DEM VOLKE DIENEN
Europa
- Details
- Category: Europa
Traditionally, Berlin is one of the greatest trouble spots and social tinder boxes in the FRG. And that for a reason: In the capital the contradictions between the poor and the rich, east and west, gentrified and decayed, Immigrants and Germans are visible on a partiality extreme scale. In combination with the combative history of the 80s and 90s principally an ideal hotbed for progressive, consequent class conscious politics with an unappeasing stand towards the bourgeois state should be visible at the 1st of May. Nevertheless the struggles are declining, the police is able to gain more ground and the political character of the demonstrations is vanishing because there is no force determined enough to lead the struggle of the enormous amount of malcontents. The same thing happened this year. Despite the still respectable number of 18.000 participants at the revolutionary 1st of May rally, the reaction is celebrating the „most peaceful 1st of May since 1987“, the chief of police is backslapping himself for the great success of his concept. But it is still there, the will to fight, as in example shown in the Liveticker of the Tagesspiegel:
„21:00 – The atmosphere becomes more aggressive: The rally arrived at Lausitzer Platz. The police is taking offenders captive from within the mass of autonomous‘ and is meanwhile attacked by sympathisers. Firecrackers are thrown. The police must massively shield their arrests to force their way through the protesters.
21.17 – Stones and bottles are thrown against police vans: At the crossing Skalizter Straße / Zeughofstraße personnel carriers of the police are attacked with stones, bottles and firecrackers. Sporadic stones are thrown at police groups. The police is defending itself with pepper spray and irritant gas.“
/p>
But that is it. No mass militancy, no agitation, no politics. The lack of organisation and structure is so immanent, the absence of political content so pressing, that even the commentators at Indymedia agree, that the current situation is disastrous:
„The first of may [in regards to Berlin] is not what it used to be. It has nothing in common with political struggle. You can’t achieve anything on this day. The day is rotten. […]
The riot – character of the 80s that partially lasted until the 2000s is out of reach. Every act of violence from the rally is nearly meaningless. What it still means though is: riot tourism and desperation“
„The problem is the missing of a conclusive concept. And a concept that the people, as well as the political scene, are interested in and which enthuses them. People can talk as many empty words as they want and plan utopic campaigns, demonstrations and open spaces – if there is no one providing the structure or is organizing one, then doing the work and implementing new concepts everything is in vane!!“
„the rally is simply degenerated to an identification event, a tourist attraction and that is also what it is perceived like from the outside. Maybe it is still a little more political than the Mayfest but it is en route to it. There is nothing that seriously questions or attacks the system. The demonstration is basically a part of the system, the critique on capitalism as a product of capitalism.“
In contrast to that, the DGB demonstration is characterized by bourgeois pacifism. Never the less: With the anticapitalist block, the strong presence of antiimperialist forces that this year tried to form an antiimperialist block and an internationalist character the political struggle, agitation and propaganda take place, are the forces politically struggling with one another and are not just celebrating an empty ritual (at least the progressive ones).
- Details
- Category: Europa
In Schwenningen 80 people participated in the combative 1st of May rally. In difference to the last years, the DGB had only organized a celebration, so that the „initiative for a combative 1st of May Villingen-Schwenningen“ organized it’s own rally. The participants torched Pyrotechnics and marched without incidents from the starting point at the train station to the DGB celebration.
In Bremen approximately 100 people attended the social revolutionary walk through the city. The unannounced action, at which slogans where loudly chanted, was organized by „self organized, extra parliamentary political associations, that regard to themselves as part of the libertarian, anticapitalist and emancipatory spectrum and that strive towards a self organized and solidary social order“. The cops, which weren’t there at the beginning, later accompanied the demonstration with multiple police vans, but stayed passive.
In Oldenburg this years autonomous 1st of May rally marked the 20th anniversary of the autonomous May activities in Oldenburg. Under the slogan “Which side are you on“ the rally demanded a clear positioning in the matter of burning questions of the movement, like the situation in Rojava. For a some time nearly all of the 400 participants held up signs with the flag of the PKK.
- Details
- Category: Europa
Revolutionary 1st of May demonstrations, be it Hamburg, Berlin or other cities are common practice since years. In Cologne, the forth biggest city in the country, however, they where in existent. A good reason, comrades thought, to introduce this tradition to Cologne and called for the first revolutionary demonstration the evening before the 1st of May. With great success: Even though the participation didn’t exceeded a hundred demonstrators, which is far beyond the participation in other cities, a successfully combative demonstration could be held and the foundation for further revolutionary 1st of May demonstrations could be laid. Not only the demonstration moved very loudly and agitating through the workers- and immigrant quarters of Mülheim, but it also succeeded in fighting back police attacks after the official end of the demonstration. According to Express informations „ … the previously peacefully May demonstration turned violent after unknown individuals torched pyrotechnics. Thereupon the police intervened. Repeatedly it came to scuffles.“ Nonetheless clips of the assault show clearly, that the police also tried to enter the facilities of a multicultural club close by.
In Cologne a noticeable increase in the mobilisation for Kögida [Colone against the islamisation of the occident], Hogesa [Hooligans against Salafists] and against the slaughtering of refugees in the Mediterranean could be experienced in this year. In correlation to the experience, the 1st of May demonstration met great appreciation of the people in the streets. The report of Rote Aktion, part of the organizing antifascist-antimilitarist-anticapitalist coordination, states in regards to this matter: „The reactions of the people that where watching from the side walks showed us that we stroke a cord; that we are not the only ones that have had enough, that we are not the only ones that know that there has to be something else in this world than bowing, begging and embittering.“
Apart from those activities at the evening before the 1st of May there were also some activities on mayday itself. First activists of different progressive German and Turkish organisations participated in the internationalist block at the DGB demonstration, which they called for with stickers and posters. Later antifascists blocked the entrances to Colognes central train station, the station platforms at Mülheim train station and the rails to prevent fascists to travel to their demonstration. At Breslauer Platz it came to scuffles with the police.
- Details
- Category: Europa
Then police rushed in with everything they had, and that´s a lot
From the revolutionary standpoint the 1st of May 2015 in Hamburg was a political victory. It is everyday life for the struggling proletariat to confront with the bourgeoisie, its state and institutions as well as with revisionism. If it suffers temporary defeats because its forces are weaker then the enemies that just shows the necessity of the development of its forces. That the demonstration at Feldstraße was crushed does not mean that the struggle was not successful.On the contrary. The resume from 2014 “We fought together. Very different Types of people. Neighbours together with Punks, Communists together with Anarchists, workers together with students, all together against their oppressors“, the statement “The world of blatant poverty rises against the world of monstrous wealth … They have got a better world in their heads and fierce hatred in their hearts” was proven correct and the demand “Do not let the bloodsuckers have their save heaven” (from the Call of the League against imperialist Agression) was fulfilled.
- Details
- Category: Europa
In this article we document the English translation on different activity reports regarding the 1st of May. Each entry can also be found separately below.
On internationalist revolutionary 1st of May in Hamburg
Then police rushed in with everything they had, and that´s a lot
