Category "Crisis! Crisis!"
The Parti of European Socialists (PES) launched the campaign for the european parliamentary elections last week. It's quite nice to see all these politicians from different countries united, and stuff. Ah, if only citizens were more interested in these elections... Anyway, the campaign also started on the web:
And this is what I have to say: I love the socialist guy's shirt. Shame it is that... "baggy".
Yesterday, I went to have a look at the Climate Camp, an initiative launched by ecologists and whose goal is to settle a camp somewhere. For this particular occasion, the G20 London summit, they squatted Bishopsgate, on of the most important streets of the City. I arrived yesterday evening, Ada and Mark were supposed to join me, they arrived a bit later but... the police had "kettled" the camp! That means nobody could get in or out of the camp!
So I found myself stuck in the camp for 4 hours! Although I had so much to do at home! Deep shit! However, it was very nice, very good atmosphere, there was food, music and stuff...
I "live-blogged" my adventures on Twitter, with pictures, if you're interested:
Important protest all accross the City, London's financial area, today, for the G20 summit.
Yesterday was the march!
I went to the march with my little placard (by the way, I got shouted at while going out of the Tube by some guy who asked if we were to "fix the human crisis" with "golden strings" - I'm not sure I got it right, I guess he meant "with magic" - and I just kept going) and I met up with my collegue Oli, The Aussie and some couchsurfers (but I was too busy chatting with The Aussie to spend time with the others, oops!).
Before the march, a guy from the BBC was asking who wanted to make an interview, but everyone was saying no. I thought it was stupid not to answer questions when you come to SAY SOMETHING, you know! So I said yes. I had loads to say!
And when I found myself in front of the camcorder, and the guy asked me a question, I fucked up. Actually, I was incapable of explaining clearly what I meant and I drifted... although I had so much to say!
- Interviewer. What do you wanna tell the G20?
- Moi. We want to tell the G20 that we don't want to... go back to... neoliberal capitalism but we want a system that fights poverty and global... yeah, global warming... You know what I mean.
Bad! So bad!!! I understood why the others didn't want to answer: they knew they didn't have any communication skills and they didn't want to be COUNTER-PRODUCTIVE! But apparently, they didn't show me on TV. I don't believe in God but thank God anyway!
Besides, the march was nice but there wasn't many people... 35 000 persons is nothing! Organisers made it sound like it was great, but in France, last week, it was more than a million persons in the streets! However, some say it was only a rehearsal for next week, when the G20 leaders come in town...
Tomorrow is the protest!!! My shout receiving some flattering exposure, I decided to make a placard out of it!
I show the different steps of the creation of a placard...
1. Cardboard: Yeah, you have to find cardboard! I found some boxes at the supermarket, they were about to throw them away:
At least, I'm gonna recycle them!
2. Flattened cardboard: Come on, flatten these boxes:
3. Cutting: You cut...
No, you stupid bitch, not with shit scissors! Go for the BUTCHER KNIFE!
4. Butchery: So...
Oh yeah, it's much faster...
5. Painting: You paint the boards in white. Great, I still have this white paint spray can that I had somewhere!
6. Handle: You have to find something to use it as a handle... I found an old brush that stayed outside for months and covered with crap:
I cleaned it, mind you!
7. Tape: Put some tape to hang the first board to the handle...
No, you skank, stop with your faggot tape, use REAL TAPE:
There you go, that looks more butch!
8. Second board: You stick the second board to the first one with tape... AND KEEP SMILING:
9. Print: You print your shout (at work, it costs nothing!)
10. Decoration: You can even decorate a bit...
11. Admiration: You glue the text to the boards with tape and... wow wow wow!!!
I'm so excited for tomorrow! Besides, I'm gonna meet couchsurfers!!! Hope it's gonna be sunny though...
Wow! I suggested my punchline to The Mega Mouth for Saturday's march and it made it to the news on Channel 4!!! The video is here! (It's about 4:50.)
The credits of that video must be on the website hosting it.
This Saturday in London, there will be a big protest for the G20 here next week. This event, called Put People First (Les gens d'abord), is supported by not less than 120 organisations such as Oxfam, Greenpeace, Fairtrade Foundation, WWF and so on...
The idea is to send a strong message to tell them to think first about social justice and the environment, and that we can't go back to business as usual. I try to mobilise as many people around me as possible to go there and I will be on the first row to take part of it!
I have an idea of punchline for the protest... I thought of "Forget the financial crisis, fix the human crisis." What do you think of it?
...is just so good!
[Found in the Royaume des Aveugles.]
In these difficult times, everything is questioned, even holy sacred free trade...
Free trade is this rule that says: "Let's buy whatever we want, in any country, at any condition, as long as it's cheap!!", ain't it? Not cool, it means the quality norms of the product probably suck ass, and let's not talk about the work/life conditions of the workers who made these products... Besides, it is said this kind of bullshit encourages offshoring (yeah, why would you make the French, the Brits, the Europeans who've got social rights and minimum wages rather than guys who are only asking for a bowl of rice?), so it causes unemplyment to rise in developed countries, and therefore worldwide levelling down.
Protectionism sounds a bit like economic xenophobia, or even autarky: "Let's make everything at home, at least you can be sure about the quality and workers' life conditions!" so there is no trade anymore between countries. (Tell me if I'm wrong.) But then, how would we get chocolate?? Or even, uranium for our nuclear power stations?! I'm sure that, should we illegalise chocolate import, it would go through customs anyway, just like drugs. So, not really efficient either, I think. And it's a bit sad not to exchange with your neighbours... I prefer having a more internationalist, more globalist vision.
But the solution seems to me to be ready already! Fair trade. Yeah, if you make fair trade compulsory, with particular criteria, for example, we state that we want items that have not been made by children, or products whose composition respects the environment, there you create levelling up.
Economy is really simple, I don't get why people bother!
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