What next for anti-globalisation - post 9/1

[peaccenicked]

Read this http://www.forbes.com/work/managementtrend.../rtr450740.html (http://www.forbes.com/work/managementtrends/newswire/2001/12/11/rtr450740.html) Is Soros giving his blessing or subtly putting us down for being too violent or both? What strategy should we take?

[Conghaileach]

Fuck him. If a few (hundred) people want to relieve their anger by smashing up a McDonald's or GAP, that's their choice.

[libereco]

the problem is that smashing up shit is really counter productive...

[Kez]

But is it?

comrade kamo

[Kez]

Soros is a great example,
How we can screw the whole fucking system, within the friggin system

comrade kamo

[peaccenicked]

Over 10000 workers attended the last WTO demo
I read about. The point I would make is that the violence comes from the State. The media is great at
pointing the blame to protestors.
Yet Soros and recently Branson super rich bastards are making noises in sympathy with our aims.
I say use your enemies words against them, let people
know what hypocrisy means.

[Mclaren]

All you want is attention that you don't derserve because you don't talk

[Derar]

well i thought about violence in protests ....... but when u think about it ........ there r normal ppl that were forced to work in mcdonald's to survive .... when u destroy it ...... these ppl will loose their jobs . or they r the ones who will be responsible for cleaning the mess up and fixing the whole thing , this way we r harming the workers not the bullshit money suckers that r on the top ...... if u go to any big corporation and mess it up ...... the ones on the top in rank will cover their loss with using the ones on the bottom ( workers ) , by forcing them fixing the whole situation ....... so we better find a way to get the head of the corporation !

[HardcoreCommie]

Attacking Mcdonalds is stupid. EIther try to elect someone or flee to the mountains and prepare for you struggle. But don't fuck with McDOnald's, they make good food. Moreover, have you people ever been to a mcdonalds, most of the employees are teens, hardly oppressed, and the LIFERS are quite inept and should be LIFERS at Mcdonalds. I don't see who they're oppresssing. Certainly not the European fat cat farmers who get soo much money out of their governments. McDonald's kicks ass.

[libereco]

by the way.....at least in germany the macdonalds "stores" or whatever arn't owned by MacDonalds...they are owned by others who simply get to use the MD recipies and get to use the name and get the food delivered.

so you're hurting those people. ;)

[HardcoreCommie]

that's the way it is everywhere. Mcdonalds the world over, save a few, are not "owned" by Mcd's, rather they are franchised.

[celticsocialist]

I heard somewhere that no one owns more than 75 Mcdonalds restaurants which is not a lot in the grand scheme of things. You would be aswell smashing up HMV or Tower.

[peaccenicked]

Attacking branches of chain stores as a goal is silly,
the question is why have some people done it? To
protest that their own culture is being over written by
US imperialism. When I see a protest , the first thing
I wonder is what is this all about.
If some anti globalisers are unduly violent it does not
change the nature of the just struggle against globalisation, The question of thinking globally and acting locally is about how do we come to terms with the unfair media coverage of our cause and how to organise for the next demo.

[I Will Deny You]

Quote: from celticsocialist on 9:15 pm on Jan. 8, 2002
I heard somewhere that no one owns more than 75 Mcdonalds restaurants which is not a lot in the grand scheme of things. You would be aswell smashing up HMV or Tower.

I think that may be part of the problem. There are hundreds of McDonald's owners across the globe, but none of them own something that is really theirs. Before McDonald's and similar fast food places came about, all owners would hire their own chefs and would usually use local produce (unless it was a Chinese place in Chinatown and not China, or something like that). They would hire decorators to make unique atmospheres, and when someone from out of town came around and ate there they would remember it (for a little while at least). I still remember local places I ate at years ago on different road trips and vacations.

Now owners aren't visionaries, they're hacks. So while I don't condone smashing up McDonald's, there is still a problem with the idea of it even if it's not just that one guy owns thousands of fast food stops.

Three cheers for Bethesda!

[El Che]

violence is very conter productive, it degrades us and gives them a golden oportunity to ignore us and to use repressive force. I would say that violence prety much renders any protest useless, dangerous and even harmfull to the cause.

[HardcoreCommie]

But isn't it the owners choice to be "hacks" I mean who are you to say that people can't own mcDonalds because you like fromage and bread better? If people didn't want mcdonalds, then the company would go out of business, the members of those oppressed cultures want it, otherwise they wouldn't buy their food there. All im trying to say is that communism doesn't render personal goals void, it doesn't justify vandalism. We shouldn't get sidetracked taking down the golden arches and the insulting their yummy food.

[tebvie]

I wanted to know everyones opinion on sweat shop labor..

[I Will Deny You]

HardcoreCommie, I don't know who you were responding to in your post but as the person who called the owners "hacks," I would like to go on record saying that I never supported violence. Maybe my post wasn't clear enough, but I was trying to support the Slow Food movement, not violence.

[HardcoreCommie]

the point i was trying to make is that people don't eat at mcdonalds because that is all there is to eat. Rather mcdonalds exists and spreads widely because that is what people like to eat.

somebody somewhere mentioned dialectical reasoning. Well mcdonalds is the synthesis, its the result.

It's unfortunate but if people valued "slow food" they would go to such resturants and keep them in business.

[Moskitto]

McDonalds sucks.

It's loaded with fat so you can't intake as much carbohydrate energy, The burgers are probably loaded with BSE, It doesn't taste very much of meat, It all sucks basically.

Oh and I heard something about them exploiting people as well.

Anyway if you want to eat that crap, Burger King's better, or try Kebab Ye next time you're passing through LB.

[peaccenicked]

Article in the Independent on the anti globalisation movement
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/...sp?story=111852 (http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/story.jsp?story=111852)
Is another world possible with the market?

(Edited by peaccenicked at 7:58 pm on Jan. 10, 2002)

[Derar]

I agree ...... mcdonald's is shit food ........
try to get a burger , keep it away for 5 hours , then try to eat it !!!
the moto should be ( healthy plastic food ) .
i also read in a magazine once that a woman in the US found a fried head of a chicken inside her mcfries ... i saw the picture..... looked so disgusting !!!
And onother thing harcorecommie , ppl dont eat at mcdonald's becoz its tasty ...... ppl eat at mcdonald's becoz its famous , which is sad !!

[Moskitto]

Actually, A large number of mcdonalds are actually owned by the company not by franchisees.

The majority in the UK are owned by the company.

[peaccenicked]

Mcdonalds are certainly a symbol of globalisation and the sweatshop. I support the idea of unionisation
But if a french nationalist drives a truck into one of them.
And gets of lightly by a French judge.
I laugh my head off.
It is wrong to support luddite behaviour and vandalism
and definitely terror that kills innocent people but
an ill thought out anti imperialist gesture, is still anti imperialist as to Sept 11, I am not alone in thinking
that there should be an inquiry into what really happened there is a petition at http://www.rense.com/general19/911inquiry.htm as when you ask the question: who benefits? It has not been the causes
that Bin Laden expouses.

(Edited by peaccenicked at 4:44 pm on Jan. 13, 2002)

[peaccenicked]

PARIS, Jan. 19 — Thousands of anti-globalisation activists gathered in Paris on Saturday for a rally called by French group Attac aimed at ensuring that poverty and Third World debt are not forgotten during France's election year.


Attac does not plan to put up candidates for the presidential election in April and May and legislative elections in June, but said it wanted to ensure all parties debated problems facing the world's poor and disenfranchised.
''Will we at last take these problems seriously in an electoral campaign?'' Attac said in a statement. ''Attac, in any case, will take them to the heart of public debates in the coming months.''
Some 6,000 people crammed into a concert hall to listen to speeches by anti-globalisation campaigners from around the world and music, Attac director Jean-Louis Sounes said.
The four-page ''Manifesto 2002,'' calls for the cancellation of Third World debt, a ban on genetically modified crops, and criticises the work of international organisations such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Trade Organisation.
Attac, whose activists often take part in protests at world trade talks and anti-war demonstrations, has garnered widening support over the years in its lobbying for the a tax on currency trading to fund the Third World.
Socialist Prime Minister Lionel Jospin went so far as to get the issue on the agenda of a meeting of European finance ministers in Belgium last year, although it received little backing and seems to have again fallen off the political screen.
French politicians obviously consider it important to show interest in Attac's message, since a bevy of ministers and presidential candidates plan to go to this month's World Social Forum of anti-globalisation activists in Brazil.
Several of Jospin's ministers, a representative of President Jacques Chirac and three presidential candidates will attend the meeting in Porto Alegre between January 31 and February 5.

[Imperial Power]

Mcdonalds a symbol of the sweatshop? Mcdonalds are franchises and how they are operated completly depends on the owner. I wish I was a police officer on riot control at the next wto.

[Moskitto]

They're not all francises, only about 40% of them are, Trust me, my case study for an exam was for McDonalds.

[I Will Deny You]

Quote: from Moskitto on 11:00 pm on Jan. 22, 2002
my case study for an exam was for McDonalds.Glad to see you're getting an education. :)