How to Stop an Abusive Stalker

Reinforcing boundaries shouldn’t be up to any single individual. This group of anarchists decided enough was enough after a friend was subjected to the unrelenting harassment of an abusive ex-partner. Social repercussions can and do influence behavior. What follows is a useful tactic for anyone struggling to maintain their personal boundaries against abuse.

Excerpt:

Our goal was to read a letter of demands to him and then turn around and leave silently. This was not going to be a discussion or a dialogue. This was an ultimatum and a warning.

Read whole report here.

Ben Barker on Resistance Radio

Every Sunday, Derrick Jensen interviews an activist for Resistance Radio, asking great questions about their work, how they got into it, and how other people can get involved.

Last Sunday, Jensen interviewed Ben Barker, a writer, activist, and farmer from West Bend, WI. He is currently writing a book about toxic qualities of radical subcultures and the need to build a vibrant culture of resistance. Barker has been a long-time member of Deep Green Resistance Wisconsin, has served in the past as DGR staff, and has contributed in crucial ways to getting the organization up and running.

In this interview, Ben talks about his experiences in and the differences between movements for social change vs subcultures, which he defines as style-based groupings of people content to exist in opposition to a cultural mainstream without making serious efforts to change it. He reassures those new to radical activism that there are options beyond such dead-end subcultures.

Play the podcast below, or listen to the interview on the DGR Youtube channel.

Download mp3

Browse all of Derrick Jensen’s Resistance Radio interviews.

Stop Thinning Forests

Stop Thinning Forests was launched by a Deep Green Resistance Colorado member whose family participated in the Forest Service’s suggested forest thinning projects for private landowners. The website shares the devastating results, including before and after photos. The site carefully documents the evidence that this sort of thinning harms forests and all their community members while increasing risk to homeowners of catastrophic fires. An important read for anyone living in areas where the Forest Service is pushing these policies!

It is our hope individuals using this website will see past the rhetoric that is being used by the Forest Service and the timber industry to convince the public that thinning will keep our homes and forests safe and healthy. It is clear that catastrophic fires are caused by climatic conditions and, as the weather changes and droughts sweep over the west, there is little we can do to stop fires. Perhaps taking a serious look at climate change and human behaviors that accelerate change, along with the insatiable desire to log our forests, would be a more effective way to address the situation.

Most importantly, take a walk into the forests and find a thinned area. Sit in that area a while and then find an area that has not been thinned and do the same. Think about the land, the ground, the living beings who depend on those areas and decide for yourself which place is truly healthier.

Food Freedom: an Integral Perspective

What do you get when you mix Deep Green Resistance EUMENA members, a focus on good food, concern for animals besides humans, and permaculture? Food Freedom! The talk explores:

  1. The food freedom of other species
  2. The food that most liberates our environment
  3. Food that liberates the human mind and body
  4. How not to be enslaved to addictions
  5. How to free our meals & economies from the Multinationals

Watch the recording below:

Support the 2014 Unis’tot’en Action Camp

The indigenous Wet’suwet’en are holding the fifth annual Unis’tot’en Action Camp to blockade the construction of the Canadian Northern Gateway pipelines, a cluster of pipelines meant to carry tar sands crude and natural gas from fracking operations. This blockade is a strategic way to fight against these extremely dangerous and destructive projects. The Unis’tot’en territory has never been ceded to Canada, so the Wet’suwet’en have both a legal standing and a deep commitment to defending their landbase. This is a battle that can be won by defenders of the land and climate change activists.

To learn more about the background of the blockade and about the Camp, visit the Unis’tot’en Camp website and watch the 2012 Deep Green Resistance West Coast Tour video below:

DGR Member Tours Philippines

Kim Hill of Deep Green Resistance Australia toured the Philippines in February, with the Mobile Anarchist School. She spoke at universities, infoshops, a farmer’s forum and many other locations about the need for a serious resistance movement.

You can read her blog of her Philippines tour, or listen to an interview of her by an anti-civ radio show in Manila.

Solidarity Statement from Vancouver Rape Relief & Women’s Shelter

Re-posted from Vancouver Rape Relief & Women’s Shelter

June 25, 2013

On June 22, 2013 Vancouver Rape Relief & Women’s Shelter hosted an all day event with local feminist allies to discuss, evaluate and strategize different tactics of women’s resistance to male violence against women.

Dozens of women participated in the day including members of the Indigenous Women Against the Sex Industry (IWASI), the Committee for Domestic Workers and Caregivers Rights, the Asian Women’s Coalition Ending Prostitution (AWCEP), EVE (formerly Exploited Voices now Educating) and past and current collective members of Vancouver Rape Relief and Women’s Shelter.

During the day we passed a resolution to publicly express our solidarity with Deep Green Resistance in light of the recent attack on their members at the Law and Disorder Conference and afterward:

We condemn the attack on the members of Deep Green Resistance at Law and Disorder Conference in Portland Oregon. We are appalled by the conference organizers utter refusal to protect DGR members from threats, bullying and silencing and troubled that no other participant interfered or insisted that the conference will practice its premise for “safe space”.

We stand in solidarity with Deep Green Resistance and its commitment to feminist principles including the right of women (as all oppressed groups) to define their boundaries and decide who is allowed in their space.

Hilla Kerner, for the Collective of Vancouver Rape Relief and Women’s Shelter

Protect Women, Feminism, and Free Speech

Call for Support! Protect Women, Feminism, and Free Speech
The past few days have seen a massive smear campaign against radical feminists such as Rachel and Lexy Garza of Deep Green Resistance. This smear campaign was launched in the aftermath of an attack on Deep Green Resistance members (one of whom was Lexy).

When feminists, supportive women and other allies responded with fury and uproar about this attack, it triggered a backlash from those who accuse DGR and other radical feminists of being transphobic. We are not transphobic, and will be further responding to these allegations.

These accusations made against us were followed by violent threats (including threats of death and sexual assault). DGR members who made similar comments would be immediately removed from the organization. This behavior is unacceptable. Now, these people have begun to contact venues for a speaking tour that Rachel is planning for next month. They have used lies and threats to coerce these venues to cancel several engagements.

Stand UP FOR WOMEN and AGAINST BULLYING AND HARASSMENT!
Let’s band together and support DGR and Rachel and help her keep her speaking engagements. A form letter is available at the link below for those who want to prevent these events from being cancelled. We urge you to consider standing against censorship. Women with controversial and salient platforms most certainly have an eager audience awaiting them, despite contrary opinion.
Support Rachel

WE NEED SUPPORT AND SECURITY!
If you would like to host the Resistance Rewritten Tour in your location please contact deepgreenresistance@riseup.net. We are calling out to feminists and allies to fight back against bullying. Don’t let the bullies stop these important words from being heard.
We will be heavily increasing security at upcoming events in order to keep Rachel and other speakers safe. This costs money, so if you can help us out with security please donate at the link below, and share this message widely!
http://www.gofundme.com/resistancerewritten

STAND UP!
This is another example of the continued threats of harassment and calls to silence those who have spoken out and organized in support of radical feminism. Deep Green Resistance will not tolerate threats of violence or attempts to intimidate or silence women. The actual and immediate threat against females as a class is continued brutalization and repression by males as a class. The real reason for this oppression is the inherently toxic violation imperative that we call ‘masculinity,” and it is on these issues that our focus will remain, despite ongoing attempts to foment horizontal hostility. Ultimately, we defend women only spaces: some of the only spaces left for women to effectively organize and resist their own oppression. We stand in solidarity with all groups and individuals who fight to end the oppression of women under patriarchy.

Criticism of the politics raised by the transgender movement is very different than a wholesale hatred of people who choose to transition. This nuance is very often missed by the very same people spamming venues with blanket declarations of transphobia.

Resistance Rewritten Tour Description
It’s often repeated that “history is written by the victors.” The colonist and the slave owner, the warmonger and the CEO alike use their stolen power to control which stories are remembered, taught, and celebrated – and which are distorted, suppressed, and in some cases, forgotten altogether.

Spanish philosopher George Santayana put it rather more bluntly when he wrote that “history is a pack of lies about events that never happened told by people who weren’t there.” But it is not enough to dismiss mainstream historical narratives as irrelevant. We must ask- what has been omitted, and why? When we look past the rosy fiction to the buried truth, we begin to uncover a true history of resistance that is still unfolding.

In the era of catastrophic biodiversity loss, toxification, and climate change, the world is facing challenges of unprecedented magnitude, and we are running out of time. The stakes could not be higher. Will we fall prey to the lies of the powerful and miss our chance at victory, or can we write a brighter future by learning from resistance movements of the past?

Response to Aric McBay’s “Deep Green Resistance and Transphobia”

Deep Green Resistance has refrained from making any statement in regards to the circumstances under which Aric McBay left the organization to date. This decision was made on the basis that it would be unhelpful to resistance efforts in general and also because DGR did not wish to speak badly of him.

Because he has now chosen to publicly make statements that do not reflect the actual events of his departure, DGR is issuing the following statement.

Aric McBay was part of a small, unsuccessful effort to oust both Lierre Keith and Derrick Jensen from the organization. The entire staff and many of the members resisted this attempt.

DGR’s stance on women’s spaces was only one issue on the table among others at this time. It was the women of DGR who made the decision to keep women’s spaces for women only. It was not decided by Derrick Jensen or Lierre Keith. The assertion that this was policy handed down from them is a lie.

Aric was part of a conference call about this subject and chose to say nothing. He left the organization soon after, taking a large sum of DGR money for work he had not done and which he has yet to pay back. His only comment was that there was a lack of transparency in decision making. Until that point the majority of decisions had been made by himself and a co-coordinator.

It is clear that Aric’s departure was for the best. Feminist politics, including the right of women to define their own spaces, is central to our work.  Anyone who does not respect the choices of women does not belong in DGR.

Incidents This Weekend

Three incidents occurred at the “Law and Disorder Conference” in Portland May 11 and 12 concerning Deep Green Resistance and transgender/queer activists. A lot of lies have been told about these incidents. We need to tell the facts of what physically happened.

Two women were tabling, handing out DGR literature and selling books. A group of five transgender/queer activists came up to the table. One of the male queer activists began shouting at the women, using aggressive language. This man made threatening gestures toward the women. He grabbed and defaced table materials. When one of the women went to protect the materials, he marked her arm and hand as well.

This conference states it has a policy of safe spaces, but “safe spaces” evidently doesn’t apply to women, because although most people in the room had no choice but to hear the shouting, no one, including the organizers, intervened to stop this man and his aggressive behavior.

A half an hour later, a male DGR member tried to engage in respectful conversation with these queer activists. They began chanting at him and insulting him, culminating in them throwing trash and food at his head.

The next day, Sunday, the DGR crew went back, for more tabling, and an angry mob of queer activists again approached the table, yelling and cursing at them, and demanded that they leave. Once again, for all their talk of “safe spaces,” the organizers did not intervene, nor provide a safe space.

You will see that throughout all of this, the DGR members were respectful and courteous. They tried to de-escalate. Nonetheless, they were the recipients of bullying, threats, and silencing.

One of the organizers, Brandon Speck, witnessed much of this, and at least pretended to express concern for the women. He originally said that the perpetrators would not be invited back next year. He also promised that he would write up a statement of solidarity with the victims condemning the attacks. He further promised to run this statement by the victims before publishing it. He was not telling the truth. He did not run the statement by the women, and the statement he did publish indeed blames the DGR members for their own victimization. Women from all over responded en masse to this by pointing out that this was the classic victim-blaming that characterizes patriarchy and misogyny. The thread was deleted, and the organizer falsely claimed this was because of “violently transphobic comments.” This was as much a lie as their original release blaming the victims. The only violence in the comments was directed at DGR members.

DGR has never threatened anyone, and has a Code of Conduct that disallows making threats against people. Any DGR person who behaved as violently as any of the queer activists did at this conference would be immediately banned from DGR. Instead, what has happened is a barrage of threats against DGR members, up to and including mass beheading. And yet these comments are allowed to remain.

We ask everyone to stand in solidarity with all victims of patriarchal, male-pattern violence, starting with the women who were subjected to this at the Law and Disorder conference.