T-Shirt Spotting

Oh, I'm a sucker for a good political T shirt - and this one has definitely caught my eye - but wearing one in Brooklyn?

I should just get it over and done with and have 'wannabe hipster wanker' tattooed on my forehead.

Saying that, I do need some new T shirts. All my politcal T shirts are simultaneously disintegrating before my eyes. And that's even on a bastard cold wash. If this was a novel, I would read some significance into this current course of clothing events.

Back to the non-365Watch post in hand. The T shirt was found via Citizen Bone and comes courtesy of Sabcat, a newly established anarcho workers co-op based out of West Midlands, who specialise in printing T shirts of a political nature. (What else are you going to do in the West Midlands on a wet Wednesday afternoon? Makes sense to me.)

What would make even better sense is if they knuckle down and work on a Kingmaker 'Armchair Anarchist' T shirt in time for this year's London Anarchist Bookfair. That revival in interest in Kingmaker has been threatening to ignite for years, and it would be chucklesome to see some market forces in operation at an Anarchist Bookfair to force down AK Press's extortionate prices.

Latest anarcho-situationist spoof?

What, a new Aufheben on the horizon and there's not even a sniff of an Anarchist Bookfair about? *

Until I have the issue in my itchy hands and I'm stumbling and mumbling through the first bastard footnote will I then believe that it's for real, and not another one of those clever spoofs of newspapers and magazines that anarcho-situationists like to put out to confuse commuters going about their private daily business.

Accompanying pic spotted via the Aufheben MySpace page.

*Not strictly true. Los Angeles is holding its first anarchist bookfair at the weekend. I'd actually pay good money to attend that. I can't help but feel that it'll just be so much more glamorous than the Anarchist Bookfairs that I've attended in London and New York.

Brangelina sitting in with Posh and Becks as they turn rebellion into money on the AK Press stall. (Maybe selling some of those replica Crass T shirts they were seen sporting a few years back.) The Beverly Hills branch of the Anarchist Federation taking time out from distributing the Resistance newsletter on Rodeo Drive to sell back issues of Organise. Rod Stewart, Vinnie Jones and Robbie Williams selling the St Pauli gear at the back of the hall, whilst regaling the onlookers with tales from past Anarcho-Rehab Footie tournaments.

And the workshops? Can't forget the workshops (even if 9/10 of attendees at Anarchist Bookfairs always forget the workshops.) Bruce Willis showing a video from this year's Earth First camp in Oregon; Jessica Simpson and Paris Hilton signing people up to LA newest rollergirl team, the Emma Goldmaniacs; and Spielberg giving a report back on the planned TinTin movie. Still going with Breaking Free, but he's now thinking of including TinTin and the Scum on the Director's Cut version of the DVD when it comes out February 2011.

Quote of the Day

From the intro to Ian Bone's recent radio interview with Tony Wood, organiser of the long established - and just passed for this year - London Anarchist Bookfair:

"Good evening anarchists, everywhere . . . On October 18th the most momentous event - some cynics would say the only event - in the annual anarchist calendar takes place, the Anarchist Bookfair. Thousands of anarchists suddenly appear like Brigadoon for the day before promptly vanishing again. Prompting the immortal quote from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, "Who were those guys?"

An mp3 of the interview can be downloaded here.

Song of the Day

I know I've already posted a late Friday's playlist, but on this day of days there can only be one song that is appropriate for today:

David Rovics - 'I'm A Better Anarchist Than You'' mp3

It's only available to download for the shortest of times, and you should high-tail it over to David Rovics website for more goodies than you can shake a rolled up AK Press catalogue at.

Good luck to Dave and Stuart with their Rag Day. (Looking forward to reading about it at FDTW.) And a special mention and best of wishes also go out to Stair. If the stallholders page for the website is any guide - and it isn't - his stall will be stuck between Aufheben and Class War. Nothing like getting a front row seat to the high end and the special brew end of the direct action/anarchist movement in Britain.

I'm sure the ACA* will be bigger than ever this year - even if it rarely ever seems to translate into a strengthened Anarchist movement all year round - and in this week of weeks which have been so damaging for the largest Trotskyist movement in Britain, it's interesting to note that one of the speakers at this year's bookfair will be Paul Mason, and that the AWL's No Sweat is doing a joint meeting with the IWW on the campaign against Starbucks.

Nice to see that old faithfuls such as Ian Bone, Stuart Christie and Iain McKay will also be doing meetings this year.

No doubt every anarchist and autonomous group in Britain will have pulled their fingers out in the last few months to ensure that if they publishing anything at all this year, it will be in time for the bookfair. The Ashbourne Court Group will probably have their stall outside the event, the AK Press mega-stall will be ridiculously overpriced and there will be some falling out amongst former friends that will be written up at length on both the Urban 75 and Libcom message boards in the coming days.

I'm just hoping that the New York rain will let off enough this afternoon for me to pop along to this event with my knapsack of abstract propaganda.

*ACA - Annual Commodification of Anarchism

The Games That People Play

I guess it's appropriate that the following should coincide with the ACA*.

What's the odds that a pirated version will be sold on the AK Press stall at the ACA 2008? I guess it gives a whole new meaning to the notion of playing at revolution.

Further Reading:

No, my name wasn't on the list: Last month in Brooklyn

From last month's New York Times: In Brooklyn, a Confluxion Junction

Oldish article about Debord from the online magazine, The Three Monkeys: The Game of War. Guy Debord and the Society of the Spectacle.