March 26th: Buggy Bloc Against The Cuts!

When: 26 March · 11:30 - 15:30

Where: London

Meeting point: Victoria Embankment Gardens

Nearest tube station: Embankment (District and Circle lines)

Meandering from Embankment to Hyde Park

_______________________________

Babies and buggy boarders, spread the word... kids against cuts being seen
and
heard!

Joining the myriads to oppose the squandering of our future.

For details of the day visit marchforthealternative.org.uk

RAG Feminist Gathering in Ireland August 2010

*** Attention all feminists! ***

* RAG, the Dublin-based anarcha-feminist collective, are organising a
gathering in Ireland on the 27th-29th August 2010 . This will be a chance
for feminists to come together to discuss, learn and share in a radical but
supportive environment. *

* As plans for the weekend are being drawn-up, we want to ask you to scratch
these dates into your diary now. *

* This great event will take place in Dublin’s autonomous social centre,
Seomra Spraoi (seomraspraoi.org). Costs will be kept to a minimum. Children
are very welcome.*

* A full update of what’s planned for the weekend will follow in the coming
week, so keep an eye on our blog (http://ragdublin.blogspot.com/), our
website (http://www.theragdublin.org), or find us on facebook. *

* If you are interested in attending this gathering, or have any questions or
suggestions please email ragdublin at riseup dot net

* Also, if you have a workshop you would like to give, please email us with
the subject WORKSHOP in the email *

Big love and mega solidarity,

RAG Dublin

*****************************************************
please forward
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Global Protests Save Iranian Mother from Death by Stoning for Adultery

Yesterday an Iranian woman, Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, was saved by global protests
from being stoned to death.

But she may still be hanged -- and, meanwhile, execution by stoning continues. Right
now fifteen more people are on death row awaiting stoning in which victims are
buried up to their necks in the ground and then large rocks are thrown at their
heads.

The partial reprieve of Sakineh, triggered by the call from her children for
international pressure to save her life, has shown that if enough of us come
together and voice our horror, we may be able to save her life, and stop stoning
once and for all. Sign the urgent petition now and send it onto everyone you know --
let's end this cruel slaughter NOW!

http://www.avaaz.org/en/stop_stoning/?vl

Sakineh was convicted of adultery, like all the other 12 women and one of the men
awaiting stoning. But her children and lawyer say she is innocent and that she did
not get a fair trial -- they state her confession was forced from her and, speaking
only Azerbaijani, she did not understand what was being asked of her in court.

Despite Iran's signing of a UN convention that requires the death penalty only be
used for the "most serious crimes" and despite the Iranian Parliament passing a law
banning stoning last year, stoning for adultery continues.

Sakineh's lawyer says the Iranian government "is afraid of Iranian public reaction
and international attention" to the stoning cases. And after Turkey and Britain's
Foreign Ministers spoke out against Sakineh's sentence, it was suspended.

Sakineh's brave children are leading the international campaign to save their mother
and stop stoning. Massive international condemnation now could finally stop this
sickening punishment. Let's join together today across the world to end this
brutality. Sign the petition to save Sakineh and end stoning here:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/stop_stoning/?vl

In hope and determination,

Alice, David, Milena, Ben and the whole Avaaz team


SOURCES:

Iranians still facing death by stoning despite 'reprieve', The Guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jul/08/iran-death-stoning-adultery

Britain condemns planned Iran stoning as 'medieval', AFP:
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hjVdkvkzicGeInqw2R10rCKrqs3A


Support the Avaaz community! We're entirely funded by donations and receive no money
from governments or corporations. Our dedicated team ensures even the smallest
contributions go a long way -- donate here.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

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the views and values of the world's people shape global decision-making. ("Avaaz"
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To contact Avaaz write to us at
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Mothers March & Speak Out: Saturday 13th March, London

An International Womens Day and Mothers Day Event

Saturday 13 March 2010

Mothers March & Speak Out

For recognition and support for all the work
we contribute to society

Come with your children, relatives and friends.

Bring your banners, placards and demands.


Assemble 2pm Trafalgar Sq
March to Parliament Sq
Westminster, London SW1 ALL WELCOME

mothering is hard work
The survival of the human race depends on the caring work of mothers.
But we get no recognition or support. Only blame when things go wrong.
And we're even expected to do more work to feed the family, often on
the lowest pay.

every mother is a working mother

Events also in: Guyana, Haiti, India, Mexico, Peru, US
MEN: Join the contingent of fathers & other male carers who support
mothers.

mothers, this march is for you who are raising children in cities, towns or villages...
Who are separated from your children or have lost children
Who are surviving war & environmental disaster
Who are seeking asylum
For you who are grandmothers, non-biological mothers, domestic workers & other women doing caring work
For you who have disabilities or have a child with disabilities
Who are fighting for justice for loved ones
Who have been raped
Who are students & mothers
Who are sex workers supporting families
Who have been criminalised by poverty
Who want to have children but havent been able to
For you mothers of every race, age, passport, income, sexuality & occupation
For all of us who are overworked & underpaid.

Our demand is: invest in caring not killing

Called by All African Womens Group Mothers Campaign (MoCa),

Global Womens Strike (GWS), and Single Mothers Self-Defence
Endorsed by: Kay Adshead (playwright/poet), Black Womens Rape
Action Project, English Collective of Prostitutes, Oliver James
(child psychologist/author), Jenny Jones (Green Party), Sheila
Kitzinger (natural childbirth campaigner/author), Payday mens
network, The Peace Strike at Parliament Square, Wages Due Lesbians,
Michelene Wandor (writer/broadcaster), Women with Visible and
Invisible Disabilities, Women Against Rape, Women of Colour in the
GWS

Sign MoCas petition for family reunion:

http://www.PetitionOnline.com/MumsKids/petition.html (
http://www.petitiononline.com/MumsKids/petition.html )

Youtube Clips on Why a Mothers' March

Selma James ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcCk9CmQD2A ), Global
Women's Strike

Isata Denton-Ceesay ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eh2orh7Gt4E ),
All African Women's Group

For info on disability access and facilities for children, to sponsor or
to make a donation: (020)7482 2496 voice/minicom

www.globalwomenstrike.net ( http://www.globalwomenstrike.net/ )
aawg02@googlemail.com womenstrike8m@server101.com

London Events this weekend: International Womens Day plus more!

Its international womens day on monday and as such there are lots of
feminist events happening in london this weekend.

Million Women Rise - Saturday 6th of march from 12 - march and rally. 3rd
national women only march to celebrate International Women's Day and
demonstrate against violence against women.
From the million women rise website at http://www.millionwomenrise.com.

"Million Women Rise is a coalition of individual women and representatives
from the Women’s Voluntary and Community Sector who have come together to
organise an annual national demonstration against male violence which
coincides with International Women’s Day in March each year.

On the demonstration, we celebrate and honour women’s activism, courage
and achievements and continued struggle against global male violence in
all its forms. Million Women Rise is an expression of women’s continued
resistance and struggle against global male violence. The first
demonstration in 2008 saw 5000 women and children take to the streets of
London. It was the largest, recent demonstration of women in UK history
and the most diverse demonstration many of us had ever attended."

London anarcha feminist kolektiv will be on the march. if you would like
to march with us we will be meeting at the meeting point (park lane,
oppopsite speakers corner) from 12. We will converge near the back, look
for the black and pink banner).
Please note this a women only event, although the rally at trafalgar
square is all-genders.

Sunday 7th March
Reclaiming birth march and rally
This event is happening because AIMS, NCT, RCM, IMUK, Albany Mums and
Midwifery Practice, many parents and midwives are so concerned about the
state of maternity services and the lack of options available to women.
Matters were brought to a head by the sudden closure of the highly
successful and loved Albany Midwifery Practice in south London.

1pm Assemble in Geraldine Mary Harmsworth Park,
Lambeth Road, London SE1 4EQ
March to whitehall for rally.
For full details visit http://www.aims.org.uk/reclaimingbirth.htm. this is
an all genders event - please support
LAFK are suuporting this campaign and will be in attendance, please look
for our banner if you'd like to march with us.

London Freeschool, 195 Mare Street - all weekend. for full details visit
http://londonfreeschool.wordpress.com/

Friday 5th March

————————————————————————————————————

•19.30 – 21.00 : Safer Space Policy discussion
•21.00 onwards : food/social
————————————————————————————————————

Saturday 6th March

————————————————————————————————————

Bar / Chill out space

•12.00 – 12.30 : Discussion/presentation of the Safer Space Policy •All
day Free tutorials for humanities students (turn up and ask for the
facilitators)
Workshop Space 1

•12.30 – 14.30 : Direct Action/ Blockading
•14.30 – 16.00 : Spanish lesson
•16.00 – 19.00 : A DIY Radio Workshop
Workshop space 2

•12.30 – 14.30 : Sexual Consent
•14.30 – 16.00 : Charm Offensive: a group discussion on charisma and
authority.
•16.00 – 17.30 : What have feminism tendencies brought to autonomous
politics in the seventies? How the perspective of feminism transcends
marxist/anarchist perspectives?
•17.30 – 19.00 : What are Children For?
Workshop Space 3

•12.30 – 14.30 : Downloading Workshop
•14.30 – 16.00 : Free and Open Source Software
•16.00 – 17.30 : Free Art/Expression workshop
Workshop Space 4


•All day: Welding (just come round and ask the facilitator to show
you!)Movie space

•… schedule to be made
Welding will happen all day

19.30 : Daily general debrief

————————————————————————————————————

Sunday 7th March

————————————————————————————————————

Bar / Chill out space

•12.00 – 12.30 : Discussion/presentation of the Safer Space Policy •All
day Free tutorials for humanities students (turn up and ask for the
facilitators)
Workshop Space 1

•12.30 – 14.00 : Misogyny, Oppression and Gyoza
•14.00 – 15.30 : French lesson
•15.30 – 17.00 : Experiences and politics of the menstrual cycle (self
identified women only)
•17.00 – 18.30 : Feminist Self Defence (self identified women only) •20.00
– 21.30 : Making Beards & Homemade Stuffers (self identified women only)
Workshop Space 2

•12.30 – 14.00 : Surprisingly empowering “women’s” work
•14.00 – 15.30 : Gender & Mental Health: Dora’s Case
•15.30 – 17.00 : London Profeminist Mens Group presentation
•17.00 – 18.30 : Workshop of Nothing
Workshop Space 3

•12.30 – 16.30 : Costume / Underwear Making
Workshop Space 4

•All day: Welding
Movie Space

•12.30 – 16.00 : The Game of War
•16.00 – 17.30 : Nomadic Queer Movie night
19.00 : Daily general debrief

Followed by a social / dressing up party!

——-

Other Workshop happening but yet to be scheduled :

Puppet Making

Bike Repair

For full details of whats happening over the next few days and weeks to
celebrate international womens day visit, http://iwd2010.wordpress.com/.
for more information about international womens day and its history
(herstory) visit http://www.internationalwomensday.com/about.asp

Plotting and scheming for welfare not workfare

*please repost

On 12 November, it became legal to force unemployed people to work for their benefits – to do 40-hour-weeks for under a third of the minimum wage. The Government's Welfare Reform Act introduced 'Work for your Benefit' pilot schemes, which once completed can be rolled out without any further debate. It also attacked single parents – who face sanctions if they fail to prepare for work outside the home as soon as their child turns three – and people with impairments, disabilities or severe andenduring illnesses.

Two days later, members of twenty-three different groups from around theUK met to share information and plan resistance to these pernicious attacks, which will take their toll on working-class and low-income communities.

Groups present included Unemployed Workers Unions from six cities acrossthe UK, the Disabled People's Direct Action Network, Southwark Mind,WinVisible (women with visible and invisible disabilities), SingleMothers' Self-Defence (part of Global Women's Strike) and members of the union in the Department of Work and Pensions – PCS. They were joined by feminist and other groups (all listed below).

The strength to be gained from meeting in solidarity with each other was immense and created a real sense that a movement is building: a movementwhich will not only fight the immediate attacks of the Welfare Abolition Act, but draw out the connections between our struggles and together challenge the ideology driving them.

The Act seeks to make our worth dependent on work; work defined in the really narrow terms of waged work for someone else's profit. By making us compete with those in waged work for non-existent jobs, it helps drive down wages and conditions. We all take the brunt as the rich make even more money out of us.
• We want solidarity with and from people in low-income, temporary and insecure work. These are the jobs that 'work-for-your-benefit' would replace.
• We want caring to be recognised as important work in society. Single parents are already working and benefits are their entitlement to a social wage.
• We want justice for people with severe or enduring illnesses. The drive to get people off incapacity benefits and Employment and Support Allowance and into work is making people more ill with stress. Only we know what we are capable of and it is wrong for conditions and sanctions to be imposed on us to force us into unsuitable work, unwanted “work-related activity”or “motivation sessions” which press us into their programmes of treatmentfor addictions and other conditions.
• We want the right not to work. People not in waged work contribute loads to their communities. We do not want to be forced into mind-numbing,insecure work that leaves us no better off, or worse off than on benefitsand definitely not at £1.27 an hour!
• We want free, high-quality, public services to support older people andpeople with impairments/disabilities. People should not have to become employers managing 'individual budgets' in order to access the care they need.
• We want to stand in solidarity with migrant workers. Just as unemployed people are pitted against people in work, so migrant workers are pittedagainst us. We believe that we must stand together and demand all of ourrights together.
• We want to fight privatisation of the Department for Work and Pensions.Attacks on DWP and Jobcentre Plus workers are attacks on our rights toaccess welfare. We will support the PCS' fight against cuts.
• We want an end to the apartheid system of benefits, healthcare and housing for asylum seekers. UK Border Agency support should be scrapped-- where people are forced to survive on incomes far below benefit levels– which are already set at subsistence level. No slum housing and dangerous and dirty hostels, dispersal, or vouchers.

After a day of info-sharing, outrage and scheming, we formed a few working groups. If you're able to help out with any of the projects, please email hackneyunemployedworkers@gmail.com
1. Media working group – monitor and respond to hostile articles in the media.
2. Our propaganda – creating posters, newsletters etc to get our messages out
3. Website – put together a website as a space to share resources, feedback and comment, get the word out about our campaign and publicise local and national action.
4. Our welfare rights – compiling information to help us access our rights now and creating 'Know your rights' leaflets.
5. Defeating the Work for your Benefits pilots – research to support the network to take action against the pilots.

If you want to stay in touch, please join our discussion list here:http://groups.google.com/group/no-to-welfare-abolition

If you agree with our demands above and would like to take part in ourcampaign, please ask your group to sign up to this statement and email hackneyunemployedworkers@gmail.com

And put the next national meeting in your diary now.... 17 April in Manchester!

The meeting had people in attendance from: South Manchester Community Union, London Anarcha-Feminist Kolektiv, London Coalition Against Poverty, Feminist Action, Defend Welfare Newcastle, Manchester Unemployed WorkersUnion, Cambridge Unemployed Workers' Union, PCS, Hackney UnemployedWorkers, Single Mothers' Self Defence, Winvisible, Alliance for Workers'Liberty, Disabled People's Direct Action Network, Southwark Mind, Women's Office Manchester Student Union, Riveters feminist group in Manchester,Feminist Fightback, Industrial Workers of the World, No Borders, StopDeportations, Anarchist Federation, Communist Students, SalfordUnemployed Workers' Union.