am i losing the drive to create things for an increasingly alien and hostile world whose mounting taste for fascism feels like a cold metal vise around my skull or am i just lazy and unmedicated and looking for excuses
May 4, 1970 - The Kent State Massacre. At Kent State University, the Ohio National Guard shot unarmed college students, some who were protesting the US invasion of Cambodia and others who were just passing by. The guards fired 67 rounds over a period of 13 seconds, killing four students (Allison Krause, Jeffrey Miller, Sandra Scheuer, and William Knox Schroeder) and wounding nine others.
While most people know that students were killed at Kent State in 1970, very few know about the murder of students at Jackson State and even less about South Carolina State College in Orangeburg.
In Orangeburg, two years before the Kent State murders, three students were killed and 28 students were injured — most shot in the back by the state police while involved in a peaceful protest.
The Jackson State killings occurred on May 14–15, 1970, at Jackson State College (now JSU) in Mississippi. A group of student protesters were confronted by city and state police. The police opened fire, killing two students and injuring twelve. [article]
Tatreez embroidery! This is an endangered craft but there are a few organizations working to preserve it. I really like https://tirazain.com/archive which is preserving motifs and turning them into easy-to-use cross stitch charts in an organized online library.
Israelis against genocide: military prison for conscientious objectors
[translated article from Perspektive Online]
Three 18-year-old Israelis objected to compulsory military service on August 7. They did so in solidarity with the Palestinian people. Now they are all being taken to Neve Ztedek military prison. It is expected that they will have to face court repeatedly for several months.
“With my simple act, I want to show solidarity with my Palestinian brothers and sisters. I know that every child in Gaza is forced to be a bigger hero than I will ever be,” said 18-year-old Israeli Yuval Moav, explaining his conscientious objection. The young Israeli from Kfar Neter was sentenced last week on Monday, Oryan Mueller from Tel Aviv was sentenced the following day and Itamar Greenberg from Bnei Brak on Wednesday. Shortly before the young men had to serve their sentences, they spoke to [the israeli-palestinian news sites] Local Call and +972 about their motives and their stance on Israeli apartheid and occupation.
They all have one thing in common: they do not want to be part of the crimes against the Palestinian people. For one of them, this opinion has only developed over the years: Itamar Greenberg explains in his reasons for refusal that he wanted to join the Israeli army at the age of twelve - not to be a soldier, but to be an Israeli. “Now that I am 18, I know that the fact that the way into Israeli society is through the oppression and killing of another people is a great injustice in our society.”
Oryan Mueller also sees his refusal as a means of influencing Israeli society: “Refusal means holding up a mirror to Israeli society, above all to show that it is possible to oppose the militaristic death machine and the cycle of bloodshed. We don't have to be part of it.”
No right of refusal
The three young men were each sentenced to 30 days in prison for the time being. Israelis who refuse to do military service are not alone in this and in their attitude to current Israeli policy. In front of the court where Moav, Mueller and Greenberg were sentenced, several demonstrators gathered in solidarity with them.
Since 2015, solidarity with conscientious objectors has also been organized in Israel: The Mesarvot Association - Hebrew for “We Refuse” - is an organization that supports conscientious objectors. It creates media attention for individual cases, offers legal support and facilitates exchanges between young and former conscientious objectors. It also gives tips on how to cope with everyday life in military detention and offers a kind of preparation program.
Its members also criticize the patriarchal violence in the Israeli military. The association, which is critical of the government, also speaks out against the occupation in Palestine and took part in solidarity actions in the West Bank, for example against the eviction of houses. During the massive nationwide protests in 2023 against the judicial reform, they also linked it to the role of the occupation.
Mesarvot still supports many young adults today, including the first young person to refuse military service after October 7, 2023: Tal Mitnick is currently serving a prison sentence for this, which will be followed by another 150 days in prison.
The exact prison sentence that awaits can never really be predicted. In Israel, there is no basic right to conscientious objection. However, experience reports show that conscientious objectors are repeatedly sent to prison after their release if they repeatedly refuse to serve. Since October 7 in particular, sentences seem to be skyrocketing. However, the three young people prove once again that resistance cannot be broken with repression.
[translated from the German original: https://perspektive-online.net/2024/08/israelis-gegen-genozid-militaerhaft-fuer-kriegsdienstverweigerinnen/]
Drei 18-jährige Israelis verweigerten am 7. August ihren Kriegsdienst. Dies taten sie in Solidarität mit dem palästinensischen Volk. Nun wer
Also read this excellent article and interview on +972 Magazine:
Conscientious objectors Yuval Moav, Itamar Greenberg, and Oryan Mueller explain why they are willing to go to jail in order to stand against
“The war in Gaza is the most extreme way the State of Israel takes advantage of the urge for revenge to advance oppression and death in Israel-Palestine,” [Oryan Mueller] said. “The struggle against the war is not enough. We must fight the structural mechanisms enabling it.”
Israelis against genocide: military prison for conscientious objectors
[translated article from Perspektive Online]
Three 18-year-old Israelis objected to compulsory military service on August 7. They did so in solidarity with the Palestinian people. Now they are all being taken to Neve Ztedek military prison. It is expected that they will have to face court repeatedly for several months.
“With my simple act, I want to show solidarity with my Palestinian brothers and sisters. I know that every child in Gaza is forced to be a bigger hero than I will ever be,” said 18-year-old Israeli Yuval Moav, explaining his conscientious objection. The young Israeli from Kfar Neter was sentenced last week on Monday, Oryan Mueller from Tel Aviv was sentenced the following day and Itamar Greenberg from Bnei Brak on Wednesday. Shortly before the young men had to serve their sentences, they spoke to [the israeli-palestinian news sites] Local Call and +972 about their motives and their stance on Israeli apartheid and occupation.
They all have one thing in common: they do not want to be part of the crimes against the Palestinian people. For one of them, this opinion has only developed over the years: Itamar Greenberg explains in his reasons for refusal that he wanted to join the Israeli army at the age of twelve - not to be a soldier, but to be an Israeli. “Now that I am 18, I know that the fact that the way into Israeli society is through the oppression and killing of another people is a great injustice in our society.”
Oryan Mueller also sees his refusal as a means of influencing Israeli society: “Refusal means holding up a mirror to Israeli society, above all to show that it is possible to oppose the militaristic death machine and the cycle of bloodshed. We don't have to be part of it.”
No right of refusal
The three young men were each sentenced to 30 days in prison for the time being. Israelis who refuse to do military service are not alone in this and in their attitude to current Israeli policy. In front of the court where Moav, Mueller and Greenberg were sentenced, several demonstrators gathered in solidarity with them.
Since 2015, solidarity with conscientious objectors has also been organized in Israel: The Mesarvot Association - Hebrew for “We Refuse” - is an organization that supports conscientious objectors. It creates media attention for individual cases, offers legal support and facilitates exchanges between young and former conscientious objectors. It also gives tips on how to cope with everyday life in military detention and offers a kind of preparation program.
Its members also criticize the patriarchal violence in the Israeli military. The association, which is critical of the government, also speaks out against the occupation in Palestine and took part in solidarity actions in the West Bank, for example against the eviction of houses. During the massive nationwide protests in 2023 against the judicial reform, they also linked it to the role of the occupation.
Mesarvot still supports many young adults today, including the first young person to refuse military service after October 7, 2023: Tal Mitnick is currently serving a prison sentence for this, which will be followed by another 150 days in prison.
The exact prison sentence that awaits can never really be predicted. In Israel, there is no basic right to conscientious objection. However, experience reports show that conscientious objectors are repeatedly sent to prison after their release if they repeatedly refuse to serve. Since October 7 in particular, sentences seem to be skyrocketing. However, the three young people prove once again that resistance cannot be broken with repression.
[translated from the German original: https://perspektive-online.net/2024/08/israelis-gegen-genozid-militaerhaft-fuer-kriegsdienstverweigerinnen/]
Drei 18-jährige Israelis verweigerten am 7. August ihren Kriegsdienst. Dies taten sie in Solidarität mit dem palästinensischen Volk. Nun wer
I’ve seen a lot of Short, Introductory, Beginner’s reading lists with ten or twenty links, and, well, they’re intimidating. While you might not want to leave off something important, if everyone gets scared off by your list, nobody reads anything. So, let’s try something a bit more approachable! Here are three easy-to-read works.
Principles of Communism
If you’re new to communism, this short-ish work will introduce you to… the principles of communism! Engels’s writing style can be a bit difficult, and he references a lot of old-timey stuff (what’s a spinning-jenny?), but it’s a good introduction!
If you like the thought of communism, but are wary of ‘authoritarian’ or ‘totalitarian’ communism, this very short (one page!) text might help you understand why historically, communists have supported those measures (hint: if they just wanted power, they wouldn’t be siding with the powerless!).
Quotations from Chairman Mao, while longer than the last two works, is made up of small, self-contained… quotations, which are individually easy to read (and reread), and if you’re interested in learning more about a topic, you can always check out the work the quote is referenced from. This ‘little red book’ discusses communist perspectives on topics ranging from education, the military, and study, to self-criticism and culture.
Mao’s writing style is, I find, much easier to read, and the little red book covers such a wide range of topics that, if you only try to read one of these, I’d say to try this one. If feudal peasants were able to study and understand it, so can you!
Here are audio books for "Principles of Communism" and "On Authority":
The "Proletarian Pocketbook" is another collection of quotes from various communists (not just Mao) in a very readable and phone screen friendly format. Link: https://archive.org/details/proletarian-pocketbook
We need more atheists on the left who are willing to openly criticize religion for things that aren't just "the church does bad stuff". We need people making strong philosophical arguments against irrational and immaterial beliefs and in favor of a rational and scientific worldview. Faith is not a virtue, faith is an admission that a belief lacks evidence to support it.
I don't personally care if someone holds religious or spiritual beliefs. I don't think they should be shamed or ostracized for their faith. I simply think that such beliefs should be challenged and that religious believers should feel the need to examine their own beliefs and the arguments given in favor of them critically and rationally rather than become complacent. I think the idea that faith-based worldviews are harmless or even beneficial only erodes critical thinking faculties and contributes to individualism and solipsism within public discourse.
To be clear, I don't want strong philosophical arguments against religion from leftists because I think religion is the #1 most important question that should be on everyone's minds all the time. I want strong philosophical arguments against religion to counter the Christian socialists and utopian socialists that replace material analysis with faith. I want strong philosophical arguments against religion to bolster critical thinking skills and maintain a materialist and scientific outlook. And I want strong philosophical arguments against religion so we can have rhetorical defenses for when religious folks of all stripes use their religious beliefs as cudgels against socialism and communism.
Lenin's work Socialism and Religion makes it clear: atheism is not revolutionary in and of itself, but revolutionaries must strive to combat religion in all its forms regardless of their own personal religious views, since religion is incompatible with a scientific materialist worldview.
Our Programme is based entirely on the scientific, and moreover the materialist, world-outlook. An explanation of our Programme, therefore, necessarily includes an explanation of the true historical and economic roots of the religious fog. Our propaganda necessarily includes the propaganda of atheism; the publication of the appropriate scientific literature, which the autocratic feudal government has hitherto strictly forbidden and persecuted, must now form one of the fields of our Party work. We shall now probably have to follow the advice Engels once gave to the German Socialists: to translate and widely disseminate the literature of the eighteenth-century French Enlighteners and atheists.
But under no circumstances ought we to fall into the error of posing the religious question in an abstract, idealistic fashion, as an “intellectual” question unconnected with the class struggle, as is not infrequently done by the radical-democrats from among the bourgeoisie. It would be stupid to think that, in a society based on the endless oppression and coarsening of the worker masses, religious prejudices could be dispelled by purely propaganda methods. It would be bourgeois narrow-mindedness to forget that the yoke of religion that weighs upon mankind is merely a product and reflection of the economic yoke within society. No number of pamphlets and no amount of preaching can enlighten the proletariat, if it is not enlightened by its own struggle against the dark forces of capitalism. Unity in this really revolutionary struggle of the oppressed class for the creation of a paradise on earth is more important to us than unity of proletarian opinion on paradise in heaven.
That is the reason why we do not and should not set forth our atheism in our Programme; that is why we do not and should not prohibit proletarians who still retain vestiges of their old prejudices from associating themselves with our Party. We shall always preach the scientific world-outlook, and it is essential for us to combat the inconsistency of various “Christians”. But that does not mean in the least that the religious question ought to be advanced to first place, where it does not belong at all; nor does it mean that we should allow the forces of the really revolutionary economic and political struggle to be split up on account of third-rate opinions or senseless ideas, rapidly losing all political importance, rapidly being swept out as rubbish by the very course of economic development.
CPUSA national shut down the Austin TX club because of "factionalism", which apparently meant two people walked out of a speech about 'israel', and for 'black nationalism' (following the Black Panther Party program and praxis).
which, not to rub it in but come on, you can't be seriously surprised atp?
its absolutely shitty and revisionist and cowardly, shows that theres no hope of any actual change in the CPUSA without total destruction of any real progressive movement.
i hate that org for stymying any actual progressive movement, i hate the total separation from anything resembling revolutionary or subversive actions or plans.
but this is absolutely the way theyve been going. the fact that anyone was or would have been caught off guard is just not paying attention
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