Radio Autonomía: Zapatismo in the Bay – July 2015 Show (Rasmea Odeh)

This month we bring attention to Palestinian activist, Rasmea Odeh and her struggle against criminalization, incarceration, and deportation. Odeh, a former political prisoner in the occupied Palestinian territories, is currently facing criminal charges and deportation by the US government. The federal government claims that she committed immigration fraud when applying for US citizenship.

We bring together three segments that offer social and political context to Rasmea Odeh’s case. First we hear from Muhammad Sankari, member of the Justice for Rasmea Defense Committee, who sheds some light on Odeh’s political work in the US and the intersections of the carceral system and the “war on terror.” After, we hear Odeh’s speech at the 4th Incite! Conference that was held in Chicago. We hear Rasmesa speak of her experience as a political prisoner in Israel and her organizing efforts towards the liberation of Palestine. Finally, we feature an interview from a local community organizer, Sami Kitmitto of the Arab Resource and Organizing Center, who offers an broader understanding of the political landscape in which community organizers like Rasmea are being prosecuted.

Throughout the segments we hear how Odeh’s longstanding grassroots organizing work for Palestinian liberation has centered the lives of arab women and children in both Palestine and US. It is clear from the outpouring of support that she acts as a significant institution in her community.

During her time in jail, activist and scholar Angela Davis wrote the following about the significance of organizing for the liberation of political prisoners.

“One of the fundamental historical lessons to be learned from past failures to prevent the rise of fascism is the decisive and indispensable character of the fight against fascism in its incipient phases. Once allowed to conquer ground, its growth is facilitated in geometric proportion. Although the most unbridled expressions of the fascist menace are still tied to the racist domination of blacks, Chicanos, Puerto Ricans, Indians, it lurks under the surface wherever there is potential resistance to the power of monopoly capital, the parasitic interests which control this society. Potentially it can profoundly worsen the conditions of existence for the average American citizen. Consequently, the masses of people in this country have a real, direct, and material stake in the struggle to free political prisoners, the struggle to abolish the prison system in its present form, the struggle against all dimensions of racism.”

Rasmea Odeh is a survivor of Israeli colonial institutional violence. Davis’ words offer a framework from which we as community members must build a movement that takes leadership from those of us who experience the direct intersection of state-sponsored colonial-racist violence. Odeh, her defense committee and other community activists continue to challenge the legitimacy of the state’s attempt to detain/incarcerate and deport her. We must understand the significance of this struggle–the ways in which the state utilizes different institutions to target women, people of color, immigrants, and prisoners to break down our movements for self determination and autonomy.

Click HERE to listen to the complete interview

For individual segments click on the links below:

Muhammad Sankari of AAAN Interview

Rasmea Odeh’s Speech at INCITE! Segment

Sami Kitmitto of AROC Interview

Featured Music

“Ya Leil Ma Atwalak/ This Never Ending Night” by Rim Banna ft. Kari Bremnes

“A Letter from a Prison Cell” by DAM

“Somos Sur” by Ana Tijoux ft. Shadia Mansour

For more information about the featured stories, check out these resources:

Rasmea Odeh’s Defense Committee

Justice for Rasmea Facebook

Arab American Action Network in Chicago

Arab Resource and Organizing Center in San Francisco

Anti-War 23 Case Information

United States Palestinian Community

Radio Autonomía JUNE 2014 SHOW

AUDIOS are from the June 1, 2014 broadcast of Radio Autonomía: Zapatismo in the Bay on Berkeley Liberation Radio, 104.1FM, livestream at http://www.berkeleyliberationradio.net

 

In response to the escalating aggression against Zapatista bases of support in Chiapas, Mexico, we join the efforts of the dignified and rebellious people of the Bay Area who have organized themselves in order to condemn, in the strongest terms, continued attacks against our compañeros and compañeras in the south, and especially the recent assassination of Galeano in La Realidad.

Across the US, compas organized events as part of a week of action in solidarity with the Zapatistas, from May 18-24, 2014. As part of this Global Week of Action, several events were held in the Bay Area, and on our June show we share reports and audios from some of these actions, as well as discussing the recent communiqués and events from Chiapas.

 

AUDIOS

Report on La Realidad

Oakland Mitote Audio

 

LINKS

Radio Zapatista (various reports, audios, texts)

An Attack on Us All: US Call to Action

“Entre luz y sombra” Communiqué

“Fragmentos de La Realidad” Communiqué

“El dolor y la rabia” (VIDEO)

Revista Rebeldía Zapatista

 

 

 

May 22, 2014. San Francisco, California. USA: “The Zapatistas are not alone!” // 22 de mayo 2014. San Francisco, California. EEUU: “Lxs Zapatistas no están solxs!”

 

May 22, 2014. San Francisco, California. USA: “The Zapatistas are not alone!”

As autonomous community members and students of the Zapatista Little School from around the Bay Area, we gather today at the Mexican Consulate in San Francisco to demonstrate our dignified pain and rage while denouncing the murder of Zapatista schoolteacher Galeano, in the autonomous community of La Realidad, Chiapas.  We distributed flyers with information about what happened in La Realidad, and we expressed our rage with our rebellious cries and the noise of our pots and pans.

In response to the escalating aggression against Zapatista bases of support in Chiapas, Mexico, as the dignified and rebellious people of the Bay Area we have organized ourselves in order to condemn, in the strongest terms, continued attacks against our compañeros and compañeras in the south. The death of endeared teacher, Galeano, at the hands of government-backed paramilitary groups creates the imperative to build autonomous and liberatory social relations here in the Bay Area. As such, we will show our force in numbers and expose both the U.S. and puppet government of Mexico for the impunity and brutality committed against the indigenous people of the continent. We do so joining the countlesss of others who are demonstrating in cities around the world as part of a Global Week of Action in solidarity with the Zapatistas and in rememberance of our fallen compañero Galeano.

¡GALEANO VIVE!

 

22 de mayo 2014. San Francisco, California. EEUU: “Lxs Zapatistas no están solxs!”

Como miembros de diversas comunidades autónomas y como estudiantes de La Escuelita Zapatista, nos reunimos hoy en el Consulado mexicano de San Francisco para demostrar nuestro dolor y digna rabia ante el asesinato del maestro Zapatista Galeano en la comunidad autónoma de La Realidad, Chiapas. Repartimos volantes con información sobre lo sucedido en La Realidad, y manifestamos nuestra rabia con gritos rebeldes y el ruido de las cacerolas.

En respuesta al incremento de agresiones en contra de bases de apoyo Zapatistas en Chiapas, Mexico, como el pueblo digno y rebelde del área de la bahía nos hemos organizado a condenar en los términos mas fuertes, el escalamiento de los ataques en contra de nuestros compañeros y compañeras del sur.  El asesinato del querido maestro Galeano a manos de grupos paramilitares respaldados por el gobierno crea el imperativo de construir relaciones autónomas y liberatorias aquí en la área de la bahía. Como tales, representamos nuestra fuerza en los que están aquí pero también de los que faltan, para denunciar los gobiernos títeres de tanto Estados Unidos y Mexico por su impunidad y brutalidad cometida en contra de los pueblos indígenas del continente. Nos unimos a muchos otros quienes protestan en cuidades alrededor del mundo como parte de una Semana Global de Acción en solidaridad con los Zapatistas y recordando al compañero Galeano.

¡GALEANO VIVE!

Radio Autonomía: Zapatismo in the Bay – April 2014 SHOW

AUDIOS are from the April 6, 2014 broadcast of Radio Autonomía: Zapatismo in the Bay on Berkeley Liberation Radio, 104.1FM, livestream at http://www.berkeleyliberationradio.net

“Prostitute,” it’s the term often used by law enforcement and the general public to label women, men and transgender people in the sex trade, but on today’s segment we use the terms “sex worker” or “person in the sex trade” since these terms consider sex as labor and part of an economy. While there are varied definitions and terms to discuss sexual transactions, there has been a heightened focus on sex trafficking in social and popular media; from rumors about human trafficking at the Super Bowl to new television programs like “Slave hunter” where bounty hunters rescue and free victims of trafficking.

Perhaps one of the most damaging misconceptions today is the confusion between sex trafficking and sex work.  In fact, it’s this confusion that has led to the panic on sex trafficking and caused an increase in raids, policies, police violence on people in the sex trade AND those who are not involved the sex trade but are profiled as “manifesting Prostitution.” Sex workers want us to be clear about the difference between those trafficked and those in the sex trade: trafficking refers to people being forced against their will to participate in the sex trade, while a sex worker or a person in the sex trade refers to anyone trading sex for something of value. Sex worker organizers stress that this difference between the terms is very important since more laws criminalizing sexual transactions are producing unsafe environments for those who are NOT being forced against their will. The current panic on sex trafficking presumes that anyone involved in the sex trade is being exploited, and SWOP (Sex Workers Outreach Project in Arizona) says programs like Project ROSE, which stands for “Reaching Out to the Sexually Exploited,” are part of the problem.  In the following interviews we will listen to members of Sex Workers Outreach Project from Arizona and the Best Practices Policy Project discuss Project ROSE and the legal case of Monica Jones, one of the many people who have been arrested by police Project ROSE stings. And finally we will hear from coalition member of PROS who helped to repeal the discriminatory regulation that denied sex worker rape survivor’s victim’s compensation.

To listen to the audio from the show, click on the links below:

Full Audio

Leahjo Carmine of SWOP Phoenix

Kirby of Best Practices Policy

California Victims Compensation Campaign

For more information about the featured stories, check out these links:

Sex Workers Outreach Project – USA

SWOP – Phoenix

Support Monica Jones

Marissa Alexander

US Prostitute Collective

 

 

 

Radio Autonomía March 2014 Show

AUDIOS are from the March 3rd, 2014 broadcast of Radio Autonomía: Zapatismo in the Bay on Berkeley Liberation Radio, 104.1FM, livestream at http://www.berkeleyliberationradio.net

What does it mean to put learning in the service of liberation and autonomy? How does the everyday lives and struggles of a community influence our learning process? What does it look like to reclaim our humanity through collective and autonomous learning centers?

Modern understandings of education and learning uphold state sponsored institutions of education, this month we pay attention to the flourishing movement of creating counter-institutions of learning. From the Zapatista escuelitas to the barrios of DF, Oaxaca, and Oakland, communities are building autonomous centers that serve their needs and allow for different forms of learning to prosper.

In today’s show we have a conversation with local community member’s about their experiences attending the Zapatista’s most recent initiative the Zapatista Escuelitas. In a Feburary 2013 communicado SupComandante Marcos stated that the Zapatista support communities were tasked with giving non-zapatista students the “basic elements of neo-Zapatista history and […] struggle for democracy, libertity, and justice.” We also revisit a special segment by DJ Alita on the Biblioteca Popular Victor Martinez located in Oakland, and we continue our observation of this occupied community space through an in-depth discussion with members of the popular library. Little by little, we continue to learn by sharing our struggles and exploring the questions of how are self-directed and self-actualized community center’s disrupting state sponsored forms of education and learning? What role does learning take in creating autonomy?

To listen to the audio from the show, click on the links below.

Full Show

Interview: Zapatista Escuelita Students

Special Segment: Aug. 2012 Biblioteca Popular Coverage

Interview: Omar of the the Biblioteca Popular Victor Martinez

 

Links for resources mentioned in the show:

Enlace Zapatista

Biblioteca Popular Facebook 

Radio Autonomía: Zapatismo in the Bay – February 2014 SHOW

AUDIOS are from the February 2nd, 2014 broadcast of Radio Autonomía: Zapatismo in the Bay on Berkeley Liberation Radio, 104.1FM, livestream at http://www.berkeleyliberationradio.net

This month, we explore neighborhood organizing and everyday forms of uprising against gentrification.

Block by block, whole communities throughout cities worldwide are being displaced by neoliberal forces. Gentrification is used to explain the phenomena of displacing working class communities and communities of color from, mostly, urban centers. In the last 20 years, we have witnessed the reversal of the mid-20th century white-flight from US urban hubs. This month, we ask, what are the signs of gentrification? What is at stake when community members and neighbors are starkly divided by class, cultural and racial lines?  What does it mean to protect your block? How do we create another type of community, that is not mediated by capital and displacement,  but rather one that it’s fabric of relations is rooted in dignity?

Recently in San Francisco and Oakland, several activists have taken up the anti-gentrification tactic of preventing commuter buses, serving Silicon Valley-Tech workers, from going through their neighborhoods. By literally blocking the buses with their bodies, the activists are claiming a stake in the urban space where they live, work and struggle. Google, and other tech companies, as well as liberal city officials are arguing that these “tech-buses” are providing a service and benefit to Bay Area communities because it is more environmentally sustainable to have tech workers commute on a bus rather than having each worker drive to the Silicon Valley from San Francisco or Oakland. This argument, sounds all too familiar to the current arguments used in the displacement of poor indigenous communities by ecotourism efforts and multinational corporations privatizing natural resources throughout the Americas.

In the stories and interviews highlighted in today’s show we take on these concerns and emphasize the surge of local resistance; we will hear from activists carving out an autonomous cultural center in the heart of the monstrous city of D.F., we will be joined live in studio by community organizers of the Phat Beets collective to discuss some of their on-going efforts to resist the total displacement of working class communities of color from the white-and-green washing of the east bay; and finally, we will hear movement artist Boca Floja of Quilombo Arte, a trans-national and localized art-in-resistance project, present his latest literary creative project, “Prognosis; decolonial poetic exhale.” Join us in exploring anti-gentrification projects here and across the globe, while considering autonomist scholar John Holloway’s poignant question, “How can we create autonomous anti-capitalists, anti-state spaces or moments in the city?”

To listen to the audio from the show, click on the links below.

1. Full February 2014 Show
2. Interview with Phat Beets Collective
3. Boca Floja Segement
4. Interview with Colectivo Karakola

La Karakol@ culture and social center

For information about the featured stories, check out these links:

Phat Beets Produce

Boca Floja & Quilombo Arte

La Karakola

 

 

zapatista inspired mural

Film screening at La Karakol@

Radio Autonomía January 2014/ Enero 2014: Los 30 y 20 años del Zapatismo

Feliz año nuevo a todos y todas! En general, hacemos nuestro programa en inglés, pero para el primer mes del año nuevo, estamos haciendo un programa especial en español.

Hace pocos días, se celebraron los 20 años del levantamiento zapatista que sacudió a México y el mundo el primero de enero de 1994, con su grito rebelde de YA BASTA. Miles de compañeros y compañeras viajaron a Chiapas para participar en el segundo ciclo de la Escuelita Zapatista y acompañar a las comunidades autónomas en el festejo de este gran aniversario. Hoy en el programa también estaremos celebrando los 30 y 20 del Zapatismo, con una serie de segmentos relacionados al movimiento.

Empezaremos con las palabras de la compañera Gloria Muñoz Ramírez, de su columna Los de Abajo publicada el 4 de enero en La Jornada. Después continuaremos con una entrevista inédita con el Subcomandante Marcos, realizada en la Chiapas en marzo del ‘94, pero que no se difundió hasta esta semana, cuando los y las compas de Desinformémonos la publicaron en su página web. Después escucharemos una serie de entrevistas realizadas por DJ Pulga de Radio Autonomía, con varios colectivos en México que están luchando con rebeldía y dignidad en proyectos autónomos barriales, culturales, y militantes. Con estas entrevistas queremos reconocer el gran impacto que ha tenido el Zapatismo en México, donde los y las de abajo siguen luchando por la humanidad y contra el capitalismo, desde sus propias realidades y necesidades.

Haz click en los siguientes enlaces para escuchar los audios:

Audio del programa completo

Segmentos Individuales:

10/20/30

Entrevista con el Sup

Entrevista con Acción Directa Autogestiva (ADA)

Entrevista con Tinta Negra

Entrevista con Coordinadora del Valle del Chalko

ENLACES:

Los de abajo, Gracias al Zapatismo :: Gloria Muñoz

Tinta Negra

Coordinadora del Valle del Chalko Sitio

Rola la Lucha Zapatista

December 2013 Show

For our December show, we spotlight some of the dynamic interventions being led by students and young people in the US and Mexico. With the ever-increasing privatization and militarization of public institutions, students and young people are continually at the forefront of resisting incorporation into the neoliberal social order. They find themselves  working against the high costs of capitalist education and the repression experienced by the state.  The struggles highlighted here center questions of wealth distribution, the increasing criminalization of protest, prevalence of voter fraud in so-called democratic states and the capitalist appropriation of public education.

We end today’s show by wrapping up our conversation on land struggles from our November show. We want to highlight a project that grates against capitalist structures and imagines, at least through small fragments, another possibility for community regeneration. This is embodied through the work of compañer@s at the ethnobotanical garden in Cholula, Puebla, where relations with the land and people are based in respect, support and dignity.

Click here to listen to the Full Audio

For individual segments click on the links below:

Nov. 20th UC Worker Strike

Week of Action Against Wendy’s

1DMX 2012 Interview

1DMX 2013 Coverage

National Immigrant Youth Alliance

Entrevista con Dr. Eloina Pelaez

Son Jarocho inspired garden at the Jardin EtnoBotanico

Compost area of the Jardin EtnoBotanico (Vermiculture Compost, “Cold” and “Hot” Compost pictured here)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For more information about the featured stories, check out these links:

UAW 2865 – UC Student Worker Union

Reviving the Sympathy Strike Article

Regeneracion Radio

National Immigrant Youth Alliance

Jardin EtnoBotanico

Recording local flora

Seed Bank

Entrevista con artista Carlos Bautista

Durante nuestra visita a Oaxaca este verano, Radio Autonomía tuvo el privilegio de conocer a artista de grafica Carlos Bautista. Hablamos con Carlos acerca de su trabajo artístico y social, de vivir en comunidad en la sierra Oaxaqueña a la importancia de la tradición grafíca de México en la sociedad. Como uno de 32 artistas seleccionados para formar parte de una exposición en honor al artista político de impresión José Guadalupe Posada, Carlos compartió con nosotros sobre lo que informa a sus representaciones artísticas de la naturaleza y las relaciones dentro de la humanidad.

Entrevista

Para mas información sobre la obra de Carlos consulta su pagína aquí. Mas información sobre la convocatoria Posada Presente. 

“La raíz del cielo”, 110×60, xilografía, 2013.

“Conífera del cielo”, 110×60, xilografía, 2013.

“Ramas con dirección al cielo”, 110×60, xilografía, 2013.

UNDOCUMENTED & UNAFRAID: Interview with Dulce & Luis of the National Immigrant Youth Alliance

11/11/13 Interview with Dulce Guerrero & Luis Leon of the National Immigrant Youth Alliance

Click HERE to listen to the complete interview.

DULCE GUERRERO was born in Mexico and migrated to the state of Georgia along with her family at the age of two. Growing up she knew that the threat of deportation and family separation was real, but never imagined that it would hit so close to home. In January 2011, Dulce became involved in immigrant’s rights after a traffic violation landed her mother in jail. She is currently an Undocumented youth organizer and the Secure Your Own Community trainer for NIYA. From organizing walk outs, to stopping deportations and participating in civil disobedience Dulce has become active in defending the community which she has been a part of for the last 18 years.

LUIS LEON was born in Veracruz, Mexico. At 5 years old, his family moved to North Carolina where he lived until finishing high school in 2011. Not able to afford college due to his immigration status, Luis’ family decided that he would go back to México on his own and continue his educational career there. After he received the news that Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) was passed, he resolved to come back to the US and return to his home. In July of 2013 Luis got the opportunity to be part of the Dream 9. This group of undocumented youths, who had been deported because of their immigration status, attempted to cross the US border demanding to be let in on humanitarian grounds. Along with the rest of the Dream 9, he was detained and spent 15 days in Eloy Detention center. Through the organizing of NIYA and other organizations, he and the rest of the Dream 9 were released and allowed to return to their homes in the United States.

FOR MORE INFO:
http://www.theniya.org

http://www.dreamactivist.org/