Derry Anti Racist Meeting: Thurs 3rd July

Foyle Gay Pride 2014

It's been announced this week that Foyle Gay Pride 2014 parade takes place on Saturday the 23rd of August. Anyone interested in having a float in the parade, all you have to do is get in touch with festival organisers at sha@foylepridefestival.com

Foyle Pride Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/foylepride?fref=ts

Hands Off Our Homes!

Did you know that plans are afoot to privatise YOUR housing. If you are a Housing Executive tenant you should know that under current proposals by Housing Minister McCausland the total privatisation of social housing across Northern Ireland is taking place. The proposals are to break up the Housing Executive, giving our public stock over to Housing Associations. These Housing Associations could possibly be local although there is a good chance they will be from mainland UK where unfortunately this kind of abolishment of public housing is common place. Our new potential landlord could be from Manchester, Wales, Scotland. ..Who knows at this point. The Housing Executive has 88000 homes, yes homes not financial units as these new landlords will see it. 

Once the Housing Executive is privatised what will this mean for us and our home. .....increase of rent, your new landlord will have borrowed money from a financial Institution. This of course will have to be paid back and also cover their increasing overheads therefore a surge in rent, sometimes as much as 35 percent. 

Withdrawal of local services. ...it is more cost effective to remove local offices and points of contact replacing them with call centres and online services.

 Public meeting on Tuesday 10th June at 7pm in St Joseph's Parish Centre, Galliagh, Derry.

Public meeting Wednesday 11th June at 7pm

Please come along to find out about the changes to social housing and what it will mean for us all.
You are the major stakeholder and you must demand your right to vote!

Thousands take part in Anti Racist March

Saturday saw a successful Anti Racist March in Belfast with thousands taking to the streets. Workers Solidarity Movement members from Derry, Dublin and Belfast took part in what was of the largest anarchist contingents in Belfast for some years. The Northern Ireland Committee of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions estimated as many as 7,000 people took part.

More photographs at the Derry Anarchists page.

Racism and the Class struggle

Racial oppression remains a defining feature of the modern capitalist world. It is manifest most spectacularly in violent attacks on immigrants and minorities by fascist gangs. More important to the fate of these communities has been the systematic and increasing discrimination by capitalist states, manifest in attacks on the rights of immigrants, cuts in welfare services, and racist Police and Court Systems.

How can racism be defeated?

An answer to this question requires an examination of the forces which gave rise to, and continue to reproduce, racism. It also requires a careful analysis of which social forces benefit from racial oppression.

 By racism is meant either an attitude denying the equality of all human beings, or economic, political and social discrimination against racial groups.

The roots of racism

Capitalism developed as a world system based on the exploitation of workers, slaves and peasants - black, brown, yellow, and white. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the young capitalist system centred mainly on western Europe and the Americas. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries Africa and Asia were brought increasingly into the ambit of capitalist power.

Article continues here: Racism and the Class struggle

Bigotry at the heart of Stormont

The recent racist attacks in Six Counties against migrant workers are an indictment of the status-quo which thrives on blaming minorities for the problems inherent in capitalism. It is the political class and sections of the tabloid press who constantly provide the ammunition for racist attacks.

 

The Islamophobic outburst by Peter Robinson the first minister of Northern Ireland needs to be seen in a context from a rise in the far right across Europe to western military occupations abroad to a local administration riddled with everything from sectarian bigots, xenophobes, and homophobes to sexists to those who believe everything stems from Adam and Eve.

Peter Robinson’s public defence of Pastor James Connell who described Islam as ‘satanic’ and ‘heathen’ going on to say he would not trust Muslims involved in violence or devotees of Sharia law; but would trust Muslims ‘to go to the shops’ provides a green light and convenient justification for the ongoing racist ethnic cleansing of newly arrived migrants by loyalist paramilitaries in mainly working class communities across the North.

His public comments are another echo from the distant past whenever shades of unionism including  his former master Ian Paisley frequently engaged in sectarian outbursts against Catholics and homosexuals helping to sow a climate of conflict and fear for decades and like his forefather this needs to confronted root and branch.

Peter Robinson’s half arsed private apology to so-called ‘Muslim leaders’ and token concern from their junior partners in Sinn Fein is another example of the entire system being rotten to the core built on sectarian bigotry. 

While last Saturday’s rallies organised across the North are an important first step, we need to be building firm foundations in communities and workplaces’ where these racist attacks are continuing and not pandering to the reactionary ideology of loyalism which does not represent ‘protestant working class communities.’ The contradictions of this message was clear on Saturday whenever a platform was provided to a PUP (Progressive Unionist Party) representative yet according to the PSNI its armed militia the UVF are involved in most of the attacks in South and East Belfast. (1)

In recent years we have witnessed governments utilise racist sediment from scaremongering over ‘asylum seekers’ to a ‘roma invasion’ none of which has come to fruition.  This is the deliberate whipping up of fear and division to divert our anger away from the real causes of their problems. Problems such as poverty, housing shortages, and unemployment have all been blamed on immigrants - rather than those really responsible such as landlords, property developers-capitalism.

Anarchists believe in equality between all people regardless of where their ancestors may be from, what colour their skin is, or where they were born. We all have an immigrant history in one way or the other. We want a world with no borders, where people are free to travel the world and settle where they wish – this is not a freedom that should be only be available to the rich and imperialism.

In confronting racism and sectarianism we need to build class unity based on common class interests, fighting for a better standard and quality of life for all while respecting our rich diversity and intersectionality of struggles from abortion rights to environmental campaigns. These symptoms must be tackled where in all areas of our social life, rather than appealing to our politicians or calling for tougher legislation or even simply a problem of ‘bad education’ as some liberals want you to believe.  All this is a distraction from the root cause of the problem. 

  We need to expose and attack the institutions which are legitimising racism in our society; we need to stand up against racist bullies and fascists carrying out attacks on migrant workers. Central to this is the need to physically and ideologically confront fascism and racist gangs wherever it raises its ugly head and the building of opposition to the system of wage slavery and exploitation which promotes racist scapegoating and the criminalisation of immigration.

Racism is motivated and perpetuated by greed, promoted by those in power. It festers in ignorance and misplaced fear. Our alternative is social equality and freedom for all.

1)      http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-26871331

Unite Against Racism March: 7th June

Anarchists from across the North will be gathering in Belfast next Saturday, 7th June, in solidarity with Amnesty Int. & Trade Union backed anti-racist March and Rally, which begins in Writers Square at 2pm. Full details on the link below. Please attend and share this link. 

Stand up Against Racism!

https://www.facebook.com/events/1613024922255339/