CALL TO ACTION!!! National Prisoners Strike: Sept 9th, 2016

We will keep this page updated with current information.  The strike starts on Sept 9th, 2016.  Please keep reading to find out how you can support the Prisoner's efforts.  There are a variety of ways to help.  If there is any information you would like us to add to this page please email us at iheartpaps.com and we thank you for your support for the Strike!

THINGS YOU CAN DO TO HELP 

Repression Response
One of the most important things outside supporters can do is respond to retaliation against prisoners. We need to shine a protecting light on their struggles, let prison staff know people are paying attention.

We need you to volunteer now! We are looking for people to commit to maintaining this pressure on an ongoing basis, and folks at IWOC have made it easy for you. If you would be willing to make calls every other day then please visit and bookmark this site: (https://goo.gl/forms/s4gBzsgvz6W9LQoN2) make the calls, and fill in the one-line form at the bottom so we can send friendly reminders if you don’t.

Tweetstorm

You can help bring attention to the strike by participating in an online tweetstorm that will last ALL DAY on Sept 9.  You can make up your own tweets or you can use tweets we have suggested.  For more information on the Tweetstorm visit our PASTEBIN HERE. 

Chalking and Distributing Pamphlets

*Printing out information to distribute or chalking important messages in public places helps bring attention to a cause.  Check out what Its Going Down in Denver has done!!

*Its Going Down also has links to printable pamphlets and e zines HERE. Just scroll down to the bottom of the page :)

Attend a Local Event

There are local events being planned for Sept 9th. If you can't find a local event consider planning one yourself.  We suggest doing a Solitary Confinement Demo.  If you are having an event and would like us to include it please email us at iheartpaps.com

*Buckeye, Arizona
 Bring signs, banners and drums to let these prisoners know they are not forgotten on the 45th anniversary of the Attica uprising.
This demonstration is in solidarity with the nationwide prisoner strike beginning on September 9 and is organized by the mother of a prisoner in this facility.

For more info contact:
LindaRobles39@gmail.com
(520) 393-3671

AZ weather during Sept is very hot. Come prepared. Water will be provided.
We will get together on Sept 7 for a planning meeting. Call or email for details.
Hosted by the EJ Mothers Safe Air Safe Water Force and the Campaign to Fight Toxic Prisons.


*Durham, North Carolina
 September 9th Durham Central Park 7:30pm


*Portland, Oregon
 Friday, September 9th: People across Portland and Northwest will converge in Downtown Portland in solidarity with the US wide prison work strike against prison slavery and white supremacy. Our goal is a mass showing of support with the growing prison rebellion in the US and to also march on the corporations in the Downtown area that make massive profits off of prisoner enslavement.
2PM: Teach-in at Chapman Square.
3PM: March to Prison Profiteers.
6PM: Reconvene at Champman for a Noise Demo @ the Justice Center (across the street from Chapman Square). This event has been organized by the September 9th coalition in Portland. Comprising the All African People’s Revolutionary Party, Black Lives Matter Portland, Portland Anarchist Black Cross, Enlace, Portland Prison Divestment Coalition, Black Rose Portland, PDX SURGE, Marilyn Buck Abolitionist Collective, Oregon Jericho, The Jericho Movement, Incarcerated Worker Organizing Committee, Northwest Alliance for Alternative Media and Education, and American Friends Service Committee.Bring banners, signs, noise makers, friends, co-workers, neighbors, family members, and more! Gather at Chapmand Square (SW 4th and Main), 2pm. From there we will march to prison profiteers in Portland and end back at Chapman Square for a Noise Demonstration at the “Justice Center” where we will send our sounds of love and solidarity to all those trapped in the white supremacist state’s cages.

*Minneapolis, Minnesota
Noise demo at the youth jail!
8:00 PM on September 10th starting from Elliot Park in Minneapolis.
Starting on September 9th, prisoners will be going on strike across the U.S. To pull it off, this strike will require support from those of us on the outside as well.
Join us to send some love to everyone behind bars. Bring noisemakers, banners, and your friends.

*Oakland, California

Friday, September 9 at 6pm-10pm PDT Mosswood Park Rec Center Oakland IWOC and our friends are planning a mass action and march on Saturday, September 10th, but before hand we want to create a space where those new to the campaign can come and learn more about is happening, and everyone involved in the mobilization can work on making banners and signs. Join us on Friday, September 9th at Mosswood Park (look for us by the amphitheater) for a BBQ, banner and sign making party, open discussion on the strike and the mobilization on the 10th, and also watch a film about the Attica Prison Uprising. Oakland IWOC also stands in solidarity with our comrades organizing the Urban Shield protest in Pleasanton the same day as well as the FICPFM Conference. We encourage people to attend these other events and join us later in the day for the BBQ to report back and cross-pollinate. *Wildwood, Florida  The primary FTP events will occur on Sept 10th at 10am in front of the Federal Correctional Complex (FCC) of Coleman, located at 846 NE 54th Terrace, Wildwood, Florida 34785.  This location is the largest prison factory in the entire country, producing material goods for government agencies nationwide. Much of the very furniture which accommodates the offices of the bureaucrats that we live under is made by prison slaves at this facility.   *Detroit, Michigan  Meet at the corner of Gratiot and St. Antoine, the proposed site for a new county jail with up to 2,000 beds -- meaning more space to send more people to prison, when instead we should be ensuring homes not jails. Bring something to make tons of noise with: drums, whistles, pots & pans, airhorns, tambourines, music, noisemakers -- anything that's loud! We'll walk from the site of the proposed new jail to the Old Wayne County Jail, handing out literature and making noise. Once there, we'll get extra amplified so those inside can hear us and know that they are not alone. Please note: There's a Tigers game that night starting at 7:10 PM. Leave ample time for traffic and parking. Free parking is available in the parking lot at Old St. John's, 2120 Russell Street off Gratiot near Eastern Market. This noise demo is just the beginning! Potluck Picnic: No New Jails! No Old Jails! Tuesday, September 13, Clark Park, 5-8 PM Bring a dish to share, plus blankets and chairs if you want them. If you're already doing a prison solidarity/abolition project, please bring info; if you want to propose a new project or organizing effort, bring your idea to share. Clark Park stage, Clark Street between Christiancy and the old YMCA, SW Detroit (rain: meet under the shelter between the stage and Scotten Street). 5:00 PM – Gather and eat 6:00 PM – Share ideas in a facilitated go-round 8:00 PM – Until we meet again! *Brooklyn, NY Sept 9 at 7pm-10pm EDT STAY TUNED! NOISE DEMONSTRATION AND SPEAK OUT! In front of MDC, on September ninth in solidarity with the #BX120 and the start of the national prisoner-led strike until all prisons fall! More information and co-sponsors TBA. Hit us up if you want to be involved, and for now SAVE THE DATE AND TIME *Los Angeles, California  Strike Against Police Terror (StrAPT) calls on prison abolitionists, community organizations, collectives, unions, workers and oppressed people to join solidarity actions for the National Prisoner's Strike on September 9th. The strike not only demands better conditions in prisons across the US and an end to prison slavery, it is also on the anniversary of the Attica prison rebellion. Open meeting August 31st at 7pm at Cielo Studios 3201 Maple Avenue. Meet near Men's Central Jail/Twin Towers (Between Vignes/Cesar Chavez & Vignes/Bauchet) 11am-3pm 2 Corner Demonstrations Teach-Ins & Workshops (Do you want to host a discussion or activity?) Tabling & Poster Making Food & Resource Share 3pm-6pm- RUSH HOUR- Speak Out, Rally, Noise Demo! Let the People Hear you! Endorsements! Have your organization endorse the event! Come thru and bring your people!  *Cincinnati, Ohio September 9th: Hamilton County Justice Center, 11 am, bring signs supporting prisoners. Contact Sonny Williams for more info: 513 751-2090. *Austin, Texas  Texas Prisoners are going on Strike! On September 9th, the anniversary of the Attica Uprising, prisoners are stopping work to shut down the system in a NATIONALLY COORDINATED STRIKE under the banner END PRISON SLAVERY. Texas Prisoners' demands include: humane living and working conditions, good time/work time , repeal of the 100 dollar medical co-pay, right to an attorney, and the formation of a TDCJ oversight committee. Lets us know if you would like to be involved! Join us outside the Texas Correctional Industries South Austin Showroom to speak out in support of the start the strike! Products distributed by TCI are exclusively made by prison slave labor and include hospital beds, furniture, janitorial supplies, tires and more. We will be picketing and hosting a speak out in support of the prisoners' demands! **** We are offering a rideshare from Monkeywrench Books in North Austin at 11 AM on September 9th. If you cannot participate in person please call: Austin TCI Showroom 512-282-7734 *Cumberland, MD Sept 9 from 8pm-12am at the Federal Correctional Institution Bring anything that makes noise! guitars, pots+pans, megaphones, etc.! This is going to be in solidarity with Maryland and Nationwide prisoners participating in the September 9th Prisoner Strike. We will set up carpools for all involved :) food + drink will also be provided, and noise making materials if you came empty handed! *Philidelphia, Pennsylvania Friday Sept 9 from 8pm-11pm EDT N48th St & Aspen St Other events near you: https://itsgoingdown.org/spreading-strike-solidarity-actions-across-north-america-september-9th/ Union Endorsements Are you in another union other than the IWW? Get your local to endorse the prisoner strike. Sample motion language can be found at:  https://docs.google.com/document/d/1QgJDD4zcAeWdv-DWcqsm1yBHuY__Ao7uAAQ92WfB2Pc/edit?usp=sharing

GROUPS SUPPORTING THE PRISONERS STRIKE

Free Alabama Movement

International Workers of the World: Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee  

Crimethinc 

Shadowproof
Support Prisoner Resistance
Milwaukee IWW
Free Jeremy Hammond 
Buffalo ARC
Project South
We Were Occupy Austin
All African People's Revolutionary Party
Black Lives Matter Portland
Portland Anarchist Black Cross
Enlace
Portland Prison Divestment Coalition
Black Rose Portland
PDX SURGE
Marilyn Buck Abolitionist Collective
Oregon Jericho
The Jericho Movement
Northwest Alliance for Alternative Media and Education
American Friends Service Committee
Conflict MN
Oakland IWOC
Strike Against Police Terror
EJ Mothers Safe Air Safe Water Force
The Campaign to Fight Toxic Prisons
Austin Anarchist Black Cross
DC IWW IWOC
Inside-Out Alliance
No New Jails, No Old Jails
IWOC NYC
The Ordinary People's Society 
The National Lawyers Guild 
Free Virginia Movement
Free Ohio Movement

 


 

Press by PAPS in support of the Sept 9th Prisoners Strike #EndPrisonSlavery

"Should Prisons Be Abolished?"
FEARocious Talk with "A1" interviews PAPS Co-Founder and IWW IWOC Media Chair, Professor Azzurra Crispino regarding prison abolition and the upcoming Sept 9, 2016 Prison Strike.  #EndPrisonSlavery

Part One

Part Two

 

Part Three

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"EX-WORKER: SEPT 9th NATIONAL PRISON STRIKE"

Crimethinc interviews PAPS Co-Founder and IWW IWOC Media Chair, Professor Azzurra Crispino regarding the upcoming Sept 9, 2016 Prisoners Strike.  #EndPrisonSlavery

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Sept 9, 2016 National Prison Strike"

SIDETRACKED with Blue Vino interviews PAPS Co-Founder and Prison Abolitionist, Leah Burris and also PAPS Member Vincent Kershaw of The Paypal 14.

Dude, Where's My Stratfor?

We have protested in front of 221 W 6th St a lot. When Free Anons  asked for solidarity events for Jeremy Hammond on his birthday after he was sentenced to 10 years for pleading guilty to one count of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) for all the hacks he allegedly committed as part of LulzSec during the Arab Spring and Occupy insurgence, we knew we could easily oblige.  I sometimes refer to it as the Building of Evil: Chase Bank, Senator John Cornyn’s offices, and of course Strategic Forecasting or Stratfor all reside here. My favorite time was the Occupy Austin street theater action placing Jaime Dimon in stocks in front of Chase Bank. The only time I got “all the way inside” was into Senator John Cornyn’s office to talk to his aides about why people are not corporations. 

Since The End of Occupy I’m usually on this particular street corner to troll Stratfor, where we have done three Jeremy Hammond birthday parties, one South by Southwest action, and a Nobody Fuck Sabu event after the snitch who ratted out Jeremy was sentenced to time served.  I transitioned from doing jail release support for Occupiers to doing prisoner solidarity for Occupiers to PAPS, and it just so happens that Jeremy will be the last of "my" Occupiers to get out - after Jay Chase, last of the NATO 5, all of the Cleveland 4 and Barrett Brown are out.  (Granted, I don’t think Barrett Brown was much of an Occupier, but we all know I support him as an accessory after the fact of the Stratfor hack, even though he’s an asshole who never writes back. But he’s a hilarious asshole, so send him some books and put money on his commissary so he can afford hooch-making supplies and opioids - like Robin Williams, he's funnier when he's high.)  Jeremy’s more of a black block anarchist and hacktivist than an Occupier to most people, but he took up space with Occupy Chicago at the intersection by BOA, Mercantile Exchange, Federal Reserve, Board of Trade - our "wall street" on LaSalle and presumably sparkled his fingers (most likely in a downward direction) while he was there. The least we can do – those of us who were Occupy Austin, and those of us who have joined in writing to Jeremy since - is throw him a birthday party in front of the Building of Evil. 

Our most glorious moment trolling Stratfor at this particular location was when they evacuated their employees out the garage entrance on January 8th, 2014. We marched straight into the front lobby with a vegan-plus-gluten-free birthday cake and a “Free Them All” banner, wanting to share. Our most glorious moment trolling Stratfor period was the Book People signing, where George Friedman decided his friendly neighborhood bookstore wasn't. Which is why I have been treating this year’s action as a bit of a “punch the clock” affair: go in, wish Jeremy a happy birthday, hand out some fliers, get some folks to sign a birthday card, go get dinner and drinks, and eventually get smashed and ignore the fact that I haven’t singlehandedly overthrown the state, abolished prisons, and ended the global intelligence-industrial complex, or even managed to really have good security practices for any of my communications.

“It will be better next year”, I tell myself silently as I accept that my vehicle of comrades will eventually get to the action – when Jeremy calls.  

“I’m half an hour late to your birthday party” I tell him when he asks me how I am. “You’re not releasing actual cats into the building?” he asks, concerned for their welfare. I’m a little annoyed – doesn’t he trust me enough to know I would never piss off the entirety of Anonymous by engaging in cat cruelty, especially in support of a prisoner particularly well known for his love of cats?  I mean, I know that I kick kittens for fun in my own spare time, but I would never do that while representing any member of LulzSec. I am tempted to shout out “Y’all we better turn back and bring these cats back to the lab where we got ’em” to see if I can get the driver to make screeching car noises, but then decide that Jeremy’s getting up there and it might be better not to give him a heart attack. I’m getting to tell him about the Bureau of Prisons hack that happened on the anniversary of the Stratfor hack, and his delight is palpable.  I listen politely as he describes the newest FCI Manchester drink craze: tea, some sort of “milk” product, and soda or kool-aid, depending on the fortitude of the drinker, which Jeremy admits he’s starting to lose now that he’s all of 31.  We agree he will call back in an hour so he can join us in front of Stratfor. 

Our comrades are already there, meowing away with “Justice 4 Bhopal” and “Happy Birthday Jeremy” banners. I was just getting into the swing of things when…

Dude, Where’s My Stratfor? 

Imagine my surprise when a security guard comes out and, effectively, tells us it's his first day and that he doesn't know why we're there. He came back out later and told us that Suite 400 is empty, but wouldn’t let us check for ourselves.  “You might as well go home, they’re not here.”

Ingenious! Tell us that Stratfor moved so that we’ll go home.  “I don’t believe you” I shouted out.  Surely this is a joke.  They didn’t move their entire corporate headquarters just to avoid our birthday party, right?

I mean, this is the Building of Evil. I don’t really care which particular reason I’m protesting outside it.  I’m sure Chase Bank finances the prison-industrial complex somehow (though I know if protesting immigrant detention centers, Wells Fargo is a far better target). If not, Senator Cornyn probably had something to do with the CFAA.  Besides, Stratfor was here when Jeremy hacked them on LulzXmas 2011. But, Jeremy’s calling in so we can sing him Happy Birthday in front of Stratfor and I don’t know where my Stratfor is. When a 1%'er loses his truck, he knows he can ask Stratfor to locate it, but as an Occupier who has lost my beloved global intelligence company, what am I to do?

Kit O’Connell jumped on the case post haste.  “Google still lists them as being at this address” he called out, “but their website both claims they have a PO box as an address and that they are open for office hours.”  Kit then began a series of funny calls to Stratfor, attempting to deliver our corporate-purchased cupcakes (we thought the home-made vegan/gluten-free had put them off our first year). This video chronicles Kit calling their tech support trying to get their address. “As you probably know, it’s Jeremy Hammond’s birthday, and we were all thinking of you on this special day so I just wanted to find out if we could what your new address was and if you would like we can bring the cupcakes by this evening” before asking for a tech support ticket number. 

This is embarrassing. We even had a National Lawyers Guild green hat lined up for this action, which is kind of a new thing to have in Austin. And we’re raising awareness in front of the wrong building? 

Our Stratfor cat box was all ready for us to pop a squat. How are we going to take our dump to celebrate Jeremy’s (data) dump in front of Stratfor if Stratfor is playing hide-and-go-seek?  Maybe I should be home answering letters instead of trolling a corporation hired to keep tabs on activists wanting to get Bhopal cleaned up or activists who want the City of Austin to have better banking practices  – what does this have to do with abolishing prisons anyway? Vince Kershaw of the PayPal14 came all the way out here with his cat just to photobomb our action, and we are not even in the right place!

Happy Birthday?

Jeremy called, right on time, and we appraised him of our cupcake flavors, as well as our current inability to locate Stratfor.  But we still sang him Happy Birthday, wherever we were: 

Video

Just wish Jeremy weren’t where he is, no matter where Stratfor is. 

Abolish Prisons! Encrypt Your Shit!  Resist!