GET THE READING HERE: ZINE OR SCREEN, AUDIO, CAMAS BOOKS’ FREE BOX, or EMMA’S FREE LIBRARIES AROUND TOWN.
Facilitators should note the Facilitation Guide.
“We are not less than the workers of the Paris Commune… They lasted 70 days and we are still here since a year and a half.” – Omar Aziz
Next time, we will be reading The Formation of Local Councils: To Live in Revolutionary Time (2012) by the martyred Syrian anarchist Omar Aziz. This foundational, strategic proposal inspired Local Councils in large swathes of Syria during the Syrian revolution against the Assad regime. Local Councils provides insights relevant to all anarchists and anti-authoritarians organizing for a more just society.
“Our hope is that by translating and distributing this text to make more visible the Syrian revolution, which has so often been denied or conflated with the armed groups that share its territories. Often leftists who support the Assad regime or anarchists who support the YPG/PYD will ask things like, “Are there really liberatory groups in these areas? What are their names? What are their ideas?” as if the organization of daily life needed a name, a website, and an English-language spokesperson to exist.” – Translator’s Introduction
You can learn more about Omar Aziz and his legacy here.
As always, we meet at Camas Books, 2620 Quadra Street, on Lekwungen Territory. Our meeting is Sunday May 25th @ 6:30PM.
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PS: Our friends at the Anarchist Network of “Vancouver Island” have put together a list of anarchist and adjacent projects on the territory. If you are looking to involve yourself in anarchist activism, look at their trifold! Particularly, Food not Bombs serves free vegan food for revolution every Sunday 4-6PM at Spirit “Centennial” Square and have been facing increasing harassment tied to the gentrification of the Square. Come show up to eat! They also need help from volunteers.
GET THE READING PORTION HERE: 
Remembrance Day, in “Canadian” national mythology, signals the end of World War 1, an imperialist travesty where the ruling classes of France, Germany, England, Italy, Austria-Hungary and Russia fomented war fever against each other, which also distracted from and weakened working class uprisings in their countries, harnessing energy instead towards squabbles over imperial carve-out rivalries globally. As Canada’s then Prime Minister Robert Borden saw it, the fight in supporting the British, was “to put forth every effort and to make every sacrifice necessary to ensure the integrity and maintain the honour of our empire.”
Next time, we will be discussing Sobre la violencia en una época de catástrofes AKA About violence in a time of catastrophes (2023). We will also be pairing it with an excerpt, Chapter 7: Trusting, from Worth Fighting For: Bringing the Rojava Revolution Home. (2023)
Spilling over from our last conversation on Turning Away from The State, we decided to revisit the classic Accomplices Not Allies: Abolishing the Ally Industrial Complex (2014) by Indigenous Action (now Indigenous Abolition), and to pair it with Peter Gelderloos’ Debunking the myths around nonviolent resistance (2020).
In solidarity with Palestinians, and our comrades on the frontlines at People’s Park and across Turtle Island, we will be reading Why the State Can’t Compromise with the Movement in Solidarity with Gaza from Crimethinc and Enclosures of Possibility: The University & The Encampment from UBC. We ask folks to read these pieces ahead of time.
For our next reading, we are going to be reviewing what happened during the Occupy movement of 2011 in order to gain insight for the current student occupations happening across North America in solidarity with Palestine. The reading can be obtained here: 
Join us for a discussion of Palestinian anarchist Mohammed Bamyeh’s article on the 2010-12 uprisings that swept through north Africa and the middle east, overthrowing dictatorships in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya.
We were so inspired by reading Andrew Cornell’s history of the Movement for a New Society that we decided to explore the conversations associated with the movement. Please read the following reflective sections regarding MNS theory and praxis for the next gathering. You can find the reading here: