Here is November 7th's update! TLDR? Here's the summary.
Here is November 8th's update! TLDR? Here's the summary.
I strategically retreated from doing an update on Wednesday (and I always perform tactical update withdrawals on Thursdays and Sundays) so this next one covers a bit from those two days.
Here is November 11th's update! TLDR? Here's the summary.
Links and Stuff
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists, for the “buh Zeleski is a jew?!?!” people.
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Add to the above list if you can, thank you.
Resources For Understanding The War Beyond The Bulletins
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map, who is an independent youtuber with a mostly neutral viewpoint.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have good analysis (though also a couple bad takes here and there)
Understanding War and the Saker: neo-conservative sources but their reporting of the war (so far) seems to line up with reality better than most liberal sources.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict and, unlike most western analysts, has some degree of understanding on how war works. He is a reactionary, however.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent journalist reporting in the Ukrainian warzones.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Telegram Channels
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
Pro-Russian
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ Gleb Bazov, banned from Twitter, referenced pretty heavily in what remains of pro-Russian Twitter.
https://t.me/asbmil ~ ASB Military News, banned from Twitter.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday Patrick Lancaster - crowd-funded U.S journalist, mostly pro-Russian, works on the ground near warzones to report news and talk to locals.
https://t.me/riafan_everywhere ~ Think it's a government news org or Federal News Agency? Russian language.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ Front news coverage. Russian langauge.
https://t.me/rybar ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine
With the entire western media sphere being overwhelming pro-Ukraine already, you shouldn't really need more, but:
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
Last week's discussion post.
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God fucking dammit why are our unions so fucking shit? They get our hopes up with rumblings of a general strike, and then the next day they roll over when the government "super pinky promises we swear" to repeal bill 28. I'll believe it when I see it, and I have no doubt things are only going to get worse for unions from here on out
deleted by creator
I dont see how youre getting out of conservatives when the no other major party is even trying to promise things. Like turnouts gonna continue dropping and the cons are gonna keep winning by default, no matter how unpopular ford is
deleted by creator
Are there any unions that aren't pro-corporate? One of the takeaways I've had from the last year is that unions around the world are libshit and their leaders best buddies with the CEOs that they're meant to be fighting against. I'm not even hoping for outright militancy at this point, just one that doesn't fuck over its workers after a lukewarm complaint about the cost of living and how wages aren't keeping up with inflation.
deleted by creator
:hex-moon: :stalin-gun-2: :stalin-gun-1: [idk what the always has been one is lol]
unions in and of themselves have class interests and trade union opposition has historically been one of the most important tasks of the communist parties to develop the class struggle as without overt communist influence unions will always protect the status quo in the last instance.
:astronaut-2::astronaut-1:
ive just been reading an excellent book called how labour built neoliberalism, focusing on the australian experience in the 80s where the trade unions (that had been buoyed in effective power through the 60s-70s by rank-and-file militancy) and the australian labor party (lol) came together to develop the "accords" where the unions agreed to take care of their unruly members and stop all this disruptive strike nonsense in return for promises about wages and other social benefits from the labor party, that shocked pikachu were almost immediately broken
the author frames it with reference to gramsci in terms of both corporatism of civil society groups that are formalised and bureaucratised and brought inside the tent to work inside the system as part of the "normal" functioning of state, and then enwrapment of those groups by the state itself to function towards its aims. in this case the ideological framework was the selling of a "national interest" of stimulating the economy and on a lower level of a shared interest between workers and management of having a thriving company that can afford plenty of staff and to globally compete etc, and to sacrifice for the greater good, in a broader effort to re-stimulate capital accumulation that had stagnated after the long post-war boom. the labor party looked like the party that could control militant labour in a way that the conservatives couldnt, and the union bureaucracies got to have themselves a place at the big boys table inside the tent, and be the important ones making the decisions for the unions and negotiating with the bosses and the politicians rather than those unwashed rank-and-file masses who didnt know whats best for them, and who got in the way of the smooth functioning of the unions core business of smoothly perpetuating its bureaucracy. edit to note that it was and still is a very well-worn career trajectory for union officials to then "progress" their career into the higher echelons of labor party politics, and the prime minister who initially put these reforms into place had previously been the "firebrand" head of the peak union coalition body, the australian council of trade unions (actu) - so obviously it is very much in their personal interests to keep the labor party onside in their union activities and be a good "team player". and of course all this gave them a framework and incentive to smash any of those unruly militant unions or branches that didnt get the memo, which they did with gusto
but of course the underlying contradiction was that the unions got that level of power to get themselves a seat at the table precisely because of the militancy, and as the rank-and-file were increasingly shut out their active involvement seemed increasingly irrelevant and membership plummeted to the point where the union bureaucrats no longer have the power base to even be listened to seriously, and most of the australian unions now mostly sell themselves as these sad clubs that can get you cheap movie tickets or discounts on car repayments etc. bargaining is at an enterprise level where broader worker power cant be leveraged effectively, and the industrial relations framework to even be able to call a strike etc is ludicrously restrictive, and the labor party is crowing about its greatest achievement of making the unions into compliant lapdogs.
going through all this personally as well at the moment, and while we have a quite militant rank-and-file at my workplace we can feel the union bureaucracy slowly but surely backpedalling away from us and trying to use their clout to make sure we settle for pathetic scraps and dont keep striking so the boat isnt rocked too much.
i dont know the answer but my feeling is that its to rebuild rank-and-file militancy within the existing union framework (as well as just the idea of unions being a relevant part of society, which has very much been lost), and just drag the bureaucracies along behind until they break, and re-form proper unions when it's clear to the membership the existing unions no longer serve the purpose of members. the success of raffwu forming as a more militant alternative for retail workers in the space occupied by the truly dire sda is i think a salutory indication of how to do things, although im sure the pathways are unique in each different country
guess the union was bought out