Thursday 8 November 2018

Banksy on Advertising


The above is from Banksys 2004 pamphlet Cut it Out  in which he lashes out at public advertising, condemning bullying advertisers for making their consumers feel inadequate and small, telling us and them we don't owe them everything, and we need our right to  choose  for ourselves.
Though I like his ideas and his work, I do find his message kinda ironic, after all he does also  thrive off the same thing that advertisers do on a daily basis. He copyrights his images, is a brand in his own right.A  marketing machine, that is just  doing it in a more subtle way than your average brand.
Advertising daily is simply used daily, as a tool of capitalism, to sell s things that we do not necessarily need , that simply reinforces a consumerist ideology, that for many cannot escape or afford. .Everywhere we go we are influenced by advertisements that have an ideological message to persuades us to 'buy  mass-produced commodities. It is clear that our capitalist society is shaping our culture, and identity, and  there seems to be no  aspect of our daily  lives that isn't being used in the ways it seeks to influence us...
Meanwhile however campaigns use advertising  to incorporate  messages of resistance creating parodies that help us reavaluate beyond this bomardmentand  of consmerist marketing.Working under the name ‘Brandalism’, a group of British street artists in Banksy's home city aims to subvert the consumer messages in advertising.According to the organisation’s website, the UK’s advertising industry pays out £16.1 billion each year to display a message or advert.
This works out as around £250 per person each year spent on sending messages or direct adverts to them.Brandalism says that advertising is not about catering to existing needs, but creating new desires. Not only desires, but insecurity as well, because we cannot desire without feeling like we lack something. This desire creates new kinds of people. Rather than the advert describing a product, we are now the product the advertiser is making. Advertising makes people feel insecure and unfulfilled when unable to access the products we’re told to desire. the subversion of advertising is developing into a political tool. It would be a strange irony if one day it were to become just another type of advertising.

Monday 5 November 2018

The real impact of Universal Credit


We had small protest outside job centre today in Cardigan , handing out leaflets about the impact of Universal Credit. A job coach wandered past and fair play to this individual did at least engage with us. But what he said was incredible, he had the audacity to claim that UC is the best thing ever and seeing more people better off. Denying UC causes a rise in homelessness and increasing debt problems. Tougher sanctions and long waiting times leaving people hungry is nothing to do with the roll out of UC we were told,  and UC is not political. But it has a real human cost that is leaving thousands in hardship, in a monstrous Tory assault on the poor and the most vulnerable in our society. It is simply a policy of relentless calculated cruelty.
Even the Tory's mouthpiece on this issue Esther McVey;after being challenged over one estimate that three million people would be about £1,800 a year worse off, told the BBC "I have said we made tough decisions and some people will be worse off."
What Mr Job coach also did not say is that under UC, disabled claimants will face a controversial mandatory “health and work conversation” (HWC) in which they must provide information to a work coach like this guy about what jobs they can undertake, or have their benefits sanctioned. This will mean people who are often too ill to get out of bed forced into a jobcentre meeting. The DWP says not all disabled people will be required to do a “face to face” interview in the jobcentre when it is unreasonable to expect it, but campaign group Disabled People Against Cuts tells me it has already seen a case of a woman with a life-threatening illness and insufficient mental capacity being asked to attend an HWC.Expecting people with mental health problems, learning difficulties, or those battling illness to navigate a complex benefit system is particularly cruel – and early signs of universal credit so far are clearly worrying.
 Universal Credit (UC)  is supposed to simplify and modernise the income and employment support system for millions of households. The system’s implementation has, however, been punctuated by controvery over missed deadlines, botched IT development, and poor project management.  Across the country there are tales of payments being late, payments reduced, pushing people already on the breadline even further over the edge,whilst many are unable to pay their rent . UC is widely seen as being cruel, a clear result of the Tory's conscious ideological cruelty that has resulted in a rise in homelessness and people using foodbanks, and making people with precarious mental health conditions health even worse. People unable to pay essential bills  already suffering with anxiety and stress, a letter  arrives about being in arrears, even if it’s only the first stage is going to send them into a tail spin. Another major flaw is that council tax support isn’t included. People automatically assume when they put a claim in for housing benefit that council tax support is included. The next thing they know they are in council tax arrears. It’s a bureaucratic nightmare.
The Trussell Trust, which runs the UK's largest network of food banks, has also released a raft of new figures as part of its annual report, giving the first systematic look at what impact the roll-out of UC has had on usage.It says there has been an average increase of 13% in food bank use across the country in the last year.https://www.trusselltrust.org/what-we-do/research-advocacy/universal-credit-and-foodbank-use/
We are living in very troubling times, under an incredibly cruel system, in which the poorest, the sickest and most vulnerable  under the sheer pressure of trying to manage on nothing are plunged into poverty, causing stress, depression and in many peoples cases their tragic demise.
Well I'm sorry Mr job coach Universal Credit is political and it is clearly damaging peoples lives, you are justifying it because you are simply making a living from it. In addition, the government anticipates that up to a further one million UC claimants who are in low-paid work will be required to see a work coach like this person.  UC payments, Jobcentre support, and the extension of benefit conditionality to around a million low paid workers are supposed  to encourage more claimants to take up employment and increase their earnings. There is a risk, however, that rather than support ‘progression’, UC will encourage the growth of ‘mini jobs’ and further underpin the dramatic growth in part-time and low paid employment and also fuel in-work poverty.
 It is a simple fact that people are not getting the support they so genuinely need. It is more than time to stop it and scrap it, and face reality, UC is a mess, it is cruel, fundamentally flawed, vindictive, unfair and simply doesn't work. As a first step at least the government could at least have the grace to admit it has got universal credit wrong and  set about limiting the damage.
 I personally am dreading when I'm rolled over on to it, really do not know what I am going to do. I'm not angry though I'm bloody livid. Real political opposition to it is however growing stronger every single day.

Sunday 4 November 2018

Wilfred Edward Salter Owen, MC (18 March 1893 – 4 November 1918) - Dulce et Decorum Est / But I Was looking at the permanent Stars



Wilfred Owen was tragically killed 100 years ago to the day - just seven days before peace was declared in 1918.The centenary of the death of First World War poet Wilfred Owen has been marked at his graveside with the sound of a bugle he took from the battlefield.
The instrument, taken from a dead German soldier, was played in public for the first time at the ceremony in Ors, northern France, today..
Elizabeth Owen, widow of his nephew Peter, attended the “moving” ceremony in Ors communal cemetery today, following a dawn visit to the site of the soldier’s death along the Sambre-Oise canal.
French locals and members of the Wilfred Owen Association gathered to hear The Last Post played on a bugle Owen took from a dead German soldier during the First World War. Some of Owen’s poetry, focused on the brutal reality of war, was also recited. His final letter home was read and wreaths were laid in his memory in a service Fiona MacDonald of the Wilfred Owen Association, described as really moving.
“There is just something really special about being here and hearing Owen’s bugle played for the first time in public.”
 

 The bugle taken from the battlefield by Wilfred Owen, held by Grace Freeman from the Wilfred Owen Association

Musician Heather Madeira Ni said she was grateful to have the opportunity to play the instrument, which had never been sounded in public before, on such a historic occasion.
She said: “The bugle is such a piece of history and a great chance for me to get to know Owen and his poetry. It’s such an important part of British history.
“The more I learn about Wilfred Owen, the more grateful I am to have this opportunity.”
The Oswestry-born soldier was killed on November 4 1918 during the battle to cross the Sambre-Oise canal at Ors, just seven days before peace was declared,
He wrote about the bugle, referring to having got some “loot”, in a letter to his brother in 1917.
Born in Oswestry in 1893, Owen lived in Shrewsbury for much of his life and a blue plaque marks the site of his former home at 69 Monkmoor Road.
A life-size bronze statue of the poet was unveiled in Oswestry's Cae Glas Park two weeks ago, while numerous events are planned across Shropshire over the coming weeks to celebrate Owen's life.A specially commissioned Wilfred Owen poetry bench will be unveiled at Shrewsbury Library on Monday.
 Of all the poets to die in the first World War, the fate of  Wilfred  Owen may have been the most cruel, if only for his family. He survived until the last week, but was “killed while giving a hand with some duckboards” [wooden walkways] near Cambrai, northern Trance. The news took exactly a week to travel home to Shrewsbury when his  parents heard of William’s death on the 11th of November, that most significant of days, heightening the tragedy of his loss all the more.
Back in 1914, the then 21-year-old Owen had been in no hurry to fight. He enlisted late the following year and only in mid-1916 reached the front.The horrors of the western front soon confronted him. On April 1, 1917, near the town of St. Quentin, Owen led his platoon through an artillery barrage to the German trenches, only to discover when they arrived that the enemy had already withdrawn. Severely shaken and disoriented by the bombardment, Owen  was soon blown into the air by a shell, landing on what remained of a dead comrade. He also spent days trapped in a trench, surrounded by corpses, and returned to his base camp confused and stammering. A doctor diagnosed shell-shock, a new term used to describe the physical and/or psychological damage suffered by soldiers in combat. Though his commanding officer was skeptical, Owen was sent to a French hospital and subsequently returned to Britain, where he was checked into the Craiglockhart War Hospital for Neurasthenic Officers near Edinburgh .
 He had been writing for some time at this point and what he saw of the war convinced him that this was no glorious conflict but one of sheer terror for those unlucky enough to experience it.  His writings were hard-hitting, telling the reader exactly how a soldier lived and died in this most brutal of environments.  His most famous poems included ‘Dulce et Decorum Est’ and ‘Anthem for Doomed Youth’.
During a lengthy convalescence, he met fellow war poet Siegfried Sassoon, the most influential friend of his short life. Under Sassoon’s guidance, he would write his best verse, which was bitterly critical of war, with none of the patriotic fervour of earlier front-line poets.If  Sassoon had had his way, Owen would never have returned to the trenches. The former once threatened to “stab [him] in the leg” if he tried.  But in the summer of 1918, Owen went back to war without telling him. In early October, he helped storm enemy positions at Joncourt, earning a Military Cross for his courage: something he had craved – paradoxically – as justification for the poetry. He didn’t live to receive the honour. 
Despite Wilfred Owen‘s prodigious writing, only five poems were ever published in his lifetime – probably because of his strong anti-war sentiment, which would not have been in line with British policy at the time.A promise made by Sassoon while in Edinburgh was fulfilled as an edited collection of his poignant war poems was published  postumously in 1920, thus establishing the name of William Owen among the country’s greatest poets.
Events are planned around the world on November 11, to mark Armistice Day – 100 years after the end of the First World War.

Dulce et Decorum Est - Wilfred Owen

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs,
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots,
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of gas-shells dropping softly behind.

Gas! GAS! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time,
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime.—
Dim through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,—
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.


But I Was looking at the permanent Stars - Wilfred Owen


Bugles sang, saddening the evening air,
And bugles answered, sorrowful to hear.

Voices of boys were by the river-side.
Sleep mothered them; and left the twilight sad.
The shadow of the morrow weighed on men.

Voices of old despondency resigned,
Bowed by the shadow of the morrow, slept.

( ) dying tone
Of receding voices that will not return.
The wailing of the high far-travelling shells
And the deep cursing of the provoking ( )

The monstrous anger of our taciturn guns.
The majesty of the insults of their mouths.

Shot at Dawn : Lest we forget



The Shot at Dawn Memorial is a British Monument at the National Memorial Arboretum near Alrewas, in Staffordshire, UK. It memorialises the 306 British and Commonwealth soldiers executed after courts-martial for cowardice or desertion during World War 1.

Never in the field of human conflict has so little been gained for the death of so many.

As the 100 year anniversary of the carnage of World War One approaches lets remember the 306 soldiers   this 11th November  who were brutally shot at dawn  by Britain for cowardice or desertion. For years they  were blighted with shame. stigmatised and condemned and history tried to forget them. Their names were never remembered on memorials and family’s often hid the truth, forced to live with a blemish on their good names for years, the shame was too much off a burden when in reality so many had died with honour. 
General Haig, or Butcher Haig as he was known, when questioned declared that all men accused of cowardice and desertion were examined by a medical officer and that no soldier was sentenced to death if there was any suspicion of him suffering shell shock. As so often, he lied.
Haig not only signed all the death warrants but when questioned later on this issue lied repeatedly.The general's stubborn and ignorant belief was that anyone suffering shell hock was malingering. In fact in Butcher Haig's mid shell shock and malingering were the same thing.
Most off those sentenced were only after a short trial lasting no more than twenty minutes, at which they were denied legal representation and the right of appeal.
These executions occurred throughout the war, beginning with Pte Thomas Highgate on 9 September and ending with Ptes Louis Harris and Ernest Jackson on 7 November 1918, less than a week before the Armistice. For most of these young men, cowardice was far from the truth, it was the traumas of war, break downs amidst the unspeakable horrors they endured in the trenches, facing machine guns, exploding shells, barbed wire, bayonets, noise, and what would have amounted to a hell on earth. They were sick, cold, hungry, tired ,terrified, in fear and often alone. They saw their friends bombed, gassed and cut to pieces in spectacular numbers and they were reduced to trembling wrecks by relentless shellfire and the imminence of their own demise. 
Today, it is recognised that several of them were underage when they volunteered and many had lied about their ages to fight for King and Country and many of them were actually suffering from a condition we now would have no problem in diagnosing as post traumatic stress disorder, or shell-shock, as it was known in 1916.
In the year 2000 a simple statue  called ' Shot at Dawn' was created byAndy De Comyn, it is modelled on Private Herbert Burden of the 1st Batallion Northumberland fusiliers. At 17, Private Herbert Burden was legally too young to be facing the German guns in the trenches of the Western front. However, his age did not save the teenager from facing a deadly volley of bullets at Ypres on the morning of 21 July 1915 – fired by his own comrades.An absence away from battle of little more than 48 hours saw Private Herbert Burden brought before a Field General Court Martial, pleading for his very life. But in complete disregard for his age was made an example of and paid the ultimate price.
His image stands, blindfolded and strapped to a wooden execution post, eternally awaiting the order to fire. Behind the statue are 340 other posts, each labelled with the names of those who suffered the same fate of being shot at dawn arranged  in the form of a Greek theatre around the statue, symbolising the tragedy that those events signify. The location of the memorial in the most easterly point of the Arboteum means that this is the first place to be touched by the dawn light.
He was one of 306 young British soldiers who met this  cruel fate, including 15 of my own fellow Welsh countrymen, induced by the horrors of this so called Great War. Private William Jones, of the Royal Welsh Fusiliers, was one of these who had volunteered for the army in 1915 while still a teenager. Assigned to the front line he was serving as a stretcher-bearer when he went missing on 15 June 1917. He had helped a wounded comrade to an aid post near their trenches, but then disappeared. He made his way across the Channel and home, but was then persuaded by his mother to hand himself in at the local police station in Neath. However, he was shown no leniency and was another of the 306 British soldiers who were futiley executed during the First World War. 
I remember too  how the late Keir Hardie the M.P for Merthyr Tydfil and Aberdare raised his opposition to this cruel war. What is also forgotten is around 200,000 miners in  the South Wales valleys that went on strike at the height of the First World War. Not everyone signed up to the  jingoistic version of patriotism that continues to be spread. It is estimated that there were 20,000 Conscientious Objectors – admittedly a very small number as compared to the around 5 million men who joined the military, most of whom were conscripts. Objectors were a diverse group, but what is clear though is that they displayed remarkable conviction and courage, both as individuals and collectively.
There were between 700-900 conscientious objectors here in Wales during this period, and it was no soft option. It meant tribunals, imprisonment and hard labor. Conchies as they were  known were faced with humiliation, called cowards and shirkers. By 1916 Home Office intelligence reports revealed the extent of anti-war, revolutionary opposition in South Wales was large. 
After the 75 year secrecy Act was lifted, members of the Shot at Dawn Organisation started campaigning for a pardon for those that had been essentially murdered in cold blood.Many now believe these men were executed to frighten other men into doing what they were told, intimidating them back into the trenches or scaring them into going over the top during an attack. Making an example of the executed men was a way of keeping others in line.
In 2006 all 306 men  eventually received a posthumous pardon, after a long campaign by their descendents. The shot at dawn campaign never asked for a blanket pardon, as claimed by many. They only asked for pardons for under aged soldiers, those suffering mental illness, and in cases of doubtful or illegal Courts Martial. Some names  subsequently went onto being inscribed upon war memorials alongside the names of the men who died fighting. The living relatives of those executed  at long last  at least gained some relief by the pardons.
Lets remember them all not as cowards or traitors, but as victims of a terrible shameful injustice that was clearly done and acknowledge that all these men were victims of war, who were not given the chance to survive,  tragically executed by their own comrades, often for little more than being frightened, confused young men. All of them heroes far braver than I could ever be. Shot for the sake of example. Victims  picked out and convicted as a lesson to others. All of the pardoned men deserve to be mentioned and their stories told, here is a list of their names. let us never forget them, always remember.


Pte Abigail J H;
Pte Adamson J S;
Labourer Ahmed M M;
Pte Ainley G;
Sgt Alexander W;
Pte Allsop A E;
Pte Anderson J A;
Pte Anderson W;
Pte Ansted A T;
Pte Archibald J;
Pte Arnold F S; L
Sgt Ashton H; L
Cpl Atkinson A;
Pte Auger F;
Pte Baker W;
Pte Ball J;
Pte Barker W;
Pte Barnes J E;
Rfn Barratt F M;
Pte Bateman F;
Pte Bateman J;
Pte Beaumont E A;
Sapper Beeby E;
Dvr Bell J;
Rfn Bellamy W;
Pte Benham W;
Pte Bennett J;
Pte Black P;
Pte Bladen F C H;
Pte Blakemore D J;
Pte Bolton E;
Pte Botfield A;
Pte Bowerman W;
Pte Brennan J;
Pte Briggs A;
Pte Briggs J
Pte Brigham T
Pte Britton C
Pte Broadrick F
Pte Brown A
Pte Brown A
Pte Bryant E
Pte Burden H F
Pte Burrell W H
Pte Burton R
Pte Butcher F C
Pte Byers J
Pte Byrne S\Monaghan M
Pte Cairnie W
Pte Cameron J
Pte Card E A
Pte Carey J
Pte Carr J
Pte Carter H G
Pte Carter H
Pte Cassidy J
Pte Chase H
Rfn Cheeseman F W
Pte Clarke H A
Pte Clarke W
Pte Collins G
Pte Comte G
Pte Crampton J
Pte Crimmins H
Pte Crozier J
Pte Cummings T
Pte Cunnington S
Pte Cuthbert J
Pte Cutemore G
Pte Dalande H
Pte Davis R M
Pte Davis T
Pte Degasse A C
Pte DeLargey E
Pte DeLisle L
Pte Dennis J J
Pte Depper C
Pte Docherty J
Pte Docherty T
Rfn Donovan T
Rfn Donovan T
Pte Dossett W
Pte Downey P
Pte Downing T
Sub Lt Dyett E (RNVR)
Pte Earl W
Pte Earp A G
Pte Elford L
Pte Evans A
Pte Eveleigh A
Pte Everill G
Pte Fairburn E
Pte Farr H
Pte Fatoma A
Pte Fellows E
Pte Ferguson J
Pte Flynn H
Pte Foulkes T
Pte Fowles S
Pte Fox J
L/Cpl Fox J S V
Pte Frafra A
Pte Fraser E
Pte Fryer J
Pte Gawler R
Pte Gibson D
Pte Giles P
Sgt Gleadow G E
L/Cpl Goggins P
Pte Gore F C
Pte Graham J
Pte Haddock A J
Dvr Hamilton T G
Pte Hamilton/Blanchard A
Pte Hanna G
Rfn Harding F
Pte Harris E W
Pte Harris L
Pte Harris T
Pte Harris/Bevistein A
Pte Hart B
Pte Hartells H H
Dvr Hasemore J W
Pte Hawkins T
L/Cpl Hawthorne F
Pte Hendricks H
Pte Higgins J
Pte Higgins J M
Pte Highgate T J
Pte Hodgetts O W
L/Cpl Holland J
Pte Holmes A
Pte Holt E
Pte Hope R
Pte Hope T
Pte Hopkins T
Pte Horler E
Pte Hughes F
L/Cpl Hughes G E
Pte Hughes J
Pte Hunt W
Pte Hunter G
Pte Hunter W
Rfn Hyde J J
Pte Ingham A
Rfn Irish/Lee G
L/Cpl Irvine W J
Cpl Ives F
Pte Jackson E
Pte Jeffries A L
Pte Jennings J
Pte Johnson F/Charlton J
Pte Jones J T
Pte Jones R M
Pte Jones W
Gunner Jones/Fox W
Pte Kerr H H
Pte Kershaw J
Pte King J
Pte Kirk E
Pte Kirman C H
Pte Knight H J
Pte LaLancette J
Pte LaLiberte C
Dvr Lamb A
Cpl Latham G
Pte Lawrence E A
Cpl Lewis C
Pte Lewis G
Pte Lewis J
Pte Ling W N
Pte Loader F
Pte Lodge H E J
Pte Longshaw A
Pte Lowton G H
Pte MacDonald H
L/Cpl MacDonald J
Pte Mackness E
Sapper Malyon F
L/Cpl Mamprusi A
Pte Martin H
Pte Mayers J
Rfn McBride S
Pte McClair H/Rowland
Pte McColl C F
Rfn McCracken J E
Pte McCubbin B
Pte McFarlane J
Pte McGeehan B
Pte McQuade J
Pte Michael J S
Pte Milburn J B
Pte Milligan C M
Pte Mills G
Pte Mitchell A
Pte Mitchell L
Pte Moles T L
Pte Molyneaux J
L/Cpl Moon W A
Pte Morris H
Dvr Mullany J
Pte Murphy H T
Pte Murphy A
Pte Murphy P
Pte Murphy W
Pte Murray R
Pte Neave W
Pte Nelson W B
Pte Nicholson C B
Pte Nisbet J
Pte O'Connell B
Pte O'Neill F
Pte O'Neill A
Pte Palmer H
Rfn Parker A E
Pte Parry A
Pte Pattison R G
Pte Penn M
Pte Perry E
Pte Phillips L R
Pte Phillips W T H
Pte Pitts A
2nd. Lt Poole E S
Pte Poole H
Cpl Povey G H
Pte Randle W H
Cpl Reid J
Pte Reid I
Pte Reynolds E J
Pte Richmond M R
Pte Rickman A
Pte Rigby T H B
Pte Roberts J W
Pte Roberts W W
Sgt Robins J J
Pte Robinson A H
Pte Robinson J
Pte Robinson W
Pte Roe G E
Pte Rogers J
Drummer Rose F
Pte Sabongida S
Pte Salter H
L/Cpl Sands P
Pte Scholes W
Pte Scotton W
Pte Seymour J
Pte Sheffield F
Pte Simmonds W H
Pte Sims R W
Pte Siniski D
Pte Skilton C W F
Pte Slade F W
Pte Sloane J
Pte Smith J C
Rfn Smith J
Pte Smith W
Pte Smith W
Pte Smythe A
Dvr Spencer J
Pte Spencer V M
Pte Spry W T
Pte Stead F
Pte Steadman J B
Pte Stevenson D
Pte Stevenson R
Pte Stewart S
L/Sgt Stones J W
Pte Swain J
Dvr Swaine J W
Trooper Sweeney J J
Pte Tanner E
Pte Taylor J
Pte Taylor J
Pte Taysum N H
Rfn Templeton J
Pte Thomas J
Pte Thompson A D
Pte Thompson W L
Pte Tite R T
Pte Tongue J
Pte Troughton A
Pte Turner F
Pte Turpie W J
Sgt Wall J T
L/Sgt Walton W
Pte Ward G
Pte Ward T
Pte Watkins G
Pte Watts T W
Pte Watts W
Pte Webb H J
Pte Welsh C
Pte Westwood A H
Pte Wild A
Pte Williams H
Pte Wilson J H
Cpl Wilton J
Pte Wishard J
Rfn Woodhouse J
Pte Worsley E
Pte Wright F
Pte Wycherley W
Rfn Yeoman W
Pte Young E
Pte Young R.

Where two names appear, the first refers to the name used by the soldier to register for service and the second is their real name. Researchers at the Shot at Dawn campaign discovered the true identities of those soldiers.
I will continue to support all those that strive to ensure that a radical anti-war message remains fully embedded in our hearts, without disrespecting others that fell.
In the words of Harry Patch the last WW1 veteran in Europe (1989 -2006)

War is organised  murder and nothing else. Politicians  who took us to war should have been given the  guns and told to settle their differences themselves instead of organising nothing better than legalised murder.'

The following  touching documentary released before the men were pardoned investigates the tragic stories of the 306 British & Commonwealth soldiers shot for acts of cowardice and desertion during World War One.

Shot at Dawn - Word War 1 Documentary 






Friday 2 November 2018

Bolsonaro Blues


Bolsonaro denies he's a fascist
Compares himself to Winston Churchill
Brazil looks truly fucked now
It's simply so bloody incredible
Man the world continues to go to shit
RIP rainforests, RIP our climate even more
W'ere all going in one specific direction
Unless we learn to fight right back
By being stupid, does not absolve the voters of blame
History is really worthless  if  we repeat it
Some like  torture, censorship, political persecution
Fuck everyone who thinks punching a Nazi makes you as bad as them
Fuck everyone who pulls the"both sides" narrative
Fuck everyone who identifies as a centrist
Lets keep  hoping, lets not give in
We need mercy not relentless purgatory
Against continual inhumanity gaining strength
Maybe his cruel policies will blow up in his face.

Thursday 1 November 2018

For Now




As  October night ends
open your windows
spread knowledge of justice
love of free existence.

Occupy your heart
invite the spirit of insurrection
stir together
solidarity, imagination

The past is gone
change is effervessing
we are goin to a future
that has never been seen

There is magic in the air
as old orders die, leaves fly
together we rise, shadows
dancing among the flames

Truth grows from roots and branches
offering promise of new beginnings
an army of believers gathering
faith confirmed, preparing for emerging possibility

Certainties shake as orthodoxies are removed
dreamers sitting on the threshold of another world
in leaps and bounds we spread our message
we declare our freedom as paradigm shifts.

From the hedges we untangle
out in the open we emerge,
where we gather some critics curse
but we carry on beyond the dry tear of fear

wave goodbye to the margins
bloom, and move forwards
push onwards, accelerate
because the whole world is watching  now.

(Sorry about the cliches.........)

Wednesday 31 October 2018

On Samhain, Remembering the Witch Hunts and the Burning Times


Today marks Halloween, Samhain, All Hallows, All Saints or Winters Eve,The Festival of the Dead. There are several explanations for its origin, one being the Roman festival of the dead 'Parentalia', but another origin, not necessarily exclusive from the Roman one, is from the ancient Celtic old day of Samhein (sa-wain). and most of the traditions that we celebrate on Halloween have its origins in Celtic/Gaelic Culture.
Samhein, which means November in Irish, was the end of summer and the harvest season in the Celtic calender. It was the last great feast held outdoors before the cold months to come. The last night of October also marked the ancient Celts New Years Eve. Marking the end of the summer and the beginning of Winter.
The Celts  believed that on Samhein, the veil between the living and the dead was dropped for one day, and the spirits of the living could intermingle with the spirits of the dead.The ancient Celts divided their year into two seasons: the light and the dark, at Beltane on 1st May and Samhain on November 1. Many believe that Samhain was the more important festival, marking the beginning of a new cycle / new year,and the most magical time of this festival was November Eve, the night of 31st October, better known today as Halloween..
Samhain, means November in the Celtic Culture, the literal translation being‘summer’s end.’ It is the Gateway to winter, a time when the veils between the realms of the living and the afterlife were said to be especially thin, marking a time for reflection to honor the worlds of the seen and unseen. In the country year, Samhain marked the first day of winter, when the herders led the cattle and sheep down from their summer pastures to the shelter of the stables, .in order to determine how many animals could be adequately fed through the winter. Those not able to be cared for were butchered, which would help to feed the family during the dark days ahead.  It is partially due to this practice that Samhain is sometimes referred to as the ‘blood harvest.’
With the rise of Christianity, Samhain was changed to Hallowmas, or All Saints’ Day, to celebrate the saints in heaven, and so the night before became popularly known as Halloween. The 2nd November became All Souls Day, when prayers were to be offered to the souls of the departed. Throughout the centuries, pagan and Christian beliefs and celebrations have intertwined
 Over the years we have ended up with the modern commercialised, corporate version that is now known as halloween  far from its original roots  when children dress up in Ghoulish costumes and go out trick and treating in what was developed in America in the late 19th and early 20th century replacing what in reality is such a sacred day The old ways are still with us despite the grip of large corporations, the real reason and respect for this occasion has never been lost.Samhein and its energy has never fully died out and still burns bright. Samhain fires have continued to light up the countryside down the ages., In some areas, ashes from these bonfires were sprinkled on surrounding fields. The day is also  about remembrance and  contemplation. Our ancestors, the blessed dead, are more accessible, more approachable during the time of the dying of the land. A day to commune with the dead and a celebration of the eternal cycle of reincarnation to honor our ancestors  and remember our deceased loved ones.
Some  in revelry and fun today will be dressing up as witches in pointy hats, perhaps forgetting this days roots. and all  those who have been tortured or killed as suspected witches during the centuries of the Burning Times in Europe, in Salem, and elsewhere across the globe.Witches have a long history of being associated with this time of year, primarily because of ritual gatherings at Samhain, the cauldron used as a symbol of the witchs' control over life and death.
 It is worth noting that the word witchcraft  has good and bad meanings in different cultures around the world. A general definition of witchcraft is the changing of everyday events using supernatural or magical forces. Witches, in folklore, and throughout history can be seen as considered outsiders of the human collective. Found in hidden enclaves (covens), or in isolation from society, they straddle the gap between the civil and the wild, the human and the element, and it is they who provoke, attack, agitate, heal and enliven the social order.They have existed in all inhabited continents of the world and across the majority of human societies.
Originating in the Mesopotamian myths of Inanna, in the Hindu stories of Kali, and in the Greek tales of Hecate, the legacy of the witch stretches back thousands of years. These goddesses had the ability to give life and to take it away, and they were worshipped for it. There once was a time when wise women were honored. They were often the keepers of knowledge about folk healing, and they were often spiritual leaders. Paganism – living in sync with nature and observing rituals associated with the seasons – was the prevailing tradition.
The witch however has long been a symbol of fear  not because she can harness forces that transcend this mortal coil, but because she embodies  a powerful femininity free from male influence or ownership. Indeed throughout history the figure of the witch has both challenged and reflected patriarchal narratives about female power.
Then  in Medieval Times, when monotheistic religions gained greater prominence, thereby consolidating belief around an omnipotent male deity, women were cast more frequently as “other,” and as villains. They were women who raised suspicion by amassing too much land, wealth, or influence. They were mothers, sisters, and daughters who were in the wrong place at the wrong time. And they were punished for it.Women  who had gained some form of social power was subjected to  patriarchal tests to see whether her heart was pure. For her to be proven to be pure, she had to lose her will to live. Should she fail the  test, by maintaining her struggle to survive, she was shown to be of impure heart. This meant that she was condemned to die for her sins.One particular test was the dunking of witches. If they floated they were guilty of witchcraft, if they sank they were innocent but would have usually drowned anyway.

guilty or dead was the choice given

During the “witch craze,” women’s power became associated with darkness and death, and folk healers were misconstrued and condemned as worshippers of Satan. Well-organized campaigns of tortures like burning, dunking, and the application of thumb screws enforced the suppression of what was by then called heresy. For three centuries of early modern European history, diverse societies were consumed by a panic over alleged witches in their midst between the 14th and 17th centuries, especially in Central Europe. This was a time when many believed in the supernatural and misfortune was thought to be the work of the Devil or his servants. here was a widespread belief in Europe that a strong nation was one that had a uniform religious faith. By consorting with the Devil, "witches" were committing treason and were punishable by courts enforcing anti-witchcraft statutes.
The witches, of course, were nothing like the stereotype of the carbuncled hags shrieking incantations around a cauldron full of devilish potions. They were ordinary people who were often the convenient scapegoats for anything from a death in the village to the failure of crops. Individuals would often have been branded a witch simply after falling out with a neighbour.
Protestant evangelists targeted all magic, claiming that witches were deluded by the devil. The Catholic Church responded in kind. Each side blamed the other for colluding with Satan. This quickly escalated, leading to a number of the most brutal witch hunts in history ,(known as The Burning Times) resulted in  false accusations of heresy and trials and led to massive torture and burnings at the stake, and executions of tens of thousands of victims, about three-quarters of whom were women.  Many question  whether the widespread violence against women and the neglect of our environment today can be traced back to those times.

 
Some have claimed that as many as nine million people were killed in the name of “witch hunts.” However, there’s a lot of discussion about the accuracy of that number, and some scholars have estimated it to be significantly lower, possibly as few as 200,000.  Still a significantly huge number nevertheless. Hundreds of thousands of women, men and children died due to mass fear, propaganda, politics, and institutions run amok. The Burning Times may actually be viewed as mass hysteria. Plagues, droughts and other natural disasters during these times were often attributed to witchcraft which further fuelled the fear of witches. Witchcraft came to be viewed upon as an unpardonable offence which resulted in capital punishment. Many an innocent woman were condemned due to it. In the past, its often been pointed out that  the European witch hunts targeted women — after all, these poor country girls were simply the victims of the misogynistic societies of their times. However, what is often overlooked is that although overall about 80% of the accused were female, in some areas, more men than women were persecuted as witches.
England's most famous case were the Pendle Witches from Lancashire who were convicted of murdering 17 people in 1612. Their prosecutors argued they had sold their souls to the Devil in return for being able to lame or kill anyone they pleased. The trial was meticulously documented and appeared the following year in book form. Enormous crowds flocked to Lancaster Gaol to watch 10 "witches" - eight women and two men - die on the gallows.
In Scotland, where nearly 4,000 people died during a frenetic period of witch trials between 1590 and 1662, one of the popular types of evidence used against suspects was the Devil's Mark. When his followers made their pact with him, the Devil supposedly left his mark, usually an insensitive spot, upon him or her.
Witch hunting was old by the time Great Britain erupted into the Civil Wars of 1639-1651, but this existential clash between royalists and parliamentarians amid a swirling miasma of sectarianism and suspicion, resulted in a fresh flowering of superstitious barbarity. Behind the frontlines of the conflict in the puritan stronghold of East Anglia, Matthew Hopkins, the self-proclaimed Witchfinder General, and his colleague John Stearne dispatched an estimated 300 people to the gallows between 1644 and 1647 for their alleged covenant with the devil.It was the largest outbreak of witch hunting in English history, a unique product of fear, war, and the breakdown of civil society.
 In 1692, -1693 there were  the cataclysmic events of Salem, Massaschusets  the belief in witches was so commonplace that anything out of the ordinary, from odd weather to a cow’s milk going sour, was explained away as “witchcraft.” In the Puritan colony of Massachusetts Bay, fear of witches was rampant. In 1692, a group of young girls accused three women of working with the devil. The accusations soon multiplied, as those who stood accused would only be saved from hanging if they admitted guilt and provided the names of others who conjured the devil alongside them.Soon paranoia gripped, as people suddenly perceived something so incredibly innocent to be the "devils work." After the girls were accused of being witches, fingers began to be pointed at everyone in the town, everyone was ready to accuse their neighbour or friend, in order to take the focus away from themselves. By the time this  event was over  141 suspects, both men and women, were tried as witches. Nineteen were executed by hanging. One was pressed to death by heavy stones. The town had become so afraid of something that was not to blame, that innocent lives were taken, creating a spread of blame, along with a chaotic panic.


After these tumultuous events  European belief in witches seemed to spontaneously disappear. The Age of Enlightenment, with its emphasis on reason and logic, was beginning in Europe and natural causes began to replace the Devil as the reason behind much of society's ills. By 1736, the Witchcraft Acts in England and Scotland had both been repealed. The same happened on the continent
But  what never died out completely, however, was the demonization of those considered "other," and it is a grim grim paradox of 21st-century life that  persecution  against people accused of sorcery is very much still with us. It resurfaced, along with witch hunting, in postcolonial Africa, as a response to the process of modernization after independence.
The last witch trial in Britain  took place in 1944, when Helen Duban was jailed for claiming to have conjured up the spirit of a dead sailor from the HMS Barham – the sinking of the ship by the Germans was classified information, and the authorities were worried that she might also reveal details of the D-Day landing plans. She was released after nine months, and lived to see the repeal of the Witchcraft Act in 1951.
Even today, we see witch hunts breaking out in different parts of the world among cultures most fearful of change. In recent years, there has been a spate of attacks against people accused of witchcraft in Africa, the Pacific and Latin America, and even among immigrant communities in the United States and Western Europe. Researchers with United Nations refugee and human rights agencies have estimated the murders of supposed witches as numbering in the thousands each year, while beatings and banishments could run into the millions.https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NEWSEVENTS/Pages/Witches21stCentury.aspx
For all the surface rationality and modernity of lives everywhere, fear of witches is still widespread, a reminder that ancient superstitions are durable and widespread. Much like xenophobia (fear of foreigners), Wiccaphobia ( fear of witches or fear of witchcraft) is triggerred especially  by the fear of the unknown. What the mind cannot perceive or what it deems as unusual, it fears. The root cause of fear of witches may also be prejudice and stereotypes. In short: witches represent everything that is threatening. Many popular childhood stories have often reinforced beliefs that witches are bad. Today, there are many Churches that continue to teach its members that witches are evil.
Today’s accused “witches” are almost all women, many of them the more outspoken, independent and prosperous women in their communities. Whether victims of simple sexist domination or scapegoats for the old ways in a modernizing society plagued with economic injustice, often they stand for a former way of life, a life more in harmony with nature. Their murder is thus a crime against women and nature, as well as a horrific violation of human rights and religious freedom generally.
Witch hunts lie at the dark heart of Western culture, so much so that they've become synonymous with any kind of vicious, dogged and irrational persecution, takeMcCarthyism in the 1940's for example when a similar paranoia  and hysteria emerged, with federal employees being dragged before loyalty boards on murky charges, their names often cleared only to be charged again and again. Eventually 8,000 employees were forced to resign. At least seven committed suicide. Then the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) began investigating communist activity in Hollywood in what critics considered an outrageous infringement of First Amendment rights, labeling the hearings a “witch hunt.” hounding politicians, academics, celebrities, and other public figures while chasing vague rumors of Communist sympathizers. As in Salem, these persecutions moved some to accuse others as evidence of their innocence.
 Later we would see the ritual child abuse panics of the 1980s. No wonder the history of the original European witch hunts of the late 16th and early 17th centuries has become politicized.
The inauguration of the US president, Donald Trump, provoked women’s protest marches around the world, with some banners reading: “Hex the Patriarchy”, “Witches for Black Lives”, and “We are the daughters of the witches you didn’t burn, and we are pissed off.”And recently an  event even took place in October in Brooklyn, New York, to hex supreme court justice, Brett Kavanaugh. The meeting was sold out and the protest made headlines across the world. It is no surprise that, at a time when women’s rights are under increasing pressure in some areas of Western society, that the witch should be used as a feminist symbol of power, both in language and in the claimed reality of witchcraft.
 Then the  the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements led Woody Allen to invoke the spectre of Salem, but with men as accused witches, saying: “You also don’t want it to lead to a witch-hunt atmosphere, a Salem atmosphere, where every guy in an office who winks at a woman is suddenly having to call a lawyer to defend himself.” In these cases, men are positioning themselves and their peers in the role of witches, but in this scenario the witch is an innocent, a victim.
 Donald Trump feels  persecuted. The most powerful man in the world is always complaining that he’s being treated unfairly. He has whined that no politician in history had ever received worse treatment, and tweeted that there was a witch hunt out to get him.In 2018 alone, Trump has tweeted the term  witch hunt 112 times.  Now, Trump is pretty bad at being president, but he’s an even worse historian. There are plenty of witch hunts in history that are much bigger than anything Trump has yet encountered. A witch hunt involves persecution as well as prosecution, and Trump is not being persecuted.We should remind him  that the Muslim ban is a witch hunt. The perrecution and demonisation of refugees is a witch hunt. And so is calling Mexican immigrants “rapists.”


Intrerestingly today it is male politicians like Donald Trump – and countless others – who still use 'witch' or generally cry 'witch hunt' as a term of vilification against women,  just as their predecessors so often led them. During the 2016 presidential election campaign, Hillary Clinton was repeatedly defined as a witch by Trump supporters: Clinton was “the wicked witch of the Left”, pictured with green skin, pointy hat, and riding a broomstick; her opponents claimed she smelt of sulphur. Aligning her with such stereotypical representations of witchcraft evidenced the power plays at the root of such blatant and public misogyny.
Men are still walking around afraid of women and their power. Hate crimes, sex crimes, domestic violence, glass ceilings,  all are testimony to this legacy of fear. The real witches who  live among us  are still  angry at having to live under patriarchal control, and the measures taken against her are no less real than the past, and raw patriarchal society still seeks to destroy her.
So  today on Samhein, as the more consumerist tradition of Halloween  takes place, along with the stereotypical  images, remember the deeper messages of the day, remember the dead , our loved ones gone before us, honour our sisters, the witches, and all of the other lives who were lost in "the  Burning Times " and celebrate their courage, and be mindful for those who still face persecution for their beliefs.
 Men are still walking around afraid of women and their power. Hate crimes, sex crimes, domestic violence, all are testimony to this legacy of fear. The real witches who  live among us  are still  angry at having to live under patriarchal control, and the measures taken against her are no less real than the past, and raw patriarchal society still seeks to destroy her. Our deepest power is to  learn and grow and talk about our fears out loud, so that we do not repeat  the tragedies of the past, make a conscious effort not to repeat the evil of history, not to repeat the evil of fear.
The air is full of the whispers of our ancestors, loved ones passed, and we remember them holding them close to our hearts. What is remembered lives. Good Samhain to you and yours.




Saturday 27 October 2018

October: Ten Days That Shook The World



In February 1917, in the midst of bloody war, Russia was still an autocratic monarchy: nine months later, it became the first socialist state in world history. How did this unimaginable transformation take place? How was a ravaged and backward country, swept up in a desperately unpopular war, rocked by not one but two revolutions? Historians have debated the revolution for over a hundred years, its portents and possibilities: the mass of literature can be daunting. But most of us now  know and accept what came next: the Revolution’s nightmare offspring – Stalinist terror and the 20 million dead. No one contests the catastrophe, but there are those, who look back to the events of 1917 and are still haunted by the thought that “it might have been otherwise. It might have been different”.
Sergei Eisenstein’s  powerful testement to his genius, artistry, and ambition, his amazing dramatisation  October — the director’s third feature, after Strike and Battleship Potemkin — was commissioned by the Soviet government to honour the tenth anniversary of the Russian Revolution. Eisenstein had nearly unlimited resources placed at his disposal, including the run of Leningrad’s Winter Palace for several months. His startling re-creation of the events of 1917 is both a sweeping historical epic of vast scale and a magnificent monument to his fascination with intellectual montage — the juxtaposition of two disparate images to convey an idea or concept not inherent in either image alone. The film’s most celebrated examples of the technique include a baroque figure of Christ reduced, through a series of successive images, to a primitive idol, and Kerensky, head of the pre-Revolutionary provisional government, compared to a preening mechanical peacock. Such metaphorical experiments met with official disapproval; the authorities complained that October was unintelligible to the masses, and Eisenstein was attacked, for neither the first time nor the last, for “formalism." He was also required to re-edit the work to remove references to Trotsky, who had recently been purged by Stalin. October remains an immensely rich experience.
The film was originally released in 1928 as Oktober in the Soviet Union, and later internationally as Ten Ten Days Shook  The World  borrowing from John Reed's well known classic account of the Revolution. In documentary style, events in Petrograd are re-enacted from the end of the monarchy in February of 1917 to the end of the provisional government and the decrees of peace and of land in November of that year. Lenin returns in April. In July, counter revolutionaries put down a spontaneous revolt, and Lenin's arrest is ordered. By late October, the Bolsheviks are ready to strike : ten days will shake the world. While the Mensheviks  vaciliate an advance guard infiltrates the palace.Antatov Oveyenko leads the attack and declares the proclamation dissolving the provisional government. You can watch this epic masterpiece of world film history below which is rousing, shocking and stunningly visualised.


Thursday 25 October 2018

Still


(This week  marks the 2 year anniversary of  a makeshift camp known as  the Jungle in Calais, France in 2016. being demolished and people evicted, yet the  the problem and tragedy nevertheless still sadly ongoing.)

Still the language of spin repeating
Still angry choruses releasing,
Still distraught tears raining down
Still lines of division, continue pressing,
Still refugees seek shelter, from fear to freedom
Still forced to flee, poverty and war,
Still abandoning man made tragedies
Still escaping darkness, hope undimmed,
Still not welcome, still told to disappear
Still building walls to keep them out,
Still made illegal, repression continues
Still in desperate search of need,
Still is the night, still is the air
Still logic flies on paths of departure,
Still the beyondness of unknowing
Still the tides keep on flowing,
Still travelling, unravelling threads
Still seeking hands of kindness
Still hoping for depth of understanding
Still offering  the hand of friendship,
Still human imagining tomorrow
Still hoping the world will change,
Still determined, carry on unbroken
Still many mountains to climb,
Still got the future, still got time
Still on the verge of hope,
Still words of truth flying high
Still inspiration calls from mind's eye,
Still displaced, but still surviving
Still the gift of dignity, keeps on calling.

https://iamnotasilentpoet.wordpress.com/2018/10/25/still-by-dave-rendle/?fbclid=IwAR31xo7BLSuGTDlkZp-nv53CYC17dLBgSn7dMlrhNgaNlQs60Qb5KWCPwzg

Tuesday 23 October 2018

Bandista: Haydi Barikata | To the Barricades | A las Barricadas | Στα οδοφράγματα | Alle barricate


"A las Barricadas" sung in turkish by the musical collective "Bandista". "A las Barricadas" ("To the Barricades") was the anthem of the spanish anarchists during the Spanish revolution and soon became an internationalist anarchist song. The original "A las Barricadas" is sung to the tune of "Whirlwinds of Danger" (based on the song "Varsovonia) which was composed in 1883, by the Polish poet Warclaw Swiercicki , when  he was locked up in prison in Warsaw, at a time when the Polish labour movement was engaged in hard fought struggles. The song was based on a popular Polish theme, and was sung for the first time at the workers; demonstration on March 2, 1885 in Warsaw and popularised and  versioned throughout Europe for the solidarity of the labor movement.
With the name.Triumphal March and subtitle "A las barricadas!", the score was published in November 1922, in the supplement of the magazine Tierra y Liberttad in Barcelona written by Valeriano Orobón Fernández  a Spanish anarcho-syndicalist activist, speaker and author. In Spain, and in exile in France and Germany, who laboured to prepare the anarcho- syndicalist CNT (Confederación Nacional del Trabajo — "National Confederation of Labor")  which was the largest Labour union and main anarchist organisation in Spain, and a major force opposing Francisco Franco's military coup against the Spanish Republic from 1936–1939 for the revolutionary battles to come. He sadly  died of Tuberculosis just weeks before the Spanish Revolution erupted on the 19th July 1936.
A rousing moving anthem, inspiring the working class to answer the call to arms and fight the fascist threat to our essential freedoms. It certainly sends a chill down my spine.
 Despite the revolution in Spain being ultimately defeated, it still provides a glimpse of what could have been and anyone who believes that a better world is possible, should reflect on the inspiring examples and hard lessons of the Spanish Revolution.
What happened in Spain has since been repeated. Currently in Kobane, countless comrades have fallen to defend this city against the fascists, just like the countless comrades who gave their lives to defend the revolution in Catalonia and Spain. The spirit of revolutionary Barcelona  lives on in Kobane, the Rojava and the Kurdish struggle. Carried on the wind, for many solidarity gives strength, and in every city, every town, the cause of freedom will never be conquered . No pasaran
The photo  in the Bandista video is from 18 March 1871 in Paris, France where attempts to remove cannons from Montmartre provoked resistance and the erection of barricades by Parisians that soon transformed the autonomous Paris Commune.


Spanish lyrics

Negras tormentas agitan los aires
nubes oscuras nos impiden ver.
Aunque nos espere el dolor y la muerte
contra el enemigo nos llama el deber.

El bien más preciado es la libertad
hay que defenderla con fe y valor.

Alza la bandera revolucionaria
que del triunfo sin cesar nos lleva en pos.
Alza la bandera revolucionaria
que del triunfo sin cesar nos lleva en pos.

Negras tormentas agitan los aires
nubes oscuras nos impiden ver.
Aunque nos espere el dolor y la muerte
contra el enemigo nos llama el deber.

El bien más preciado es la libertad
hay que defenderla con fe y valor.

Alza la bandera revolucionaria
que del triunfo sin cesar nos lleva en pos.
Alza la bandera revolucionaria
que del triunfo sin cesar nos lleva en pos.

En pie el pueblo obrero, a la batalla
hay que derrocar a la reacción.

¡A las barricadas! ¡A las barricadas!
por el triunfo de la Confederación.
¡A las barricadas! ¡A las barricadas!
por el triunfo de la Confederación.

egras tormentas agitan los aires
nubes oscuras nos impiden ver.
Aunque nos espere el dolor y la muerte
contra el enemigo nos llama el deber.
El bien más preciado es la libertad
hay que defenderla con fe y valor.
Alza la bandera revolucionaria
que del triunfo sin cesar nos lleva en pos.
Alza la bandera revolucionaria
que del triunfo sin cesar nos lleva en pos.
Negras tormentas agitan los aires
nubes oscuras nos impiden ver.
Aunque nos espere el dolor y la muerte
contra el enemigo nos llama el deber.
El bien más preciado es la libertad
hay que defenderla con fe y valor.
Alza la bandera revolucionaria
que del triunfo sin cesar nos lleva en pos.
Alza la bandera revolucionaria
que del triunfo sin cesar nos lleva en pos.
En pie el pueblo obrero, a la batalla
hay que derrocar a la reacción.
¡A las barricadas! ¡A las barricadas!
por el triunfo de la Confederación.
¡A las barricadas! ¡A las barricadas!
por el triunfo de la Confederación.
https://lyricstranslate.com/en/las-barricadas-barricades.html

Negras tormentas agitan los aires
nubes oscuras nos impiden ver.
Aunque nos espere el dolor y la muerte
contra el enemigo nos llama el deber.
El bien más preciado es la libertad
hay que defenderla con fe y valor.
Alza la bandera revolucionaria
que del triunfo sin cesar nos lleva en pos.
Alza la bandera revolucionaria
que del triunfo sin cesar nos lleva en pos.
Negras tormentas agitan los aires
nubes oscuras nos impiden ver.
Aunque nos espere el dolor y la muerte
contra el enemigo nos llama el deber.
El bien más preciado es la libertad
hay que defenderla con fe y valor.
Alza la bandera revolucionaria
que del triunfo sin cesar nos lleva en pos.
Alza la bandera revolucionaria
que del triunfo sin cesar nos lleva en pos.
En pie el pueblo obrero, a la batalla
hay que derrocar a la reacción.
¡A las barricadas! ¡A las barricadas!
por el triunfo de la Confederación.
¡A las barricadas! ¡A las barricadas!
por el triunfo de la Confederación.
 
 English lyrics: 

Black storms shake the air
Dark clouds blind us
Although pain and death [may] await us
Duty calls us against the enemy

The most precious good is freedom
It must be defended with faith and courage

Raise the revolutionary flag
Which carries us ceaselessly towards triumph
Raise the revolutionary flag
Which carries us ceaselessly towards triumph

Black storms shake the air
Dark clouds blind us
Although pain and death [may] await us
Duty calls us against the enemy

The most precious good is freedom
It must be defended with faith and courage

Raise the revolutionary flag
Which carries us ceaselessly towards triumph
Raise the revolutionary flag
Which carries us ceaselessly towards triumph

Get up, working people, to the battle
[We] have to topple the reaction
To the Barricades! To the Barricades!

For the triumph of the Confederation
To the Barricades! To the Barricades!
For the triumph of the Confederation

Turkish lyrics: 

Haydi barikata, haydi barikata!
Ekmek, adalet ve özgürlük için (x3)
Yek, dü, se, car!

Kara fırtınalar sarsıyor göğü,
Kara bulutlar kör eder gözleri.
Ölüm ve acı beklese de bizleri,
Onları yenmek için yürümeliyiz.
Ve en değerli varlığımız özgürlük,
Cesaret ve inançla savunmalıyız.

Haydi barikata, haydi barikata!
Ekmek, adalet ve özgürlük için (x2)

Kalplerimizde, kardeşlerimizle,
Tüm dünyada büyüyor direniş.
Haydi barikata, haydi barikata!
Ekmek, adalet ve özgürlük için (x2)

Kalplerimizde, kardeşlerimizle,
Tüm dünyada büyüyor direniş.
Haydi barikata, haydi barikata!
Ekmek, adalet ve özgürlük için (x6)