Activism

This US election year an unprecedented number of voters will likely head to the polls to cast their ballots in an exercise that should take just a few minutes to complete. But what about the rest of the minutes left in the year? Author and activist Chris Carlsson has some suggestions for social change beyond voting in Nowtopia, a new book about modern day rebels who, in his words, "aren't waiting for an institutional change from on-high but are getting on with building the new world in the shell of the old."

Claude Marks is the director of The Freedom Archives, a San Francisco-based organization. Through the website and email list-serves, Freedom Archives provide a valuable resource documenting both revolutionary struggle and police state repression. Freedom Archives also creates high quality audio and video documentaries, including the recent video about the San Fransisco 8, titled "Legacy of Torture."

"Freedom only comes through persistent revolt, through persistent agitation, through persistently rising up against the system of evil." - Martin Luther King

Nothing is inevitable, including peace and justice. In fact, history proves that exactly the opposite is the case. War and oppression is inevitable, unless…. Unless we heed the call for Perpetual Revolt; Perpetual Revolt against war and oppression.

"Every time there's a natural disaster you see this wave of people suddenly organized into this help-mode… It's in moments of crisis that the system is actually peeled back and you see people naturally organize into these situations of mutual aid…It's interesting that the government is always trying to sell itself to us, that without the government it would instantly be like Mad Max and we'd all be killing each other for the last drops of oil. But I'm not so sure that that's true." - Erick Lyle