Edinburgh Anarchists

RBS – Give us back our fucking money
VisionOnTV present a stunt almost as barefacedly cheeky as Fred Goodwin’s pension heist.

Need cheering up after the last 24 hours’ parade of brutality and ignorance. This is Mark Thomas at the Put People First rally last Saturday.

Where's Bonnie & Clyde when you need them?

So RBS are sacking 2300 workers to pay for the bonuses of their bosses and the speculation division in the City of London.

This is making people angry, unsurprisingly. Us anarchists usually get stick for being extreme and violent. But who’s this discussing the return of the guillotine for bankers? Economists on the BBC, that’s who (via BoingBoing). Strange days.

With all the talk of “worst economy for a 100 years”, there is some cheer. Classic Depression-era songs like this one are now copyright expired, meaning you can do anything with them. Here’s Woody Guthrie singing “Pretty Boy Floyd”:

Well you say that I’m an outlaw, you say that I’m a thief
Here’s a Christmas dinner for the families on relief[...]
Now as through your life you travel and through your life you go – o
You will never see an outlaw drive a family from their home

…is kind of difficult. I don’t know anyone involved and don’t know people who know people who are involved. The media is painting it as purely “anti foreign worker” but 200 Poles joined a walkout in Plymouth.
And then the BBC pulls this nakedly propagandistic stunt. Watch this 30-second video if you think that its reporting is fair and impartial.

“Quotes from News At Ten and Newsnight (half an hour later), Feb 2 2009. The striker’s quote is edited in the News At Ten segment to make it appear as if he does not want to work alongside foreigners – to justify an editorial claim that the strike is xenophobic. In the fuller Newsnight report, it is clear that he is saying that he _cannot_ work alongside them, because they are segregated.”