CrimethInc.'s Blog, page 10

Running from the Devil: An Interview

In 2012, Steve Jablonski was subpoenaed to testify before a grand jury and chose instead to leave the United States. In this interview, he describes his interactions with law enforcement and his time on the run.

Download Zine PDF (online reading version). [3.1MB]

Download Imposed PDF (print-ready version). [2.1MB]

 

Running from the Devil
An interview with grand jury resister Steve Jablonski

If you were contacted by the FBI, what would you do? Do you know who you would call? Would you be able to find a lawyer? Would you quit your job? Would you talk to your partner, your comrades, your parents? More importantly, would you talk to the government? If the FBI informed you that you were being made to stand before a grand jury, at which you could not have a lawyer present and you might face jail time if you did not answer questions—what would you do?

In 2012, several anarchists in the Pacific Northwest had to answer these questions. They were brought before the court to determine if they knew anything or anyone that was connected to a riot that broke out on May Day of that year. Three people kept their mouths shut and did several months in jail. One other person talked and was released, and quickly vanished without telling her former friends what she had done.

What follows is the experience of another person, Steve Jablonski, who took another route. While standing in solidarity with other people in the Pacific Northwest who resisted the grand jury, Steve instead decided to leave the country in order to avoid spending time in jail. Steve, like his comrades, kept his mouth shut in the face of government repression, but also faced other obstacles. He had to contend with the police forces of another country, and continues to face the realities of political repression now that he has returned.

There are many ways to defy the powers that be. Sometimes, you keep your mouth shut and do a few months; other times, you flee the country. We leave it up to you, dear reader, to choose what is right for you.“Wherever you find injustice, the proper form of politeness is attack.”

–T-Bone Slim

Say Nothing (information about grand jury resistance)

Why Riot (an essay)

About Grand Juries

Solidarity with Steve

 

Can you tell us a little about yourself? How did you arrive in the Pacific Northwest and become an anarchist?

I grew up in New Jersey, about 45 minutes outside of New York City. I lived out there till I was eighteen, when I moved out to Olympia, Washington to start going to college. I started getting interested in anarchist ideas when I was around thirteen our fourteen. I was introduced to them through the punk and hardcore music I was listening to at the time. But up until I moved to Olympia, anarchism was always just words and ideas in my head; I was not involved with any anarchist projects.

Once I moved to Olympia, I started being a part of the anarchist movement. I came across my first black bloc about a month after I moved out to Washington, at the Seattle Anti-War demo that happened in October 2007. But shortly after that, all of the port militarization resistance stuff was happening in Olympia [physical blockades of military equipment being used in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan]. This was the first time I witnessed street fighting with the cops, property destruction as a political (or “anti-political”) tactic, building barricades in the street, etc. The resistance obviously was not explicitly anarchist, but there were lots of different anarchists involved in the various organizing meetings and street confrontations. So basically, since 2007 I have been living in the Puget Sound area, aside from the time I spent in Montreal. I have maintained being heavily involved in anarchist projects since arriving in Olympia.

Why did the FBI target you after the May Day riot on 2012?

Well, the story of the FBI targeting me actually started about a year or so before the 2012 May Day riot in Seattle. In early 2011, there were a lot of anti-police demos in Seattle around the murder of John T. Williams. He was an indigenous man who was known in the city for being a prolific wood carver. He was shot dead at point blank range by Seattle pig Ian Burke. Burke was acquitted of all charges and this triggered several confrontational demos in Seattle. Along with these demonstrations, there were various acts of anonymous property destruction around the Puget Sound area, mainly in Seattle, Tacoma, and Olympia. The two biggest actions were the attempted arsons of the police substations in both Seattle and Olympia. A few days after the attempted arson on the cop-shop in Olympia, I was approached by FBI agents when I was taking a jog around my neighborhood. They rolled up on me in an unmarked car and started talking a bunch of shit to me. They said things about how me and my friends were going to go to prison for a long time and they knew that we were the ones who burnt down the substation, that it was just a matter of time before they would come and arrest us. They also referenced me as “Mr. Sabot Infoshoppe,” because that was the name of the anarchist student group in Olympia that I was the coordinator for.

A few months after that, the FBI went and talked to both my mom and my aunt on the same day, both of whom live in New York. They told them how I was an anarchist terrorist and how I was going to end up in prison if I don’t change the direction of my life. A few months later I got detained by the TSA/FBI when I was flying down to the Bay Area. They told me they knew I was an anarchist and, once again, that I was going to end up in prison for a long time for the things my friends and I had done.

Several months after the May Day riot on May 1st, I received a phone call from someone saying he was an FBI agent. He referred to himself as “Special Agent McNeil” and said he had a subpoena that he needed to deliver to me. Obviously, at that moment it was a huge shock to receive such a phone call, but at the same time, the FBI had already harassed me multiple times before, so it was not entirely out of the blue.

How did you come to a decision to leave the country?

After sitting down with a couple of friends and talking over all the options I had available, I decided that I did not want to walk into my own prison cell. If you refuse to testify before a grand jury, you are likely to end up serving a prison sentence for civil contempt. I knew that under no circumstance would I testify at the grand jury and therefore that I would be going to prison for up to eighteen months. But I had a very unique circumstance; a subpoena is only valid if it is delivered to you in person. Because the FBI had the wrong address, they were not able to locate me. I definitely don’t think they expected me to just take off like I did. In reality if they had never called me and had just tracked me down, my options would have been entirely different.

After I’d sat down with friends, the choice became pretty clear. I totally understand that prison is a reality of life for many people in this world and that by my involvement in anarchist activities I certainly risk ending up spending some time there. But something about presenting myself to the state for a prison sentence did not sit well with me.

Was it difficult for you to get into Canada?

Actually no, it was surprisingly easy. I mean, the emotional and mental aspect of leaving my friends and not knowing where I was going and what I was doing was extremely terrifying, but the actual border process was simple. At that point, I don’t think the FBI knew that I was going to leave the country. I think they underestimated just how committed all the grand jury resisters were.

I took a bus from Bellingham, which is only about thirty minutes south of the US/Canada border. I told the border agent I was going to Vancouver for a few days to look at grad schools and within three or four minutes I had entered into Canada. It was one of the most surreal things I have ever experienced.

Were the authorities aware of you living in Canada?

For sure. Within a few months of my arrival in Montreal, I was stopped by CSIS (Canadian Security Intelligence Service)—which is like the Canadian equivalent of the FBI, but they do not have arresting powers. I had also gotten voicemails to my old US phone from “Special Agent McNeil,” about how I was not going to win this battle and I would regret my decisions. It was also pretty obvious that my new phone was tapped and that some of the emails from my yahoo account were being read by the FBI.

What was the emotional toll while living in this situation?

The emotional toll was really, really heavy. Being away from my friends, who I’m closer to than my family, was definitely hard. Also, none of us knew that I was going to be gone for twenty months. The Grand Jury ended up getting a six-month extension, which caused another delay in my return.

The hardest part was that my older brother died in December of 2012, when I was still in exile. Because of my legal situation, I was not able to attend the funeral or spend any time with my family. If nothing else in the world has solidified my utter hatred for the Capitalism and the State, then being torn away from attending the funeral of my brother certainly has. It’s something I have lost a lot of sleep over and still have only begun to address.

Luckily, I was able to have a wonderful group of people in Montreal who offered more support than I have ever received in my life. I don’t know what I would have done without the anarchists I met in Montréal.

In what ways did the authorities fuck with you while you where there?

Oh man, in lots of ways. I got harassed by CSIS on multiple occasions. Throughout the year and half I was there, I would say that I was harassed about ten times. The most intense harassment came from the Montréal city police (SPVM). One night I was walking to the store a block away from my apartment and they stopped me and threw me in the squad car. They drove me about forty minutes outside the city and left me in a random industrial parking lot. They took my phone, keys, wallet, jacket, and shoes. Luckily, it was September so it wasn’t too cold, but I had to walk about a half mile just to figure out where I was and get ahold of my roommates.

Also, during my last two months there I was definitely under something like 24-hour surveillance. The cops were stopping me almost every day for a straight week and posting outside my new apartment for hours on end. It was a pretty surreal experience, but my friends in Montréal definitely did everything they could to help me get through it.

Have you been harassed since coming back to the US?

Yes. I was in the Bay Area a few weeks ago and two FBI agents approached me as I was leaving the BART station. It was a really short interaction and they basically just said they were here to welcome me back. Creepy.

But another close friend of mine was also stopped by the FBI a few weeks ago when he returning from Europe. They interrogated him for an hour or so but he refused to answer any questions. So the FBI hating on all our lives is still very much a real thing. But at this point, it is something that I am trying to get used to rather than just eliminate, because I don’t think it’s very realistic the Feds will be going away anytime soon.

Looking back, did you feel like you were supported?

Overall, I would say yes. I felt much supported by US anarchists as a whole. I think the response people had to the Grand Jury was really inspiring in a lot of ways. I think some of my individual friends could have done a better job at being there for me and given that, I have definitely been reevaluating a lot of my relationships. But at the same time, I feel like many of relationships have been strengthened from this experience, and I have built more trust, affinity, and love with some of the people in my life. I kind of feel like, if my friendships can make it through an experience this intense and straining, they should be able to make it through anything. And that is a pretty great feeling to have.

I will say that I was extremely inspired by all of the solidarity actions that happened all over the world. Just off the top of my head I can think of actions that happened in Australia, Greece, France, and definitely everywhere across the US and Canada.

Somebody burned down an “Eco-Condo” in Seattle and claimed solidarity with the grand jury resisters and that was something that really excited me. It was really nice to see that in such an intense time of repression someone(s) were willing to throw down like that. I was really happy to see people continuing the anarchist struggle in solidarity with all the resisters who couldn’t participate due to the repression we were facing.

It appears that grand juries are not going away any time soon. What advice would you give people facing a similar situation?

I would just want to let people know that there are lots of different ways to resist grand juries. For some people I think it makes a lot of sense to appear in front of the judge and then do their time for contempt, but for others fleeing a subpoena is a much more appealing option. It’s kind of like, nothing in life happens in a vacuum, and each person needs to decide on their own what way they want to resist. I think talking it over with friends is a pretty essential thing to do. I know when I first got subpoenaed I was really freaking out and it pretty much felt like my life was falling apart, but I had good friends around me who were able to keep me in check, and let me know that I wouldn’t be going through this thing alone.

But I will say that I think the “legal” strategy is a strategy that one can use, but certainly not a strategy that one has to use. Sometimes it makes sense to use this strategy, but I feel like portraying oneself as a victim is almost essential to having a successful legal strategy. In a way, it is true: when the State fucks with you, technically, you are a victim. But I try to understand that the state is fucking with me and my friends because they don’t like us, and myself and my friends in turn hate the State. For me, it is important to say that I don’t give a fuck about rights. I’m not interested in portraying myself as a victim because I view the State as my enemy. I seek no sort of resolution between myself and domination; I want it to be completely destroyed. The courts, the prisons, hetero-supremacy, white supremacy—I want to work on consistently attacking the manifestations of these forms of domination.

Clearly these are ideas that don’t fit into any sort of legal strategy, but I’m not concerned with a legal strategy. No disrespect to any anarchists who are focused on their legal strategy, but I feel really glad to be able to use this opportunity to let people know there is more than one way to successfully resist a grand jury.

Long Live Anarchy!

This interview was conducted by Doug Gilbert, the author of the book I Saw Fire: Reflections on Riots, Revolt, and the Black Bloc recently published by Little Black Cart, and a stalwart contributor to anarchist media projects in the Bay Area.

Ex-Worker #23: Paris ’68 & the Situationists

#23: May ’68 and the Situationist International – The Ex-Worker is back! In our 23rd episode, after we catch up on how radicals around the world celebrated May Day in the streets this year, we’ll turn back the clock a few decades to a particularly notorious May: Paris in 1968. This episode focuses on the strikes and riots that nearly toppled the French state – as well as the Situationist International, those Marxist-influenced art radicals whose theories influenced the uprising. One of the key texts coming from the Situationist tradition, Raoul Vaneigem’s The Revolution of Everyday Life, appears on the Chopping Block. Listeners weigh in future episodes, “Uncle Ted,” and the Ukraine episode and anarchist strategy. And as usual, there are plenty of news, events, prisoner birthdays, and more.

You can download this and all of our previous episodes online. You can also subscribe in iTunes here or just add the feed URL to your podcast player of choice. Rate us on iTunes and let us know what you think, or send us an email to podcast@crimethinc.com. You can also call us 24 hours a day at 202–59-NOWRK, that is, 202–596–6975.

The Ex-Worker #22: Ukraine

#22: Ukraine – This week on the Ex-worker, we’re responding to a few listener requests and presenting an analysis of the situation in Ukraine, largely borrowed from our recent feature The Ukrainian Revolution and the Future of Social Movements. We’ll also hear an interview with a member of Belarus Anarchist Black Cross about repression in Belarus and Ukraine, courtesy of our comrades at A-Radio Berlin, as well as our recommendations for which insurrectionary journals you should take if you get stranded on a desert island. The episode is rounded out with news, and lots of upcoming events and prisoner birthdays.

You can download this and all of our previous episodes online. You can also subscribe in iTunes here or just add the feed URL to your podcast player of choice. Rate us on iTunes and let us know what you think, or send us an email to podcast@crimethinc.com. You can also call us 24 hours a day at 202–59-NOWRK, that is, 202–596–6975.

Steal Something from Work Day 2014

Happy Steal Something from Work Day! Every April 15, on Tax Day, when the government robs us to pay for the police and bureaucrats who extort us, we observe Steal Something from Work Day. On this day—like every day of the year—millions of workers across the country smuggle whatever we can out of the workplace in a modest attempt to reclaim a little of the time and effort we are forced to sell. It’s a paltry substitute for the freedom we deserve, but pending revolution, we’ll take what we can get.

This year, in honor of all the workers whose stories are never told, we present the testimony of one wage slave who recalls his misspent youth in the stockroom of an upscale clothing store and recounts how he exacted his revenge, ultimately calling into question whether there is anything worth taking from the world of work at all.

More resources for the pilferous toiler:

A Theft or Work?—A grad student brings poststructuralist theory to bear on time theft, why the master’s degrees will never dismantle the master’s house, and how to resist work when it has spread so far beyond the workplace

Out Of Stock: Confessions Of A Grocery Store Guerrilla—A former Whole Foods employee recounts his efforts to run his employer out of business by means of sabotage, graffiti, and insubordination, reinterpreting William Butler Yeats’ line “The falcon cannot hear the falconer” from a bird’s-eye view.

Steal from Work to Create Autonomous Zones—The shocking true story of how a photocopy scam nearly escalated into global revolution around the turn of the century.

And there’s more! Steal Something from Work Day videos, corporate media coverage, and even a journal (pdf, 4.3 MB).

What Became of the Boxes

My friends in high school though I was joking. I’d gotten a job at Express, an upscale Armani-Exchange-type clothing store in our suburban Texas shopping mall. How could they allow the sight of me in my duct-taped Chucks and Clockwork Orange hoodie? It made more sense when I explained that I worked in the back, in a stockroom where no one could see me. Occasionally my manager would pop in when the front was slow to tell me about a Rob Zombie concert, but other than that I was left alone with the clothes.

My responsibilities in the backroom were twofold: new stuff comes in, old stuff goes out. I wheeled in the boxes of new clothes delivered daily from the hidden passageways that run behind the stores of any proper indoor shopping mall. If you’ve never been inside, think of it like the modern equivalent of the walkways under the Roman Coliseum where dudes, or tigers, or gods from the machine pop out from trap doors all day to keep the crowds happy. The khakis, and cardigans, and skirts, and chamois got opened, sorted, shelved, and most importantly, security tagged. This made me, essentially, the first line in loss prevention. That was a mistake.

Pretty soon into working there, I figured out that I could steal whatever I wanted by just going for a walk out the back door, down that gloomy hallway, and out the door into the sunlight, to stash merchandise underneath a bush to grab after I got off. It was pretty easy, since the other half of my job was to take the trash and empty boxes out. In fact, looking back on it, it was laughably easy, and it felt nice and vengeful in a workplace where we were all marched out one by one through the security sensor at the end of each night and had our bags checked to boot. I started stealing jeans and coats for my friends who wanted them, but I never took much for myself. Partly because Express Ltd. didn’t really cater to my teenage punk fashion sense, and also because my Mother, who still did all my laundry, also worked there as a second job (which was embarrassing on multiple levels) and would totally bust me if she noticed a sudden influx of expensive pants.

After a while, my friends had their fill, and I didn’t really know enough about eBay to set up some sort of fencing scheme. Stealing from work can be an exciting break from the drudgery, but, in all the jobs I’ve ever worked, it can also be a huge drag. Every time I go to a college dining hall, I walk in the door with big ambitions: “I’m gonna eat for the next two days, and then fill my bag with all the food I can carry!” But half an hour in, when my second plate of pasta hits me and I’m comatose with mediocre nutrition, the very though of bringing all that crap home with me makes me wanna ralph. Work’s the same shit. Even if they’re expensive power tools or building supplies, the thought of bringing the things you’ve been stuck with in a warehouse for 12 hours home with you can be revolting. It’s just hard to get excited about it. You feel a little cheap acting as if the stuff that the company has or makes could somehow compensate for the emotional toll work takes on you.

One particularly grueling day, when I was feeling that kind of nausea with the job and the boxes seemed endless, I had a stroke of genius: it would be a lot simpler to combine my two responsibilities into one. Why not just throw out the new boxes of clothes? No sorting, hanging, or tagging, and no smuggling or fencing, either—just garbage, straight to the dumpster. It was exhilarating: all of the fun and none of the baggage. As long as I didn’t throw out too many, it would never be noticed till next year’s inventory, and I (correctly) assumed that I would probably be fired for some other reason by then anyway.

So it became a routine: some time after lunch, I would load up the little dolly, roll it down those hallways, and heave ‘em into the big dumpster never to be seen again. They looked just like empties anyway.

Was this theft? I don’t know. I mean, if I got caught, I would have been charged with that, but it just seemed different when I didn’t keep or even want the stuff. It was my time, my effort, and some sense of control that I was trying to steal back. All that shit was just trash to begin with.

New Zine about Capitalism and Anxiety

This week, our friends will be touring the Northwest to speak about the political dimensions of care and how it can perpetuate or subvert systems of oppression. Among other publications, they will be distributing a zine version of “We Are All Very Anxious: Six Theses on Anxiety and Why It is Effectively Preventing Militancy, and One Possible Strategy for Overcoming It,” a timely new text from the Institute for Precarious Consciousness in the UK discussing the affective dimensions of capitalism. We offer the zine here in printable pdf form, including a brief afterword of our own, in order that you might circulate and discuss it in your own community as well.

Download the zine.

Cause and Affect

Reflections on “We Are All Very Anxious: Six Theses on Anxiety and Why It is Effectively Preventing Militancy, and One Possible Strategy for Overcoming It,” from one study group within the CrimethInc. Workers’ Collective

When we understand capitalism as affective—as producing and being sustained by certain feelings, attitudes, and ways of relating—many things come into focus. These affects are not simply the effects of economic relations; they are essential to the relations themselves. The ostensibly material needs that drive the economy are socially produced, just as the obedience and dissociation it demands are culturally conditioned. The individualism of modern workers and consumers, our estrangement from other living things, our sense that finance is real while ecology is abstract, above all the ways we are accustomed to private property and authority—without these, the market that seems so timeless and unassailable would collapse. Attempting to understand the economy by following the stock market rather than starting from our lived experiences is symptomatic of the same disconnect that drives capitalism in the first place. Private sentiments and personal relations are no less fundamental than material conditions. We need language with which to discuss the affective conditions.

Considering capitalist relations through this lens clarifies, among other things, how protest activity that doesn’t succeed in redressing the grievances it opposes can still leave its participants feeling fulfilled—sometimes more so than if the object of their immediate demands had simply been granted outright. We treasure the nights in the square together telling stories, the times we held our ground, more than the meager concessions we sometimes win. Until now, this phenomenon has usually been explained somewhat glibly in terms of the “dignity” of standing up for ourselves. But when we conceptualize our conditions under capitalism as affective, we can see why forms of resistance that transform the affective conditions could be fulfilling in and of themselves, not just as a means to fuller bellies and higher thermostats. As Occupy and other movements have shown, many would gladly eat sandy beans and sleep on bare bricks if only they could break with misery, with boredom, with anxiety! Likewise, framing the problems we face as affective can help us to avoid pursuing or accepting apparent solutions that do not change how we feel and relate.

This text from the Institute for Precarious Consciousness goes a long way towards posing the question of affective anti-capitalist strategy. Perhaps it is a little pat to impose discrete periods on history[1], but we must understand such generalizations chiefly as a way to formulate hypotheses about which tactics will succeed here and now.

What could actually counter anxiety? Do we have to beat security guards, insurance policies, religious communities, and antidepressants at their own game, somehow making people feel safe in a hostile and hazardous world? Trying to allay anxiety as a separate project from abolishing the conditions that create it is surely doomed. Should we accept the worst-case scenario as a foregone conclusion and hurry forth to meet it, transforming our anxiety into a weapon? If anxiety is the omnipresent guardian of the prevailing order, it presents the perfect point of departure for resistance—but this does not answer how those already immobilized by it could perform such alchemy. Perhaps, in the course of taking on the ruling order, we could create something together that inspires confidence, grounding ourselves in a shared sense of reality that no market or military could take from us.

 

 

[1] If only the Yippies had lived to see their pranks described as “a machine for fighting boredom”! If we must use industrial metaphors, it would be more historically accurate to speak of machines in reference to what the authors describe as the era of misery, and assembly lines for the era of boredom. Accusing the poor Yippies of creating “an assembly line for fighting boredom” makes the irony of this line of thinking clear enough. Matching metaphors to our current era, we would call for “a global network for fighting anxiety,” and indeed we are still so deeply entrenched in this era that such a monstrosity sounds perfectly sensible. Yet if we are to take the authors at their word, machinery produces misery, assembly lines produce boredom, and global networks produce anxiety—so the Marxist industrial metaphors have got to go. One does not fight misery with machines—as history shows, one fights machines with sabots, assembly lines with wildcats, and global networks with what certain Francophiles call “human strike.”

Episode #21: Communism & Socialism, pt.2

#21: Communism and Socialism, pt.2 – We’re back with the second installment of our exploration of anarchism’s complicated relationship with communism. Ex-worker’s Russia correspondents Misha and Anastasia come to us through the fuzzy airwaves of history, reporting live from the Russian revolution and what the anarchists are up to…. we’ll see how that goes. We’ll also hear some more feedback from everyone’s favorite gubernatorial candidate, anarchist prisoner Sean Swain, as well as extensive coverage of eco- and animal-liberation actions and prisoner rebellions from around the world.

You can download this and all of our previous episodes online. You can also subscribe in iTunes here or just add the feed URL to your podcast player of choice. Rate us on iTunes and let us know what you think, or send us an email to podcast@crimethinc.com. You can also call us 24 hours a day at 202–59-NOWRK, that is, 202–596–6975.

Presenting Rolling Thunder #11!

This one goes to eleven! We are pleased to inaugurate the second series of Rolling Thunder, our anarchist journal of dangerous living, with a new issue full of adventure and analysis. Whether you’re a committed revolutionary looking for the latest strategic reflections from the front lines, or you simply enjoy the gripping tales of suspense and subversion, you can’t get this stuff anywhere else.

The issue opens with an epic account of prisoner resistance from anarchist Sean Swain, who met the dreaded Extraction Team of Mansfield Correctional Institution in open battle and lived to tell. Our central feature, “After the Crest,” analyzes the opportunities and risks in the waning phase of social movements, including case studies of Occupy Oakland and the 2012 student strike in Québec. We also present a narrative direct from the tear gas in Taksim Square, the epicenter of the uprising that rocked Turkey in June 2013.

Another feature tackles gentrification, recounting one neighborhood’s fierce struggle against development from multiple perspectives to pose questions about what we can hope to accomplish in such fights. Elsewhere, in a fascinating interview, a longtime Israeli anarchist reviews the history of anarchism in his region, from the Kibbutzim through punk and the animal rights movement to Anarchists Against the Wall, closing with some straight talk about nonviolence rhetoric in the Palestinian resistance.

In the theory department, we offer devastating critiques of ally politics and of the ideology coded into digital technology. The issue concludes with a discussion of Eternity by the Stars, the book by the notorious insurrectionist jailbird Auguste Blanqui that became so influential on Nietzsche, Borges, and Walter Benjamin. Francophiles and other bookish types will also enjoy some scathing gossip about Victor Hugo and Charles Baudelaire.

All this, plus the regular features, gorgeous artwork, and 16 pages in full color. At 128 pages, this is our thickest issue yet. Order your copy here, or better yet, subscribe, starting with this issue.

This issue of RT boasts a new format, implementing some of the ideas behind our redesign of Recipes for Disaster, as well as production changes lowering costs without sacrificing print quality, towards meeting our goal of making the magazine financially sustainable: we’ve reduced the size to 7″ x 10″ and added more pages, discarded the spot-gloss-on-top-of-matte-lamination treatment on the cover, and switched to a slightly thicker, but also lighter, 100% post-consumer recycled paper stock.

Using a smaller, taller-proportioned page, we were able to ditch most of the whitespace that had previously been necessary to make the larger pages more palatable and less intimidating. Needing less whitespace allowed us to more efficiently use the new, smaller space we were working with to create a denser but still visually comfortable reading experience. At the same time, the new page size was still large enough to maintain the grandeur of a full-page photo or the dynamism of a blown-out two-page spread.

And the results are in: RT#11 has the same number of words as the longest previous RT (#10 at 66,000 words) and even more photos and illustrations (97 in RT#11 vs 92 RT#10), while also using less paper and weighing 1.6 ounces less, a 15% reduction. That adds up to a 10% reduction in cost per issue while not reducing the amount of content, and though we’ll still be in the red with this issue, we’ll certainly be less in the red. Thank you, and we hope y’all enjoy it.

Eternal Subscription Mailing

All you subscribers should have your copies in hand by now—we hope you enjoyed experiencing the new format without being spoiled by pixely photos on the internet (a rare thing these days). Thanks again for subscribing, y’all make RT possible!

CrimethInc. Events on Three Continents

This April, CrimethInc. operatives will speak in ten countries on three continents. In Europe, we’ve organized a seven-nation speaking tour to discuss the role of anarchism in the unfolding wave of global revolts and promote the forthcoming German translation of Work from our friends with Black Mosquito. In the Pacific Northwest, contributors to Self as Other: Reflections on Self-Care offer another leg of their tour exploring the revolutionary potential of care. Finally, in Chile, another operative is attending the third Anarchist Book Fair in Santiago, Chile to present two workshops and table with a variety of English and Spanish literature.

If you are interested in setting up a speaking event where you are, email rollingthunder@crimethinc.com.

 

European Tour: “Anarchism and the New Global Revolts”

We’ve organized another European tour to discuss the importance of anarchism in the new wave of global revolts and promote the forthcoming German translation of Work from our friends with Black Mosquito. The route will cross Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia, and Serbia, stopping at anarchist book fairs in Zagreb, Croatia and Prague, Czech Republic.

Building on our recent experiences participating in uprisings around the world and corresponding with other participants, we’ve synthesized our observations into a new presentation, “Anarchism and the New Global Revolts.”

As rebellions from Brazil and Turkey to Ukraine and Bosnia expand in both exciting and frightening directions, what common threads connect the occupied squares and torched police cars? To imagine how anarchists might bring out their radical possibilities, we’ll explore today’s global uprisings through the lenses of policing, citizenship, and democracy. As repression and surveillance across the world intensifies, what new opportunities for revolt will arise? As conflicts over nationality and migration intensify, how can we challenge the state’s efforts to use borders and citizenship to contain the crises of capitalism? As trust in government erodes, what visions can anarchists offer beyond representative democracy? Our struggles must spread narratives and tactics that contest the legitimacy of these forces—and the future of freedom hangs in the balance.

Tour Dates

30.03. Basel, Switzerland – OFF

31.03. Salzburg, Austria – SUB

02.04. Ljubljana, Slovenia – A-Infoshop

3.4. Izola, Slovenia – Kulturni dom

04-06.04. Zagreb, Croatia – Anarchist Bookfair

07.04. Belgrad, Serbia

09.04. Köln, Germany – Wem gehört die Welt Wagenplatz

10.04. Düsseldorf, Germany – Linkes Zentrum Hinterhof

11.04. Hambacher Forst, Germany

12.04. Bielefeld, Germany – Infoladen Anschlag

13.04. Bremen, Germany – Sielwallhaus

14.04. Hamburg, Germany – LIZ

16.04. Berlin, Germany – Tempest

17.04. Berlin, Germany – Braunschweigerstr. 53-55

18.04. Leipzig, Germany

19-20.04. Prague, Czech Republic – Anarchist Bookfair

21.04. Plauen, Germany – Infoladen Plauen

 

“Beyond Self-Care” Speaking Tour in the Pacific Northwest

In activist circles and beyond, it has become commonplace to speak of self-care, taking for granted that the meaning of this expression is self-evident. But “self” and “care” are not static or monolithic; nor is “health.” How has this discourse been colonized by capitalist values? Contributors to our zine Self as Other: Reflections on Self-Care will present on the political dimensions of care, illuminating how it can serve oppressive or revolutionary purposes. Taking the self as an object of political struggle, this discussion will address how health and resistance are linked, and what forms of care could subvert today’s systems of power.

Download the zine

Buy the zine

Tour Dates

April 15, , 5:30 pm: PSU in Portland, OR

April 16, 5:00 pm: The Cusp in Olympia, WA

April 18: Boiler Room in Port Townsend, WA

April 19, 7:00 pm: 38 Blood Alley in Vancouver, BC

April 20, 7:00 pm: Left Bank Books in Seattle WA

 

CrimethInc. Table at the Anarchist Book Fair in Santiago, Chile

We will participate in the third Feria del Libro y Propaganda Anarquista de Santiago on April 12-13, offering a table of literature in both English and Spanish. In addition, a CrimethInc. operative will present two workshops: “Propaganda by Podcast (Propaganda por el Podcast)” and “Prison Abolition and Political Prisoners in the USA.”

Episode #20: Communism & Socialism, pt.1

#20: Communism and Socialism, pt.1 – Your patience has paid off—we now present to you, dear listeners, the first part of a massive, two-part episode clarifying the age-old question: how are anarchists different from communists and socialists? In the first part, we’ll be covering some basic definitions of communism and socialism, and dive headlong into some heated historical splits between Marx and Bakunin. Spoiler alert: it gets UGLY. This episode includes statements from Jeremy Hammond, Marshall “Eddie” Conway, and some anarchist comrades holding it down in Ukraine, as well as an extensive interview with Anarcho-communist Wayne Price, who’ll share his opinions on how anarchists should be organizing, de-mystify the hyphen in anarcho-communism, and reveal his true feelings about Bob Avakian.

The second part will be coming at ya next week. Until then, you can download this and all of our previous episodes online. You can also subscribe in iTunes here or just add the feed URL to your podcast player of choice. Rate us on iTunes and let us know what you think, or send us an email to podcast@crimethinc.com. You can also call us 24 hours a day at 202–59-NOWRK, that is, 202–596–6975.

Ukraine & the Future of Social Movements

We have heard terrifying stories from the revolution in Ukraine: anarchists participating in anti-government street-fighting behind nationalist banners, anarchist slogans and historical figures appropriated by fascists… a dystopia in which familiar movements and strategies reappear with our enemies at the helm.

This text is a clumsy first attempt to identify the important questions for anarchists elsewhere around the world to discuss in the wake of the events in Ukraine. We present it humbly, acknowledging that our information is limited, hoping that others will correct our errors and improve on our analysis. It has been difficult to maintain contact with comrades in the thick of things; surely it is frustrating to be peppered with ill-informed questions amid the tragedies of civil war.

What is happening in Ukraine and Venezuela appears to be a reactionary counterattack within the space of social movements. This may be a sign of worse things to come—we can imagine a future of rival fascisms, in which the possibility of a struggle for real liberation becomes completely invisible. Here follow our hypotheses and an English-language reading list for those who are still catching up.

Read the analysis.