This is the (almost) weekly newsletter that will inform you about the activities of 15M movement in Barcelona, Catalonia and occasionally the main events in Spain.
1. “Let’s get rid of them, together we can” 50 cities against the financial dictatorship 2. A week of non-stop protests in Barcelona 3. Public health care system alternative: 2 cooperatives in Barcelona Continue reading “Barcelona #15M Newsletter 40: General Revolt”
“You, the latest representative in Spain of the band of drunks, pimps, idiotic, brainless, bastards, nymphomaniacs and vagrants that over the centuries have shaped the Bourbon royal line.”
For these words the prosecution asked 15 months in prison for the crime of libel to the Crown for the retired Colonel Martinez , from article he wrote in 2011.
After his arraignment, Martinez had some words for the press. “I came out of respect for the law, not for these judges. I have not committed any crime, because, apart from military, I’m a writer and historian who has the right to freedom of expression. I have not slandered the head of state, or even care, I just want him to go. ”
In the Hall of the Central Criminal Court, the trial continued without witnesses or accused. The prosecution has maintained its request for conviction for “libel and slander to the Crown”
Victims of pedophile priests “break” in the Vatican conclave
From the United States, Mexico and Belgium, victims of pedophile priests “broke” in the debate surrounding the conclave to require that certain prelates are not considered to become the next pope, having covered or minimized the sexual abuse scandals in the Church.
“If the Church elects a new pope whose balance in combating pedophile priests is poor, it means that nothing has changed,” he told AFP James Salt, director of Catholics United Association (Catholics United), who called “All cardinals splashed by the caucus scandal to apologize.”
Present and active for several days in Rome, the U.S. network of victims of SNAP issued a “black list” of 12 papabili who urged not choose for inaction, including two of those listed as favorites: the Canadian Marc Ouellet and Italian Angelo Scola. Continue reading “Victims of Pedophile Priests crash Vatican conclave”
Civil liberties activists in Germany and elsewhere are taking a novel, and militant, approach to CCTV culture. A new game dubbed ‘Camover’ has taken the country’s cities and the internet by storm. The premise? Get a group, a catchy name, then black-block up and decommission street cameras in whatever inventively destructive fashion you like, from axes to lassoes.
Bizarrely, considering the general anti-camera focus of the hi-jinks, the trashings are being filmed and shared on the net – where they are compared and scored. Points are given for each camera smashed and for the originality of the method, leading commentators to claim a new era of militancy where reality-gaming meets activism.
The first round ended in February but new games are spawning
The game originated in Berlin, where anti-CCTV feeling has been brewing in the radical circles. Attempts at more standard protest, including a small march and film showings, made little impact, so a black bloc took to the streets one night to take more shady direct action. Now participants are getting in on the game from Finland, Greece and the US.
As one Camover blog put it, “In the supermarket, in the university, at work, in the tram or in the ATMs – we hate them all. We are not interested in feeling “safe” and we don’t want them to stop crime.”
And from the Finnish: “During the last weeks we have blinded several CCTV-cameras around capital area of Finland. CCTV-cameras are important part of social control against people. It’s about power and control, and not about peoples values and rights. It’s about turning us into slaves and fearing authorities. But we can defend ourselves against the state and against corporations and take away Big Brothers sight.”
from SchNEWS, The free weekly direct action newsheet published in Brighton since 1994 – Copyleft – Information for Action. | Part of Issue 838 | Print Friendly Version
The spokesman for the Platform of People Affected by the Mortgage, Chema Ruiz, criticized Spain’s economic model that defends banks and leaves people with a huge debt, that of being unable to pay their home mortgages.
This situation has meant that there are six million empty houses in Spain while 400,000 families have no place to return at the end of the day.
Ruiz reiterated the need for efforts to ensure that housing is a right rather than a commodity, and that called people to fight against evictions rather than suicide.
He also demanded a moratorium on evictions, a foreclosed law retroactively applied and also toi form a public park in social rented housing.
And from the Finnish: “During the last weeks we have blinded several CCTV-cameras around capital area of Finland. CCTV-cameras are important part of social control against people. It’s about power and control, and not about peoples values and rights. It’s about turning us into slaves and fearing authorities. But we can defend ourselves against the state and against corporations and take away Big Brothers sight.”
The Free 