#maple spring

[temblorcomics]

Jean Charest as Maxwell’s Demon, sorting “entitled” students (from 2012). I meant the length of the leash to equal how entitled. On the right, good Gleick quotations. 

[jfxphotos-blog]

allthecanadianpolitics. This was the scene today at the University of Manitoba, where the University of Manitoba Student Action Network had organized a rally to “Stop the Cuts” at the U of M. The administration is imposing austerity measures in the coming academic year by cutting the university budget by a proposed 4%-5%. The University’s president David Barnard claims these cuts to be absolutely necessary, however many students continue to be suspicious by the lack of transparency on the part of the administration regarding the budget proposal. Although just a fraction of the size of student protests in Quebec the rallies in Winnipeg have been growing ever larger and louder as the year has progressed, these are by far the largest student protests the University has seen in years. More information about the Student Action Network’s views can be found by searching “University of Manitoba Student Action Network” on facebook. A story on the matter from the CBC can be found by clicking here, http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/students-protest-university-of-manitoba-job-cuts-1.3017881 

[resourcesforradicals]

Posted before as part of the Street Politics 101 doc, this is the amazing song from the end on its own.

Best line:

"We don't disrupt anything! We remain pacifists! We don't break anything! Must not harm public opinion!"

lolz

[resourcesforradicals]

Street Politics 101

In Street Politics 101, subMedia.tv features some of the best footage from what some called “the maple spring.” It also features interviews with students, teachers and anarchists involved in one of the most militant rebellions in Quebec.

Really, really, really great doc about the anti-capitalist student eruption in Quebec.

If you've ever wondered what combative syndicalism means, why ASSE and CLASSE are different, how they moved from student strikes to economic disruption to "anti-capitalist revolt".

The revolt helped "anarchists educate students about the importance of keeping the streets", and generated a really great zine Blockade, Occupy, Strike Back: a collection of tactical knowledge for students and others (with tips on masking up, building barricades as well as media support and other logistics).

Doc ends with an amazing music video shitting on pacifists. What's not to love?

[clover-and-mess]

"Through intermediaries like Twitter and Facebook, they are able to concert with thousands of people, instantly, without leader or someone to give the go. Proof: the nightly protesters who kept Montreal alert, in the spring of 2012, were not lead by anyone in particular but by all at once. A foot in reality and the other online, they followed one another through the dizzying rush of tweets, retweets and statuses that reached their mobiles."

From the article "Génération #moi" published in French in the magazine L'actualité, March 15th 2013, by Noémi Mercier (translated by myself)

This is something that thrills me of the Internet generation - the "maple spring" was a bit of a First World Arab Spring, but it moved the same way: the youth got fed up, and using the powerful social tool that the internet is, went about to change what they felt needed to move. The generation before us keep saying that the web has ruined social interactions - I believe that it enhances them, if we're only willing to see it.

[thepeoplesrecord]

From an email:

Hey comrades,

Recently, a campaign to target Sallie Mae's central, detrimental role in the student debt crisis has began to build great traction. Conversations have been sparked amongst various collectives and organizations as to how everyone can participate to effectively target Sallie Mae and how together, this can be an avenue to make strong demands and envision alternatives on fundamental issues like free public higher education, racial justice, and equal access to education for immigrants.

Organizers at Jobs with Justice and Student Labor Action Project have already begun to coordinate efforts against the already beleaguered corporation by organizing workers in Sallie Mae call centers, to pressuring the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau for tougher regulation to pursuing legal recourse for Sallie Mae's redlining practices.

Here in New York, folks from New York Students Rising, Strike Debt, Occupy Student Debt Campaign, and All in the Red have been discussing what it would look like to continue to focus on Sallie Mae together in the context of building a broad-based coalition.  

We'd like to open up the discussion to organizers and activists across New York City (there will be a national call following this) to unpack what this could look like locally and nationally in the coming months. Please send this to anyone in and around NYC who may be interested and indicate your availability on this Doodle if you'd like be a part of the call: http://www.doodle.com/8tz3w6nwc7a63xvd

Best, Matt Tinker, (479-366-8609) #allinthered

Janna Powell (484-695-1204) #allinthered

In my humble opinion, All in the Red is one of the most promising new economic-justice/education groups you can choose to be involved with in the U.S. They are creative & smart & serious about testing innovative organizational tactics. 

All in the Red fights for accessible debt-free education for all!

Through visionary tactics, surprising actions, and creative networking, we resist corporate ownership of our schools and the commodification of knowledge.

By combining artistic and organizational innovations with grassroots direct action, we strive to create dynamic experimental spaces of connectivity and collaboration–incubators for new forms of creative protest.

Source

[resourcesforradicals]

This has always been the essence of our strike and our mobilization: a shared, collective vision whose scope lies well beyond student interests. In our campuses, in our workplaces, in cities and villages across our province, people have come together like never before: to talk, to debate, and to imagine a new society with us. And we are making new alliances, overcoming old divisions, all across Canada. At the upcoming provincial summit on the future of education, the Parti Québécois will aim to increase tuition fees by indexing them to the cost of living, their stated policy. But we think the time has come for free post-secondary education. This is what we demanded on Saturday, marching as we have on the 22nd of each month since the spring. If we have demonstrated anything in Quebec, it is that a condition for social change is not that people should hunger for it — we know they do. It is that they believe their actions matter.

Quebec students aren't stopping at their fees being frozen at the election - they're continuing their joined-up fight for free tertiary education.

Badass.

[isacrimonie-blog]

Student Power Triumphs in Quebec

"After a year of revolt which became known as the "Maple Spring"—including massive street protests that received global attention—university students across Quebec were celebrating victory on Thursday night following the announcement from newly elected Premier Pauline Marois that the government was cancelling the proposed tuition hike that led to the student uprising and nullifying the contentious

Bill 78 law which was introduced to curb the powerful protests. “It’s a total victory!” said Martine Desjardins, president of the Fédération étudiante universitaire du Québec, which is the largest student association with about 125,000 students. “It’s a new era of collaboration instead of confrontation.” “Together we’ve written a chapter in the history of Quebec,” she added. “It’s a triumph of justice and equity.” Well-known Canadian author and activist Naomi Klein, responded to the news by tweeting: 'This is why radical movements are mercilessly mocked. They can win.' http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/09/21-1