UK Indymedia - UK Newswire Archive

West Mids Vegan Festival, more details...

21-10-2011 20:47

There's only one place to be on Sat 29th October 2011 - Wolverhampton Civic Hall for the biggest vegan extravaganza ever staged anywhere north of London!

From 11am - 5pm, featuring: 85 stalls, 20 talks/workshops, 5 cookery demos, FREE goodie bags for the first 200 visitors, all vegan bar, live entertainment all day, FREE food samples galore, push-up competition, Vegan Society Awards presentation, Best Vegan Cupcake Competition, after party till midnight and so much more...!! (see more details below)

All welcome, admission is just £1 (under 16's free).

http://www.midlandsveganfestival.org.uk

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News from Uganda

21-10-2011 20:09

A response to an article in Schnews 793 and informative information about the present situation in Uganda

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Defend the Factory Social Centre, Bristol - Wednesday

21-10-2011 18:43

The Factory is a squatted autonomous space in St Pauls, Bristol. It has been occupied since March 2010. It currently provides housing for a large group of people as well as a number of projects. It is now under threat of eviction. Please join us for a march and demonstration against the proposed threat of eviction, this Wednesday.

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Decoding the Battle of Syntagma Square as More Greek Austerity Bites

21-10-2011 17:48

As yet more austerity measures pile on the agony for the Greek working class, a potentially revolutionary situation is developing. In this period, the real relationships of various political forces to the working class are ever more nakedly expressed. But still, they must be identified, if Greek workers are to go from being what Marx called a "class in itself" to a "class for itself", and organise society in their own interests. In this article, I will seek to explain the different battle lines and formations, as they were drawn yesterday.

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UG#574 - Occupy Wall Street Special (Hip Hop Audiocollage)

21-10-2011 14:57

A special show this week devoted to Occupy Wall Street. How to make a show of interest both to OWS attendees and to those who know next to nothing about it? Inspired by the popularity of episode 536, we give you an audio collage including live radio interviews with participants and local residents, video soundtracks, historic material and quite a lot of music.

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UG#573 - I Spit in The Face Of The Money God (Mike Ruppert, Collapsenik)

21-10-2011 14:48

We devote the whole show this week to a remarkable talk from 2011-09-11 by Michael Ruppert, who back in episode 95 became the first speaker on this show to question the events of Sep 11th. However, in this talk he says that 9/11 belongs to a 'bygone era' and he focuses instead on the urgent need to transition away from a paradigm of infinite growth and fiat currency.

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UG#572 - Monopoly and Money (Contradictions of Capitalism)

21-10-2011 14:42

If competition is such a good thing, why is it not tolerated in areas of government or law? Or in the money system, which functions as a highly profitable private business? And what about cartel agreements which align the interests of multi-national corporations firmly against the interests of consumers? Are corporations really competing to bring better products to market more cheaply, or are they competing for control of government to grant them privileges?

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UG#571 - Mother Nature Knows Best (Masanobu Fukuoka, Helen & Scott Nearing)

21-10-2011 14:31

This week we hear about three people who, unimpressed by technological 'progress', quit city life to live successfully off the land - all three of them remained active into their 90's. Although travelling widely, they remained rooted to their homestead farms. In our first hour, Masanobu Fukuoka, who researched no-till farming in Japan for decades before Bill Mollison and David Holmgren coined the word permaculture. In our second hour, an audio adaptation of a film on the life and death of US back-to-the-lander Helen Nearing, and her husband, Scott.

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My further political crimes

21-10-2011 13:40

By the Guild of students Vice president Education (in exile) Edd Bauer.

Article from the defend Birmingham blog on new allegations the guild have levelled against Edd Bauer, including and this is no joke, having other people write letters about his suspension.

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This Exactly How PR works using Oxford

21-10-2011 12:50

Bell Pottinger's role in using Oxford Union to cover up the mass killing of Tamil civilians is up again through an establishment inquiry

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Critical Mass Portsmouth

21-10-2011 12:31

Critical Mass Portsmouth

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Big Society V's The Big Society

21-10-2011 12:04

Big Society kick back at BIG Society

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NARM BHM 2011 Programmes Highlight British Civil Right History  

21-10-2011 11:52

Brent based, pan-London voluntary organisation BTWSC will be delivering a number of Black History Month (BHM) events across London this year, using information from its ‘NARM (Naming And Role Model) Highlighting African British Male Role Models 1907-2007’ book. The NARM British African Civil Rights History programmes aims to show that there have been numerous African-led civil rights movements in Britain, and not just in places like the US or South Africa.

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Defend Grow Heathrow

21-10-2011 10:52

On Thursday 17th November 2011 Transition Heathrow's squatted community garden project 'Grow Heathrow' will be heading back to court. Despite no support from the local community, the local council and the local MP, the owners of the land at Grow Heathrow are going ahead with a third attempt to remove us from the site.

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Students of Birmingham! Defend Education! 02 November

21-10-2011 10:45

Time: 02 November · 14:00 - 17:00
Location: Clocktower University of Birmingham

This is it! Invite your friends, family, house-mates. Students of Birmingham defend education; Assemble 2pm by the Clocktower at the university of Birmingham.

If you want to be involved in planning the demo, come along to weekly planning meetings Mondays at 6pm on.fb.me/o2LPii

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Foreign police sent to crush Greek resistance?

21-10-2011 10:40

It seems that foreign police - in effect mercenaries - have been brought into Greece to put down the revolt on the streets.

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day 6 of newcastle occupation

21-10-2011 08:42

well the weather maybe rough in geordi land but that wont deter us
we are the 99%

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Stalinists and Euro-cops block revolution

21-10-2011 06:54

STATE repression against the Greek uprising hit a new low on Thursday as Stalinist trade unionists were deployed to defend the parliament buildings from the wrath of the people at yet more 'austerity' measures.

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#OccupyLSX Updates Thurs 20th Oct

21-10-2011 00:55

Some updates from OccupyLSX (see also Indymedia feature + occupylondon wire)

In general the occupation has grown very well with something like way over 300 tents now. NB The space is getting pretty crowded now, so please contact the Shelter working group if you want to bring a tent - some tents are free - pls don't just set up a tent now anywhere you like.

There's an outreach event planned for 11am Saturday - "Meet the movement" type thing. The media re invited to come along and meet the different working groups, visit the kitchen, have a tour of the site etc This is the proposal presented to the General Assembly, and formulated by several working groups in discussion this morning and at the lunchtime assembly.

The afternoon General Assemly on sat is planned to be at midday (scheduled wedding pending) and to be a Public Assembly, starting with updates from news from the occupy movement, from the uk and the world - from the international movement.

Then the idea is to have personal testimonies from activists involved in setting up the OccupyLSX camp and the working groups.

We're also inviting testimonies from social justice movements outside occupation to show solidarity and the links, with people from or involved in:

- Occupy halfterm - a group from cambs planning an occupation during school half term

- A banker who has been sleeping here

- Electricians involved in dispute and strikes and action like the recent Blackfriars blockade

- Disablbed people's alliance against cuts (who are marching on saturday) and involved with atos office occupations

- Dalefarm - after the evictions

- Single mothers self defence campaigning

- Tottenham defene campaign

- Jodie McIntyre

- Queer resistance

- Women of colour

- Student occupations

- Polly Toynbee

The tent city university group is holding daily lecturesd and discussion - this Saturday there's a panel on systemic change and pragmatic ways to bring about change. If you have ideas for workshops email tentcityuniversity@gmail.com

The last two days has seen people from OccupyLSX linking up with the electricians who blockaded Blackfriars station site and protesting at mining company BHP Billitons annual general meeting.

There's been some hassle from the police in terms of health and safety regarding fuel for generators and kitchens and people have expressed concern over police Forward Intelligence Teams photographing and filming people in meetings.

In terms of communication there are plans to schedule specific coverage for the video livestream and to ensure that the main minutes from working groups and assemblies are published quickly.

Interview extracts from wednesday: So what's happening next?

There's some specific things we've got planned.

We've begun a daily lecture series chaired by university lecturers, authors and activists.

Tomorrow we are marching to protest a meeting of large mining company executives in solidarity with the victims who have been displaced by large-scale mining projects in South America.

On Saturday we've planned a rally called "Occupy London, Occupy World" to invite members of the public and community groups to speak out about their lives under austerity. It will also be an opportunity to stand in solidarity with all the occupations around the world and share experiences and new insights.

We're thinking more and more about our strategy. We feel like we're reaching out to the British people - to let them know that their experiences are mutual, that we are the majority, and that there are alternatives - but we're being pragmatic about how we might hold "the system" to account and to meet people's needs.

From reading about other social movements we know that organized people are the only way to create and safeguard our freedoms. The suffragettes and the civil rights movement showed how people don't get the things they need simply by asking the government nicely. Pressure has to be applied and we are a part of a new struggle to create a more civilised society.

I think we should take the following strategy very seriously. For our demands to be met, we have to make the costs to the government of not implementing humane and social policies so high that they are forced to concede. This is the only way we will tackle the power of the multinational corporations.

Hannah:

The first thing to say is that he next move depends on what we as a collective occupation decide to do. and where we decide to take the occupation, where we decide to go next. we don't have a pre-prepared plan, because we are building the direct democracy which allows us to take decisions collectively. I personally would agree with you that it would be great to keep dynamic and doing new things which reflects the newness and the excitement of what we're doing here. There have been loads and loads of ideas about what to do next. At the General Assembly last night about 300 people broke into small groups and shared ideas about things that we could do. These include: direct action, further connections with other grassroots groups and political struggles, e.g. this morning we connected up with the electricians who are currently striking over conditions, this hasn't been reported much in the media and we hope to use the momentum we do have now to make the connection with more working people who are suffering under the current system.

We'd love to hear your ideas, also would like to point out that although it's really great having media coverage, so others of the 99% can hear about what we're doing, we are not thinking primarily about if the papers want to cover us, but want to concentrate on working together collectively to build processes for ways of making the world better.

Postal correspondance or donated kit can be sent to:
Occupy London St Pauls Cathedral, The Chapterhouse, St Pauls Churchyard, LONDON, EC4M 8AD, United Kingdom

Wikis and wishlists:
http://occupylsx.org/?page_id=192
http://olsx.wikia.com/wiki/Wishlist
https://occupywiki.co.uk/London/Wishlist
https://occupywiki.co.uk/London/Tech

General Calendar
http://occupylsx.org/?page_id=176

Live video stream (sometimes live otherwise looped content)
http://livestream.com/occupylsx

Ideas / Manifesto bank (3,363 votes on 102 ideas from 236 people)
http://www.google.com/moderator/#15/e=f76a0&t=f76a0.40

Flickr Pics
http://www.flickr.com/groups/1769303@N20/
http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=occupylsx
http://www.flickr.com/groups/15o/

Youtube channels
http://www.youtube.com/user/occupylsx
http://www.youtube.com/user/occupylondon

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Occupy Nottingham: Day 6

20-10-2011 22:55

The occupation of Nottingham's Market Square is now into its sixth day.

I wandered along briefly around 9pm. Not much was going on and occupiers and supporters were milling around chatting.

I understand a representative of the city council has been back today, but the authorities are still taking a relatively hands-off approach and a police van drove past, showing no interest in the camp, while I was there.