Category: Issue #145: Winter 2026

Our collective can barely process all the correspondence coming our way. The least of which comes with scrappy limited edition zines. We endeavor to highlight them here when we can. Thankfully we have found a bright and wise ally who, when not tending to the garden warmly sits and reads deeply and widely freaky shit on paper. Maybe you will find a new life of reading zines, reviewing or even making them to thicken the plot we’re in.

By Jose

Ear of Corn #66
24 pages – $2 foodfortunata@hotmail.com

It’s really endearing that even after 18 years, Ear of Corn still uses pasteup for the design, even as it’s moved to glossy paper. You can see on every page that Ear of Corn is still assembled old school and copied like we all used to do at Kinkos with glue sticks. The glue had a mild starchy taste, slightly sweet with a bitter finish; not unlike bad cheese pizza. 

I have this conspiracy theory about this zine. I usually write reviews in batches, and I’ll often have multiple issues of Ear of Corn on my desk at a time. But I’ve never had any sequentially numbered issues. I’ve begun to suspect issues are not numbered non-sequentially or perhaps they are sequential, but aren’t printed in that order. Their practice of reviewing old and new releases side by side makes it impossible to know for sure; but they’re definitely up to something other than eating the glue. 

Out From The Void #8
$5 – 70 pages outfromthevoid@yahoo.com

This issue goes places Out From The Void hasn’t gone before. The new topics are mostly adjacent to the core topic: the missing. So it’s the CAHOOTS program, police records requests, suicide, and police killings. But on page 51 begins a 6 page essay about Israel’s genocide in Gaza. It’s sober, historical and philosophical without trumpeting statistics. 

In the middle of Issue #8 is a photo essay reprinted from the zine Here’s What I’ve Hidden Under My Tongue. Writer DJT was visiting an abandoned and mostly collapsed mental institution. In the introduction Brenton Gicker comments that he didn’t write any of the stories in this issue. I appreciate that Gicker puts his mission ahead of his ego to spread awareness of these topics but I do miss his voice as a writer. But until next time, we get more tales of the missing, the lost and the found.

NXOEED #4

nxoeed.carrd.co $5 – 28 pages

The story of James B. Hunt and Fluke goes back to issue #16 of the infamous Fluke fanzine in 2018. Kudos if you kept that issue, it’s now a fine collectible. Even Maximum RockNRoll said so. They saw the future, perhaps even more clearly than I did. Gina Murrell always had a sixth sense for such things. But if you wake up feeling a bit goth, have a soft spot for monsters, or just like dead stuff, NXOEED might be for you.

If you don’t recognize his art that tells me you don’t skate bruh. His art appears on show flyers, album covers, websites, rad stickers and other greasy places. But among all that ephemera this issue is special. Usually Mr. Hunt lets the ink speak for him, but this time we actually get a few precious pages of text; our first sense of the man himself. He’s a geezer, like me, trying to do punk rock things, but to also go to bed on time. I feel that in my soul. 

Big Hammer #24

$20 – 192 pages inequitypress@hotmail.com

It’s hard to say that many poets are famous today. But as poets go, some of those published in Big Hammer are highfalutin people now like David Cope, Donald Lev, Chris Stroffolino, Ken Greenley, and Enid Dame (RIP). Others, like Michael Pingarron, are still writing for Big Hammer. They’ve found their layer of strata, and one would hope some sense of belonging. 

The first issue of Big Hammer rolled off the press in 1988. That was 38 years ago, kids. Statistically most of you reading this weren’t even born yet. That zine was way underground, like the Lincoln Tunnel; like the FDR Train Car in the pitch blackness of Track 61 marooned below Grand Central since 1945. But Dave Roskos is still out there in the tunnels, in the darkness, still editing and publishing Big Hammer. He’s doing it his own way, and accountable to no one. Doesn’t it sound grand?

Homocore Anthology

68 pages – $15

flukemags.com/product/homocore

Zine content from the eighties makes more sense in the context of its contemporary punk 7-inches” like “Too scared to be queer,” “Be a Fag,” and “Forbidden Love.” So I queued up the Homocore Hit parade cassette, and pondered its place in history. Homocore ran for just 7 issues between 1988 and 1991. If you didn’t catch my drift, it tapped into two communities which still remain the core of the underground today: queers and punks. 

Art and history like this often end up in library archives, and museum collections — down in the basement. The art gets intellectualized and institutionalized; separated from the artist, and their community. I’m generally a fan of official zine anthologies; but that’s because it makes art available to the public. The only better option is for zines to be unofficially anthologized: i.e. bootlegged. But the good stuff is always hard to find. 

People remember the letters section, because it was hilarious but don’t forget they had some legendary writers: John Zerzan, GB Jones, and Larry Livermore. Deke Motif Nihilson even did an interview with William Burroughs. Notwithstanding my intro, don’t assume everything inside was for queers or punks. To quote Issue #2, “You don’t have to be homo to read or have stuff published in Homocore. One thing everyone has in common is that we’re social mutants… sexuality is an important part of it, but only part of it.” 

My Teeth Need Attention – Issue 6

$7 – 36 pages myteethneedattention.com

It has been interesting in my lifetime seeing zines switch to primarily color printing. Zines used to be such a lo-res affair. In this case the gray cover conceals a glossy color interior. These pages clearly came off an inkjet printer, but in every other way it descends from the original zine aesthetic. 

This is the first issue of MTNA in a year, but Joe Tunis kept busy. He operates Carbon Records, makes podcasts, books shows, played shows, and still runs a distro. This zine seems to be another way to keep his hands busy. The zine opens with a 5 page feature on an Australian record label, Another Sunday. It rolls into book reviews, zine reviews, a scene report, interviews, and a free form essay that defies all description. That essay was long, trippy and self-indulgent. It could have just stopped at “Man, you’re tripping balls.” But it was also my favorite part.

Fan Scene – Issue #1

$7 – 24 pages zaftigpress.com

Are you a near-sighted, aging punk rocker who reminisces about the old days when you spent all your money on records and pizza? Yeah, me too. But in that case this zine may be for you. It’s full of reviews from old concerts from 30 years ago; accompanied by pictures taken by Dan Varenka. If Dan was a fan of Huey Lewis and the News this would not be so notable. But Dan saw every band you’d want to see in New York in the 1980s. 

He saw Ministry in 1986 and the Butthole Surfers in 1988 with Gwar. He saw Rapeman in 1988 in Hoboken, at Maxwells. [I miss that place]. On different nights in December he saw the Jesus Lizard and L7 at CBGBs. He saw the Rollins band in 1990 and Unsane in 1991. The list goes on and with every page you might begin to measure your own life against Dan’s. You will inevitably feel envious. For me it was the two pages on Cop Shoot Cop. I am jealous of you forever Dan Varenka. We cannot be friends. 

The Misery of Love & Other Essays From Social Disease

$14 – 34 pages mar-stratford.com

This zine collects essays from 5 issues of Social Disease published between 1972 and 1974; translated from French. The original publication was run by members of FHAR (front homosexuel d’action revolutionaire), an autonomous collective of Paris-based activists who led direct actions against homophobia. The zine’s translator, Mar Stratford, is an American writer residing in Philadelphia. She discovered Misere du l’amour via a collective-run leftist bookstore in Ales, France named L’impossible.

The era was a critical time for LGBTQ rights. Homosexuality was only removed from the DSM in 1973. Between 1918 and 1973, per the DSM and its predecessors, medically speaking, homosexuality was considered a mental illness. 

I have translated French for publication before. For me it was a struggle. Stratford translates French elegantly. The cultural weight and complexity shine through the text. Her two page introduction was so high brow it blew my hair back: situationists, reification, Marx… She’s brilliant. It’s not clear who foot noted this edition, but it helps.

The Little Book of Pennsylvania Folk Songs, Vol I

$15 – 24 pages jodijonesmusic.com/store

The mythology of the Appalachian mountains focuses on the mid-Atlantic. The images evoke the mountains of North Carolina, and West Virginia. But the Appalachians start in Alabama and extend up through New England. That includes the section of the keystone state north of the Mason Dixon line called Pennsyltucky. Let me tell you, there are parts of central PA where you can hear dueling banjos just as loudly as in the darkest hollers of Kentucky. If you hear someone call your name in them woods, no you didn’t. 

Jodi Jones digs into the history and ethnomusicology of the region. She explores coal mines, labor unions, steel mills, strikes, poverty, and her own family history to tell the story of that folk music tradition. She includes musical notation which is highly unusual. Boffo! I already bought Vol 2 and 3. This zine is fabulous. 

Public Transport – Issue 6
publictransportmagazine.com Free – 8 pages

It’s free if you can find it. Public Transport is hyper local to the New York City Subway system. Their website does not tell you where to get one. It asks readers where they found it, like some reverse scavenger hunt. Readers post the answers, train by train, stop by stop. It has that kind of magic.

I used to ride the Subway every day and I remember it fondly; despite the rats and the ubiquitous smell of urine. There were benches back then, and they sold beer on the platform. People smoked between the cars, but that’s also where they went to puke. I got pick pocketed once and fought back. A drunk guy cheered me on from his seat, but didn’t help. “That’s how they do it in Jersey, pal!” 

The zine is written by a rotating collective of comedy writers, and subway riders. The content is indescribably random: doodles of flattened rodents, profane pigeons, punchlines, subway etiquette, train announcements, and one liners. This is the most New York thing I’ve ever read. 

I Was Bound To A Machine
$25 – 40 pages instagram.com/wavethebanner

The zine opens with an explanation “In this age of social isolation & computer generated art there is nothing more important than something HAND DRAWN. Nothing more important than seeing the world with your own eyes.” I couldn’t agree more. 

The zine contains a series of 6 short stories and each is supposedly true. But each is also a parable. Every train ride is an adventure. Trust is earned, and lost. Most people are worth knowing but some strangers are more than strange. People will let you down, but some may also lift you up. 

Honestly, this is my favorite genre of zine. In our dreams we all want to feel this kind of freedom: sleep on the ground, drink cheap black coffee, cook on a campfire, and ride that train across the plains and disembark wherever it stops. But if you ride that train please tell me about your travels. I’m a sucker for this stuff. 

Copyright Kills Culture – #3

retro.social/@LeoKirke 30 pages – $Free-ish

When I provide legal advice to others, I often quote the Brown Buffalo. “…As your attorney, I advise you to rent a very fast car with no top….” Leo gives advice with a more professional and prudent disclaimer. “Nothing in this zine should be construed as legal advice…” We do live in the same timeline where ASCAP sued the Girl Scouts. We must protect ourselves.

Leo goes on to explain copyleft, copywrong and the different types of anti-copyright licensing you can use to ensure your intellectual property remains in the public domain. He interviews writers, musicians and artists to bring these high-minded legal concepts back into the terrestrial world so we common folk can all understand them.

Rogues Gallery by Joel Schechter

joelschechter.wordpress.com 97 pages – $10

This isn’t quite a zine; it’s the size of a novella and I still read the whole mofo because Schechter writes top tier satire. We have to call these essays “satire” for legal reasons. Schechter writes satire in the same sense that Hunter S. Thompson wrote politics. We’re taking liberties with the sharpest knives of social criticism. Every essay stabs skyward at the degenerate American ruling class: felonious statesmen, military brass, plutocrats, war criminals, cannibals and billionaire welfare queens. It’s satire for a new world order.

We live in an era when The Onion struggles to parody these public displays of madness, where truthiness reigns supreme. In Schechter’s world, the Feds arrested Santa Claus, ICE agents are bludgeoned unconscious with sandwiches, the president wears golden diapers, and now Punxsutawney Phil is afraid to come out. I prefer to think that in the future there are serious moments to come: high-minded community initiatives, coherent economic plans, and rational political discourse. But not here, not now and not for some time to come. Rogues indeed.

AGAIN!

andrewconti.net/shop 22 pages – $10

The subtitle of this zine is “several thoughts on metastatic cancer.” It’s 22 full color pages about Andrew Conti’s experiences on his second fight with cancer. Each page is hand written and hand painted, pouring out his health struggles and personal experiences into the ink.

Metastasis is when cancer spreads from one part of your body to another. For Andrew’s day to day that means, scans, nausea, IV drugs, vomiting, drugs, diarrhea, hair loss, neuropathy weakness… We all know someone who’s been there. On the back cover in blocky script are two words: FUCK CANCER. Ame, and good luck Andrew. 

Public Bathrooms of Twin Cities Cemeteries Vol. 1 & Vol. 2

muffinsurection@protonmail.com 28 pages – Free on Archive.org

I thought on first glance that this was a gothic zine about gravestones, then I thought it was about scenic public bathrooms. It turns out to be both of those things and more. This is a zine about horrible people, the horrible things they did, and logistically how, where and why to piss on their graves. There’s even a map. This is amazing. This is a heart-breaking work of staggering genius. We are in the presence of a giant. 

I’ve heard this specific insult issued many times, and only rarely seen it fulfilled. They all have it coming. Colonizers, war criminals, gentrifiers, capitalists, mass murderers, war mongers… they all get named, receipts are shown, then at the end of each entry, it reads “PISS ON HIS GRAVE.” I’m ready for Vol. 3. 

Go Cat Go #3 / Little Blue Rooster #1 1304 175th Pl. NE, Bellevue, WA 98008

16 pages – Free

Fishspit’s other zine Wiseblood has been around for decades. He’s been cranking out zines since 1984. I’ve reviewed some of his fine publications over the years. Here he pairs a Rockabilly Zine with a Blues Zine, back to back, in one dual issue. He’s an odd duck but he has great taste in music and I would trade mix tapes with Fishspit any time.

This issue is about the blue collar cousins to the genre of rock n’ roll. He reveals the stories of raucous players who binge drink and pop benzedrine. Elvis and Jerry Lee Lewis play minor roles in features about Hound Dog Taylor and Ronnie Self. Some animals just can’t be tamed, they live and breathe with a feral intensity that doesn’t belong in the suburbs. Some of us are better off sleeping outside with the other beasts and that’s something Fishpit knows about. 

The York Misprint, Vol 1, No. 9

Free online – 8 pages msprint.media

Some of you over 40 may recall we used to have local publications in every city, often more than one. This was a genre of highly localized non-fiction called “newspapers.” They focused on events relevant to a geographic area. These “newspapers” were not bound but were printed on cheap paper just folded and sorted into sections. Most of them came in daily or weekly editions and were delivered to your door by child slave labor. My recollection is hazy on the fine details, but I assure you the phenomenon was very real.

This adorable little zine is printed double-sided on legal paper and folded in half. The stories inside cover the closure of a public park, a proposed tax bill, a review of a literary magazine and an article on sustainability. The rest of the zine is local events: a bird walk, a coffee klatch, plant sales, gardening tips… We used to have this in every city in America. You kids don’t know what you lost. 

The Great Unraveling

instagram.com/sparkandpen N/A – 10 pages

This zine is about a dream Rachael Price had about the end of everything. The front cover is a nice rough brown paper which feels nice on the fingers. The art is almost liquid, flowing from page to page, like water and ink. The pages sequentially describe a poetic apocalypse: mountains, serpents, bones, and darkness. The text feels ancient like Beowulf. It strikes an apocalyptic tone that also reflects our present political malaise. Maybe I’m projecting but the end feels imminent doesn’t it?

Review by Steve Brady

Where do normal people come from?

In Empire of Normality, Robert Chapman, a British, neurodivergent Marxist, traces the idea of a normal person from the early stages of the industrial revolution. With the dismantling of the feudal agrarian economy, where a weird person still found belonging in family and community, society became a machine, a system where the roles of humans must fit the criteria of the machine, and if the machine adapts to humans at all, it considers an average person. Those who can’t adapt become deviant. 

Classic Normality

Chapman traces the change in the meaning of health, from harmony to normal functioning, by looking at key thinkers who helped this process along, starting with Descartes thinking of a human as a machine. This opened the door to evaluating each person according to a ideal of a correct, functional human. This was also the era of what Foucault called the “Great Confinement”, the warehousing of those considered insane or unemployable.

The Belgian statistician Aldolphe Quetelet wrote, L’Homme Moyen (the average man) in 1835, suggesting such a person as the basic interchangeable building block of an army or industry. Francis Galton, 1822-1911, applied statistical methods to human behavior to promote biological racism, social Darwinism (Darwin was his cousin), and eugenics. His idea of “hereditary genius” seems elitist rather than normal-centric at first, but paradoxically most people consider themselves above average. 

Galton didn’t claim to be a doctor, but Emil Kraepelin followed up by using his methods to help with the medical discipline of psychiatry. This segued into the normalization of eugenics. The early Eugenics Society included “the economist John Maynard Keynes, the biologist Julian Huxley, and Galton himself.” You could show your child fit for life by cultivating their normality. “better baby” and “fitter family” contests. At the Iowa State Fair in 1911: “You are raising better cattle, better horses, and better hogs, why don’t you raise better babies?”

Modern Normal People

With the Holocaust, eugenics fell from popularity. Non-biological psychology, including Freudian psychoanalysis, returned to the older idea of health as harmony and balance, yet also advanced psychiatry into all aspects of society. And it could also be a tool of elites: Freud’s cousin, Edward Bernays, applied Freud’s concepts of the unconscious to advertising, spawning vast social control. 

By the 1960s, the anti-psychiatry of Tomas Szasz, advanced in his pivoted The Myth of Mental Illness, challenged the consensus, and was perceived by many as a path of liberation from psychiatry. But as a conservative libertarian, he divided the mentally ill into those with a measurable medical illness, and those with mere problems in living, who he said sometimes pretended to be ill to get attention and avoid responsibility.

This perverse capitalist response to psychiatry influenced deinstitutionalization in the 1970s and 80s. As the ideal was “personal responsibility”, few resources were available to the liberated patients, who now faced nursing homes, prisons, homelessness and drug addiction. “From the Szaszian perspective, then, the shift from asylum to prison incarceration was a desired outcome, not an unfortunate side-effect.” Ironically, according to Chapman, Szasz’ claim, that so-called mental illness had to be a biological problem to be real, led to a re-medicalization of mental illness, the explosion of medications in our society, and even a return to Galton’s eugenics:

“In her 2008 book The Ethics of Autism, bioethicist Professor Deborah Barnbaum argued that, once prenatal diagnostic technology is capable, there will be a moral obligation to abort autistic foetuses on the grounds that being autistic is inherently incompatible with living a good human life.”

You might think that post-Fordism, the transition from an assembly line economy to more diverse forms of employment might ease the pressure for conformity. But it really diversifies that pressure to many aspects of life. In the service economy, one must always wear the mask. The work-life barrier collapses; one must be accessible to one’s employer by phone or email all the time. Not only is work driving more people to mental illness, but with the level of normality required, more people become classified as disabled relative to the economy. 

Weird Resistance

At the end, Chapter reviews the neurodiversity movement, particularly autism acceptance. It expands the social model of disability, which frames disability — physical, mental or otherwise — as a relationship to society rather than individual deficit. The value of a diversity in neurology rather than a normal ideal has been affirmed in business research. “Neurodiversity may be every bit as crucial for the human race as biodiversity is for life in general.” – Harvey Blume.

Yet as a Marxist, Chapman emphasizes the intersectionality of normalism and other oppressions. “Capitalism always has a neurological in-group and an out-group, the boundaries of which shift.” Capitalism always has a surplus proletariat, and the goal shouldn’t be to integrate some “high functioning” autistics and ADHD persons into the middle-class and elite, at the expense of less worthy people who take our place in the surplus.

I have three hopefully constructive criticisms:

1. The emphasis on key thinkers rather than historical processes leads to a “great man [sic]” impression of the history. Especially with Thomas Szasz: Chapman’s detest of him exaggerates his role in the fiasco of deinstitutionalization; the role of the advancement of pharmaceuticals in more people leaving hospitals is neglected. To emphasize the right-libertarian side of anti-psychiatry, major left critics of psychiatry, R.D. Laing and Peter Sedgwick are but mentioned in passing. 

2. Chapman’s Marxist background brings a helpful class analysis; he’s right about the dangers of liberal-reformist neurodivergent activism just changing the surplus workers. However, there’s that communist stereotype of setting everything aside to focus on the revolution (which means joining the correct alphabet soup group). Chapter could do more to connect to praxis, and mention the work of autistic activism that is egalitarian and intersectional: read Devon Price’s Unmasking Autism.

3. I wanted more about normalism on the left. Chapter does talk about human standardization and eugenics the USSR under Lenin and Stalin. But I would love to hear his thoughts on normalism in radical communities. As Christian Gajewski writes, the moment one shifts from participant to tolerated presence. 

With all that in mind, this is a worthwhile book. I’m not aware of a similar overview tying together such a range of material on normality to create a coherent historical thread, and I hope to see others build on Robert Chapman’s work.

, By Tony W. Njoroge

My first teaching job straight out of college was on the other side of the mountain from my village, the second-highest mountain in Africa after Kilimanjaro. Mount Kenya separates two ethnic communities: The Samburu on the leeward side and the Gikuyu on the windward side. The land of the Samburu is endless savanna perfect for pastoralism. The windward side is characterized by heavy rainfall, dense forests and high-quality agricultural land; we are tillers of the soil.

Children on my side of the mountain grow up hearing wild tales of the people who live on the other side. How they only drink cattle blood mixed with milk, how a young man has to kill a lion to prove himself a true warrior, how they move often with their livestock chasing after the rains and the like. I found it quite fascinating. That’s why when the one-year contract teaching job arose in Samburu land, I accepted it quickly. I believe experiencing another people’s culture is the highest honor there is. 

The Samburu people are a proud people who have clung to their culture despite “civilization” happening around them. They are also a very handsome people. The Samburu women in particular are quite graceful and charming. 

Most of the teachers in the school, and in the entire Samburu land, came from my side of the mountain since literacy levels are very low in Samburu land. Over seventy percent of the Samburu cannot read or write while literacy levels are high at about ninety-two percent among the Gikuyu.

The year was 2015, and I quickly noticed how underdeveloped the area was as compared to the other side of the mountain where I’m from. They were decades behind. All the classrooms in the school were made of mud. A single room made of iron sheets served as the administration block and office for the teachers. We all had to cram into it. There wasn’t a library nor a laboratory and the latrine floors were a sea of urine. There was no lunch program, yet the little children would sometimes bring teachers milk in old soft-drink bottles which I found quite touching. Half the students had to cross a dangerous bridge from their villages to school, made of two long slippery tree trunks placed side by side, where brown water raced and roared at terrifying speed underneath them. 

One of the students in the school was fifteen-year-old Nashipai who was in her second to last year of primary school. She was a brilliant student. I taught her class English. She wrote poems and short stories which she often handed to me for critique. Her literary deftness was many years ahead. I still remember the last poem I received from her, about the never-ending tribal clashes in Kenya. A lovely, sad, melodious poem. I still have it to this day and hold it dear. She handed it to me on a Friday; on Monday she didn’t show up to school.

I asked her classmates about her absence but they were tight-lipped. Ntoye, a close friend of Nashipai, came to me secretly during break. 

“Nashipai got married on Saturday,” she said. “To an old man as his fourth wife,” she said, shaking her head. “She ran away on Friday night but her elder brothers caught up with her and beat her badly.”

I was a few weeks in the school and quite naïve about Samburu culture. I and two other teachers marched to the chief’s office not very far from the school. If it was any other girl, maybe they could have accepted it, they said. But Nashipai seemed like a girl who could light up the world someday. There’s a law against child marriage in Kenya, but it is rarely enforced. I believe the law only exists as one of the conditions to get funding from the West. 

The chief listened keenly. 

“But if the ceremony has already taken place and the ceremonial bull slaughtered and eaten, then there’s nothing I can do,” he said.

“She’s fifteen, chief,” we begged, “and one of our best students.”

“She’s someone’s wife now,” he said with finality.

We cycled to the nearest police post eight miles away. The police weren’t of any help either. They said they would look into it, but we knew they were going to do diddly-squat. We trudged back to school defeated. The teachers who had been in the school a long time laughed at our ignorance. They had seen it many times before, even with girls as young as eight.

Speaking to the girls of my class I realized how tradition meant everything to them. It was who they were. They couldn’t imagine not marrying a man picked for them by their fathers. Nor not getting circumcised, which they all were and is a prerequisite for marriage. 

The next day in the afternoon I walked to Nashipai’s home alone, secretly directed by Ntoye. The other teachers didn’t want to get involved anymore. There were several manyattas (Samburu homesteads) encircling a huge thorn enclosure where the animals slept, for safety from wild animals. Nashipai’s mother was home with a few small children. The men were out herding.

“It wasn’t my will,” she said. “It was the men who arranged it and besides, her husband paid double the usual number of cattle for her bride price.”

I remember talking about her daughter’s potential and capabilities, and that she could get many more cattle if Nashipai could continue with her studies. She could make something of herself which would be much more beneficial than being an old man’s fourth wife, but I was basically flogging a dead horse. We ended our conversation on a sore note. She reported my meddling to the chief who came to the school the next day huffing and puffing and basically said teachers from other tribes should mind their business.  

I later came to learn that the chief himself had been a guest in Nashipai’s wedding ceremony. Ntoye, Nashipai’s friend, was married off a month later. I visited the school ten years later and sadly not much had changed. 

I met Nashipai again eight years later in the largest town in Samburu County. I was there for the town’s camel derby event which is hosted every August. Nashipai was selling kienyeji chicken by the roadside.

“Mwalimu,” she called at me, meaning teacher. 

I was so glad to see her. I thanked the gods for our paths crossing again. I had often thought of her over the years. She looked different from how I remembered her. She was now taller than me, shabbily dressed and her honey-brown skin seemed to have lost its luster.

“You still remember me?” she asked.

“Of course I remember you, Nashipai.” 

We spoke dearly for what seemed an eternity. She had a baby strapped to her back, her fourth child. I also learnt that her husband had died recently and she seemed quite beat up about it.

“He was old,” she said.

Two potential customers approached. After much haggling they left without buying any chicken. 

“You still write poetry?” I asked.

She shook her head sadly.

“I still have some of your poems,” I said, “I truly treasure them.” 

I saw her face beam. I asked about her chicken business.

“I rear these myself and sell them on market days,” she said.

I bought a hen from her, but she refused to take my money. I thanked her and we parted ways as I pondered the life that was stolen from her. I wished I had done more for her, fought more for her, and for all those girls that got plucked from my class to be someone’s wife while I looked the other way. The guilt and shame will haunt me to my grave.

Child marriage rates still remain alarmingly high in many communities in East Africa: 1 in 3 girls in Samburu is married before their 18^th birthday. A few people from these communities are fighting day and night to see the end of the practice. One such person is Josephine Kulea who is the founder of Samburu Girls Foundation. She herself was saved from child marriage at the age of nine by a priest who took her in and paid for her education in a boarding school three hundred miles away from her village. Josephine, who is now in her early forties, studied hard till she earned a nursing degree.

Josephine’s foundation has rescued and educated over 1,100 girls. Many are now nurses, teachers, engineers etc. Elders of the tribe led by her uncles have cursed her for what they view as her attempt at killing their culture. Her foundation is now also helping vulnerable boys whose parents would rather see them herding than go to school. 

I am a big advocate of maintaining our African cultures. We shouldn’t just adopt Western culture and discard our own. Let’s pick what’s good from both and do away with some outdated customs: We no longer abandon twins in forests like in the old days when we considered them unnatural and that they could bring misfortune to societies. Child marriage should be done away with completely.

By Barbara Zagorc

Growing up in the 90s in post-socialist Slovenia, people around me would say something was “American” when they meant it was really great. I heard things like, “Those pants are really American!” and “Wow, look at that table. That’s really American.” Soon after, however, that prevailing view became much more skeptical. While studying sociology in Slovenia, American practices were constantly on the table, subjected to ruthless criticism, starting with American military ambitions. That criticism is still very present, so whenever I go to America, people always ask me the same question: “Why?” Why would I want to go there? And yet, I found my way to Berkeley for the first time five years ago. Whatever one might think of the broader picture of America, UC Berkeley has long been seen as a top university, internationally known for both academic excellence and socio-political activism. Still, I did not expect to encounter what I did there. Berkeley surprised me. What I encountered there stayed with me.

One day in 2021, I was walking miles from South Berkeley to the Rose Garden … Yes, I walked to the Rose Garden. “You are a European, of course you walk,” people told me. On the way, I was admiring how people in Berkeley leave books they no longer want or need anymore on the sidewalk for someone else to take. Looking at it more closely, there it was – a cartoon book, Marx for Beginners by Rius. At first, I thought, “Wow!”, then I said, “Oh, of course, it is only for beginners!,” and later that book convinced me to take it home. Not because I needed an introduction to Marx, since by then I had already read the whole Capital during my Master’s. Not just once. A real one – three volumes, actually, no summaries. With footnotes, a lot of them. I took that book home because I found it fascinating that, at least in the past, it served someone. In America. And I took it home because I became part of a sharing practice that was new to me.

Marx’s famous line from his Theses on Feuerbach, “The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point is to change it,” had never really stuck with me. I had always been among those just criticizing the capitalist mode of production. But seeing alternative practices in Berkeley every day changed that and put me on the path to thinking about social relations outside of the dominant ones. Seeing a student as a temporary resident/visitor and a local as a permanent resident playing chess together on Telegraph, a piano at the Sproul Plaza welcoming passersby, Food Not Bombs feeding people in solidarity, not charity, unhoused people at that time living in People’s Park asking me about the result of the last Warriors game. Being part of practices like these, I think, can motivate or maybe even enable us to imagine relations outside those generated by competition. It can help us think beyond the demand to see ourselves constantly as entrepreneurs or projects, as people who have to manage and improve themselves and be as productive as possible, or even to think of our children in terms of human capital.

I came to think of these practices through Foucault’s view of resistance, meaning not as something outside power, but as ways of refusing to be governed in a particular way (see Security, Territory, Population). Sharing, cooperation, care, mutual aid, and collective self-organization can create what I think of as communities of resistance – communities that are not simply formed first and then resist but are produced through the very practice of relating to one another differently. These practices matter because they show that resistance is not only protest, opposition, or defending something from destruction. It means creating and sustaining different kinds of social relations in everyday life. During his repeated visits to California from the mid-70s to the early 80s, Foucault was critical of what he saw as a Californian search for an authentic “true self”. What interested him instead was how people actively shape themselves and their ways of living. What struck me in Berkeley, though, was that this experimentation was deeply relational. It was not only about shaping oneself, but also – and perhaps above all – about shaping ways of living with others. That relational dimension of Berkeley is, to me, what makes it truly distinctive – and what makes me want to return.

Does my excitement mean that if I want to live a radically different way of life, I need to pack my bags and move to Berkeley? Of course not! There are many other places to go, not only in America but across the globe. But do I really have to move somewhere to live differently? I do not think so. Again – I believe the most distinctive element of communities of resistance is specific social relations. That is, social relations that are not based on competition, on seeing others as competitors, but rather on cooperation, on collectively creating different ways of living and relating to one another. Relations like that can be built everywhere. They can persist everywhere. But at the same time, they can also disappear – when people can no longer sustain them or, just as importantly, when external forces work to destroy them. Attempts to do so are happening all across the globe. So, Berkeley, keep and cherish what you have. Space is not something stable, it is constantly produced, as Lefebvre (see The Production of Space) put it. Nor is place’s authenticity fixed, as Zukin adds (see Naked City). Power relations shape both a place and its transformation, but so do the everyday social relations through which communities reproduce what they value about those places.

Barbara Zagorc is a PhD candidate in sociology and a researcher at the University of Ljubljana, Slovenia. Her PhD research focuses on the transformation of People’s Park and the conflicts surrounding it. 

By Sirkka Miller 

In December 2025, the racketeering charges brought against 61 people indicted as co-conspirators in the Stop Cop City movement were dismissed as procedurally invalid. This marked a major victory for the movement and the co-defendants’ collective defense strategy. It might go without saying, but I’ll say it anyway: we do not always lose these big repression cases, and it is important that we emphasize the wins just as loudly as we decry justice denied. Moreover, talking openly about people’s experiences with criminalization and working together to craft collective strategies rooted in solidarity can help us feel less afraid in the face of legal repression. Backing down is not an option, so how do we contend with the terrain we must navigate to keep fighting? 

With this in mind, two members of Slingshot Collective (Sirkka and Antonio) talked with Hannah Kass: a former defendant in several prosecutions of Stop Cop City activists on RICO and arson charges. 

Note: this interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Slingshot: To get us started, could you give us some background on the Stop Cop City RICO case and its outcomes?

Hannah: Yeah for sure. Over the course of the struggle to stop Cop City there were a number of arrests on different charges, starting from babypants criminal trespassing charges but then escalating to a point where people started getting felony domestic terrorism charges just from being at protests in proximity to property destruction; just for being in the forest and being part of this forest occupation, allegedly. There were other arrests that weren’t domestic terrorism charges though too. They raided the bail fund – the Atlanta Solidarity Fund – and charged them with baseless financial crimes like charity fraud and money laundering. Then, you know, they picked up people who were doing basic first amendment activities like passing out flyers naming the officers who murdered Tortuguita, and charging them with felony intimidation. 

After all these separate arrests, all of us were then rounded up in this giant RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations) case of 61 people, basically alleging that this movement to stop Cop City and defend the Welaunee Forest, if you’re a part of it, then you’re part of a terrorist criminal organization and conspiracy. It basically uses the fundamental tenets of how social movements work, you know: resource mobilization, social coordination, relationships, etc., against us. And using conspiracy law, specifically RICO, to criminalize being part of a protest or a social movement had such a devastating effect on the movement. 

Slingshot: Could you say more on that, why do you think the RICO case had the effect it did?

Hannah: Sure. Of course, there were actions that happened after the RICO indictment. Some effective ones too: in November 2023 like 12 Ernst concrete trucks got burned and they dropped their contract right away, and they were pouring concrete for Cop City. So it definitely wasn’t a sudden like “oh man, we’re RICO’d, game over” but the RICO case sucked energy out of the movement, and it also produced fear and trauma in people. I mean, I’m still dealing with that trauma to this day, and I know a lot of other people are. And not just the emotional trauma but the way that it impacts your life to be labeled a domestic terrorist or to be in a RICO case, you know that’s basically being labeled as a terrorist organization, it’s really hard to get a job, and get housing. It’s hard to participate in society, this kind of repression is designed to produce social death for anyone who resists the expansion of a police state, essentially. Or whatever other monstrosity they’re trying to push through.

Slingshot: How do we push back against this? We would love to hear your reflections on the state of political repression in the U.S. right now more broadly, and what this means for continued resistance and movement strategy. What do we need to be thinking about as we face the escalation of domestic “lawfare” against political movements?

Hannah: Yeah, I think lawfare is a great way of putting it. I’ve been thinking a lot about lawfare with regard to these prosecutions, and also how we’ve beaten them back. So first with the question of where the case is today and where we’re going: The RICO case was dragged out for two years but it was ultimately dismissed on a technicality. Now it is on appeal, but chances are good that the appeal will also be dismissed because of the state’s ineptitude.
The thing about lawfare is that it has been generally conceptualized by legal anthropologists as coming from the top-down, which is totally legit and true, but there’s also some emergent scholarship on asymmetric lawfare and how people fight back in the courts, using the law to their advantage. I’ve been thinking a lot about this – how do we use a creative legal strategy in fighting back? We were able to win against the RICO indictment through a solidaristic, collective defense strategy, so I’d love to talk a little bit about that. 

There were 61 of us indicted, so we had a big group. In these big prosecutions of movements, like we saw with the J20 case, you can use the numbers to end up winning. The J20 case, for those who don’t know, came out of a protest at Donald Trump’s first inauguration. Something like 200 people were charged with felony rioting and just like a bunch of different felonies that added up to 80 years to life in prison. So it was a really serious escalation of political prosecution against a really large group of people. But they used their numbers to end up winning by putting people who had weaker cases up for trial first and filing for speedy trial, overwhelming the system. Saying “no, fuck you, we’re not gonna take plea deals, we’re gonna go to trial and we’re gonna beat this,” and they did. We took a similar approach, like, these charges are bullshit and our legal strategy will reflect that. We will also use our numbers to the extent that we can. We had some folks who had weak cases, like some of the people mass arrested at the music festival, these folks put themselves on the line to go to trial first and demand a speedy trial. The idea being to exhaust the prosecution’s resources, hopefully drawing the energy away from the co-defendants who are more vulnerable in terms of their cases and legal needs.

In doing that, and then pummeling them with motions to dismiss, and taking offensive action… just throwing spaghetti at the wall and seeing what sticks can be super effective, and it has been. The tactic that won with RICO was a motion to quash the indictment because they didn’t get a letter from the governor like they were supposed to, and that won. Like I said, they did appeal it, but now they’re struggling to actually complete the basic steps that it takes to appeal the dismissal, because it’s a giant 61-person case and they kept piling like terabytes and terabytes of discovery on the defendants and defense teams — which is a strategy prosecutors use to make it hard for you to defend yourself because there’s just so much information, but now that’s backfired.

Slingshot: This is so cool to hear, beating them at their own game.

Hannah: I want to elaborate on the no plea deal thing. It’s not just not taking plea deals because the charges are stupid, right, it’s also the fact that the system relies on plea deals to continue to function. I think the latest statistic is like 97% of criminal cases are resolved through plea deals, because the state doesn’t have the resources to take everyone to trial and for us to have our right to due process. So part of that strategy is exploiting that weakness by forcing them to take us all to trial. You want to indict 61 people? Okay, fuck you, then prove your case or drop it.

We did a similar thing on a smaller scale in my second prosecution, which was in April 2026, after the RICO indictment got dismissed on a technicality. Three of us who were arrested in May 2022 were charged with arson way after the fact – only three weeks before the charges would have expired under the Statute of Limitations. I took the strategy of filing for speedy trial, first of all, which meant that I would have to be tried within six weeks. By doing that I took the case into a pre-trial hearing where the defense teams for the three of us could then pummel the prosecution with our motions to dismiss. 

The prosecution actually helped us win this one, hilariously, because they basically admitted in open court that because the RICO got dismissed they decided to go back to the cases in the RICO to individually prosecute each of the 61 and “take one bite of the elephant at a time,” that’s literally what they said. Our argument was that this is a due process violation. One, because you waited four years to actually indict this case, and that’s way too long and in violation of our constitutional right to a speedy trial. And two, you are not supposed to use that delay in a way that gives you a tactical advantage, which they had just admitted on the court record. My lawyer was like “your honor, the state just told you exactly why we should have this case dismissed for due process violation,” and then the judge was like “let me go to my chambers,” and then came out and was like “I’m dismissing this case.”

Slingshot: Wow. Do you have any big picture takeaways you want to share?

Hannah: My takeaway is that — if you feel like you have strong facts, and believe in your case, and that what they’re doing to you is bullshit — then this is the time to be brave, lose your fear and take bold and aggressive legal actions. These repression cases that are happening right now are really fucked up and scary, but also the prosecution can be weak and we can win. At the same time, there’s no shame in taking a non-cooperating plea deal if you find that to be best and/or strategic for yourself, your co-defendants, your comrades and the movement you’re a part of. Emphasis on the non-cooperation. If you become a snitch, it won’t help you, but your solidarity with us earns our solidarity with you. Solidarity must be reciprocal in that way.

Slingshot: Yes, through solidarity with your co-defendants and solidarity with your movement, absolutely. Do you have any thoughts on how we can strengthen our movements to prepare for these repressive situations before they happen?

Hannah: Building up anti-repression organizing and infrastructure is super important. I’ve been having a lot of conversations about how there’s a hierarchy or divide between the frontline and non-front line activism. But so much of frontline activism depends on people who are not on the frontline. The people who are putting out the press releases, bailing people out, tracking people in the jail system, picking those people up from jail, packing the courts, taking care of people’s pets, I could go on and on about all of the different roles beyond the frontline… there needs to not be a hierarchy between those roles. They’re all essential.

I think we have this thing in the anarchist milieu where there’s a valorization of street fighting or insurrectionary actions which are actively confrontational. There’s a reason for that, of course, because historically-speaking we know that we need disruptive action somewhere along the line. But we know that the actions themselves aren’t the whole movement, we need a wider base of support and transformation.

The question of how we value all of those things, and how people practice solidarity, is key. I think one thing that has gotten better over the last 5 years is this understanding of diversity of tactics, this refusal to condemn people. Like in the movement to stop Cop City there were so many people who did not destroy property, but largely as a movement we don’t talk shit about those who did, and we will support them if they get prosecuted. 

Slingshot: Yes, that refusal to denounce each other’s tactics and to embrace diversity in how we fight and how we can plug in is such a big part of this. As we reach the end of the conversation, we wanted to give you some space to share about the new initiative you’re working on.

Hannah: Oh, yes. So a legal worker friend and I are developing this project, called the Repression Resilience Think Tank and Archive. It’s a research and political education initiative that’s trying to answer some of the questions that y’all are asking. Questions like how do we actually equip our movements to survive and thrive and remain resilient in the face of pretty unprecedented state repression? What are the infrastructures and relationships that we need to build? What has been helpful in the past? What hasn’t? How are people being cared for in the aftermath, and how can aftercare be improved? We’ll be conducting interviews, oral histories, and document analyses of already existing anti-repression resources and making them publicly accessible. We want to talk to political defendants, prisoners, support committees, movement lawyers, legal workers, court supporters… all kinds of actors within this broader movement defense and anti-repression ecosystem, and create a digital archive that stores the lessons that we learn from this research. We hope to create political education materials that are helpful to movements, like zines, videos, and webinars.

Slingshot: That’s great. Collecting and sharing this information openly and learning from previous situations could help people feel empowered to take bold, collaborative, and strategic action in their legal cases, like you were talking about.

Hannah: Oftentimes in repression cases we’re operating in crisis mode or reactively, out of necessity. I think these resources could help armor us, so we can create more room for reflection and have more thoughtful responses. That’s really the core of the project.

Slingshot: Beautiful, are there any final thoughts you would like to share with Slingshot readers?

Hannah: Love and rage!

★

Hannah Kass is a Visiting Assistant Professor of American Studies at Kenyon College. Her scholarship, organizing, and teaching focuses on guiding the next generation through the hard work of grappling with the repression, resistance, and resilience of liberation struggles in the US.

By Rosehairy Legs

It all started with house shows. I moved into a garden shed in the back of a large communal house in North Oakland, and we were excited about a lot of things. We’d discuss our creative visions, share epic stories about our favorite alternative forms of travel (hitch hiking vs train hopping vs bike trips) and plot our immersive parties on the front porch over endless pots of coffee and shared spliffs. We decided to host shows once a month, and the everchanging and endlessly creative inhabitants of our home meant we had a lot of connections to musicians within the community and abroad. 

Once a month or so our messy collective sprang to life — brooms and rags in action, record player bumping. We’d clean up the yard and the common spaces, redecorating with newfound objects from freepiles, sometimes fabricating props like cottony clouds billowing down from the ceiling. By early evening there were good smells bubbling out of the kitchen from big pots of stew, or pasta and veggies simmering in a cauldron of sauce. Eventually, some time before or after the last hangers-on finally stumbled home, guest musicians would retire into their sleeping bags on the living room floor or curl up on the porch sofa. Perhaps one band member was lucky enough to get snuggled by Sazmo, the sweetest of house cats.

I’ve done a lot of touring with my own bands over the years, making the most of friendships with other musicians. If I follow opportunity there’s always a place to play, a place to stay, and I can provide the same hospitality when folks come through Oakland. These creative connections still feel like my truest form of riches, the epitome of what I love about DIY music culture. You get a view into someone else’s world, what the stars look like from their backyard, what crazy outfits are in their closet, which albums they collect, where they walk for morning coffee. The (deaf?) kitten who likes to hang out inside the kick drum even while the drums are being played. 

These days I don’t do as much band touring anymore, but I still find myself plotting adventures with brave friends. We travel by bicycle, and living in California gives us the opportunity to do so year round. I have a solid crew: a motley assortment of young and old bicycle riding weirdos, staunch outdoorspeople and lifelong wanderers, fearless of the weather. 

It was on a bicycle trip to Angel Island about 5 years ago that my life took a turn. Angel Island is a place that you may not have heard of, since many residents of Berkeley and SF don’t even know it exists. It sits in the middle of the bay not too far from Alcatraz, across from the chaos of San Francisco’s bustling waterfront and North Beach neighborhoods, yet somehow entirely remote. What makes this place special, besides a little endemic mole and many strange abandoned buildings from bygone eras, is its complete inaccessibility to automobiles. You can take a ferry there, or a sailboat, or even a kayak, but no bridge spans from the mainland to the wilds of this mysterious place. How raccoons, deer and, more recently, coyotes got there remains a bit of a mystery — I like to imagine they came on tangled rafts of floating trash.

We had camped out at kayak camp, a 20 person site down a muddy hillside, and as the fog rolled away we went out to ride around the island and explore. We found a military battery, doors open, dark passageways that once held ammunition now littered with driftwood and pinecones. The battery was perched near the top of the mountain facing San Francisco, flanked by 3 campsites and not much else. As we surveyed the multi level ramparts, the strange passages, odd staircases and plateaus of concrete, a sweet adventurous friend of mine, a retired librarian, turned to me and said “Wouldn’t this be the best place for a music festival?”…and I had to agree. It didn’t take long for our excitement to spark like the cracklings of a fresh campfire. What could be more fun than exploring the world, sleeping outside, communal meals, evenings full of music and mornings full of coffee and sunshine? Sharing all this with our not-yet-bikey friends! And inviting bands!!! We had to try it…

The trickiest part about creating a multi-day DIY music festival campout is finding community to collaborate with. Lucky us…we have just that. My bike camping crew is family. We cook together, we eat together, we climb mountains together, we draw arrows on the ground in chalk so that no one misses the turns. When someone’s got a flat, we sit down with them while they fix it, offer them whiskey and make up a silly song. We dry our socks over an open fire, teach each other crafts and wilderness skills. We swim naked under bridges with the swallows and the bats. 

And now I’d like to share the newest skills we’ve acquired, the ones we use to book music festivals…

You can find out how to book any campsite by checking online. You do have to plan ahead — sometimes as much as six months in advance. 

Here, we have multiple group campsites that can host between 35 and 300 people depending on the price. These are sites that anyone can book if they call in. But you’re up against a lot of other boy scout troops, church groups, schools and other well-organized normies, so it’s best to have a team of at least 5-10 people to call in on the appropriate morning in order to secure camping. For our events, we pick a first choice of dates and locations, and try to have our second and third choices planned out as well, since there’s no guarantee that we’ll get what we want even with multiple folks calling in for several hours on end. At some parks, we find that we need to reserve 3 or more sites in order to avoid sharing our sonic space with other campers who might be seeking a quiet time in nature, not a bunch of bands.

This brings us to another necessity — site visits. The more people you can get to visit the site ahead, the better understanding you’ll have of what your event might be like. Folks start to get excited when they see a space and can imagine the possibilities. Some campgrounds have cool structures that can provide shade or shelter in inclement weather. Some allow fires, some do not. You might find location specific ways to install art or deco, and visualize how to add lighting for utility and ambiance. 

What do you need to make a music festival? If you’ve never done an event like this before, try it on a small scale first. Our very first music campout, our practice run before Angel Island, was a 35 person campout at Pt. Pinole. 

We loaded a few vans with an excess of music gear – drums, battery powered amps, mics, stands and a small piano. Acoustic pianos once inhabited every well-to-do parlor in the country. They’re free on Craigslist, but someday even this seemingly endless resource will disappear. We treat our pianos with love, passing them to good homes and even installing pneumatic wheels on our main set of ivories so it’s fit for adventure. If you need battery powered music gear, Guitar Center has a great free rental policy – Buy stuff, save the box and receipt, and return within 45 days for a full refund.

As experienced campers, we knew to bring a lot of firewood and a lot of beer to Pt. Pinole. Over the course of our four day weekend we set up camp, adorned the stage and kitchen areas with lights, deco and tents for shade, and enjoyed the good vibes as 12 bands serenaded each other, plus a few lucky guests. Really it felt like everyone there was participating in the art in some way. Some people were making food. Another person brought battery and solar powered lights that proved indispensable. Others brought cargo bikes and helped musicians move their gear from the parking lot to the site — a hefty 1.5 mile trek through forested hills and grasslands along the bay. Seal Pup Fest went very well. As we stood on the hill watching the sunset and hearing the music waft up from our little pop up village below, we knew we could do it again. And that we wanted to.

What about food? Well, it depends on your style and resources. We love to feed people, and our lead chef has a determination as big as his heart. A few heavy duty portable propane stoves, a big cast iron griddle for frying potatoes, a giant tea kettle, large coffee filters and insulated carafes, and a heavy duty fire extinguisher have all become part of our arsenal. Buckets upon buckets of vegetables get chopped at home and hauled out so they can go into the stir fry. 

How do you communicate about a music festival? Well, I’m old fashioned and I like email. I send emails to plan in-person picnic meetings, online meetings and group bike rides to visit proposed event sites. We have an email account just for our event series, which was annoying to set up but very useful — it means the communication stays separate from my personal affairs. It also means we can have multiple email moderators (also a bit tricky to set up, but worthwhile). We use multiple email lists for volunteers, core volunteers, and campers. We try to remember to use b.c.c. — and just in case I screw it up, my sweetie helped me set up the “undo send” email function, which has saved me from tears. There might be ways around this, but we also use many of google’s free services such as sheets, docs and forms. 

We’ve turned to using forms as an easy way to aggregate the info we collect. Not because we’re monitoring whether or not people chip in funds, but because we need to understand our numbers so that we buy enough food, and have enough parking. It turns out that cars are by far the biggest hassle of a group campout. You can (often) fit a lot more humans into a campground than the technical capacity of the site, but if they each drive their own vehicle you’re fucked. So we encourage people to carpool, or better yet ride a bike! Heck, we’ll bring your camping gear to the site ahead of time if you wanna join the group ride. Or if you want to try bike camping, strap a rack on your steed and hit the bay trail with us. There’s some fabulous bike camping opportunities for beginners all around the bay, keeping to the flats and the bridges. And there’s mountains here that will kick your ass and prepare you for bike touring anywhere you want to go in the world.

How do you finance a music festival? This one is tricky. If you need a starter fund to pay for food and camping, you can throw a few fundraiser house parties. This can also help spread the word about your endeavor and recruit more movers and shakers to participate. If folks like the idea some may be able to pitch in out of pocket. And we’ve always found that when a lot of people are doing a lot of quality work for free, it spreads a sense of goodwill that inspires folks to be generous. Our events are never advertised or ticketed, they are notaflof and the costs are covered by suggested donation. No one gets paid to work — it’s a giant labor of love. When we collect funds that exceed our expenses, we offer thank you stipends to the bands.

How do you advertise a DIY music festival campout? YOU DON’T! At least we don’t, because we don’t want the cops or the park rangers to shut us down. Our events are not technically festivals, they are Family Reunions, a point that we reiterate over and over in our email communications. We encourage our community to forward the email invitation to their friends, to help the community grow, to keep bringing in new artists of different genres. But we draw the line and say NO POSTING ON SOCIAL MEDIA. When bands mess that up, as touring bands sometimes do, we ask them to take down their posts so they don’t jeopardize our events. Amplified music is technically not allowed in regional parks, but rangers tend to turn a blind eye because they appreciate what we do. State Parks are trickier — be aware that state park rangers can have a stick up their ass about the rules, and they may shut down your event. It’s happened to us.

How do you book a music festival? Well, start small. Book your own band, and a few others that you really know. If you don’t know bands, investigate the DIY scene where you live. Look for the house parties, the cafe shows, the park shows, the anarchist collective shows, the underground parades. Remember that you can’t quite control what you create if you aren’t offering people cash dollar capitalist compensation, which is cool. Real DIY community isn’t one person’s dream, it’s a group effort, organic and alive. People have to want to join for the love of it, and for that they need the freedom to influence it as well. Once you make friends with a few really rad bands, once you show people hospitality, appreciation, hard work, quality art…the reputation that your events are fun will ripple across communities. Pro sound people will offer their time and their gear, because they know they can enhance the experience for everyone. More people will want to join, to help, to bring their ideas and talents. Through word of mouth, we’ve recruited large interactive musical installations, epic sculptures, bike-powered carnival rides, homemade ice cream pop-ups, live screen printing of fresh designs for events, and pedal-powered sound systems. We’ve enjoyed performances by bands spanning from punk to hip hop, folk, jazz, blues, rock, brass bands, balkan music, choirs, ambient and noise music, touring bands, and many artists with unique and undefinable sounds. Our strength lies in our diversity and open mindedness. Brave visual artists have installed works perched above poison oak groves, with hammocks for restful viewing. We’ve been asked to remove swings installed high in trees, we’ve followed dancers on interactive journeys through the forest, and heard the power of live music in dimly lit, reverberant spaces. We’ve had pillow fights and cuddle puddles and climbed trees while epic bands serenaded the crowd. We’ve enjoyed morning qi gong. We’ve vacuumed scores of dusty rugs, and adapted our living spaces to store all kinds of weird gear. Trashy treasures that get pulled out and appreciated at least a few times a year, by a few hundred happy people.

Looking back over my story, it may seem like my friends and I live in a perfect world where everything goes smoothly. It’s not. You can’t make everyone happy, and you can’t insure against catastrophe. Vehicles break down at inopportune times, bands show up too late to get into the campground. Equipment gets forgotten, and hopefully people are forgiving. You might find yourself setting up the floor tom on logs and rocks because you forgot to bring the legs. You might find bands and audience cold and disappointed because the music is running hours late, and you might regret having said yes to so many performers, and creating a schedule that is impossible to uphold. You might learn the hard way NOT to bring someone into the fold in a high-stress volunteer position unless they have already attended an event and seen what they are getting into. You might train a small child against the dangers of poison oak and days later, find that you squatted in it yourself while peeing in the dark. Hosting events can be really stressful, and I have repeatedly ended up with bathroom issues while at our music campouts — a problem I’ve never faced before. Sometimes I wear down my immune system by working too hard, aiming too high, partying too much to cope with the stress. Drink lots of water! Try to get some sleep! Be kind to yourself and your friends, and remember that just doing something big and communal is a success in and of itself, even if there’s hiccups or failures. Making mistakes is unavoidable, but also it’s the best way to learn, or to remember how to do things better. One thing I have been working on is learning how to delegate and ask for more help, since burnout is real.

I hope these anecdotes have proven entertaining. And I hope they can inspire you to bring your friends together, to share the music and art that you make with each other under the open sky, away from the confines of buildings, cars and busy city streets. Wherever you live, we welcome you to explore the beauty of nature and witness your community feasting and reveling in musical celebration for its own sake, whether it’s a few hours drive out of town or better yet, just a bike ride away, in the lush wild corners of your own backyard.

By Jesse D. Palmer

We’re in a simultaneously dark and exhilarating time. Many people are feeling paralyzed and overwhelmed by economic stress, authoritarianism, the collapsing ecosystem and war.

And yet the system is toppling itself — bringing danger but also a path to a better future. How many people other than the oligarchs, the dictators and their henchmen feel like things are going well or support the economic and political establishment at this point? The bosses have over promised and under delivered — and billions of people are seething. Capitalism faces a looming debt crisis and stock market bubble of its own making, ruinously high fuel prices because of the war in Iran, increasingly destructive weather, and populations unable to start families, get decent jobs or afford health care and basic necessities. All the system seemingly has to offer is AI that will either usurp control over our lives, or go off the rails and kill us by mistake. 

Extreme contradictions like this are highly unstable. You can feel it in the air — something has to give. Around the world revolts and riots are breaking out and old illusions and inertia are slipping away.

The only tool the system has left to save itself is distraction, disempowerment, isolation, and maintaining a sense that there are no alternatives — that current conditions are inevitable. Also police thugs and attacks on immigrants. None of it brings fulfillment, contentment, meaning or more than a fragile and superficial resignation to the status quo. 

I want to do something to fight, but most of the time I can’t figure out what will work. It is tempting to just focus on my personal life because my little corner of life is still pleasant. But keeping our heads down under these circumstance is dangerous and just makes me feel worse in the long-run. 

I think it helps to articulate the world we want clearly, boldly, publicly, and often. Corporations, computers and hierarchical structures only offer more of the same. It is up to us to dream worlds worth living in — full of emotion, cooperation, pleasure, abundance, beauty, community engagement, local color and meaning. You can’t make social change if you’re only focused on how bad everything is all the time.

We need to get beyond our bubbles and avoid setting our expectations too low. Community gardens and free boxes are great, but we can think bigger and demand more fundamental transformations. Let’s eat the whole pie, not just nibble around the edges. 

When established structures collapse, it can suddenly open up opportunities for alternatives based on life-affirming values and principles. Luckily, decentralized networks and counter-institutions have been developing and refining non-coercive, horizontal, cooperative forms of organization and DIY skills for decades. These sleeper cells are ready for our moment. 

We also need to be clear about what is unacceptable: wars in Gaza, Iran, Ukraine, Sudan, Myanmar and elsewhere. Masked thugs on the streets snatching our neighbors and surveillance cameras on every corner. We can’t tolerate a system which concentrates wealth for a few billionaires while most people are struggling — built on ecological destruction, fossil fuel dependence, deforestation, toxic pollution, and plastics choking the oceans and our bodies. 

The passion behind the widespread rejection of data centers isn’t just about electricity prices or noise. AI is the logical conclusion of capitalism. The bosses have always sought to increase efficiency by replacing human labor with machines. Unlike previous tools that expanded human abilities, AI seeks to replace us entirely — our ability to make decisions and create. Constant interactions with machines brings only loneliness, isolation and meaninglessness. AI can’t benefit regular people — concentrates ever more wealth and power in ever fewer unaccountable hands. 

To wake up from this nightmare, we need to focus away from danger, loss, grief and fear of police repression — and instead concentrate on our desires, the brighter future we’re fighting to build and the unbelievable weakness, fragility and isolation of the billionaires, their government puppets and those with fear and hate in their hearts who seek to serve them. 

Making trouble in the streets isn’t the only answer — you can’t riot alone and sloppy actions can empower repressive forces — but a little disruption sure feels better than doing nothing. Action can help break the veneer of apathy and acceptance. 

Since no one knows what will get us out of this quagmire, it’s time to throw spaghetti against the walls and see what sticks. Being in community is especially vital right now. Acting against this rotting edifice feels impossible on my own. But when I’m with my housemates, at a Slingshot meeting, or on a midnight parade in San Francisco with paper lanterns, costumes and a marching band, survival and creating a new world worth living in seems within reach and even inevitable. 

Liberation isn’t only something we’ll achieve later. We should practice, nurture and achieve freedom now as often as we can and in as many aspects of our lives as possible. Not just on a political and economic level but culturally — in our families, workplaces, schools and on our blocks.

Creating a new world isn’t a duty or responsibility we have to others. It’s a constructive and important game we play for ourselves and with those around us that makes life exciting and that helps us to figure who we really are. 

By tom eichlersmith
	One way to look at it is that I boycott a lot of things — Amazon, Target, AI, Israel, cars, animal-products and probably others that I'm forgetting since its been so many years.
 	I am against harm. The simplest way to reduce my contribution or complicity in harm is to refuse to participate in it. This is why I boycott all of these things, but it seems to be more clear to others that I am always against something.
	Boycotts are often pitched as "targeted" actions that "can force" some other organization or system to change, as purely "wallet activism" that only works if there is enough participation to force change through economic pressure, but that is too small scale. I don't want apartheid states, mega-corporations, slop-factories, animal agriculture, car-centric transportation, or other sources of harm in my future society so I remove them from my life now.  Living in the future society I want now. Since we as individual earthlings form a society, a radically and systemically different society will require all of us to radically and systemically change how we live our lives.
	A boycott that never ends defines a new culture, a new set of rules about what is valued. 
	These never-ending boycotts are a new frame of mind; one that pushes against the convenience and consumerism of capitalism. In the short term, there is a perception of friction as you are trying new, different things. Where do I get this item now that I'm not shopping on Amazon? What do I eat now that I'm not eating boxed mac-n-cheese? However, life and happiness are not about these conveniences. This perceived friction quickly evaporates as you develop new habits, ones that are more life-giving, ones that require you to push back against convenience capitalism by biking to your nearby hardware store or cooking a meal from produce grown in your community garden.  The longer-term friction, the one that consistently causes me difficulty, is interpersonal friction.
	When friends and family consume animal products in my presence, I feel disgust, frustration, and sadness. “You still shop on Amazon? You ‘asked’ ChatGPT? How have you not woken up to the real harm apartheid states, mega-corporations, slop-factories, animal agriculture, car-centric transportation, or other source cause?” These internal feelings focus on a basic question: how can they believe this is all right? Our current culture tells us that these sources of harm are not only acceptable but inevitable. The process of defining a new culture, a new society, requires us to communicate our discomfort, our friction, with others in our community.
	I don't want to argue in favor of total "individual responsibility" politics. We must demand change from institutions, but changing ourselves and our community now improves our quality of life. Many of the replacement activities bring me a lot more joy than what I was doing before. I enjoy riding my bike and the community of public transit so much more than the fear and anxiety of driving a car. The folks at my local hardware store are so much nicer than the folks at whatever mega-corporation is near by. I eat a larger variety of food, have become a much better cook, and saved a lot of money once I embraced plant-centered cuisine as compared to my old meat-and-potatoes meals. While these boycotts originated out of an ethical imperative for me, they also improve my quality of life now — giving me the energy necessary to also fight for larger, systematic change.
	The power of boycotts is in the interpersonal friction that they originate — the force dragging people near you along, towards a better world. Some folks will resist more than others, but they are still feeling this force. They are feeling the discomfort, the pull towards a new world, one that does not have these sources of so much harm today.
	I am not boycotting these sources of harm because I want them to change. I am boycotting them because they do not improve my quality of life. Removing them from my life, my community, my society, and my culture demonstrate that they are not inevitable and we can form a happier society, choosing instead habits and practices that foster community and improve our quality of life now.

By Friend 

On July 27th, 2026 the U.S. government and Fisher industries cut down three ancient cottonwood trees in a small town called Lochiel, Arizona in order to build not just one but two border walls. This area is the habitat of the endangered Mexican Wolf as well as jaguars, bears, foxes and many other bizarre, beautiful bugs and animals. It is also the home of the Tohono O’odham people, important to many indigenous tribes on both sides of the border. When the three grandmother cottonwoods were cut, one brave comrade stood in front of construction equipment, preventing the destruction of the last ancient tree and the construction of the border wall. In that last tree, we began our tree sit. With the support of hundreds of activists, the land owners, nearby towns and tribes, and even the local sheriff department, we halted construction of the walls for 75 days.

For 75 days, activists sat in the remaining cottonwood as ground support grew into a sprawling camp. It was the first tree sit to stop border wall construction and was briefly the first binational tree sit in history, with a sit erecting on the Mexican side for three days in August. During these 75 days, O:shad camp, jaguar in O’odham, held morning ceremony in the easement, the road which enforced the border. Ceremony frequently extended to effectively halt all construction vehicles for the day, or days at a time. People fell in love, they danced in the mud, cooked communal meals, all while defending the land. Utopia felt nearby. 

Then, on October 5th, hundreds of border patrol officers, accompanied by turning point usa, invaded O:shad camp. They cut down the grandmother cottonwood and forcibly removed the tree sitter without a proper extraction team, risking her life. Activists on the ground circled the trunk to protect the tree and continue their resistance against the wall. More than 10 activists were arrested and many more brutalized. Though on private property and with no warrant, they ransacked the camp and destroyed our belongings. 

Indigenous and non-white activists were singled out and beaten much worse than white comrades. Border Patrol violently pushed, pulled and dragged, but also kneeled on throats, punched eyes, pushed skin into barbed wire. They specifically targeted our medic (who is Indigenous) to be violently dragged, beaten, and arrested. They prevented our media team from capturing what happened, while escorting Turning Point USA to film the day in order to spread their right wing propaganda. 

The next day, as Border Patrol expanded their boundaries further into private property to make way for the wall, five more of us were taken, and lawyers were unable to find them in the system while border patrol ignored calls from their lawyers, friends and family.

A day later, my comrade locked herself to a cement truck and stayed in a stress position without food or water for 7 hours while Border Patrol covered her with an emergency blanket despite the hot climate. One officer told her and the other officers that they should drive her to the middle of nowhere where no one would be able to hear her scream. They began to move the vehicle with her still above the tire; we all thought she would be killed. Two comrades who ran towards her, worried for her life, were tackled, brutalized, and arrested – one was sexually assaulted during her arrest. Finally they brought in an expert extractor who took her out of lockdown and she was taken to detention and then federal prison. She is now facing federal assault charges.

The rest of us were shot with pepper balls, tear gassed, leaving us vomiting, injured, bruised and emotionally exhausted. After the tree sitter was removed from the grandmother tree in Lochiel, a comrade reinstated the sit on the mexico side. Cut off from ground support by border patrol, she went over two days without food or water. When mexican firefighters and Fisher construction workers went to pull her out, she free climbed further up the tree. They destroyed her platform and life sustaining materials, leaving her to perch in the cottonwood branches without a platform or supplies. She suffered dehydration and starvation in high heat but still managed to keep a backpack on her, which she filled with clippings of the Abuela tree so that no matter what happened, the trees offspring could be replanted. 

The following day the wall continued.

In total 30+ of us have been arrested, and many more brutalized, injured, and traumatized. We are the first people to be charged for this specific resistance against the border wall and our court date is in January 2027. Some of us have misdemeanor charges, others have felonies.

Some of us in Lochiel are intertwined through solidarity work in Palestine. We have seen how the same tactics used overseas to commit genocide are the tactics used here in the united states. Much as in Palestine, on the border there is constant surveillance. We cannot let this continue here or anywhere —these are the struggles of all people and we are all interconnected. 

Though camp is now over, our resistance has spread. What took them five days to finish had been stopped more than 70 because of everyday people who believed in something. An ancient cottonwood in Mexico was preserved, the town of Lochiel now has international attention and resistance to the double wall got support from Palestine, Norway, Italy, Berlin, and across the US. We have clippings from the grandmother and Abuela trees that are already being propagated.

Border patrol came from sites all over the region to deal with us, which prevented them harassing other more vulnerable populations during that time. Border checkpoints that hadn’t been closed in years shut down because border patrol officers from all over were relocated to deal with protesters. We were able to pull away hundred of goons throughout 70+ days from harassing “immigrants” and citizens alike.

Though we can’t see all the things our camp accomplished, it helped question what a border means. 

The state has created borders everywhere which means they can be resisted ANYWHERE. You can’t do everything but you can do SOMETHING. The federal government is still initiating ice surges. Families, your neighbors, your favorite spaces will lose people to these abductions. It’s time to give up comfort and ignorance to do what’s right. 

It’s not about winning anymore, it’s about doing everything you can do to resist fascism and create the world you want. Chattel slavery took 400 years to end. Along the way resisters were consistently told they couldn’t win, and it’s true that most did not see the end. It took dedication and movements of people throughout hundreds of years to kill it.

People love to yell fuck ice but this moment calls for more than just vocal support. There are always things to do. Accompany people to their immigration hearings, host foot patrols in areas dense with migrant communities, set up free coffee and know your rights cards outside of day laborer sites like home depot, throw up banners on freeway overpasses, make a zine, take a stop the bleed training and use it at protests, canvass your neighborhood, host a fundraiser and donate the proceeds, research who profits and find out how fast their windows can be smashed. Learn how good it feels to be free. 

We have everything we need to resist. One day the land will be free. Fight tonight, dance tomorrow, and if you need help, just ask.

By two comrades based in Oakland, CA

“Wii’i Gdwiisa [we-e gud-we-suh], known in english as Red Butte, is a sacred mountain just south of the Grand Canyon. It is the birthplace of the Havasupai people. In 1974, uranium was discovered on the Havasupai reservation. Despite the tribe’s attempts to prevent mining on their sacred lands, the u.s. government approved mining permits and the land was stolen (again). There is a long history of violence in the so-called american southwest committed against indigenous people and land by the nuclear industry. This is a story of that legacy and the uranium mine currently operating at the northern base of Red Butte. This is also a story of the steadfast resistance by the people born from these lands and those who fight alongside them. Wii’i Gdwiisa is still alive, still breathing. Her people ask us to live and fight in solidarity with her and all sacred land/water under attack by the settler colonial capitalist regime.”

On the weekend of May 14th–18th 2026, networks of land defenders called a gathering to defend Red Butte against uranium mining. We gathered some comrades to make the journey and as we left Oakland, we didn’t realize how transformative the trip would be. On the journey back home, we decided to pull over to pray and honor the sunrise the way we had been taught at the gathering, and we knew our lives and organizing would be forever changed by Red Butte.

When we arrived at Wii’i Gdwiisa after two days of travel, comrades were setting up camp at the southern base of the mountain. Our Indigenous comrades invited us to greet the land, give an offering, share our lineages and intentions, and ask permission to camp. We listened to the wind and rocks for answers and proceeded only once the land responded. Ceremony was at the center of this gathering, grounding us in an ongoing conversation with the land itself as we planned our actions in defense of Red Butte.

The gathering was autonomously organized and guided by Indigenous organizers with established protocols. People were invited to take whatever action they were called to, rather than relying on direction from specific leaders. The autonomous strategy was apparent in moments of confusion and disorganization, but allowed us to nimbly shift programming in response to emergent situations like radioactively contaminated desert winds and police repression. It also created opportunities for everyone to contribute what they could and grow into roles that needed doing, like bathroom duty, shelter construction, political education, vibes, radioactive decontamination, or cooking in a fully-functional desert kitchen serving three hot meals to 150 people every day. 

Two sacred fires, one for Wii’i Gdwiisa and one for Dookó’oslííd (known in english as the San Francisco Peaks), were the heartbeat of the camp. We burned medicine and other offerings in their flames which burned uninterrupted throughout the gathering, we shared stories and meals around their circle, and we sang and danced in their warmth at night. We were taught to gather and cut wood with clear minds and good intentions. Fire-tenders stayed up every night to ensure the fires didn’t go out. As we kept watch over the fire, we also kept watch over the safety of the camp. Other practices, like the daily sunrise ceremonies and a ceremonial sheep slaughter led by Diné comrades, similarly intertwined spiritual consciousness and soulful embodied connection to Red Butte with the meeting of basic needs like sleeping and eating. The rituals were hard work, which taught us to be good guests and showed the necessity of strong spiritual practice in sustaining a lifelong militant commitment to fighting for land. 

We were invited to Red Butte by Havasupai elders, who cannot themselves return to the birthplace of their tribe because the radioactive contamination is too big of a threat to the tribe’s survival. They wanted us to learn about uranium mining and make a public show of support for the tribe’s fight. After taking the first day to set up, the following two days were full of teach-ins, workshops, discussions, and planning for the elders’ call to action. We thank those who shared their knowledge with us, including groups like Haul No! and Stop T.H.E.M., as well as indigenous experts of the local land and academic experts of history and hydrology.

Local elders told us their stories about the u.s. government colluding with private companies to extract uranium while poisoning the land and people. They also told us about their fights against these violations. This legacy has left a deep scar in the so-called american southwest, and indigenous communities still suffer health impacts from the “uranium boom,” which peaked in the 1960s and waned in the following decades. Now, with growing global interest in data centers and a desperate need to power them, the extractive nuclear energy is rising again. Many companies are activating mining claims after years of dormancy and either digging new mines or re-opening existing ones. One such company is Energy Fuels, which first laid claim to a patch of land just north of Red Butte in 1986 to build the Pinyon Plain uranium mine. This mine began extracting uranium in earnest within the last few years.

Today, radioactive material from Pinyon Plain Mine contaminates vast underground aquifers, pollutes soil, and generates toxic dust. The impact compounds because the trucks hauling uranium ore to the mill in White Mesa Ute lands spread dust along the entire haul route, primarily on reservation lands. Plants and animals, rivers, humans, and mountains are impacted for millennia when nuclear contamination occurs. The wake of destruction compounds when you consider how uranium is used to reinforce bullets and tanks and make bombs that are used by the u.s. military machine to kill people worldwide. There is also potential for the uranium to be used in small modular nuclear reactors to power data centers, further entrenching us under the technofascist foot of empire. The anti-nuclear movement needs to forefront Indigenous sovereignty and show up for protecting sacred sites; we can stop the machine at the source of the raw materials it needs to wage war.

On the day of our camp’s action, the energy was buzzing, as if Wii’i Gdwiisa was charging us up for the fight ahead. We were excited, but felt like we could have used more time to prepare or talk about contingency plans. We had built relationships with a lot of people, but still had questions about how much we could trust folks. We lined up along the highway, the main road to and from the Grand Canyon, busy with tourists who knew nothing about the toxic uranium mining destroying the land for corporate profit happening just a few feet away. Comrades from all over the southwest joined us for the demonstration. We made a stand with banners, buckets, and chants, and despite police pressure, we stopped traffic and educated people passing through. At one point a hauling truck arrived, headed to collect uranium from Pinyon Plain, but it was stopped and had to be towed away due to certain actions that were taken against it. The action was a success and although the police used intimidation tactics to scare us, we built trust and were vigilant, organized, and protective. That evening, we had a feast and stayed up late strategizing how to continue the support for Red Butte and the Havasupai people once the gathering ended.

Looking back, our time in ceremony with Wii’i Gdwiisa was empowering and moving; we realized that even the action on the highway was a form of ceremony for us. Some of the rituals we learned have reaffirmed our connection to the land through introductions, altars, and care. We always pay our respects when in new lands, whether a city or a mountain. Thinking back to camp, we recall with a mix of nostalgia, longing, and awe how at home we felt. Our practices made us feel like we could sustain the camp for months and months. It feels weird to be back home, far away from Red Butte, thrust back into our regular lives. But life is not regular anymore. Every day we think of our comrades, of the fires, of the fight for sacred lands, of ceremony. We tell friends about the sense of transformation we feel after participating in the gathering. This trip has made us more powerful, more deeply rooted than ever before, and more able to fight for the land. Our movements for liberation need to be connected to land and spirit to win.

“Once a fire is lit, it desires to spread. We invite you to join the struggle to protect sacred land against extractive industry. We invite you to share this knowledge with others. Most importantly and urgently, we invite you to take action.” ______

This article includes excerpts from the zine “Fire for Wii’i Gdwiisa” to which the authors contributed: tinyurl.com/redbuttezine. It has more info and actions you can take. Also check livingandfighting.net.