An anonymous commentator brought to my attention the Resistance Festival 2015 which begins today at the Agricultural University of Athens and lasts until next Sunday. Judging from their website, there will be an extensive musical program. The website indicates nothing about special guests and speakers.
My commentator has inside information. He tells me the festival is practically hosted by SYRIZA with main speakers from the Greek side being journalists/producers from SYRIZA's radio, SYRIZA MPs and a member from SYRIZA's political board.
According to my commentator, there will also be the following foreign dignitaries attending, whether in an active role or not I don't know:
- Alvaro Garcia Livera (Bolivian Vice President)
- Luis Brito Garcia ("Venezuelan intellectual")
- Samir Amin ("internationally renown economist and activist")
- Tarik Ali (writer and activist)
- Inijo Ereggòn (political segretary of Podemos party, Spain)
- Erturul Kiutsiu (honorary president of HDP Party, Turkey)
- Muna Matari (People's Front, Tunisia)
Since the main subject of the festival is "Opening roads for the 21st century: Is a post-capitalist world possible?", one can be confident that the answer to that question will come out to be a resounding "YES, IT IS!"
My commentator has inside information. He tells me the festival is practically hosted by SYRIZA with main speakers from the Greek side being journalists/producers from SYRIZA's radio, SYRIZA MPs and a member from SYRIZA's political board.
According to my commentator, there will also be the following foreign dignitaries attending, whether in an active role or not I don't know:
- Alvaro Garcia Livera (Bolivian Vice President)
- Luis Brito Garcia ("Venezuelan intellectual")
- Samir Amin ("internationally renown economist and activist")
- Tarik Ali (writer and activist)
- Inijo Ereggòn (political segretary of Podemos party, Spain)
- Erturul Kiutsiu (honorary president of HDP Party, Turkey)
- Muna Matari (People's Front, Tunisia)
Since the main subject of the festival is "Opening roads for the 21st century: Is a post-capitalist world possible?", one can be confident that the answer to that question will come out to be a resounding "YES, IT IS!"
There is actually no need for "inside information". If one looks at the official poster (which i already posted) and does a little search in greek, there is everything open for everyone to see:
ReplyDeletehttp://resistancefestival.gr/anakoinoseis/32-resistance-festival-2015
The article sounds as if this is festival has been organized right now, exactly for today, as a strategy, a plan, a contra action of the pro Euro demonstration on Thursday on Syntagma Square in Athens. At least, this is how I interpreted this post, until I clicked on the link.
ReplyDeleteIt is not!
It is an 8 year "old" yearly festival, and until the moment I watched nobody has shared the article in the media, not on Facebook, not on Twitter, not on Pinterest, not on Google+, with other words: nowhere.
Quoting you, Herr Kastner:
"Since the main subject of the festival is "Opening roads for the 21st century: Is a post-capitalist world possible?", one can be confident that the answer to that question will come out to be a resounding "YES, IT IS!""
My answer on this: "NO, IT IS NOT, AND IT WILL NEVER BE!."
Not because the article has not been shared in the media (until this moment, only by you, in fact, here in the blog) but because nobody can eliminate capitalism there, or there, because it is related with greed, and maybe they, in the Greek Government pretend they are anti-capitalists, they are capitalists as well, another kind maybe, another greed maybe, another name maybe for the word capitalists but in its essence they are greedy, and capitalists. It is possible to mislead naive people with left wing names from history though, and colors related with "left". Not any socialist name can change the capitalism inside. Not any red color. Not any connection with a "communist" country like Russia: Putin is a capitalist, and the country is a capitalist country.
Greed is in the genes of all human beings, also in Syriza, also in Tsipras and his communist wife. Also and that might be obvious, in Varoufakis, who shamelessly shows to be a capitalist. He even lives in the most expensive part of Athens.
A post-capitalist world is NOT possible unless people start to learn how to transform their inborn greed into something that until now only belongs to what others name "idealists", the Buddhists, Taoists, nature activists, peace activists, those who name themselves spiritual, who want to create peace and harmony on earth, taking care and responsibility for nature and mankind, having a moral duty. Spirituality is for the most of the people too far away: they prefer to ridicule it. It is for the silly ones....
The idealists in this Greek Government have nothing to do with the concept of peace. The people of the Greek Government and all who voted for them, are violent, not willing peace but war, via an infinite resistance against all and everything. Mikis Theodorakis did and does the same. It is not the state of being he pretends/pretended he was/is resisting for, it is, was and will be the never ending fight against something vague in fact. The motive is hatred, their source is hatred, and it is rooted in their own unconsciousness.
Not aware that all the dirt of the world is inside themselves, and they see it mirrored in this rotten world. Rotten, because people do not want to watch in their own darkness, inside, and therefore the rottenness of the world will never stop unless human beings start to go inside their own depths, and start cleaning up there. That is a hard, courageous act. The most don't even dare.
Carl Gustav Jung:
"The Origin of Evil"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNKvbT_3b0s
Carl Gustav Jung:
"Carl Jung on Accepting the Darkness of Self and Others"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvgmyaSTosg
Ms. Antoinette,
DeleteJust for the record, i assure you that i am not a SYRIZA member nor support for what matters, but the internet is a vast place and in such places, one may find what another cannot.
So, just as reference:
- This is from a SYRIZA Athens district website (Patisia district):
https://syrizapatisia.wordpress.com/tag/resistance-festival/
- This is the twitter greek page:
https://twitter.com/resistancefest
- This is the facebook greek page:
https://el-gr.facebook.com/ResistanceFestivalAthens
If you look the official poster at the bottom, it has the sponsors, the first of which are,
- EΡΤ (=ERT, the greek state television)
- Η Εφημεριδα των Συντακτών (= a well known pro-SYRIZA newspaper) http://www.efsyn.gr/
- 100,5 FM Red (= SYRIZA's radio) http://www.stokokkino.gr/list.php?id=5
It was actually easy to find the page in the radio where the advertize the festival:
http://www.stokokkino.gr/article/1000000000010920/Resistance-Festival-2015
Followed by a variety of pro-SYRIZA webpages.
All the foreign guests, are there to speak. In last year's edition, Alexis Tsipras himself was a speaker, along with other SYRIZA MPs and members of SYRIZA's central party committee as can be seen in this manifest:
https://syrizapatisia.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/resistance-2014-kentrikes-ekdiloseis.jpg
This just for the record, one can make whatever conclusions he wishes. And believe it or not, i have neither facebook or twitter of myself. I occasionally go to twitter to read others, but i don't have it for myself. Still, if i saw it (and i saw it on twitter), you can be certain that others saw it too. Because i am not the most media connected person in the world. But i am rather good in using logical search. For instance, despite the fact that i don't possess a twitter account, i found the news on Turkey's HDP party in its twitter page, about its honorary president going to this festival on June 16
https://twitter.com/hdpint
And in one misses it in twitter, here is a photograph:
Deletehttp://s27.postimg.org/opt1ijrcz/image.png
"In direct transmission from Bolivia TV" from Athens Agricultural Faculty.
And a small note, since i like accuracy. I just noted that in the english version, it cites:
ReplyDelete"Opening Ways to the 21st century
Is a post-neoliberal world possible?"
This is completely wrong translation of the greek program and poster.
In greek it is clearly said: "Είναι εφικτός ένας μετακαπιταλιστικός κόσμος;"
Is a metacapitalist (μετακαπιταλιστικός-metacapitalistikos) world possible?
Neoliberal in greek is "νεοφιλελεύθερος". Totally different.
Since capitalism has morphed into neoliberalism, it seems a perfectly reasonable synonym at this moment in time.
DeleteGranted, if there is some radical watershed in the economic agenda of the developed world, moving back to capitalism, then it might seem odd. However, it is very clear where things are moving to -- more towards neofeudal structures and irrelevant government than back to capitalism as we knew it.
To Guest (Xenos),
DeleteIt wasn't my intention to dispute the prevailing form of today's capitalism, but the literal accuracy of their translation. I am also the most harsh SYRIZA critic, i think, in the blog, although, occasionally, i might have seemed pro-SYRIZA to some. This is because i try to understand all sides, even the ones i don't like. I don't know for example, if you happened to watch this video i posted:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkmad9Ul1UE
He is one of SYRIZA's prime intellectuals (member of the central committee) or theorist if you prefer. He is also a professor in King's College, London. Let me tell you, that from his perspective, i find his reasoning impeccable. It is actually the policy that KKE has steadily since 1990. I can also follow his entire reasoning on how SYRIZA had its arms tied ever since the elections...
But the bottom line is this: Even if i believed in SYRIZA's capacity to generate new wealth (i don't believe it, unless they get direct investments from EU), the whole attempt to "change the world", "make the alliance of the South to change Europe", can't be done, by small Greece. And of course, the moment where i understand his ideological fervor, but i can't follow him realistically, is when he says "default so to help Podemos". It's the opposite. A greek default will be used to compress Podemos in Spain in the short term.
Small Greece can't change neither capitalism nor the EU. If you ask me, a dose of neoliberalism, would be good in the economy. SYRIZA's love for the public sector can't be the cure. Neither the troika's "arm hurts, cut the arm" policy, but since Papandreou signed it, you may as well follow it up until you can do otherwise.
Economic systems change with time, especially when they fail. Natural selection dictates that in order to survive, you must adapt to the enviroment. This enviroment is currently the EU/EZ. If SYRIZA believes that Greece can change the world or open a "post-capitalistic" road, i think they are delusional... They were equally delusional, to think and promise, that they would make a proposal to Merkel and she would just accept. Mind you, i don't disagree with SYRIZA's reasoning that "more cuts don't help the patient". I think that neither the "traitors" (Papandreou and Samaras) disagreed either. But the "traitors" had more contact with reality. They too would have liked to be able to do 0 cuts and only "real" reforms. But they couldn't...
For me, more than the form of current capitalism, the more worrisome, is that this is de facto, a german Europe. In 2010, if a Greek dared say this, he would have been immediately attacked, as full of "blind antigermanism". Today it's on all press, even the german one. And if someone had doubts, one has just to look at the "extra-institutional" meetings and phonecalls between Tsipras, Merkel, Hollande, Juncker. The rest of EU heads of state will just follow like the herd they are. Or the latest incident that prof. Varoufakis claims that happened (and i have no reason to think it's one of his inventions, since he posted his proposal in his own blog). Or the latest game where "we didn't ask to cut pensions".
I can only hope, that in some time in the future, Greece will be able to escape at least from the EZ. But i wouldn't trust SYRIZA to make the transition. But for now, fortunately, i think Tsipras will try to surrender with "offsets" (debt). If he can't get offsets, he will go to elections in summer.