After a year of frustration living with pandemic restrictions, the mood is ripe for uprisings in the streets, blossoming worker cooperatives, new community commons, and wild carnivalesque festivals dedicated to freedom, sustainability, and love. More than half a million people died needlessly from Covid in the US — powerfully demonstrating the failure of mainstream institutions to protect basic health and safety. The power structure only really cares about corporate power and greed. And Covid is only the tip of the iceberg — how much more of the American Dream can we take in the face of systemic racism, climate collapse and billionaires getting richer while millions face eviction?
For those who can get the vaccine, there is finally light at the end of the tunnel — although it is hard to feel too happy because the legacy of colonialism means the global South may not see relief for years.
Now is the time to organize what will come next — on a decentralized, non-hierarchical, basis in every city, every small town, every neighborhood and in each social scene. As society reopens, we don’t want to go back to normal since normal wasn’t working. Everyone’s exhausted by zoom, fear, distance learning, isolation, loneliness and lack of touch — all our collective pent-up energy is a powerful force. How sweet it will be to re-emerge to rebuild a world worth living in.
The system wants to set the agenda and trap us into a boring rat race for money, status and distraction. It can tolerate protest so long as they are limited to a cycle of reaction against the latest police shooting, oil spill or homeless camp raid.
So its crucial not to settle for crumbs when we need and deserve the whole pie. We need to say what we’re for. When we seize the initiative, frame the debate and pick the issue, we can win. Where the system focuses on competition, status, property, laws, technology, conformity and obedience, the world we’re struggling for is about treating each other with caring and kindness, living meaningful and pleasurable lives, and protecting the earth and each other from harm. Good values and humanistic goals and priorities are ultimately more powerful than laws and organizational structures.
Let’s organize fun, free stuff together — less gig work and more giggling. The pandemic has concentrated power in corporate and government hands — so a key value in the reawakening times is decentralization with communities making their own decisions. Did anyone else notice that the pandemic forced more plastic into the world with take-out food and lots of disposable stuff to avoid germs? What can we do to get rid of plastic altogether?
The pandemic also underlined how we’re small and vulnerable to natural forces — the takeaway is the need to respect the earth and defend it from the industrial machine. Our lives and health are fragile — it’s important to stay present with those around you and live in the moment. After so much isolation there’s a greater awareness right now of how much we all need each other — so let’s build alternative community institutions based on mutual aid, cooperation and sharing: housing collectives, underground venues, community gardens, artists’ warehouses, tool lending libraries, free stores, bike kitchens, health clinics. Some things people did during the pandemic like home baking, outdoor dining, DIY crafts, community sing-alongs, etc. are worth keeping and expanding.
Building back better is going to take creativity, bravery and moxie — and in particular your involvement and dreams. Revival – rejuvenation – renewal – recovery!
So many aspects of our lives ground to a halt last March as the first wave of covid swept the US. One thing that hasn’t slowed during the pandemic: industrial logging. Here in the Pacific Northwest, the timber industry spent 2020 logging full speed ahead, and folks across the bioregion have been busy resisting. Read on for spicy dispatches from the forested frontlines.
Lichen It Up Here
By a flying squirrel wearing a fanny pack
Comradely greetings from the temperate rainforest canopy on the coast of northern California! We’re Redwood Forest Defense, an affinity group of tree-climbin’ wingnuts who have been living aloft for the last year to prevent two groves from being clearcut by a billionaire-owned corporation.
Back in March of 2020, we were visiting a grove that treesitters had defended from 2012 to 2017, and we found fresh stumps and a chainsaw on the ground. We climbed the closest tree, stopped work, and we’ve been here ever since.
The forest that has become our home lies within the Indigenous village of Tsurai, on ancestral Yurok territory. This forest is second growth, a landscape developing toward maturity after being logged for the first time several decades ago. This is the next generation of old growth in the making – and it’s actually the rarest type of redwood forest. Of the 2 million acres of intact redwoods that were thriving on the north coast when settlers arrived, less than 5% is left, protected in parks. The vast remaining portion was either lost to development or is being managed, mostly by massive corporations, as monocropped tree farms.
Enter Green Diamond Resource Company, a “family business” and the fifth largest landowner in the US with over a million acres of forest under their management, mostly in the Pacific Northwest. Their plan for all “their” stolen land is short rotation clearcuts – returning to a given patch of forest every 45 years with heavy machinery to completely denude the landscape. In a mixed forest like this one, where several species of conifers and hardwoods commingle, Green Diamond’s practices involve cutting literally everything, including the less marketable species like alder and spruce, which are then burned in massive piles. Afterward, the area is replanted with a redwood monocrop and treated with herbicides to discourage competition. We wish we could say this is exceptional, but it’s actually the norm for industrial forestry here in the Pacific Northwest, and all over the world.
Of course, treesitting is nothing new in our area, and we are grateful to be surrounded by elder activists and the intact forests that they protected through direct action, litigation and advocacy. One of the paradoxes of forest policy in the state of California is that generations of forest advocates have put on the books some of the best environmental regulations in the country, but there is so little enforcement that corporate Big Timber is getting away with murder – both on private timberlands and in state and national forests. That’s the case here, where these forests provide habitat to creatures like the Pacific fisher and northern spotted owl who are headed for extinction because of industrial logging, and who the feds continually refuse to protect under the Endangered Species Act.
This is where direct action comes in. When all the public comments have been ignored, the lawsuits have failed, the politicians aren’t listening and the timber lobby is cackling with glee as the heavy machinery crunches over the forest floor, sometimes you gotta just get in the way. We’re now holding down two adjacent tree villages, protecting about 20 acres between them of the largest trees and best habitat in the immediate area.
In July and again in October, our defenses were put to the test when Green Diamond showed up to log. We responded by holding strong in the canopy and raising additional treesits to block road construction into the harvest units. Green Diamond was hands-off toward us, never calling the cops, and hiring half-assed security who didn’t prevent resupply, but they treated the forest with no such consideration. We grieved from on high for weeks as their heavy machinery flattened the landscape and the trucks hauled away what had been a living, breathing ecosystem. Witnessing the clearcuts is deeply saddening, but when I enter the treeline and know that the trees that still stand are there because of our presence, I am filled with purpose and gratitude.
Putting our bodies on the line can only protect a small area, but we are honored to be one of many thorns in the side of the global machinations that sacrifice forests for profit. Defending this place is a humanizing experience. Each ascent into the canopy is both a reminder of our smallness among giants and a reminder of our power to fight back against the cold logic of capitalism that threatens life on earth.
If you want to get involved, contact us. We host climb-trainings regularly and welcome local and faraway support and engagement in many forms, including but not limited to actually treesitting.
In late September forest defenders of the South Salish Sea region launched a blockade in the so-called “Capitol State Forest,” which is the traditional territory of the Chehalis, Quinault, and Nisqually people and is currently under the colonial management of the Washington State Department of Natural Resources (DNR). The forest that the blockade protected was part of the “Chameleon” timber sale. Chameleon was auctioned off by DNR to Murphy, a logging company with offices and mills in Washington and Oregon which has been gobbling up many of the large timber sales on DNR land in this region.
Any observant visitor to Capitol Forest can attest to the destruction done by nearly 200 years of colonial extraction, first under the ownership of private timber companies and now under state management. Many folks have stories of visiting their favorite foraging or hiking spot to find that the forest has been callously clearcut. Rather than accepting the state narrative that the forest is simply a ‘necessary’ sacrifice-zone to fund schools (and cops and prisons), or the mainstream environmentalist notion that second-growth is not worth protecting, forest defenders decided a chance for this late-successional Douglas fir forest to grow was worth fighting for.
Utilizing an infernal contraption likened by some observers to an umbilical cord, an antennae, or “that scene from Alien,” forest defenders blocked the main road into the unit with a car that was anchoring a tree-sit in a nearby 100+ year old Douglas-fir. The blockade was erected before further work on the road had begun in the hopes of preventing access into the forest for future logging. If anyone were to attempt to move or mess with the car blocking the road in any way, the tree-sitter in the nearby platform could have fallen and risked serious injury or death.
In the week that followed, the blockade was honored by the presence of Protectors of Salish Sea, Red Road Rising, and many other community members who were disturbed by the ongoing ecological devastation perpetuated by DNR. A ground camp meant to support an expansion of involvement along with the tree-sitter began to flourish. However, about a week into the blockade, the camp was raided without warning by four different agencies including Thurston County Sheriff’s Office, the Washington State Patrol, the State Fish and Game Department, and the Washington State Department of Natural Resources. The two forest defenders on the ground were briefly detained and then released and DNR cops brought in spotlights and a generator in preparation of an extended siege of the tree-sit.
In the final days of the blockade, DNR cops kept the tree-sit under 24/7 surveillance and prevented friends and supporters from delivering necessary supplies to the tree-sitter. Folks continued to show up and voice their support for the blockade as well as their disapproval of DNR’s ecocidal practices with almost-daily noise demos, prayers, and songs from a nearby road that could be heard from the tree-sit, led mostly by Red Road Rising and Protectors of the Salish Sea.
Wet and cold from the first big PNW autumn storm and deprived of the warm supplies DNR prevented them from receiving, the brave tree-sitter came down on October 11th and the blockade was subsequently removed. As of January, forest defenders learned that the forest where the blockade took place was in the process of being clearcut.
The grief of not being able to save the forest that folks had grown to love and call home for a couple weeks has been powerful, but the spirit of forest defense is as alive as ever in this upper-left pocket of Turtle Island as the DNR continues to sell off critical forest to the highest bidder, undermining the survival of future generations of forest dwellers, river critters, and all who reside in the spaces in-between, above, and below.
The blockade inspired a new group of forest defenders to continue taking action together, it provided an opportunity to form affinities and relationships with local Indigenous-led groups, and it has hopefully inspired others to take action to protect the places that they love, whether those places be pristine old-growth or second or even third growth forests that, given enough time and respect, could support complex, mature ecosystems.
The blockade is dead, long live the blockade!
To stay up-to-date and to get in touch: Instagram: @southsoundfd Email: worthmorestanding@protonmail.com
The Rainforest Flying Squad; A New War in The Woods
By Joshua Wright
After two long decades, the war in the woods is back on, and not a moment too soon. British Columbia is currently clear cutting old growth forests at a rate of over 150,000 hectares per year, and with less than 400,000 hectares of what is considered to be “large tree” old growth left, the timber beast is on track to annihilate the last of the region’s ancient forests in a matter of years. The government said that they would act and they lied. NGOs have been petitioning for decades and they have failed. The activist community has stood paralyzed. Until now.
The 5,150 acre Fairy Creek Rainforest on Pacheedaht Territory is the largest unprotected old growth forest on Southern Vancouver Island, containing the only intact watershed in the region outside of a park. In summer 2020, the Teal Jones Group submitted plans and contractors began road building into the headwaters of Fairy Creek.
I had been watching the region via a dystopian satellite imagery service that allowed me to get up-to-date images of Fairy Creek from my home in Washington State. I saw the road building, and a friend put me in touch with a group of activists, veterans from the war in the woods, and days later we set up a blockade. In response, the logging contractors removed their road-building equipment from the mountains around Fairy Creek, and days later we shut down another logging operation, then days after that another. Thus the Rainforest Flying Squad was born. For over six months, with the invitation of Pacheedaht Elder Bill Jones, we have been playing a game of cat and mouse with the industry, shutting down their road building, letting the company remove their equipment, following them, then shutting them down at the next place they try to destroy. What we want is simple: An end to all old growth logging immediately.
We currently hold down two blockades and a watch camp. We’ve prevented logging and road-building in over a dozen ancient forests, we’ve prevented the logging of Fairy Creek, and stopped road-building hundreds of feet before it reached an ancient yellow cedar tree estimated to be up to 2000 years old. Close to 1000 people have visited the blockades, and we have big expansion plans.
Once the snows in high-elevation old growth forests melt later this spring, we expect the industry to attempt one last free-for-all and seek to liquidate as many forests as they can before the government yields to our pressure. We will not let that happen. It’s time that British Columbia had its own Redwood Summer. A Cedar Summer during which we shut down all old growth logging on Vancouver Island and beyond, but to do that we need people. A lot of people. This summer will be our last chance to save the last fraction of our ancient forests, forests so magnificent that they seem unreal, forests that store more carbon than any other ecosystem in the world, forests with more biodiversity than any other ecosystem on earth. This is our last chance; clear your summer schedules and find a ride to Port Renfrew BC, you’ll find us there.
Contact; @fairycreekblockade on Instagram and Facebook Email: rain4estflyingsquad@gmail.com
~~~~~
What will 2021 bring for PNW forest defense? You can bet that Big Timber is gonna keep trying to destroy the world’s forests and climate, but all up and down the Pacific Coast, affinity groups are organizing, monitoring timberlands, and sharing skills. The above mentioned campaigns are still active, depending on when you pick up Slingshot. More of the same is brewing elsewhere. Here’s what we know of:
The current iteration of longtime Eugene group Cascadia Forest Defenders is gearing up to fight post-fire logging this year after another record breaking fire season. Climb trainings and events are being held regularly.
Instagram: @treesittersunion Email: treesittersunion1312@protonmail.com The Blue Mountains Biodiversity Project monitors and surveys national forests in eastern Oregon and, with data collected by volunteers every summer, is able to effectively challenge timber sales in that region. Survey with them! bluemountainsbiodiversityproject.org
A shout-out is due for the nonprofits who are working through legal realms to protect these same places. These fine folks spent the last four years suing the shit out of the Trump administration as the feds attempted to gut environmental protections, but they aren’t placated by typical lib greenwashing. As masked, peanut butter eating woods rascals, we value and respect their paperwrenching. Much love to the Environmental Protection Information Center, Cascadia Wildlands, and The Center for Biological Diversity.
These suggestions from the National Lawyers Guild “Know Your Rights” guide summarize the rules to which the police are theoretically subject. However be careful: the police, the courts, and the government can and do manipulate and ignore these rules. Police often retaliate against people for exercising their rights. These tips may help you later on in court, and sometimes they won’t. It’s best to know your rights so you can decide when to assert them, even though the state can’t be counted on to follow its own laws. Always use your best judgment — if you aren’t doing anything wrong, there may be no reason to be excessively paranoid or escalate a potentially innocent and brief encounter with a police officer. The point is to avoid giving information.
Providing this information isn’t intended to scare you into inactivity or make you paranoid. Even in the current context, the vast majority of radical projects proceed with no interference from the police. The police hassle and arrest people because they hope that such repression will frighten the population into submission. We can take reasonable precautions while continuing the fight for liberation.
Never Talk to the Police
Anything you say to an FBI agent or cop can and will be used against you and other people — even if the questions seem routine or harmless. You don’t have to talk to FBI agents, police or investigators on the street, if you’ve been arrested, or if you’re in jail. (Exceptions: Your name, date of birth and address are known as “Booking questions” which are not included in your right to remain silent. In some states you can get an additional minor charge for refusing to identify yourself after a police stop based on reasonable suspicion). Only a judge has the authority to order you to answer questions. Many activists have refused to answer questions, even when ordered by a judge or grand jury, and subsequently served jail time to avoid implicating others. It is common for the FBI to threaten to serve you with a grand jury subpoena unless you talk to them. Don’t be intimidated. This is frequently an empty threat, and if they are going to subpoena you, they will do so anyway. If you do receive a subpoena, call a lawyer right away. Once you’ve been stopped or arrested, don’t try to engage cops in a dialogue or respond to accusations. If you are nervous about simply refusing to talk, you may find it easier to tell them to contact your lawyer. Once a lawyer is involved, the police sometimes back off. Even if you have already answered some questions, you can refuse to answer other questions until you have a lawyer. Don’t lie to the police or give a false name— lying to the police is a crime. However, the police are allowed to lie to you, in fact they are trained to — don’t believe what they say. If you’ve been arrested, don’t talk about anything sensitive in police cars, jail cells or to other inmates — you are probably being recorded.
What To Do About Police Harassment On The Street
If the police stop you on the street, ask, “Am I free to go?” If yes, walk away. If not, you are being detained but this does not necessarily mean you will be arrested. Ask, “Can you explain why you are detaining me?” To detain you, cops must have specific reasons to suspect you have committed or about to commit a crime. Police are entitled to pat you down during a detention. If the police try to further search you, your car, or your home, say repeatedly that you do not consent to the search, but do not physically resist.
What To Do If Police Stop You In Your Car
If you are stopped while driving a car, you must show police your license, registration and proof of insurance, but you do not have to consent to a search or answer questions. Keep your hands where the police can see them and refuse to consent (agree) to a search. Police may separate passengers and drivers from each other to question them, but no one has to answer any questions.
No matter your age or documentation status you have constitutional rights: right to remain silent, right to a lawyer, and protection against unreasonable search and seizure.
Common Sense Activist Security Measures
Don’t speculate on or circulate rumors about protest actions or potentially illegal acts. Assume you are under surveillance if you are organizing mass direct action, anything illegal, or even legal stuff. Resist police disruption tactics by checking out the authenticity of any potentially disturbing letter, rumor, phone call, or other form of communication before acting on it. Ask the supposed source if she or he is responsible. Deal openly and honestly with the differences in our movements (race, gender, class, age religion, sexual orientation, etc.) before the police can exploit them. Don’t try to expose a suspected agent or informer without solid proof. Purges based on mere suspicion only help the police create distrust and paranoia. It generally works better to criticize what a disruptive person says and does without speculating as to why.
People who brag about illegal activities, make reckless proposals, or ask for unnecessary information about underground groups may be undercover police but even if they are not, they should be treated with extreme caution. The police may send infiltrators/provocateurs posing as activists to entrap people on conspiracy charges of planning illegal acts. You can be guilty of conspiracy just for agreeing with one other person to commit a crime even if you never go through with it — all that is required is an agreement to do something illegal and a single “overt act” in furtherance of the agreement, which can be a legal act like going to a store. It is reasonable to be suspicious of people in the scene who pressure us, manipulate us, offer to give us money or weapons, or make us feel like we aren’t cool if we don’t feel comfortable with a particular tactic, no matter why they do these things. Responsible activists considering risky actions will want to respect other people’s boundaries and limits and won’t want to pressure you into doing things you’re not ready for. Doing so is coercive and disrespectful — hardly a good basis on which to build a new society or an effective action.
Keep in mind that activists who spend all their time worrying about security measures and police surveillance will end up totally isolated and ineffective because they won’t be able to welcome new folks who want to join the struggle. We have to be aware of the possibility of police surveillance while maintaining our commitment to acting openly and publicly. The changes we seek will require mass movements as well as secretive covert actions by a small groups of your trusted friends.
For more info contact the National Lawyers Guild: 415 285-5067 or 212 679-5100; read The War at Home by Brian Glick or Agents of Repression by Ward Churchill
These are publications that came to Long Haul Info Shop. It’s amazing that they are still cracking away in this age of extinction. They are kinda hard to read since Covid-19 and the 2020 Elections not only take up most of the air space around town but the pages of these works.
Most of these papers could use your eyes and mind or they might disappear. We also received new issues of Fifth Estate, The Lavender Menace, Razor Cake, The Match, Earth Island Journal and the Rebel Worker. We just got them at deadline and think they are all worth hunting down.
Anarcho-Syndaclist Review
#80 Summer 2020 $5.00
PO Box 42531, Philadelphia PA. 19101
This long running periodical prints 3 times a year. They seems to use their time between editions to write savvy articles about current events as well as having a deep understanding of the historical precedent of anarchism. This issue not only looks at how Covid intersects with radicals but also topics exploring issues effecting Chile, South Africa, the Press and the ever dreaded 2020 elections. There is a fair amount of things that would interest a progressive activist with articles showing a deep concern over issues like labor, poverty, war and police abuse. The approach here is bookish and has a sharp conviction of their brand of radicalism. The pages are dense with words and what graphics you find hardly appear larger than your thumb. This alone could scare most frivolous journeys into this offset-printed magazine. To further induce yawning the piece on Covid by Ian MacKay almost delves into academic-speak. This issue has a 3 part series dissecting how Marxist scholars misinterpret Proudhon’s view of the Paris Commune. There is very little to get the impression that the writers occupies a street and talks to strangers (but then again most of us are lacking in that area). Kropotkin seems a very real person to the point that the people today walking around ready to change the world will be held back by this old way of thinking.
I almost want to get a subscription. (egg)
Change Links
September 2020
$20 for 1 year subscription
PO Box 34236, L.A. CA 90034-0236
A newspaper for hardcore progressives in the Los Angeles area. Regular features include write-ups of local concerns like abusive police, a community calendar that covers the gambit of activist concerns and a regular column from Mumia. This issue warns of a group of astroturf activists attempting to change the Pacifica radio network for the worse. And in other bad news the Peace Center where this paper and many activists groups operate out of is in danger of being sold. It seems that the minute founder Aris Anagnos died his son is attempting to dissolve the board and destroy this vital organizing space. You are cordially invited to intervene. (egg)
The Gainesville Iguana
September 2020 $15 for 1 year subscription
PO Box 14712, Gainesville FL 32604
I read this during a stultifying heatwave–which is a good setting to regard this Northern Floridian activist newspaper. It’s long running and consistent voice makes the factoids reliable. It’s a bit mainstream for me. I understand the norm for that region is that its full of reactionary (right wing) people so they are taking a chance putting themselves out there. Still, for my tastes the September issue has too much election items compelling the reader to run to the embrace of the Democrat party.
Thankfully there are other issues covered; news of the local university being challenged about using prison labor, a local river about to be given to Coca Cola to sell as bottled water and a farewell note written by Congressman John Lewis. There’s a directory of activist groups in the area and even a wrap-up of news items worthy of attention but couldn’t make print due to space limitations.
There’s a piece on a local school that was named for a confederate soldier and a lyncher now being renamed to celebrate an Africa American woman physicist…who worked on the atomic bomb in WW2. They don’t expound much on the harm that invention has brought to humans and the living planet. At least her bio is fleshed out. The same is done for a couple of local activists given obituaries. But more impressive I found out Scott Camille is alive by reading about an award he just got. He was a soldier that occupied Vietnam. When he came home he helped organized the Winter Soldier forums where soldiers gave public testimony about war crimes the US military enacted. He then helped to create the VVAW (Vietnam Veterans Against the War) where they held a rally outside the gates of the White House. There they called the president a “mother fucker”, denounced the military and threw their war medals over the police barricade. This should be a weekly protest in the modern age — that simple act will make the orange man flee to the panic room.
Worth reading to fight the power (egg)
POZ
September 2020 $3.99
subscriptions@poz.com
A solid production that means life and death for its readers. This is a glossy magazine with some fancy layouts and graphics. At times the ads almost take over having the energy and verve you’d see in the mainstream press. Quite a few news items and reporting on AIDS medicine will would require special attention for the uninformed. This issue pays tribute to the passing of Larry Kramer — who not only impacted the world and the Gay community, but made a special impression on the crew making POZ. Many facets of his life are given space. Who knows, that old person irrationally yelling at the meeting may have a long list of cool things they were involved with.
Covid is a prominent topic given that this community learned how to survive the pandemic of AIDS. This monthly publication mixing science and medicine with the spirit to take on city hall and the federal government makes for some smart activists. POZ gives a good example of collective action being utilized to solve an untenable situation. (egg)
The Dispatcher
July/August 2020 Subscription $10
1188 Franklin St. S.F. CA 94109
Get a load of that name, Dispatcher harkens back to the age of publications using zippy titles. Besides you know what (see intro) this issue looks back and deep at the 1934 General Strike in San Francisco CA. The events of Bloody Thursday swayed the general public to support the demands of dock workers. This made the present day Longshore Union (ILWU) who have unceasingly supported radical causes. Shit no one touches like shutting the ports in solidarity for jailed Black political prisoner Mumia Abul Jamal, as well as in protest of the US invasion of Iraq. Everything in here relates to ILWU and their allies. This issue features a full page tribute to John Lewis and looks at his lifelong work expanding Civil Rights. This issue also has a call to support the dock workers of the Pacific Northwest who are in conflict with grain companies who hope to break their agreements. These companies even started a lawsuit the week of X-mas demanding protesting workers pay up to $250,000. This article is pretty ripe with traditional union jargon which isn’t the case for the other pieces. Duller fare does makes up a portion of the read — small news items like someone retiring or a zoom conference reminds me of a college newspaper. Dispatcher is a newsletter in newspaper format. They have enough money to sport full color designs on each page. That and the use of open space makes the world of a labor union seem wealthy and welcoming. There’s a section that wraps up this issue called “Transitions.” Man, what is it about activist papers and their army of the dead? (egg)
Cometbus #59 Post-Mortem $5
PO Box 1318 Cooper Station, NY NY 10276
You can glume from the title that the theme of this issue alludes to the ever popular sense that we entered the end times (yet published before Covid). But don’t despair, when you see the parade of weirdos and their projects you’ll be in safe harbor. You will get a taste of the hustles that they divine to keep their head above water as they make use of their short time here to create a new world.
This issue opens with people who made independent record labels and bands, which is a given considering this zine’s pedigree coming from the 1980’s punk scene. This then takes it a step farther featuring people who created movements like Riot Grrrl, people who opened book stores like Bound Together Books or performance and community spaces like Intrepid. Comic Publishers like Fantagraphics. Squats. Radical Archives. Vegan donuts. Skateboard Mags. There’s a real sense that making a counter cultural institution is normal and necessary. Special attention is paid to the humans who make organizations and how they’re flawed and mortal. Many questions are poised including the hard fact that our people get old, sick and die while keeping the doors open.
This is in zine format with large clear type to relax your eyes after looking at a screen for 7 hours. It makes for brisk reading. The 23 chapters are fairly short so that its easy to read while waiting for public transit or to sneak a peek while at work. It’s also a joy to read. Ordinary info is given flourishes often one sees in creative writing classes but here the word play is adept. Also unusual is that in this age of internet searches the main body of info is extracted from conversations Aaron had. These interviews span a wide range of people from 1960’s radicals to Occupy Wall street radicals. The whole thing is designed for impact….and to nudge readers to look at things in a deep way. (egg)
Search for Weird / V. Vale Bio-Comic #0$10
www.krustywheatfield.com
www.researchpubs.com
Artist Krusty Wheatfield transcribes talks with independent publisher V. Vale. The art is mostly minimalistic (even sloppy) while the life story has a grandness. Who knew that young Vale lived in an adopted family who were Black? Who knew that he got a $100 check from Allen Ginsberg and that set the motion for him to start printing the punk newspaper Search & Destroy? Krusty goes kinda deep with the details of Vale’s life in a tone that is humorous and generally delightful. This is the first of many comics on Vale to come. Good if you want to peek behind the scenes of a counter culture and get quirky personal anecdotes. Better than the internet. (egg)
Decibel
September 2020
$6 or $30 for 1 Year Subscription
This monthly glossy magazine covers the vast and diverse world music related to Metal and Hardcore Punk. World wide in scope. This issue talks to people making shit in Canada, Sweden, Idaho, Portland and Oakland. This issue has a lot of content that’s very much aware and supportive of the Black Lives Matter uprising since George Floyd’s lynching. In general this publication sides with enlighten people (woke?)–though there is a tirade/editorial this issue about a co-worker that smells of sexism. Thankfully this publication distances itself with right wing ideology. Interesting since there’s a large segment of this music scene that relishes in being mean and stupid.
Decibel also gives space to makers of craft beer this time featuring Black owned businesses. A fascinating regular feature is an interview with a mother of a gigging heavy metal-er. The personalities you get go beyond the generic images of long hair growling men though they do get a lion share of the stage here. Decibel covers a wide range of expression under the banner of loud, heavy and fast music. Even if you don’t understand the sound these people are making its written about in a way that compels the imagination. If you look at it all as a facet of a cutting edge artist movement you might get what the noise is about. You might actually see people creating a different reality than the sterile strip mall that’s eating the planet. (egg)
Baited Area #1 $10(WHYYYY!)
www.baited-area.com
You leave the party away from the popular crowd who are upwardly mobile and carefree. Just on the threshold are people making shit, commenting on reality. Armed with surrealism and hacked technology. This publication is composed of short (but in-depth) talks with these people. They are friends so there’s warmth and follow through with what’s said. The concepts are given room to breathe. People making comics, noise music, performance art, bad movies. People who read books and drop acid. There’s also a thoughtful essay on vasectomies that explores the reactionary response normies give to the act of disabling your reproductive abilities (see also Slingshot #414 ). But it adds another room to the idea—sex without the possibility of children enhances the pleasure of sex. Cut your nuts with this paper. (egg)
Warning: Most likely you’ll need a magnifying glass.
Fluke #18 $4
PO Box 1547, Phoenix AZ 85001
Fluke No. 18 has a little bit of everything for everyone. From skater culture to hobo graffiti to punk shows – all cracks of alternative arts and culture were reached with this edition.
One of the most prominent pieces was an interview with Susan A. Phillips, doctor in anthropology and researcher of “gangs, graffiti, and the US prison system since 1990.” Her interview tapped into various graffiti scenes throughout the U.S. Phillips speaks on early taggers like hobo artist A-No.1 and rail rider buZ blurr. She comments on the social aspect of graffiti and its position as a medium to give the silenced a voice. Overall, a very interesting interview with great takes.
A connecting link in this edition was artist buZ blurr. buZ is not only not only mentioned by Susan Phillips, but also in an interview with lead singer of The Dicks/Sister Double Happiness Gary Floyd. Gary’s interview shifted into its own thing too shedding light on his experience as a gay punk in Austin, Texas and opening for Nirvana.
buZ, himself, wrote a short piece and created some art about his friend, filmmaker Bill Daniel. Bill had his own interview with Fluke and spoke about zines, the everlasting influence of Cometbus, and how he began looking at hobo graffiti. The way the zine is laid out gives it a very fluid feel. The various interviews that mention buZ definitely gives this edition a “small world” impression and offers a rad perspective into how community is created in alternative spaces.
I think one of the coolest aspects of this edition are the various anecdotes spread throughout it. One of my favorites was “Affle House 1999” written by Fluke author/curator Matthew Thompson. The anecdotes do a great job of pulling at the strings of nostalgia. Sick photos, like some from photographer Sergej Vutuc, work with the anecdotes and transport the reader inside these intimate settings – giving them a chance to look around and stay for a while.
Overall, this was a very enjoyable edition. It is filled with more amazing art and stories than I could review here. It is a great pick-me-up for anyone who misses the sense of community and friendship during these tumultuous times – or equally for those who are looking for inspiration to start off their hobo graffiti adventure. (Alexis)
Radical DIY events spaces, libraries and zine shops are doing what they can to provide community and alternative resources as the pandemic drags on. If there is one near you, please give generously since rent is still due and a lot of income has dried up. Here are some additions to the 2021 Slingshot Organizer, as well as some corrections. An updated on-line contact list is at slingshotcollective.org/radical-contact-list/
What’s Left Records – Colorado Springs, CO
An underground/DIY oriented record store w/ zines and events. 829 N Circle Colorado Springs, CO 80909 719-203-5826
Bookspace – Columbus OH
A mobile and on-line radical bookseller Bookspace that sells books and zines at flea markets, poetry readings, and other events in Columbus. They are trying to get a space to host events. bookspacecolumbus.com
1418 Fulton Daily Market – Fresno, CA
A PoC owned community centered bookshop that hosts printing and zine-making workshops, book releases, bike club meet-ups and photo walks. 1418 Fulton St Fresno, CA 93721 559-697-3044 1418fulton.com
A European Tour
Following are a number of spaces in France and one in Switzerland sent in by our friend Giz in Marseille:
+ Mille babords 61, rue consolat – 13001 Marseille, France
+ Manifesten 59 rue Thiers – 13001 Marseille
+ La Salle Gueule – 8, rue d’Italie – 13006 Marseille, France
+ L’élégante – 8, rue du petit Goye – 63600 Ambert, France
+ L’étoile noire – 5, rue saint jean – 02000 Laon, France
+ La rétive – 42, rue du faubourg d’Auvergne – 30100 Alès, France
+ La Lezarde at the 66 grand rue – 30270 Saint Jean du Gard, France
+ Espace Autogéré Rue du docteur César-Roux, 30 1005 Lausanne Switzerland
Corrections to 2021 Slingshot Organizer
• Bluestockings Books in New York closed. The project is going to restart at 116 Suffolk Street soon.
• Blackbird in Chico, CA has closed.
• Peace Iowa lost its space – pocket only.
• We forgot to include Goodness Tea at 261043 Hwy 101 Unit 3 Sequim, WA 98382 360-670-1041.
• Issues in Oakland closed largely due to the pandemic. They were not on the radical contact list, but they sold the organizer for years and were friends. They paid their bill in full even though they had to close the shop, which isn’t the way it often goes.
• Just Books / Réalta Civic and Social Space in Northern Ireland is closed.
• Infocentrum Salé in Prague, Czech Republic has closed.
• Avtonomna Tovarna Rog at Trubarjeva cesta 72, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia changed its name from Socialni Center Rog.
“MUTUAL AID IS NOT CHARITY! IT IS AN ATTACK!” • unknown
Mutual aid is a long tradition of reciprocity and camaraderieship, both materially and interpersonally. When people work together, identifying our needs and thinking of creative ways to fulfill them for one another, we break apart false ideas that we are separated from each other. By way of mutual aid, we grow roots for reconnection enriched by the soil–our visions of thriving communities–and readily plant seeds for the possibility of our collective future. Since pandemic, several Bay Area mutual aid efforts have gone underway in response to compounded challenges. Some have also transformed to implement new safety precautions, but also because this time has given us a hard poke to examine systems that do not work (and never have). There’s a collective mourning, a collective reassessment of things; many of us (even gasp! those outside of political circles) have been given this moment to reflect upon our relationships–with ourselves, with each other, and to the current economic system we try to survive in. For some, shifts in awareness around the pandemic are felt much differently. When I (droohlz) was doing a food drop-off at an encampment in Oakland, one of the residents said they didn’t even know there was a pandemic going on until one or two months after the shelter-in-place order began. However, can we think of a time in which such far-reaching interruption of everyday life has happened? Despite the opportune moment for collectivity, there’s also been an increased risk to fall into hella apathetic headspaces, hopelessness, and despair, for those of us aware of how shit just seems to get worse even more so…especially as we struggle with isolation. I see it as like, yeah, we’re extremely fucked right now in ways we haven’t been in the past. But since we’ve been put in this situation where we’ve been forced to rethink things, what possibilities are there for mutual aid in this moment and what do they hold for the future? By thinking in this realm, can we maybe hit pause of the normal flow of hopelessness and fear? In terms of food security, many current mutual aid projects addressing these issues actually didn’t stem from the pandemic, since they have been deeply entrenched within communities for as long as they have existed. But some are choosing to see now that they have some degree of autonomy to gather people and resources together, and in doing so, expanding our networks to each other. The food redistribution groups mentioned below are making a mockery of overconsumption and what is considered “work” (the the capitalist system) by recapturing food “waste” and in turn feeding people delicious, healthy food. They do this through a decentralized power model (with everyone participating as they can), helping build a different foundation of basic health for houseless communities. In return, new systems of care and love begin to form from within, and communities can begin to change. …I (rachelle) grew up in Fremont, CA. The wealthy bedroom city full of townhouses and Silicon Valley types city treats houselessness like a big blister on its face, and does anything it can to brush unhoused folks under the proverbial rug. While there is a lack of allocated resources for the unhoused in Fremont, money is spent on cops and homeless sweeps in the name of development. Seeing my friends and a mutual aid organization rise to try and meet the (usually apolitical) town’s needs gave me an unbelievable hope for the future.
Renegade Feedings is a grassroots group which distributes food and supplies to unhoused people in Fremont, CA while working to connect them with greater resources outside of Renegade’s abilities. Since 2019, founders Paul Webster and Justin Valenzuela coordinate all the volunteers making shit happen. P: “Instead of serving food at a fixed location, they go into encampments to pass out food and develop relationships with the people living there. We get to know these people and build deeper connections within our community. It’s hard to really help someone when you’re just passing out food and leaving…we try to listen to people and hear what they’re saying–to learn what they really need. With that, we connect them with resources and through those resources, they can get the help they want. Our usual situation is when we see someone on the street, we stop and ask if we can help out.” Renegade visits two to four major encampments in Fremont regularly, but most of their distro is to less formal arrangements. They use 4-5 groups of volunteers to drive to specific areas in Fremont, and if they see someone (even just one person) camping out, they go up and ask if they need any resources and then take it from there. The food Renegade distributes varies, depending on where they source it from. During the pandemic, they’ve joined forces with another local mutual aid group called Meals to Heal. J: “I saw Meals to Heal was on Nextdoor, so I reached out and asked if they wanted to collaborate on feedings during COVID. They were like, ’Bet.’ We’ve been doing that for a steady amount of time. They actually have stopped doing their own feeding program while trying to establish a community kitchen.” Renegade also sources hot meals from local restaurants, and ready-to-eat (but close to expiration) foods from Tri City food banks. The meals are ready and prepackaged, and volunteers create kits with supplies and snacks. When Renegade Feedings first started, it was just a thing to do with friends once a month. But later on, they realized that they could build a network in which everyone could be involved. J: “It’s really all about community. We’re really asking: ‘How can we truly build a community where, if someone needs help, we can provide that help?’ We’re fighting this parasitic, individualistic, capitalistic society where we try to take-take-take and do everything ourselves. Everyone’s different, but we can all collaborate..and together we can make better decisions….
Food Not Bombs East Bay is an all volunteer-run organization established in 1991 which cooks anywhere from 60-100 hot meals six days a week, and serves at People’s Park. The Park feedings have sadly seen a decline in people showing up, so FNB recently started distributing the excess hot food out to Oakland encampments. Silver Zahn works in multiple food justice organizations throughout the East Bay. Silver: “When the pandemic hit, I had just started volunteering with EBFNB. Most of their volunteers are older folks who are immuno-compromised; luckily I’m very able bodied, so I needed to step in because these people couldn’t show up.” In the kitchen, normally all are welcome, but now we have to deal with logistics of limiting the number of volunteers we can have working at one time. Problems have popped up, since a lot of people want to volunteer but can’t commit to a regular schedule…organizing random volunteers around a schedule has been messy. Right now, we want concrete people who can show up for specific times on specific days”.
Throughout the pandemic, FNB EB has also been doing their regular distribution of prepackaged foods to encampments throughout Oakland and Berkeley. How this usually works is that volunteers pick up refrigerated packaged foods a few days from their posted expiration date from a national distributor in Oakland. The volunteers then load up their bike carts (or car) and ride around, looking for new and familiar faces to offer food to. Sometimes, water in reusable bottles is distributed, and when the pandemic started, they were even distributing donated hand sanitizer bottles from the students at UC Berkeley.
Food Not Bombs in Arcata, CA, been occurring for over 30 years now. The origins of the group are mysterious, seeing as it has been picked up and passed around by different community homes and groups over the years. It shape-shifts the way most things do in this town, due to its constant fluctuations of being a travelling hub. At this time, the Bayside Community Hall is hosting us alongside Humboldt Mutual Aid efforts. They reached out to us when the pandemic hit, incidentally in perfect timing. The community house we were cooking out of had asked us to stop cooking there since they have an elder and a newborn living in their home. The transition was seamless and worked out fantastically. Our operations have changed a lot since the days of bike carts and the huge plaza demonstrations that people associate with our chapter. We have had to switch to distributing food in compostable to-go containers, because before the pandemic we used communal dishes and a wash station at our servings. Using these containers has raised our expenses. Luckily, we were given a grant by a local organization to supplement our funds for the next year as we adapt to the changes brought on by the pandemic. There have been some struggles with conflicting opinions regarding the extent of safety protocols being put in place as food distributors between individuals and collectives in our area. We are adapting and growing through a shared motivation and interest for restoring food waste and being a presence advocating for non-violent direct actions.”
Our friend Silver also helps out with the North Oakland Restorative Justice Council, which put together a distribution project in response to the pandemic. The reason the distro is on a three-week cycle is that the donations need to sit for two weeks to “quarantine.” As a collaboration with and for the community, they get specific donations from the community and make up to 500 “packages” with hot meals, hygiene products, groceries, batteries, tents, and other personal items on request that people need. They then spend all day driving around to encampments and delivering the kits.
Food Not Bombs volunteers rách and Dara mask up and prepare to distribute food to encampments in the Lower Bottoms, West Oakland, CA. Credit: ANKA
In the face of crumbling infrastructure and climate crisis, in addition to redistribution, it is more important now than ever to cut our dependence on the corporate food supply and be able to sustainably grow and provide our own communities with the healthy food we need. Urban farms and guerilla gardens are making this possible within our cities. Leah Van Winkle told us that at the Gill Tract Community Farm in Albany, CA, the Gill Tract Farm Coalition has been working toward food/land access and food sovereignty in the East Bay for nearly a decade. With several partnering groups, including Sogorea Te Land Trust, Black Earth Farms, and the Gill Tract Herb Collective, they’ve been growing food and herbs and distributing them for free to the community from the all-volunteer run farm. Leah: “When COVID hit, our work continued and new opportunities to feed the community came our way. Working with local organization Fresh Approach, we’ve received some funding from the USDA Farmers to Families Foodbox program to source local, organic produce from farmers around the greater Bay Area. We are primarily working with Latinx farmers in Salinas, CA, who have lost virtually all other markets for their produce. We then pack 1000 CSA-style produce boxes each week, that we are then able to freely distribute to the local community!” With 10+ distribution partners, they are reaching folks all over the Bay – primarily those of marginalized identity living under the poverty level. They’ve heard countless testimonies that these boxes are providing the cleanest, freshest food a lot of these families have ever had access to, greatly furthering the mission of food access for all!
As you have read, groups have still been figuring out how to support the most impacted communities differently from a charity model, making moves towards mutual aid. While they are autonomously organized and for the most part not funded by anyone in particular (in fact, pretty much every week are scrambling for resources), true mutual aid requires both parties to collaborate and exchange. Members of these groups share a common vision for a liberated future, one in which they don’t have to exist because everyone is able to meet each other’s needs in community. However, it is yet to be stated how the recipients of the aid are in turn participating in some kind of reciprocal process with the volunteers, materially and politically. This is definitely a way in which mutual-aid-intending groups need to grapple with their approach in a way that is revolutionary and dismantling these systems that choke us, leaving us on ontologically separate ends. If you’ve ever done food distribution, you’ll see how much work it is, how frustrating it can be because it’s never enough, but it can still be a break from the everyday monotonous way of accepting the conditions we live in. You’re agreeing that shit is fucked up and the worst thing to be is immobile. As both of us continue to work in food distribution, we are also looking for ways to actually build relationships across communities, to get to work on bringing some shit down. As we thwart attempts at mass pacification by getting up to do something, what is actually our purpose and how are we getting there? Because true mutual aid allows for us to envision what we will grow, and practice doing it, building upon intra-communal resilience…once we have prepared the soil.
Do you see a need? Maybe you should try to fulfill it! Consider plugging into already forming groups, rely on the communities for networks, or start a group yourself to make safe and healthy food accessible in your area. Please feel free to email Slingshot and give us updates about what cool stuff you are doing in your town 🙂
The flip-side of the tribalism taking over America is a force sorely lacking on the left: the notion of community. If people can be driven to endanger their own health in support of a thinly-veiled con man, what might they do in support of a movement for self-actualization, freedom, & justice, and why aren’t they?
Among 45’s most ardent supporters are evangelicals. These are people who gather in community at least once a week. They look to their church for support and save their pennies to give back to that community. The community is stronger than rationality or rule of law. To wit, one of the first claims of sociology is that the rule of law of one’s community has a stronger pull than the wider laws of society (anomie).
Look to moments when the left has won significant battles. The Civil Rights movement was also born in churches. The Black Panthers grew out of community members providing mutual aid through programs like school lunches. Unions are a powerful force in part because workers, in spending day after day together, can easily form communities. The hard work of forming a union is the strengthening of community to the degree that workers feel they can trust one another to keep the organizing of a union secret.
Other movements that have grown quickly are built of autonomous zones, like Occupy. People sharing food, shelter, childcare and medical supplies quickly develop community bonds.
Now let’s assess where the left is at today. To those who want to fight climate change, how many are part of a community that meets weekly to work on this issue? Indeed the most successful group that has brought attention to the climate crisis are the student walk outs. Consider that students are inherently powerless. Their only power is in their pre-existing community.
I’ve been involved in countless lefty movements, most of them ineffective. I recall an Indymedia group I volunteered for in the nineties that was driven by one determined and amazing single mom. Despite her efforts, the group had only a handful of volunteers. I suggested they start having socials to bring in new people. But no, they said, these are not the kind of half-assed recruits they wanted. Stopping corporate oligarchy isn’t supposed to be fun, they argued. You do it because you have to. Because it’s necessary. Activism becomes a form of self-sacrifice. As it turns out, self-sacrifice isn’t popular.
Compare this to a friend who explained why she still attends church even though at heart she doesn’t believe in God. She explained: she has friends there. They sing songs together. Being a part of the church makes her feel good. I wonder, is the church weakened by her lack of belief? Or is it stronger because of the size of their community?
Long before cancel culture was a term, the left has been overly careful of purifying our ranks to only the most devoted. Casual participants who are more interested in making friends and breaking bread are deemed unworthy and do not belong.
This point of view fails to recognize that devotion is only fostered through participation. Few people will take the time to read the pamphlets and learn the issues without the pull of community. So folks find their community elsewhere. There’s more community in a casual Dungeons & Dragons group than in many activists organizing for change in their own neighborhoods! You will find that the organizers that last are the ones engendering community.
If you have found that you joined a rally or attended a political meeting because you should, not because you wanted to, you intuitively feel the heart of the problem. Years ago, I lived in a temporary autonomous zone formed to protest the poor monitoring of the sweatshops for my university’s apparel. I remember being surprised how much I enjoyed doing tedious work like dishes and cleaning up. It felt like all labor was important, because all of it was necessary to achieve change. It was frustrating at times, and celebratory too. In community we build toward something together and that sparks an excitement for all that must be done. Perhaps there must be sacrifice for us to reach our goals. But it can’t only be sacrifice. The surest way to get people excited to show up is to create a space that fuses those goals with a commitment to building bonds between members.
A lot of people like to joke that Gil Scot-Heron was wrong when he sang that the “The Revolution Will not be Televised,” but they leave out the second half of the line, “the revolution will be live.” If people don’t come together to build the thing, the revolution won’t happen in the first place.
“You’ll not be able to stay home brother. You’ll not be able to plug in, turn on and cop out…”
Through the connective power of the Internet, these words are more prescient than he could have imagined. Many of us care deeply about the issues that plague society, but that caring happens in isolation. You will not be able to participate by blacking out your Facebook avatar or posting a story on insta-Twitter. Those things do help with advocacy, but in the face of mask-off fascism, advocacy is no longer what is needed. You will not be able to Instagram your way to the revolution, brother, because community organizing doesn’t happen through a screen.
What Is Community?
I’m not saying community can’t be built on the Internet. Perhaps at this point it would help to establish what community is.
The root word in community is munos meaning debt. A community is a group of people who are in debt to one another. This mutual debt builds trust. (For a thorough exploration of debt and community, I highly recommend the book Debt: the First Five Thousand Years by David Graeber.) All of society is a web of acts done for one another. Before market economies meant that debt could be scrupulously measured, the daily routines of life engendered community. The lawyer who defends you in court could not do so without the farmer who makes her food, while the farmer could not share his crops without the construction worker who builds the roads, on and on we are in debt to each other, tracing back to the original bonds of debt you owe to the family that fed you and changed your diapers.
However, capitalism decreases our communal bonds by giving us immunity. There’s that munos root word again, this time meaning free of debt. By putting an exact price on everything, we feel free of obligation to the restaurant that feeds us, or the lawyer who defends us, or the crew who lays asphalt. We may debate whether the labor of the lawyer is worth twice that of a social worker, but it is taken as an assumption that everyone is better off with the attachment of some exchange value for the work they contribute to society. We come to believe that we are truly immune to our debts to society. This leads to isolation and distrust on an epic scale.
Mutual Aid Is the Key to Community
It is only in service to one another that community is built. I am not speaking of the good feeling that people get from volunteering. I’m speaking of the gratitude people feel for what has been done for them at no price. If you preside over a local club, you will feel indebted to the secretary who takes the time to write out the notes and the editor who takes time to publish the newsletter, just as they are grateful to you for taking the time and energy to organize the meetings. If these roles were paid, they would engender entitlement, as participants debate whether your contribution matches your compensation. Stripped of this framework, these acts instead create gratitude, and that gratitude inspires further commitment. It’s through such small acts that relationships are fostered, and a web of these relationships make up a community.
There is a crisis of community in American society. Immunity, the community killer, has become the goal of American life. How many would rather drive to the store than trouble their neighbor to borrow a cup of sugar? Though true immunity is impossible for society to function, people feel safer if they can claim they owe nothing to anyone. But without these debts they become increasingly isolated. In isolation we can’t organize against injustice.
What Can We Do?
We would benefit from putting community at the heart of our organizing efforts. Getting to know one another, building trust and cooperation are just as important as creating agit-prop and organizing rallies.
We might consider how our movements make people feel. Are they showing up because they feel obligated or guilty? Or are they excited to be a part of a group they feel warmly towards, who shares their values? Do they have fun? Do they trust one another? What do organizers know of the lives of the other participants? Of what struggles they face? Of who is important to them? If they were snatched up by Trumplethinskin’s goons, how long before those in your group would notice?
When we look out for one another and share resources, these acts of mutual aid have the added power of fostering community.
A movement built of isolated activists is easy to infiltrate or destroy. Instead we should strive for more than a gathering of people with a common goal. We can make our spaces a third place, a home away from home. While we tear down the state, we can also work towards the future we want to build through acts of kindness and generosity.
Someone accused me of trying to sell snake oil when I announced I was entering the City Council race. For anyone new to that term, it’s saying that I’m tricking the people by trying to sell politics as any kind of solution to our problems.
They’re not wrong. The world burns around us because of extractive capitalism as we pillage the earth for all her resources in exchange for fast fashion, depleted food systems, endless war, and fleeting comforts.
There have been many candidate forums and interviews, and really I have been asked basically three questions at this point:
What is my stance on the new stadium proposal?
What will I do about homelessness and housing?
Do I agree with defunding OPD?
These are important issues to talk about, but it’s pretty clear where any even slightly left-leaning candidate sits in those discussions, and it’s low-hanging fruit.
I want to talk about greed. I want to yell about resource hoarding. We are in over our heads because of unfettered capitalism. We treat the basic need of shelter as a business. We foam at the mouth over professional sports revenue. And by we, I mean the political system. I mean the hands exchanging shakes behind closed doors. I mean the people allowing countless lives to be lost as they wait for perfect policy and perfect candidates that will never happen.
I want to talk about rematriating this whole country. The divine feminine is a nurturing energy that has the stamina to get torn to shreds and keep showing up with grace. 2020 has been screaming for more yin, for more rest, to slow down and examine where we are and how we got here. But we keep barreling ahead, ignoring that our clothes are on fire and we’re running on shards of glass right over a cliff with no bottom. We need feminine wisdom to lead with a resilient, forward-thinking heart. We need to end the culture of dominance and applaud softness and vulnerability. It is so much more powerful to be vulnerable than to be “tough”.
I want to talk about reparations. This country was built with the blood and sweat of colored bodies. And it’s even commodified blackness at that. Blackness has won our wars, got us to the moon, raised our children, and the repayment is incarceration, predatory lending, and sterilization. As if that slow, strategic death wasn’t enough, now they’re just being murdered in broad daylight: sleeping in bed, birdwatching, jogging. And our country is still telling us to ask nicely for equality.
I want to talk about gender identity and neurodiversity and ableism. About collectivity and true sustainability.
As long as political discussions stay centered on the spending of resources and not on the effects of ego, extraction, and toxic masculinity, the world will continue to burn around us, filling our lungs with ash.
‘That would be 500 yen’ uttered the 20-something surfer with a ‘naicha’ (Okinawan for mainland Japanese) accent demanding that our family pay for parasols at Nakagusuku beach on Miyakojima Island, where my family on my mother’s side come from. I will never forget that moment; the look of shock on my mother and my second-aunt’s faces. The beach that they once knew to be untouched was now rammed with tourists and litter scattered everywhere. A hipster from the mainland peddling parasols and snorkeling gear from the back of his VW Van seemed to have claimed that space as his own to commodify.
I thought going back to Miyakojima would cleanse my eyes and ears, tired and sore from the noise of fighter jets and the hideous display of US military bases on Okinawa’s main island. Instead, I saw more of the juxtaposed landscape of pristine nature and militarism present on the main island. Military trucks and bulldozers passed by, on their way to clear lands for housing complexes and stations for the Japanese Army. They were adorned with the Imperial Japanese flag, a painful reminder of Japan’s fascist past, but also a real reminder that Japan has not moved on but backwards, into the terrifying reality that many still live to remember, including my grandparents.
Formerly known to the Chinese as the ‘country of courtesy’ the Ryukyu Kingdom (now Okinawa), are a group of islands that had its own bustling economy and served as an important trade route between South-east and East Asian countries. Made up of 150 islands, 60 of which are uninhabited, have various traditions, customs and languages that are distinct from one another, but all share the Okinawan spirit omnipresent across the archipelago. Purveyors of diplomacy and peaceful inter-state trading, the Ryukyu Kingdom was an empire in its own right.
The Kingdom of the Ryukyus was subsequently annexed in 1879 during the Meiji Restoration and became Okinawa prefecture. This, however, did not mean Okinawans were now Japanese, instead mere colonial subjects of Imperial Japan. My grandmother often recalls how she had to wear a ‘Hogen Fuda’, a heavy slab of wood around her neck as a punishment for speaking in Miyako. Ryukyuans, Ainus, Africans and Taiwanese, were among the many indigenous people put on display at Imperial Japan’s ‘Human Pavillion’ (Human Zoo) held in Osaka in 1903.
Fast forward to World War 2, Okinawa was used as a buffer to fend off American forces attacking the mainland. To instil fear of the US and foster allegiance to Imperial Japan, the Japanese Army convinced up to 700 people from children to the elderly to commit mass suicide. The lives of one-third of the total population were lost to the war and rendered 90% of the population homeless. The Shuri Castle, once home to the Ryukyu Dynasty was burnt to rubble. These memories are some that haunt people like my grandmother, who understandably still cannot speak about them.
Japan ‘sacrificed’ Okinawa not once, but twice. As part of Japan’s post-war peace process, full administration of Okinawa was given to the US Being under US authority, Okinawa was excluded from Japan’s post-War constitution as well as the US obligation to guarantee human rights as it was not formally part of the US
27 years of US occupation was fraught with human rights abuses against the locals with Agent Orange even being tested out as Okinawa was used as a base for the US brutal war in Vietnam. After enduring 27 years of injustice, hoping that under Japan’s rule life would get better, Japan yet again betrayed the Okinawan people.
Currently, Okinawa holds over 70% of Japan’s US military bases but accounts for a total of just 0.6% of Japan’s total landmass. Our rainforest continues to serve as a ‘Jungle Warfare’ training centre for the US military. The gang-rape of a 12-year old schoolgirl by US servicemen in 1995 prompted a referendum a year later, on the future of US military bases in Okinawa. An overwhelming majority of 89% voted against it, but the central government were not legally obligated to respect the result. Ignoring the referendums are a regular occurrence. In February 2019 another referendum against another military base was ignored. The most devastating part of this is the fact that the new base is being built on Henoko Bay, home to two coral reefs, 300 endangered species and to the near-extinct Dugong, which will all be destroyed in the name of ‘security’.
In June 2020, the Japanese Prime Minister and openly fascist Shinzo Abe stepped down from his role citing health concerns. Abe, the longest-serving leader in Japan’s history, had no shame in openly discussing his ambitions to revert Japan to its Imperial Wartime state. He was dedicated to denying important facts in Japan’s political history, such as Japan’s use of sex slaves and the forced mass suicides of Okinawan people during WW2.
Abe’s successor, Yoshihide Suga, has vowed to continue Abe’s policies into the future, meaning very little change on issues such as US militarism and cultural & ecological preservation in Okinawa.
But regardless of politics, one thing that has remained constant is the Okinawan will and drive to ensure that their culture and their right to self-determination is never forgotten.
Unlike in the mainland, Okinawans refuse to sing the Imperial Japan Anthem, and the cultural dance ‘Eisa’ remains a mainstay of the high school experience for Okinawan youth.
Protests outside US military bases are common in Okinawa. The majority of demonstrators are elderly Okinawans who remember the sordid, painful history of US militarism in their land.
Expressing too much dissent in Japan can have harsh consequences and is heavily frowned uponw, but campaign groups such as No Base Henoko as well as the vibrant, active Okinawan community in Hawai’i are dedicated to shedding light on an issue that is seldom put on the international agenda.
In the words of Franz Fanon, the immobility of the native is condemned, unless they put an end to their colonization. Perhaps that is why Japan does everything possible to veto any efforts made by Okinawans and refuses to recognize us as indigenous, as that would automatically give us the legal right to claim back the lands that were forcibly taken from us.
Whilst the free movement of people remains a heavily scrutinized and over-reported topic, the free movement of nuclear weapons, military bases and overworked foreign workers across islands in the Asia-Pacific such as Okinawa goes widely underreported. Absence of the voices of Okinawans as well as Chamorros, Nauruans and Hawaiians are the reason why indigenous futures remain uncertain and are close to being pushed over the precipice of fascism and climate devastation.
