Am reading 'NO LOGO' and depressed ?

Question

The rise of the superbrands, mono-multiculturism, corporation monopolisation etc.
Any one with words of succour.....?

Answer 1

Here is what Naomi says:

What comes next is up to you.

Resistance—to privatization and enclosure, to poverty and forced migration, to capitalism and colonization—is everywhere. It is rooted locally, in day-to-day work carried out for the dignity and freedom of communities and individuals.

To globalize resistance is to participate in building transnational networks of solidarity and resistance between communities, individuals, collectives and organizations fighting on the front lines of struggles for justice and supporting them as allies.

Below, you'll find a growing list of radical grass-roots organizations and collectives engaged in fighting and supporting struggles against capitalist globalization (premised on colonialism and imperialism), and forging ways of resisting and living that maximize human dignity, freedom, mutual aid and solidarity.

Get in touch with them!

Most of the groups listed respond to speaking invitations, and are happy to share their skills, knowledge and experiences in workshops and at speaking events, actions, convergences and conferences. They welcome participation at their actions and events. Many of them also have publications or email lists to which you can subscribe.

A-Infos
A-Infos is a multi-lingual news service by, for, and about anarchists. The A-Infos Project is coordinated by an international collective of revolutionary anti-authoritarian, anti-capitalist activists, involved with class struggle and who regard it as a total social struggle.

Web:www.ainfos.ca


Chain Workers
Based in Milan Italy, the ChainCreW uses media tools and organizes actions in defense of the rights of part-time and temp workers. Chain Workers = Media + Union Activism.

Email:[e-mail] Web:www.chainworkers.org


Coalition of Immokalee Workers
The CIW is a community-based worker organization in Florida, US. They fight for a fair wage, more respect from bosses and the industries where they work, better and cheaper housing, stronger laws and stronger enforcement against those who would violate workers' rights, the right to organize on the job without fear of retaliation, and an end to indentured servitude in the fields.

Tel: [phone] Email:[e-mail] Web:www.ciw-online.org


International Solidarity Movement
The ISM is a Palestinian-led movement of Palestinian and International activists working to raise awareness of the struggle for Palestinian freedom and an end to Israeli occupation. The ISM uses nonviolent, direct-action methods of resistance to confront and challenge illegal Israeli occupation forces and policies.

Email:[e-mail]
Web:www.palsolidarity.org


Maquila Solidarity Network
The MSN is a Canadian network promoting solidarity with groups in Mexico, Central America, and Asia organizing in maquiladora factories and export processing zones to improve conditions and win a living wage.

Tel:[phone] Email:[e-mail] Web:www.maquilasolidarity.org


Ontario Coalition Against Poverty
OCAP is a direct action anti-poverty organization. They mount campaigns against regressive governmental policies as they effect poor and working people and provide direct-action advocacy for individuals against eviction, termination of welfare benefits, and deportation.

Tel:[phone] Email:[e-mail] Web:www.ocap.ca


Peoples' Global Action
The PGA is an international network of of struggle & solidarity that allows grass-roots groups communicate and coordinate to fight the destruction of humanity and the planet by capitalism and build local alternatives to globalisation.

Web:www.agp.org


Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign
The AEC is an umbrella body of 15 organizations that have come together to fight evictions, water cut-offs, poor health services, for free electricity and against police brutality.

Email: [e-mail] Web:www.antieviction.org.za


This list does not come close to being a thorough list of organizations and collectives doing valuable and creative justice work. It doesn't attempt to be. It does, however, attempt to assemble up-to-date contact info for the many incredible groups and collectives that we know.

If you have comments or suggestions about this resource list, please email [e-mail].


'Never Before!' The Amnesiac Torture Debate

by Naomi Klein > December 8 2005

It was the “Mission Accomplished” of George W. Bush’s second term, and an announcement of that magnitude called for a suitably dramatic location. But what was the right backdrop for the infamous “We do not torture” declaration? With characteristic audacity, the Bush team settled on downtown Panama City.

It was certainly bold. An hour and a half’s drive from where Bush stood, the US military ran the notorious School of the Americas from 1946 to 1984, a sinister educational institution that, if it had a motto, might have been “We do torture.” It is here in Panama, and later, at the school’s new location in Fort Benning, Georgia, where the roots of the current torture scandals can be found.

Click here to read more...

The Threat of Hope in Latin America

by Naomi Klein > November 4 2005

When Manuel Rozental got home one night last month, friends told him two strange men had been asking questions about him. In this close-knit indigenous community in southwestern Colombia ringed by soldiers, right-wing paramilitaries and left-wing guerrillas, strangers asking questions about you is never a good thing.

Click here to read more...

Why Can’t the Homeless Have Bourbon Street?

by Naomi Klein > September 22 2005

Outside the 2,000-bed temporary shelter in Baton Rouge’s River Center, a Church of Scientology band is performing a version of Bill Withers’s classic “Use Me”—a refreshingly honest choice. “If it feels this good getting used,” the Scientology singer belts out, “just keep on using me until you use me up.”

Answer 2

Just read a article on the Yahoo! news network about how ethical investment has risen sharply in Britain in the last couple of years.

I guess that means that people are finally putting their money where their hearts are, and not into global multinationals with no motivation but profit. Or, if they do, using their voting power as shareholders to direct company policy. (e.g. There was a reference in the article to the directors of a big oil company wanting to prospect the antarctic, and being blocked by the shareholders).

So, globalisation is here, there's no point moaning about how we want things to be, we should just start changing them. Change starts at the grassroots level. If we are consumers, that means that collectively we have the power to direct production, because there's no point—i.e. profit—in supplying something for which there is no demand.

Think global, buy local—and so on. Avoid buying the products of companies whose ethical standards are lower than yours. They'll get the message fairly quickly.

Answer 3

Don't get depressed, its not all about global adverting campaigns, global markets, international business and satellite communications....

For example: at the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization they say that:

"one of the oldest applications of international cooperation is found in the area of peace and security"...

So the Center is engaged in supporting the generation of ideas to improve global collaboration in these areas.

"The painfully acquired awareness of the need for an international rules-based framework is what led to building the existing multilateral system, a system that has made important contributions to the unprecedented progress and economic growth that many countries have enjoyed since the end of the Second World War. Yet, the challenges of globalization today cannot adequately be handled by a system that was designed largely for the world of more than half a century ago. For a range of common problems the world has no formal institutional mechanism to ensure that voices representing all relevant domains are heard in the discussion, nor is there an instrument or procedure commonly agreed upon for deciding who does what. The Center aims to contribute to the discussion of how to fill the existing gaps in global economic governance."

So, just think that there are other people working in the following themes:

Global governance for peace and security
Foreign policy role of key international players
Global economic governance
International cooperation for development
Strengthening the multilateral trading system
Protecting shared environmental resources
Global health issues
Key factors for inclusion in globalization
Extracting lessons from national or regional experiences

As Nayan Chanda wrote an essay titled "Coming Together":

"Globalization means reconnecting the human community".

And here are we, perfect strangers from different countries talking about the things that worry and motivate us.

There is hope.
Don't give up.

http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/about/essay.jsp

Answer 4

Mains the Saddler is a wee shop in the centre of Haddington in Scotland. You can buy a saddle, a pair of boots, a spatula and a handful of nails. Paint and keycutting available. When I Asked Mr Main if there's anything he doesn't sell, he said, "hmm. boiled ham."
It's been run by the Main family since late 19th century.
The good life DOES still exist!

Answer 5

Without minching my words, you should check out the background of the author.
She's hardly as pure as driven snow and rah rah revolution as she protrayed herself in her books.

Answer 6

Put it down! If it's depressing stop reading it.

Answer 7

Isn't it funny how antiglobalists always seem to be sooooo miserable?

No fun at parties AT ALL.

Pass the Coke, please.

Answer 8

its an anagram of "go Loon".