cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/16040607

"Brian Thompson, CEO of UnitedHealthcare since 2021, was shot and killed outside an entrance to the New York Hilton Midtown in Manhattan, New York City, on December 4, 2024. He was in the city to attend an annual investors meeting for UnitedHealth Group, the parent company of UnitedHealthcare. Authorities believe the attack was not random. Thompson had been criticized for UnitedHealthcare's rejection of insurance claims, and his family reported that he had received death threats in the past. The shooting occurred early in the morning, and the suspect, initially described as a white man wearing a mask, fled the scene."

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Brian_Thompson

(edit) I would like to point out that Luigi Mangione is only a suspect and there are currently doubts about the integrity of the evidence.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/16000164

Abstract

During the fourth millennium BC, public institutions developed at several large settlements across greater Mesopotamia. These are widely acknowledged as the first cities and states, yet surprisingly little is known about their emergence, functioning and demise. Here, the authors present new evidence of public institutions at the site of Shakhi Kora in the lower Sirwan/upper Diyala river valley of north-east Iraq. A sequence of four Late Chalcolithic institutional households precedes population dispersal and the apparent regional rejection of centralised social forms of organisation that were not then revisited for almost 1500 years.

The history of capitalism and the state is the history of attempts to abolish them and establish a free society without domination and exploitation. Revolutionary workers in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries believed that another world was possible. It is still possible today. One of the main social movements that attempted to overthrow capitalism and the state during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was anarchism. Members of the historical anarchist movement not only attempted to change the world but also produced an elaborate body of ideas that guided their actions. This book is concerned with explaining what their ideas were. Historians sometimes unearth old ideas from the past because they are an interesting way of gaining insight into a different time and place. This is not my principal motivation. I wrote this book because I want to live in a society in which everyone is free. I am convinced that, if we are to achieve this goal, it is important to know the history of previous attempts to do so. My hope is that, through learning about how workers in the past sought to emancipate themselves, workers alive today can learn valuable lessons and develop new ideas that build on the ideas of previous generations.

How to define anarchism is a contentious topic and will be discussed in depth in chapter 1. For the purposes of this book, it will be understood as a form of revolutionary antistate socialism that first emerged as a social movement in late nineteenth-century Europe within the International Workingmen’s Association between 1864 and 1872 and the subsequent Saint-Imier International between 1872 and 1878. During and after its birth as a social movement, it spread rapidly to North America, South America, Asia, Oceania, and parts of Africa through transnational networks, print media, and migration flows. I will focus exclusively on anarchist collectivists, anarchist communists, and anarchists without adjectives who were agnostic about the nature of the future society but advocated the same strategy as anarchist collectivists and anarchist communists. I do not claim that this is the one true form of anarchism. It is only the kind of anarchism I am focusing on.

These thoughts of acute grief inevitably give way to the broad and impersonal grief that is existing with any intentionality/awareness in this world of death machines. Every manifestation of genocide, every act of police brutality, every eviction, every encampment sweep, every person denied medical care, every hour of life sacrificed to work builds the grief in my blood towards toxicity. I open my mouth to scream but no sound comes out. I try to go through the motions of my day, but my brain is molten and leaking from my nose. I try to swallow the grief until it all but chokes me, threatens to burn me up from the inside out. I am afraid. I thrash against the waves until I am exhausted and I begin to drown.

But despite the fear and exhaustion, there is something powerful to be found beneath the waves, as your mouth fills with sand and the water rushes into your lungs. Through the pain and despair there is a clarity that insurmountable grief opens up. Grief is not merely something that happens to us that we must swallow. It offers a framework, a logic against logic that seems to cut the world in two; what matters from what doesn’t, what we desire from what is forced upon us. Grief does not need to be a burden, or at least not only a burden, for us to bear.

Grief can be a weapon for us to wield.

Perhimpunan Merdeka (literally “freedom association”) is a specifically anarchist organisation being formed in Indonesia, the largest archipelagic country in the Global South. The Komite Pembentukan (Starting Committee) of Perhimpunan Merdeka has been organising for some years and is made of some of the most seasoned anarchist organisers in Indonesia.

Admittedly haven't read this yet, but according to Anark, this is one of the best books on the subject of the Anarchist movement in the Spanish Civil War, and goes into detail of some missteps and failings they fell into, which we can hopefully learn to avoid.

Apparently, Anarchism and Workers' Self Management in Revolutionary Spain by Frank Mintz is a good companion book as well, and is available on Archive.org!

Perhaps not essential reading, but if you're a history buff and have a particular intrigue in Anarchist Spain, then hopefully you'll find these two books useful and interesting. :)

Rojava’s future depends on navigating regional and international power dynamics while safeguarding its commitment to values such as direct democracy, pluralistic autonomy, libertarian socialism, ecology, and feminism. The project’s survival may hinge on sustained international solidarity in an increasingly volatile geopolitical landscape.

Perspectives from both Western and Northeastern Syria on the taking of Aleppo and the renewed prospect of the fall of Assad.

Taken from the telegram linked below.

🔥Greta Thunberg meets with DEM Party co-mayor of Amed, North Kurdistan

Yesterday, climate justice activist Greta Thunberg, known for spearheading the Fridays4Future ecological youth movement, met with Serra Bucak co-mayor for the DEM Party on the city of Amed in North Kurdistan. During the meeting, views on the impact of climate change and global warming on nature were exchanged.

In recent years, Greta Thunberg has combined her ecological activism with the defence of the rights of oppressed peoples, such as Palestinians, Armenians and Kurds. This has cost her the support of most of mainstream media and political institutions, but despite that the young Swedish activist continues her struggle unabated.

❗️For updates follow: t.me/legerinmagazine

“the fascists call us ‘degenerates’, blaming us for all of society's woes, while the liberal ‘left’ throw us under the bus again and again, blaming anyone but themselves for their loss of state power.”

it’s scary but “we slowly build a future for ourselves by fostering communities of all kinds”

I hope this is the appropriate community for this question, if there is a better community for this, I can post it there.

It's been a bit over a week and I've had time to accept what has happened and what will happen as a result of America's recent decision. Even though I am from Canada, the news has many direct and indirect consequences which still has me concerned for the near future.

I feel that right now is the time for me to start and build a local community. I just don't know how to do that or where to begin.

I'm not the most social person so networking and leading will be a huge hurdle for me. I'm not creative enough with drawing or writing so creating flyers or propaganda would also be a challenge for me. I've always been more comfortable working and building things with my hands and have a pretty deep interest in land management and sustainability.

I also have the additional issue of being a person of colour in a mainly white town. Lifted trucks, SUVs, unwelcoming stares and plenty of entitled behaviours. The population in this town is mostly young families with younger children or old white folks which I doubt have any care for the future ahead of us. There's not much in between.

Over the past couple years, I have been buying various types of seeds and collecting seeds from my garden as plants mature. I've been trying to create a seed library for myself. Lately I've been thinking of trying to start a local seed library as a way to start some sort of community. Maybe even use that as a way to teach more local, sustainable habits.

I just don't know where to begin and starting feels quite overwhelming for one person.

I'm hoping to start a discussion or even brainstorm some ideas on what people can do, how to begin and how to follow through with building local communities.

Any idea outside of a seed library is welcome. It would help to have a nice, broad spread of ideas to draw from. I believe that would help keep the progress of the local communities adaptable as time goes on.

Check it out:

• Six free eBooks from AK Press

• Ten free eBooks from Haymarket

While the future, no matter who wins the upcoming election, doesn’t look rosy, at the same time there is still a lot of people who are looking for an anti-capitalist and anti-authoritarian alternative to the established political order and are searching for concrete ways to get involved in real life action.

In past installments of this column, we’ve fleshed out ideas about how to to go about forming a group and promoting events, but this time around, we wanted to talk about concrete ideas on starting more long-term projects in your community. While this list isn’t exhaustive, we do hope this presents you with some real ideas about how you might start to begin.

“Punitive grandstanding” is the most descriptive short phrase I could come up to describe the following concept:

A situation where someone pushes for extreme punitive measures against in immoral act, which in practice “virtue signals” moral superiority and implies people proposing lesser punishment are immoral. This behaviour often goes beyond what is proportionate or productive.

You probably know what I mean. Say there’s a new lemmy thread on a news community, it’s about someone having committed a horrible crime. All the comments end up being a sort of “jerk off contest” for who can propose the strongest punishment and thereby assert their moral superiority.

Instead of taking an approach to actually reduce the incident of said crime, looking at what problems might have led to it, how to care for the victim/family, and how to properly rehabilitate and treat someone who committed such an act, solely focusing on coming up with the most draconian punishment possible.

Anyone who comments something about the justice system ideally being rehabilitative gets accused of being no better than the criminal themselves or “helping” criminals.

I’ve just noticed this general trend which seems to be at odds with anarchist principles. I wonder what you think? Have you noticed this too? Do you think it’s a major problem? What can we do about it?

Greta Thunberg @GretaThunberg

#UsaElection #USA2024 #StopArminglsrael #FreePalestine #ClimateJusticeNow

This year we have seen many defining elections all over the world. On November 5th, It is time for one of the most powerful countries in the world — the USA — to go to the polls. It is probably Impossible to overestimate the consequences this specific election will have for the world and for the future of humanity.

There is no doubt that one of the candidates — Trump — is way more dangerous than the other. But no matter if Trump or Harris wins, the USA — a country built on stolen land and genocide on indigenous people -will soll be an imperialist hyper-capitalist world power that will ultimately continue to lead the world further into a racist, unequal world with an ever increasingly escalating climate- and environmental emergency.

With this in mind, my main message to Americans is to remember that you cannot only settle for the least worst option. Democracy is not only every four years on election day, but also every hour of every day in between. You cannot think you have done "enough' only by voting, especially when both those candidates have blood on their hands. Lets not forget that the genocide in Palestine is happening under the Biden and Harris administration, with American money and complicity. It is not in any way 'feminist." "progressive" or "humanitarian" to bomb innocent children and civilians — it is the opposite, even It it is a woman in charge. And this is of course one example among many of American imperialism. I cannot for my life understand how some can even pretend to talk about humanitarian values, without even questioning their own role In further deepening global oppression and massacres of entire countries.

So, Americans, you must do everything in your power to call out this extreme hypocrisy and the catastrophic consequences American Imperialism has on a global scale. Be uncomfortable, fill the streets, block, organise, boycott, occupy, explicitly call out those in power whose actions and Inaction lead to death and destruction. Join and support those who are resisting and leading the change. Nothing less will ever be acceptable.

In this article, we argue that a Slow Feminism, which evolves through the slow but consistent support of other women that is embedded in care, compassion and constructive challenge against patriarchal expectations, is essential for the future of feminist praxis within higher education. This work emerged from our coming together to reflect-on-action on our experiences as disabled, women, postgraduate researchers in different disciplines during the COVID-19 pandemic. Feeling ‘othered’ by and invisible to hierarchal structures, we sought to understand our individual challenges through a collective lens. Relational ethics and a praxis of care in line with feminist epistemology underpinned our systematic ‘feminist collaborative autoethnography’, whereby we critically engaged with individual reflections and together in online meetings to interpret shared social, emotional and structural challenges. In this article, we draw on our experiences sharing this data through poetry, during the stage of our collaborative project in which we utilised ‘poems’ to identify the challenges of being a disabled woman navigating higher education, and the resistance we employed individually, and collectively, in support of one another. Through this process, we challenged the neoliberal, patriarchal and oppressive systems that we are forced to engage with daily and our own complicity in them. Using our individual, collective and overlapping voices, whereby we recognise the tensions and supportive narratives created by and within our research conversations, we identify that feminist activism and feminist futures are not solely a response to extreme events.