Emma Goldman (27/6/1869 -14/5/40) - If I can't dance, it's not my revolution! (the real quote)

'Emma Goldman  was deemed controversial in her own lifetime, with Teddy Rossevelt calling her a "madwoman.. mental.... as well as a moral pervert." In her life she was certainly not one who bowed down to convention or compromise. Her ideas were all about the right to stay alive in ones senses, to live in a world that celebrated this. She certainly lived her life with a fierce intensity, with her unthwarted desire for freedom and all it's possibilities. Her creed was one of individualism and essentially libertarianism and spent her life consumed by its spirit of revolt. A Russian Jewish immigrant at the age of 17, she moved by her own efforts from seamstress in a clothing factory to become an internationally known radical lecturer, writer and friend of the oppressed. She was many things I guess, a feminist, a writer of vision, incredible public speaker but was first and foremost an anarchist. Her writing and ideas covered a variety of issues, including athiesm, freedom of speech, capitalism, free love and women's suffrage. From the 1890s and for years thereafter, America reverberated with the sound of her name.

 She was jailed for inciting riots, advocating birth control, and is their at nearly every turn point in America's 20th Century history.Some have argued that it was her passion that was her undoin, her unwavering commitment to her ideals..... but it was because she loved the world and had so much thirst for it that she gave back 100 percent. Oh there a Welsh connection too, because in June 1925 she married a coal miner from Carmarthenshire named James Cotton in order to obtain British citizenship, In Wales too, she found people who shared her vision and her calls for social justice. Many years after her death she remains an iconic figure to many. Her most fundamental message was the paradoxical command to be yourself and be your own commander-in-chief. The possibilities and expectations of her words still commanding hope.

If I can't dance, I don't want to be part of your revolution'.

The above quote was widely attributed to Emma Goldman, but was the invention of anarchist printer Jack Frager for a small batch of Goldman T.shirts he printed in 1973. However in her memoirs,from the early 1950;s. 'Living My Life Goldman remembers being censured for dancing and states:-

"At the dances I was one of the most untiring and gayest. One evening a cousin of Sasha, a young boy, took me aside. With a grave face, as if he was about to announce the death of a dear comrade, he whispered to me that it did not behoove an agitator to dance. Certainly not with such reckless abandon, anyway. It was undignified for one who was on the way to become a force in the anarchist movement. My frivolity would only hurt the cause.
I grew furious at the impudent interference of the boy. I told him to mind his own business. I was tired of having the Cause constantly thrown into my face. I did not believe that a Cause which stood for a beautiful ideal, for anarchism, for release and freedom from convention and prejudice, should demand the denial of life and joy. I insisted that our Cause could not expect me to become a nun and that the movement would not be turned into a cloister. If it meant, that I did not want it.
'I want freedom, the right to self-expression, everybody's right to beautiful, radiant things.' Anarchism meant that to me, and I would live it in spite of the whole world - prisons, persecutions, everything. Yes, even in spite of the condemnation of my own closest comrades I would live my beautiful ideal."

Emma Goldman 1911, from p56 of her autobiography,
Living My life

 The story has since been passed around and condensed in the folk process as simply the slogan 'If I can't dance, I don't want to be part of your revolution'. And although, one the one hand, a fake quote, it''s since had  a lot of positive results–it’s been a rallying cry for feminists, a rallying cry for anarchists, an inspiration to many. me included, and I don't feel undermines Emma Goldman's rich legacy or her charisma, and actually makes more people aware of  her actions and deeds.

Remembered as a  passionate political activist.writer and thinker during the beginning of the 20th century and  known for her free-thinking and rebellious anarchist and communist beliefs. Her writings include discussions on free love, marriage, free speech, atheism, prisons, homosexuality, and capitalism, among other topics.

Goldman continues to command respect for her outstanding contribution to the history of radical working class struggle. As she once declared, “Everyone is an anarchist who loves liberty and hates oppression;” amen to that.

 

Earlier post here

ANARCHISM: WHAT IT REALLY STANDS FOR:-

http://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/emma-goldman-2761869-14540-anarchism.html

Lucia Sanchez Saornil (13/12/1895 - 2/6/70) - The Song of Mujeres Libres

Lucia Sanchez Saornil  was a Spanish poet, painter, anarchist and feminist icon. Her early highly erotic paens to female beauty, were written under the male pseudonym of Luciano de San-Saor, at a time when  homosexuality was criminalised . She fought against the fascists  in  the Spanish Civil War. She is know best remembered  for being one of the founders of Mujeres Libres, a group of working class politically active women who struggled against patriarchy. They tried to create an autonomous female community to empower women to realize their individual potential within the larger anarcho-syndicalist movement.
She was also a leading light   in the avant garde literary movent of this era.
She was also active in the CNT in Madrid ( The National Confederation of Labour).
Though openly lesbian,  after the failure of the Spanish Revolution, she spent her later life in a rather clandenstine existence, exiling herself to France,but would return secretly to Spain on occasions, to Madrid and to Valencia.
She died of cancer in Valencia in 1970.

The Song of Mujeres Libres

Fists upraised. women of Iberia
towards horizons filled with light
paths afire
feet on the ground
face to the blue sky.
Affirming the promises of life
we defy tradition
Let us mold the warm clay
pf a new world born of suffering.
Let the past crumble into oblivion!
What is yesterday worth to us!
We want to write anew
the word WOMAN
Fists upraised, women of the world
towards horizons filled with light
on paths afire
onward, onward
toward the light.

Ambrosio Vilhalva ( 1960 - 2013) Lies, Theft and Murder, the sickness of civilization

'While I'm still alive, I'm not going to to shy away from anyone, I'm going to demand action.'

' This is what I most hope for: land and justice... we will live  on our ancestral land, we will not give up.'

- Ambrosio Vilhalva

Guarani leader and film star Ambrosio Vilhalva was found dead  in his hut on December the first, at the entrance to his community, known as Guyra Roka, in Brazils Gross o Do Sul State,he was reportedly stabbed multiple times. For years he campaigned for his tribes right to live on their ancestral land, travelling  extensively internationally to speak about his tribe's plight, and to the Brazilian government to live up to its legal obligations and protecting Guarani land.He fought hard afainst the suger growers in the region, and consequently had had a number of death threats, because he was seen as one of the main leaders of the Guarani peoples  campaigns. According to the Brazil-based indigeneous rights group CIMI, 319 Guarani-Kaiowa Indians were slain from 2003 -2012. More than half of all 558 Indians killed in the entire country during the same period, mostly killed in disputes over land with farmers and ranchers encroaching on their land . Lies, theft and murder,continue sadly to be  part of  the sickness of civilisation that the world's  media ignores. Another senseless death, please help carry forward Ambrosio's struggle and message.

http://www.survivalinternational.org/emails/guarani-stopmurders

Ambrosio Vilhalva  1960 -2013

(following clip includes scenes from the film 'Birdwatchers' by Marco Bachis)

Taking 'Selfies' at Mandela's memorial service simply beyond contempt.

South African President  Jacob Zuma had called  on people to celebrate the life of Mr Mandela, who died last week aged 95, but I am sure a selfie with beaming smiles was not appropriate  behaviour for world leaders on such an occasion.
Their supposed to be acting  in accordance with their status, but here we get their true, worth, much worse than a bunch of giggling teenagers, because in youth one does not always understand the rules of engagement.
Snapping selfies at such a solemn occasion is the ultimate sign of disrespect, it more than sums  up what kind of people they really are. Behaviour that is simply beyond contempt. It is now official they have no class or shame.
A Pictures speaks louder than a thousand words.

Steve Bell Cartoon in yesterday's Guardian 

65 years after Universal Declaration of Human Rights, why so many still not free.

Whilst President Obama and our world leaders, attend Nelson Mandela's memorial service, speaking  and praising Mandela as one of the last great liberators of the 20th Century, urging the world to carry on  his legacy in fighting inequality, poverty and discrimination. Let us today remember that today the world observes the 65th International Human Rights Day, commemorating the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) by the United Nations General Assembly.

" All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards another in a spirit of brotherhoood."


I concur  , but today also marks the 12th  year British national Shaker Aamer will have spent in a prison cell without being told why. He is still  not free, and he is far from alone. From Aamer's fellow detainess at Guantanamo,  free expression activists across the globe , in Russian , the U.S.A, China, Iran, Israel, etc etc,  all arbitrally detained prisoners need the advocacy of global citizens  dedicated to impartial justice and universal rights.
The history of injustice  has many parallels in  the United States,  take a look at the case of Leonard Peltier, an American Indian activist who has been in prison for 36 years, wrongfully convicted say many. His case full of holes and irregularities, part of Americas enduring  history  of colonialism of the Native communities in the United States. Evidence of his innocence  has continued to mount, leading organisations such as Amnesty International, as well as notable individuals such as Nobel peace prize winner Desmond Tutu, continue to declare him a political prisoner and call for his release.http://www.leonardpeltier.net/

Leonard Peltier

Poverty, exclusion, and deprivation still spread in equal measures across the globe, the dream of human rights for all unfortunately still more of a dream than an actual reality. The press is still not free in many countries, and dissenters are silenced, too often permanently. People face  unfair trials in at least 54 countries, and freedom of restriction is still restricted  in at least 77 , as well as the use of torture and abuse in at least 81. There are still millions of people in slavery, more than 1 billion without access to clean water.
Then we have Israel, whose persistent human rights violations would not be possible without the complicity  or support of the international community. Because of Israel's systematic discrimination, occupation and colonization, the Palestinian people have faced increased  violations to their right of life, their right to housing and property, their right not to be subjected to torture  to torture, their right to return.
It seems we still have a long long way to go in terms of global human rights, but we should not give up, we should keep on pushing our own individual governments, if we are strong enough to achieve this, encouraging others to do the same. We should not give up, all  our history  is based on change, as a result of people  having pushed hard enough for it.
Without human rights  for all, there can be no justice, without justice there can be no peace. The assertion that "another world is possible," is now an absolute necessity.

Denis Goldberg on Israeli Apartheid

Denis Goldberg is a South African social campaigner. Golberg was a technical officer in the armed wing of the African National Congress, Umkhonto we Sizwe and was sentenced in 1964 at the end of the famous Rivonia Trial to four tems of imprisonment.
Goldberg draws parallels between apartheid South Africa and Israel and highlights the importance of Boycott, Divestment and Sanction.
The struggle continues.
Free Palestine.

' The histories of our two peoples, Palestinian and South Africa correspond in such a painful and poignant ways, that I intensley feel myself being at home among compatriots.'

- Nelson Mandela (October 1996)

Snarling Kids with Video Games

Short film by an advertising company about how they snare kids  with their Army recruitment video games. Targeting children for war service is a relic of the past that should go away. We should not allow the military to target minors with recruitment, they should not be allowed to market to children, but it does. It is simply wrong.
Those recruited at 16 have faced double the risk of fatality of adult recruits throughout the conflict in Afghanistan.

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela (18/7/18 -5/12/13) Freedom fighter and man of the People R.I.P

It is with great sadness that I have heard the news that South Africa's first black President and anti-apartheid revolutionary icon has died at the age of 95. A freedom fighter of long inspiration, who stood for justice, freedom and solidarity, with his selfless struggle for human dignity, equality and freedom. A true man of the people, his life of courage and fighting back is a testement to us all.
Today we grieve but we should all, also  continue his struggle for a better world.We must carry on the fire of resistance, this should be the  everlasting legacy to this great man.
The fight continues.

' I dream of an Africa which is in peace with itself.'

'Any man or institution that tries to rob me of my dignity will lose.'

'I stand here before you not as a prophet, but as a humble servant of you, the people.'

'Where globalization means, as it often does that the rich and powerful now have new means to further enrich and empower themselves at the cost of the poor and weaker, we have a resposibility to protest in the name of universal freedom.'

'We know to well our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians.'

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela

R.I.P

Flotillas from Gaza break Naval Blockade

On Saturday, November 30, some 250 Palestinian children launched minitature  boats along the Gaza coast  to raise awareness about the ongoing Israeli maritime seige of the 25-mile long coastal territory. The naval blockade has destroyed Gaza's fishing industry and fishing has become physically dangerous. Fishermen have reportedly been shot and arrested within the six mile nautical miles limit, where they are officially permitted to take their boats.
Also a Palestine Flotilla named 'Steadfastness and Justice' lauunched on Monday morning and managed to break the naval blockade imposed on the Gaza strip, reaching a distance of 6  nautical miles of Gaza's coast in an act of symbolic defiance. Israel forces threatened to prevent the flotilla from crossing the 6 nautical mile barrier.
The flotilla was composed of 20 boats carrying Palestinians and international activists from Sweden, the United States and Japan.
Before returning  back to the shores, the activists threw bottles containing  messages into the sea, which included calls for the international community to put more pressure on Israel to lift its strict seige on Gaza. The messages also included calls for the Israeli naval forces to stop their daily violations against the fishermen in Gaza.
Meanwhile the main pumping station in Gaza  is still not working, due to lack of fuel, so the people of Gaza  are currently without fuel and electricity. Also  lacking access to clean-drinking water and medicines,.
The siege of Gaza continues,  but it's people still search for means of getting a vestige of justice, equality, freedom of movement, and despite  their daily suffering their will is not yet broken.
I try to pass on the news, that unforunately  in my country the B.B.C deems not important enough to report.

Tennessee Williams (26/3/11 - 25/2/83) - Nobody sees anybody truly but all through the flaws of their own egos.

' Nobody sees anybody truly but all through  the flaws of their own  egos.That is the way we all see each other in life. Vaity, fear, desire, competition.... all such distortions within our own egos, condition  our vision of those in relation to us. Add to those distortions to our own egos the corresponding distortions in the egos of others and you see how cloudy the glass must become through which we look at each other. That's  how it is in all living relationships except when there is that rare ease  of two people who love intensely enough to burn through all the layers of opacity and see each other's naked hearts.'