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BitTorrent Now Available: 'Route Irish' Documentary - Come and Seed
national |
anti-war / imperialism |
feature
Friday November 23, 2007 13:03 by ec - Revolt Video Grey Squad
'Internet!, Video!, Seed!' sez Wag. 'Sounds kinky. I'll have some of that.' 'Route Irish', a feature length verité/essay film on the campaign(s) against Irish facilitation of the US/UK Invasion of Iraq, is now available for bittorrent download. The torrent file is available for download at this torrent link: Route.Irish.DivX.avi.torrent. Please seed the torrent as much as you can for as long as you can. You can find detailed information about the film and some high resolution screenshots from it here. This is the first time a feature length Irish documentary has been distributed primarily through P2P technology and it needs your help for it to work out. You can also help the film on its way by spreading the word that it is available for downloading beyond the Indymedia Ireland community. The file fits neatly onto a CDR. Burn it and spread it around that way too. Continue to the rest of the article for assistance if you are unfamiliar with the use of bittorrent and need some help to download. If you are unfamiliar with BitTorrent please go to this page at Pirate Bay for a simple guide to setting yourself up to download and share material through BitTorrent. Where they say 'download a torrent from the piratebay' - replace with 'download the 'route irish torrent from indymedia.ie'. All the rest is the same. 'Azureus' is very simple and straightforward to use and is available for PC and Mac. For viewing you can use VLC. It is available as a free download for Mac and PC here. Thanks to those who have been assisting with this. The film is free. If you want to support this kind of initiative you could make a donation to Indymedia Ireland or Revolt Video. If you hold a screening please leave details in the comments here. Copies of the film without the voice-over commentary are available to interested parties within the broad activist community which uses and contributes to the development of Revolt Video and Indymedia Ireland. It is hoped that those who disagree with the personal analysis/version of events put forward by 'Route Irish', or find it unsatisfactory, or want to improve it, will take it upon themselves to version this slice of history. You can contact the editor of the film at ecrudden (at) gmail (dot) com. route.irish.divx.avi.torrent 0.05 Mb
by ec Wed Nov 28, 2007 18:26
thanks for the suggestion rahood. I'll make an mp3 and put it somewhere.
by ec Thu Nov 29, 2007 01:24
Managed in my innocence of p2p etc to muddle through and get torrent file uploaded to mininova and son of shun and downloads got busier very very quickly -
by Seán Ryan Thu Nov 29, 2007 06:27
Managed to upload it.
by loninappleton Thu Nov 29, 2007 19:15 lon at athenet dot net
Just saw this at OBT.
by hamish - www.undercurrents.org Thu Nov 29, 2007 20:34
Its posted on http://visionontv.net as well as a torrent.
by ec Thu Nov 29, 2007 21:34
I have a very hi quality as per vision on guidelines version on the way - it's taking me auld mac a long long time to output it.
by ec Thu Nov 29, 2007 22:00
I suppose it's part of trying to do this kind of thing. Registered at both. Posts get bumped off.
by Miriam Fri Nov 30, 2007 01:56
Niall said/quoted
by S. Aerobics Fri Nov 30, 2007 13:50
by From memory Fri Nov 30, 2007 14:50
Peace camp intitiated as an all women's weekend peace camp by Mary Kelly and others around Christmas 02 involving at least one woman veteran of Greenham (seen speaking on Route Irish thanking men taking up the eventual invitation to join following the intital weekend). Doubt it was the product of a lot of strategising....
by ec Fri Nov 30, 2007 15:35
"From my search of the indymedia archives the first mention of the Peace Camp is found at the Second Grassroots Gathering, which took place in Cork in the spring of 2002.
by S. Aerobics Sat Dec 01, 2007 15:43
"The peace camp [was] initiated by some veterans of Greenham Common..."
by Conor Cregan - Cosantori Siochana Sat Dec 01, 2007 21:08
As one of the many founding members of the Shannon Peace Camp I think I am in good position to give the definitive history on the debate of the “who and how” the peace camp started. Of course this is really only my point of view. Please feel free to challenge me. Apologies if I don't mention you but there were hundreds of people who came and went during this period.
by Conor Sat Dec 01, 2007 21:15
We hope to show it in is Shannon and Limerick during December as a run up to the peace camp vigil.
by ec Sun Dec 02, 2007 00:17
I quote from the film
by Ciaron - Catholic Worker/Ploughshares Sun Dec 02, 2007 08:37
Thanx Conor for that history. I suspect the "Canadian student" was actually a U.S. student Mike. The first recruit to the Dublin Catholic Worker. Following Ecotopia, he called to vlolunteer at the nonexistent Catholic Worker soup kitchen. I said "Sure!".
by ec Sun Dec 02, 2007 11:04
Well the number of views/downloads of the film that I can count through torrents / vuze (Thanks to whoever put it there yesterday) / Stage 6 went well past the 500 mark last night. 60 people are now seeding so it's fast to get at present. About 15 people are downloading it at any given time. Big thanks to seeders and others who have been helping spread the word.
by ec Sun Dec 02, 2007 19:13
http://www.eurotrib.com/
by Seán Ryan Sun Dec 02, 2007 19:50
Congrats Eamonn on the success so far, tis shifting like hotcakes. I'd advise putting Mousetrap on torrent too.
by Mary Kelly Sun Dec 02, 2007 22:57
Eamon, to watching your documentary over xmas. Great achievement on getting it finished ! and out there far and wide.
by ec Sun Dec 02, 2007 23:39
for backing me up on that one! Discussing things and actually doing them are two different things as you I imagine well know.
by ec Mon Dec 03, 2007 12:35
Thanks to the efforts of a very hard working Indymedia volunteer the film is now available at Piratebay. If you haven't downloaded yet and are intending on doing so go there to get it so there are seeds for it as it is a different torrent to the original.
by Anthony Mon Dec 03, 2007 14:20
The torrent file as originally published on this page is the best one to use. The only difference between the Pirate Bay torrent and the original indymedia.ie torrent is that it uses a different tracker which doesn't really matter to regular users.
by Apparat - ISN Mon Dec 03, 2007 20:01
Anyone want to upload this on rapidshare?
by nerdcore Mon Dec 03, 2007 20:08
http://www.archive.org
by d'other Mon Dec 03, 2007 20:34
Rapidshare says "Upload-Limit: Unlimited! (Max. 100 MB per file! Split-Archives allowed!)."
by Uncle Bill Mon Dec 03, 2007 22:24
More bleedn' tarrants. Whatever happened de good aoul trip to xtravision for a betamax and some of manhattans finest popcorn?
by ec Tue Dec 04, 2007 00:41
DIRECT downloads are available at archive.org and stage6. Look up through the earlier comments for exact links
by S. Aerobics Wed Dec 05, 2007 11:28
A Peace Camp Primer has been
by K Fri Dec 07, 2007 10:03
Is there anyway this feature can be moved to the opening indymedia page. I know of people who would still need this link to get get hold of Route Irish but might not be familiar with the website enough to go through the feature pages to find it.
by Rahood Fri Dec 07, 2007 15:19
Direct download from Archive.org for those moaning
by ec Fri Dec 07, 2007 18:44
downloads from various places with counters now add up to 1000 or more. They've dropped absolutely like a stone since it got bumped off front page so I second k comment above - even the thumbnail somewhere would be nice.
by ec Thu Dec 13, 2007 21:33
Just looked at torrent statistics. Lots of downloads still going on. If you have downloaded via piratebay please seed as much as you downloaded at least. Lots of people (55) leeching from 3 seeds there at present. The indymedia torrent is much more healthy with 56 leeching from 35.
by Tech1.0 Sat Dec 15, 2007 15:36
^ It's a great documentary and people should really keep seeding after they've downloaded it. Certainly up to a 1 share ratio at least. Remember the more you upload the fast you download so set your upload to maximum or unlimited. But make sure you are also running PeerGuardian along with your bitTorrent software http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peerguardian "PeerGuardian and PeerGuardian 2 are free and open source programs developed by Phoenix Labs. They are capable of blocking incoming and outgoing connections based on IP blocklists. The system is also capable of blocking advertising, spyware, government and educational ranges, depending upon user preferences." (also check out the tutorial video above ^. or http://youtube.jimmyr.com/#UugQ1sS41mc ) Various media corporations, governments, the RIAA and front groups have peers and IPs set up, and even clients such as ziptorrent* which are designed to slow down the swarm. Using a simple application to block them, such as PeerGuardian, prevents this activity and will speed up your P2P downloads. PeerGuardian also protects your pc and your ip address from malicious software and organisations. Also some of the IPs used to block the swarms are...quite interesting... And if you're having trouble with your router or firewall blocking ports then enable port forwarding. The site http://portforward.com/ shows you how for every make of router. * _________________________________________ http://torrentfreak.com/ziptorrent-pollutes-and-slows-d...ents/ ZipTorrent Pollutes and Slows Down Popular Torrents Written by Ernesto on July 16, 2007 "BitTorrent users are facing a new enemy. A BitTorrent client named ZipTorrent, allegedly created by our friends from the anti-piracy organization Media Defender, leeches bandwith and spreads useless data chunks...."
by Anthony - rtorrent user Sun Dec 16, 2007 20:45
The above comment is good advice if you're downloading torrents that contain executable files (they may contain viruses or other malware) or if you're downloading files of copyrighted material that the MPAA or RIAA are interested in.
by ec Fri Dec 21, 2007 15:20
http://www.mininova.org/distribution
by hs - sp-personal capacity Thu Dec 27, 2007 19:45
congratulations on it, good to see a critical view of the movement. On the positive side I think if nothing else the movement exposed the Irish state's complicity very clearly. And whatwere genuinely very small numbers did cause cause some trouble for the state. Its not easy to stop a war, I don't think that we should beat ourselves up for trying. Much of what Eamom mentioned, mass civil disobiedence and arrests did happen in other countries, but that ddn't stop the war either. Whole military bases were surronded in Italy. i don't think we can stop wars by direct action or protest marches, it takes something bigger and invariable political. Direct actions and marches (large and small) are part of this sort of struggle but I suppose we need a mass of people involved in prolonged action, which again isn't easy. It is hard not to be pessemestic when the movement lost such an obvious battle, but on the other hand the people in Ireland who organised and stuck with it (of which i don't include myself) were tiny in number and I think you should all take pride in what you attempted to do. If thats egotistical so be it.
by ec Thu Jan 10, 2008 14:47
http://torrentfreak.com/bittorrent-uncensoring-to-indep...0109/
by NeoCon Hitman - MyPetGoat.co.uk Thu Jan 10, 2008 19:55
The Pirate Bay has millions of users. If the site contained any spyware or viruses then it would be well publicised. However, usual common sense should be applied as with any download off the internet.
by Tord Sat Jan 12, 2008 23:57
Thank you very much for this movie, I enjoyed it a lot and found it very interesting.
by seedot Sun Jan 13, 2008 12:20
When the footage of the American quizzing an indy vid head while behind Garda lines at Shannon first surfaced, he was identified as Lt. Col. John O'Sullivan who was based in the US embassy.
by ec Mon Feb 04, 2008 19:36
The Piratebay is really being attacked from all angles at present
by redjade Sun Feb 24, 2008 20:15
''The European Union has invested $20.5 million in a research project that is exploring the use of peer-to-peer technology for Internet television delivery across Europe. The P2P-Next project is using an open-source BitTorrent client called Tribler, which partners including the BBC and European Broadcasting Union plan to use to stream live TV. “This cooperation with both the British and German public broadcasters indicates that P2P is here to stay. We welcome the decision of the European Union to award this proposal around P2P. This means that Europe can expand its roughly two year lead in this important area,” Tribler’s Johan Pouwelse told TorrentFreak.''
by Disengagement? Sat Mar 08, 2008 20:27
This article by Simon Hattenstone in today's 8/3/08) Guardian
by silver6 Fri Apr 25, 2008 14:51
I just watched route irish last week - it's a great movie, that a lot more people should see if they can.
by redjade Fri Apr 25, 2008 16:37
There isn't any cover art for Route Irish.
by redjade Thu May 08, 2008 22:04
The Ulster Herald writes:
by Tech1.0 Fri May 09, 2008 12:46
Along with my big-up of PeerGuardian above, I can't recommend the light, open-source and accessible utorrent enough. |
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Comments (78 of 78)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78I welcome the video online! However, people should be aware of the PC/Internet security issues surrounding P2P Technologies like this one. Indeed, when I visited The Pirate Bay website I had 3 Spyware intrusions with 2 minutes. Spend a couple of minutes reading this neat (and easy to understand) Trinity College P2P Security overview if your new to this technology. Nasty things these feckin spywares and viruses. "careful now, down with that sort of thing"!
P2P Security
http://ntrg.cs.tcd.ie/undergrad/4ba2.02-03/p10.html
Probably better to Google video and YouTube it for the non-techie heads out there.
Turn on that updated Firewall
I'm a PC user and I use The Pirate Bay all the time. So does quite alot of the internet. To say that you had a spyware attack from them is quite an accusation. Of corse I can't be sure, but as far as I know, and have no reason to think otherwise, my computer is completely healthy after years of using torrents. This is the full potential of the internet. Stop trying to scare people away from it.
Besides, nobody has to go to that website anyway, the link to the torrent is on this page. It's completely safe!
Mail me at ecrudden At gmail dot com and I will send you the torrent file.
I would recommend utorrent which is available at ( http://www.utorrent.com/download.php ). It is opensource( http://www.opensource.org/ ) and small and reliable.
On the same topic, another country.
Here's a small videoclip I made on the complicity of the Belgian railway system. War is all around us...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9JiFeP6KhU
Could somebody please put this film up on video google it would make the whole process easier for everybody!!!!!!!!!
I must say though that I looked at Google Videos terms and conditions and they are downright scary especially when a lot of the material has been given to me on trust by others. If someone else takes it upon themselves to do it - so be it.
The torrent will work well if people take a couple of minutes to set up to get it. No corporations involved and much higher quality file. This is how the kids get their pirated movies etc and it works great. The scaremongering above is just that - scaremongering. Millions do this every day.
RE:P2P Security Issues by Hecky Teckie
""I welcome the video online! However, people should be aware of the PC/Internet security issues surrounding P2P Technologies like this one. Indeed, when I visited The Pirate Bay website I had 3 Spyware intrusions with 2 minutes. Spend a couple of minutes reading this neat (and easy to understand) Trinity College P2P Security overview if your new to this technology. Nasty things these feckin spywares and viruses. "careful now, down with that sort of thing"!""
Its very clear from your post that you have no clue what you are talking about so it either by ignorance or malice that you are spreading FUD.
The paper you link to was written in 2002/2003 and does not mention torrents. It deals with KazaA Morpheus and the Gnutella networks specifically the default share folders that people need to set up to use the clients. The crux was that people failed to RTFM and allowed their entire home folders to be shared allowing you to just search across the entire network looking for exel access or word file extensions.
It has nothing to do with the BitTorrent protocol nor does the image you linked which if you understood it serves only to highlight the need to keep mission critical systems unplugged from the internet.(air gapped)
And as for TPB hawking spyware ....crawl back under your bridge.
@ ec. "This is how the kids get their pirated movies etc "
While very true ;-) it is also how Blizzard's WoW players receive official updates. Linux users grab the latest and greatest iso . Universities Projects share large data files etc
It has many uses but those with a vested interest would have you believe otherwise.
Joost users watch video via p2p, Skype users make calls via p2p. SKY by Broadband installs the Kontiki p2p client and shares out your bandwidth the list goes on and on.
I agree that the ToC on Google Video and YouTube are unacceptable.
Perhaps you might have a look at uploading to Archives.org or Miro(previously known as Democracy Player) it contains a BT client and VLC.
http://www.archive.org/details/movies
http://www.getmiro.com/create/
/Thanks to all involved in the making of this film.
I am well aware that P2P Bittorrent has many uses outside movie piracy but it is the most widespread use of it, and the use of it that indicates how effective a method it can be for small producers of media to do distribution - I suppose that's the half baked thought that made me post the above.
In fact making as much 'legal' use of this kind of technology as possible as far as I understand it is one of the most effective ways of ensuring that it continues to exist. The more legal use is made of it the harder it becomes for legal systems in various juristictions to force isps to strangle it and shut it down.
As for putting the file elsewhere - I'm very happy for anyone who downloads the file to use their imaginations in helping to ensure it gets wide distribution. Post it to Archive.org. Write to blogs and ask them to mention it. Post reviews if you have a blog. Recommend it to people. Mail people the torrent etc. Seed the file and upload the torrent to other trackers. Make it available as a direct download if you have a server etc. I'm in dial-up land so can't do much about putting the file elsewhere.
http://video.stage6.com/1888068/.divx
Right click the link and 'save target as' to download.
Thanks pixie. No terms and conditions.
Anyone wants to view it streamed / embed in a site/blog details here
http://stage6.divx.com/IT-IS-ON/video/1888068/
Wow! It Works!
I downloaded the film yesterday, and just watched it now.
The film covers most of the tactics I remember used by the movement (from NVDA and Ploughshares actions to talks, media work and vigils), but there's very about strategy in there. As a consequence the viewer is left agreeing with the film's suspicions about politicians and organizers and just about everyone else who participated. The only people who escape judgement are those who didn't join the movement at all -- i.e. 95% of the Irish population.
"Appealing to the egotism of a generation" is pretty harsh, and as is all the stuff about "not in my name Vs over my dead body". If we're to be successful in loving our neighbour (never mind our enemy!) as we love ourselves, we need to start by loving ourselves a little. Yes, we've all got ego. So do villagers in Afghanistan, and some of them do rotten things you don't even want to know about. No, we don't need to be a martyr to "be authentic" or "for real" or whatever.
I'd like to see something like:
1. A film about the NVDA tactics used at Shannon and elsewhere, including they objectives, resources required to pull them off, results, learnings.
2. A film about the media strategies used by the movement and by our opposition, including online/press/tv/radio, objectives, results, learnings.
3. A film about the political and legal strategies used by the movement and by our opposition, objectives, results, learnings.
The film is really good! Well done.
It is harsh I suppose. But the campaign as a whole if you take the denial of Shannon as a transit point to the US military as it's objective, or if you take forcing the government to search planes going through as an objective, did fail comprehensively despite there being huge popular support for it at one time. So it was never going to be a happy tale. I find it hard to see any bright side to the whole situation looking back on it.
As for tactics and strategy - you're right - the film goes through the tactics used - it is meant as a history and I don't ever remember there being any sense of an overall sense of strategy - the whole thing was very fragmented and the combination of events that succeeded in bringing the situation to a head was as much luck as anything widely agreed by the groups involved.
I always thought at the time, and still think, that a way of forcing in a safe way Faslane style mass arrests would have been key to any effective way of upping the ante in the campaign.
But even March 1st if you look back was planned without this being an objective / favoured outcome. People were left with no possibility for something between smashing a plane - heading into shannon in the night - or marching.
The state here does not want to do this ever really during any campaign. The way the rossport 5 became popular heroes helps to show why. There was great solidarity around those arrested at shannon. If many ppl had been facing court for lesser charges it would really have been something. People seem to be attempting this outcome in Rossport at some of the actions there lately and maybe they will succeed at some point. If I was them or involved (which I'm not) I'd be trying to find a way to make the point strongly to the public at large that the Gardai SHOULD be arresting people who break the law.
The 'egotism' thing is the only way I could find of trying to explain why the whole Feb 15th phenomenon happened the way it did - huge but insubstantial in terms of staying power or follow up. It made ppl feel good about themselves. Like the centre of the world. Quite like Live Aid in a way. Or Live Earth. One of those consumed experiences of global togetherness. A cheap high - a kind of coke buzz.
As for your proposed subject matter for a film - yes these things are important - but I was trying to capture what happened - not what I would like to have happened - or 'what should have been done' according to me.
As for the Martyr thing - I was comparing i think people at war / people trying to get in the way of war - with people saying of a war - 'not in my name'.
Anyway my big get out of jail free card for this one is that I'll give the raw materials of the film to anyone who wants badly enough to tell the story in a different way.
Thanks for feedback and seeding Eoin.
Both are very much appreciated.
US Military / CIA planes are still landing in Shannon
http://www.indymedia.ie/article/84964
Does minister Gormley still support removing US military presence from Ireland?
http://www.greenparty.ie/en/news/news_archive/governmen...q_war
If someone wanted to stick up the video on YouTube, BlipTV or whatever e.g. see this guide
http://www.getmiro.com/create/
then the audience expands even more. Miro (used to be called DemocracyPlayer) is a nice little player (not quite as good as VLC ) but the important thing is that the creators are trying to make it simple and easy for everyone to watch "internet TV".
You can now also get 'Route Irish' at
http://www.archive.org/details/RouteIrish
click here
http://www.archive.org/movies/thumbnails.php?identifier...Irish
I prefer the filmmakers other quote "if you're going to get to them, you have to go through us" or even better the quote by Dorothy Day inscribed on the Ploughshares mattock used in the disabling of the U.S. Navy plane at Shannon "If they come for the innocent without stepping over your body, Cursed be your religion and your life!" These are rejections of the racist lie that our lives and freedom are more significant than the Iraqis under threat from the troop movements through Shannon
Angry words maybe, but anger is part of the prophetic emotion. I think the filmmaker makes a point here that "not in my name" is not enough. Given the nature of modern warfare, the state does not need popular support (like the jingoinsm of WW1) to wage war. All they require form us in the First World is our silence, sedation and cynicism. As I wrote from Limerick prison at the time there is a consensus between the warmaking state and the protest opposition "You can have your protest, as long as we can have our war!"
The dynamic absent was the lack of a relationship between the protest movement in Ireland and the nonviolent resistance that occured at Shannon. Was that just unfortunate bad luck or did those calling the shots in the protest movement in Ireland seek to marginalise NVDA? Also from a prison letter at the time I reflected on political groups playing the old games of stack and counterstack seeing the war as primarily a marketting opportunity for their brand, newspaper sales, possible recruitment potential to their own organisations and in the Greens case in retrospect a springboard to join the warmaking state. As the filmmaker suggests the protest movement leadership was not serious about having their lives disrupted to intervene in the war.
I must object to your popular desirory misuse the term "martyr". A martyr in the Christian tradition is a witness to the fullness of life, not someone obssessed with death and suffering for its own sake. Someone who wants to live life to the full and pays for not compromising. The 6 Jesuits and tens of thousands of Latin Americans who died in the U.S. wars on Central America www.soaw.org desired life and justice for all and paid with their lives, torture, imprisonment, scandal, blacklisted. Daniel Berrigan reflects well on this following Catonsville 9 draft board raid. The consequences of the ploughshares action at Shannon were perceived through privileged First World eyes as great, in the Third World they would be minimal. Yet the moderate and authoritarian left kept branding, attacking and marginalising us with this term.....martyr! One way to define something out of existence in this context, I guess.
Like all texts, "Route Irish" is a limited text. It is a subjective view of what occured at Shannon and the rise and fall of the anti-war movement in Ireland in a specific limited period. Others wished for a more objective film to be made. You desire films on techniques. Those films are not this one, but they wait to be made.
The nonviolent resistance strategies were in someways short term, immediate and urgent. (Well they weren't too short time for the Pitstops www.peaceontrial.com who remained engaged with the war and resistance through three trials for 3 1/2 years!) The movement collapsed before longer term strategies could be explored. As was being advocated by a few folks at the time the Trident Ploughshares campaign http://www.tridentploughshares.org/index.php3 in Scotland is a workable, relatively local model that could be amended and adopted in Ireland. A model that is based on nonviolence, direct democracy and high risk/low risk direct action. A model that ressurected the nuclear weapons issue in a post-cold war period where the cultural & political elites defined it as dead. A model that may in the near future be politically successful in removing nuclear weapons from Scotland. (as they were removed with similar strategies form Aotearoa/New Zealand and as U.S. troops could be removed fromIreland).
The film has a theme of disappointment. And that is a relevant theme as the war escalate and expands and the anti-war movement dissipates.
Italics = quotes from the film commentary.
Congratulations to Eamonn on a great piece of work and a really serious full length documentary with a powerful commentary.
I'm supposing it can't have been easy for him to run with what is, in my opinion, an accurately harsh and honest analysis of a comprehensive failure as he puts it. And Eamonn says that he finds it hard to see a bright side.
But I see a bright side to this very sad but very uplifting and surprisingly edifying documentary. And there's the power of it. And if we learn from it, and it's a very good lesson, then the brave move of the film-maker will have paid off.
A movement of huge popular support, the sense that anything could happen, in the hope of an event to emerge to set the clock to zero and free us from a nation led by a suffocated generation (eh ... that'd be the State) of crooks and jugglers.
CIA agents at Shannon given positions of authority. Ignorant cops and cabinet ministers refusing to give account for themselves. New opaque norms, as much a part of the unrestrained imperial aggression as any secret prison.
Green politicians, SWP'ers and other 'not in my name' opportunees playing a game with no stakes and no intention for serious dissent. And no appetite for a real conflict with the state.
Unlike the grassrootsy activist movement working hard to organise collectively. And the peace camp. Sourcing, learning and spreading information that gives legitimacy to a civil disobedience which is being preached. Solidarity in numbers. A sense of community and a common responsibility and ability to the right thing. Powerful stuff. Anything could have happened ... but ...
Foiled by the strongest weapon of the state ... again. The cops. An Garda Síochána. The state protectors and the people haters.
And The state knows that those who want, who bombard with demands without a willingness to sacrifice anything meaningful can always be outweighted.
Not that the movement is without those who are willing to sacrifice meaningfully, it's just that it was compromised by those who aren't. Inexperience and ignorance of the law didn't help either.
In my opinion, in order to make progress in any conflict between the people and the state, it is essential to disarm the state of it's most important weapon - the pigs they call the guardians of the peace whose only power to protect a criminal state comes from their unlawful abuse of the law. The lesson to be learned has got to be that we must learn, know and use the law to assist us in removing unlawful barriers to protest and/or legitimate civil disobedience to the greater state crimes of social injustice, environmental destruction and in the case of Shannon, murder and torture committed in complicity by the state.
Then you've a chance to set the clock to zero and ... anything can happen.
So 'Route Irish' is a real opportunity to reflect and learn - not in a vacuum - but from hard work already done and experience gained. And to think on the good things and repeat them alongside a fresh strategy and effective tactics. Cos there's always gonna be a next time.
Hi folks
How about mailing that video using roxio's yousendit service (www.yousendit.com) It's designed just for this kind of thing
Thumbs up on the dvd but the critical mind must be unpacked once it has had its say so that we can reinvest in relationships right across the radical perspective.. Much of what's being said is best left to internal review and re-assessment amongst the activist community; there's a real danger that you just expose the cracks to the system, which of course will apply the levers and wedges free of charge.
There is no going on without friends and allies; so use critical capacities to reconstruct not deconstruct..
If the property market is all about 'Location, Location, Location' then the activist movement must be about:
SOLIDARiTY; SOLIDARiTY; SOLIDARiTY ----- note the small 'i' (he observes hypocritically)
Revelation is a home truth, so keep it there.
Having watched the film. I think that the voice-over/commentary could stand alone as a podcast
A failure for the 'activists' or failure for Ireland? The latter I think.
Here in Budapest Hungary I think we have three seeders now and the Közért Collective (a space similar to seomra spraoi) has bought a new video projector for a regular friday night activist video show.
'Route Irish' will be the first film shown publicly at 'Közért Mozi'
(Közért means a 'corner shop' general store or literally 'for the public' and Mozi means cinema - therefore 'Közért Mozi' means 'Cornershop Cinema' or 'Cinema For The Public' - more or less)
If the technology goddess blesses us this friday we plan on having a group Skype Q&A immediately after with eamonn about his film. We have high hopes this will be a model for future public events.
click on image for full A4 sized .jpeg
click to download the .pdf format file 0.32 Mb