Over 30 years of anarchist writing from Ireland listed under hundreds of topics
Opinion
The opinion of a WSM member. This piece has not been reviewed by any WSM editing body
Iraq, Syria and the Islamic State
Date: Thu, 2014-08-14 19:34
The desperate plight of tens of thousands of Yazidi people stranded for the past week and a half on Mount Sinjar in Northern Iraq, having fled their homes in the nearby city, has focussed the world’s attention on what has been happening in that region.
Threats of airstrikes from U.S. president Barack Obama in a region where U.S. intervention in such recent memory has already been responsible for the killing of up to a million people and the injuring and displacement of many more causes alarm bells to ring in the minds of all who care about a fair and just world. This is further exacerbated by the knowledge that it is the stoking of sectarian tensions as a result of U.S. policy in Iraq that is largely responsible for the emergence of the fundamentalist and ultra-reactionary Islamic State organisation.
The Warsaw Ghetto and the assault on Gaza - is there anything in the comparison?
Date: Tue, 2014-08-05 15:45
The text below is translated from the poster at the centre of this image of the destruction of Gaza by the Israeli state. But it refers not to this horror but another in 1943 when the Nazis crushed the Warsaw ghetto, wiping out the poorly armed organised resistance that operated out of a warren of bunkers & sewers hidden beneath the ghetto. This poster was by one of the armed factions that defended the Ghetto, the Jewish Combat Organization (ZOB)
All people are brothers;
Yellow, brown, black, and white.
Talk of peoples, colors, races -
Is all a made-up story
Rallies, ‘Black Bloc’ and the Meaning of Direct Action
Date: Fri, 2014-08-01 17:10
Over the last couple of months we have witnessed an unprecedented wave of large demonstrations. Across Australia people have risen in opposition to the current administration’s escalation of attacks on worker’s rights and conditions, erosions of living standards and civil liberties.
The Zionist Project, Anti-Semitism and Ethnic Cleansing in Palestine
Date: Thu, 2014-07-31 20:39
We published the map (insert in graphic) and accompanying text on our facebook page four days ago as a commentary on Israeli expansionism in Palestine. It's proved massively popular, some 400,000 people have now seen it. There are also many comments and in one of those, a WSM supporter said "I do think that you've very lazily reproduced an image that is borderline anti-semitic by back dating the problem of israeli expansionism to before Israel existed when the "problem" was not Israel, but Jews"
We take the issue of continuing to oppose anti-semitism while opposing the Israeli state's massacre in Gaza very seriously. That has involved deleting blatantly anti-Semitic comments and banning repeat offenders (and the same with Islamophobes) and debting with and educating those making softer versions of such comments. So this criticism coming from a supporter concerned us, had we, albeit accidentally, stepped over the line?
Another supporter (David Landy) responded to that accusation and we found that response so educational we asked if he might write it up in more detail.
Below David discusses the difficult question of the nature of Zionist colonisation prior to the creation of the state of Israel.
If Ireland was treated like Palestine - An alternate history
Date: Sun, 2014-07-27 21:20
For the size of its population Ireland has seen very large Gaza solidarity demonstrations. It is also one of the few places in the world outside the USA where there has been public displays of support for the Israeli military assault. Internationally there are many variations of this map where activists present to their population what the expulsion of the Palestinians from much of the land they once occupied would look like in a local context. One of our members prepared this but we soon realised its an impossible image to post without some reflection on our own settler colonialist past.
Bullshit to truth - Greyhound's email to customers deciphered
Date: Wed, 2014-07-23 14:21
Following a succesful day of community action, blockading scab labour operated refuse trucks, in support of locked out Greyhound waste workers, the company sent a hilariously whiny email to customers. In the communication they blamed "certain political organisations" for orchestrating the blockade on social media and claimed the actions put the strike-breakers' health and safety under threat.
It's all the more bizarre given the fact that outrageous violations of health and safety have been logged by scab crews, who have been working outside of the allowable refuse collection times.
Warsaw 1942 to Gaza 2014 - Walls, fences and ethnic cleansing
Date: Tue, 2014-07-22 19:54
On this day in 1942, the Nazi's began the mass deportation of Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto to the death camps, putting into practice the policy known as "the final solution". Over the next two months, over 250,000 residents were sent to Treblinka.
The ghetto itself, was established in 1940, while Warsaw was occupied by Nazi forces, and 400,000 Jewish people lived here, in an area of 3.4 square kilometres.
Gustavo Esteva Interview
Date: Sun, 2014-07-06 19:45
Gustavo Esteva is an independent writer and grassroots activist. He has been a central figure in a wide range of Mexican, Latin American, and international nongovernmental organizations and solidarity networks, including the Universidad de la Tierra en Oaxaca and the Zapatistas. The WSM's Tom Murray caught up with Gustavo at a recent public lecture at the Kimmage Development Centre to discuss hope, friendship and surprise in the zombie-time of capitalism, and how people are taking initiatives, reclaiming control of their lives and creating vibrant, autonomous alternatives here today.Where to next for the anarchist movement in Australia?
Date: Sat, 2014-06-14 18:51
An Irish anarchist and migrant worker in Sydney, Sean reflects on the recent Sydney anarchist bookfair, the anarchist movement more broadly and the relevance of the platform in terms of building a popular movement. First published by Anarchist Affinity:
‘At a time when the intensity of the ruling class attack on our living standards, on our wages and conditions, on free speech and assembly, are increasing at a frightening pace, Australian anarchism must heed the wake-up call. Either it undergoes a renaissance, with the possible emergence of grass roots struggle and relates to that struggle, or it consigns itself to continued irrelevance.’
Review of Gustavo Esteva’s talk on Anarchy and Buen Vivir at Kimmage - All Power to the Imagination
Date: Fri, 2014-06-13 14:35
It does not prove difficult to persuade an anarchist to go to a meeting with the subtitle ‘ Anarchy and Buen Vivir (Good living)’ and more especially when the speaker, Gustavo Esteva, has direct links with the Zapatista Army for National Liberation (EZLN) who inspired the world with their uprising in 1994.
Gustavo was invited to speak by the Kimmage Development Studies Centre (DSC) as part of their 40th year celebrations. Gustavo addressed the gathering in the parish hall and started with the position that Development was counterproductive. Considering this was the Kimmage DSC’s raison d'être is to facilitate education and training for development practitioners, this was a sharp starting point.
