From AGI.it:
Around 30 members of Naples' "Occupy" and "zero81" movements shocked a branch of Bnl bank with a "naked" flash mob. After hanging banners with their slogan "Occupy banks", the protesters began to undress before the incredulous bank employees and clients till both male and female protesters stood in their underwear, some wearing the Anonymous mask, then wrapped themselves in a banner which stated "the rich should be the ones who pay". . .
photo from Zero81
Saturday, June 30, 2012
"Occupy bank" flash mob in Naples, protesters in underwear
How Media Makes Reality Relative
Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegory_of_the_Cave
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69F7GhASOdM
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiral_of_silence
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJ7lAy7RCNg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fahrenheit_451
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nineteen_Eighty-Four
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Orwell
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Bradbury
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noam_Chomsky
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Vonnegut
Amy J - 'Double Think'
Doublethink means, according to George Orwell's dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four:
... the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them. ... To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, when it becomes necessary again, to draw it back from oblivion for just so long as it is needed, to deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality which one denies—all this is indispensably necessary. Even in using the word doublethink it is necessary to exercise doublethink. For by using the word one admits that one is tampering with reality; by a fresh act of doublethink one erases this knowledge; and so on indefinitely, with the lie always one leap ahead of the truth.
As Orwell explains in the book, the Party could not protect its iron grip on power without degrading its people and exposing them to constant propaganda. Yet knowledge of this brutality and deception, even within the Party itself could lead to disgusted collapse of the state from within, as the Soviet Union later fell in the late 20th century. For this reason, Orwell's idealized government used a complex system of "reality control". Though the novel is most famous for its pervasive surveillance of daily life, reality control meant that the population could be controlled and manipulated merely through the alteration of everyday language and thought. Newspeak was the method for controlling thought through language; Doublethink was the method of controlling thought directly.
Doublethink was a form of trained, willful blindness to contradictions in a system of beliefs. In the case of Winston Smith, Orwell's protagonist, it meant being able to work at the Ministry of Truth deleting uncomfortable facts from public records, and then believing in the new history which he himself had written.
Through doublethink, the Party was able to not only bomb its own people and tell its citizens that the bombs were sent by the enemy, but all Party members—even the ones that launched the rockets themselves—were able to believe that the bombs were launched from outside.
Additionally, Doublethink's self-deception allowed the Party to maintain both huge goals and realistic expectations: "If one is to rule, and to continue ruling, one must be able to dislocate the sense of reality. For the secret of rulership is to combine a belief in one's own infallibility with the power to learn from past mistakes". Thus, each party member could be a credulous pawn, but would never lack relevant information. The party is both fanatical and well-informed, and thus unlikely either to "ossify" or "grow soft" and collapse. "Killing the messenger" disturbed the command-and-control of the Nazi (and later the Iraqi) militaries, but would not present itself in such a system. Doublethink thus functioned as key tool of self-discipline of the Party, to complement the state-imposed discipline of propaganda and a police state. Together, these tools hid the government's evil not only from the people, but also from the government itself, but without the confusion and misinformation associated with more primitive totalitarian regimes.
Occupy DC revived
Occupy DC was one of the longest standing branches of the Occupy Wall Street movement in America until The National Park Service police bulldozed the headquarters back in early February. But now a resurgence of occupiers has begun. Tents are back in McPherson Square in the nation's capital. So is Occupy DC here to stay? RT's Abby Martin has more.
Yemenis vow to continue protests until fulfillment of revolution goals
Thousands of Yemeni protesters took to the streets in the capital Sana'a, stressing that they continue to protest until all revolution's demands are met.
Vode's electoral Speech. Presented at Ordo Ab Chao @ Camp - Back to Athens . 2012
Vode's electoral Speech. Presented at Ordo Ab Chao @ Camp - Back to Athens . 2012 from theopsy on Vimeo. VODE CAMPAIGN: Speech performed by Theopsy at Ordeabchao, curated by Myrto Boudouris
CAMP FESTIVAL "Back to Athens" , MAI 2012
Video: Zan Tot
more @ boom-wow.tumblr.com
VODE is a virtual political campaign launched by artist Theopsy in April - May 2012 during the national election in Greece.
Take the future into your own hands - AP2P interview
An interview with M1 from Dead Prez and Bonnot who are part of AP2P - all power to the people. This interview was filmed in Exarchia, Athens - Greece. They talk about global movements as well as what is happening in Greece, and the need for revolutionary struggle. This film also explores the importance of neighbourhoods which serve as a bastian of resistance, like the anarcho bohemian neighbourhood of Exarchia in Athens.
In Tokyo, Thousands Protest the Restarting of a Nuclear Power Plant
Shouting antinuclear slogans and beating drums, tens of thousands of demonstrators gathered in front of the Japanese prime minister’s residence on Friday in the largest display yet of public anger at the government’s decision to restart a nuclear power plant.
Impressions of the massive demonstration against the restart of nuclear power plants that took place in front of the official residence of Japan's Prime Minister on June 29, 2012. See photos at https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.336917429719983.78032.115812641830464
Every Friday, demonstrators protest in front of the official residence of Japan's Prime Minister against the restart of nuclear power plants. Most news programs have ignored them, but last Friday, Asahi reported on that day's protest. And the next day, several newspapers did as well.
Possibly because of the exposure, as well as the government's decision to restart two nuclear reactors in West Japan on July 1, today's protest was massive.
The organizers claim that at least 160,000 people attended, a figure that can not easily be checked. The police put the number at 17,000. Local media estimated the crowd at between 20,000 and 45,000.
At first, the police tried to keep the road open for traffic. This always makes the crowd look much smaller than it really is. But today, the crowds surged forward, albeit in a well-mannered way, and totally overpowered the police, who reluctantly gave up the road to the huge crowd of protesters.
They shouted "Saikadou Hantai! Saikadou Hanzai!" "We are Against Restarting the Nuclear Power Plants. Restarting the Nuclear Power Plants is a Crime."
As Assange awaits asylum answer, US demands separate extradition from Sweden
While the exact future of Julian Assange remains unknown to just about everyone — including Swedish prosecutors demanding his extradition, American investigators asking questions about his role with WikiLeaks, his family in Australia and the government of Ecuador where he is seeking asylum — America is already asking for Sweden to send over someone else for them to scold. David Hemler, the 49-year-old US Air Force vet who went AWOL nearly 30 years ago, might soon be sent from Sweden to the States.
Helmer made headlines earlier this month when the servicemen long-assumed dead by his biological family came clean with his whereabouts — disillusioned by America’s foreign policies, he fled the Air Force in 1984 at the age of 21 and hitchhiked to Sweden, where he has since lived comfortably under an assumed identity and has fathered three children.
Robert Mundell, evil genius of the euro
"It's very hard to fire workers in Europe," he complained. His answer: the euro.
The euro would really do its work when crises hit, Mundell explained. Removing a government's control over currency would prevent nasty little elected officials from using Keynesian monetary and fiscal juice to pull a nation out of recession.
"It puts monetary policy out of the reach of politicians," he said. "[And] without fiscal policy, the only way nations can keep jobs is by the competitive reduction of rules on business."
He cited labor laws, environmental regulations and, of course, taxes. All would be flushed away by the euro. Democracy would not be allowed to interfere with the marketplace – or the plumbing.
Top CIA Spy Accused of Being a Mafia Hitman
From Wired:
Enrique “Ricky” Prado’s resume reads like the ultimate CIA officer: veteran of the Central American wars, running the CIA’s operations in Korea, a top spy in America’s espionage programs against China, and deputy to counter-terrorist chief Cofer Black — and then a stint at Blackwater. But he’s also alleged to have started out a career as a hitman for a notorious Miami mobster, and kept working for the mob even after joining the CIA. Finally, he went on to serve as the head of the CIA’s secret assassination squad against Al-Qaida.
That’s according to journalist Evan Wright’s blockbuster story How to Get Away With Murder in America, distributed by Byliner. In it, Wright — who authored Generation Kill, the seminal story of the Iraq invasion — compiles lengthy, years-long investigations by state and federal police into a sector of Miami’s criminal underworld that ended nowhere, were sidelined by higher-ups, or cut short by light sentences. It tracks the history of Prado’s alleged Miami patron and notorious cocaine trafficker, Alberto San Pedro, and suspicions that Prado moved a secret death squad from the CIA to Blackwater.
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