Socialist Alternative La Trobe | Political organisation
Socialist Alternative La Trobe
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22.01.2022 The Labor right on campus who control the student union has registered an "All lives matter" ticket at the same time as also registering an "Abolish the police, and Breonna Taylor" ticket to contest the student union elections this year. This puts the politics of the Labor party in full display. Registering a ticket like "All Lives Matter" encourages students to identify with this racist slogan that is being peddled by fascists and the far right, and makes the argument that p...eople should support it and vote for it. Student union elections are not simply to get elected by any means necessary its about making an argument about what direction the student union should take. What are the social justice issues it should campaign around and what should be the politics that drives these campaigns. The ALP have clearly chosen cynical opportunism and frankly their racism and right wing politics above all else. As the left we need to stand against this and all forms of racism. When we campaign under slogans like Climate Action, Refugee Rights, Bring Them Here, these are not just slogans for us these are messages we fully support, will campaign on, and want to fight for. Shame on the Labor right.
21.01.2022 Reading the headlines, you’d think Victorians were itching to end the lockdown and fill up the workplaces/morgues. But the lockdown measures have roughly 70% public support, it’s business owners that want to reopen. Bosses don’t care about ordinary people’s lives, they just want to get profits flowing again. Frustrated by their temporary inability to exploit workers, capitalists have started campaigning more openly to end the restrictions. And it’s not just the usual suspect...s in the Murdoch press parroting their bullshit, establishment liberal media outlets like the Guardian and the ABC are taking the bosses’ side. At the end of the day, ‘the ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas’ and mainstream media is always going to err on the side of bosses. For an unabashedly left-wing perspective on the covid crisis, check out: https://redflag.org.au/node/7376 And subscribe today to access the full digital edition and support Australia's leading anti-capitalist publication: https://subscribe.redflag.org.au
16.01.2022 September 26th marked the 6 year anniversary of the kidnapping of 43 students in Iguala, Mexico by corrupt police. The students had commandeered five buses to travel to a rally in Mexico City, but were stopped by police and handed over to a local cartel, where reports claim they were killed and burned. In the lead up to the anniversary, family members protested outside of Mexico’s supreme court, displaying photos of their missing sons and demanding justice. The mother of Jorg...e Anibal Cruz, one of the missing students, said on Thursday, as time passes, we are not going to get tired, we continue to demand the presentation of our children alive. Mexican authorities have long been complicit in the disappearance, failing to provide any information on what happened to the students. 6 years after the kidnapping, warrants have finally been issued for those involved, including military members, as well as federal and municipal police. The disappearance the students and the government’s attempts to protect those involved through lack of investigation exposes the nature of the state. But the dedication of their families to continue fighting this injustice is inspiring. Read more: https://www.theyucatantimes.com//six-years-later-parents-/
15.01.2022 Pro-democracy protestors continue to take to the streets of Thailand in opposition to Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha. Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators have shut down Bangkok and other cities, becoming the biggest challenge to the regime since the 2014 military coup. The new movement emerged following a rigged election after Thai authorities dissolved the Future Forward Party, who ran in the 2019 election in opposition to Prime Minister Prayut, the general who led the... coup 5 years prior. Protestors have three demands: dissolve the parliament, end the intimidation of the people and draft a new constitution. The movement has a long struggle ahead but the mass scale of the pro-democracy rebellion has ensured that things will never be the same. Read more: https://redflag.org.au/node/7427
14.01.2022 The Victorian Government is rapidly moving to a full reopening of the economy, arguing that it is now safe to do so because covid19 cases are extremely low. At the same time they have banned protests. The Daniel Andrews government has introduced a ban on groups of more than 10 people gathering for a common purpose. The NSW government had similar bans at the same time as thousands congregated in shopping malls beaches, footie stadiums, etc. We need to fight for the right to protest. The same political structure that gave way to the climate crisis we are in, the health crisis we are remains intact and we need to fight it.
12.01.2022 The modern state under capitalism is a means of maintaining the domination of the bourgeoise. The state emerges with the development of irreconcilable class antagonisms, and acts as a tool for the capitalist class to control the working class. The state is not a neutral body intended to mediate class interests, it will always be on the side of the bourgeoise. The power of state is ultimately limited by capitalist control of the economy, which enables the bourgeoise to rule ...without governing. Marxists argue that the state apparatus cannot be reformed, but must be overthrown and replaced by the working class majority. The abolition of the state is not something that can happen quickly, but is necessary to free the masses from class society. Read more: https://socialistworker.org/2008/07/22/state-and-revolution
12.01.2022 Over the past week, Ruth Bader Ginsberg’s death has caused a wave of widespread grief from the liberal left. But absent from all these glowing tributes, which praise her for bringing the feminist movement forward, are the things which Ginsberg did to uphold capitalism and racism in one of the highest positions one can hold within the American ruling class. During her long career Ginsberg openly supported Israel, donating money and accepting awards from the Israeli governme...nt, openly supported removing indigenous people off their lands to give these lands to oil companies, she claimed that the repression activist and ethnic groups have faced in the pasted was simply due to forgetfulness of past mistakes on the part of the US government and not because of the state’s need for repression to control the masses. Most recently she compared Colin Kaepernick’s peaceful protests of kneeling during the national anthem to flag burning, describing the protests as dumb, disrespectful and arrogant. While Ginsberg’s actions have improved the lives of ruling-class women, she has done nothing to improve the lives of working-class and oppressed women, and has destroyed the lives of millions. The left should not look up to figures like Ginsberg - her commitment to upholding the capitalist system and her position as part of the ruling class of America should be scrutinized. Read more: https://www.leftvoice.org/rbg-or-not-abolish-the-supreme-co https://blackhammer.org//7-ways-that-liberal-ruth-bader-g/
12.01.2022 Massive protests continue to sweep Thailand. Thousands took to the streets over the weekend demanding major democratic reforms such as the dissolution of parliament, an end to state repression, and an overhaul of the military-backed constitution. Students are leading the movement in defiance of the government and their conservative university administrations. And they’re drawing increasing support from young workers, with calls for a general strike on the October 14 annivers...ary of the 1973 student uprising. For background info on the pro-democracy movement, the military, and the monarchy, check out this interview with Giles Ji Ungpakorn, an exiled Thai socialist. https://redflag.podbean.com/e/the-resurgence-of-the-democr/
09.01.2022 Join us TONIGHT to discuss the latest development on US capitalism and what left wing activists should expect from Joe Biden. https://fb.me/e/1Im16AMro
09.01.2022 74 people have been arrested for anti-lockdown protests in Melbourne last Sunday when they stormed Queen Victoria Market followed quickly by riot police. While there are obvious reasons for which we disagree with what people were out protesting for, including the fact that many of the protesters were right-wing conspiracy theorists, there should be no debate that the left always supports the right to protest, and this is a right currently under attack. New South Wales is alr...eady seeing this, with hypocritical judgments being made on the fact that it is considered unsafe to protest outside with masks and adequate social distancing but nightclubs and restaurants are allowed more than 20 people inside at one time without masks, an activity that has proven to be more dangerous. Victoria may be set to follow with these same anti-protest measures post reopening unless there is a strong stance taken and fought for now, that the right to protest is a human right. Otherwise, there is a strong likelihood that the state will push for stricter police measures and state repression on all protests in the future. Read more: https://redflag.org.au/node/7369 https://www.theguardian.com//police-arrest-74-people-at-me
06.01.2022 For decades, at all levels of government, the policy of the capitalist class, and both major political parties, has been to slash and burn public assets, handing them over to private companies who run them for profit. Perhaps the most depraved example of this has been the privatisation of aged care facilities. The state has ceded responsibility of providing aged care to companies who are only out to make profit. From their perspective the bodies of the aged have been used up... over the years, and they can no longer be exploited for profit. Electoral politics in Australia has so far presented no viable solutions. The Greens distance themselves from the working class, who are the only class with the power to mount a serious resistance to capitalism. The Labor Party have long found a comfortable position inside the system and have betrayed the working class. Socialists have a solution which can bring together a worldview which can solve the great problems facing society, with the working class, who have the power to run society for the good of all, not just a minority of people with power. The class war has been well and truly raging for a long time. We must take the first steps to form up our own ranks. One of those steps can be establishing a genuine opposition to the functioning of the system within the local councils, and using those positions to organize our resistance. Read more about that project: https://redflag.org.au/node/7377 Another is equipping yourself with ideas an arguments to challenge the system by subscribing to RedFlag: https://subscribe.redflag.org.au/
06.01.2022 The latest edition of Red Flag is now available. Featuring: - 'The politics of the pandemic' by Louise O'Shea - 'Australia's history of fighting for civil liberties' by Sandra Bloodworth... - 'Restore the right to protest in NSW' by Josh Lees https://redflag.org.au/node/7359 Subscribe today to access the full digital edition and support Australia's leading anti-capitalist publication: https://subscribe.redflag.org.au
03.01.2022 Mass protests have returned to the streets of Colombia in response to the brutal police murder of an unarmed man in Bogotá. On the evening of 9 September, under the pretence of enforcing COVID-19 curfew measures, police repeatedly tasered Javier Humberto Ordóñez, a 46-year-old father of three, who later died in hospital. Within hours, protests and street fighting spread throughout the country’s major cities including Medellín, Pereida, and Ibague, as well as the capital Bo...gotá and continued for four consecutive days and nights. In response, police have killed 13 people and injured hundreds, as mobilisations continue. In many ways, the protests are a continuation of the anti-government mobilisations of late 2019, which directed their anger against police brutality and neoliberal policies that have impoverished the majority of Colombians. But the new mobilisations led by students and youth are also taking place in response to the government’s handling of COVID-19, which has led to 716,319 confirmed cases and 22,924 deaths, and one of the worst economic crises in the country’s history (July alone saw over 4 million lose their jobs in a country of 49 million people). This is Not a Country, say protesters. This is a Mass Grave With a National Anthem. Read more: https://www.leftvoice.org/this-is-not-a-country-this-is-a-m
01.01.2022 The climate crisis has arrived, and is demanding our attention with apocalyptic fires raging across the United States west coast. Wildfires in California and Washington have already set an annual record of acres burned, while Oregon faces the worst air quality on record. This year has seen unprecedented fires across the world, including our own backyard. Governments and businesses around the world claim solidarity with those fighting for the climate action without undertaking... any serious change. This is clearly seen in presidential candidate Joe Biden, who promises net-zero emissions by 2050 but has assured his platform won’t be stopping fracking, a major source of methane emissions. Serious and dramatic action needs to be taken to combat the climate crisis, and capitalism has proven it’s not willing to make that change. We need to work towards a society that puts human need over profit if we want to prepare and tackle the climate disaster. Read more: https://redflag.org.au/node/7380 Join the digital climate strike this Friday: https://www.facebook.com/events/238739667555735
01.01.2022 John Dewar and the LaTrobe administration are cutting courses in the Arts and Education faculties left, right and center. The courses on the chopping block include creative arts, Hindi, modern Greek, and Indonesian studies, as well as philosophy and planning and community development. Regional students will only be able to access an online arts course! This comes on top of existing sackings of thousands of staff, and remaining staff taking a pay cut in order to 'save jobs'. Clearly no amount of appeasement from staff or students will deter Dewar from his warpath. Come to this meeting to organize and plan our collective response - students and staff must fight back!
