Spanish Revolution Storify...to be updated regularly

Latest on the near on revolution in Tunisia

I've copylefted this from Luna17 because it is excellent! Thanks luna

Join the Support Tunisia facebook page for very regular updates

Latest at 18.00 (reverse order): 

SOURCES SAY BEN ALI HAS FLED TO MALTA. OTHERS SAY TO FRANCE. STILL TO BE VERIFIED. SOME REPORTS ALSO SAY SOME OF HIS CORRUPT RELATIVES HAVE BEEN ARRESTED. STILL TO BE VERIFIED

THE TYRANT BEN ALI HAS FLED THE COUNTRY. LEADER OF PARLIAMENT TEMPORARILY IN CHARGE. CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL TUNISIANS

Army surrounds Carthage presidential palace, and the airport with tanks. Rumours that army taking over, and that soldiers have arrested some of the President's in-laws, the Trabelssi family at the airport as they try to flee the country! (to be verified)

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Channel 4 News is currently liveblogging events in Tunisia, where the popular revolt appears to be growing and threatening key sites of power like state television. The government and parliament have both been disbanded.

For understanding the dramatic events in Tunisia I highly recommend two articles by SOAS student activist Joseph Daher, both published at Counterfire in the last few days:
Tunisia and Algeria: the wind of anger rises
Gunfire in Tunis: Protests and repression continue

There will be a solidarity protest in London on Monday, followed by a public meeting (at University of London Union) on Thursday.

Protest at Tunisian Embassy in London - Monday 17 January, 2.30pm - see HERE

Public meeting in solidarity with Tunisia uprising - Thursday 20 January, 7.30pm - see HERE

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Love Mutiny tickets now on sale.

After a teriffic response from our first time Mutiny goers, tickets
are now on sale for everyone else.

I hope you're looking forward to our second event. You may buy as many tickets as you like :-)

Students/Concession £3
Standard £5.

Make sure you type your name into the correct bit for the guestlist.

Standard/solidarity £5.00 Student/concession £3.00

Priority tickets to first time Mutineers & contributers

We are nearly ready to set sail for our second voyage and tickets are already selling like hot cakes. If you went to the first one we are offering you the chance to get priority tickets as a way to say thank you. Please email us at jointhemutiny@gmail.com telling us what you liked best about the 1st and what could be changed and we will send you the link to the ticket site.

You also get an advance ticket if you contribute to the evening so send us some suggestions and we'll work out how to use them, and we'll give you a ticket.

Here's a glimpse of some of the artwork. We still have a few spaces for artists so email us if u want to submit something.

It's LGBT history month so we are pleased to be able to offer you some of the finest additions to the night. 5 people (including myself!) from the NUS LGBT campaign will be either speaking or exhibiting. Thanks to Belle from Soas for arranging the art exhibition.

See some of the other speakers confirmed so far at http://jointhemutiny.org/blog

In terms of other help, the simplest thing you can do is perhaps add the event link to your facebook status or invite some friends directly.

You could also print off this image and put up as a poster or make into flyers to hand out at work or college, send us short videos of you asking some of the key questions on the blog, or submit questions for our speed debating session.

Happy Valentines...

Money on Trial programme. The Mutiny has started...

MUTINY @ Resistance Gallery

MUTINY invites you to put MONEY ON TRIAL...

Mutiny presents a series of carnivalesque evenings providing live entertainment and meaningful debates. We are a network of activists who have come together to create an exciting, safe space for discussion, critical theory and alternative media.

Our debut event, Money on Trial, takes place on Thursday, September 24.


There will be three main themes:
Has money destroyed the music business;
Can the money markets deliver on climate change and
Can the government be trusted with our money?

A taste of what can be expected: leader of Pirate Party UK on the implications of filesharing and the onslaught of government reforms trying to be introduced; a showing of the brilliant Greenpeace film A Time Comes about the occupation of Kingsnorth directed by Nick Broomfield; the latest Vestas film from Reel News, a cameo performance from Victory, a hip hop star from the People’s Army collective and comedy from Kate Smurthwaite.

Plus art exhibits from Anna Logophobia, Green artist Kat Austen and the Young Unknowns.

The best part, however, is the audience. I mean, what do we know about anything? We need you to join the Mutiny.

Doors and bar open at 6pm with music and the performances start at 7pm so get there early.

For updates and playlist go to blog at http://jointhemutiny.org/blog 

For map and venue details go to http://resistancegallery.blogspot.com

Cyberspace Lenin...absolutely

Thanks to Luna 17 for his well presented argument HERE

Following on from my continuing calls for better use of the new technologies that are at our disposal, in the implementing of the Internet for Activists conference that I helped set up in March, and also from the way ICT was employed in the recent occupations I am currently writin a paper on the political uses of the internet vis a vis the revolutionary paper for Historical Materialism conference in November.

Please add any useful links and advice below.

So relevant is the 'quote of the day' below to our situation today that I want to flag it up as a post as well...

Solomon Quotes Marxists (and friends)

Quote for the Day: 22 August 2009

any army which does not train to use all the weapons, all the means and methods of warfare that the enemy possesses, or may possess, is behaving in an unwise or even criminal manner. This applies to politics even more than it does to the art of war.

Lenin, Left-Wing Communism: An Infantile Disorder (1920)

Iran’s 1979 revolution

A protest during the Iranian revolution

 

Thirty years ago Iran’s revolt struck a blow against US imperialism and showed the power of workers in the Middle East, writes Simon Basketter

The US government hates Iran. One reason for this is that when the Iranian people overthrew a brutal dictator in 1979 they also inflicted a massive blow to US imperialism in the Middle East.

Up until the revolution, Iran – alongside Saudi Arabia and Israel – was central to upholding US policy to ensure the stability and safety of Western oil supplies in the region.

Iran’s ruler, the Shah, was a despotic monarch brought to power in 1953 by a coup organised by the CIA and British intelligence.

Read the middle bit HERE...

The left’s failure to organise independently among workers and the poor to fight for socialism allowed Khomeini to consolidate power.

But the 1979 Iranian revolution sent shockwaves around the world.

It showed that Western-backed dictators could be overthrown by a revolution from below.

It also showed the power of workers in the Middle East and raised the possibility of workers’ control of society.

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Ken Livingstone's appaling excuse for an excuse for the shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes

I invited Ken Livingstone (mainly because the new President wanted to invite a pop star otherwise!) to the 1st Union General Meeting of SOAS Students' Union to talk about activism and grass roots democracy.

Chatting to him briefly before hand I asked him to stress the importance of working with United Fronts such as Stop the War, which in the past he has supported. Not only did he not even mention it but he blatantly had a dig at revolutionaries and continued by saying that he was a realist and an unrepentant reformist.

When questioned on his response to the shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes and the fact that he backed Police chief Ian Blair, he was even more disgusting. He said that everyone makes mistakes whatever their line of work. When a journalist prints an inaccurancy, he said, they have to apologise and get on with it.

What a disgraceful comparison to make-oops sorry, we just shot you repeatedly in the head...back to work lads.

Children of the Revolution

Women are now using their appearance and sexuality to fight the regime.

In 1979 Iran went through a major upheaval with the Revolution.

While this political and social transformation was just beginning the country was thrown into a terrible and costly war with Iraq, that would last eight years.

During these years, the revolutionary leader, Ayatollah Khomeini, encouraged Iranians to have large families, to make 'Armies for Islam'.

At the time, Iran's population was 25 million: today the population is 68 million with nearly 70 percent aged 30 or younger - these are the Children of the Revolution, (also known in Iran as "the burnt generation").

Today unemployment amongs this generation runs at 50 percent. Officially half the population lives below the poverty line. Prospects for young people are not good and many graduates are lucky to get jobs as taxi drivers.

This generation of young Iranians has experienced real extremes - the turmoil of war, social and religious reform, and the conservatism and poverty that followed.

Zohreh Soleimani is not a journalist - but she sets out to give a picture of Iran that reflects the reality of day to day lives.

Read more at the BBC here

• 23 mins

• Download (mp3)

• Documentaries

Download or subscribe to this programme's podcast.

Pigs publish racist 'Crime Maps'

How dare they.

How do they even categorise 'crime' in the first place? Do they record every incident of tax evasion, police brutality, war crime, exploitation, racist/homophobic/sexist oppression, deportation, empty property, over-crowded state school, crimes against the environment and the such like? Do they eckers like...

These maps only show where poverty and deprivation are at it's worst. Where kids can't get a job coz they are the wrong colour or refuse to work for £2.50. Where schools and housing are so run down that the councils sell them off to private developers for yet another flat-pack high street of Starbigbucks, Costa-lot-coffee and Mc-bloody-Donalds.

With the police under ever increasing targets to book or arrest a certain number per day, it's no wonder that there is growing resentment to the governments policies of 'getting tough on crime'.

I know many police officers and ex-officers (my Dad for one) who join the police because they want to help the community. But who soon realise (see the bottom paragraph of this link) that they are not there to solve problems in society but to protect the rich. I have encountered many police who, after years in an innercity area, become more and more racist because all they see is poverty and somehow make the link that minorites are to blame rather than blame the system.

Fuck the Government-Someone Blow up Parliament

from a good young boy he said