US EF! organizers’ conference & winter rendezvous, 15th Feb on: update; international invite; discussion on Do or Die article

Addi­tion­al info to that on http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/?q=node/117

Inter­na­tion­al Invite:
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South Flori­da is an acces­si­ble loca­tion for inter­na­tion­al trav­el, and is a social hotspot of cur­rent glob­al com­merce and pol­i­tics. For sev­er­al years, the glob­al­iza­tion move­ment has influ­enced (and been influ­enced by) EF! But rarely has it been pos­si­ble to dia­logue with eco-rad­i­cals in oth­er parts of the world, espe­cial­ly the major­i­ty world move­ments who have been inspir­ing direct action efforts with­in the U.S. empire. For these rea­sons, the invi­ta­tion is being put out to help bring folks from oth­er coun­tries’ rad­i­cal envi­ron­men­tal move­ments and indige­nous strug­gles here for the OC and Win­ter Ren­dezvous (this means visa assis­tance and some extra fundrais­ing, so if you can be
of any help in those areas, please con­tact us ASAP!)

Organ­is­ers’ con­fer­ence 15–17th Feb­ru­ary:
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— Last year’s OC seems to have been a more reflec­tive, inner-growth and recov­ery focused con­fer­ence. So we are propos­ing this year we reach towards the oth­er end of the spec­trum and be ori­ent­ed towards move­ment strat­e­gy and vision on the broad­er scale; tak­ing a look at glob­al ecol­o­gy and inter­na­tion­al move­ments on the front­lines.

- Reports from the Earth First! Jour­nal- this is a stan­dard sub­ject of EF! gath­er­ings, but there are some recent hap­pen­ings in the eco-rad­i­cal pub­lish­ing world that might make for inter­est­ing discussions/proposal. For exam­ple, two promi­nent move­ment pub­li­ca­tions, Wild Earth and Do or Die have ceased pro­duc­tion, while new­er projects, such as Green Anar­chy, have grown in cir­cu­la­tion and recog­ni­tion. Does this influ­ence where the EF!J should place the focus of its con­tent?

- Eval­u­at­ing strate­gies, tools and tac­tics- in the past year and a half an article/proposal “Down with Empire, Up with Spring” (from the UK-based Do or Die, Issue 10) has been cir­cu­lat­ing the eco-anar­chist net­works. Essen­tial­ly, it is pro­mot­ing the Hotspot The­o­ry as a glob­al eco-defense/indige­nous sol­i­dar­i­ty strat­e­gy and a SHAC style tac­ti­cal approach for its grass­roots appli­ca­tion. Is it the most coher­ent vision of move­ment direc­tion since EF! first pro­mot­ed wilder­ness cor­ri­dors for North Amer­i­can bio­di­ver­si­ty restora­tion over 20 years ago or is it too rigid, lofty and spoiled with corporate/NGO influ­ence?

- Exam­in­ing our visions and aspi­ra­tions- for the dura­tion of EF!, the per­spec­tives of deep ecol­o­gy have been a dri­ving and uni­fy­ing fac­tor of the move­ment. In the past few years, an anar­chis­tic world­view has had a growth spurt with­in EF! Cer­tain ele­ments of anar­chy have, of course, been there all along, but most would agree that there is a shift of some sort that appears to be occur­ring. In cer­tain ways it is as cul­tur­al as it is ide­o­log­i­cal. The ‘green anar­chy’ ten­den­cy seems to still reflect the prin­ci­ples of deep ecol­o­gy but also bring some of its own aspi­ra­tions and visions of a future world and how we might get there. Is the grow­ing ener­gy around the Fer­al Visions/Green Anar­chy gath­er­ings evi­dence of this shift? What, if any­thing, does that mean for EF! as a ‘move­ment’?

- Review of State Repres­sion- how has new anti-ter­ror­ist leg­is­la­tion of the past sev­er­al years impact­ed EF! and relat­ed groups? How have folks been effec­tive in fight­ing back?

- Anti-oppres­sion check-in- How have racism, sex­ism, xeno­pho­bia, homo­pho­bia, and oth­er oppres­sive ten­den­cies been man­i­fest­ing them­selves in our orga­niz­ing & direct action efforts? How are peo­ple chal­leng­ing them suc­cess­ful­ly? Are there still anti-immi­grant sen­ti­ments in our midst? How can we expose them and send ’em on their way for good?

- Bioregional/international roundup- what are peo­ple up to with­in the EF! net­work, the envi­ron­men­tal direct action move­ment and it’s extend­ed webs of affin­i­ty with­in the full ‘activist’ spec­trum from local grass­roots com­mu­ni­ty groups to glob­al autonomous social move­ments? How do we fit into the big­ger pic­ture? Whose cam­paigns could use some extra hands, who has hands to spare? We can also expect a direct update from the Alter­na­tive Social Forum in Venezuela.

Win­ter Ren­dezvous! feb 17–19
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This is a time to kick back, enjoy each oth­ers com­pa­ny, inform & inspire each oth­er with our skillshares/workshops, eat damn good food and rev­el in the good times so that we can more clear­ly know what kind of rela­tion­ships with peo­ple and with the land that we are fight­ing for in our day-to-day lives.

At recent EF! gath­er­ings there has been a lull in musi­cian par­tic­i­pa­tion, so tell your friends to bring their songs and instru­ments. This year we will be hon­ored with a per­for­mance by Sobre­vivien­cia, a Guatemalan indige­nous Mayan rock band. We are also hop­ing that some of the new­er gen­er­a­tion of rad­i­cal folkies that have been rous­ing the rab­ble in the streets will come ser­e­nade us in the swamps too.

Fri­day night will be the annu­al ‘Night To Howl!’ gath­er­ing of the War­rior Poets Soci­ety, so bring poems, songs and sto­ries to share.

You can expect to see some of the fol­low­ing top­ics pop up over the week­end:

• Fight­ing Gen­tri­fi­ca­tion
• Prob­ing the Tech-Night­mare: bio, nano, robo, cel­lu­lar, etc.
• Prim­i­tive Skill­shares
• Plant Walks
• Indige­nous Sol­i­dar­i­ty in North Amer­i­ca
• Coastal Ecol­o­gy Issues
• Cli­mate, Ener­gy and the Eco-Intifa­da
• Defend­ing Pacif­ic North­West Forests
• Moun­tain Top Removal
• Com­mu­ni­ty Gar­dens
• Earth & Ani­mal Lib­er­a­tion Pris­on­er Sup­port
• Deep­er Effects of Civ­i­liza­tion on our Bod­ies & Com­mu­ni­ties;
• Mak­ing Your Own Home­brew

Spe­cial Work­shop on Sun­day Feb­ru­ary 19:
From Defen­sive to Offen­sive: Strate­gic Latin Amer­i­ca Sol­i­dar­i­ty

Details of this and more onhttp://www.earthfirst2006oc.info/