Anti-racism

  • Sydney to rally against fear and racism

    PM Tony Abbott's desire to sign Australia up to the “coalition of the killing”, currently dropping bombs over northern Syria, is a gamble that current levels of fear and Islamophobia will indemnify his government.

  • Letter from the US: Black Lives Matter is demand, not a plea

    #BlackLivesMatter activists Marissa Johnson and Mara Willaford stormed the stage as Sanders began speaking and demanded an opportunity to address racial injustice. Seattle, August 8. There is a lull in the large mass mobilisations associated with the Black Lives Matter movement, but the campaign targetting racism and police brutality remains central to politics in the US.

  • Ecuador: Behind the 'Indigenous Uprising' against Correa — divided left weakens struggle for change

    Indigenous anti-Correa protesters. Ecuador’s President Rafael Correa is facing the most important challenge yet to his self-styled “Citizens' Revolution”. A range of indigenous groups, trade unions and leftist parties mobilised across the country on August 13. Their long list of demands included calls for land reform, opposition to mining, support for bilingual education and the shelving of the government’s proposed water and labour laws.

  • A look at Rojava's democratic, feminist revolution

    Rojava, the Kurdish-majority liberated zone in northern Syria, is the location of a unique experiment in grassroots, participatory democracy. It is undergoing a profound social revolution that emphasises social and economic equality, ecology, religious tolerance, ethnic inclusion, collectivity combined with individual freedom and, most obviously, feminism.

  • No charges for cop who shot 'skateboard-wielding' Black youths

    The white police officer who shot two unarmed Black youths in May in Thurston County, Washington state, will not face criminal charges, the Thurston County Prosecutor announced on September 2, because the youths’ skateboards were said to be “threatening” the officer. Prosecutor Jon Tunheim said that rather than charging the cop, whose bullets left one of the young men paralysed from the waist down, assault charges would be filed against the two men, Bryson Chaplin, 21, and Andre Thompson, 24.

  • Carlo's Corner: Cruelty battles idiocy in Team Abbott

    I am sure we all appreciate the federal government's bid to secure Melbourne's borders, but in the aftermath of its farcical Border Force debacle, I have a tactical suggestion. If you really want to catch visa violators, just invite Liverpool FC back to play another match at the MCG, then round up the 90,000 English visa over-stayers who rock up. In fact, once everyone is in, just lock the stadium's gates and you have yourself a brand new ready-made detention centre.

  • Behind ‘Border Farce’ are serious human rights abuses

    Within hours of the Australian Border Force — Prime Minister Tony Abbott's paramilitary amalgamation of the Customs Service and immigration department — announcing on August 28 that they would be joining the Victorian police and privatised public transport operators in Operation Fortitude to check the visa status of “anti-social” elements on the streets of Melbourne, hundreds of protesters had gathered at Flinders Street Station and social media had exploded in outrage.

  • Why Asylum seekers are begging Europe for help

    “Are we animals? Why? Why?”  Those were the words of one Syrian refugee to BBC's Channel 4 recently after Macedonian police attacked desperate families seeking entry into the country along the border with Greece.