London Indymedia

London Mayday 07' - Join the Autonomous Workers Bloc!

The Wombles | 25.04.2007 09:15 | Workers' Movements | London

Join the Autonomous Workers Block 12pm Clerkenwell Green behind the red and black flags.

For the last half century we were told to trust leaders that controlled the market on our behalf. That the market could be forced to provide the things we needed to have a good life. But anywhere the market has been managed, it has broken free.

Markets do not care about healthy workers, about their free time, about their security – the only thing they need is profit, and profit can never stabilise, it must always grow. We can never work hard enough. We can never buy enough.

Clothes and food might be cheap, but try buying a house or getting decent healthcare. Our media is more powerful than ever before – so we can watch our governments lie to us on thousands of front pages, millions of channels, 24 hours a day.

We work longer than ever – to make sure the gap rich and poor between gets bigger than ever. We do not have a choice about whether to struggle – we are struggling right now.

We can either try and control the market again a little bit through political parties, or try and reduce the worst of the devastation through charities – or we can learn the lesson of the 20th century and accept that when the economy does not need us, we do not need the economy.

When we fight to get back what we have lost and create something new in its place, we cannot let anyone else but ourselves be responsible. Control over our lives is exactly what we have lost, so this is exactly how we can attack - with democracy and independence.

These methods are also the most effective because they are the hardest to pay off or mislead. Over the last few years, grassroots democracy has returned or sprung up in a number of different and inspiring ways; on this Mayday we march to celebrate our new resistance to our oldest problem – united in unrepentant struggle against their unrelenting war. Join us on Mayday!  http://www.wombles.org.uk

P.S. Then get off to the party in the city, dancin in the streets @ 5pm. Check out the spacehijackers website for info:  http://www.spacehijackers.org/html/welcome.html

The Wombles

Comments

Hide the following 6 comments

grassroots democracy is not spontaneous

25.04.2007 14:17

where and how is this movement going to be consolidated or is it going to stick with 50 bods doing their own thing- is that it?

you offer the solution of syndicalism- seize power and then go err what now, quick you take the power back we dont know what to do with

grassroots democracy is not going to just appear because the situation is getting worse

it has to be developed which requires action on the ground in a particular direction

Jock


words in mouth

25.04.2007 17:32

dont put words in mouth will u?,
I agree with what your saying, great keep getting involved in direct democracy we agree , just stop criticising us. Theres thousands of us, we are growing & we dont want power, I want workers cooperatives & communities runnning things with consensus & delegation,
true freedom!

spock


wobblies & wombles of the world unite,

25.04.2007 17:37


dont just support your fellow workers one day of the year,join the IWW & lets support each other for life, wether a wobbly,clown,ef'er,bus driver , barrista or zapatista

www.iww.org.uk

spock ps


jock - eh?

26.04.2007 09:20

jock, you seem to miss the point. may day is about militant workers coming out in the streets as a symbolic expression. i don't think anyone's making any suggestions that marching on one day of the year is going to make a difference.

i'd agree with spock here, the IWW are cool as funk. but more generally if you want to develop a revolutionary strategy, look for a group who are doing stuff you agree with and then get involved. if there's a gap in the 'market' (bad choice of words i know!), then go ahead and set up your own group on what you feel is important. maybe in the may day march you'll find people who are like-minded and you can use the opportunity to network?

clint


MayDay Now and here

30.04.2007 23:24

I was at the MayDay last year in London and joined the so called "autonomous block" and was truely shocked. No political engagement could be seen besides the black and red flags. Instead everybody walked, and danced behind a loud soundsystem playing wierd electro music. In my opinion the mayday is a day to fight for your rights, its the day the streets belong to us! Its not a party, there are reclaim the streets events for that. Its a day of our everyday struggle for a more social and fair world.
To prevent an other party block, I made a CD with good political music. Allthough I rarther would like to see people shouting and chanting for the cause of mayday, I would hate to see and hear another mayday 2006.

soli

Antifascist


to 'antifascist'

06.05.2007 03:22

"I was at the MayDay last year in London and joined the so called "autonomous block" and was truely shocked."
Truly has no 'e' you spacker.

"No political engagement could be seen besides the black and red flags."
Bollocks. It had 2 months promotion, had explicit euromayday material and was part of the euromayday anti-precarity actions. It had ties with No Borders, who effectively called it, and was attended by the IWW. It also rounded off the anarchist conference 'Anarchism06' hosted by The Square social centre, who were also a big part of the planning and political background to the event.

"Instead everybody walked"
fuck that must have been well odd, people walking.

"and danced behind a loud soundsystem playing wierd electro music."
Utter shit. It was a small soundsystem on a bike playing mainstream music from Anti-Flag to drum n bass.

"In my opinion the mayday is a day to fight for your rights, its the day the streets belong to us!"
Oh all power to you writer of great platitudes on websites. Thats exactly what the block was about anyway, getting back to mayday rather than fucking stunts and happenings. Bringing us neatly to:

"Its not a party, there are reclaim the streets events for that."
GET THE FUCK OUT. There hasn't been an RTS in over 5 years you massive twat.

this is what happened you fool:
 http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2006/04/339047.html

Ana Belen
- Homepage: http://www.spacehijackers.co.uk/


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