The poet Brendan Behan was born at 14 Holles Street in the heart of Dublin. He was brought into the rot of the inner city tenements. A house painter by trade and a communist by conviction, his politics were a material necessity. He famously quipped, "I'm a Communist by day and a Catholic as soon as it gets dark."
At sixteen, Liverpool had swallowed him. Arrested with explosives in 1939, he was held in Walton Jail before being sent to Hollesley Bay Borstal. This was his first lesson in the spatial politics of empire. The cell was the state’s attempt to map his defiance and cage his movement. Later, in London, he took his brush to King Street and painted the Communist Party of Great Britain's headquarters for free. He literally coated the walls of the movement in lead and oil. He understood that the brush was a tool of reclamation.
The material toll broke him early. He died at forty-one, collapsing in a Dublin street, his body used up by the tenements, the cages of the ruling class, and the slow suicide of the bottle. He did not just want a change of flag. He wanted the concrete to crack and the grass to grow for everyone. He wanted a world where no one needed a permit to exist. His life was a loud, brilliant refusal to be managed by the state.
#BrendanBehan #MarxistTheory #SpatialPolitics #ClassWar #WorkingClassHistory
The British government should condemn the forced removal and attack for the aggression that it is and call for an immediate cessation of military action by the US, and the return of Maduro to his country.
We call for full solidarity with the Venezuelan people and the return of their govt.
Comrades, campaigners and representatives of socialist countries celebrated another year of tireless work @socialist_china 3rd annual Xmas social in London strengthening links, knowledge and solidarity with PRC 🇨🇳
@CPBritain@yclbritain
No War on China!
#TheEastStaysRed!
The 12-point Freedom Charter for #Iran
Two years on from its launch, the Charter remains the authoritative articulation of the core demands of the ever-growing opposition to the Islamic Republic dictatorship inside Iran...
@CODIRInfo
For the full article, see the reply below👇
Wow just wow Candance Owens literally making Piers Morgan speechless. She clearly explains how BB Netanyahu is a war criminal, how he knew the Oct 7 and wanted it to happen to exploit and commit a genocide
🚨 Emergency day of action - 7 December🚨
Following the rapid escalation in Ukraine, CND and @STWuk are organising an emergency day of action, calling on political leaders to pull back from the nuclear brink. #PeaceTalksNow
Get involved: https://t.co/nfYgpY4dHJ
Peace needs to be a strategic priority!
STEVE BISHOP argues that the US failure to restrain Israel is pushing the region towards wider war, with an attack on Iran likely to be disastrous…
https://t.co/9drmJX8WAO
#Iran#Lebanon#Palestine@CODIRInfo@CPBritain@M_Star_Online
📢 Upcoming National Marches for Palestine 📢
Join us at the next two national marches on 21 September in Liverpool and 5 October in London. We must keep the pressure up until the genocide is ended and Palestine is free.
📹 “We're not going to accept the division between working class people and pensioners.
They’re one and the same.
So, transport workers or nurses or care workers getting a pay rise does not mean that the heating has got to be switched off for pensioners.”
@RMTunion Mick Lynch
"We don't just want the cake, we want the whole goddamn bakery."
@RMTunion President @alexgordon4me at #TUC24 calling for the renationalisation of all public transport.
The British government has no business keeping a war going which has cost hundreds of thousands of lives.
Arms to Ukraine must end and the govt call instead for a ceasefire and peace negotiations as a matter of urgency.
https://t.co/mKSYWiMrFw
Some photos from today's 125,000-strong 19th national march in London since the start of Israel’s genocide in Gaza.
#WeWillMarch#StopArmingIsrael
Credit: Steve Eason
Structural racism in the UK jobs market is driven by insecure work.
But the article is silent on the ubiquitous #Outsourcing of Cleaning, Catering, Maintenance jobs, which institutionalises super-exploitation.
Fight structural racism #EndOutsourcing
https://t.co/dPm3DRRxAk