Act-Up SF Slams Slingshot

In Slingshot #74 we printed a letter deriding ACT-UP SF for their stance on HIV-AIDS. Boy, did we step in it! Slingshot was flooded with email and letters critical of us for printing the letter and our response to it; way too many to print in our little paper. We are going to print excerpts from some of the correspondences we received, for the full text please go to our web site. Also please note our policy on listing groups in the organizer in the organizer update on this page.

I don’t agree with everything that ACTUP-SF stands for and think that they have some of their facts wrong, but people have a right to know that they exist. You’re not doing the people who buy the organizer a favor by censoring ACTUP-SF. Shouldn’t your readers be intelligent enough to make up their own minds on the matter? Rupert Murdoch would be proud of your decision. It should at least be clear that ACT-UP is sincere. They have a number of HIV positive people in their group — These people aren’t suicidal; they think that AIDS drugs aren’t the answer and their survival rates would indicate that they might be on to something.

I think it reflects negatively on Slingshot that when you approach a complex and controversial issue like AIDS treatment/prevention, you ask “what is the acknowledged politically correct position on this?” rather than “What’s actually going on here? Perhaps I should try to find out for myself instead listening to PR flacks and other establishment lackeys.” What if Greenpeace thought that biotechnology and genetic engineering was the solution to world hunger? Would you go along with that too? So much for independent thinking, eh? Who needs it anyway when the “left” (whatever that is) already has a pre-packaged opinion for you to pick up off the shelf and take home. Let’s hope for better judgment in the future.

Dear Folks at slingshot.

I was just informed that you have decided to remove ACTUP SF from your listing of radical community groups on the whim that someone has decided that because they don’t like them the easiest way to get rid of them is by slander. It is a common practice in radical left/ anti-authoritarian circles that if someone or their ideas are disliked we can purge them by using slanderous language. We’ve all heard it done before… “He’s a misogynist”… “she’s really classist”… “They’re racist”… “Homophobes”…etc. Even when there is no supportive evidence proving their heinous guilt we all jump on the shunning band wagon because the language appeals to our lefty sensibility of defending the perceived victims. This is a self destructive practice we all need to think about and try to avoid. Before the accusation is made–be right!

A better way for the radical left to deal with the AIDS debate instead of slandering it would be to simply acknowledge that the debate exists and that people be encouraged to learn as much as possible about both sides of the debate before deciding where they stand. I’m sure there are people of many political persuasions who are challenging the HIV=AIDS=death paradigm, just like there are people from every political persuasion who believe that HIV does cause AIDS. The AIDS debate is not a left or right issue it’s a scientific debate and a public health issue, and it’s the general public who will ultimately decide the outcome.

Organizer Update

We’ve already started work on the 2003 Slingshot Organizer which will be out around October 15. If you know of an Infoshop, community space or radical contact that should be listed in the radical contact list, please let us know by August 1. Only contacts that have a physical location or a phone number will be listed — no internet only entries. We usually want both an address and a phone number to list a contact. Please let us know any corrections you have to the 2002 version.

If you have historical dates we should include, please send ‘em to us by June 30. Keep in mind that we now have so many that only a fraction of the historical dates for any particular day get used in any particular edition of the Organizer. We don’t publish death dates unless the death was interesting in some way. We like birthdays and especially dates for uprisings, protests, rebellions, strikes, etc.

2002 Organizer Round-up

The 2002 Organizer was the first edition to reach all continents on earth other than Antarctica. We received orders from Australia, Asia, Africa, South America, Europe and North America. As we now have a large distribution in Canada, we’re looking for Canadian contacts and relevant Canadian info.

The biggest controversy about the 2002 Organizer was our inclusion of ACT-UP San Francisco in the contact list. They were included in the 2000 version, were dropped in the 2001 version, and were added back in to the 2002 version at their request.

ACT-UP SF questions the mainstream Western medical understanding of the causes and appropriate treatments for AIDS. We got a ton of letters, calls and emails criticizing us for including ACT-UP SF in the 2002 version, including a large Infoshop on the East Coast which almost returned 300 Organizers over the issue, before they decided to go through each copy with a magic marker to cross out ACT-UP SF. In response, in the last issue of Slingshot Newspaper, we ran one of the critical letters with a notation that we would not include ACT-UP SF in the 2003 version.

In response to that note, we have received a huge number of critical emails and letters from supporters of ACT-UP SF.

At this point, our tentative feeling is that its our job to publish an Organizer with a wide range of radical contacts. We may not agree with each contact listed — its up to our readers to decide. We want to avoid having a “Slingshot party line” about who gets included. Passions on both sides of the ACT-UP SF debate are strong, and both sides are convinced that if people either do mainstream AIDS drugs or don’t do mainstream AIDS drugs, premature death will result. We’re confident that anyone facing these difficult decisions will thoroughly investigate the matter and make their own choice, regardless of the contacts that may be printed in the Slingshot Organizer.

Ordering Information

Prices for the 2003 Organizer will be the same as for 2002: $5 for one copy, $16 for 4 copies and $30 for 8 copies (postage included) ordered direct from Slingshot. Please don’t send orders until October. Infoshops, bookstores and distributors should contact us for wholesale rates for orders of 20 or more copies. We still have copies of the 2002 edition ($4 each includes postage or seconds (slightly damaged) for $3 each.) Send checks, money orders or well concealed cash to:

Slingshot Collective

3124 Shattuck Avenue

Berkeley, CA 94705

510 540-0751 ex. 3

Letters

Endless Fire

Everyone @ Slingshot

Thanks so much for what you’re doing. You have no idea what hope you bring to a 17-year-old anarchist living in a small town who often feels completely alone and is constantly encouraged NOT to share his ideas. You have made an impact on my life, and that’s what will change the world. Thank you all. Love hope and endless fire,

–Chris P, Washington State

Down with Conformist Flag-Waving Lemmings

Greetings:

Thanks for the latest Slingshot. We desperately need this kind of info out here in the cornfields of the midwest. Nothing like what you describe happening around here I can tell you. Particularly in the wake of 9-11 you never beheld such a bunch of anal, pathetic, mindless, conformist flag waving, lemmings. Best wishes for the revolution,

–Zack

Trashed and Toxic

West Oakland Community Fights Back

The gorging gut of capitalism necessitates excessive production and consumption as well as devastating unsustainable environmental damage. Industry proliferates, millions are spent to convince a gullible public to consume, and the profits line the bulging pockets of the rich. Many Industries — oil, automobiles biotechnology — are detrimental to the environment while providing scant comfort or enjoyment for the humans they supposedly serve.

Collectively, industry and the acceptance of an industrialized society has created a standard of living that is destroying the planet. Destroying it quietly for those who reap the benefits of this unsustainable lifestyle and destroying it glaringly for those who do not.

Zip code 94607, West Oakland, is the ultimate example of a local community that does not benefit from the luxuries afforded by industry, but suffers from its waste products. Its the ultimate example of environmental racism.

The oldest district in Oakland, West Oakland is home to 23,475 residents. It began as a vibrant and diverse working class community based around what served as the final stop on the TransContinental Railroad. By the mid-1900’s the population consisted of mostly African American residents and West Oakland became known as a center of black cultural and social activism — it was called the Harlem of the West.

After World War II and the subsequent economy boom, the government implemented “Federal Renewal Projects” for West Oakland. This meant freeways and additional industry that was to be the beginning of a physical fragmentation of the community that would continue to the present day.

By the 1980’s, residents of West Oakland had to live with numerous toxic brown-fields, high lead concentrations, illegal dumping and massive industrial activity. Their home contained the Port of Oakland and the Oakland Army Base, with massive railway yards, freeways and constant truck traffic to serve the port and base. Neighborhoods were broken up by freeways and factories, with housing contaminated by lead built right next to industrial facilities. The neighborhood had a higher rate of exposure to toxic materials than in the almost any other community in Alameda County.

There are many negative environmental crises currently afflicting the area. Between January and June of 2000, the City of Oakland removed 263 tons of illegally dumped garbage from the streets. This was three times more per capita for West Oakland residents than for residents in the rest of Oakland. Nearly 82% of area residents live near an industrial area. In 1998 West Oakland generated six times more toxic chemicals than the rest of Oakland combined. There are higher incidences of asthma within the zip code area 94607 than in the rest of Alameda County. (See graph).

In 1998, 34,103 pounds of toxic air releases were reported by the Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) (See graph) Keep in mind that TRIs only account for half of the toxins and pollutants discussed. Point sources such as automobiles, local business (Laundromats), and residences are not included in these numbers.

In response to these and other economic and social problems (a lack of civic engagement, the lack of sufficient public transportation, etc.) the community formed a partnership to address the crisis. 7th St/McClymonds (a local community activist group) and Pacific Institute (a local research organization) joined forces to developed the Environmental Indicators Project (EIP). The project aims to answer questions raised by disadvantaged communities by conducting research to promote revitalization.

Aman Bloom, a West Oakland resident and EIP Neighborhood Committee member note, “The impact on me came from the overall sum of the indicators. This project proves that there is a socially-responsible community of researchers whose interests coincide with the grassroots and who can take part in the process of improvement without taking control.”

This community driven project functions democratically with the residents deciding what needs to be measured or reported to further their own community goals. In the beginning the most important part of this process was choosing the indicators. As it is used in this research project, an indicator (like rates of asthma) is a measurable result of pollution. The community then can organize to reduce the indicator by going after its causes.

West Oakland residents defined quality of life in their community as “the economic vitality, the strength of the social institutions, the well being of its members and the state of its environment.” Most similar projects focus on environmental threats on a larger scale, such as asthma rates for entire cities or states rather than asthma rates within a city’s zip-code. This project is one of the few neighborhood projects that show such glaring environmental racism on a neighborhood scale. A scale that often goes unnoticed.

The work that has been done has made information available and understandable for the general public. The Environmental Indicators Project is the beginning of a strong local community movement against environmental racism. It has engaged and activated its residents and is providing them with the means to improve their community.

Out of the project, the Clean Air festival was born, with over 600 attending a demonstration in front of Red Star Yeast (a major West Oakland polluter) in 2001. Countless community groups are working on all of the indicator projects. They are providing an inspirational example as well as a working model of community activism that often goes unnoticed in a time when globalized struggles are at the forefront of our vision.

Beware: Nosy Neighbors

Attorney General John Ashcroft and television sleazeball Ed MacMahon, renowned for his Publisher’s Clearinghouse and Budweiser beer advertisements, announced in a news conference March 6 that the middle-class Neighborhood Watch organization would no longer be monitoring suspected car thieves and burglars. Instead they will be focusing on “Domestic Terrorists”, (e.g. us). During this press conference, they also released a 24 page “Citizen Preparedness Guide” which offers guidelines to snooping and informing on your neighbors.

My first thought was that this new Neighborhood Watch could be used for some excellent monkey-wrenching. I could report that police car that is constantly patrolling my neighborhood to the Neighborhood Watch.

But seriously, this shit is scary. Like a modern witch hunt, we will soon be one telephone call away from being shoved into camps like the hundreds of other suspected terrorists the federal government is currently holding in detention throughout this country.

To make matters worse, the government announced it will be initiating Operation TIPS this summer. Operation TIPS trains delivery men, taxi drivers, mailmen, and other public service employees to snitch on the public they serve.

The FBI, CIA, INS, ATF, and the Secret Service all already have toll free numbers used to report any suspicious activities. Now, not only do we have to be afraid of being investigated by this alphabet soup of government agencies, we have to watch out for our mailmen, garbage collectors, and next door neighbors as well. Welcome to the Land of the Free.

Another World Is Possible

But What Kind, and Shaped by Whom?

During the World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting and related demonstrations in New York from Jan. 31 to Feb. 4, the Village Voice put its finger to the shifting political winds. That week’s cover headline read, “Passing the Torch: Anarchists Pick Up Where Progressives Left Off,” and the corresponding image depicted a middle-aged white male running in a business suit while handing off a Molotov cocktail to the young white male in “anarchistic” attire sprinting along behind him. While this front page could be critiqued for its damaging stereotype ”that all anarchists are youthful, violent Caucasian guys” the article inside sympathetically acknowledged that “the anarchist fringe is fast becoming the movement’s center.” Anarchists are indeed outstripping progressives because they offer a form of contestation and transformation that speaks to the times — a form in explicit opposition to the world’s powerful elites, but one that also acts as a thorn in the side of many social justice activists.

This is especially apparent when comparing the WEF to its critics: the simultaneous gathering in Porto Alegre, Brazil of the World Social Forum (WSF) and the anti-capitalist convergence on NYC’s streets.

The WSF maintains in its slogan that “another world is possible.” It is in fact not only possible but certainly probable, given that the process known as globalization, among numerous other remappings, is fundamentally reconfiguring power relations. And far from settled, the ability to (re)shape the world is being both openly and surreptitiously fought over by nation-states as well as transnational corporations, nonprofit organizations as well as the millions ravaged by the globalizing process, and many others. Some potential worlds could, of course, be more dystopian than today’s — say, those asserted to be the divine word of a god or prophet by fundamentalists of all creeds. Yet even the more humane visions, like that of the WSF’s, beg the questions, Whose world will it ultimately be? Who will make social, economic, political, and cultural decisions, and how? While there are multiple answers, they all emanate from one of two distinct poles of governance: centralist vs. decentralist, or to put it more starkly, authoritarian vs. anti-authoritarian.

Of all the new authoritarian models, the WEF’s can be said to be the most avant-garde. The WEF is ahead of its day in forging an organizational culture and structure capable of stylish world dominance in the age of globalization. It is certainly not alone in its quest to “further economic growth and social progress” for a limited few — social progress being measured by economic growth. Institutions from the World Bank to the European Union to the U.S. government share the same pursuit. What sets the WEF apart is its innovative means, potentially making it all the more dangerous. To borrow its own language, the WEF’s membership meets in “a unique club atmosphere,” always luxurious, “to shape the global agenda,” “to mold solutions,” with the aim of controlling sociopolitico-economic processes to its own advantage.

Such maneuverings have been militantly challenged at the WEF’s past couple annual meetings in Davos, Switzerland. Part of the alleged reason the WEF ventured from its secluded retreat for the first time was to avoid this mounting resistance. The social costs, especially for the Swiss authorities, had gotten too high. WEF leaders also likely hoped to discredit such opposition altogether by meeting in New York City so soon after Sept. 11. They could claim to be both mourning the dead and doing their bit to rebuild NYC by convening at the opulent Waldorf-Astoria hotel. In contrast, so the WEF probably assumed, the protesters would be seen as funeral crashers, dishonoring the dead by running wildly through the streets of a still- grieving city without regard for property or propriety. Resistance would be irrevocably tainted, thereby allowing institutions like the WEF to go about the lofty mission of governing capitalist society without any pesky interference from “anti-globalist marginals,” to cite one WEF member.

To extend these speculations further, though, the best reason for trooping to Manhattan was to highlight the growing global influence of this relatively small, young organization. As 9-11 and the subsequent anthrax scare revealed, fixed and visible centers of power can be targeted and attacked. The physical homes of those institutions that have played such a large role in determining the postwar world economy (like the New York Stock Exchange) and geopolitics (like D.C.’s Capitol building) are at risk of being shutdown. The U.S. government, complacent with overconfidence in its own preeminence, still has the might to lash out violently at home and abroad, yet like all bloated empires, it tries to preserve its authority in the same tired ways, even as its leaner adversaries dream up new strategies to assume the mantle of global power broker. It could thus be argued that the WEF came to NYC precisely because Sept. 11 exposed America-the-superpower’s vulnerability, thereby allowing the WEF to flaunt itself as heir to institutions like Wall Street and nation-states. Or at least hold itself up as a potentially more resilient form of domination ”flexible, savvy, and placeless.

The WEF boasts of being a trendsetter, and indeed it is. Started as a nongovernmental organization (NGO) in 1971, it brings together the best and brightest of the global power elites: 1,000 business leaders, 250 political leaders, 250 academic leaders, 250 media leaders, along with a sprinkling of labor, social justice, and entertainment leaders. They are leaders not because an electorate or the public says so but by virtue of their wealth, influence, and power, and their farsightedness in being able to maintain all three. This ensures that those most adept at foreseeing where the globalizing world might go, and hence most able to engage in steering its course, will constitute the WEF’s fluid and, if needed, easily rearranged membership (witness the summary disinvitation of Enron’s Ken Lay). These privileged few are bound to neither space nor place, geography nor nation-state. They are accountable only to themselves, and when it serves their self-interests, each other. In the WEF’s own words, this NGO “is tied to no political, partisan or national interests” ”although “beholden to” would be more descriptive. It is as transnational and elastic as the form of capitalism it promotes. And in its extremely exclusive, private global clubhouse, glamorous hobnobbing among WEF members legislates real-world economic and social policy.

Take just one iconic participant: Bill Gates. Money can’t be his only goal; for eight years, he’s been the world’s richest individual. More pointedly, having achieved the near-monopolistic power to determine how humanity communicates electronically, Gates has now taken a philanthropic turn. He is busily deciding health care policies for whole countries and even continents by funding his version of wellness. This grand gesture includes creating mass dependency on a healthy dose of his corporate buddies’ designer pharmaceuticals, particularly after Bill’s donations run out. Even if he had only benevolent motivations, can one person know what’s best for billions of peoples’ bodies? As radical feminists have long contended, control over one’s body relates to self-determination and social freedom as well as health.

The “representative” democracy of many nation-states almost begins to look good by comparison, at least as a way to keep the WEF in check. But these same allegedly democratic countries, along with a host of blatantly undemocratic ones, are partners in and frequently under the sway of the WEF itself. Even at the tender age of three, the WEF could already claim in 1973 to have “grown from humble beginnings” to be “the leading interface for global business/government interaction.” Now in its yuppie prime, this NGO has developed its muscle by in
tegrating countries ”from those in Latin America, the Middle East, and Africa, to Eastern and Central Europe, Asia, and even North America ”into its institutional frame, often well ahead of the so-called international community. As the “premiere gathering of world leaders in business, government, and civil society,” an autonomous supranational body such as the WEF looks to limit the power of nation-states, not vice versa, and increasingly has the clout to do so. This is the hazy yet ever-sharper organizational outline for a potential form of one-world, nongovernmental governance, where a handful of individuals judge right and wrong by the bottom line of buy-sell relationships, unimpeded by constituents, much less ethical considerations, cultural constraints, or even anti-capitalist convergences.

In this context, the WSF is held up as a promising candidate to stand against the WEF and campaign for a better world. Pulled together by eight NGOs as the socially oriented counterweight to the WEF, the WSF first convened last year in Porto Alegre during the WEF’s Davos session. This year, the Brazilian meeting again purposefully coincided with the WEF’s. As a “forum for debate” for all who seek an “alternative to [the] neoliberal model,” the WSF “brings together and interlinks . . . organizations and movements of civil society from all the countries of the world” along with “those in positions of political responsibility, mandated by their peoples, who decide to enter into the commitments resulting from those debates.” Certainly, the WSF and those who participate in this alternate forum place “special value on all that society is building to centre economic activity and political action on meeting the needs of people and respecting nature,” to again cite the WSF. And much-needed social justice work has and will come out of the WSF’s relatively (in comparison to other global gatherings) open meetings.

But wittingly or not, in trying to parallel the WEF’s meetings as its alternative, the WSF ends up mimicking its hierarchical structure: a supranational, nongovernmental body that seeks to shape the global agenda, with no accountability to and far removed from those whose daily lives are affected. Like the WEF, the WSF offers an informal, fluid, and centralized networking environment for the globally influential ”in this case, those in the “nonprofit” and “movement” sectors. Such influence on the world stage, as the WEF wells knows, can soon translate into a power that rivals or exceeds that of nation-states.

Once the WSF’s annual meeting is seen as the premiere gathering of socially concerned leaders, which in two short years is already becoming apparent, its statements will carry extraordinary political weight and its “debates” will soon map out public policy. Big, bureaucratic NGOs will continue to flock to the WSF in ever- greater numbers; and unlike activists and community-based organizations operating on a shoestring, they will be able to attend meetings annually and serve as members of the organizing council in between. These NGOs, then, will largely set the themes and strategies discussed at the WSF, limiting from the start the concerns of grassroots groups and radical movements. Moreover, these NGOs have the financial and organizational resources to, at a minimum, lobby governments and corporations ”who are often involved with or monetarily supportive of these NGOs ”to implement their notions of social change, thereby assuring that any “change” accords nicely with the status quo. Or a la Gates, the NGOs can attempt to directly implement the ideas they themselves have developed at the WSF’s annual gathering through global social service projects. Since these NGOs have their own agendas, such projects will always carry political, social, and/or cultural price tags. This might not be a problem were it not for the fact that as private, nongovernmental bodies, NGOs don’t have to worry about participatory processes, accountability, or transparency. So much for representative democracy, much less community control or even public scrutiny.

As the WSF gains in global influence it will even be courted, as it already was this year, by the very entity it set out to challenge, the WEF, which is perhaps able to recognize a kindred spirit well before the rest of us. This may have something to do with the WSF’s mission itself, in that it neatly inverts that of the WEF’s. Whereas the WEF views everything through an economic lens, and is thus concerned with social issues insofar as they hinder economic growth, the WSF views everything through a social lens, and is thus concerned with economic issues insofar as they hinder social justice. The WEF, for instance, troubles itself over a lack of water, education, or transport in countries because these basic necessities serve as vital infrastructure for economic expansion. (Besides, the utterly destitute don’t make particularly robust markets and can even get unruly.) Conversely, the WSF strives to reduce economic exploitation because it limits peoples’ access to essentials like jobs, food, or housing. Socioeconomics, or more precisely capitalism, can therefore be utilized for opposite ends: in the WEF’s eyes, it is good for business; in the WSF’s, it can instead help bring about social justice. The WSF displays the best of aims: to meet human needs in a just manner. But because it accepts only those possibilities obtainable within a capitalist society (say, higher wages) rather than those that may be generated by but also dismantle present-day social relations (like the end of the wage system altogether), the other world that is possible is already circumscribed, already damaged.

If unaccountable, free-floating supranational bodies like the WEF and WSF prove themselves better able to determine “public” policy than so-called public servants elected in democratic republics, participation becomes even more meaningless (leading some to the regressive demand to strengthen nation-states). An influential few will have set themselves up as untouchable “leaders” more capable of knowing what’s good for humanity than the vast majority of the world’s peoples, who will be completely shut out of shaping the societies they want to live in. Indeed, eerily similar to the WEF ™s notion of a “corporate citizenship” voting on the allegedly better society, the WSF proposes a “planetary citizenship.” Who, pray tell, would govern this global citizenry?

Lost in the WSF ™s mission to bring about social justice, no matter how noble, is the very notion of freedom itself, of self-determination and self-governance, without which there can be no social justice. Surely the possible world of the WSF would be far preferable to the WEF’s. Yet in attempting to oppose the WEF, the WSF only succeeds in offering a kinder, gentler version of top-down decision making, and hence offers no real alternative at all.

Which brings us back to the anti-authoritarian “keepers of the flame” explored in the Voice article mentioned above, where writer Esther Kaplan observes that anarchists don’t oppose “the WEF just because their policies exploit the poor, but because their power is illegitimate. [Anarchists] envision an egalitarian society without nation states, where wealth and power have been redistributed, and they take great pains to model their institutions in this vein.” David Graeber echoes this in his recent In These Times piece: the anti-capitalist convergence during the WEF meeting held out “new forms of radically decentralized direct democracy [as] its ideology. If nothing else, the ‘bad’ protesters have managed to prove that they can do anything the (hierarchical) NGOs or unions can, probably much better.”

As NGOs and social justice activists bailed out of the WEF demonstrations from fear in the post “Sept. 11 climate and/or the desire to be part of the more high-profile, safe WSF in Brazil, a variety of anti-authoritarians were handed the reigns of the U.S. direct action movement (re)birthed in Seattle. They became the main organizers and spokespeople
for the pivotal NYC convergence. Thus, even the mainstream media were forced to cover anarchist beliefs and visions ”which, of course, have been there all along ”if they wanted to report on the convergence at all. So despite the usual demonizations in the corporate press (as in the case of another Voice article, titled “Law of the Fist,” that basically labeled anarchists “Al Qaeda-like”), it became a fairly universal assertion that anarchism was openly opposed to capitalism and just as openly for direct democracy. This was especially so among the participants themselves. While for anti-authoritarians direct democracy can include everything from collectives and affinity groups to worker and/or neighborhood councils, acting in networks or confederations that keep power at the grass roots, most concur that self-governance must be part and parcel of present as well as future forms of social organization. Nowhere at the North American convergences of the past few years has this been more palpable, more public.

Instead of signaling the death knell for resistance and reconstruction, New York’s demonstration may just have “normalized” anti-authoritarians’ notions of social and political contestation, whether one is an anarchist or not. The use of substantively participatory decision-making processes before and during the WEF convergence, while not perfect, were nonetheless able to settle on street tactics that were sensitive to the feelings generated by Sept. 11, especially in NYC, and hence thoughtfully somber and restrained. Though comparatively dull for the marchers, not to mention the media and police, this explicitly anti-capitalist event not only reasserted that resistance is permissible again after 9-11’s tragedy but that it is increasingly necessary and courageous in light of new, rapidly consolidating forms of global authoritarianism. More important, it helped to vindicate and validate liberatory alternatives.

Such alternatives have of late flickered momentarily though brightly at anti-capitalist convergences and in localized anarchist projects, but also in everything from the spontaneous gatherings of diverse New Yorkers in Union Square right after Sept. 11 to the banging of pots and pans during protests in Argentina by the middle class.

This article was shortened from the original, which can be read at www.social-ecology.org/learn/library/milstein/wsf.html. Cindy is a faculty member at the Institute for Social Ecology (www.social-ecology.org), a board member for the Institute for Anarchist Studies (flag.blackened.net/ias), and a columnist for Arsenal: A Magazine of Anarchist Strategy & Culture (www.azone.org/ arsenalmag). She can be reached at cbmilstein@aol.com.

Infoshop Update

Here’s information on a bunch of new Infoshops and community spaces that have opened within the past few months. Within the last year, we’ve seen the largest number of new spaces opened since the early mid-1990s. Good luck to everyone opening a space! Please let us know so we can list any future openings here and in our Organizer.

Center for Creative Autonomy opens in Houston

CCA is a DIY art/music space with a coffee bar, lending library, meeting place free skool and radical community resource. They host concerts, workshops, art teach-ins, puppet shows, benefits and skill sharing to promote education, mutual aid and solidarity. Open Sunday – Thursday 6 p.m. – midnight, Friday and Saturday 6 p.m. – 2 a.m. 2014 Washington Ave. Houston, TX 77007. 713 864-0972, creative_autonomy@hotmail.com.

Monkey Wrench Books opens in Austin

MonkeyWrench Books is an all-volunteer, collectively operated radical bookstore and community space. We host meetings, video screenings, book signings, and a myriad of other types of events. The store stocks a slew of anarchist books and periodicals and a selection of broader radical literature. Open Mon-Fri 11 am – 8 pm, Sat-Sun 10 am – 9 pm 110 E. North Loop, Austin, TX 78751 (512)-407-MWBK collective@monkeywrenchbooks.org

Boiling Point Infoshop And Resource Center

An infoshop, radical book library, educational space. arts/music venue with space for art galleries, bands, creative events, etc. Also free store with clothes, books and food. Open Monday, Wednesday, and Friday-Sunday from 2-8pm. 2109B N. Graham Street, Charlotte NC 28206, 704-517-0501 boilingpoint@ hotmail.com, www.boilingpointinfoshop.com

Breakdown Book Collective and Community Space

Breakdown is a community space and book store in Denver, Colorado dedicated to building a non-capitalist participatory institution that will provide alternative forms of information and a space for community, political and artistic events. Featuring new and used books, lending library, video library, meeting space and free high speed internet access. Open 12-9 everyday but Monday. 1630 Platte St. Denver. 303 433-5836 Breakdowncollective@hypocrisy.org

Civic Media Center – Harrisonburg Opens and then gets Shut Down!

Folks opened a media center and infoshop at 360 N. High St. in downtown Harrisonburgh, VA early this spring, operating Food Not Bombs, having shows, etc. We just got word that they were suddenly shut down April 26 by the city and their landlord on bogus grounds (alleged fire code violations, etc.). The shut down was without warning, and appeared to be politically motivated. They’re trying to find another space and re-open. Wish ‘em luck.

Solidarity Books opens in Indianapolis

860 Virginia Ave., Indianapolis, IN 46203-1705, 317-822-8004, solidaritybooks@ yahoo.com

Bookshop INFO and Kafé in Stockholm, Sweden

An Infoshop open everyday except Saturdays noon-8 p.m . Tjärhovsgatan 46, 116 28 Stockholm Sverige Tel +46 (0)8- 6445312. Metro: Medborgarplatsen

And here’s some more addresses we got for which we lack phone numbers, hours, or what, precisely, they do. If you’re in the area, check ‘em out. We hope we’ll have more information about them for next issue:

Stonewall Library

1717 North Andrews Ave.

Ft. Lauderdale, FL 33311

Durland Alternative Library

127 Anabel Taylor Hall

Ithaca, NY 14853

Alternative Reading Room

40 Wall St.

Asheville, NC 28801

Spaces that have shut down

We’ve been told that the following spaces have shut down since publication of the 2002 Slingshot Organizer. Let us know if you have information like this..

Liberation Collective, Portland, Oregon

Secret Sailor Books, Bloomington, IN

Hungry Head Books, Eugene, OR

Obituary: Beth O'Brian 1979-2002

Beth aka Horehound, aka Dumpster Leg falls to her death from tree-sit at Eagle Creek, Oregon

“It could have been me but instead it was you So I’ll keep doing the work you were doing as if I were two” — Holly Near

Our friend Beth O’Brien was killed at the Eagle Creek tree-sit in the Mount Hood National Forest in Oregon on April 12 2002. She fell 150 feet (50m) when she slipped while climbing a rope ladder between two platforms. She had just snowshoed in with supplies. We know that she was very excited to be there and her death in this tragic accident makes us very sad. She was 22 years old. The tree-sit had just, three days before, succeeded in saving the forest from logging, and activists were only waiting for signed documents canceling the timber sale before coming down.

She was from Santa Rosa, California where she started a local Food Not Bombs, worked with Earth First! and the Purple Berrets-against police brutality and she made many things happen with her energy. Recently she had moved to Oregon to work with the Cascadia Forest Defenders. In the Bay Area we remember her coming to events where she shared her indignation at protests and showed her love of life.

At her funeral in Santa Rosa her Father noted right-wing talk-show host Rush Limbaugh had called her a “Tree-sit suicide bomber” and said “If she was saving the trees why didn’t they save her”. This outraged him and he called for us to take action.

Cascade Forest Alliance noted “Years of community efforts, heralded by direct action, have protected the Eagle Creek area thus far. . . . Tree-sitting is a risk taken to protect our remaining native forest from destruction. It is a tragedy that such risks must be taken. While we recognize the dangers inherent in tree-sitting, we take safety seriously. Tree-sitters and tree-climbing trainers are taught the best safety available and constantly stress the importance of conveying safety protocols to others. This tragic accident results because communities must risk their lives to protect their land. We view Beth’s death in a tradition of courageous action to defend life that extends through decades of non-violent protest in the US and abroad.”

Obituary: Ooona Sofia Wieske and Emma Alyse Berger

On February 12, Oona and Emma, activists with Detroit’s anarchist Trumbullplex project, and their Trumbullplex housemates/friends, Jason and Jesse, were returning from an incredible journey to Hawaii, when a terrible automobile crash occurred only 10 minutes from Emma’s uncle’s house in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Emma and Oona died instantly. Jesse was seriously injured and is recovering quickly. Jason was able to walk away from the accident with bruises. We are so fortunate that Jesse and Jason survived the accident.

We at the Trumbullplex would like to attempt to share with you a few words regarding what it is Oona and Emma meant to us. Inside a poverty stricken Detroit, we call the Trumbullplex our home, three collectively owned houses and a community “theater” space. Together we try to live the revolution in our everyday lives. The loss of our two beloved friends is nothing less than losing family to us. Oona had lived in the collective for about three years. Emma’s trips to Detroit were always too short, though we got so much from them. And to our delight, Emma had recently decided to live with us. We are so grateful that she trusted us, loved us, and considered us her family.

In Hawaii, they had been staying in a tree house, hiking around volcanoes, swimming in bottomless pools, sleeping on beaches, and eating coconuts and passion fruit. The last conversations with Emma and Oona on the phone were so descriptive of the amazing experiences they were all having. Their friends and family are so grateful, knowing that they were in “paradise” having the time of their lives.

Words fail to express the deep loss everyone who knew Oona and Emma feel. In Emma’s brief life, she touched so many people, giving hope, a smile, or a hug to all she met. She was a traveler like a pirate, an organizer like a true anarchist/feminist, and an artist without any apologies.

Oona was a gardener, a cook, a geologist, a linguist, a prankster, an organizer, a Detroiter, an anarchist, an explorer, an adventurer, a pirate, a lover, and like Emma, our friend and so much more.

Oona’s and Emma’s personalities are indescribable, but we can definitely say they were incredibly passionate people. They both shared so many desires and dreams, inspiring all of us with their determination to make them come true. What they offered to our struggles here is irreplaceable.

We miss Oona and Emma so much, however, we recognize how incredibly grateful and privileged we are to have had their love and friendship. With their families and friends, we have had the most amazing memorials and parties to celebrate their lives. We should all aspire to live such inspiring and fulfilling lives as Oona and Emma. Us kids at the Trumbullplex live for revolutionary change through them everyday. Oona and Emma will always be alive in our hearts.

The loss of four amazing anarchist womyn already this year–Oona, Emma, Sera, and Beth (Horehound)– is a devastating blow to our communities, as it is to the world. We must keep their fires burning, and as best we can, make all of their dreams come true.

We at the Trumbullplex are forever grateful to all of the donations and support that we have received. We thank you all so much for your compassion. Donations can be made in Oona’s honor to PuppetART/the Detroit Puppet Theatre or to Detroit Waldorf School. Donations can be made in Emma’s honor to Prevent Child Abuse DE (PCAD), which will allow a coloring/activity book for children, that Emma designed, to be published.

4210 Trumbull Detroit MI, 48208

313.832.1845/79520

Obituary: Sera Bilezikyan 1978-2002

Activist, traveler, musician, and one of the best goddamned writers around, Sera lost the good fight on January 12, 2002 when she drove her truck over the Susquehanna River, turned around and traveled halfway across the southbound side, and leaped into the water. The lives of hundreds of people across the country were dimmed in the following weeks.

Friends tell of her passion for life, an energy and strength of emotion so strong that it also took the form of inner demons. As her friend Sascha puts it, “She struggled for justice and peace wherever she went, but she didn’t know how to treat herself justly or what it was like to be at peace within.”

In her last column in Slug and Lettuce, she wrote: “These days, I’ve been climbing a lot. Bridges, abandoned building, rusty iron structures which serve no obvious purpose except to jump from the past into the immediate. And I am not scared, looking at myself. If anything, I’ll recognize the real truth of who I am.”

And Sascha wrote: “It was obvious from the first time we hung out that Sera wasn’t afraid to feel really strong emotions and dream big dreams. Underneath all the tattoos and attitude, Sera was definitely insecure in a bunch of ways, constantly struggling with her sense of identity and feeling out of place in the world. But the flipside of her insecurity was that she had this brilliance which shined.”