Ciao Paolo: a tribute to Paolo Finzi from the collective of Centro Studi Libertari
A tribute to the Milanese anarchist, author and publisher. (libcom.org 22/07/2020)
We are deeply saddened to announce Paolo Finzi’s passing. Yesterday, July 20 2020, he took his own life.
Born in 1951, since the mid-Seventies he has been responsible, together with his partner Aurora Failla, for the monthly magazine A rivista anarchica, which he contributed to (and founded as well). He was also among the founders of Centro Studi Libertari / Archivio G. Pinelli.
A friend and comrade through many battles, a master of anarchism and ethics, dialogue and debate, a brilliant, intelligent, sensitive and kind man who taught us to doubt and reflect, to listen and respect in a deep and profound way.
From Portland to the World: A Call for Solidarity with the Struggle against the Federal Occupation
Since the end of May, demonstrators opposing police violence and white supremacy have thronged the streets of Portland, Oregon, clashing with law enforcement officers. Last week, aspiring autocrat Donald Trump escalated the situation by announcing that he would be sending federal agents around the country to assert his authority through acts of violence against protesters. The past few days have seen thousands sweep into the streets of Portland to defend those who were already protesting and demand the departure of Trump’s federal agents from their city.
Now participants in the movement in Portland are calling for solidarity actions starting this Saturday, on July 25. The following statement from several Portland organizations—including (Pop)ular (Mob)ilization, Portland Rising Tide, the Revolutionary Abolitionist Group, Colectivo X, and Symbiosis PDX—entreats everyone who has been inspired by the determination and endurance of demonstrators in that city to spread the struggle countrywide, just as Donald Trump hopes to deploy federal forces everywhere.
Please circulate this video and statement—and think about how you can prepare to fight against the escalation of state tyranny wherever you are.
From Portland to the World
We love that people are thinking about the ways they can support the people in this city, especially those who have been pressing hard in the streets for the past seven weeks in support of the struggle for Black lives and for freedom for all—and despite the brutally repressive tactics of police and federal forces. We want to accept your support—and we say the best way to support us is to take inspiration from Portland and bring this fight to where you are in any way you can.
Go as hard as you want, use every tool in the toolbox, and employ every tactic you can. Our fight is your fight and we want to share it with you. Our common struggle against fascism and against the police and federal officials defending white supremacy are intertwined. The movement is moving: solidarity is spreading and the bigger we get the faster we win.
We will stay in the streets until every institution in our society reflects the acknowledgement that BLACK LIVES MATTER—and we hope you will too.
Endorsed by:
(Pop)ular (Mob)ilization Portland Rising Tide The Revolutionary Abolitionist Group Colectivo X Symbiosis PDX
…
See also: Portland Awakens: A Report From The Front Lines (Its going down 21/07/2020)
18.07.2020: Social rebel, counterfeiter, bandit, modern Robin Hood – the list of titles with which our anarchist comrade Lucio Urtubia was honoured is long. His life, which sounds like an adventure novel, is a mirror of the revolutionary movements in Europe in the second half of the 20th century. Lucio Urtuba passed away today. Rest In Power Lucio! (enough is enough!)
By Black Flag Catalyst (Anarchist Library 16/07/2020) …
Foreword
My city: Portland, Oregon is currently under siege from an occupying force. Make no mistake in assuming the state will hesitate to occupy other cities with their militant, violent force, for less than reasonable reason(s). It’s spread to Columbus, Ohio, and Miami. We learned from Standing Rock, the state uses protests as a testing ground for what they can do at other protests.
When it happens, please take into account the following lessons I’ve learned from nights of protest interacting with federal agents and police:
The New Terror Bill in the Philippines: Another Front in the Worldwide Struggle against Tyranny
(19/07/2020)
Yesterday, a new “anti-terror” law went into effect in the Philippines, marking another stage in the worldwide rise of autocracy. The law enables authorities to warrantlessly arrest and detain anyone for two weeks or more on the sole suspicion of inciting terrorism “by means of speeches, proclamations, writings, emblems, banners or other representations,” even “without taking any direct part in the commission of terrorism.” What constitutes terrorism is defined at the whims of the Anti-Terrorism Council, a group comprised almost entirely of members of authoritarian president Rodrigo Duterte’s cabinet.
From one country to another, the pretense of democratic constitutional rule, respect for citizens’ rights, the presumed worth and dignity of everyone, is stripped away as quickly as the crises multiply and rain down upon us. Increasingly, the one obvious function of the State shows itself: to maintain order – however violent it be -, and repress dissidence. If the “wretched of the earth” have always known this truth in the flesh, it now unveils itself to all. What remains to those condemned, in one way or another, is to refuse this power, to walk away from it, to resist it, to sabotage it.
From the Crimethinc. Collective, news from the military-police intervention in Portland, Oregon.
Posted with the CrimethInc. Collective (15/07/2020) …
Looming Recession, the Ban on Freedom of Assembly, and the Death of Vassilis Maggos
Since coming to power last summer, Greece’s far-right New Democracy party has waged an all-out war against immigrants, anarchists, and rebels, attempting to evict the entire network of occupied social centers that animates the country’s ungovernable movements and to crush other spaces of autonomy such as universities. The COVID-19 pandemic has offered New Democracy additional pretexts as they attempt to replace this rich history of rebellion with a police state suitable for international investment. Yet the looming economic crisis promises to render this effort moot. In this tense context, the past month has seen conflicts escalate all around the country, with the government attempting to ban freedom of assembly, police beating countless demonstrators—one of whom later apparently died of his injuries—and determined anarchists giving battle to the forces of oppression on every front.
This update is adapted from RadioFragmata’s forthcoming monthly contribution to the “Bad News Report” podcast. You can read last month’s report here.
To be obliged to work will always be to die a little. To enrich others, to obey disgusting bosses, to run so as not to be late, to pretend to smile, to receive starvation wages: everything kills. To lose moments of love and pleasure, of leisure and creativity, and to forget the capacity to imagine totally different mornings is the sentence to which we are condemned by the masters of all times and colours. To be an exemplary worker and to endure without saying a word will never be a sign of pride. We will not be happy slaves. We want to win ourselves back, we demand Life. And if something has to die, let it be the order of exploitation that oppresses us.
Well-being and freedom!
Anarchists in Temuco(Chile)
May 1st, 2014
___
I know few texts – none? – that better portray the condition of our daily life. … What do I see behind these lines? I see, above all, a frank response to one of the inumerable expressions of voluntary servitude. We end up believing in the incredible, and we think, at the same time, and against all reason, that working gives us unlimited pleasure. As if a subsistence wage or, in some cases, the income that allows us to acquire what we do not need, filled us with happiness. In between, as is well known, something far greater is felt, that the former opens onto and makes possible: compliance with hierarchy and exploitation, understood as two innate features of the human species. And we can perceive how the memory of life that at some point – presumably – made us happy has disappeared. Good for the Temuco anarchists.
Life, or the memory of peoples, cannot be measured by the number of years lived, but by life’s moments of intensity.
We won the revolution, what we lost was the war. The revolution consisted in the fact that the workers became masters of the instruments of labor and did not falter in their management of the means of production. The revolution did not fail, it was defeated militarily. Perhaps with the passage of time it would have developed a paralyzing bureaucracy but we will never know. There are victories that are defeats and there are defeats that are victories. If the Russian revolution was a victory, who won? The workers? No. On the other hand, the Commune of Paris was a great working class victory. Ours, too. It was a revolutionary victory although it ended with a military defeat. We pushed the revolution as far as we could.
Abel Paz
A translation of Raoul Vaneigem’s Preface to the French translation Abel Paz’s/Diego Camacho Escámez’ Memoirs, shared with us recently by the notbored collective, is the occasion to return to this anarchist who participated in the Spanish Revolution (1936-9), the anti-Franco resistance and the post-Franco transition period, and who would also become one of the movement’s historians.
The latter work remains essential for any understanding of the anarchist movement in the country, and beyond. But perhaps above all what we learn from Paz’s life and chronicles is that anarchism is a form of life, and ethical and political engagement to live revolution and all that it demands.
Below, we share Vaneigem’s Preface, an interview with Paz published originally in a Spanish newspaper, and two video records dedicated to him.
The Cop-Free Zone: Reflections from Experiments in Autonomy around the US
The cop-free zone is not the particular block or traffic circle or park. It is the shared commitment to defending a space and eliminating the dynamics of policing and white supremacy. In the following collection, we explore some people’s experiences attempting to create police-free autonomous zones in different parts of the United States.
Yesterday, Seattle police evicted the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone (CHAZ), also known as the Capitol Hill Organized Protest (CHOP), ending an experiment in autonomy that had extended over three weeks of inspiring creativity and heartbreaking tragedies. Yet the legend of this space has spread around the world, inspiring solidarity actions as far away as Tokyo and attempts to emulate it from Portland to New York City and Washington, DC. For an overview of the story of the occupation in Seattle, you could start here.
Learning From Portland
By Black Flag Catalyst (Anarchist Library 16/07/2020) …
Foreword
My city: Portland, Oregon is currently under siege from an occupying force. Make no mistake in assuming the state will hesitate to occupy other cities with their militant, violent force, for less than reasonable reason(s). It’s spread to Columbus, Ohio, and Miami. We learned from Standing Rock, the state uses protests as a testing ground for what they can do at other protests.
When it happens, please take into account the following lessons I’ve learned from nights of protest interacting with federal agents and police:
Continue reading →