Sean Swain on his hunger strike; Operacion Pandora update from Spain; North American Anarchist Studies Conference 2015

SeanSwain.org
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This week: Sean Swain announces that he’s escalating his hunger strike and will begin denying his hypertension medication this evening. This could put him in dire danger, he could die within a few days. This protest is in response to the administration at OSP & ODRC selectively denying his access to communicate with his supporters, in particular with Ben Turk via the jpay video chat. From his support page:

“Sean needs support right now. Rick Kerger, his lawyer is filing a restraining order preventing the ODRC from cancelling future video visits. There are three things you can do.

1. Call OSP Warden Forshay and demand that he meet with Sean in good faith and negotiate a reversal of the ODRC policy of f**king with Sean on flimsy pretexts. 330-743-0700. Ext. 2006.

2. Write Sean a letter, or even better, request a video visit yourself. The first step is getting approved as a visitor, using this form. The more communication we send Sean’s way, the more of their time they’ll have to waste f**king with him. Sean often says “they’ll get tired of killing me before I get tired of dying.” Let’s make sure he’s right.

Sean’s address:
Sean Swain
OSP 243-205
878 Coitsville-Hubbard Rd
Youngstown OH 44505

3. Call ODRC Investigator Paul Schumacher, who cancelled Sean’s video visits, and say whatever you want to his voicemail. 614-728-1152”
Script suggestions for the conversation can be found at http://seanswain.org

Then, we hear from Andrew Hoyt about the upcoming North American Anarchist Studies Conference in San Francisco during the 20th through the 22nd of March, 2015. He talks about the network, which was created to link researchers with activists and assist dialogue to spread anarchism in society. If you’re interested in putting on a workshop, the deadline is coming up on February 14th, so hurry up! Info on the network, the upcoming (free) conference, past conferences, how to join the email list and more can be found at http://naasn.org

Finally, we get an update from a comrade in Barcelona about Operacion Pandora, the Spanish government’s series of raids and arrests on December 16th, 2014, of anarchists around the country. The Spanish government, according to the guest, is trying to link those 7 remaining with charges of connection to the GAC (Coordinated Anarchist Groups) which published a rather dry book criticizing Democracy and it’s uses by existing governments to justify VERY undemocratic actions. The Spanish government is then proposing that GAC is aligned with the Informal Anarchist Federation Tendency (FAI/IAF). The text, which will be distributed for free on February 14th in protest around Spain, can be found here in Spanish and portions have been translated into English. The guest speaks about La Ley Mordaza (Gag Law) recently passed in Spain and how this operation appears to be a first step of illegalizing effective protest tactics (such as protesting at religious institutions or setting up barricades) and branding them as terroristic in order to choke off resistance within Spain.
More on the case and shows of resistance against it can be found at http://efectivopandora.wordpress.com

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Free Alabama + Mississippi Movements in prisons + updates on Sean Swain

freealabamamovement.com
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Prior to the main portion of this week’s episode, we hear a Sean Swain segment and also Ben Turk comes on to talk about difficulties Sean’s currently facing (for instance beginning a hunger strike on Monday due to shenanigans by officials at OSP, where Sean is being held, and possibly JPAY (the company that contracts communication with Ohio’s DRC) that have limited his communications again.

It is suggested that folks concerned called the boss of the ODRC Lead Council Trevor Clark’s boss (Stephen Grey 614 752 1765). More on this can be found here: http://seanswain.org/support-seans-hunger-strike-call-the-odrc-on-monday/

The majority of this week’s episode is a conversation with incarcerated members of the Free Alabama & Mississippi Movements. The FAMMC (now including inmates in California as well) is an inmate-drive non-violent, civil disobedience movement with the goal of bettering the situations of prisoners, challenging the profits of prison corporations and departments of correction, ending the impunity of wardens and guards and abolishing the “new slavery” of mass incarceration in the U.S.

Due to the poor connection with the guests, some of the audio is difficult to hear, so a transcript should be posted in a few days at ashevillefm.org/the-final-straw where this post can be found and later at thefinalstrawradio.noblogs.org (oh yeah?  where is that, now?)

Melvin Ray (aka Bennu Hannibal Ra(y)-Sun) at St. Clair Correctional Facility/SCCF and R.EARL (aka Kinetic Justice Amun) at Holman/HCF near Atmore, AL, two founders of the Free Alabama Movement along with a member of the Free Mississippi Movement break down mass incarceration, the forms of struggle they’re taking, the economic underpinning to prison labor and prison privatization, issue of sanitation, diet, cost to inmates and family of incarceration, assault and rape in Women facilities, networking across state borders… M & Kinetic also talk about the recent lock-downs at their facilities.

A call-out for folks on the outside to pressure the administrations of these AL facilities to get rid of Warden Davenport (St. Clair, formerly Tutwiler) & Bobby Barrett can be found here: http://prisonbooks.info/2015/01/30/help-stop-the-reign-of-terror-by-alabama-prison-officials/

A post concerning the lockdowns from a few days ago but with information on the death row hunger strikes at Holman facility can be found here: https://denverabc.wordpress.com/2015/01/30/fam-press-release-protest-at-st-clair-prison-in-alabama/

An upcoming way for folks around the country to get involved in this movement is to share the information of the FAMMC with folks on the inside and try to help them to get involved in the movement. Keep up on the upcoming pushes to protest at and outside of prisons around Alabama, Mississippi and more by checking out their facebook and twitter pages. These groups are planning to focus demonstrations and campaigns against McDonalds Restaurants (which use prison labor to make it’s burger patties, uniforms and more) and other businesses that are all around us that contract prisoner labor to make a profit.

These folks run a weekly (often up to 3 times a week) podcast-radio show called The People’s Platform that can be listened to and called into when live or found as archives. More on this show can be found at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/freealabamamovement

For more information generally about the FAMM, check out their main website at: http://freealabamamovement.com/

A recent report about the violence (sexual and otherwise) perpetrated by officials against the prisoners at the Juliet Tutwiler Women’s Facility in Alabama (at which the current warden of St. Clair, Curtis Davenport, who’s overseen this rise of violence was once an official), check out this US DOJ report from January of last year: http://www.justice.gov/crt/about/spl/documents/tutwiler_findings_1-17-14.pdf

For the book that M. Ray has written about the goals and background of the Free Alabama Movement: http://freealabamamovement.com/FREE%20ALABAMA%20MOVEMENT.pdf

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Candace Falk on preserving Emma Goldman’s works

sunsite.berkeley.edu/goldman
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The full chat on finding Emma’s letters

This week’s episode features a conversation with Candace Falk, founder and main editor at the Emma Goldman Papers Project in Berkeley, CA.

A quick introduction. Emma Goldman was born in what is today Lithuania in 1869, moving to the U.S. at the age of 16. As a Jewish woman immigrating from Eastern Europe to New York city, she was not alone in the struggles she would face in terms of racism, patriarchy, nativism capitalism and so more. But Emma became involved in the Anarchist movement after the Haymarket Massacre and subsequent show trials of the next year and would grow to become known for a time as the most dangerous woman in America (J. Edgar Hoover). Her agitation and writing in support of free love, athiesm, the abolition of state and capitalism, contraception, beauty, literature, gender parity and more made tidal waves in her day and have continued to inspire people since she died in 1940. She aided would-be assassins, was jailed for agitating against World War I, was exiled to Russia, preached against the corruption of the Soviet Government, did propaganda work on behalf of the Spanish Anarchists in their Revolution, loved, lived and lost.

For the hour we talk about how Candace came to love Emma Goldman, the creation of the EGPP archives, what they provide, their relationship with the University of California at Berkeley and what the future may hold for the project. Candace also shares stories of how curating a history of Emma has bled into including bits of related and overlapping history and the rewards of this sort of seeking.

More on the project can be found at http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/goldman

Artnoose on zines, anarchism, and Letters of Insurgents + Aragorn!’s introduction

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This week, we spoke with Artnoose. Artnoose is a zinester, author, printer, parent, anarchist and more. She gives a brief history of her relationship with art, her long-running personal letter-pressed zine entitled Kerbloom!, how she became an anarchist, the Berkeley Anarchist Study Group, the Cyber Punk Apocalypse fiction-writing house in Pittsburgh, erotica and more!

Later in the conversation we discuss Letters of Insurgents, an epistolary novel written by Fredy Perlman. The book is a series of letters between two characters separated by two decades and a continent and discusses politics, intentions, memory, age, communication, deception and more. There is a free audio version of the book that Artnoose helped to narrate, it’s available in pdf form for free on theanarchistlibrary.org and was just recently reprinted and made available for sale via Left Bank Books. This episode also features a recording of Aragorn!‘s introduction to the new edition of the book.

Artnoose and Aragorn! both participated in the 2010 internet-based reading group of Letters of Insurgents known as Insurgent Summer.

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Phil Africa of the MOVE9; Operation Pandora in Spain; update on repression in Eastern Europe by ABC Belarus

move9parole.blogspot.com
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“On Saturday, January 10th 2015 Phil Africa, revolutionary, John Africa’s First Minister of Defense, and beloved brother, husband and father, passed away under suspicious circumstances at the State Correctional Institution at Dallas, PA. On Sunday, January 4th Phil Africa wasn’t feeling well and went to the prison infirmary. Though he wasn’t feeling well, other inmates saw Phil Africa walking, stretching and doing jumping jacks. Hearing that Phil was in the infirmary MOVE members drove up to visit him and were denied a visit by the prison. While they were visiting with Delbert Africa, Phil was secretly transported to Wilkes Barre General Hospital where he was held in total isolation, incommunicado for five days.”

from OnAMOVE.com’s statement on the death of Phil Africa. More can be found by following that link.

This week, The Final Straw spoke with Kevin Price about the medical emergency that William Phil Africa of the MOVE9 was undergoing and lack of transparency on the part of his captors at SCI-Dallas in Pennsylvania. Phil Africa was suffering from diarrhea and vomiting and his supporters and family were not being clearly communicated with in terms of his whereabouts or his state of well-being for days on end. Phil was moved to Wilkes Barr General Hospital and his supporters were told he wasn’t there for days until public pressure on the prison officials and hospital employees forced them to acknowledge his presence there. Arguing HIPPA, they refused to comment on his status or allow him to call his wife (Janine of the MOVE9) or the MOVE organization until enough calls and twitter pressure occurred that Janine was allowed to speak with Phil on Thursday. This conversation was recorded on Saturday, January 10th 2015.

Just before The Final Straw airtime (January 11th, 2015), we caught wind of the news that Phil had died. Our sympathies go out to his supporters and loved ones.

We’re deciding to air a slightly modified version of this episode for a few reasons. Though this effort won’t bring attention to help save Phil’s life from the horrors of prison, it stands as a testament to his work and that of the other defendants in the MOVE9 case. It discusses the corruptions of the police, prisons and courts (particularly in PA in this case) and the struggles and injuries suffered by the MOVE organization over the years. The fact of Phil’s death brings extra weight to the argument that prisons kill, that imprisonment is a political punishment, that aging prisoners have special needs that prisons (even if they were to work “humanely”) don’t have the infrastructure and don’t function to sustain the healthful life of prisoners, particularly those who’re aging and have special needs. This is, among many others, a case of Medical Injustice, torture and murder.

Firstly, though we announce that Eric McDavid, long time anarchist prisoner of the Green Scare in the U.S. has been released after 9 years in prison. His petitioning of the courts and activists on the outside have revealed information that the prosecution denied him information that may have exonerated him of his accused “crimes”. More info at http://supporteric.org/eric-is-free/

Also on this episode, we feature audio from Črna Luknja (Black Hole), an anarchist radio show from Slovenia and airing on Student Radio in which they speak to “P” in Barcelona, Spain, about the recent series of raids and repressions against anarchists around that country. The raids and repression has been dubbed Operation Pandora and has ostensibly centered around the publication of a book entitled “Contra la Democracia” (Against Democracy), which breaks an arcane law against the current order which remains on the law books from the era of Francisco Franco’s dictadura.
https://efectopandora.wordpress.com/category/english/
More from Black Hole at: http://radiostudent.si/dru%C5%BEba/%C4%8Drna-luknja/

Finally, we air audio from A-Radio Berlin. In this segment, A-Radio interviews a member of Belarus Anarchist Black Cross about current situations for radicals and refugees in Belarus, Ukraine, & Russia, as well as how those ABC’s work together. More from A-Radio at http://aradio.blogsport.de

Layla AbdelRahim on domestication, childhood and wildness (rebroadcast)

http://layla.miltsov.org/
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This week, The Final Straw takes pleasure in re-presenting a conversation with Layla AbdelRahim about her book, “Wild Children – Domesticated Dreams: Narratives of Civilization and Wilderness”. She is an anarchaprimitivist who explores ideas of education, domestication and civilization in terms of childhood development and overall human health. In these excerpts from the conversation we define some terms and talk about instrumentalization of living things and symbolic thought and how they are used to shape the child’s mind into the civilized and non-empathic perspective. Info on the book can be found at http://www.fernwoodpublishing.ca

More of her writings can be found at http://layla.miltsov.org/

This conversation initially happened in June of 2014

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Tom Nomad on Insurgent Theory

http://isiw.noblogs.org
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This week, Bursts speaks with Tom Nomad. Tom is a midwest-based anarchist who authored The Master’s Tools: Warfare and Insurgent Possibility and a member of the Institute for the Study of Insurgent Warfare, which recently published the first issue of Insurgencies: A Journal on Insurgent Strategy. Tom talks about anarchist approaches towards ethics and strategic choices, the Insurrectionalist turn in North America and the growing focus among many of a study of Insurgency and Counter-Insurgency for the purpose of reframing our struggle against State, Capital and other enemies. There’s also brief discussions on Deep Green Resistance, ISIS, YPD, Policing, Summit hopping and more!

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Paul Z. Simons on Modern Slavery (rebroadcast) (December 21, 2014)

http://modernslavery.calpress.org
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This week is a rebroadcast of William Goodenuff’s interview of last year with Paul. Z. Simons of Modern Slavery Magazine. The description will be found below. This week, Sean talks about Keith “Bomani Shakur” Lamar’s ongoing court appeal for his life. More updates on Lamar’s case can be found at http://www.lucasvilleamnesty.org , including audio from some of the court proceedings.

“This week William talks with Paul Z. Simons, a contributor to and editor of the journal Modern Slavery; A Libertarian Critique of Civilization available at http://modernslavery.calpress.org. Mr. Simons is also an essayist and former contributor/editor of Anarchy: A Journal of Desire Armed and Out of Anarchy among other projects. Modern Slavery delves into the conception of a modern slavery through an explicitly radical discussion of the history and present condition of wage economies and wage slavery. In addition, the journal showcases poetry, short stories, book reviews, and art. If you wish to become a contributor, you can do so through the journals website.

Among other topics, William and Paul discuss the inspiration for and inception of the journal, some forms a post collapse society could take, other forms of modern day slavery, and the socially chaotic potential of horror movies.”

Dean Spade on “Normal Life” (rebroadcast) + metal + punk

http://www.deanspade.net/
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“This week features a conversation with attorney, educator and trans activist, Dean Spade about his new book, “Normal Life: Administrative Violence, Critical Trans Politics and the limits of law”, just out from South End Press. Normal Life is a finalist for the 2012 Lambda Literary Awards. Follow Mr. Spade’s writing at http://www.deanspade.net/

In the conversation, we discuss “mainstreaming” efforts by liberal LGBTQI organizations towards pressing for same-sex marriage, removal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, hate crimes legislation and other reformist measures in the U.S. Dean contrasts these efforts and visions with abolitionism. We also discuss calls for justice in the wake of the killing of Trayvon Martin, attempts to reform aspects of the Prison Industrial Complex and discuss Foucaultian models of power in society.

Following the interview, we featured tracks from Skaphe, Youth Avoiders, Oblivionation and more for the last half of an hour.

Kristian Williams on Police Abolition (orig. Aug 2011)

www.kristianwilliams.com
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This show originally aired in August of 2011

Today’s show features an interview with the Portland-based author and activist, Kristian Williams. Williams speaks on his first book, Our Enemies in Blue (a history of policing in America), on recent articles about community policing and the counterinsurgency training shared between the U.S. military and domestic law enforcement agencies and the growing movement calling for the abolition of police in the United States, and the Pacific Northwest in particular).

Check out www.kristianwilliams.com for more information on the interviewee.

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