Workers Solidarity Movement

On April 20th, a crowd gathered from 4-7pm outside the Russian Embassy in Rathgar, Dublin, to protest the recent campaign of violence against queer men in Chechnya and show solidarity with those under attack and all queer people across the planet (#chechnya100ireland). Gardaí reported that it was the largest ever protest outside the embassy.

Several placards included the (downwards) pink triangle, a reference to queer men being condemned to Nazi concentration camps. Others read ‘LGBT People Exist Everywhere’, ‘You Can’t Imprison My Sexuality’, and ‘Queer Solidarity Means Migrant Rights’. Demonstrations have also taken place in Amsterdam, Brussels, Lisbon, London, Madrid, Paris, and Vienna. The demo was called by a couple concerned queer women who decided something had to be done - a lesson to us that we don't need to wait for 'Someone Else', a tendency we all have in this passive society.
 

Yes Duplicity: Irish State, Give Queer Chechens Asylum Now

The WSM’s politics are fundamentally intersectional. ‘Intersectionality’ is a fancy word for some rather basic ideas. You can think of it as ‘overlap-ism’ instead. There are three main points, 1) that each person needs to be seen as a whole, 2) that no power system exists in isolation, and 3) that all forms of oppression and exploitation should be uprooted at the same time.

The first point refers to the fact that real people aren’t cartoons. We are each complicated and multi-dimensional. For instance, a person is not just ‘working class’. They also have a gender. In general, life for a working class woman will be significantly different than for a working class man, not only because a woman is oppressed by sexism but because class itself is experienced differently.

In what is by any measure a wonderful mark of solidarity the women fighting ISIS in Rojava have taken the time to send solidarity greetings to next Wednesdays #strike4repeal in Ireland.

Just because Disney characters look cute doesn't mean Disney films are inoffensive. In fact, they should be recognised as a powerful propaganda weapon, meant to inculcate neoliberal ideology in the earliest years of life. Thus, by virtue of self-defense, the authors of this article, who work in the industry, will not be bothered to avoid spoilers.

Disney’s Moana is set in Hawaii. Moana, the daughter of the Island’s chief, is meant to become the first woman to rule. But the island faces ecological imbalances which threaten the survival of the islanders and lead Moana on an adventure that she will share with a demi god named Maui.
If the title of Disney’s feature is the name of its main female character, one wouldn’t go so far as to say that Moana is the central character of the story. Indeed, as soon as Maui appears on the screen, a shift of focus occurs and Moana becomes no more than Maui’s side-kick. This is neatly illustrated by the memorable “go save the world” addressed by Moana to Maui as he is about to face Te Ka the lava demon. A closer look at Maui’s character can help us understand why this failed attempt at creating a strong heroine might have happened.

War is hell. In September 2015, the heartbreaking image of Alan Kurdi went viral. The picture of the little Syrian-Kurdish boy lying face down on Ali Hoca beach in Turkey highlighted Fortress Europe’s racist response to those refugees fleeing conflict in the Middle East.  Abdullah Kurdi, Alan’s father, returned to Kobane to bury his wife and two sons. He wrote to the world: ‘I am grateful for your sympathy for my fate. This has given me the feeling that I am not alone. But an essential step in ending this tragedy and avoiding its recurrence is support for our self-organisation’. Kurdi was referring to the emergent experiment in popular democracy sweeping Rojava, the most hopeful thing to have happened in the Middle East for a very long time. A popular, anti-authoritarian rebellion is struggling against the death-world of capitalist modernity. And for now, it seems to be winning. 

On Wednesday the 1st of February there was a solidarity vigil for Umut Firat in Dublin, Ireland. Umut is a writer for the recently jailed in Turkey and on the 53rd day of a hunger strike. Anarchist Meydan Newspaper Anarchists and supporters of Umut’s hunger strike gather outside the Turkish Embassy. Turkish embassy staff came out to mock the protesters. Embassy staff called the police to have get the protesters to remove a banner that was tied to the fence of the embassy. The banner said FREE UMUT FIRAT! SOLIDARITY FROM IRELAND. The police stayed on till the vigil was over.

Saturday 21st January saw 1000s take part in a Women's March against Trump in Dublin, a local solidarity march with the Women's March on Washington. It's estimated that 1% of the US population took to the streets to protest the Trump presidency that day with solidarity protests in dozens of cities around the world including Belfast.

Irish anarchist living in Sydney reports from recent march against ‘Australia Day’- On the 26 January tens of thousands of people took to the streets across Australia to protest against ‘Australia Day’ representing 227 years of resistance against the British crown colonial invasion, dispossession and genocide.

In Sydney, thousands also marched representing the biggest Invasion day march since the 1988 bicentennial. The march organized by FIRE Fighting in Resistance Equally represented an amalgamation of groups across the political spectrum. Irish migrants living the in Sydney took part in the march including people from the James Connolly Society.

Meanwhile on Twitter Trump is losing it again. It's really not surprising he'd hate whistle blowers, is it?