, where he has been since June 27:
“Since June 27 the guards have had me in the hole, a small miserable cell with little air that is dangerously hot. They are torturing me by keeping me in solitary confinement-this is an effort to break and kill me. However, the public pressure being generated by my many supporters and counsel is making a real difference.”
He continues that “the government wants me to die here, but I’m not going to.”
As the letter continues, Peltier makes a plea for support of his defense fund so that his legal team, led by Robert R. Bryan from San Francisco can have the adequate funds to mount his defense.
True to his strong heritage as a warrior he concludes:
“I believe in the Spirit of Crazy Horse. They have imprisoned my body, but my spirit soars like an eagle. I will never give up, despite the threats to my health and life from this long imprisonment. I am an innocent man and will continue fighting against the genocide of my people.”
“The copyright system grew up with printing—a technology for mass-production copying. Copyright fit in well with this technology because it restricted only the mass producers of copies. It did not take freedom away from readers of books. An ordinary reader, who did not own a printing press, could copy books only with pen and ink, and few readers were sued for that.
Digital technology is more flexible than the printing press: when information has digital form, you can easily copy it to share it with others. This very flexibility makes a bad fit with a system like copyright. That’s the reason for the increasingly nasty and draconian measures now used to enforce software copyright…”
by Karen Seidman, The Gazette (Full Text)
Saying they must battle a “wave of repression” that is sweeping the province, students took the Montreal police force to task on Monday for turning student protesters into criminals with the recent arrests of four activists months after a demonstration against tuition-fee hikes.
“This is an unprecedented wave of arrests,” said Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, spokesperson for L’Association pour une solidarité syndicate étudiante.
ASSE says four of its members - three of them on the group’s executive committee - were arrested recently in connection with the occupation of Finance Minister Raymond Bachand’s office on March 24 and a demonstration on March 31.
Nadeau-Dubois said each student is facing between four and nine charges, including mischief, aggression and breaking and entering, and more arrests are expected.
“We are a legitimate organization that represents 45,000 students,” Nadeau-Dubois said at a news conference. “There is nothing criminal in our intentions or actions.”
It was the second time in a week that a group has criticized Montreal police’s GAMMA unit, created in January to deal with increasing vandalism and assaults on police officers during protests.
Last week, the Coalition against repression and police brutality accused the Montreal force of targeting people for their political beliefs.
Both groups have filed complaints with the Quebec Human Rights Commission.
Last winter, Quebec announced a plan to raise university tuition by $325 a year over five years beginning in September 2012, which sparked several protests.
Nadeau-Dubois said more demonstrations are planned for this fall, as well as the possibility of a strike.
Montreal police spokesperson Ian Lafrenière said he was “embarrassed” by the students’ accusations of intimidation.
“When you occupy an office and someone gets a broken wrist and there’s a broken window, that’s not a peaceful demonstration,” he said.
“I agree that people should be allowed to demonstrate. If you do nothing illegal, we won’t bother you.”
He said some students at the March 31 demonstration had Molotov cocktails and “criminal intentions.”
But Nadeau-Dubois said the worst infraction students committed was to put stickers on the walls.
Now, he said, students are being targeted by the police, and investigated and arrested at their homes as a means of intimidating them.
He said peaceful occupations have been used as a tactic of protest for decades by students, women and minorities. “I have a message for the Montreal police,” Nadeau-Dubois said. “You can chase us, arrest us and hit us but you will never succeed in intimidating us.
“No police squad will stop our fight to halt the increase of tuition fees.”
“…By freeing its citizens from the fear of prosecution and imprisonment for drug usage, Portugal has dramatically improved its ability to encourage drug addicts to avail themselves of treatment. The resources that were previously devoted to prosecuting and imprisoning drug addicts are now available to provide treatment programs to addicts…”
So I found a similar version in English. Much less detailed and with vague facts (in comparison to the French articles posted before), it’s still worth a read. Spreading for interest and necessary knowledge of that which will undoubtedly repress us.
Trois articles sur l’arrestation et détention de quatres manifestants accusé(e)s de violences contre les policiers et d’agitation lors de la manifestation anticapitaliste du 1er mai 2011. Plus important encore dans tout ça c’est la création du GAMMA, le Guet des activités des mouvements marginaux et anarchistes, lié directement aux escouades et sections criminelles de la SPVM…la répression avance, camarades.
IN ENGLISH:
A series of articles in French describing a worrying new development in State repression in what is believed to be a ‘free country’ by many. In the past week, four people have been arrested for alleged violence against the police and agitation during the Anticapitalist Demonstration of the 1st of May in Montreal. Although this is not particularly surprising, as the State seeks to cover its own multiple violations of rights during that particular demonstration, there are other associated facts that present a more general and insidious threat to activists and specifically anarchists.
As a result of what the police sees as more provocation and generalised violence during demonstrations on the part of demonstrators (a gross generalization, to be honest), they have decided to create a special task force, named GAMMA, with the aim of surveilling and repressing ‘marginal’ and ‘anarchist’ movements. The acronym in French literally translates to ‘Watching for the Activities of Margninal and Anarchist Movements,’ although the word ‘guet’ is often rather linked to the watching done by a predator, in preparation for some decisive and sudden action…but it doesn’t stop there! This new task-force is directly linked to criminal task forces and squads already existing in the SPVM (the Montreal police). They’re planning on putting the same guys they’ve had exchanging gunfire with the Hell’s Angels into spying on and harassing ‘marginals’ and ‘anarchists’? Shit people, we’re in for some hard times…
This is just another overt, yet almost entirely unreported event that demonstrates the rapid pace at which surveillance and generalised repression are once again gaining on us.
I am willing to translate if there’s anyone who is really interested in reading the articles…although I’m warning you that I will abridge, though I won’t change any meaningful content.
In Solidarity. En Solidarité.
