[IMC-UK-Features] feature proposal: Go Indymedia, go! - Response to the SHIfT article

[Shiar]

On Wed, May 21, 2008 2:01 pm, guidoreports at riseup.net wrote:
> 1) After reading this proposal I went to meet 8 friends in the pub. All of
> them are involved (politically speaking) and NONE of them have ever heard
> of SHIFT magazine. I had never heard of it before this bullshit article
> was spotted. Why give them the attention?

Well, apparently other activists have heard of it. See, it's based in
Manchester and Londoners may well never hear of it!

> How do we know that Greenstein
> was not behind it and this is just an attempt to goad us? Something that
> we will fall for, hook line and sinker, by giving this a centre column
> feature. We don't even know who published Atzmon's stuff on the site to
> begin with. Could it be that we are being manipulated here?

I don't think Greenstein had anything to do with this and i don't think
we're so stupid to be manipulated in the way Guido's suggesting.

> 2) This is NOT grassroots news from the movement. Are our egos so
> important that we have to put up such a high profile response to a
> publication that noone has ever heard of?

What egos?! The Indymedia ego perhaps? So an attack on 'our' project
(which's incidently activisty and grassroots) is not news?!

> Will we do the same every time that someone has a go at IMC UK?

If it was the Daily Mail and the like, of course i wouldn't have bothered.
But when such shit comes from alleged activists in an alleged radical
alternative magazine, then the damage could be much greater if we don't
confront it.

> 3) Collective response???? This is the first that I have heard of it!

It is very typical that *one person* drafts a feature and signs it as
imc-uk-features. When the proposed feature gets consensus on list, it de
facto becomes a 'collective feature'. Now, this feature was put together
by 4 imcers (actually 5, including one international techie who helped
with the stats) and the article was discussed at the network meeting. I
think that enough reasons to dare and propose it as a collective response.
Whether it gets consensus or not is a different issue.

> 4) Do we really need to open the whole Atzmon affair again? Has this not
> done enough damage already to our internal and external relations? Who
> will benefit from this? Noone except Greenstein as far as I can see. Every
> year he tries kick up a stink about Atzmon playing gigs at leftie events
> like Marxism and commercial music venues. Every year the trots have enough
> common sense to ignore him as do other London venues. It seems to me that
> he craves attention and so far we are the only people who have been stupid
> enough to give it to him.

As FTP said in his email, I don't think it ever went away. Moreover, it,
and similar fiascos, are now being distorted and used against us. That is
surely worth some of our collective attention.

-- 
Shiar