Pinko Postcards

2006-08-16T23:09:00.000+02:00

>>> BARCELONA >>> NUEVA YORK >>>

Given the already obscene amount of time I spend chronically attached to a computer, I've been debating whether or not to ween myself off of occasional blogging. Put down the laptop, Lucas, and enjoy your surroundings. So this very post could mark the timely death of Pinko Postcards, which was after all intended to reflect on my days in voluntary exile. We shall see...

Nine glorious months in the Barcelona area came to an end last week. It wasn't an easy decision, but ultimately I opted to return to the hustle and bustle of NYC. Even with all the excitement of seeing old friends and hitting up my favorite spots in the City, I already miss comrades back in Spain. Despite some of the linguistic barriers that made it difficult at times to deepen my relationships with certain people, I've never had a better network of fun, generous and politically engaged friends than I did in Terrassa/Barcelona. It was an honor working with the gang at the Ateneu Candela. I hope that many of them can scrape some change together to come visit me in the States. That said, I do feel that Spain is now a second home of sorts, one I feel I could rather easily reinsert myself into later down the road. And having a Spanish/EU passport certainly makes that an attractive option.

A recap of the month: Clemens arrived in Barcelona on July 18th and we immediately headed to the coastal city of Alicante for the International Union of Socialist Youth 2006 World Festival. There we joined some 4000+ young activists from virtually every corner of the planet (though, as always, these events are entirely too Eurocentric). Got to see friends I'd met previously in Paris, Vienna and at Queer Easter in addition to meeting amazing activists from Colombia, New Zealand, Ireland, Argentina and the like for the first time. Spent the better part of the week camping out in tents, chatting up delegations, and snatching posters to give to folks at YDS events.

The IUSY Festival was especially important for me to get a reading on actually existing social-democracy and the state of left-wing youth organizing around the globe. As someone who has been conditioned to focus on the shortcomings of party-oriented, center-left politics, it was refreshing to hear folks on the left of their organizations grapple with these limitations in an honest and principled fashion.

Also dedicated much of my time to the LGBT Working Group activities, speaking on a panel about same-sex marriage, leading an meandering discussion on the relationship between socialism an queer politics, introducing an event with Louis-Georges Tin, President and founder of the International Day Against Homophobia (he's the super sweetie sitting next to me in photo at left) and speaking on a panel in another thematic area about the role of religion in society.

After the Festival was over, spent a lovely week with Clemens (and much of the Austrian crew) back in Barcelona. Following that, moved in with Mick, Mauro, Miriam, Juan Carlos and a certain Italian bloke for my last week in Spain. Mick, I must say, is one of my favorite people on the planet, and not just because we could kvetch, scheme and humor each other in English. Beautiful people all around, and it was nice to spend my final days with them (nudey beach alcove with friends = highlight / slogging around Barcelona with a broken sandal and Spaniards who always lie about "just one drink" = lowlight).

Back in NYC I'm living with Clemens and Bowie at their apartment in Harlem until I score a place of my own. Also shopping around for lefty jobs. Promising leads on both fronts. This past weekend I helped out with the YDS conference (at left) where we voted to focus much of our organizational efforts on immigrant rights.

All in all, if feels good to be back. Now to chip away at right-wing hegemony with home court advantage.

2006-06-25T21:06:00.000+02:00

NEWS FROM THE EURO CARAVAN FOR FREEDOM OF MOVEMENT

I've mentioned here before some of the groups I've been working with focusing on immigrant rights and challenging the current border policies of Spain/EU. This weekend several months of coalition efforts and strategic planning culminated in the 2nd European Caravan for Freedom of Movement. You can read a bit of the political rationale for the mobilization here (I did the English translation, though they botched the formatting a little).

I've been spending the past few days chatting with activists that came to Barcelona for this unique set of events from Slovenia, France, Italy, Germany, the UK, and several other cities throughout Spain. Friday was mostly focused around a conference/presentation style set of discussions taking place in a large artist/circus performer squat.

On Saturday a group of 100 Caravan participants gathered together at 9am in a radical social center to make final preparations for the morning's direct action targeting a massive immigrant detention facility that is currently under construction. I was in the "safe" group that was in front of the facility while the others crept around back. I won't go in to too much detail because you can read what went down below. The short end of it: 59 folks are in jail now, including a few friends of mine. We had a press conference and a solidarity rally out in front of the jail this evening, but things aren't looking good at the moment.

In addition to the morning action, there was also a sizable demo yesterday that snaked its way around Barcelona. You can see the banner I made with a few folks from the Ateneu Candela in the article below. That protest was followed by a free concert that I was just too exhausted to attend.

In the comments section in this post, I will later describe some of my reservations about what transpired (the police slander in the article is not entirely inaccurate), the demands of the Caravan and some of the positive outcomes as well. And now if you can read Spanish, the following is from one of the many papers that carried the story.

Arrestan a 59 personas por ocupar un centro de inmigrantes

La Caravana Europea por la Libertad de Movimiento se ha manifestado en Barcelona. (Foto: EFE)

BARCELONA.- La Policía Nacional ha detenido a 59 personas que ocuparon de forma pacífica el nuevo Centro de Internamiento para inmigrantes de la Zona Franca de Barcelona, que se prevé abrir este verano.

Entre los detenidos figuraban dos reporteros gráficos, uno de TVE y otro de Europa Press, José Luis Asensio y Lago López, respectivamente, que ejercían sus tareas profesionales durante la 'okupación'. También un redactor del semanario 'La Directa', para el que el juez ha admitido el "habeas corpus" que había presentado.

Los cámaras quedaron en libertad a primera hora la noche de este sábado. López, que ha estado maniatado durante más de cuatro horas, ha destacado la ausencia de violencia. Deberá comparecer en el juicio que se celebrará por esta causa, aunque todavía desconoce si en calidad de acusado o de testigo.

La reivindicación realizada en la Zona Franca formaba parte de una serie de actos de la segunda Caravana Europea por la Libertad de Movimiento. Cuando los 'okupas' entraron en el centro, desplegaron pancartas de denuncia donde reclamaban el cierre de este tipo de centros y reivindicaban la libre circulación de las personas y su derecho de permanencia.

Poco después de ocupar las instalaciones, todavía en construcción, agentes de la Policía Nacional entraron de forma "agresiva", según denunció un portavoz del colectivo 'okupa'. En el interior del centro, ubicado en la calle D sector C, los policías rompieron el micro de la cámara del periodista de TVE y retuvieron al cámara de Europa Press.

Posteriormente, una treintena de agentes de los Mossos d'Esquadra acudieron para reforzar la actuación de la Policía.

"No utilizamos armas de fuego"

Según señaló la Policía en un comunicado, sobre las 11.50 horas los 'okupas' se introdujeron en dependencias policiales de la Zona Franca por diferentes vías de acceso. "Una vez dentro, han cortado los cables del circuito cerrado de televisión y han pretendido ocupar las obras del Centro de Internamiento de Extranjeros".

"El personal de seguridad que en esos momento se ocupaba del control de los accesos de las dependencias, al verse superado notablemente en número de ocupadores, prefirieron, a fin de evitar daños irreparables, no utilizar sus armas de fuego y esperar refuerzos", añade.

En menos de dos horas detuvieron a la mayoría de personas que habían accedido al recinto, según la Policía, "no se han producido daños reseñables en las instalaciones ni se han registrado lesiones, ya sea por parte del personal del CNP o entre los alborotadores".

Según los primeros datos facilitados, las 59 personas detenidas son de diferentes nacionalidades, la mayoría con "semejante estética 'okupa' y corte anarquista y radical, simpatizantes de algunos detenidos en operaciones policiales anteriores. Por su parte, los participantes de la Segunda Caravana Europea por la Libertad de Movimiento indicaron que el acto fue "totalmente pacífico y legítimo en defensa de todos los derechos para las personas migrantes". En este sentido, denunciaron la "desmesurada y agresiva acción policial" y sus abogados presentaron un Habeas Corpus por detención ilegal ante el juzgado de guardia.

2006-06-10T03:16:00.000+02:00

FAMILY, FRIENDS AND FAGGOTRY

My parents paid me a visit several weeks ago. They also fell in love with Barcelona (dinner with my folks and friends at the Ateneu Candela at right). We then went to visit family in Madrid for a few days (me being tortured by my cousin's son Lucas at left). All around a great time.

I've since moved to downtown Barcelona. I live in one of the most dynamic immigrant neighborhoods around. And my flat is smack-dab-in-the-middle of everything, just a few short blocks from the Ramblas and a historic, massive open-air market (shown below). A great place to find fruit, nuts, and all sorts of fresh dead things. And get this, I live on Jerusalem street with an Israeli guy, his Cuban partner (haven't confirmed 100% they are a couple) and a lovely young Italian single mother with her gorgeous 16 month old, Tito.

On my second day here at the new place I decided to walk to the beach. Fell asleep face down. My whole backside burnt. I ended up in the emergency room after a terrible reaction to the expensive lotion I bought. Just now the last of my skin is pealing off. Damn, I'm sexy.

Then my friend Pierre from MJS in France stopped by for several days. We meandered around the city, hung out at my neighborhood queer dive bar, and went on excursions to ancient monasteries and a certain coastal beach town.

Today my friend Brie is joining me here for a few days with a buddy of hers. I know Brie from joint work in the National Youth and Student Peace Coalition. She was a rep for the Student Farmworker Alliance. Their new staffer, Marc, will be arriving in Barcelona tomorrow as well.

Activism-wise, I've been busy as the lead organizer of an event at the Ateneu Candela. Roughly translated the gimmicky title is: Are You Going to Miss Out on the Sexual Revolution?: A Conference on Gender, Sex and Orientation. There's a photo/flyer exhibit, a roundtable discussion with speakers from the Gay Liberation Front and the Transsexual Collective of Catalunya. Following that I've put together a series of short video clips that range from abrasive, kitschy, educational and rage-inducing. Food and DJ accompanied faggotry to follow. I'm not entirely satisfied with the end product, but Aleix and I designed the flyer for the event (at right).

Next up is a European-wide mobilization for immigrant rights and freedom of movement. I translated the call-to-action last month and have been attending some of the weekly coordination meetings as well. More info here... and more reflections from me on immigration policy and activism to come as well.

2006-05-16T15:22:00.000+02:00

ETIQUETAS POLÍTICAS Y UNA CRÍTICA AL ATENEU CANDELA
(Y OTROS AMIGOS DE LA IZQUIERDA RADICAL)

What follows is a Spanish translation of a recent posting. A number of folks rightly complained that it was absurd of me to write about them... in a language they have trouble reading! Oops. So now thanks to the wonderful and gorgeous Marina, a loose translation is provided below. Stay tuned for promised denunciations in response... in Spanish!

Algunos de mis amigos activistas españoles que leen este blog se burlan de mí por nombrar los movimientos con los que elijo asociarme y mis creencias utilizando términos ideológicos como ‘izquierda’ o ‘socialista’. Para ellos, imagino, estos términos han sido usurpados y mancillados por fuerzas institucionales más centristas (como el PSOE) y por ello ya no sirven para demarcar con precisión aquello que ellos defienden. O quizás asocian el uso de estas etiquetas políticas con la ‘vieja izquierda’ (la variedad social-democrática o leninista), cuyos planes para manejar el poder del Estado y transformar la sociedad están operativamente muertos (de nuevo, en sus cabezas). Algunos quizás objeten el clasificar las creencias propias más allá de vagas referencias al ‘movimiento global’ y en cambio argumenten que necesitamos un vocabulario político ‘post-identitario’ inclusivo (junto con la ‘multitud’ mal definida como el agente político de hoy en día). Y quizás haya incluso quien se suscriba a una forma de movimientismo social (o ‘autonomismo’... ¡ack, etiquetas!) amorfo y anticapitalista cuyo voluntarismo y énfasis en un descentralismo prácticamente total es simplemente incompatible con la mayoría de modelos políticos socialistas.

En mis interacciones aquí casi siempre estoy dentro del armario respecto al marco ideológico desde el que funciono. Y sin embargo me aferro obstinadamente a las etiquetas políticas, aunque sea un bicho raro. He elegido a una serie de camaradas aquí que de manera consciente han optado por un estilo de compromiso político que encuentro fresco y excitante, pero algunas veces limitante al mismo tiempo. Mientras mis compañeros insistirán en que no comparten ninguna ideología global y han trabajado exitosamente para superar la división sectaria, hay algunas creencias generales que parecen informar sus ideas. Estoy de acuerdo con gran parte de sus análisis, visión y aproximación a la movilización, así que me centraré solamente en aquello que algunas veces nos separa.

Ofrezco estas críticas sabiendo que no son aplicables con justicia a todo el mundo o a toda situación. La mayoría de las veces me encuentro con que mis camaradas aquí tienen un grado notable de sofisticación y compromiso en ser prácticos a la vez que visionarios. El contexto desde el que han conformado individualmente sus filosofías políticas y métodos organizativos es obviamente distinto del mío y este hecho no se puede pasar por alto. Invito a los amigos del Ateneu Candela a compartir sus respuestas a las siguientes críticas:

Desuso prematuro de lo viejo: Una tendencia a ver las tradiciones políticas de antaño como anquilosadas y un obstáculo para el cambio. Un énfasis en “nuevos” movimientos, “nuevos” paradigmas, “nuevas” estrategias puede significar descartar “viejas” percepciones que todavía son operativas. Una postura así puede conducir fácilmente a una segunda falta:

Desprecio por los logros reformistas: Ignorar o ridiculizar logros pasados y presentes que, si bien de manera no sistemática, han mejorado incuestionablemente la vida de la gente y el funcionamiento de la sociedad. Una especie de pureza de todo-o-nada puede acompañar esta postura, una postura que típicamente celebra sólo aquellas victorias que se han obtenido como resultado de la movilización de la protesta.

Falta de una estrategia dentro-fuera: Centrándose casi exclusivamente en la construcción de movimientos de base, ya sea dentro del contexto local o global. Un enfoque de este tipo puede significar tener poco impacto real sobre los resultados políticos que son negociados a través de instituciones grandes e imperfectas, a menudo a nivel nacional. Una mirada al resurgir de la izquierda en América Latina, por ejemplo, apunta a la eficacia de desarrollar una relación más fluida (aunque siempre conflictiva) entre la política electoral y la presión desde abajo.

Distorsión de la crisis de la democracia representativa: Un rechazo a las instituciones formales, que aunque débiles e incompletas, son todavía uno de los mejores (menos malos) sistemas para reconocer los deseos públicos. Esta postura puede dejar a los activistas independientes consigo mismos, sin mandato democrático, una poco concreta agenda política y virtualmente ninguna responsabilidad para con el más amplio proceso de toma de decisiones que la mayoría de la ciudadanía asocia con la democracia. Un enfoque de este tipo puede conducir a los radicales a denunciar a cargos progresistas, electos (en gobierno, sindicatos, asociaciones de estudiantes) como traidores cuando ocasionalmente contraen compromisos necesarios para mantener el apoyo del electorado, conservar coaliciones mayoritarias o presionar para lograr nuevas leyes.

Cada una de estas limitaciones relacionadas entre sí, tal como yo las veo, reflejan de manera inversa mis sensibilidades políticas, que también se han desarrollado y han cambiado a lo largo del tiempo (desde mis años como un pre-adolescente ambientalista, luego como un alumno de instituto trotskista y más tarde instalándome en la democrática familia socialista de pragmáticos idealistas). No hace falta decir que mis arriba expuestas críticas en modo alguno indican que sea blando con los defectos de la socialdemocracia. Cada día se me recuerda la incapacidad del centro-izquierda para ofrecer alternativas genuinas al desastre que conocemos como capitalismo global. La izquierda socialdemócrata convencional de hoy en día es pobre de visión y demasiado complaciente con el poder privado concentrado. Los partidos que representan esta tradición pueden encontrarse hoy a sí mismos formando parte de la clase política elitista contra la que una vez se movilizaron.

¿Estas descripciones son caricaturas? Desde luego, hasta cierto punto. Pero creo que empiezan a describir el bizarro mundo de la política en el que trato de negociar. Desde mi punto de vista, una estrategia política que no incorpore la política electoral y la reforma institucional al tiempo que la organización comunitaria local y la fractura de los movimientos sociales necesariamente estará incompleta. Tener en posiciones de poder (con transparencia democrática) a gente que simpatiza con nuestras ideas casi siempre será mejor que ignorar al gobierno como un ámbito de lucha. Y si hay políticos que no simpaticen terriblemente con nuestros objetivos pero que sean nuestra única opción para derrotar a un candidato todavía más a la derecha, deberíamos tener asimismo la suficiente madurez política como para apoyar al “menos malo”. Esto puede sonar amoral, pero es precisamente lo contrario. Votar es un acto estratégico y no moral. Socavar a la derecha y desplazar el poder económico y social para ponerlo en las manos de la gente corriente significa aprovecharnos de cualquier oportunidad que se nos brinde. Esto a mí me parece increíblemente obvio, así que me asombro cuando oigo argumentos (no infrecuentes entre los participantes del Ateneu Candela) en sentido contrario.

Afirmar las etiquetas y afiliaciones políticas propias es útil no solamente en determinados contextos. Generalmente me refiero a mí mismo como un ‘demócrata socialista’, y no solamente para que se me asocie con una organización particular. Prefiero esta etiqueta a ‘socialdemócrata’ por razones que están más o menos explicadas aquí: Wikipedia, Hacia la Libertad, pero también en el último párrafo de la entrada referente a este asunto del blog de Geoff. Puesto que el vocabulario político de los EEUU está bastante empobrecido y que el espectro de debate “aceptable” es todavía más estrecho y torcido a la derecha, creo que es imperativo hablar clara y convincentemente sobre ideología y sus (no dogmáticas) implicaciones prácticas. También invoco regularmente la categoría más amplia de ‘la izquierda’ cuando discuto sobre política, dado que esto me permite argumentar mis ideas en el seno de una comunidad más amplia y diversa.

Una Izquierda del SXXI capaz de guiarnos lejos del colapso ecológico, superar desigualdades construidas sobre la clase, la raza y la opresión de género, desmilitarizar gran parte del planeta y, simultáneamente, ofrecer una alternativa apremiante que maximice la libertad, la solidaridad y la satisfacción personal debe incluir una fuerte dosis de prescripciones éticas y políticas socialistas. Dudo de que en el corto plazo (o alguna vez) seamos una mayoría en este proyecto en marcha de transformación económica y social, pero sin más compañeros ondeando orgullosamente la bandera democrática socialista, me temo que nos quedaremos cortos en la visión y el programa necesarios para sacarnos de este lío.

2006-05-08T10:06:00.000+02:00

FAILURES, SELL-OUTS AND THE UTOPIAN IMAGINATION

I've had the pleasure to be surrounded by a marvelous collection of books on political theory and social movements that Tomas (who I live with) has picked up over the years as a scholar, professor and activist. Going into his cramped study is like entering a candy shop where everything on the shelves is both tempting and within reach.

Should I delve into his stack of paperbacks exploring the relationship between political economy and cycles of protest? Should I dust off some old Marx? Perhaps some Harvey, Hobsbawm or Negri (Tomas is a T.N. fanatic)? Hundreds of titles to choose from, all of them deserving a look.

And yet this is where my problem begins. I have failed rather miserably to take advantage of these tremendous intellectual resources free for me to peruse at any time. Over 5 months have passed and I've barely skimmed through a handful of them. It's a shame, really.

That said, I have been going through a book I picked up a few years ago used for 50 cents. It's become one of my favorites to date: Commitment and Community: Communes and Utopias in Sociological Perspective by Rosabeth Moss Kanter. Written during the resurgence of communal living brought on by 60-70's radicalism and the hippy movement, Kanter's book analyzes a wide range of utopian intentional communities that have sprung up in Europe and the U.S. over the past few hundred years. The designers of such communes sought a more perfect set of social arrangements between human beings and their natural surroundings--where a harmony between cooperation and shared principles would overcome the alienation and exploitation of the dominant culture. These utopian experiments were motivated by faith-based rejections of societal ills (common of first generations of setters in the U.S.), a desire for an alternative to an exploitative economic order (created often by utopian socialists in response to the industrial revolution) and/or a desire for a psycho-social environment that better enabled self-realization (a dominant characteristic of post-WWII/hippy enclaves).

Commitment and Community details the specific institutions, social arrangements and cultural values that underpinned each of these utopian (mostly rural) spaces. Each individual commune allows us to explore alternative practices, some of which are praise worthy and others that were certainly a bit nutty. Rather than merely theorizing what a better world might look like, these past attempts to perfect society offer tangible evidence of what does and does not work (well) within the confines of small scale (although some grew to be rather large) communities.

While wholly rejecting their escapist attitudes and the shortcomings of collectivism, I suspect there are a great many lessons we can draw from these experiences. Looking at really-existing utopian models (past and present) is a healthy exercise that encourages us to rethink the foundations of what we normally take for granted while unleashing our solution-oriented, creative potential. How might we better organize society with relation to child-rearing, education and skill-sharing, workplace democracy, local decision-making, personal and community space/belongings, leisure time, rational planning and allocation, inter-personal relationships, order and incentives, sustainability, personal fulfillment, economies of scale, etc.?

The movement to create social centers/ateneus approaches many of these same questions though in a less all-encompassing fashion. These contemporary experiments promote more egalitarian and cooperative social relations, but unlike most communes, they seek to intervene in the greater society rather than run away from it. At their best, these social centers/ateneus rekindle the utopian imagination while staying firmly rooted in practical political realities and committed to a cosmopolitan sensibility.

So I was thinking of looking up Kanter to see what she's been involved with these past 30-odd years since first publishing Commitment and Community. Her work seemed to embody the kind of participatory action research (she conducting interviews/lived in dozens of then present-day communes) and scholarly approach that I'm considering taking up. I admire her critiques of and sympathy for those putting their ideals into practice. But get this: she is now a famous guru for the business community! WTF?

I guess this shouldn't surprise me. After all, it's pretty trendy for people to recant their past idealism and "mature" into adult professionals, right?

To close out, I saw an excellent Spanish/Catalan film in the theaters last week that addresses many of these same themes. Check out Remake, if you get the chance.

2006-05-03T18:46:00.000+02:00

POLITICAL LABELS & A CRITIQUE OF THE ATENEU CANDELA
(AND OTHER FRIENDS ON THE RADICAL LEFT)

Daraka at hoverbike asked fellow members of “our little democratic left corner” of the blogosphere to write responses to this question:

In our post-post-modern era, in which we are told by pundits and social scientists that ideology is dead, what is the importance of political labels? How do you label yourself? Is there a unique discussion around labels in your own national or regional political culture?

Here’s my belated response, somewhat awkwardly tacked onto a critique I’d been previously drafting of the political practices and attitudes I’m surrounded by here in Spain:

Some of my activist Spanish friends who read this blog poke fun at me for labeling the movements I choose to associate with and the beliefs I hold with ideological terms like 'left' or 'socialist'. For them, I imagine, such terms have been usurped and sullied by more centrist institutional forces (like the PSOE) and thus can no longer accurately demarcate what they personally stand for. Or perhaps they associate usage of such political labels with the 'old left' (or the social-democratic or Leninist variety) whose plans for wielding state power and transforming society are operationally dead (again, in their minds). Some may object to classifying one's beliefs beyond vague references to the 'global movement' and instead argue that we need a 'post-identitarian' inclusive political vocabulary (along with an ill-defined 'multitude' as today’s political agents). And there may even be those who subscribe to a form of amorphous, anti-capitalist, social movementism (or 'autonomism'… ack, labels!) whose volunteerism and emphasis on near total decentralism is simply incompatible with most models of socialist politics.

In my personal interactions here I’m mostly in the closet about the ideological framework I work from. And yet I stubbornly cling to political labels even if I’m the odd one out. I’ve chosen a set of comrades here who have consciously opted for a style of political engagement that I find fresh and exciting, but also limiting at times. While my cohorts will insist that they share no overarching ideology and have successfully worked to breach the sectarian divide, there are some general beliefs that seem to inform their ideas. I agree with a large part of their analysis, vision and mobilizing approach, so I will only focus on what occasionally sets us apart.

I offer these critiques knowing that they don’t fairly apply to everyone or to every situation. Much of the time I find that my comrades here possess a remarkable degree of sophistication and commitment to being both practical and visionary. The context from which they have individually formed their political philosophies and organizational methods is obviously distinct from my own and this fact can’t be overstated. Friends from the Ateneu Candela are invited to share their responses to the following criticisms:

Premature casting off of the old: A tendency to regard political traditions of yesteryear as ossified and an obstacle to change. An emphasis on “new” movements, “new” paradigms, “new” strategies can mean discounting “old” insights that still remain operational. Such a posture can lead easily to a second fault:

Disdain for reformist gains: Ignoring or deriding past and present achievements, that while piecemeal, have unquestionably improved people’s lives and the functioning of society. A kind of all-or-nothing purity can accompany this posture, one that typically celebrates only those victories that have come out of protest mobilization.

Lack of an inside-outside strategy: Focusing almost exclusively on grassroots movement building within either a local or global context. Such an approach can mean having little real impact on policy outcomes that are negotiated through large, imperfect institutions often at the national level. A look to the left-wing resurgence in Latin America, for example, points to the efficacy of developing a more fluid (although always contentious) relationship between electoral politics and pressure from below.

Distorting the crisis in representational democracy: A rejection of formal institutions, that while weak and incomplete, are still some of the best (least bad) systems for gauging public desires. This posture can leave independent activists to themselves, with no democratic mandate, little concrete policy agenda, and with virtually no accountability to the larger decision-making process that most citizens associate with democracy. Such an approach can lead radicals to denounce progressive, elected officials (in government, unions, student associations) as traitors when they make occasionally necessary compromises needed to sustain voter support, to maintain majoritarian coalitions, or to push for new legislation.

Each of these related limitations, as I see them, inversely reflect my own political sensibilities that too have developed and changed over time (from my years as a pre-teen environmentalist, a high school-aged Trotskyist and later settling into the democratic socialist family of pragmatic idealists). It goes without saying that my above criticisms in no way indicate that I am soft on the shortcomings of social democracy. I’m daily reminded of the center-left’s inability to offer genuine alternatives to the disaster we know as global capitalism. The conventional social democratic left of today is low on vision and far too accommodating to concentrated private power. The parties that typify this tradition may now find themselves as part of the elite political class they once mobilized against.

Are these descriptions caricatures? Certainly, to a degree. But I think they begin to describe the bizarre world of politics I try to negotiate between. From my point of view, a political strategy that doesn’t both incorporate electoral politics and institutional reform along with local community organizing and social movement disruption will necessarily be incomplete.

Having people sympathetic to our politics in positions of power (with democratic transparency) will almost always be better than ignoring government as an arena of struggle. And if there are politicians that aren't terribly sympathetic to our goals but they are our only shot at defeating a more right-wing candidate, we should still have the political maturity to advocate for the "least bad". This may sound unprincipled, but it is precisely the opposite. Voting is a strategic and not a moral act. Undermining the right-wing and shifting social and economic power into the hands of ordinary people means taking advantage of every opening available to us. This seems incredibly obvious to me, so I'm astonished when I hear arguments (not uncommon from Ateneu Candela participants) to the contrary.

Asserting one's political labels and affiliations is useful but only in certain contexts. I generally call myself a 'democratic socialist' and not just to associate myself with a particular organization. I prefer this label to 'social democrat' for reasons that are more or less spelled out here: Wikipedia, Towards Freedom, but also in the last paragraph in Geoff’s related blog entry. Since the political vocabulary in the U.S. is so impoverished and the spectrum of “acceptable” debate is narrower and skewed to the right, I think it’s imperative to speak clearly and convincingly about ideology and its practical (non-dogmatic) implications. I also regularly invoke the much broader category of 'the left' when discussing politics, since this allows me to argue my ideas within a larger and more diverse community.

A 21st century Left capable of steering us away from ecological collapse, overcoming inequalities built on class, race and gender oppression, demilitarizing much of the planet and simultaneously offering a compelling alternative that maximizes liberty, solidarity and personal fulfillment must include a strong dose of socialist ethics and policy prescriptions. I doubt we'll be a majority within this ongoing project of social and economic transformation any time soon (or ever), but without more folks proudly waving the democratic socialist flag, I fear we'll fall short on the vision and program needed to get us out of this mess.

2006-04-25T12:00:00.000+02:00

THE RED SIDE OF THE LGBT MOVEMENT:
A REPORT FROM QUEER EASTER

The seventh annual Queer Easter (QE) occurred in the outskirts of Berlin, Germany this past Aptil 11-17th. The week-long seminar--hosted in cooperation between the International Union of Socialist Youth (IUSY), ECOSY and the IFM-SEI--brought together around 100 lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and allied activists from over a dozen European countries along with a sizable delegation of Arab and Jewish comrades from Israel.

I arrived in Berlin a few days before QE hoping to explore the city and its rich leftist history. I first met up with Andi from the Falcons (aka the Socialist Youth of Germany) for a rooftop bar-b-que at the his squat-like high rise flat in the city's eastern quarters, later heading to some neighborhood bars frequented by the younger radical set. The following day Andi took me on a bike tour of Red Berlin... visiting the sites where Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht were murdered, where Liebknecht declared Germany a "free socialist republic" in 1918, the cemetery for leaders of the worker's movement, and a host of Communist statues commemorated Soviet participation in WWII and German participation in the International Brigades against fascism in Spain (obvious disclaimer: I'm no fan of the drab authoritarianism that was the GDR).

The next day I met with my friend Pierre (at right) from the French Movement of Young Socialists (MJS). After a morning stroll through Berlin the two of us headed to the the impressive Falcon retreat and education center in the country-side town of Werftpfuhl.

Although currently living in Spain, I was essentially a YDS delegate to the seminar. The daily program centered around a set of workshops, trainings and media working groups... with smoking, drinking and general gay frolicking around the edges.

I was drawn to one discussion early on that focused on the following questions: "How have the radical left and LGBT movements intersected and clashed since they emerged from 19th century Europe? How is socialism beneficial to queers & why should queer people be interested in leftish politics? What are the inequalities that might complicate this alliance?" A review of the economic reductionism and social conservatism that has pervaded strains of the socialist movement illustrated that such bonds between class politics and sexual liberation must be consciously forged as they are not automatically connected. A good historical overview of such tensions and possibilities can be found here.

I later attended a workshop that dealt with how activists in "the West" can best offer practical solidarity to sexual minorities (not "gay" men and women since some semi-convincingly argue that this is a term referring to a "Western" lifestyle construct) facing persecution in more repressive and less developed countries. This conversation predictably boiled down to a clash between cultural relativist arguments and a universalist human rights paradigm (I'm a defender of the latter, naturally). I put forward, in summary, that "our" best approach is to:

1) Clean house in our own societies and thus undermine arguments that we are hypocritical. This means not just fretting about Islam, but also the intense homophobia of the Catholic church, for instance. This can also entail creating a LGBT movement that isn't so heavily biased toward gay white men and shallow consumerism.

2) Identify civil society actors (in this case LGBT organizations and activists) within "the other" country and listen to what they are demanding and what support they ask for. Instructive counter example: the case of the how the U.S. pressuring the Egyptian regime for its mass arrest of homosexual men only increased the repression (guilt by association with "imperialism").

3) Offer resources, space, trainings, etc. for activists within target countries... and by extension, celebrate their immense courage. Queer Easter is a good example of this as many of our LGBT comrades from Eastern Europe face a rather harsh social climate and political barriers to equality.

4) Uphold a multilateral human rights framework. Such a rules-based set of international agreements should have the power to sanction even those bigoted practices that are defended on cultural or religious grounds. One important advance in the field is the EU directive that member countries must include persecution based on sexual orientation as potential grounds for asylum status.

Moving on... (you can see a summary of other workshops and trainings here)

Apart from the important political discussions, QE primarily offers a social space for LGBT activists. For many attendees the seminar is the first occasion where their sexuality is normalized (you basically have to "come out" if you one of the few straight participants). This social function is important in itself, even if an emphasis on politics waned in relation.

As part of my formal contribution to QE's political agenda, I was asked to draft a statement "For Action Against Homophobia / The Right to Assembly" that we hope to pass through IUSY. I also worked on the preparations for the Queer Tent at the IUSY World Festival (July 18-23, Alicante, Spain).

There are many more stories I could tell (some of them rather scandalous!) but in closing I'd say that aside from seeing amazing friends and making news ones, I most enjoyed talking with participants about their organizing experiences, about the political realities in their countries, and about the shared principles of liberty, solidarity and equality that inform our day-to-day commitments. I would also like to point people to the incredibly impressive organizations that QE participants work with that focus on building a culture and movement that embody these emancipatory goals. You can see links to all the participating organizations here, but I want to highlight those that start working with children as young as 6. The Falcons are one fine example... and so is the Federation of Young Students and Workers - Israel's largest youth organization. Can you imagine how cool it would be in we had our own socialist Boy and Girl Scouts in the U.S.?

Postscript: Immediately after coming back to Spain, I started to prepare for an international conference we organized at my social center on migration, citizenship and globalization. The event was fantastic (covering what I think is one of the 3 most critical arenas of struggle for the Left in the EU)... but it means I've been in exhaustive conference mode for a few weeks straight. Spent this past Sunday selling books on the Ramblas in downtown Barcelona with friends from the Gay Liberation Front as part of St. Jordi Day, where millions of people flock to the streets to buy books and roses for their loved ones. Great tradition.

Off to "gay Paris" tomorrow for to see friends and attend May Day demonstrations!

2006-04-24T08:49:00.000+02:00

LA CONSTRUCCIÓ D'UN SOMNI PER FER-NE REALITAT D'ALTRES

As May transitioned into April, 8 months of hard manual labor and a little dreaming paid off with the amazingly successful inauguration of the Ateneu Candela in its huge new location. I and many others were doubtful we’d be able to pull it all off in the exhaustive days leading up the opening. There was still major structural work to be completed and huge piles of debris littering the converted factory space up until the last minute.

But everything came together in the end. The concert/conference space looked immense and gorgeous, the bar and eating area was equally attractive and the library/free internet station, the ecological cooperative, the community radio/recording studio, and the two upstairs meeting rooms were decorated with photo and lit. presentations from the various collectives working out of the Ateneu (gender, precarity, intercultural, solidarity groups with communities in Guatemala and Nicaragua, etc.). I spent my final available hours meticulously selecting, mounting and hanging a beautiful collection of political posters representing left politics and social movements from about a dozen countries. We officially opened our doors to the public shortly after I finished teaching my Friday afternoon English classes.

By night’s end the place was packed so densely with hundreds of visitors from around Terrassa and other parts of Spain that it was hard to move, much less take all the drink orders in between the cabaret, poetry, folk, and rock performances (side note: although terrible at it, I found my first bartending experience almost addictive. I’ve scheduled a weekly volunteer shift to keep at it).

The Ateneu Candela is now one of the largest and most important movement-oriented social centers in all of Spain. Our space will serve as a reference point for those working to strengthen the social fabric of the region and promote political reflection and mobilization. From here on we’re charged with programming daily activities and special events with the aim of involving a much wider audience. The inauguration proved that we have the capacity to break out of the “activist ghetto” by attracting a crowd that reflects the surrounding community: teenagers, the retired, families with children, immigrants, and the more typical 20’s-30’s set. The diversity of inauguration activitities, ranging from kids theater, a communal paella lunch, fire juggling and the screening of a 30 min. documentary of interviews with Ateneu Candela participants (with a few embarrassing cameos from yours truly) helped ensure as much.

Without visiting the space it may be difficult to get a sense of its actual potency and what sets the Ateneu Candela apart from the more traditional civic centers and the more alienating ‘okupa’ squats. (Side note: “ateneus” were first developed at the turn of the 20th century by the worker’s movements. They were social spaces that helped sustain a vibrant culture of resistance and solidarity. These spaces were also some of the only institutions where one could receive a secular, democratic education at the time). Creating physical spaces that us folks on the left can call our own should be a more central component of our transformative strategies. Such spaces can provide a stable home for our community-based projects (conferences, campaigns, film screenings, collectives, concerts, etc.), promote a welcoming politicized cultural milieu, and allow us to intervene and create social bonds within a given territory.

With that said, I once again extend an invitation for you to visit us here in Terrassa. And once I’m back in the States in August (most likely), perhaps you would like to join me (and Jan!) in promoting the development of such spaces within the U.S.

2006-04-22T12:53:00.000+02:00

HELLO ROME... BYE, BYE BERLUSCONI!

A quick, belated review of a trip that Jan, Marta and I took to Rome a few weeks ago.

After arriving in Rome and dropping our stuff off at the apartment of a friend four times removed, the three of us headed to the center to join a rather large anti-war protest on the anniversary of the invasion of Iraq. Most of the folks assembled seemed to be members of Rifundazione Comunista, some of the more radical trade unions (like Cobas), student collectives and other organized groups on the left. It was thrilling to be able to walk through the city passing all the major building, plazas, and ancient ruins surrounded by hoards of red and rainbow peace flags. And you can probably imagine how giddy I was to sing classics like Bandiera Rossa with everyone from rowdy teenage girls to aging movement veterans.

That night we went to a massive social center (probably one of the biggest in the world) for an annual festival that brings together ecological cooperatives from around Italy to sell wine, cheese, crafts and the like. The sprawling occupied former military fort is home to dozens of rooms, several concert areas, a radical bookshop, a record store, cafes, bar areas, theater spaces, and more. In total, there were well over 1000 people mingling, drinking and stuffing their faces with yummy fresh food (with the highest percentage of attractive guys, I must admit, that I’ve ever seen). Even if the political focus appears to have declined in relation to the party element, this social center is as close to an activist Mecca that I can possibly imagine (unless folks that seem somewhat content to stay on the radical margins bothers you excessively).

After being severely molested on a bus (crazy story!) and some sacrilegious posing outside the Vatican, we bid Jan farewell at the train station as she headed for Croatia to reunite with her boyfriend. Marta and I continued our journey, visiting museums, a very stylish social center similar to the Ateneu Candela, and walking through parks outside the main tourist areas.

The now concluded national electoral campaigns were in full blast during our stay. It was amusing to track the frenzied efforts to blanket the city with political posters from competing parties (Italy has dozens of them… with various factions from the often fratricidal left to neo-fascists like Il Duce’s granddaughter running for office). The post-script is obviously a happy one. The EU’s most despicable head of state has since been deposed in the hotly contested race. None of the folks we met in Rome expected any dramatic progressive changes to come out of a Prodi-led center-left government, but kicking Berlusconi out should at least give them some breathing room and new strategies to explore.

Let’s see what happens next.

2006-04-22T12:45:00.000+02:00

MONTHLY REVIEW... MINUS THE CRYPTO MAOISM

Maybe it’s the Jewish quilt I seem to suffer from, or perhaps just the somewhat narcissistic urge to share my life with a phantom audience, but I do regret not updating this page over the past month.

I’ve been a busy boy helping destroy the planet with atmosphere-altering plane trips to Madrid, Rome and Berlin. Then there was the inauguration of our social center. And at the moment of writing this, I’m sitting in the middle of an international conference we organized at the Ateneu Candela on migration, citizenship and globalization.

My recollection of past events over the past 4 or 5 weeks may not be terribly fresh, but I’ll try my best to jot down some notes in the coming days.

2006-03-23T15:13:00.000+01:00

CONFLICT RESOLUTION: ETA CEASEFIRE & THE IRAQ WAR

Yesterday, the Basque separatist terror group, ETA, held a press conference where they announced a permanent ceasefire and a turn toward the democratic political process. Such a move should be welcomed by everyone who wishes to rid Spain on the pointless carnage, the poisoning of its political culture and the intimidation and violence that have scarred targeted individuals and entire communities for decades.

With this new development, Spain’s center-left government has scored a diplomatic victory. While ETA’s declaration is certainly related to the group’s diminishing support and the arrest of key figures in its clandestine hierarchy, the Zapatero administration’s invitation to dialogue in exchange for a repudiation of violence was also a critical factor.

The ensuing process of negotiations over disarmament, the status of ETA prisoners, the currently banned Batasuna party and that of the Basque region itself are still far from clear. But it seems likely that Spain has entered a new phase--one where other pressing issues will hopefully get more attention now that ETA's heinous and pathetic crimes should no longer dominate headlines or frame policy debates.

As predicted, some of the cretins in the right-wing Partido Popular, seem to be doing their utmost to undermine this achievement. The PP has long relied on tough-guy posturing and the manipulation of public fears to secure electoral successes. The ETA bogeyman has been one of the party's most reliable assets. This knee-jerk strategy backfired when the Peperas were caught lying about the true culprits of the March 11th terror bombings 2 years ago. But even after having lost the last election amidst popular outrage, the PP continue many of the same dirty rhetorical tricks.

Considering obvious and major contexual differences, there are significant parallels between this scenario and the political climate that has dominated the U.S. since 9/11. What the Spanish electorate came to understand and that the U.S. public may slowly be waking up to, is that bellicose and politically-driven "war on terror" policies tend to exacerbate our vulnerability to attacks and close off space for genuine conflict resolution.

Now if only the Democrats could drive home this message (we're less safe now) and maybe even provide a coherent alternative to Bush's "stay the course" policies in Iraq, then we might actually cease to have a one-party state after next fall's midterm elections. Until then, the GOP will shamelessly play the terror-card to no end.

That said, I can't see the Democratic leadership or the American public accepting an arrangement similar to what may be worked out between the Spanish state and the Basque terrorists. There are legitimate concerns about how to negotiate with various armed actors in a way that strengthens democratic institutions and not those who resort to violence. But at this point, the U.S. might have to set accords with elements of Iraq's insurgent forces if it wants a political solution to the chaos and bloodshed we are contributing to daily. Smart-thinking and political leadership are in short supply these days stateside. And this is precisely what's needed given the complex interplay between garnering electoral support to undermine the GOP domestically and working against Iraq's descent into civil war on the international stage. Of course, ending the disastrous military occupation of Iraq is central to these efforts.

It will be interesting to see how the political theater plays out here after ETA's surprise announcement. Perhaps there will be further lessons about effective anti-terror policies that could be exported back home and elsewhere.

2006-03-11T10:28:00.000+01:00

THE INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY THAT WASN’T

Every year, all around the world, March 8th is a day to commemorate the historical and contemporary struggles of women in the fight for equality. It is widely celebrated in most countries, that is, other than where it was first initiated. Chock up this sad fact next to the non-observance of May Day (May 1st, International Worker’s Day) in the U.S. and we can begin to see just how thoroughly the best of America’s radical past has been systematically erased from the public consciousness. Despite their indigenous roots in U.S. trade union organizing and socialist internationalism, few in the States are aware of the enduring legacies of March 8th and May 1st that continue to inspire generations of men and women across the globe.

To show just how far this historical amnesia goes, let’s compare mainstream print coverage of International Women’s Day this year both in the U.S. and in Spain. Over here, March 8th commemorations were front-page headlines across the spectrum, from small local papers to the major national press. In the States, in stark contrast, there was only 1 reference to International Women’s Day in our paper of record, the New York Times. Oh, and that article referred to women from a left-wing movement of farmers occupying land in Brazil to mark March 8th, not any activities actually occurring within the U.S. itself.

Around Spain (and again, much of the world), there were women's rights demonstrations organized both by the government, labor unions, and a broad range of activist groups. I went to the Union General de Trabajadores HQ on Thursday to meet with some of their youth reps and to check out an amazing exhibit chronicling the feminist movement from its earliest manifestations to today.

In a similar vein, at the public high school where I teach English classes, March 8th celebrations were in full effect. A large student-made banner still adorns the main wall celebrating the Day of the Woman Worker--true to the event's class-conscious roots. Next to this colorful banner stands a floor-to-ceiling time line of important dates in the struggle for gender equality. I was particularly struck by its inclusion of the publication dates of both August Bebel's Women and Socialism and Engels' instructive--though theoretically flawed--Origins of the Family, Private Property and the State. As with many other things here, I can't imagine such a scenario in the United States. My students were very surprised to learn that we Americans don’t officially celebrate International Women’s Day. And many of them even knew the story of the March 8th, 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire that the day commemorates.

It's ironic that of all places it feels somehow less than authentic to celebrate March 8th or May 1st in the U.S. It might appear as if we were merely seeking comfort from past glory in an era of defeat. Is there any way to revive these traditions in their place of birth without simply relying on leftist nostalgia? I wonder.

2006-03-04T10:43:00.000+01:00

HOMEWORK #3: POLITICAL IDEOLOGY TEST!

Students! Here is a fun, informative test for you to take on-line (click here). It's great practice for reading in English! You will answer a series of questions (strongly disagree, disagree, agree, or strongly agree) about your political opinions and values.

There are several tests like this on the Internet. This isn't the best one. For example, after answering all the questions, I correctly fit the "socialist" profile, but in the picture/graph, my political position overlapped a little with Hillary Clinton! She is not a socialist! My politics are much closer, if not practically identical to Martin Luther King, Jr. (minus the religious elements). But I chose this test because at the very end it asks you:

"if you could make up ONE new law and have it enforced FOREVER, by goons, what would your law be? Use your imagination, let your despotic instincts run free"

So take the test, and if possible, post your results (are you a fascist, democrat, socialist, anarchist?) to my website by adding a comment below. Do you agree with your results? Please include the "one new law" you would enforce in your comment. Enjoy!

2006-03-02T00:57:00.000+01:00

PARTICIPATORY ACTION RESEACH: MAPPING IMMIGRANT LIVES

I’ve taken notes during several activist meetings, convergences, and personal conversations with movement figures over the past few months in Spain. I intended to post many of them here (like those from the city-wide gathering of grassroots groups inspired by the Zapatistas' 6th Declaration) but time just seems to pass too quickly. Since I'm sick and stuck in bed today, I decided to type up some thoughts from an excellent meeting I attended on Tuesday.

First the setting: The meeting was held in Miles de Viviendas, a six-story occupied social center situated along a major street facing the Mediterranean coast in Barcelona. Like the Ateneu Candela, Miles is home to many collectives, film screenings, workshops, etc., in addition to providing free housing for its inhabitants and weekly public meals that attract the city's scrappy activist set.

The room where the meeting was held was covered in posters from various campaigns and mobilizations. I was particularly drawn to a set of maps detailing various political developments, sites of conflict, the locations of notorious corporations and institutions, along with statistics related to patterns of migration, wage exploitation, environmental degradation and military expenditures. Apart from my attraction to these posters on an aesthetic level, I found them a remarkably effective way to visualize relations of power and our potential targets for action. They also remind me of some of the Situationist mapping projects back in the day that sought to redefine our sense of geographic placement and territorial agency. I've pasted a few examples below (click to enlarge), but you can find more beauties here.

The meeting I attended was hosted by the collective that gathers weekly to work on issues of immigrant justice. We discussed the April conference we're organizing in Terrassa (see previous post) and the demonstration taking place here this weekend in response to the arrest and threats of deportation against some of our Moroccan friends recently. But the bulk of the meeting was dedicated to the launching of a video and mapping project to profile the lives of Barcelona's diverse immigrant communities.

This initiative is intended to encourage participatory action research in the lead up to the second Europe-wide Caravana for immigrant rights and the freer movement of people scheduled to take place this summer in Barcelona. Unlike the first Caravana which brought some 500 activists to the conflict-ridden zone separating Spain from Morocco, the focus this year is more on the internal borders that separate and exclude immigrant populations within nations.

By interviewing a series of immigrants and working with organizations that represent their communities (some who were at the meeting and are active in designing its contours), the goal is to explore the "other city" that is mostly invisible to outsiders. The final product will include a documentary film and a map illustrating where different immigrant communities are populated, elements of their formal and informal economies, institutions they rely on or suffer under, cultural and religious meeting points, and spaces of conflict and mobilization.

We decided on roughly 10 archetypal "legal" immigrant and undocumented individuals to profile: a domestic worker, a child of immigrant parents, a refugee/asylum seeker, a college student, a sex worker, someone facing deportation issues, a retiree, a queer person enjoying the relative freedoms Barcelona affords, someone connected to the NGO circuit, a street vendor and someone who was a political activist before arriving to Spain. Pointing to me, someone joked about including an immigrant from the "corazon de la bestia", but the focus with be on African, Arab, Asian and Latin American (and possibly Eastern European) men and women.

A project of this kind, one that facilitates greater understanding and cooperation between Spain's native born and its newcomers, seems especially vital given the concerns raised by both the Paris riots and the ratcheting up of "us vs. them" rhetoric in the wake of the Danish cartoon rubbish. It's a process of critical inquiry and intercultural listening that is possible to replicate elsewhere with degrees of variation. And while addressing the persistent barriers and differences of language and culture, racism and xenophobia, wage stratification and social exclusion, we can also be supportive of those progressive elements within immigrant communities that are working toward greater gender equality, an appreciation for secular democracy and other matters the Left should never abandon.

2006-02-27T23:43:00.000+01:00

YOU GET WHAT YOU ASK FOR & GAMBLING FOR THE TWISTED

I've been asked by several of you to post more pictures. Truth by told, I still don't have my own camera... so I've been compiling photos from friends and from off the web.

Pictures 1-5 below are all from Saturday night's Carnival insanity. The 1st features four of the six boys that Jan is living with at La Mina (most of whom with also be in Germany for Easter week). The 2nd is Coco taking a break. The 3rd shows Vane putting on pink piggie make-up with me in a rather "special" pose. The 4th is Arnau (aka Monty) before he busted his arm on his roller skates. The 5th is Ubi and the crew representing in Terrassa's main square. And the last is Marta and her sporty beau Albert. Marta has been giving me and Jan Castillian lessons over dinner every Tuesday night. All very lovely people...

On an unrelated note... Joey and I made some "futures" bets against each other last night. Don't worry... I'm only into low-stakes gambling.

The first bet is rather sick and twisted. I stand to gain $5 if the avian flu mutates before the end of 2006 so that it is transmittable between humans (projected to kill tens of millions of people). I know, I'm going to hell.

The second bet is much more hopeful. I will make another $5 if the GOP lose their majority in Congress in the upcoming mid-term elections.

I really hope I break even (lose the first, win the second)!

2006-02-26T17:41:00.001+01:00

THE PINKO GOES PIGGIE!

Long live pagan-inspired, catholic-appropriated debauchery!

Like the little kids swarming around Terrassa, I've been taking in a bit of folk tradition and unadulterated reveling these past several days. Last week it was the march of the donkeys, horses and ponies (so cute!) in honor of their patron saint. This week practically the whole city has been celebrating Carnival with all sorts of games, parades, parties and weird rituals (including the burial of sardines).

On Friday night, though not part of official Carnival observance, I went with a couple of super fun and friendly lesbians into Barcelona to hit up some bars of the "ambiente". I'm pleased to report that I've found my favorite homo spot in the city to date. It's a small divey bar hidden away in the Raval neighborhood on a street replete with immigrant men huddling in groups and female sex workers during the day. The bar is informally connected to the Gay Liberation Front of Catalunya, whose "leader" I'm meeting up with again in early March. After leaving the Raval, we went to a few other clubs in the notoriously cheesy and rather elitist Eixample gay ghetto. I had been previously warned to stay away from Barcelona's center of "pink capitalism" and I now know why.

Last night me and a bunch of friends from the Ateneu Candela got dressed up as the "three little pigs" (even though there were 9 of us). People here seem quite a bit less inhibited and are not too jaded to embarrass themselves with ridiculous costumes. And some of the costumes really would not fly in the U.S. (think black-face with afros and all sorts of orientalist garb). One group of families came dressed as chickens with signs reading, "we're bringing the avian flu." Ah!

We ended up at a giant warehouse party hosted by the city government. Jan rightly pointed out that you wouldn't find a similar multi-generational crowd at a publicly-run function in the States. Certainly not one where the MC constantly exalts the audience to get drunk and frisky or that would attract the city's cool kids. Even the official banners for the Carnival, like almost every year, featured characteristically naughty sexual references.

Maybe it's just the tourist in me in search of "authentic", uncorrupted cultural practices, but I've really grown to love all these quaint festivals and ceremonies. Especially those that encourage everyone to feast, frolic and make a total fool out of themselves.

Oink! Oink!

2006-02-16T00:41:00.000+01:00

MAKING THE PAPERS: YDS IN THE VILLAGE VOICE!

I've been spending much of the past few weeks helping the good folks back home organize the conference featured below... with a snappy picture of Bill Fletcher, Jr. no less! Here is a rather smart and succinct article he co-authored with actor Danny Glover last year outlining an electoral strategy for the U.S. Left. Feel free to offer your thoughts on the inside/outside "Neo-Rainbow" approach they are advocating. Could Fletcher be my favorite American socialist? The following appeared today in "the nation's first and largest alternative newsweekly", the Village Voice:

Sonic Youth: A New Wave of Activists Makes Some Noise

by Joseph McCombs
February 13th, 2006 5:28 PM

Bill Fletcher Jr. of TransAfrica Forum
photo: Courtesy of Vanessa Mosley

Turning the Tide Towards Freedom: Building the Youth and Student Movement for Justice
Bayard Rustin High School for the Humanities
351 West 18th Street
Friday at 7 p.m., Saturday at 9:30 a.m.
Barnard College, Barnard Hall
Broadway & 117th Street
Sunday at 9:30 a.m.
212-727-8610, ext. 24 $10 to $50

A message to all you fine young minds who feel disempowered and disenfranchised, and that your government is unresponsive and unjust: The Young Democratic Socialists wish to remind you that paralyzed defeatism is no solution, and to illustrate and motivate, they offer this three-day conference over Presidents' Day weekend. To combat what they call the far right's "war on America's fundamental democratic values," the YDS have assembled an array of panels and workshops featuring many of America's top leftist writers, educators, and activists, all sharing goals of increased liberty and equality in the U.S. and beyond. The Friday opening plenary, "Beyond Katrina: Continuing the Struggle for Racial and Economic Justice," features the energizing Bill Fletcher Jr. of TransAfrica Forum, while Saturday and Sunday panels explore such interconnected issues as imperialism, global capitalism, and unequal access to education. Leading academics like postcolonial theorist and Derrida scholar Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak and sociologist-author Frances Fox Piven (The War at Home: The Domestic Costs of Bush's Militarism) join muckraking journalists including frequent Nation contributors Liza Featherstone and Christian Parenti in conversations whose urgency is underscored by a Frederick Douglass quote: "Power concedes nothing without a demand!"

2006-02-09T23:51:00.000+01:00

HOMEWORK #2: HOW MUCH DO YOU LOVE/HATE YOUR GOVERNMENT?

English students! Here is your second assignment: Please write two things that you like about Zapatero and/or the PSOE... and then write two things that you don't like about them. If possible, try to not repeat the responses that others have already written.

2006-02-08T09:18:00.000+01:00

FEAR OF A RED PLANET: MY PLANS FOR GLOBAL DOMINATION

My planetary invasion is well underway! Below you can see the various countries and U.S. states I've visited (for more than a day) over the past quarter century (a mere 6% of the total).

I hope to cover more territory over the coming months. I need to work out the details for a potential trip to Morocco where I would like to stay with friends/family/comrades of exiled dissidents I've met here. During semana santa, I plan to go to Berlin for Queer Easter. I was worried that this would conflict with my desire to attend the European Social Forum in Greece, but I just learned that the Forum was pushed back because of the Italian national elections (Berlusconi is going down!). Scandinavia, eastern and more of southern Europe are also on my list. Probably won't get to all of it... but maybe I can tag along with you if you're plotting to invade any of these areas yourself.

(And yes, ever since my stint as a teenager working with the trotskyist SWP during a semester abroad in London, I've found this Sherman-Williams Paint ad immensely funny. Got to respect the attempts of the workers' vanguard to smother the globe under their suffocating hegemony. At least they take planetary domination seriously! Ha!)

2006-02-05T21:57:00.000+01:00

MARCH 31-APRIL 2 & APRIL 20-APRIL 23: COME TO SPAIN!

So far, stateside friends who have visited me here have included a union organizer buddy, a couple of gender and sexuality professors and a Clowns Without Borders world traveler (featured above, right), not the mention Jan's enjoyable extended stay. I know a few others who are planning to come this way to play guest to my host. If you fancy a trip to the land of winding old streets, extravagant modernist architecture, seaside romance and kind people with mullets, just let me know.

There are two particular upcoming events I would like to invite my friends and politico pals to come attend:

The first is the much anticipated re-opening of our community activist social center, Ateneu Candela, in its grand new location.

Moving from a relatively small space into a giant old factory has been a massive undertaking. Construction started this past summer, and we're still working regular shifts to build the two story structure that will soon house the radio station, the ecological food co-op, the library, the office, the cafe/bar, the concert/conference space, etc. It's all being done with volunteer labor mostly on the weekends when the gang gets down and dirty, breaking midday for group lunch.

A quick explanation about the social center: The Ateneu Candela is a space for activists with a global perspective to engage in locally relevant political projects. It is run in a cooperative fashion by a number of collectives focusing on distinct issue areas (gender, immigration, disobedience, Central American solidarity, precarity and urban ecology). Many of the Ateneu's participants previously cut their teeth in the once fertile squatter "okupa" movement. The okupas became an increasingly self-marginalizing "identitarian" (mostly anarko-punk) phenomenon, spending much of their time posturing as radical oppositionists and fending off the threat of police-enforced eviction. The social center model, on the contrary, operates as a more stable community institution attracting a much wider range of participants. The model is growing in Spain and is already quite extensive in Italy. The Ateneu Candela promises to be one of the most important spaces of its kind in the region.

The March 31-April 2 grand opening will feature a weekend full of exciting activities. We're inviting organizers of similar initiatives from around Spain to join us... just as you are welcome to take part. There will be an open house of sorts to showcase the new space, presentations of the various collectives, a communal food block party, concerts, theater performances and more. We're also tentatively scheduling a round table discussion on the relationship between social movements and political parties. We're hoping that leading reps from the governing Socialist Party, the Communist-led United Left, and the nationalist Republican Left of Catalunya) will come and speak. You should come too!

The second major event we're hosting at the social center is an EU-wide conference entitled MIGRACIONES, CIUDADANIA Y GLOBALIZACION: Destruir las fronteras construyendo movimiento. If you are interested in the concept of global citizenship, take issue with "fortress Europe", enjoy social movement theory, and/or want to link the work of the "precarious" with immigrant struggles, then you'll be right at home. I'll post the website for the conference soon. I'm still trying to figure out my own positions on immigration, looking at it through both a human rights and a utilitarian paradigm. I'd be happy to host you during this April 20-23 weekend to explore the issues together.

2006-02-03T01:01:00.000+01:00

ENGLISH: THE NEW ESPERANTO

Jan and I started teaching English classes at Ateneu Candela a couple of weeks ago. Wednesday we have an intermediate conversation class and Thursday is the basic "zero patatero" class. Reading this entry is a homework assignment! (That's why I am trying to use basic English). Are you there, our favorite English students?

I also teach four classes at a local public high school called Montserrat Roig. My high school students are between the ages of 12-18. But, the students at the Ateneu Candela are all friends. The classes should be 90 minutes, but unfortunately everyone arrives 30 minutes late. From now on, if our students arrive late we will punish them by writing embarrassing stories about them here! Ha!

English students, here is your homework assignment: please write a comment (in English!) using these vocabulary words:

1. George Bush
2. sexy
3. birthday cake
4. belly button
5. Toni Negri

Directions: click the 'comments' button below and write your response!

2006-02-02T11:36:00.000+01:00

THE LAW ON OUR SIDE: MY FIRST MEDIA STUNT IN SPAIN

On Monday morning Jan and I were invited by our friend Ernesto to take part in a little subversive political theater against a giant, evil golf course.

A little over-simplified background: The Real Club de Golf del Prat was built last year in spite of tremendous opposition from an array of environmental, community and political organizations. The location, once owned by a pension bank and reserved for public use, was sold off under the shadiest of circumstances. One of the few remaining forest areas populating the urban outskirts of Barcelona was destroyed in order to establish what is now one of the largest gulf courses in all of Europe. The new course takes up almost 300 football fields worth of land, requiring chemical fertilizers and a massive quantity of public-utility water in a region that suffers from drought and deplenishing water tables. It also happens to be one of the most expensive courses anywhere, catering to multi-millionaires who can afford the exclusive membership fee starting in the tens of thousands of euros. Taken together, it's a classic example of elite private interests trumping the public good.

We were called into action on Monday by members of the Association for the Defense and Study of Catalunya's Environment (ADENC), an influential and well-respected organization of ecologists in the region. Our target was a section of a newly constructed water treatment facility being used by the golf course in clear violation of the law. The golf course does not have the right to divert water from a nearby river via municipal water infrastructure to use for purely private ends. So we arrived at the site dressed as members of the fictitious "Water Company for the People" to demand that the government dismantle the water processing facility as the law requires.

All of this garnered a lot of mainstream press. Several national and local television stations, radio outfits and newspapers showed up to cover the stunt. You can see a goofy picture of me, Jan, Ernesto and two members of ADENC at right.

It's nice to have the law on your side and to use it as a leverage for justice. There are obvious benefits to having a regulatory framework governing individual and institutional behavior. Assuming proper enforcement mechanisms are in place, such laws (if democratically determined and transparently implemented) can be used to punish big polluters, corporate crooks and others who betray the common good.

These advantages are sometimes overlooked by (especially young) activists who may be unfamiliar with how democratic governance and rules-based systems work and/or are distrustful of the authorities charged with managing them. The regular abuse of power fuels this distrust. And the decline of civic life along with the growth of inaccessible bureaucracies only increases unfamiliarity with public policy and it's consequences.

"Direct action" pressure from a mob of fed-up citizens, contrary to what some anarchists might think, is no substitute for legislative action. Of course there are laws and institutions that are unjust and must be challenged, sometimes through acts of civil disobedience. And there are moments when public shaming and castigation can be remarkably effective at drawing attention to our issues, as Monday's stunt clearly illustrated. But instead of merely bearing witness to our own righteousness, such efforts should have meaningful reform as one of their central intended goals. Winning concrete change, even if it doesn't go as far as we would like, can inspire and make possible more radical gains. Ultimately, this is also an argument for taking political power (especially winning elections) since this allows us to implement the very standards for society we hope to uphold.

Which brings me to a few other clever examples of using the law to fight for justice:

Back in Ithaca I was peripherally involved with some folks from S yracuse United Neighbors. At the time, this community organization was mobilizing against the construction of a massive, technologically retrograde waste treatment facility in a poor, mostly black neighborhood. The group used some of the same tactics as ADENC in order to stall, disrupt and offer alternatives to the destructive project. They filed suit against the plant promoters, charging them with environmental racism and violation of civil rights statutes.

The Maryland Fair Share Health Act, brought forward by community and labor activists, seems to be one of few effective strategies for forcing Wal-Mart to provide health care coverage for its employees. We can imagine several similar legislative measures to halt the corporate giant and the race-to-the-bottom it represents.

The KWRU-led Poor People's Economic Human Rights Campaign cites the Universal Declaration of Human Rights when arguing that the U.S. government, as a signatory nation to the 1948 document, isn't meeting its legal obligation to provide living-wage jobs, health care and the like to its citizens. If the Declaration were to be fully implemented, we'd basically be living in a democratic socialist society. It's too bad that most people are either totally unaware of the Declaration or consider it a quaint, but impossible wish list.

2006-01-28T02:49:00.000+01:00

ON THE AESTHETICS OF SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC ADS

Some interested back-n-forth over the style and content of political party propaganda:

Back in November Clemens designed some rather stunning mock campaign ads aimed at bringing about a red-green majority coalition in Austria's next national elections. I made a few sloppy generalizations when critiquing these at the time that Geoff Kurtz has since rebutted on his blog.

I stand by my hunch that the visual presentation (and particularly the websites) of today's social democratic parties is partially related to a hollowed out, professionalized, and accommodationist politics. I say this recognizing that it's all a matter of degree... this is not the old Trotskyist in me calling for a purist and impractical alternative or the art snob in me insisting on my own preferred aesthetic sensibility.

None of the sites Geoff recommended in his post show images of collective participation (either civic forums or demonstrations) or images meant to signify a social problem in need of redress. Politics as contention is lost. Politics as problem solving barely comes through either. Instead, these sites rely more on showcasing party leaders and mirroring the sleek aesthetic appeal that at times I find sterile and well, corporate. Don't get me wrong; I agree with Geoff that the party websites he linked to were vastly more appealing than the average lefty outfit in the States. But there are also campaigning NGOs and even more radical political sects and parties that have very well designed, sharp and contemporary websites... websites that connote political values and movement. These needn't be flush with old-school images of fists in the air or crowds waving red flags, but they could certainly do better than a few colored boxes and uniform fonts that dominate most mainstream party homepages.

Again all of this is understandable given the relationship to power and the very different roles and responsibilities that oppositionist groups have as compared to governing parties. I could just be conflating the role of parties who have to project an imagine of being competent managers of society with the work that social movement and advocacy organizations who can supplement institutional party politics with demands and persuasive visual styles of their own. And perhaps my love affair with political propaganda posters from back-in-the-day--when images where needed to communicate ideas to an occasionally illiterate audience--is out of step with today's more advanced societies where written text is a sufficient communicator.

Two examples to further illustrate the gripes I have:

Big elections just concluded in Canada. Despite the Tories taking the lead, our people in the NDP did really well. Go to their website. For years it's been a Jack Layton fan-page. Does the party boss really need so much face time? WTF?!?

Spain's Communist Party (PCE) used to preside over much of the mobilized citizenry that led the transition to democracy. Along with the PSOE (that now has vastly more electoral support), the PCE no longer represents any real base of active support. They demobilized the once potent neighborhood associations through clientelist measures. The PSOE rose to power capitalizing off disillusionment with the PCE in the years after La Transicion, but has since opted for a style of political leadership almost entirely based on elite power-brokering.

It doesn't have to be this way. Political parties are an essential mechanism for structuring democratic participation in modern society, but the Left needs to figure out how to reverse the growing disenchantment with institutional politics. I'm forever in search of forms of political organization and struggle that are the most pragmatic in terms of improving peoples lives, but that also inspire us collectively to fight for and achieve a fundamentally different world. I find it frustrating that these two mutual aims don't seem to coexist more regularly.

Any hard-nosed idealists out there care to chime in?

2006-01-27T13:05:00.000+01:00

RADICAL HIP HOP & COMMUNITY CONSTRUCTION

I trekked down to Madrid this past weekend with Xavi, Maribel, Ernesto and Andres for what ended up being a scrappy tour-de-force of the capital city's alternative left.

There were two main reasons for putting up with the exhaustive 10 hour trip of train, bus and subway:

1) My friend Jan had previously arrived in Madrid and would be coming back to Terrassa with us to be my sidekick for a few months. Jan and I first met each other 5 years ago studying in Chile and have stayed close ever since, exchanging visits between Philly-NYC and sharing mutual friends and similar interests in community organizing and lefty cultural projects.

2) Madres Unidas Contra La Droga had organized a massive hip hop concert featuring some of Spain's top raperos. The event was billed as a fundraiser to help the Madres' campaigning efforts on behalf of incarcerated minors trapped in a system of social exclusion, repression, and a denial of productive alternatives to jail time.

After arriving at the converted bull-fighting stadium situated in a peripheral neighborhood south of the city center, I was immediately struck by one obvious contrast: almost all the kids waiting in line outside were white. Now even if it's true that most consumers of hip hop in the States are also white (suburbanites), a concert in a major city back home would see a lot more black and brown faces. But while for demographic reasons Spain has a more homogeneous population with only a few decades of substantial immigration flows, hip hop, true to its origins, is very much a form of expression for the country's marginalized working-class urban youth.

We were lucky to get in for free since the people from Ateneu Candela are tight with the Madres. Once inside, as the caliber of each performing act improved, the size of the crowd grew toward an impressive 8000.

The highlight of the show for me was undoubtedly when two of the Madres got on stage to deliver impassioned speeches denouncing social inequality, the criminalization of youth, immigrant scapegoating and capitalism itself. They were met with prolonged roaring applause. It was a beautifully surreal experience, one I couldn't imagine happening readily back home where we've largely squandered the opportunity to mobilize disaffected communities with a non-commercialized musical genre. From what I could understand, each of the performers that night also injected a steady dose of protest politics into their acts.

While I was eating this up from the cement bleachers, the night was not without its flaws. Some of the rhetoric was a little rough around the edges as to be expected (like one rapper who glowingly praised Arafat), all the performers were male, and (this almost goes without saying) the event was entirely heteronormative.

That night after spending 5 gruelling hours helping dismantle the stage, we eventually made it back to an apartment the Madres have for hosting guests. We crashed there along with some prisoner support activists from Galicia and a woman from the south who had come to visit her husband in jail.

It's worth pointing out that the groups name, Mothers United Against Drugs, is in some ways an intentionally misleading populist trick. They are anything but drug prohibitionists. In fact, there was more hash smoking at the concert than I had ever been around. The organization started in response to the heroine pandemic that struck the country's poor neighborhoods in the 80's. From then on they've been a militant force arguing for drug treatment, for employment opportunities and against police abuse and detentions for petty offenses. Their primary work, however, is to help prisoners secure the necessary housing for provisional release, to arrange family visits to incarcerated individuals and other direct support services. Through these efforts they've become a point of reference for Madrid's oppositional social movements. In the massive anti-war mobilizations leading up to the Iraq invasion, the Madres occasionally led the marches. It looks bad when cops attack a group of middle-aged women, even the gruff Madres who seem to rather enjoy taunting men in uniform.

Saturday morning we started by visiting one of Madrid's better known social centers El Seco. Next up the group ventured into the Lavapies neighborhood. On the way to the social movement bookshop, Traficantes de Suenos, we stopped by another activist community space that was under construction. This one was organized by a feminist collective who had negotiated with the city government to subsidize the bulk of their rent. Last year I had seen a video documentary they had produced interviewing "precarious" women. Good stuff. The Traficantes bookshop, I must say, was one of the nicest lefty hangouts I've ever been in from an aesthetic and utilitarian perspective. After getting a tour and perusing titles, we went down the block and stopped in another swanky spot, a cyber cafe owned by the trumpetist for the now defunct anti-capitalist band Hechos Contra el Decoro. They've set up free wireless internet coverage for the entire neighborhood. Lastly, before heading back to the Madres compound, we stopped into a women-only sex shop. All of this within just a few blocks radius.

A trip to Sunday mass at the Parroquia de Entrevias bookended the weekend. The church resides in a run-down part of town and is covered by amateur anti-war graffiti. This is no ordinary place of worship. The "priest" of the dilapidated space filled with a small group of poor folk is the author of God is an Atheist. The service and mass were conducted in true Paulo Freire popular education style. Quotes from the bible were used in a participatory fashion to reflect on the hip hop concert, on neighborhood conflicts and the state of the world in broader terms. Afterwards everyone headed upstairs for a free communal paella.

There is so much beauty and creativity to be found on the margins if you know where to look. I can only hope that such initiatives are able to have a transformative impact beyond the small corners they currently occupy.

2006-01-05T12:55:00.000+01:00

MY ELECTRONIC CRISIS & SINCEREST APOLOGIES

I´ve been in technological withdrawal for the past week or so, partially explaining my absence from this page. Both my new iBook and iPod are in the shop, depriving me of the basic requirements of modern living.

In the end it wasn´t taking my laptop into the bathtub that led to its demise... or having my godson smear yogurt over the screen... or my knack for typing up notes in dusty construction sites. The computer simply slipped off a cushion one night and that little bump put it out of commission (ps: unlike the picture at right, my iBook looks perfectly fine. It just won´t start up). Fingers crossed that the magicians at the Mac repair shop will fix everything lickety-split.

In the meantime, I´m working on a borrowed desktop from the paleolithic era. It´s so slow I even had time to shower and get dressed this morning while simply waiting for it to boot up.

Apologies to anyone I have not written back yet. I´m trying to catch up, but it could take some time.

2005-12-24T20:20:00.000+01:00

BABY JESUS LIVES!

Now in Madrid with my lovely relatives for the holidays.

I've already committed a cross-cultural error. Instead of getting gifts for everyone, each family member is designated as the "secret friend" to another. I picked up a few presents for Nacho, my cousin and amigo desconocido, but I really don't think it will be hard to discern who the rainbow peace flag (friede in German... snatched from the Austrian Socialist Student Union office) or the Viennese chocolates are from. Doh!

Enjoy this picture, taken last week at the market off Las Ramblas in Barcelona, of an animal carcass dressed as Santa.

2005-12-18T09:25:00.000+01:00

OFF TO VIENNA, THEN MADRID

I've been meaning to write several entries over the past few days, but simply haven't found the time. My friend Mike has been visiting me for the week, and we've been trekking across the area, up into the mountains, down thru the slums and as recent as last night, finding ourselves in the middle of a protest mini-riot (poster at right, more to come).

I'm leaving in a hour to stay with Clemens in Vienna for several days. Following that, I'll be in Madrid for the holidays with my aunts, uncles, cousins and their kids. I should be back here in Catalunya by the end of the year. In the meantime, I'll try my best to post a few items here. I've been chewing on several interrelated themes I'd like to digest. Meeting the head of the Gay Liberation Front, hanging out with Argentinian anarchists, sitting in on interviews with Moroccan immigrants, and running around with Mike doing touristy things has given me plenty to think about.

2005-12-10T17:24:00.000+01:00

SOCIALIZED HEALTH CARE & MY UNDERWATER INSECT UPCHUCK

As far as my health goes, these are the best of times... and the worst of times.

The good news is that yesterday I found out I am eligible for free treatment in Spain's public health system. I had been misinformed by the Spanish Consulate in New York that even though I am now a citizen of Spain, I would have to have a contracted job that pays into the social security system in order to reap the benefits of the county's excellent socialized medical and preventative care. They were wrong.

It was actually better than I ever could have imagined. I walked right into the local public health building and signed up for my first appointment. I will be receiving a card shortly that entitles me to free health care anywhere in the EU. According to Tomas, the public facilities here, which are said to be better than their private counterparts for most everything, even offer therapy sessions on the spot without prior scheduling. It was almost too good to be true (perhaps it is). Ah, the joys of welfare state protections and well-funded universal public goods. The years of navigating the outrageously expensive, complicated and inefficient U.S. private insurance bureaucracies would finally be over.

Then of course there is the bad news. Public transportation, affordable housing regulations, and post-secondary education are all pretty sub-par here. More on this later.

But what I really want to complain about, however, is the food. I got really sick last night and wound up emptying my stomach of a days worth of assorted fried critters. In the U.S. I basically live as a vegetarian with very occasional exceptions. Beyond egg/potato/bread variations and nibbly tapas options like olives and cheese, there are few items I can eat here, especially when we go out in large groups and share a number of small dishes. I had given in and have been nourishing myself with the bountiful fruits of the sea.

Until last night, that is. The more of think about it, the more I am repulsed by seafood. My friend Eric back in NYC has a mortifying fear of shrimp that I used to regularly tease him about. But now I'm starting to develop my own visceral disgust for what are essentially underwater insects. It's one thing to have the exo-skeleton of a creature removed and then have them disguised in caked, fried batter. It's quite another to see all the gross antennae thingies of prawns, the suction-cup thingies of octopus, or the fleshy fold thingies of clams up close. Maybe I'll see if Spanish public health covers nutritionist visits. I've got to work out a diet here so I can keep on the pounds and avoid future late night trips to the porcelain dumpster.

2005-12-07T14:27:00.000+01:00

"LEFT-WING" NATIONALISMS & EUROPEAN PRIDE

Yesterday, some here celebrated the 28th anniversary of the post-dictatorship Constitution, the founding document of Spain's liberal democracy (albeit with the trappings of monarchism).

ETA, the Basque separatist terror group, marked the occasion by planting a series of bombs around Madrid's highways. Good job guys. Believe it or not, ETA, and its now banned political party Batasuna, consider themselves to be leftists. I think that label of fascist is perhaps a little more fitting. In a democratic state, any group which legitimizes political assassinations based on ethno-nationalist sentiment is a dangerous force indeed. (Yes, I am aware of the long, brutal history of supression of Spain's cultural minorities and regional groups, I just don't see how these grievances match up in post-Franco Spain)

On this same day, the Republic Left of Catalunya (ERC) held what I suspect they would consider a disappointingly small rally in downtown Barcelona. Only a few hundred supporters showed up. As the main nationalist political party in Catalunya, the ERC is currently mobilizing against the possible withdrawal of a Zapatero goverment measure to grant the region greater autonomy. When compared to el Pais Vasco, nationalism in this region of Spain has always had a more cultural and cosmopolitan emphasis. Nonetheless, I'm not about to wave Catalunya's red and yellow striped flag anytime soon.

How such calls for national independence (or greater "autonomy") make sense in the context of a pluralistic state (Spain) and continental cohesion (Europe) is beyond me. But I suppose I am willing to entertain alternative perspectives. I'm also playing around with versions of "European pride" that the Left might embrace. Identifying with the project of building a social EU that is open to the world has its merits. So long as there is no racial element associated with it, I find this a much more appealing concept. I would argue that NYC residents, likewise, should do more to celebrate what makes The City, despite its enormous problems, so kick-ass. A community of immigrants contibuting to a rich social fabric, one that offers haven to many outcasts, is worth championing. And the possibilities of what could be are even that much greater.

2005-12-06T22:13:00.000+01:00

CENSORSHIP & THE MOST DANGEROUS MAN IN THE EU

I asked some comrades from the Mouvement des Jeunes Socialistes (France) who were staying with me in New York a while back who they thought was the most dangerous person is all of Europe. After a short pause they both responded, "Putin." Follow-up question: the most powerful evildoer among EU member states? A slightly longer pause... "Berlusconi." After watching Viva Zapatero! the other night, a new "satirical documentary" about the regime of Silvio Berlusconi, Italy's right-wing premier certainly tops my list as well.

Berlusconi is practically a caricature of a leftist's worst nightmare. As the richest man in Italy, his personal media empire holds monopolistic control over both private and public television stations, rendering them pliant sources of infotainment and conservative drivel. His coalition government includes proto-fascists and he just happens to be one of the most unbelievably tacky and contemptuous S.O.B.s imaginable.

The film centers around the cancellation of a political satire program that was openly hostile to the regime and its blatant abuse of power and conflicts of interest. I'm not about to review the whole documentary here, so if it is ever shown in your area, I urge you to see it. It brings up important questions about how free speech, political humor, Murrow-style journalism, market-driven media, censorship, civic activism, and economic power mix, match and collide. While Viva Zapatero! is critical of the center-left opposition for failing the public and at times colluding with the same corrupt interests that back Berlusconi, the film's ultimate goal is unseat the right-wing in Italy's elections next year. Hence the amusing title. Spain's Zapatero came to power on the heals of a media disinformation campaign launched by the conservative Partido Popular in the immediate aftermath of the March 11th (of this year) terrorist bombings in Madrid. Once elected to office in a dramatic backlash against the Aznar government, Zapatero implemented a reform of Spain's public media outlets intended to make them independent of political party manipulation.

Add that to the withdrawal of Spanish troops from Iraq, gender parity in political posts, gay marriage, and a more diplomatic (and less repressive) political culture, and you have the makings of a modest reform agenda. Viva Zapatero?

2005-12-04T19:15:00.000+01:00

CLAUDIA, THE CHINESE MAFIA & IMPOSSIBLE GENEROSITY

Yesterday a couple people from Ateneu Candela came over to eat lunch and work on a rather ingenious political project. I won’t go into much detail now, but it involves creating a fictitious character named Claudia who is meant to represent the plight of those stuck in the low-wage economy. We spent a few hours creating Claudia’s blog which will soon serve a space to reflect on the lives and struggles of the “precarious” and to analyze the socio-economic conditions that perpetuate such structural inequalities (you can view the rudimentary site here). As an almost post-modern composite of fragmented identities, it should be intriguing to see how Claudia will alter the way questions of agency, universality and participatory research are normally dealt with. Tomas hopes that within a year, Claudia will be known “by everyone” in Barcelona (by which he primarily meant "new economy" young workers and students).

Later in the night I went to a live jazz club that the metropolitan government publicly runs or at least finances. After some time we met up with other friends to check out a few commonly frequented bars. Along the way I was introduced to Ana who sings in a hip-hop group and teaches both English and Chinese (I think). Somehow we ended up talking about patterns of Chinese immigration to Spain. There are a couple of things Ana brought up that I think warrant further investigation. More than any other immigrant community found here (from elsewhere in Europe, Pakistan, Latin America and north and sub-Saharan Africa) the Chinese are the most “mysterious”. By this I mean that there is less communication between Chinese workers (and their families) who come to Spain and the rest of society. Most people outside the community understand very little about how this fairly sizable population lives. Like many other groups of immigrants they rely on business and neighborhood networks within the community that act as a set of parallel institutions to regulate economic opportunities and the provision of services. I don’t know if this is an orientalist urban legend, but it is said that Chinese people rarely die here. Their papers are secretly passed onto someone else to assume the identity of the deceased.

Even though there’s apparently very little written about this, I’m curious about how these immigrant networks, both formal and underground, operate within the Chinese community in Spain. Ana mentioned certain practices (however anecdotal they may be) that can only be described as mafia-like. The systems of patronage that help families set up Chinese restaurants and small shops in the diaspora is also likely profiting at their expense. How severe the level of exploitation is within this gray economy is worth looking into. It could range from a more benign series of associative contacts that arrange mutually beneficial enterprises to scenarios that more closely approximate indentured servitude. Chinese immigrants may “choose” to work 14 or 15 hour daily shifts to save up to help their families, but there must be ways to lessen the hardship they experience and render transparent the shadier elements that may be taking advantage of a community already hemmed in by racism, social-exclusion, and a cultural/linguistic divide. Fighting labor exploitation within an economy that includes “family-owned” businesses is more complex than, say, campaigning for better wages and benefits for immigrant workers in “Spanish-owned” businesses.

OK… back to bar-hopping.

An older sketchy-looking guy at the Reina Victoria bar walked up to me last night and handed me a small ball of hash. We had not spoken a word to each other beforehand nor exchanged looks from across the room. I immediately assumed he was hitting on me and was hoping for something in return. Here’s the kicker: my friend Quim suggested to me that what he had done was most likely a sincere act of generosity and nothing more than that. I found this impossibly hard to believe. Could someone really just decide to share with a complete stranger without having ulterior motives? Quim also claimed that the oddly placed live snake in the bar was known to eat entire rabbits, another claim that at first seemed quite dubious. I had to get a second opinion. Today I asked Tomas and he confirmed that such random acts of generosity are perfectly normal here (although more common in the south). Back home where “rational choice” theory increasingly dominates political science as a discipline and the logic of the market more profoundly colors our everyday social behavior, an act as simple as giving a gift to a fellow human being is hard to make sense of. It’s a shame, really.

2005-12-02T13:29:00.000+01:00

“CHAOS” & PEOPLE-CENTERED URBAN DESIGN

[I was hoping to read and report-back on a lengthy essay suggested to me about Spain’s Socialist Prime Minister, Zapatero, but the on-line link was only available to New Left Review subscribers. Once I find a print version lying around, I’ll jot down some more notes on how Zapatero fits into the current political scene here. In the off chance you do have an NLR subscription, please look up the article titled,

A Spanish Spring?

and email it to me.]

After a meeting last night of a collective that works on issues of “precarity” (insecure job market, housing costs, immigration, etc.) and the requisite hours of talking/eating/drinking/smoking at a bar/restaurant afterwards, I was given a ride back home by Andres (pictured here helping with Ateneu Candela construction). His family, like many others in Terrassa, “immigrated” to the area from Andalusia during the last years of Franco. He has lived here all his life, witnessing the dramatic expansion and population increase of the area (now over 200,000). He referred to these changes as mostly positive, undermining the “chaos” that typified years past.

Living in NYC, I grew to appreciate a certain amount of chaos, but still found the city rather alienating and lacking the unpretentious public life that is so common here. But what exactly would a more perfect urban community consist of? How does the physical layout of our surroundings affect the quality of our lives? How to unleash the full creative potential of our fellow citizens while maintaining stable public institutions that respond to community needs?

Barcelona and Terrassa are much more people-oriented cities than those back in the States. There is more public space, pedestrian-only roads and plazas, fewer towering drab boxes, and a much richer social life in the streets. The typical explanations for this point to the fact that European cities are much older and were designed before “car culture” would dominate the landscape. The characteristic Mediterranean emphasis on community life and the corresponding outgoing personality traits are also said to be contributing factors. This much is fairly straightforward.

What interests me is the degree to which current public policies work to preserve or enhance the integrity of livable neighborhoods. The rapid development of sprawling peripheral communities here challenges not only the ecological limits the area can sustain, but also access to common public space and public services. I did learn, however, that several streets in downtown Terrassa were converted into car-free walkways over the past decade of so. These changes seem to have enhanced the city core’s function as a hub of social and economic life (map of Terrassa at right... orange colored streets are pedestrian-only). Obviously the process of community decentralization (meant here in negative sense) is reversible. We should be able to transform existing neighborhoods and build new communities that share the charm, efficient access, and people-centered qualities I think a great many of us desire. Of course this would involve rational, democratic planning, something the anarchy of the “free-market” isn’t so fond of.

2005-11-29T18:42:00.001+01:00

CAMPAIGNING AGAINST SEXIST VIOLENCE & THE PUBLIC SPHERE

I bet you didn’t read about it in the New York Times. It didn’t find its way onto the pages. And it probably wasn’t mentioned on American television either (correct me if I’m wrong).

November 25th was the International Day for the Eradication of Violence Against Women (or a variation of
the name depending on the organization/country/translation). And while the American public was largely kept in the dark, here in Spain (and elsewhere in the world) media outfits, political institutions and civic organizations marked the day with public pronouncements against sexism and domestic violence.

I didn’t have to go out of my way to look for this stuff. The front page of a daily paper I picked up on the train carried headlines about the brutal realities many women face here and around the world (official statistics claim that at least 55 women have been murdered this year alone by abusive partners in Spain). And later flipping through TV channels I encountered both serious reportage about campaigning efforts against gendered violence but also a number of public service announcements that TeleCinco (privately owned) put on in conjunction with the Ministry of Work and Social Affairs, Amnesty International and the Women’s Foundation. The image at right was part of a series of famous Spanish women telling stores of abuse. Other ads showed prominent male sports players proclaiming their opposition to such abuse.

A poster with similar messaging caught my attention at Terrassa's Municipal Institute of Culture, Education and Tourism. The image, posted below, features a number of notable local male politicians, professors, sports players, etc. The caption reads, We Say No... to Violence Against Women. And you? (sidenote: the guy with the scruffy white beard one up and over from I TU? is the father of a woman who works at the Ateneu Candela social center. I had lunch with both of them and others compas on Sunday. We ate Migas, typical poor peoples food from the south of Spain made with just wheat and water. Yum.)

Now I don't think it's particularly controversial to make public pronouncements against sexual violence. Just like it should be a no-brainer that torture must be forbidden and punished (ahem, Cheney). But what did impress me was the way in which a serious social problem was brought to light in the public sphere and with clear support from the state (at least on the rhetorical level). From what little I know, it seems as though domestic violence is dealt with in a more shamefully private manner in the U.S., where one might be more likely to hear about spousal abuse on exploitative shows like Cops or Maury Povich.

All of this got me thinking. Can you imagine how amazing it would be if leftists like you and I were in charge of the U.S. Ad Council? Instead of useless rubbish about how pot-smoking will ruin your life, we could... well, just think about the possibilities.

2005-11-28T14:07:00.000+01:00

FIRST NIGHT ON THE TOWN & INTRO TO QUEER ORGANIZING

That same night (Friday) I took the train into downtown Barcelona to meet up with Pere, half of an older gay couple who had previously visited me in NYC, and a friend of his who later promised to introduce me to some leading local members of the Juventudes Socialistas.

After dinner Pere and I went to La Paloma, a turn-of-the-century grand ballroom that is simultaneously kitschy and magisterial, for a concert in solidarity with HIV-positive gay men and women. This annual event, 17 years in the running, is a fundraiser sponsored by a prominent national queer rights organization. The slogan of the night, Prevention is Also Solidarity, encapsulated both the message of public health/sex education but also the necessity of standing up for (and with) a segment of society that is often denied basic rights.

After a few bands and a drag act performed a predictable set of thumping tacky gay numbers (can you guess which Gloria Gaynor song they played?), the swelling crowd turned around to hear speeches from the balcony. While I had trouble understanding those who spoke in Catalan (note: many languages are spoken in Spain... not just Spanish! My attempts to finally be able to speak my mother's tongue fluently are hampered by the fact that castellano is the second language here in Catalunya) the speeches provided an instructive political context to the cause at hand. The fight against AIDS is linked to demands for affordable/free access to treatment for the HIV-positive population, ending discrimination in the job market and in housing and insurance policies, introducing comprehensive sex education in the schools, promoting condom use, ending the imposition of conservative religious norms when determining domestic and foreign health policies, and defending the rights of transsexual men and women.

For those with previous experience in queer rights organizing or campaigning against AIDS, the above list of policy demands and changes needed in social behavior is nothing new. What did strike me, however, was how these issues were addressed in light of the historic victory this past summer when gay marriage and same-sex adoption laws were passed here. Once I have a better grasp of the Spanish queer rights movement I plan to write more about what U.S. activists can learn from it and vice-versa. For starters, the most obvious difference is that the Christian Right currently dominates the political sphere in the U.S. whereas Spain has a left-of-center government. Lest we forget, Spain's Socialist Prime Minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, put the full prestige of his office and party behind passage of the gay human rights legislation. He delivered a remarkable speech at the moment when the laws went into effect. You can read the English translation here. I suspect it is one of the most impressive public addresses ever given by a head of government anywhere in favor of full equality along the lines of sexual orientation. (Tomas suspects that the speech was written by Pedro Zerolo, PSOE secretary of Social Movements and Non-Governmental organizations. He and the other radical "horizontalists" I'm working with here aren't big fans of the Socialist Party. But Tomas likes Zerolo. I hope to meet him at some point).

After years of dictatorship, Spain only has a few decades of post-Franco democracy under its belt (my grandfather was a ranking member of the fascist army here... more on that later). The repressive Catholic Church continues to lose its grip over society while the culture of machismo diminishes as well. The transformation of attitudes related to gender and sexuality are impressive and lasting (for one, my male friends here all kiss each other on the cheek). How these trends developed over time, and where they may head in the future, will be discussed here further down the road.

One thing the speeches made clear this past Friday was that we need to celebrate our victories, remember those who have sacrificed for emancipatory causes (many of them are no longer with us), and mobilize to win new reforms that build off past successes. It's going to take a while, but I look forward to the day when we'll be able to hold a party to mark the coming of marriage equality in the U.S. (and other causes not always on the mainstream gay movement's agenda). When that day comes, hopefully the music will be more to my liking.

2005-11-27T14:00:00.000+01:00

TOUCHING DOWN & A FEW PRECAUTIONARY WORDS

I arrived in Spain on Friday morning via Dublin and New York. Tomas picked me up at the airport with our friend Quim and quickly whisked me a way to his apartment in Terrassa (outskirts of Barcelona) where I will be living from now on. After dropping me off, Tomas then headed immediately to a conference 6 hours away in San Sebastian (Basque country) that I would have attended had it not been for the previous 16 hours of travel (roughly translated: Between Militancy and Investigation: Toward New Political Creations). Tomas’ partner Susana and their son Eric (my godson) shortly left thereafter to her family’s village for the weekend. I had the place to myself to set-up my room and take a nap.

Disclaimer: I’m mostly a novice when it comes to Spain. I’ve been here about a dozen times to visit family in Madrid (my mom is still a citizen) and activist friends in the Barcelona area. But even with these periodic trips and shared heritage my understanding of Spain’s history, cultural nuances and contemporary realities is partial at best. Hopefully overtime my insights will move from impressionistic sketches to more fully fleshed out analyses. While I do think there is much to celebrate about Spain's comparatively advanced civil society, the greater influence of left politics, the maturity of social movements, and the beauty and vibrancy of Barcelona as a city, I do not intend to romantize life here. Xenophobia, the low-wage "precarious" job market, the banality of consumerism, the limits of social-democracy... all issues I intend to explore. Please challenge any assertions I make on this page that seem off base. I’ve also never written on a regular basis before, so punctuation and sentence structure are not my forte. But I do take pleasure in making sense of the world around me. Once I purchase a digital camera, I’ll be sure to share first-person images with you. Nuff said.

2005-11-26T23:33:00.000+01:00

WELCOME TO PINKO POSTCARDS!

I *heart* Barcelona. I’m a lover of politics. And at least until next summer, I’ll be sharing my socialist-tinged missives with you, my phantom audience.

It’s difficult for me to gauge how much time I can devote to chronicling my ex-pat adventures. At the moment my daily commitments are few, so you can expect a steady stream of commentary and catharsis.

Until my Spanish improves substantially, I’m stuck with the communicative skills of a small child. Writing here should (hopefully) offer space for reflection on a variety of topics. Expect observations and personal anecdotes related to: gender and sexuality; citizenship rights and immigrant struggles; electoral politics and public policy; social movements and civil society; community space and urban planning; leisure and consumption; language and cultural values; ideology and activist strategies. The geographic scope will move from Barcelona, to Spain as a whole, to the EU, crossing the Atlantic at times in order to draw comparisons to the socio-political realities in the United States.

Sound a bit grandiose and overly academic? Not to worry. I promise to carry on the unavoidable tradition of self-deprecation and inane gossip. You—my friends, comrades, and family—are also invited to poke fun, ask questions, and help me synthesize disparate thoughts.

So here it goes…