Avalanche - The Anarchist correspondence zine Avalanche-EN-13 | страница 13
en, kids, elders, everyone, were on the streets, fighting
with nothing to lose. This was why it was so strong.
It did not stay in a small group. But now, those who
are working don’t give a fuck, or even worse, become
snitches, on the side of the State, these kids arrested
yesterday are because of snitches. But the problem is
that there are many people who would fight who are cur-
rently in prison.
The State seems to also use a very common and current
legitimation for its armed security apparatus, which is
the threat of Islamic terrorism.
This is something that started just after the revolution
and was convenient for the state, they used it well.
Immediately after the revolution, thousands of people
broke out of prison or were let out, they say that the
new government was behind this [Ghannouchi, January
15 th – February 27 th 2011]. All the more radical Islam-
ic political prisoners were then freed and armed with
weapons mostly from Libya. They were being used to
crush the revolution, both as militias and as an excuse
to implement very harsh security laws. After the fall of
this government, these people went into hiding in the
mountains or became Daesh foreign fighters. These Is-
lamic fighters took up weapons, they control the con-
traband routes from Algeria, sometimes attack police
officers and soldiers, never the people, at least in my
region. There are many young people, mostly people
that believe in sharia law. It is a pity. Some of these
fighters took this path because they felt like they want-
ed to fight but had no other choice. There is still very
religious people here.
The budget for security service, anti-terrorist and minis-
ter of internal affairs is bottomless, it seems...
You are right, there is always lots of money for repres-
sion, and never for food. People are being picked out
from the streets by the police. Anyone they don’t like is
subject to these laws. They picked up a cousin of mine,
who drinks and is definitively not a good muslim, ac-
cusing him of ties to terrorist groups. They do whatev-
er they want. Lock up, torture, anything, the terrorist
scarecrow is the perfect excuse.
How are people effected by what is happening in other
countries close by?
Libya is next door, people know about the mess going on
there. Everyone talks about this, and mostly people say
‘perhaps we didn’t take our revolution far enough, but at
least we are not in such a fucked up situation’, compared
to other countries. The adults are talking about this.
It is strange to see how Tunisia was the spark of the rev-
olutions that gave the inspiration and courage to many
countries to fight, some of those countries ended up in a
bloodbath, and now these are countries contributing to
hold back Tunisian revolutionaries for fear of end up in
civil war. A very disturbing house of mirrors…
This is why people start believing in the promise of de-
mocracy, they believe that some politicians are chang-
ing, acting more sympathetic, talking about being
against corruption. They start to forget that they are all
shit, no matter what they call themselves.
But even worse are the international multinationals that
have absolute interest in keeping things stable, but that
is also an economic topic, something that never changed
from before the revolution, that comes from the French
occupation. But these corporations also endorse this
huge security apparatus, showing that it is very impor-
tant for them that things remain stable.
The real danger, it’s the capitalists. Something that
changed is that people start liking or respecting more
rich people. I see that from my time in Europe, things
are starting to look more like each other. The capitalists
want control. Still the house of mirrors...
What is going to happen in the next days?
In my heart I want to believe that things will grow and
people will wake up. But there is a big media campaign
talking about lootings on shopping streets and burnt down
police stations. They are really creating a negative hype
against those who riot at night as gangs of delinquents.
But they are fighting the cops, not stealing from their
neighbours. They are just saying these things because
they want to justify the police’s violent intervention.
Somehow I think that from the last seven years the state
has learned a lot about how to control, calm down and
crush unrest. It is up to us to also find new way and new
determination to fight for freedom. Not let them get too
much ahead. The experiences that we made during the
revolution are important, but something went wrong, in
the sense that we are not living in freedom now. Peo-
ple here know how to fight, but are also tired of strug-
gling for survival. And if you are tired you either rest, or
you’ve had enough and you take your life back. How to
open this way?
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