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Richard Walker, Pictures of a Gone City in SF Chronicle, SF Commonwealth Club

"The Bay Area has gone through an astonishing growth spurt in the 2010s, with the region’s gross domestic product rising by nearly 50 percent from $323 billion in 2009 to $470 billion in 2016. The Bay Area is the unrivaled world leader in information technology, with the biggest concentration of firms, startups and risk capital. Silicon Valley now stretches around the bay and is home to the first trillion-dollar corporation, Apple, and corporate behemoths such as Google (Alphabet), Facebook and Salesforce....So what could be wrong? Quite a lot, it turns out.

Political paralysis: The Bay Area tradition of progressive politics has frayed badly. Too many of the elite are self-satisfied, too many techies are naive libertarians, and too many activists end up in Portland, Ore. A shabby record of kowtowing to the tech industry puts local politicians in a poor position to lead the country forward. The Bay Area’s blue tilt is now mostly attributable to the new working class of color, which wants basic needs met, such as good education, health care and transit.

This coffee table book is not ashamed of its 43 abortion stories.

"The expectation of silence around abortion isn’t just interpersonal, it’s cultural. Collectively, we need art to help us get comfortable with the reality of complex issues like abortion—it’s easy to act like something isn’t happening when it’s not happening in films, on television, in music.

I think we should be making and engaging with all sorts of creative work about abortion, and of course fashion is part of that. It has been since the beginning. The way I see it, the conversation about abortion is starting to percolate to the surface in all kinds of ways, and stuff like abortion positive t-shirts are a part of the overall change.

It might seem too radical for some people; that’s fine, we will keep doing it until it’s not considered radical. Culture doesn’t just stay in a perpetual state of shock about things like this. We evolve. Seeing your first abortion dress is going to shock you like your first gay pride parade is going to shock you."—Brie Ripley, KUOW.org

The Global Imagination of 1968 in The San Francisco Bay View, Foreword

"Political organizing must be directly in the interest of the people, and the issues involved must be organically linked to the oppressed community. And Comrade George Katsiaficas, in his latest book, called “The Global Imagination of 1968: Revolution and Counterrevolution,” provides an answer to the many questions our revolutionary movement is struggling with every day.

Movement people must start reading the great works from the past that give us the first steps of understanding how we can set this oppressive and neo-liberal world on fire. One of the good things about the book “1968” is how it delineates for 21st century revolutionaries the international composition of revolutionary activity in every country on the planet.

It shows why this struggle, to be successful, must be international in scope and range..."—Shaka Zulu, San Francisco Bay View

The right wing is not a monolithic force - Insurgent Supremacists in Truthout

No, the right wing is not a monolithic force. One of the key points Matthew N. Lyons details in his book Insurgent Supremacists: The U.S. Far Right’s Challenge to State and Empire is that the right wing is composed of groups with different historical roots. Trump, Lyons argues in this interview, is a right-wing populist....To be clear, Trump isn’t just more of the same. He builds on his predecessors (Republican and Democrat), but he is qualitatively worse than them. Trump is accelerating the decline of the United States’ liberal-pluralist system (often mislabeled “democracy”), and his rise has helped to mobilize popular forces that have the potential to turn toward more insurgent forms of right-wing politics. In this situation, it’s important for leftists to join with others in opposing the growth of repression, demonization and supremacist violence. At the same time, it’s also important for us to strengthen and amplify our own critiques of the established order, our own visions of radical change — and not let far rightists present themselves as the only real opposition force.

Read more
Buy Insurgent Supremacists: The U.S. Far Right’s Challenge to State and Empire

Upcoming Events

Saturday, Nov 10

Michael Fine (Health Care Revolt) @ APHA in San Diego, CA

Tuesday, Nov 13

Richard A. Walker (Pictures of a Gone City) @ Oakland, CA

Amelia Bonow (Shout Your Abortion) @ Omaha, NE

Mark Bray (Anarchist Education and the Modern School) @ Highland Park, NJ

Wednesday, Nov 14

Silvia Federici (Re-enchanting the World & Witches, Witch-Hunting, and Women) @ UC Irvine, CA

Thursday, Nov 15

Richard A. Walker (Pictures of a Gone City) @ California Studies Dinner in Berkeley, CA

Richard A. Walker (Pictures of a Gone City) @ UC Berkeley in Berkeley, CA

Mark Bray & Robert Haworth (Anarchist Education and the Modern School) @ Philadelphia, PA

Latest Blog Entries

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Be Vewy, Vewy Quiet, Good Old Boys Are Hunting Susie Day
In a recent New York Times column titled "White Male Victimization Anxiety," Charles Blow described how President Trump publicly apologized to Justice Brett Kavanaugh for "the terrible pain and suffering you have been forced to endu...

FDA Investigates Feminist Abortion Pill Site Aid Access Jenny Brown
As U.S. states restrict abortion, more people are going online to get abortion pills. For years, the Netherlands-based feminist organization Women on Web has been mailing abortion pills (a combination pack of mifepristone and misoprostol...

Food Not Bombs Activists Murdered in the Philippines Gabriel Kuhn
President Rodrigo Duterte’s hardhandedness directly affects the country’s anarchist community.

Islamic Anarchism Gabriel Kuhn
An updated version of Anthony T. Fiscella’s zine “Varieties of Islamic Anarchism: A Brief Introduction” has been made available.

Theodor Herzl - Visionary or Antisemite Leon Rosselson
Herzl is everywhere in Israel. It would be difficult to find a town without a street named after him. He is memorialised in the names of boulevards, parks, squares, a city (Herzliya), a forest, a sprinkling of restaurants, a museum and even a ...

Sneak Peak of Slaughterhouse Prayer John King
Little Michael Tanner is shocked to discover that the adults are killing animals and that he has been eating their bodies.

"Best to Do What We Can" Gabriel Kuhn
A review of "Can the Working Class Change the World?" by Michael D. Yates.

Matthew N. Lyons at the Peace and Justice Studies Association 2018 Matthew Lyons
The theme of this conference is “revolutionary nonviolence in violent times.”

Muehsam Goes Graphic Novel Gabriel Kuhn
A new graphic novel about the life of German anarchist Erich Mühsam has been released.

For Brett Kavanaugh: Beer and Sympathy Susie Day
Dear Brett,Now that you’re a confirmed Supreme Court justice, it must be a huge relief to realize that whatever you did or did not do to Christine Blasey Ford never really mattered.

French Labor's Historical Defeat; U.S. Teachers' Surprising Victories Richard Greeman
As the French get ready for the “rentrée” – the annual back-to-school/back-to-work day following the August vacation – social peace appears to reign in the land.

The Instinct for Cooperation: A Graphic Novel Conversation with Noam Chomsky & Jeffrey Wilson JJ Amaworo Wilson
How about this for a hybrid: take an 80-something professor, sit him down for a conversation, and turn it into a graphic novel. It really shouldn't work, but it does.Noam Chomsky has long been the world's foremost intellectual, an unrivaled author...

The Other 9/11: Chile in the time of Pinochet JJ Amaworo Wilson
A few days ago, my 10-year-old son asked me why I’d scheduled an event on 9/11. “Bad timing!” he said. He knew about the Twin Towers. But he didn’t know about 9/11/73, a date of infamy in Latin America.9/11/73 was the day...

Ngugi Wa Thiong'o: "The scars of history are on every writer" JJ Amaworo Wilson
The great Kenyan writer Ngugi Wa Thiong’o is known for at least four things: writing a series of superb novels such as The River Between and A Grain of Wheat while still in his twenties;writing the novel Devil on the Cross on toilet paper wh...

SPEAKING TRUTH TO POWERLESSNESS: THE MAD ACTIVIST GOES PUNDIT Susie Day
"But, Mabel, you really think The New York Times will review my book? Masha Gessen will write a blurb? WOW!"

Bartolomeo Vanzetti: The Immigrant Writes! Steven
By Jon Curley, New Jersey Institute of Technology. A requiem for Sacco and Vanzetti on the ninety-first anniversary of their execution in Cambridge, MA on Wednesday, August 22nd.

The Guardian hack, lies and distortions Leon Rosselson
Though we resist oppression, still our dream is peaceTheirs is the mask of hatred, ours the human face

How One Woman Became an Activist With the Hashtag #ShoutYourAbortion j. stephanie pasvankias
Founder Amelia Bonow started a movement with just one post.

Punks Boycotting Punks Gabriel Kuhn
An open letter to the coordinators of Maximumrocknroll (MRR), who have decided to no longer feature Israeli punk bands, citing the BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) movement.

Sankara Gabriel Kuhn
A review of "A Certain Amount of Madness: The Life, Politics and Legacies of Thomas Sankara".

Workers of the World Indeed Gabriel Kuhn
A review of "Wobblies of the World: A Global History of the IWW".

Searching For Rhythms: Small Town Reading Tune Up G.H. Mosson
A PM Press poet muses on reading in the small town of Crisfield, Maryland, while searching for rhythms to make this thing we call art.

Antiimperialist Comeback Gabriel Kuhn
An interview with Torkil Lauesen, author of "The Global Perspective: Reflections on Imperialism and Resistance".

The Perils of 'Dropping Knowledge': Dr. Aziz Choudry interviewed by Erika Massoud j. stephanie pasvankias
Dr. Aziz Choudry interviewed by Erika Massoud Summary: Based on shared interests around social justice activism and research, our conversation focused on navigating the tensions, challenges, and contradictions of activist research in academia.

'1968' and all that: Left legacies and the counter culture of remembrance j. stephanie pasvankias
There is an old saw about the so-called swinging sixties: if you can remember it you weren’t there. This has the rather interesting corollary that if you were’nt there, if you have to consult the archive or rely on second h...

Shakespeare in the Age of the Tyrant JJ Amaworo Wilson
Stephen Greenblatt's new book, Tyrant: Shakespeare on Power, is a timely tome. As Greenblatt well knows, we're living in an age of ruthless strongmen. The world's recent and lamentable swing to the right is embodied by all-powerful authoritarians.

Working Class Heroes project Mat Callahan
Dear Friends: Two important items this month. First, progress with Songs of Slavery and Emancipation. Second, progress with a new project: Working Class Heroes.

ON THE OTHER SIDE OF OUTRAGE: MOHAMMAD HAMAD AND HOPE Susie Day
I wanted to talk to Mohammad Hamad because, in the midst celebrating Gay Pride, it may be time to look at some of our prejudices....

TRUMP, LYNCH, AND WHO WE CALL ANIMALS: A SAFETY ALERT Susie Day
Did you hear Trump call undocumented immigrants animals? It's stirring up – rightly – a lot of concern. Among humans, "animal" is the essential, go-to word to deprive people of their humanity. It's the permission some people ...

The Day the Black Panthers Came to Town (with Tupac Shakur's Step-Uncle) Kenneth Wishnia
In March 1970, Jean Genet, the radical French author, lifelong rebel and supporter of deviant causes, began touring US college campuses known for their activism with members of the Black Panther Party, hoping to win support for the Black Panthe...

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