Friday, March 25, 2022

This Is America #162: Student Walkouts Continue; McGill Occupation; An Anti-Capitalist Analysis of High Gas Prices

photo: @DivestMcGill

Welcome, to This Is America, March 25th, 2022.

On today’s episode, first we speak with someone involved in a recent occupation at a university in so-called Montreal. We then present an interview with several folks in Merced, California who are supporting an ongoing hunger-strike in local jails.

We then turn towards our discussion,were we look at what is driving high gas prices and how its connected to war profiteering and the ongoing Russian invasion of the Ukraine.

All this, but first, let’s get to the news.

Living and Fighting

Amazon workers at different facilities and across two different states organized a walkout to demand a $3 raise.

Resistance to anti-LGBTQ bills and attacks on trans and queer people continued across the US. Last week in Rhode Island, students across various high schools walked out against proposed pieces of legislation. This week in Idaho, students rallied against anti-LGBTQ bills at the state capitol. In Iowa, “About 100 students from [two] high schools marched out of the school and [marched to a rally in a] park.”

At the University of North Texas, over 100 people mobilized against a group of self-described “Christian fascists” who were scheduled to hold an event featuring a speaker connected to the white nationalist “Groyper” movement. The speaker ended up being (ironically) cancelled and only about 30 people attended a meeting by the group on campus while a much larger crowd rallied and protested outside. The rally was only the latest in a string of ongoing actions against the presence of far-Right activists on campus linked to neo-Nazis and white nationalists.

In other student news, at Edina High School in Minnesota, students walked out and marched against the surfacing of a racist video. Students in Seattle also walked out in protest of the state ending mask mandates. As the Seattle Times wrote:

The newly formed Seattle Student Union, a group of student activists that organized the rally, have been demanding stronger safety protocols since January, including district-issued high-quality masks. The group has been threatening a walkout since Gov. Jay Inslee announced plans to end mask requirements in schools, child care facilities, and most other businesses. “Every time we try to get hasty and toss our masks off, we have another spike and another thousand people die,” [one student stated].

Meanwhile in Minneapolis, in solidarity with teachers who have been on strike for two weeks, students occupied “the administration building for Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS), calling for striking teachers’ demands to be met,” as Unicorn Riot reported. Students said ” they were occupying the admin building because they were “tired” of the district using the media to say “that the teachers are taking advantage of the students and using” them.”

Resistance against development of ‘Cop City’ continues in the Atlanta forest. A new communique posted to Scenes from the Atlanta Forest reads:

Last week, we sabotaged six Earth-raping machines——including two large excavators and a bulldozer——at a Reeves Young construction site in Flowery Branch, Georgia.

We do not need more training centers for the police to practice killing us. We do not need more Amazon warehouses for two-hour delivery of fleshlights and Quest bars. What we need is what we already have, what Reeves Young aims to ruin: spaces free from Empire; soil, roots and water, mutually healing; trees bending in the wind; a friend’s eyes shining in the light of the fire.

We will not rest, so neither will our enemies. In solidarity with all those locked in cages; in solidarity with all those combating Russian and Amerikkkan imperialism——let us strike without fear at everything which confines and assails us. May the flame that burns inside us burn everything around us.

In the Bronx, people took to the streets against the police after 18 year old, Luis Monsanto, was shot in the head and hospitalized after law enforcement opened fire into a moving car.

Finally in Los Angeles, protesters have been disrupting Mayoral debates in protest of the cities ongoing attacks on the houseless. As Sam Levin recently reported in The Guardian, a year after the violent mass eviction of Echo Park, the vast majority of those displaced still remain on the street, despite promises from politicians. On a positive note, a group called the Crosswalk Collective is installing DIY crosswalks to make the streets safer for pedestrians and bicycles. On the group’s Twitter they stated, “The city doesn’t keep us safe, so we keep us safe. Until City Council acts, we paint crosswalks.” Their Twitter account also includes a link to request a crosswalk.

Upcoming Events

  • March 26th: The Phoenix Anarchist Federation will be hosting several workshops. More info.
  • April 9th: San Antonio Anarchist Bookfair. 1- 7 PM. More info here.
  • May 8th – 15: Call for week of action to defend the Atlanta forest. More info here.
  • June 5th: Bay Area Anarchist Bookfair returns to Oakland, California. More info here.
  • August 13–21st: The Institute for Advanced Troublemaking’s (IAT) is hosting eight days of popular education, blending theory and practice, for adults of all ages. More info.

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