Direct action

Uh-huh.

What led me down this path to a massive direct action was, you know, our legislative session goes from January to roughly March, April.

So here we were at the end of January and we're watching the events play out in Minneapolis.

We're watching the people and the community of Minneapolis stand up against our government, stand up against ICE.

But then we started this conversation about, like, what's next? And my memory is you had a fire lit under you.

Yeah.

So as we were looking at, before we even got to the final decision of what we were going to do, but when we were starting to talk about, friends, I think this is a moment for civil disobedience and direct action.

Yeah.

4RJ.

Tuesday 26th October, Is Direct Action Democratic? Newcastle AWL, Northumbria Uni, SU, 2nd St Difford Road, NE18SB.

Socialist Feminist Book Clubs, Manchester Transitional Demands, 2.30pm, Sunday 1st November, Manchester Art Gallery, Moseley Street, M23JL.

Page 8.

I can see you all, you know, falling over.

But it's an exceptionally important strike because it led to the creation, it led to the Labour movement moving from direct action into parliamentary action.

This is a fascinating history.

So the 1891 Shira strike, tonight you're all invited.

The fact

is that in both cases, the finger can ultimately be pointed at the fact that we as a society and we as individuals in the community do not demand the redistribution of the common wealth.

And you can demand that through legislative change or you can demand that through direct action.

And that's the situation we find ourselves today in Australia in 2026.

Mm.

The main characters that we're sort of following end up in a meeting for a direct action group.

We'll just put it that way.

[laughs] Um, and as soon as they walk in, it says, "Balthus is talking about the need for, quote, 'establishing a solid ontological foundation and modus operandi to ensure ideological consistency for future direct actions.' And even with all my academic training, I can barely make sense of him." This is, like, straight out of a union meeting I had at UC Santa Cruz [laughs] in like 2013.

[laughs] It's, it's so...

Anyone who has been to any kind of sort of leftist meeting knows that there is always a piece of this in them.

It's going to take...

Direct action.

Like when you really...

Because you got to understand that the way...

So let me throw it back to you another way.

What you're doing, this kind of direct action, publicizing a, making awareness through graffiti, vandalism, whatever you wanna call it, but sounds like it's mostly temporary vandalism 'cause it just washes off.

Am I right? It's not like paint that just stays there.

Yeah, it looks like, but the purpose is, as you saw, to see the, the reaction.

This is Jay.

In this episode, we had the rare opportunity to interview a spokesperson from a direct action group that has targeted toll holdings in Australia.

The campaign has engaged in a range of sabotage, vandalism, and disruptive actions, including sledgehammering windows, cutting internet cables, blockading roads, and an international port entrance.

They have also slashed lines and cut valves to disable vehicles, covered facilities inside and out with paint and foul liquids, and sabotaged infrastructure such as signal boxes used by Toll.

In this discussion, we asked them about the development of the anti-Zionist movement in Australia after October 7, 2023, and asked about how their group settled on its target, prepared their campaign, and selected the tactics they wanted to use in it.

As our guest raises the spirit of adventure they see as necessary to take meaningful direct action to confront the genocidal war machine, I also ask them what they think about allegations of adventurism that can be levied from the left at those who take such actions.

because this campaign is heavily under threat by the state we agreed to some additional security measures in this conversation the voice you hear is not the actual voice of the person we interviewed the original interview was transcribed and then converted to audio using a text to voice generator Just as an editorial disclaimer from me, amid heightened attacks on various forms of speech, I just want to say as a platform, we are not advocating that people engage in any form of illegal activity.

Having said that, we do understand that the greatest crime that humanity has recognized, the crime of genocide, is still ongoing.

In short, anarchism strives towards a social organization which will establish well-being for all.

The germ of such an organization can be found in that form of trades unionism which has done away with centralization and bureaucracy and discipline, and which favors independent and direct action on the part of its members.

The very considerable progress of anarchist ideas in America can best be gauged by the remarkable success of the three extensive lecture tours of Emma Goldman since the Amsterdam Congress of 1907.

Each tour extended over new territory, including localities where anarchism had never before received a hearing.

The political superstition is still holding sway over the hearts and minds of the masses, but the true lovers of liberty will have no more to do with it.

Instead, they believe with Stirner that man has as much liberty as he is willing to take.

Anarchism therefore stands for direct action, the open defiance of and resistance to all laws and restrictions, economic, social, and moral.

But defiance and resistance are illegal.