[New-imc]

Tue Aug 5 04:56:13 PDT 2003

tuc2002 at fastmail.fm <tuc2002 at fastmail.fm> wrote:
> 
> Dear lize and other listmembers,
> 
> Let me clarify some issues, to know where we all stand.
> 
> Of course, I agree with your comments on the PTB-dominated IMC-Belgium. I
> personally don't know of many people and organisations that still support
> IMC-Belgium (and are not satellites of the PTB). I, too, felt like a
> 'diversity excuse' when wanting to be involved in IMC.be (even when
> actively trying to install diversity I felt like legitimising the
> situation).
> 
> IMC-Vlaanderen is indeed a group of people (already bigger and more
> diverse than IMC-Belgium when things weren't discussed in public) that

I'm really not sure of that.
besides, half of those people on you mailinglist will actually never do some work. that's how things are. I've seen it so far wherever I worked in imc.

> wants to leave all these problems behind and work on a healthy IMC and
> cooperation between IMC's in Belgium. You know some of us rather well
> Lize, and you know what these people stand for. For the others, like me,
> you'll have to find out in the future. Just like everybody does when
> meeting new people I guess.
> 
> You referred to the discussions on the forum on our testsite
> http://pingpong.piexie.net/. 
> 
> First of all, this is an open forum. The views of people on that forum
> are personal views, not views of the collective. We have to be honest in
> these things (you know the pros and cons of for a – and the explosivity
> of internet debates).
> 
> Second, we indeed want all these problems to be over with. We don't lie
> about this. We want diversity, democracy and pluralism and therefore we
> wanted a new IMC. We've been trying for years to make a pluralist and
> positive IMC out of belgium.indymedia.org, but it didn't work. Therefore,
> people want to start IMC-Vlaanderen.
> So I guess you're right that a lot of us want to see an end to the
> existing Belgium IMC, for being non-democratic, non-pluralist, etc. I
> don't think it's bad to end such practices. All that we did in the past
> years tells even more: we wanted to end it, but we didn't want to end it
> with fights.
> Now, two weeks ago a proposal was made by IMC-Liège and IMC-wvl. It
> called to discontinue superregional IMC's (meaning IMC-Vlaanderen and
> IMC-Belgium) and to set up a portal website that would gather all local
> IMC's. Something completely new for a lot of us. But hey, it solved our
> problem (undemocratic and non-pluralist IMC's). So we started discussing
> the proposal.
> On thing about the proposal is clear: we don't think IMC-Belgium will
> like it. Some people might like it (those who feel like being a diversity
> excuse), but probably not the people from the PTB. And they decide in the

please speak for yourself.

> first place what happens with IMC-Belgium (not you, I'm afraid).
> This being said, we don't want to implement the proposal if it is
> implemented as far as 3 out of 4 IMC's is concerned and not implemented
> for the IMC that constitutes the reason why we are going through all this
> in the first place. If it wasn't for the problems with IMC-Belgium, none
> of all these discussions needed to take place.

> In other words, we (and I suppose the people from IMC-Wvl and IMC-Liège
> too) are dealing with this proposal in order to solve the existing
> problems. If IMC-Belgium does not cease to exist, of course the proposal
> is null and void, because it wouldn't solve the problem.

I think by now you just proved allready you just think the problem with indymedia in belgium is that some people from the ptb are involved.
I'm convinced that there are various problems

> So: the people on the forum were discussing what to do with the proposal
> of the two local IMC's. You were referring to the discussions we had
> about the situation wherein we would retreat from the new-IMC process in
> order to implement the proposal, but IMC-Belgium would continue to exist.
> 
> And in that respect IMC-Belgium needs to be dissolved before the proposal
> can be implemented. That was what we were discussing. We just want an end
> to the undemocratic practices at the IMC-Belgium level, and we want it as
> hard as IMC-wvl en -Liège want it.

again. please speak for yourself. I don't like it when people try to speak in my name./my imc's name

> If it is clear that the problems with IMC-Belgium can not be solved this
> way, then we continue with making alternatives for it. And I hope to
> cooperate with IMC-Wvl and –Liège while doing this.
> 
> "They even think about
> withdrawing their proposal to become a new imc.vl if the imc.be
> collective could be "purified", which means : they take over and throw
> the ptb members out of the imc.be collective. "
> 
> You should read what is written on the forum: we are thinking about
> withdrawing our proposal for an IMC-Vlaanderen, if we can implement the
> portal-proposal. In that proposal, a portal website will be put in place
> of IMC-Belgium. We are not going to "take something over" if that
> "something" doesn't exist anymore.
> 
> Concerning the "purification" of IMC-Belgium: if you want a pluralist IMC
> (like we do) than you'll have to accept PTB-members in your collective.
> So if you're suggesting that we don't want to have PTB-members in our
> collective, you're wrong.
> Now, I think everybody involved in IMC (apart from the Crickx-group at
> IMC-Belgium - some six people of the PTB) has asked him- of herself the
> question if he/she could still cooperate with the people from the
> Crickx-group. After all these troubles, fights, accusations and
> propaganda, I think it is not really surprising that indiciduals don't
> want to deal with any of these people in the future. That is their
> PERSONAL opinion (and I confess: I understand it).
> Personnaly, I could cooperate with anyone in the future. As long as we
> work in respect to the IMC principles and philosophy. I don't think I
> should work together with people not supporting these principles and
> trying to impose their agenda through IMC's. If people work in a positive
> and correct way in all IMC collectives, I personally wouldn't have a
> problem with people from the PTB or even the six from the Crickx-group in
> any future IMC.

and who the hell is "the crickx-group" ? or you give names or you don't.
there are more people involved there than just them you seem te refer to.

> Gosh, I don't think I ask to much, do I?
> 
> "At imc.vl there is simply no door for ptb-linked people. Ptb-members in
> their eyes seem to be '(the axis of ?)evil' and they want to 'purify'
> Indymedia from ptb presence."
> Again: not true. Without hidden agenda's and undemocratic practices,
> everything is possible. PTB-members are not evil (gosh, I have personal
> relationships with some low-ranking members, though I'm an anarchist
> myself). People with hidden agenda's and opposed to pluralism do indeed
> form an "axis-of-somewhat-more-evil-than-others". I hope anyone involved
> in Indymedia agrees on that one.
> 
> Conclusion: we should leave words like "purifying", etc. out of the
> debate. They distort any serious discussion, in particular any discussion
> that is going to be difficult and hard anyway. This counts for both
> parties. We are no better than you are. Especially because I know that
> you care about the IMC-philosophy and you want things to be right.

> Hopefully we can work together soon,
> best regards,
> 
> TUc
> 
Greetings,

just my 2%
Bart.

> 
> 
> 
> Hi all,
> 
> 
> I am lize and I am working since a year as an edito member of imc.be. I
> made some reportages (sometimes together with other imc members) about
> ESF Florence, about the repression of the movement in italy and I
> followed up the Iraq war, the G8 of Evian and some international issues
> like the situation in Argentina and Venezuela. 
> 
> I would like to give my opinion on the terrible discussion going on now
> about the imc's in Belgium.
> 
>  
> 
> First. ** About IMC Belgium **
> 
> There are some true problems at imc.be. Diversity in the collective is
> lacking and hence the coverage of all actions of the Belgian diverse
> movement against globalization. The presence of people linked to the
> Belgian communist party (ptb) in the collective is dominant and other
> members of the .be collective - like myself - often feel as a kind of
> 'diversity' excuse to cover up the ptb dominance.
> 
>  
> 
> Second. ** About proposed new IMC Vlaanderen **
> 
> The IMC.vl people seemed to turn their endless criticism on IMC.be into
> a positive project by starting to become imc activists themselves. 
> 
> My enthusiasm for these newcomers is reducing rapidly when I read their
> discussion list at the test <http://pingpong.piexie.net/>  site :
> instead of building up imc teams and start covering, all energy goes to
> what seems to be there main objective : dissolve the present imc.be
> collective. Horrible words like "purifying" ("cleansing?") are used.
> They also write that "the dissolution of imc.be has always been part of
> 'their plan' ".I don't think the aim of putting up a new Imc could be to
> destroy another one. But it goes further. They even think about
> withdrawing their proposal to become a new imc.vl if the imc.be
> collective could be "purified", which means : they take over and throw
> the ptb members out of the imc.be collective. 
> 
>  
> 
> ** My conclusion **
> 
> At imc.be it was always (and still is) very difficult to get (and stay)
> involved as a non-ptb member. One quickly feels isolated as there is a
> lack of democratic decision making. But the door to other groups is
> still open at the imc.be collective, and could solve the problem of ptb
> dominance.
> 
> At imc.vl there is simply no door for ptb-linked people. Ptb-members in
> their eyes seem to be '(the axis of ?)evil' and they want to 'purify'
> Indymedia from ptb presence. This can not be tolerated. The ptb is part
> of the movement, and at Indymedia, that's it's place : part of. Not to
> be dominant, but surely not to be 'purified' neither.
> 
>  
> 
> ** My  proposal **
> 
> As both 'collectives' refuse to work together, I think an additional
> imc.vl site might be the best solution to get more people involved into
> Indymedia making in Belgium. There are not a lot of different
> independent media channels in belgium, so the more media-activists, the
> better I think. 
> 
> So I would give green light to their proposal, let them work out a
> 'competing' imc in Belgium and let's see if in a future some
> 'collaboration' (e.g. by taking over some features from each other)
> could be possible. 
> 
> The aim of imc.vl to dissolve imc.be cannot be tolerated. If global
> Indymedia would make it possible for them to do this, there is a risk
> that no good Indymedia coverage at all will be done in Belgium, as the
> imc.vl people didn't prove yet a lot about their skills of Indymedia
> making untill now. I really would like to see them make some coverages
> and features before talking about dissolving another, after all, hard
> working IMC collective.
> 
>  
> 
> That's it I guess. Sorry if we Belgians are giving you so much troubles,
> but I do not feel responsible for it.
> 
>  
> 
> Kind regards,
> 
> Lize
> 
>  
> 
> Ps due to some personal problems and the fact that I urgently need to
> find a job, my participation into the imc.be collective is very low at
> the moment. When things get better for me, I'll be back !
> -- 
>   
>   tuc2002 at fastmail.fm
> 
> -- 
> http://www.fastmail.fm - A no graphics, no pop-ups email service
> _______________________________________________
> New-imc mailing list. Lista de correo New-imc
> New-imc at lists.indymedia.org
> http://lists.indymedia.org/mailman/listinfo/new-imc
> 
> 

-- 
"Intellectuals are the shoeshine boys of the ruling elite" (Killdozer)

http://wvl.indymedia.org  |     bart at indymedia.org
http://thepits.be         |     bart at thepits.be
http://pseudopunk.be      |     icq: 48682266

gebruik vrije software -- Debian GNU/Linux -- http://debian.org
gpg --keyserver keys.indymedia.org --recv-keys be196251