Category Archives: Feminism

#LibertadDiDimora, activism, Autonomia, Bologna, CounterInsurgency, Feminism, General, Immigration, Italy, Labor, Neoliberalism, Police, repression, Student

#LibertaDiDimora: Hobo, Repression and Autonomia around the University of Bologna, Italy

hobo-bologna.info
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This week’s episode features a conversation with Francesca. Francesca is a student at the University of Bologna in Italy and is one of the people at the center of a wave of repression in response to ongoing autonomous organizing inside and outside of the University. The University of Bologna is the oldest, continuously operating public University in the world. Francesca is also a member of the Hobo collective, which runs an autonomous social space inside of the Poli-Sci department of the University.

In December of last year, after numerous marches and interventions around the city and university on a range of issues such as immigrant rights, precarity of employment, underpaying of university workers, increased cost and decreased quality of services at the university, affordable housing, the censure of political dialogue and more, the District Attorney of Bologna had Francesca and 5 comrades arrested as a preventative measure in order to stop their organizing and to terrorize the students and militants of the area. 4 students have been placed on house arrest in Bologna, making it quite difficult to make ends meet economically, and 2 were exiled from the city, thus cutting short their educational career. In response, a campaign called “#LibertaDiDimora”, which translates to freedom of home, was launched to respond to the repression of the 6 comrades and to continue struggles around freedom of movement and housing issues inside and outside of the university. More on student organizing around the world at http://commonware.org/

For the hour, we’ll be speaking with Francesca about her case, the campagn, the Autonomia movement which Hobo is alligned with, the monetization of education, precarity, internships, immigration in Italy, squatting and more. More at http://hobo-bologna.info

But, first a few announcements.

In the wake of the tragic murder of nine African American bible study members on June 17th, 2015 at the Emmanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church by a white supremacist their was an outpouring of grief and solidarity expressed around the world. This was followed by a series of protests and direct-action removal of the Confederate Battle Flag from the capital grounds in Colombia, South Carolina. The pressure built in other Southern States to remove the CSA Battle flag from their state flags resulting in blowback from some white folks to the removal of this “heritage” symbol that means oppression to so many others. Subsequent to the killings and flag debates, at least 6 black churches were torched between June 22nd and June 29th around the South East. Churches in: Knoxville, TN; Macon, GA; Charleston, SC; Elyria, OH; Tallahassee, FL. To top this, and never to lose an opportunity to display their pointy heads, the Klu Klux Klan has decided to call for a rally on the steps of the South Carolina State House on July 18th at 3pm and just as the racists will be coordinating to show up at the rally, so are anti-racists and regular-ass folks around the region. There are all sorts of calls for participation in all sorts of ways to counter a public display of hatred by the KKK. I hope to see y’all there. http://columbiascdemocallout.tumblr.com/

In a perfect segway, the next evening, July 19th 2015, folks are invited to come to the new location for Firestorm Books & Cafe at 610 Haywood Rd for a presentation by Saralee Stafford & Neal Shirley on their book, Dixie Be Damned: 300 Years of Insurrection in the American South. For our conversation with the Shirley & Stafford, check out this link.

A reminder to listeners with graphic talents, we’re soliciting designs for stickers, posters and more. The artists who’s designs are selected will receive a few prizes from our freeboxes (actually, some tee shirts and literature). We’re looking for the name of the show, our website and images that may reflect the project. We’re hoping it can be a tool for better advertising the project and getting more folks involved. You can email designs in pdf format to thefinalstrawradio(aat)riseup( dott)net or send them in physical form to, again:
The Final Straw
C/o Ashevillefm
864 Haywood Rd
Asheville, NC 28806

Finally, I’d like to give a brief shout out to some other audio & video projects that have been kicking out the jams of late. If you’re familiar with The Final Straw, you may have heard some of their names on our 4th Anniversary show last year.

Check out the Free Radical Radio at http://freeradicalradicalradio.net for a mostly weekly mix of commentary, comedy, critique and always witty reparte.

For great action updates, audio documentaries, reviews and more, Crimethinc’s podcast called “The Ex-Worker” is not to be missed. You can find episodes at http://crimethinc.com/podcast, along with links and transcripts of the episodes.

WhichSide Podcast, which features hosts Jeremy Parkin & Jordan Halliday, did a great interview with Kevin Van Meter, contributor to the book “Life During Wartime”. Regular episodes feature chats on anarchism, activism, animal liberation, veganism and more. More can be found at http://whichsidepodcast.com.

Finally, I want to give a shoutout to The Stimulator & his f-ing show, It’s The End Of The World and We Know It (And I Feel Fine) for riot porn, interviews, commentaries, updates and stunning images and movie references. More from that project at http://submedia.tv

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Anarchist, Author, Capitalism, communization, Feminism, gender, General, History, Indigenous, Mexico, Neoliberalism, Racism, Transcribed, Zapatista, zine

Hilary Klein on “Compañeras: Zapatista Women’s Stories”

http://hilaryklein.org/
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This week, William spoke with Hilary Klein, author/editor of the new book Compañeras: Zapatista Women’s Stories, out from Seven Stories Press.

Over the hour, Hilary talks about her 7 years of living in Chiapas and recording the stories and experiences of women there, collecting stories on their behalf. The book covers the Zapatistas experiences before the EZLN uprising of 1994, during that period and after. Discussion address what gender, indigeneity and class looked like and how that’s changed in the Zapatista communities, the state of Chiapas and in Mexico. William and Hilary also explore the effects that the EZLN & La Otra Compaña have had on radicals and anarchists abroad, the origins of the EZLN, some parallels and distinctions between anarchism and Zapatismo and much more.

More writings by Hilary (and links to the book) can be found at http://hilaryklein.org/

Playlist

Continue reading Hilary Klein on “Compañeras: Zapatista Women’s Stories” →
AK Press, Anarchist, Author, Capitalism, Coal, communization, Feminism, gender, General, History, Indigenous, Labor, Marxism, Neoliberalism, North Carolina, Philosophy, Police, Prisons, Racism, Transcribed, zine

Dixie Be Damned: a regional history of the South East through an Insurrectional Anarchist lens

http://www.akpress.org/dixie-be-damned.html
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This week, we’re excited to present a conversation with Saralee Stafford and Neal Shirley, editors and authors of a new book out from AK Press entitled “Dixie Be Damned: 300 years of Insurrection in the American South”. The book is a study of Maroon, Indigenous, White, Black, worker, farmer, slave, indentured, women and men wrestling against institutions of power for autonomy and self-determination. All of this in a region stereotyped to be backwards, slow, lazy, victimized and brutal. The editors do a smash-bang job of re-framing narratives of revolt by drawing on complex and erased examples of cross-subjectivity struggles and what they can teach us today about current uprisings in which we participate.

Throughout the hour we explore some of the examples that became chapters in the book, critiques of narrative histories and academia and what new ways forward might be towards an anarchist historiography. Keep an ear out for Saralee and Neal’s book tour, coming to a bookspace near you.

Playlist

Continue reading Dixie Be Damned: a regional history of the South East through an Insurrectional Anarchist lens →
Anarchist, Anti-Civ, Author, Canada, Feminism, gender, General, Health, Layla AbdelRahim, Quebec, Rebroadcast

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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activism, Author, Capitalism, Dean Spade, Feminism, gender, General, Music, Neoliberalism, Prisons, Queer, Racism, Rebroadcast

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.

A-Radio Berlin, Anarchist, communization, Dilar Dirik, Feminism, gender, General, Iran, Rojava

Dilar Dirik on the Rojava Revolution, pt 2; Nicky Danesh on (A)’s in Iran

Turkish anarchists from DAF cross border to support resisters in Kobane
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This week’s we’re presenting the second half of my conversation with Dilar Dirik, Kurdish feminist and anti-capitalist, about the Rojava Revolution. The Rojava Revolution, as we spoke of in the last episode, is the name for the Kurdish-initiated project to organize stateless communities in Northern Syria into 3 autonomous cantons in the wake of Syrian State withdrawal during the progress of the civil war in that country. Rojava is West in Kurdish and refers to the communities of Kurds living in that area as distinguished from Kurds living and struggling inside of the borders of Iraq, Iran & Turkey. Folks aligned with the Democratic Union Party, or PYD, in Rojava have been among the people fighting against incursion by Islamic State militants.

After hearing from Dilar, we’ll be hearing a segment shared by the folks from Anarchistisches Radio Berlin, which they worked together from audio recorded by Furia de Radio, an anarchist programme on 97 Irratia FM in Bilbao, Euskadi. It can be heard every Friday at 7pm in the Basque Country, or on http://www.mixcloud.com/FuriaDeRadio. The folks at Furia de Radio conducted an interview with Nicky Danesh, an Iranian anarchist living in exile in Australia this September. More content from Anarchistisches Radio Berlin can be found at http://aradio.blogsport.de in German, English, Spanish, French and more.

This week we’ll hear Dilar continue to speak about the Rojava Social Revolution, the Kurdish Women’s movements media representation of women in Rojava and in the YPJ Star militias fighting against ISIL, if there’s an overlap between anarchism and Democratic Confederalism and more. The first half of this conversation can be found here.

You can find writings by Dilar at http://dilar91.blogspot.com

A quick reminder to those in the Asheville area this week: Leslie will be speaking at Warren Wilson College in Black Mountain this Monday, the 3rd at 7pm in the Canon Lounge about his life and continued activism despite constant sureveilance!. Leslie James Pickering – former head of the North American Earth Liberation Front Press Office (NAELFPO), author, publisher, and co-founder of the Buffalo, NY bookstore, Burning Books – has endured heavy state repression for years. Leslie will discuss the current ongoing FBI investigation into his work and life as well as his extensive legal campaign to resist this surveillance. This is a free event. https://www.facebook.com/events/729763163770135/

Can’t make it out to Warren Wilson? On Tuesday, Leslie will be speaking at Downtown Books & News on Lexington Ave in Asheville at 6pm on Tuesday, November 4th. This is another free event. https://www.facebook.com/events/1419215874989621/

On Wednesday, there’ll be a benefit vegetarian dinner with music offered at the Wine Hause at 86 Patton Avenue. All proceeds will go to the Kurdish Red Crescent, offering free emergency health aid to the people of Rojava, in particular in the beseiged canton of Kobane. This event runs from 6:30 to 8:30pm.
http://bit.ly/aid4rojava

Finally, on Wednesday night at the Odditorium, on Haywood Rd in West Asheville, at 10pm there will be the opening salvo of a hopefully ongoing queer dance party series and safer space entitled Cake. This night’ll feature a performance by Bootz Durango from Charlotte and it’s suggested that queers and allies come dressed as their favorite confections. https://www.facebook.com/events/1500284163556631/

Another article recently published on the subject of Rojava from an Anarchist perspective:
http://anarkismo.net/article/27540

One in a series of blog posts by British filmmaker, Adam Curtis, on this same subject: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/posts/HAPPIDROME-Part-One

The playlist for this episode is here.

communization, Dilar Dirik, Feminism, gender, General, History, Indigenous, repression, Rojava, Turkey

Dilar Dirik on the Rojava Revolution, part 1

http://dilar91.blogspot.com/
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This week, Sean Swain rescinds his 5 minute segment for an election statement from Jwow “Kasich”.

For the main portion of this episode, Bursts spoke with Dilar Dirik. Dilar is a Kurdish refugee living in Germany who’s a phd candidate studying and working around issues connected with the Kurdish Women’s movement and the PYD, or Democratic Union Party, in the Rojava territories within the borders of Syria.

Dilar is a Kurdish refugee living in Germany who’s a phd candidate studying and working around issues connected with the Kurdish Women’s movement and the PYD, or Democratic Union Party, in the Rojava territories within the borders of Syria. With it’s foundation in 2004, the PYD has been attempting to create a dual power situation with the government and centering on an anti-state, anti-capitalist, feminist & ecological critique stemming from the influence of the PKK’s founder, Abdullah Öcalan, and his model of Democratic Confederalism. Democratic Confederalism is, in a large part, influenced strongly by the libertarian socialist philosophy of communalism, a term coined by the late Murray Bookchin. Bookchin, although not an anarchist upon his death, had been influential to certain strains of social anarchist thought since the 1960’s and included elements Communalism of Left Anarchism, Marxism, Syndicalism and Radical Ecology. Following the the 2012 pullout of Syrian government forces from the northern territories, the PYD, a group aligned with the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, has held the territory as three independent cantons (Rojava, Cizre and Efrin) organized through a series of communes, councils and alternative representational structure.

Primarily during this episode and the following, Dilar speaks about the methodologies of the Kurdish Women’s movement in Rojava to autonomously push the PYD at large to create not just an inclusive but to attempt to center on gender balance in all functions, moving to shift things often called “women’s issues” to the fore and make them issues for the movement at large. Dilar also speaks about the shift from the former national liberation struggles of the Kurdish people for inclusion in the nationstates of the middle east to an embracing of a stateless status and an attempt to invite and include as many ethnic, religious and national communities and individuals of the region into the implementation of Democratic Confederalism (that implementation is also known as Democratic Autonomy) as could be done. Their hope, as people in the larger Rojava Revolution, is to expand the model into a self-sustaining, directly democratic society in tension with the state and capitalism.

The Democratic Union Party (PYD), Rojava region, the YPG (Peoples Defense Units) militia and YPJ Star (Women’s Defense Units Star) have come into media headlines in the U.S. of recent because they’ve been some of the main actors in the defense of Kobane (the capital of Rojava) against the forces of the Islamic State In the Levant (ISIL). ISIL has been attacking the three cantons in recent months, in fact for the last 2 years prior to U.S. recognition of it’s existence, and the YPG and YPJ Star have been among the groups fighting ISIL back. The press of ISIL to take the lands, weapons, slaves and wealth and to destroy heretics, continues throughout the 3 cantons despite the retaking of most of the city of Kobane. Perhaps the U.S. public hasn’t learned about resistance and attempts at alternative self-organization until the Siege of Kobane because it challenges the stability of U.S. allies like Turkey, Syria and also of Iran and other countries with significant Kurdish populations in the region.

In the last 2 years, many anarchists in the west have been looking on with interest on the organizing and resistance in Rojava. Recently, David Graber wrote in an op-ed for the U.K. Guardian that the PYD in Rojava fighting the ISIL parallels the Spanish Revolution of 1936 with the Rojava as the anarchists of the FAI and ISIL as the Falangists, and thus that social libertarians worldwide need to pay attention and offer support to the struggles in Rojava. Other western anarchist sources have been critical of the shortfalls of the Rojava Revolution from their ideological perspectives. We here at the Final Straw are excited to present the words of Dilar Dirik about Rojava not because the revolution is by name an anarchist project, but because it teases some boundaries between philosophies and attempts to put them into practice in the midst of a warzone and fight for their lives. This case of Rojava is interesting, but more importantly it’s people, again fighting for their lives.

With that said, because the PKK, which is aligned with the PYD, is on the U.S. terrorist list, it’s difficult to solicit donations for them in the U.S. However, if you’re in the Asheville area, on Wednesday November 5th, 2014 at the Winehaus at 86 Patton Ave, in Asheville from 6:30pm – 8:30pm. There will be music, vegetarian food and the sliding scale tickets from $20-60 will go to the Kurdish Red Crescent to offer material support for those facing assault from the Islamic State. More info can be found at http://bit.ly/aid4rojava

You can find writings by Dilar at http://dilar91.blogspot.com
Also, we’d like to apologize for the quality of Dilar’s audio on the episode, we had a poor connection.

Next week’s show will be the second half of our conversation on the Rojava Revolution and Kurdish women’s movement, media representation of women in Rojava and in the YPJ Star militias fighting against ISIL, if there’s an overlap between anarchism and Democratic Confederalism and more.

For some articles on the Rojava, check out: http://tahriricn.wordpress.com/tag/kurds/ and remain aware that the KDP (Kurdistan Democratic Party) is a seperate movement operating in Iraq and that the PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party) is a movement based in Turkey. Both groups operate inside of Syria and were involved in the fight against ISIL on Mount Shengal (Sinjar in Arabic), which crosses the border between Iraqi Kurdistan and Rojava.

Playlist

activism, Anarchist, Antifa, Canada, Feminism, General, Nazis, Poland, Police, Queer, Squatting

Olga + Kuba on Anarchism and Squatting in Poland today

https://www.rhythms-of-resistance.org/
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This week, Olga and Kuba speak with William about anarchism in Poland and their experience of living in Canada. Olga is from Poznan, a city in Western Poland where anarchists have been able to open 2 squats in the city center, and a member of the musical network, Rhythms of Resistance. Kuba is a member of Tektura collective, Autonomous Social Center “Cicha4″ collective and Rhythms of Resistance Lublin, based out of Lublin.

The conversation, sprouting from Olga and Kuba’s presentation at the 2014 Montreal Anarchist Bookfaire, ranges from talking about squatting, resistance to the rise of nationalism, intersections of anarchism with feminism and queer existence, and homogeneity all within the context of modern Poland.

Due to the length of the conversation, it didn’t make sense to include Sean Swain’s commentary for this week, however his Bastille Day message to the world can be found here: http://www.radio4all.net/index.php/program/76396

A-Radio Berlin, Anarchist, Author, Chile, Feminism, gender, General, harm reduction, Health, History, Political Prisoner, Prisons, Racism, repression, Sean Swain, United States

Dan Berger on “The Struggle Within: Prisons, Political Prisoners, and Mass Movements in the United States”

98217821-young-woman-wearing-groucho-marx-mask-gettyimages
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This week, William speaks with Dan Berger – who is an author, prison activist and movement historian – about his new book “The Struggle Within: Prisons, Political Prisoners, and Mass Movements in the United States” just out from PM Press. They speak about histories pertaining to radical mileus as well as the much debated term “political prisoner” and how it relates to prison abolition and support work, among other topics. More about him and his work can be found at http://danberger.org.

Also included is a piece by comrades at ARadio Berlin entitled “Practical Self Help; An Abortion Hotline in Chile”. More of their works can be found at http://aradio.blogsport.de.

Sean Swain’s segment this week is read by The Stimulator of http://Submedia.tv, check out their radical films at that site. Sean is still refusing meals, so far as we are aware. Updates can be found at http://seanswain.org

Anarchist, Feminism, gender, General, Queer, Russia, Sean Swain, Ukraine

Interview with Volodya: Anarcha-feminism + LGBT in the former-USSR today

http://freedom.libsyn.com/
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This week William talks with Volodya, a Russian anarchist podcaster whos podcast Echo of Freedom can be found at http://freedom.libsyn.com. They talk about his experiences working in the anarchist milieu, anarchafeminism, and intersections between the LGBTQ movement in Russia and movements such as antifa.

Sean Swain (website http://www.seanswain.org) discusses Mumia Abu Jamal and class/race struggles as related to police forces. Among other things…

First up, an announcement from the Autonomous Worker’s Union in Kiev, Ukraine, about Russian military invasion of the Crimea and other parts of Ukraine. More info at http://avtonomia.net and http://nihilist.li