Missed Opportunity

Should have had terrorist do this so we could blame others for our own shortcomings, start a war, create oppressive laws...

Whatever Happened to $40 Shows? Yes Four Zero!

Will today's kids one day ask themselves, "Whatever happened to $40 shows?"

It's a question that is sad but true. Shows have gone from under $5 to the too common cost of $30 or more. Top that off with security pat downs, no re-entry, ever larger venues, and no more all ages shows, it's a wonder anyone participates in what used to be known as Hardcore.

I think Hardcore truly died for me when I read Eric Weiss' words in Rumpshaker stating he knew no one from the Hardcore scene that volunteered time as much as his not in to Hardcore room mate, in fact he couldn't think of anyone who actually did more than work and go to shows from the scene.

I for one and many others took the words of Hardcore to heart and put them in to meaning. I try my best to help others on a daily basis and have attempted to live a life of less harm and less burden to all around me. It's not easy to practice what you preach and from that I have learned to stop preaching. 

Yet the preaching continues and it continues from the mouths of those who no longer believe and have long left the path of their own words from lyrics of many Hardcore bands. So why would so many reunite to sing the lyrics that once meant so much but are now looked on as feelings of our youth that have gone to the wayside of adulthood? Wasn't adulthood the one thing we swore we would never take part in? Wasn't this "normal" society what we wished to leave behind and change this world forever?

Is there really enough money to pay someone to get back on stage and sing the words that no longer hold meaning to them? I guess it's a fairly cheap sum to bring to the stage so many that left their own beliefs behind.

There was a time I wouldn't think twice about driving 600 miles to see a band that I felt such a connection with, now that I live in New York I don't even walk down the street to see those same bands. The members may be the same, but their lives are no longer recognizable to me. We sang of unity and change through changing ourselves, not of gossip and using people for our personal gain. We had a vision in sight and felt together we could get there. Today we just fear our retirement may never come unless we make more money.

So the question is, do you still care, and if not, why are you still here?

Tax Day 2013

You don't like the national debt, yet you pay bureaucrats to keep it going.

You don't like war, yet you still buy it.

You don't like excessive police presence, police brutality, cctv, drones, martial law, yet you pay for it.

You don't like fracking, yet you pay for it.

Barclays Circus

What is best, creating alternatives that replace the corrupt and chaotic tradition, or to change the system that has created the tradition?

Somehow the Ringling ringleader managed to walk from the subway exit through the crowd without a single boo from protestors.

The last time she will see daylight until April 2nd.

Your Taxes Pay for Prisons

Political Prison

by SUPPORT CREW posted on MARCH 10, 2013

WALTER EDMUND BOND (37096013)

3/10/2013 9:01:50 AM

Political Prison

To be in prison is to be a whipping post for those in political power. I will always find it a little odd and slightly offensive when people of an intellectual background or mindframe try to explain the mechanics of oppression to me. As if life was a classroom or thesis where real experience is trumped by word-ideas and an ability to apply precision to philosophy. Those of us in the prison system know oppression. We live it everyday, every hour. Authority, slavery and domination are our lot. Any employee, guard, visitor or invisible faceless bureaucrat need only snap their fingers and we are whisked away to confinement cells smaller than your bathroom. For days, months, or years.

In a capitalist system of immense social stratification ‘prisoner’ is the lowest rung in a classist and racist society. When you face federal prison charges your indictment reads ‘The United States of America Vs. (insert your name)’. That is usually the first and last truth you will be awarded. From that point forward you face the largest maniacal bully on the face of Mother Earth, the United States government.

Currently there are more than 2 and a half million people imprisoned in America. With more than 6 million on parole, probation or supervised release. That is approximately 1 out of every 33 adults in the U.S. which are in some stage of ‘corrections’. Nearly everyone in this system falls into one or more of four categories, those being: 1. Black, 2. Latino, 3. Poor, and 4. Uneducated.

Women in prison are routinely incarcerated hundreds of miles away from their families and children. Much further distances than men. Due to their minority status amongst the prison population (most prisoners are men) women endure imprisonment by a system that makes little concession for sex and gender differences, and often heaps extra derision and scorn upon the female prison population. Women that come into the prison system pregnant are often chained and shackled to tables while giving birth. They also have immensely greater chances of never seeing their children again after the hour or two that they are allowed to spend with their newborn babies. Upon return to their prison cells, robbed and stripped of their progeny, women in prison face a grief and hollowness worse than anything I can imagine. There are currently over 150,000 African American women imprisoned in America or on probation, parole or supervised release. That’s 1 out of every 9 African American women in the United States.

Under the guise of the war on drugs, the war on gangs, the war on guns, and of course the war on terrorism the prison system incarcerates the indigenous, people of color, and the poor at unprecedented rates. In the process criminalizing many addicts and small time ‘middlemen’ drug dealers that would benefit far more from help with their addictions, instead of criminalization and imprisonment around more serious or violent offenders.

As much as I identify with being vegan, straightedge or anarchist I also Identify with being a prisoner. I have been incarcerated in county jails such as Cerro Gordo county and Black Hawk county in Iowa. Or Davis County in Utah and Jefferson County in Colorado. I have been in state prisons in Iowa, such as Oakdale Classification Center, Mount Pleasant Correctional Facility, Anamosa State Penitentiary, and North Iowa Correctional Facility at Rockwell City. I have been in a corporate run prison at the Nevada Southern Detention Center and I have been in Federal Prison in Oklahoma at the Federal Transfer Center and now the United States Penitentiary of Marion on the Infamous Communications Management Unit for ‘domestic terrorists’, where I currently reside.

Contrary to how the media or politicians portray prisoners we are just people. Among the millions of people that are incarcerated are mothers, daughters, sisters, wives, children, parents, friends, fathers, brothers, uncles, aunts, grandfathers, grandmothers and family. As a prisoner you experience first hand far more diversity than you do in the open air prison (society). Instead of being divided by class, politics, religion, gender, sexual orientation, color, culture and all the other dividers we use to tribalize and separate ourselves from each other. We are all right here in close quarters. People that you once thought were repulsive in manner, attitude or appearance become more familiar to you than your best friends from free world.

Of course Prison can also be a violent world just like in the open air prison you live in. The difference is that there is no running away from violence in here. Which means that as a prisoner you relearn instincts that  you may have lost or never thought you had. Like a child you learn how to read people, you learn how to not be fooled by nice clothes, slick talk or kind words. You learn that not everyone that postures violently is dangerous and some that seem completely non-threatening are very dangerous indeed. You learn how to deal with lots of truly different people under adverse circumstances as a matter of everyday life. You learn how to not be sensitive over other peoples views or beliefs.

Unfortunately, you also learn that the outside world, much like the media define you by your crimes. If you stole some money when you were a kid, wouldn’t you find it unfair and discriminatory if 20 years later when you were trying to get a job, or an apartment, or admission to college you were told “sorry, we can’t allow thieves here”? This is exactly the case with nearly all that come out of prison. there is years of time between you and your offense but you still must be defined by it.

The first time I was released from prison I had many a good job denied me, solely because of my criminal record. I started to lie about it on my job applications and then was finally able to get a job as a fry cook at Applebee’s, a shitty corporate restaurant. An old acquaintance recognized me and told the boss about my past. I was brought into the office and thoroughly berated and threatened with being fired for being a liar. And then finally allowed to continue my ‘privilege’ of working in a place completely against my ethics as a vegan so that I could avoid going back to prison on a parole violation for not holding ‘adequate employment’.

This is to say nothing of the difficulties that gay lesbian and transgendered people face in prison or the slave wages prisoners must endure while working in the prison if they want to keep their ‘general population’  status and have the ‘privilege’ of looking at the sky or of making a 15 minute call to family.

In a hierarchical society where all life is viewed in ranks or the rungs of a ladder. In a consumer driven society where all life is a commodity or only as important as it’s output for consumer gain the prison is quickly becoming the model used in  society. Schools, workplaces, post offices, airports and the shopping malls. Along side the nastier businesses such as slaughterhouses, military and police training which all go off of the same model as the penitentiary design and mentality. Which is, by the way, why so many ex-military people work in prisons. It’s because they themselves were institutionalized by the government.

It is only a matter of time before the open air prison drops it’s facade and the walls go up, and the razor wire glistens in the afternoon sky and the rights you thinks you have all become privileges. Because if you want to see the future of a class society, of imperialism and corporate fascism you need look no further than the lowest class within that society, it’s prisoners. But just like slaughterhouses, prisons are tucked away in small-town USA, in rural areas where you don’t see. The mainstream media ignores prison and it’s millions of inmates unless it happens to make a good story to interview one of the ‘human monsters’ that languish within. Just like it ignores the murder and death of Animals behind walls to feed filthy and destructive industries.

So it’s up to you to care where other don’t. It’s up to you to raise awareness where others won’t. And it’s up to you to use your freedom and privilege in the cause of liberation . If not you, then who? If not now, then when?

For Liberation,

Walter

Walter Bond is in prison until the year 2021 and cannot use Facebook or the internet.  This page was set up to support him.

Walter Bond is very low on funds right now and would appreciate donations.  For more info on sending funds to him in prison, please visit his support site:  http://supportwalter.org/SW/index.php/donate/

Here is his mailing address (he can only reply to letters that include a full name and address):

Walter Bond

37096-013

USP Marion CMU

PO Box 1000

Marion IL 62959

Taxation

By Definition...

tyr·an·ny noun \ˈtir-ə-nē\ Definition of TYRANNY 1 : oppressive power ; especially : oppressive power exerted by government 2 a : a government in which absolute power is vested in a single ruler; especially : one characteristic of an ancient Greek city-state b : the office, authority, and administration of a tyrant 3 : a rigorous condition imposed by some outside agency or force 4 : an oppressive, harsh, or unjust act : a tyrannical act 

AMENDMENT II A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed. 

Amendment IV The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. 

Subtitle D—Detainee Matters SEC. 1031. AFFIRMATION OF AUTHORITY OF THE ARMED FORCES OF THE UNITED STATES TO DETAIN COVERED PERSONS PURSUANT TO THE AU- THORIZATION FOR USE OF MILITARY FORCE. (a) IN GENERAL.—Congress affirms that the author- ity of the President to use all necessary and appropriate force pursuant to the Authorization for Use of Military Force (Public Law 107–40) includes the authority for the Armed Forces of the United States to detain covered per- sons (as defined in subsection (b)) pending disposition under the law of war. (b) COVERED PERSONS.—A covered person under this section is any person as follows: (1) A person who planned, authorized, com- mitted, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored those respon- sible for those attacks. (2) A person who was a part of or substantially supported al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners, including any person who has committed a belligerent act or has directly supported such hostilities in aid of such enemy forces. (c) DISPOSITION UNDER LAW OF WAR.—The dis- position of a person under the law of war as described in subsection (a) may include the following: (1) Detention under the law of war without trial until the end of the hostilities authorized by the Authorization for Use of Military Force. (2) Trial under chapter 47A of title 10, United States Code (as amended by the Military Commis- sions Act of 2009 (title XVIII of Public Law 111– 84)). (3) Transfer for trial by an alternative court or competent tribunal having lawful jurisdiction. (4) Transfer to the custody or control of the person’s country of origin, any other foreign coun- try, or any other foreign entity. (d) CONSTRUCTION.—Nothing in this section is in- tended to limit or expand the authority of the President or the scope of the Authorization for Use of Military Force. (e) REQUIREMENT FOR BRIEFINGS OF CONGRESS.— The Secretary of Defense shall regularly brief Congress regarding the application of the authority described in this section, including the organizations, entities, and individuals considered to be ‘‘covered persons’’ for purposes of subsection (b)(2).