Phoenix Insurgent
Joel Olson's politics have influenced those of us in PCWC a great deal, there's no doubt about that. Not so much when it comes to the organizational question (Joel is a founding member of Bring the Ruckus, a group that PCWC has come into conflict with several times), but certainly when it comes to the fundamental importance of white supremacy in American society. Of course, that's just fine because we at PCWC take what we think is worth taking from wherever it needs taking from.
For those that don't know, essentially boiled down to its essence, race traitor politics is an analysis that puts forward the hypothesis that white supremacy is the primary contradiction in American politics. Whiteness is a political relationship and a political alliance. Said another way, whiteness is the agreement between what we call white people of all classes that, in exchange for not upsetting the capitalist applecart, even poor whites will receive a series of benefits above and beyond similarly classed people of other races. And this necessarily means the continued exploitation and reduced status of people of color. Thus it puts white people's political aspirations in contradiction to those of the rest of the working class and therefore likewise against the cause of revolution.
For instance, much more than people of color, even a poor white can expect not to be harassed by the police as much (and therefore to remain out of the prison system), to have better access to schools and health care, to have access to better jobs and higher income, and to accumulate family wealth and a variety of other benefits. In order to receive these benefits, poor and middle class white folks have to agree to a devil's bargain with rich whites. This cross-class alliance is responsible for the otherwise unexplainable and bizarre political behavior of whites, who consistently refuse (much to the consternation of liberals and leftists of all stripes) to take revolutionary or even progressive positions of solidarity with people of color (witness the immigration question here in Arizona, where Sheriff Joe's electoral numbers are dwarfed by the totals in favor of anti-immigrant propositions). It explains why whites do not find common cause with people of color from their own class: they have been given a sort of aristocratic position within the class. It's what DuBois called the "wages of whiteness". Thus, whites wind up reactionaries that defend the current order. They defend their whiteness. And that sustains capitalism, despite the fact that even white folks who aren't rich are exploited under the system as well.
Of course, strategically this has implications for the way we organize. The analysis suggests that, if white supremacy is so important to the maintenance of capitalist domination in the US, then the way to attack that domination is to put that glue, white supremacy, into crisis. In essence, not to act politically like a white person. The idea is that if the elite can no longer count on the allegiance of white folks to white supremacy, then the opportunity for a real attack on capitalism and the state become possible.
Anyhow, there's more to it than that, but that's it in a nutshell. One of the other interesting things that Joel researches is the role of fanaticism in politics. A couple years ago, he gave a talk at ASU on fanatacism which I recommend everyone listen to, and I did an analysis of it at my old blog, Phoenix Insurgent (check both out here). As Joel puts it, fanaticism is "a critique and a rejection of political moderation - not a rejection of reason, of rationality or anything like that. And, as such, fanaticism and reason can be consistent. And furthermore, it can be consistent with justice and democracy in times when moderation lends support to the enemies of democracy."
In essence, fanaticism is a political orientation towards both one's enemies and the middle ground at the same time. It seeks to evaporate the middle ground occupied by political moderates at the same time it engages its enemies. That's because the fanatic wants to force sides to be drawn on an issue. The fanatic seeks to polarize.
This jibes really well with the anti- or post-leftism that guides many of PCWC's actions and ideas. Leftism, as I see it is a false political alliance that assumes relationships and a continuity of ideas and goals that is simply not generally borne out by history. That is, if the anarchist and the communist are both leftists, then why does the communist sell out the anarchist (and everyone else, for that matter) so frequently in history? Likewise the liberal. So often the mantra on the left is that "we're all on the same side". But the results of political struggle tell a different story. That's reason to question the existence of the left, then, at least in terms of revolutionary strategy.
So, whereas the post-leftist looks for alliances that break out of or defy the tired old leftist spectrum, the fanatic seeks to do a very similar thing, although by pointing a good deal of its arrows at political moderates -- many of whom may pose as more pragmatic allies. To the fanatic, the existence of the moderate is a political problem that must be resolved if progress is to be made. The moderate is a political impediment. To this end, the fanatic takes positions and actions that force the middle to make a choice.
Anyhow, the long and short of it is that Joel has been doing some interesting research that brings the two main currents that PCWC agrees with him on together in his study of the abolitionists and fanatacism. Here in Phoenix, PCWC has been circulating and promoting his ideas in this regard (and we carry his book, "The Abolition of White Democracy") and so it was with some excitement that it came to my attention via Collin Sick that Joel had recently given a talk on the topic at NAU (where he teaches) and that the video had made it onto the internet. Thanks to whoever put it up we can now all enjoy it. I recommend it highly and I've posted the first of four parts below. Check it out. The other four parts are posted here.
Friday, May 8, 2009
Thursday, May 7, 2009
News of Interest 5/7/09
Texas police shake down drivers, lawsuit claims
Nevada town rallies to save prison camp
A small town finds out that slave labor is something worth fighting for in this recession.
SC man is latest accused recession bank robber
See also this article from the Arizona Republic today for local insight into this phenomenon otherwise known as the "reverse bailout".
Millionaires don't feel so rich: survey
Cow jumps fence, escapes slaughterhouse
I think there's a lesson here for all of us.
Maryland resident Amanee Busbee said she also was threatened with losing custody of her child after being stopped in Tenaha with her fiancé and his business partner. They were headed to Houston with $50,000 to complete the purchase of a restaurant, she said.-CNN"The police officer would say things to me like, 'Your son is going to child protective services because you are not saying what we need to hear,' " Busbee said.
Guillory, who practices in nearby Nacogdoches, Texas, estimates authorities in Tenaha seized $3 million between 2006 and 2008, and in about 150 cases -- virtually all of which involved African-American or Latino motorists -- the seizures were improper.
"They are disproportionately going after racial minorities," he said. "My take on the matter is that the police in Tenaha, Texas, were picking on and preying on people that were least likely to fight back."
Nevada town rallies to save prison camp
A small town finds out that slave labor is something worth fighting for in this recession.
In this former boomtown forgotten by much of the state, the small prison is a savior for residents and the cash-strapped town manager. Supervised inmates shovel snowed-in driveways, yank out weeds, clean rain gutters, slash brush and dig graves.-Los Angeles Times
"They do everything but herd cattle," said Perchetti, 63, who runs the Tonopah Convention Center. "Shoot, they fixed my plumbing a few times."
So when state officials proposed mothballing the camp to help narrow Nevada's $3-billion budget gap, residents prepared for battle. They repeatedly car-pooled to the capital -- a 460-mile round trip. To lawmakers and their staff, they handed out save-the-camp pleas written by senior citizens, high school principals, the Salvation Army, students.
SC man is latest accused recession bank robber
See also this article from the Arizona Republic today for local insight into this phenomenon otherwise known as the "reverse bailout".
Windsor is one of a growing list of unlikely suspects, ordinary people from ministers to ex-cops citing financial duress since the start of the recession in late 2007 for allegedly turning to a crime that targets fast cash — bank robbery.-Associated Press
Money troubles, specifically job losses, have also been named as possible motives in at least four of the mass shootings that have scarred the country this winter, including the deaths of 13 people and a gunman in Binghamton, N.Y., the killings of three police officers in Pittsburgh and four more plus the shooter in Oakland, Calif., and the deaths of 10 people and a gunman in south Alabama.
Bank holdups haven't grabbed the same attention, but industry figures show they go up during recessions, and experts say the pressure inevitably pushes some otherwise law-abiding people to find themselves accosting a teller at a window.
Millionaires don't feel so rich: survey
Some 46% of the 1,012 participants in the annual Fidelity Investments study said they "do not feel wealthy and are taking action to reassess and rebuild their wealth."-CNN
0:00 /5:27Buffett: Behind the scenes
That's a big change from last year, when only 19% said they didn't feel rich. Fidelity blamed the drop on the corresponding plunge in wealth, with an average 19% reduction in household income and investable assets, and a 28% plunge in real estate holdings.
Fidelity, a Boston-based financial services company, described the average respondent as having $3.5 million in assets and $306,000 in annual household income.
Cow jumps fence, escapes slaughterhouse
I think there's a lesson here for all of us.
A cow has escaped from a New York City slaughterhouse and may have a new lease on life.-Associated Press
Police say the black heifer bolted Wednesday afternoon from Musa Hala Inc., which butchers animals according to religious restrictions.
The cow wandered in Queens for about a kilometre before police captured her an hour later and took her to an Animal Care and Control centre, where she was nicknamed Molly.
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
Phoenix Class War Council Presents: The I <3 Somali Pirate T-Shirt Promo
Collin Sick
This video was something we did for fun over the weekend after a very successful weekend with our new shirts. Friday saw PCWC tabling at the monthly First Friday art walk in Phoenix, and much like last month our table was busy all night. We moved a bunch of books, pamphlets, and copies of our paper, in addition to the "No More Racism" and "I <3 height="344" width="425">
This video was something we did for fun over the weekend after a very successful weekend with our new shirts. Friday saw PCWC tabling at the monthly First Friday art walk in Phoenix, and much like last month our table was busy all night. We moved a bunch of books, pamphlets, and copies of our paper, in addition to the "No More Racism" and "I <3 height="344" width="425">
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
A future remembered in past tense
Phoenix Insurgent
Below I have embedded Helena Norberg's classic film "Ancient Futures" about globalization and capitalist accumulation on the Indian/Tibetan border. Her video, brought to my attention this week by the very informative anti-authoritarian radio show Unwelcome Guests, shows visually what many have tried to articulate in words: that poverty is an inevitable result of capitalism, not the failure of it. That is, capitalism creates poverty from whole cloth where none existed before. Norberg illustrates this by showing us that material deprivation and poverty are not the same thing.
Indeed, we see this in Mexico, where the process of capital accumulation that has occurred since the Spanish set foot there, and increasing steadily with the passage of NAFTA and the laws that preceded it, has privatized vast swaths of land, uprooting whole communities. Once living lives without material abundance as most economists would understand it but high degrees of autonomy, now they are forced into the cities of North America where they must work for a wage, creating the phenomenon of rising wages alongside rising poverty.
Capitalist economists literally don't count what you produce for yourself or trade to others in your small hamlet, but it does count those rent payments and grocery store bills. If you didn't sell it, it doesn't count, in other words. Thus, your material wealth may seem to increase at the same time your level of poverty does.
Since the PCWC members have recently read John Gibler's wonderfully insightful book "Mexico Unconquered: Chronicles of Power and Revolt", I thought I would introduce Norberg's video with an excerpt from that. As an aside, PCWC recently got a chance to hang with Gibler after a talk he gave and we can vouch that this guy is the real deal and his book is an insightful and provocative people's history of Mexico. Go get it now. You'll thank us for it.
John Gibler:
What this illustrates is the complexity of our task as revolutionaries and the depths to which the dominant ideology of capitalism has infected the dialogue of even those who seek to resist it. Here at PCWC, we seek to dig deep beyond the surface. But one question dogs us at every turn: what if our distance from these changes, what if the transformation wrought by Capital on our lives is so complete, that our imaginations fail us? This is the question of our time.
Perhaps my answer will sound more than a little Situationist influenced, then, when I say:
All power to the imagination!
And now, "Ancient Futures":
Below I have embedded Helena Norberg's classic film "Ancient Futures" about globalization and capitalist accumulation on the Indian/Tibetan border. Her video, brought to my attention this week by the very informative anti-authoritarian radio show Unwelcome Guests, shows visually what many have tried to articulate in words: that poverty is an inevitable result of capitalism, not the failure of it. That is, capitalism creates poverty from whole cloth where none existed before. Norberg illustrates this by showing us that material deprivation and poverty are not the same thing.
Indeed, we see this in Mexico, where the process of capital accumulation that has occurred since the Spanish set foot there, and increasing steadily with the passage of NAFTA and the laws that preceded it, has privatized vast swaths of land, uprooting whole communities. Once living lives without material abundance as most economists would understand it but high degrees of autonomy, now they are forced into the cities of North America where they must work for a wage, creating the phenomenon of rising wages alongside rising poverty.
Capitalist economists literally don't count what you produce for yourself or trade to others in your small hamlet, but it does count those rent payments and grocery store bills. If you didn't sell it, it doesn't count, in other words. Thus, your material wealth may seem to increase at the same time your level of poverty does.
Since the PCWC members have recently read John Gibler's wonderfully insightful book "Mexico Unconquered: Chronicles of Power and Revolt", I thought I would introduce Norberg's video with an excerpt from that. As an aside, PCWC recently got a chance to hang with Gibler after a talk he gave and we can vouch that this guy is the real deal and his book is an insightful and provocative people's history of Mexico. Go get it now. You'll thank us for it.
John Gibler:
But what is this, one may resonably ask, about poverty being an ideology, an idea? Isn't poverty a condition, and a bad one at that? Isn't poverty about living without nutritious food, without electricity and indoor plumbing, without access to adequate medical care, drinking water, good roads? Wouldn't it be insulting to say these conditions don't exist or aren't bad?We can take this a step further by considering that what this discourse further does is lock us into a dialectic in which the struggle is against poverty, or for the advancement of particular groups (workers, women, national minorities) within this economic construct. Thus, the logic of the system that creates poverty becomes the defining characteristic of the struggle against it. You can see how it's very difficult to escape from this two-edged sword. In the end, this explains why so many struggles against capitalism only wind up with the subject further embedded within it. Take the unions and communist parties as prime examples. Once standing in opposition to Capital, they everywhere now bargain with it and even prop it up.
Excavating poverty's ideological content does not deny the existence of harsh and brutal living conditions, or insinuate that such conditions reflect a wiser, truer way of life than modern industrial capitalism (a typical red herring used to counter critics). The excavation is meant to show how people ended up in horrid conditions, why they are seldom able to change those conditions, and who is responsible for pinning them there; it is meant to help understand both historical and present human actions that forced (and continue to force) people into miserable situations. The ideology of poverty performs a kind of discursive illusion to obscure both historical and current human responsibility for the creation of destitution and suffering, and thus to convince the hundreds of millions of people who are destitute that no one is really to blame for their state, and that national governments and international economists are the best ones to figure out how to help them in their toil.
What this illustrates is the complexity of our task as revolutionaries and the depths to which the dominant ideology of capitalism has infected the dialogue of even those who seek to resist it. Here at PCWC, we seek to dig deep beyond the surface. But one question dogs us at every turn: what if our distance from these changes, what if the transformation wrought by Capital on our lives is so complete, that our imaginations fail us? This is the question of our time.
Perhaps my answer will sound more than a little Situationist influenced, then, when I say:
All power to the imagination!
And now, "Ancient Futures":
Monday, May 4, 2009
Release them all! Stop jailing migrants!
This is the second text printed on the fliers that PCWC members distributed on the May Day/May 2nd immigrant solidarity march in Phoenix. This piece was by our good friend and comrade Sallydarity, "Release them all! Stop jailing migrants!" is yet another valuable contribution of hers to the understanding of the situation facing immigrants in Maricopa County.
by Sallydarity
http://chaparralrespectsnoborders.blogspot.com
We've heard the stories: Undocumented immigrants are getting kidnapped and held for ransom, and perhaps found in drop houses if the police get a tip. The migrants are vulnerable targets because they have been criminalized by the state. Something we don't hear too much about is that the biggest armed gang in the country is kidnapping migrants and holding them against their will. They're not holding them in drop houses; these uniformed kidnappers are handcuffing the migrants and incarcerating them in jails and detention centers.
If we feel that it is tragic when traffickers do it, why do we let the police get away with it? Whether they are "rescued" from traffickers, stopped while driving in one of Arpaio's sweeps, or confronted with the ridiculous charge of conspiracy to smuggle themselves, migrants get caught up in the US prison system for no other reason but crossing a man-made line in the sand.
Arpaio, taking pleasure in humiliating brown-skinned people and getting cheers from racists, stands out as the villain of Maricopa County. But the other police departments are acting in similar, more quiet ways. While migrants and activists wait to hear what the federal government will do to save us from Sheriff Joe, the Department of Homeland Security is holding hundreds of thousands of people- triple the number of people in detention just ten years ago- in detention centers. If they end 287g they will only replace it with something more tasteful; something called "Secure Communities" which will target our "criminal alien" population. Meanwhile our legislature is coming up with new ways to criminalize migrants.
Migrants have been criminalized for who they are and where they are from- not for doing harm. If anything is harmful, it's punishing people for trying to survive the results of colonialism, capitalism, and globalization (which most US citizens enjoy the benefits of). When it is nearly impossible to make a living and nearly impossible to migrate legally, anyone would travel to where they have more opportunities. Why then would advocates for immigrants' rights legitimize the arrests of undocumented immigrants by complaining only about the "legal" people who get caught up in the racial profiling sweeps? We mustn't buy into the efforts to divide us! We need to bring down the walls between us, as well as the physical walls- the border walls, the jail walls, and the walls of the detention centers.
It should be a crime to imprison people for trying to survive!
by Sallydarity
http://chaparralrespectsnoborders.blogspot.com
We've heard the stories: Undocumented immigrants are getting kidnapped and held for ransom, and perhaps found in drop houses if the police get a tip. The migrants are vulnerable targets because they have been criminalized by the state. Something we don't hear too much about is that the biggest armed gang in the country is kidnapping migrants and holding them against their will. They're not holding them in drop houses; these uniformed kidnappers are handcuffing the migrants and incarcerating them in jails and detention centers.
If we feel that it is tragic when traffickers do it, why do we let the police get away with it? Whether they are "rescued" from traffickers, stopped while driving in one of Arpaio's sweeps, or confronted with the ridiculous charge of conspiracy to smuggle themselves, migrants get caught up in the US prison system for no other reason but crossing a man-made line in the sand.
Arpaio, taking pleasure in humiliating brown-skinned people and getting cheers from racists, stands out as the villain of Maricopa County. But the other police departments are acting in similar, more quiet ways. While migrants and activists wait to hear what the federal government will do to save us from Sheriff Joe, the Department of Homeland Security is holding hundreds of thousands of people- triple the number of people in detention just ten years ago- in detention centers. If they end 287g they will only replace it with something more tasteful; something called "Secure Communities" which will target our "criminal alien" population. Meanwhile our legislature is coming up with new ways to criminalize migrants.
Migrants have been criminalized for who they are and where they are from- not for doing harm. If anything is harmful, it's punishing people for trying to survive the results of colonialism, capitalism, and globalization (which most US citizens enjoy the benefits of). When it is nearly impossible to make a living and nearly impossible to migrate legally, anyone would travel to where they have more opportunities. Why then would advocates for immigrants' rights legitimize the arrests of undocumented immigrants by complaining only about the "legal" people who get caught up in the racial profiling sweeps? We mustn't buy into the efforts to divide us! We need to bring down the walls between us, as well as the physical walls- the border walls, the jail walls, and the walls of the detention centers.
It should be a crime to imprison people for trying to survive!
Sunday, May 3, 2009
News of interest 5/3/09
A Workers’ Paradise Found Off Japan’s Coast
HIME ISLAND, Japan — If Marxism had ever produced a functional, prosperous society, it might have looked something like this tiny southern Japanese island.
-New York TimesAt first glance, there is little to set Hime (pronounced HEE-may) apart from the hundreds of other small inhabited islands that dot the coasts of Japan’s main isles. The 2,519 mostly graying islanders subsist on fishing and shrimp farming, and every summer hold a Shinto religious festival featuring dancers dressed as foxes.
But once off the ferry, the island’s sole public transportation link to the outside, visitors are greeted by an unusual sight: a tall, bronze statue of Hime’s previous mayor, rare in a country that typically shuns such political aggrandizement. Rarer still is that the statue was erected by his son, who is the island’s current mayor.
The Secret History of Kim Jong Il
I first met Kim Jong Il in October 1959. He was a senior at the elite Namsan Senior High School, and I was a 27-year-old professor of Russian at the Pyongyang University of Education. I also happened to have been chosen as a private tutor for the family of North Korean President Kim Il Sung. One day, the Great Leader remarked that he found his son’s Russian to be very poor and told me to go to his school and evaluate both Kim Jong Il’s proficiency and the quality of Russian education there. Handpicked by Joseph Stalin to rule over North Korea and a fluent Russian speaker himself, Kim Il Sung deemed study of the language essential to relations with the Soviet Union, North Korea’s biggest political, economic, and military patron. At the school, I attended every Russian class, made evaluations, and then summoned the 17-year-old Kim Jong Il into the principal’s office. The principal, one of the school’s Russian teachers, and I, in accordance with Kim Il Sung’s orders, jointly administered an oral Russian exam for Kim Jong Il.-Foreign Policy Magazine
Drug War Repression Hits Zapatistas and the Other Campaign
In an operation that bears all the marks of drug war-style repression, state and federal police detained six adherents to the Other Campaign, one Zapatista, and one unaffiliated man in Agua Azul, Chiapas. The military was also involved; it shot six warning shots into the air with live ammunition at a protest blockade, and it provided military intelligence that Chiapas state officials say was used to detain the men. The Agua Azul region is an area that in recent years has been the site of violent attacks against Zapatistas perpetrated by members of the paramilitary Organization For Defense of Indigenous and Campesino Rights (OPDDIC). OPDDIC members allegedly participated in the operation-Narco News
San Francisco May Day: Anarchists Attack Union Square Stores
High-end Union Square stores felt the wrath of a “black bloc” Friday night, just before nine p.m. That’s when, according to witnesses, a herd of about 50 protesters wearing black bandanas over their faces and cloaked in black hoodies tore through O’Farrell and Grant Streets, leaving havoc in their wake.-SF Law and Politics ExaminerThe group, police believe to be anarchists, may have splintered off from a May Day protest on immigration, before smashing at least 15 storefront windows in the Union Square shopping district. Debeers, Longchamp, Prada, Armani, Tumi, Guess and Montblanc were among the stores hit by the masked mob. Bystanders said the group shot paintballs and burned fake $100 bills while using bricks and sledgehammers to smash-in windows. Their message: down with capitalism.
Mike Davis: The swine flu crisis lays bare the meat industry's monstrous power
The Mexican swine flu, a genetic chimera probably conceived in the faecal mire of an industrial pigsty, suddenly threatens to give the whole world a fever. The initial outbreaks across North America reveal an infection already travelling at higher velocity than did the last official pandemic strain, the 1968 Hong Kong flu.Stealing the limelight from our officially appointed assassin, H5N1, this porcine virus is a threat of unknown magnitude. It seems less lethal than Sars in 2003, but as an influenza it may be more durable than Sars. Given that domesticated seasonal type-A influenzas kill as many one million people a year, even a modest increment of virulence, especially if combined with high incidence, could produce carnage equivalent to a major war.
Meanwhile, one of its first victims has been the consoling faith, long preached by the World Health Organisation, that pandemics can be contained by the rapid responses of medical bureaucracies, independent of the quality of local public health. Since the initial H5N1 deaths in Hong Kong in 1997, the WHO, with the support of most national health services, has promoted a strategy focused on the identification and isolation of a pandemic strain within its local radius of outbreak, followed by a thorough dousing of the population with antivirals and (if available) vaccine.
-The Guardian
Saturday, May 2, 2009
NEW SHIRTS FOR SALE!!!
Watch the shirts in real life action in our demo video:
New shirts from Phoenix Class War Council, hot off the presses! We have modified the jolly roger with two crossed RPGs (a favorite weapon of the pirates). On the back is the Phoenix Class War Council logo and the classic pirate quote, "And what do you mean by seizing the whole earth? Because I do it with a petty ship, I am called a robber, while you who does it with a great fleet are styled emperor."
Sixteen bucks gets it, plus shipping. All money goes directly back into expanding our propaganda operation, buying books, magazines, making more shirts and various other things. Our desire is to grow the operation so we can bring in as much anarchist and other literature/schwag, etc, as possible so we can increase the exposure of Arizona anarchy and deepen anarchist dialogue in general. Help us help you! Email us at firesneverextinguished[at]gmail.com to get one and we'll work it out.
Also, don't forget that we still have the "No Racists" Sheriff Joe shirt as well, which we're selling for twelve bucks. These are both quality shirts. Get 'em while you can.
Blood on the Line: Resistance, Empire and Repression at the Border
This is the first text from a flyer distributed at the May 2nd demonstration in front of the county jail. Perhaps a critique will appear here if I have some time to do it. Certainly a lot can be said about the generally sad state of the pro-migrant camp these days.
By Phoenix Insurgent
The border fence is a result of three factors, inextricably intertwined: the expansion of capitalism, global war for empire and the desire of common people to organize their own lives free of the first two.
In 1854, the ratification of the Gadsden Purchase settled a border dispute stemming from the American invasion of Mexico seven years earlier (the “Halls of Montezuma” reference in the Marines battle hymn pays tribute to the occupation of Mexico City). With the war over, Southern capitalists and slavocrats turned their greedy eyes west, hoping to expand their trade and the slave system. Mountainous northern Arizona was deemed too difficult for a railway, and so the US purchased from Mexico the region that now encompasses southern Arizona. Thus the border moved, splitting both Mexican cities like Nogales and native peoples' traditional lands.
During this time, the border remained open and people moved relatively freely back and forth. A surveying team in the region left stone piles every couple miles as they traveled, delineating on the land a line on a map generally deemed meaningless by the region's inhabitants, who were keen on constructing their own lives free from such interference. In fact, the first physical barrier wasn't built between the two countries until 1918, when US war hysteria led to the Battle of Ambos Nogales.
Paranoid about a German-backed invasion from Mexico, the US deployed forces to Nogales. When a man crossing the border refused inspection by US troops, it quickly degenerated into open warfare, with American soldiers exchanging fire with Mexican troops and ordinary Mexicans fed up with the degrading treatment routinely meted out by US border guards. The resulting bloodshed left three US soldiers dead and hundreds dead and wounded on the Mexican side, including the mayor of Nogales. As a result, the US built the first chain link fence dividing the two countries.
Since then, as Capital and the State expanded their domination of the region, that fence has grown, even though our resistance to it has continued. While American Capital has become increasingly free to travel to Mexico, sucking the wealth into American banks, people have fought for their right to cross the border on their own terms, free from regulation. Tribes divided by the border have struggled to maintain their historical right to cross and migrant workers have voyaged back and forth in search of work and visiting family.
And, of course, millions of white Americans have crossed for vacations and to set up second homes, something that is largely unremarked by mainstream American society. Indeed hundreds of thousands of Americans live in Mexico, many of whom never register with Mexican immigration agencies. In the US, the freedom of white people specifically and American citizens in general – and the rich of all nations -- to travel to Mexico is considered a birthright, the spoils of war. Meanwhile, the legitimate desire of other people to do the same is criminalized and regulated.
Nevertheless, the right of all humans to travel wherever they wish, whenever they want is elementary to being a free person. As an obvious impediment to that, it is therefore our position that not only should the border fence be stopped and dismantled, but that free movement of all people should be encouraged. All people now held for “immigration” violations should be immediately freed and those already deported should be allowed free travel back if they so desire. All facilities for immigrant detention should be closed and leveled without delay.
By Phoenix Insurgent
The border fence is a result of three factors, inextricably intertwined: the expansion of capitalism, global war for empire and the desire of common people to organize their own lives free of the first two.
In 1854, the ratification of the Gadsden Purchase settled a border dispute stemming from the American invasion of Mexico seven years earlier (the “Halls of Montezuma” reference in the Marines battle hymn pays tribute to the occupation of Mexico City). With the war over, Southern capitalists and slavocrats turned their greedy eyes west, hoping to expand their trade and the slave system. Mountainous northern Arizona was deemed too difficult for a railway, and so the US purchased from Mexico the region that now encompasses southern Arizona. Thus the border moved, splitting both Mexican cities like Nogales and native peoples' traditional lands.
During this time, the border remained open and people moved relatively freely back and forth. A surveying team in the region left stone piles every couple miles as they traveled, delineating on the land a line on a map generally deemed meaningless by the region's inhabitants, who were keen on constructing their own lives free from such interference. In fact, the first physical barrier wasn't built between the two countries until 1918, when US war hysteria led to the Battle of Ambos Nogales.
Paranoid about a German-backed invasion from Mexico, the US deployed forces to Nogales. When a man crossing the border refused inspection by US troops, it quickly degenerated into open warfare, with American soldiers exchanging fire with Mexican troops and ordinary Mexicans fed up with the degrading treatment routinely meted out by US border guards. The resulting bloodshed left three US soldiers dead and hundreds dead and wounded on the Mexican side, including the mayor of Nogales. As a result, the US built the first chain link fence dividing the two countries.
Since then, as Capital and the State expanded their domination of the region, that fence has grown, even though our resistance to it has continued. While American Capital has become increasingly free to travel to Mexico, sucking the wealth into American banks, people have fought for their right to cross the border on their own terms, free from regulation. Tribes divided by the border have struggled to maintain their historical right to cross and migrant workers have voyaged back and forth in search of work and visiting family.
And, of course, millions of white Americans have crossed for vacations and to set up second homes, something that is largely unremarked by mainstream American society. Indeed hundreds of thousands of Americans live in Mexico, many of whom never register with Mexican immigration agencies. In the US, the freedom of white people specifically and American citizens in general – and the rich of all nations -- to travel to Mexico is considered a birthright, the spoils of war. Meanwhile, the legitimate desire of other people to do the same is criminalized and regulated.
Nevertheless, the right of all humans to travel wherever they wish, whenever they want is elementary to being a free person. As an obvious impediment to that, it is therefore our position that not only should the border fence be stopped and dismantled, but that free movement of all people should be encouraged. All people now held for “immigration” violations should be immediately freed and those already deported should be allowed free travel back if they so desire. All facilities for immigrant detention should be closed and leveled without delay.
Friday, April 17, 2009
News of Interest 4/17/2009
You are being lied to about pirates
Who imagined that in 2009, the world’s governments would be declaring a new War on Pirates? As you read this, the British Royal Navy - backed by the ships of more than two dozen nations, from the U.S. to China - is sailing into Somalian waters to take on men we still picture as parrot-on-the-shoulder pantomime villains. They will soon be fighting Somalian ships and even chasing the pirates onto land, into one of the most broken countries on earth.But behind the arrr-me-hearties oddness of this tale, there is an untold scandal. The people our governments are labeling as “one of the great menaces of our times” have an extraordinary story to tell - and some justice on their side.
-San Francisco Bay View
Dozens of U.S. citizens deported
Pedro Guzman has been an American citizen all his life. Yet in 2007, the 31-year-old Los Angeles native - in jail for a misdemeanor, mentally ill and never able to read or write - signed a waiver agreeing to leave the country without a hearing and was deported to Mexico as an illegal immigrant.For almost three months, Guzman slept in the streets, bathed in filthy rivers and ate out of trash cans while his mother scoured the city of Tijuana, its hospitals and morgues, clutching his photo in her hand. He was finally found trying to cross the border at Calexico, 100 miles away.
-Associated Press
Get the Feeling You're Being Watched? If You're Driving, You Just Might Be
The village of Schaumburg, Ill., installed a camera at Woodfield Mall last November to film cars that were running red lights, then used the footage to issue citations. Results were astonishing. The town issued $1 million in fines in just three months.But drivers caught by the unforgiving enforcement -- which mainly snared those who didn't come to a full stop before turning right on red -- exploded in anger. Many vowed to stop shopping at the mall unless the camera was turned off. The village stopped monitoring right turns at the intersection in January.
-Wall Street Journal
Paris liberation made 'whites only'
-BBC NewsPapers unearthed by the BBC reveal that British and American commanders ensured that the liberation of Paris on 25 August 1944 was seen as a "whites only" victory.
Many who fought Nazi Germany during World War II did so to defeat the vicious racism that left millions of Jews dead.
Yet the BBC's Document programme has seen evidence that black colonial soldiers - who made up around two-thirds of Free French forces - were deliberately removed from the unit that led the Allied advance into the French capital.
Obama to seek $83.4 billion for Iraq, Afghan wars
President Barack Obama is seeking $83.4 billion for U.S. military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, pressing for a war supplemental spending bill like the ones he repeatedly voted against when he was senator and George W. Bush was president.-Associated Press
Obama's request would push the costs of the two wars to almost $1 trillion since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, according to the Congressional Research Service. The additional money would cover operations into the fall.
Thursday, April 16, 2009
March was a month on the move!
Phoenix Class War Council(ers) are back in the valley after a month of travels, adventures, and politics.
Sorry for the lack of updates recently. March has been a month of movement for us here at PCWC. Collectively, we put out our newspaper (email us for a copy at firesneverextinguished[at]gmail.com for a copy) and distributed the shirts we printed. Aside from that, much of the month was taken up with travels and scheming.
***
Phoenix Insurgent was in Europe again, drinking and touring, and meeting up with anarchos there. France and Spain were mostly occupied with forgetting politics and integrating into the much more laid back French and Spanish lifestyle. A return visit to the great bookstore Alternative Libertaire produced a copy of an biography of Durutti in Spanish, French and English. Ample opportunities to practice French, especially at the bars, led to some great conversations about French politics and, especially, the role of minorities from Brittany to Algeria (you can email PCWC in French, English or Spanish, by the way).
Moving on to London via train, PI met up with some folks from the great journal Occupied London, threw back some beers and Turkish pizzas, and got some great conversation and a better picture of politics in that neck of the woods -- especially the revolutionary green sense of the word. That part of town is slotted for that combination of building boom/demolition/expulsion/colonization that accompanies the Olympics wherever it goes (London 2012), and work is already steadily underway with all the usual characteristics (new sports stadiums, extension of subway lines and the clearing out of old -- or even not so old -- buildings for new ones dedicated to the new capitalist enterprises).
On the other end of town, PI met up with some folks at Freedom Books and then got a great political/historical tour of Whitechapel and the Whitechapel Anarchist Group space. Apparently a political history pub crawl had just taken place recently, sparking all sorts of ideas for similar projects here in Phoenix, especially downtown. PCWC has been reading Bradford Luckingham's very interesting histories of Phoenix lately, revealing just how much we have to learn about our own town and how Capital and politics has shaped it.
As for the WAG space, the Valley would be doing great if it had a space like that here. In what they call the London Anarchist Resource Center, they boast what is probably the biggest anarchist library publically available and have room for meetings, movie showings and an area for the construction of the various accoutrements of protest and struggle, such as signs, banners and the rest. Also, for those that don't know, WAG puts out a great broadsheet in the Class War style (i.e., snotty, uncompromising and graphically appealing). Apparently it gets quite decent distribution, which is a hell of an accomplishment given that the neighborhood they're in is undoubtedly the most conservative Muslim neighborhood in London.
While in London, and searching for pubs that didn't close at eleven (!), PI had some time for seeing the sights, including a trek to Marx's grave. Most notable about the grave are three things. First, and obviously, the head.
Apparently, the sheer and quite ridiculous size of it was even controversial amongst Marxists when it was built. Secondly, it was so big it was impossible to get a decent photo next to it without looking silly. Thirdly, even though communists the world over have declared their opposition to private property (but is it really not private property if the new landlord is the State?), some of them obviously knew vaulable real estate when they saw it, because surrounding Marx's grave are the final resting places of at least a dozen notable communists.
Also, while in London, that trademark British sense of humor was evident in the weirdest of places:
Irony outlasts empire every time.
A walking tour of Notting Hill, following the directions from a Class War pamphlet, revealed George Orwell's house while a meandering tour through the financial district and the surveillance geography of the "ring of steel" put an exclamation point on it. Cameras there cover all entries and exits, and one certainly gets the feeling not only that one doesn't fit in, but that one is at least potentially tracked at all times while in the vicinity.
In terms of tactics and issues that anarchists are having in London, I came away with a warning on "kettling" and police Forward Intelligence Teams. Kettling, not an unknown phenomenon here in the US (PCWC members encountered it as early as 2000 in LA during the Democratic Convention), has become widely known now thanks to the recent G20 protests in London. Kettling basically involves the police attempting to hem in anarchists -- to follow them with massive force and to pen them up, preventing any action to take place. This often leads to violence and detention.
FIT, however, may be less known. FIT teams gather information of event organizers, leaders and other important information, for the purpose of disrupting actions. Apparently, they can be quite intrusive as well, not being satisfied to gather data passively from a distance. As a result, something calling itself FIT Watch has emerged to counter the increasingly intrusive presence of the police at protests. According the London FIT Watch's blog,
As for kettling in Phoenix, there were attempts during the May Day protests to surround anarchists, but they were often thwarted by going the wrong way down one-way streets, which prevented the po-po from following us with their cars and wagons. In Tempe (which doesn't have one way streets downtown), however, the police brought in bike cops and were more successful in keeping us in place, at least the second time May Day was organized there (after they had received training from the Eugene police department). At the most recent immigration protest in Phoenix, cops did attempt what looked like a proto-kettling operation, but it was foiled by staying in the streets, the sheer numbers and the medians in the streets.
The rest of the European vacation eventually moved to Spain and was aimed primarily at accomplishing two main tasks: (1), relaxing in the sun, and (2), successfully driving a car through southern Spain. Both were accomplished, to varying degrees, with driving coming in a distant second given the insane driving conditions in Spanish cities. Fortunately, driving in Mexico provides preparation to a limited degree for the "devil may care" attitude of Spanish motorists (although it made Mexican drivers look quite sane by comparison).
One thing that is always apparent when traveling in Europe is the total lack of working class Americans. International travel in the US is almost exclusively the domain of five groups of people: the rich and upper middle classes; students (mostly coming from those classes); traveler kids and musicians; retirees; and the military. Almost nowhere does one find folks in their thirties and forties from working class backgrounds that aren't in the military. This is a great tragedy. While recognizing the destructive nature of air travel, it would surely be worth everyone's while to find a way to correct this deficiency. Certainly first class would make a great spot for an open bar, if we could prevent the business class from flying.
***
Collin Sick's been busy as well, traveling across the state, as well as venturing into the Bay Area, and making a trip down to Quitovac, Mexico. March began with the benefit show for the Unity Run that our O'odham friends organized, and Collin was able to help out with. The show raised hundreds of dollars for the run, and collected a sizable amount of flour, coffee, and rice for the runners. Highlights included the spray can artists going to work on massive panels outside, Dumperfoo doing live art, and DJentrification, Optimal, Shining Soul, and The Insects killing it during their sets.
The next weekend saw some frequent flier miles thrown down for the annual excursion to the Bay Area for the 14th annual San Francisco Anarchist Bookfair and the 9th annual BASTARD Conference. This is the fourth yearly trip from Phoenix to the Bay, and sadly the first without PI attending, although to be fair he was in Europe having a wonderful time of his own.
The trip was split between political fun and vacationing with friends, as many old comrades had come down from Portland just for some good ol' fashioned drinking and trouble making. Social highlights included the free admission to the last half hour of the Simian Mobile Disco show, being taken out by the greatest radical queer ladies for a stop at the worker owned Lusty Lady peepshow, and a night out with our homeboy Crudo that saw us hitting up a warehouse party in Oakland and finishing the night at Zeitgeist in the City.
Politically, the trip was full of highs, the annual anarchist cafe was seemingly full of familiar faces. Lots of good discussions that began that night carried over into the next two days, with Saturday's Bookfair, and the BASTARD on Sunday. Although the bookfair has extended to a two day affair in recent years, the trip to Berekely for the BASTARD conference is worth skipping the second day.
The day at the bookfair was great, more reunions with old friends; chatting about politics; buying a grip of new books, pamphlets, and magazines; and sharing laughter and gossip on the scandal of the bookfair, the dumping of water on the literature/propaganda of the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP). The RCP had shown up to the bookfair in a typically sectarian manner, they had not reserved a table space, they demanded to be given a space on the property, and when refused by the bookfair organizers, they continued to protest while their propaganda and materials were moved by attendees to a spot outside of the San Francisco County Fair Building (the space where the bookfair is held). Sometime after this a comrade had heard enough of their complaining that their authoritarian Maoist communist group was barred from tabling, so the person did the sensible act, or maybe just did something that should have been done long before, and took a gallon of water to their propaganda.
Folks gathered outside the bookfair to continue the discussion from Doug's "Importance of Intentions in Anarchist Actions."
Unfortunately the chat ended abruptly when a few "comrades" from the RCP came back to confront the person who allegedly dumped water on their propaganda. Most folks seated leaped to the alleged water dumper's defense and told the RCP off, the RCP responded by retreating, but were later seen wandering around asking bookfair attendees to sign a petition denouncing the water attack. Sadly, a few anarchists actually went ahead and signed their petition, a truly pathetic show of solidarity with one of the worst authoritarian commies groups. PCWC wants to make it clear, we stand behind the person(s) who took action against these Maoist jerks, and share the sympathies of other comrades who have voiced their support for the action.
The BASTARD was a great time as well, Jason McQuinn, the former publisher of Anarchy Magazine did two fantastic sessions, one on Post-Leftism, the other on Max Stirner. Both were really engaging, a note to the organizers of the SF Bookfair: Give this guy a session next year, he's a great speaker.
It was back to Arizona for Collin, with the next weekend paying a short visit to the Dry River in Tucson for a discussion on networking and future statewide meetings with other Arizona anarchists.
The next weekend saw a 4AM wake up call for the drive down to Quitovac, a Tohono O'odham village in Sonora, Mexico. For the second time in two years, the O'odham of Quitovac are resisting plans for a toxic waste dump on the ceremonial lands near the village, they have again been joined by other O'odham and allies from across Mexico and the United States. The O'odham Solidarity Project, in cooperation with O'odham people on both sides, worked to get the word out that last year's victory in shutting down the dump was a temporary win, and that the traditional ceremonial land is in peril once again.
PCWC members have worked in solidarity with local O'odham youth for a few years now (before the PCWC was even kicking), and fully support the O'odham people and their fight to preserve their Himdag, their way of life, both in the Phoenix area as well as in southern Arizona and northern Mexico. O'odham people are struggling not just against the environmental racism and destruction that indigenous people across the Americas are fighting, but also the racism that comes with being a people whose land is divided by the U.S/Mexico border.
This most recent meeting in Mexico produced a resolution calling for support for the O'odham, and demanding the state of Sonora and the government of Mexico respect environmental laws and put a permanent end to this toxic dump. The Phoenix contingent had also brought down clothes, blankets, and school and medical supplies for the village school. The time spent with the kids was a fantastic experience, and PCWC looks forward to continuing to support this community in resistance.
Below are some of the snap shots of this trip, with a few notes.
Blockading the highway outside of Quitovac for traditional O'odham song.
Walking back to the village from the highway, an elder and children from Quitovac joined with those from the other side of the border.
The youth! These kids were great, at one point there was even some beat boxing and a freestyle session. The kids love hip hop!
Saying goodbye. The kids line up at the gate to say good bye.
Back on the other side of that goddamn reinforced line.
"That's one tall cactus on that hill..."
(AKA) Camoflaged border patrol spy vehicle.
***
Future projects:
*Be on the look out for a PCWC sponsored anarchist pub night! Taking a cue from New York's turn of the century German anarchist movement, we will be hosting a regular social outing for anarchists & anti-authoritarians at a local bar. Official announcement and more details to follow.
*A new flier and essay are in the works, there's more t-shirts on the way, and a ton of new stuff for tabling. On the way, a new order of books from AK Press and crimethinc.
*Catch us at the Marquee Theatre on Sunday, May 24. We'll be tabling at the Propagandhi show, make sure to come out and support one our favorites acts, and stop by the table and say hi and grab a pamphlet or shirt.
*Look for a return to regular blogging as well.
And, as always, if you want to contact us, hit us up at firesneverextinguished@gmail.com.
Sorry for the lack of updates recently. March has been a month of movement for us here at PCWC. Collectively, we put out our newspaper (email us for a copy at firesneverextinguished[at]gmail.com for a copy) and distributed the shirts we printed. Aside from that, much of the month was taken up with travels and scheming.
***
Phoenix Insurgent was in Europe again, drinking and touring, and meeting up with anarchos there. France and Spain were mostly occupied with forgetting politics and integrating into the much more laid back French and Spanish lifestyle. A return visit to the great bookstore Alternative Libertaire produced a copy of an biography of Durutti in Spanish, French and English. Ample opportunities to practice French, especially at the bars, led to some great conversations about French politics and, especially, the role of minorities from Brittany to Algeria (you can email PCWC in French, English or Spanish, by the way).
Moving on to London via train, PI met up with some folks from the great journal Occupied London, threw back some beers and Turkish pizzas, and got some great conversation and a better picture of politics in that neck of the woods -- especially the revolutionary green sense of the word. That part of town is slotted for that combination of building boom/demolition/expulsion/colonization that accompanies the Olympics wherever it goes (London 2012), and work is already steadily underway with all the usual characteristics (new sports stadiums, extension of subway lines and the clearing out of old -- or even not so old -- buildings for new ones dedicated to the new capitalist enterprises).
On the other end of town, PI met up with some folks at Freedom Books and then got a great political/historical tour of Whitechapel and the Whitechapel Anarchist Group space. Apparently a political history pub crawl had just taken place recently, sparking all sorts of ideas for similar projects here in Phoenix, especially downtown. PCWC has been reading Bradford Luckingham's very interesting histories of Phoenix lately, revealing just how much we have to learn about our own town and how Capital and politics has shaped it.
As for the WAG space, the Valley would be doing great if it had a space like that here. In what they call the London Anarchist Resource Center, they boast what is probably the biggest anarchist library publically available and have room for meetings, movie showings and an area for the construction of the various accoutrements of protest and struggle, such as signs, banners and the rest. Also, for those that don't know, WAG puts out a great broadsheet in the Class War style (i.e., snotty, uncompromising and graphically appealing). Apparently it gets quite decent distribution, which is a hell of an accomplishment given that the neighborhood they're in is undoubtedly the most conservative Muslim neighborhood in London.
While in London, and searching for pubs that didn't close at eleven (!), PI had some time for seeing the sights, including a trek to Marx's grave. Most notable about the grave are three things. First, and obviously, the head.
Apparently, the sheer and quite ridiculous size of it was even controversial amongst Marxists when it was built. Secondly, it was so big it was impossible to get a decent photo next to it without looking silly. Thirdly, even though communists the world over have declared their opposition to private property (but is it really not private property if the new landlord is the State?), some of them obviously knew vaulable real estate when they saw it, because surrounding Marx's grave are the final resting places of at least a dozen notable communists.
Also, while in London, that trademark British sense of humor was evident in the weirdest of places:
Irony outlasts empire every time.
A walking tour of Notting Hill, following the directions from a Class War pamphlet, revealed George Orwell's house while a meandering tour through the financial district and the surveillance geography of the "ring of steel" put an exclamation point on it. Cameras there cover all entries and exits, and one certainly gets the feeling not only that one doesn't fit in, but that one is at least potentially tracked at all times while in the vicinity.
In terms of tactics and issues that anarchists are having in London, I came away with a warning on "kettling" and police Forward Intelligence Teams. Kettling, not an unknown phenomenon here in the US (PCWC members encountered it as early as 2000 in LA during the Democratic Convention), has become widely known now thanks to the recent G20 protests in London. Kettling basically involves the police attempting to hem in anarchists -- to follow them with massive force and to pen them up, preventing any action to take place. This often leads to violence and detention.
FIT, however, may be less known. FIT teams gather information of event organizers, leaders and other important information, for the purpose of disrupting actions. Apparently, they can be quite intrusive as well, not being satisfied to gather data passively from a distance. As a result, something calling itself FIT Watch has emerged to counter the increasingly intrusive presence of the police at protests. According the London FIT Watch's blog,
Fit Watch are a fluid group of people who have come together to resist and oppose the tactics of the Forward Intelligence Teams (cops who harass protesters).Such tactics, by both the police and anarchists, have made various appearances in Phoenix in the past, especially during the height of the May Day protests in the early 2000's. Nothing particularly matching FIT Watch in terms of aggressiveness and specific aim emerged, however, to counter the cops. Copwatch, of course, routinely documents protests and police activity at them, and so, occasionally, do the ACLU. But neither of these seeks to actively disrupt the activities of the police. As things heat up here in town, we'll surely see the return of the "red squad" to anarchist events, and when that happens, we may look to our comrades in London for some ideas about how to deal with them.
We aim to act in solidarity with each other, supporting campaigns by being at meetings and protests, making it harder for the police to film and gather intelligence.
We hope to encourage a culture where their presence is not acceptable and to act when we see people being followed and harassed.
We aim to make it harder for them to photograph and intimidate us by getting in the way of their cameras, taking photos and publishing as much information as we can about them on our blog.
As for kettling in Phoenix, there were attempts during the May Day protests to surround anarchists, but they were often thwarted by going the wrong way down one-way streets, which prevented the po-po from following us with their cars and wagons. In Tempe (which doesn't have one way streets downtown), however, the police brought in bike cops and were more successful in keeping us in place, at least the second time May Day was organized there (after they had received training from the Eugene police department). At the most recent immigration protest in Phoenix, cops did attempt what looked like a proto-kettling operation, but it was foiled by staying in the streets, the sheer numbers and the medians in the streets.
The rest of the European vacation eventually moved to Spain and was aimed primarily at accomplishing two main tasks: (1), relaxing in the sun, and (2), successfully driving a car through southern Spain. Both were accomplished, to varying degrees, with driving coming in a distant second given the insane driving conditions in Spanish cities. Fortunately, driving in Mexico provides preparation to a limited degree for the "devil may care" attitude of Spanish motorists (although it made Mexican drivers look quite sane by comparison).
One thing that is always apparent when traveling in Europe is the total lack of working class Americans. International travel in the US is almost exclusively the domain of five groups of people: the rich and upper middle classes; students (mostly coming from those classes); traveler kids and musicians; retirees; and the military. Almost nowhere does one find folks in their thirties and forties from working class backgrounds that aren't in the military. This is a great tragedy. While recognizing the destructive nature of air travel, it would surely be worth everyone's while to find a way to correct this deficiency. Certainly first class would make a great spot for an open bar, if we could prevent the business class from flying.
***
Collin Sick's been busy as well, traveling across the state, as well as venturing into the Bay Area, and making a trip down to Quitovac, Mexico. March began with the benefit show for the Unity Run that our O'odham friends organized, and Collin was able to help out with. The show raised hundreds of dollars for the run, and collected a sizable amount of flour, coffee, and rice for the runners. Highlights included the spray can artists going to work on massive panels outside, Dumperfoo doing live art, and DJentrification, Optimal, Shining Soul, and The Insects killing it during their sets.
The next weekend saw some frequent flier miles thrown down for the annual excursion to the Bay Area for the 14th annual San Francisco Anarchist Bookfair and the 9th annual BASTARD Conference. This is the fourth yearly trip from Phoenix to the Bay, and sadly the first without PI attending, although to be fair he was in Europe having a wonderful time of his own.
The trip was split between political fun and vacationing with friends, as many old comrades had come down from Portland just for some good ol' fashioned drinking and trouble making. Social highlights included the free admission to the last half hour of the Simian Mobile Disco show, being taken out by the greatest radical queer ladies for a stop at the worker owned Lusty Lady peepshow, and a night out with our homeboy Crudo that saw us hitting up a warehouse party in Oakland and finishing the night at Zeitgeist in the City.Politically, the trip was full of highs, the annual anarchist cafe was seemingly full of familiar faces. Lots of good discussions that began that night carried over into the next two days, with Saturday's Bookfair, and the BASTARD on Sunday. Although the bookfair has extended to a two day affair in recent years, the trip to Berekely for the BASTARD conference is worth skipping the second day.
The day at the bookfair was great, more reunions with old friends; chatting about politics; buying a grip of new books, pamphlets, and magazines; and sharing laughter and gossip on the scandal of the bookfair, the dumping of water on the literature/propaganda of the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP). The RCP had shown up to the bookfair in a typically sectarian manner, they had not reserved a table space, they demanded to be given a space on the property, and when refused by the bookfair organizers, they continued to protest while their propaganda and materials were moved by attendees to a spot outside of the San Francisco County Fair Building (the space where the bookfair is held). Sometime after this a comrade had heard enough of their complaining that their authoritarian Maoist communist group was barred from tabling, so the person did the sensible act, or maybe just did something that should have been done long before, and took a gallon of water to their propaganda.
Folks gathered outside the bookfair to continue the discussion from Doug's "Importance of Intentions in Anarchist Actions."Unfortunately the chat ended abruptly when a few "comrades" from the RCP came back to confront the person who allegedly dumped water on their propaganda. Most folks seated leaped to the alleged water dumper's defense and told the RCP off, the RCP responded by retreating, but were later seen wandering around asking bookfair attendees to sign a petition denouncing the water attack. Sadly, a few anarchists actually went ahead and signed their petition, a truly pathetic show of solidarity with one of the worst authoritarian commies groups. PCWC wants to make it clear, we stand behind the person(s) who took action against these Maoist jerks, and share the sympathies of other comrades who have voiced their support for the action.
The BASTARD was a great time as well, Jason McQuinn, the former publisher of Anarchy Magazine did two fantastic sessions, one on Post-Leftism, the other on Max Stirner. Both were really engaging, a note to the organizers of the SF Bookfair: Give this guy a session next year, he's a great speaker.
It was back to Arizona for Collin, with the next weekend paying a short visit to the Dry River in Tucson for a discussion on networking and future statewide meetings with other Arizona anarchists.
The next weekend saw a 4AM wake up call for the drive down to Quitovac, a Tohono O'odham village in Sonora, Mexico. For the second time in two years, the O'odham of Quitovac are resisting plans for a toxic waste dump on the ceremonial lands near the village, they have again been joined by other O'odham and allies from across Mexico and the United States. The O'odham Solidarity Project, in cooperation with O'odham people on both sides, worked to get the word out that last year's victory in shutting down the dump was a temporary win, and that the traditional ceremonial land is in peril once again.
PCWC members have worked in solidarity with local O'odham youth for a few years now (before the PCWC was even kicking), and fully support the O'odham people and their fight to preserve their Himdag, their way of life, both in the Phoenix area as well as in southern Arizona and northern Mexico. O'odham people are struggling not just against the environmental racism and destruction that indigenous people across the Americas are fighting, but also the racism that comes with being a people whose land is divided by the U.S/Mexico border.
This most recent meeting in Mexico produced a resolution calling for support for the O'odham, and demanding the state of Sonora and the government of Mexico respect environmental laws and put a permanent end to this toxic dump. The Phoenix contingent had also brought down clothes, blankets, and school and medical supplies for the village school. The time spent with the kids was a fantastic experience, and PCWC looks forward to continuing to support this community in resistance.
Below are some of the snap shots of this trip, with a few notes.
Blockading the highway outside of Quitovac for traditional O'odham song.
Walking back to the village from the highway, an elder and children from Quitovac joined with those from the other side of the border.
The youth! These kids were great, at one point there was even some beat boxing and a freestyle session. The kids love hip hop!
Saying goodbye. The kids line up at the gate to say good bye.
Back on the other side of that goddamn reinforced line.
"That's one tall cactus on that hill..."
(AKA) Camoflaged border patrol spy vehicle.***
Future projects:
*Be on the look out for a PCWC sponsored anarchist pub night! Taking a cue from New York's turn of the century German anarchist movement, we will be hosting a regular social outing for anarchists & anti-authoritarians at a local bar. Official announcement and more details to follow.
*A new flier and essay are in the works, there's more t-shirts on the way, and a ton of new stuff for tabling. On the way, a new order of books from AK Press and crimethinc.
*Catch us at the Marquee Theatre on Sunday, May 24. We'll be tabling at the Propagandhi show, make sure to come out and support one our favorites acts, and stop by the table and say hi and grab a pamphlet or shirt.
*Look for a return to regular blogging as well.
And, as always, if you want to contact us, hit us up at firesneverextinguished@gmail.com.
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