Responding to a call from the NYC Anarchist Black Cross, communities across the so-called US and beyond are calling for noise demonstrations outside of jails, juvenile halls, prisons, and detention centers tonight. Click through for a long list:

https://itsgoingdown.org/noise-demos-across-na-2020/

As the smoke clears in Washington, DC after Trump supporters stormed the capitol building—some preliminary thoughts.

Today's events will discredit Trump supporters in the eyes of centrists, but it will also push the envelope regarding what is acceptable. This may help the far right recruit locally countrywide and could normalize similar actions in the future.

The state clampdown after this will suppress freedoms across the board, targeting all forms of dissent. In Turkey, when Erdoğan put down a right-wing military coup, that paved the way for him to repress every form of protest.

State repression of the right will follow the playbook they use against our movements—incorporating reformist elements while isolating and destroying "extreme" elements.

If the only pressure on the government is from the far right, the state will make concessions to them.

Proponents of liberation should not remain spectators, hoping the state will protect us. Let's use this opportunity to reach out to others in our communities to organize against local far-right efforts and also against forthcoming state repression and economic/ecological crisis.

Brown Berets call for a national day of action against ICE on January 20th

Further info: https://shepherdexpress.com/news/features/brown-berets-will-march-for-immigrant-and-human-rights/

#J20 #StopFamilySeparation #AbolishICE #AbolirICE

Why We Need Real Anarchy

https://cwc.im/RealAnarchy

Politicians have come together across the aisle to decry the storming of the Capitol on January 6 as “lawless,” “anti-democratic,” and “extremist,” going so far as to misrepresent the result as “anarchy.” The problem with the invasion of the Capitol was not that it was unlawful, undemocratic, or extremist, per se, but that it was an effort to concentrate oppressive power in the hands of an autocrat—which is precisely the opposite of anarchy.

Direct action, militant tactics, and a critique of electoral politics will remain essential to movements against fascism and state violence. We must not let the far right gentrify revolt, nor permit centrists to confuse the issue.

We may be entering an era when a variety of political actors will find it more strategic to be positioned outside the government, so as to avoid being discredited with it. Now that the state can no longer mitigate the effects of capitalism, people are bound to become more and more disillusioned and rebellious. Where left parties hold state power, seeking to pacify those who remain in the streets, it will be easier for right-wing groups to present themselves as the real partisans of revolt—as they have in Venezuela, for example. The insurrections of the past decade are sure to continue, but the important question is what kind of insurrections they will be. Will they put people in touch with their own collective power, setting the stage for the final abolition of capitalism? Or will they look more like what happened in the US Capitol?

In 2015, when SYRIZA, a far left party, won Greek elections on the platform of anti-austerity, we correctly predicted that they would fail and that, in their failure, they would pave the wave for a groundswell of far right movements. Looking back at our reflections just six years ago still feels helpful for thinking through the problems we face today:

https://crimethinc.com/2015/01/28/feature-syriza-cant-save-greece-why-theres-no-electoral-exit-from-the-crisis

The Signal encrypted messenger being down off and on today is a reminder not to put all of your secure communication eggs in one basket. Though Signal holds a unique place balancing popularity with a trusted security ethic consider diversifying your secure communications so that if Signal goes down you have another means of more secure communication.

One example would be creating adding your contacts in a fallback network in the Zom Mobile Messenger app which is a fork of the original TextSecure encrypted messaging system that Signal is also based off of. It offers end-to-end encryption in a easy to use UI. Instead of phone numbers Zom uses emails to create and find accounts.

Or if you’re worried about service crashing for your burner at a demo using the Briar encrypted mesh net app so you can communicate directly between nearby phones.