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Reclaim the streets Saturday 10th September East London

TreeHouse said:
The RTS street party is a seperate event to the actions ahead. I think the idea behind it is to get loads of non political people along who want to party and then get them interested in the campaign to shut down the arms fair. In the same way that Rock Against Racism got people involved in the campaign against the National Front in the late seventies.
http://www.disarm-trade.org
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Strangely optimistic given that there is already a history of street parties in London and they then died a death because of police tactics.
 
gabi said:
That's what we were wondering. As I said, not what we expected at all. It was advertised as an RTS party, but there were a lot of very confused looking people standing outside said warehouse when we got there.
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you got done mate the priciple of RTS is free party
 
The Reclaim The Streets idea in the late 90s spread to other UK cities and other countries, then it faded. Its orginal aim was to target road building and the ever increasing car use. Then it took on wider aims.
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Well by the time of the M41 party in 1996 the agitprop made it pretty clear that the 'wider aim' was capitalism...
 
gahi said:
That's what we were wondering. As I said, not what we expected at all. It was advertised as an RTS party, but there were a lot of very confused looking people standing outside said warehouse when we got there.
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Herbert Read said:
you got done mate the principle of RTS is free party
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It was a fiver to get into that Reclaim The Future warehouse party in June(which was a somewhat different thing from RTS anyway, although I think some of the same people were involved).

I don't think I was 'done' -- that fiver payed for a superb party with all sorts going on. Well worth it IMO.
 
goldenecitrone said:
I'll be there. Hope there are good parking facilities provided. It's a bugger to park is this people carrier.
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:D

I'm quite tempted to go but i can forsee spending the afternoon 'partying' in a small confined space surrounded by a load of riot cops, which kind of puts me off. :rolleyes:
 
the B said:
Was that Reclaim the Future?

I've heard they are wank from some, good by others - but they aren't anything like RtS from what I've heard. Just a bit bandwagon on the name.
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thats pointlessly bitchy isn't it mate? RTF is just a play on a well known phrase: its a wombles organised conference cum party, and being the wombles, there are some of the original RTS lot involved. And also, being the wombles, you KNOW some of the organisers so i rilly don't get ur post...

Treehouse: you need to distinguish RTS parties from RTS the group in ur history. RTS was a campign against cars from EF! in the uk. When it dided out they went back to being EF! Nobody told me this until last year and i thought (and i'm sure many still do) that RTS were a much wider group than they actually were, mostly due to the media making a very big deal about them and Naomi Kleins chapter on them in her book.
 
SubZeroCat said:
I don't think I'll be making it actually, got several things to do tomorrow....
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You're going the SSC gig too right? Yeah I wouldn't go to this - a good chance you'll just get penned in all day and not be able to go!
 
Lalu said:
RTS was a campign against cars from EF! in the uk. When it dided out they went back to being EF! Nobody told me this until last year and i thought (and i'm sure many still do) that RTS were a much wider group than they actually were.
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This is hardly the whole story, any more than No Logo was.
 
Treehouse: you need to distinguish RTS parties from RTS the group in ur history. RTS was a campign against cars from EF! in the uk. When it dided out they went back to being EF! Nobody told me this until last year and i thought (and i'm sure many still do) that RTS were a much wider group than they actually were, mostly due to the media making a very big deal about them and Naomi Kleins chapter on them in her book.
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Um, that's a funny perspective. RTS (proper) started in London, and came of age through the no-M11 campaign. The London group doubled as an EF! group. Pretty soon RTS became a 'banner' under which like-minded collectives worked AROUND the world - common themes being street parties and anti-capitalism etc.. So RTS was / is really a 'network' based on direct action, reclaiming the commons, and resistance to capitalism...

When RTS in London fizzled out (a few years ago) they didn't transform into an EF! group. Although one was set-up not long after.

Peeps come and go. RTS was never made up of the same individuals - very few were involved consistently over the lifespan of London RTS.

It's a misnoma that RTS were ever single-issue (ignore what the media or confused individuals said).

A good article on RTS can be found in Do or Die No.6.
 
I may or may not be coming to this depending on whether gergl is feeling better and wants to go and whether I can be arsed.
 
boing! said:
i can forsee spending the afternoon 'partying' in a small confined space surrounded by a load of riot cops, which kind of puts me off. :rolleyes:
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I think that's quite unlikely. There was room for improvement in 2003. I think it's been noted. Certainly, who would set out to organise a repeat?

Edited to add: See where on this flyer it says Reclaim the Future was a benefit?


If anyone knows how to organise a fundraising party that's free on the door, do PM :D

Anyway...

dsei3-1a.gif


Outside Royal Albert DLR, 1pm - be on time!
​
 
There is no reasons why anyone wanting to an RTS-style event needs to use the RTS name, or even refer to it. In fact it will probably atract far more problems than it is worth - from paranoid and over-reacting authorities who ended up demonising RTS to possible annoyance and unflattering comparisons from activist/other types who will feel that any new events are free-riding on the efforts of the 'original' RTS stuff, or not being 'true' to it.

The fact is that people will tend to know when they see something they like. Word of mouth, knowing some of the people and crews involved, seeing that things are tight and well organised, seeing that various potential problems have been thought about and dealt with/prepared for and most importantly a good track record of smaller parties, events and actions where people/crews/ideas have been seen to actually work and have been fun. All this needs to be done way in advance of simply 'announcing' a big action/party if you really want to pull of something special.

If people do all this then they will also think up some cool new name and labels - they won't feel any need to hark back to RTS or anything else, nor will they feel the need to follow any kind of blueprint - they will work out how they want to do things themselves.
 
Lalu said:
thats pointlessly bitchy isn't it mate? RTF is just a play on a well known phrase: its a wombles organised conference cum party, and being the wombles, there are some of the original RTS lot involved. And also, being the wombles, you KNOW some of the organisers so i rilly don't get ur post...
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Maybe some people just think they aren't great as parties. Nothing against the people that do them at all!
 
Lalu said:
Treehouse: you need to distinguish RTS parties from RTS the group in ur history. RTS was a campign against cars from EF! in the uk. When it dided out they went back to being EF! Nobody told me this until last year and i thought (and i'm sure many still do) that RTS were a much wider group than they actually were, mostly due to the media making a very big deal about them and Naomi Kleins chapter on them in her book.
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RTS were a much wider group. They originally came out of the M11 campaign and EF! but soon became an anti-capitalist group with a lot of situationist influences. In 1996/97 they were making links with the striking Liverpool dockers and London tube workers, they organised a "Never Mind the Ballots" demo in May 1997 with the Liverpool dockers as a protest against the general election which culminated with a party in Trafalgar Square and some of the soundsystem organisers were charged with attempted murder (later dropped). There were RTS groups in other cities, with the first G8 protest being an RTS party on the Bullring in Birmingham in 98.
 
RTS were a much wider group. They originally came out of the M11 campaign and EF! but soon became an anti-capitalist group with a lot of situationist influences. In 1996/97 they were making links with the striking Liverpool dockers and London tube workers, they organised a "Never Mind the Ballots" demo in May 1997 with the Liverpool dockers as a protest against the general election which culminated with a party in Trafalgar Square and some of the soundsystem organisers were charged with attempted murder (later dropped). There were RTS groups in other cities, with the first G8 protest being an RTS party on the Bullring in Birmingham in 98.
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Well said...

It's also worth noting that the G8 street party in Birmingham was GLOBAL, and that the G8 were forced to find an alternative venue to meet in outside the city...
 
Those of you who are not reclaiming the streets this afternoon might instead prefer to join me & ms MarkMark at the free blues 'open-mic' session, at the Aint Nothin But blues bar, Kingly Street nr. Oxford St Tube. Quality blues music in a quality blues venue :cool:
 
MarkMark said:
Those of you who are not reclaiming the streets this afternoon might instead prefer to join me & ms MarkMark at the free blues 'open-mic' session, at the Aint Nothin But blues bar, Kingly Street nr. Oxford St Tube. Quality blues music in a quality blues venue :cool:
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Some other time, maybe. I tried to drive down there, but there was some bunch of idiots having a party in the middle of the street...

:D
 
Velouria said:
Some other time, maybe. I tried to drive down there, but there was some bunch of idiots having a party in the middle of the street...

:D
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Yea, it's hard to get around london these days without tripping over anarchists, bless 'em. Mind u, they still don't make molotov cocktails like they used to :)
 
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