We are the ones we have been waiting for.

I spent the last weekend in Dripping Springs Texas at the 9th Radical Encuentro Camp (REC). This year Rainforest Action Network cosponsored it with some amazing anti-authoritarian Texans and community groups. It was a meeting of about 200 activists around the state to share skills and ideas. The theme this year was “climate justice.” We saw panels of amazing women fighting coal companies from native reservations in the Four Corners, to mountain families in Kentucky. Workshops were led by community groups resisting environmental racism, by spiritual leaders about staying spiritually grounded in the struggle, about skills such as media and legal defense, presentations by Rising Tide (radical roadshow on tour educating about climate change), and lots of other fun stuff.

The location was a ranchy type place near Jacob’s Well, one of the deepest underwater caves known - no one has found the end!

The trainings, workshops, and panels were accompanied by a three act Emma Goldman play, and the Afro-Cuban hip hop group Krudas.

see some videos of Krudas here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snk9KYKEwqQ
and
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31P6ie047b4
or
http://www.myspace.com/3krudas

I met lots of amazing and inspiring folks, and learned a whole lot about the logistical considerations in putting together an Action Camp. As SDS gears up to do our Action Camps this summer, we sure will need a whole lot of people workin. Events like this seem to be the focal point of the development of vision, strategy, and skillsharing on regional or statewide levels. Once SDS develops a template for Action Campin’ we really should have them as regularly as we have capacity for.

After a weekend of learning about climate change and coal, folks did an action against the coal plants and TXU.

It reaffirms my thinking that the organized, radical Left really really really needs to seriously take on the implications of Climate Change as a major issue. The rest of the country is getting organized around it, and most of us are dragging our feet. In a few days I’ll post up a proposal for more cooperation between the antiwar and climate change movements, the uniting piece of the puzzle being oil…

On Thursday at noon Neena Pathak and I gave a workshop / presentation at Brandeis University in Waltham.

The title was “Zapatismo and the Anatomy of Solidarity”

And the stated description was:
Ever wanted to do activism abroad? Fascinated by transnational social movements? Thought about power and privilege and how that plays into folks from the Global North doing work in the Global South? How do we navigate our privilege and travel in an ethical and reciprocal way? What is Zapatismo? Come join Neena Pathak ( ‘08 ) and Josh Russell ( ‘06 ) in a participatory workshop about the challenges and complications with doing “solidarity work” abroad, that draws on these two Jane’s and Karpf Grant awardees’ experiences with the Zapatistas and other indigenous rights groups in Chiapas, Mexico. We will use Theater of the Oppressed tools and other games, so come ready to move around!

(Neena!)

About 20 students showed up. The games and involvement were interesting and I was really impressed with the depth to which folks wanted to engage these issues. Given the way Zapatismo and that movement is romanticized and idealized by people up North, people had a really grounded and serious approach. The issue of folks who have the privilege to travel abroad often go with the pretense of activism and “helping,” cuts through so many lines and legacies of imperialism, colonialism, racism, etc etc. Its only going to increase as neoliberal globalization pushes forward; more universities are going to find ways to give students grants, stipends, and fellowships to go abroad in the Global South, and unless we develop models to make that process look a lot more like solidarity and a lot less like charity, students will probably keep perpetuating the process of unconsciously taking a lot more than they give.

(me!)

A lot of what we talked about were our own struggles in confronting these issues within ourselves; we certainly had our share of hypocrisy and embodying our own critique. A lot of these issues seem to be simply irreconcilable to some degree. We drafted a pseudo-coherent document of what we learned in our research called “The Anatomy of Solidarity” that shares some ideas, but not answers. I wish we were on top of our shit enough to have answers! (I don’t actually think there are hard and quick “answers” to these things). It may get published as a workshop manual later in the Summer.

For folks interested in this kinda stuff, my friend Bruin is putting together an anthology that deals with the contradictions and problems with being someone from the North going to the South. It’s called Less Than Settled, and feel free to email me if you’d like to contribute a chapter.

p.s. - a great scam: Dominoes Pizza has this giveaway where if you are a reporter they will deliver free pizzas. As long as the place you need them delivered is not a residence (i.e. an office or a school) you can just call up and say you are a reporter from anywhere and get free pizzas. We scored 4 free larges with toppings! Hott.