One night in Sofia, Bulgaria, a gang emerges from a train station singing, blood pumping with youth, energy and alcohol. Vulnerable and easy, two Roma men are in their line of vision… and boots… and fists… The mindless assault is interrupted by a man who couldn’t endure the scene. The Roma haul themselves away while the group turns their blood-rush attentions to him and bear down. Slipping, fearing and blacking out under their number this man and his knife swing defensive. Later, one man dies and oblivious to what went wrong, another gives himself to police. Jock Palfreeman has been in prison in Bulgaria since December 2007. He is an Australian man who lived in the Bulgarian countryside for a while. While back in the country on holiday to visit friends he intervened in a racist attack and was forced to defend himself against a gang of 16 young fascists. One man, Andrei Monov, died and another, Antoan Zahariev, was injured....

Earlier this year federal Resources Minister Martin Ferguson introduced legislation to target Muckaty (120km north of Tennant Creek in the NT) for a federal radioactive waste dump site. This comes after years of uncertainty and divide and rule tactics imposed on Aboriginal communities by the racist policies of both the Rudd (now Gillard) and former Howard governments. There is strong opposition to the dump from Ngapa and other Traditional Owners, whose land, culture, and sacred sites are threatened by this toxic legacy of a technology long-since proven dangerous and inadequate. To see the full video 'Muckaty Voices' check out: beyondnuclearinitiative.wordpress.com/video Some quotes from Muckaty Traditional Owners featured in the film are below... Marlene Bennett Nungarrayi: Once they put that thing there in the ground and they bury that, it stays there for hundreds, possibly thousands of years.  It get into the water systems, it starts poisoning country.  And that’s breaking down land, law, culture, your spirit, your songs, your dreaming.   It’d be wiped out.  It’d be...

“The nonprofit system has tamed a generation of activists. They’ve traded in grand visions of social change for salaries and stationery; given up recruiting people to the cause in favor of writing grant proposals and wooing foundations; and ceded control of their movements to business executives in boardrooms.” The Revolution Will Not Be Funded is a collection of cutting essays published by INCITE! about the Non-Profit Industrial Complex. It outlines some of the ways in which governments and foundations co-opt and compromise groups working for social change. The essays are solidly based in grassroots experience and provide examples from ongoing struggles  to end violence against women, Latin American solidarity, Palestinian liberation and US indigenous peoples' struggles, which brings a much needed tangible and emotional aspect to the intellectual and political arguments presented. Other themes deal with the 'professionalisation of activism', solidarity and the states' role in violence and oppression. Refreshingly, the views presented do not have a 'more radical than thou' tone,...

Looking after your wellbeing, asking for your friends support, and being a helpful support person - This article talks about  some of the manifestations of anxiety, depression and burnout and could be triggering. It might be a good idea to read it with support and friends and comfy pillows around- So our WASEN (and extended) crew included a bunch of maggotheads that had been working and sometimes living pretty closely with each other. Perhaps we had pushed ourselves and our relationships too far; certainly burnout was an issue for most of us and at times communication was frustrated and underused. We needed a weekend away together in the bush to hang out, cook, play, breathe and do some workshops that would help us understand where we are at and how we can support each other. The Totally Rad Skillshare was conceived and this workshop based on self-reflection and sharing was created. - This article has been structured so you can go through it...

Jeanette De Foe My family has always eaten tofu. So many delicious varieties of tofu prepared in so many different ways! But I never ate it as a kid, rejecting it as something foreign and strange that would make me foreign and strange if I were to eat it. Do you know when I really started enjoying it? When I became a vegetarian activist and saw that White people could like it too, and it didn't make them any less White. I've spent all my life trying to assimilate. What choice did I have? I was that silent Asian kid with a constant runny nose, who couldn't run or catch a ball, who was the smallest kid in class. I got teased for “speaking funny” so I changed the way I spoke, artificially sounding as “Austrayan” as possible. I rejected so many things of where I was from – religion, language, the values of my family, and perhaps most tragically of all,...