from Iffy Books
February 2 @ 6:00 pm – 8:00 pm
Join us Thursday, February 2nd at 6 p.m. and help write letters to six Atlanta Forest defenders who have been denied bail.
Graffiti
Submission
Opponents of Philly FDR Park Development Speak Out
from Unicorn Riot
January 26, 2023
Philadelphia, PA – The FDR Park in South Philly is in the midst of a new redevelopment plan supported by the city and private groups like Fairmount Park Conservancy. Opponents of the plan have dubbed their cause “Save the Meadows,” referencing a wild area that was partly bulldozed late in 2022. The plan’s authors are finally hosting a community event on January 26, 2023, although opponents believe that they will not be allowed to speak inside.
A demonstration outside the Grand Yesha Ballroom in South Philly is highlighting reasons they oppose the plan. An ad-hoc coalition of several groups, under the flag “The People’s Plan for FDR Park,” has pushed local officials to reconsider the plan and preserve more meadows while unlocking often-shuttered sports fields around the city.
Among the main concerns opponents have is that the expansion of the Philadelphia International Airport will remove wetlands near the town of Eastwick, which can thus expect more flooding as climate change intensifies. (The airport’s expansion is a key part of the financing of the FDR Park project.)
Live coverage below:
See our video report from last fall below:
Opposition to the development plan was also an element in a large demonstration and march in November 2022 that highlighted several different, yet related causes in the city.
Vigil and Stroll for Tortuguita
Submission
On Saturday 1/21 there was a vigil for Tortuguita Manuel Teran. A group of about 40 adults and children placed candles and homemade signs by the turtle in Clark Park.
People spontaneously made speeches about Tortuguita’s death. The speeches touched on people’s experience of them, grief, martyrdom, and continuing to struggle. People called on each other to target cop city’s sponsors and the contractors responsible for building.
After people had been speaking for a while a small group broke off from the vigil. They took the street with banners. Barricades from a nearby construction site were pulled into the street to block cops and traffic. As the march moved graffiti memorializing Tortuguita and against police was tagged. A realty office had its windows smashed.
The rowdy vigil is the first time things have popped off from Clark Park in a while. A few years ago Cark Park was a regular spot for mid sized black bloc demos to start from. We think that this is worthwhile to revisit because it’s a traditionally anarchist neighborhood and there are lots of alleys nearby to easily change in. It’s exciting to see this kind of energy re-emerge in Philly.
Even though Philly is far from Atlanta, Tortuguita’s death has been deeply felt here. We are angry. We are watching. We are acting. Cop city will never be built.
RIP Tortuguita
Neither innocent nor guilty
Neither terrorists nor protesters
Simply anarchists!
A warm embrace to those arrested in Atlanta, Seattle and everywhere else
Death to civilization
Graffiti for Tortuguita in Philly
Submission
Graffiti In Philladelphia in Solidarity with Tortuguita!
It Says ” FTP-ACAB-161-1312-(///)- RIP TORTUGUITA-DEFEND FORESTS-(A)”
West Philadelphia Vigil Remembers Tortuguita
from Twitter
West #Philadelphia earlier tonight: A vigil at a turtle sculpture in Clark Park to remember #Tortuguita, the forest defender killed near #Atlanta. About 70 people joined a vigil and talked about local struggles. One shared a memory of meeting Tort in the forest last year.
In West #Philly tonight, a small breakaway march from the vigil at Clark Park looped thru the streets and someone tagged “RIP TORT” on a Jersey barrier. #CopCity #Tortuguita
Solidarity Vigil For Tortuguita
from It’s Going Down
Philadelphia, PA
Graffiti in Solidarity with Atlanta and in Memory of Tortuguita in the South NJ
from Jersey Counter-Info
Graffiti placed in the Pinelands of NJ in solidarity with the struggle to Stop Cop City and to Defend the Atlanta Forest and in memory of Tortuguita who was murdered by police while defending the Atlanta Forest.
January discussion – Life Against Death
from Viscera
We’re taking December off, which means our next discussion is happening Sunday, January 22nd from 1-3. Weather permitting we’ll be in Clark Park near the chess tables, but will relocate or reschedule if necessary.
We’ll be reading “Life against Death: Fate, love and revolution in Mawaru Penguindrum“:
The wild ride Ikuhara takes the siblings for will showcase his own skepticism of big-R Revolutions and the Society they struggle against. Yet there is also hope – a hope that this unchanging world can be overcome, or at least survived, through revolutionizing our relationships with one another.
You can find the essay on The Anvil with cool screencaps or on the library with no screencaps. For extra credit, you’re encouraged to watch the show!
Animal People Screening 1/9
Submission
Screening of Animal People (2019)
Monday January 9
7PM
Ask here & now zines for location
(IG @hereandnowzines Mastodon ni.hil.ist/@hereandnowzines)
In conjunction with the Weekend of Solidarity to Stop Cop City. Animal People (97mins) is a documentary about animal liberation activists using innovative strategies. Discussion to follow about local land struggles.
Abolish the Family: Book Launch and Discussion with Sophie Lewis
from Making Worlds Books
RESCHEDULED – Stay Tuned!
Making Worlds Cooperative Bookstore & Social Center: Book Launch and Discussion: Abolish the Family: A Manifesto for Care and Liberation
What if we could do better than the family?
Families can be filled with love and care, but for many they are sites of pain: nobody is more likely to harm you than your family. Even in so-called happy families, the unpaid, unacknowledged work that it takes to raise children and care for each other is endless and exhausting.
Abolish the Family traces the history of family abolitionist demands, beginning with nineteenth century utopian socialist and sex radical Charles Fourier, the Communist Manifesto and early-twentieth century Russian family abolitionist Alexandra Kollontai. Turning her attention to the 1960s, Lewis reminds us of the anti-family politics of radical feminists like Shulamith Firestone and the gay liberationists, a tradition she traces to the queer marxists bringing family abolition to the twenty-first century. This exhilarating essay looks at historic rightwing panic about Black families and the violent imposition of the family on indigenous communities, and insists: only by thinking beyond the family can we begin to imagine what might come after.
Registration required. Please RSVP here.
Sophie Lewis is a freelance writer living in Philadelphia, teaching courses for the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research. Her first book was Full Surrogacy Now: Feminism Against Family, and her essays have appeared in the New York Times, Harper’s, Boston Review, n+1, the London Review of Books and Salvage. Sophie studied English, Politics, Environment and Geography at Oxford, the New School, and Manchester University, and is now an unpaid visiting scholar at the Feminist, Queer and Transgender Studies Center at the University of Pennsylvania.
New Years Eve Noise Demo Reportback
Submission
On the evening of the new year about 10 people held a banner, made noise, shone lazer pointers and set off fireworks in front of the Federal Department of Corrections at 7th and Arch.
People met at a nearby park and walked over together carrying a banner, banging on pots and pans and chanting as they went. Everyone was in bloc and people stayed tight and alert during the demo which lasted about 20-30 minutes. At the prison we were greeted by a heavy police presence of at least three cars. More cops came within 10 minutes of us being there including a few bike cops who followed us for a block or two after we left. Everyone got home safe and no arrests were made.
It seemed like the cops were anxious since there hasn’t been a noise demo at that spot since a particuarly rowdy one two years ago. That demo in 2020 ended with multiple arrests and some people facing heavy charges (all of which have since been cleared I think).
Considering the history, this demo felt like a success. People inside the prison were able to see and hear us and responded by flickering their lights. The police intimidation only reaffirmed how important it is to show up for people on the inside and let them know we’re thinking of them and that they are not alone.
Hopefully more demos happen this year and people are inspired to keep acting in defiance of the police state hellscape we live in. I hope we keep finding each other and keep being creative with new tactics and old ones too.
See you next year!
1312
FREE THEM ALL
FIRE TO THE PRISONS
ONCE THERE WERE NO PRISONS AND THAT DAY WILL COME AGAIN
HAPPY 2023!
XOXO
We’re on ActivityPub!
Anyone looking to follow us on the Fediverse (Mastodon, Pleroma, etc.) can now do so. Follow Philly Anti-Capitalist by using the username phillyanticap@phlanticap.noblogs.org or the URL https://phlanticap.noblogs.org/author/phillyanticap or clicking the image below if you are using Mastodon.
-Philly Anti-Capitalist
