Features

The June 2009 Indymedia Newsreal is complete and on its way to airing on Free Speech TV. This month's episode features dispatches from the anti-war movement in Colorado, the immigrant rights movement in Arizona, a performance by the Raging Grannies, and more. The program is downloadable HERE and DVDs are available to subscribers who sign up by emailing newsrealsubs at gmail.com

Newsreal is a longstanding IMC project, the show has been produced for over eight years. The newsreal team would like to take this opportunity to open up the project to the broader network, most of the material is currently produced in North America but we actively welcome contributions from other parts of the world. All producers, and future producers, should sign up to the imc-satellite at indymedia.org list. This is the main way we all communicate about this project. Get those videos seen!

DOWNLOAD JUNE 09 NEWSREAL | May09 Newsreal

The National Distribution Union has announced that it's response to 186 of clothing manufacturer Lane Walker Rudkin's (LWR) 470 staff being made redundant - (102 in Christchurch, 61 in Greytown, 19 in Pahiatua and four in Auckland) - is to hold a cake stall. LWR is New Zealand's oldest unionised company, a company which in recent years has been forced to endure incompetent management as a result of the break up of Ken and Patricia Anderson, the owners. The bank, Westpac, won't even pay redundancy payouts. The NDU's response to trying to keep jobs in what should actually be a profitable company has been called a "great initiative". It is actually nothing more than a sell out of the people who pay the salaries of union bureaucrats. A real path of resistance would be immediate occupation of all LWR factories and plants and the reorganisation of the company as a workers' cooperative. Even an occupation of a Westpac bank to get the redundancy money is better than baking a cake. The NDU's response has been an absolute disgrace to New Zealand workers.

"Well, with the world economy now looking remarkably like Argentina's in 2001 (and for many of the same reasons) there is a new wave of direct action among workers in rich countries. Co-ops are once again emerging as a practical alternative to more lay-offs. Workers in the U.S. and Europe are beginning to ask the same questions as their Latin American counterparts: Why do we have to get fired? Why can't we fire the boss? Why is the bank allowed to drive our company under while getting billions of dollars of our money?" - Naomi Klien and Avi Lewis in The Cure for Layoffs: Fire the Boss!

Video: “The Worker Control Solution from Buenos Aires to Chicago” | The Take -a film about how workers in Argentina took over the factories abandoned by their owners | Facebook group: Bake a cake for LWR workers

Worker's struggle: libcom.org | Anarcho-Syndicalism 101 | LabourStart | Infoshop - Fire Your Boss

It took five years for Mussolini to crush the Italian working class and get away with incarcerating its leaders. At Gramsci's show trial in 1926, the fascist judge sentenced him to 20 years gaol. In a reference to the tremendous impact Gramsci had had on the engineering workers while editing L'Ordine Nuovo and his subsequent leadership of the Communist Party in the 1920s, the judge declared: "we must stop this brain working for 20 years". Gramsci spent the last 11 years of his life in Mussolini's gaol.

Socialist Aotearoa hosts a series of meetings on Marxist revolutionaries- this week we look at the great Italian revolutionary Antonio Gramsci and the ideas of Cultural Hegemony.

Thursday, May 14, 2009
7:00pm - 9:00pm
Room (short name): 105-029 Room (long name): ClockT029
University of Auckland Clock Tower Building off Princes Street

Socialist Aotearoa

At the heart of Tasmania's Southern Forests, wild rivers flow through valleys containing forests which evolved from the ancient continent of Gondwanaland. In the valleys of the Styx, UpperFlorentine, Middle Huon, Weld, and Upper Derwent flourish some of the world's oldest and mostspectacular ecosystems. - Still Wild, Still Threatened Campaign Site

7 May: The Sydney Morning Herald is talking about the "battle on two fronts to remove protesters", and warning of activists leaving booby traps in the forest. Two weeks ago an arson attack destroyed $1.2 million worth of forestry equipment [ Article ]

6 May: Two activists are being charged with assault despite claiming that they were assaulted by a member of forestry Tasmania. [ Upper Florentine newsblog ]

5 May: At 2:30 this afternoon a 26 year old female forest defender was removed from a 45 metre high tree sit by Police Rescue. Police continue to climb trees to remove more tree sits in the area. Logging machinery is expected to arrive tomorrow and stop work protests are expected to take place. [ Media Release ]

4 May: 60 Police have raided camp Florentine this morning to remove road blockades so that logging of the contentious area can begin. An Exclusion Zone has been declared by Forestry Tasmania, to prevent public access to the area. A Hobart man has already been arrested for being in the exclusion zone. More arrests are expected today. [ Report | Video ]

The Wilderness Society has placed an advertisement in Britain's Financial Times warning European banks they will be "pulping their profits'' if they finance the controversial mill proposed for Tasmania's Tamar Valley. The Tasmanian Forest Industries Association has described the society's action as "tantamount to economic sabotage''. Insiders have told GetUp! that the full-page ad in The Australian on Wednesday has scared banks off the Gunns pulp mill and sparked crisis meetings to discuss the ad’s effect.
[ Wilderness Society campaign Site | SydneyIndy: Ad scared banks ]