Today's Topics:
1. France, Alternative Libertaire AL - Corsica: The state of
emergency tolerate racist attacks! (fr, it, pt) [machine
translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
2. TURKEI: CIZRE, SILOPI, SUR: Posted in Deutschsprachige
Artikel, Direnis, Duyurular, by Karakök (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
3. South Africa’s anarchist hip hop collective
(a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
4. France, Alternative Libertaire AL #256 (Dec) - feminism,
Buying sex" soon banned. That's good, but ... (fr, it, pt)
[machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
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Message: 1
Certainly, the "socialist" government uses the very selectively emergency: while the
establishment of a state of emergency after the killing of 13 November had served as
pretext to ban numerous events and to suppress activists during the COP 21, an openly
racist manifestation threatening collective reprisals capita es a popular area of Ajaccio
is not only tolerated but supported and filmed by all televisions. And hosts a pogrom
project are then received by the Prefect! ---- We do not endorse the aggression of
firefighters, whose missions are of public interest, but we can not accept this racist and
Islamophobic outburst that culminated in the ransacking of a Muslim place of worship. The
struggle for recognition of the rights of the Corsican people is legitimate, but the
political and trade union organizations must lead this fight, as some have done, denounce
and firmly combat xenophobic drifts which distort their fight.
These events show that we were right to denounce the state of emergency, which is nothing
but a political weapon with variable geometry. The police and judicial repressive arsenal
is strengthened for one goal: to silence the popular anger which thunders against the
antisocial policy of a government at the service of the rich and powerful, against the
daily operation of the workplace and against unemployment. This same government is now
planning to include in the Constitution deprivation of nationality for binational,
measuring directly drawn from the FN program, which only reinforces the stigma and
prejudice against immigrant-es.
This is why we actively participate in the collective "Stop state of emergency" and that's
why we are in the street during the first weekend in February calling for the immediate
lifting of the state of emergency. Freedom and equality: the fight continues.
Alternative Libertaire, December 29, 2015
http://www.alternativelibertaire.org/?Corse-L-etat-d-urgence-tolere-les
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Message: 2
Attacks by state forces killed yet another civilian in Cizre district of S?rnak where a
state of siege continues for 19 uninterrupted days. ---- SIRNAK – ANF ---- Attacks by
state forces killed yet another civilian in Cizre district of S?rnak where a state of
siege continues for 19 uninterrupted days. ---- Police and military forces have
intensified tank and artillery attacks on Cudi and Nur neighborhoods since yesterday
evening. The aggression has left many houses in both neighborhoods damaged. ---- Civilian
Cabbar Task?n (40) got heavily wounded as a result of gunfire near his house in Cudi
neighborhood late yesterday evening. ---- While the man’s body remained at the scene
throughout the night due to continued fire from armored vehicles, no ambulance was allowed
to the area either. Residents of the neighborhood managed to reach the scene only this
morning, to see that Task?n had already died.
On the other hand, civilian Sükrü Duymak (45) was similarly shot by special operation
police on Caba Street of Cudi neighborhood yesterday. People managed to get Duymak’s body
into a house where he was held till this morning due to the ongoing obstruction of
ambulances from entering the neighborhoods under fire. The man has been taken to hospital
today but is reported to be losing blood and in critical condition now.
One civilian and one soldier killed in Silopi
In Silopi district of S?rnak where a curfew has left 19 days behind, deliberate and random
attacks by state forces claim more civilian lives every passing day.
45-year-old civilian by the name of Ömer Yalman was shot by special operation police as he
tried to go from Barbaros to Basak neighborhood earlier today. The man got heavily wounded
after being shot by a bullet in the stomach, and died of blood lose while police didn’t
allow ambulance into the neighborhood where clashes continued. Yalman’s body is being held
in a mosque.
On the other hand, self-defense units have hindered a group of special operation police
and soldiers that attempted to enter Kars?yaka neighborhood Friday afternoon. One soldier
was killed and many other members of security forces were reported in clashes in this area.
Turkish soldiers kill another Rojava citizen near the border
Turkish soldiers have killed a Kobanê citizen near the border between North and West
Kurdistan.
Farûq Osman Mihemed (40) from the village of Xanîkê on the eastern side of Kobanê Canton
was shot by Turkish soldiers as he attempted to cross into Bakurê (Northern) Kurdistan
yesterday.
The man got heavily wounded after getting shot by two bullets in the head near Kurelî
village 10 km west of Kobanê Canton. Local people living in the area took Mihemed to Emel
Hospital in Kobanê where he lost his life despite all the medical efforts.
According to local sources, Farûq Osman Mihemed meant to cross into Bakurê Kurdistan for
treatment for a health problem he had been suffering for a while. The man will be laid to
rest in Xanîk village today.
16-year-old murdered by police in Sur
As the curfew and onslaught by state forces in Amed’s central Sur district leaves one
month behind, troops and police forces continue attacking civilian areas with tank and
artillery fire.
In Has?rl? neighborhood where intensified attacks were conducted by Turkish forces today,
special operation murdered a 16-year-old in the evening. The youth lost his life at the
scene soon after he was shot by a bullet in the head.
The youth’s body, which people around retrieved from the scene and covered with blanket,
is being held in a house in Has?rl? neighborhood.
https://karakok.wordpress.com/2016/01/02/turkei-cizre-silopi-sur/
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Message: 3
How do you make people realize they’re in chains? For Soundz of the South (or SOS) – an
anti-capitalist resistance collective from Khayelitsha, Cape Town – you give them hip hop.
---- That injunction dates back to hip hop’s origins in New York City. At street parties
in the South Bronx in the 1970s, sound equipment was often wired up to park lampposts. Hip
hop’s origins were strictly DIY and, most importantly, a direct reaction to the structural
marginalization of communities and the racism of the mainstream media. SOS are carrying on
that initial spirit through hip hop activism that is relevant to their own struggles. ----
As a collective of both activists and artists they are committed to decentralization,
direct action, autonomy and self-reliance. Like anarchist thinkers Emma Goldman or Mikhail
Bakunin, they believe that hierarchies corrupt and only horizontal organisation can
eliminate inequality. Besides recording albums, SOS hosts regular meetings and “critical”
documentary screenings, weekly slam sessions, organize protests and discussions, attend
regular conferences and have set up campaigns such as “Don’t Vote! Organise!” or
initiatives to save Philippi High (a school on Cape Town’s Cape Flats). They also started
the Afrikan Hip Hop Caravan, an annual series of events (this is the third edition)
currently taking place through the end of December.
A recent track was directly inspired by the collective’s involvement in the #FeesMustFall
student protests. When I interviewed members Milliha, Anele, Khusta, Sipho and Monde, they
were resolute that their music has to be political. “What hip hop should be about is hold
accountable those who are in power,” says Anele. The reasons are that it’s a genre young
people can relate to, and accessible because, as Milliha explains, unlike punk music, “You
need a pen and paper, and the beat will come on its own.” The sentiment is that, when
country’s President, Jacob Zuma’s main virtue is a charismatic dance, and bling bling,
booze and bitches flood the mainstream, grassroots hip hop is the alternative media.
SOS members, who are also part of other activist organizations such as the Housing
Assembly and ILRIG, understand that there’s more to social change than music. To be part
of the collective, you have to be involved in regular discussions, protests, meetings,
take on tasks, organize, and identify with the principles. Many times on-the-ground work
comes first, which inspires ideas for songs. But Anele stresses, what hip hop does do is
help listeners wake up and mobilise action. “It demystifies big issues and brings politics
back to the people,” he says, or as Monde puts it, “We’re taking whatever is out there and
bring it closer to those who can’t reach it.”
The Afrikan Hip Hop Caravan aims to take this kind of awareness across the continent. It
was conceived by SOS, Uhuru Network, and various cultural activists in 2011. In each
participating African city, there’ll be the Afrikan Hip Hop Conference, to encourage
discussion about hip hop’s role in community struggles, and the Afrikan Hip Hop Concert,
to give repressed, underground hip hop a platform. 2015’s edition will start in Arusha,
Tanzania, and the main focus will be migration against the backdrop of the recent
xenophobic attacks in South Africa, the European refugee crisis, and shooting of black
teenagers in the United States. Inspired by Dakar hip hop artists who got together to stop
president Abdoulaye Wade from unconstitutionally seeking a third term in office, the idea
is to explore the origins of certain problems, relate them to current issues and transcend
borders.
SOS’s involvement in the caravan, as well as everything else they do, is self-financed.
Strictly rejecting any funding from corporate brands (saying no to Red Bull for instance,
Khusta tells me) to maintain autonomy, SOS decide collectively what happens to any
proceeds. Nobody receives money to spend at their own discretion. Instead, Khusta
explains, it goes back into the community. As a group with no set amount of members,
they’re not interested in branding themselves nor registering with a label – “We don’t
make songs for the radio,” says Anele.
In South Africa music has played an important role in the struggle of oppressed people.
President Jacob Zuma must be aware of a rhythm’s convincing power – when it’s election
time he brings mainstream DJs to the township. That’s why SOS don’t want listeners to
switch off to their beats. Following Bakunin, they believe a “sweet” democracy that
demands gratitude for pseudo-freedom distracts from important realities. “And that’s what
we have, and that’s why we’re doing what we’re doing, to make people realise they’re in
chains. They are working and creating wealth for others to enjoy,” explains Anele.
Unfortunately, he continues, many anarchist comrades don’t get hip hop – “They see a lot
of black power and think it’s nationalism” – but he’s convinced that there is no line
between anarchism and hip hop. Hip hop is the voice of the working class.
*The Cape Town Afrikan Hip Hop Concert and Conference will take on December 12th 2015 at
Moholo Live, and on December 13th at Buyel’mbo Village, Khayelitsha. If you can’t make it,
watch out for Freedom Warriors Vol 3. and The Afrikan Hip Hop Caravan Collaborations from
2013 to be released soon.
http://africasacountry.com/2015/12/south-africas-anarchist-hip-hop-collective/
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Message: 4
The law of "fight against the prostitution system" will soon be enacted. The AL Congress
in May 2015, supplemented by a position taken by the Federal Coordination AL October, made
a nuanced analysis. If it can not dry up the sources of social and economic system of
prostitution, some provisions are an important asset in changing male attitudes. ---- This
is the final stretch for the bill "fight against the prostitution system." The
parliamentary shuttle lasted almost two years, because of significant differences of
opinion. The Assembly would prohibit "use the purchase of sexual acts" and repeal the
crime of solicitation; conversely, the Senate wanted to preserve the tranquility of johns
and maintain hunting prostitutes [1].
The last word back to the Assembly, the law should be adopted before the end of 2015. As
usual, the decrees, they probably will wait another two years.
What are the main points of this legislation?
It includes "information about the realities of prostitution and the dangers of the
commodification of the body" in the education program for gender equality from the college;
It provides for the issuance of a residence permit for six months to prostitute es
undocumented prerequisite for their emancipation trafficking networks [2].
It abolished the odious "crime of passive soliciting" established in 2003 by the Internal
Security Act (LSI) wanted by Nicolas Sarkozy. This "crime of solicitation" - subject to
two months' imprisonment and a fine of 3,750 euros - was making delinquent prostitutes and
encouraged police persecution against them, with the blessing of governments seeking to
make them invisible.
It stresses the responsibility of "clients" in the existence of the prostitution system,
by imposing prohibits "use the purchase of sexual acts." The men caught in the act will be
fined and must follow a "awareness course ".
The latter provision, often called the "criminalization of clients," is one that has the
most ink spilled in the media. What to think?
When survivors open their eyes
On the one hand, one can criticize his repressive side: the contravention of 1,500 euros
maximum is uneven - for a paltry DSK, exorbitant for a precarious. Its educational side is
much more interesting, provided it does not go by the wayside. Indeed, the law does not
say what will happen the "awareness training". According to the means used, it may be a
vain civic moral lesson, or a real educational approach. Abroad, the training has been
successful when it has been entrusted to survivors of prostitution who undertake to
disclose to "clients" upside sordid backdrop of a supposedly libertine [3].
Most important however, is the symbolic value of the forbidden, the blow that door
patriarchy in its liberal version, by repealing the "freedom" of others to monetize sexuality.
We are witnessing in fact, in countries where prostitution is legal, a return to male
mentality of the nineteenth century, with the trivialization of this mode of
"consumption". The phenomenon is already palpable in France, in the border regions of
Catalonia and Germany, where the men fired at the brothel, on the other side of the
border, is becoming commonplace [4].
"Puticlub" Paradise at the Jonquera (Catalonia).
Paradise includes 200 prostitutes to clients in good French side, with "Bachelor Party"
formulas "private party", "business" ...
Conversely, in countries like Sweden and Norway, where "buying sex" was banned, the
effects were positive. In terms of the mass of forced prostitutes (in France, 85% of the
workforce), it has discouraged the "market" and has driven investors - trafficking
networks, pimps, brothel keepers and Password hotels - , which mechanically driven down
the number of women "upright" (kidnapped and raped in "training house") to be placed on
the sidewalk or in the window [5].
As for independent prostitutes (in France, 15% of the workforce), it has certainly dried
up much of the clientele but by placing the clients insecure, it has strengthened the
position of prostitutes in the market report and even, in some cases, raised prices of the
passes [6].
A symbolic Advanced
What can we conclude from this?
That the reasons for satisfaction should not mask the essential, namely that such a law
can not of course, in any case abolish prostitution system.
While this bill is positive on four points:
for residence permits promised to prostitutes without papers;
for the decriminalization of prostitutes;
for the positive impact that the ban could have on the mentality of men;
to the negative impact it can have on the business of trafficking networks.
The problem is that, whatever the speech of PS government, its austerity policy and border
closures exacerbates poverty, undermining social protection, and is therefore succeed the
market of prostitution.
That is why this law will be powerless to abolish the system of prostitution itself. To do
this will require firstly reducing poverty through collective struggles:
the right to housing;
the right to an income for everyone (even if that access to the RSA for the under 25 years);
freedom of movement of migrants (who are forced-underground, are an ideal prey for pimps);
educating men to non-sexist reporting.
Guillaume (AL Montreuil), with Stephanie (U Nantes) and Alain (AL Alsace)
Illustration: Thierry Ehrmann
[1] "Prostitution: exit the criminalization of customers, the Senate wants to restore the
offense of soliciting," Le Monde, March 27, 2015
[2] According to the investigation report "health and social situation of prostitutes",
from October 8, 2013, in France 80% to 90% are foreigners - mostly Romanian, Bulgarian,
Nigerian, Brazilian and Chinese.
[3] "Norma Hotaling, initiator of an awareness program" clients "of prostitution in the
United States", Prostitution and Society, April-June 1998.
[4] Sophie Avarguez (ed.), From the visible to the invisible: prostitution and border
effects,. Balzac ed, 2013. Solid sociological survey on the impact of "puticlubs" Catalan
Youth Pyrenees-Orientales.
[5] Interview with Gunilla Ekberg in Prostitution and Society, July to September 2004.
[6] "Prostitution: Stockholm, the city or the customer is invisible", L'Observateur, 1
December 2013.
http://www.alternativelibertaire.org/?L-achat-d-acte-sexuel-bientot
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