World Free Spaces Newswire Archive

What we are seeing is a well-orchestrated clampdown on alternative culture. Again. By the Tories. Again.

We need to keep our eyes peeled.

Amsterdam: Persistent resistance at the 01-11-2011 eviction wave

Solidarity with the squatters in the UK!

Below is an open letter from Glasgow Women's Activist Forum to Occupy Glasgow. If your organisation would like to sign the letter, please email  glasgowwomensactivistforum@gmail.com

Despite the respondents to its very own consultation overwhelmingly supporting squatting, the Government is still moving full steam ahead to criminalise a solution to emptiness. It's a farcical situation! But one which may have far-reaching consequences...

Occupy Pomey TODAY!!Guildhall Square.

Big Society kick back at BIG Society

In Vienna, one day before the global day of action 15th of October, people started occupying a huge building. It has been opened as a social center named Epizentrum, for the neighborhood and the whole city, and it is right now in a humming process of being built up.

One notable feature of Occupy Wall Street is its participants’ lack of hesitation in using the term ‘revolution’. Here comes the revolution! This is the first step of the revolution! Get up, get down, the revolution is in this town! You won’t stop our revolution! etcetera, etcetera. Distinguishing from these assertions of a revolution that has arrived, what does it really mean to envisage a revolution? And why should revolutionaries fear to act as well as talk, camp, and march?

Starting with the occupation of a park next to Wall Street on September 17, a new movement is spreading across the country in which people gather in public spaces in protest against social inequalities. We’ll present a full analysis of this phenomenon here shortly; in the meantime, here’s an open letter to the occupation movement, engaging with some of the issues that have arisen thus far. Please forward this widely and print out versions to distribute at the “Occupy” events!

Dear Occupiers [online viewing version]

Dear Occupiers [print version]: A two-sided flier intended to be folded down the middle, longways.

For anyone who is not familiar with this movement or the events taking place all over the world, we would like to try and provide an introduction….

Here are a number of reasons why one might feel compelled to get involved in the Occupy Britain movement.

In 2008 the global recession was felt worldwide, and although the media reported ‘recovery’ there has not actually been one, in fact, what has held off the, what appears to be an inevitable global financial collapse thus far, is a process called ‘quantitive easing’ and the selling off of national institutions, such as the NHS, with job losses, redundancies, cuts to vital services, school closures, unreasonable welfare reforms, increase in the cost of living, banking institutions requiring bail outs, and the tax payer footing the bill and paying for the mistakes of others.

People are now recognising that there is a split in fairness and equality, we see bankers bonuses increasing, media tycoons controlling and withholding information that they should be reporting, in the public interest, systemic corruption of our police force, politicians and quite possibly our prime ministers, the introduction of, an ever increasing amount of legislation and statutes to further restrict our ability to speak out against them.

Occupy the London Stock Exchange - World Revolution Day 15th October

It began as a call in July 2011 by the magazine Adbusters to hold powerful business interests on Wall Street to account, and drawing on inspiration from the famed 2011 grassroots protests across the Middle East. But the mantle has been taken up by grassroots activists in New York City to forge an ongoing occupation outside of Wall Street and throughout New York City. The effort in its first two weeks has spurred a national movement with sibling efforts in at least 130 other cities, including Chicago.

Occupy Chicago, merely a week old, has already drawn hundreds of grassroots protesters, who "march…each day…After an hour long general assembly meeting, demonstrators headed through the financial district, Millennium Park, the Magnificent Mile and back to base camp to once more spread messages of solidarity, positivity and persistence in the face of a political system that’s left 99% of Americans without a real voice in governance…While it may be young and still trying to get organized, the movement to Occupy America is growing and cohering. And though many went home after Saturday’s march, more than a hundred stayed to continue organizing and evangelizing, with no plans to leave until they feel their job is done."

UPDATE: Occupy Chicago threatened by Chicago police to stop.

Additional Coverage: Lessons Learned from Occupy Wall Street | Five Things that Occupy Wall Street Did Right | Occupy Chicago Entering Day 6 | Protestors Occupy Chicago in Solidarity with Occupy Wall St NY | An American Spring is Possible | Open Letter to Occupy Chicago.

Outside Resources: Think Progress; NY Times' Andrew Ross Sorking Sneers at Occupy Wall Street | Protests Work Better with Specific Demands | Occupy Wall Street Makes Its Own Media.

Social Media Resources: Tumblr | Twitter | Live Video Stream

It's time to say enough is enough.

SQUATTING IN SWINGING REGGIO EMILIA

Dateline: Clapham Common, London, UK, 20:00-23:30, Sat 24 Sep 11 – Land & Freedom Campers (  http://landandfreedom.squat.net ) and intrigued local folk get to share an al fresco cinema experience centred around the 1975 biopic of the great English revolutionary pamphleteer and Digger Gerrard Winstanley (  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerrard_Winstanley ). Under the spreading London planetrees, we enjoyed reclaiming our C17 radical history, the better to empower ourselves for ensuring C21 continues to be a century of radical history in the making.

Karla, 15 years old, is one of 50 Chilean school and university students on hunger strike in the occupations of Santiago de Chile.

French pate, African ivory burned, KFC continues scalding live chickens in defeathering, McDonald's expands cowkilling further in China, Japan trains police to deal with protests of dolphin killers, Korean activists shut down dog meat festival, Latvians protest UK bear skins,
etc.

A letter on the criminalization of squatting

fox beaten to death, horse dragged behind truck, seal slaughter filmers threatened
with arrest etc

Please come along and experience the beauty and biodiversity of veganic growing.
Oakcroft Gardens Open Day on Saturday 23rd July from Midday..