The Freedom Shop Aotearoa

In late February, early March Ryan Conrad from Against Equality will be visiting the country. Currently events are planned in Auckland, Wellington and Dunedin. Details of events are on Aotearoa Indymedia . If you would like him to visit your town, send us an email and we will see what can be arranged. Against Equality Against Equality (AE) is an online archive, publishing, and arts collective focused on critiquing mainstream gay and lesbian politics. AE are "committed to dislodging the centrality of equality rhetoric and challenging the demand for inclusion in the institution of marriage, the US military, and the prison industrial complex via hate crimes legislation." In March 2014 many of the resources and pamphlets were put together into one book - Against Equality . Ryan has described it as " the culmination of many years of collective work that challenges the celebratory discourse around gay marriage, gays in the military, and LGBTQ inclusive hate crime legislati

In late February, early March Ryan Conrad from Against Equality will be visiting the country. Currently events are planned in Auckland, Wellington and Dunedin. Details of events are on Aotearoa Indymedia . If you would like him to visit your town, send us an email and we will see what can be arranged. Against Equality Against Equality (AE) is an online archive, publishing, and arts collective focused on critiquing mainstream gay and lesbian politics. AE are "committed to dislodging the centrality of equality rhetoric and challenging the demand for inclusion in the institution of marriage, the US military, and the prison industrial complex via hate crimes legislation." In March 2014 many of the resources and pamphlets were put together into one book - Against Equality . Ryan has described it as " the culmination of many years of collective work that challenges the celebratory discourse around gay marriage, gays in the military, and LGBTQ inclusive hate crime legi

The Freedom Shop Collective invites you to a discussion of grassroots strategy, organisation and issues for the left in the wake of the continuing failure of electoral politics. This is an opportunity to discuss how the activist left can make progress at this time, after a general decline in its impacts.  What are our strengths and weaknesses? Can we learn from history or do we need to re-invent our movement? What issues and strategies should we consider? When: 7pm, Tuesday, 25 November 2014 Where: 19 Tory Street, Wellington We are inviting speakers from a variety of left groups to give a short presentation on this theme, followed by general discussion. Contact us at FreedomShopAotearoa@gmail.com .

The Freedom Shop Collective invites you to a discussion of grassroots strategy, organisation and issues for the left in the wake of the continuing failure of electoral politics. This is an opportunity to discuss how the activist left can make progress at this time, after a general decline in its impacts.  What are our strengths and weaknesses? Can we learn from history or do we need to re-invent our movement? What issues and strategies should we consider? When: 7pm, Tuesday, 25 November 2014 Where: 19 Tory Street, Wellington We are inviting speakers from a variety of left groups to give a short presentation on this theme, followed by general discussion. Contact us at FreedomShopAotearoa@gmail.com .

Film Screening and Discussion on the Bogey of the 'Boat People' People around the world mourned the tragedy of Lampedusa when several hundred people drowned after their boat capsized only a few hundred metres off the coast of the Italian Island. But deaths at sea of people seeking asylum should not be news. Hundreds of people seeking asylum have already drowned in the Mediterranean and hundreds have drowned in the waters between Indonesia and Australia. Just the week before Lampedusa nearly 80 people drowned making the journey to Australia. However, instead of welcoming and assisting refugees, the focus both in Europe and this part of the world is to prevent the arrival of asylum seekers – irrespective of the 1951 UN Convention on Refugees. Australia has a particularly bad record and now has the dubious honour of practising both mandatory detention and mandatory exclusion for all asylum seekers; if the NZ National Government has its way here, we will be following suit and in th

Film Screening and Discussion on the Bogey of the 'Boat People' People around the world mourned the tragedy of Lampedusa when several hundred people drowned after their boat capsized only a few hundred metres off the coast of the Italian Island. But deaths at sea of people seeking asylum should not be news. Hundreds of people seeking asylum have already drowned in the Mediterranean and hundreds have drowned in the waters between Indonesia and Australia. Just the week before Lampedusa nearly 80 people drowned making the journey to Australia. However, instead of welcoming and assisting refugees, the focus both in Europe and this part of the world is to prevent the arrival of asylum seekers – irrespective of the 1951 UN Convention on Refugees. Australia has a particularly bad record and now has the dubious honour of practising both mandatory detention and mandatory exclusion for all asylum seekers; if the NZ National Government has its way here, we will be following suit and in th

"Fire Your Boss!"... "Abolish the wage system!" On the centenary of the Great Strike of 1913, we invite you to listen to the voices of the ' Industrial Workers of the World ' . Started in 1905 under the motto “ an injury to one is an injury to all ” , the IWW was the only union open to all trades and to men and to women; and the only union (past and present) to state “ it is the historic mission of the working class to do away with capitalism. ”    An IWW branch was established in Wellington in 1907, and IWW members were involved in many of the early militant labour unions and struggles here , including the Great Strike. The Wobblies (1979; Stewart Bird, Deborah Shaffer) provides an overview of the IWW (Industrial Workers of the World), complete with archival footage, loads of interviews, Wobbly art and songs . Further information about events organised in Wellington to mark the 1913 Great Strike can be found here: http://1913greatstrike.org/ Wh

Mining and drilling is experiencing a resurgence with plans for more open cast mines and deep sea oil drilling rearing their ugly heads. Join us to see a film that tells a story of resistance against Rio Tinto, one of the world’s biggest mining companies. The Coconut Revolution is the story of the extraordinary struggle of the Bougainville Revolutionary Army for their land, their culture and their independence – against an overwhelming Papua New Guinea army, backed by the Australian government and the billions of Rio Tinto. Friday, 20 September 2013, 6:30pm at the People’s Cinema, 57 Manners St, Wellington

Rebellion (Original: L'Ordre et la Morale) Mathieu Kassovitz says his first film La Haine was about police brutality, while Rebellion is about government brutality. “It’s April 1988 on the Ouvéa Island in the French colony of New Caledonia. 30 police are kidnapped by Kanak separatists and in response 300 special-forces operatives are sent in to restore order. To avoid unnecessary conflict, Philippe Legorjus (Mathieu Kassovitz), the captain of an elite counter-terrorism police unit, is sent in to the heart of the rebel base to negotiate a peaceful solution. But against the highly pressured backdrop of presidential elections in France, the stakes are high and all bets are off. Mathieu Kassovitz (La Haine) makes a powerful comeback in front of and behind the camera with this violent thriller, based on true events.” Craig Grobler, The EstablishingShot . Friday, 16 August 2013, 6:30pm at the People’s Cinema, 57 Manners St.

We are hosting a film screening and discussion evening on Friday, 21 June at the People’s Cinema. On June 13, parliament passed the Immigration Amendment Bill into law - just in time for World Refugee Day on June 20. The new law allows the mass detention of groups of asylum seekers, should they ever manage to arrive in here. The changes bring New Zealand in line with Australia’s much condemned mandatory offshore detention regime. On top of that, earlier this year John Key signed an agreement with Julia Gillard to take 150 asylum seekers off Australia, further reducing New Zealand’s already small annual quota of 750 UN refugees and making New Zealand complicit in Australia’s human rights violations. In order to show what mass detention looks like, we will screen the documentary “No Advantage: Inside Australia’s Offshore Processing Centres”, which exposes the conditions inside the detention centres on Nauru and Manus Island. When: Friday, June 21, 2013, 6:30pm Where: People’s Cinema, 57