Category: Communique

For statements and reportbacks regarding certain actions of events. Usually submitted to us.

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#TexasFightBack Press Release

Submission from campus antifascists, including members of the Autonomous Student Network, Solidarity 6.04, and United Students Against Sweatshops

UT students call on Austin to protest Katie Hopkins
British white nationalist encouraged Europe to meet migrants with “gunships”

On Tuesday November 13, UT students and greater Austin residents will gather outside UT’s Patton Hall to protest white nationalist Katie Hopkins’ scheduled speech. The UT chapter of Turning Point USA is hosting Hopkins, who is known for her extreme anti-migrant and Islamophobic rhetoric. Hopkins has advocated for the use of “gunships” against refugees entering Europe and a “final solution” for Muslims. In 2017, she collaborated with Defend Europe, a white supremacist organization with ties to the Ku Klux Klan.

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No Platform For Feds!

An Anonymous Submission

This week, job recruiters from the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) will speak to students with disabilities and student veterans. According to the Services for Students with Disabilities (SSD) website, CIA recruiters will offer informational sessions and one-on-one advisory sessions for interested applicants. Concerned students will wonder why the CIA is openly recruiting on a bustling college campus. In fact, colleges have become prime poaching grounds for federal agencies looking to bolster the surveillance state that is now commonplace in the so-called United States and beyond.

College campuses were once radical nerve centers that led disruptive actions against the Vietnam War and other atrocities. Post 9/11, they have been tamed by predatory organizations such as the CIA and the US military. Colleges feature a steady flow of international intellectuals, malleable minds, and relative anonymity. The intellectuals provide key information about the health and strength of rival states. Flexible and eager students, especially younger ones away from family for the first time, are vulnerable to manipulation by ruthlessly trained recruiters. And at a campus like UT Austin, a probing face in the crowd can do a lot of damage.

The presence of the state’s eyes and ears makes everyone less safe. Far from friendly, and even further from scrupulous, CIA agents are responsible for massive destabilization campaigns across the world. And under the vaunted liberal values of diversity and inclusion, the CIA is not only allowed but encouraged to recruit from various student communities, such as those receiving services from SSD. Apparently, they need more token members to prop up their reputation.

UT members concerned about autonomy and freedom from the state’s apparatus of surveillance and murder should be gravely concerned about the CIA’s presence on campus. It is up to us to send the message that feds and their ilk are NOT WELCOME in any capacity.

Editor’s note: The recruitment session described above will occur on September 27th in the Student Services Building.

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Austin Goes #AllOut: Autonomous Antifascists Assemble

Submission from a few black flags

#AllOutATX was the final act in a month of struggle against fascism in central Texas. While the ongoing Occupy ICE San Antonio encampment faced attacks from Patriot Front, local police, and the FBI,this marked the final event of #AllOutAugust, which had been a series of successes from Portland to D.C. in which antifascists defeated far-right forces, often facing brutal clashes with the police who defend them. On the 18th, attention from across the nation was on Austin. Jennilyn Kae Lohmer-Salinas, one of the main organizers of the nationwide marches “against far-left violence,” hails from the area, and Austin was one of the first cities to announce such a rally. In the days leading up to the event, the doxxing of some supporters by an independently set-up honeypot site along with internal conflict resulted in the cancellation of multiple rallies and a fracturing of fascist forces. Locally attention was also focused on this event as it promised to be a test of the strength and future potential of both fascist forces and new autonomous antifascist networks in the area. Below is an account of the events of the day and reflections on how we could have conducted ourselves better. 

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SeaSol Backs Tenants Against Mega Landlord

Submission from Seattle Solidarity Network (SeaSol), originally published on their blog.

This article is published in solidarity with comrades in Seattle organizing a tenant campaign against American Campus Communities. As they fight against ACC’s practices in their community, we offer our support and solidarity against the housing monster which lives in our own backyard.

After months of targeting and harassment by the landlord, tenants from American Campus Communities (ACC) have organized an association and executed the first of many visible actions. With help from SeaSol ACC tenants held an informational picket attended by 30 tenants and community supporters on Saturday, June 30th from 11 am to 1 pm in front of ACC’s flagship building Hub in the University District. Tenants from ACC first got in touch with SeaSol in April to seek help in their fight against their massive new landlord. Over the next few months we assisted tenants with door knocking, community outreach, and putting together their first association meeting earlier in June.

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¡Viva La Huelga! Report-back from San Antonio’s Cesar Chavez March

This is a report-back submitted to us by The Autonomous Brown Berets de TejAztlan, SATX chapter.

 

Editor’s note: On Saturday, March 24th, The Autonomous Brown Berets de TejAztlan, SATX chapter, attempted to disrupt the local Cesar Chavez march, which had become nothing more than a liberal parade that failed to uphold Cesar’s politics. In particular, they were protesting the parade’s collaboration with the police (i.e. the strikebreakers of the ruling classes) and their refusal to endorse a boycott of an exploitative agricultural corporation, a direct affront to everything Cesar Chavez fought for.

 

We are republishing this report back in order to break the media silence around what happened yesterday. Despite numerous journalists with cameras taking photos of the disruption and the police repression it encountered, not a single news outlet even mentioned the protest or its content in their articles. We in Austin know too well how the police will silence stories and keep their media contacts in line, so that nothing that serves as bad press for the cops will make it onto a story. We encourage all who read this to share this article, spread the word, to recognize who the cop collaborators & enemies of the people are, and to discredit those who would seek to use Cesar Chavez’s image in service of exploitation and oppression.

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Barbarians at the Gates: A Statement From the Vandals (2017)

In April 2017, a wave of vandalism struck frats across West Campus over the course of three nights. Frats were tagged with “racist” and “rapist,” among other slogans. Fiji, which was targeted the first two nights, held a racist “border patrol” party in 2015. A study published in March of 2017 found that 15% of undergraduate women on UT campus reported being raped. Actual statistics are believed to be much higher. 

The anonymous statement republished here was originally sent to It’s Going Down, which made the acts even more notorious across the country. The graffiti came near the end of a year marked by student struggles against fascist activity on campus, the University’s failure to address racism, and other issues. The University, ironically, tried to make use of its (at the time) new hate & bias incident policy to investigate the vandalism. Shortly afterwards, the piece was again thrust into the spotlight as fraternities and the alt-right tried to connect the May 1st, 2017 stabbings at UT with the vandalisms (and by association all “antifa” and leftists). 

Three years later, almost to the day, the Kappa Alpha Theta sorority was tagged with “Eat the Rich.” We host this article to keep alive the memory and intergenerational spirit of insurgency against Greek Life. You can find online readable and printable zine versions of this statement HERE.

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NAVIGATING OUR WAY OUT: REPORT-BACK FROM J20 DEMONSTRATIONS IN AUSTIN, TEXAS

Originally published by the Autonomous Student Network at UT. This report-back from the Inauguration Day protests is offered on our site as a critical snapshot of a moment in autonomous activity in Austin. This report-back marks an attempt to forge an anarchistic pole in a moment rife with conflicts between groups over tactics, ideology, and police collaboration. This is also offered without an endorsement of the Maoist groups mentioned, but as a snapshot of a moment of tenuous (and temporary) unity between certain anarchists and Maoists in Austin. 

On January 20th, students, workers, and radicals of all stripes—mainly Maoists and anarchists—took to the streets to inaugurate Trump’s regime with renewed militancy. For some, the day began early with a strike by fast food workers and members of Austin Socialist Collective and Fight for 15. Slightly later in the day came some of the most visible protests. A student walkout had been planned for 12:15, scheduled to meet in front of the UT Tower. While some student organizations were setting up for the event, members of the Revolutionary Student Front and Autonomous Student Network rallied in West Campus a few blocks away from the university and took to the streets with a group of about 20 radical students. With multiple megaphones, banners, and flags displaying anarchist, maoist, and anti-capitalist slogans, they grabbed the attention of students and set the tone for the day’s events as they marched down Guadalupe blocking traffic, and with NO police presence around to respond and parade them down the street.

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Navigating Our Way Out: Report-back from J20 demonstrations in Austin, Texas

Originally published by the Autonomous Student Network at UT Austin

On January 20th, students, workers, and radicals of all stripes—mainly Maoists and anarchists—took to the streets to inaugurate Trump’s regime with renewed militancy. For some, the day began early with a strike by fast food workers and members of Austin Socialist Collective and Fight for 15. Slightly later in the day came some of the most visible protests. A student walkout had been planned for 12:15, scheduled to meet in front of the UT Tower. While some student organizations were setting up for the event, members of the Revolutionary Student Front and Autonomous Student Network rallied in West Campus a few blocks away from the university and took to the streets with a group of about 20 radical students. With multiple megaphones, banners, and flags displaying anarchist, maoist, and anti-capitalist slogans, they grabbed the attention of students and set the tone for the day’s events as they marched down Guadalupe blocking traffic, and with NO police presence around to respond and parade them down the street.

Continue reading “Navigating Our Way Out: Report-back from J20 demonstrations in Austin, Texas”