Film Review: Che (part one and two)
3 February 2009Posted by AFed
Benicio Del Torro stars as the oft romanticised revolutionary, Che Guevara, in Steven Soderbergh’s two part epic. The sweep of the two films is certainly ambitious, covering the entire period of the Cuban revolution as well as Che’s last months in Bolivia. Del Torro‘s performance is impressive giving a convincing performance that displays the sheer will and strength of character that was central to Che’s personality. Yet, there is also a sense that despite the meticulously researched history of Che’s life the film presents very little in terms of the inner workings and controversies surrounding the man.
Walkouts in refineries by an oil worker
3 February 2009Posted by AFed
I work for a contracted company in charge of the maintenance of a oil refinery in south Wales. The start of the strike occurred due to an Italian company being contracted to increase refinery capacity at the Lindsey refinery. The strikes quickly spread across the rest of the refineries sporting the slogan “British Jobs for British workers”.
“Sometimes we shoot the same way” – The attack on Gaza, Internationalism and the Left
20 January 2009Posted by AFed
Israel’s brutal attack on the Gaza strip has elicited widespread revulsion, and has led to protests across Britain and the world. It is clear that the Israeli state has committed atrocities which anyone with an ounce of humanity would seek an end to. Its savage bombing of one of the most densely populated places on earth has resulted in over a thousand deaths. Nowhere is safe – Mosques, schools and UN sites have been attacked by the IDF. Even by the “civilised” standards of warfare between nation-states, which allow for a reasonable degree of “collateral damage”, several incidents stand out for their brutality.
State Murder And Unrest In Greece
8 January 2009Posted by AFed
The Killing of 15 year old Alexis-Andreas Grigoropoulos in Athens, Greece was cold blooded, unprovoked murder. Alexis was murdered by someone working for the state, a policeman, who we are lead to believe are there to keep order and help the public. Of course, it is our rulers and their colleagues in the mainstream media who need us to believe that that is what the police are there to do. We Anarchists, however, are fully aware of the purpose of the state, we hear regularly of police and state corruption and abuse of power and it is the mainstream media who keep that information from the majority of the public. The mainstream media and those working for states and big corporations around the world claim that those who protest riot and mobilise autonomously are a minority of crazed anarchists who want to create chaos and destroy anything and everything. They want everyone to believe that we anarchists want chaos, insanity, everyman for himself, back to year zero, a mad nihilistic sect who want to create a society akin to fascism. They want us to believe this because they need us to believe that without them, without the state; the police, the military, the courts, the government and capitalism there would be chaos. That without our noble, powerful and bold leaders we would be helpless, vulnerable and in panic, back to the stone-age, our great civilisation crumbled to dust. However as events have shown us the total opposite is true.
Israeli Anarchist on Gaza Bombings
4 January 2009Posted by AFed
Most people in Israel will remember one thing about the protest later today (Sat 3/1/2009): that the organizers went to the Supreme Court in order to make sure they are allowed to present a Palestinian flag.
Middle Eastern Anarchist Analysis of Gaza Bombings
3 January 2009Posted by AFed
The following text was received from an anarchist activist living in the Middle East. It has been edited slightly for clarity, but is largely as written by an activist on the ground in the Middle East. For obvious reasons we publish it here anonymously.
EU’s deal begins to melt under climate concessions
19 December 2008Posted by AFed
European Union officials once again proved themselves to be the standard-bearers for free-market capitalism by making a series of concessions to the continent’s heavy industries in the latest series of international climate change negotiations in Poznan, Poland. These industries will now only have to pay for 70% of their climate ‘credits’ on the already-flawed EU Carbon Trading Scheme, while hospitals and universities remain paying the full charge. The talks, which are designed to iron out the differences between the various national capitalist interests ahead of the Copenhagen climate summit in late 2009, have been littered with obstructions that are exclusively based around state sovereignty (such as Brazil’s reluctance to allow isolation of the Amazon akin to that of Antarctica) or corporate interests from the oil, coal, aviation and automobile industries.
The Unrest in Greece
19 December 2008Posted by AFed
The unrest in Greece following the killing of 16 year old Alexandros Grigoropoulos has held the attention of the world and electrified the anarchist movement internationally. In the UK, solidarity actions and demonstrations have taken place in London, Leeds, Brighton, Birmingham, Newcastle, Glasgow and Edinburgh. The Greek embassy in London was blockaded, and there were tussles with police during a demonstration in Dalston. Internationally, solidarity actions and demos took place in Mexico, the US, Portugal, Spain, Denmark, France, Germany, Belgium, Poland, Russia, Turkey, Bulgaria, Italy, Ireland, Croatia, Finland and Canada. The ruling class is vocal about the threat of the conditions in Greece spreading throughout Europe, and unsurprisingly anarchists are being presented as “dark forces” stirring discontent behind the scenes. But the widespread sympathy for the anarchists amongst youth in Greece has thrust the ideas into the spotlight, and represents the possibility of advancing ideas about creating real freedom and community as viable, current and living ideas
Obama – the Second Coming?
7 November 2008Posted by AFed
Make no mistake, Barrack Obama’s victory in the United States does not mean black liberation any more than Margaret Thatcher’s government was a victory for women’s liberation. Neither does it herald a new dawn for the world.
Outrage as Leicester Council hikes district heating prices by 76% – who or what is to blame?
2 November 2008Posted by AFed
In Leicester, tenants’ are rightly up in arms about being tied into domestic heating scheme whose prices are poised to almost double during this month, an increase that was announced last month by the city council.
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