The Final Straw Radio is a terrestrial radio show and podcast started in 2009 featuring information by, for and about anarchists and other anti-authoritarians. The show airs weekly on Sundays from 2-3pm EST out of Asheville, NC, USA.
This week’s show features the second half of the conversation with Ukrop. Ukrop is a longtime anarchist, antifascist activist and documentarian from Moscow. This show features conversations about the rise of the new “Cossacks” movement in Russia, a rural militia with anti-Semitic and xenophobic perspectives receiving support from the government. We also talk about who participates in Antifa in Russia, specifically relationships between the Antifa movement and Feminist movements, LGBTQ movements and Immigrant populations.
This week we speak with Ukrop, an anarchist, antifascist activist, and maker of the documentaries “Antifascist Attitude” & “Actions vs. Repressions”. This is part 1 of a two part interview, in which they talk about the history and context of Nazi influence in formerly-Soviet Russia and the rise of radical anti-fascism. Ukrop also discusses how the internet effected punk and anarchist subculture in Russia in the 1990’s and the first decade of the 21st century. In the conversation we cover overlaps between police and prisons and nazi’s as well as how the education system in that country feeds into nationalism and capitalism.
To keep updated about ongoing things in Russia, check out the following websites:
This week’s show features a conversation with Jenny, who works with Sacramento Prisoner Support. Jenny and Bursts discuss the case of Eric McDavid, a Green Anarchist prisoner in the U.S., in terms of the green scare and the upcoming June 11 Day of Solidarity with Long-Term Anarchist Prisoners.
Briefly, Eric and two other activists were entrapped by a government informant who went by the name, Anna. Anna, over a series of months, attempted to pressure the 3 to plan and execute radical actions to save the earth, paid for all of the means, even plied Eric with romance. Despite the fact that the 3 kept walking away from actions proposed by Anna, the FBI raided them and convicted Eric of conspiracy (the younger Lauren Weiner and Zach Jensen took a plea and turned on Eric).
We discuss Eric’s health, how to support Eric and other prisoners, increased use of conspiracy and terrorism charges by the State, how to support each other when repression happens and how to resist bullies pushing bad ideas!
Root force aims to stop the spreading of those infrastructure projects (bridges, dams, highways, factories…) that allow for the spread of neoliberal capitalism into comparatively less “developed” environments in hopes of helping protect environments and their stewards and force an economic retraction of imperial projects of the north.
Also, Bursts speaks to Bella about Marius Mason, long term ecological, animal rights, labor and anarchist activist. Marius is also serving a 22 year sentence. Bella also talks about the upcoming day of Solidarity with Marius Mason, Eric McDavid and Other Longterm Anarchist Prisoners on June 11th. We also talk about the despicable snitch, Frank Ambrose (more info on the below sites).
Anne Petermann, of the Global Justice Ecology Project, joins us this week to talk about the threats posed by Genetically Engineered Trees getting released into the U.S. as the USDA considers allowing Arborgen to found millions of acres of plantations across the southern U.S. These plantations, reaching from Texas to South Carolina, where the company is based, could destroy forest diversity, kill wildlife, exacerbate droughts, feed fire storms (not Firestorm), and spread quickly with the help of cold-resistant gene modification.
In the last week of May, Asheville will be hosting a Biotech Tree conference. Concurrently, Katuah Earth First! and GJEP (along with other projects) will be holding protests and workshops around the issues of GE Trees to educate the public and grow resistance.
This week’s show features an interview with Kristian Williams, author of the books, “Our Enemies in Blue,” “American Methods” and numerous articles on policing, torture, anarchism, cartoons and much more. Kristian speaks about his in-progress book on the Anarchism of Oscar Wilde, Wilde’s experiences in prisons and his sexual politics.
Interview with Ramona, an anarchist activist in Slovenia and member of the Federation for Anarchist Organizing. She speaks about the uprisings which have been happening in that country since November, 2012 in reaction to widespread political corruption and police surveillance. Among other topics, we touch on the conditions leading up to these ongoing uprisings, a brief history of anarchist organizing in Slovenia, and the upcoming Balkan Anarchist Bookfair, which will take place in Ljubljana this May.
To keep yourself informed on this situation, go to the FAO website at www.a-federacija.org/english for english content.
The FAO is also a member of the International of Anarchist Federations (IAF). More info on that project can be found at http://i-f-a.org/
We also bring you an anarchist black metal project Hesperian Death Horse, which hails from Croatia, and the band Aylwin from California.
Enjoy.
This week’s show features an interview with Adesina, Jude and Emily, three folks doing support work for the NATO5. The NATO3 consist of Brent Betterly, Jared Chase, and Brian Church who were arrested in a house raid orchestrated by Chicago PD and with the use of two undercover infiltrators known as Mo and Gloves, during May of 2012 as Chicago prepared for the protests against the NATO Summit. The 3 are being charged with 11 felony counts including terrorism. With the addition of Sebastian Senakiewicz (Sabi) and Mark Neiweem (Miggs) who were picked up seperately, they are collectively known as the NATO5.
The conversation with support people introduces the case to listeners, talks about the ongoing use of conspiracy and infiltration in the United States of movements of dissent and the creation of the threats by the U.S. government that it simultaneously claims to be protecting the population from as it further expands the prison culture that is America. We talk a bit about the Gulf Port 7, Eric McDavid and the Cleveland 4, cases over the last decade focusing on Anarchists in the U.S. that included police infiltration and false imprisonment on terror-related charges.
This week’s show features a conversation with Hannah Dobbz about their new book, Nine-Tenths of the Law: Property and Resistance in the United States. Hannah was also the creator of the documentary “Shelter: A Squatumentary”. We talk about squatting in the U.S., homesteading, market values, views on squat resistance in other countries from the U.S. and more. The latter half of the show features a musical selection from the metal and gothy end of the spectrum.
