F.L.O.W.E.R. on Opposing "Rock Stone Mountain" 2019 + Black Flags Over Brooklyn with Kim Kelly

Firstly we’re presenting a conversation that William had with an organizer with F.L.O.W.E.R., which stands for Front Line Organization Working to End Racism, about opposition to a neo confederate rally scheduled to take place on February 2nd at Stone Mountain Park about half an hour’s drive outside of Atlanta, Georgia. We talk about the longstanding history of this rally, which originally was a KKK event, its resurgence alongside the rise of far right activity, and some of what’s been done to oppose it in recent years. We also talk about what to keep in mind when standing against this event and how to learn more and plug in, plus much more.

This group is @flowerunited on Twitter, and that’s a great way to get rapid updates as February 2nd draws nearer. Also a great way to keep updated and read more about the history of this event, plus to see a long list of endorsing groups, you can go to https://flowerunited.org/

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Next up, Bursts spoke with journalist, metalhead, anarchist, and antifascist Kim Kelly. Kim is an editor at Noisey, the VICE music site and has contributed radical content to Teen Vogue and many other platforms online and in print. For the rest of the hour we spoke about the upcoming “Black Flags Over Brooklyn” antifascist and antiracist heavy metal festival that Kim and others are organizing January 25 and 26 in New York City alongside a day-long anti-authoritarian leftist gathering. We also talk about the culture wars in metal, taking radical space in mainstream publications and more. You can find much of Kims work at noisey.vice.com, more about Black Flags Over Brooklyn and how to get merch or participate by just searching it on the web or finding its kickstarter or eventbrite. If you want to hear our interview with one of the headlining bands, Dawn Ray’d about politics and extreme music check the link in our shownotes.

Update from Unist'ot'en Camp

Here's an official update from the Unist'ot'en Camp about the raid on the Gidimt'en Access Point we talked about on last week's episode of The Final Straw.

Eric King Comms Blocks, Possible Hungerstrike

A post up at SupportEricKing.org that we read from in the episode starts with an announcement that Eric has been denied his monthly call with his wife who is recovering from surgery, was assaulted by staff at FCI Florence and transfered to FCI Leavenworth (though still under Florence's jurisdiction) and away from his daughters and wife, is coming up on 5 months in solitary and may have begun a hunger strike.  There is a request for call-ins. Here is a sample script:

Hi I am calling about Eric King, #27090045 to demand that his phone restriction be lifted. It is unacceptable to take away a prisoner’s calls to his wife and family without any notice and without him being brought up on any charges.

Supporters are asked to call and email:

FCI Florence
Call: 719-784-9100
Ask for: The warden/assistant warden, the legal department, Counselor Quintana, Counselor Rivera. If denied demand the person answering the phone take down a message.

Email: FLF/ExecAssistant@bop.gov

BOP North Central Regional Office
Call: 913-621-3939
Ask for: Director Jeffrey Krueger. If denied ask to speak with his assistant. If denied again, demand the person answering the phone take down a message.

Email: NCRO/ExecAssistant@bop.gov

Yiddish Anarchism Conference

Also coming up in NYC, on Sunday January 20th there’ll be a free conference entitled “Yiddish Anarchism: New Scholarship On A Forgotten Tradition”. The conference will be conducted in English, will be free, run from 10am to 8pm at the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research at 15 West 16th St. More info can be found at yivo.org/Anarchism

The latest Error451

This week we released a new Error451 episode into our podcast stream, this time an interview with Kali Kaneko about Leap Encryption Access Project, about VPNs and psuedonymity online. If you haven’t, visit our website and take a listen. Or, better yet, subscribe to our podcast by visiting “podcasting” link and following the instructions there!

Support Our Work

If you appreciate the work that we put into making this show happen, week after week, sometimes more than once a week and if you can afford to help us out, please consider donating to The Final Straw. If you visit our website, you can click the Donate/Merch button and there you’ll find a few options. We can take one-time donations via paypal or venmo, we can take ongoing donations via liberapay, you can buy t-shirts, stickers, buttons and more via our bigcartel store or become a sustainer via patreon and make monthly donations. The patreon option has a lot of options for thank you gifts including what’s already been mentioned, plus homemade mixtapes and an option to get a zine made of any interview we’ve conducted, getting those words into the hands of translators and folks who have hearing impairments!

If you can’t afford a monetary donation, no worries, tell your friends about the podcast, share an episode on social media, write us an email or a letter to suggest content. You could also contact your local community radio station and say that you want us on your airwaves. We have a weekly, 59 minute and FCC-friendly episode out every Sunday afternoon up for radio stations to download and use. More info on that can be found at our website by clicking the radio link at the top of the site.

As an aside, we’ve just started sharing Political Prisoner button mixpacks for Blue Ridge Anarchist Black Cross. The buttons feature the faces of 54 (and more to come) political prisoners held by the U.S. government. The sales go to benefit the activities of BRABC. Prisoner support sites and distributors should contact blueridgeabc@riseup.net for deals on the buttons. If you want to make your own and have a button maker, the pdf’s of the button images are up at https://brabc.blackblogs.org/pp-ppow-buttons/ for download for free.

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Playlist here.