Delenda est
lundi matin #221 (16/12/2019)
It is characteristic of all political moments to reactivate a certain amount of evidence and sharing. Should we reform society? Upset what exists? Repair the world? The following text was written by a collective of teacher-researchers, Kylo V. Nèr, and who propose to resolve these eternal questions, for which in their eyes, there is but one possible answer: “There is nothing but to destroy.”
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It is necessary to stop just talking, and to be without pity!
André Bernold
lundi matin #221 (16/12/19)
The comedy has gone on long enough, the insurgency is on the agenda, and the immediate removal of those responsible for the disaster.
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December 6th marked the beginning of a general strike in france against proposed reforms to the national pension schemes for different categories of workers. The “reforms” are the typical State driven “neoliberal” cuts in the value of the pensions, extension of the working age to 64 from 62, both a consequence of the desire to unify the different pension schemes (structured by collective contracts for different types of work) into a universal or general public pension programme.
Called by the country’s major union centrals, the strike has held, but essentially in the “public sector”: transportation, health, education, etc. Marked by demonstrations and protest marches, the strike, as a general strike, is nevertheless curious for its inability to paralyse the country’s economic activity. If things are slowed, if there are inconveniences of mobility, the overall affair continues to function. With more and more workers not covered by collective labour contracts, with the base of labour unions concentrated in public-state workers and with the inability to extend the strike to all “reproductive” labour – to all of the work which sustains social relations -, the strike risks falling into a merely defensive gesture of too little too late.
One is tempted to call for a strike against the strike, that is, a strike against the ways in which strikes are carried through, to radicalise them, to render them rebellious, wild. And yet, with each daily protest, the rebelliousness lurks just beneath the surface.
From the lundi matin collective, reflections on a strike still frightened of itself …
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We share a letter in two parts, a letter which is a reflection on the chilean insurrection, on insurrection, and on anarchism and insurrection. (Posted in spanish at portal libertario oaca and a las barricadas. The letters were published in English translation at Act for freedom now! – letter 1; letter 2).
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From Roarmag …
The popular assemblies at the heart of the Chilean uprising
Bree Busk (11/12/2019)
Chile has a long history of radical neighborhood organizing — a tradition that is now put at the service of drafting a new constitution for a country in turmoil.
More than fifty days have passed since the Chilean uprising burst into existence. For those living it on the ground, it feels like much longer. The movement has already gone through several upheavals, alternately evolving and disintegrating in response to the changing terrain of struggle. The Piñera administration and its sympathizers have called — without success — for a return to normality. In response, the people have unequivocally stated that “normality” was the problem. Throughout the capital city of Santiago, graffiti reads: “I prefer the chaos.”
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More than tiring, the capitalist world exhausts possibilities; indeed, through fatigue, it blinds to our exhaustion. What lies before us is a repetition of the same. But that repetition can not entirely cover over the meaningless of our lives divorced from the world and any sense of self, that is, divorced from everything but spectacle.
We live in times of depressed narcissism.
Yet, it may be from the depths of our exhaustion that the felt need to create emerges; if we can care for possibilities ignored and/or erased and come to desire to create them anew.
A reflection on the politics of exhaustion (in translation); another face of the politics in times of catastrophe.
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From Roarmag (26/11/2019) …
Colombia on strike: “This government has to fall”
José Antonio Gutiérrez D.
Colombia’s national civic strike is paving the way for a rural-urban coalition of protesters and movements that together can take on President Duque’s right-wing government.
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From Roarmag (25/11/2019) …
Leftists worldwide, stand by the protesters in Iran!
The following is a statement by the Iranian leftist diaspora in the United Kingdom, France and Germany who have formed a loose coalition of academics and militants to express their support for the ongoing popular uprising in Iran.
For a full list of the signatories to this statement, including David Harvey, Catherine Malabou and Etienne Balibar, click here.
Continue readingWe are protesting against problems in the whole system in general. We reached a crisis where we noticed that the system cannot handle it anymore
a protester in Chile
Greece: The war against squats continues
Athens: Massive intervention in the streets of Kolonaki
(19/12/2019)
There is a completely false belief that Exarchia is an area on the map bordered by Patision, Alexandra, Charilaou Trikoupi streets and the hills of Steki. In fact, there is today an area of the city called Exarchia, where for decades there has been a partial territorialisation of radical political movements, an excessive accumulation of organised or spontaneous political and cultural negations. But this is a product of history, and history is being redefined. Nothing guarantees that Exarchia will remain where it is, either alone or with the same size forever. And when we write Exarchia between quotation marks, we do not want to speak of the neighbourhood, but of a political phenomenon: a territorial centre of overcrowded negations in the metropolis.
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