http://news.infoshop.org/article.php?story=20090331210131133
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=5192342478
http://detrich.wordpress.com/2008/02/04/get-involved/
Filed under: Anarchism, Anarchists You Should Know, Capitalism, Environmental Activism, Law Enforcement | Tags: activist, Anarchism, anarchist, anarchy, battle of seattle, earth liberation front, elf, g-8, international day of action against global capitalism, oregon, prisoner, reclaim the streets, rob los ricos, robert thaxton, world trade organization, wto
Robert Thaxton (born December 31, 1959) is an anarchist theorist and activist sentenced to seven years in prison for an incident at a Reclaim the Streets protest in Eugene, Oregon on June 18, 1999. Many have argued that his sentence was excessive and was intended to intimidate other protesters.
Thaxton (who also used the name Rob los Ricos) participated in the “International Day of Action Against Global Capitalism”, a Reclaim the Streets action in Eugene. On September 3, 1999, he was convicted of assault and riot, based on the charge that he threw a rock at a police officer. His plea of self-defense was rejected. He was sentenced to seven years in prison. While there were protests in more than 140 cities around the world that day against the G-8 summit being held in Cologne, Germany, Thaxton is said to have received the longest sentence of any participant. That protest was said to be an important precursor to the 1999 protests against the World Trade Organization in Seattle, Washington.
During his imprisonment at the Oregon State Penitentiary in Salem, Oregon, he has tangled with prison authorities, who charge that he is involved with the Earth Liberation Front. A long time author and political organizer in cities throughout the United States, Thaxton is also notable as one of few publicly acknowledged people of color imprisoned for his activities in the high-profile 1990’s Pacific Northwest anti-globalization movement. His case, actions and writings have also been important in the movement’s discussions of non-violence and prisoner support.
Rob is the author of a zine entitled Manufacturing Dissent and co-author, with fellow prisoner Jeff Luers, of Heartcheck. Rob is reachable at #12112716, MCCF, 4005 Aumsville Highway, Salem, OR 97310.
Filed under: Anarchism, Anarchists You Should Know, Capitalism | Tags: boulder, technocrat, university of colorado, ward churchill, world trade center
Ward LeRoy Churchill (born October 2, 1947) is an American writer, political activist, and academic. He is a tenured full professor of ethnic studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder, and author of over 20 books and hundreds of essays. In addition to his academic writing, Churchill has written for several general readership magazines of political opinion. His work is primarily about the U.S. and its historical treatment of political dissenters in general and of American Indian peoples in particular.
Churchill was widely discussed and criticized in the mass media in 2005, for a 2001 essay in which Churchill questioned the innocence of many of the people killed in the World Trade Center attacks, labeling them as “technocrats” and “little Eichmanns.” The University of Colorado stated support for Churchill’s right to engage in controversial political speech.
Following an investigation, the University’s Standing Committee on Research Misconduct recommended Churchill be sanctioned for repeated acts of “serious research misconduct”, Some observers concerned with academic freedom argue that the investigation is in retaliation to Churchill’s critical statements about the World Trade Center attacks.
Filed under: Anarchism, Anarchists You Should Know, Environmental Activism, Law Enforcement | Tags: alf, animal liberation front, arson, craig marshall, earth liberation front, elf, free, jeff, jeff "free" luers, luers, oregon, political prisoner, Prison, suv
Jeff “Free” Luers is an anarchist and environmental activist from Eugene, Oregon currently serving a twenty-two year prison sentence for arson. In 2000 he set fire to three SUV’s as a protest against global warming along with Craig Marshall, who was sentenced to five and a half years. Supporters argue that he is a political prisoner, due to his abnormally long sentence; they point out that sentences for arson and even crimes such as rape are generally much shorter, and that Luers was not endangering any human being, only destroying property in an act of direct action.
Jeff Luers describes the motivation for his act: “In an act of resistance designated to raise awareness and draw attention to a problem that affects every human being, every animal, every plant, and every form of life on this planet. I am speaking of global warming, air, soil and water pollution. We are in the midst of a global environmental crisis.”
He has become a cause célèbre among anarchists, radicals, anti-prison activists, and people associated with the Earth Liberation Front despite the fact that he has denied concrete affiliation with the ELF.
Each year since his imprisonment, there has been some call to action in his support around the anniversary of his sentencing. On June 12th, 2004, there were demonstrations in several places in the United States, along with events in other countries. There were also a number of concerts, video showings, and dinners to raise support for Luers. In Moscow, supporters spray painted “Free Jeff Luers!” on a wall outside of the American Embassy. The FBI issued a warning to various businesses and media outlets that actions it calls “eco-terrorism” might have occurred around this date. No such actions occurred, and activists claimed that the FBI was using scare tactics to intimidate its opponents. A similar “Weekend of Resistance” took place from June 10th to 12th of 2005, with actions occurring worldwide.
Filed under: Anarchists You Should Know | Tags: Alexander Berkman, Anarchism, anarchists, bolshevik, communist, henry clay frick assassination, mother earth, prison memoirs of an anarchist, russia, the blast emma goldman
Alexander Berkman (November 21, 1870 – June 28, 1936) best known to the general public for his failed assassination attempt on Henry Clay Frick, which sentenced him to 14 years in prison. This led him to writing Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist, mostly an account of his life in prison. Over his life time he was publisher and editor for multiple publications, notably The Blast and Mother Earth.
When Berkman went to assassinate Frick, he knew he was sacrificing himself. That he would either be killed in the attempt or in prison for a very long time.
This is a detailed account of how It went down:
Along with Emma Goldman, the anarchist Alexander Berkman plotted to murder Frick in revenge for the seven steelworkers killed when they were attacked by the Pinkerton detectives hired by Frick to disperse the locked-out workers and allow in strikebreakers. On July 23, 1892 Berkman, armed with a revolver and a sharpened steel file, entered Frick’s office in downtown Pittsburgh.
Frick, realizing what was happening, attempted to rise from his chair while Berkman pulled a revolver and fired at nearly point-blank range. The bullet hit Frick in the left earlobe, penetrated his neck near the base of the skull, and lodged in his back. The impact hurled Frick off his feet, and Berkman fired again, again striking Frick in the neck and causing him to bleed profusely. Carnegie Steel vice president (later, president) John George Alexander Leishman, who was with Frick, was then able to grab Berkman’s arm and deflect a third shot, saving Frick’s life.
Frick was seriously wounded, but he still rose to fight back and tackled his assailant. All three men crashed to the floor, where Berkman managed to stab Frick four times in the leg with the pointed steel file before finally being subdued by other employees, who had rushed into the office. As the police entered the room, guns drawn, Frick reportedly yelled, “Don’t shoot! Leave him to the law, but raise his head and let me see his face.” Frick pointed to Berkman, who was chewing on a capsule of Mercury (II) fulminate which might have exploded near Frick, Berkman, and everybody else in the office. For more than two hours doctors probed for the bullets; Frick reportedly refused anesthesia so he could help guide their efforts.
Frick was back at work in a week; Berkman was charged and found guilty of attempted murder. Berkman’s actions in planning the assassination clearly indicated a premeditated intent to kill, and he was sentenced to 22 years in prison. He eventually served a total of fourteen years, and under pressure from supporters in the labor movement, including the forming of The Berkman Defense Association, was pardoned in 1906.
Negative publicity from the attempted assassination resulted in the collapse of the strike. Two thousand five hundred men lost their jobs, and most of the workers who stayed had their wages halved
Towards the end of his years in 19 36 he was in constant pain from a medical condition, and killed himself.
Quotes:
“When the highwayman holds his gun to your head, you turn your valuables over to him. You ‘consent’ alright, but you do so because you cannot help yourself, because you are compelled by his gun. Are you not compelled to work for an employer? Your need compels you, just as the highwayman’s gun.”
“War means blind obedience, unthinking stupidity, brutish callousness, wanton destruction, and irresponsible murder.”
For further reading see anarchy archives.
And for one of the greatest books ever written in “simple words” on what is anarchism theres his book “What is Anarchism?”. Please note the book goes by many names.
Filed under: Anarchists You Should Know, Video | Tags: Alexander Berkman, american experience emma goldman, Anarchism, anarchist, anarchy, documentary, henry clay frick, pbs
A documentary about Emma Goldman’s life.
To download or watch in a bigger screen go to google video.
Filed under: Anarchism, Anarchists You Should Know, Capitalism, Law Enforcement | Tags: american history, Anarchism, anarchist, anarchy, anti-immigration, bartolomeo vanzetti, cobbler, death penalty, execution, fishmonger, howard zinn a people's history of the united states, italian, italian-american, luigi galleani, nicola sacco, sacco, sacco and vanzetti, shoemaker, stereotyping, subversive chronicle, the cure is in you, us history, vanzetti, webster thayer
Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti are probably two of the best known anarchists in the United States. Their arrest, trial, and execution are commonly brought up during the course of the average high school U.S. History course. Usually they are cast as the otherwise acceptable victims of the stereotyping and mod mentality that was typical of that period of American history (though certainly not continuing today) As such large parts of the population know the names of Sacco and Vanzetti, a few even know that they were anarchists executed by the state. But beyond that even many anarchists don’t know their story.
Both men emigrated to the US in 1908, Sacco was a cobbler in Torremaggiore and Vanzetti a fishmonger from Villafalletto. They were both followers of Luigi Galleani, another Italian-American anarchist who advocated for a violent anarchist revolution through his Italian language publications Cronaca Sovversiva (Subversive Chronicle) and La Salute è In Voi! (The Cure is In You!), the later an explicit step by step guide on bomb making. After Galleani and his closest supporters were exported, many of his followers went became inactive, but a few, known (ever so creatively) as “The Anarchist Fighters” went underground and continued to fight in what they described as a “class war“. The Anarchist Fighters were implicated in a number of bombings and assassination attempts.
It has never been satisfactorly determined whether Sacco and Vanzetti were members of the Anarchist Fighters, though it was clear from their own testimony at their murder trials that they were close associates of many known members.
On 15 April 1891, an attempted armed robbery in Braintree, Massachusetts left a pay-clerk and security guard shot dead. When the police investigated a fellow Italian-American anarchist Ferruccio Coacci in relation to the crime, they found his alibi foolproof, yet deported him anyway because of an earlier offense. When the police told the garage repairing Coacci’s Oakland to phone them when someone came to collect it, they arrested Sacco and Vanzetti as they attempted to collect their associates belongings.
If this seems contrived and bizarre, it is because it is. The state had no reason to suspect Sacco and Vanzetti of the crime save for the fact that they were associates of a previous suspect, and they were anarchist immigrants.
Once in custody, Sacco and Vanzetti at first attempted to conceal their politics from the police, but eventually came clean and were unapologetic for their beliefs. Much time was spent during the trial addressing their politics and immigration, rather than discussing the actual case.
Sacco and Vanzetti were found guilty of murder in the first degree and were sentenced to die in the electric chair by Judge Webster Thayer. They were executed on August 23, 1927.
Sacco and Vanzetti were not writers, thinkers, or organizers. Were it not for the state-sponsored violence of the death penalty they may have never achieved much beyond enlightening a few friends. This fact did not escape Vanzetti’s notice, as shown in his closing statement after sentencing:
If it had not been for this thing, I might have lived out my life talking at street corners to scorning men. I might have died, unmarked, unknown, a failure. Now we are not a failure. This is our career and our triumph. Never in our full life can we hope to do such work for tolerance, justice, for man’s understanding of man, as now we do by accident. Our words – our lives – our pains – nothing! The taking of our lives – lives of a good shoemaker and a poor fish peddler – all! That last moment belong to us – that agony is our triumph.
To this day, Sacco and Vanzetti serve as symbols of state oppression and xenophobia. Their story is taught in every US History class, and while their story isn’t, their names are familiar to many Americans.
Further Reading:
- Wikipedia
- Infoshop.org Memorial Page
- Sacco and Vanzetti.org
- Vanzetti’s Final Statement (delivered moments before his death)
- Legal Study of the Case
Surely a fair trial was possible with this being a typical political cartoon from the 1920's.
Filed under: Anarchists You Should Know, Breaking News | Tags: anarchist may day, emma goldman haymarket, haymarket, haymarket wiki, international workers day, labor movement, living my life, swine flu
Haymarket Square Chicago
See haymerket affair
May Day(May 1st, also called international worker’s day and labor day in most countrys except the US) is a celerbration of the fight for the 8 hour-work day, and in honor of the workers murdered by police in the Haymerket massacre. Also 7 anarchists were arrested and found guilty in a unfair trial with throwing a bomb into a crowd of police. Whoever really threw the bomb is still unknown till this day. The haymarket martyrs were a big influence on previously mentioned Emma Goldman.
You could print out and put up some posters from here.
How does one celebrate May day? With red and black ballons, music and dancing, and of course good food and friends!
Update: I apologize to are readers, but the author forget to mention that there would be protests and marchs today. Protesting things such as workers rights and wage slavery, to the unemployment. According to wikipedia, ” Several May Day marches, which are traditional events, have turned violent in Germany and Turkey as riot police battle protesters in their respective countries.” More updates to come from us, but stay tuned to wikipedia for the latest.
Update: To avoid just regurgitating what wikinews has already reported, I will just link you to the article. What I will say here is that there have been a increased number of protesters, a lot of people are unemployed and there angry.
Filed under: Anarchists You Should Know | Tags: Alexander Berkman, anarchism and other essays, anarchist, Anarchists You Should Know, anarchy, Emma Goldman, living my life, public speakers, radical feminism, spanish civil war
Emma Goldman (June 27, 1869 – May 14, 1940) was a anarchist and a feminist. Born in Russia into a jewish family, shes one of many jewish anarchists (notabaly Noam Chomsky). As a teenager she moved to New York State, after a year or so she moved to New York City were she met Alexander Berkman. He would become a influential figure in her life as a lover and lifelong comrade. She was famous for her writing, her public speaking, and of course her fiery persona. Her last few years alive were spent helping the spanish anarchists such as the CNT in the Spanish civil war.
Places named after Emma are the Emma Goldman Clinc, and the Red Emma Bookstore Coffee House.
Quotes:
“When we can’t dream any longer we die.”
“The most violent element in society is ignorance”
“If voting changed anything, they’d make it illegal.”
“Someone has said that it requires less mental effort to condemn than to think.”
“I do not believe in God, because I believe in man. Whatever his mistakes, man has for thousands of years past been working to undo the botched job your God has made.”
Emma Goldman addressing a crowd at Union Square, New York.
Notable things she wrote:
-Mother Earth was a anarchist journal edited by Emma and her longtime comrade and lover Alexander Berkman. It contained from what I understand; poems and essays, written by mulitple contributers. Some issues of it are available from ak press. I also found what appears to be a collection of essays and such from mother earth on google books. You can also read a entire issue of mother earth on PBS.
-Anarchism and other essays is a collection of essays ranging from prisons to feminism. You could read it on google books, or download audio of it on audio anarchy.
-Living My Life Goldman’s autobiography, while rather lengthy it is well worth the read. It gives insight into a woman who lived a amazing life. You can try and get it at your local library, or you could read it online.
-Red Emma Speaks: Selected Writings and Speeches is not written by Emma, but is a edited collection of her work. You might also be able to get this book at your local library.
Emma Goldman, New York 1932
