Showing posts with label Colonialism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Colonialism. Show all posts

19.8.16

Citizens Disrupt Investment Summit at the Sheraton in Puerto Rico

"You look way too Maoist"
"They need to get a job and work up through the system"
"This is the easiest place in the world to get an education"
-Dr.Scott Brown Professor of Fiance at UPR

Today at 9am activist crashed the 2016 Puerto Rico Investment Summit at the Isla Grande Sheraton hotel. The arrived in mass and with banners and called for an end to Act 20 and 22.The Annual summit is a way to encourage potential investors to take advantage of  incentives these two laws provide. 

Both of these laws give unfair advantages to foreign and US corporations and investors. Act 20 gives a 100% tax exemption on dividends and/or profit distributions to both export services. Act 22 gives individual investors 100% tax exemption on dividends, interest income and all capital gains.





Scott Brown(left) Pete(right)
The event had a heavy police and private security presence. Hotel security was verbally abusive and there some physical altercations as objectors to the event disrupted passage into the event room. We spoke with Pete (Just Pete) and Dr. Scott Brown, a Kansas City professor of finance at the University of Puerto Rico. Hear the interview here.

This was an inter-organizational action and one of many to come, not just in the coming days but in the coming months.

Photo: Stevie Elepan

Photo: Stevie Elepan



Photo: Stevie Elepan

Photo: Stevie Elepan

Photo: Stevie Elepan


Photo: Stevie Elepan

Photo: Stevie Elepan




Photo: Stevie Elepan

Photo: Stevie Elepan


Photo: Stevie Elepan

Photo: Stevie Elepan


Photo: Stevie Elepan

Photo: Stevie Elepan

Photo: Stevie Elepan

If you enjoyed this article check out Through Our Own Eyes at KBOO 90.7 FM and get a post card from Puerto Rico when you make a donation to our project before the 1st of November 2016.









25.7.16

Being Embedded and Participating in Revolution in Puerto Rico

Today marks one week since I started staying at the Campamento Contra La Junta. It has been challenging and empowering. Being embedded with highly motivated, loving , passionate radical people that organize and work collectively is delightful. It is hot, the feds have gas powered lighting towers pointed toward the camp, they come out and patrol with dogs sniffing around the tents. There is no internet and charging your phone requires luck and coordination. Even with all those challenges the camp works and does what it was meant to do. The camp creates space for people to discuss not just the fiscal board but the colonial relationship Puerto Rico has with the U.S.


Youth in revolt while on summer break.
The camp has been a staging ground for projects and actions such as:


  • The march in the capital against Naled.


  • In Plaza Las Americas,the largest mall in the Caribbean,  fliers were handed out and activist held space and gave speeches about PROMESA and its impact on Puerto Rico.


  • Mobilization to support actions against Energy Answers from burning of trash near rural towns like Arecibo.


  • The camp has also provided food services, entertainment, educational activities and creative projects for the youth.


It has been interesting living in the space between activist and journalist, not that I have been either for very long. Luckily there is a label for my style. I am apparently doing Gonzo journalism, much like the Algerians during the revolution or Hunter Thompson. I am not as good as any of those but considering I am in the shit and have limited resources I should embrace that style. Mainstream journalism is biased in favor of capitalism and neoliberalism why can't I do the same thing against the current?


Revolutionary work is sometimes organizing the pantry.
It's is frustrating to be working with limited resources knowing that in a few months you will have resources that would benefit your host. Even though you are  operating far from home on a very small and tight budget and embedded,dealing with some of the same pain as your host, working with your host, building relationships, even becoming comrades but in a few months, bam! You find yourself 3000 miles away from all their troubles.

My presence has been received with gratitude but I feel like a burden most of the time. Maybe it is my internalized capitalist thinking, maybe it's that European settler imported guilt, maybe journalist are just remora. Not that there is anything wrong with a remora. A remora and its host benefit from their relationship greatly without the host feeling any effects. That should be my goal as a journalist, be beneficial without being an expense. Not easy and probably impossible.


The best I can hope for is that this experience makes my skin thicker, my brain sharper and my entire self more motivated. My body feels beaten down and tired and I am always sticky but my heart beats with love. Never before in Puerto Rico was I ever told I was this cool. It's like I went into a spaceship and traveled near the speed of light for a minute then came back to five years into the future. On the other hand, my time in Portland gave me the resources and experience be useful and motivated here in Puerto Rico.
More of us than there are of them.


No one is a perfect revolutionary. Fame,sainthood, martyrdom and medals should never be your goal. I would say sometimes assholes, pirates and trolls are needed on the radical left. As long as you're using those impulses to destroy capitalism without being shit to your fellow working poor or marginalized people then have at it. There are times I really want a monster on my side working with me to defeat the bourgeois and elite. Sometimes that is what it takes. Rebel scum and scoundrels.

No matter how I perceive I myself, the important thing is if my actions are hurting the very people I am supposed to be helping. Am I serving the people? Am I fighting against capitalism, patriarchy, white supremacy, ableism and queerphobia? Am I working for an oppressive system or am I building revolution. I don't have to feel good about myself I need to do the work and be open to fuck off when asked to.
Why even have a caption?


I am interested to see what Portland will be after Trump wins and how I will engage with Portland in the fall. Will I see myself differently? I don't know but I hope my time here will do more for the people I am embedded with than what they have all done for me.



LONG LIVE INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY!

PALANTE, SIEMPRE PALANTE!

If you enjoyed this article check out Through Our Own Eyes at KBOO 90.7 FM and get a post card from Puerto Rico when you make a donation to our project before the 1st of November 2016.

19.7.16

Praise and Critique of Campamento Contra La Junta

French Toast for the prole.
The mobilization against PROMESA in Puerto Rico has been slow but steady and strong like a tortoise. And like a tortoise, Campamento Contra La Junta will become massive. The local media has tried to depict the participants as dirty, unemployed college students that are just hanging out. I would say the discipline and organization is superior to what I had observed in Occupy Portland although Portland had mobilized more people initially and did not obtain support from the mayor.

San Juan mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz, of the Popular Democratic Party, has provided verbal and material support up to now for the protestors. The camp area receives regular visits from the cities sanitation department providing trash pickup and portable latrine maintenance. That does not mean that this has been an easy occupation.

Totem of  Devils
Most of the participants I have encountered have been staying at the camp and going off to their jobs then returning to continue working on the camp site. As I said in a past article Work and Resistance, capitalism does not accommodate organizing or resistance. The same still applies to colonialism. There are folks sacrificing personal time off and leisure time to stand up for the rights and emancipation of millions of people. The work to maintain themselves and donate their energy and labor to disrupt the operations of the federal government. All of this is happening in the heart of the financial district amidst the towers of Banco Popular, UBS, AIG and other devils.

The camp does not exist just to become contested space. This action has created an opportunity for dialogue between people that would never have met. One of the major topics is decolonization and independence. Can you have independence without decolonization? Is independence the same as decolonization? My own outsider opinion is that independence or autonomy is part of decolonization but independence itself does not equal decolonization. Hawaii on the other hand was “decolonized” in status and made a state but it still is very much colonized. So decolonization is not independence but independence would be a milestone for progress in that direction. Once you achieve independence you likely will have to deal with neo colonialism where a former occupying nation matins or strengthens political and economic control over a former colony nation. All that this can be another article for another time soon.

My critique of the Campamento Contra La Junta is the dominance of voice and space of European or White presenting individuals. There is an abundance of people of color but directing voices seem to come from folk with white privilege and people of color, especially women of color and queer folk get drowned out. To be clear I observe this not so much in the evening meetings but in conversations and discourse in the camp. It is not something that goes unnoticed but some folks may be tired of fighting for space. The fact that it is even discussed and acknowledged gives me hope. It has given me a chance to put into practice not taking space and making sure others are heard. I hope I can contribute to women of color and queer people going a voice. There is a lot of work to be done when it comes to our misogamy and the silencing of queer voices. We are getting there but more is needed. Too often ,as a collective,we put it off feminism and equity. 

Intersections at the Intersection
It is creating a space that educates and is now starting to agitate. Just the other night I had a conversation with a young person who felt awaken and empowered by this action. The impact does not look huge and glamorous but the impact is there and I hope it will have a lasting effect and increased momentum. I believe that the camp is serving as an incubator for some bad ass radical folks.
If you live in Amerikkkan and are anti-colonization then Boriken should be on your radar. What is happening on the island should not be ignored and needs the material support and advocacy of the very people that benefit from the subjugation of Borikuas.  Reach out to them on Facebook and follow this blog for further updates.


If you enjoyed this article check out Through Our Own Eyes at KBOO 90.7 FM and get a post card from Puerto Rico when you make a donation to our project before the 1st of November 2016.

15.7.16

Leisure Colonization


 

I cannot ever remember, in the five years I lived
in Oregon, hearing a person of color say that they were moving to Canada or some other country, just to get away from Amerikkkan conservatism or its ruined economy. I cannot recall hearing that from anyone but European folk. Maybe it’s because I live in Oregon and there are an abundance of white European settlers. Growing up, when people of color talked about moving they had their eyes on the United Snakes. Is this a coincidence?       

It was not uncommon to find many of the tourism jobs being owned or operated by European Americans or Europeans from the continent managing staff at chain hotels tour companies. You can see it from the Hilton in San Juan to the catamaran tours in on the west end. There is nothing wrong with people of any skin tone making a living. 

It is interesting that a person from a world power moves to a colony or a struggling nation and will get chosen for an entry level job over a local even without speaking the dominate language of the region. Tourism is a monolithic industry in Boriken with a preference for English speakers. Yet few of us are fully bilingual or comfortable operating in English. 

I was a bar back one summer in a west side town called Fajardo. There I was offered a job by one of the patrons to go work in Culebra as a grounds keeper. I explained to them I knew nothing about landscaping or even what to do with a trimmer. They made it very clear that they needed me because they  where a manger but they knew no Spanish. They wanted someone bilingual that they could trust. I cannot recall everything that was said but there was stress on the need for trust.

Working twelve hours a day, at $6.00 per hour and no overtime pay as a bar back, bouncer, stock boy, janitor at the same job then offered $8.00 an hour to work in Culebra, of course I took the job. Keep in mind Culebra is an island off the coast of Boriken and many of the business are owned by Europeans, from the US and from Europe, but staffed by locals that would not have the capital to own the businesses. The few Borikuas that own the business are from the mainland and are coming from economic privilege. 

After a week there it turned out that pool maintenance would be the best role for me because 1) I was the only groundskeeper that spoke English 3) I knew how to “behave” around guest and 2) I was not great at mowing huge lawns on a steep incline. When I was not caring for the pool or raking up leaves I was running back and forth between my manager interpreting instructions and responses. Mostly I was interpreting lies that I would be blamed for. 

Soon I was to assistant manager of grounds keeping but the pay did not change. The title should have been assistant to the manager of grounds keeping, I was put in charge of supervising, ordering (because I spoke Spanish and my boss still did not), inventory, pool maintenance, waiting on guest. 

It was a strange position to be in, I was not a boss but because I bilingual I had to float my boss and be the face of his reprimands and frustration. It was not fair to me and it certainly was not fair to my coworkers. I left that job promptly after I got wind that they were shutting down the resort after only eight months in operation. 

Some resorts are run by hotel management companies but the infrastructure is rented out to them. The property owner is a rich European man from Puerto Rico that had developed the property despite local opposition to is construction and devastation to the environment. He had not been a great landlord and the company owner, a German guy named Walter that once worked for Donald Trump, decided to pull out. I gave my notice and picked up another job, selling brightly colored garbage to tourist in a boutique for the same pay and less responsibility. The owner was also a European from the US but I hardly saw them and did not have nearly as much drama to deal with. 

I worked a few more tourist jobs on mainland Boriken before I moved to Oregon and the whole time, if I ever heard a person of color on the island talk about moving they meant to go to the US. Meanwhile, even homeless Europeans would find their way down to the island with less proficiency in Spanish than money. Here I was struggling working in restaurants but always hungry with no way of leaving for the US and no one in there that I knew. Vacation friends never rite back and if they do it’s remind you what a great time they had.  

Tourism does not bring island to the people, at best it creates demeaning low wage jobs for some locals that further the colonization process. Tourism in itself is not bad but it neither is a blade. A blade could be used to cut bonds or slit thoughts. ToTourist under capitalism and colonialism is a rapier that is used mortally wound minds and bodies. 

If you enjoyed this article check out Through Our Own Eyes at KBOO 90.7 FM and get a post card from Puerto Rico when you make a donation to our project before the 1st of November 2016.

22.6.16

Through Our Own Eyes: What this project is all about.


When colonialism is spoken about in the USA it is often as a foreign practice of old empires.Through Our Own Eyes is a multimedia project illuminating the truth behind colonialism in Boriken. Boriken,known by its colonized name ,Puerto Rico, is a free associated state ( or colony), of the United States of America. Few residents of the American Empire know or understand the 118 year old relationship between the two nations. For instance, Boriken provides a steady supply of recruits for the US military, tax shelters for US businesses and cheap labor for pharmaceutical companies. Borikuas also pay medicare tax yet receive less benefits than residents of the US. Let us not forget that although Borikuas are subject to selective service and past drafts since WW1 they do not have the right to participate in presidential elections.

European-American settler folk are trying to understand their place in the world. This project's objective is to educate them and to create solidarity between Borikuas and other people suffering under colonialism. Follow us on Blogspot, Facebook, Youtube and KBOO 90.7 FM.  If you feel moved by this project and want to support it further please feel free to donate $here$. Do not forget to email stevie.elepan@gmail.com. All contributors will receive a postcard from Boriken.

Palante, Siempre Palante!

Stevie Elepan

Stevie Elepan

20.6.16

Through Our Own Eyes: Update 20/6/16

Hello Comrades,


We are 7 days away from starting the Puerto Rico phase of our project. Already we have organized interviews and coordinating with other comrades both in Oregon and Boriken (Puerto Rico).


This phase will be multimedia educational series on colonialism in Boriken. With help from our friends at KBOO we have a platform for weekly radio segments, training, access to some minor equipment, and the assistance of KBOO volunteers in developing this series. There will be a video element that connects the colonial past to the colonial present and the blog I Will Not Obey on blogspot will also be incorporated.


We have decided to name the series THROUGH OUR OWN EYES. Colonialism is often presented through a eurocentric or imperialist gaze. it is time there is more work presented by the people that live under colonialism.


At this point we have raised $896, out of the $10800 we are asking for, in one month. KBOO has given us airtime to promote this project. A Zumba fundraiser, hosted by a comrade, was successful in raising funds. Other folks have volunteered their time, skills and equipment to help this project go forward. Even Jubilee Oregon has offered to contribute.


We still have a long way to go of course. The project will run from the 27th of June to the 10th of November. Funding will go to any travel expenses that the team may need, daily meals, and unforeseen expenses and compensating host.


Of course, you do not have to throw a fundraiser or be a big organization to help. Sharing our fundraiser, blog, KBOO page to help support us. If you do feel intrigued or inspired by this project please feel free to donate $10, $20 or even $100 to our crowdfunding page. Make sure we get your mailing address too so that we can send you a postcard with our gratitude from Boriken.




Stevie Elepan
Team Leader
Through Our Own Eyes
stevie.elepan@gmail.com

2.6.16

A Colony to Rule All Colonies

Great. They are going to open an artisanal mayo shop!
Ever wonder what colonies the Empire of the United Snakes of Amerikkka poses? I know that some settler folk here on turtle island never even give it a second thought. As I have stated many times colonialism is spoken of as a foreign thing from another time. This may come to a shock to some of you but the Amerikkkan Empire is itself also a colony. It would fall under the category of a minority rule colony. A minority rule colony is when a minority group, often settlers from an empire, hold power over indigenous folk in the region they have colonized. Examples would be the Ottoman Turks, Imperial Romans, the protestants under British occupied Ireland and current examples are South Afrika,Australia and the USA.


Confusing? Try this out. Initially, when Europeans settled in the Amerikkka's they were minorities, yet they pushed out, killed, kidnapped, raped and subjucated many indigenous people as the moved out and dominated large areas of land in proportion to the population of their settlements. In North Amerikkka during the 1800s there was a greater push west that was supported with the use of military force. Roving patrols of US cavalry hunted and murdered indigenous folks in one of the greatest genocides in known history. This practice was justified by the ideology of manifest destiny. Manifest Destiny was a belief, endorsed by democrats, that Amerikkkans had the duty to expand west and recreate the continent into utopia that would lead the settlers to fully abandon their old world roots and create a new agrarian based nation.


Those indigenous folk that survived were put through programs to whiten them and their progeny in blood and ideas. Those that resisted, were executed, jailed or confined to reservations. The few descendants that exist in the USA today live in poverty and are considered ward of the state. There is much celebration of their culture but usually in ironic and insensitive ways.


The USA has also upholded some dated ideas of race and ethnicity. Some of the indigenous nations crossed what is now considered the Mexican and Canadian borders. Many indigenous people in the Amerikkka's crossed and interacted with each other, only limited by their means of transportation. We can find evidence of this is the languages of indigenous people. Unfortunately, there are fewer and fewer speakers of many languages each generation in North Amerikkka. Fortunately, in the caribbean and South and Central Amerikkka there are languages that are still commonly used in spite of efforts of European settlers efforts to eradicate them.
The people that are called Hispanic or Latino in the Amerikkka's forthe most part are neither of those things. Hispanic implies that a person is of a Spanish culture. If Amerikkkans are not English then how can we consider indigenous people Spanish all because that is the language they are presumed to speak. Nor can it or should it be based on who invaded and occupied the region. If that was valid then inhabitants of Iraq, Germany, Afghanistan, Dominican Republic, Philipines, Japan would be Amerikkkan?


This brings me to the meaning of colonialism and imperialism
Although they are closely tied together there is a difference. Imperialism is when a nation gains influence over another nation through military force or hard diplomacy. Iraq, Afghanistan, Dominican Republic, Japan,Philipines, South Korea, Mexico, Canada, Turkey, Brazil, Honduras, Somalia and Jamaica are examples of nations strongly influenced by Amerikkkan imperialist activities.


Colonialism is when a nation settles and has direct control over a people and its resources. Puerto Rico, Amerikkkan Samoa, North Mariana Islands, Guam, St. Thomas, St. John, St. Croix, Alaska and Hawaii are all colonies of the Imperialist USA. Some of the residence from these colonies pay taxes and social security to the USA and almost all have to register for selective service but other than Hawaii and Alaska, none of them have any representation or the ability to vote in presidential elections. Citizens of Amerikkkan Samoa have to apply for citizenship. Puerto Ricans and Hawaiians can not afford to live on their islands.


When you start to scrutinize it you see that Imperialist Amerikkka is not about equal right other than the right to starve. Even among European settler folk there are hierarchies of whiteness with rural or poor Europeans crushed on the very bottom. Capitalism is the driving force behind these practices. Racism is belief system used to justify the exploitation of other people and their labor. When there is an absence of people of color, Imperialist Europeans have subjucated those considered lesser europeans. The Austrians oppressed the Germans and Polish, the British subjugated the Irish and Scottish, and the Amerikkkans exploited immigrants and refugees from the old world. Italians, Askanazi, Russians, Germans, French and Swedes were not considered white by Amerikkkan settlers. Even Benjamin Franklin considered those of Saxons decent superior to all other Europeans.


In the the Amerikkkan narrative we see that whiteness is a privilege in itself and even some European folk do not fully benefit from it when interacting with other European folk. Those that possess whiteness are few and distribute some privileges and has the ability to make a group of people honorary whites if they properly assimilate or display satisfactory whiteness. This privilege in Amerikkka comes with the precondition that a group of people abandon their heritage and history unless they are mocking it. St. Patrick's day in the US is a perfect example. In Ireland it a religious holiday,in the United Snakes it is an Irish minstrel show that seems to mock Irish people and for one day “everyone is Irish”.  I suspect that Asians in the United Snakes are next up for honorary whiteness as they are often portrayed as a model race. In a few more generations, they too may benefit from white privilege but only a select few.


The number of “whites” that live and hold power on turtle island is negligible. White is an idea not race. It is a standard of purrity, beauty, status and righteousness that has its roots in capitalism. When people around the world speak of Amerikkkans they speak of  not Irish-Amerikkkans, Afrikan-Amerikkkans, Jewish-Amerikkkans, or even Native-Amerikkkans. When the world speaks of Amerikkka they speak of the few “whites” that hold the power and and wealth. The USA is a minority ruled colony with imperial power and influence. This regime sits on land that it took in a long and bloody jacking and rules the ocean deep and the night sky. Its wealth was built by people stolen from Afrika. Those of us that live under this regime and do not possess witness are not a minority.


We have numbers and we have each other. We know how to work the fields and run the machines. We know how to manage resources and how to share them. The capitalist imperialist exploiters through their hubris and laziness have relied on our labor and our fear. More and more of us are awoke and soon we will seize the means of production. Indigenous, Afrikan, Asian, South Pacific and European workers can overthrow our masters and control our collective future to save our species and this planet. The power is in us all. Many of us can labor to serve a small group why not labor for each other? We know hard work all we must do is study, organic and fight. As individuals we are limited in what we can achieve but together we can take the stars.

Palante,Siempre Palante!