Over 30 years of anarchist writing from Ireland listed under hundreds of topics
In a time with a marked absence of mass politics this Rethinking Revolution talk looks at one of the largest mass-movement in Irish history. This movement was incredibly broad involving groups as diverse as the catholic church and the fenians leading to tensions over issues we can identify with today - the role of women in society, the issue of violence in politics and the issue of reform vs revolution.
7pm in Seomra Spraoi, Wednesday 29th of July
Saturday June 25th saw another massive Pride in Dublin with the Garda estimating that as many as 26,000 took part in the parade and another 100,000 spectated. While Pride has very much become more of a social and commercial event since its early years in Dublin it also remains a strong political expression of the ongoing struggles against Queer oppression.
Labour's Gilmore says we must all share the pain. A water charge of 200 euros a year, wage cuts for the low paid courtesy of Minister Bruton, house reposessions by the bailed-out banks, emigration for school leavers, overcrowding for prisoners, fee hikes for students, cuts in hospitals... none of this really affects the life style of the wealthy, whose very wealth insulates them against the worst effects of the recession. Not many bankers, newspaper editors, company CEOs or government ministers are suffering in any real sense.
The reality behind the new beginning to policing was once again revealed on the streets of the North yesterday when children returning from a bus trip to Dublin where terrorised by heavily armed PSNI members for up two hours. The bus trip organised by the Republican Network for Unity contained 13 children and 6 adults were returning from a trip to Kilmainham Gaol was stopped and searched allegedly for explosives just outside Banbridge by up to 60-70 PSNI officers with a forensic lab and helicopters.
A good few words in the world originate from my mother tongue Greek. Nearly all words in Greek mean something. That helps me understand things better when i interact with people in English plus it creates a sense of pride. In my opinion, specially in the last 100 years, the political systems, we all live in, have tried very hard to manipulate words and language. They constantly change the meaning of the words we are using, to either mean something completely diffrent to what their original real meaning was, or to make them soft, light and insignificant without power.
The big bad ECB wolf is a-huffing and a-puffing but the first of the three little pigs is showing no signs of surrendering just yet. And behind the spectacle of the Greek populace standing up against its government and the core EU powers, lurks a recent historical shadow - a spectre is haunting Europe, the spectre of Yugoslavia.
Today Greece is the target of pressure and brinkmanship by the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund who are holding back the next installment in the so-called "bailout" agreed last year. The payment of €12 billion was originally scheduled for this month and without it Greece will default on repaying its existing bonds due for redemption on Jul 15.
The “World Wealth Report 2011”, published by finance conglomerates Merrill Lynch and Capgemini, has shown that the amount of wealth held by the world’s wealthiest elite increased by almost 10% in 2010. The number of ‘High Net Worth Individuals’ (i.e. those with investable assets of over $1million) also rose last year – to 10.9 million.
The population of Greece are in revolt again the IMF /ECB austerity plan that is being imposed on them. WSM member Con who is a migrant to Ireland from Greece tells us what it is like to follow the struggle by home from Ireland and especially the extraordinary events yesterday when many police, who for months have been attacking demonstrators, instead joined the demonstrations. Presumably they will soon be bought off and return to business as usual but all the same perhaps such an usual event is close to a miracle.
WHAT WE THINK
To the activist who strives to contribute to the birth of an authentic memory of the anti-authoritarian current of the workers' movement, the question is posed thus: what is the contribution of the historic episode that was the acts and ideas of the Friends of Durruti? Therefore to complete this study, we must draw up a balance-sheet, to assess in some way their achievements and failures.
In the first issue, there is an article on page 4 with the very title "war and revolution". Here are the main passages.