moof

There’s a tragi-comic moment in the Irish Easter rising in 1916 well described by Thomas Coffey in his book ‘Agony at Easter’. On the third day of the rising James Connolly is making his military dispositions in the Dublin Post Office when three Citizen Army Volunteers approach him and offer him their rifles. A perplexed Connolly asks their reasons. ‘The Easter holiday is over’ say the Volunteers ‘ we have to go back to work tomorrow’. Whether Connolly laughed or cried Coffey doesn’t say.

The Volunteers action strikes me as very similar to that of anarchists post G20 – back to life as normal – no inkling as to the possibilities to be seized. We won the war at G20 –but lost the peace. Unlike the poll tax riots when people had good reason to keep their heads down – Operation Carnaby – this time it was the cops who’s faces were beamed out from tv screens and newspapers caught doing acts of violence. The public mood turned decisively against the police. If ever there was a moment to ram home the political advantage of police bungling and cover up it was in the days after G20. But where were the anarchists? No initiative was taken, no urgent meetings held over the midnight oil to hammer out a strategy – just people going back to life as normal before G20.

Only the much maligned Chris Knight attempted to seize the time – contacting the Tomlinson family, organising the memorial march the Saturday after and the leafleting of Millwall football club. And what did he get for his pains – a suggestion on a discussion list that he be excluded from anarchist circles! Predictably into this vacuum have stepped the SWP – setting up a front organisation and organising the anti-police violence demonstration on May 23^rd. The anarchists whinge about the SWP but they are only able to fill the vacuum because we let them. And in the many voices to be heard in the media on police violence can we hear any anarchists trying to get their views across - no of course we fucking don’t comrades because we ‘don’t talk to the enemy’. So we leave the field to Chris Knight then we whinge even more ‘cos we don’t like what he says.

‘Events Dear Boy events’. We seem capable only of organising an event every decade then retreating with exhaustion. I sometimes seriously wonder if all anarchists are vitamin deficient. We are seriously the only people in the entire world capable of doing only one thing at a time. A juggler with one ball. It’s either a trip to the Visteon picket line OR a G20 meeting.

To respond to the post G20 situation we should have had emergency London anarchist meetings all fucking week – nutting out a strategy with the kind of high media visibility we had before G20. We should have been able to instantly respond to events and seize the initiative. I suggested this to one incredulous anarchist.’But I’ve got a job’ he replied’ as if ti was a cast iron reason for inaction. Try telling that to Comrade Connolly – oh shit – they did!

Taken from Ian Bones ‘What the Butler saw’ column in Freedom.

More than 300,000 Tamils are currently under siege by the Sri Lankan forces. Aerial bombardments and shelling of civilians are continuing. Children and elderly are dying as a direct result of the aerial bombardment. There has been increased violence in Sri Lanka following the capture of Tamil territory. It is estimated more than 70,000 people have already died in the conflict.

On the Indymedia newswire: Fast unto last breathe (day 13) | Video of the Tamil protests | Massive Tamil Protest Against Sri Lankan Genocide | Tamil Hunger Strike, London – pictures (day 6) | Stop the Genocide in Sril Lanka Protest – London April 11 2009 | Tamil protest (day 6) | Tamil Demo in Central London | Emergency Protest In London 11th April Please Come | Supporting the Tamil protests, SOCPA arrest | parliment square still going strong (day 4) | Tamil Protest in Parliament Square: Students on Hunger Strike to the Death (day 4) | Tamil protest still going strong / 8th April 3pm (day 3) | Tamils protest against chemical attacks | Tamil protest amid more police violence (day 3) | A lively night in Parliament Square (day 2) | Tamil protest still going strong /continues (day 2) | Tamil Protest still going strong | Tamil Protest on Westminster Bridge (day 1) | Sri Lanka: Killings, Concentration Camps and International Silence | Students on Hunger Strike | Tamilgotcha! Westminster Bridge occupied for 3 hours – Sat 31st Jan

Around the world: Netherlands | South Africa | New Zealand | Scotland

Links: British Tamils Forum | Online appeal | Wikipedia on Tamil people http://puthinam.com

We like to think that we’re ‘unique’ and yet we spend a fortune on clothes that will stop us from ‘standing out’ in a crowd, following fashion guarantees nothing but anonymity. In clothing, décor, transportation and gardening, do your own thing. Come gather ye peacocks and strut.

The old punk adage never trust an hippy become true for us, for a couple of weeks we began a conversation based on trust, our word is our bond etc., there are a load of thoughts in our heads as to why our trust was fucked over and we become shafted.

In this city of concentric circles of bullshit, everyone knows you, or shall we say they presume a lot on their ignorance, often based on history or reputation. They like to think there ‘unique’ but the truth is they’re no better than the other sheep, like lambs to their own slaughter they follow each other, bitch gossip and the word of a coked up fool, a drunken crass fool, is worth more than an angry white working class man.

Following fashion guarantees nothing but obscurity, they become the nothing they are, as they stand in The Washington, the person to them might be oh so working class, but do they stop to ask there truth, time to go powder there noise, never stooping to ask where there drug dealer lives and the impact that they have on the community, the get-along gang are gregarious.

They have time for their fair weather friends, meanwhile their children are at home with another baby sitter, the dog is walked, a promise made, then broken through ill spoken conversation, this verbal masturbation, is all part of the concentric circles of bullshit. We see it happen all too often, then when we stop being gregarious, outrageous, the court jester becomes the anarchist not the fool, cannon fodder for their paranoia, the predictability becomes all too common.

We are human and we all need to be loved, perhaps a little humanity, in a world where there seems little might go far, but informing, the fact of you have been shafted through social networking, is not social, but everything they inform us that is wrong with us, the fact we are openly classist raises some concerns in there heads, because it ask questions of concentric circles of bullshit, take a look at there networks.

We dislike not hate, hate being such an ugly and vile representation of capitalism, to hate the Middle Class, to be frank would be a manifestation of capitalism as Anarchists we have no need to repulacte the very injustice it offers the Working Class, it is simple and as has been proven to us time again the concentric circles of bullshit i.e. the middle class have nothing to offer us.

Our dislike is neither envy, or us being jealous, to envy is to desire to be like them, likewise to be jealous would be much the same. Just why would we want to become arrogant, gregarious, outrageous, selfish, attention seeking and so it goes on, these are the very attributes of the concentric circles of bullshit.

As Class Struggle anarchists we are seeking a better world, we desire social change through revolution, not to become the next bunch of Middle Class, we simply desire to make them history and all they stand for.

Meanwhile the kids don’t get out onto the streets anymore, they stay at home, huddled over computer monitors, anti-socialised dessicated fingers tapping blindly in an effort to find some warmth like a chimp hugging a metal cage for comfort.

When the signal fails during the advertisement break, who will be screaming: the children in the middle of getting their fix of consumer messages; the shoppers finding out what they can buy on their next mall run; the drivers being tempted by vehicles with more power, more safety and more sexiness; the television sales executives placing advertisers’ messages where they will be absorbed by the maximum number of people; the advertisers creating the adverts that sell product and dreams for their clients; the companies that produce the goods and services that make them money; the system that needs the children, the shoppers, the drivers, the sales executives, the advertisers and the companies to all play their part so that the economic machine can keep on turning?

Meanwhile The World Health Organisation’s emergency committee raised the pandemic threat level for swine flu last night after the death toll in Mexico rose above 150, the number of cases in the US doubled and the first infections were confirmed in Britain.

In Israel, where there is one suspected case, the deputy health minister, Yakov Litzman, said the disease will not be known as swine flu, because religious Jews do not eat pork. “We will call it Mexico flu. We won’t call it swine flu,” he said.

We can not but fail to smile as The Pandemic of modern civlisation becomes a reality, 28 days latter, we can but hope the headline reads mass unrest as swine flu deaths increase, once again those who pay the cost for capitlism will be paying the real cost, and in other news.

A Boeing 747 used by the president was escorted over lower Manhattan by a US air force fighter jet today as part of a government photo opportunity and training mission, causing a brief panic among office workers near the site of the September 11 terrorist attacks.

Now we take an add brake

http://smashedo.org.uk

Yesterday The Independent reported that more than £150 billion has been wiped off the fortunes of the UK’s richest people. They went on to site some of the ‘victims’ of the credit crunch…

The biggest single loser is London-based steel magnate Lakshmi Mittal who has seen his personal fortune drop by almost £17 billion to £10.8 billion.

Despite that, he retains his place as the country’s richest man for the fifth year running.

Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich keeps his position at second on the list despite his fortune falling to £7 billion from £11.7 billion.

The richest British-born billionaire is the Duke of Westminster. His fortune, mainly based on property, has shrunk to £6.5 billion from £7 billion.

Collectively, the 1,000 multi-millionaires in the list are worth £258 billion, down from last year’s record total of £413 billion.

The recession has also bitten into the fortune of Virgin boss Sir Richard Branson who has lost £1.5 billion and is now worth £1.2 billion.

Formula 1 tycoon Bernie Ecclestone suffered too – he lost £934 million this year, leaving him with £1.46 billion, the list reported.

Oh, how our hearts fucking bleed!

Compare the previous quotes with these  from a report in the National Geographic…

Food prices around the world have spiked because of higher oil prices, needed for fertilizer, irrigation, and transportation. [sic] With food prices rising, Haiti’s poorest can’t afford even a daily plate of rice, and some must take desperate measures to fill their bellies.

[A] traditional Haitian remedy for hunger pangs: cookies made of dried yellow dirt from the country’s central plateau. [The] cookies [are] made of dirt, salt, and vegetable shortening have become a regular meal.

“When my mother does not cook anything, I have to eat them three times a day,” Charlene said. Her baby, named Woodson, lay still across her lap, looking even thinner than the slim 6 pounds, 3 ounces (2.7 kilograms, 85 grams) he weighed at birth.

Though she likes their buttery, salty taste, Charlene said the cookies also give her stomach pains. “When I nurse, the baby sometimes seems colicky too,” she said.

Fuck the rich! The annual ‘Rich List’ could come in handy though – if it came with a free M40 snipers rifle and 1000 rounds of ammunition!

Were hit by graffiti climate activists, The Campaign Against Primate Change.. As working class (high-primates)we are tired of hearing about Climate Change (the over consumption of the priviledged classes). From the evolution of human kind and the moment of enlightenment our Earth, our Mother, has been exploited by the caretakers of her earth.

Our evolution was an agreemenet with our Mother and our Earth to act responsibly, with love, understanding and basic kindness to all other primates along with this earth we live upon.
From our evolution we have not only failed our Earth, our Mother, but other primates and living creatures, we have become selfish, exploitative and moved away from the basic principles of Nihililism to a world of Barbarism.

This action will cost Mother Earth, from the manufacture of the paint used, i.e. spray paint, what transport was used, we doubt it was public that early in the morning, the chemicals to clean of this damage, no doubt from an underpaid cleaner.

No one but a few people will have seen this, also the image is not that clear, another classic self indulgent act for petulant children have temper tantrums, would it not have been better to have done a flyer and handed them outside said stores?

TESCO ( http://projectsheffield.wordpress.com/2009/04/08/new-tesco-for-crookes-round-2/)boss Sir Terry Leahy, above, is set to defy the credit crunch by revealing that till takings have smashed the £1 billion-a-week barrier.

It will be the first time such huge takings have been registered by a UK firm. Tesco is expected to announce on Tuesday that turnover soared from just under £52 billion to a record £54 billion last year, while profits are likely to thrust past £3 billion, also an all-time high. The milestone comes 30 years after Tesco’s revenues first topped £1 billion-a- year. Since then the company has forged ahead of Sainsbury’s to become Britain’s biggest retailer. It is also the world’s third largest shopping chain. Tesco – slogan “Every Little Helps” – has 2,115 stores and employs more than 280,000 in Britain alone. It also has 476 branches in Thailand, 301 in Poland, 137 in South Korea and 125 in Japan.

But Helen Rimmer, of the Tescopoly ( http://www.tescopoly.org/)campaign website, said: “Tesco’s growth has come at the expense of vibrant town centres, farmers and the environment.” The Campaign Against Primate Change, are as concerned about the impact of Tesco on the environment and local community,s but we ask was there any thought to this action, this form of vandalism is no better than the acts of vandalism from Tesco, think about it?

ORIGINAL DOWNING ST SMEARS VICTIM RETURNS TO HAUNT NEW LABOUR

Thatcher Room
Portcullis House
Tuesday 28 April 1.45pm
Formal Evidence Session on UK Complicity in Torture
Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights
Witness: Craig Murray, former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan
(currently Rector of the University of Dundee).

In 2004, Craig Murray told us that:

- The British Government was complicit in the most vicious forms of torture
- He had been the victim of a lurid smear campaign initiated by New Labour
- The government was lying about all this

In 2004, much of the public and media was not willing to accept that the government would cooperate with torture or with false allegations against an innocent man. Many still had trust in the basic honesty and decency of government.

The evidence that Craig Murray was telling the truth about torture has now become overwhelming, including from the case of Binyam Mohammed. The UK “benefited” continually from intelligence passed on from the CIA waterboarding programme and from torture in countries including Uzbekistan, Pakistan and Egypt.

Craig Murray suffered the most high profile sacking of any British Ambassador for a century. But in 2005 the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee refused to hear him in evidence, despite allowing Jack Straw to appear and attack him.

Astonishingly, this is the first time Craig Murray will ever have been allowed to give formal evidence in the UK on his grave allegations, and be questioned on the truth of his testimony.

As the Scotland Yard investigation proceeds into MI5 and MI6 collusion in 16 cases of torture, Craig Murray will argue that it is not the security service operatives, but the Ministers who set the policy – and specifically Jack Straw – who should be facing criminal charges.

Contact: Craig Murray on 07979 691085 or craigmurray@mail.ru
Transcript of Craig Murray’s formal evidence statement is at http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2009/03/trying_again_my.html

Word format: http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/craigjhrc.doc
PDF format: http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/craigjhrcpdf.pdf

It has been very interesting in the last few days, to read the range of comments posted here about the police justification of policing the G20 protest and the tactics of containment.

It has been particularly interesting to get some views from TSG officers themselves. One, going by the name of MCM comments, “we were doing our job, we were doing what we were told and we were getting on with it and we were doing exactly what we were trained to do. If you don’t agree with the training then fine, but don’t try and persecute us for doing what we are trained to do.”

Personally speaking, I can’t help but agree that the officers highlighted in the G20 footage were doing nothing out of the ordinary. It may not have been justifiable – as was also said on the comments page, protesters behaving the same way would “be in front of a magistrate within days”. But it certainly wasn’t unusual. For many years now the police have been operating a policy of containment (as opposed to dispersal) of demonstrators, and this is what it looks like. It is close up, and involves kettles and cordons and inevitable pushing and shoving of protesters with hands or shields and the extensive use of batons. As MCM says, “this has been going on for years – especially at football – because we are trained to Police public order situations that way.”

Containment as a tactic was developed by the police as a way of avoiding the sort of full-on confrontation seen at the Poll tax protest in 1990. According to many commentators, including academics and police themselves, the widespread violence was largely caused by police dispersal tactics, such as baton charges and horses being ridden at crowds of people. The criminologist academic Peter Waddington suggested that the police should have contained rather than dispersed the crowd, and the tactic of ‘kettling’ was born.

Containment has been widely criticised, apart from the violence inherent in it, because it involves the lengthy detainment of people who have committed no offence. MCM’s views on this are revealing. “The tactic of containment or kettling DOES work however, by having a significant majority of people who don’t want trouble they naturally keep the minority in check, even after many hours of getting bored and pissed off.” I suspect that ‘the significant majority’ may have some understandable objections about being held for hours on end, without water, without food, without toilets, sometimes in the cold or wet, just to ‘keep the minority in check’.

As a tactic containment has surely has reached the end of the line. For years it has been a disaster waiting to happen, and now it has resulted in a death. I stand to be corrected, but as far as I know, the UK police are the only ones in Europe to operate such a strategy. Police elsewhere in Europe adopt more of a stand-off approach, interfering less and using dispersal methods (tear gas, water cannon) from a distance in cases of disorder. Police have criticised this idea as being even more likely to produce injury, but I have no figures on this. But clearly has the significant advantage of allowing people to go home!

Yet European tactics seem unlikely to be adopted here. It runs counter to the UK police’s philosophy of ‘preventative policing’, and I suspect that CO11 and their FIT teams will be particularly loath to let the ‘kettles’ go. They have provided extraordinarily useful opportunities for CO11 and their FIT teams to get photos and personal details of political protesters. In fact, I suspect ‘kettles’ have sometimes been formed for entirely that purpose.

So where will we go from here? I suspect we may see attempts, by police and by press, to make divisions in political protest between the good protesters (law abiding and compliant) and the bad protesters (those who object to having their movements restricted, who defend themselves from police batons, who push at police lines or who may be prepared to damage property in expression of their dissent). The politicians will then seek to give more freedom to the former, whilst putting even more restrictions on the latter.

I fear that the police focus on ‘preventative policing’ of demonstrations will end up being strengthened rather than weakened. This could lead to ‘bad protesters’ being treated increasingly like terrorists, having their movements monitored and being pulled from their beds in ‘anticipation’ of crime or public disorder. Not unlike the action taken against a group in Nottingham last week. Given the ease with which the police can currently go after suspected ‘terrorists’ without apparently even a shred of evidence, that is a worrying thought indeed.

I hope I’m wrong. I hope that all the G20 coverage and the awakening of middle England in outrage at police brutality will bring about a greater degree of freedom for all of us. But I’m not holding my breath. Instead, I think it will ultimately be down to us to get a hell of a lot better at protecting ourselves (and others) from G20 style policing.

http://fitwatch.blogspot.com/2009/04/tactics-of-containment.html

Thornseat Lodge was originally built in 1855 as a shooting lodge for William Jessop steel maker. Thomas Jessop was born on 30 January 1804 at the family home in Blast Lane, Sheffield. The house was situated next to William Jessop’s works, the company, taking the name of the partners, being known as Mitchell, Raikes and Jessop. With expanding markets in the United States Thomas and his brothers joined the business in 1830 and just two years later the small crucible steelmakers became William Jessop & Sons.

The business moved to a site in the Brightside area of Sheffield and later a works at Kilnhurst was added. The Brightside works eventually covered 30 acres (120,000 m2) and included the site of the former water works. Following the deaths of his father and brothers, Thomas was in sole charge of the business by 1871. The company which was originally established in 1793 became a Limited Company in 1875. Thomas Jessop died on 30 November 1887 and is buried in Ecclesall Parish Churchyard.

Jessops in America. In 1901, with problems in Sheffield caused by the high price of fuel and an adverse American tariff the company was having difficulty offering competitive prices to its U.S. customers. Following an amalgamation of some U.S. crucible steel makers, which would make competition even harder, it was considered that a successful melting facility could be set up in the U.S.A. Many British steelmakers considered that the “Made in England” or “Made in Sheffield” marks were a big selling point for their materials, however Jessop’s did not hold the view and considered that they could use their Sheffield name on steel which was made in America

It became a children’s home in the 1930’s and remained such up until the early 1980’s Since then it has become derelict.

There’s not much about it on the net really. The place is in a terrible condition, the floors are a death trap, there is no way to get upstairs, Not much of a problem as most of the floors have fallen down to ground floor level!

Thornseat lodge was sold in the mid 80’s to a local businessman, Doug Hague who owns it then he is a successful local business man who had a haulage/digger hire firm for many years. he has diversified into land and property over the recent years. he also owns the old waterworks, the old school and house and Wilkin hill centre and numerous other buildings around Bradfield.

All, except the old school have had the roofs removed and just left to fall down The property is owned by Hague Construction according to Land Registry From what we understand, it has never belonged to the local authorities, but been in the posession of the Fitzwilliam (Wentworth) Estates, who are also responsible for the plantations around the lodge.

We have to wonder, why anyone owning such a beautiful property would be prepared to stand by whilst it falls apart, although possibly in the current owners defence, Thornseat Lodge was considered, in 1994, as the possible location for an eight-place secure unit.

At that time the Sheffield City Council advised that the building was unsuitable for conversion (although presumably not for it being derelict), but in any case the Peak National Park planners had advised the council that they would not give permission for any new buildings on the site which is in the Green Belt. Perhaps, just perhaps, red tape being what it is in this country, they have not actually been allowed (or it’s been too much of a hassle to pursue) to do anything to the building, restorative or otherwise?

Although time has worn justly on the upstairs of the lodge, the cellars tell a very different and chilling story, but down there the grandeur of the lodge still remains, in a much less obvious way.

Thornseat lodge is a dangerous place you cannot possibly get to the cellars without putting yourself in danger, especially from the asbestos requiring the wearing of a mask .