Archive for the ‘Fourth International’ Category
For What Died the Daughters and Sons of Róisín?
A prominent Irish politician, Sinn Féin President Mary Lou McDonald, recently congratulated the English monarch for sitting on her Elizabethan throne for 70 years. This is behaviour we usually associate with Gombeens. Diarmuid Breatnach writes a brilliant exposé of Sinn Féin’s current policies.
https://rebelbreeze.com/2022/02/15/british-queens-long-service-to-colonial-imperialist-war/
The word Gombeen comes from the Irish language :
A term of contempt dating from the years of the Great Hunger to describe capitalists who are happy to use the colonial system to amass personal wealth at the expense of their compatriots; its source is in the Irish language (an gaimbín/ gaimbíneachas — https://www.dictionary.com/browse/gombeen).
The war is over. The Gombeens triumphed 100 years ago. Luke Kelly of the Dubliners asked :
“For What Died The Sons of Róisín” – and today, in 2022, we ask “For what Died the Daughters and Sons of Róisín”? The words of Kelly’s poem should should raise the hair on the back of your neck.
Ukraine – Left without a voice, anti-war Russians pen open letters to Putin
Anti-War activists in Ireland and other parts of the world should extend solidarity to anti-war activists in Russia. A remarkable report comes to us via Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières (ESSF).
http://www.europe-solidaire.org/spip.php?article61107
See Also https://fourth.international/en/566/asia/418
Highlighted Extracts
Many of the more than 150 signatories are well-known in Russian intelligentsia circles : leading activists, artists and intellectuals who in recent years have formed a small but vocal minority against the Kremlin’s increasingly repressive politics.
More surprising was another anti-war letter published shortly after. It was signed by Leonid Ivashov, a retired colonel general widely known as a saber-rattling nationalist with anti-Western views.
Then, on Sunday, another voice joined in — Yabloko, a small, liberal opposition party that has been sidelined from mainstream politics. As U.S. officials warned an all-out war could begin any day, the party said it would be gathering signatures against the war online and at its offices throughout the country. A day later, the online petition had some 4,000 names.
Tomás Ó Flatharta
Tomás Ó Flatharta was the first known Irish supporter of the Left Opposition to the Stalin-led Bolshevik Government in Russia, in the 1920’s. He is pictured here with comrades
William F. Dunne, T.J. O’Flaherty (Tomás Ó Flatharta), William (Big Bill) Haywood, and James P. Cannon together in Moscow from Labor Defender. Vol. 1 No. 8. August, 1926. Frank Little Memorial Number.
Thanks to Des Derwin for the information.
Public Meeting – Uprising in Kazakhstan
Uprising in Kazakstan
Zoom meeting ‒ Report, Questions & Answers, Discussion
Zoom meeting, Saturday, January 22nd, 10am PT / 6pm UTC / 19h CET Ainur Kurmanov, Socialist Movement Kazakhstan – with a report, Q&A and discussion. Sign up at → tinyurl.com/uprising2022
Public Meeting- Solidarity with the Kazakhstan Uprising
Please sign up here to get the login details for our Zoom meeting with Ainur Kurmanov (Socialist Movement Kazakhstan), with reports, Q&A and discussion on Sat, Jan 22, 10am PT / 6pm UTC / 19h CET.
https://tinyurl.com/uprising2022
Since January 2, the uprising in Kazakhstan has offered an inspiring chapter in the global revolt against oppression, endemic poverty, and yawning wealth inequality. We are excited to hear from Ainur Kurmanov from the Socialist Movement Kazakhstan about the background to this uprising, recent developments, and the fight for working-class power.
While different factions of the old regime are trying to exploit the anger and unrest, the striking oil workers and miners provided a glimpse of working-class power. We stand in solidarity with all the people arrested, protesting the hundreds of killings that reportedly took place at the hands of an armed Russian intervention and brutal state repression.
This meeting is organized by AntiCapitalist Resistance (England and Wales), ControCorrente (Italy), ecosocialist.scot (Scotland), Internationale Sozialistische Organisation (Germany), Lernen im Kampf (Germany), Reform & Revolution caucus in DSA (USA), Republican Socialist Platform (Scotland), Russia’s Socialist Movement (Russia), RISE (Ireland), SAP ‒ Antikapitalisten (Belgium).
Aufstand in Kasachstan
Veranstaltung mit Ainur Kumarow
von der Sozialistischem Bewegung Kasachstan
Internationale Online-Veranstaltung
am Samstag, 22. Januar 2022, 19 Uhr
auf Russisch und Englisch
Mitveranstalter:
Anti*Capitalist Resistance (A*CR, England und Wales),
ControCorrente (Italien),
ecosocialist.scot (Schottland),
Internationale Sozialistische Organisation (ISO, BRD),
Lernen im Kampf (BRD),
Reform and Revolution ‒ Caucus in the DSA (R&R, USA),
Republic Socialist Platform (RSP, Schottland),
RISE (Irland),
Rossiskoje Sozialistitscheskoje Dwishenije (RSD, Russland),
SAP – Antikapitalisten (Belgien)
Bitte hier anmelden:
https://tinyurl.com/uprising2022
Uprising in Kazakhstan ‒ Zoom meeting
Please also consider signing our international statement of solidarity with the uprising in Kazakhstan, https://tinyurl.com/KazakhstanSolidarity
Solidaritätserklärung auf Deutsch:
https://sozialismus.ch/international/2022/internationale-solidaritaet-mit-dem-aufstand-in-kasachstan/
Kasachstan: Farbrevolution oder Aufstand der Arbeiterklasse? Interview mit Ainur Kumarow
https://sozialismus.ch/international/2022/kasachstan-farbrevolution-oder-aufstand-der-arbeiterinnenklasse/
Internationale Sozialistische Organisation (ISO), Sektion der Vierten Internationale in Deutschland
iso@intersoz.org
www.intersoz.org
http://facebook.com/intersoz.org
For a democratic and socialist Kazakhstan! Stop the intervention, release the detainees!
An interesting statement signed by a number of Russian fighting-left organizations is below. Source : https://internationalviewpoint.org/spip.php?article7477. See also https://tomasoflatharta.com/2022/01/15/public-meeting-solidarity-with-the-kazakhstan-uprising/. And for more information, read this blog https://kazakhsolidarity.wordpress.com/
For a democratic and socialist Kazakhstan! Stop the intervention, release the detainees!
Mass protests have been going on in Kazakhstan for several days. The detonator of the uprising was the rise in prices for liquefied gas, but it is obvious that the contradictions, which eventually led to a social explosion, accumulated in Kazakhstan for years.
At the moment, the protesters are forming their own self-governing bodies, in some cities administrative buildings and offices of law enforcement agencies have been taken by storm.
Read the rest of this entry »Solidarity with the uprising in Kazakhstan
Solidarity with the uprising in Kazakhstan
This is an excellent initiative. Organizations and individuals from many parts of the globe – including five members of the Dáil in Dublin and elected representatives from Belfast and Derry, along with trade unionists, socialists, feminists and left public representatives” in other countries. Hopefully more people and organizations will endorse this statement, and stimulate the building of a mass movement in solidarity with the people of Kazakhstan.
There has been a rapid and strong response to the circulation of this Kazakhstan solidarity statement. Very close to 200 signatures in almost 40 countries were collected in the space of just two days, with many prominent individuals and organisations.
For more information read this blog https://kazakhsolidarity.wordpress.com/
Statement issued 12 January 2022.
Sources :
Solidarity with the uprising in Kazakhstan
http://www.europe-solidaire.org/spip.php?article60687
We, socialists, trade unionists, human rights activists, anti-war activists and organisations have watched the uprising in Kazakhstan since 2 January with a sense of deep solidarity for the working people. The striking oil workers, miners and protesters have faced incredible repression. The full force of the police and army have been unleashed against them, instructed to ‘shoot to kill without warning’. Over 160 protesters have been killed so far and more than 8,000 have been arrested.
We reject the propaganda of the dictatorship that this uprising is a product of “Islamic radicals” or the intervention of US imperialism. There is no evidence of that whatsoever. It is the usual resort of an unpopular regime – to blame ‘outside’ agitators.
Read the rest of this entry »How the Russian Left Survived in a Post‑Soviet World. : Ilya Budraitskis, Translation : Giuliano Vivaldi
This fascinating history of the fighting left in Russia since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 is recommended to readers of this blog.
The author, Ilya Budraitskis, is a leader of the “Vpered” (“Forward”), Russian section of the Fourth International, which participated in the founding of the Russian Socialist Movement (RSD) in 2011. This article was spotted on this blog : https://anticapitalistresistance.org/how-the-russian-left-survived-in-a-post-soviet-world/
This article originally appeared on the global dialogue website and can be located here.
Long Read
After the demise of the USSR on December 26, 1991, the Russian left had to find its place in a society transformed beyond recognition. In the face of huge challenges, its activists have led important struggles against the system established by Yeltsin and Putin.
The story of the modern left movement in Russia begins in the late 1980s, during the era of perestroika. From the very beginning it carried a contradictory combination of two political tendencies of the late Soviet period: popular (anti-market, statist) Stalinism and democratic socialism; nostalgic idealization of the USSR and criticism of it from the left. These political tendencies entered the public political arena in the late 1980s, and immediately found themselves on opposite sides of the battlefield dividing supporters and opponents of Mikhail Gorbachev’s perestroika.
Read the rest of this entry »Improving Science Literacy – And Supporting Mass Vaccination to Fight CoVid-19
This blog offers two very good quotations and an illustration to act as a helpful political and personal guide. Origin of the quotations? I do not personally know the authors. I wish to thank a Greek comrade, Kostas Skordoulis, who started the relevant Facebook discussion. The cartoon is just brilliant.
No. Most lay people don’t have the tools to “question the science”. They are just deluding themselves. Just look at any flat earther video. The emphasis should be on improving science literacy so people can learn to identify media misrepresentation of studies, or how to spot weak or obviously flawed studies, or to follow trustworthy sources, instead of thinking they are some modern day Galileo.
Rupture magazine: Issue 6, Winter 2022
Special feature: Home sweet home Green gaffs for all, by Nicole McCarthy & Des Hennelly Mica & the fight for 100% redress, by Kiran Emrich The …
Rupture magazine: Issue 6, Winter 2022
Special feature: Home sweet home
- Green gaffs for all, by Nicole McCarthy & Des Hennelly
- Mica & the fight for 100% redress, by Kiran Emrich
- The North’s housing crisis, by Amy Merron
- Expropriate the big landlords, by Nelli Tügel
Features:
- Fascism & the algorithm, by Méabh French
- “Learn from each others’ struggles: Interview with Laurence Cox, by Brian O’Cathail
- Tax haven Ireland – the inside story, by Brian O’Boyle
- Feeding an insatiable monster: Data centres in Ireland, by Diarmuid Flood
What is to be done?
- The feminist challenge to traditional political organising, by Penny Duggan
- Keep it in the ground, by Sarah Frazer
- Permanent revolution: Myths, reality & relevance, by Sami El-Sayed
- Lighting the way: Transitional demands & the struggle for socialism, by August Thalheimer
Rupture Regulars
- The Tipping Point by Jess Spear
- Lesser-spotted comrades: Walter Rodney, by Emma Finnamore
- Gaslighters, Ghouls, and Gobshites, by Des Hennelly
RUPTURE is produced by RISE, a network within People Before Profit. Paul Murphy TD, Dublin South-West is a member. https://rupture.ie/. See also : https://www.letusrise.ie/
Tomás Ó Flatharta 