[copied from Anarchist news dot org]

Submitted by anon on Wed, 2010-01-20 07:07

A network of street medics, action medics, and other skilled individuals with politics of mutual aid has developed to help send organized teams of volunteers to Haiti to help earthquake survivors. This network is building off experiences gained working at the Common Ground Clinic in New Orleans and as street medics and campaign medics from the West Coast to Appalachia to the Northeast Anarchist Network, with varying levels of medical and herbal knowledge & clinical experience.

We are:

* Providing direct medical aid, medical and social advocacy;
* Documenting the developing situation on the ground and providing an alternative media source; and
* Establishing a grassroots structure that allows the effective distribution of aid.

Donations will immediately go towards:

* Provision of emergency medical supplies and gear;
* Travel costs for medics and team to reach devastated areas of Haiti; and
* Supporting grassroots relief efforts on the ground.

The first team of five landed yesterday, just in time to live through a 6.0 level earthquake this morning. They are safe and sound, treating patients, and beginning to establish a new field hospital.

Breaking news and reports form the field:
http://mutualaiddisasterrelief.org/reports.shtml

Our network, and a link to donate:
http://mutualaiddisasterrelief.org/

Who to e-mail if you want to help:
mutual-aid-disaster-relief-in-haiti@googlegroups.com

Hellz yeah!

My latest news commentary is up at Center For A Stateless Society.

Olympic Games advertisements on Winnipeg bus shelters were recently subverted to read “RIOT 2010.” The saboteurs also glued on a person holding a brick and a short list of things to revolt against. Much could be said about this use of art and the merits or dangers of encouraging riots. But for now I’d like to examine a claim made in the saboteurs’ statement, which can be viewed with pictures of the action at flickr.com/photos/weweremadeforthis.

Their objections to the Olympics include the charge that “By presenting the games as a festival of international peace and friendship, the IOC [International Olympic Committee] allows the nations of the world to deny any internal conflict, pretending to represent their people as anything but discontented.” [read the rest.]

My longer feature article this month will discuss a soft transition to a stateless society, something that is difficult to squeeze into a news commentary.

It’s Monday, and as promised my first Center For a Stateless Society commentary is online.

On Sunday, January 3, thousands of airline travelers were delayed after an unknown person walked the wrong way through an exit at Newark Liberty International Airport. Continental Airlines, the largest user of the affected terminal, was still behind schedule on Monday morning. Though it is relieving when a security scare results in no innocent casualties, this incident shows the vulnerability of the rigid institutions that are supposed to provide security. The possibility that a freed market can provide security better than a state ought to be examined…(Read the rest: Newark Airport Disruption and the Failure of State Security)

Writing for C4SS involves a different style and focus than I’m used to. C4SS commentary is about writing newspaper-friendly editorials that take a current news item and examine how it provides evidence in favor of market anarchism. But I think I’ll ease into it.

“However, if time travellers do break into the LHC control room and pull the plug out of the wall, then I’ll refer you to my article supporting Nielsen’s theory that I wrote in 2025.” – Brian Cox

Let’s get this straight: a man was arrested for “aiding illegal protests” using Twitter, so “The F.B.I. raided his Queens home on Thursday and removed boxes of subversive materials, along with his personal computers.” This is considered normal.

H/T Freedom Book Club

In Indiana, a woman was arrested for buying two boxes of cold medication in less than a week. Government cares for your health by preventing you from buying effective medicine.

Speaking of beneficial drugs, Keene, NH activists have staged a series of marijuana smoke-ins at the town central square. Will your town be next?

Rad Geek shared an incredible video on the vastness of space, and some comments on the civilization that lets us view it.

I cannot watch it without reflecting on how awesome life is.

The drive for more discovery, more life, and the hubris that enables it will take us to where gods were once the only ones permitted.

Concerns have been raised over the Obama administration soliciting reports of “fishy” information regarding health care proposals. The blog post that announced the program appears to have been amended, but it previously said:

There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.

Many critics called this a snitch line for the building of an enemies list. True, there is a sinister power motive behind every government action, but a deeper analysis is necessary.

The Obama administration has numerous means at its disposal to note enemies on more issues than health care. The flag@whitehouse.gov initiative is really a way to include more people in policymaking and give the White House a heads-up in responding to criticism.

Obama’s system of governance works through participatory tyranny. Individual desires for empowerment are taken in by the political system. Control over life is co-opted and activism is channeled into efforts that suit authority. This is by itself more dangerous than a restructuring of the corporate-state health care establishment. As I noted in The Strategy of Propaganda:

Let’s take a moment to think about what authoritarian movements offer people. Desires that people have are co-opted, influenced, and/or manufactured by those who want to be in charge. Leninism and Nazism promised followers a part in building a better future. This future was meant for those whom the leaders chose. To foster unity behind the leader, the act of joining the followers was presented to individuals as a method of empowerment and those who were not followers or who were designated as enemies were attacked. United States imperial expansion after September 11 worked in a similar manner. The overwhelming mass murder of people Americans identified with left many feeling vulnerable. The state promised security, and many individuals felt empowered by getting behind the state as they were now part of something that they thought did heroic deeds. Similarly, the Obama campaign profited from the sense of historical significance that it inspired in voters. By supporting the political ambitions of one black man, the voter was told that he would himself be sitting with Rosa Parks, marching with Martin Luther King, and putting his own hands into building a new tolerant and enlightened nation.

The above paragraph should certainly not be read as examples of what to do. Authoritarian ends are served by authoritarian means. They are examples of what we must undermine.

Brown Shirts and Red Guards operated on a similar principle of decentralized groups carrying out the wishes of the leader. Of course, Obama’s leadership kills far fewer people and his domestic supporters are less likely to take the violence that the state institutionalizes into their own hands.

The right wing of statism is catching up to the more modernized participatory tyranny of the democrats. Sure, their base buys guns with the intention of securing their faction’s control (they call it “freedom”), but I doubt the Republican leadership wants a shooting war that would lower their constituents’ property values. They have tried to channel frustration into right wing politics, and put activism where they can control it – witness the partisan control of many Tea Party rallies.

As politics becomes more overtly a media spectacle and mainstream media becomes more overtly a partisan hackfest, the political media uses a similar strategy to gain followers. It is all “us versus them” factionalism and you have to pick one of the sides they give you. Glenn Beck has surpassed even Bush and Giuliani in using mass murder as a marketing gimmick.

Government is based on the principle that some people have the right of authority over the lives of others – Death Panels, All the Way Down. And yes, we should prepare to build liberty in the worst of likely scenarios. But if we look for a death camp behind every blog post, we can easily be mislead.

The question remains: who will send volumes of Carson and Von Mises to White House lackeys?

In related news, Mike Gogulski posted a very quotable piece on health care today.

[cross posted at fr33agents.net]

darianworden.com

When people are struggling to have enough to eat, it’s good to know that activists are working to make it harder for them.

An Infoshop News post says,

In the early morning of July 23 our cell decided to return to attack exploiters of innocent animals, entering their slaughterhouse, we sprayed gasoline on the tires of a truck, creating chaos and fear to those people who make their living from the suffering of others. The fire spread throughout the complex, leaving machines of enslavement and torture unusable. This is the 4th attack targeting trucks at this SLAUGHTERHOUSE in our town…

This time the target was a dairy shop and warehouse. The darkness of the night was lit by the flame of subversion; with the use of 2 incendiary devices and a little extra gasoline the site was burned; one device was placed in the main door and the other in the window, leaving the electricity and the fabric sign for the place damaged and as if this action was not enough the walls were also painted using paint bombs and spraypaint.

Advocating different treatment of nonhuman beings is one thing. But don’t pretend it’s revolutionary to make life harder for the productive class – authoritarians have been doing just that for millennia – “If you oppose us then we’ll wipe out your food supply!”

It would be funny if those who value the well-being of humans less than the well-being of inferior animals had their houses destroyed and turned into a more favorable habitat for reasonless beasts.