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Category: Columns

1 Controled Entry — Imaginary Lines

February 1, 2014
by Comrade Black
· Columns · PE Web Zine · Uncategorized

by Comrade Black

Yesterday I crossed the colonial imaginary line which divides the stolen territory claimed by one colonial nation state from the territory of another. My experiences crossing the border haven’t been too extreme, but they are interesting in the context of class,and how it intersects with race and gender.

A few months ago while on tour with Layla AbdelRahim, as I went through customs the guard asked how long I would be in the country, then proceeded to ask “what kind of job do you have that lets you take an entire work week off?” I replied that I am on disability, at which point he looked away, gesturing dismissively with his hand to move along. A bit surprised I asked unsure “were you still going to search my bag?” (which was open beside me). Again, continuing to not even look at me he waved his hand in a manner suggesting to “get away from me.” I didn’t argue and proceeded to Seattle. Layla later joked that he must have been afraid he would catch my disability if he continued to interact with me.

Last night as I crossed through from Victoria again on way to Seattle to see Rod Coronado speak. This time I had a bit more trouble at immigration than the time before. I was one of the first

still dates in: Saturday Feb 1st Portland OR at PSU Student Union Room 238 7pm Sunday Feb 2nd Eugene OR at UO, room McKenzie 221 7pm Saturday March 1st Philly at Wooden Shoe Books and Records 7pm

in line in case there was any issues since I had heard horror stories from friends who had been interrogated for 6-9 hours when they tried to cross, so I wanted to be there early just in case.

The immigration officer this time was a woman of colour. She began with generic questions, and went to scan my passport, when her computer began having problems – so her supervisor – a white male- came to help. He was actually the same Immigration cop who processed me when I went through in October. As he was trying to help her with the computer, he asked why I was crossing; and as I said I was going to see Iron Lung and Despise You, he began talking to me about how much he liked metal, and the documentary Metal: A Headbangers Journey by Sam Dunn (a Victoria based metal head and film maker). He asked a bit about the bands I said I was going to see, and told me he once processed Lemmy crossing through on a flight at a San Diego border crossing. “He was an interesting guy” the cop told me enthusiastically.

Everything was going ok until the woman who was the original border guard asked what I did for work. I replied I was on disability. Suddenly she seemed to become hostile, and began asking how much money I had, if I had been asked for proof of Ties and Equities last time I went through, and so on. “So you don’t have much money for hotels, are you just planning to stay on the streets?” I told her 2 or 3 more times I had a friend putting me up. She continued asking if I had been arrested ever, to which I replied I hadn’t (even though I was a bit unsure if a few things would come up or not from when the Integrated Security Unit for the 2010 Olympics game was harassing me and following me, or when I was volunteering with SHAC Canada in 2006). to my relief nothing did and I continued to act as casual as possible. At this point she asked if I was ever arrested for drugs, to which I replied “no, I am actually what is called straightedge, I haven’t even smoked in 10 years.” Surprisingly to me, she didn’t drop the subject and persisted “have you ever received any treatment for your addictions?” and so on the questions continued.

The supervise was still near by, and came back over towards her, she told him she was concerned I didn’t have much money with me. “I don’t think there is any reason to deny him entry” he told her. So instead she gave me a controlled entry, which involved finger printing me, photographing, and telling me I had to return by the 4rth or else (what else I am not sure exactly).

How much did class, gender and race play into the outcome of this experience? I have to wonder if I hadn’t been a white male, if the supervise wasn’t also a white male, would I have been denied entry? On the other hand, if I hadn’t looked poor with my black patched cloths, tattoos and locked hair, and more so if told her I was on disability; would I have had so much trouble? Borders are an inherently racist construct; if I had told the guards I was coming over to see a Indigenous man speak about defending wildlife rather than to see some bands in a scene where one could safely assume they are likely white males – would I have been allowed to enter?

A year ago I was on welfare waiting for my disability application to be approved (and hoping it wouldn’t be denied). Until then, traveling wasn’t even a possibility I considered real. On $610 a month, I couldn’t even afford to put in the passport application, never mind ferry costs, bus, or food. The only travel I oculd afford was my thumb. The interplay of class, race, and gender – of privilege and oppression under capitalism; within a colonial civilization is complex and anything but just. My experiences were mild in comparison to what many racialized people and those who present in a way that is visually queer often experience, yet they served me as an interesting examination of power and privilege.

In the end I am reminded of a line by Crass ”
Are we really so dumb, so cowered into submission
That not only are we prepared to eat shit
We’re also prepared to say thanks for the privilege?”

1 R.I.P. David Finkelman

January 28, 2014
by Comrade Black
· Columns · News · PE Web Zine

When I was a lot younger and getting really into anarchp-punk, one of the biggest influences on me at the time was a little known band from Edmonton (where I lived) called Self Rule.

I still think they have one of the best names of all time. They were an explicitly anarchist band, most were straightedge (except one member who was still trying to quit smoking, and later did), I think all were vegan too. They were awesome live – with incredible energy, jumping 3 feet in the air during songs with multiple vocalists; but the recordings never translated as well. Anyways I loved them. They were one of my favorite bands.

When I first moved to Victoria, about the second day I was here I saw a poster for a show with Self Rule and Iskra, and a band I had never heard of called Mechanichal Separation. I Had just seen Self Rule a week before in Edmonton, so they were quite surprised when they saw me at the Victoria show at the Hillside house. It was a blast, and I met a lot of people at that show who have stayed my friends ever since.

Self Rule had a number of members come and go over the years, but really they were comprised of 3 people from the beginning, and the rest just came and went. One of those 3 was an Edmonton punk named Dave. a good guy all around, even if we didn’t always see eye to eye, I learned a hell of a lot from Dave.

Today I just heard Dave passed away. I don’t know how. I do know it is a loss to the Alberta punk community. I wasn’t really friends with Dave, we occasionally went for coffee years back at which time we would argue over bands, he would introduce me to new bands (many of which I still listen to), and I was a fan of his band (still am) even if every time I told him they played a rad show he would be like “really, I thought we sucked.”
So this is me sending my condolences out to his friends. I know he meant a lot to a lot of people. Dave was a good guy who contributed a lot to his community.

0 ReWild

December 7, 2013
by Comrade Black
· Columns · PE Web Zine · Radness

by Comrade Black

I hate cement
A concrete statement of the hatred of life
that your world is built on
Paved over earth
worms
life
Yet you cannot kill the wild
that grows
even under the pavement
habitual wildness
as civilization
cracks
A plant reaches for the sun again
Anarchy!
Uncontrollable
Feral
Wild
Life!

1 Fast Food Worker Strikes in a Southern Context

December 4, 2013
by Wingnut Anarchist Collective
· Columns · Uncategorized

by Mo Karnage in Richmond, Virginia

The South isn’t known for our good labor practices – and that might be an understatement.

In the Southern context labor has always looked different. Exploitation of workers has often taken a grim tone, slavery and coal mines being just two examples. I’m not giving yall Yankees or Capitalism in general an out here, both perpetuate a classist society, exploit workers out of greed, and generally benefit from the extra exploitation workers in the South put up with. But anyone from the South will tell you, exploitation down here has a different feel.

In the South, we don’t have a living context for unions- instead we have the “right to work”. The “right to work” laws are actually just anti-union and anti-labor laws with a deceptive name. While historically all states had extremely exploitative labor practices and anti-union laws, currently, the spread of “right to work” policies holds almost the entire South back in terms of labor organizing. This is just one way in which Southern workers have it worse than workers else where.

Unions have been so repressed that the work to build one is really complex. There is a lot of anti-union rhetoric out there, even to the point of being included in employee training videos by giant corporations. The economy has changed since the hey day of unions, and it is difficult to imagine what a union in the South would look like now.

Well, the Fast Food Worker’s are about to show everyone one way a union can look on Thursday, December 5th.

2 Never Been So Lucky?

November 9, 2013
by Comrade Black
· Columns · PE Web Zine

by Comrade Black

All my life people have been telling me how lucky I am.

There was a time in my life where I was jumped by 3 men, who held my head to the ground while one jumped up and brought his foot down; all over a hundred or so dollars. I tell people, and they tell me I am lucky. Oh so lucky to have survived. Or the time I was hit to the head with an aluminum baseball bat. So lucky.

If this is what luck is I wish I would quit getting it.

Recently I was approved for PWD (Persons With Disabilities) after years of struggling through the hoops of bureaucracy. Sometimes when I tell people this they reply “wow you are so lucky.” “I wish I didn’t have to work for money, and could get a BC wide bus pass, free camping, and ½ off at the ferries”

Yeah, lucky…

I wake up in pain, nearly every day. When I awake my feet ache from sleep, and my back is often sore too. I deal with crippling spells of fatigue that shut me right down. If I walk too long, or go up too many stairs my knees remind me of when that drunk driver said to the cops “no, I didn’t hit him, I just drove up and he was laying here.” At the hospital as I came back to consciousness the nurse said to me “You are pretty lucky… It was pretty stupid to be riding at night without any lights.”
Dumb luck.

I deal with 4 different conditions that each manifest as different forms of chronic pain, AS, fibramialgia, soft tissue damage to my knees, and migraines. At least one of them I was assured will only get worse throughout my life, and likely will cripple me permanently. Eventually. All products of poverty, and living in the disaster we call civilization.
but hey, its ok cause I get a free bus pass… Well, actually it is $45, but still, so lucky.

When I was a kid, I was bullied in school. Although bullied doesn’t even begin to describe it accurately. Terrorized would be more honest. Daily I would get my ass smacked, or my crotch grabbed, while I was called fag, tripped, spit on and they would destroy my locker so I had to carry my binders with me all day in my book bag. They even once tore my pants off my body, in half. Tore them right off of me, and laughed. I was suicidal until I was in my mid 20s, and still struggle with depression and anxiety. When I tell people these stories they often tell me “man, you are lucky you got out of there alive.”
Apparently choosing to hitchhike across the country and live on the streets to get away from there had nothing to do with it…
It was just luck.

I find the word luck dis-empowering.
Luck implies that fate or random chance of the universe just fell in my direction.
It takes away all agency, and neutralizes participation,
As if nothing I did had anything to do with why I survived, and even thrived despite it.
I don’t think I have been lucky, I have been unlucky. But I persevered, in spite of it.

My life has been a struggle, it hasn’t been easy. Sure, I wasn’t a child soldier, or sold into sex slavery, so many others have definitely had it worse – but that doesn’t undermine my own struggles and hardships.

I survived because I fought, and had the support of friends, allies, and community.
“You’re so lucky to have such a great community.”
No, sorry, I have to disagree.
I have community because we have put in the work to make it a reality.
To build and maintain those relationships which are important.
Community, relationships, they don’t just happen accidentally.

I once read a article about sexual assault, where the author meditated about how almost every woman she knew had bad it done to them
and she kept saying “I am the lucky one, lucky it never happened to me.”
Like the drunk driver who ran over me, or the people who assaulted me, the perpetrators in her story didn’t do anything, the women were just “unlucky.” Where the fuck is agency?

We live in a world, where species go extinct every day, where forest get paved, where women are prey, where most of the world (human) population lives in poverty. Yet we are constantly told we are lucky.

Fuck luck. We need action, compassion, and empathy.
We need to quit giving up our agency, and most importantly, to take responsibility.
And never be so lucky

1 Poisoning My Candy: Consumerism, Alcoholism, Patriarchy, and why I have grown to hate Halloween

October 31, 2013
by Comrade Black
· Columns

by Comrade Black

I use to love Haloween.
Now I despise it.

When I was a kid Halloween was by far my favorite day of the year. I have a distinct memory of the year I got chicken pox, I was 4 years old living in Ardrossen Alberta, and oh boy was I upset that I couldn’t go trick or treating with my older sister. She shared the candy with me, but it just wasn’t the same. Every year my mother would take me to the thrift store to find a cheap ski-suit, then come Halloween I would get on 2 pairs of long johns, don the ski-suit, and my mother would get out rolls of masking tape to cover me head to toe – I went as a mummy, with the help of mommy. And since I couldn’t bend my knees or elbows, I walked like one too!

As I got older, the costumes became more complex. My mother hand sewed me a Beetlejuice costume when I was about 12, and I spiked my hair for the first time (using green Halloween hairspray). I remember one year working for weeks with liquid latex to hand make a Halloween mask for my Lich costume (a Lich is like a zombie mage from D&D, what happens when evil wizards take a potion to extend their life at the cost of dying while staying alive so they can continue to gain more power). One year I went as the Devil, and even spent hours dying my skin red with watered down food coloring which stained for weeks, but looked awesome! Or there was the year I dressed up as a mafia guy, including a Tommy gun I spent week making, with a copper pipe barrel, coffee can magazine, and oak, hand cut and stained rifle butt. The cops pulled me over to confirm it wasn’t real – and of course to run my name for warrants – cause you know, they are assholes. That incident lead to its own humorous story, but I will tell that one another day.

Eventually I began setting up Halloween parties as a community event. This was really the first DIY organizing I ever did, years before I ever organized DIY all ages punk shows or anarchist bookfairs. I would rent a hall, get my (former) friend Pat to DJ, and my friend Yvonne to run the bar (this was years before I went Straightedge). People donated to get in, and the bar would usually break even, even after the costs of a liquor license and me setting the prices far below normal. The majority of attendees were people I played Vampire or D&D with.

The reason I loved Halloween so much as a kid, and even until I was a young adult, was that it was the one holiday where you could be dark, dress up scary, as something evil. Where you could embrace all the things normally frowned upon in this fake Christian and legalistic culture. It was the day the freaks, geeks, artists and picked on kids could shine. It was DIY, and encouraged youth to be creative, and use their imaginations. And it was the only holiday where you went out into the community, often with friends to meet your neighbors, and knocked on the doors of other people (who you would threaten with pranks if they didn’t give you candy). Every other holiday meant staying home with family to celebrate some weird depiction of a dead deity and gorged on dead animal carcasses. On Halloween, instead of consuming a carcass, you would try to create a costume that made you look like one! Halloween for me was the collective accumulation of everything missing from every other day of the year all wrapped up into one dark night. I was always drawn to darkness, just as I was always drawn to be creative.

But Halloween has been recuperated by the consumer capitalist mainstream and drunken party culture. Now it exists as nothing more than another excuse to buy more junk (made by children in a sweatshop in China), consume, and get drunk. Whereas the costumes of my childhood were mostly homemade, even if people occasionally bought a mask or the fake blood, or whatnot, there was always a DIY element to it; now the norm is to purchase your costume at the mall, 100% plastic shit, shipped from overseas, and throw it out the next day. Mom’s and dad’s no longer take their kids door to door in many cities, as the fear of poisoned candy and sexual predators has become so pervasive (even though no one has ever actually poisoned candy to hand out, and the vast majority of child molesters are family, close friends, or people given authority over the kids; not a stranger in the bush) that the new tradition for many parents is to drive their kids (in their gas guzzling SUV) to the mall where they go store to store instead of door to door, and managers or employees of corporations hand out candy along with promotional materials. Because as we all know, Corporations are far more trustworthy than the people who live down the street from you.

For young adults and teenagers, the new trend is a mix of sexist shit costumes such as “Slutty Nurse,” or “Breast Inspector” and the always popular cultural appropriation and other racist ‘costumes’ such as white people wearing blackface. And have you noticed the disturbingly sexualizing Halloween costumes being marketed for young girls these days? Costumes become more and more sexualized by the year, for both adults and children. From “Slut Shaming” to sexualizing children, the corporations who make and sell this shit have no problem profiting off of rape culture. Just as the bars have no issue with profiting of addiction, and binge drinking.

Then of course there is the Halloween candy, made of shit and chemicals that are toxic, glued together with processed sugar, and often containing the milk of abused cows or other products stolen from the bodies of animals which our species domesticated who live tortured lives in industrial farms and feedlots before being shipped to the slaughter house. This poison cocktail then gets wrapped in a couple sheets of plastic “to make sure it safe from contamination” before being shipped halfway across the world so you can give it to kids to ensure they become addicted to sugar. TRICK OR TREAT!

Even the horror movies have gotten worse, turning into movies that fetishize and sexualize torture for 2 hours straight.

Over the last few years I have pondered various strategies to try and re-appropriate what is left of the once very DIY and community oriented former Pagan holiday. As much as I am disheartened by what it has become, I still do see some hope in the darkness. The continuing popularity of the Halloween screenings of the cult classic The Rocky Horror Picture Show give me some hope, and honestly dressing up in drag and throwing toast in the air can be quite a blast! The overt queerness of Rocky Horror may be what has saved it from being appropriated and recuperated entirely by this consumerist and homophobic culture.

I use to see some possibility as well in November 5 – Guy Fawkes Day, before the iconic V mask became mass produced and adopted by the right wing Libertarians and conspiracy theorists who never bothered to read Allan Moore’s anarcho-antihero epic, nor taken the time to learn the real history of the Gunpowder Plot to blow up Parliament. But alas, I have given up on Guy Fawks day after burning only 1 effigy of Steven Harper.

And of course there is the Pagan revival, people going back the roots of Samhain. There is definitely something encouraging about people, especially settlers on stolen land, wanting to go back to their roots. The potential for decolonization is there. Yet I am not entirely sold on this either, as those pagan roots are often from cultures that have already engaged in the domestication of animals and plants, and worship warlike patriarchal gods, or gods who offer the control of nature for faithful servitude. Spirituality has also been largely recuperated by civilization and turned into an escapist retreat from taking action and creating change. Then there is the questions of cultural appropriation whether it is neo-pagan Wicca and reinvention of Samhain, or the appropriation of Día de Muertos.

Another thing I have attempted with limited success is to organize sober spaces that are alternatives to the drunken Halloween party culture. There is many people that can’t be in spaces where alcohol is, whether it is cause they are struggling with addiction, a youth who legally is not allowed into a space that sells booze, or someone who just doesn’t like being around drunks or doesn’t feel safe around them do to past experiences.

A new idea I had this year was to make posters which read in large text something along the lines of:
“GET TO KNOW YOUR NEIGHBORS
Halloween is suppose to be about building community
DON’T TAKE YOUR KIDS TO THE MALL
trick or treat & meet the people you live next to.”

Another idea I have played with is to make vegan treats, which may not be healthier but are a lot better than the toxic corporate crap candy most folks are handing out to trick or treaters. I have a simple recipe for Vegan rice crispy squares for example, and I thought if I was to make them with a note attached explaining who made them, why, and all the ingredients including a phone number and address to accompany my name; perhaps, just maybe, parents would let their kids actually eat them??? A connected idea to make this one work better, was to make a batch of Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies, using Sarah Kramer’s awesome recipe, in about august/September, and make a note with the ingredients that reads “hand made for you by your neighbor,” then take these door to door and hand them out for a few blocks, as a good opportunity to get to know the people who you share geographical locality with. This way not only do you meet them which can help build community, but also make them more open to homemade candy come Halloween.

The other type of strategies would be to find ways to use the current consumer culture and appropriate it’s energy for anarchist purposes. Thousands of people in the streets wearing generic disguises can offer a perfect smoke and mirrors type of potential for low level warfare against capital. Although with the enormous police presence and normalization of snitch culture amongst yuppies, there are some real risks to this. Alternatively one could try to use the trendy hipsters as a funding base for anarchist projects. Put on an event or sell something targeted towards pop culture (Zombie paraphernalia?) and use the money from it to pay the rent on your infoshop, to restock your punk distro, buy media or AV equipment, send to prisoners, or to cover travel to conferences, summits, or elsewhere for people who should be there but can’t afford it. There are many projects that are in constant need of funds in the anarchist movement. However, this strategy also runs into some risks of recuperation or wasting our energy on projects that don’t help further our own.

Halloween has been reduced from the night to creatively celebrate horror and the dead to a dead holiday where zombies dressed as in costume celebrate the death of creativity and consume the horrors of capitalist civilized reality. Is it time to bury this tradition? Or can transform into wild beasts and enact a séance to resurrect it from the death that is this modern reality called of civilization and destroy the monster called Leviathan?

3 Damien Inbred’s Column: Put Some Politics (back) In Your Punk!

October 21, 2013
by damieninbred
· Columns · PE Web Zine

First and foremost, my apologies for basically disappearing from the PE world in recent months. I hit a huge wall as far as writers’ block, and I was sort of stuck in my usual bout of self-doubt, self-loathing, and that sort of thing. The never-ending cycle of mental shit that I’m too [whatever] to look into.
But that’s not why I’m here today!

I’m here to ask a simple question of the DIY punk scene. What the hell happened? Why is it that in arguably the most horrific period of this generation, there is virtually no response from the youngest and least jaded punks? Have we as a subculture accepted defeat already? Has the political punk scene become so stale and reliant on old cliches that we cannot adapt to new challenges? Or has the stupid mindset of punk being “just music, maaaaan” taken over for good?

The world is absolutely fucked right now, and things are only getting worse. From rampant climate change, to reckless predatory capitalism. From Nobel Prize-winning presidents’ beloved assassin drone acceleration to Russia’s state-sponsored criminalization of an entire group of people. From the ongoing war of terrorism to the war on First Nations’ people in Canada. From rape culture to the scourge of fascism in Greece. And that’s just the first few examples from the top of my head. This is all right in front of our faces right now, and we’re fiddling while the planet burns.

In the last couple of years I’ve seen political discourse in punk drop sharply, as I’ve seen sub-sub-subgenre revival trends come and go. Instead of thinking about current or relevant issues to sing or write about, it seems that these revivalists would rather ape their beloved punk heroes word for word (or in the case of seventh-rate American raw-d-beat attak bands, even write their lyrics in broken English as a gimmick). After all, the fashion and sound is much more important than having anything relevant to say these days!

I’ve even noticed this apathy in the punk scene in the reviews section of Profane Existence! It’s become so rare that I see a review that mentions a band’s lyrics, let alone challenges a band on anything. Reviews are always the most boring part of a magazine (and yes, I still do reviews here), especially when they are nothing more than a short puff piece for a record. Maybe I’m alone here, but I think a review should cover more than just what a band sounds like. What are they singing about? What are the lyrics like? Is there something dodgy in the art or the lyrics? Let us know! Something strike you as amazing, or as horrible? Speak up! There is a major difference between Profane Existence and other major punk zines. Profane was founded as a blatantly political magazine and label. An alternative to punk scene apathy. A place for the anarchists and radicals to exchange ideas and listen to some killer tunes at the same time. If the anarchopunk community can’t rise above lazy apathy, what’s the point in continuing? We’re anarcho-punks for a reason. Anarchy still isn’t about hanging out on the internet and paying 600 dollars for an old record.

Am I calling for a “PC police” or whatever ignorant bullshit term is going to be thrown my way when this gets published? Give me a break. I’m far from perfect, and frankly I’ve never met anyone who isn’t. I love the DIY punk community, I love anarchopunk, and I hate the state of the world. We’re all in this for a reason, and we should all take a moment to think deeply about why we’re here. Do you give a shit? Or is this just another fashion for you? Have you ever stopped to consider any of this before?

Activism takes many forms, and you can still rock the fuck out while educating or making a difference. Punk can be a huge part of the revolution, as long as we let ourselves!

ENDNOTES:

-Doomed Society Radio still exists. It’s also growing, and becoming a label. I’m putting on a couple of benefit shows to help pay for the first release, which will be a much-beloved Canadian anarchist band. It will be co-released with their label and a couple of others. http://doomedsocietyradio.wordpress.com
-I’m not trying to alienate people with this column. I’m just sick of punks not challenging the status quo.

12 Oh shit, where you been and what’s that buzzin under your bonnet?

October 15, 2013
by stinkbot
· Columns

First off, how are you? It’s really been a while and I hope that everything is coming up roses for you and yours.

Just over a year ago I needed a break, and boy did I take one. I avoided all things Profane related and focused on my girlfriend, my son, school and work. Just before that point I’d had about a year of intense stress (all personal) and I was at the breaking point, so rather than let everything go to shit I took a sabatical and gave myself the time that I needed to recharge my internal battery. I think that it’s important to do that from time to time. Step away for a moment (or a year) and come back to what you love when you’re ready.

Now let’s get into it shall we? A couple of weeks ago I was hipped to the fact that Death in June was playing the Mezzanine in San Francisco. Not too shocking that the band is touring again, but I was annoyed at the fact that I people that I knew, and like were attending this bullshit. Now there are numerous debates on the internet about whether or not Death in June is a fascist/nazi band or not. I think the evidence is clear, that Pearce is a fascist sympathizer and an elitist xenophobe and members of Death in June have been involved in the National Front. The fact that DIJ uses fascist imagery is indisputable. Those arguing in his favor say its all shock, “the punks do it after all!”.

No. The early punks did it, for a little bit before it quickly (and rightly) became clear that using these particular images were not just annoying to those who fought in WWII, offensive and hurtful to people whose families were slaughtered, but using these images also drew in elements that truly held racist and fascist ideology and saw punk as a racist and fascist sub-culture and that punks could be coerced into joining the BNF or any of the Fascist goups in the U.S.

So though there was some use of fascist imagery in the beginning, there was a backlash from within the community. We stopped doing it and many punks started stating that they were anti-nazi, anti-fascist and anti-racist.

Death in June and Douglas Pearce in particular does not denounce the fascists who show up at his shows, not the “artists” like Boyd Rice, a self proclaimed nazi and total piece of shit and Tony Wakeford who was a member of the National Front, who have worked with Death in June, nor the boneheads (skinheads/nsm motherfuckers) who show up to DIJ shows. He won’t answer to his work for the Croation fascists during the conflict in Yugoslavia, and has pulled out of playing gigs upon discovering that they were anti fascist/racist.

Why is this important to me? I don’t listen to Death in June, Burzum, Skrewdriver, Rahowa or any of that shit so why is this important? Because punks, some of them people I consider my friends go to these shows. When I bring this up, I get simple excuses like “it’s all shock”, or they point out that Pearce was in Crisis and played some Rock Against Racism gigs. The worst excuses I heard were: “Pearce can’t be a facsist, he’s gay!” , or “I’ve met him, he’s very charming” and “When he’s in San Francisco he and his partner cruise the castro…” First, being gay does not mean you are immune from being an asshole. I know a lot of assholes who happen to be gay. Ernst Roehm, Hitler’s number 2 in the early days was also gay, and one hell of a fascist, hence an asshole!

See, the whole “since he’s queer he can’t be a fascist” argument don’t hold no water.

It’s time to get off the fence, you can’t waver about this sort of thing. If you go to the shows, buy the records and wear the gear, you are supporting fascism. In interviews he makes xenophobic statements about the poor and immigrants that he feared so much he fled his native england, claiming it had been soiled.”BRITAIN IMPORTED MILLIONS OF UNSKILLED LABOURERS FROM THE COLONIES FOR THAT KIND OF WORK AND LOOK WHAT A HUGE SUCCESS THAT WAS! THE HATRED IS BARELY RESTRAINED INTO THE OCCASSIONAL RIOT. I DON’T LIKE BEING IN A PLACE WITH SUCH AN ATMOSPHERE. EVEN GERMANY, THE FORMER RICHEST COUNTRY IN WESTERN EUROPA SEEMS TO BE TANGIBLY FALLING TO BITS. IT IS NO LONGER AS CLEAN AND AS WELL ORGANISED AS I REMEMBER FROM, SAY, 10 YEARS AGO. IT HAS BEEN FLOODED BY THOSE WHO WANT BUT, WITH LITTLE TO GIVE! THE WEST’S LIBERALISM WILL BE ITS DEATH.”– Douglas Pearce

Is this the kind of behavior you want to support?

I’m pissed because people don’t think that by buying a patch or a record that it’s making any difference. They want music not politics. Well, the two are combined. You can’t have one without the other and the money and support that you give these assholes go to support their causes, so while you may not want to support NSM or National Front groups, there is a good chance that you are giving them your money by buying records from New European Recordings, or DIJ in person. Certainly if you are getting their stuff online you are likely supporting a fascist or racist DIY label, because they do small labels and distros too. There is no excuse to supporting shit like this and so it has to stop. You have to make a choice, and if you choose to support bands and artists with sketchy politics, be ready to defend yourself. I’m calling on you to confront your friends when they do this shit. I’m calling on you to call out strangers when they do this. Don’t be afraid of the consequences because our silence is their greatest weapon.

Keep on truckin’

-bot

some source material…

http://www.whomakesthenazis.com/2013/09/queers-to-shut-down-death-in-june-in.html

http://libcom.org/library/death-in-june-a-nazi-band

0 Kerry King and Punk Rock Gangs…

October 10, 2013
by thrashpunx
· Columns

We grew up far from LA but when we were younger and had our “crew” many, including the local police, considered us a gang. Sometimes we might have even operated as one in just how we stuck together. We didn’t parlay in any illegal enterprise per se, we just kind of did what we wanted and were tight. We stood up for one another and to many that meant we were a gang…

A few years back we were on tour and were kicking it over at Rito from SMD’s pad and I was reading an issue of Razorcake that covered this very topic. The Suicidals, the TSOL crew and the Circle One gang. Basically they were all hoodlums looking for the next adventure but often times it got violent and punks fought punks. On this particular evening Mike from Circle One happened to be in the room and he was giving us some knowledge as he expanded on the stories I was reading. He confirmed what I had always heard…TSOL were the baddest mofos on the scene, they were the ones to avoid for fear of getting your head kicked in or at least getting your ass robbed.

Years ago I had a chance to interview Mike Roche from TSOL and I asked him a bit about their legacy as a gang. From his perspective they were just a bunch dudes that hung together, like my “crew” as described above, and didn’t really consider themselves a gang. They were petty thieves and hoodlums, there was nothing organized about they were doing. There certainly wasn’t any criminal enterprise other than some burglaries here and there to score beer and drug money alongside some basic vandalism.

The Decline of Western Civilization’ was on the TV and watching it with someone who was part of the scene at the time was an unreal experience. Circle One Mike narrated the entire movie like it was our own personal directors cut version or something. He corrected the names of venues, pointed dudes in the crowd out and explained that as much as the movie claims to be set in LA the real scene was in Orange County, LA was full of “art-punk” and the hardcore kids were all from the burbs…OC. With that much of the movie actually filmed in OC.

Kerry King from SLAYER seems like the type of dude that owns some assault weapons. I’m not getting into a gun debate here, just simply stating that I bet he owns some. He always wears military styled boots and those camo man-pris. I mean isn’t that just enough right there to draw the logical conclusion that he owns some semi-automatic weapons if not the fully automatic kind even? Of course it is!

Jack Grisham as the singer for TSOL was probably the gang leader I reckon. If a dude sings in a band and is in a gang he is the gang leader I also reckon. Isn’t the singer always the gang leader? Of course he is!

If you’re all hanging in SoCal, the greater LA area to be exact, it’s likely you might have crossed paths. Especially if your bitchen’ metal band covered some bitchen’ punk tunes by the other guys band. And if your son is some sort of wanna’ be gang banger dude and he crosses paths with the toughest motherfuckers in the punk-gang circuit it’s likely he might get his ass handed to him by the lead singer / gang leader. And if it goes too far your son might just become another gangland statistic. That’s means your offspring is dead and Jack Grisham killed him. Since you are Kerry King the next logical move is bust out some of that artillery you have and fill that punk-goth weirdo full of fucken’ lead. Time to light his ass up with a full clip from your AR-15!!! Die fucker!!!!

It seemed so real…So plausible…I even woke up thought about the events as they were understood and went back to sleep to explore this crazy ass story further.

The story that unfolded told the sordid tale of LA punk gangs crossing paths with pseudo Satanic metal dudes and their families. As it unfolded it became clear that Kerry King’s son was fucking around in some shit he had no business fucking around in. He thought he was quite the bad ass until Jack Grisham capped his ass and put an end to his fucking around. Kerry King was not going to let the death of his son go un-avenged so he grabbed some firearms, some banana clips, hunted that cold blooded killer down and lit him up like a fucking Christmas tree! “Take that punk!!! “ Yes, Kerry King killed Jack Grisham in a gangland shootout. Jack’s 9mm was no match for Kerry’s full on Satanic assault.

Now what the hell is that dream supposed to mean? Whew! I have some fucked up dreams…

Notes:

The ROAC record is almost done. We went back in to record one more song a couple of weeks ago. We got some sick as fuck cover art and a new logo. We are in business!
There has been an unusually high number of “punx” in the Denver area drinking Coors. This is unacceptable. Coors has ties back to the Ku Klux Klan and still to this day gives money to groups like Focus on the Family and other right wing groups. You vote with your dollar!!!! Punx have no business giving businesses like this their business. FUCK! Stand for something!
Check me and some of my friends out at www.thrashpunx.com

1 Pulled Sweet Potato Bar-B-Que Wraps

October 9, 2013
by Wingnut Anarchist Collective
· Columns · Uncategorized

by Mo Karnage

This is a dish I learned to make 6 or 7 years ago. Originally, to my knowledge, my friend Pablo invented this dish. But he never wrote down the recipe, and I have repeatedly re-worked it over the years. So here is my version, with thanks to Pablo. What’s great about this recipe is that you can make it and it will be vegan and gluten free and high fructose corn syrup free with no weird specialty foods needed. I’ve been cooking it a lot lately for family dinners at the Wingnut Anarchist Collective in Richmond, VA. We also recently made it with Food Not Bombs for an event we were catering. You can eat this plain, or in wraps with rice, or on bread for sandwitches etc. I personally prefer recipes with lots of room for customization.

Pulled Sweet Potato Bar-B-Que Wraps

Serves 4-6 people (depending on the size of the potatoes) (with leftovers duh yummy)

You will need: a cheese grater, knife, cutting board, pot, large frying pan, pot or rice maker, etc.

For the dish

4 sweet potatoes

2 yellow onions (or more to taste)

1 head of garlic

1 bag of spinach

1 pack of tortillas

3 cups of rice

vegetable oil

bar-b-que sawce – You can buy store bought sauce if you want. But I highly recommend making your own. Typically I don’t use a recipe for my bar-b-que sawce. I make mine from memory and taste as I go. And we all know bar-b-que is a helluva personal, important thing. North carolina style is very vinegary, other styles are very mole-asses or ketchup based. I combine them all for the best flavors. To make my bar-b-que sawce you will need

1/2 cup apple cider vinegar (I recommend Braggs) (other vinegars can work, I just prefer apple cider)

1/4 cup molasses

salt, pepper, cayenne, chili powder, bbq rubs, seasoning salt, garlic powder, onion powder

4 tablespoons whole grain mustard

1 small can tomato paste or more if you like a super tomatoey sawce

water

ketchup w/out high fructose corn syrup – not necessary if you use more tomato paste or like a more vinegar based bbq

Step 1- Put rice on, however you prefer, stovetop or rice maker. You can pretty much use whatever type of rice you prefer for this as well. Go wild.

Step 2- Start shredding the sweet potatoes on a cheese grater. You are making shreds of sweet potatoes, similar to hash browns, and resembling pulled pork bar-b-que. Shredding potatoes on a grater is hard work and can make your arm super sore. Trick a friend into doing it! (they’ll be happy to have helped when they get to eat it)

Step 3- Dice the 2 onions and garlic to taste, put in a sauce pan with some oil to simmer.

Step 4- Once the garlic and onions have started to carmelize, begin to add in the other sauce ingredients. How thick, how spicy, how sweet, how vinegary your sauce ends up is up to you. Keep tasting it as you let the sauce simmer. Add ingredients as you see fit. If you have and bbq rubs or similar spices you might want to add those too.

Step 5- Put all your shredded pulled sweet potato in a frying pan with some vegetable oil and start frying it. Once its about half way as soft as you want the potatoes, add in the bbq sauce! You want to have enough sauce to keep all the sweet potatoes well lubed. If you realize you made too little sauce you can always bulk the sauce up as you go, throwing in more vinegar/molasses/ketchup/etc. Just keep tasting it and try to keep it to the ratio you like. If you make lots and lots of yummy sauce you can have extra for people to add to their wraps as they prefer.

Step 6- Once you have the rice and sweet potatoes cooked, assemble burritos with raw spinach, rice, and bbq in tortillas. Or eat it however you like. It is very deeelicious.

Variations- add tofu cubes or carrot shreds into sweet potato bbq mix. Or use jalopenos in the sauce, with the potato pulls, or raw in the wraps.

Hope you eat up in good spirits with good company and use the energy to do positive things!

Step 7- Smash the patriarchy and tear down capitalism!

Page 4 of 10

The legendary crust classic is now available once again!

We are happy to announce our next new release

WILT – “Self Titled”

Here is a track from the upcoming LP

“Sermon for the Bootlickers”

Category: Columns

1 Controled Entry — Imaginary Lines

1 R.I.P. David Finkelman

0 ReWild

1 Fast Food Worker Strikes in a Southern Context

2 Never Been So Lucky?

1 Poisoning My Candy: Consumerism, Alcoholism, Patriarchy, and why I have grown to hate Halloween

3 Damien Inbred’s Column: Put Some Politics (back) In Your Punk!

12 Oh shit, where you been and what’s that buzzin under your bonnet?

0 Kerry King and Punk Rock Gangs…

1 Pulled Sweet Potato Bar-B-Que Wraps