Wednesday 31 October 2012

ORGANIZE

This year marked the 17th annual National Day Of Protest Against Police Brutality  And The Criminilization Of A Generation, down in the good ol' u.s.a. This is happening in the middle of the election campaign between the fascist romney, and the current president (and the liberals' favourite) obama. But when it comes down to upholding the actions of the police, they are indistinguishable. When it comes to their stance on capital punishment, they are identical. Has the Guantanamo torture camp been dismantled yet, as obama promised? Nope. They would have moved it to another place anyway. And who gives a fuck about the elections, when murdering pigs are running wild in the streets no matter who wins? Read on, motherfuckers...


October 22, 2012: The National Day of Protest to Stop Police Brutality, Repression, and Criminalization of a Generation

October 28, 2012 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us


Revolution received the following initial reports of protests on October 22, the National Day of Protest to Stop Police Brutality, Repression, and Criminalization of a Generation. Check back for additional reports which will be posted as we receive them.
Updated October 28, 2012, with reports for Greensboro and San Francisco Bay Area, and photos from New York.

Los Angeles Area


Anaheim, California, friends and families of Manuel Diaz, Joel Acevedo, Cesar Cruz, Joe Whitehouse, Andres Avila were present.
In Los Angeles, people and families who have been targets of police brutality, murder, and incarceration came together with others who refuse to condone this injustice. About 35 people from Las Vegas, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Diego, and Los Angeles rallied at the Twin Towers/Men's Central Jail at noon. A huge banner that read "Mass Incarceration + Silence = Genocide," signed by people from the Crenshaw area in LA and Cal State Northridge, was held up facing the street. The Cuauhtemoc Aztec Dancers brought a spirited cultural participation to the action.
Wayne Kramer, of Jail Guitar Doors, a Unitarian Universalist minister, and Keith James of the Stop Mass Incarceration Network spoke at the rally. By joining together to "break the silence" people found a way to do something about the horrors of mass incarceration. Yolanda Trotter, whose 96-year-old mother died after being tased by the police who had been called to help her, came all the way from Vegas to LA to tell her story to the world and cry out for justice. Visitors to the jail and people going to the nearby court joined the protest and shared their stories. One of them, a woman who had come to the jail that morning to tell her incarcerated husband that their son had died in police custody that Saturday because, out of fear, he had swallowed the drugs he was carrying when the police stopped him, stayed for a while by the banner. "I felt so happy when I came out and saw this here," she said. In an embryonic way, collectively breaking the silence transformed people's outrage and pain into strength and resistance.
A spirited march of about 300 people, led by a truck decorated with pictures of people killed by police, went from Pershing Square in downtown LA through Skid Row to police headquarters. On Skid Row, people welcomed the marchers; many took flyers, and people enthusiastically took up whistles (building on the Stop Mass Incarceration Network's "Blow the Whistle" campaign). Some of the homeless joined the march, vigorously blowing their whistles. At 5th and Spring Streets, in the downtown arts district, where Dale Garrett, a 51-year-old Black man was shot down by an undercover LAPD detective in broad daylight, the march defiantly stopped. A die-in covered the intersection. Body outlines were chalked in the street.
Black stickers reading "Mass Incarceration + Silence = Genocide! October 22nd. Break the Silence!" were widely taken up, as well as "Fight the Power, and Transform the People, for Revolution!" At police headquarters, friends and relatives of people killed by police and representatives of various organizations spoke to the crowd.
In Anaheim, California, friends and families of Manuel Diaz, Joel Acevedo, Cesar Cruz, Joe Whitehouse, Andres Avila, and others killed by police, and 16-year-old Jesus Aguirre, sentenced to life in prison, held a march and rally on Sunday, October 21, as part of the National Day of Protest Against Police Brutality, Repression, and the Criminalization of a Generation.

Chicago


Chicago rallies were held in various neighborhoods throughout the day and came together at the main city-wide event in the evening, a march around the walls and barbed wire fences that surround the massive county jail complex.
Despite a morning of pouring rain people chanted, blew whistles, and called on the public to stand up and stand together against police brutality and mass incarceration at rallies that were held in various neighborhoods throughout the day. At one community college people were called on to get handfuls of flyers and whistles and take the protest inside the school (because of the rain).
People involved in forming Revolution Clubs together with family members of people shot and/or killed by the police were at the center of some of the neighborhood rallies. Where family members spoke it gave powerful testimony to the impact of the outrage of police brutality.
These rallies unleashed people to tell their own stories of police brutality and abuse, as well as to dig into the overall impact of mass incarceration. One person encouraged people to reach out to those who were formerly incarcerated, talking about how they are the constant target and victim of police harassment. He knows because he, himself is one. Another person described how a friend received a call from his wife saying she was being set upon by men down the block from his house. He rushed from his house to the scene—where he was shot to death by an undercover cop.
People at the neighborhood rallies recalled the "Blow the Whistle on Stop-and-Frisk, Police Brutality, Racial Profiling and Mass Incarceration" day on September 13 and saw the October 22nd actions as part of a growing movement of resistance. Revolutionary communists described how they saw this resistance as part of building a movement for revolution in which "Fight the power, and transform the people, for revolution" is a central part. And Revolution newspaper was in the mix. Hundreds of whistles and flyers got out, with people joining on the spot to distribute them at some of the rallies.

In Chicago, youth formed the core at various neighborhood rallies.
One feature of the rallies were banners reading "Mass Incarceration + Silence = Genocide" which people were encouraged to sign. These banners were brought from the neighborhood rallies to a citywide gathering the evening of October 22nd at the County Courthouse/County Jail complex.
The evening citywide gathering brought out some of the people who had been at the earlier neighborhood events, an anarchist drum corps, "punks against apartheid," people who are part of the Occupy movement, victims of police torture and others. Members of the group Rebel Diaz dropped by the event at the end of the evening. Speakers addressed the question of mass incarceration, its origins in the workings of the system and the conscious policies of the ruling class. The situation with stop-and-frisk in New York City and the resistance to it were described. And a call was put out for people to support those facing trial for that resistance.
The highlight and main event of the citywide gathering was a march around the walls and barbed wire fences that surround the massive county jail complex. Marchers carried a banner announcing the "October 22nd National Day of Protest to Stop Police Brutality, Repression, and the Criminalization of a Generation," 20 feet long by 6 feet high. The "Mass Incarceration + Silence = Genocide" banners were bright yellow with big black lettering standing out starkly. Among the chants were "We don't want a Prison Nation—Stop Mass Incarceration" and "Mass Incarceration IS the Crime." Visiting hours stretch until 9 pm and the marchers were able to connect with many family members who had come to visit loved ones. The message of October 22nd struck a chord and the resistance was welcomed.
The county sheriff's deputies, on the other hand, were anything but welcoming. They grew increasingly tense as the marchers message received support from family members and long lines of traffic backed up because of the increasing number of sheriff cars.
When prisoners crowded the galleries to watch and when the prisoners' fists went up in the air, the sheriff's deputies started blaring their sirens to drown out the chanting from the marchers. This drew even more attention to the marchers and their message.
Throughout the march there was an exuberance as people stood up right in the face of the state authority to get their message out.

Atlanta


In Atlanta, protesters gathered in Troy Davis Park. The demonstration opened with drummers and a brief speakout that included Nicholas Heyward, whose 13-year-old son was killed by the NYPD.
On Saturday, October 20, at the historic Auburn Research Library, several activist groups worked together to organize two events to address police brutality. The first event, called "Break the Chains," was an open forum calling on the audience to speak bitterness about their encounters with police or to recount the circumstances surrounding the murder of their relatives, as well as a platform for the resisters in Georgia who are part of the undocumented youth movement. They even had the testimony from a former corrections officer who detailed the attitudes and vicious culture of hatred among prison guards towards the prisoners, collaborating on how to make life more miserable and tortuous for targeted prisoners. The second program, called "Every 36 Hours: Extrajudicial Violence in the Black Community," was sponsored by the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, the Ariston Waiters Foundation, and the October 22nd Coalition. There were a number of cultural presentations, from several dozen children from a local Black Liberation School marching in the auditorium to perform, to prominent local hip hop artists. The first panel featured several parents of children whose lives have been stolen: Nicholas Heyward, Freda Waiters, Missy Stafford and Joe Harris, as well as a close relative of Troy Davis. All of their testimony was riveting, making clear with substance not only how their loved ones were deliberately murdered, but how they feel the pain like it was yesterday. While some still held out hope to pressure those in power or even use the ballot box to get justice, Nicholas Heyward from New York City's Parents Against Police Brutality explained why he was part of the October 22nd Coalition, and why we must not rely on the system. He explained that over many years he had found that his time spent in the courts and in politicians' offices had gotten him nowhere... appealing to the audience to cast aside such illusions and go directly to the people to mobilize ever greater resistance that cannot be ignored. The second panel featured activists from Copwatch, Nation of Islam, October 22nd Coalition, and National Action Network, and Mawuli Davis, a defense lawyer known for taking on the cases of victims of police murder, and Vincent Fort, a politician who has stood with the families and got arrested in defense of the Occupy movement.
Revolution Books got a lot of attention with big display boards featuring different quotes from the book BAsics, from the talks and writings of Bob Avakian, as well as an enlarged image of him. A huge hit was a banner, "Mass Incarceration + Silence = Genocide" which was signed all day.
On October 22, protesters gathered in a downtown park called Troy Davis Park (renamed by the people during the Occupy days). The park has an interesting mix of homeless people (mostly playing chess), students from Georgia State University and Atlanta Metropolitan College, vendors, and office workers. In a sea of people wearing black, the demonstration opened with drummers and a brief speak-out including Nicholas Heyward, whose 13-year-old son, Nicholas Jr,. was killed by the NYPD, and civil rights attorney Mawuli Davis, before stepping off for a very lively march that took Peachtree Street to the Atlanta Detention Center. Piercing the air were the sound of whistles blowing and loud chanting as the march snaked through the downtown traffic. The October 22nd banner led the way with people holding signs with the names of those killed by the police followed by "The Whole System Is Guilty!," a banner that said "Mass Incarceration + Silence = Genocide," and the most popular banner was "Fuck the Police." As the march passed by the MARTA transit station, lots of Black youth joyously joined in the demonstration. They were really attracted to the "Fuck the Police" banner. By the time the march arrived at the detention center there were about 120 people. To the dismay of the jail guards, the demonstrators took the front stairs and had another speak-out. There was a continuous stream of harrowing stories by those whose loved ones were murdered by the police: Freda Waiters spoke about her son Ariston Waiters, who was shot in the back by the Union City police a year ago; Mary Neal spoke about her mentally ill brother Larry Neal, who was murdered in a Tennessee jail by the guards; a Vietnamese mother spoke about her son who was shot by the police and left to bleed to death; a teenage boy spoke about his brother who was killed in an Atlanta jail by the prison guards. And going through the crowd, you could hear outrageous story after outrageous story of those who were either brutalized by the police or jacked up by the "injustice" system. A middle-aged Black man who came over to see what the demonstration was about said he just walked out of jail after doing 60 days for littering (!) and lost his job. Following the families, several organizations made statements: Revolution Books Atlanta, National Action Network, FTP Movement, and others.  After the speak-out, the march took off through the streets once again, this time winding its way through the MARTA station plaza and back to the park. The day really captured the anger and anguish of all the lives devastated by this system on the one hand, and on the other tapped into the feeling of joy and liberation in standing up and fighting back, and the need for revolution.
During the course of the afternoon, Revolution Books distributed very widely a palm card with theBAsics quote 1:13, "No more generations of our youth, here and all around the world, whose life is over, whose fate has been sealed, who have been condemned to an early death or a life of misery and brutality, whom the system has destined for oppression and oblivion even before they are born. I say no more of that." They also distributed a flyer for an open house at Revolution Books including the URL for the Cornel West interview with Bob Avakian and sold 60+ copies of Revolutionnewspaper.

Seattle


One focus of the Seattle protest was the police murder of six people in the last three months alone.
On the evening of October 22 a mixed crowd of family members who have had their loved ones murdered by the police; revolutionaries; proletarian and middle strata youth; Veterans For Peace activists; and Occupy people braved the cold and drizzly evening to show their opposition to the epidemic of police brutality in Seattle and around the country. There were large posters that read "Stolen Lives" that had the pictures of people who had been murdered by the police. One of the images was of Henry Lee, an elderly Black man with dementia who was recently shot by the police in the doorway of his home in south Seattle. Friends and family members of Jedidiah Waters, Prince Gavin, and Victor Duffy Jr. courageously spoke out about the injustices and shared their stories of loss and pain. Waters, Gavin and Duffy were some of the most recent Seattle-area young people wantonly murdered by police this year. There have been six people murdered in the last three months alone in the region. One of the things about October 22nd is that every year, there are always new families who show up who have had their loved ones murdered by the police. Friends of Jedidiah Waters described how they found out at the inquest hearing that Jedidiah had been shot 11 times, five in his head, mutilating his body. After hearing this at the inquest, they ran into the hall screaming and crying. All this for "allegedly shoplifting" from Walmart. Marie Young, whose son, 23-year-old David, was murdered last year by the same cop, Matthew Leitgeb, who murdered Waters, also spoke. Pointing to the Stolen Lives posters, she said, "This is just getting ridiculous. We have to do something. This has to end." She said the inquest hearings were ridiculous and weren't set up to get any kind of justice for the people. A Native woman whose nephew was found dead in a juvenile detention facility spoke out about the daily police brutality and intimidation inflicted upon Native youth and the fear that this instilled in her and her son. The family members of John T. Williams and Victor Duffy Jr. took the stage holding pictures of their loved ones, and spoke through their tears and anger with a spirit of determination to keep up the fight for justice in memory of them. To be there in the crowd and listen to these stories was completely heartbreaking but also inspiring. Many in the audience were emotionally moved and responded with shouts of encouragement and agreement.

Seattle
The president of the Seattle Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild spoke about mass incarceration and repression, remembering how the system murdered revolutionaries like Fred Hampton and other Black Panther Party leaders.
A volunteer with Revolution Books spoke about the nature of this system we live under, the scope of police brutality, mass incarceration and repression, and saluted people who have participated in the righteous resistance that has taken place this year and called for others to build off of it and take it further. The statement also told how within this situation there lies the possibility and basis for a radically different world through revolution, and Bob Avakian's new synthesis of communism. Some greeted this speech with exclamations of "right on" and a former prisoner said this spoke to everything that he had wanted to say.
Whistles were passed out and it was announced how these whistles were about everyone standing up to police brutality by blowing this whistle if they see or are being harassed by the police. People donated money in the donation bin that was passed around to support the work of O22.
The march set off for the Cinerama theater, where Chris Harris had his head rammed into a brick wall by the police, and is now unable to feed or dress himself because this caused a traumatic brain injury. The police presence was huge: motorcycles, cars, vans, and bicycles. A long row of bicycle cops lined up against the brick wall where Chris had his head smashed, as if they were proud of the fear and violence it represented. The people called this out, telling these cowards how much they hated them and the system of terror they represent. The march went into populated and visible areas of downtown and the protest was covered by at least two major mainstream news stations. People chanted, "Mass Incarceration: We Say No More! Police Brutality: We Say No More! Racial Profiling: We Say No More!" and added the names of people unjustly murdered like "Troy Davis: We Say No More!" Some people off of the sidewalk joined in the march and whistles were going off all throughout downtown. As the march continued, people along the way got copies ofRevolution, O22 palm cards that had the faces of those who had been recently murdered, andBAsics cards with the "No more generations..." quote. There was intense anger, a resolve to get justice, and a determination to put an END to all this!

Houston

A group of about 50 people gathered at Market Square: several organizations fighting mass incarceration and police brutality were represented, as well as prison rights, LGBT rights, and anti-drug war activists, students, a group of homeless people, and artists. People penned their outrage on a banner reading "MASS INCARCERATION + SILENCE = SLOW GENOCIDE" that had been taken out to housing projects, stores, outside a county jail, and different neighborhoods the weekend before. Many comments described set-ups, victimization and murder by cops and the "criminal justice system."
An Occupy activist wrote in large letters, "Free Eric Marquez," a young man incarcerated and awaiting trial on felony charges, set up by an undercover cop for Occupy Houston's port protest last year—an example of how political dissent, too, is being criminalized.
A hallmark of O22, 2012 was the passion and participation of those whose lives have been directly and horribly impacted by police brutality and murder. Arlene Kelly spoke about her mentally ill daughter, Colleen, who HPD shot and let bleed to death in 1999. A woman people met at the jail came down with her sister, who got on the mic to tell her story. One after the other, people testified.
As the march stepped onto the street, whistles and chants reverberated across train stops and skyscrapers and people along the way grabbed flyers and copies of Revolution newspaper. Several people joined along the way. At the police station a couple joined in, one of them saying, "The words of people speaking out rang so true with me." Another joined because "this situation with the police is out of control and it affects the whole community, no matter where you live."
A Black veteran carrying a Stop Mass Incarceration sign recounted how he got arrested for arguing with a friend. Because he had a knife on him—one that he carried every day for use at his job—they hit him with a felony weapons possession charge. He subsequently lost his job and is now homeless. He marched because "I'm one of those persons that's fed up with this type of brutality… I've been everything in the book—I've been tased, I've been pepper-sprayed—for no reason—I've been falsely arrested, several times… Somebody got to start stepping up…I got some friends, they're like, 'Oh, it'll go away'.  No it won't go away."
He agreed with the quote from BA about how the police "serve and protect" the system not the people. He added, "Like you said, it's an emergency, and it's something that is needed right now, very much needed right now, not later. Every day it's destroying people's lives; innocent children being murdered, handicapped people being murdered.  They're not stopping.  So it should be other people coming up and making aware of what they're doing that won't stop either. And eventually itwill bring about change."
A cousin of Chad Holly, a 15-year-old whose brutal beating by HPD cops drew national attention and protest, remarked, "I'm so glad to see you out here because this has to stop."
Later, some of the participants got together with the revolutionaries to reflect on the day.  Several said that this protest helped open people's eyes, especially about the link between the system and the police, and were struck by the unity expressed among people coming from different directions, and among different nationalities. One immigrant referred to a palm card she had recently gotten, with the quote from Bob Avakian, BAsics 1:3, which she said "got right to the point—that yes, this is not a democracy—this is imperialism."

Cleveland


Several youth joined the march in Cleveland and went by the county jail, where many inmates showed solidarity by raising their fists.
On October 22, there was a real swirl of curiosity, excitement, and engaging even before the rally started. People were moved and riveted by the stark, enlarged photos of people who had been killed by the police in Cleveland. Many stopped in their tracks, and just tried to take it all in, with reverence, shock and anger. One woman said she knew one of the victims pictured there, that he was full of love and potential never to be realized.
People testified to Revolution sellers about their experiences with police brutality and murder. A middle-aged Black woman who worked for the transit company talked about her nephew who has repeatedly faced police harassment. A white woman from a small town in Ohio where a young woman had been killed by the police told people the details of the police murder. A Black man in his 20's, who at first seemed apathetic, had a lot to say—including how police brutality and mass incarceration is all linked to the history of slavery in this country. When he saw the first quote in BAsics, it immediately resonated with him: "There would be no United States as we now know it today without slavery. That is a simple and basic truth."
With djembe drumming in the background, the MC called on people to join the movement of resistance against the horrors of police brutality and murder, the degrading practice of stop-and-frisk, and the massive incarceration especially of Black and brown people. He spoke about a Black homeless man in Saginaw, Michigan, Milton Hall, who was shot 48 times and killed, and that is only one of hundreds every year. He called on people to "Fight the Power, and Transform the People, for Revolution."
A Black student from Cleveland State University's African American Cultural Center spoke about how he was arrested and convicted of three felonies for having some marijuana on him, and now can't get a job. He said, "We need to take revolution to the youth, got to get to the youth with that message." A Black woman said, "We all need to take a stand on the police brutality: Black, white, everyone." Members of the New Black Panther Party spoke about the need to fight the police who are an occupying army in the Black community. A 25-year-old woman who just met up with the protest that day spoke about how she was abused in jail, strip-searched and degraded, and she called on people to continue to fight back.
Several youth jumped into the march to the "Justice" Center, blowing whistles, chanting "ICE, FBI/No more detentions, no more lies," "Stop the killing, stop the lies/NO MORE STOLEN LIVES," and more. At the "Justice" Center, suddenly about 50 cops in formation came marching right by the protest, yelling their reactionary grunts, trying to intimidate people and block out the message of the march. That didn't happen. Whistles blew loudly, and people yelled "Fuck the Police" at them. Then the family of Guy Wills (killed by an off-duty cop) came along. As the march went by the County jail, many inmates raised fists and the V-sign at the windows and people in the march raised their fists in response, whistled and chanted.
With deep passion and conviction, a Black youth said, "WE ARE SLAVES. I stand for my people, like Tupac and others did. FIGHT THE POWER." Afterwards, some people finished off the day by going to Revolution Books to watch the BA Everywhere DVD and listen to Cornel West's interview with Bob Avakian.

Detroit

On October 22, one person went down to the Frank J. Murphy Hall of Injustice. This is the site of the courthouse where countless people, mainly Black and Latinos, are sent off to prison. This is also the site of a scheduled hearing on the criminal trial of the cop who shot and killed 7-year-old Aiyana Jones as she slept on the sofa.  Officer Weekly has filed a motion to dismiss the charges and some say his attorney, the prosecutor and judge are colluding to find a way to grant this motion.
With all of this going on at the Hall of Injustice, the National Day of Protest to Stop Police Brutality, Repression, and the Criminalization of a Generation was met with a lot of enthusiasm. A young Arab guy said that he was down at the courthouse because of racial profiling. He pointed to the part of the flyer about discrimination against Arabs and told about how the police confiscated his $60,000 truck because he is Arab. An older, well-dressed Black man paused, looking at the flyer, and finally said, "I didn't know anyone else thought about this the way I do." A lot of younger people took the flyer and agreed that police are constantly harassing, brutalizing, and arresting people for bullshit.
After the person distributing flyers had been there for a while, a county deputy came out to the courthouse plaza and ordered him off "their" property. Immediately they threatened to arrest him for failure to obey a lawful order by a police officer, a felony in Michigan. A crowd gathered around as the distributor asked what law prohibits distributing literature on public property. Rather than answer the question, three more deputies and a city cop with a dog appeared. After the confrontation ended, some people came up to the distributor and expressed appreciation for what he was doing to stop police brutality.
Later that afternoon a small group of people went downtown to an area where there is city bus traffic. Again the response was enthusiastic and a number of people took flyers to give to people on the bus, in their neighborhood, or to friends. Person after person spoke with anger and disgust about the abuse they've suffered at the hands of the cops. An older white man said the cops have always brutalized people. He told of a beating he received at the hands of the cops in his youth. A young Black man pointed to an unhealed wound on his face. He had received it at the hands of a cop after he objected to an overly intimate pat-down. He was beaten unconscious for this "crime." He said when he regained consciousness he was in a cell in a pool of his own blood. No charges were ever pressed against him. A well-dressed middle-aged woman from India told about how the police everywhere do this, it's not just in Detroit. An older Black man spoke with bitterness about how many young people are being sent to prison. He spoke about grandsons and nephews who were all locked up.  He said he thought this was being done because there are no jobs for youth so they just lock them up.

New Orleans

Community activists held a protest rally in front of the New Orleans city hall on October 22nd: "We were demanding an end to police brutality and the decriminalization of a generation," said Rev. Brown, who joined thousands of protesters across the country demanding justice for innocent people killed and arrested by law enforcement. Speaker after speaker denounced racism in the criminal (so-called) justice system and will continue to fight for justice.

Greensboro, North Carolina

October 22nd in Greensboro, NC was marked by a spirited march through the Smith Homes housing project and was preceded by a rally/picket at the newly opened $114 million, 1032-bed Guilford ("Guilty") County Jail where banners, signs and drummers lined the street. An activist for immigrants' rights noted that the new jail "has made room in the old jail [next door] for immigrants awaiting deportation. It is now becoming a new regional detention center."
In the housing project, people were waiting for the march and some readily joined, including quite a few youth who were encouraged by their parents. One mother in a motorized wheel chair beamed as she joined the march: "My kids do this every year and they bring their friends. This is important." Another wheelchair-bound resident joined. The Cakalak Thunder drummers provided a loud pulsating beat that got people's attention and was hard to resist.
The march easily tripled in size as spectators were now discussing and debating with each other whether or not to join in or just wave support from their porches. Some people walked along the sidelines. Others took O22 Calls and revolutionary literature.
Significantly, Bob Avakian's name is beginning to be known to people here and some in the march (particularly young folks) took multiple copies of BA cards to distribute to others stating, "No more generations of our youth…" (BAsics 1:13) One man who had bought BAsics last year approached a person selling Revolution saying that "That first sentence in the book [about the exploitation of slave labor as central to the "wealth" of the U.S.] says it all!" The BA quote about the role of the police was distributed and discussed.
After the march, people gathered to talk about the police and their tactics, like arbitrarily "banning" residents (especially young males) from all public housing in Greensboro. One man spoke to the rally stating, "This tactic (banning) breaks up families, keeping men from their children and loved ones. It breaks your support, for instance, if you've just gotten out of prison, you often can't stay with your family if a cop decides you are 'undesirable.' There is no recourse and the 'banning' can last for years."
A "Blow the Whistle on Police Brutality" campaign was announced at the rally and young people got or signed up to receive whistles. At the end of the rally, the Stolen Lives Pledge was read by the mother of another Black man killed. Names were read from the Stolen Lives banner and the crowd shouted "Presente!"

SF Bay Area

Downtown Oakland on October 22nd a hundred people rallied, marched, and blew their whistles against police murder and mass incarceration. Called jointly by Cephus Johnson (the uncle of Oscar Grant) and the Bay Area Stop Mass Incarceration Network, the rally brought together many families of young men recently killed by police in Oakland and neighboring cities, high school and university students, people from the neighborhoods, revolutionaries, and activists from Occupy Oakland.

San Francisco, at a wall listing people killed by police.
This was the first demonstration for one high school youth. He was challenged by one of the speakers in his class to step forward, and said he was amazed that there were so many different kinds of people standing up together. In fact, hundreds of students were part of raising the issue of mass incarceration to another level. At one high school, classroom doors were thrown wide open to speakers against police murder and mass incarceration. A teacher there told us how when one speaker asked how many knew someone in prison, every single student in a class of 40 raised their hand. Over 300 students (all the 9th and 10th graders in the school) heard from Cephus Johnson, Adam Blueford (whose son Alan, was killed by Oakland police only days before his high school graduation) and a youth from the Revolution Club. Cephus spoke to the epidemic proportions of police brutality and murder, from New York's Stop and Frisk, to Trayvon Martin and thousands of others; and how it's increasing. He spoke bluntly, "If you think it's bad now, just think what it will be like in a few years—unless you come out and stop it now. You are the future." The youth from the Revolution Club told the students that the situation they face of mass incarceration and police brutality is not their fault.  In fact, they are the answer to this horror.  Their stepping forward now to be part of this fight to end mass incarceration and police brutality is a very important part of changing what people are facing here and all over the world.
At the end of the day, students grabbed up hundred of whistles to blow against police brutality and mass incarceration, as well as copies of Revolution, stickers and leaflets to get out everywhere.
The use of BAsics 1:24  in the schools and more broadly has been both controversial and provoking—going up against the mantra of a "few bad cops spoiling the barrel." We challenged one family member on that. She admitted that "I kind of felt that unless I say that 'not all cops are bad, there are some good ones too,' I would come off as sounding too biased against the cops—too radical. But what he [BA] says is really true. We can't be lying to people."
At the rally, many spoke bitterness and outrage, both to the crowd and to the press— the mother and family of Mario Romero (one of the six people killed by Vallejo police since May), who was executed while sitting in his car in front of his house; the father of Alan Blueford, chased down and killed while lying on his back, unarmed; Denika Chapman, mother of Kenneth Harding Jr., gunned down by San Francisco police for not paying a $2 bus fare. At the end of the rally, the Pakistani/American family of 21-year-old Mohammed Shah—killed only days earlier in Hayward—bravely stepped forward to join in expressing both their pain and their determination to fight for justice.
Students from U.C. Berkeley brought a banner against police brutality they had made and signed. One older man from Egypt, after viewing photos of conditions of prisoners at Pelican Bay Prison, commented, "If this was in Libya, or some other country, this government would be screaming about it. But it's not there. It's here in the U.S.A.” Many passersby were attracted to the Stolen Lives Wall, listing some of the names and photos of the thousands who have been killed by law enforcement across the country. Others came up to the table to get their whistles, stickers, copies ofRevolution, and to look through and buy a copy of BAsics.
Carl Dix's call "All Out for October 22nd" in Revolution newspaper was a crucial part in building for the day. What he said about this being an "emergency situation" really resonated with people—how "the powers-that-be have unleashed their whole criminal 'injustice' system to carry out intensifying murderous assault on oppressed people across the country."
People got a sense of  a new movement of mass resistance against the whole system of mass incarceration as a powerful march, led by the families of the "Stolen Lives," took to the streets and marched to the jail—the Alameda County "pipeline to prison." We pledged to continue to stand with those incarcerated, and to spread the word of the courage of the hunger strikers and the call by the leaders of the Pelican Bay Hunger Strike for "peace between different nationalities in prisons and jails" (reprinted in Revolution #282). The rally ended with a call to blow the whistle here from this day forward, to have each other's back, to build the spirit of resistance against all of mass incarceration. Mass Incarceration + Silence = Genocide!

New York City


Carl Dix speaks to the rally in Union Square, New York City.


New York City

Sisters (two women on the left) of 23-year-old Shantel Davis who was murdered by the NYPD in Brooklyn on June 15, 2012 after she ran some red lights and crashed into a car; Constance Malcolm (at the mic), the mother and Franclot Graham, the father (far right) of 18-year-old Ramarley Graham, who was murdered by the NYPD in their Bronx apartment on February 2, 2012.

Sunday 28 October 2012

"THEY'VE EARNED IT"

For all of those idiots who like to claim that the free market and democracy are the best of all possible worlds, and that people need an incentive to keep working, keep in mind those billions, yes billions, whose incentive to keep working so hard is to stave off starvation, and are the real source of the wealth of the parasitic rich motherfuckers who suck the blood out of the workers, especially the workers of the Third World. Fuck the bourgeoisie.


This Is the Imperialist System... This Is What They Want You to Vote For

The Real Cost of iPads

October 28, 2012 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

Yes: Romney and the ruling class figures most associated with him have a blatantly fascist, greed-is-good, fuck-the-poor, AmeriKKKa über alles agenda. Case in point, the billionaire Koch brothers. Their company is one of the top 10 air polluters in the United States, and they have poured millions and millions of dollars into union-busting, anti-environment politicians.
But what is represented by Obama, and ruling class figures he lauds as models and who are generally associated with the Democratic Party, is also a horror for the people. He acts in and promotes the interests of the system we live under, just as Romney does.
Case in point: The late Steve Jobs and Apple Computer.
In December 2010, Obama told us, “We celebrate somebody like Steve Jobs, who has created two or three revolutionary products. We expect that person to be rich, and that’s a good thing. We want that incentive. That’s part of the free market.”
What Obama didn’t say is that the enslavement and super-exploitation of tens of millions of workers throughout vast sections of the world are the source of these riches. And the global competition between these capitalist-imperialist enterprises compels them to scour the planet in search of the most vulnerable and exploitable workers, and the contractors and ruling classes in these countries most able and willing to organize efficient systems for sucking the life, and the spirit, out of these workers.
• • •
“Life is meaningless,” says a 21-year-old worker whose fingernails are stained black with dust after a 12-hour overnight shift. “Every day, I repeat the same thing I did yesterday. We get yelled at all the time. It’s very tough around here.” Conversation is forbidden on the assembly line; bathroom breaks are limited and timed; the constant noise from the factory is damaging his hearing; and he makes too little to send money home.
The youth was explaining in the spring of 2010 why at least 10 of his coworkers had committed suicide in a year working for Foxconn, the Taiwanese company that is the world’s largest contract electronics manufacturer in the world, making Apple’s iPhones and iPads. Foxconn employs 1.2 million workers in China and produces 40 percent of the world’s consumer electronics, some in factory complexes with nearly 200,000 workers. They are mostly young peasant-workers from the countryside; 86 percent of the workers at the enormous (three square kilometers, or 1.16 square miles) complex outside Shenzhen where he works are between the ages of 16 and 25, housed in dormitories with 8-10 people sleeping in a room.
An 18-year-old who came from the countryside after high school jumped from her dormitory’s fourth story, surviving but in a coma for two months. Her father said she felt isolated and without friends. Another worker was hospitalized after he slit his wrist.
 “I do the same thing every day; I feel empty inside; I have no future” explains a college graduate who works in product development and who has considered suicide. A 24-year-old said 80 percent of the production workers have to stand for 12 hours, 6 days a week. “It’s hard to make friends because you aren’t allowed to chat with your colleagues during work.... Most of us have little education and have no skills so we have no choice but to do this kind of job. I feel no sense of achievement and I’ve become a machine.”
Apple commended Foxconn for the measures it took to improve working conditions following the suicides. And Steve Jobs himself told a tech conference in Rancho Palos Verdes, California, “We’re all over this.” He assured his audience that his company does one of the best jobs inspecting suppliers, and that Foxconn is “not a sweatshop.”
Under the laws of the “free market” system Obama extols, and of which he extols Jobs as a model, Apple and all its competitors are driven to move production around the world in search of more vicious exploitation and an edge on the competition. Apple is not alone at Foxconn. Microsoft makes the Xbox there, Amazon builds Kindles, Hewlett-Packard and Dell make laptops there, Nintendo makes Wii, and on and on (and while the owner of Dell Computer is a prominent backer of the Republicans, Microsoft’s Bill Gates and Amazon.com’s Jeff Bezos are major backers of the Democratic Party).
Whether in the form of old-school fascist oligarchs like the Koch brothers, or in the form of liberal, new-style monopoly capitalists, capitalism-imperialism does what it does: crushes lives, destroys spirits, and ruins the environment in its meat grinder of exploitation.
Knowing this, think about what it means to vote for the “lesser evil” in this election, and to be drawn into and accept the terms that define elections for president under this system.
This Is the Imperialist System...
This Is What They Want You to Vote For

Workers at the Foxconn factory in Shenzhen, China.
Photo: AP

Thursday 25 October 2012

ALL AGES vs. BAR SHOWS

This has been a  debate in punk/hardcore circles for as long as I can remember. I have played in bands that have done both bar and all-agers, and I have played in bands that will not do bars. It all depends on how the other band members feel about the issue. I stand on the side of the all ages shows, my argument being that they are actually age inclusive rather than being age restrictive. If you "feel old" or insecure about going to these, it's not my fucking problem. Also, it always felt like the folks at the all ages shows were actually there for the music, and not just to get fucking stupid on legal poison. And that's another thing. The real reason many people do not like going to all ages shows is because they want to drink. Going out and listening to music means they have to fucking drink. Otherwise they just do not socialize. Stop lying.
   This leads me to AK-47. The previous line-ups were pretty much unanimous about only doing non-bar shows, except for Jamie, who didn't care either way. The only exception we made was the annual Jay Brown Memorial Show. With the new line-up, we are open to playing more bar shows, because I am the only one who maintains the all ages stance. It is not a point of tension in the band. I just didn't want to be the one dictating what everyone else would be doing, or not doing. So now, we will be doing both. Am I a hypocrite, or sellout? Do I give a fuck if someone with no principles or something to stand for judges me? Well, just guess. And sellout would imply that we are getting something for playing. The past almost thirty fucking years of playing this music has cost me way fucking more than I've made. In fact, I never expect to see a fucking dime, and am usually not disappointed.

Friday 19 October 2012

DELUSIONAL

Recently, a co-worker was talking about how she was watching the romney vs. obama debate, and how "crazy" the u.s.a. is. She said that we were "lucky" to live in canaduh.  I know I've gone over this before, but too fucking bad.
   Considering the recent events surrounding the extremely sad and cruel case of the Amanda Todd suicide, with teenagers making vicious and cruel comments even after her death, how much more of a civil and kind society is this? What about the entire pickton case, with all of those streetworkers murdered, and the cops (and society at large) not giving a fuck? The murder of Robert Dziekanski in the vancouver airport, because those stupid motherfuckers (rcmp) couldn't find a Polish speaking person to interpret for him, so they kept him locked up for hours until he lost it, and then they tasered him to death? The Highway Of Tears, with all of those young women missing, and the authorities not having a clue about who's doing it. The fact that the Downtown Eastside of vancouver is what it is. KKKanadian troops in foreign lands killing people along with their amerikkkan comrades, or at least teaching others to do the same. The ugly racism that erupts everytime French canada complains, or the Natives (righteously) put up barricades to protest their living conditions, or some fucking asshole wanting to put up some fucking resort or pipeline on their land. Attawapiskat. Justin bieber. The barenaked ladies. Boatloads of refugees trying to get in from oppressive countries that  kkkanada has friendly relations with (because of the profits derived from the exploitation of those countries by canadian corporations), and the hideous racism exposed by that. And how the fuck did harper get elected? Because this is a gentler country than the u.s.a? Believe it or not, this place is chock fulla assholes, too. Do you think harper would support the lying and useless obama, or the blatant idiot and just this side of fascist romney? Just fucking guess. Stop fucking lying to yourselves.

Tuesday 16 October 2012

THE FIRST SESSION

We started recording last weekend at Kent's house. We managed to get the bed tracks for 16 songs down, and even started on some vocals! We'll go back and do the bass, and maybe some of Kent's solos, and of course the rest of the yelling. It went remarkably smooth. Recording is generally not my favourite thing to do. It always seems like it's a struggle to get the drums sounding just right, and everything feels like it takes forever. But last weekend was definitely an exception. The drum sound was figured out relatively quickly, and everyone was so relaxed, it was actually fun. I never thought I'd say that about recording. I don't know yet which or how many songs are going to be on the record, but we'll get it all figured out. We have a show or two coming up, but I'll get the details out once we know for sure. See ya later, fuckers.

Saturday 13 October 2012

THE ATTEMPT

I've been up since 5:30 am, going to work from 7-3, and then the latest incarnation of AK-47 are going to record. I think we have 14 songs in total. It's time to see how many of those we want to fit on a 7" record. I'd like to put at least 10 on there, so the sound quality doesn't suffer too much. We'll see. Wish us luck.

Tuesday 9 October 2012

IT IS THEIR SYSTEM

To continue with my harping on a singular theme, over and over again....it doesn't matter who is the president, or what fucking colour he is, what matters is the fact that he's the leader of the most horrific imperialist genocidal country in the history of the world. Black and Latino people are still being incarcerated at an alarming rate, and once again, it has nothing to do with obama not being able to change things because of everyone else, or george fucking w. before him. He got to the top because he truly believes in amerikkka's role as the deliverer of democracy and freedom in the world,(or the u.s.'s version of it), and also amerikkka's right to go and do whatever they want, and to steal whatever they want. Fuck him,and fuck them. They are losing, and they will lose.

 Executions, Official and Unofficial… the Killing Thing About American Democracy

This Is the Imperialist System…
This Is What They Want You to Vote For

If you are horrified by how Black and Latino youth in cities across the country are gunned down by police for some b.s. reason or for no reason at all…if you are outraged at the blatantly racist way disproportionate numbers of Black people are thrown into and executed on death row…and if you are being pulled into the presidential election circus at the same time, then you need to confront this reality: Voting for either candidate means voting for a system that carries out unjust executions, official and unofficial.
The essence of the democratic “rule of law” in the U.S. is the monopoly over the legitimate use of violence by the state to protect and enforce the rule of the capitalist-imperialist class. In practice, wanton illegitimate killing by police—overwhelmingly of Black youth, as well as Latinos and youth of other oppressed nationalities—is so ever-present that the essential “coming of age” talk Black parents must have with their teenage sons is not about sex but about how to act when stopped by cops, in hopes of minimizing the chance of their becoming another police murder statistic. This terror against African-Americans as a people is the modern-day version of the “legal” lynchings of thousands of Black men during the hundred years of Jim Crow.
The police murder of Sean Bell in New York, hours before his wedding in 2006, and of Oscar Grant on a BART train platform in Oakland, CA on New Year’s Day, 2009, triggered widespread anger and protest in the streets. And the way in which the killers were protected by the justice system in both cases was as predictable as it was fundamentally unjust.
When a judge acquitted the cops who killed Sean Bell in 2008 on all charges, presidential candidate Barack Obama was quoted as saying, “The judge has made his ruling, and we are a nation of laws, so we respect the verdict that came down.” And he attacked the protests by saying that “resorting to violence to express displeasure over a verdict is something that is completely unacceptable and counterproductive.” Obama was auditioning for the role of leader of the U.S. global empire at that time, and he was showing those who rule that he could combine generating a sense of hope among sections of people disaffected from the system with ruthless enforcement of the crimes needed to maintain and extend the empire. The “slap on the wrist” given in July 2010 to the cop who killed Oscar Grant did not call forth any comment at all from PresidentObama.
At the same time as the police murders, the U.S. conducts openly sanctioned, almost ritualized, legal lynchings of Black men put on death row. While Black people comprise 13.4% of the U.S. population, 34% of prisoners executed since 1976 have been Black. As with police murder, the more blatant the injustice in the use of public executions, the broader the terror it induces.
The execution of Troy Davis in 2011, after 22 years on death row, is but the most recent example. The execution by lethal injection was carried out despite the fact that there was an outcry of people around the world, including prominent figures such as Pope Benedict and Jimmy Carter, against it because so much compelling evidence had been brought to light of Davis’ innocence. Obama refused to lift a finger to stop the execution, or to say a word about it.
Obama and Romney see eye to eye on giving a pass to the most brutal police murders. On the death penalty, they have expressed similar views, saying they are for it if it’s “narrowly applied” or “in certain circumstances,” including in crimes where no one was killed. When it comes to the exercise of brutal state violence against the people, there is no debate.
This Is the Imperialist System…This Is What They Want You to Vote For

Wednesday 3 October 2012

OBAMA, BUSH, WHAT THE FUCK?

To all of those delusional motherfuckers who still think that obama is the lesser of two evils, or that his hands are tied by the republicans, how the fuck do you think he got to the top of the most murderous, freedom crushing empire on the fucking planet? It's not that "he can't do anything, because of what bush did before him, and the republicans won't let him! (boo fucking hoo)", it's that he's the leader of the biggest imperialists on earth. Recently, as I was watching the news, I heard him say that "America can't solve all of the world's problems". Well, no shit. Not only can't they, but they are the root of most of them. Problems are not "solved" by invading other countries, killing and detaining civilians, stealing their natural resources, and using the population as cheap labour for your fucking corporations. No, they are not. And speaking of detaining civilians, check out obama's latest efforts in defence of amerikkkan freedom:

Dangerous New Turn in
Obama Administration’s Assault
on Fundamental Rights

October 7, 2012 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

The Obama administration has demonstrated yet again its resolve to clear away any legal obstacles to enforcing the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). This law, enacted in December 2011, contains a provision (section 1021) that gives the government the power to indefinitely detain, without charge or trial, a broad and vague category of people—which could include people who have nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks or with terrorism in general.
The NDAA is a dangerous assault on fundamental rights.
A lawsuit, Hedges et al. v. Obama et al., brought by Chris Hedges, Daniel Ellsberg, Noam Chomsky, and four other plaintiffs, challenges this draconian provision of the law. On May 16, Federal District Court Judge Katherine Forrest ruled in their favor, declaring that section 1021 of the NDAA is unconstitutional. The judge imposed an injunction temporarily blocking enforcement of the law. The Obama administration immediately appealed.
On September 12, Judge Forrest rejected a government request to reconsider her ruling and ordered a permanent injunction against this section of the NDAA. But within 24 hours, Obama administration lawyers filed a motion to stay this order, claiming that the injunction caused “irreparable harm to national security and the public interest.” And this stay was granted.
In other words, the NDAA is in effect! The government’s expanded authority to arbitrarily detain citizens and non-citizens, under the pretext of national security, is now being enforced—pending further legal challenges.

Harmful Characterization Still Part of Trial Record

It is especially alarming that as this lawsuit winds through the courts, the erroneous and potentially harmful mischaracterization of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA and Bob Avakian that Judge Forrest incorporated into her May 16 opinion remains part of the official trial record of this case.
Judge Forrest’s ruling, though mainly positive, contains a profound mischaracterization of the RCP and Bob Avakian. Specifically, it says that the Party “endorses the use of violence towards revolutionary ends,” a phrase that could lend itself to the false interpretation that the RCP might seek to achieve its aims through acts of terrorism. For critical background on this threatening situation for the RCP and Bob Avakian, readers should go to: “Letter Points to Dangerous Mischaracterization in National Defense Authorization Act Ruling,” Revolution #274, July 8, 2012, and “Brief Filed Objecting to Dangerous Mischaracterization of RCP, USA,” Revolution #275, July 22, 2012.
Acting on the seriousness of this assault, including the unacceptable singling out of the RCP and its Chairman Bob Avakian, “A Call To Stand Together To Oppose The Obama Administration’s Dangerous Assault On Fundamental Rights” has been issued. This public statement has been signed by over 650 people including Daniel Ellsberg; Cornel West; actor-director Mark Ruffalo; attorneys Ron Kuby and Michael Steven Smith; Cindy Sheehan; scholars Stephen Zunes, Donna Haraway, Colin Dayan, and Andrew Ross; film/TV actor Peter Coyote; antiwar veterans Scott Olsen and Matthis Chiroux; and Project Censored founders Mickey Huff and Peter Phillips.
The call declares: “Those of us signing this statement cannot speak for the RCP and indeed have various levels of familiarity with and a variety of views on its philosophical and political principles and objectives. But we do not countenance—and recognize as very dangerous—the designation by the powers-that-be of groups as politically ‘acceptable’ and ‘unacceptable.’ History teaches, by negative and positive example, that we must stand against attempts to divide progressive, radical, and revolutionary forces along any such lines.”
The call also states: “The pattern is disturbingly clear: not just a continuation but a further leap in the draconian measures taken by the Bush administration—under the pretext of the open-ended, so-called War on Terror—to detain, torture, and assassinate... not just a continuation but a further leap in measures to restrict and criminalize dissent and opposition to the status quo.”
This call is all the more important in the face of the latest legal turn. It can be signed atopposerepressionndaa.net. Funds are being raised for high-profile publication of the call in coming weeks.

Monday 1 October 2012

TO THE MAGNIFICENT SCOTT HENDERSON!!!

It was a great weekend full of reminiscing, but without the bullshit sadness that goes with a life of emptiness, and people who can only have fun by reliving the past. It was a celebration of Mr.Scott Henderson's 30 years of recording in Victoria, which started in 1982 with the now legendary Neos. Henderson himself has said that nostalgia is bullshit, and he has a rule of only seeing bands when they are in their prime. I couldn't agree more. All of these fucking bands who do these reunion tours and shows because they couldn't get jobs, is for old suckers, and young kids who were too young to have seen them when they were actually doing something new and exciting. All that aside, AK-47 played Friday night with The Role Models and The Poor Choices. The Role Models are a straight-up punk rock band, complete with songs about "the scene", and an anthemic song called "I Suck At Life", which I doubt they actually do. Many of the song structures remind me of Section 46, which is a band I was in in the late '80s 'til the early '90s. The Poor Choices were a fun and catchy pre-punk style of garage rock, chock full of hooks. The whole night was fucking awesome. Great turnout, a wide variety of ages were represented, and Scott Henderson got the tribute he deserved. Saturday night was also great, with Scott playing three fucking sets. (Yes, he is a rock monster). Tool and The Eel and High Arctic were full of Mr.H's trademark weirdness, with T&The E being more of a rootsy inspired thing with David P.Smith, and High Arctic reminding  me at times of early NoMeansNo. Anthemic and crazy, and fucking great and heavy. People's War played that night, whcih is a band that I play in with Scott, Scott, Glen, and Brad. We are a reggae type of thing, and have had three practices in the last three years. At times it showed, but I think we pulled it off. It was a great time, but sadly, Johnny Pollard could not make it out. Hopefully next time, as we have no intention of going three years without practicing again.
   All in all, it was a fantastic night. Thanks to Hermione, Scott, and everyone who worked so hard to make this happen, and of course everyone who came out to support local music, and someone who has dedicated his life to the local scene, no matter the genre. Thank you, Scott.
MON_P9ScottNow_Sept2712.jpg