Action

Every Bank is a Blank Canvas

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Jun 162018

Anonymous submission to MTL Counter-info

In the night of June 14th, some artists who wish to remain anonymous made a contribution to MURAL Festival 2018. The piece is a postmodern, extinguisher acrylic on bank window, measuring (approximately) 15ft x 8ft. More specifically, we sprayed the facade of the National Bank on Saint-Laurent Boulevard with a fire extinguisher filled with black paint.

It is obvious that politics, both the G7 politician’s and the social activist’s, is a dead end. The problem is figuring out what to do instead. We choose to experiment with confronting that which seeks to turn every part of our lives into a commodity. We’ve watched the state waste hundreds of millions of dollars on a security apparatus for the spectacle of a summit that bears little relation to our lives and long-term struggles. Instead of falling for this trap, we enjoy acting when and where the cops are not expecting us. We will continue to do so.

Solidarity with the anarchists facing repression in Quebec City, Montreal, Hamilton, and worldwide.

– Some vandals

G7: Statement of the Popular Expression Zone

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Jun 152018

Anonymous submission to MTL Counter-info

8 June 2018, so-called Quebec

Faced with the hideous deployment of the security apparatus put in place during the G7, we decided to organize among friends and block the Dufferin-Montmorency expressway ourselves. We clearly saw that the gatherings and other actions called by the RRAG7, the CLAC and others had no chance of allowing us to experience something seriously enjoyable, and all that needs to be said is we didn’t want to stay discouraged while our neighborhoods were stormed by the cops.

Euphoric, we placed couches in the intersection and furnished the space with banners, laughter, and songs. Comrades put their bodies between the riot police and the space we named Popular Expression Zone for the occasion to allow us to enjoy ourselves a bit longer. Then we set the living room on fire and left in a demo into the city.

Life, or nothing…

The media, hypnotized by the couches in flames, chose not to relay the communiqué of the Public Space Brigade (BEP). So we decided to share it here:

Public Space Brigade: Don’t panic, everything is under control

That’s the problem.

Even the possibility of criticizing the state is regulated by the cops and fences. Walled-off free speech zones, demonstrations permitted as long as they bother no one. The world has been stolen from us, even the possibility of putting it in question. And quietly people stay in their place, in front of the TV, listening to the radio, suspended in front of screens.

Every year it’s the same theatre piece that is replayed: everyone is there, at their post. The dictatorship of orders reaches its peak, and the peoples try as well as they can to demonstrate an organized opposition to this spectacle.

While we’re battered with messages of fear with respect to possible rises in tension between police and protesters, the politicians discussing security and repression, colonization and oil extraction, war and hatred of migants, exploitation of works and deregulation, have it easy. The question of violence must be posed on a different level.

This popular expression zone is on the opposite end of this buffoonery, this desert you call the G7. It’s the reappropriation from the bottom, from the street, of our lives and our bodies, the relearning of territory and of the freedom to take action against the misery of this rotten system.

Here, we stop the old world. Here, we carve our own in the cracks of its declining power. Here is now – life.

Antifascist Action at the Quebec/US Border

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Jun 152018

From It’s Going Down

June 3rd, 2018 – Faith Goldy had called a rally at the Roxham border (U.S/ Quebec) attracting roughly 100 far-right groups and individuals from Ontario and Quebec, as well as a few stragglers from as far away as Alberta and Nova Scotia. This is the first time this sort of collusion between provincial groups has ever been observed at the border here.

Faith Goldy is currently one of Canada’s most prominent far-Right internet personalities. She appeals to both populist forces concerned primarily about “illegal immigration” and “the Muslim threat,” as well as to actual fascists and neo-Nazis. Not only has she not eschewed the latter, she has made a point of pandering to them, i.e. repeating and defending the 14 words (a neo-Nazi slogan), joking with people from the Daily Stormer in Charlottesville, and being an avid defender of “identitarianism” in Canada, including promoting the Alt-Right Identity Canada group. More on Goldy here.

Goldy’s fame spiked in far-Right circles recently, when she filmed herself being spat on and ejected from an antifascist counter protest at the Quebec/U.S. border at Lacolle a few weeks earlier. Many who had never heard of her before, especially within the Quebec far right, took notice, and the June 3 rally suddenly took on greater importance for their forces.

Those who showed up on the 3rd represented Goldy’s range of appeal. There were members of the Proud Boys from Ontario, along with other far-Right internet media warriors, such as Ronny Cameron (self-described “white nationalist” and supporter of the Alt-Right), Alex Van Hamme (Free Bird Media), and Georges Massaad (The Phalange Media). The bulk of those who attended the rally were from Quebec, though. Despite the fact that Goldy had essentially snubbed Quebec organizers, not responding to overtures from Dave Tregget and Sylvain Lacroix, and that her call for “patriots” to bring Red Ensign flags alienated some Quebec nationalists, there was a significant showing of individuals associated with Storm Alliance, Atalante, la Meute, and even the Front Patriotique du Quebec (which had officially disassociated itself from the rally due to the sensitive “red ensign” issue).

In her promo videos, Goldy had asked attendees to be on their “best behavior” but she certainly did not object to Threepers showing up at the Fisher and Roxham Rd intersection, dressed in full tactical gear, to patrol the area. The suggested violence is not lost on observers, the intersection looked more like a militarized zone than a pro-borders demo. But, that’s just the thing–the very presence of far-Right demonstrators and known neo-Nazis is violent. Their fetishized need to patrol settler borders on stolen Indigenous lands reveals them for the white supremacists that they are and the infrastructures of white supremacy they uphold (i.e. borders, anti-migrant legislation, detention centers, safe third-country agreement).

In the past, anti-fascists have publicly called counter-demos. We are often pushed out of the way by SQ riot cops in order to make way for far-Right groups. This time, we made no public call out. Instead, we waited to position ourselves at a strategically advantageous point along Roxham Rd and proceeded to set-up a highway blockade. Our numbers were small, we intentionally chose to be so. Our objective was to concretely disrupt their demo for as long as possible. This was an experiment, one that we are still evaluating.

Solidarity with all migrants crossing borders. Solidarity with all those detained in immigrant detention centers. Solidarity with all Indigenous folks leading the ongoing resistance against the settler colonial states and their borders.

Report-back on the Demo Against the “March for Life”

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May 282018

Anonymous Submission to MTL Counter-info

Each May, thousands of people meet in Ottawa for the “March for Life,” an initiative of organisations opposed to free choice and free information concerning the voluntary termination of pregnancy. This year, it was on May 10th that the anti-choice demonstrators took the streets of the capital city to demonstrate against the rights of women (and every person with a uterus) to control their own body, to have the right to an abortion. The Riposte Feministe organised a Montreal contingent to join the counter demonstration with feminist groups from Outaouais and Ottawa. We were about 50 people leaving from Berri-UQAM station that morning, caffeinated with indignation.

The demo departed from Confederation Park, downtown, where there were already activists distributing pamphlets to passers by. For about an hour, women and those of diverse sexual and gender identities spoke about the common themes of defense of bodily autonomy in all its expressions, colonial and imperial state institutions who silence the voices of gender oppressed people, and the right to safe, accessible, and legal abortions.

At 1:30pm, we left the park, strong and in solidarity, to block the departure of the “Pro-Life” demonstration, a hypocritical name that distracts from the real meanings of this conservative position: the desire to control women and their bodies, the discrimination against LGBTQIA+ people, and racism. Despite our smaller numbers, we formed a solid and vocal opposition that effectively prevented the anti-choice demonstration from advancing. After almost an hour of resistance, the antifeminist camp gave up and moved back. This was the most significant symbolic moment of the day.

The counter-demonstration split in two to attempt to again block the demonstration, who had continued their march on another parallel street. We took another smaller perpendicular street to reach them. The police passed us in order to create an impenetrable wall out of their bicycles to prevent us from crossing the intersection. This enclosure was a police repression tactic: one consisting of making a revolutionary radical subject exist; us, a dangerous and violent counter gang. The cops weren’t looking to destroy us, but rather to produce us as a political subject. As the Invisible Committee explained it in To Our Friends: “When repression strikes us, let’s begin by not taking ourselves for ourselves. Let’s dissolve the fantastical terrorist subject which the counterinsurgency theorists take such pains to impersonate, a subject the representation of which serves mainly to produce the “population” as a foil—the population as an apathetic and apolitical heap, an immature mass just good enough for being governed, for having its hunger pangs and consumer dreams satisfied.”

Our non-violent intentions were clear from the beginning of the counter-demo. We expressed our anger peacefully. The police repression that we experienced was therefore unjustifiable through excuses of safety. It is evident that the force they used served to legitimize the “Pro-Life” position. It was an undeniable demonstration of support for anti-feminist arguments, camouflaged under a supposed responsibility to protect the uncontestable freedom of expression in a neoliberal society.

The repression also served to reduce our positions to unfounded and violent postures. The cops succeeded in inverting the backlash, transferring the violence of the anti-choice position onto us, who were only affirming our rights to our own bodies. This allowed them to open the path for a openly violent masculinist and anti-feminist demonstration to turn toward our immobilized and thus vulnerable contingent.

The “peace line,” formed by cops, reinforced the old dualist paradigm, creating an opposition: on one side, the good citizens defending the right to life, and on the other, the gang of violent insurgents. But we must not forget that the real violence is found on the protected side. This demonstration reflects the rise of the far right and of fascism in North America. We could read slogans such as “All Lives Matter”, “Make Canada Great Again,” and “Not Your Body Not Your Choice”. The majority of these posters were held by cisgender white men. What’s more, there were many high school students, mostly coming from catholic schools, who came with their pro-life signs made in class, which reflects state and systemic indoctrination imposed from a very young age.

Let’s continue to denounce neo-nazi and fascist movements so we don’t normalize violence like this. Let’s be in solidarity with Indigenous peoples, racialized people, women, and people of diverse genders and sexualities! Despite the emotional, psychological, and physical difficulties, this counter demo brought forward activist voices past and present and served to remind us that we still need to fight. Thanks to the Montreal Riposte Feministe for reminding us of the living force of our community.

First Anti-G7 Banner Drop in Saguenay

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May 262018

Anonymous submission to MTL Counter-info

One cold morning, the anti-G7 collective « Saumons la terreur » spawned downstream to the Bagotville military base to drop its first banner: “G7, Stay Home, Use Skype,” in protest of the summit being held in June 2018 in La Malbaie.

We act to point out that the Charlevoix region is already completely paralyzed by drastic and disproportionate security measures put in place at a high price by the Canadian and Quebec governments to welcome dignitaries, even though a simple video-conference would have sufficed. We intentionally chose the Bagotville base, an important international entry point for the region, to show our disapproval of the arrival of these leaders and the deployment of the Canadian Forces to assure their safety.

It is deplorable that the media coverage of the issues raised by the G7 is practically non-existent. The numerous substantive criticisms brought forward by various community groups are barely heard in traditional networks of information sharing, drowned out by a campaign of fear brought to legitimize the millions of dollars sucked from public funds which will serve to finance the ridiculous security protecting this political masquerade.

The G7, under the cover of a peaceful and progressive agenda, seems to us to be nothing more than a manifestation of institutional violence. We believe that the countries forming the G7 constitute themselves the principal reasons that the world’s social inequalities exist. Other actions against the G7 are to be expected, both in the region and across the province.

Anti-construction Crew Releases Thousands of Crickets into Immigration Prison Architecture Headquarters

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May 192018

Lemay’s head office, 3500 rue Saint-Jacques

Anonymous submission to MTL Counter-info

One morning in April 2018, our amateur construction crew released thousands of crickets into the newly built headquarters of the Montreal architecture company Lemay. We pulled a sheet of plywood off the side of the building and funneled the crickets into a recently completed office space. Lemay, along with Quebec-City based company Groupe A, has been awarded a contract to build a new immigration detention centre in Laval, a suburb of Montreal. It is slated to open in 2020. We oppose borders, prisons, and immigration detention centres. We struggle for a world where people are free to stay and free to move; a world without white supremacy, capitalism, colonialism, and patriarchy.

We see the release of these crickets as merely the beginning of a concerted effort to stop the new immigration detention centre from being built. Crickets are known to reproduce quickly and are difficult to exterminate. Their constant noise and quick proliferation through any space they have access to makes them much more than a nuisance to have around. The crickets will multiply inside Lemay’s new headquarters in the gentrifying neighbourhood of St. Henri, even after the wall we deconstructed has been replaced. Meanwhile, we will get even more organized in our resistance to this new immigration detention centre and all that it represents.

The new immigration detention centre in Laval has been proposed as part of a Liberal government “overhaul” of the immigration system. The bulk of the overhaul is focused on infrastructural changes: $122 million of the $138 million overhaul project will be spent on building two new immigration detention facilities (in Laval and in Surrey, BC) and upgrading an already existing detention centre in Toronto. The stated reason for this change is that the current detention centres are not up to international standards. The government claims they also want to move away from detention and towards alternatives to detention.

The new facilities are being pitched as “nicer” prisons. They are supposed to be “non-institutional in design,” and have easy access to outdoor spaces and meeting spaces for family and NGO representatives, but still prioritize state security and keeping people locked up inside. The companies who have been awarded the contracts are known for designing LEED certified court houses and prisons as well as libraries and university spaces. So, it’s hard to imagine that this new prison won’t have an “institutional” feel. Much like the overhaul of the federal women’s prison system in Canada in the 90s and the current attempt by the Ontario provincial government to soften their prison system, this “overhaul” of the immigration detention centre aims to put some pretty curtains on a building that people can’t leave and pretend that it’s okay to lock people up.

The new prison in Laval seems like it will have the same or slightly more capacity to imprison people than the current immigration detention centre (current capacity is between 109 and 144 people, while the new centre would supposedly hold 121 people). This is strange in a context where the numbers of immigrants being detained is down in recent years and the government claims to plan to reduce these detentions even further. It wouldn’t surprise us if they’re just talking more bullshit. As someone said, “if you build them, they will fill them.” A reduction in the number of folks detained seems unlikely.

In fact, let’s talk about that a bit more. As part of the overhaul to the immigration system, Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale announced the government’s intention to explore “alternatives to incarceration.” In the report that was written about the overhaul, the government said that alternatives to detention included “the ability to report by phone through voice recognition technology to minimize the need to report to the CBSA in person, maximize freedom of movement, facilitate compliance and optimize efficiencies.” Sounds like it’s about making border cops’ jobs easier and saving money.

More commonly known alternatives to immigration detention include electronic bracelets and halfway houses, or a parole-like system run by NGOs willing to act as prison guards. In some ways, these options are better than sitting in a prison. In other ways, these options will act as a carrot, with prison as the stick. In the end, these “alternatives to detention” will reinforce the legitimacy of the detention centre as an option at all (“we gave you a chance to use the phone system and, even though we gave you no option to regularize your status and, in fact, gave you a deportation date instead, you went MIA, so now we have to put you in detention”). Alternatives to detention are more sophisticated forms of controlling migrants that allow the state to seem benevolent, while still deporting and detaining people who don’t submit to the more sophisticated controls.

The strategy of pursuing alternatives to detention would likely lead us further down a road where NGOs collaborate with the government in detaining migrants, in exchange for funding for their staff salaries. In 2017, the government signed a new contract with the Red Cross to monitor conditions in immigration detention centres. However, the Red Cross has technically been monitoring immigration prisons since 1999, this is just the first time they’ve gotten “core funding” for the program from the government. In exchange for $1.14 million over two years, the Red Cross will keep “monitoring” detention centres and telling the government that everything is a-ok; rubber stamping the continued practices of imprisoning migrants. Don’t you just love it when NGOs step in to make government repression look good?

So what do we make of this overhaul in the end? It means more money for more repressive prisons, some money for some slightly less heinous ways of controlling people’s movement, and some money for the Red Cross. In a context where people are walking across the border from the US to flee Trump’s America, a context where most of those people won’t be granted refugee status and they could very well end up in immigration detention, we want to stop this new immigration detention centre from being built. We see this as the perfect time – in fact the only time – to intervene in order to keep this from happening. We mobilize against this new prison, without forgetting that we also want to see the old one closed. We see the prevention of construction on this new prison as just one part of a much larger fight to tear down the others already standing.

In addition to understanding this struggle in the context of a global “migrant crisis,” we understand that this is also happening in a context of a rise of activity in the far right. Storm Alliance, a far right racist anti-immigrant group, has organized a handful of anti-migrant demonstrations at the border, often joined by La Meute, Quebec’s home-grown populist far right group. Influenced by anti-migrant and far-right rhetoric on the internet, Alexandre Bissonnette shot and killed six people in a mosque in Quebec City a year and a half ago. TVA and the Journal de Montreal publish far-right fake news to popularize these sentiments.

With all this in mind, we understand a fight to stop this new detention centre from being built as a fight based in anti-fascism, as part of the fight against white supremacy. We seek to connect our actions to those of other people in our communities, both near and far, who are also fighting white supremacy and the rise of the far right. Even as we fight the liberalism of the current governing party in Canada, we also fight the rise of the far right and their violent visions for the future.

We are inspired, recently, by the campaign to try and stop the deportation of Lucy Granados. We are inspired by the everyday bravery of people living without status and by those who get organized and get together to protect each other and our shared communities. We are inspired by all the people who are standing up against borders, prisons, and other forms of domination. We are inspired to struggle for their freedom to stay and freedom to move, and to call on others to join us.

Lemay is not the only company involved in the design and construction of the prison, and thus not the only possible point of pressure. From the architectural plans of Lemay, to the contributions of Groupe A, to the materials and construction crews, it takes many hands and many parts to build a prison. This is a call for more research, discussion, and action around Lemay’s involvement specifically, but also all the other firms and groups invested in the project. We hope to see other anti-construction crews take action in the future, and we hope that this project can become the target of a sustained campaign, capable of bringing together many people to support an end to prisons and borders.

We hope that the resistance to this prison continues to proliferate, faster and further than thousands of crickets.

Two Queen Victoria Statues Vandalised in Montreal

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May 192018

From subMedia

Original anonymous communiqué by the Henri Paul Anti-Monarchy Brigade, shared with subMedia:*

In advance of colonial ‘Victoria Day’ holiday, two Queen Victoria statues are (again) vandalized in Montreal

Racist and imperialist legacy of the British Monarchy denounced

May 18, 2018, Montreal – Days before the outdated and insulting Queen Victoria holiday, two landmark statues to Queen Victoria in Montreal were vandalized last night.

The Victoria Memorial in downtown Montreal (erected in 1872) as well the bronze statue on Sherbrooke Street (erected in 1900) at McGill University were both sprayed in red paint.

This action is rooted in opposition to colonialism and imperialism, and a dislike of the parasitic British monarchy (and all monarchies). We are also directly inspired by the recent vandalism (with green paint) of the same Queen Victoria statues in advance of St. Patrick’s Day this past March by the Delhi-Dublin Anti-Colonial Solidarity Bridage

These statues represent, to quote the Delhi-Dublin Anti-Colonial Solidarity Brigade, “a legacy of genocide, mass murder, torture, massacres, terror, forced famines, concentration camps, theft, cultural denigration, racism, and white supremacy.”

The Queen Victoria statues should come down and be placed in a museum as a historical artifact. Public statues and monuments should not represent oppression. The presence of Queen Victoria statues in Montreal is, to again quote the Delhi-Dublin Anti-Colonial Solidarity Brigade, “an insult to Indigenous nations in North America (Turtle Island) and Oceania, as well as the peoples of Africa, the Middle East, the Caribbean, the Indian subcontinent, and everywhere the British Empire committed its atrocities.”

These statues are also insulting to people who represent the progressive struggles of the Irish, as well as Québecois. However, we denounce the far-right anti-immigrant racist souchebags in Quebec who coopt the legacy of the patriotes, but actually represent neo-fascist ideas.

Important context: our action last night contributes to a tradition of targeting colonial symbols and monuments for vandalism and eventual removal: Cornwallis in Halifax, John A. Macdonald in Kingston and Montreal, the Rhodes Must Fall movement in South Africa, the resistance to racist Confederate monuments in the USA, and more.

To once again repeat the words of the Delhi-Dublin Ant-Colonial Solidarity Brigade: “Our action is a simple expression of anti-colonial and anti-imperialist solidarity, and we encourage others to undertake similar actions against racist monuments and symbols that should be in museums, not taking up our shared public spaces.”

— Communiqué by the Henri Paul* Anti-Monarchy Brigade

* Henri Paul was the driver of the luxury Mercedes with Lady Diana that crashed in Paris in 1997. Every member of the British monarchy deserves a drunk French driver!

Invitation to the Last RRAG7 Assembly

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May 112018

From the Réseau de résistance anti-G7

There is only one month left until the G7 Summit at La Malbaie, which will take place at the Richelieu Manor from June 7th to June 9th! As is the case each year, the seven main imperialist and colonialist powers of the world will meet to decide how to keep pillaging our communities, while extracting as much profit as possible.

We will not leave them alone! Mobilization and resistance to the G7 keeps moving forward…

Here are the actions planned by the RRAG7:

Thursday, June 7th, at 6PM in Quebec City at the Parc des Braves: Join us in a festive and popular protest against the G7, capitalism, colonialism, racism and for open borders!
Friday, June 8th, in the Quebec City area, at 7:30AM, there will be an activity to disrupt the G7 Summit. The RRAG7 also calls for a full day of disruptions of the activities of the G7 Summit: Be creative!

We are ready to denounce this unfair system as long as it is necessary!

Subscription: Buses and lodging

It is now time to subscribe. Yes, yes, subscribe. Because without a subscription it is difficult to reserve the right number of buses and to find lodging for those who need it. To subscribe, go on our website and reserve your place before May 27th. The website also include details on how to subscribe non-electronically!

Note that reservation will only be effective when you will confirm your subscription during one of our General Assembly, or during one of our vents. At that time, there will be a “Pay What You Can” box. We suggest a contribution of 20$ for transport. Of course, nobody will be turn back for lack of funds. All the information collected will remain confidential and will be destroyed after the G7.

Last general assembly of the RRAG7 : May 12th

The RRAG7 invites you at its last organization assembly, on Saturday, May 12th from 1PM to 4PM at the 1710 Beaudry (Comité social Centre-Sud).

Spread the word, let’s be as many as possible for this last assembly! It will be an opportunity to exchange on the actions to come or to participate in their organization by joining one of the committees (legal, mobilization, logistics, students, popular education). This assembly will also be an opportunity to confirm your bus and housing reservation as well as the last logistic details.

** The room is wheelchair accessible.
** Whisper translation is available.
For more information, email info@antig7.org or vitit our website.

May Day 2018 Montreal: Anarchists Attack Police

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May 042018

From subMedia

On May Day, the CLAC, or anti-capitalist convergence, started their demo at Parc LaFontaine in Montreal. People took the sidewalks to prevent the cops from flanking the demo. About 5 minutes in, shit kicked off! Anarchists attacked police with rocks, bricks, flags, and fireworks.

Stop Deportations

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Apr 172018

From subMedia

After the federal court refused to stop Lucy’s deportation on Thursday evening and in the face of continued silence from the Minister of Immigration Ahmed Hussen, one last effort was made to stop the deportation. Around 50 people arrived at the Laval Immigration Detention Centre shortly after 3am on Friday morning. Armed with banners, balloons, flowers, music, and love, they chained the gates and barred the exits, hoping to prevent Lucy’s deportation until Lucy’s immigration application was decided.

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Original anonymous communiqué by the Henri Paul* Anti-Monarchy Brigade, shared with subMedia:

Original anonymous communiqué by the Henri Paul Anti-Monarchy Brigade, shared with subMedia:*