Category: Actions

Kingston Pride and Solidarity with Queers Against Police

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This year at Kingston Pride, a small group of people gathered with signs that read “STONEWALL WAS A RIOT” and “NO PRIDE IN IMPERIALISM, NO PRIDE IN POLICE,” a black flag and flyers. We weaved through the parade, handing out flyers about why the military and cops weren’t welcome at Pride and expressing solidarity with racialized people, indigenous folks, migrants and poor folks who – like LGBTQ+ folks – experience brutal violence at the hands of Canada’s police and military on this territory and abroad. Read More …

Hamilton Pride 2019 Reportback

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Submitted anonymously to North Shore June 15, 2019: By 2pm the group of bible-thumping homophobes and white nationalists who had crashed pride were escorted out of the park by an ensemble of late-to-the-party cops and a boisterous crowd of jeering queers. Their visit to Hamilton Pride 2019 lasted just under an hour, and was filled with some of the most confrontational behavior we’ve seen from these people yet. By the Read More …

The Raptors Riot That Wasn’t: Notes on a near-miss

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I like riots, they’re pretty much my favourite thing. My very favourite is riots whose common feeling is rooted in overcoming an injustice, something with a bit of content. But even stupid riots are fun, and I find them worthwhile, even if they don’t have more content than playing basketball with your friends in the park.

I was hoping for a stupid riot when the Raptors won the NBA final. Yes, it’s Toronto, an incredibly dull and pacified place, but still. So on game 6 of the series, a crew of friends and I came in from out of town. With the exception of one pal who has been a Raptors fan for years and was excitedly following the score on her phone, the rest of us don’t pay any attention and didn’t mind not seeing even a single play of the final game. With our knock-off Giant Tiger Raptors gear and multiple layers of clothes, we spent the last minutes of the game eavesdropping on police radio conversations and watching the public order cops deploy to try to figure out what might happen next. Read More …

Hamilton Police PR Stunt met with Counter-Demo

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Police are doing “Coffee With a Cop” events across the region, including in Chatham-Kent on May 22 or Windsor on May 30. They’ve been happening in Toronto and Niagara too. Holding a “Coffee Without Cops” event outside is an easy way to spoil their party and make space to critique the role police play in society as well as specific abuses.

Perhaps the easiest question ever asked: “Would you like your coffee with or without cops?” “Coffee with a Cop,” a public relations event by Hamilton Police, found itself competing for attention with “Coffee without Cops.” Read More …

RCMP Vehicles Destroyed in Hamilton

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Since 1873, the Canadian government has been using the RCMP and all police services at their disposal to forcefully invade indigenous territory, helping to steal their land for resources and aid in their assimilation.

Out west on Wet’suwet’en territory in Northern BC the RCMP continue to harass individuals travelling to and from their homes, seizing cars and leaving youth and mothers stranded in the wilderness. In addition, police continue to keep the Wet’suwet’en from freely accessing hunting and fishing grounds and – as the spring thaw continues – areas where they would gather berries and medicines for sickness and ceremony. All this on behalf and in favour of TransCanada/TC Energy. Read More …

Reflections on Toronto May Day 2019

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May Day in Toronto this year was marked by a couple of rallies, plenty of rain, and one bloody guillotine. It was my first May Day in Toronto, and I wasn’t really sure what to expect, but was excited for the opportunity to be explicitly and confrontationally anti-capitalist in the streets. May Day to me is about celebrating labour victories of years past and fighting for a world free from all forms of oppression. I’d heard that the main feature of Toronto May Day is the evening march, organized by a coalition of organizations, and that most people came with their union or political group. Read More …

Toronto: Anti-PEGIDA after-action report

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From the Toronto IWW General Defence Committee Local 28 On Saturday May 4th, 2019, PEGIDA Canada (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West) – the anti-Muslim, anti-immigration, white nationalists, along with their collaborators – assembled for a rally and a march outside Staples’s University and Armoury location just steps away from City Hall with alarming numbers yet again. The fact they did this on Star Wars day out of Read More …

Hamilton May Day: Causing some shit and wearing our politics proudly

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Anti-Authoritarian & Anti-Capitalist Mayday 2019 Reportback

Anyone who lives in Hamilton knows that JSquare is truly a temple of precarious jobs. Maybe you’ve put in your hours sweeping yellow skittles off the theatre floor or selling cigar boxes at one of the telemarketing firms; maybe you have a friend who pushed data plans at one of the cell booths or slung Mooseheads at the Honest Lawyer. Whatever your experience of Jackson Square, you can perhaps imagine how satisfying it might be to march with a crew of 40 radicals through the mall, spreading May Day cheer and working class solidarity to all those stuck working on this International Worker’s Day.

This year’s May Day began two months prior with an attempt at coalition organizing. It was a real possibility, but for the presence of a small yet committed group of authoritarian communists (working under different banners of the Revolutionary Communist Party) whose behavior during the meetings rendered the word “solidarity” meaningless. Thus proving once again that there can be no solidarity with those who seek power over us, those who worship the murderous dictators of history, those who follow party lines instead of their own ethics. And so anarchists went our own way, calling for an anti-authoritarian & anti-capitalist march on our own terms. Read More …