By members of the Slingshot Collective

Recently we had a screening at the Long Haul Infoshop of the 2005 film Commune, about California’s own Black Bear Ranch.  Prominent in the film is our neighbor, Osha Neumann.

A tireless homeless advocate, artist and writer with a radical past chronicled in his memoirs, Up Against the Wall Motherf**ker, we invited him over to watch the film with us and followed up with a lively conversation. This is some of what ensued.

A. Iwasa (AI):  Do you have anything you want to say to start the conversation?

Osha Neumann (ON):  It’s really complicated for me seeing that film.  I don’t know what to think.  Part of it is it was a long time ago, a lot of those people are dead.  You know when you have something that was wonderful, but also very complicated, it’s hard for me to know what to say about it, that it’s honest and true to that complexity.  It was an incredibly important period of my life, I loved it.  I loved being in nature and I loved living communally… and I loved all those things we can’t do here.  To be together all the time and to not to have… people dividing up according to what their jobs are.  And home life being separated from work life and having children being separated by having your work in the world, and having all those relations with people that are really intimate, and sexual sometimes… When you’re naked with each other, not simply in the fact that you’re not wearing clothes, when you’re emotionally naked with each other and things that are hidden aren’t hidden.  We had a communal shitter, and you shit and peed publicly.  It was nothing, you just did it.

Cooking together.  Everybody cooking, everybody taking care of the children.  And it’s so much closer to the way people live most places in the world. During the war in El Salvador I went up into one of the provinces where the guerrilla army was in control, and these little villages that had been run out of the country by the army and then had come back, and in those villages they lived so much more like back at Black Bear.

Just knowing the origin of things, the food you eat is the food you’ve grown, the bread you eat is made from the grain you ground in a hand grinder, and the milk you drink is the milk of the goats you milked in the morning, and the cheese and the yogurt come from the goat milk that you made.  You get up in the morning and you heat the big old stove with the wood that you chopped that morning so it fit into the stove.  You live in houses that you built yourself. All of that is really important, wonderful stuff.  [Here we are] so separated from all that, living the way we should live in nature.

When I would drive down from Black Bear, the first thing was the air was different.  I breathed at Black Bear differently.  And there was night, you know there’s no night in The City.  There’s night with stars and the moon.

We lived with the season, we weren’t protected from the seasons.  With the snow you’re snowed in, then it thaws and it gets warm. You live with your body alive in a way, here your body just isn’t alive in the same way.

Your rituals are rituals of nature.  We celebrated solstices and equinoxes because you could see the solstices and equinoxes.  We’d stay up all night on the longest night of the year and drum and chant and sing songs, some that we made, some that we appropriated from other cultures.

We really lived without and we shared.  What money there was we shared.  There weren’t some people who were richer than other people… or some people were homeless and other people were housed, or some people had better houses and some people had Priuses.  We all had the same stuff, and it was all sort of grungy.

If you had a car you needed to know how to fix it.  I learned to weld there because it was needed and I wanted to and it was wonderful to learn how to work with metal. We made an irrigation system.

We didn’t have the Internet, and we didn’t have phones, and we didn’t have television, we didn’t have any of that.  We didn’t have electricity, we didn’t have electrical lines coming in, we generated electricity with pelton wheels, so we didn’t need all that stuff.

So there was a way of being in the world, and being with one’s self, and with others and with nature that was… in some ways it tears me up just looking at it.  Partly just that I was younger then, we had these wonderful, beautiful, muscular bodies.  We relished them.  I became strong there just by working.  I worked there with my hands, and walking up and down the hills, building things.  You had a body and it was wonderful.  And with all of that, we did a whole lot of just trying to live rightly in terms of some of the issues in the film:  how to be with children, how to deal with the bonds of children, how to spread those bonds beyond just the nuclear family, but not necessarily to break them.  The tensions around that.  How someone suggested in the film, to equalize the work between men and women, and processing the questions we don’t question here.  Everything was up to question it seemed:  how we organized our lives, how we did sex, children, family, relationships; all of those things were subject to conversation that we had.  Long, long conversations.

We made music, we didn’t have canned music.  All that was wonderful.  And for me it was transformational, I was a city boy, I grew up in New York, and I came from the Lower East Side and the intensity of the Mother Fuckers which was urban, street fighting craziness, and I was totally armored from that.  There was a transition when I lived in New Mexico, but I was armored, I was always looking out, but there, the armor just fell off of me.  I was able to be feminine and masculine in ways that I couldn’t be there.

So all that was wonderful.  But with all that, there were all kinds of stuff that was not resolved, and did not get talked about.  There was a level that it was not surprising that for most of the folks I lived with up there, that sort of living didn’t last.  We didn’t continue to live that way for all kinds of reasons.

For me it was just the level of isolation, from history, the lives of most people in this world, the United States and the struggles here, was something I didn’t want to continue.  My ambitions intellectually, artistically, politically, in terms of engagement we had separated ourselves, and there was a problem with that separation.  I didn’t want to do that.

And for all the sharing that we did, and the communal living, people kept their parachutes, that was still there when they wanted to get out of that.  And once people got out of that, then all those divisions that had been not there, all of a sudden they reappeared.

When people left, all those class differences just woof! they were there like they had never not been there.  And some of the people, like you see Richard Marley was working as a super and had no money and others have tons of money, gobs of money, some of which they inherited, some of which they made.  All of those divisions re-emerged.

It was obviously really not diverse in terms of race.  It was a white scene.  Aside from one or two folks it was almost racially homogeneous.  But even within that homogeneity there were differences, in background.  We all looked the same, but there were people who came from educated, middle class, intellectual backgrounds like I did.  Jews and non-Jews, there were those differences.  People from more working class backgrounds there, those different experiences didn’t disappear there.

In terms of the political agenda… there’s not this intense political engagement continuing for a lot of the people there.  Everybody was on the progressive, counter-cultural side of things, pretty much, but the radicalism of it did not continue.  Black people who looked at hippies and said, “Oh, that’s just a phase, we’re going to stay Black while you’ve gone and taken up all of your white privilege.” All of that is true about Black Bear.

It’s complicated, when you talk about men and women, not all the women had such a good experience.  When you take all of that sexual freedom, it looks more attractive to men.  Not all of them, we all loved it, it was just harder for some of the women, I think.

It was complicated for the children.  Some of the children had a really great experience and some of them didn’t have a great experience.

Many people like me came back down to The City.  There were people who stayed up there.  Some people like Creek, in the film, they moved down to the Salmon River, where most people in that area live.  There are little pieces of land, mostly it’s national forest, they have remained there and now they are the old timers.  You had the old timers in the film talking, now they are the old timers!  They have really created community around there and they have gotten very involved in protecting the river.  They have done an amazing job fighting the Forest Service to preserve the river, to prevent them from using pesticides to get rid of the invasive species, pulling the weeds by hand.  Fighting the clear cutting, fighting the damming of the rivers.

They also connected more than most of us did to the Native populations.  There were a few people at Black Bear who connected with the Karuk and the Yurok who were the Native populations, there was a Hoopa Reservation just down the road, so some of the people who stayed up there made those connections which is all good, they’ve done really good stuff.  Those are some of my thoughts.

AI:  I thought it was really interesting, among other things, this is the second time I’ve seen it, that Peter Coyote didn’t talk about the Diggers.  You talked about being in the Mother Fuckers, the one woman talked about knowing people who were in the Weather Underground Organization and supporting the Black Panthers, but I didn’t know he was a Digger when I saw this the first time, but I’m reading his Sleeping Where I Fall, so I thought that was kind of strange.

ON:  I don’t know why he did that.  Peter’s relation to Black Bear was less central than you would think from the film.  I mean he’s in the film partly because he’ll sell the film, and having Peter Coyote in it is a plus for the film maker, but his amount of time up there was not long.

Jesse Palmer (JP):  What is interesting to me is that people are increasingly fascinated by going Back to the Land, but everything I learn about the 1970s projects makes me feel skeptical.

ON:  Well, you’re right to be skeptical.  When I talked about how I was moved thinking about it doesn’t mean you don’t have every right to be skeptical about it.  I would be.  That’s why it was initially difficult for me to figure out how to talk about it because I have all those mixed feelings.  I moved on.  I had to move on from there.  And if I stayed there, it wouldn’t have worked for me.

There’s a real division among the Black Bear kids, between the ones who went as far away, Aaron is the one in the movie, but there were others also, and there are ones that are still very connected to the place.

The problem with Black Bear is that because it is so isolated, for example if you have children, and want to have them go to school, you can’t stay up there.  There’s no way unless you want to home school them, and so on.  But if you want them to have any experience of being socialized in school it’s not going to happen.

Black Bear is still around.  I don’t know what it’s like, I don’t think it’s anything like when we lived there, but it’s still up there.

 

You can read more about Osha and check out some of his artwork at www.oshaneumann.com.

 

 

 

 

 

 

By appropriate cycles

Cynical about the city

It seems infighting has become a staple of radical urban organizing. Through constant internal criticism and shaming we have effectively disarmed parts of the movement. Although we should, as an activist community, be motivated to support and teach each other, we instead have bred communities who demonize and scrutinize each other.. Potential revolutionaries are discouraged back into the safety of the status quo and we continue to lose more and more meaningful projects and people to “drama.” All the while the police are policing and the capitalists capitalizing unabated. Why? A theory:

Though often ignored, subconsciously we understand that the cities in which we live would collapse very quickly without the global exploitation that sustains them. To live in a city is to vitally depend on the very thing we say we want to destroy. And this destruction would mean no more food in the stores (or dumpsters), no more electricity, which in most cities means no water, no gas. So we ‘half-ass it,” preferring drama to revolution, or intellectual critique over action.

Thus, without an alternate infrastructure (or at least a plan) to provide food and resources during a revolutionary moment, even the most radical city dweller would hesitate, knowing such an immediate halt to oppression would be suicide. This is not to say the only way to be revolutionary is to move to the country; but investment in systems of self-sufficiency is an essential part of making change possible. It is truly ignorant for urban movements to think clean soil, water and food are not crucial aspects of what we’re fighting for. No one will smash the platform they are standing on without a safety net.

Rural towns are in a unique position to reject the status quo, self-manage themselves, and create an example, hopefully something worth defending. They are often already geared toward self-sustainability, autonomy and are, at times, blatantly anti-state (though usually still pro-private property). With economies driven by agriculture and ranching food production is localized and when not industrialized relatively sustainable. This food independence is further supplemented by a culture strong with gardening, hunting and interacting with nature.

Compared to the near anonymity of the city, in a small town one can very quickly build a personal connection with nearly everyone in the area. This continuous contact with the same people builds an affinity based on who you live near and who you interact with. Of course this means you can say goodbye to local mass demos (the Utah Tar Sand Resistance is a possible exception) and house shows for that matter, but more rare to see, a few people CAN have a big effect when they act on a smaller stage. In short, smaller community systems are better scaled to efforts for social change, thus utilizing “people energy” efficiently, and building autonomous structures for the future.

Appropriate Cycles

A couple years ago Appropriate Cycles was formed by a few people who decided to put some of this theory into practice. We each had many different experiences that led us here. One influential experience was a month spent with an indigenous community in Central America, blocking the construction of a mega dam. Another was a bike trip to a rural anarchist collective near the Bay Area, organized as a cultural rehab and retreat from the stresses of urban radical life. Reading Bolo’bolo was a radicalizing influence for one of our collective members that pointed to the country.

For years we poured our hearts into urban squats only to find as they were quashed, that many allies were more forthcoming with critique then solidarity. With this in mind we decided to try legally occupied land as a long term approach to building a culture of resistance capable of defending (not just critiquing) liberated spaces.

We worked, saved, borrowed, and found an acre in a small, predominantly working class, town on the west slope of the Rocky Mountains with pay-as-we-go terms we could afford, thus avoiding a bank loan. We are very aware of the role our white privilege has lent us in acquiring this space. Only revolution is truly capable of ridding us of our privilege, so instead of focusing on minimizing it we decided to use the privilege we have to work toward long term radical infrastructure that supports revolutionary potential. There is no one correct way to do this. Below are some of our current projects and ideas, but we could easily end up with some of yours.

Healthy, sustainable, and accessible food production is a central focus. One goal is to produce enough food to help sustain not only ourselves but other regional endeavors, for example the Utah Tar Sands resistance. We want to educate and empower others to be more autonomous from oppressive and unsustainable food systems.

With only a few people working the land we have started with a few modest gardens. Irrigation is provided by a pedal pump which lifts water from a hand dug micro-well up to an elevated tank. We have built two green houses, one with a fire heated bathtub inside; the other well insulated and with a loft, making it winter habitable for plants and possibly an adventurous human. Many plums, apricots, apples, and currants have been planted as well as various other perennials. We also built an elevated two chamber composting toilet with a wonderful view.

We care for a few goats, many chickens, two dogs and two cats. They provide us with milk, eggs, cuddles, and camaraderie. We love them and would defend them from oppression as we would a close friend.

On the land is a small warehouse divided into storage units. Some of the space is used as a community workshop with a variety of tools for bikes, welding, carpentry and hacking. Community access to these resources creates an alternative to consumerism and provides a social environment of cooperation and skill sharing. Building bicycle machines, helping people fix their bikes and creating a basic mesh network with old routers are just a few things we have been working on, but we need more people with a diversity of skills to support the project and expand its scope.

Another unit, partially set up as a community audio recording studio, has stalled since its bottom-liner moved out a while back; but with a little bit of gumption it could be just that, or anything else. Ideas for other units are a free store, meeting space or free school but most likely it will be whatever the next person to show up is excited about. We are also excited to build more habitation with possibilities for tree houses and cabins.

Outside of our property, we helped create a local food co-op in town that prioritizes supporting small scale farmers and bringing affordable, regionally produced food to our community. The co-op plans to offer eduction around self sufficiency, permaculture and food systems working to connect our most basic needs to larger structures of oppression and environmental degradation. One long term plan is a cooperative farm for the town. We actively support the community garden and an arts and theater group which have a big influence on people and the way they view community. Implying again that within community organizing bonds and connection are vital to create a lasting impact.

We do not see these projects as revolutionary in and of themselves but necessary infrastructure to support more revolutionary models of resistance such as a town general assembly or anti-fascist militia. We also don’t want to imply organizing is easy here and that we don’t run into similar issues of apathy that we see in urban zones. But we have experienced the ability to influence our soundings at a faster speed, making actual models for resistance more tangible. Furthermore the isolation, intense climate, and smaller population create a stronger culture of self-sufficiency and a community more willing to share skills, trade and teach.

We know there are all kinds of aspects, contradictions and dreams that did not make it into this article. If you made it this far and want to continue the conversation or visit the land email us:

appropriatecycles@riseup.net

* We, a collective of three, co-produced this article.An anarchist perspective on leaving the city

 

 

 

It hurts our eyes to constantly resort to computers to find an alternative voice that reflect the events of our time. Looks like it’s a good time to seek out the latest in printed thought. Yeah it’s sad that we are squandering precious resources like trees, water and oil to keep the cycle of consumer goods and “self expression” devouring the foundation of consensual reality. That’s why you should send your collection of books and zines that you no longer use to one of the info shops we list each month. Or better yet—start your own local and autonomous info shop/zine library. Your first holdings could be these titles:

 

Dispatches From Rojava by Paul Z. Simons

http://modernslavery.calpress.org/

Originally published as seven dispatches from the Rojava region of northern Syria and posted online. The first six were attributed to an anarchist from the United States, El Errante, with the seventh revealing Simons’ identity and chronicling his journey home.

Having just heard Simons talk before reading this, I was a bit disappointed. But it’s still a great place to start for those looking to learn more about the social revolution taking place in Rojava, and/or for literature to distribute on the subject.

As pundits continue to try to pretend we only have Western Imperialism and Islamic Fundamentalism to choose between, this shows that argument to be less than a straw man. (A. Iwasa)

 

As You Were: a punk commix anthology volume four $10.00

Silver Sprocket

1057 Valencia St.

San Francisco, CA 94110

When I found out that this volume of As You Were was going to be about living situations, I couldn’t have been more excited. The first few volumes of this ‘zine are both some of the best comics and documents of Punk that I’ve ever read.

This volume is a bit different, with far more artists, and in turn, much less space per artist for the most part. It was still rad, just a bit scattered to me, since I was expecting something more like the first few issues.

Liz Prince, Ben Snakepit, and Rick V are among the 32 other artists all worth looking into. Some of the stories are really far out, and other don’t so much deal with Punk directly, but never loose the edge that makes real Punk something you can Love and live all your life. (A. Iwasa)

 

The Rusty Razor $6 +$2 Shipping

Fishspit 1304 175th Pl NE Bellevue WA 98008 or RD Hontiveros P-34034

PO Box 290066 Represa CA 95671

A Split zine by RD who is a prisoner & Fish Spit who is an “Escapee.” You might recognize Fish’s rambling style from Wiseblood zine. You will find that his work in the Razor has similar sloppy verse that aims to be funny and tragic — but comes across slightly bigoted. He could spend more time revising his writing, and energy in considering the kind of audiences that read zines (most don’t like even a hint of racism or sexism). This time around he takes us on a trip to a mental ward and social security offices. It reads like an excited 8th grader.

RD aka “Big Joker,” has work that is hand written and is bent on revolution. He is an ex gangbanger who aims to promote unity and survival in a never-ending living hell. Other prisoners also write about their life outside the law and behind bars. There’s advice about drugs, info on prison conditions and as a whole it’s bursting with personality. They hope to make this publication free to other prisoners across the country so that a prairie fire of resistance can overtake this bleak reality. Any rich people reading are invited to donate to help in this endeavor. (eggplant)

 

Cyborg Legs $5

http://omgpress.tumblr.com

The first third of this story is slow paced – so much so it might confuse you of your own journal entries. There’s listless soul crushing descriptions of life and work in modern day San Francisco. The by-product of doing service industry is examined. Witness the author washing his mouth out with booze to be able to say, “May I help you??” for the 1,000th time. The break in the monotony comes with the author writing poetry — then more drinking. The writing style has the brute defeatism with this stale reality yet still maintains engagement and a lust for life that one sees in the works of Bukowski, minus the misogyny. The last act takes a surprise turn into fantasy. (eggplant)

 

FLUKE #11 $3

PO Box 1547 Phoenix AZ 85001

A handsome production in the classic punk zine format. Interviews that cover a broad interest range, from train graffiti to old punks and bands. Its not printed on a shitty copy machine. And the way it’s put together the pages emote a great care for the subjects. Next issue make the type font bigger will ya! (eggplant)

 

Felled Wrecks#1

$4ppd, $3 in person – 1454 San Joaquin St Richmond CA 94804 or paypal yacobdafisk@hotmail.com

Interviews and insights into obscure art noise acts like the Inflatable Boy Clams, Ornette Coleman and Mark E. Miller. The care brought into examining the work of these maligned people is refreshing. There’s an essay on pain that reveals the physical destruction that comes when doing a radical performance — and it doubles as a travel log of sorts. You’ll find reviews of some recent releases by groups that you probably will never hear. New & different sounds are treated with serious enthusiasm, the likes of which I have not seen since spying the early copies of Crawdady, when itself was essentially a zine (at a time when Rock n’ Roll as it fushioned with all of music.) The small type font, obtuse band names and messy layout make it sort of hard to read at times. But in some ways the anti-art scene that this covers is a self-induced headache. (eggplant)

 

East Bay Punk Zine #2

eastbaypunkclub@gmail.com

A ratty looking assembly of paper that highlights music. A lengthy article on the influence that 60’s garage bands has on today’s punk music. Show reviews, photos and a band interview fill out the remaining space. Sadly it seems to cover the acts that play larger clubs. I would like to see more of what’s happening at the underground spaces. At least I found my copy on top of a garbage can on Telegraph Ave — where any self-described punk should be found. (eggplant)

 

NonServi.am

by Jules Bentley

Http://NONSERVI.AM

Twisted shit. Three prose pieces. The first entry seems to be setting out to offend those with delicate senses. Lots of sex dripping all over the streets and living rooms of New Orleans. Anything that moves it would seem. The 2nd piece about a beloved cat goes the populist route – who doesn’t like cats? The 3rd piece dwells on a psychotic thought. The writer is pretty intelligent and has deft control over the language. There’s a lot of phrases peppered throughout the stories that you would find in a highly regarded novel. This particular zine is a benefit to keep a squat in the hands of the community. The silk screened cover looks cool as it exudes the kind of perfected skills to make it that the writing also embodies. (eggplant)

 

Baba Yaga Burns Paris To The Ground

by Wren Awry

Seamsandstory@gmailcom

Baba Yaga is a witch that appears in folk stories where a young woman who is endangered learns the skills to survive. This zine loiters at the intersection of history, fairy tales, feminism and radical critique. Blending factoids about the Paris Commune, women wielding fire, illustrators who worked for oppressive regimes by publishing in reactionary newspapers as well as for fairy tale books, and insights into how the hysteria of witch hunts echoed across time. A smart bit of writing here. It could be printed in the New Yorker but here it is, likely to be on display by some Pirate distro outside some gathering. It isn’t as obtuse and vague as other anarchist pamphlets. It has a bunch of academic leanings (even has a bibliography) but it reads like a conversation. (eggplant)

 

Punk In NYC’s Lower East Side 1981-1991 $5 Microcosmpublishing.com

This is the first issue in series of scene histories published by Microcosm Publishing. This historical tale is told through the lens of the late, Dave Insurgent of Reagan Youth. It documents in great detail beginnings of the anarchist punk movement in Manhattan’s Lower East Side from 1981-1991. The tragic life of Insurgent is followed as he navigates from growing up in Queens with two parents who were Holocaust survivors, to his involvement in the anarchist punk movement in NYC to his drug addiction followed by lobotomy, to his tragic death following the murder of his girlfriend by serial killer, Joel Rifkin. This zine paints an incredible time in history where benches were set on fire by tent communities on the Lower East Side to keep warm and an inside look at the Tompkins Square Park riots. A must read. (Rory)

 

Ker-Bloom! #117 $3

2480 5th Street Berkeley, Ca 94710

It can be ordered online at: etsy.com/shop/artnoose

Ker-bloom! Issue 117 is a lot more light hearted then some of the previous issues I was lent in the past. It contains a short story about while having lived in many collective houses over the years finally (gasp!) contracting scabies from a partner. It’s a quick read and will make anyone who’s ever had to deal with infestations feel a little less alone. This issue is a great zine for the collection and her attention to detail is always great. This issue was printed on a Vandercook Model 4. The cover was made from wood and metal type. The interior used polymer plates and metal type. (Rory)

 

Boy Zine #2 $5

theBOYZINE@gmail.com

BoyZine is an Oakland based zine put together by Cole Becker and friends and focuses on feminism through the lens of teenage boys who do not identify through the traditional understanding of masculinity. The second issue tackles the topic of sex: inter-sectional feminist dialogue pertaining to sexuality, virginity, conversations on how sex should be inherently pleasurable for both parties even a step to step guide on oral sex, and other often taboo topics for teenage boys to openly discuss. This zine is by teens for teens however completely non alienating for any outside reader. (Rory)

 

Dispatches from Rojava

By Paul Z Simons AKA El Errante

This 20-page travel log is a firsthand account of the Rojava insurrection, through the eyes of an American journalist. The zine offers a glimpse of communities such as Kobane and Serekaniye continuing to function amid violence or aggression by ISIS, Assad, and the Turkish and American states. The dispatches foreground the experience of Simons as a (white) foreigner for whom much of this is new, which creates room for some fresh anarchist insights, though sadly at the expense of local voices. Spending time with soldiers, Simons was privy to information regarding logistics, organization, and other institutional knowledge. Most importantly, perhaps, his dispatches confirm older reports regarding the influences of Abdullah Ocalan, Murray Bookchin, and other anarchist or far-left thinkers on the way Rojava’s organizing has unfolded. Ironically, critical analysis of institutions and ideologies at play in the uprising is notably absent, as time and safety constraints probably hampered deeper investigative work. At times, the author’s writing style (e.g. random flair and a hetero love scene at the end) brings the zine dangerously close to the genre of older Orientalist adventure writing. Thankfully, though, these dispatches are refreshingly free from the kind of Orientalist tropes, racist caricatures, shallow analysis, and reckless speculation that one may find in mainstream media. The zine assumes little previous knowledge, and is accessible to the general reader. (khanosaur)

 

Malevolent Europe: Regarding Refugee Oppression and Resistance at the Borders

By anonymous ill-will-editions.tumblr.com illwill@riseup.net

This 16-page zine includes a little bit of everything. Historical background, personal observations, social analysis, numerous photos, and quotes from survivors all support the author’s calls for direct action to help the large group of Syrian refugees finding their way through Central Europe. Written in late September of 2015, the zine lacks up-to-date information regarding reactionary policy or violent reaction from skinheads against the refugee camps and their residents. Written for a European audience, it also omits suggestions for Stateside activists who are not connected to the camps by land. However, it illustrates well the disparity, even early on, between European humanitarian discourse and the reality of refugee experiences. Witnessing police brutality, barely livable conditions, and inadequate provisions, the author cites these and other indignities faced by people navigating Europe as “refugees” as opposed to tourists or citizens. By reading the camps as prisons rather than waystations, the author effectively exposes the oppressive logic of borders, and the contradictions of “aid.” By applying a radical critique of a liberal intervention, this zine may help the reader develop frames for resistance and revolt against borders in general. (khanosaur)

 

Rice Harvester #14

$2 PO BOX 40786, San Francisco, CA 94140

This is the last issue of a twenty year zine that documents the life of Greg Harvester, a punk from Alabama who has lived, traveled, and played music all over the US. Greg now resides in SF and is still making music and heavily involved in the DIY punk scene. In this issue, Greg talks about trauma and the anxiety of living in a tech filled city. Those new to Rice Harvester will learn that Greg was shot in the face several years ago while living in New Orleans and is still reeling from the trauma of that event. There’s a first hand account of the shooting written by his friend Sarah who wrote the essay three years after it happened. Sarah rushed Greg to the hospital that night and her story had me sobbing, it was very unexpected and a perfect example of why sharing our trauma with others can be powerful and healing for both the author and reader. There’s a fun interview with 510-BAD-SMUT that documents the Bay Area hotline’s origins. The interview reads like a time capsule of how the Bay Area underground has changed over the years but still remains a cultural hot spot for DIY shows, movies, plays, protests, parties, and why an underground hotline can be useful for those looking to connect with others offline. Greg lists all the issues of Rice Harvester that he’s ever made, equipped with a brief summary of each and there are short and funny show reviews towards the end. Issue 14 is a nice farewell to a zine that has traveled and been born in so many places. Get this issue while you still can and read Greg’s writing in Maximum Rock N Roll and on his tape blog, Remote Outposts. (Vanessa)

 

No Gods No Mattress #25

$3 – Enola D. PO BOX 3936, Berkeley, CA 94703

Every time I get a new issue of No Gods No Mattress, I have to make sure I’m in a quiet place, usually my bed, and that no one is there to distract me because NGNM is my favorite personal zine ever! I love to read each issue as if my friend is telling me really juicy secrets because that’s what reading this zine is like. I love Enola’s writing and haphazard layout style, it’s as if each issue is made in a hole in the wall with whatever scraps that happen to be lying around. In issue 25, Enola talks about all the people they’ve ever loved, hooked-up with, or had crushes on. It made me want to write something similar because it was so personal and engaging and I couldn’t stop reading. There are also continental breakfast reviews where Enola and their friends hit up hotel and motel breakfasts and try to pass as hotel guests but end up disappointed with stale pastries and having to be surrounded by business people. I could relate to Enola’s struggle with trying to find time to write while living on the fringes and also trying to prioritize their self-care regimen. I always feel comforted by this zine and Enola’s writing makes me feel so many different emotions. A must read! (Vanessa)

 

 

Reviewed by Steve Brady

Octavia’s Brood, edited by adrienne marie brown and Walidah Imarisha, is a collection of science-fiction and fantasy short stories published last year, by people involved in social justice movements. The title is a play on Lilith’s Brood by Octavia Butler, the pioneering Black female sci-fi author, suggesting that these new writers, mostly of Color, are following in her footsteps.

I learned about Octavia’s Brood at a presentation at the Bay Area Anarchist Bookfair. Co-Editor adrienne maree brown described their idea of “Visionary Fiction.” Like existing forms of speculative fiction, sci-fi and fantasy, Visionary Fiction involves imagining possibilities outside the realm of everyday life, but in an expressly political way, visualizing the fulfillment of our unmet needs and dreams that are stymied by the system we live in. From the introduction by Walidah Imarisha:

All organizing is science fiction. Organizers and activists dedicate their lives to creating and envisioning another world, or many other worlds—so what better venue for organizers to explore their work than science fiction stories?

Of course I got myself a copy and dug in. But to my surprise, only one of the stories had a utopian element. More common themes are last-ditch, often tragic resistance in dystopian futures, or someone fighting the system with magical powers. Interviewed in “Yes” magazine, co-editor Walidah Marisha explains:

In our collection, Octavia’s Brood, my co-editor adrienne maree Brown’s story, “The River” explores this idea [alternatives to dominant narratives of justice]. What does justice look like? What does holding people accountable look like for crimes that this system does not consider crimes—like gentrification, economic displacement, the violence of poverty?

Except “The River” is about an anti-gentrification sea monster! Again, not the blueprint for a just society I expected from visionary fiction.

At the presentation, adrienne maree brown described their outreach to collect the stories in this anthology. Outstanding activists in social justice movements with little or no experience writing fiction were encouraged to just go for it, putting their passion into words.

Looking at the author bios, not only are there a few experienced fiction writers, but many have backgrounds in performance art, music, theater and poetry, rather than being organizers and rabble-rousers new to expressing themselves. For me, this belied the “anyone can do it” spirit of the promotional workshop.

 

The good news is that once I put all these expectations aside, the stories in this anthology are wonderful. Especially from those new to the craft, the stories are refreshing, and despite (or because of) the politics, unpretentious. Part of the joy is that the heroes have more similar values to me than in mainstream science fiction. But besides that, I think they’re just more likable, more admirable people.

Back to the introduction, Marisha explains:

“Visionary fiction” is a term we developed to distinguish science fiction that has relevance to building new, freer worlds from the mainstream of science fiction, which most often reinforces dominant narratives of power.

That’s too simple for me; I see a variety of political biases in science fiction. Many of the most famous writers, while not radicals by our standards, are creative in their approaches to society’s problems. Authority and tradition are constantly questioned, even if from a tacky intellectual libertarianism. And some of my favorite famous authors are from the psychedelic era, writing as weird as possible for weirdness’ sake—as Imarisha says, “there are as many ways to exist as we can imagine.”

But reading Octavia’s Brood had me realize that despite this, something is really wrong and toxic about modern sci-fi. A pervasive snarkiness, a fear by author’s that they’ll be perceived as naïve. Whether I agree with the author’s politics or not, there’s a cowardice is today’s sci-fi, striving to be “nuanced” about anything smacking of politics, thus embracing a quasi-neutrality that defaults to literary liberalism. There’s also this negativity; regardless of genre everything reads more like horror, a combination of shock value and a perverse delight in a meaningless universe.

Octavia’s brood is the opposite and the antidote.

I wanted to describe my favorite stories in the book, but I can’t put my finger on it. I’ll try:

“Black Angel” by Walidah Imarisha: An angel cast out from heaven (not a demon) fights injustice on Earth. This surprised me with how much a enjoyed it, as I usually hate the angel/demon sort of urban fantasy. The inner life of the angel moved me.

“Evidence” by Alexis Pauline Gumbs: In an idyllic future, someone sends messages of hope back to her ancestor struggling in our era. A lot of the technology for this was over my head; I didn’t know whether this was on the edge of 21st century hard science, or quantum terms strung together. But when the focus was on the social message, dang that was powerful.

“Sanford and Sun” by Dawolu Jahari Anderson: In screenplay form, Sanford’s primetime TV reality is interrupted by visions from Sun Ra about the spirituality and nobility of Black history. As wacky and original as it sounds.

“The Long Memory” by Morrigan Phillips: In a fantasy archipelago, people with magical memory keep tradition alive, and an evil up-and-coming emperor hunts them down. Yes, this is familiar, but for all the reasons I mentioned above, this version of speculative fiction is more human, and the politics are courageous instead of bland.

 

West of Eden: Communes and Utopia in Northern California edited by Iain Boal, Janferie Stone, Michael Watts and Cal Winslow. PM Press.

Reviewed by A. Iwasa

Coming out of what started as the Communes Project, a collaborative effort between the Institute of International Studies at the University of California, Berkeley and the Mendocino Institute in 2003, this book is a striking example of the radical potential to utilize the resources of academia when people make a point of making them accessible to the general public.

Communes are placed historically both in the broader sense of general Utopian history, and the more particular focus of the book revolving around the 1968 social upheavals.

Fantastic chapters on the Native American occupation of Alcatraz and communalism in the black Panther Party work to dispel the myth of communal living as a white people thing.

Prominent also are back to the land projects such as the Morning Star and Black Bear Ranches. First hand accounts abound, and sources are extremely well cited for those interested in following up. The ongoing legacies of the communes and the people involved are also addressed from the pot economy to high tech industry.

This book is a must read for anyone interested in communal living, especially those now who think our much smaller and tamer communal living movement, or lack there of, is The Revolution. We’ve got a long way to go to rebuild what was, and the lessons we can learn from past efforts should be studied in works like this.

I think virtually every commune dweller past and present could fill a book this size alone with great stories fun and sad, economic and historical.  All these sorts of details are very important, and the editors were great about never getting stuck on any of the specifics.

On a personal level, I was able to make it in the Bay Area from Slingshot 119 to 120’s editing largely because of a communal living situation I was able to get into on my credentials as a member of the Slingshot Collective doing research on the topic.  Almost every place I’ve lived since I moved out of my mother’s house For The Last Time back in 2003 has been some sort of collective, so the topic is very dear to my heart.

I made a specific point of getting our review copy at the Howard Zinn Book Fair from PM Press because of this, and even though it’s a little old, Ramsey didn’t hesitate to donate it to us.  It would be great to see more work like this, both about the 1960s and ’70s, and the time since then which has been fascinating in its own ways.

 

 

Crashing the Party: Legacies and Lessons from the RNC 2000 by Kris Hermes. PM Press.

Reviewed by A. Iwasa

Starting off with a strong Foreword then Introduction placing the 2000 Republican National Convention (R2K) squarely in the pre-9/11 National Security State trajectory showing again and again how the United States government had been steadily ratcheting up its monitoring and disruption of political dissidents long before 9/11.

Philly itself, host of the R2K and future host of the 2016 Democratic National Convention (DNC) is similarly contextualized in its bloody history of police brutality and heavy-handed injustice system when it comes to civilians, and total lack of accountability when it comes to the police.

Also the R2K Legal Collective and the defense of the R2K arrestees is outlined as part of the re-emergence of activist-led legal collectives and radicals leading their own defense in political trials.

Then with the beginning of the first chapter enters the infamous John Timoney. Sworn in as Philly’s police commissioner in 1998, I first became familiar with him after he led the oppression of the 2003 Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) protests. The police brutality was so bad and systematic, it became known as the Miami Model. It turns out Timoney had been heading such affairs since the August 1988 Tompkins Square Park Riot in New York City. Here again, a systemic series of oppressive acts, regardless of which of the capitalist class political parties are calling the shots is outlines. He even policed the DNC in 1992!

Then Hermes moves on to the initial threats of political repression from the state and the beginning of street action. Similar to his own form of counter-protest hopping, Timoney had Philly police go to Seattle six months before the R2K to observe the actions against the World Trade Organization (WTO). This shows how we must also be vigilant, constantly studying the state, and not simply trying to use old tactics that may have worked in another time and/or place.

Along the same lines, February 2000 the FBI Academy in Virginia hosted a conference for police commanders around the country to study the WTO protests, and to prepare for future actions. Philly police attended other events in preparation such as the April 2000 International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank protests in Washington, DC, where they even conducted surveillance. And all this before the protests even started!

There are many reasons to read this book: history, strategy both in the streets and in the courts, and for those of us thinking of attending the upcoming protests against the DNC in Philly, and/or the RNC in Cleveland, Ohio. We should all be doing this sort of homework before we hit the streets, since we know the ruling class is doing theirs.

All out for Philly! All out for Clevo! All Power to the People!

 

 

Dark Tales from the Dungeons: Horrors from the ‘Hood for Youth to Beware

The Men for Honor Writing Group;

Edited by Dortell Williams

srmshodges@la-archdiocese.org

Reviewed by d’ eggplant

A totally unique DIY project that seeks to expand the voices of incarcerated people. That alone gets my attention and motivates me to turn pages. Sadly this book is so filtered through and through by the institution that’s killing these people I don’t end up lingering on the pages very long. While reading this I got the sense that every word of this work is scrutinized by some malevolent guard. The stories and poems here are laden down with a cautionary tone intent on converting youngsters off of a destructive path.

If you can get past that part then you’ll find some captivating storytellers. The people in prisons are immensely creative and quick witted. They tend to master the mind and exceed in social skills that most people stop flexing after college. They can master most fields given a chance as is evident here with regards to these half dozen writers. Their techniques using allusions, similes, puns and allegory are very effective in this book. They are people who have witnessed amazing things the least of which is seeing the human spirit soar while in toxic environments.

I wonder what if this book didn’t have to get approval from some bigoted prison guard. Having the writers coerced into using a confessional tone is another example of emasculating people who resisted the lingering effects of slavery and capitalism. In my utopian dream similar warning tracts would be crafted and delivered to the future police, bankers, politicians, developers, lawyers etc — the people in power who are educated and should know better, but continue to go on fucking everything up.

by Maximus Thaler

Hello Slingshot! I’d like to take up the next 10 minutes of your life talking about the chemical glyphosate. (You can also follow along with the above video!)

Here is Glyphosate’s chemical structure. Its IUPAC name is (N-(phosphonomethyl)glycine)

Glyphosate is by far the most heavily used herbicide in the United States, with over 200 million pounds used annually(i). So what’s all this chemical for? Well, it kills weeds.

Glyphosate is an enzyme inhibitor. Glyphosate stops the enzyme 5-enolpyruvylshikimate-3-phosphate synthase from doing its job, which is to help synthesize the amino acids tyrosine, tryptophan, and phenylalanine.(ii) There are twenty two amino acids that all creatures need to stay alive. Not having three means death.

So, if we don’t have any copies of this enzyme, then glyphosate shouldn’t do us any damage, right? Unfortunately, it’s a bit more complex than that.

But, it’s important to remember that humans, and most other animals, don’t actually make 5-enolpyruvylshikimate-3-phosphate synthase themselves. We’ve got mouths instead. We eat creatures (plants) that make fancy molecules like this, so that we don’t have to make them ourselves.

So, if we don’t have any copies of this enzyme, then glyphosate shouldn’t do us any damage, right? Unfortunately, it’s a bit more complex than that.

Glyphosate was developed by the Monsanto corporation in 1970. For the last 46 years it’s been marketed under the name of Roundup®.(iii) But, Roundup® didn’t reach absurdly high levels of use until genetically modified foods became widespread.

Monsanto developed Roundup Ready® soybeans in 1994 and Roundup Ready® corn in 1996. These crops contain an alternative version of 5-enolpyruvylshikimate-3-phosphate synthase, a version derived from bacteria and which is not inhibited by glyphosate. Today, Roundup Ready® genes are found in about ninety percent of the soybeans and seventy percent of the corn and grown in the United States.(iv)

Are you with me so far? Let’s pause here for a second, because it’s about to get pretty complicated.

There are four hot-button issues all tangled up together which make it extremely difficult to talk about this chemical without someone getting angry at you. And they should get angry, because a lot of this is pretty messed up.

So here’s the deal: Some people are upset about the use of genetic modification technology. Some are also upset about the ecological damage caused by monocultures. Others worry about the toxicity of herbicides and pesticides, and still others don’t like the way our food system has fallen under the sway of international corporations like Monsanto.

Here are those four issues in a list:

1. Corporate Oligarchy

2. Monoculture

3. Agricultural Chemicals

4. Genetic Modification

These problems are all intertwined, but they have very distinct solutions. Unfortunately, the public debate surrounding these issues tends to look like this:

It’s possible that propaganda like this might be true, but I think we owe it to ourselves to try to figure out why…

It’s possible that propaganda like this might be true, but I think we owe it to ourselves to try to figure out why, OK? So, let’s look at each of the four issues I raised above individually.

Issue #1: Is Monsanto bad?

Absolutely, unequivocally, yes. They are terrible.

Most of their terribleness comes from their legally recognized monopoly. In 2009, Monsanto was investigated for violations of anti-trust laws. (v) This investigation went nowhere, perhaps because Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas (along with several EPA and FDA officials) is a former Monsanto employee (vi). It should come as no surprise then that Thomas wrote the majority opinion in the 2001 court decision which found that “newly developed plant breeds are patentable under the general utility patent laws of the United States.”(vii)

Monsanto has begun to research Genetic Use Restriction Technology (GURT), also known as terminator seeds—seeds genetically engineered to produce sterile offspring, so seed saving is impossible. 

What this means in practice is that Monsanto has an unfair amount of control over how farmers grow and distribute their crops. Their patents prevent farmers from hybridizing Monsanto seeds with heirloom varieties.(viii) It’s also illegal to save seeds from Monsanto crops to use for the following year, forcing farmers to annually buy new seed from Monsanto. (ix)

For developing countries outside of the US without such strict patent protection, Monsanto has begun to research Genetic Use Restriction Technology (GURT), also known as terminator seeds—seeds genetically engineered to produce sterile offspring, so seed saving is impossible.

Thankfully, the international response to GURT was strong, and Monsanto halted research in 2006, (x) but the fact that this technology was even considered shows the ethical plane that Monsanto is operating on. Their policies make it harder for small farmers to make a living, and exclusively incentivize large industrial monocultures.

However, it’s important to keep in mind that Monsanto, as a corporation, is distinct from the idea of monoculture, or chemical use, or even genetic modification. Monsanto is terrible for political reasons, (the revolving door and unfair IP laws) and it might be possible for some version of the other ideas associated with the company to be applied sustainably in a different context.

For example, imagine a permaculture school which operates a lab, and uses open source methods to adapt the genomes of its crops to the local microclimate. Or, imagine a worker owned fungicide manufacturer, whose products are designed for targeted, ecologically sensitive use. There is no fundamental reason organizations like this couldn’t exist, but our current ideological landscape makes them difficult to conceive. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves here. As it stands, the agricultural chemicals and GM crops that Monsanto produces are inextricably tied to monocultures.

Let’s take a look at why that’s a problem.

Issue #2: Is monoculture bad?

The problem with monoculture is that it optimizes land use for machines, at the expense of biodiversity, human accessibility, and even yield. That’s right, even yield. Yields could be much higher if different species were planted amongst each other, to take advantage of different seasons and growth patterns and such (this is permaculture 101). But, we don’t often grow food like this anymore because it’s difficult to make a machine that can harvest one kind plant while leaving another kind intact. And so instead, we have thousands of acres occupied by loose grids of one kind of creature. This keeps prices low. But, this also keeps pest populations unusually high, so fields like this require a lot of pesticides. Like, a lot.

So, does that mean that agricultural chemicals are terrible too?

Issue #3: Are agricultural chemicals bad?

Well, it depends.

The vast majority of agricultural chemicals used in the US are used on monocultures. Thousands of acres are fumigated all at once, creating ecosystems of literally one species. Such “ecosystems” are unstable. It’s very easy for other organisms (“pests”) to enter and fill unoccupied niches. This forces the monocultural farmer to spray even more chemicals, creating vicious cycle. Here’s a stunning quote:

“[D]espite the more than 10- fold increase in insecticide use in the United States from 1945 to 2000, total crop losses from insect damage have nearly doubled from 7 to 13%”(xi)

Each season of monocultural production sees an increase of both pests and pesticide use in an evolutionary arms race. Clearly this use of agricultural chemicals is destructive. But, a monoculture is not the only place these chemicals can be used.

Let’s go back to glyphosate. A lot of the criticisms of Roundup® aren’t about the direct toxicity of glyphosate itself (although the surfactants it is mixed with are often toxic (xii)), but rather, its unexpected ecological effects. For example, glyphosate runoff has been shown to be particularly destructive to aquatic ecosystems. (xiii). But the only way that Roundup® could ever reach those aquatic ecosystems, when it’s supposed to be applied to just crops, is when it’s applied massively and repeatedly, over a huge area – monoculture applications.

Applying Roundup® to individual weeds with tenacious roots in your backyard garden likely isn’t going to do that much harm. If we chose to use these chemicals infrequently, for a specific pest in a localized area, we could protect our crops without bulldozing the surrounding environment. The goal is to use chemicals that are ecologically specific.

And, oddly enough, this is the promise of genetic modification.

Issue #4: Is genetic modification bad?

Let’s think about what’s been done to Roundup Ready® plants. They’ve been given an alternative copy of 5-enolpyruvylshikimate-3-phosphate synthase, a copy that’s not inhibited by glyphosate. (xiv) Glyphosate can then be applied to these crops, and it will leave them alone, while eliminating the more harmful weeds nearby. This style of modification could allow for incredibly specific chemical control, if used properly.

Or, take another GM crop, BT corn. BT corn has been modified to produce a bacteria toxin which is deadly to caterpillars.(xv) It is not however deadly to other insects like beetles or grasshoppers, nor is it harmful to humans. The toxin is produced in the tissues of the plant, so there is no risk of it leaching into the environment, like what would happen if the pesticide were sprayed willy-nilly all over the place.

Basically, genetic modification has the potential of providing highly specific, ecologically sensitive ways of controlling pests and improving fertility. Unfortunately, the way we’ve been using it has increased, not decreased our ecological footprint.

Basically, genetic modification has the potential of providing highly specific, ecologically sensitive ways of controlling pests and improving fertility. Unfortunately, the way we’ve been using it has increased, not decreased our ecological footprint. But that has more to do with the politics of Monsanto and the economics of monoculture than it has to do with genetic modification itself, or even the nature of agrichemicals. Instead of designing crops to resist the application of a broad spectrum herbicide, we could design them such that our chemical use could be precisely targeted, or even unneeded. Instead of adding artificial fertilizers, what if we modified our cereal crops to form nitrogen fixing symbioses like beans? Could our vegetables form mycorrhizal relationships with edible fungi?

Instead of designing crops to resist the application of a broad spectrum herbicide, we could design them such that our chemical use could be precisely targeted, or even unneeded. 

This is why I get so frustrated with the GMO debate. The fact of the matter is that GMOs are not inherently evil. They’re certainly not going to give you cancer, although there are plenty of articles which will tell you otherwise.(xvi) The same goes for many pesticides (although not all). The problem with these technologies is not inherent, but that their development and use is controlled by terrible corporations like Monsanto, which use their power to expand a destructive monocultural food system.

For the last century or two, various voices (mostly corporate) have promised us that each new technology on the horizon is going to dramatically improve our lives. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don’t. Often, it feels like these technologies cause more problems than they solve. After so many high-tech innovations gone awry, we are right to be skeptical of the scientific establishment and their monopoly on facts. Research on potential toxins funded by the industries that make them should be received extremely critically, or flat out rejected. But (and this is a big but) just because these technologies pose a risk of harm does not mean that they will unconditionally cause harm in all contexts. Harm to a human body is different from harm to an ecosystem (those GM corn flakes won’t give you cancer, but they’re terrible for biodiversity). And technologies that harm ecosystems can also be used to heal them.

The enemy here is not science, and it’s not technology. It’s not GM, and it’s not agrichemicals. The enemy is the political and economic conditions which allow small groups of people to control the sustenance of billions. 

The enemy here is not science, and it’s not technology. It’s not GM, and it’s not agrichemicals. The enemy is the political and economic conditions which allow small groups of people to control the sustenance of billions. Were our food system local, diverse, and horizontally managed, the specter of these technologies would not look nearly so terrifying. 

1.  Source: http://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2015-10/documents/market_estimates2007.pdf

2. see Wikipedia page on EPSP synthase

3. see Wikipedia page on Gylphosate

4. see Wikipeda pages for Corn and Soy, See also http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/04/business/energy- environment/04weed.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

5.  The Monsanto 2009 anti-trust investigation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto_legal_cases#2009_antitrust_investigation

6. + 7. Monsanto & public officials conflicts of interest: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto#U.S._public_officials.27_connections

8.  Monsanto Lawsuit in Canada: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto_Canada_Inc_v_Schmeiser

9. On the lawsuit allowing Monsanto to patent seeds: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowman_v._Monsanto_Co

10.  On Genetic use restiction technology, aka suicide seeds: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_use_restriction_technology

11. see ENVIRONMENTAL AND ECONOMIC COSTS OF THE APPLICATION OF PESTICIDES PRIMARILY IN THE UNITED STATES, Pimentel, 2005

12. See Glyphosate Poisoning, Bradberry et all, 2004

13. see THE LETHAL IMPACT OF ROUNDUP ON AQUATIC AND TERRESTRIAL AMPHIBIANS, Rick A. Relyea,  2005

14. Molecular basis for the herbicide resistance of Roundup Ready crops, Funke et all, 2006  http://www.pnas.org/content/103/35/13010.full

15. ‘Insecticide-Producing Corn’ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetically_modified_maize#Insecticide-producing_corn

16. see http://www.collective-evolution.com/2014/07/15/new-study-links-gmos-to-cancer-liverkidney-damage-severe-hormonal-disruption/ for a typical example

Compiled by Jesse D. Palmer

Here are some additions and corrections to the 2016 Slingshot Organizer radical contact list. Let us know if you find errors or run across other spots we should include. We also post periodic updates at slingshot.tao.ca.

Arcus Center for Social Justice – Kalamazoo, MI

A space at Kalamazoo College that hosts a radical book exchange and events with availability to non-students. 205 Monroe St, Kalamazoo, MI 49006 (mail: 1200 Academy St, Kalamazoo, MI 49006.) 269-337-7398 reason.kzoo.edu/csjl

The Plant – Tallahassee, Fl

A DIY community workshop/art studio that offers anarchist free skool-style classes, film screenings, shows, display art, and hosts activist meetings and reading groups. All events are free/suggested donation and all ages. 517 W. Gaines Street, Tallahassee, FL 32304. theplanet.tally at gmail.com

El Hormiguero – Medellín, Colombia

An infoshop that hosts events. Cra. 44 No. 41A-24 (second floor) Niquitao, Medellín, Colombia casaelhormiguero.blogspot.com.co

Infoladen Magazin – Basel, Switzerland

An infoshop with a small anarchist library (books + zines), a free-access computer and printer. They host meetings, movies, discussions and workshops on topics including anti-repression, anti-racist, anti-gentrification, etc. Open Wed, Sat and Sunday afternoon. Inselstrasse 79, 4057 Basel, Switzerland

riseup.net/magazin.noblogs.org/post/author/magazin/

La Rizoma – Managua, Nicaragua

A radical collective / commune with an infoshop, community center, arts venue and student center. They have room for up to 7 volunteers / visitors / troublemakers if you’re in the area. Colonia Miguel Bonilla #129, Del Bar Esquina Fiel 3 Cuadras al Sur, Media Cuadra Arriba, Managua, Nicaragua. (on Facebook at La Rizoma Nicaragua.)

Changes to the 2016 Slingshot organizer

• Guide to Kulchur has moved. They are not at 5900 Detroit, Cleveland, OH 44102

• Yin Yang Fandango in Corpus Christi, TX closed.

• Last issue we published an address for Bombs Away in Athens, GA, but that address didn’t work out. They hope to have a new location in August.

• BRYCC house in Louisville, KY has closed.

• Soap Box in Cincinnati, OH has changed their name and moved. They are now McMicken Freespace at 527 W. McMicken, Cincinnati OH 45214.

• AK Press is moving. Their new address is 370 Ryan Ave #100 Chico, CA 95973.

• The Centro Social y Cultural Libertario in Medellin, Colombia no longer exists.

• The Red and Black Umbreall Social Centre in Wales (UK) has closed.

• The Valija de Fuego Bookstore in Bogotá moved and their new address is Cr 7 No 46-68. Chapinero, Bogotá, Colombia

• Biblioteca Social Reconstruir has moved. Their new address is Godard 20, Guadalupe Victoria II, 07790 Ciudad de México, D.F.

 

By Luna Lovebad

Radical communities, despite their best intentions to lessen systematic isolation, can be at risk for falling into the toxic interpersonal patterns that they purport to fight against. The following is an excerpt I read to a small radical community I am currently connected with. I share it in hopes that it will help other folks struggling with interpersonal tension in their communities that prevents productivity and action.

Shortly after the New Year, when I was at a local punk house/DIY venue, I noticed a man because he was impossible to not notice. He was loud, opinionated, and good at commanding attention. He appeared to like drinking beer, as many of us do. He also appeared to me, to be a white straight able-bodied cis male who had been socialized to fill up the space around him with his words. When he loudly gave unsolicited negative feedback to a friend, I told him he was being an alpha and that it was coming across a little funny to me. He responded, “Well, at least you had the balls to call me out.” I walked away and wrote him off, despite the better-than-I-expected response.

Hours later, I noticed he was sitting alone. It looked like there was a lot on his mind, and I decided to ask him about it. I am so beyond happy that I let my guard down to talk to him. I think the conversation that ensued will change me forever.

He told me that he is 20 years old and since he could remember, his family primed and trained him to become a fighter. His Christian military family saw a future for him of being a warrior for the federal United States government and did not encourage development in any direction more strongly than this one. In a recent training, his drill sergeant told him that he is “240 pounds of American kick ass”.

The problem is that he doesn’t want to do this with his life. While he has not been deployed, he has signed documents determining that if he backs out, he gets time in prison and comes out with a felony, along with serious conflicts with his family. These consequences would lead to being totally dependent on strangers to forgive his felony when he looks for jobs and housing. To say this man has been raised to be the strongest and most independent person in a room could be an understatement, so I can imagine why he does not feel like he has any choices. As he clutched my hand, and I clutched his back, I wanted so desperately to save him from his coerced servitude. But I know I can only save myself.

How many young people are terrified as they remained trapped into these circumstances? How many times have they been judged for joining the service on one side while being forced into it by the other?

Not everyone is necessarily oppressed, but everyone suffers under this system. Lost in the understandable defenses I developed toward men, I forgot that there is usually a very good reason for people being how they are. If there’s anything I’ve learned in life, it’s that. We are traumatized, some more than others. There are reasons why I am on my guard around loud white men, and many times I’ve deeply regretted trusting them. I regret trusting men who command power and authority in radical movements and all other aspects of my life who assault me or belittle my experiences of oppression, thus perpetuating the painful cycles. I regret trusting women who claim to love women but tear me down as soon as I show them my vulnerable side.

These instances are products of our environment and people have not yet always turned the mirror on themselves, and I was caught in that crossfire, as other people have been caught in mine. Understanding is not the same as justification. We all make mistakes. But I don’t regret trusting this man that I met. Being able to be vulnerable with one another in this world is a radical action and not a mistake. What a wonderful gift he has given me! And in that place of mutual vulnerability, I was able to share the ways in which I had felt he was unaware of his privilege, and he was open to listening.

I would like to see us all work together to create a culture in which we are vulnerable with each other, in which we do not cast immediate verbal judgments and offer unsolicited advice. I want people to listen to each other’s stories, thoughtfully and quietly, and not invalidate them. I want people to be aware of how much verbal and emotional space they are taking up in their interactions with others. We all have something to teach each other, but we all have something to learn from each other, too. I am sharing what I’ve learned in hopes that it can encourage us to make changes to how we are all conducting ourselves in this space and in this movement. I believe that cultures of gossip need to become cultures of direct and respectful communication. I have contributed to gossip cultures, and I imagine most, if not all have as well. Communities seem to work better together when oppressive and toxic behaviors are recognized and discussed face to face. It can be helpful to define differences between healthy processing and dishonest, passive aggressive gossip and other maladaptive, ego driven behaviors. To me, building solidarity means being directly honest with ourselves and others. Our oppression is built on lies and secrets. It is built upon a system that tells us to shove connection and humanity somewhere behind closed doors. I seek to tear down those doors.

To quote an excerpt from a zine called “Friends Make the Best Medicine” by The Icarus Project:

“There are so many of us out here who feel the world with thin skin and heavy hearts, who get called crazy because we’re too full of fire and pain, who know that other worlds exist and aren’t comfortable in this version of reality. We’ve been busting up out of sidewalks and blooming all kind of misfit flowers for as long as people have been walking on this Earth.”

“…We feel things stronger than the other people around us, a lot of us have visions about how things could be different, why they need to be different, and it’s painful to keep them silent.”

“…We need to start talking and networking- finding common ground and common language with the other people around us. We need to get together in groups and find language for our stories that make sense to us and leave us feeling good about ourselves. We need to summon up everything we’ve got to create social webs and lasting support networks for ourselves and the people who will follow us.”

For example, consent language could be a norm that is set to maintain solidarity within the group subculture. Consent language isn’t just about sexuality. It’s about saying, “hey, I want to have a discussion about solidarity but we’ve been meeting for 2 hours already. Let’s do a check in on who would like to shelve this until next week.” It’s about listening when someone says no the first time. There have been a couple of times I observed someone saying repeatedly that they wanted to engage in the activity or discussion that the rest of the group didn’t seem really excited about right in that moment. It seemed more about that one person’s agenda than what the group wanted.

Norms acknowledge that there are basic limits to the human body and psyche that must be taken into account. Emotional states change when we are overriding the messages our bodies are telling us, and some of us are more capable of these overrides than others. People often become grumpy when talking too and feel stuck in a meeting. The productivity of the meeting decreases. Then people snap at each other. This will not build the solidarity we seek.

Building solidarity requires not that we build a safe space, as no space is safe from the poison that we each have been steeped in as members of this giant machine. It requires, however, that we are aware of our poison, that we take ownership of it. We do not wake up one day perfectly attuned to everyone’s oppression and we just never participate in it again. Maybe we’ve tried to become as conscious as possible and stopped intentionally doing it, but that does not clear us of responsibility when someone calls us out, even if we had no idea we were doing it. I have been actively studying intersectional feminism over half of my life and have been a woman my whole life, yet I still have sexist thoughts. So when a man who has studied little of it tells me that he did not just do a sexist thing to me, or someone else belittles it when I recount that experience, I am not going to feel in solidarity with this person. And that does not make me reactionary or oversensitive. It makes me a non-robotic human who feels as though their valid experiences have been discounted.

I’ve noticed that in radical spaces I’ve frequented, many people have well-informed political and philosophical discussions about the problems with this society and our world, but do not always turn the mirror on themselves. Particularly for those with power and responsibility in these spaces, it is important to ask questions such as: How are the past romantic and sexual relationships between people in this collective impacting the way these meetings and groups are run? What about roommates and old friendships? Are people of color and older radicals feeling heard and welcomed here? Do homeless women even feel safe coming here, or are the men who are terrorizing them on the streets taking too much of the emotional and physical space without having boundaries set around those behaviors? Problematic behaviors could be something as seemingly simple as eye rolling or being frequently interrupted.

Is it possible that these factors are dragging us away from our goals of truly connecting with each other and being productive because we are trying to ignore it all, put it behind the door that I referred to at the beginning of this speech? Are we desperately avoiding uncomfortably direct and honest conversations, only to create a build up of even more painful discomfort? Are we trying to reinvent the wheel rather than actively looking for literature and advice from other radical spaces who have been through these same things?

As a counselor, a seeker of peace and social justice, woman, a queer person, a childhood victim of emotional, sexual, verbal, and physical abuse, a sufferer of severe depression and anxiety, and a person with white, cis, class, able bodied, thin privilege, I want to proclaim that it is time for us to wake up and start looking at how we unintentionally hinder others’ healing processes. We need to work to heal our collectives and heal ourselves, or how will we be able to heal anything else? We don’t need a restrictive 10 commandments to run a radical space. But, as the Icarus project says, we do need a common ground and a common language that leaves us feeling good about ourselves and our interactions, and that common ground and language should actively challenge privilege and support those who call out abuse of power, no matter how small of a micro aggression it might seem to someone who has never had to be at the receiving end of that micro aggression. We need a common language that helps people feel heard and empathized with even if they are not agreed with. We can reform the way we communicate with each other. But some will have to give up more power than they may be comfortable with. We can choose to do this by continually reminding ourselves that many struggles are invisible, or easy for someone from a privileged group to overlook. To bridge that gap, we can keep listening, stay open, and be willing to take accountability when our mistakes in doing this are brought to our attention.

 

FEBRUARY Black History Month

 

February 13 • 7pm – 9pm

1 Vision! 1 Voice! 1 Victory! VDay event to end violence against women and girls focusing on the resilience of women of color. Alicia Garza founder of Black Lives Matter keynote speaker. Historic Sweet’s Ballroom 1933 Broadway Oakland

 

February 14 • 12pm – 2pm

One Billion Rising: Dance Across the Golden Gate Bridge. Gather at the southeast end of the eastern walkway (San Francisco side). FREE ALL AGES

 

February 15 • 730pm

Anarchist Study Group (Weekly Event every Tuesday) @ Long Haul 3124 Shattuck Ave. Berkeley FREE ALL AGES

 

February 16 • 7pm

Liberated Lens Movie Nite (Weekly Event every Wednesday) @ Omni Commons 4799 Shattuck Ave. Oakland

 

February 18 • 7:30pm

KPFA Benefit Talk about Mumia Abu-Jamal’s Writings Hosted by Angela Davis, Johanna Fernandez and Walter Turner. First Congregational Church of Oakland, 2501 Harrison, Oakland

 

February19-21

Earth First UK Winter Moot Stroud England

 

February 20

Cardfiff Anarchist Bookfair UK

 

February 24 • 7pm

East Bay Homes Not Jails (Weekly Meeting every Wednesday) @ Omni Commons 4799 Shattuck Ave. Oakland. eastbayhnj@riseup.net

 

February 26 • 6pm

Free Film Screening – “Incident at Oglala” 906 Columbia Street SE, Olympia, WA 98501 David William Building, 2nd Floor

 

February 26 • 6pm

San Francisco Critical Mass. Gather @ Justin Herman Plaza FREE ALL AGES

 

February 27

National Day of Action: Demand Obama Grant Clemency to Leonard Peltier!

 

February 29

Leap Day Action Night

 

MARCH Woman’s History Month

 

March 3 • 7:30pm

An Evening with Jonathan Lethem author of Dissident Gardens and others. First Congregational Church of Berkeley, 2345 Channing Way, Berkeley

 

March 5-6 • 8am – 9pm

Code Pink summit examining U.S.-Saudi ties. The UDC Clarke School of Law 4340 Connecticut Ave NW, Washington, DC

 

March 6 • 7pm

Slingshot new volunteer meeting / article brainstorm for issue #121. Berkeley.

 

March 9 • 7:30pm

An Evening with Rebecca Solnit “Hope in the Dark: Untold Stories, Wild Possibilities” KPFA Benefit. Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar Street, Berkeley

 

March 6 • 11am – 6pm

LA Zine Fest. The Majestic 650 S. Spring St. lazinefest.com

 

March 8

Int’l Woman’s Day

 

March 19 – 25

Sacred Peace Walk. Pilgrimage 63 miles from Las Vegas to the Nevada Test Site. Join for an hour, a day, or the entire week. nevadadesertexperience.org

 

March 20 • Noon

National March for Palestine and the Palestinian people. White House 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW Washington , DC

 

March 27 – April 2

Shut Down Creech Air Force Base and stop the killer drones, Indian Springs, Nevada. shutdowncreech.blogspot.com

 

April 1

St Stupid Parade / Fossil Fools Day

San Francisco

 

April 9 • 3pm

Slingshot article deadline for issue #121. 3124 Shattuck Ave. Berkeley.

 

April 15

Steal Something from Work Day

 

April 15 -16 • 11am – 6pm

NYC Anarchist Bookfair Judson Memorial Church, 55 Washington Square South, Manhattan anarchistbookfaire.net

 

Sunday April 17 10-5pm

Gilman Zine Event. 924 Gilman St. Berkeley CA FREE ALL AGES

 

APRIL 23 • 10 – 6pm

21st Bay Area Anarchist Book Fair.

Oakland Metro Opera house

 

April 24 • noon-dusk

People’s Park Anniversary, Haste above Telegraph, Berkeley FREE ALL AGES

 

April 20

Earth Day

 

April 30 • 11am – 6pm

Bristol Anarchist Bookfair, Trinity Centre Trinity Rd, Bristol BS2 0NW 3ca.org/uk

 

Late April – various days

Take Back the Night march – all over.

 

May 1 May Day!

 

May 1 – June 10

Oakland Spring Rising oaklandwiki.org/40farms

 

May 1 • 11 – 4pm

Asheville Zine fest The Grey Eagle 185 Clingman Avenue, Asheville NC

 

May 20 – 22

Left Forum. John Jay, NYC

 

June 11 • Noon-10pm

SF Free Folk Fest. Everett Middle School 450 Church Street (between 16th and 17th St.) San Francisco FREE ALL AGES

 

July 6

Pacific Northwest Climate Camp. Lemon Island, Oregon – 11 miles from Portland (strategically located within easy paddling distance of railroads hauling oil and coal, other earth destroyers. pnwclimatecamp.blogspot.com