December 2011
“If your experience is that your water comes from the tap and that your food...”
– Derrick Jensen (via cultureofresistance)
“Nonviolence is an inherently privileged position in the modern context. Besides...”
– Peter Gelderloos, How Nonviolence Protects the State, p. 17 (via so-treu)
War is the Essence of Capitalism: How Capitalism... →
“The personal, as everyone’s so fucking fond of saying, is political. So if some...”
– ~Richard K. Morgan
TwitLonger — When you talk too much for Twitter
brandnewswastikas:
Tickling homeless people reduces stress and promotes bone growth.
What is Debt? – An Interview with Economic...
PP: You mention that the IMF and S&P are institutions that are mainly geared toward extracting debts for creditors. This seems to have become the case in the European monetary union too. What do you make of the situation in Europe at the moment?
DG: Well, I think this is a prime example of why existing arrangements are clearly untenable. Obviously the ‘whole debt’ cannot be paid. But even when some French banks offered voluntary write-downs for Greece, the others insisted they would treat it as if it were a default anyway. The UK takes the even weirder position that this is true even of debts the government owes to banks that have been nationalized – that is, technically, that they owe to themselves! If that means that disabled pensioners are no longer able to use public transit or youth centers have to be closed down, well that’s simply the ‘reality of the situation,’ as they put it. These ‘realities’ are being increasingly revealed to simply be ones of power. Clearly any pretence that markets maintain themselves, that debts always have to be honored, went by the boards in 2008. That’s one of the reasons I think you see the beginnings of a reaction in a remarkably similar form to what we saw during the heyday of the ‘Third World debt crisis’ – what got called, rather weirdly, the ‘anti-globalization movement’. This movement called for genuine democracy and actually tried to practice forms of direct, horizontal democracy. In the face of this there was the insidious alliance between financial elites and global bureaucrats (whether the IMF, World Bank, WTO, now EU, or what-have-you). When thousands of people begin assembling in squares in Greece and Spain calling for real democracy what they are effectively saying is: “Look, in 2008 you let the cat out of the bag. If money really is just a social construct now, a promise, a set of IOUs and even trillions of debts can be made to vanish if sufficiently powerful players demand it then, if democracy is to mean anything, it means that everyone gets to weigh in on the process of how these promises are made and renegotiated.” I find this extraordinarily hopeful.
PP: Broadly speaking how do you see the present debt/financial crisis unravelling? Without asking you to peer into the proverbial crystal-ball – because that’s a silly thing to ask of anyone – how do you see the future unfolding; in the sense of how do you take your bearings right now?
DG: For the long-term future, I’m pretty optimistic. We might have been doing things backwards for the last 40 years, but in terms of 500-year cycles, well, 40 years is nothing. Eventually there will have to be recognition that in a phase of virtual money, safeguards have to be put in place – and not just ones to protect creditors. How many disasters it will take to get there? I can’t say. But in the meantime there is another question to be asked: once we do these reforms, will the results be something that could even be called ‘capitalism’?
“The U.S. Government doesn’t drop bombs on people because of their race....”
– Norman Solomon, This War and Racism (via cultureofresistance)
“Anyway it only makes sense if you assume those premises; that all human...”
– This interview with David Graeber on “What Is Debt?” is one of the most thought-provoking things published this year about the premises of finance. (via cultureofresistance)
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Think Progress: 11 Quotes From 2011 →
think-progress:
1. “There’s been class warfare going on for the last 20 years, and my class has won.” — Warren Buffett
2. “Gay rights are human rights and human rights are gay rights.” — Hillary Clinton
3. “Today, we are all Troy Anthony Davis. Tonight, a little piece of all of us will die.” — Rep. John…
insert lyric here: Because a White Guy Said It →
uhuh-she-said:
Listen,
It does not matter what you say. As a woman, as a woman of color, as a woman of size, as a woman with large breasts or no breasts and a lifetime of experience with bucket loads of passion. It does not fucking matter.*
Because unless there is a white guy backing you…
Yemeni Leader to Be Admitted Into U.S. for Medical... →
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In the future, history classes will be told that...
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US to give Israel extra aid for rocket system →
cultureofresistance:
Israel’s defence ministry said on Sunday that the United States has agreed to provide it with an additional $235 million (180 million euros) to finance its rocket defence system.
“The aid from the American Congress is a supplementary step in the reinforcement of Israeli-American relations in the area of defence,” Defence Minister Ehud Barak said in a statement.
The...
“When the issue of fighting back comes up, I sometimes hear people argue that we...”
– Aric McBay, What We Leave Behind (via cultureofresistance)
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Hate of Church, State, and Templars: Israel vs... →
anticapitalist:
jusjac asked:
Lmao :L Your addition to my post :L So you support Palestine? You support the fact that Hamas and Hezbollah drop bombs on Israeli schools, homes, and school buses? That’s sick. Regarding them stealing land from the Palestinians. Well. How uneducated can…
this is absolutely ridiculous. “America” complains about terrorists and stopping terrorism...
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Watchanticapitalist:
peace-love-justice:
7urriyatalwatan:
Did you know that recent studies made by Child Psychologists, have shown that 80% of Palestinian children have lost the will to live?
I bet your government didn’t tell you that.
i really recommend everyone watch this full documentaryy. soo good!
Forever reblog.
holyshit. Reblogging so I watch and fact check this.
My Top 5 Artists (Week Ending 2011-12-25) →
“Work for something because it is good, not just because it stands a chance to...”
– Vaclav Havel (via think-progress)
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Culture Of Resistance: 11 Facts From 2011 →
think-progress:
1. The CIA is monitoring up to 5 million tweets per day.
2. Income inequality in America is worse than in Ancient Rome.
3. Twenty-three straight polls find Americans overwhelmingly want to raise taxes to pay down debt.
4. 68% of millionaires support raising…
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“Pacifists tell us that the ends never justify the means. This is a statement of...”
– Derrick Jensen, Preface to Pacifism as Pathology by Ward Churchill (via cultureofresistance)
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“Anarchism covers lots of different things— If there’s one leading principle...”
– Noam Chomsky (I like this quote)
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“Why, for example, should the international socioeconomic system, or for that...”
– Noam Chomsky (via cultureofresistance)
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COLOUR-BLIND RACISM: The Four Frames →
darkjez:
ABAGOND—
“Eduardo Bonilla-Silva asked samples of White Americans, most of them born between 1940 and 1980, questions about race issues. He noticed that at least half of them used each of the following four frames:
abstract liberalism – the key word here is “abstract”. Unlike Jim Crow racists, most whites now agree that all Americans, regardless of race, should have equal rights and...
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“hypothetical question: if you had free reign over classified networks for long...”
– Private Manning (via anarchisttiger)
“I don’t have demands because I don’t recognize the legitimacy of those in power...”
– Stephanie McMillan,
Interview — HuffPo
(via cultureofresistance)
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“Language is a process of free creation; its laws and principles are fixed, but...”
– Noam Chomsky (via cultureofresistance)
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