Blog

Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.

In hindsight, I can gladly admit that my original reaction to the first day of Occupy Melbourne was wrong. As a left-wing cynic, weary from years fighting alongside the fragments of an old and obsolete reactionary left, I noted the usual suspects and assumed too quickly that these dogmatic, semi-cultish organisations would try to succeed in taking over the movement. I wrongly doubted the new faces would survive the first assembly and assumed most passers-by would leave when confronted by an outdated lecture on Marx or Lenin. While the left’s key thinkers are still relevant, their use as a quasi bible by self-righteous crusaders and vanguards sits somewhat uneasily in the struggle against the contemporary form of capitalism. Yet the idealist in me was still alive and I went back the next day to see how the movement had evolved. While the square was much less populated on that Sunday afternoon, there seemed to remain a spirit of freedom and independence which made me optimistic, if not for the future of the movement, for its relevance in the ongoing emancipatory struggle. ... read more

Written by Aurelien Mondon on 5-01-2012, 48 user comments

Brull’s bookshelf

I’m not a Christian, so I didn’t think of doing this earlier and saying ‘go and get these for Christmas for your pinko friends’. But the end of the year is as good a time as any. So, I thought I’d recommend some books.

I just read it, so this one’s first: Bleeding Afghanistan, by James Ingalls and Sonali Kolhatkar. I think leftists should understand the wars we should be opposing now. This book is five years old, but is very, very good. It looks at the history of Afghanistan; it rightly situates Hamid Karzai as the Western puppet he is, talks about the Islamist warlords we’ve supported, the Islamist theocracy we’ve created and the role of Zalmay Khalilzad. There have been developments since then and greater documentation. But in a pretty brief book, it’s very well reported, hits all the right notes and sets out the contours for understanding our occupation of Afghanistan. I do not necessarily agree with all of its recommendations – it is rather equivocal about ending the occupation. Specifically, the authors say public opinion in Afghanistan at the time was supportive of the occupation continuing. They therefore recommend ending the occupation when the country is safer and warlords are disarmed (or something like that). I think the former condition is the kind of condition Cheney would support – so that they could justify occupation for the next 20 years. The other recommendations are more reasonable. Considering recommendations only take up a few pages, I would not want my reservations on this score to detract from what I consider an excellent and important book, which is the one book above all I would think should be read by activists against this war. People should not just talk about bombing of civilians in Afghanistan – they need to understand more, and this book sets it out clearly and carefully. ... read more

Written by Michael Brull on 30-12-2011, 2 user comments

The US forces in our country

On 17 of November Barack Obama touched down in Darwin for a visit that sent Darwin into a tailspin. The visit had been announced weeks earlier, giving Darwin time to spruce up for the visit. This included painting all the public benches on The Esplanade, where Obama was going to pay tribute to the US sailors who were killed when the Japanese bombed the USS Peary in 1942. It also included moving all the ‘Longgrassers’ (itinerant people, mainly Aboriginal, who congregate on the green grass, under shady trees during the day) out of town. ... read more

Written by Rohan Wightman on 22-12-2011, 3 user comments

Mr Rudd: Protect Assange!

This is an open letter to Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd and Attorney-General Nicola Roxon. It calls on the Australian government to take steps to ensure Julian Assange's human rights are protected. It will be delivered on 19 December 2011, but we encourage members of the public to sign the letter below by adding their full name in the comments section, together with any comment they may wish to make. Please feel free to spread the word about the letter to others who may be interested.

Bernard Keane and Elizabeth O'Shea

The Hon Kevin Rudd
Minister for Foreign Affairs
Parliament House ACT 2600

Dear Minister

We write to express our concern about the plight of Julian Assange.

To date, no charges have been laid against Mr Ass

Written by Editorial team on 18-12-2011, 885 user comments

City Hall as Trojan Horse: lessons from Occupy LA

While protesters in Oakland, Portland, Boston, New York and cities throughout the US faced riot police with tear gas canisters, their comrades in Los Angeles enjoyed a much cosier relationship with the city and its police. From the very beginning, organisers of Occupy LA made a decision to work closely with the city government and the police, through liaisons, in an effort to avoid the kinds of confrontations seen in other cities. As media team organiser Lisa Clapier put it in characteristically New-Agey prose, ‘[We] chose collectively to remain in our integrity and NOT break the law, unless doing so WAS in integrity.’

Though initially gathering in Pershing Square, a large public space near many financial institutions, organisers quickly opted to set up camp in the grassy park surrounding City Hall, just a stone’s throw from LAPD headquarters. The LAPD set up a command post inside City Hall, allowing for easy surveillance of the park and assigned twelve full-time officers to the protest. The activists, for their part, toed the line, dutifully moving their tents to the surrounding sidewalk each night at 10:30, in keeping with park rules. It was, as one sceptic noted, an ‘occupation by permission’. ... read more

Written by Matt Cornell on 16-12-2011, 1 user comment

Lessons from the age of riots and revolution

An interview with Brad Nguyen

Brad Nguyen is the co-editor of Screen Machine, an online magazine on film, media and cultural criticism. He studied Cinema Studies at the University of Melbourne and has done film reviewing for Triple R Breakfasters. He chats with us about his essay ‘Morality Begone!’, which is featured in the latest edition of Overland.

In your essay you write that by framing outbreaks of social violence – one example being the London riots – in moral terms, ‘the true political dimension is obliterated’. Could you please describe what you mean by this? ... read more

Written by Editorial team on 15-12-2011, 1 user comment

Dispatch from our intern

From a first-hand account of what it is like to be imprisoned inside Guantánamo Bay to our enduring affection for bookshops, here is my pick of some of the most interesting links from around the web.

Jay Rosen has teamed up with the Guardian to provide alternative coverage of the 2012 US Presidential campaign. The aim is to articulate the ‘citizens agenda’ by making election coverage more relevant to voters’ needs and concerns.

Mohammed el Gharani, the youngest prisoner to be sent to Guantánamo Bay – he was arrested at 14 – has written a personal account of his imprisonment in Guantánamo for the London Review of Books.

Crikey has posted a video of Barbara Walters interviewing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Walters poses some fairly tough questions to Assad, but for the President accusations of state brutality are ‘false allegations and distortions of reality’ and he denies killing his citizens – something, he insists, only a ‘crazy’ leader would do. UN Security General Ban Ki-moon, however, says otherwise.

... read more

Written by Roselina Press on 13-12-2011, No comments

On Breivik and Europe’s far right

An interview with Mattias Gardell

Mattias Gardell is professor of comparative religion at Uppsala University, Sweden. His research focuses on the interaction between religion and politics, and is the author of a number of publications including In the Name of Elijah Muhammad and Gods of the Blood. Following the terrorist attacks that occurred in Norway on 22 July, Mattias has focused much of his current research on the militant anti-Muslim environment that produced Anders Breivik Behring. We spoke to Mattias about his article, ‘Terror in the Norwegian woods’, which is featured in the latest edition of Overland. ... read more

Written by Editorial team on 9-12-2011, No comments

Embrace the renewables revolution

An interview with Xavier Rizos

Xavier Rizos researches relationships between economics, governance, regulation, politics and culture. We spoke to him about his article ‘Will the market save us?’ which is featured in the new Overland, and why it will take more than a ‘carbon tax’ for Australia to have an effective climate policy.

What motivated you to write this article now? Do you find that there is still much confusion around what the government’s carbon package actually involves? ... read more

Written by Editorial team on 8-12-2011, 2 user comments

A reply to CIS on the Intervention

intervention_protest

At first I didn’t think it was worthwhile responding to Sara Hudson’s response to me on the Intervention. I thought it was pretty insubstantial, and its ad hominem tone seemed to me suggestive that replying would reduce the issues to one of personalities, rather than the issues. However, I then decided that some comments may help illuminate the issues to outside parties.

So, let us review the state of debate. In April, I wrote:

The mountain of evidence of the failures of the NT Intervention defies summary here. Suffice to say, there is literally no evidence, even in government reports, that it has helped improve the socio-economic conditions Intervention supporters claim to be concerned about. Its supporters are simply backing racist policies because they believe racism is the best way to deal with Indigenous communities.

... read more

Written by Michael Brull on 2-12-2011, 2 user comments

Not all feminists are equal

I-am-a-feminist

The following thoughts came to me after a recent Melbourne Free University lecture on the Future of Feminism. The insightful presentation given by Melbourne Feminist Collective’s Neda Monshat and Alexia Staker led to a fascinating discussion in the second part of the event. Two points in particular finally convinced me to write about feminism and its future, if it is to have one. ... read more

Written by Aurelien Mondon on 30-11-2011, 1 user comment

Universities in ruins

etonboys1936Peter Cook once said that nobody had actually read Don Quixote, and though Cervantes might have written it, even he couldn’t be bothered reading it as well. When I heard Cook say this, it relieved me of a great responsibility, that of reading Don Quixote. These days I try never to read any book that weighs more than a brick, but it’s very easy to fill one’s own bookshelves with books that should be read, rather than books that one wants to read and might enjoy.

I still haven’t read Don Quixote, and don’t own a copy so I’m never tempted to try. Gathering a library of books together can be a bit like creating a new family. Biological families, as most of us have hopefully found out, just aren’t enough. Putting together a family of choice that doesn’t in some way replicate the family of origin can be tricky. You can end up accidentally marrying one of your parents (‘You’re just like my mother!’) or squabbling with friends over a variety of objects you’re highly attached to in the same way you used to argue with your brother over who got the GI Joe and who got the Action Man. In the same way we can end up with libraries of books that we hump around for all kinds of reasons other than we enjoy them. ... read more

Written by Stephen Wright on 16-11-2011, 36 user comments

Under the hammer

Under the hammer

On Saturday 12 November at 7.30pm, a multidisciplinary activist-artists collective called Under the Hammer will be setting up shop and having a ‘pre-launch’ at 158 Sydney road, Coburg. The pre-launch will include performances by comedian Toby Halligan, spoken word artist Khepa Markhno and 3oB DJ set as well as visual art by Van Rudd. Overland’s Rjurik Davidson spoke to organiser James Crafti.

So you’re starting up a radical cultural space called Under The Hammer. The name comes from a quote from Mayakovsky (sometimes also attributed to Brecht), which reads, ‘Art is not a mirror held up to reality, but a hammer with which to shape it’. Can you briefly describe the aim of the space? ... read more

Written by Rjurik Davidson on 11-11-2011, 5 user comments

Subscriberthon: Occupy the story

jenjeninchinaWhen I ran away from activism to be a writer about ten years ago, I did so with a degree of guilt. I was in need of consolation, and the imagination has always been my strongest fortress, my best escape. I felt exhausted by the anti-globalisation and squatting movements I was intensely involved in, bruised by the mode of pressing bodies against barricades, fighting for inches of territory.

My focus as an activist was not just physical space; I was interested in making imaginative spaces, social and democratic spaces where grassroots democracy might flourish. I was a facilitator as well as a breaker-and-enterer. The huge groundswell of anti-capitalist protest that surged forth in the late 1990s, in answer to movements which began in the global south, following the lead of the poor, was a romantic time, but it was also serious. I was passionate about a movement which held itself accountable, which sought to find better decision-making structures than had got us into this global mess. ... read more

Written by Jennifer Mills on 8-11-2011, 2 user comments

God without borders

St Pauls

God Without Borders: an address to the ‘owners’ of St Paul’s...

St Paul’s, we will
Not let words fail
On your threshold,
Nor world be sold

Off to the rich
Who will entrench
In their towers
Of selfish prayers.

Witness the tents,
See homelessness,
Mark ‘industry’
In community!

St Paul’s, we will
Not let words fall
On your threshold,
Nor world be sold.

... read more

Written by John Kinsella on 1-11-2011, 8 user comments