flyer

Call to Join the River Camp

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Jul 222018

From the Committees for Territorial Defence and Decolonisation [Facebook page]

Last summer, a barricade stopped gas extraction by the petroleum company Junex at the Galt site, near Gaspé in Quebec. Ever since, the River Camp, established not far from the blockade, continues to keep watch over the territory. We are asking you to join the camp and make it vibrant. The takeover of this region by oil companies and its destruction are not a fatality. Only a sustained presence can put an end to the destruction of the rivers, forests, and all forms of life. Defeating the dispossession of the region’s inhabitants and the pillaging of unceded and unconquered Mi’kmaq territory is possible.

The River Camp held on through the fall and winter. As well as being a site of resistance, the camp became a place of meetings, exchanges, and popular education warning against the predation by oil companies on the Mi’kmaq territory of Gespegewagi. Since the end of May, the Quebec government has made known its intention to evict the camp which is on so-called public lands. This threat does not scare us, it only signals a desire by Junex to start drilling again. Everyone who cares about protecting the land and creating new solidarity between settlers and indigenous peoples is called to join us to continue building a front against extractive industries.

The defence and decolonisation of territories require more than an individual, moral, or theoretical stance – it implies physical presence and confrontation with the destructive forces of capital and the State. All decolonial or ecological critiques that motivate our mobilisations are worth nothing if they can’t be deployed during significant political moments. Such events are the perfect occasion to invent new practices of resistance and create new bonds

In view of the imminent resumption of drilling, our pursuit of solidarity on Turtle Island brings to question our ability to lead struggles on a level with the current catastrophe. The fantasy of alliances between political tendencies, like those between settlers and indigenous peoples, must make way for concrete and continued engagement on the ground.

The colonial machine is ravaging the world by its extractive economy in a sempiternal process of deprivation and destruction. The struggle against this disaster, in solidarity with the historic guardians of the water and the land, constitutes a meaningful opposition to a dispossession of more than 500 years. The defeat of the modern/colonial project will only be possible by means of concrete actions leading to a radical transformation of land use.

The River Camp is anactualisation of that project.

The call is out! In order to persist, and build force in the region, the River Camp needs renewed energy over the course of the coming months. This is an invitation to those willing to spend a few days at the camp or stay for months or even years. All contributions are welcome.

THE CAMP IS LOCATED ON ROUTE 198, 20 KM NORTH OF GASPÉ AND 60 KM SOUTH OF MURDOCHVILLE

Bring your tents, hammocks, friends, and everything necessary for the upkeep and expansion of the camp: food, materials and tools for construction or mobilisation, as well as everything that is necessary to sustain your life form.

To join us, you can write at the following address: campdelariviere@gmail.com or on our Facebook page Camp de la Rivière.

For help in forming Committees for Territorial Defence and Decolonisation in your neighbourhood, your reserve, your city, or your region you can contact us at the following address: cddt@riseup.net or our Facebook page Comités de défense et de décolonisation des territoires.

150 years of colonialism is nothing to celebrate!

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Jun 092017

Anti-colonial and anti-imperialist demonstration in Montreal on July 1st

From CLAC
Time and place soon to be announced!
Mark your calendars!

As you might know, this year is the 150th anniversary of Canada. The government will spend half a billion dollars in 2017 to organize ceremonies, parades and parties to celebrate the colonialism, imperialism and racism that is so characteristic to nation-states. Those amounts will be invested in questionable projects that will benefit the tourism industry and the friends of those in power, rather than the residents of the area.

We should never forget that the territory we call Canada has been stolen by European settlers from the Indigenous peoples who have lived here for thousand of years. The land was taken in order to appropriate natural resources to make the English and French crown richer. Why should we celebrate that?

Canadian colonialism isn’t something of the past, as the oppression and racism against Indigenous people still exists, whether we think about the disproportionate rate of incarceration compared to white people, to the police abuse they face, or the military interventions (Restigouche, 1981, Oka, 1990, Gustafsen Lake, 1995, Elsipogtog, 2013). These interventions were meant to « discipline » Indigenous communities while they claimed rights that the Canadian government agreed to in treaties. Even then, the treaties were signed after settlers invaded Indigenous territories and destabilized the ecosystem their communities depended on. Once again, is there anything to celebrate?

Even if the vast majority of the Canadian population comes from immigration, beginning with the16th century period of colonization, the Canadian government maintains racist policies towards new migrants. They are marginalized, deprived of essential services they need to live in dignity, and are often treated like criminals or terrorists. Should we be proud of the welcome we offer to the people that often have to migrate here because life in their country of origin has became unbearable, often because of the imperialistic policies of our government or of other rich countries that can’t get enough power and money?

This is why we’ll disrupt Canada day on July 1st as much as possible. There is no pride in living in a country built on stolen land; a country accumulating riches all these years through the brutal exploitation of the resources here and everywhere else. There is no pride in living in a country that marginalizes Indigenous people and migrants.

Call to action:

In addition to our demonstration, we encourage you to also organize other actions.

There are symbols of Canadian colonialism all around us: Canadian army buildings, cannons, military museums, government offices, Hudson Bay Company stores, prisons, courthouses, parliament buildings, city halls, offices of CSIS and the RCMP. Let’s be creative!

Fun activity to do with your friends on July 1st: gather all of the Canadian and Quebec flags that you can find. There are lots of things that you could do afterwards around a nice bonfire. Additional challenge: replace the flags that you’ve found with more appropriate ones, such as black flags. Hours of fun!

The CLAC – Anti-Capitalist Convergence info@clac-montreal.net – clac-montreal.net

Organized as a response to the call for a national day of action on July 1st 2017 made by IDLE NO MORE and DEFENDERS OF THE LAND.

What the fuck is anarchism?

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Apr 062017

We’ve made an ‘introduction to anarchism’ flyer, merging several texts by comrades from elsewhere. The flyer includes a list of local spaces and resources for anyone interested in anarchism in Montreal. For distribution at schools, workplaces, barricades, events, and demonstrations!

[Print, bilingual, 8.5″x11″]

Anarchists oppose all forms of oppressive power. we strive for a world based on self-determination and mutual aid. As the world veers towards tyranny, only grassroots direct action can keep our communities safe. If you’re ready to take action without waiting for orders, you’re one of us.

Anarchists look reality in the face and desire its complete transformation: the elimination of exploitation and domination. Anarchists are among the only ones offering a clear vision of another way of living. In organizing networks and community spaces around the world, we come together to assist each other in meeting basic needs and building the collective capacity for self-defense. In neighborhoods, workplaces, and schools, anarchists are fighting gentrification, the violence of the police, and exploitation while creating inclusive alternative infrastructures for survival. Across bioregions, we are organizing to protect our drinking water and the earth we all depend on for life.

Anarchists see the imposition of racism, class society, nationality, gender and patriarchy all playing parts in creating a world where a few own everything and the rest are forced to work for them in order to survive. A world that is also held in place by institutions of direct control in the form of police and prisons.

Anarchists recognize the one-two punch of the right and left wings of the state. The right-handed uppercut of market capitalism and the strong left hook that more government offers have taken turns pummeling people and the earth for hundreds of years. Anarchists are those who have had enough of it all.

Naturally anarchists are decried as dangerous by cops, politicians, and the rich, and rightly so, because if anarchists had their way those roles would no longer exist. While we’re told to grow up, to quiet our rage, to check another ballot, wait another decade for change, our limbs and minds grow weary. Our dreams and desires yearn to overflow, for something different.

Anarchism means destroying the forces that seek to keep us on our knees, as much as it means finding your friends, lovers, families and communities to have each others’ backs, with unbounded rage and joy. The riot that spills into the streets with dancing and laughter, the potluck that leaves everyone fed, the social center filled with books and ideas, the friendships based in affinity and unconditional solidarity, the window smashed to let in the light from outside.

In a world full of alienation and apathy, anarchists are willing to act in accordance with their ideas. Anarchists are those who would set fire to a bulldozer or a new luxury home rather than let a forest be cut down, who would rather hear the sound of shattering glass than a politician’s speech. Deserting and disobeying all the rules written against us, by squatting and stealing for our survival, and rejecting the roles we’re assigned, as good worker, good student, good citizen, good woman or man. Rewriting the usual endings; by supporting prisoners rather than letting them disappear in isolation, by beating up rapists and homophobes rather than suffering their violence, by creating forms of love that only strengthen us rather than containing and limiting us. Taking control over our surroundings by painting graffiti on the walls or occupying space and planting gardens. By arming ourselves with the ability to create a new world and destroy the one that has been imposed on us.

Anarchism in Montreal:

Montreal Counter-information is a local website that publishes news and analysis about anarchist struggles in Montreal.

Visit resistancemontreal.org for a calendar of radical events in the city, and a larger list of anarchist groups, spaces, and news.

If you want to learn more about anarchism across North America, you can visit these (anglophone) websites:

crimethinc.com — anarchist analyses and introductory resources

itsgoingdown.org — coverage of anarchist activity across North America

sub.media — video coverage of anarchism (sometimes with French subtitles)

Why warriors at Standing Rock wear masks flyer

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Nov 072016

For distribution at Standing Rock solidarity initatives, to disprove the accusations against those who wear masks and counter narratives of pacifism.

8.5 x 14″ | PDF

A Challenge: Spread the Strike to Every Jail, Juvie, and Prison, in Canada too!

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Aug 212016

From La Solide, adapted from IGD

This is a challenge to anyone who is supportive of the September 9th prisoners’ strike but who has remained on the sidelines until now.

In order for this strike to not be snuffed out by a handful of prison censors and violent guards, it needs to spread uncontrollably beyond their reach. And because prisons strictly forbid communication between prisoners, it is our responsibility on the outside to facilitate this contagion. Spreading the call to prisons in Canada will further this contagion, and give an opportunity to link our struggle against prison and the world that needs it, through prison walls and across borders.

The first obvious step is to begin sending in word of the strike, immediately. If people on the inside are to be able to meaningfully act, they are going to need some time to begin spreading the word to their friends and formulating a plan. To that end, we are suggesting that outside accomplices begin printing the strike announcements (below) and mailing them inside en masse.

Mail to whom you ask? To anyone! To your old high school friend stuck in county jail, your friend’s little sister in juvie, to Black Liberation prisoners who have inspired you, your neighbor’s relative in an immigrant detention center, or to that person on the local news who robbed four (!) banks before she finally got caught last year.

If you’re not able to provide ongoing support to the people you mail or if you give a fake return address, please be clear about that in your letter. People on the inside need to know if people on the outside will have their backs or not. If you do maintain communication with people you contact, however, be opaque and creative in the ways that you talk about these things. Use different return addresses to confuse prison censors, or find clever new ways to get information inside without it being attached to your legal name. And don’t forget to act as a signal booster for their actions; for instance, if the strike has taken hold, and/or the prison is retaliating against them, post that info to sites like lasolide.info, itsgoingdown.org or supportprisonerresistance.noblogs.org so that people can organize call-in’s or other solidarity actions to target the prison administration.

“Right away, one shouldn’t be able to start a university course, a theater performance or a scientific conference without someone directly intervening or letting loose a rain of flyers that pose the questions, ‘What has become of the prisoners on strike?’ and, ‘When will the authorities give in to their demands?’ No one should be able to walk down any street in the U.S. without seeing news of the prisoners’ struggle on the walls. And the songs that are sung about them must be heard by all.”

There’s no denying that this is a historical moment, a rare opportunity that simply cannot missed. There are no sidelines in a world without leaders. Everyone has a role to play so let’s get going!

Flyer, 8.5″x11″(Text to be printed and sent into prisons)

Here is the content:

Things are heating up in the prisons!

The letter that follows was written by inmates of American prisons involved with the IWOC (Incarcerated Workers Organising Commitee). They wrote it to inform you of a massive struggle that will rock many American prisons this September 9th. There will be a coordinated prison strike, with the goal of putting an end to prison slavery. In the US, private businesses have inmates work in federal and state prisons, in exchange for abysmal salaries. The use of their work force is an integral part of the economy of the country. All this in a context of institutionalized racism where the majority of inmates are black and latino; where slavery never ended.

In Canada, imprisonment is no less unbearable; society itself produces the crimes of those it imprisons, especially by keeping them in precarious living conditions. By no accident, the majority of people who find themselves in prison are there for these “crimes” caused by the absence of possibility offered by this society to those who its marginalizes. Colonial violence and white supremacy are perpetuated here as well: indigenous and racialized people, in particular the women in these communities, are massively overrepresented in Canadian prisons. Although the act of working can help to pass the time and is perceived as a privilege, businesses (like CORCAN) exploit prisoners in exchange for ridiculous salaries. These businesses profit from the vulnerability of inmates who are still considered sub-humans, and exploit their labour and their time.

For instance, diverse struggles have taken place in the last years against prisons in Canada. At this moment, around sixty detainees are on hunger strike at the immigrant detention centre in Lindsay, Ontario, to demand a maximum time limit to detention without charge for people who don’t have status. As well, in 2015 and 2016 there were two hunger strikes in the maximum correctional centre in Regina, Saskatchewan to demand more hours of yard time, and in 2013, there was a strike against the salary cuts in federal prisons. Organizing in prison is never easy, and yet here are concrete examples.

We wish to transmit this call for solidarity, firstly to keep you in the loop. We are aware of the difficulty of communicating between inmates in different establishments. If you are interested in contributing in any way, if you would like to write a letter of solidarity to prisoners on strike, or if you would like to communicate with people who wrote this introduction, you can get in touch with

lasolide@riseup.net

or write as at
PRS c/o CKUT,
3647 rue University, Montréal, Québec, H3A 2B3

…until we are all free
La Solide

Announcement of Nationally Coordinated Prisoner Workstoppage for Sept 9, 2016

Mtlcounter-info flyer

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Aug 162016

8.5 x 11″ | PDF

How to safely submit communiques to MTL Counter-info

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Aug 082016

We thought it would be useful to summarize a basic technique to anonymously submit communiques, using the Tails operating system.

Tails is a computer operating system designed with security in mind, which can boot off a USB or CD, from any computer. After shutting down Tails and ejecting the USB or CD, the computer can start again with its usual operating system. Tails is designed to leave no trace on the computer by not interacting with the hard-disk, and only using the RAM for memory (which is automatically erased when Tails shuts down). In addition, it forces every internet connection to go through the Tor network [1. TOR is a network of proxies run by volunteers with the explicit purpose of maintaining anonymity online. With TOR, your connection goes through three proxies. You connect to TOR and each of the three proxies (nodes) you access encrypts your data. No individual node can know both what you are connected to and who you are. The third node decrypts the data and accesses the website, sending the information back through the proxies in encrypted form.], so is much safer than using just a Tor browser on your normal operating system.

IP and MAC addresses:
Every internet connection has a specific IP address[2. An Internal Protocol address is a string of numbers that allows you to send and retrieve data over an internet connection (for example, 78.125.1.209). This number identifies the location, Internet service provider, and technical details of your connection. It is comparable to a house’s street address. An unobscured IP will lead investigators directly to your connection.] that can be logged by websites that are visited, and which reveals the connection that was used. An IP address can be traced to the internet subscriber it’s assigned to, whether an individual or a business like a café.

Every computer has a MAC address[3. The Media Access Controller address specifically identifies your computer. If you access the internet, the router may log your MAC address and maintain that log. If investigators were to read the logs of a router you accessed (say, a public wifi from which a communiqué was sent), and then compare that address with the MAC address of your computer’s wireless card (say, confiscated in a raid), you’d be connected to your activity while using that router’s connection. If the MAC address is not changed, there is the possibility of your activity being traced back to you if investigators are persistent or lucky enough.] , which can identify the specific computer that connected to a site via the IP address.

Tails automatically conceals the IP address by using the TOR network, and automatically gives the user a fake MAC address upon starting.

1. Download and install Tails
Tails can be downloaded at tails.boum.org. See ‘Tails Installation Assistant’ on the site for instructions on how to download and verify the file, install it on a USB or CD, and boot it on your computer.

2. Boot Tails
Depending on how risky your activity is, it might be best to use a computer that isn’t connected to your identity (in case Tails, for whatever reason, does leave a trace). This could be a public computer out of sight of surveillance cameras, or a laptop used specifically for this purpose.

If you start the computer with the USB plugged in, and Tails doesn’t start automatically, you might have to access the ‘boot menu’ of your computer. On most computers, you can press a boot menu key to display a list of possible devices to start from (identify the potential boot menu keys for the computer depending on the computer manufacturer in the list below). In the boot menu, choose your USB. For troubleshooting, see ‘Start Tails’ at tails.boum.org. You may need to edit the BIOS settings.

3. Connect to internet
If using a laptop, you can access many wifi networks with prior knowledge of the password from outside the building, even at night if they leave the wifi on. Use wifi that doesn’t have a ‘captive portal’ (that makes you accept terms and conditions).

4. Submit Communique
Open TOR browser, and verify TOR is functional by going to check.torproject.org. Change your TOR Security Level in ‘Privacy and Security’ preferences from Standard (default) to Safest. Visit https://mtlcontreinfo.org/publish/ to send us your communique! If submitting any images, video, etc., remove identifying information (metadata) with the Metadata Anonymization Toolkit (MAT) on Tails.

More In-depth Resources:
• Surveillance Self-Defense: Tips, Tools and How-tos for Safer Online Communications
• Anonymity/Security zine
• Surveillance and Counter-surveillance Guide

8.5 x 14″ | PDF

Staying safer in the streets

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Apr 082016

For the next time… Staying safer in the streets

Why wear a mask? It allows us to take action without fear of immediate identification. It’s not enough to cover half our face. Even if we get away, the police may use photos or video to charge us later. It’s best to cover our hair, face, arms, tattoos, and hands. Cloth gloves are best because they don’t transfer print, unlike plastic gloves. Make sure there are no identifying features on your clothes, shoes, or backpack; it’s nice to have a change of clothing. If we bring any materials with us, let’s wipe them down with rubbing alcohol to remove fingerprints. Bragging and storytelling are natural, but they’re easy to use against us. Don’t post anything on Facebook that we wouldn’t show a cop. The same goes for Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr. Remember that police will read our texts and call-log if they arrest us. If you are arrested, invoke your right to remain absolutely silent; name, address, birthdate and no more.

8.5 x 11″ | PDF