This Is America #202: Report from North Carolina on Mutual Aid Efforts, Interview with ‘The Dugout’
Description
<html><body>
Welcome, to This Is America, September 27th, 2024.
On this episode, we feature an interview with an organizer with Rural Organizing and Resilience (ROAR) and two collective members at Firestorm Books, both located in Western North Carolina, who speak about organizing autonomous mutual aid relief efforts in the wake of recent hurricanes. We then speak with two hosts of the new anarchist podcast, The Dugout, and finally, we dive into the unfolding election.
All this and more, but first, let’s get to the news!
Living and Fighting
Resistance in solidarity with Palestine and against the continued war and genocide in Gaza continues, as mass protests, student walkouts, building occupations, and direct actions continued across the world.
Militant anti-war march in the streets of Montreal.
In Montreal on September 30th, as Clash MTL reported, a militant march hit the streets, breaking windows in a luxury shopping district, and fighting with police with fireworks and Molotov cocktails. As one report noted “…militants targeted Concordia University because of their refusal to divest from genocide and police brutality unleashed against students…”
Protesters stream into building in Claremont, CA.
In early October, hundreds of students at Pomona University in Southern California walked out in protest of the ongoing war and genocide happening in Gaza, taking over Carnegie Hall for several hours. The occupation and walkout is just the latest mass demonstration organized by students who this spring voted in a campus referendum for the university to disclose and divest from Israel. After the university refused, in April the students stormed and occupied the office of the president, leading to around 20 arrests.
In the bay area, “…[p]rotesters blocked entrances to a Lockheed Martin research facility…”, at Harvard students organized a “study-in” in solidarity with Palestine, at UCLA a demonstration organized by Jewish students in solidarity with Palestine was broken up by police and one person was arrested, and at the University of Minnesota, students in late October occupied a hall on the university campus. Read a statement here on the occupation, which ended in arrests and students being suspended.
In repression news, a heavily armed group of riot police raided the residential home of a students in Philadelphia, under the pretext of investigating minor pro-Palestinian vandalism that had taken place on the Penn State campus. No one was charged and no arrests were made. Read a full report on the incident in The Intercept here.
Autonomous anti-capitalist groups mobilize to block eviction in Montreal.
In tenant news, in Montreal, according to a report from the Anti-Eviction Brigade:
Yesterday morning, a precarious tenant in fragile health was to be evicted by a bailiff, following shenanigans by her landlord. The tenant had managed to pay their rent, but only by going into debt. She paid cash to the janitor, but the owner denied receiving the payments and dragged the tenant to court…[where the judge] ruled in favor of the owner.
After a few other equally dishonest misadventures, an eviction procedure was ordered…In response, more than thirty comrades associated with the brigade and from various anti-capitalist backgrounds through their organizations, came to oppose this eviction and show their support for the tenant.
The brigade managed to keep the bailiff at bay for the day, allowing the tenant to go to an important medical appointment and allowing her to get her first good night’s sleep in days. The landlord had promised that she could stay in her home until the end of October. However, the word of a landlord worth what it is worth, the bailiff evicted the tenant this morning. The brigade takes good note of this. Further details on this case will follow.
Autonomous activists in Montreal also took over a building for a community gathering of workshops and other radical events. See photos and a report here.
The Montreal Autonomous Tenant Union has also been busy organizing pickets demanding a rent freeze at one location, in Boston, MA, the local tenant union organized a block party, and in Sacramento, CA, the Sac Valley Tenants Union took part in a rally at an apartment complex organized by tenants to demand repairs following a fire.
Rally in Sacramento, CA by tenants demanding repairs following a fire at their apartment complex.
Meanwhile in Los Angeles, CA, locals of the Los Angeles Tenant Union (LATU):
…organized two back-to-back protests against gentrifying real estate companies who have been harassing elderly tenants in Highland [and…] Echo Park…For the second protest, over 100 tenants marched up a quiet street in La Cañada to confront [a] developer…
Locals with the Los Angeles Tenant Union hold rally against developer.
Service workers continue to organize and join the anti-capitalist labor union, the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW). In Portland, OR, workers at a Peet’s Coffee location have now joined the union, joining workers in the bay area at several stores who have also been organizing and holding demonstrations. Last week in Oakland, CA, IWW members held a in store protest “supporting a fellow worker in a disciplinary hearing.” Back in Portland, service workers at the Fried Egg also have been fighting and holding pickets against the targeting of IWW organizers.
IWW picket outside of the Fried Egg restaurant in Portland, OR.
Autonomous disaster relief efforts continue across Appalachia and the South in the wake of devastating hurricanes Helene and Milton. A recent “Palestine to Appalachia” caravan was organiz
United States
