This Shit Be Banging
So I’ll admit it. It is only in the past week that I decided to give a flying hoot about our Parliament. To be blunt, they’re all a bunch of stuck-up assholes and I don’t really care that the Conservatives feel all hard-done by now, which makes the coalition feel all persecuted, which makes the Conservatives..etc.etc.
There are two nice things that result from only starting to pay attention now:
First off, the world is taking off:
Clashes Between Fired Workers and Management
Unpaid Textile Workers Clash with Riot Police
Immigrants and Anarchists Erect Barricades
5000 Prisoners Hunger Strike
Hunger Strike Ends After Government Promises Release
Nurses Occupy Ministry of Health
This is just what has been reported to libcom from Greece and ignores the rest of Europe. The rest of Europe includes Italian students “We Will Not Pay For Their Crisis,” Spanish auto-worker occupations, and a variety of unrest in the British Isles. I’m just keeping my eye on Greece because I have a feeling they’ll be the next Argentina (occupied factories, the whole lot).
Recently, some mainstream coverage: Riots in Athens after Police Shooting
I find myself growing more sensitive to responses like these to state and capital. The recent financial crisis helped highlight both the inequity in distribution and the inequity in in treatment for many people. Many people are prepared to put up with less-than-ideal conditions, but not while the fat cats keep getting their meals. The amount of money being poured into banks is unfathomable to most people on working incomes, but worse is the realization that capitalist wealth is secured but no-one will bail them out when things go south.
Just today I saw Republic Windows Workers Occupy Factory (video on fb ). Chicago plant workers are doing a factory occupation! Just three months ago the much-asked question: “Is there something different about other countries? Why don’t we occupy plants?” but in the heart of Obama-land we have the answer: When the full breadth of inequity is so obvious that you would have to be a fool to ignore it, people are prepared to act.
Right now they are demanded redemption from the state, which is where our parliamentary crisis comes in. The Chicago plant workers still believe in the legitimacy of their state and its laws, that these things will come through for them. North across the border you have a different perception of our government, as conservatives try to claim themselves as the true defenders of ‘democracy’ you increasingly see the non-voters coming out of the woodwork and taking their rightful positions as detractors of the ENTIRE system rather than piecemeal critiques of one ridiculous side over another. And for (perhaps) a brief period, people of all parties will be receptive to this point of view.
So in different parts of the world I see mass rejection of capital, locally I see the seeds of mass rejection of state. Moments such as this are sensitive ones, they could be precursors to the social upheaval necessary towards a more equitable world. It is all too easy to see these forces linking up and generating the mass-movement for the new millenium, but it should be tempered with the realization that it is easy for each of these sides to be ignorant of one-another. People who reject the state, all to easily fail to see that they must simultaneously reject capital, and vica versa. To those reading this, remember that all great moments fizzle when you fail to unilaterally reject all systems of oppression: To reject one but not the other is to give all the strength of the first to the second. There is still time, and we can make this bridge. It has been built before, we can build it again, and with the wisdom of our past missteps.
(and as a completely tangential point I enjoy the title of this post as it is from this penny arcade comic )