Thursday, 25 March 2010

No to Welfare Abolition - the national planning meeting

*No to Welfare Abolition - the national planning meeting*

Manchester University Students Union, *Steve Biko Building, Oxford Road, Manchester, M13 9PR, rooms MR1 and MR2*

Saturday 17th April Arrive 11.30am for 12 noon start. Finish 5.30pm.

Our rights to welfare are under attack from all sides. The Welfare Reform Act passed last year is making it harder for single parents, unemployed workers, people with illness, disabilities or impairments and carers to get by. High profile poster campaigns target 'benefit thieves', while benefit fraud is at a low and bankers escape the recession with billions of taxpayers' money.

17 April is our chance for welfare and disability rights activists, members of unemployed workers' groups and trade unionists to get to together, build links of solidarity and plan our struggles. If you are organising to defend welfare or want to start doing so, please make sure people from your group come along!

Free lunch will be provided.

Let us know you are coming by emailing *hackneyunemployedworkers@gmail.com*.

Contact *rebecca.galbraith@yahoo.co.uk* if you want to use the free creche.

Join the email discussion list here: * http://groups.google.com/group/no-to-welfare-abolition*

Thursday, 18 March 2010

Class, childcare and the Women’s Liberation Movement.

Below is the text of a leaflet circulated at the WLM@40 conference at Ruskin College, Oxford, UK, (http://www.wlm40conference.org.uk/booking.html).

Class, childcare and the Women’s Liberation Movement.

Anticapitalist feminists have written a letter to the organisers of the wlm@40 conference, raising concerns about the price of the event and the lack of childcare at the conference.

According to the call for papers
“The aim of this conference is to create a space for debate about the issues facing feminists today and celebration of feminist work. WLM@40 will capture the energy, vibrancy and vision of the first [Women's Liberation Movement conference held at Ruskin College in 1970], building on the foundations that it laid. This conference will reflect on the historical significance of the 1970 (and later) conferences, share information and skills for contemporary feminist activism, create and celebrate feminist art and look to the future of feminism(s). Speakers will cut across boundaries of age, class, location and sexuality and voices that were originally absent will now be heard.”

It is hard to imagine how a conference that is so prohibitively expensive will cut across class boundaries.

To be working class often means that we do not have access to the funds to do the things we would like to do and many things are put out of our reach.
As women living under capitalism, all our work is undervalued and underpaid and we receive no income for the work as carers we often do. Many of us in the UK are dependent on paltry state benefits and those of us who are in paid work are facing increasing strain on our already stretched budgets.
The feminisation of poverty is something that we are all aware of, and much grass roots feminist activism targets this fact.
Much of feminist activism is unpaid, we do it for free and in our spare time, because we care about women and the conditions we face. The majority of feminist groups, organisations and campaigns are underfunded, if funded at all.
As feminists we recognise the oppressive and inherently exploitative nature of capitalism, we feel its effects in our everyday lives, so we act in solidarity with those around the world who experience the far worse effects of the capitalist nightmare -- death, poverty, ecological destruction, etc.

The past few years have seen an increase in feminist activism around the UK, much of it anticapitalist, and it is only right that this should be celebrated. The first conference 40 years ago was dynamic and historically significant, and it would be great if this conference could build on this. We need to rebuild the Women’s Liberation Movement in order to effect the societal change we need. However, we cannot build a movement if only those with the privilege of ready cash get to contribute. We should always be about accessibility and inclusiveness, after all we are organising around the very fact that patriarchal society is not inclusive of women, and actively excludes people on the basis of gender, class, race, sexuality, ability, age, etc.

The means must reflect the vision. How we organise must reflect the vision of what we’re fighting for, anything less is counter-revolutionary. That means that events must be accessible, affordable and always inclusive.

In relation to childcare at the wlm@40 conference

The original conference had a free crèche that was organised by men. This conference will have no childcare, but will instead offer parents or carers a list of registered local childminders with whom they can place their child, and presumably pay for this themselves.

One of the first four demands of the Women’s Liberation Movement, which, ironically, were formulated at the first Ruskin conference in 1970, was the demand for free 24 hour childcare, because feminists have always recognised that many women have always been unfairly excluded from much of mainstream life by their childcare and caring responsibilities. The demand for decent, free childcare for all has always been one of the basics of feminist activism. How can we demand this of society in general, if our own events are lacking in decent free childcare?
Women who are parents and carers are often in underpaid work, or are dependent on state benefits; the money we do have has to pay for our families, and not just ourselves.

The price of this conference will rule it out for many working-class and lower paid women, especially parents and carers, and the lack of free childcare is a double insult.

Because of the way this conference has been organised, most of us are not here, although we would very much like to be.
Will we be missed?
Radicalfeminists4wlmat40@hotmail.co.uk

Monday, 8 March 2010

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

Saturday, 6 March 2010

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

Thursday, 4 March 2010

Anarcho-feminist Conference in Barcelona, Spain this weekend

Iberia - Anarchist Communist Event
Saturday March 06 2010
Start Time: 11:00 AM

Barcelona: Anarcho-Feminist Conference

This year - 2010 - the CNT celebrates 100 years since it was founded, in
a context very different from today's. For this reason, we want to
analyze and reflect on the path that this class-struggle union has
followed throughout its history and examine its role today. There is no
doubt that the people who have been members of the CNT have mostly been
women and men with a capacity for critical thought, sometimes well ahead
of their time, and there have been times when the CNT has played a vital
role, as in the social revolution of 1936. Today we ask ourselves how it
sees itself as a union that fights against every form of authority, and
especially against something as important as patriarchy which, along
with capitalism, inhibits the freedom of many living beings and is
destroying the planet.

So, this Feminist Conference arise from the need of various female
members of the CNT to visualize the vital role that women play in the
anarchist movement, to reflect on the connection between anarchism and
feminism, to challenge traditional gender roles, female and male, on
which patriarchy are based.

The Conference on Women and Anarchism will be an opportunity to get
closer to the realities of female militancy. We intend to analyze,
discuss and highlight the participation and organization of women who
identify with libertarian principles without giving up their gender
identity. We want to see the problems that affect us as women in the
various areas where we operate: labour, educational, organizational,
health, emotional, etc., and the problems arising from a patriarchal and
capitalist society such as ours that affects us and our comrades, male
and female alike.

To this end, we will try to deal with the subject on two levels: one
level is our own situation as female workers and union activists in a
class-struggle, revolutionary and libertarian union, covering the
historical perspective and the needs that we see today. The second level
is feminist women's participation in the various organizations that seek
to contribute to social change. We are interested in highlighting these
daily struggles, the projects that result from them, the difficulties
that exist and the contradictions that we encounter. We also wish to
work on these aspects by collecting multiple experiences from the past
and others that are in progress today all over the world.

To try to cover these objectives, we have organized five topics:
1. Women, work and the union
2. A historical reference: the Mujeres Libres
3. Anarcho-feminism: organized women
4. Women in the press and propaganda of The Idea
5. Sexual diversity and anarchism.

Everyone is invited to participate in these reflections on our/your part
so that we can try to get closer to achieving our/your utopian society.

Let our thoughts become action.

PROGRAMME:

- Saturday 6 March 11.00 a.m.

Women and Anarcho-syndicalism: with Ana Sigüenza (first Secretary
General of the CNT) and Laura Vicente (Doctor of Contemporary History at
the University of Alicante), author of "Teresa Claramunt. Pionera del
feminismo obrerista anarquista".

Venue: Centre Cívic Drassanes - Sala d'Actes. C/Nou de la Rambla 43. (
L-3: Liceu, Drassanes ó Paralel).

- Sunday 7 March 5.00 p.m.

Workshop - Self-managing our health (women-only event - prior
registration required: libertariascnt@hotmail.com)

Venue: Casa de la Solidaridad. C/Vistalegre, 15. ( L-2: Sant Antoni)

- Wednesday 10 March 7.00 p.m.

Cine forum: "Adrift (by casual women workers)" Authors: precarias a la
deriva.

Venue: Espai Obert. C/Violant d'Hongria 71, 1º. ( L-5: Plaça de Sants i
Badal; L-3: Plaça del Centre)

- Friday 12 Marzo 7.00 p.m.

Anarcho-feminist Theory & Practice, with La Katino Anarkista (member of
the Red Anarcofeminista de Mujeres and creator of the publication
"Alejandra") and Vanessa Ortíz, from the Juana Julia Guzmán collective
(Bogota).

Venue: Fundació d'Estudis Llibertaris i Anarcosindicalistes - FELLA.
C/Joaquin Costa 34. ( L-3: Catalunya ó L-1 i L-2 Universitat).

- Saturday 13 March 5.00 p.m.

Anarchist women propagandizing The Idea, with María Ángeles García
Maroto, anarcho-feminist journalist and writer, member of the Alcoi SOV,
and Antonina Rodrigo, writer, author of the book "Amparo Poch y Gascón,
médica y anarquista".

Presentation of feminist publications. RAG (Ireland), Herstory
(Barcelona), Histeria (Barcelona), Mujeres Preokupando 8 (Barcelona) and
others...

Venue: Centre Cívic Pati Llimona. C/Regomir 3. ( L-3: Liceu ó L-4 Jaume I).

- Sunday 14 March 5.00 p.m.

Feminist self-defence workshop. Organized by a Barcelona self-defence
group (women-only event - prior registration required:
libertariascnt@hotmail.com).

Venue: Casa de la Solidaridad. C/Vistalegre, 15. ( L-2: Sant Antoni)

- Friday 19 March 7.00 p.m.

Animal liberation, liberation of the land and liberation of women.
Natalia, Maria, Isabella and Clara.

Venue: Espai Obert. C/Violant d'Hongria 71, 1º. ( L-5: Plaça de Sants i
Badal; L-3: Plaça del Centre)

- Saturday 20 March 5.00 p.m.

Mujeres Libres, yesterday and today, with Martha Ackelsberg, professor
of Political Science and Women's & Gender Studies at Smith College,
Northampton, MA (USA) and author of "Free Women of Spain: Anarchism and
the Struggle for the Emancipation of Women", together with comrades from
the Mujeres Libres in Extremadura and Madrid.

Venue: CCCB -- Aula 2. C/ Montalegre, 5 ( L-3: Catalunya ó L-1 i L-2
Universitat).

- Friday 26 March 7.00 a.m.

Gender, race and class. Carla.

Venue: Espai Obert. C/Violant d'Hongria 71, 1º. ( L-5: Plaça de Sants i
Badal; L-3: Plaça del Centre)

- Saturday 27 March 11.00 a.m.

Sexual Diversity and anarchism: debate organized by D-género, a
pro-sexual liberation libertarian collective from Madrid, Karolina,
Filipo Brenda and Maricarmen.

Venue: Centre Cívic Barceloneta. C/Conreria 1 -- 9. ( L-4: Barceloneta).


* Workshops are for women only. Prior registration is required - write
to: libertariascnt@hotmail.com . Dates for the workshops are subject to
change, and in this case participants will be advised by email. Further
workshops may be organized if the maximum number of participants is
exceeded.

Organized by: Comisión del CeNTenario (Barcelona)

English translation by FdCA-International Relations Office

Related Link: http://www.cnt.es/centenario

Source http://www.anarkismo.net/article/15927

Monday, 15 February 2010

"Spratz - a feminist kidzine" available on-line now



Our fantastic kidzine "Spratz" is now available as a readable or printable pdf at the zinelibrary here.
Instructions for printing it are here.
Please distribute freely.

Wednesday, 27 January 2010

This Saturday: Brighton Anarcha-Feminism Day!

This Saturday 30th Jan 2010 sees the new year welcoming...

A DAY OF ANARCHA-FEMINISM
a completely free day and night of super feminism for all ages and genders
@ the cowley club, 12 london road, brighton

this event supports a new brighton womens homeless shelter and the launch
of the new anarcha-feminist group 'Organise!'- come along and get involved

DAY EVENT:
10.30am-6.30pm

including:

workshops n discussions (what is anarchfeminism?, feminist squats,
feminist childrearing, privilige, self-defense, men and anarchafem plus
many many more!)

skillshares n distros (DIY herbalism, zines, stencilling, subvertising,
radical knitting, plus so much more!)

PLUS!
-creche all day with kids workshops on storytelling n zines
-film sessions from 6.30-8.30pm
-yummy vegan lunch, tea n cake
-open to all, if you are new to anarchafeminism or an old hat!
-most workshops are wheelchair accessible and if not they can be adapted,
so please do ask the organising group for any particular needs you may
have: brightonanarchafeminists@lists.aktivix.org

NIGHT EVENT:
Fundraising gig, comedy, djs
7.30pm-2am

ALL FUNDS FROM THE DAY N NIGHT EVENT GO TO LATITUDE SAFE SPACE- A NEW
INITIATIVE FOR A BRIGHTON WOMEN'S HOMELESS SHELTER.

please support Latitude and get involved in the new brighton
anarchafeminist group ' Organise!' by coming to this event,

see you there!