Over 30 years of anarchist writing from Ireland listed under hundreds of topics
Poolbeg incinerator - city council manager assures company they can ignore vote of council
Date: Mon, 2015-08-24 10:46
In a further confirmation of the empty nature of electoral democracy its been revealed that the Dublin City Council manager wrote to the company building the controversial Poolbeg incinerator to assure them they could ignore the two city council votes against the project. This after a special meeting when 50 out of 52 councillors voted against the proposal!
How to avoid Bad Meetings & hold a Conversations about Anarchism - WSM training report back
Date: Wed, 2015-08-19 15:22
WSM recently held our first Facilitation and 'Conversations about Anarchism' training day in Dublin. The photo shows the problems attendees had already encountered in meetings they had participated in. How many of them have you come across?
The purpose of the training was to give people the basics of facilitation that can avoid or at least minimise these problems.
At the end of the training all the 11 people who had taken part were very positive about it. One said “It was good to meet new people, I learned a lot about facilitation and would now be more confident now, I also learned about anarchist process” while another said “It was very comprehensive with detailed techniques about how to facilitate.” Everyone said they would be interested in future trainings.
A Non-Exhaustive List of Facts about Denis O'Brien
Date: Tue, 2015-08-18 15:20
The wealthy and their media would like us to be forgetful.
Here is a non-exhaustive list of facts about Denis O’Brien...
Denis O’Brien is a media baron.
Europe Forged in Crisis: The Emergence and Development of the EU - discussion with the author
Date: Tue, 2015-08-18 11:33
"Although the EU is not new, and its role in determining the economic and political development of Europe is both substantial and well established, critical analysis of the EU is sorely lacking. Most of what is written on the EU is uncritically liberal and focuses on diplomatic and legislative detail. What little critical literature exists often simply interprets the EU in terms of the function it plays for neoliberal globalization. When analyses of the EU go from what it does to the larger questions of what it is and why it exists, analysis often becomes completely un-rooted."
Europe Forged in Crisis: The Emergence and Development of the EU - discussion with the author Oisin by Workers Solidarity on Mixcloud
Save on Child Care: Smash the Patriarchy!
Date: Tue, 2015-08-11 13:52
Child-care in Ireland is so expensive because it is so undervalued. Only through care-workers’ collective withdrawal of labour will those who rely on us realise how vital our work is.
Across the European Union, childcare costs around 12% of a family’s income, but in Ireland, it accounts for over 35% [1]. Where does that money go? With most childcare employees on minimum wage, it isn’t going to ordinary care workers. At a protest outside Leinster House in February, 2015, the Association of Childhood Professionals estimated that there are around 25,000 people in the early childhood workforce on an average pay rate of less than €11 an hour [2].
We defend Public Transport! (Of Irish Rail and EU Privatisation)
Date: Tue, 2015-08-04 14:20
As Iarnród Éireann’s contract for operating train services is due to expire in 2019, the National Bus and Rail Union claims that it will vehemently oppose any move towards privatisation [1].
In recent months, the EU Commission has been pressing for changes which would see Irish Rail opened up to tenders from competitors [2]. The successful operation of the Luas by French company Veolia has convinced EU officials that there would be sufficient demand by other investors for the rail contract [2].
Turkish state launches massive assault on Kurds under cover of finally tackling ISIS
Date: Thu, 2015-07-30 16:00
The cartoon on the left is from a few months ago but expresses how Kurds saw the role of the Turkish state towards ISIS and the conflict in Syria. Considerable evidence of support for ISIS from the Turkish state has been published in the international media over the last months. An ISIS commander told the Washington Post on August 12, 2014, "We used to have some fighters -- even high-level members of the Islamic State -- getting treated in Turkish hospitals."
This Sunday the Observer revealed details of a US Special forces raid on an ISIS compound. “One senior western official familiar with the intelligence gathered at the slain leader’s compound said that direct dealings between Turkish officials and ranking ISIS members was now “undeniable”.” Oil smuggling was what that ISIS leader was co-ordinating with the Turkish officials and ISIS were getting an “estimated $1m-$4m per day in oil revenue”
WSM locations
Date: Thu, 2015-07-30 15:48
This is a list of locations that the WSM often uses for meetings. That doesn't mean that we are there all the time or that all these meetings are open to anyone.
Belfast
The WSM often meets in the Réalta Civic and Social Space on King street.
Migrant seriously assaulted during Cloverhill prison riot - release Walli Ullah
Date: Thu, 2015-07-30 12:15
A disturbing feature of the prison rebellion in Cloverhill yesterday was that, if the prison is to be believed, a large group of prisoners took a fellow prisoner as a hostage seemingly because he was a migrant.
Up to 60 prisoners were initially involved in a protest in the exercise yard. 45 agreed to return to their cells while according to media reports "armed themselves with homemade weapons, including razor wire and goalposts" and took Walli Ullah, an asylum seeker who is being held in Cloverhill as a hostage and subjected him to a violent beating.
Irish Water fails EUROSTAT – we advance
Date: Wed, 2015-07-29 17:09
Eurostat, the EU statistics agency, will likely decide today that the Irish State’s spending on Irish Water will stay on the exchequer balance sheet. Since Irish Water has failed the market corporation test, money spent on it will be included in the annual deficit and national debt (as measured to meet EU austerity targets). This decision is likely to hold until 2017 [1]. It follows a European Commission report earlier this year which questioned whether Irish Water was ever likely to be self-funding.