First of all, while the title sounds cool, I’m not sure that hinting at killing all data is really sensible; some of it is quite useful, although it is a German publication so it may have lost something in translation. Considering the content of the magazine, it could be inspired by the character Data from Star Trek the Next Generation, which would quite impress me. The cover is a grey monolith of what looks like an oil rig. Most of the pictures look like this. It does make the feel of the magazine rather miserable, even the picture of the VW van in black and white made it kind of miserable. The writing is largely in two large columns that get close to the sides. I did once criticise a publication for having only one column and the writing almost on the edges, making it difficult to read. This isn’t anything like as bad, but it would still be better in three columns and allowing more space at the sides. I know colour is more expensive and detrimental to the environment, and not using all available space for print could be seen as wasteful, but there are reasons for the judicious use of colour and space. It says on the cover it is a magazine for noise and politics. The noise is most definitely that of the free party scene, and the politics is largely that of historical anarchist theory and the free party scene. However, while the feature pieces are almost completely dominated by those subjects, it does have other things in it too, making it quite a mixed bag and having something of interest to pretty much any British or German Anarcho-type, so I’ve ended up reviewing it almost piece by piece.

Following an introduction page which was largely a repetition of the contents page in sentences, it started very strongly for me. There was a good and thorough enough news round up of the things that would concern activist types- undercover police, new police powers and weapons, the ‘War on Terror’ and state surveillance. There is also a slightly longer piece about the problem of neo-Nazis in Germany apparently being allowed to get away with rather a lot; possibly a large number of racist murders, as part of the tendency of the German Government to downplay any problems with right-wing extremism. There was a page of UK anti-fascist news round-up which seemed quite comfortable with making probably reasonable criticisms of what is happening in UK anti-fascist circles- the main difficulty expressed here that one group is allowing the leaders of one particular mosque in London to set the agenda, which seems to mean shutting out anyone they don’t like, such as feminists, secular Muslims, LGBT people etc. There are also a couple of pages on the scandal of the way rape claims have been dealt with within the SWP and how well- or rather badly- it and its off-shoots are doing in general these days. I thought it was informative and pretty good analysis.

My favourite was the 12 page article by a man who got caught up in a politically motivated tangle over a play he put on in Uganda as part of his work there that was dealing with gay issues. The introduction detailed how he, an English, privately educated man, came to live in Uganda, something of the political history of Uganda, and how it was he decided to produce this play- not necessarily as stupid as you might think, given the usual publicity around the treatment of gay rights in Uganda. As a general rule, people on the ground don’t really care too much, and the authorities only get involved if they notice- in this case they were told about it by people annoyed with the producer for not giving them parts in the play. The play wasn’t exactly about gay issues, it just happened that one of the protagonists being gay was used as a plot device to betray him and bring about his downfall in the end. It was as much about the political history of Uganda and the way politics and people are used by people who want power and prestige. The twists and turns of the story which resulted in the producer being imprisoned in inevitably poor conditions and deported to England, separating him from his wife and children are too much to go into here. However, it really was a very interesting insight into the way that justice works and gay rights are seen in Uganda, and how it is used by the Ugandan Government. While there are some mad people- including the First Lady and a very strange pastor who claims that gay men like to eat faeces- who want to wipe all gay men from the face of the Earth, the Ugandan Government only really threaten to make being gay punishable by death when they want something from the international community, say ignoring Uganda invading the Congo to steal another diamond mine, or less noise made about corruption. When they get what they want, it gets pushed back to the bottom of the agenda again. Gay men are largely treated like an eccentric uncle, and while this is not ideal, the situation for gay men in particular in Uganda is not as bad as one might think in normal daily life. The writer argues that it would be foolish to push too much for gay rights as it puts the people on the defensive, and distracts from much bigger, more real problems for Ugandans in general, such as, in 2013, the removal of the right to assembly, and the fact that this issue dominates international politics where Uganda is concerned is very bad for the average Ugandan.

There were then two articles about the free party scene of the nineties in Britain, one an interview with a man behind Spiral Tribe, and one about the Criminal Justice Act passed in the mid-nineties in response to the free party scene. This was interesting to me because I know almost nothing about it, and it was certainly interesting to be reminded that even having fun separately from the capitalist system and Government can be seen as such a threat that it can be turned into a perfect storm of media hate resulting in laws passed to limit free parties.

Next was an article starting with lots of the brave new world of technology that is obviously very scary to pretty much all activists- cloning, GM, nano-tech etc. There was then a run through of the possible versions of the future that are normally proposed; give up and just carry on with your life as best you can, embrace the technology, hope that we can achieve a sustainable way of living for all, primitivism and finally, what is called here, hypercapital, basically an extension into the future of the capitalist system we have now. It concludes that basically, we can’t know or decide the future because there are far too many variables and far too many groups, all with massively varying amounts of power. It is also far too late to stop the worst happening. All we can really do is keep with our principles and practise, take them into the future and hope to pass them on to the people who have to live it. This didn’t seem too bad, but it was rather overwritten, making it a little difficult to get at what it was trying to say. It was also a bit too emotive I thought, for example, “We must speak to the storm from our place of power.” I’m not sure why, but this kind of language when discussing how we need to deal with things like this does bother me. I’m a very emotional person but I’m not sure this really helps.

It really went downhill for me with the next piece, entitled , Wikipedia: A Vernacular Encylopedia (Datacide Version). You would be forgiven for thinking this was about Wikipedia, and the introduction certainly looked like it. It talked about how this was a by the people for the people project. It then spent most of the rest of the article talking about how historically rebel groups often informed themselves using study groups and taught themselves to read so they could pass on information and skills. I was confused for a while and wondered what this had to do with Wikipedia. In the end, the conclusion admitted, not much. The only connection is that it is by the people for the people, it’s not even about being subversive, and really the writer seemed more interested in showing off his knowledge of rebel history and saying, “yeah, we may have Wikipedia now, but Anarchists did it first and better.” I wouldn’t mind so much if he was just saying in the first place he was writing about the history of rebels passing info on underground networks, and didn’t bother mentioning Wikipedia at all. It just seemed like a cheap shot at something not Anarchist that certain Anarchists like to make because they think they are superior. I find this kind of attitude unhelpful to the Anarchist movement as a whole because it makes it more difficult to connect with people in general, and if we are to make things better, we need to be prepared to connect with people who aren’t us, and stop assuming that anyone who doesn’t fit our ideal is inferior and not worth bothering with.

There was then a page of poetry and prose about sex. All seemed rather pretentious to me. Anyone who can use more than twenty words I’ve never heard of on one side of A4 is spending far too much time alone with a twelve volume dictionary. Then a bizarre and depressing futuristic short story about renegade sexbots trying to be free. Written by the same person. I’m sensing a theme. Next a series of pieces called Cut up Marx. This was columns of words from pages of Marxist writing. I really did not see the point of this. I was never a fan of Marx anyway; this wasn’t giving me any insight or help at all. Then, by the same writer, there was Impressionistic notes on Pierre Goyutat’s Tomb for 500,000 Soldiers. I looked this up because I had no idea what it was, and it turned out to be a book about intense sex and violence. Theme ongoing. I made a genuine attempt to read this, but once I was through 3/4 of a page and saw I had over a page left to read, I gave up. Impressionistic notes are possibly not my thing. One pulled out at random, “The second coming? Meaningful only to necrophiliacs.” Perhaps I need to read the book. I’m guessing this is some comment on the nature of the followers of Jesus, but I’m not sure how this adds to any debate about religion. I really think there are better ways, if you want to be taken seriously. It’s certainly not accessible to many people.

I looked at the next piece and really started to think I couldn’t manage any more. I more or less left it for a month, and once I finally filed my tax return I had no more excuses left, so I did, as I promised myself, read the first page, just to see if I really wanted to read an 18 page piece comparing two books about two political theorists I had never heard of. I didn’t. I did gather that the intent was to show that the arguments presented to support the premise of one of the books actually showed the opposite, and that the other book supported this. It was again, overwritten, and as far as I could see, mostly interested in showing off the cleverness of the writer and his knowledge of historical political theory. The books are; Max Horkenheimer and the Foundations of the Frankfurt School by John Abromeit and The Sociology of Theodor Adorno by Matthias Benzer, in case you’re interested. I am sorry my dedication to reviewing failed at this point and I am therefore not in a position to tell you how well this was argued, but I have things to do in my life and really felt this was time I was not going to get back.

Happily, it turned out this was a rock bottom moment and it got much better thereafter. There followed three page long reviews of books of interest to political activists of the Anarchist persuasion. The first is Life During Wartime: Resisting Counterinsurgency, a collection of articles saying that tactics used by the US Government in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are also being used by the authorities in the US mainland against political dissidents and activists. I’ll be honest, I’m kind of thinking, “duh” on that one. The second is One Night in Stammheim, a book claiming that the final deaths in prison of Baader Mienhof group members were murders, not suicide as officially claimed. The third was White Power Music- Scenes of Extreme Right Cultural Resistance, about the music that the extreme right listen to. All the reviews were quite interesting, and seemed pretty well thought through and reasonably critical, if again having a tendency to being overwritten. I was particularly interested by the one about the Baader Meinhof group because I don’t know much about them, and the reviewer, while quite comfortable with the likelihood of the murder hypothesis, felt the evidence was over played and was keen to point out that there were other problems that were important to consider in this sorry episode. I found this analysis interesting and informative.

Next up was another interview with someone from the free party scene of the nineties. I only read one page of this four page piece, feeling I had got all I wanted on this subject, but great if that’s what you’re into. Then record reviews, all of the free party nature; great if you’re a DJ or just into that music. Then some press reviews of alternative political magazines, mostly German, one British and one French which were quite interesting and which left me informed about them.

The last article, Vinyl Meltdown, was interesting because it talked about the Muzak label, which I hadn’t realised was a genuine label that was all about selling music to hotels, restaurants, factories and so on. It was all about the right music to increase profit, the use of music in factories, in particular to increase productivity. It did then go a bit into how this kind of music was subverted by DJs in the free party scene, which was slightly less interesting. Unfortunately this had one of the problems of the Wikipedia piece; the introduction and conclusion didn’t seem to connect very well with the main article. It was introduced with a bit about the fact that vinyl sales have gone down a lot and it’s all on computer these days, and concluded by saying that we shouldn’t get too worked up about it because we can just find other ways of subverting the virtual world of music. I’m sure this is true, but it wasn’t what most of the article was about, and the link was rather tenuous.

There was then a page detailing Datacide activities. I was quite amused to see that aside from doing the London Anarchist Bookfair and an event of political discussion and parties to launch Datacide Twelve, the activities were pretty much all putting on parties. It finished with a list of charts of the type of music you want to know about if you do free parties a lot, and a cartoon which I thought was not very nice and kind of rubbish, although it did remind me a bit of a few Anarchists I’ve encountered. It featured a woman who asked a man for the time, he didn’t have a watch, she went off on some random rant about the evils of capitalism, he felt ashamed, then she robbed him at knife point, the end. Not that I’ve been robbed at knife point by any Anarchists you understand, but I’ve known a few who will go off on some random righteous rant, then having blindsided you will do something quite horrid themselves. Perhaps the cartoonist is feeling bitter, or it could be some clever satire on Anarchists or people who abuse the name of Anarchist. I’ll be honest, I have no idea, but it seemed an odd cartoon to put in an Anarchist publication, and more the kind of view that the Daily Mail would have on the subject.

On the whole I would say for a publication that is yearly, it is a pretty good round up of anything of interest to the many shades of Anarchist that I personally know. I felt it gave me information I would not otherwise have known and often added to what I already knew. Most people will find several things in it that are not of interest to them, with the proviso that it really is heavy on the party scene and historical Anarchist history and theory. Also, a significant number of the writers need guidance on writing simple sentences using words well known by the general populace. There’s no point writing something if few people can understand it. Most people who haven’t anything to do with activism, as well as plenty who have, would struggle with a lot of the content. This may seem strange, but I think it’s worth making information about Anarchist interests accessible to people who aren’t Anarchists too; although if you are, it’s well worth a look.

PS. I apologise to any writer in this who feels a bit targeted, but I am certain I have never met you, never heard of you and therefore do not know you. Please don’t take it personally, I’d only judge you personally from your writing if you were a Daily Mail columnist, and even then I tend to want a bit more than just what they write.

February 2014 will see the Sochi Winter Olympics happening in Russia, our favourite liberty-free landmass of the moment. Premier Vladimir 'Ra-Ra-Rasp' Putin is giving backhanded compliments to gay athletes and attendees, saying that they are welcome, but should "leave the children alone". We're not sure if he is insinuating that all gay people are paedophiles, which is absurd and untrue (and of course, no straight person could ever be a child molester), or if he’s quoting from Pink Floyd's Another Brick in The Wall, although he appears to be the one building the walls himself, even if he is a few bricks short. Macho Man Vlad clearly feels that the onslaught of punk rocking women, environmental protesters and now the gays all pose a threat to his manhood. We're fairly sure that none of them want to go anywhere near his manhood if they can help it. It is uncertain which team Putin plays for, but he's clearly covering his Olympic ring.

Of course, it isn't clear where Putin stands on bisexuals, and if any will be participating in the biathlon. Although he granted the prisoners a pardon, perhaps it was Putin's intention to use the various activists that he had incarcerated as part of the proceedings? Pussy Riot could have put on an awesome opening ceremony, their knitwear-based angry rock anthems rousing the spectators to a furious uproar. The Arctic 30 would make great targets for the shooting or archery events, while gay people could be used as markers in the bob-sleigh, as it's clear Putin would like to sleigh them all, given the chance. He's a good sport like that, and lives by the Olympic principles of fair play and equality, and is definitely not a cretinous, oppressive hypocrite.

The Greenpeace activists may also be skating on thin ice, but don't worry, it will melt soon if the gas and oil companies get their way. Best to put them under lock and ski!

Ed Snowden could even put in an appearance, as he has plenty of hurdles to overcome before he's repatriated. We're not sure that all of these are winter sports, but that doesn't matter, none of this is based on fact, apart from Putin being a mad, homophobic, dissent-hating oligarch. Let's hope he doesn't get 'luge' mixed up with 'lube'! Imagine one of those sledges covered in lubricated jelly soaring down your cold crevasse! It's all going downhill fast - dasvidanya!

SIDNEY STREET-PORTER

Peachy is one year old and to celebrate a year's worth of debauchery and hedonism they're putting on Peachy, A Year in the Making- The First Birthday Affair.

Not only is it Jacob Solstice's EP launch, but there'll also be a command performance from the Furher of Swing Frank Sanazi as well as a fire show by Peachy regulars Miracle Cyanied Productions, massage by Radha Rose and sets by the resident Peachy DJ's

The Now or Never! Film Club will be there too, showing a selection of Video Nazis

All this and more, Friday, 29th November at The Waterfront, Norwich for a mere £4.50 on the door, £3.50 N.U.S.

Crit-hop pioneers Makings of a Maniac released their debut single so that wer all bullshit then? a couple of weeks ago  (sorry guys!) amid reports of an exceptionally high number of graduates unable to find meaningful employment in a system that appears to be collapsing.

The northern duo mix Critical Theory with spoken word poetry, and set it to funk-infused hip-hop beats.
Originally from Doncaster, South Yorkshire, this unlikely crit-hop duo now reside and perform in Manchester. For more information, dates and bookings email makingsofamaniac@gmail.com or find them on Facebook

On Saturday 5th October, from 4 until 7pm in the Coffee Lounge of Manvers Street Baptist Church in Bath (a minute's walk from Bath Spa train station), the Black And Red Federation will be organising a discussion on anarchism, and invite members of the public to come along and take part. The group feels that recent government policy and business lobbyists have made the UK a better place for millionaires and rightwing politicians, but an increasingly uncertain and unhealthy place for everyone else.

Anarchism has received a bad press ever since its birth 173 years ago, with anarchists forced into stereotypes of either violent thugs or sandal-footed hippies – caricatures repeated by both the media and political establishment on one side, but also by self-proclaimed anarchists on the other. But many anarchists see it differently: the philosophy has come a long way since its roots amongst the Taoists of ancient China and the Christian Anabaptists of 16th Century Europe, promoting mutual respect, equality and rationality, and opposing oppression wherever it appears. Indeed, anarchism had become a mass movement of hundreds of thousands of everyday people fighting for and winning freedom from the 1920s to the 1930s in the Ukraine, Spain and Korea, however briefly. Far from embracing destruction and chaos, anarchists say that 'Anarchism is Order'!

In Bath on Saturday, a handful of local speakers will make short presentations on the ideas and history of this important but controversial political philosophy, before breaking down into longer group sessions where all present are invited to discuss and offer their two cents. The group will ask whether, in this current climate of biting austerity and growing global unrest, anarchists and their ideas have any role to play?

Entry is free, food and hot drinks will be available, as will stalls of literature, and all are welcome to come along and join them on the day! This will be the first in a series of talks this year.  https://network23.org/barf

We're extra excited about our film club at Peachy this month for a couple of reasons. Firstly, thanks to a new deal  with The Waterfront and the UEA Student Union,  there'll be a new, lower admission price- so from now on you'll be able to enjoyour rancid films for just £4.50 on the door and £3.50 NUS.

Furthermore,  guests at  Peachy will have full access to the UEA's biggest student night The A-List which takes place downstairs every month. Add to that the best bar prices in town and we think it's going to be a really unbeatable night out.

This month features, amongst other things,  DJ Jonny Megabyte (who also runs Palm Springs at The Lounge in Norwich on occasional Friday nights) and entertainment from Miracle Cyanied. But here's the bit we're shitting our faces off about; this month as well as a triple-bill of out of this world drive in masterworks,  we'll be showing sci-fi shorts accompanied by an alternate electro soundtrack from Catnip and Claws .

Peachy:Attack of the 50 Foot Peach is this Friday, 27th September, 10pm - 3am at The Waterfront, Norwich. Did we mention it's now only £4.50/£3.50NUS? Awesome.

Check out a sneak preview of what's in store....

With well over fifty million registered war gamers online, and six out of ten of the top selling video games of all time being of the war game genre, with huge numbers regularly ‘playing’ on a daily basis, and two generations now well and truly weaned, this article is going to be about as popular as jugs of Shandy being served up at Oktoberfest, but here goes:

That is really just the point; when a thing in society is gradually installed into the mainstream it eventually becomes very normalised in the mindset of the populous, this is the work of the hidden persuaders of PR and marketing who have learned our human condition so well that they could literally once again find a way to successfully promote and reinstate smoking in pubs and work places!

You have got to hand it to these devilish so and sos,  when it comes to designing these ‘games’, by working directly with the government, top military advisors, as well as the very best people in psychology, through years of research they know very well exactly what makes us tick and turns us on.

Yes indeed, do they know how to make these games appeal?!  Pure adrenaline and turbo charged glorification of violence, allows the gamer to be a real testosterone fuelled hero of a man anytime on demand.

These wicked games have certainly come a long way since the pioneering days when Space Invaders was about as hardcore as it ever got.

But it is the political message which is clearly the underlying agenda here, yes people, these dastardly demons don’t just want your cash- they claim part of your loving being every time you grab your controller to play Call of Duty or Medal of Honour.

If this is beginning to sound exaggerated (and I know it must) it is simply because these games have become so normalised and thus seemingly innocuous, much like that seventies Marlboro cowboy on Formula 1 billboards and his unspoken promise of sex appeal and good health.  

With this ‘militainment’ any wimpy kid who has never even been in a real fist fight can feel like an invincible all American chisel jawed hero saving the planet from the… erm, ‘bad guys’.

American ‘heroes’ and pro Americanism feature heavily, the message here being, ‘support the West’s plans for one world order, revel in the prospect of endless war’

What these games never contain is the horrendous realities of war such as 170 million slaughtered in modern warfare, the bombing of residential areas with up to a million civilians killed in Iraq, the horror of the Fallujah depleted uranium babies and the illegal and shameful use of phosphorus by the us military- these games are truly tools of propaganda creating a distorted reality in a world where freethinkers now account for a mere 5% of the population, and where many have a twisted understanding of true courage.

Apparently official studies indicate that playing violent games in no way encourages actual violent tendencies in gamers. These findings suggest they do however desensitise players to violence, but regardless, the truth is these games certainly do NOT promote philanthropy, compassion or love for our world, but just MAY indirectly encourage lovely family-friendly days out at the newly opened RAF Waddington drone base.

Realistically, can we expect war gamers addicted to atrocities and the latest technological fire power, to be well equipped for any independent, ethical and political views regarding real world conflicts?

It was found that Norwegian mass murderer Anders Breivik regularly played war games for six hours or longer per day, a few days after this information was released in the news it was quickly played down by the marionette media, no doubt due to the type of editorial pressures and constraints dictated from the very top that we very seldom learn of, and ultimately because of the enormous value of the marketplace that the story could potentially jeopardise.

The Guardian recently published an article ‘Are war video games military training tools?’- I would suggest they are at very least indirect tools for war, which cleverly glamourise killing with the kinds of macho imagery that guys aspire to, girls will be turned on by, and mums will desire to buy. What we have here is modern day propaganda at its most cunningly polished, so much so as to be almost invisible.

Ultimately real men don’t need guns, recently Bradley Manning was sentenced to 35 years for revealing the truth about war, proof if ever it was needed that war serves big business, under banners of freedom and justice, and all the while these ‘fantasy games’, which are evermore submerged in current and real world political situations, are directly implicit in engineering consent for those wars.

Whether guy or gal I say find more constructive ways to ‘man up’ and entertain yourself, next time you are forced into a Tesco for instance, you would be doing absolutely nothing wrong in simply ‘misplacing’ a stack of ‘gears of war’ in with the frozen pizza, and if a member of staff does see you just give a peace weirdo’s look and say it is in order to ‘cool the flames of war’.

The extent of these problems are more deep rooted than most are aware of, and so huge as to be almost overwhelming, going way beyond the game publishers or developers, right to the top in the world’s controlling elite. Don’t let these authoritarian overlords steal your love with their fear and control, don’t get addicted to the trauma, help regain the balance in these dangerous times- away from this destructive path man is now on, femininity does NOT equal weakness, it is sad so many women should confuse this and sell out their opposite, subtle yet equally powerful female strengths to the aggressions of man, women need not act like men, it is this which has damaged humanity and has made our world more dangerous.

Those responsible, the mind controllers even have ways to make you believe it’s YOU coming up with this or that great idea, you’re SO smart… Be aware of this control agenda on how we think, what we buy, who we support, not only in the media but throughout  the entire world of entertainment, where our defences are dropped and we’re more susceptible to manipulation.

Grow-up, put away your toy soldiers and see beyond the patriarchy that surrounds us, and work towards a more healthy state of balance and a better, safer future for the world.