Continue reading “VisiononTV at the Rebellious Media Conference: What’s wrong with the tradtional media?”
Category: politics
Two meetings on reclaiming the media
Update: Following these two successful meetings – and also raising the issue at tonight’s NUJ Claudia Jones lecture, I’ve set up a new mailing list and will discuss setting up a follow-up discussion and planning meeting with NUJ colleagues. Stay tuned for further details.
The roots of Cable Street
Following the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Cable Street, it is important to remember not just the day itself, but where it came from. The most important thing about what happened on that day was how the other major East End community – the largely Irish dockers – came out in solidarity with the Jewish community in Whitechapel. The roots of this solidarity lie in the strikes of the Great Unrest period more than 20 years before.
For the record – I supported the clean-up operations
Readers of a certain blog on a certain newspaper site might have gotten the false impression that I was against the post-riot clean-up operations in London. On the contrary, I promoted plans for Tottenham on Twitter, started early collecting abandoned shopping trollies on Wednesday morning en route and then, alas, found that it wasn’t possible due to the police cordon still being in place on Tottenham High Road. By Thursday, the area had pretty much already been cleaned up by the Council.
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Riot criminality is a product of consumerism and social breakdown
Commentator after commentator, from politicians to journalists, is blaming the recent chaos in London and beyond on “criminality”. What does that even mean? Crime is a product of social conditions, not a thing in and of itself. Recognising that people smashing, looting and burning are committing crimes is not an explanation – of course they’re criminals, what they’re doing is against the law.
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The truth about anarchism
Event: Busting the Myths – learn the truth about anarchism, 7pm, Thursday 11 August, University of London Union, Malet Street, London.
Speakers: Donnacha DeLong (chair), Chetna Yuvraj, student occupier, Andy Littlechild, RMT activist,Zoe Stavri, activist with UK Uncut and Andy Meinke, activist in the Legal Defence and Monitoring Group and Freedom Press worker.
Will work for – a reasonable sum based on my skills and experience
I thought this would be a little bit easier, to be honest. Having taken redundancy last year and returning to university to do a Masters, I didn’t think I’d still be sitting here, nearly August a year later, without work.
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Unasked questions about Murdoch’s influence
The Labour Party got a lot of mileage from David Cameron’s refusal to give a straight answer in Parliament on Wednesday. Watching minister after minister ask him whether he had discussed the BSkyB during any of his meetings with representatives of News International, I was struck by the unasked question.
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My piece in the Guardian on News International and the NUJ
I’ve written a new piece for the Guardian, which you can read here: The NUJ could have saved the News of the World
I’ve also done a playlist of trade union songs if you want to listen to some radical tunes, which you can watch on Youtube.
Continue reading “My piece in the Guardian on News International and the NUJ”
My Open Democracy piece
Before I go to bed, here’s another plug for my piece on Open Democracy – Unions, why not harness the power of the media? It’s got everything, a bit of syndicalist history, a look ahead to J30, slagging off Labour as well as the Condems and a call to arms to the media to improve their communications to the public. Enjoy!
